Dark Ages

Is It Still OK to Refer to the Dark Ages?

by Max Adams

An historian explains why he thinks it is.

The Surprising Development that Helped Bring about the End of the So-Called Dark Ages

by Peter Frankopan

It was slavery in Europe, which made an elite hugely wealthy.

Grotesque Mummy Head Reveals Advanced Medieval Science

In the second century, an ethnically Greek Roman named Galen became doctor to the gladiators. His glimpses into the human body via these warriors' wounds, combined with much more systematic dissections of animals, became the basis of Islamic and European medicine for centuries. Galen's texts wouldn't be challenged for anatomical supremacy until the Renaissance, when human dissections — often in public — surged in popularity. But doctors in medieval Europe weren't as idle as it may seem, as a new analysis of the oldest-known preserved human dissection in Europe reveals....

When Were the Dark Ages?

by Daniel Mallia

The Dark Ages weren't actually all that dark.