AncientPages.com – On December 15, 1612, Simon Marius (1573 – 1624), a mathematician and astronomer, independently rediscovered the “Nebula in the Girdle of Andromeda,” actually the Andromeda Galaxy (M31). Marius was a German astronomer, the pupil of Tycho Brahe, one of

AncientPages.com – On December 14, 1883, Ueshiba Morihei – the ‘Founder of Aikido,’ was born in Nishinotani village (now part of Tanabe), Japan. Until he died in 1969 at the age of 85, the master of Aikido maintained an undefeated record.

AncientPages.com – On December 13, 1577, Francis Drake set sail from Plymouth with a five-ship flotilla on the dangerous path that killed Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan 50 years earlier. He planned to become the first Englishman to sail around the world.

AncientPages.com – On Dec 12, 627 AD, the Battle of Nineveh was fought between the forces of the Byzantine Empire, under Emperor Heraclius, and those of the Sassanid Persian Empire, under the Persian King Chosroes II’s lieutenant, Rhahzhad. In this battle,

AncientPages.com – On December 11, 1792, King Louis XVI of France was put on trial for treason by the National Convention. Louis XVI (also known as Louis Capet) was King of France from 1774 until his deposition in 1792. The

AncientPages.com – On December 9, 1824, the Battle of Ayacucho was fought on the high plateau near Ayacucho, Peru. It was one of the Latin-American wars of independence, and it brought a revolutionary victory over royalists. This battle ultimately broke Spanish

AncientPages.com – On December 10, 1948, the United Nations adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. According to the Guinness Book of Records, it is considered the world’s most translated document. It was accepted by a vote of 48 in

AncientPages.com – On December 8, 1542, Mary Queen of Scots was born. She represents one of history’s true enigmas. Historians know plenty about what she did and where she went during her short life. However, they do not know much about

AncientPages.com – On December 7, 1941, the Imperial Japanese Navy conducted a surprise military strike against the United States naval base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. The attack was planned as a preventive action to keep the US Pacific Fleet from

AncientPages.com – On December 6, 1214, King Alexander II was crowned at Scone. Scone is a village or suburb of Perth and Kinross in central Scotland. The medieval Scone was located west of the New Scone village and was the

AncientPages.com – On December 5, 771, Charlemagne became the King of the Franks after the death of his brother Carloman. Charlemagne, son of King Pepin the Short, succeeded his father in 768 and was initially co-ruler with his brother Carloman.

AncientPages.com – On December 4, 1154, the only pope to have been born in England and the first pope from the Anglosphere, who served from 1154 to 1159. His birth name was Nicholas Breakspear. He was an English priest of

AncientPages.com – On December 3, 1872, a translation from Babylonian cuneiform tablets of the Chaldean account of the deluge was read by George Smith (1840 – 1876), an English archaeologist and Assyriologist, before the Society of Biblical Archaeology in London. This

AncientPages.com –  On December 2, 1594, Gerardus Mercator, the best-known mapmaker of all time, died. He was born on March 5, 1512, in Rupelmonde, Flanders (now Belgium). After earning a master’s degree in philosophy and theology from the University of

AncientPages.com – On December 1, 1955, Rosa Parks disobeyed an order to give up her seat in the black section of the bus to a white passenger. She was arrested and then challenged the arrest, her case leading to a

AncientPages.com – One of the most famous murders of the Middle Ages took place on December 29, 1170, when four knights of King Henry II of England silently entered Canterbury Church to kill the Archbishop, Thomas Becket (c.1120 – 1170). Santa Maria della