Author: Reporter

One tarnished silver coin at a time, the ground is yielding new evidence that in the late 1600s, one of the world’s most ruthless pirates wandered the American colonies with impunity. Newly surfaced documents also strengthen the case that English buccaneer Henry Every, the target of the first worldwide manhunt, hid out in New England before sailing for Ireland and vanishing into the wind. “At this point, the amount of evidence is overwhelming and indisputable,” said historian and metal detectorist Jim Bailey, who has devoted years to solving the mystery. “Every was undoubtedly on the run in the colonies.”...

The debate over who owns ancient artifacts has been an increasing challenge to museums across Europe and America, and the spotlight has fallen on the most visited piece in the British Museum: The Rosetta Stone. The inscriptions on the dark grey granite slab became the seminal breakthrough in deciphering ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics after it was taken from Egypt by forces of the British empire in 1801. Now, as Britain’s largest museum marks the 200-year anniversary of the decipherment of hieroglyphics, thousands of Egyptians are demanding the stone’s return. “The British Museum’s holding of the stone is a symbol of...

As alarms began to go off globally about a novel coronavirus spreading in China, officials in Washington turned to the intelligence agencies for insights about the threat the virus posed to America. But the most useful early warnings came not from spies or intercepts, according to a recent congressional review of classified reports from December 2019 and January 2020. Officials were instead relying on public reporting, diplomatic cables and analysis from medical experts — some examples of so-called open source intelligence, or OSINT. Predicting the next pandemic or the next government to fall will require better use of open...