Mental Floss

STONES, BONES, AND WRECKS









A portrait of the scientists who found and examined the Piltdown Man skull (accompanied by a picture of Charles Darwin on the wall).

From forged artworks to fake mummies and even fraudulent orangutan bones, archaeological hoaxes fool scientists and stir the public’s imagination—until the culprits are forced to come clean.

Stacy Conradt
Tollund Man on display at the Silkeborg Museum, Denmark.

The bodies of Iron Age Europeans are so well preserved in peat bogs that they’re sometimes mistaken for modern murder victims.

Kristina Killgrove








The massive megafauna of the Ice Age / Getty / VICTOR HABBICK VISIONS/SPL

In this episode of Misconceptions, host Justin Dodd  thaws out a few myths about the ice age, from the idea that Earth was once frozen solid to what actually caused the mammoths’ extinction.

Kat Long


A reconstruction of Ötzi the Iceman at the South Tyrol Archaeological Museum in Italy.

Nicknamed Ötzi the Iceman, the mummified man was around 40–50 years old when he died in the Copper Age. Here are 13 surprising facts about him.

Kristina Killgrove






The RMS 'Titanic'

The 'Titanic' sinking became the most infamous shipwreck in history—but what really happened on that unusually calm night in the North Atlantic?

Kat Long