From a vampire graveyard in Poland to a lost German city swallowed by the sea centuries ago, this is what happened in the world of history this month.
As always, we’re finishing out the month by highlighting a number of the most interesting history news stories we featured on the site, as well as some historic anniversaries of events that happened in June.
This month, we wrote about the discovery of human blood in a 2,000-year-old ritualistic Egyptian vase, an unearthed Bronze Age sword in Germany so well-preserved that it practically gleams, how a French mayor became the “most hated man in the country” for removing stones which may have been 7,000 years old, the discovery of a “vampire graveyard” in Poland, and new evidence that seems to confirm the existence of the long-lost city of Rungholt in Germany.
The very existence of Rungholt, which was allegedly swallowed by the sea in 1362 in an act of divine retribution, has long been debated by historians. But researchers from Kiel University, Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, the Center for Baltic and Scandinavian Archaeology, and the State Archaeology Department Schleswig-Holstein were able to use modern technology to find traces of the lost city while examining mudflats near Hallig Südfall, a small island in the Wadden Sea off the coast of Germany.
Public DomainAnne Boleyn was controversially crowned queen of England on June 1, 1533.
In addition to these history news stories, we also discussed a number of historical anniversaries from June, including the coronation of Anne Boleyn (June 1, 1533), the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II (June 2, 1953), the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. (June 5, 1968), the death of Anthony Bourdain (June 8, 2018), and Sally Ride’s historic trip to space (June 18, 1983).
Of these June anniversaries, we noticed the curious coincidence that Anne Boleyn and Queen Elizabeth II — who passed away last year — were both coronated in June. Anne Boleyn’s coronation was on June 1, 1533; Queen Elizabeth was coronated almost exactly 420 years later on June 2, 1953.
Queen Elizabeth apparently had no qualms about almost sharing an anniversary with the notorious Anne Boleyn. And the close dates didn’t seem to cast any dark shadows upon her reign. Anne Boleyn, of course, was beheaded just three years later in 1536 after King Henry VIII determined she wouldn’t give him a son. Queen Elizabeth, on the other hand, remained in power for 70 years and died at the ripe age of 96 in 2022.
In addition to these anniversaries, we also discussed our featured cocktail for the month, which happens to have also been Queen Elizabeth’s favorite drink: a Dubonnet and Gin.
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