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Louise Pryke, Honorary Research Associate, University of Sydney

Necromancers, demons and friendly ghosts: humans have been fascinated with the afterlife since ancient Mesopotamia

Mesopotamia Gilgamesh Wikimedia Commons

As Halloween approaches, we start to think about ghosts, monsters, and demons.

Grave goods from Ur, Mesopotamia 6000-1500 BC Gallery, British Museum.

But a fascination with the afterlife and other worlds is not new: ghost stories from all over the world prove it’s been part of the human experience from prehistoric times.

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