texts: On the history of Jewish places of worship

texts:
I was recently on holiday in Israel and Jordan on a tour that focussed on biblical and archaeological sites. As part of the tour, we visited Tel Arad which was probably built around 1100 BCE and destroyed around 600 BCE.

Initially, I was surprised that the remains of a temple can be found on the Tel because up to then I had assumed the first and only Israelite centre of worship to be the temple in Jerusalem. Retrospectively, I realise that that was a silly assumption to make.

However, after the heyday of Tel Arad, when returning from the Babylonian exile, rebuilding the Jerusalem temple was one of the prime objectives of the Israelites and after the Romans destroyed the second Temple diaspora started, suggesting that the Jerusalem temple was somehow very important in the perception of the Israelites/Jews. Thus my questions:

Can we assume that the temple of Jerusalem has typically been the most important for Israelites, both pre-exile and post-exile?
Does evidence exist that smaller temples were closed down in favour of the Jerusalem one even pre-exile?
When returning from the Babylonian exile, is there again evidence for multiple temples built and used other than the ‘central’ one in Jerusalem?
If the answer to the previous question is ‘yes’, have these minor temple sites been closed down prior to the Roman destuction of the second temple?
Is synagogue merely a new name for temple or did synagogues and temples co-exist during the period of the second temple (and potentially pre-exile)?

I realise that especially in the pre-exile period, temples such as the one in Tel Arad were often not exclusively used to worship the Jewish God but also to worship Baal, Asherah and potentially others. It only takes a skim of the relevant books of prophets to realise that. However, I would like this question to ignore other gods and concentrate solely on the worship of the god of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.

When using exile in this post, I am consistently only referring to the Babylonian exile, not to one in Egypt whether it can be proven or not.


texts: Who originally described Attila as "Attila The Hun"

texts: He has been known as "Attila The Hun" for centuries; however, who originally described Attila as "Attila The Hun"? Does this description date back to Roman times or was it invented during a later historical period? If so, which period?


texts: What are the effects of creating inflation to eliminate domestic debt?

texts:
T.E.D. commented on this answer:

  Sometimes (particularly in developing countries) they literally are printing more money. In the USA typically we increase the money supply to make up for some kind of undesirable market tightening (which in theory should not cause much inflation). In developing countries, it is often done just to inflate away domestic debt. It doesn't hurt the decision makers any, as they can hide their assets in foreign currency. But it absolutely trashes domestic savings.

(Emphasis mine.)

What are the advantages and disadvantages of inflating away domestic debt by literally printing more money?  What are some examples from history?  Have the theories of inflation been supported by historical evidence?


texts: Did ancient or medieval people know about underground rivers/lakes?

texts: If they did, did they utilize them for farming? If so, how would they?


texts: Were there many "co-headed" commands where the senior member was younger than the junior?

texts:
When one thinks of "partnership" commands, one may think of the Duke of Marlborough and Prince Eugene. Perhaps Hindenburg and Ludendorf in World War I Or Robert E. Lee and "Stonewall" Jackson. In each case, the senior commander was older than the junior commander.

I can think of only one military "partnership" where the senior commander, Villars, was younger than the junior commander, Boufflers. http://www.spanishsuccession.nl/boufflers.html These were the men that opposed Marlborough and Eugene at Malplaquet. In civilian life, such a "dual command" might consist of Warren Buffett (aged early 80s), and Charlie Munger (aged late 80s), Chairman and Vice-Chairman of Berkshire Hathaway.

I'm not talking about situations with a senior commander and a "random" (but older) junior commander, in the ranks, but ones where the junior is "next to" the senior and is effectively the senior's "alter ego" or even "Mini Me." To take the example's I've given, Churchill described Marlborough and Eugene as "one soul in two bodies." Lee referred to Jackson as "my right hand." Munger has been referred to as Buffett's "Doppelganger." Were there many such situations in history?


texts: If Bill Clinton was impeached, why did he finish his second term?

texts: I don't understand how he could have been impeached but did not have to leave office.


texts: What Land Runs were there in the U.S., and were the Indians paid for their land?

texts:
In 1893, the U.S. paid the Cherokees $8.5 million for the Cherokee Strip or Outlet for the land run that year.

Were Indians paid for land in the other Oklahoma land runs? Were there land runs in other states, and if so, were the Indians paid?


texts: When were the first timezones established?

texts:
I understand that the world never used the same universal time everywhere, and that before timezones people used sundials and other solar time-keeping technologies, therefore every few 100 meters would have a noticeably different time.

This led me to wonder: When were the first time zones established? Where and by who?


texts: Why did Sidewinder missiles score so well before Vietnam?

texts:
In the Wikipedia article about the Second Taiwan Strait crisis that the USA had provided Taiwan air forces with Sidewinder missiles. During clashes with PLA's air force, Sabre equipped with the missiles seem to have scored pretty well.

However, in next conflicts such as the 1971 Indian war, during which Pakistani Air Force used Sabre and Mig-19 jets armed with Sidewinder missiles, it seems not to have performed that well.

Even more, during engagements in Vietnam, the US Air Force and US Navy fighters such as F-4 Phantoms needed many missiles to score one hit. And a gun was asked to reinforce the capability of the F-4 at close range.

So how can we explain the differences of efficiency?
I can think of some possibilities:

Process of evading manoeuvres that allowed Indian and Vietnamese pilots to escape, while PLA's pilots did not have (because they were the first to encounter the missile)?
Some countermeasures systems? However I did not find such systems on Vietnamese aircrafts.


texts: Why was ancient Christianity more successful than the Roman pantheon and Judaism in gaining followers?

texts:
Around the 1st century AD, the three biggest religions in the Roman empire were the Roman pantheon, Judaism, and Christianity.

Why was Christianity so much more successful in gaining and keeping followers compared to the other two that by the end of the 4th century AD, it had become the Roman state religion?


texts: Has there ever been a month with 32 days?

texts:
As the title says. I believe (and correct me if I'm wrong) that with our modern Gregorian calendar, no month will ever be longer than 31 days.

But have there been any times in the (perhaps recent) past where we had 32 days in a month?


texts: What island in the Caspian sea did Ala Ad-Din Muhammad die on, after escaping Genghis Khan?

texts:
At the end of the invasion of Khwarezmia Empire, Genghis Khan chased Ala Ad-Din Muhammad to the Caspian sea, where he hid on an island and died several weeks later. However, none of the sources I can find ever mention the actual island that he died on.

I've always been curious since as far as I know there are not too many islands to speak of in the Caspian sea. The only real information I can find is that it was an Island close to the port of Abaskun.

What is the island and does it still exist today?


texts: What did Germany gain from the Armistice of 11 November 1918?

texts:
The conditions of the armistice were very unfavourable for Germany: The naval blockade continued, prisoners of war were not released, but parts of Germany were occupied and Germany lost the practical means to continue the war.

This may be too naive, but why did Germany not just stop fighting or surrender?

Surely, this may have lead to the occupation of Germany as a whole, but it would have ended the war immediately, so that Britain and France would at least have a moral obligation to end blockades and release prisoners of war.


texts:
The word Khorasan finds mention in many ancient texts pointing to a place in Middle east to Afghanistan . The question is what were the boundaries of the historical Khorasan which parts of the Middle East were included in Khorasan.

Wikipedia says  that Greater Khorasan, a historic region which lies mainly in modern-day Iran. It was previously known as Parthia; later, during the Sassanid era, it was renamed to Khorasan. But the etymological meaning of Khorasan (Persian) is "land of rising sun".

Thus wanted to know which regions of earth were included in Khorasan of  1500 years ago?


texts: Earliest use of Renaissance Era innovations in Islamic countries & culture?

texts:
Though the title may be vaguely broad, I have two specific things in mind I wanted to ask about.

While I was recently considering the cultural and technological advancements of Europeans in the early Middle Ages, which was soon to be spread by them to the New World, I also began to consider Islamic history and cultural advancement at that same time (especially - for them - in areas of science, literature, and mathematics), and particularly in North Africa where some of the the Portuguese had contact and intermingled with Muslims through trade. So along parallel historical tracks I began to wonder at the comparative development between Renaissance Era European culture and Islamic culture at that time, and pursuant to that a few unusual questions arose in my mind.

In particular I was wondering about two innovations of the Europeans of which I have never heard mention of their first use in the Islamic world (in terms of their initial adoption, though of course in the modern world there is hardly any distinction now): Firstly, use of the printing press; and secondly, the use of canvas (hemp-weaved) for painting (which first took off in Italy). In terms of technological advancement I'd say the former is more significant and utilitarian, while the argument about the "sophistication" of using canvas for art seems more subjective and preference driven (whatever its actual practical and aesthetic advantages may have been), though I still am curious about it. So to plainly state my two questions:

When was the first recorded use of a printing press in Muslim lands? (Note: I am not asking what the first Islamic book printed on a printing press was, given that it might very well have been from a printing press operating in Europe. I want to know about actual adoption of the printing press in Muslim lands.)
What is the oldest known Islamic work of art composed on canvas?

It may be taken for granted now that Islamic countries use both, but since they appear to be exclusively European innovations at that time of the Renaissance Islamic adoption of it must have been taken from them at some later time. Islamic art was of course prolific at that time, but I've never heard of Islamic use of canvas during the Middle Ages, for example.

Also, although I am especially interested to know the answer to those questions specifically in instances outside of the European continent, in terms of spread of influence I have to wonder if the Muslim held portions of Spain during the Renaissance Era were perhaps the earliest adopters of those technologies for printing and art.

Can anyone provide at least a rough guess for when those two things first appeared in the Muslim world, even if we do not know the actual earliest instances precisely?


texts: Which attempts to create or revise states resulted in action?

texts:
A History Channel report on the failed attempt by counties in southern Oregon and northern California to create a new state called Jefferson suggests that supporters would have brought their case to a vote in Congress on December 8, 1941, but for the attack on Pearl Harbor.  I couldn't find any evidence that a vote was actually scheduled that day, but the statehood attempt was abandoned when war was declared.

DC statehood is still an ongoing effort and the subject of a license plate campaign.
Puerto Rican voters seem to have rejected statehood in favor of commonwealth status.
Residents in the Upper Peninsula section of Michigan have sought separate statehood, too, and the idea resurfaced in the 1970s over taxation disputes with Michigan's state house.

There are other states where there are or have been discussions about secession, partition and statehood.

The following questions are provided to try to analyze the topic and guide the answers away from raw opinion and towards scholarly opinion, supported by evidence and analysis.

What would be necessary for one of these movements to succeed?

What are the barriers/gateways?

Did any of these attempts generate any official action? For example, have any of them caused any of the following:

a committee hearing in Congress
a successful referendum at the local level?

Which statehood campaigns are still on-going?
Are there any that are likely to succeed? Are there structural impediments that are out of proportion to the motivation of the backers? Are there any where the backers appear to have the momentum necessary to overcome the structural barriers?


texts: Why did greaves go in and out of fashion?

texts:
I made a very counterintuitive find. Wikipedia says:

  Greaves were common until around the ninth century, when they largely disappeared.There is not much evidence of their use until the second quarter of the thirteenth century.

If chausses rendered them obsolete, why did they reappear? Were chausses preferred for flexibility? Were they rendered ineffective by the introduction of more tapering swords or polearms?


texts: Why did Michigan abolish capital punishment so early?

texts:
The US state of Michigan abolished the death penalty in 1846, and according to Wikipedia, was the first English-speaking government in the world to do so; the death penalty has not been reinstated since then. On the other hand, the bordering state of Ohio is one of the most frequent users of capital punishment in the US.

So what led to Michigan's early abolition of capital punishment, as opposed to other states?


texts: Who gave Charles the Bold his nickname and why?

texts:
I am talking about the Duke of Burgundy here.
Wikipedia has a tantalizing footnote (n. 1):

Charles le Téméraire is more accurately translated in English as "the
Rash", but the English speaking world generally refers to Charles as
"the Bold". The history of Charles' epithets is complex: le Hardi (the
Bold) may be Burgundian propaganda: far from being a
nineteenth-century historians' appellation, he was already labelled
Temerarius by the French in 1477.

It is then followed, however, by a dead link to a pdf file, so my curiousity is not entirely satisfied.


texts: What prevented slaves in Classical Greece from running off?

texts:
I was once again reading the Old Oligach’s rant on slaves and how good they supposedly had it.

if it were customary for a slave (or metic or freedman) to be struck by one who is free, you would often hit an Athenian citizen by mistake on the assumption that he was a slave. For the people there are no better dressed than the slaves and metics, nor are they any more handsome. [11]

Now perhaps this is to be taken with more than a mere grain of salt. Or it might be peculiar to Athens, hence worth stressing to the author of the text.
If there is truth to this, why didn‘t most Greek slaves (even if they were a minority among slaves) run off to their cities? Some cities, such as Megara were less than 50km away and long standing enemies of Athens. I assume, if the slave could find his way into the city and to his family without being spotted, they would have helped him to re-settle in Megara!
Despite the Old Oligarch’s information, was there anything such as a metal ring around the neck, a branding, etc., whereby to recognise them?
Edit
Thanks for bringing to my attention this  informative answer. As a Greek I am of course aware of the problems associated with enslaving Greeks. There is still no doubt that it was done. As the aforementioned answer states:

When cities fell, there was a recurrent tendency for the victor (even when dealing with Greeks) to kill the men and enslave the women and children.


texts: Is there a precedent for a large amount of refugees granted asylumn by a distant foreign nation

texts:
As you all probably know, Europe is getting a stream of refugees lately. They are mostly coming from Syria and most of them would be in the border countries like Greece, Italy, Hungary, ... However I have seen refugees clearly state they do not want to stay there, they want to move on to wealthier countries, read: countries with more social welfare like Germany and neighbour countries.

Now I have searched a bit already for similar circumstances where this has happened, but I'm not really getting anywhere as I'm not sure where to look.

There is a convention that dictates we should help them, but as always in politics, it isn't that easy. There are a lot of people for granting asylum to all refugees as well as opponents that would rather send them back.

Now my question is quite simple. Is there a precedent where refugees from a war region were not happy with 'just getting the hell outta dodge', but were also picky where they would like to go?** Is this the first time and therefore a new conundrum to solve for EU leadership?

I am interested in all examples, but mainly the ones to and from Europe. Did a majority of Europeans flee during either of the world wars? And where did they go?

** As I stated before, some refugees do not want to stay in Hungary but want to move on to Germany. I guess this might be a minority enlarged by media but still, it's generating a lot of tension among Europeans. For some it is not a matter of choice as the refugees are fleeing from war, so they should be happy with 'not being shot at' and being safe in their respective neighbouring countries where the bulk of refugees still is.

Edit: typo's.


texts: Which Canadian universities required Ancient Greek and Latin? From when to when?

texts:
I limit this question to universities in Canada.

1.  What rough percentage of universities required Ancient Greek and Latin, for admission?

2. Then what about after admission, during university?

3. If 2 is true, to what difficulty or degree were these mandated  courses?

4. For both questions 1 and 2, would you please roughly date your answers (from when to when)?


texts: What percentage of the German population worked on gathering the harvest in 1917?

texts:
It is a well-known fact that Germany suffered from food shortage during World War I, and that there were several causes of this, including in no particular order:

The blockade restricting food imports
The blockade restricting fertilizer imports
Haber-process nitrate production diverted away from fertilizer to explosives
Labor shortage because so many men had been sent to the front lines
Shortage of horses for similar reasons
Late and poorly designed food rationing measures

What seems to be much more difficult to obtain is any kind of numerical estimate for the relative importance of each of these causes. https://everydaylivesinwar.herts.ac.uk/2015/04/food-and-the-first-world-war-in-germany/ confirms that it wasn't just loss of imports:

As men and horses were called up, farmers’ wives took over the running of the farm, but lack of equipment, fertiliser and manpower, even though some 900,000 prisoners of war worked on the land, saw substantial falls in crop yields, which almost halved by the war’s end.

Right now I'm trying to get an idea of the importance of labor shortage. The time of year when labor is most needed for food production is harvest. In medieval times, pretty much the entire population, at least everyone able to walk, would help gather the harvest. By 1913, this was no longer necessary. But what happened during World War I? Sure, the men were on the front lines, or buried under them. But there were cities full of women and children who would be perfectly capable of harvesting crops. Were they employed in that capacity? If so, why was there still a labor shortage? If not, why not?
So to ask a specific factual question:
What percentage – or what absolute number – of the German population worked on gathering the harvest in 1917? (I would also be interested in figures for other years. But I pick 1917 in particular because by then, there had surely been enough time to make whatever changes from the peacetime economy, needed to be made.)


texts: Why didn't Hannibal attack Rome after the Battle of Cannae?

texts: Hannibal Barca defeated 8 Roman legions in the Battle of Cannae. At that time Carthage also had control over Hispania. Why did Hannibal not seize Rome at that time?


texts: What degree of relations did the different Hawaiian islands have between themselves before Kamehameha's unification?

texts: I am trying to figure out if there were actual cultural, commercial and political links among the islands, and especially if there was an actual Hawaiian unified identity or this is constructed after the British intervention and alteration of the archipelago dynamics. The distances between Hawaiian islands seem to be a difficult gap to cover regularly without proper means of transportation, hence I would imagine that the degree of similitude between each Hawaiian island culture would not be very different to the one between these and any other Polynesia islands.


texts: Why didn't the ancients produce purple dye via admixture?

texts:
A great deal of prestige is attached to the colour purple - the hue of bishops and emperors alike - and, if you've read a little about the ancient world, you'll probably have heard the story explaining why this is the case.  The Greeks and Romans - the story goes - knew of only one way of obtaining purple dye: a painstaking and eye-wateringly expensive process involving the extraction of the precious substance from sea snails.

As a boy, I always imagined that the root of this purple business was an inability on the part of the Greeks and the Romans to produce blue dye. I know little about dyes, but the colour blue is notable for occurring in the natural world only very rarely. So it makes sense, at least at first glance, that the ancients would have struggled to produce dye of this colour. The colour purple was the closest that they could come to achieving to such a rarity, hence its prestige. In any case, if they could produce blue dye in quantity, they could just have mixed it with red dye - which has always been one of the cheaper pigments - and every Roman and his dog could have strolled across the forum in lurid purple vestments.

This theory took a bit of a knock a couple of years ago, when I read that the colour purple only became available to the non-fabuously wealthy in 1860 with the invention of magenta pigment (named for the Battle of Magenta of the previous year). Given that, for centuries before that date, the armies of Britain and France marched into battle wearing vivid red and blue uniforms respectively, it seems unlikely that lack of blue pigment was the main contributor to the rarity of purple.

Given that both red and blue dyes were plentiful pre-1860, what, then, was stopping the ancients (or anyone else for that matter) from mixing the two to create purple? Do clothing dyes not mix the way that acrylic paints do?


texts: Can the Cassini maps of France be found online?

texts:
I am looking for online versions of the Cassini maps (i.e. "the first general maps of the territory using a measuring apparatus were made by the Cassini family during the 18th century" from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_cartography) - preferably all maps combined in one map if such a thing exists. I

I tried the national library of France site (http://www.bnf.fr/fr/acc/x.accueil.html), but when I click on a Cassini map, it always gives me the message "La page recherchée n'existe pas !" (the page you were looking for does not exist).

Does anyone know where I can find the maps online (and preferably combined in one map)?


texts: How many samurai warriors were there during the Sengoku period?

texts:
I was trying to estimate the number of warriors who were part of the samurai class. I am mainly interested in the 16th and 17th centuries.

Trying to search for that, I came across this. It states that in the end of the Tokugawa period, samurai and their family members comprised 5-6% of the total population. Which actually raises the question of whether the expression "family members" of the samurai class includes children, women and elders or not. And please remember, my question here is about the number of capable samurai warriors who were ready to join battles under their Daimyo's command. Also please note that the end of the Tokugawa period is closer to 19th century than to the 17th century, but I am also clueless on how to account for the time difference on the number of the samurai class.

Another important question is the population of Japan during this period. Any numbers would actually be useful.


texts: Has there ever been an archbishop or bishop younger than the 16-year-old James of Nicosia?

texts:
In 1456, King John II of Cyprus appointed his illegitimate son James as Latin Archbishop of Nicosia. James was just 16 at the time.

James soon lost his position, being forced to flee the following year after murdering the Royal Chamberlain. Later, he was pardoned and regained the position. In 1463, he became King James II of Cyprus after ousting the Queen, his half-sister Charlotte who had succeeded their father John II.

Although it was not uncommon for medieval monarchs to put relatives in prominent positions in the church, James' youth seems to be very unusual. Googling has not turned up any other information on very young archbishops or bishops.

The only other 'teen' I've been able to find is Odo of Bayeux, half brother of William the Conqueror. Unfortunately, we don't know his year of birth; estimates range from 1030 to 1035 so he may have been as young as 14 or as old as 19 when his brother William made him bishop in either 1049 or 1050.

Were there any archbishops or bishops, either from the medieval period or later, who are known to have been younger than James when they were appointed? Or is the case of James, and even a possibly older 19-year-old Odo, extremely unusual?


texts: Did Cao Cao really say the greatest traitor resembled an honest man?

texts:
The greatest traitor has always resembled an honest man and the
greatest falsehood comes across as truth.
Righteousness and evil cannot be discerned by their appearance.
People have decided wrongly about me in the past.
Today they still misjudge me,
and may continue to do so in the future
However, I shall remain myself.
I have never cared about others misjudging me

Did Cao Cao say that? In what context? Is it fictional?
Who was Cao Cao? Cao Cao was the last prime minister of the Han Dynasty and usually remembered as the king of Wei, one of China's Three Kingdoms. After his death, his son toppled the Xian Emperor and established the Wei dynasty.
Why do I seriously doubt the quote? I do not know the source. I've read the whole Romance of Three Kingdoms and I do not remember him saying this.
Searching the web only shows that he supposedly said this but not the source.
I want to know more context.


texts: Did the Romans ever deploy troops to, or try to conquer, Ireland?

texts:
The Romans obviously conquered Ireland's nearest neighbor, Britain (at least the southern part of it), but they seem to have stayed away from Ireland, at least as far as I am aware.

Is this the case, and if so, why did they abstain from military involvement in Ireland, when they were already in Britain, only a few miles away?


texts: Which countries banned Ferdinand the bull?

texts:
Background

The book "The Story of Ferdinand" is a short illustrated children's story featuring a bull who would not be provoked by a matador. When it was published in 1936, it was widely interpreted as pacifist propaganda by the fascist powers of the time, and it was subsequently banned in many countries including Spain and Germany.

The Question

In which countries or territories was "The Story of Ferdinand" banned by the relevant local authorities, when, and with what justification?


texts:
So I'm writing a novel taking place during the Prohibition Era, and although I've got the basics down, I'm curious as to whether anybody knows any specifics to how rum-running worked.

What kind of ships were commonly used for transporting alcohol? Also, how long would a trip take?

Any information would help, thank you!


texts:
Who made this Sino-Soviet Propaganda Poster?
And, why was it made so early?

By the left armpit, there is a signature:

The Who:

I believe this says "ВИКТОР ИВАНОВ" which google says translates to "VIKTOR IVANOV". Unfortunately, this is a very common name - wikipedia has dozens of people with this name.

I think that it might be Viktor Semyonovich Ivanov as a lot of his previous posters have a similar style. Or maybe it is Viktor Ivanovich Ivanov?

Where did the artist work when this poster was created?

The Why / The When:

Google translate tells me that the bottom: "Да здравствует дружба народов СССР и Китая"
Translates to: "Long live the friendship Peoples of the USSR and China"

Mao didn't proclaim the PRC until October 1949, and the Sino-Soviet Friendship treaty wasn't signed until Feburary 14, 1950. The date on the poster is 1949. One would assume that this poster would not be produced until after the treaty had been signed. Perhaps it was ordered prior to the meetings with Mao? What information is available about the production of this, and other early Sino-Soviet friendship propaganda?

Extra Info:

SE user @TonyK did some legwork to provide translation for the text on the poster. I hope it will help someone dig up the answer. TonyK says:

The Cyrillic text reads:

  Da zdravstvuyet druzhba narodov SSSR i Kitaya!

meaning "Long live the friendship of the peoples of the USSR and China!"

The Chinese text reads:

  中蘇两國人民友誼萬歳 !

In pinyin:

  Zhōng-sū liǎng guó rénmín yǒuyì wànsuì!

or "Long live the friendship between the two nations China and the Soviet Union!"

Characters 蘇, 國, 誼, 萬, and 歳 are traditional; only character 两 is simplified. (The remaining four characters were not changed in the Great Simplification.)

Edit 2016 December

I had the opportunity to read through Iconography of Power by Vitoria Bonnell. In it, she describes how the purposes of Soviet posters changed from 1917 to 1953; very fascinating. One of her primary sources for Soviet posters was the Russian State Library, which has a collection of over 400,000 posters.

Perhaps someone with basic Russian reading skills can find it in the online catalog? Here's a search that I did in the catalog; but I can't read!


texts:
I wonder what the purpose is of the structure located above the entrance of the Charter Street Ragged School & Working Girls Home in Manchester:

Is it purely ornamental? According to this page it was built in 1847.

Image from Google Street View.


texts: Why did Stephen II of Blois (father of King Stephen of England) abandon the First Crusade in 1098 knowing how much he would lose by doing so?

texts:
Having taken the crusader’s vow and raised an army of thousands, why did Stephen II of Blois forsake the enormous prestige associated with crusading and risk shame and accusations of cowardice by abandoning the First Crusade? Then there is also the fact that the cost of crusading was enormous as crusaders bore most (if not all) of the military and other expenses. Why did he basically throw everything away by leaving?

Stephen was apparently close to his wife Adele, daughter of William the Conqueror and sister of Henry I of England, but even she felt he had not fulfilled his vow. Perhaps regretting what he had done, Stephen did later go on another crusade and was killed in the Holy Land in 1102.

None of the online sources I’ve seen give a clear reason, but I can think of a number of possible ones:

he fell out with other leaders of the crusade
he felt that Antioch, after a lengthy siege, could not be taken and that the crusade was doomed to fail
Wikipedia says he fled the battlefield at Antioch, implying he was coward
he was in poor health after such a long siege in what, to a north European, was a hostile climate
he ran out of money.

Is there any evidence as to which (if any) of the above reasons might be correct.


texts: What were the ranks in the Army of Imperial Spain?

texts:
At the time of the Latin American wars of independence, the Imperial Spanish army employed men in ranks like Capitán (captain), Sargento (sergeant) and so on, between the King and the lowliest footsoldier. Wikipedia suggests that "Royal Ordinances for the Regime, Discipline, Subordination and Service in his Armies" of 1768 was in place, but the Naopleonic Wars may have occasioned some reforms.

What were the military ranks used by the Spanish Empire?


texts: Did foreign language phrase books exist in the ancient world?

texts:
I am finding out about the ancient equivalent to modern foreign language phrase books, used in conversations. Such as a medieval Italian-Latin conversational book, or an ancient English-French learning book.

For example, in Korea, during the Joseon dynasty, there was a Mongolian-Korean conversational book. I don't know the name in English, but the Korean name is mong-uh-no-gul-dae, '몽어노걸대'.


texts: Is there any sort of list of Roman senators?

texts:
I am looking for records on Roman senators (specifically around 100 B.C., around the time Caesar was born)
Googling for it I only find various Wikipedia articles on how the Roman senate worked, but no real list of names of the Roman senators.
My question is:
Is there any sort of list of Roman senators available?


texts: How important was the role played by the US in rebuilding Germany post-WWII?

texts: There is a perception that the presence of Allied forces in Germany and the Marshall Plan was crucial in the successful rebuilding of Germany. Also, I've heard from informal discussions with friends that reduced spending on military allowed West Germany to spend more of its budget on nation building. I want to know if the facts align with the above assertions.


texts: Why did the Monitor and Merrimac (aka Virginia) have such radically different designs?

texts: This is something that's always baffled me. You have one ship that appears to sit just above the water with one little canon on a turret (the Monitor) and a second that sits high and is brimming with canons on either side. Why did these two ships look so radically different? Were the designs intended to achieve different aims?


texts: During WW1, did any Irish join Kitchener’s Army?

texts:
Were there Irish recruits for Kitchener’s 3 year enlistment program during WW1? I understand that most Irish volunteers were Protestants from Ulster, but am wondering if they would have qualified for the 3 year service recruitment in 1914.
What division would they like serve, if they joined under these circumstances?


texts:
As far as I know, the Muslim empires and kingdoms in the Indian subcontinent were either based in Lahore or Delhi.

List of cities in Pakistan by population

I searched for the history of the top 10 largest cities in Pakistan. I only found Lahore and Peshawar had connections with some Muslim empires/kingdoms where Peshawar was used as the winter capital by some dynasties.
Did any Muslim empire/kingdom have its capital in modern Pakistan except Lahore?
The various capitals of the Princely States that joined Pakistan do not count as  I am interested in the period before the British colonization.


texts:
Why is there a big gash in the side of the Pyramid of Menkaure?

If you look at a picture of the pyramid, on the side where they have the entrance to get inside, above that there is a 100 yard long indentation/gash that looks strange, almost like it caved in at that spot.


texts: Did Egyptian civilization start from North to South or vice versa?

texts:
I've been reading archeological claims that say that the ancient Egyptians came from the South and that the first chiefdoms and kings were in the south.

Some also claim that there is a crown of Upper and lower Egypt, with the southern or white crown (Upper Egypt) being superior to the red crown.

If I take the Bible as a historical document, Ezekiel 29:14-15 says :

  "After forty years, I will gather the Egyptians from all lands to
  which I scattered them, and they shall go into Pathros the land of
  their Nativity and they shall be there a base kingdom".....

So I want to know how this is possible. The Egyptians are middle Easterners, they are Semitic people. So how can archeologists claim that they came from the south.

So I would like to know:

Where Pathros is located historically
The pieces of evidence that argue for or against a Northern origin of the Egyptian civilization.


texts: Has banning controversial ideas ever not lead to much violence in enforcement or resistance?

texts:
In the past year or two I've noticed the public discourse to increasingly contain arguments about "hate speech" and that this shouldn't be covered by free speech laws. I won't be interested in any moral or legal arguments here, but a historical perspective on free speech. The reason I'm getting more curious about that specifically today is because today a Scottish court found a man guilty of a hate crime for teaching his girlfriend's pug to respond to "Sieg Heil" with the Hitler salute.

One of the central arguments in support of free speech is that people do not change their opinion by being threatened with punishment if they voice it; basically the claim that outlawing an opinion won't get rid of it.

Now that sounds pretty plausible to me, but what's actually the historical experience we have with this? Have there been controversial ideas that were successfully outlawed, without generating any significant violence (on the part of the government or the population) or civil unrest? I'm not really looking for a very concrete idea, as hate speech laws themselves don't, say, enumerate a list of concrete notions that you express on pain of certain penalties, but if such ideas existed, that'll be interesting, too.

Question: historically, were any controversial ideas outlawed and then successfully eliminated without requiring significant force to implement that?


texts: Did Edward VIII's abdication follow constitutional procedures?

texts:
Edward VIII abdicated the English throne after discussion with his Prime Minister.

  Edward informed Baldwin that he would abdicate if he could not marry Simpson. Baldwin then presented Edward with three choices: give up the idea of marriage; marry against his ministers' wishes; or abdicate.[50] It was clear that Edward was not prepared to give up Simpson, and he knew that if he married against the advice of his ministers, he would cause the government to resign, prompting a constitutional crisis. He chose to abdicate.

Quoted from Wikipedia in order to establish context; the wikipedia text includes references & citations not reproduced here.

Were the procedures used to force Edward VIII to renounce the throne legitimate? Were there established precedents and procedures?
Were there procedures which would have allowed Edward  to retain the throne?
To what extent were there covert, unstated objections to Edward? (e.g. "sympathy for Germany" is frequently cited). Is this a conspiracy theory, or is there any real evidence to support this contention?


texts: What was the plan for an abort of the Enola Gay's mission to drop the atomic bomb?

texts:
Following up on this answer...

@mark, in the answer, writes that "[i]n the event that the crew of Enola Gay had to abort their mission, they had no intention of trying to land with the bomb still aboard".

That sounds like there was a plan to drop the bomb somewhere else if they were forced to abort the mission. Was there such a plan?


texts: Which countries (or comparable geographical units) have a lower population now than they used to at some point in history before 1950?

texts:
It is generally seen as a given that the human population worldwide has increased everywhere since the end of the second World War.
There are very good reasons for this, so you can imagine my surprise finding out that the island of Ireland had a population of 8,175,124 in 1841. This of course was before the Great Irish Famine, that roughly halved the population through death and emigration. The population would never recover, having reached 6.66 million in 2016. (To be clear, the data both times includes what today is "Northern Ireland").
Are there any other examples of large pieces of land whose population was higher at any point in history before 1950 than it is now? If you know of more than one example, please include them all.
Criteria:

The geographies in question must be at least 20,000 km² in size.
They must have had a population of at least 500,000 people back then. If the numbers are not certain, it must historically be plausible to have had this population.
It must either have been an administrative unit in some way (Duchies and similar are fair game) or a geographical unit (Like the Island of New Guinea, the Balkans, or Manchuria); or is one of them right now.

Why the criteria: Since the question arose in the comments: (Rule 1) to avoid depopulated cities or similar as answers, which there are plenty in history. (Rule 2) to have a certain significance of the depopulation. (Rule 3) to not draw arbitrary boundaries as to answer the question. (Rule "4", the cutoff at 1950) because quite a few countries experienced a population loss in recent years (e.g. Russia, Japan, Croatia, Poland, Syria). This is a trend that will only get more common in the developed world in the years to come and therefore is not particularly noteworthy. Conversely, not having a larger population now than at the end of WW2 is very unusual, as the world population has tripled since then, mainly due to a post-war baby boom and a significantly longer life expectancy in close to all regions. Also, sustaining a given population in an area has become easier through advances in agricultural techniques and global supply.


texts: Thomas Jefferson's "misogynistic" views?

texts:
I'm reading The Hemingses of Monticello, by Annette Gordon-Reed, and I came across a quote on page 93 that reads:

  "...As a teenage boy, [Jefferson] reproduced excerpts from poems and other literature that can be interpreted as hostile  to women..."

Later, Gordon-Reed refers to Jefferson's views as misogynistic. What poems/literature is she referring to and where did he "reproduce" them? I've searched on Google but haven't found anything.

*Obviously, it was the 17-1800's, so he wouldn't be championing modern feminism, but there is room between modern feminism and misogynism.


texts: When was the "Alexandrian period" of Greek sciences?

texts:
Engels (1880):

The foundations of the exact natural sciences were, therefore, first worked out by the Greeks of the Alexandrian period, and later on, in the Middle Ages, by the Arabs.

When was this "Alexandrian period"?

The linked Marxists.org page says in a footnote:

The Alexandrian period of the development of science comprises the period extending from the 3rd century B.C. to the 17th century A.D.

But I'm not sure if this is correct.


texts: please if anyone can give any info on a statue my aunt found in her garden (elkton oregon)


texts: Did any slaves with Jewish owners ever adopt Judaism?

texts: In a separate question, it was suggested that because Jews tend not to proselytize, there would not, in contrast to slaves who became Christians, be many Blacks who became Jewish even though their owners followed that religion. But has there been any records of this ever happening?


texts: Is there a British equivalent in architectural history to American cabins?

texts:
I've been watching a lot of American horror movies, and a big trope is the characters staying in old, abandoned cabins in the woods. Or if not cabins then lodges, or in Westerns or haberdasheries etc. Which makes sense, because America's such a vast landscape and such cabins were used by travellers covering hundreds of miles.
I noticed it's not a big thing in British horror cinema, and I'm wondering if it's because there's nothing like that in British architectural history (perhaps because Britain's so much smaller and therefor not needed), or if it's just not a very prominent trope in British cinema.
So, any architectural or cinema historians that could help would be appreciated.


texts: Why did the French Revolution bring secularism?

texts: The Roman Catholic Church was one of the victims of the French Revolution. Many of the priests, nuns, and other clergyman were abolished. Why did the revolutionaries "hate" the Roman Catholic Church?


texts: Where did Otto von Bismarck say "lying awake all night, hating"?

texts:
I am trying to identify a reference for a quote attributed to Otto von Bismarck.

From tagesspiegel.de: "Politik braucht mehr Prosa und weniger Poesie": "Wie enorm der Druck der Widerstände auf ihm [Otto von Bismarck] lastete, zeigte jenes morgendliche Geständnis, er habe die ganze Nacht wach gelegen und „nur gehasst“."

English Google translation: "How much the pressure of the resistance weighed on him [Otto von Bismarck] showed that morning confession that he had lain awake the whole night and "just hated"."

I am interested in knowing where OvB made that "just hated" statement.

Update 1

Thanks to @IndianaJenna's interesting answer, a further Google Books search for the phrase "Ich habe die ganze Nacht gehaßt" reveals the following sources

Erich Marcks, Männer und Zeiten: Aufsätze und Reden zur neueren Geschichte. Zweiter Band, page 23.
Alois Atzler, Deutsche Geschichte Seit 1815 Bis Zur Gegenwart, page 131.
Fritz Richard Stern, Gold und Eisen: Bismarck und sein Bankier Bleichröder, which includes a reference note 58 at the end of the quote on page 279. Unfortunately access to the bibliography seems to be restricted in the Google Books preview version.

Update 2

Below is the email I received from Prof. Ulrich Lappenküper, managing director of the Otto-von-Bismarck-Stiftung, in response to an email I had sent (following the advice given by @MarkJohnson in his post, and @LangLangC in one of his comments). Prof. Lappenküper was very kind in responding within a few hours.

  [D]as fragliche Bismarck-Zitat wird in elektronischen und sonstigen Medien immer wieder und in unterschiedlichen Fassungen kolportiert, aber stets ohne Quellenangabe. Im Gegensatz zu manch anderen Bismarckiana gibt es aber eine seriöse Quelle: Christoph von Tiedemann, Persönliche Erinnerungen an den Fürsten Bismarck, Leipzig 1898, S.42. Tiedemann zitiert dort aus einem undatierten Gespräch mit Bismarck folgenden Satz: „Ich habe nicht schlafen können, ich habe die ganze Nacht gehaßt“.

  Mit freundlichen Grüßen (and best greetings to Australia)
  U. Lappenküper

So it appears that the conjecture of Tiedemann being the source of this quote which has been articulated by various respondents to this post, is a correct one. Also note Prof. Lappenküper's comment that the quote is part of an undated conversation between Tiedemann and Bismarck.


texts: What is the most number of times someone has become leader of a European country?

texts:
Among monarchs, Henry VI (1422 to 1461, 1470 to 1471) and Edward IV (1461 to 1470, 1471 to 1483) both ruled England on two separate occasions. Hethum II of Armenia went one better, ruling three separate times (1289 to 1293, 1295 to 1296 and 1299 to 1303). However, one might dispute the latter as there is some controversy as to whether it is in Europe or Asia.

Among elected leaders, William Gladstone went one better still as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (1868 to 1874, 1880 to 1885, Feb to July 1886, 1892 to 1894).

I'm interested in any period in history. Although I would accept an answer citing either the effective leader (e.g. the Prime Minister in the UK or Ireland, the Chancellor of Germany), or the ceremonial leader (e.g. the ruling monarch in the UK or the President of Ireland or Germany), I'm more interested in the former than latter (i.e. the real holder of power).

The manner in which the leader attained power does not matter (elected, inherited, seized power by force etc.). However, as the focus is on leaders making a comeback after losing power, re-election does not count (so Margaret Thatcher only counts once despite winning three elections).

Note: One of the answers to this question has an example of the Moroccan ruler Abdallah II who was in power on seven separate occasions.


texts: Why didn't Zheng He colonize the countries he explored like what the Europeans did to the New World?

texts:
Hundreds of years ago, China was more advanced than Europe and even the Ottomans. Why didn't China become a colonial master?

Ming Dynasty Zheng He went on huge shipping expeditions and could have done what the Europeans did to the New World. Most puzzlingly, instead of robbing gold from the weaker countries like what the Spaniards did to the Aztecs, Zheng He did the opposite by presenting gifts of gold to the countries his ships dropped by. Today, the new world has become a extension of old Europe. China is still China.

Did the Chinese make a wrong calculation with their extreme generosity or were they really such magnanimous people?


texts: How were cattle cut out in the 19th century?

texts: In the largest cattle raising countries - Australia and the USA, huge free ranging herds were kept. Nowadays, we use yards and crushes for husbandry activities such as drafting and calf marking  (castration, etc). Small herds can be pretty tame, but it must have been painstaking to cut calves out of a 1000 head herd with defensive mothers out in the open, keeping track of your progress and stopping them from running back in. Was this the case? Or was there a particular way? Corrals/round yards may hold the manually separated animals, but what might free grazers have done without any facilities?


texts: Was swordsmanship important in the American Civil War?

texts: I know swords were issued and I think they were used but my impression was that men on horseback (officers?) would simply slash at men on foot. Was swordsmanship actually studied with the idea of facing another person with a sword (as I assume was more important in the past) or were swords wielded without much skill or technique?


texts: Is More's 'Utopia' intended to depict an ideal city?

texts: On the surface 'Utopia' (1516) describes an ideal community : natural law, religion, and reason are its guiding principles. But I come across frequent references to its satirical nature. Does it satirise contemporary abuses in Western Europe, especially I suppose Western Christendom, or is some of the satire directed at the institutions and practices of the Utopians themselves? Or both?


texts: In WWI, which countries used prisoners as soldiers?

texts:
What happened to prisoners incarcerated for domestic crimes (not war) before and during the outbreak of the Great War?

Using a UK report, in 1914 the prison population dropped around 5000, but 11,000 prisoners remained throughout the war. In perspective, this population would have been nearly a division!

Conscription was adopted before and during the war across the European powers. Would this typically lead to a pardon of minor crimes in exchange for military service? Furthermore, with the threat of death for desertion or disobedience - would it not have been prudent to take all prisoners, regardless of their crimes and place them on the front?

Given the shortage of manpower all powers faced, this could well have been a boost, and surely fewer resources spent on the home front.

This has been a question it's hard to find material due to the large quantity of material that comes up on prisoners of war.


texts: Where did Cimon spend his time while in exile?

texts:
The Athenian statesman Cimon was ostracised from Athens for ten years (461-451 BC), after the Athenian expedition led by him and sent to help Sparta during the helot uprisings was dismissed by the suspicious Spartans.

Other than a little appearance at the Battle of Tanagra, in Boeotia, the quick Google sources (Wikipedia, Britannica, Ancient History Encyclopedia) don't mention anything about him during this time.

Is it known where did Cimon spend his time in exile?


texts: Has there ever been a revolution backed by a royal or a noble against their own family?

texts: Has there ever been a true rebel in the higher Royal or noble society who charged against a regime or a kingdom that is run by his own family, for altruistic reasons?.


texts: Why didn't America finish Saddam Hussein after the first Gulf War?

texts:
I have read To Die in Babylon by Harold Livingstone and it shows how powerful USA is, but some parts are not clear to me. Saddam thought Iraq is prepared for the Americans and it turns out not. At the end of the story a Iraqi soldier said that America will come back to finish Saddam in the future, and they did(Iraq invasion, 2003).

My first question is why didn't USA finish Saddam's reign in the first place?

Second what are Iraq's failures that caused them to lose the war?


texts: What metallurgy advancement allowed the transition from mail hauberk to plate armor?

texts: Why did it happen in the 14th century, when the blast furnace was invented much earlier? Can someone explain, how medieval blacksmiths figured it out? What discovery enabled them to create plate armors?


texts: States calling themselves a dictatorship

texts:
Yesterday I learned of the (somewhat obscure) Centrocaspian Dictatorship, an unrecognised state that existed for less than 2 months in 1918.

Are there any other (less obscure) states that have called themselves a dictatorship?  It seems more common dictatorships call themselves the free democratic people's worker's utopia and so on.


texts: Why did Napoleon divide his army during the retreat from Smolensk?

texts:
In the Wikipedia article on the Battle of Krasnoi:

Having lost contact with Kutuzov during the previous two weeks, Napoleon incorrectly believed that the Russian army must have been as devastated by the elements as his own. Not expecting an offensive by Kutuzov, Napoleon made the strategic mistake of resuming his retreat by dispatching the Grande Armée's corps individually from Smolensk on four successive days, starting on November 13. Napoleon left on 14th, Davout on 15th, Beauharnais on 16th, Ney on 17th, together with Joseph Barbanègre, the city commandant. Thus the French approached Krasny in a piecemeal 53 km (33 mi) long column of disconnected corps, not massed together in preparation for battle.

It turned out to be a mistake, but Napoleon must've had his reasons for making this plan. After all, if there were nothing to gain by retreating over four days, Napoleon would presumably have chosen to leave in one day. Why did he choose to retreat in four groups?


texts: For how many years in the eighteenth century were Russian soldiers present within the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth borders?

texts:
For modern Poland, the answer is rather simple. Russian, and later Soviet soldiers, were stationed inside the Polish borders for almost the whole 19th and 20th centuries (with a notable exception for interwar period Poland (minus 1920)). The last Soviet soldier left Poland on September 18, 1993 (some kind of symbolic date taking into consideration that Soviet aggression started on September 17).

But... what about eighteenth century?

For sure they stayed from 1792 till the end of the century (War in Defence of the Constitution, Kościuszko Uprising, Third Partition of Poland).

Did Russian troops presence was permanent from the start of Augustus III of Poland rule (1733) or rather Seven Years' War (1756)?

But...

What about Great Northern War? Did they leave in 1719 as they promised during Silent Sejm?

Can we say that Russian troops were here for 250 years or rather 300 years?


texts: Why was Basel, Switzerland chosen for the First Zionist Congress?

texts: Why was Basel, Switzerland chosen for the First and other later Zionist Congresses to be held in?


texts: Can someone explain the joke that killed Chrysippus of Soli?

texts:
There are a number of versions of how Chrysippus died, one of which says he drank some overproof wine while another says that he died of laughter*.

Apparently, he died laughing at his own joke. The story goes something like this*:

  ...one day on his way home Chrysippus came across an ass eating figs. He instructed the old woman who lived with him to give the ass some unmixed wine to drink afterwards, and with that he laughed so violently he died.

Or according to Wikipedia*:

  In the second account, he was watching a donkey eat some figs and cried out: "Now give the donkey a drink of pure wine to wash down the figs", whereupon he died in a fit of laughter.

I don't know if it is the zeitgeist or some weird Stoic sense of humor but the joke is completely lost on me. I found multiple sources telling the story, but none provided an explanation.

Can someone explain why somebody in that time period (ca. 200 BC) would find that joke hilarious?


texts: Why did Roman Army rarely field large Roman cavalry units and rely on foreign auxiliaries?

texts:
I have been reading a bit recently about the Roman period between say around 100bc to 100ad and I have noticed that the Roman's cavalry was almost always a small portion of their total troops and it was usually entirely made of foreign units (Gauls, Germans, Sarmatians, etc...)

From what I understand the equestrian branch (lower nobles) used to be the cavalry but by the time period I mentioned they no longer acted as cavalry but rather as military staff and civil administrators.  Why did Rome move away from using their own citizens for cavalry?


texts: Why aren't ICBMs (and missiles in general) built using stealth technology?

texts:
I read this question and was struck by something "obvious": why are not ICBMs built using "stealth" technology? A rocket, basically a pipe, must be much easier to "stealthify" than a irregular vessels like a plane or a ship.

Furthermore, according to the question above, the radar used to detect these missiles was using very low frequencies. AFAIK that means it wouldn't be good at detecting small objects. Compared to ships and planes an ICBM is quite small, making it even more motivated to build it stealthy.


texts: Material Basis of the Golden Age of Bohemia

texts:
On a recent visit to Prague I was much impressed by the city's beauty and the number and splendor of its historic sites, such as Prague Castle, the Charles Bridge (a bit further afield Karlštejn Castle), its many stone towers, and lovely details such as the ubiquitous cobblestone streets.

The extraordinary richness on display reminded me much of Seville, Spain, which also possesses e.g. mighty palaces of the nobility and a huge cathedral. For Seville the main source of its extraordinary historic wealth seems clear: its location is where ocean-going cargo ships from the South American colonies were unloaded on the river Guadalquivir and where hence a lot of money was made and spent during the Golden Age of Sevilla.

Many prominent historic sites in Prague similarly date back to a Golden Age of Bohemia that began with the reign of Charles IV (1316 - 1378), Holy Roman Emperor and King of Bohemia. I am wondering what brought the Golden Age about overall in this case. The Czechs are an enterprising people and in Charles IV they had an enlightened ruler, but I assume there must still have been some economic fundamentals, perhaps in the form of raw materials or new crafts specific to the region, that allowed the king and the people to catalyze their own Golden Age, which still shines today.

So what was the material basis for the Golden Age of Bohemia?


texts: Has any country ever had 2 former presidents in jail simultaneously?

texts:
I suspect that today, this achievement has been granted for the first time to Brazil, with the arresting of Michel Temer, and considering that Lula da Silva is still under arrest.

It is normally big news if a former president is incarcerated, so I'd be surprised to know this occurred twice somewhere else.


texts: Why didn't Romans conquer/explore the African Atlantic Coast?

texts:
I know that the Romans, when their empire was at its peak around the 1st and 2nd century AD, controlled the northern coast of Africa and had the Sahara desert as some kind of natural "wall" as well as a border beyond which they thought that it was the end of the world so they did not bother to explore it.
But looking at this map, I do not understand why they did not expand further west from Mauritania Tingitana. In Roman times, this coast was pretty fertile as was the rest of northern Mauritania and Numidia. So why didn't they expand further west on the North African Atlantic coast? As far as I know, thanks to their old enemy Carthage, they knew that there was a lot of land in that direction since Hanno traveled down to Gambia centuries ago.
I mean, the Romans were expanding everywhere they could. And since the African Atlantic Coast was not really claimed by any empire or strong barbarian hordes in that time, there would have been no resistance against the Romans.


texts: Did a forged seal ever seriously compromise a political or military operation?

texts:
Wax and clay seals have always struck me as a rather imperfect security mechanism. Better than nothing, of course, but imperfect. So I was interested to learn that Los Alamos National Laboratory's Vulnerability Assessment Team had conducted a study, "Were ancient seals secure?"

  Abstract: Forgeries of ancient seals have been found in modern times,
  but there has been little previous analysis of how much security
  ancient seals might have offered. In this paper, we demonstrate four
  different vulnerabilities of clay seal impressions using attack
  methods and materials that were available thousands of years ago. The
  success of these attacks suggests that ancient stamp and cylinder
  seals may have been highly vulnerable to spoofing.

However, the authors don't mention any known instances of ancient seal-spoofing, let alone any consequential instances of spoofing. But the authors are not historians, so I don't take this as indication that it never happened.

So, did a forged seal ever seriously compromise a political or military operation?

A forged seal could be effective in at least two ways. First, you could send out counterfeit orders, telling a vassal to march west when the king or whoever really wants the vassal to march east. Second, you could conceal an act of espionage by resealing an order: the vassal receives the order to march east, and because the seal is intact the vassal does not take extra precautions, only to be ambushed along his route. You can imagine plenty of other scenarios.

Given the several thousand years of history when seals were an important security mechanism, I imagine that a forged seal was pivotal at one point--but I haven't found any examples yet.


texts: Has anyone survived triggering a bounding landmine?

texts:
I just watched an episode of the television series Flashpoint, where a member of the police force steps on the trigger of a "CR38 bounding mine."

Has anyone survived triggering a bounding mine in this way? What has worked and what hasn't?


texts: What does this Swiss banner/blazon/coat of arms/flag stand for?

texts:
The blazon can be found on the Basel town hall

It depicts two war axes that are crossed. The other flags depict banners of states of Switzerland, the one to the right is Wallis.

More pictures of the town hall

Wikimedia
Tomas Travel
Handelszeitung

It does not seem to depict a blazon of one of the Swiss cantons/states, as the banner cannot be found in the table of states (de)

What does, or did, it represent?


texts: Nursing in Bude, Cornwall, UK during WW2

texts: I am working on a writing project and the main character is a young nurse in Bude during WW2. I'm not quite sure how to put her there or get her there -- would there have been nurses stationed at RAF Cleave? Was there a hospital in Bude at that time? Would it be likely that a young girl might go from London to Bude during the war? Also, tangentially, was anyone in town using bicycles at that time?


texts: How to explain the Khalkhin Gol outcome in view of Soviet weakness and Japanese strength at that time?

texts:
Conventional wisdom says that the USSR was very weak in 1939/40/41, in large part due to the purges of the 1930s, ideological interference in the armed forces, and lack of equipment, preparation and tactical sophistication. This is the usual explanation for the poor showing of the USSR in the Winter War against Finland in 1940 and the colossal defeats in the early stages of Barbarossa. Later in the war, it is said, the Red Army recovered from the purges, Stalin learnt to interfere less and soviet tactical sophistication evolved. But only later on.

Similarly, for a time, Japan seemed unstoppable, with vital areas of China as well as British, American and Dutch possessions overrun at tremendous speed in the early 1940s. Only later was she defeated by the might of a fully mobilised United States and the vastness of China. But only later.

So how then to explain the USSR's defeat of Japan at the little known (in the West) battles of Khalkhin Gol in 1939?


texts: Are the "bone fields" of the Stalingrad encircled battlefields real?

texts:
In this podcast by Dan Carlin's Hardcore history show, Dan mentions that there are areas inside of the Stalingrad pocket where human remains are openly visible above ground, exposed to the weather. For anyone familiar with the area, is this true?

If so, why weren't the remains buried?

On a side note - what is the status of those areas today?


texts: Why was the Federal government's assumption of state debt so significant?

texts:
Alexander Hamilton advocated for the assumption of the states’ debts by the Federal government. Why was this so significant? The reasons Chernow gives in his book are:

the wealthy bond holders would have a stake in preserving a government that owed them money
if the government didn't assume states' debts, states might take import duties which would clash with federal import duties

This all makes sense, but these reasons don’t seem as significant if this is just a one-time assumption? I say one-time because today states can take out debt. The only reasons I can think that Hamilton would give up the capital for this assumption was because:

the state debt was so significant and wouldn’t be paid off by the most debt-burdened states
something to do with the fact that it was debt from the revolutionary war
the legislation was not a one-time assumption but a permanent assumption which was later  changed in other legislation


texts: Has there ever been a truly multi-sided war?

texts:
I was playing StarCraft the other night, and it occurred to me: that game series portrays effectively a 3-way war, where all three factions are fighting the other two with equal ferocity.

Obviously, in real life various factions tend to make alliances in order to fight shared enemies, even if they aren't natural allies on their own, like the Soviets and the Western Allies in WWII allying to fight the Axis.

So I was wondering: what's the biggest, longest conflict in real history that truly had more than 2 sides?  I'm sure there have been skirmishes between city-states or factions within a civil war where a whole bunch of groups were all fighting amongst themselves, but has there ever been a large-scale, protracted conflict that remained equally fierce amongst multiple powers/alliances, all fighting each other?


texts: What was the tonnage carried in the Triangle Trade?

texts:
I'm interested in metrics regarding trans-atlantic trade in the era of the sail.

The specific timespan doesn't matter.
The specific cargo also doesn't matter.

I've searched but not found any estimates regarding the tonnage of the materials transported.
I'm specifically interested in goods, not people (free or enslaved), and the corresponding timespan for those metrics, or per-shipment.

E.g. [x] tons of consumer goods were transported across the northern trade winds per [y] timeframe.
or
The typical ship in 1649 carried [x] volume of goods, and there were an average of [y] shipments per [z].


texts: Why did the Confederacy think they could win the American Civil War?

texts:
The early Confederacy (The 7 founding states) attacked Fort Sumter in April 1861, starting the American Civil War. The Confederacy knew this would lead to war with the Union, yet they seemed to be confident in their odds of succeeding.

Shortly after the start of war, 4 other States joined the Confederacy. They also must have thought that this was a war they would win.

I know the Confederacy expected at least to some degree an involvement of Europe that did not come (i.e. cotton diplomacy), but there must have been better plans than that. Unlike the Confederacy, the Union had a large industrialized and urbanized area (the Northeast), and more advanced commercial, transportation and financial systems than the rural South. Additionally, the Union states had a manpower advantage of 5 to 2 at the start of the war.

What documented evidence exists which indicates the political, industrial, infrastructure, economical, military, and/or other significant factors considered favorable to the Confederacy as reasons for having confidence in a victory over the Union?


texts: How was Takeda defeated at the Battle of Nagashino?

texts: The 1575 Battle of Nagashino resulted in the eventual end of the Takenda clan during the sengoku jidai in Japan.  In the movie "Kagemusha", the Takeda cavalry charges guns and is devastated.  The wikipedia article claims a similar scenario.  However, I read (I don't recall where) that the actual battle involved Takeda sending sappers in "penny packets" against prepared positions looking for a non-existent weakness in the Oda defenses.  After frittering away their sappers, Takeda could not overcome the prepared positions and was defeated.  Is there a definitive account of the battle or any strong evidence for how the actual battle occurred?


texts: In WW2, which midget submarine program was the most successful? I know at least Great Britain and Japan had midget submarines and used them during the course of the conflict. Which WW2 combatant had the most success with their midget subs?


texts: What was the order of precedence for ancient China nobility ranks?

texts:
I would like to ask a question about ancient Chinese nobility. I was researching some background on Confucius, and I found a weird discrepancy on Wikipedia about his homeland, Lu. About its ruler, the article says "Marquess: Hereditary dukes of the House of Ji (姬)".

I thought Dukes and Marquess are different ranks. But this sounds like the Marquess of Lu is hereditary dukes? How come? Is it a translation error? Wikipedia problem?


texts:
I heard this interesting dialog in Season 1 of Mad Men.

  You know how Hitler got Neville Chamberlain to give him everything at Munich? He held the conference at an old palace that forbade smoking. And after an hour and a half of not smoking, Neville Chamberlain would have given Hitler his mother as a dance partner.

I've been trying to seek clarity of this online but haven't been able to find anything useful. Mad Men usually tries to honour history, but did this really happen? I guess the latter part of the statement which suggests why things went the way they did is subjective, but what about the actual setting of the meeting?


texts: Did the ancient Greeks revere the Titans?

texts:
We know that the ancient Greeks worshiped the Olympian Gods and their descendants but what about the Titans? did the ancient Greeks ever worship the Titans such as Cronos, Okeanos, Rhea and Hyperion?

If not, why? where there any legends of Greeks been punished for worshiping the Titans?

If so, how did the Greeks worship them? did they build temples in their honour?


texts: Why didn't the United States occupy Baja California during the US-Mexican war?

texts: What were the limitations on further US expansion at that war? why did they stop on the bank of the Rio Grande and in particular what stopped them from taking over Baja California?


texts: What was the population of Indian subcontinent in 1000 AD?

texts:
According to World History Site  Indian subcontinent's population in 1000 AD was 79.5 million. (30% of 265 million = 79.5 million)

This estimate is rejected by K.S. Lal who claims its population was about 200 million in 1000 AD.

  K.S. Lal concluded that the population of Indian subcontinent in 1000
  was about 200 million ...K.S. Lal on Wikipedia

Which estimate is more widely accepted by researchers? What was the population of  Indian subcontinent in 1000 AD according to the most widely accepted estimate?


texts: Who taught Russian in Eastern-bloc satellite countries?

texts:
After the USSR gained many satellites countries in central/eastern Europe in 1945, Russian became obligatory at school. It seems those Russian courses were highly unpopular and only a small minority of people managed to actually get fluent in Russian.

Did the USSR send actual native Russian teachers to every school to their satellite countries, or did they just force local teachers to teach Russian ?

I ask because in my region German language is obligatory at school, but there is a huge lack of German-language schoolteachers and the vast majority of German teachers actually are local teachers, often rather mediocre at the language themselves, but they don't have a choice. The typical result is a awful quality of German course, low motivation for both the teacher and the class, and as a result an overall dislike of German language for schoolchildren, perpetuating the problem to the next generation.

I wonder if the situation in soviet satellite countries was analogous.


texts: What tactic/strategy won Napoleon the six-day campaign

texts:
I am using this source: http://www.napoleonsims.com/battles/battles.htm#Fr1814

From the overall statistics, I see that Napoleon was outnumbered 1:10 (!) but still managed to win because he attacked one section at a time. Was this his main strategy? Isolation? Did he intentionally target the center at Chaumpaubert to divide the other two wings of the army?

If not, then what was the crucial factor that caused Napoleon to defy extreme odds?


texts: Why did the UK Parliament sit on Saturday 30 July 1949?

texts:
Good question by Andrew Sparrow on the Guardian Politics' live blog:

According to the House of Commons website, the Commons has only sat on Saturdays four times since 1939.
Three of those sittings were prompted by way or military conflict: 2 September 1939 (the day before the outbreak of the second world ward); 3 November 1956 (the Suez crisis); and 3 April 1982 (the invasion of the Falklands).
The other took place on 30 July 1949, when the last sitting before the summer recess was on a Saturday. (Anyone know why?)

(To these sittings must now be added 19 October 2019.)
Nothing seems to stand out in the Hansard for that day or the previous week.
A Wikipedia timeline suggests that Parliament passed the Legal Aid and Advice Act on that date, which establishes a much-extended system of Legal aid in England and Wales -- but the source given doesn't specify the specific day.
What happened on that day that was so important to get Parliament to sit on a Saturday rather than on the following week?  Was it the aforementioned Legal Aid and Advice Act indeed? Was it a desire to just get on with the recess? Or was there something else?


texts: Why is neither side of the warhammer blunt?

texts: I have seen a lot in medieval reconstrunctions like this, that the side opposite to the spike is not flat, but have cross notches (sometimes very pronounced, like in the example). Does anyone know what is this? Of course it has to do because the weapon is used as a piercing armor, but, what is the specific role of these?


texts: Did Modernism believe urban life was bad?

texts:
I'm not entirely sure whether this is the correct site for my question by here it is:
My English teacher recently mentioned that the Modernist movement believed that urban landscapes were essentially "bad" due to causing individuals to feel alienated.
I've read various articles online and haven't found anything which confirms this.
My question is: was there ever this belief in Modernism that urban life was "bad"?
Thanks in advance (if my question isn't appropriate for this site, it'd be much appreciated if you could redirect me somewhere)


texts: Why didn't global trade and investment prevent World War I from erupting in Europe?

texts:
It has often been said that world trade and investment between nations makes war between nations an irrational act. If your trading partner is hurt, it hurts your own wallet as well because you lose the profit from trade.

I have been reminded several times that world trade will prevent world war. Today, the world is enjoying globalisation and prosperity from global trade.

The globalisation before World War I look similar to today's situation.

http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/wwi-100th-anniversary-how-global-trade-changed-forever-1456773

  Characteristic of the pre-1914 decades was what we would now call
  globalization. Trade may have risen from one thirtieth to one third of
  world production between 1800 and 1913; between 1855 and 1914
  investment flows grew 20 times. Europe accounted for nearly two thirds
  of global trade and even more of global investment, and from the 1890s
  Europe’s major currencies were fixed in value in relation to each
  other under the international gold standard. Hundreds of thousands of
  foreign-born labourers worked in the heavy industries of French
  Lorraine and Germany’s Ruhr. The British writer Norman Angell in his
  1909 best-seller, Europe’s Optical Illusion, maintained that war
  between advanced modern economies was now irrational.

Why didn't global trade prevent World War I?


texts: What where historic influences on US unemployment rate from 1949 to 2014?

texts:
I just found this graph. The red line is the employment-to-population ratio of the USA. I've added some numbers - green for upwards trends, red for downwards trends:

One thing I'm very confused about is the scale. But what I'm interested in is what happened there (a can't read the numbers exactly, this is a best guess):

 1. 1949-06 to 1953-06
11. 1953-06 to 1954
 2. 1954    to 1957
12. 1957 to 1958
 3. 1958 to 1960
13. 1960 to 1961
 4. 1961 to 1969-04
14. 1969-04 to 1971
 5. 1971    to 1973-09
15. 1973-09 to 1974-12
 6. 1974-12 to 1979-03
16. 1979-03 to 1983
 7. 1983    to 1990
17. 1990    to 1992
 8. 1992    to 2000-06
18. 2000-06 to 2003-04
 9. 2003-04 to 2007
19. 2007    to 2009: Financial crisis of 2007–2008
10. 2010    to 2014

I found a couple of things that might fit:

1961–63: Vietnam war?
1990 / 1991: End of the cold war?
2000-03: Burst of the dotcom bubble

Only for 19 I know that this was the Financial crisis of 2007–2008, but I don't know what changed that again in an upwards trend.

So my question here is: What actions / events had a major effect on the US unemployment rate from 1949 to 2014 as shown in this graph?


texts: Were drugs used in early Buddhist traditions?

texts:
I'm reading a Wikipedia article on Vajrayana Buddhism and it says: "In Tantric Buddhism, which originated in the Tibeto-Himalayan region, cannabis serves as an important part of a traditional ritual..."

It cites a journal that I don't have access to, so I can't look too much deeper into the source.

What's the historical background of this claim? Are there serious documents or Buddhist texts showing the use of cannabis or other drugs?

Note: Had to ask here because the answers in Buddhism SE were of low quality.


texts: Is there audio of Malcolm X's original The Ballot or the Bullet speech?

texts:
Malcolm X's famous Ballot or the Bullet speech - his first after leaving the Nation of Islam and "ranked 7th in the top 100 American speeches of the 20th century by 137 leading scholars of American public address" - was given just twice; first in Cleveland, Ohio on the 3 April 1964, and then in Detroit, Michigan on the 12 April 1964.
According to a footnote on that Wikipedia page, recordings exist of both versions, but of the many audio recordings I've come across on YouTube, all of them seem to be from the later Michigan speech. This is significant because based on the transcripts, the Ohio version seems to be a more eloquent speech that makes Malcolm X's case much more clearly, with the Michigan version seeming more informal and improvised and covering less content.
Where can an audio version of the original Ohio speech actually be found?
N.B. Audio of the two recordings can be differentiated based on the first line: the Michigan speech refers to a "Reverend Cleage", whereas in Ohio it refers to a "Brother Lomax".


texts:
Came upon this pin in a box of stuff from my grandfather:

The back has a little inscription, and a screw-on back that makes it clear this pin is designed to not come off accidentally:

My grandfather moved to Aspen, CO when he was 9 and spent his entire life there.  He was a member of the Fraternal Order of Eagles but this doesn't seem related to that.  I thought "H.S." might be "High School" but he attended Aspen High School.

How can I learn more about this item?

EDITS

He never worked for General Electric
These guys don't know what it is either (that's not my grandfather's pin but it's identical)
LGB has been identified as meaning the pin was produced by the L. G. Balfour company.  Balfour stopped making pins 25+ years ago; their lapel pin line was taken over by Stylecraft USA.  Neither Balfour nor Stylecraft have records that go before 1999.
"1/10 10K GF" means that it is "Gold Filled":  it's covered with a layer of 10 K gold that constitutes one tenth of the weight of the pin.
There is a Gardner Edgerton High School in Gardner, KS, and my grandfather was born in White Rock, KS, but the two places are 230 miles apart.  And the school wasn't built until 2000.
His wife (my grandmother) was Head Nurse at Cincinnati General Hospital in 1919 (in case "H.S." means something like "Health Systems")
I emailed Classic Medallics, hoping the "M" was their logo, but they replied "Sorry this is not our pin or box"
I emailed The Academy, they replied "Unfortunately we never handed out pins like that to our health system GE Fellows. We started this program back in 2005 for high potential leaders that are about 1-3 steps away from taking on a c-suite level role (CEO, CFO, COO, CMO, CNO, etc.) at a health system."
I contacted General Electric and they recommended I email The Museum of Innovation and Science (formerly, the Schenectady Museum Hall of Electrical History) as they have archives of GE company history and photos from the 1880s to the present.  I have done so.


texts: Are there notable incident(s) where Russia/SU was wrongfully accused by Western powers in the 20th century?

texts:
I would like to know incident(s) where SU/Russia was accused to have done something by Western powers where Western historians also came at least now to the conclusion that the accusation was unwarranted.

I decided to exclude the 21th century precisely for the reason that I don't want any discussion about recent incidents which are politically charged. I want something which has now a broad consensus and can be safely observed from the distance of time.

Background of the question that I want to know how both SU/Russia and the Western powers acted and how the story developed. What was the cause for the accusation? The problem with the long-time Cold War period was that both sides inflated any accusation for propaganda and corrections rarely, if ever, happened.


texts: How much has U.S. currency inflated since 1792?

texts:
How much has U.S. currency inflated since the Coinage Act of 1792 established the U.S. Mint? Adjusting for inflation, what amount of modern currency would have the same buying power as a 1792 dollar?

Likewise, what hypothetical denomination in 1792 would have the same buying power as a modern penny? (Presumably it would be much less than a half penny, which I understand was the smallest coin at the time).


texts: How much did brigs of 200 tons vary in 1800?

texts:
I am researching the LYDIA, a brig of 200 tons, built of teak around 1800. I think it had a crew of around 20. (Details on the ship are in Judge Howay's "List of trading vessels in the maritime fur trade").

Not having found any drawing or diagram of it yet, I'm wondering whether  another similarly-sized brig of the same era would have been substantially the same. To what degree would they have looked alike? Could LYDIA have had any unusual features or would it have been built to a well-known pattern?


texts: Did some Roman/Pompeiian houses have atria for slaves?

texts:
According to Wikipedia (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_the_Vettii) the House of the Vettii brothers had two atria, one specifically for slaves.

  Servants' quarters are to one side off the atrium, arranged round a small atrium of their own.

However, according to this discussion of the house, http://web.mit.edu/course/21/21h.405/www/vettii/houseblue.html the room identified as the slave's atrium is a courtyard, with a compluvium -

  Room v is in the northern corner of the house. From the room, also considered a courtyard, a variety of other rooms can be accessed. To the west, the room leads to room w. Room x and y are off of the northern corner of the room. Room z also has a small entranceway to the northeast, as does room 08 which is off of the eastern corner of the room. In the center of the room is an impluvium, or pool. On the western wall there is a painting of lararium aedicula (seen in the photo). The painting was done in Fourth Style. Artifacts found in the area, such as razors and cups, suggest the room served a bathing purpose. emphases mine.

Against this, the "slaves' atrium" does appear to lead to the kitchen, and is largely separate from the reception areas of the house. Moreover, in Rome:Its People, Life and Customs,  U E Paoli (1958) states that in The House of Pansa,

  "There are two adjoining atria.... the Tuscanicum and it's surrounding rooms were used by the owner's family. The tetrastyle, on the other hand,... was in the humblest part of the house, reserved for slaves." p68

In my admittedly limited understanding, the notion of specific "servants' quarters" - particularly an atrium - seems anachronistic; according to some ancient writers, slaves should be either working or sleeping, so why would they need an atrium? I have always understood that Romans shoehorned their slaves in wherever there was space, and the notion of providing a room for their own use appears unlikely. I realise history is not linear, but servants' quarters in the sense of the great country houses was a fairly late development; medieval servants bedded down wherever they could!

Can anyone resolve my confusion?


texts: Why did Italy abandon its alliance with Germany in WW1 and join the Allied side?

texts: Before WW1 Italy was part of an alliance with Germany and Austria-Hungary, yet it didn't join them when the war started and it even joined the Allied side later during the war. Why did Italy do this? And if there were good reasons to join the Allies why did it ally itself with Germany and Austria in the first place?


texts: Voting enfranchisement in the USA in the 18th century

texts:
It is frequently asserted that when the US constitution was ratified in 1788, it was a very progressive piece of legislation because it gave everyone the right to vote, making the US the first modern democracy.

However, on close inspection, one finds that the franchise at the time was hardly universal. Indeed the following groups were certainly excluded: women, slaves and indigenous peoples.

In addition, I am not sure about the following groups.

Indentured servants - I am not sure but I understand they were formally attached to their masters and couldn't just apply for citizenship (I may be wrong).
Settlers on the frontier - even if they were legally citizens, I understand it would have been practically impossible for them to vote due to inefficient communication.
Anyone looking poor without any prominent member of the local community to vouch for them - they didn't have driving licenses, so how did they check if someone was a citizen or not?

Overall, what proportion of the then US population had the right to vote? How many of them could exercise this right in practice?


texts: How would residents of Central Slovakia travel to seaports in 1880's?

texts: How would residents of Central Slovakia in 1880s travel to northern departure points like Hamburg in order to board Ships to the US ?


texts: Seeking identification of a military uniform in a watercolor painting

texts: Can anyone provide information for the uniform in this watercolor? It was discovered in an estate sale in New York City as part of a larger art collection (no other similar pieces). The lettering at the bottom reads "la mascotte du Régiment Nisse" (not sure of the exact spelling of the last word as the script is faded). Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.


texts: Spanish Influence on the Netherlands and Belgium?

texts:
Spain had ruled the Netherlands (and Belgium) in varying degrees between the 16th and 17th centuries. However, I haven't noticed much of a cultural influence or impact with historical roots in Spanish rule had on the Dutch (Spanish influences). While searching this question up online, I found a phrasing for this question that captured my sentiment, from this source:

The Netherlands was a Spanish possession for nearly a hundred years, beginning in 1556 when its crown passed to the foreign king Philip II of Spain. There was a Dutch revolt in 1566 and a declaration of independence in 1581, and while the north part of the Netherlands was effectively autonomous from 1585 onwards, their independence wasn't formally recognized until 1648. In the hundred years of Spanish rule parts of the country were subject to Spanish occupation.
I've visited the Netherlands, and don't seem to recall there being much trace of Spanish culture or language. Was I not looking hard enough, did the Dutch thoroughly eradicate any trace of the Spanish after their independence, or did the Spanish not influence Dutch culture very much to begin with? Even if there is no surviving architecture and other visible art in the Spanish style, surely there must be some traces of Spanish influence in the Dutch language. I mean, you can't go through a hundred years of Spanish rule, commerce, and occupation without acquiring at least a few loan words, can you?
Are there any Spanish loan words in Dutch dating to the time of Spanish rule, and if so, what are they?

My question goes beyond linguistics however to cover the cultural impact that Spanish rule on the Netherlands had. I haven't been able to detect very much Spanish influence on the Dutch.


texts: Were Korea and Tibet's relationship with Qing China similar?

texts:
Korea (Joseon) and Tibet both paid tribute to the Qing Empire, while maintaining internal autonomy. However, Chinese Nationalists were happy to support the independence of Korea, but not that of Tibet. Was there any difference between the relationship between Korea-China and Tibet-China before 1897?
Edited in response to a few comments: As someone in the comments has mentioned, Wikipedia has separate discussions on each of the two relationships (Tibet under Qing Rule and Manchu Invasion of Korea). Another response on Stackexchange on Tibet says that it was always administered separately. The only thing that came out of these links is that while Tibet actually had around 2000 or so Qing soldiers stationed, Korea did not. The key question here is: did the Qing soldiers actively enforce the Emperor's direct administrative orders in Tibet? And if they indeed do so, how often was this done?


texts: Were there moves to make anti-miscegenation laws apply to Jews in the USA?

texts: The laws applied to not only Blacks but also Asians. At one time I think Chinese in the USA could not effectively marry at all due to immigration policy. Jews could legally be discriminated against in housing and employment. Hotels also did openly discriminate against Jews. But as far as I know, there were no laws that prevented intermarriage. Is this correct?


texts: What is the logic for the map maker classifying the map this way, specifically in Canada?

texts:
I recently came across the map displayed above. It is a map showing the spread of totalitarian and authoritarian governments right before WWII.  The countries that are black are totalitarian dictatorships and those in yellow are free democracies.  The ones in grey are what is confusing me.

Why is Alberta (and for that matter Quebec) labeled as countries that aren't completely free and labeled as "Varying degrees of control, censorship, and intimidation."

I found this to be very odd, as I always thought all of Canada would be classified the same.  I googled politics in Alberta,  1930s politics in Canada, and other combinations but never was able to locate an answer for this.

Now for Quebec, I know there are some different politics in play, mainly because of the Quebecois population. But I have never heard of anything like that for Alberta.  And anyway, even with the differing politics of Quebec, I never thought of it as falling into that category of not completely free.

I thought perhaps that it may have to do with native peoples and the Quebecois being treated differently and maybe not having as much rights as other Canadians,  but if this was the case I would think Algeria, Belgian Congo, etc, would be classified the same way, but this was not the case.

So I am at a loss as to the logic for the map maker classifying the map this way?

The information on the map is:

  William Henry Cotton
  Carriers of the New Black Plague
  Publication Place / Date
  Baltimore ? / 1938
  Image Dimensions 21.5 x 12 inches

The map illustrates the nature of governments based upon 3 types:

  Dictatorial Control of the Agencies of Public Communication
  Varying Degrees of Control, Censorship and Intimidation
  Relative Freedom from Official Supervision

The commentary below the map is instructive on its world view,
identifying:

  Ten adult bipeds, each equipped with distended ego and
  outsized adrenal glands, whose ten totaled brains wouldn't
  counterbalance that of one Einstein in the measurement of man's
  distance from the anthropoid ape.

  Of note, Cotton has adapted and satirized Deal Carl Ackerman's
  contemporary "map of the black plague in the 20th Century" for this work

As explained on the site selling this map:

  As noted by the PJ Mode Collection of Persuasive Cartography at
  Cornell University website description for this map:

    A powerful satirical commentary on totalitarian control of speech from the first issue of Ken Magazine.

      "Caught here in all their
      peculiar beauty by the soul searching stylus of W. Cotton, Ken holds
      up for wonder the mangy motley pack of little 'strong men' who are now
      leading the world on a backward march to the Dark Ages. . . . In
      effect, over more than half the world, Liberty is now in totalitarian
      Eclipse."

  Each country is characterized by the degree of "dictatorial
  control" over communication. Each of the totalitarian leaders is named
  and shamed ("His Blood-red Loneliness, Nobody's Comrade, Stalin").

  Ken was a controversial anti-fascist magazine, first published in April 1938. It was distinguished by unusual and powerful graphics like
  this one and a number of articles on the Spanish Civil War by Ernest
  Hemingway. The magazine failed in August 1939 as a result of wariness
  by advertisers and a boycott by the Catholic Church (Baptista 2009, 109-115).

I am not sure who wrote this, it was not attributed on the web site that is selling the map and I was not sure if it was ok to link to commercial websites on here.  If so I will be happy to provide the link to where I got this info from.


texts: Why there is no Islamic architecture with glass in windows before 18th century? Glass windows frequently appear in gothic architecture since 11th century but why Medieval Islamic architecture lack glasswork?