Going to ramble a little bit to try to clarify my question a little bit.

I think of the soldiers in Caesars army as the polar opposite of what I’m asking about. They spent massive chunks of their careers in foreign territory, fighting battles, conquering land, and basically just doing war time stuff.

From my understanding, most of a soldiers career would be spent acting as police, laborers and administrators in conquered provinces. Assuming this is even true (which I’m not really sure about) how many soldiers would basically spend their careers doing this kind of stuff versus actually going out on offensive campaigns or fighting huge battles? Would every Roman legionary retire having fought tons of battles? Would the average Roman soldier even see large scale violence in their careers?

This is for a novel I am writing taking place during 1850 in saint louis, Missouri

Some examples of matriarchies in the Americas are:

a. The Iroquois (Matrifocal and Matrilocal as well) b. The Hopi c. The Wayuu in La Guajira, Venezuela.

While the closest things to matriarchies in the old world are perhaps the Scythians, Mosuo and the Pre-Indo-Europeans, yet none of these are true matriarchies, rather, they perform in an egalitarian manner. So why is it that the Old World never fully developed matriarchal societies?

Hello

I recently read Johnathan Parshall and Anthony Tully's Shattered Sword: The Untold Story of The Battle of Midway. Really informative and a book I highly recommend if you're interested in the material.

Of all the background information leading up the actual battle, the simultaneous invasion of the Aleutian Islands, the huge dispersal of the combined fleet, the unrealistic time table, the thing about Yamamoto's plan for a decisive battle with the US Navy that stuck out the most to me is that Kidō Butai and its aircraft carriers, (in this battle composed of CarDiv1's Akagi and Kaga and CarDiv2's Hiryū and Sōryū) was expected to soften up Midway and any enemy naval forces encountered until Yamamoto's main body, including the battleships Yamato, Nagato, and Mutsu could show up and blow away whatever was still afloat.

I know that ever since the Japanese forced the Russians to sue for peace in the Russo-Japanese War following the Japan's incredible naval victory at Tsushima, the Japanese Navy had become obsessed with the idea of ending wars through a decisive naval battle, but why did Yamamoto think the way to achieve that in 1942 still lay with the battleship?

Aircraft carriers had been critical in Japan's success in the war thus far, and Yamamoto and the top brass seemed to be in agreement that the USN's aircraft carriers had to be eliminated, which suggests they all recognized how important such vessels were, so why were they given a support role in the planning for this decisive engagement?

Considering that the prevailing Japanese notion was that the Americans would have to be coaxed into fighting, and the superior speed and range of aircraft carriers, how exactly were the battleships supposed to contribute? It seems like they'd only be able to sink aircraft carriers that had already been effectively eliminated as threats: those that could no longer launch planes or move quick enough to escape. In which case, it seems like Kidō Butai's own battleships should be sufficient to sink them rather than waiting for combined fleet to show up.

I know a major part of the answer to this can be summed up as "Naval doctrine," but I'm hoping I'm missing something that makes the expectation that an operation intended to wipe out aircraft carriers would be determined by battleships make a bit more sense.

Thank you

So to be upfront, I'm an atheist and therefore I may be coming from a biased viewpoint. However, for most of my life I've excepted that Jesus Christ was a real living person even if his miracles were fabricated.

Recently I have been recalling that at school I was told things such as, "there's more evidence for the existence of Jesus than there is for Julius Caesar". Though I can't remember ever being presented with such evidence.

The only evidence that has ever been given to me for his existence is the Bible, and I'll be honest I don't take that as a reliable source.

So, what reliable sources are out there that support the idea of Jesus Christ being a real person? Or was he just another mythical prophet perhaps derived from other religions?

Watching the latest Ghost of Tsushima gameplay stream made me curious to know about what types of settlements there might be in the game.

I tried searching for more information on this but I couldn't find any. Did Tsushima Island have any cities/urban areas during the time period that the game is set on (The first Mongol invasions of Japan in 1274)?

The only information I could find about Tsushima Island during that time period was that it was an important trading center that traded with other Japanese islands and the Goryeo kingdom.

We often hear that Byzantines had better economical system than their neighbours and that it was the reason why it lasted so long among other things. What did byzantines do better than their neighbours and just how much better was their system compared to that of the western Europe? Did average byzantine peasant live better than a peasant from elsewhere? And how much was trade responsible for their revenue?

Searching the vast expanse of the internet led me two a whole lot of viewpoints to tackle this issue, Iranian culture is no doubt rich; however, western culture seems to be the culprit that everybody is pointing at. It led me to wonder why everything points to something and as a result, getting an unbiased historical reference seems to be hard on this matter.

I hoped that this could be answered while acknowledging that things without further evidence (mere speculations or theories) are taken with a grain of salt.

This is a stupid question, but I'm watching History of The Entire World...I Guess, for the 70th time because I'm bored during lockdown.
During the video there's a part where he mentions that the Ottoman Turks blocked off Europe from the Indian Spice Trade, and Portugal decided to completely sail around Africa to find it's way to India.
Why not go around the Black Sea? Or Through the Black Sea, even? As far as I know, there's NO geographical border to block them from going around, but to be fair geography definitely isn't my strong suit.

Thank you!

I am a proud and patriotic American. I served my country by fighting in Texas and California. Although Georgia is my home, I love the Union and believe that seceding from the Union is a terrible mistake. I am also not supportive of slavery because it is a cruel and evil system. I want to stop the Confederates with any means necessary and do my part in preserving our Union. What can I do?

Hello, historians of Reddit!

While researching about the Khmer Rouge, I read in the introduction to Ben Kiernan's *The Pol Pot Regime: Race, Power, and Genocide in Cambodia under the Khmer Rouge, 1975-79* that the Khmer Rouge had exterminated dozens of Khmer nationalists fleeing Southern Vietnam for having "Khmer bodies with Vietnamese minds", despite that the fact that the Khmer Rouge itself was staunchly nationalistic and chauvinistic. It was an ethnically-based justification for the destruction of potential political opposition (even though the "opposition" was zealously nationalistic and would have supported the Khmer Rouge and its attempts to create an ethnically homogenous state).

I was also taught in school that Mao Zedong, during the Cultural Revolution, encouraged people to label anyone who had been politically opposed to him as "counter-revolutionary". This was an ideologically-based justification for the destruction of political opposition.

There seems to be a pattern for authoritarian governments to label political dissent as being associated with persecuted minorities. Dissenters of Maoist rhetoric were labeled as having"counter-revolutionary" thought and in collaboration with the landlords and the bourgeoisie. Potential opponents to the Khmer Rouge were eradicated under the basis that they had "Vietnamese minds", and were threats to the ethnic hegemony of Kampuchea.

I was wondering if there have been any other examples of governments labeling political dissent as being associated with the thoughts of persecuted minorities (political minorities, ethnic minorities, etc.).

For instance, did the Nazis label political dissenting ideas as being Jewish in nature? Did Pinochet label anyone opposed to his regime as having the minds of communists? Etc.

Thanks!

This seems like a huge generalization to make about the hundreds of cultures inhabiting North America from the time of the European arrival to the beginning of the 20th century (the period and location the speaker seemed to refer to). It certainly fits with the stereotypes propagated about Native Americans in the 20th century. But is it true? The Lakota, for instance, seemed very aware of their physical territory, based on their policy and storytelling. Did they really not see it as having borders?

I read about Tsar Nicholas II praising the Phanagoritsy regiment for shooting down some workers, but any research I do is not helpful at all in understanding what the Phanagoritsy regiment actually is, if someone could help or guide me to a useful source I would really appreciate it.

I would think that artillery a few to a lot of miles back would be able to destroy everything on the beaches and off the coast.

Whatever the reason for cutting it off, I imagine a society lady would still want her hair to somehow conform to the fashion standards for the period. Were there any specific hairstyles that were recommended in those instances, or anything women might've done usually, aside from the use of hair rats/additional hair pieces?

As far as I know, European pandemics like the Black Death typically killed up to half of the population in towns and cities. However, we also know that when smallpox was brought to the Americas, it killed 90% of the Native American population. Neither side had decent healthcare systems or much scientific knowledge, so why were the Native Americans hit much harder than the Europeans?

Just a few examples: The T-55, first deployed in 1949, is still in use in many countries, including in Russia. The M4 Sherman, from 1942, from all I can tell, has been phased out everywhere since at least the early 70's. Another example: the AK-47 is in the arsenals of half the world. Surplus StG 44's lingered just for a few years after WW2. The B-52 has been flying since 1952, but the idea of flying a Me-262 was laughable by the time the last survivors were phased out in 1951. Much of the immediate post-war military hardware has become a stock of militaries for the last three-quarters century, but I couldn't find any example of WW2 hardware lasting anywhere near as long.
What's the reason for this discrepancy?