Dear kindly reddit historians.... I love collecting very old teacups. I’ll hunt thrift shops and garage sales and flea markets and I have very specific ideas as to what makes a cup perfect for me but I’ve become worried. These cups that I’ve collected can be very very old and I’m worried about the paint and lacquer used on them. I only take them out on special occasions when I really want to just zen out and relax but I think about old items that were kind of famous for having deadly ingredients in them, like lead in cosmetics and radioactive coating on clocks.

Is there an actual danger in these cups that I do enjoy? I don’t know where any of them come from, I just pick cups that are very fine, with no chips or cracks, that are big enough to hold a decent cup of tea. Are any old cups known for having dangerous chemicals or ingredients in their paints?

Any info is greatly appreciated. I don’t want to stop my collecting because it brings me joy but don’t want to continue to accrue items if I can’t use them and enjoy them. I’m not one for collecting something just to look at it. I love useful collectibles.

I'm looking for movies specifically about:

- The Greco-Persian wars

- The Peloponnesian wars

- Alexander the Great

Brazil at the time was a dictatorship with authoritarian ideas that seemed to resonate much more with the axis than with the democratic allies, so why did they join the side that defended an ideology contrary to the one they had?

I just came across this stat in the wikipedia page for Veracruz, "Before the slave trade was abolished, Mexico had the second-highest population of African slaves in the Americas, following Brazil.[citation needed]" and I know Mexico's abolition of slavery was a big part of Texas' revolt, but I know nothing about the timeline and forces behind the abolition of slavery in Mexico, nor did I appreciate how vast it must have been prior to that. Gracias!

When Pearl Harbor was attacked, the US got involved and would not back from retaliation, I guess? And once the UK decided to push Germany away, I guess Europe was in total war? But during the years between 1939 and 1945, was there any point in time when Germany and/or Japan has fulfilled large parts of their goal and could simply have stopped all expansion and waging of war, and simply continue under the new land boarders created? If yes, when? If no, at what point was it a point of no return for the two?

At what point and why did the Corinthian style Bronze helmet fall out of use in warfare during the Classical era?

Hi there, I've recently been playing the game Beat Cop and in one of the missions you get a 'good-will visit' from a Soviet police officer and this got me interested. How was 'regular' policing in the Soviet Union handled? Was it handled as just another wing of the security agencies like the NKVD/KGB or were there more standard police departments akin to the West or something else entirely perhaps?

Thanks in advance!

It’s 150ft high. He’s enormous and entirely covered in gold. It’s in a prominent place in London. He sits atop, inter alia, Shakespeare, Homer and Goethe. Was he really that big a deal?

I was watching Pirates of the Carribbean and Elizabeth becomes a pirate. But if she is on a ship all the time what would she do when she got her period? Also, how did other women do it? Did they have different underwear? Did they use cloth? How did it change throughout history?

Nazis did make Americans reach to the moon because of the former Nazi rocket scientist,Wernher von Braun,so im curious to know about the question .

Is a History degree really worth the worth if you're going to be forced into working as a Professor? I love History, but I really don't want to work as a Professor. I would prefer to do Historical Research but still somehow be paid a decent living. Is this a dream that just cannot happen? Should I instead pursue a different passion of mine like Astronomy, Meteorology, or Computer Information Systems?

Hello. I'm doing a project involving the Second World War. Many men of 'fighting age' served in the campaigns of WW2, but what about those who were exempted or had to be discharged? Were they looked down upon society? I would like to know especially the situation for men in places such as Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan. I hope I'm not asking for too much.

Thank you.

So this is a weird question but I was wondering how many Vikings populated Waterford Ireland Before the Viking wars?

Most maps I’ve seen show northern Siberia untouched by the Mongols. Was there any documented Mongol presence there, or did they truly just leave it alone? If so, why?

I have recently seen examples In modern media (won't lie, a lot of it has been in TW games) of the use of fire arrows in ancient warfare, and i am skeptical that in actual history they were used very frequently. Were fire arrows used at all in warfare to useful effect, or are they more of an added dramatic and aesthetic feature of modern media? (This is my first post here so i hope i don't break to many rules)

Modern technology can be used to read damaged texts. I’m not sure, but I think there’s a way to read even charred texts. I would imagine there would be many books in a city such as Pompeii. Were they completely destroyed? Or perhaps are they just buried waiting to be rediscovered? Needless to say it would be very exciting to get back lost Greek and Latin classics.

As an aside, is there a lost work that classicists are most hoping to discover?

I'm somewhat aware of Federalists vs Anti-Federalists. But surely there was no one who said, "Nah, let's leave out the free speech, and search and seizure stuff, and quarterimg soldiers, no state would let that anyway.". But then...when these ideas get proposed as amendments there's enough overwhelming support to get voted into the Constitution. ??? Thanks...

It's a very widespread language family, but how similar are the different languages that comprise the family as a whole? Could a Mi'kmaq person speak or at least make themselves clear to a Cheyenne person? Are there any significant outliers linguistically?

I was wondering if Homer and Hesiod left out any myths in the ‘Greek Dark Ages’. If they did leave out or miss these myths, was it done to repress some cult groups?

Today Albania and Bosnia+Herzegovina are two of the only Muslim-majority nations in Europe, largely due to Ottoman control, despite being historically Christian. Why did these regions convert, but not others, including the much closer Greece and Bulgaria? Were the Turks simply uninterested in converting these populations?