My question particularly relates to Patrician families during the Republican era.

My apologies in advance if anyone takes offense to seeing these words. My small amount of research so far indicates that some of these terms are taken pejoratively, but I'm not aware of the level of insult they imply. I am only asking about them in a purely knowledge-driven manner and I mean no insult.

I have seen many terms used to describe followers of Islam in English, with almost all modern sources using "muslim", but older sources being much more varied. Why are there so many different usages? When did new terms come into favor or fall out of use? Were any deliberately meant to be insulting? Are they just alternative spellings of one another, or do they have deeper separate meanings?

Hello! I’m currently writing a paper on the influence epistemic injustice had on women psychiatric admissions and treatment during the Victorian era, relating it to the progression of women’s rights. I’ve found a wonderful primary source in the testimony of Elizabeth Packard, as well as some great secondary sources, but I’m hitting a bit of a research wall. What are some notable figures or what would be some accessible sources in this area? Apologies if this question is not suitable to the sub; please let me know if this is not an appropriate question and I will remove it. Thank you in advance!

When the first Europeans came to Easter Island, the Moai were still mostly upright, but by the 19th century, all of them had been turned on their side.

Jared Diamond speculates that this is because the islanders associated the heads with the older social order which had caused the decline in their civilization, but I can't find any concrete evidence for this.

Are there any accounts from the Rapa Nui that explain who knocked the Moai over and why?

In the 1970 film "Waterloo", several senior commanders are depicted as personally leading military actions: General Picton is shot in the head whilst riding ahead of his infantry; General Ponsonby is killed when the Scots Greys are counterattacked by lancers; and Marshal Ney leads the ill-fated cavalry charge against the British squares.

More narrowly, did these events occur at the Battle of Waterloo?

More broadly, is this reflective of the Napoleonic Wars in general? In large battles such as, say, Leipzig, would one find staff-rank officers embedded in the front ranks of infantry, leading cavalry charges, or clashing steel against enemy bayonets? If not, what would be the highest rank one would normally find in such positions - Captain, Major, Lt. Colonel...?

Many thanks in advance.

I've been really surprised to learn recently that Napoleon had committed many war crimes and made ethically dubious decisions to the point of betraying (abandoning to certain death) one of his best generals. Could you please elaborate on that topic and/or point me to some sources about Napoleon's misdeeds?

A bit of a backstory: Some time ago there was a Reddit thread along the lines of "Who was literally worse than Hitler?". I was really surprised to find out that there was a number of people pointing to Napoleon Bonaparte as a prime example of such a morally dubious ruler. They even provided some details and sources for that claim.

I shared this surprising fact with students I teach English which in turn spurred their interest, especially that of one half-French girl who asked me to point her to the original discussion to learn more. Unfortunately (of course) I was unable to find that thread, and so I am in a bit of a pickle.

We talked about how every nation needs a hero that is mythologized and revered with his/her dark side purposefully hidden. In case of Poland it was Józef Piłsudski and in France that seemed to be Napoleon. The girl said she'd never learned any negative facts about Napoleon and is eager to know more. So I don't want to let her down in the topic I think might be really important to her.

Thanks in advance for any and all help in that matter!

France launched many crusades against Egypt and the Holy Land in that time but Spain was controlled by the Muslims. Why wouldn’t the king of France crusade in Spain when they shared a border.

Recently I've gotten it into my head to get together kit for reenactment and wanted to do a 15th century halberdier. However, my research has turned up pretty empty as to how armoured halberdiers were, so it'd be a great help if anybody here has proper answers.

The current state of the world has had me researching past pandemics, and I am fascinated by smallpox. I read that the disease was especially deadly to the native Americans, killing up to 90% of the population! That is absurd and got me thinking: just how devastating was this disease? Was it a bigger contributor to the collapse of native civilization than colonization? Further, without smallpox would colonization have been as successful?

In the weeks running up to the battle of Trafalgar, Nelson references those who served under him at the battle of the Nile as a band of brothers. How commonplace was such a chill relationship between those in charge and those who served in British life in the very early 1800s?

I've suddenly found myself with a lot of free time. My favorite part of AP World was always Chinese and East Asian history, but we never went too in-depth.

What are some good books for covering the comprehensive history of China at a level acceptable for an amateur historian? It's also OK to point me to syllabi and I can take it from there.

I was going to reference syllabi from my school, but our only Chinese history class is scoped to modern (read: 19th- and 20th-century) history. And yes, I am willing to read and digest content for a very, very long time.

So, me being a bit of a history nerd, WW2 is quite the interesting topic for me. However, i dont really know that much about the Pacific War. I know the rough course of it, but thats about all. So, my question is, can anyone recommend me some good way to learn about it?

Sadly, the World War Two series on YouTube, busy covering the war week by week, has yet to reach anywhere near that point in time, and as we all know, History Channel is often dodgy (Like that one time they reported about Surigao Strait by proclaiming that the americans had "only" 6 battleships, which is like saying you are "just" fighting 3 world powers at once).

Hi! I figured this would be a good place to ask this, but I'm interested in seeing how any historians/history majors/previous history majors handled researching for assignments. I have an archaeology research paper deadline coming up in 10 days, but I've noticed while researching secondary sources, many of the journal articles range from like 30-50 pages. When you guys work on your assignments, do you tend to consume a broad amount of literature in whole, or "skim" articles and extract key ideas/points? The research/reading stage of essay writing is something I've struggled with in college and I'm trying to look at ways to make papers less stressful. The paper is a fairly broad "explain the significance/wider meaning of this discovery/site"

If you play Crusader Kings 2 that date may be significant for you, because it’s the earliest start date available. The Indian subcontinent was only relatively recently added to the game and hasn’t received nearly as much love as other regions.

A notable feature of the landscape is that Jainism is portrayed as extremely popular and widespread with Buddhism similarly to a lesser extent. In contrast, Hinduism is shown as less popular with the people and geographically isolated but very popular with the ruling class.

So is this anywhere near accurate?

I'm interested in learning more about interwar Europe (WW1-WW2) are there any good books that are recommended?

While reading the scriptures this morning, it looks to be as if the people of the book had more of a familiarity with the written word than most societies before mass printing and education. Would this assumption be correct?

and did that have anything to do with them having better equipment (like using mail armor and so on)?

What happened to all those crime families? I’m sure some still exist, but not to the extent of a couple decades ago. What happened? They used to have a lot of influence and media attention but now a days they’re the thing of Hollywood.