At least in California, everyone I know was taught about the dust bowl during early elementary school years. I honestly don’t remember most what history was taught back then but it seems like such a random event to teach to us when we’re that young. I get that it’s probably cool for the kid, but it’s never been brought back up for me in more detail later in school.

I was doing some reading and couldnt find much on the historical sources we have for the life of the man who invented the printing press

Is there somewhere online that has that info?

It's such an insignificant thing, and could just as easily (maybe?) be made from cheaper wood. So when did metalwork become common enough that you could waste it on the little nub you yank on to open a drawer?

I love history so I subscribed to this subreddit hoping to learn some cool factoids about history. However, within an hour of a question posting, almost all answers get removed. Can the mods open a meta-discussion to discuss the level of pruning that is acceptable? This is basically an empty, useless sub now and I feel like I'm wasting my time clicking on questions. Very frustrating, I feel it's time for an overhaul on the posting rules or this sub will die off.

I'm looking for books on the ritualistic aspect of medieval war customs. I'm reading an article on the campaign of Agincourt now by Jan Honig, who emphasizes that trying to understand medieval war in terms of modern strategy is largely senseless as a result of this ritualistic nature, which issued from a Christian/metaphysical worldview of the act of war, which was a judicial appeal to God's judgement for the justness of one's cause.

Any book recommendations that flesh this out would be greatly appreciated.

I am currently writing a collection of historical fiction based off of events during the Second World War. I cannot find any source that mentions who these firefighters were, but their bravery was insurmountable. The main character is Joachim, and he’s a young man who volunteered to be a firefighter, rather than going off to war. (If this is inaccurate, I’m not opposed to changing details) he finds himself in a nearby city as a firefighter but his squadrons are called over to Hamburg as the bombing begins, and he, along with his crew leader and many other firefighters rush through the city to save civilians.

It's a silly thought but where the people just that much smarter when it came to spelling or was it just easier to get correct?

I believe a recent answer put it at £500000, and said it was a major strain on the finances of England and Richard's French territories. How would receiving a kings ransom impact the Empire?

I always wondered did shakespear rock the boat at the time or was his plays not of particular controversy.

Just with all the suicides in them despite it being the 1600s and it being a taboo subject. And shakespear portraying some of the female characters like Portia in the Merchant of venice strong minded

And if yes, how did the Spanish government react? (After reading about a rise in Sinophobia with the coronavirus, I've been wondering if there's any historical parallels).

To my knowledge, all prisoners in KL Auschwitz II (Birkenau) were meant to be gassed by the Nazis, as opposed to the Auschwitz I camp where prisoners capable of working were placed. Nonetheless, the Nazis chose to allocate male and female prisoners to separate buildings, which puzzles me. If you turn people into administered objects that will be disposed, why would you care about their gender?

Two thoughts that I had:

• fear of reproduction is unlikely, because they also killed babies in the camp
• it is likely that separating families could break the morale and prevent uprisings

Thank you in advance for your thoughts!

Just about any source you look at on the process of becoming a knight will mention how some squires did not want to become knights and so would stay squires for years (even their whole lives). But the sources never really go into any detail regarding why that is. What is it about becoming a knight that's so costly?

I understand that they had expensive equipment and several horses that they needed, as well as paying for a lot of the same stuff and wages for their own squire(s), servants, men-at-arms, and other soldiers like archers that would accompany them. But is that all they mean when they say it was so expensive? If you remain a squire or a man-at-arms you still have to have the same expensive equipment as a knight and perhaps some of these additional costs.

The sources tend to avoid going into any sort of detail when they make this claim. Did they have to pay their lord or the person knighting them for the dubbing ceremony? Did they have to pay a cleric for his or the church's part in it? Did they have to pay for a feast and possible tournament and festivities surrounding the event? Did the king require a one-time tax or fee at the time of being knighted, or was there a regular tax on knights I've never heard of?

Whatever the costs, they must have been insane, because there are accounts of squires paying several pounds to avoid being knighted even just temporarily (the one I saw was something like a 3 year delay bought for this payment). Are there any sources you know of that break down all these costs of becoming a knight and why they were so onerous?

Most of the time the sources I've read will just make some vague statement like: "Some squires chose not to be knighted because the dubbing ceremony was prohibitively expensive." I just don't find this to be very helpful and am hopeful that you fine people can do better.

Thanks in advance!

Title, basically. How long would movies be available to watch in theater? Were they rereleased from time to time?

The 1487 dedication of the Templo Mayor in Tenochtitlan famously had 80400 sacrifices, or one every 4 seconds. While I know that many historians have claimed that these figures are exaggerated, partly by the Aztecs themselves as a way of appearing more frightening and also by the Spaniards to accentuate their brutality, it is unlikely that the figures are wildly far off. Even taking the smallest reasonable estimates leads to thousands of sacrifices each year, the equivalent of the population of a good-sized town in their realm. Is there any record of anyone ever expressing worry over this before the Spanish?

I’m Jewish and I was wondering today when the earliest known instance of this was, and why/how it proliferated as much as it did.