Recently I've been reading into post-Roman Ireland and Britain and there are many mentions of the pagan Irish raiding and capturing Welsh peasants and bringing them back to Ireland as slaves.

I was wondering what types of boats would the Irish raiders have used? I was thinking currachs but they seem to be too small to carry many prisoners back, and I can't really find any other mention of other boats.

for clear context, I was reading a thread on Antony Beevor's various books, and u/Jon_Beveryman made the point (hope I'm not misrepresenting) that Beevor did quality work, yet at times fell back on old tropes of the conflicts. With that In mind, how accurate is the respective ideas about the opposing sides and their tactics?

I have been trying to find the answer for weeks to no avail. My best theory so far is that it has to do with tax laws in England targeting the ingredients used in brewing in homes, but I haven’t been able to find anything definitive. Thanks for any help!

I've read a lot about how Egypt is suffering from the Russian invasion of Ukraine because it imported a majority of its grain from Ukraine. And yet, if you read any ancient historian, they mention Egypt being one of the most fertile places in the west, with its grain exports feeding much of the Mediterranean and making its rulers exceedingly wealthy.

What happened over the past two thousand years that changed Egypt's agricultural productivity? Was it just a massive population increase? Was there a change in the climate of the Nile valley?

I'm trying to gather more research and sources on the history of Denmark-Norway (their military, culture/reforms, government, notable figures, colonies, etc.), specifically from around the late 1700s/early 1800s. However, I can't find many other reliable sites (that aren't Wikipedia) on Denmark-Norway that go in-depth about its history, aside from vague articles about their union. If anyone can provide some sources I'd really appreciate it!

I've read that following news of Hitler's suicide, the Soviets engaged in a disinformation campaign to spread rumours that he had actually escaped Berlin, with Stalin himself apparently claiming he was in Spain or Argentina. What's not clear to me is why they would do that - what did the Soviets hope to gain by sowing seeds of doubt regarding Hitler's fate?

In season 4 episode 11 of The Simpsons Officer Wiggum says the above quote in response to a crime in progress.

On the surface this seems like a joke about how little help the description is and how inept the chief is at his job, however it's not entirely uncommon to see this description in old newspaper articles from the 19th century.

Special attention to people being without or losing their hats is also paid in articles about disasters ie. The Malbone street wreck and the Brooklyn Bridge Stampede, to the point that not having a hat or losing ones hat seemingly compounds the tragedy.

What is the source of this obsession with hats?! When did it start? Why did it end?

Basically, I've heard several contradictory theories for why people attempted to develop neutron bombs (or enhanced radiation weapon? I think is the technical term?)

1. The common one that I think is basically a myth, that it was meant to kill people while not destroying infrastructure. If I'm correct, this is not true and also no nuclear bomb could do that as they'd still have a big explosion.
2. It was made to kill tanks as tanks are resistant to explosions at a surprisingly short distance but steel doesn't really block neutrons?
3. It was made to be used for tactical purposes against soviet forces without covering much of central europe with fallout.

If I'm correct also, the promise of it, to cut the fallout as a percentage of the yield, and up the neutron dispersion, never really worked out to the degree they wanted and even the cleanest h-bombs still had a lot of fallout and could never get the neutron-emissions to be that high a percent of the yield?

Hello everyone, i am a masters student in history(i am in my first year).My main focus is 19th century Ottoman History, and i am planning to prepare my dissertation about “wallachian revolution of 1848 and it’s socio-economic reasons etc.”.I love the era that i am studying right now, but i also get very interested in european history between 15th and 19th century.I started to read things about rise of the reformation movement, 30 years war, holy roman empire and Ottoman Empire’s effect on that time’s politics.

So i thinked that maybe focusing on “Suleiman the first’s campaign on hungary and the rivalry between him and ferdinand” in my phd thesis will be a good place to start.Maybe a phd about habsburgs and holy roman empire will be a stepping stone for me to switch my study focus in my later studies.My program provides classes for me to learn one more modern language, so i am thinking learning german will be a plus for me.There are also latin courses so i guess i will attend to those classes too.

But i don’t know the rules of the academia, do universities allow me to study a different era in my phd ?

Some megastructures do have a practical use for the masses (the arena can host events for tens of thousands of spectators, for instance), but some others serve only the need of the few (or not at all: it served Gods).

If the sole purpose of the Pyramid was to ensure the successful reincarnation of the Pharaoh (correct me for errors), did any less "pious" people (however few) at that time consider it more useful to divert the resources spent on the Pyramids on other things (aqueducts, perhaps)?

From my hardly scientific observations, when you look at what was depicted in the popular culture of the 1920s you see images of the Smoking, Drinking, Sexually available Flapper girl. Homosexuality was slightly more acceptable than in previous decades. Women could work. Jazz and Petting Parties were all the rage.

Whereas when you look at the Popular Culture of the 1950s, it seems as though all of that progress had seemingly reversed. The nuclear family was the pinnacle of life. Women went back to dressing more modestly, were discouraged from working, and going to college. Homosexual behavior was condemned and could get you institutionalized.

While on the other hand, the 1950s saw the beginnings of the US Civil Rights movement with Rosa Parks, MLK Jr, and the backlash against racism in general after the horrific Emmet Till incident. Anti-Miscegenation Laws began to be overturned in some states as well.

So, is this simply my overlooking more progressive aspects of the 50s, or is there some truth to my entirely subjective observation?

If you'll excuse the flippancy, why do we still have an Earth?

I definitely acknowledge, based on what I've read, that there were several mistakes on the part of both the flight crew and the Soviets, and I'm less interested in placing blame or arguing that either side should have escalated than in the fact that, given what I've always heard about the Cold War, after the Soviet Air Force killed a sitting member of the federal government, cooler heads prevailed and led to a diplomatic resolution instead of, you know, the end of the species.

One can easily find examples of medicine, even surgeries, in ancient China, India, and the Near East.

But I've never heard of it in the Americas.

Say I'm living in Tenochtitlan or Cusco in 1490. I'm sick or injured. What are my options? Is there an equivalent of a doctor? Are surgeries performed?

I've heard this repeated online that "bear' in old english means "the brown one" or "brown animal" because of a linguistic taboo about naming bears, cause if you mentioned them, they'd come for you. All the sources I've searched for seem to just repeat this with no citation. Is this apocryphal? Partially true?

I'm aware and reading/have on my reading list the accounts of Evliya Çelebi, Ibn-Battutah and of course Marco Polo. But are there notable accounts of travellers originating in east Asia or Africa who travelled and reported on life in European or Muslim world?

(my interest is to get inspired for fiction writing, so fictional accounts are also of interest to me)