In school, we're learning about South Africa, and the Apartheid, in the 1800 - 1970 ish year range. I read something in our packet that really confused me:

"Many Afrikaners were poor and living in cities. They wanted to be distinguished politically and socially from blacks and wanted job protection." (time was 1948)

Wasn't there racism that was suppose to already give white people a bunch of rights that Africans didn't have? Or did that only extend to British, and Afrikaners were discrimminated against?

I've often read that Japan's rapid modernization hid quite a lot of backwardness still present in the country, but never see it go into detail. How backwards, or modern, exactly was Japan in the Taisho and early Showa periods? Could an average Japanese expect to live a life akin to an average Aussie or American, or were they still quite poor in comparison and living more rudimentary lives? How was their technological and scientific base at this time?

After the Western Roman Empire fell did regions like Gaul or Hispania "revert" to any degree to their pre-Roman culture or had they been thoroughly Romanized? I'm sure there was a good degree of Christianization going on at this point, at least in the cities.

A little context. I am a rather amateur lover of history, wanting to explore what I can, when I have time. My educational background is psychology and sociology. Over the last five years, I purchased and read several books, listened to many podcasts, etc. Now, I’ve thought the time read some proper historiography books, to help me step up my game. I just bought the following and would appreciate any thoughts on these and/or suggestions for further reading:

“What Is History?” by E.H. Carr

“The Landscape of History: How Historians Map the Past” by John Lewis Gaddis

“The Historian’s Craft” by Marc Bloch

I know that cavalry were widely used up to, and including, the great war, though obviously the tactics changed. Yet I have never seen any mention of chariots past the fall of Rome in any stories or artwork. What made the concept of a chariot fall behind cavalry in military tactics? Were they simply not as effective as traditional cavalry, or were they never actually widely seen in combat at all?

I.e. would it be improper for a noble to show up to a feast smelly and with stained clothes, or would it be totally acceptable, if not expected?

McCarthy's reputation in pop culture is as someone who led a wild witch-hunt. However, the KGB must have been doing something in the time he was influential, and recent events show that the idea of a Russian cultural infiltration of America is not as preposterous as the pop-culture version of events would imply. I can't help but feel like even if he was throwing around plausible-seeming accusations merely to boost up his own reputation without any concern for the truth value, given the number of fingers he was pointing, he would of eventually hit someone who looked suspicious for a good reason by pure accident. Was he so incompetent that he managed to miss every actual Soviet asset? Or did he get a few actual agents, but the level of collateral damage was so great that it totally outweighed any successes in the judgement of history? Bonus question- why was he so bad at his job? Was he making some assumption about how the KGB operated that was completely wrong?

In fantasy and historical shows set in medieval Europe or a similar setting we see kings at will declaring that a person be put to death, shortly followed by the subsequent head of the unfortunate condemned person adorning the gate to the city. Is this in any way accurate to the realities of medieval life?

How did everyone from different regions agree on the 7 days a week? For example, in the 7th century, the romans, the arabs, the persians all spoke different languages, have different religions, and have different calendars. How did they all agree on the number of days in a week, and if it was monday in the arab peninsula, was it also monday for the romans?

A lot of Sikh separatists (who want a separate country from India) seem to have roots in Canada. The attack against an Indian plane a few years ago is probably the most obvious example. In addition, when Justin Trudeau visited India, he invited a separatist to have lunch with him.

How did he think Paul corrupted Jesus's message? What did he think was original and what was a later addition? I've found that Islamic scholars hold a similar view of Paul? Where does this come from and what in particular is thought to be changed?

Sorry for formatting, I'm on mobile. Some years ago I remember reading something about some early settlers looking ashore at night and seeing essentially multiple large domes of light in some areas from villages and the population was dense enough to have large, well worn trails/roads between them.

I also recall reading letters or accounts of some men and (mostly)women being seduced into leaving the other settlers and joining the a native Nation's by these strong, healthy, tough, well tanned people. I even remember a picture of a little mixed Native/English family!.... But for the life of myself, I can't find anything about these subjects online. I don't know if I'm suddenly terrible at googling or of I dreamt it all up. Does anyone know what I'm talking about?

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In 1810, Kentucky, after just some decades of settling, had 406,000 people - while Pernambuco, a center of Portuguese colonization since the 1500s, had about 300,000. Ohio went from 45,000 in 1800 to 581,000 in 1820. These booms would keep on going throughout the rest of the century. Why were Americans so "hungry" for land? As far as I know, places like Brazil, Argentina and Venezuela didn't have such massive interiorizations not even in the 20th century.

Being the major military and naval base in the Malay peninsula with a significant large force of combatants, why was it decided to surrender? Was this made on orders of London or a decision directly by the high command in place.

I was thinking that we humans have existed for so long in this planet, that there's more than enough time for civilization to arise, collapse, and then do that a couple more times until our current rise that started some ~20,000 years ago with the invention of agriculture.

How would we know if this is the first time that humanity arose?

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