Visited yesterday and was amazed by how big it was and I just don’t understand how they could build something so large and detailed without modern machinery. Tried looking it up but couldn’t find much.

I know that farmers were usually lean and cut, but today we have giant men specifically trained through special weight lifting techniques and diets.

Were there men of similar physique in ancient times? Or were they impossible due to the lack of weight training science and steroids?

I’ve just been wondering when they stopped using cannon balls and how did they get better over time and become modern cannons?

Hi, it was recommended to me to crosspost here, my apologies if my questions seem a little... Disjointed

I'm here because I'm seeking answers in regards to philosophical positions on the colonial genocides of the new worlds. My experience is specifically to Australia, and how the British took the land using methods well established from the colonisation of the Americas. The establishment of the day used scientific knowledge to dehumanise the traditional peoples, claiming land deemed unclaimed because it didn't have agriculture or roads upon it. Bands of "police" went on slaughtering sprees, massacring peoples in huge swaths of land, like the Forrest River Massacres.

This trauma, this injustice, is still in living memory, the there are still people alive today who were affected by the West Australian 1905 act or the 1945 Native Citizenship Act, if that's not enough The Stolen Generation is an even more recent black mark on my nation (Read the "Bringing them home Report, 1997"). It just keeps happening with the 2007 Northern Territory intervention and Don Dale Detention Centre, it's endless.

I suppose my question, if any, is how can we trust the values and positions of philosophers in the past 200 years (or longer for the Americas) if they knew thats what was happening? Who objected? Why were they ignored? Is this even a philosophical debate even though at it's core it's an issue of ethics? (At lease from where I'm standing). And why do we just keep doing it?

I suppose it all relates to Raphael Lemkin and the Armenian Genocide, "nobody is speaking about Armenia" is an oft quoted term for the reasoning behind the Holocaust. Silence is easy sometimes.

I keep seeing Vietnam written as Viet Nam in earlier sources, and so it had me wondering.

Most colonisers heavily outgunned native populations. Why is it that they never tried to independently start a colony in the new world? I've only heard of Rhodesia that has attempted this

Also in the newly acquired Kingdom of Bulgaria, how did Basil's cruelty effect the intergration and administration of the area?

I read that his expedition brought back some ~50,000 pounds of cloves and other spices, but how much was the haul sold for? In general, how profitable were voyages to the spice islands before the Dutch and Portuguese took over and centralized the operations?

I understand Macbeth is based in the Scottish Highlands but why did he choose to create a play based in Scotland. Why not in Wales, Cornwall...? What was the appeal about Scotland during this time?

My first thought is French, because the sheer influence France had on the world in this period and the extent of their bureaucratic system, which I suspect would result in there being tons of primary sources in French.

I also feel like Spanish would useful, but perhaps not as useful as French.

German would probably help too, but because of their limited influence outside Europe I feel like German wouldn’t be too useful for broadening perspectives beyond Europe.

Edit: uggh “market trading” not “maker trading.”

We’ve all heard about European old world diseases killing millions of natives in the Americas, but were there any that affected the colonists?

With the Aztecs being so aggressive and expansionist, it seems like there would be a whole history of them going to war with the Apache or Comanche. (At least, it would make a cool story.) But I’ve never read about anything like that.

Thank you for reading this.

• Western Europe

• Interested in a broad range of years, 1600's to about 1950's. I know this is a huge range so, feel free to recommend on a more specific period.

• Interested specifically in paintings, but I am a bit interested in learning about drawings and sculpture as well

• I have only read a few history books and probably need something fairly accessible.

Are the Ancient Chinese recorded to have anything like firing by rank for their crossbowmen or having them fire in massive volleys or even "platoons" similar to what was seen in 18th century Western Europe?

Exactly what the title says, are governmentvshut downs a thing that happened say in the mid 20th century, how about the 19th century? Did the founding members of the USA have shut downs did they anticipate them? Where they or are they common in other governments?

I read in “Born a Crime” by Trevor Noah that there was a tendency to kill cats amoung the Black Africans in South Africa because of them being associated with witches, at least around Apartheid times, I don’t know what happens now, and I know that cats being killed for those reasons happened centuries ago with White Europeans, around medieval times i think, so that made me wonder if the killing of cats due to being associated with witches was something both groups Came up with on their own or if the black Africans got the idea due to being influenced by White Europeans?