Now, I'm not trying to cause a stir. I'm simply a curious person. We're there Africans present in ancient Greece? If so, were they accepted into society, slaves, or a mix of the two? My question arose from the Netflix series called Troy: Fall of a City. Zeus, Achilles, and a good number of his myrmidons (I think thats spelled right) were played by african-american actors. I know most movies and tv series aren't exactly accurate but it did make me wonder. I honestly don't care if the show is accurate or not, I still enjoyed it.

I've realized I don't know much about middle eastern empires and history. The only thing I know is Mesopotamia and then rise of Islam. Even then, I don't know how the religion actually spread. I was wondering if anyone had any suggestion.

Everybody knows about the intimate link between the cotton industry of the American South the the institution of slavery in the United States, I often read or hear that the invention of the cotton gin and its ability to increase profitability "saved" and perpetuated slavery in the South, the expression "king cotton" comes to mind. But I know slaves were also used in other industries, most notably the tobacco industry (at least, I know for sure they were integral to the tobacco industry of the Caribbean pre-British Abolition, and I assume slave labour played as critical a role in the tobacco industry in the United States), and I am asking how big a role chattel slavery played in the United States' economy beyond cotton and textiles.

Hey all! I am really interested in this topic. Unfortunately, primary sources give only nuggets of information, and I was wondering if maybe there is a modern work that systematized what we know on the Ancient spies and agents and subterfuge. Thank you in advance!

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[Manhattan Project] I've been reading Rhodes's The Making of the Atomic Bomb—which is fantastic, by the way—and while he details the timeline going from Fermi's handmade pile at the University of Chicago to having Oak Ridge and Hanford up and running, I don't understand how it was possible to make the jump from "first-ever atomic pile" to "two fully-operational nuclear power plants" in such a short period of time.

How the heck does someone sit down and design the first full-blown nuclear power plant from scratch? Are there any books that address this question?

Would they have spoken with a British accent, a modern American accent, or with some mix of the two?

If they did talk in Early Modern English, when did they stop talking like that and start talking in the manner that we talk today?

Do you guys think that the extent so which Julius Caesar is known was heavily altered by his depiction in the Shakespearean play? To clarify, was it possible that Caesar’s legacy and influence had slipped into obscurity in the centuries that passed and was later revamped after the play potentially drew attention to that time period? I ask this because both Caesar and Shakespeare are widely known (arguably to an equal extent of notoriety in the western world) and due to other cases in history of people swiftly gaining popularity centuries after they’ve ruled (I refer to King Tut). Obviously the influence King Tut had is vastly overshadowed by everything Caesar had done so I’m well aware that the two aren’t exactly comparable but perhaps they’re similar in principle. Thanks.

I'd like to go through humanity's history in chronological order. From the first atom to our current day president. I have 2 years left at my university library and can and am willing to read complicated books on the matter. The problem is, is that I don't know what book would be the best place for the beginning for human evolution.

Supposedly the Bering Strait between Russia and Alaska is only 51 miles wide at it's narrowest point, so wouldn't it have been comparatively easier for the people of Russia to have crossed that gap at that time, rather than the transatlantic voyages?

Why did ancient norse peoples foretell of their doomsday and reference it so often in their stories? Was there a cultural reason? When did they believe it would occur?

I was watching an episode of "Call the Midwife" (S4E3) which is set in 1959 England. One of the character's husband gets set up by a "honeypot" in a men's public restroom. According to the police character they specifically set up the officer there to catch people since they had had reports about it being a meeting place for gay men. The police officer says they put in the "pretty police" whose specific job was to "smoke out [their] type" Was this a real thing? How common was it?

Also, since homesxuality was so stigmatized what kind of person would agree to have that sort of job anyway?

For those that haven't seen the episode: The specific scene is that the husband is in a public toilet and is washing his hands. He keeps making eye contact with the other man (the honeypot) through the mirror while the other man is using the urinal. The other man comes to the sink and the husband grabs his hand and starts kissing him. The honeypot then steps back and blows a whistle, calling a nearby officer to the restroom. The husband then gets arrested for "gross indecency."

I know they took some islands, but, they had real capacity to take major regions like Hokkaido ? I have this question because in a lot of debates about the atomic bombs some people say that the japaneses were fearing with a soviet invasion most than the bombs.