Looking into the Republic of Madawaska and Brayons how did this area of Northern Maine and Western New Brunswick develop a distinct enough identity to have their own name? Also, how is Brayon culture different from that of the Québécois and Acadians?

Often in games like Skyrim you have the everpresent "bandit", a malevolent NPC whose main job is to say "never should have come here" before you fling them off the cliff. They usually live in isolated caves, outposts, or forts abandoned by armies and lords. My question is: How realistic of a picture is this, really? Were bandits really just "lone wolves" on the edge of society, or did they receive considerable protection and support from communities in times of chaos? Did they fulfill social functions at all, like supplanting officials when central auhority was weak?

I'm especially thinking of periods such as the 17th century in the Ottoman Empire or early 19th century Southern Italy, where banditry in the countryside was particularly rife. If they didn't have any support or protection, how did bandits survive so long in these regions?

In the 1700’s a major scientific problem of the day was how to determine the longitude of a vessel at sea. Latitude, you see, can be determined by measuring the angle of the sun to the horizon at its highest point in the day. Longitude was not so simple in those days. Who is credited with solving this problem and how was it solved?

I recall reading or hearing somewhere that the resources/technology/etc of Ming China reached levels even in sea travel great enough for such an expedition, but they simply didn't think about exploring at the time due to border issues.

[deleted]

The ancients had brilliant ways of writing language and mathematics. Why couldn't they figure out how to write notes on a scale?

For example, Aristotle's writings point to Homer, Socratic dialogues, and other works by Aristotle, all of which survived to the present day at least partially. But shouldn't we be seeing far more references to texts we've never heard of in ancient writings? Am I wrong in assuming we don't?

A good friend of mine had to recently put his beloved "Bogey" down. He wants some help naming his new dog, he is a very proud Navy veteran who named his other dog "Bandit."

He's having a rough time trying to stay with the aviation aspect of naming a dog.

I know it's silly that I've come to this sub asking for help naming a dog, but I really enjoy reading all the different responses. And I also really enjoy history!

Thanks!

I'm currently reading Martin Meredith's Mugabe: Power and Plunder in Zimbabwe and it mentions that in the 80s there was a recommendation from the Chief economist to develop Zimbabwe's rural areas by converting all villages into trust companies.

The idea was apparently unanimously accepted at the local level but Mugabe supposedly ditched it because it would take away his powers of patronage i.e. 'no on would have a reason to vote for us once the law was passed'?

Does anyone know anymore about the scheme? Was it ever introduced?

Thanks.

I've always wondered how The Influence of Sea Power upon History became such an influential book for so many decades. Alfred Thayer Mahan was a competent but unexceptional author, and it sounds like his actual book was decent but no special work of scholarship. Somehow though Mahan became the most important naval thinker of the late 19th & 20th century.

I can understand why Mahan as so popular in Japan since the victory that elevated Japan onto the world stage (Tsushima) was a classic Mahanian "decisive battle" between capital ships. How did Mahan have so much staying power in the rest of the world though, especially after WW1? Was it a self-reinforcing circle-jerk since he was telling a bunch of battleship admirals exactly what they wanted to hear?

I could not find any "mainstream" reviews of this book. Is it revisionist history or can it contribute to a better understanding of Muslim Spain?

Were they able to successfully avoid bottlenecking their colonial populations?

So this has been bugging me for actual ages of mankind and now I have a place to ask. I recall that French authorities during the colonization of Algeria used as justification for imperialism the "regreening" of a desert back into a Roman cornucopia after many hundreds of years of mismanagement. Edward Gibbon points to the Berbers as being responsible during the wars against Uqba Ibn Nafi and the first big Muslim incursion into Algeria for "ruining" North Africa as a measure to deny the land to the Arabs.

I've also seen Romans themselves being blamed for it, or the Fatimids during the medieval period for "unleashing" a bedouin tribe and their goats upon the vulnerable soil, turning it into marginal scrub-land.

But none of these answers, besides being really scattershot and mostly not very well sourced, are very conclusive to me (at least from what I have).

So I thought I'd give it a go and ask you guys; Is North Africa significantly less fertile than it was in antiquity? If so, why?

What did politicians call their rivals, and how exaggerated, if so, were those claims?