In one of the episodes of Dan Carlin's Hardcore History, he asks the listener to imagine living in, say, England in the waning years of the Empire, and suddenly receiving a letter informing you that the Empire needed their legions back, that they would no longer be supporting your roads, etc. etc. Did this really happen so quickly and suddenly? If so, how did local populations react?

EDIT: And to clarify, I mean the original, fell-in-395-CE empire, not later Western Roman Empire or Byzantium.

I'd like to expand my question a bit, because I was looking through the chapter on Haiti in this period in the Cambridge History of Latin America, and there is no mention of any massacre - instead, the only line about whites after the declaration of independence on Jan 1, 1804 is "During the war most of the whites still in the colony had been killed." I thought this happened after the revolution was over in Haiti proper, and there doesn't seem to be any mention of any state-sponsored massacres - is the wiki article fully correct?

I just found out I have Melanesian ancestry through a DNA test and being a supposed white male I had to say I was a little curious. After some digging I found that there was recent evidence of a Norse settlement in Australia. This made me ask the question is there anywhere the vikings didn't settle?

If so, what do we know of it; if not, why not?

I'm spending the next two weeks traveling through Peru, and seeing a bunch of Spanish signs made me think: why do all of these seemingly unrelated languages share the same alphabet? A lot of them probably have developed independently, and I cant see why they'd all use the same alphabet.

I've always wandered how different history would have been if Ireland had followed the Scandi countries and Scotland in converting to protestantism.

Was Catholicism always part of the identity of Ireland? Was it part of objecting to British Rule? Could Ireland had converted?

Mny thks for any info

Hello everyone. I've read many articles on the topic but none seem to address exactly how all these countries came together after literally thousands of years of fighting and resentment not only to form an alliance but a true intermingling of governments, currency, borderless countries, and free movement? How did all these people put it all aside and do something like this? From everything I've learned about European history this seems like it should have been impossible. Heck even 30 years ago this seems like pure fantasy. Not only that, ask any citizen of these countries and they don't harbor any resentment toward anyone else even when less than 100 years ago (and far less in some cases) these same people were seriously oppressing or committing war crimes against the others? It seems like they view what happened like how they view a rival football team.

Growing up I've just always accepted Europe was a peaceful, progressive place but it wasn't that long ago that it was a seriously hard place to live. I wasn't sure if this should have been an Explain like I'm 5 post or not.. I must be missing something.

I've bene looking into the Napoleonic wars, and given Napoleon was such a genius, how was it that Wellington was able to beat him in Spain?

From what I understand, the French had a larger and better army (with officers promoted due to merit), and had better cannon and cavalry.

The only advantage the British had was rifles and because they ended up having Spanish partisans on side, and they had Wellington.

Was Wellington the deciding factor?

Mny thks for any info

Pre-war, Britain was considered the stronger power. During the war, Russia lost over 20 million people and had about a fifth of its landmass ravaged by scorched earth policies, first by the retreating red army and later by the Wehrmacht. Britain's losses weren't anywhere near the Soviet Union's, and yet it was the latter that came out of the war a superpower, while Britain was bankrupt and with reduced wealth. What accounts for this?

What was the justification at the time? Did anyone object to the CSA in 1970 as being unconstitutional?

My friend has microtia, and ultimately, has one ear. He believes the nazis wouldn't do anything to him, but I am skeptical of that. What would he nazis do to someone with this deformity?

The games do not necessarily have to be completely accurate, but should allow for a dialogue in the class to discuss inaccuracies and compare to our coursework. I'm not entirely sure AskHistorians is the best subreddit for this, but I assume I would receive much better answers here than a gaming subreddit.

By this I mean, are there any books that look at the role of cavalry in warfare and how they were used in scouting, how charges were made and what their tactical role was? I know that there are a few books out there which deal with horses, their equipment and their social role/value, but I don't know of any that detail their actual use in warfare.

Did any societies have laws against riding horses under the influence of alcohol? Or driving horse drawn carriages/coaches/buggies while intoxicated?

Wardruna is a Norwegian band that attempts to recreate traditional Nordic music, usually centered around neo-paganism. They claim to use verse common in Nordic poetry, as well as traditional instruments and singing styles. One of their most popular songs is "Helvegan" which was also featured in season 2 of the history channel series "Vikings" along with numerous other songs by Wardruna.