Are there examples of this?

I am sitting here reading a book by the fireplace and waiting until dinner is done cooking. But what would a serf do on this day, November 27th 1116? There is not much daylight to labor in with the sun rising around 7:45 and setting around 3:50.

I'm wont to fail to understand how exactly Gaius Octavian was the heir of Julius Caesar? Was Octavian ever actually viewed as a Julia, or was he merely an Octavia made heir to a Julia's fortune and name?

My other question is over Cleopatra VII; would the Egyptian people have accepted Caesarion as their rightful king, despite his bastard status?

I bring up these two cases because they fall through the female line, something Europeans would later view, as I understand it, something inherently incomparable to the male line. Or was it simply that the Roman's were more accepting of adoption?

Im not sure when the term 'World War II' was coined, but I'm assuming it was only coined that after the war ended or at least a few years in to it. What did people around the world refer to all the fighting that was going on?

During the second half of the 19th century European powers managed to extend direct control from mostly small strips of coastal holdings to nearly the entire continent. How did Liberia and Ethiopia manage to avoid being colonized?

A lot of different minerals were mined in a lot of different places in the classical era in Europe and the Near East. Did the social status of miners differ based on what material they were working with?

For example - would a gold miner at Las Medulas be about the same "rank" as a tin miner in Brittany or a malachite miner in Britain in about 100 CE?

In modernity there are a lot of people who transition from one gender to another, identify as both genders, or don't feel like they have a gender. But all of these identities seem like they sprung up out of nowhere in the last two centuries. Were any historical people recorded as identifying as one of these groups?

As a follow-up, how were they treated in various cultures, and what was their role in society?

The outline (and I'm remembering from a lesson i took five years ago) went something like this:

1. There is some status quo around which there is some element of dissatisfaction

2. There is an inciting incident or group of incidents of some kind which mobilizes those dissatisfied with the status quo

3. There is a period of conflict between those in power and those revolting

4. The revolutionary element seizes political control

(After this is when this outline begins to seem questionable to me)

5. The most extreme elements of the revolution generally exert the largest amount of influence

6. There is, as a result of this, usually a period of some kind of "reign of terror" around which the extremist revolutionary ideals are enforced aggressively

7. There is some sort of backlash against the "reign of terror" or enforcement of extremist revolutionary ideals (a coup, a counterrevolution, etc.)

8. Moderate elements eventually gain control and establish a new status quo

As I noted above, I remember thinking how how the second half of this outline especially seemed questionable. Is it so rare to have a "revolution of moderacy?" Do more extremist elements of political revolution actually overwhelmingly receive the most attention?

For context, this outline was presented in the context of the French Revolution.

So I suppose my question is: is this sort of thinking actually something to which historians lend credence? Or was this simply a teacher trying to make a much more complex subject more digestible for her students?

For example: What are some major points about how the brain and mind works that are common knowledge/pretty well-known today that were uncertain/unheard of back then? Anything we would cringe at a modern doctor assuming today?

I'm asking because I've been listening to Laibach, which began as an art collective in the former Yugoslavia. I was under the impression the band could have been killed for creating art that portrays the state in a negative light.

What was the relationship between the Yugoslavian state and artistic expression, and what impact did this have on the population?

What conditions made Italy a good place for "the Renaissance". I know it had to do with a rediscovery of Greek and Roman texts from Byzantine and Arabic libraries and translations, and the explosion in art had to do with the whole patronage thing. I don't get why the Renaissance didn't start in Spain or Greece or some other place altogether.

Also, what about the Northern Renaissance? Did it develop in a similar fashion to the Italian Renaissance?

If this isn't the right place to ask let me know, thanks for any information or advice you can provide.

My grandmother was born in the United States (Utah) in the 1920s to Japanese immigrants. When she was very young, her family moved back to Japan, where her father died soon after. During WWII, she was living and working in Hiroshima in a factory. The factory was converted to be part of the war effort, and she was transferred to the office. When the bomb fell, she was protected by the office and desk and miraculously avoided radiation poisoning. After the war, she tried unsuccessfully for six years to return to the US (her native country) with her mother, due in part to anti-Japanese sentiment/policies.

She was approached to tell her story about 30 years ago as part of a book, but she refused. When he was alive, my grandfather (himself a very vocal Heart Mountain internee) would press her to tell her story, which only caused her to retreat further. My family has always wanted to know and document her story, but we were always hesitant to dredge up painful memories. She has only ever discussed memories sparingly and indirectly, but with more frequency in the last few years.

I feel a sense of obligation to tell her story, and I'd love to know if anyone has any experience with this sort of thing. I'm not sure if she'd be willing to share with us, much less with a journalist/historian.

I was reading a book on Genghis Khan, and it mentioned many large cities in modern Afghanistan, Uzbekistan, and Kyrgyzstan (Bukhara, Samarkand, Bactria, Merv). It seems these places, mostly are very irrelevant after the Mongol empire. What happened to these cities of Central Asia, which seemed to be at one point prosperous and strong?

I am currently reading Tolstoy's War and Peace. In the book and on wikipedia it is stated or implied that French was the language of the Russian nobles, sometimes to the point of only knowing enough Russian to command their servants. For example, there is a character in War and Peace who is fluent in French but is taking lessons in Russian, the language that should be her native tongue.

Is this really an accurate depiction of the Russian nobility of the time and, if so, how did such a situation arise?

I've talked to classmates, friends etc. All of them know who Rasputin is, but none of them have heard the Romanov name. Further, they only know vague details about him. I'm curious why his name has persisted through the years.