I'm interested specifically in pre 1917 battles where tanks weren't so much a factor. How would an offensive force have dealt with a machine gun nest? Outflank them? (is that even possible on the Western Front?) Just overwhelm them with targets to shoot at?

Considering both the Immense size Nazi Germany was able to grow to, and that the chief goal of the war was living room, were regular german citizens able to take advantage of this during the brief period it was tenable?

I read in a book on World War I that some thinkers thought to push the idea that there was a good Germany - of the great arts and more specifically one embodied by Kant's works, whereas the militaristic, imperial-sided Germany was embodied by Nietzsche's works. Did Nietzsche ultimately end up being viewed negatively during this period (and Kant more positively?)

In an academic book on the history of philosophy I've noticed most of it's selectors and commentators were from the West, although the language of the publication wasn't Western.

This was even the case for passages on Islamic and Chinese philosophy. However, a very detailed section on Indian philosophy was the work of an Indian scholar from India.

On another occasion I found the discovery of a tractate, purportedly, by Zeno of Elea in Ancient Armenian first got published in Modern Armenian; Five years later it was published in Russian and subsequently reviewed in a renowned German magazine, but an English translation wouldn't come out until 50 years later.

What do historians generally hold of their colleagues working and discussing sources not in English, Spanish, French or German? If a scholar found an important manuscript in a regional language of his country and reviewed it in his native tongue, how long would it take for this discovery to reach European and American scholars researching his region? Will they rely on his review or attempt to get a translation of the respective manuscripts? Will the respective third world scholar be given the credit he deserves? Or: what if he just made an interesting piece of a analysis on his country's history - Will it be noticed elsewhere in the world?

Are there any balkanized regions in historiography where native and international scholars hold one another in a very low regard? Do non-Western historians generally get translated and published in the West? It certainly happens the other way round and there is a market for non-Western novelists. What with historians?

I imagine that first sons rarely went into the priesthood. But what about second sons? Was that common, rare?

Context: anywhere in Europe.

In the fictional land of Westeros, hedge knights are so named because they travel so much that they often sleep underneath thick hedgerows. They have more wealth than an average peasant - they can afford basic arms, armor, and a horse. But that's it. They wear, wield, and ride the entirety of their wealth.

They are the lowest caste of knighthood. They have no land and no lord. They travel Westeros selling their sword as a mercenary and perhaps entering tournaments to win renown. Their one avenue for social mobility is to find some lord who wants their service, and perhaps earn land and titles through their deeds and loyalty.

So is there evidence for such a class existing in European feudal society? Or was it essentially a prerequisite to serve a lord or have some established wealth before you can even think of affording the lifestyle of a knight?

Right before humans went into space, almost the entirety of the world was explored and charted mostly with great detail. However, were there areas that hadn't been charted yet or that were off from what humans believed it to be like, and were only discovered to be wrongly mapped once space footage came in?

I've read that funding is a popularity contest to a certain extent and that certain time periods and locations get funded less (e.g. early modern Eastern European history gets funded less after the Cold War ended). What are the currently popular time periods and locations? Or am I asking the wrong question?

Having just finished Keegan's book, and having heard a bit about the impact it made, I wonder how much it changed the way military historians describe battle. Was it truly "groundbreaking"?

I don't read much military history but I'd be interested to know how much writers today tackle combat at the "ground level" and, if they do, do they owe a debt to "The Face of Battle"?

British and Americans have all of these amazing/known programs of codebreaking and the Soviet NKVD seemed to be able to slip a spy into anything. The Allies also became very good in military diversion/"maskerovka". Their sophistication and creativity in deceiving the Axis seems limitless, at least based on popular stories.

On the other hand, the Axis seemed to have failed in their intelligence gathering, over and over. Greatly underestimating the strength of the Red Army, inability to determine the location of allied landings, and other intelligence disasters, like giving up the exact timing of Operation Citadel.

I get that beyond the ability to work with various resistance groups and partisans in occupied lands probably benefited the Allies greatly in intelligence gathering in occupied lands, but there were plenty of Nazi sympathizers in those areas too. There were many right leaning people in western Europe and plenty of anti-Semites in Belorussia and Ukraine, for example, who were nazi collaborators.

What's the story of Axis intelligence?

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After signing the Ribbentrop-Molotov non-aggression pact on August 23, 1939; 77 years ago today, Germany invaded Poland at 0445 in the morning prompting Britain and France to uphold their obligations under the Treaty of Versailles and declare war on Germany. Why then, after the Soviet Union invaded Poland on September 17th, didn't they declare war on them as well?

If this is the case, why do we not classify them as such?

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At a glance, Pelagius doesn't seem to have been spouting off anything too strange. Anti-predestination, pro-salvation through works. Why were so many in the church threatened by this?

Additionally, how strong did Pelagianism become in Britain, and did it ever have much hold beyond the island?

[Late Antiquity] - [UK] - [Religion]

I'm interested in the early history of the movement and the development of Shiite theology and identity, not so much on more modern developments. If someone could recommend a book, I'd really appreciate it.

Are famous musicians a relatively recent occurrence?

As a Vietnamese, I've been thinking about this a lot lately. Obviously, all the materials we have in Vietnam depict a feverish atmosphere back then, where everyone professed unquestionable love for the Socialist motherland and was ready to die liberating the South.

However, I wonder how many percent of those people and soldiers genuinely believed in the propaganda, versus the percentage of not believing but simply being forced to fight?

The 1968 and 1972 campaigns saw almost every NVA soldier leaving their bodies in the Southern battlefields. Wouldn't this spread a certain atmospheres of fear among the population at home, in the villages and hometowns? If your neighbours, uncles and brothers were never to be heard from again, wouldn't your survival instincts be prioritised over your faith in propaganda--no matter how powerful the rhetorics?

What I mean is that in most sciences, as you go back in time, the details of an analysis become increasingly sketchy. You wouldn't want to trust a 1971 textbook on things like cell biology because the details have changed so much in the past 50 years. The broad sketch would probably be fine, but the details would be off-key or flat-out wrong.

So, similarly, how old can historical research on, say, Ancient Rome be before they become dubiously trustworthy? Are there specific things that should be monitored in older works that are otherwise accurate? Are there specific dates before which historical information definitely should not be trusted?

At what point in the timeline of the Roman Kingdom/Republic/Empire was it safest to be a Roman citizen? Given you liveon the Italian Peninsula.

Can historians point to any real events that may have served as the inspiration for the Illiad?