Reference to this is made in various fictional works such as "Sherlock Holmes Shadow Games", and earlier in Joseph Conrad's 1907 novel "The Secret Agent". What was these groups ultimate goal? Was it a combination of movements among the Socialists, Communists, and Anarchists? Did they want to overthrow the monarchies of Europe?

''Prior to 1937, Aden had been governed as part of British India (originally as the Aden Settlement subordinate to the Bombay Presidency, and then as a "Chief Commissioner's province"). Under the Government of India Act 1935 the territory was detached from British India, and was established as a separate colony of the United Kingdom; this separation took effect on 1 April 1937''

This seems like a rather weird happening, what were the reasons for the British administration to put these two separate areas together?

Thanks!

I would love to make an education YouTube video talking about his ideas, but I wonder how bad they are for this.

Edit: to clarify, it just seems that other revolutions had a definite start for the people of the time, like with the American Revolution and the Declaration of Independence. However, in the French Revolution, the National Assembly basically controlled the state while the King was still nominally in power.

Before the King was executed, was there any talk of a revolution occurring, or did the people consider their actions legal, and not a seizure of power?

I was lookig up lyrics to "Down in the River to Pray" and the Wikipedia page claims that some historians believe that larts of the hymn were coded messages with advice to escape. This is something I have heard all my life about this type of song from many different people, but the claims seem a bit far-fetched. For example, all of the "codes" are always either really obvious advice like "go through the river to cover your scent" or "use stars for navigation" or things which seem too specific to be a widely understood secret code.

In the above example, it is claimed that "going down in the river to pray" was advice to go through the water. The same is said about the hymn "Wade in the Water" (though for that one it seems a bit more likely to me). "Swing Low Sweet Chariot" is often said to refer to the underground railroad in the phrase

*I looked over Jordan and what did I see? (Coming for to carry me home) A band of angels coming after me (Coming for to carry me home)

Anyway, my question is this- is there any evidence of these songs actually being a code? If so, how would slaves have known about the code, and are there notable instances of slave escapes which were inspired/aided by these? If not, how did this myth become so widely circulated?

Also did Corn get it's name because of Cornwall?

What are the major theoretical approaches to handling occasions where the historical data suggests conclusions that contemporary scientists reject?

For example, a (hypothetical) historian writing in the 1940s about alleged "ball lightning" incidents would be going against the scientific consensus if he concluded that ball lightning actually existed. But modern research has showed that ball lightning does, in fact, exist. So a (hypothetical) 1940s historian who concluded that ball lightning incidents actually happened would have been correct.

Do historians universally just assume the consensus of science is accurate on all points? If not, what are the usual lines of demarcation?

I'm especially curious if there are any works that approach this issue by examining individual case-studies, looking at particular incidents (if any) where trained historians argued against scientific consensus based on their historical analyses.

I've often wondered if the occupants of the white house have always been exclusively the president and his immediate family. I don't expect "Fillmore's out-of-work brother slept on the couch in the Lincoln room" but I do wonder if anyone's mother / mother-in-law or a distant relative or anyone outside the norm ever lived there too because of the president.

Did Poland know Germany was going to invade before they actually did in WW2?

If so did they try to do anything about it?

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An addendum to this question is, why weren't they in Alexandria to begin with?

Hi there everyone,

I just wanted to see if my people could offer me some help with a problem I've been having in my research.

First a little introduction. I'm a second year masters student at Ball State Univeristy studying Medieval Scandinavia. More specifically I've chosen to focus on Scandinavian mercenaries as I feel that they are a largely overlooked, yet instrumental part of Northern Europe until at least the end of the eleventh century.

For my thesis, I am attempting to create a digital project which will involve text analysis, GIS mapping, and honestly whatever else I can think of to impress my professors. However, my main goal is to show that Norse sellswords were first and foremost have been overlooked by history due to the nature of their profession. Despite this, the appear in historical accounts from Anglo-Saxon England, to Frankish Normandy, Muslim Spain even ranging as far as the Middle-East as well as North Africa. To add on to this, I would like to also help establish the connection that mercenaries were likely employed wherever merchants traveled and therefore, have walked those lands as well.

Secondly, I believe that the Norse mercenary played an instrumental role in developing the gift-giving economy of Medieval Scandinavia. Despite the presence of huge silver coin hoards in Denmark, Norway and Sweden, the most important gifts of this time period were not those of monetary value, but instead gifts which held symbolic importance. In order to reward loyalty, it was common to award a follower something like a ring, armband, or perhaps a ceremonial weapon, essentially something that was not currency. While silver could certainly be a part of the gift, it held little symbolic value among Medieval Scandinavians. In general, what I have found is that the more difficult the gift was to obtain, the more foreign it was to Northern European soil, the more valuable it ended up being. Therefore, besides merchants and raiding parties operating on foreign soil, the Scandinavian mercenary was one of the most important providers of these exotic tokens.

Finally and this brings me to my problem, I'm hoping to approach the topic of the Scandinavian mercenary from a more cultural/environmental approach. By that I mean I want to find if there was anything in the landscape of Denmark, Norway and Sweden that promoted the development of mercenary work as a viable way to live. I have already done some dabbling here and have discovered some interesting connections to the Baltic Sea, but I am always hungry for more.

This brings me to my request, do any of you scholars know of any good books on mercenaries or Scandinavian environmental history? I'm looking more so for stuff on mercenaries as I'm having more trouble with sourcework there. I've already dabbled into the standard military stuff like Machiavelli, Clausewitz and Keegan, but I was wondering if the family knew anything else I should be looking at? I'll take suggestions on most anything, however, I would prefer if the subject matter of the monograph or article was around my time period.

(tldr: Do you guys know any good books on mercenaries? Preferably their use in the Early to Mid Medieval period (600-1100ish)

I'm not quite sure if this is kosher or not but I asked on here before with some research problems that I was having and found the responses very helpful. Thanks in advance if you do reply.