From what I hear, sieges were far more common because it was easier to simply surround a fortification (assuming there is enough manpower) and wait them out than fight.

Exactly what the title says. My father and I were watching a video of some storm chasers and I couldn't help but wonder how Native Americans viewed these massive funnels of destruction. Does the density of people effect the perception of these destructive events?

Was it everyday or just for special events, or was it like the equivalent of Sunday diner, regular but not every meal?

In my experience, discussions on combat in World War I almost always revolved around trench warfare on the Western Front.

As I understand, both the Eastern and Western (before and after the stalemate) Fronts saw open warfare to at least some extent. I'm having a difficult time visualizing what this would look like in the context of 20th century warfare.

Of course, it must have looked very different than the line infantry tactics of the 19th century, and I would imagine modern tactics as well.

Can someone describe in detail what open warfare looked like in the First World War? How would this compare to similar situations in other wars, such as World War II? Was it mainly focused in urban environments?

Thanks in advance, and please forgive me if this question is founded on a misconception.

To clarify, by open warfare I mean combat beyond the scope of trench warfare.

Just wondering if any historians knew the exact workout routine that the Spartans did.

I've always had this question, and I apologize if I don't word some of this right: first post. Anyways, were some if not all trenches already set up for defense, or were they built on the go during the war? I am assuming it depended on the nation, but I don't really know.

Did it make the river more dangerous when there is flooding? Did it remove the floodplains?

It was reported today that Ted Cruz is already looking forward to the 2020 election and another run for the White House. It made me wonder how often through history candidates got close once (or more than once), but were later successful in becoming President.

All I can discover about this photo is Luis Echeveria, the Mexican president from 1970-76 is pictured front left, and the photo was taken at Casa De Carranza (that is Carranza in the painting). However, I don't know exactly when the photo was taken, or who else is in the photo (I can only assume people close to the deceased, whoever that is, or possibly cabinet members, politicians, etc.). If you can assist in discovering more information, even the smallest details, would help a ton.

Photo to follow in the comments.

Taking a cursory look, ancient beliefs about lightning and thunder are odd, to say the least. Obviously of course, it makes sense that ancient cultures attributed the phenomenon to gods, but I would have at least thought they would have figured out there was a link between the two.

Instead, Aristotle believed that thunder was caused by the collision of clouds. He apparently didn't work that out in spite of the fact that lightning almost always occurs while it's raining and there's lightning around that always precedes it. And surely there was at least a few times that people were very close to the lightning and realized that the lightning was the source of the thunder.

In fact, hardly any ancient cultures seemed to make the connection. The closest I can find is some Native Americans believing that thunder comes before the lightning. This itself is still odd and you would think that after a few thunderstorms, they would make the connection that it's the other way around.

I realize I'm speaking from the privilege of having a modern Western education, but it still baffles me that this is one of the things the ancients just had no clue about. They were able to work out that the world was round by a few factors like boats disappearing bottom first, but millions of people across hundreds of cultures didn't figure out that lightning and thunder are related and that there was a "sound delay" between the two despite witnessing thousands of thunderstorms over thousands of years until the modern scientific era. Am I mistaken about this? Is there some factor I'm missing that would explain why they couldn't make the connection?

I heard that "feet" was used in place of "male genitals" in the Old Testament, such as in Exodus 4:24:

24 At a lodging place on the way, the Lord met Moses and was about to kill him. 25. But Zipporah took a flint knife, cut off her son’s foreskin and touched Moses’ feet with it. “Surely you are a bridegroom of blood to me,” she said. 26. So the Lord let him alone.

(I don't have a source for this but it seems apparent.)

In the New Testament Jesus and feet are mentioned together several times. Mary anoints Jesus's "feet" with oil:

Then Mary took about a pint of pure nard, an expensive perfume; she poured it on Jesus’ feet and wiped his feet with her hair.

-John 12:3

And the iconic scene of Jesus washing his disciples "feet":

After that, he poured water into a basin and began to wash his disciples’ feet, drying them with the towel that was wrapped around him.

-John 13:5

Where the authors using innuendo or am I reading too much into this?

I feel with the superior arms, training, and leadership (other than Hitler, Himmler, and Goebbels) that the Germans had, the Germans could have easily ended the Eastern Front and then, as in World War I, move the German forces west in case of an Allied invasion and then maybe have proceeded with Operation Sea Lion. Everyone blames Hitler for his inept military leadership, but were there other factors involved in Germany's military defeat?

I had always accepted the argument that the atomic bombing of Japan saved lives that would have been lost in a ground invasion, but a history professor told me recently that the Japanese had already offered to surrender and that it was necessary. I have never heard this before and was suspicious because if this is true I don't see why the issue is so controversial. Thanks.

The U.S. has the Republican Party, the Democratic Party, and a smattering of smaller parties (including the Libertarian Party and the Green Party). The UK has the Conservative Party and the Labour Party. Germany has the SPD and the CDU/CSU (and smaller parties).

Has there ever been a transnational party which tried to get its members elected in different countries? I'm not referring to friendly relations between two parties in separate countries. I am specifically asking if there has been a single party, with a defined party platform, that has worked to elect representatives in more than one country.

Did it strike European contemporaries as being a bunch of upstarts falsely reaching back to an unrelated legacy, or that Americans were somehow bringing back the Roman Republic?

On a related note, what was the contemporary response to all the Roman trappings in our DC monuments?

Thanks!

It seems like quite an endeavor to move a whole society like that. How would the planning and execution of a migration work?

After the French became occupied by Germany they began setting up a complex resistance network to sabotage their occupiers, I'm wondering if the German government had plans to do something similar.