What the question says really, when was the first democracy, excluding the ancient Greeks and Romans

I'll try to be clearer. In English, for example, there agreement that Shakespeare is high grade English literature. Does anyone know of high grade works (like Shakespeare-ish or so level) that is from oral tradition? Thanks!

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In my U.S. History class, the total coverage of President Nixon was 'he was President, then he screwed up a scandal and resigned only so he wouldn't be impeached'. Watergate is something I know more than enough about - I'd like to know about the rest of the man's presidency. Were his policies favorable to most citizens? Was he, objectively speaking (as difficult as that is to do in the charged world of American politics), a "good" president?

Additional questions if you're willing/able:

EDIT: Apparently these are bigger stumpers than I had anticipated! Can anyone shed some light as to why these are difficult questions to answer? Are there any mods/experts here who specialize in the Baroque period in France? At this point I'm asking half for the kids and half for my own insatiable curiosity. Also, I thought up another question out of personal interest:

How am I traveling? I'm sure this would be determined by my finances/class/other factors. How much would a decent horse (get me from A to B) run me?

I also have audiences asking me to demonstrate my ability with a sword (I am very skilled in this) do I display my skills against an opponent, or is it possible to perform solo?

What is the etiquette in securing a "gig?"

I am very talented. What kind of living am I making? How much do I make in a typical night?

How long can I stay in town until my welcome is worn out?

How do I decide where to go next?

How are any of your answers changed if I am a woman?

The USSR in 1952, via memo known as "the Stalin Note", proposed a reunification for Germany along with disengagement of superpowers from the region.

What were the reasons for the Western allied powers (UK, USA and France) rejecting this proposal?

Fictional works usually represent the military forces of antiquity as very brutal. My question is whether every breach of standards was handled with a beating or was there a bureaucratic side to punishment (being written up?)

Beyond that was there a concept of 'dishonorable discharge?' Or did leaving the military on bad terms always end with "off with his head?"

Hmm.

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There is a gif on r/gifs called Story of a Stone, iirc. It depicts a mountain gradually become smaller, and at one point is fired out of a cannon. How likely is that to have actually occurred?

When you take a step back, business suits (and especially ties) are a very, very strange institution. Why do we have a "grown up" uniform at all? Why does it have this particular form? Why is dangling a piece of cloth from your neck considered anything other than ridiculous?

I've read the existing answers (linked in the FAQ) to questions about suits and ties. They focus on tracing the fashion precursors of the current styles of the suit. For instance tracing contemporary ties to cravats worn by Croatian mercenaries. While this is fascinating, it does not answer my question. I would like to refocus discussion on why the institution of the business suit exists and is so widespread today.

Let me be more specific. Here are the reasons that I find the very existence of business suits counter-intuitive:

(Non-functional) Unlike some uniforms (e.g., hard hat, overalls, flame-retardant suits, and even deliberately revealing "Hooters" uniforms), business suits are entirely non-functional. They are usually worn by office workers, who could do their job just as well (perhaps better) if they were wearing something else.

(Low signalling value) Often the ways people (and animals) choose to dress (or evolve to look) are designed to communicate to others who or what they are. However for a signal to have value (at least in biological evolution, which I'm more familiar with) it must be hard for at least some individuals to fake the signal. However it's easy for anyone to go out and buy a suit or to borrow one from someone else. There are services that loan good quality suits to homeless people going for job interviews. These days a suit provides as much signalling value as a little pin that says "I'm a business person!" Were suits once unattainably expensive, and so had signalling value, but now the price has dropped yet the norm persists?

(Mandatory) Some progressive companies like Google are (apparently) letting their employees come to work in neat casual attire, as long as they get the job done. However, as far as I know, most big companies in large wealthy cities still insist that their workers come dressed in a strange, seemingly arbitrary "business suit" uniform. Where it's not mandatory, my understanding is that workers are often disadvantaged by not wearing one. Given that the uniform is both non-functional and its signalling function is easily faked, the insistence that people must wear them seems especially peculiar.

(Arbitrary) Perhaps there are reasons for the particular normative form of the business suit. For instance, the presence of a tie (forbidden for women), the presence of a pointy collar, the standard colour scheme, skirt/dress style and length for women (forbidden for men), shirts must have long sleeves, etc. However to me they seem entirely arbitrary. Why not, instead, have a short sleeved shirt with collar that goes all the way around the neck, with pieces of coloured cloth hanging down the arms? If there is some historical or contemporary function to the particular form of the business suit, I would love to learn it. To be unambiguous here, I have read existing answers tracing the precursors of the current suit forms; that's not what I'm asking about. What interests me is the arbitrariness of those forms. Are they arbitrary? If so, why should something so arbitrary be so prevalent and so strictly enforced?

(Prevalence) Despite the peculiarities above, the business suit seems to be present worldwide. Business people wear it in India, Brazil, Japan, Kenya and Finland. How did something so seemingly arbitrary and non-functional come to have such widespread adoption? How does it retain its seemingly arbitrary form while migrating between cultures and generations, despite the pressures of innovation, reinvention, cultural assimilation, and historical change that buffet most other domains of human activity (e.g., architecture, decor, language, art and media, etc.)?

And so, historians, I ask you: Why the "Business Suit"?

Why is something so non-functional, with such little signalling value, something whose form is so arbitrary, nonetheless so prevalent across the world and often even mandatory?

Modern academic discourse asserts that the Spartans had sexual pederast relationships but Xenophon says they never did. Because Xenophon was a primary source, shouldn't he have more credence, what do you all think?

• for what it's worth, I don't care if they were or weren't. I just want to know the truth of the situation.

EDIT: /u/Masaryk has pointed out that linguistic and cultural conservatism are not linked. In that case, I'll specify that the language and mythology are specifically what interest me.

They just seem like a waste of fabric and serve no real utilitarian purpose. Granted they add style to clothing but it doesn't seem like the only reason they became popular

I have had a big interest in the Second World War for about 15 years, but I don't really know a lot about Pavelić's reign in Croatia or the war in the Balkans so, would you please help me on the subject matter?

I'm reading a couple books about wars fought in Africa (such as the First/Second Congo War) and it touches very briefly on wars of decolonization. I'd like to learn a little more about the Angolan Civil War, since it had such an interesting Cuban intervention to it. Some book recommendations would be nice too.

Is cancer something that has taking hold of us in the past few centuries because of our health choices? Perhaps in the past they did not know what cancer was or how to diagnose and it was just as prevalent? Perhaps because we have longer life spans?

Tacitus wrote that after bands Chatti began raiding Roman territory around 50AD, Pomponius Secundus led a legion supported by auxiliaries to destroy them. After surrounding and defeating the Chatti, they discovered Roman soldiers who had been captured and enslaved after the battle of the Teutoburg Forest 40 years earlier.

This story has always interested me, but Tacitus was born 7 years after it supposedly happened and there isn't much I can find beyond the basics that I have provided, with some points often differing slightly. Did it happen? Could it have happened? As uplifting as the story is (I use uplifting in lack of a better word), I find it hard to believe when I would have expected it to have been documented a great deal more, instead of being briefly described by someone who wasn't even alive when it happened.