Bad title, but I don't exactly know how to present my question. I'm essentially asking for a clarification about how accurate the presentation of Romans are in pop culture, where they're massively civilized and organized in comparison to everyone else outside their borders.

I've been reading about the Russo-Finnish Winter War lately, and was very interested to read that the war might have convinced Hitler to invade Russia (due to the Soviets' poor performance).

On Wikipedia it states: "Perhaps more importantly, the very poor performance of the Red Army encouraged Hitler to think that an attack on the Soviet Union would be successful."

It didn't link a source however, and I couldn't find any through my admittedly short Google search. Any insight? Maybe some sources?

I am not sure this is the right place to ask this question, but I want to learn the history of this part of Hitlers army. It's a bit of a jungle out there so any helpful books, articles and other kinds of reading material would be appreciated.

Hello everyone,

I'm doing a school project about purgatory in age of reformation and I'm searching for information about Calvinists and purgatory, does anyone have any good, credible resources? I read some books about reformation and few works of Calvin but I can't find any evidence that Calvin somehow responded to the Doctrine of Purgatory directly or indirectly. I'll very appreciate any tips for books/articles or anything else in English or German.

Thanks for the help!

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Hey all,

I was interested on doing a project on the Chinese emperor Puyi. Does anyone have any good, credible resources that I could use for research? I've gotten his autobiography but that's about it. I'm specifically looking for information about his time as emperor of Manchukuo, and about the true extent of his power, but any books/articles/anything will do.

Thanks for the help!

It seems like the Nation of Islam and other groups often engage(d) in Holocaust denial and ideas of the Jews being behind the American slave trade. Am I right in this assumption? And, if so, how and why did they end up adopting these beliefs?

I've recently started watching a YouTube channel called "The Great War", and one of the biggest things that caught my attention about the whole War was the Austrian Army in action. Now excuse me if my armchair general in me starts to talk, but what I want to know is why they were so bad at doing basic things, like feeding their troops for example.

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I was watching a documentary on the Crusades earlier today and I realized this isn't something that is ever discussed. I couldn't find anything with the search feature, so any information would be greatly appreciated.

I don't know, I just think that, given the might of say, the persians they should have been able to fend off horse archers.

What would of the writers had in the forefront of their mind? (disclaimer - not asking about current gun regulations and that whole can of worms - as this is a historian subreddit - just what did exist at the time in terms of militia)

The Wikipedia page for the siege lists 600 Ottoman defeaters, siting some kind of Turkish blog, that doesn't make much sense to me once translated by google.

Does anyone have any thoughts as to why the post-colonial experiences of Zimbabwe and Zambia have been so different? They were both British Colonies, (North Rhodesia and South Rhodesia) that were founded by the same colonist company established by Cecil Rhodes.

Why then have their post-colonial experiences been so different? Zimbabwe has faced civil war and economic collapse whereas Zambia seems to have built a nation that has matured into a peaceful society with a good economy.

Was it the presence of a larger number of white settlers in Zimbabwe which gummed up things in that country by making it difficult to move forward in independence? Perhaps the fact that the white settlers forced the blacks to go to war before giving up power set up corrosive dynamics that founded the nation on a state ripped apart by war with lots of wounds to heal.

I would love to hear what the historians think.

These countries, if they were determined to fight, seemed basically impossible to defeat. Russia had masses of people and land. It would not have been physically possible for German, with its limited population, to conquer and occupy the entire country.

Similarly, even if Germany did manage to invade England, the British empire still had many parts of the world they could fall back to.

They became the most powerful bankers of Europe, from destitute origins, but the Wikipedia articles I read got extremely hand-wavey about where the initial capital to start a bank came from.

The article on the house says:

The family originated in the Mugello region of the Tuscan countryside, gradually rising until they were able to fund the Medici Bank. The bank was the largest in Europe during the 15th century.

From the page on the founder:

Though he is considered the founder of the rich Medici dynasty, he was not born into a rich family. The little money left by his father was divided between a widow and five sons, leaving Giovanni with little.

Giovanni was somewhat uninterested in politics, unless the issues pertained to his family or bank.

So how did he become so rich, and what's with the elision?

Some areas of Antarctica actually have a very livable climate. The Antarctic Peninsula, for example, has some areas that are quite a bit warmer than Longyearbyen, Svalbard (in the arctic ocean).

There are permanent research stations, of course. But nobody stays more than a year or two. There is at least one industry in the area, fishing, which should be able to support at least a few towns. If nothing else, why doesn't someone decide to spend their life there, just to be the first?