He was vastly out numbered by this point, and all Europe was marching against him. Did he believe he could still win? Did he believe he could get better terms than France's natural borders and retaining his throne?

Is that were we get the 'Mammy' archetype?

Aramaic was the language Jesus and his disciples spoke; and it was the primary language of the Levant at the time. Why would the texts of a religion that originates from the Levant be written in Greek? A regular Jew or Syrian would not be able to read or understand Greek.

I'm currently reading John Norwich's history of Byzantinum, and he mentions the spread of malaria in Italy and the subsequent population decline as being a factor in Constantine's decision to move the capital east. Why did malaria suddenly become worse around this time? And was malaria a factor in the long term decline of Roman Italy?

I read a little bit about this only when looking at Chinese history. I wanted to see if anyone had more information on this.

I've married into a small native American tribe, the Lumbee tribe. With thanksgiving right around the corner it has me wishing I knew more about the history of my wife's people (and my future children's history). Anyone have insight on the history of the Lumbee's and other small eastern tribes. What was their culture like? Have a great reference? I've become very interested in the smaller tribes as they aren't well known and often overlooked. Thanks!

I have a lot of friends who've become black nationalists recently and they talk a lot about the Egyptians being black. I've looked it up and there doesn't seem to be much written on it. What I have read basically says that it is impossible to attach modern motions of race to an ancient peoples but that seems like a cop out to me. If that is true, then why? What makes it impossible?

Both have poli-religious groups trying to gain territory and impose religious rule in some way. Is there any similarities?

I'm wondering what the "hot" sectors were historically in the U.S., prior to the rise of Wall Street (and now Silicon Valley). What kind of jobs did the top talent gravitate towards?

I know Iran and West were fairly close before the revolution, and probably US's closest ally in the region besides Israel. As far as I understand they even had exclusive access to some US military equipment that even other allies didn't have access to (F14).

So my question is this, Was there every any interest/attempt from either side to have Iran join NATO?

Hello all,

A friend of mine (who is a teacher) recently posted a link to the Sykes-Picot agreement, with the comment: "The West is to blame for all the chaos in the Middle East, here's more proof". As an amateur historian, I know that conflicts are almost never this black and white, but I don't feel confident enough in my grasp of Middle Eastern history to answer this myself. Perhaps I am completely wrong, but I feel that the conflicts in question are much more complicated than this.

Just to clarify, I'm asking about the modern day consequences of actions taken by Western powers from the colonial era to the end of decolonization (around the time that most Middle Eastern states achieved independence). Thank you in advance!

So here's a multi-part question I'd love to get some more information on, from both the Eastern and Western perspective.

1. In general Western clothing, men's clothing goes left over right, and women's clothing right over left. When and why did this become a thing?

2. In traditional Eastern clothing, robe-like clothing is worn left over right regardless of gender. I have read sources that say that this is to accommodate things being stored in the robe that could be easily accessed with the right hand. Is this correct? As I understand it, in Japanese culture, wearing the robe in the other manner signifies funeral wear. My parents (Chinese-Taiwanese) have told me that the direction of the robe is irrelevant in Chinese culture, and I've had some Vietnamese friends tell me the same as well. Is there any reason that the Japanese have a different view of the direction of fabric folds, or was this a common mentality in East Asia that has slowly faded everywhere but Japan, etc. etc. etc.?

I remember reading an account of an English King who enjoyed fighting in battle so much that he disguised himself as a knight in order to get his hands dirty amongst his soldiers (I unfortunately don't remember his name). How often did this happen? Were there any famous accounts of such things happening and are there any factual accounts /stories that are available to research or read about? Are there any great stories of victory on the battlefield because of brave Kings or Generals taking part or alternately any famous stories of mishaps that resulted in the loss of elite/ royal lives or toppling of kingdoms or empires due to certain overzealous leaders galloping down from the hillsides to their unnecessary deaths because they liked to fight?

I am aware that in most battles, knights would typically avoid conflict with one another for reasons along these lines. Even if a knight is on the other side of the field from you, he is still your 'brother' and fellow Christian, and thus slaying him is of little appeal. Yet why would knights so readily slay peasants and mercenaries, when they too were fellow Christians?

Does anyone have a good resource for learning more on this subject?

We often see Lions on european coat of arms, and even as far back as the Mycynae civilization with the lion gates of Mycynae, and the ancient greek myth of the nemean lion. My question is, how did these europeans know of how lions looked like? Were there any lions in Europe/Greece that went extinct? And even if there were, how did Scandinavians adopt that said symbol?

Long title, I know, and it may not explain my question the best.

So, for a while Fascism existed as a kind of legitimate ideology; at least in the sense that it did have a major impact in multiple countries and gave birth to parties striving to put fascist ideals into practice. After the horrors it unleashed in WWII for the most part Fascism as an ideology kind of just... well, died off. There exists far-right nationalist groups, of course, but as any kind of "legitimate" ideology it has been thoroughly discredit by the wider world and ultimately rejected.

Even today many "fascist" groups generally place an emphasis on racial politics and nativism rather than the other aspects of Fascism such as national fraternity, radical change, opposition to Marxism, so on.

The Socialist movement, comparatively, has managed to survive the fall of the Soviet Union, even if it's been bloodied. You still have some openly Socialist politicians making waves with people, some nations openly aligning themselves based off of "Socialist" economic models, heck you even have a few very light "Socialist" works and views gaining popularity.

What I want to ask is why, by comparison, does it seem like Fascism just up and died as any significant ideology after WWII when Socialism is doing comparatively alright? Both sides horrifying acts committed in their name and both sides suffered a large blow when the major nations pushing "Socialism/Fascism" up and died. Can any Historians point to an exact time where Fascism as an ideology just up and dropped out of relevance? Did any kind of openly Fascist groups anywhere see a light revival during the cold war because of their opposition to Marxism?

I'm intrigued.

The most recent episode of the AskHistorians podcast has the special guest(who's name I have shamefully forgotten) claim that American doctirine was developed from French techniques of pre-testing fire locations and then applying that technique on a much greater geographical scale starting in 1941, implied to be data from across Europe. But what exactly were the logistics of such pre-fire study? Was it tested out before the war? How did they update that data as the war went on?

I'm listening to the audiobook "Bridge of Spies" while I pretend to work and the author makes this claim. I'm aware that it isn't really an academic book though. I did some googling and couldn't find much.

What do historians think about this?