I recall that my elementary (public) school textbooks (I'm twenty, by the way) used BC and AD exclusively. By the time I had gotten to high school the texts had switched to BCE and CE.

I'm not Christian myself, but I've always been confused by this change. It takes me a moment to 'translate' when a BCE/CE date was and I was curious if there is some practical advantage to it since the date for the 'Common Era' shift isn't actually any more sensible from what I can tell.

Why is January 1st on the day that it is? In terms of our year-long trip around the sun, the calendar starts seven days after the shortest day of the year. Why then?

Of all the major waves of immigrants to the U.S., the germans seem to have produced the fewest gangs/organized crime groups. I'm sure part of this is because a german immigrant was less likely to settle in a dense ethnic enclave within a major city than say an Italian, but there were quite a few predominantly german neighborhoods in New York, Chicago, Pittsburgh, etc. So what's the deal?

In terms of survival rate, day to day quality of life, expected income, etc.

e.g. the Spanish Treasure Fleet, a pirate captain, a Royal Navy patrol?

a village farmer, city person and knight.

Fish included.

preferably central east europe and Italy or Spain.

I'm rewatching the Second Season of Mad Men and one of the characters told her daughter "do you remember what happened to the girl in Gone With the Wind?" Since I know that the movie came out in 1941, how would a child (roughly eight) have a chance to see it?

I read a while ago in a book on the Russian Revolution(s) that Lenin purposefully overprinted currency under War Communism in order to eliminate the idea of capitalism, or something of that nature. Is this true or was the rampant inflation purely an accidental consequence of War Communism policies or previous events?

In movies it is often depicted that SS members got shot on the spot while members of the Wehrmacht were taken captive. Is there any truth to that?

How legitimate are these memoirs by Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne as a historical source?

From what I've gathered, he exaggerates the close bond the two had but that's all I could find. I'm just looking to figure out if they're worth the read as I picked them up recently for a decent price!

To better explain my questions, nowadays 'conspiracy' and 'conspiracy theorist' are used to negatively portray someone as crazy, nutty and a lunatic. When in reality the terms actually apply to a wide range of people, including daily activities. How did these terms become so misrepresented from their real definitions and how have they become a term that is used to attack peoples credibility, when in reality, a conspiracy could be something as simple as a group of kids planning to key their teachers car or steal from a shop.

I was thinking about the Zimmerman note, and how the US famously had a weak military going into the war. What was the state of the Mexican army? Did they have complicated mobilization plans in case of war with the US?

This is something very controversial between the two nations. I'm natively Polish and was always taught in school that Poles did everything to save the Jews despite being threatened death of their entire family for doing so.

It therefore came as a shock to me that most Jews consider Poles their enemies and pretty much Hitler's collaborators. Needless to say us Poles feel very hurt by this attitude. On the other hand I'm not going to dismiss that attitude out of hand. Where there is smoke there is usually a fire if you get what I mean.

So please tell me the raw story. Were Poles particularly antisemitic before and during World War II? Any worse than other (non Axis) European nations? Thanks in advance for all informed replies.

Sorry about the multiple questions, but it's a concept that I have trouble forming into a singular question. Were Mongol warriors responsible for some / all aspects of their weapons manufacture? Were weapons a large target of pillage? As archery was a large part of Mongol warfare, who made all of the iron arrowheads, and shaft materials?

In John Little's collection of Will Durant's essays entitles 'The Greatest Minds and Ideas of All Time', Durant describes David as:

'a fascinating brigand who made himself rich with robbery, usurped the throne of Saul, stole other men's wives, broke every commandment, and is honoured [falsely] by posterity as the pious author of the Psalms'

Is this view in line with modern academic consensus?