I need to find a book on Mormons!

I can't find a reputable history on early american Mormonism, but I would really like to learn more about the history around the movement.

5 Answers 2014-09-25

What were some influential documents written in between 1500 and 1700?

1 Answers 2014-09-25

What books would you recommend on your era of expertise

1 Answers 2014-09-25

Accuracy on bombs dropped on Britain during WWII? Trying to do some math on the subject.

The reason I'm asking is I'm trying to do some of the math behind the payload that is in accordance with what was dropped. Checking wikipedia it's stated that it was about 100 tonnes.

Using google I get the conversion of 100000 kilos = 220462 lbs. This means that roughly 5 B-2 bombers with full payload (2 internal bays for 50,000 lb (23,000 kg) of ordnance and payload) have the ability to cause the same damage that was done in roughly 8 months (September 1940 and 21 May 1941).

1 Answers 2014-09-25

Can You Please Direct Me to Educational and Thought Provoking Podcasts Which Address Military History?

I'm suffering from a paucity of wasted and hopelessly repetitive material already well known to the public. I want to dig much deeper. Thank you

2 Answers 2014-09-25

How did the political layout of Mesopotamia change over time?

I'm pretty confused currently on how the whole changing of states and rulers took place in Mesopotamia. Ask if something needs clarification because I'm kind of having trouble with this.

This is what I thought but am not sure:

You had the settling of people in the "fertile crescent" which could be divided into Phoenicia, Assyria, and Mesopotamia. Though I have seen maps where it appears Mesopotamia was split into Akkad and Sumer at one point in time. Then Sargon of Akkad conquered and united Akkad, Sumer, and part of Assyria into the Akkadian Empire (missing anything?). Was this then the end of major events in Mesopotamia or was there more?

Side Note:

Did all of these places share the same basic religious ideas and origin stories for their societies? More specifically did Sumeria use the same origin story as Mesopotamia?

4 Answers 2014-09-25

What happened to Peers from the colonies after the American Revolution.

I was wondering if all those with hereditary titles living in the Colonies after the American Revolution left or if any gave up their titles and stayed.

1 Answers 2014-09-25

What were the most important documents written between 1500 and 1700?

1 Answers 2014-09-25

Japanese hair decorations at the end of the Edo period - motoyui mizuhiki yokiri etc

Hi there,

I'm a paper conservation student in London.

http://imgur.com/a/xnc1S?#0

I wonder if anyone can help me with any background information about these Japanese paper strings. They were used to tie and decorate hair or wrap gifts (money ones). I don't read or speak Japanese so some of my research has not been so fruitful.

As part of my MA in Paper Conservation at Camberwell I was fortunate to get the chance to conserve and rehouse a group of Japanese paper strings used for tying and decorating hair and money gifts. They were lent to the college’s conservation department from the Economic Botany Collection at Kew Gardens which holds a small portion of the Sir Harry Parkes Collection. This collection, containing samples of almost all of the Japanese papers that were manufactured at that time, forms part of the report sent by the British Consul Sir Harry Parkes in 1871, from Tokyo. As requested by Prime Minister, William Gladstone for the purpose of stimulating the struggling paper industry in Britain. The report ended up in the Kensington Museum (later to become the V&A) after passing through the concerned government offices. And, after word had spread of its existence, samples were requested and received at Kew Gardens.

I'm interested in the cultural/social history of these objects. How they were used; was there any meaning behind the various types/colours; local variances.

edited for clarity

Parkes Report

V&A collection

1 Answers 2014-09-25

What was the view of the more uncivilized regions of Europe (Mainly the Baltic tribes and Scotland/Ireland) during the Early Middle Ages?

And I mean from the point of view of the Franks, the Byzantines, and what not

1 Answers 2014-09-25

When and How did conscription get accepted in Nations like Singapore and South Korea?

1 Answers 2014-09-25

What were the reasons behind The Chinese Warring States Period? What caused them to start and why did they go on for almost three hundred years?

I understand this is probably a huge question with no one answer, since it is a period that lasted for almost 300 years and historians don't even agree on the year they began.

But what were the initial reasons for them, then? What was going on in China at the time that caused such an exhaustingly long age of state? What kept these wars going on for so long?

Thank you.

1 Answers 2014-09-25

[For all specializations] Are there any noted historians writing essays about the "experience" of being a historian...

...and/or the personal, cultural, spiritual implications they find through their knowledge and experiences. Or perhaps in History of history (but not in a technical or didactic frame)?

I'm broadly educated and looking for well-informed but non-specialist work.

Thinking of things along the lines of the essays of anthropologist Loren Eiseley (many titles) or neurologist Oliver Sacks (The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat and Other Clinical Tales).

EDIT:

Many thanks to everyone who has taken their time to make recomendations and explanatory comment.

As of ~10:30am CST Friday, below is a list of suggested reading from this post:

Books:

Barbara Tucuman - Practicing History

Gordon Wood - The Purpose of the Past

Greg Denning – The Death of William Gooch

Natalie Zemon Davis - A Passion for History: Conversations With Denis Crouzet

Marc Bloch - The Historian's Craft

Jan Vansina - Living with Africa

Toyin Falola - A Mouth Sweeter than Salt

J.G.A. Pocock - The Discovery of Islands (and others. See u/talks_like_farts below)

Geoff Eley - A Crooked Line: From Cultural History to the History of Society

J. H. Elliott - History in the Making

Carl Schorske - Thinking With History: Explorations in the Passage to Modernism

John Lewis Gaddis - The Landscape of History

Peter Novick - That Noble Dream: The 'Objectivity Question' and the American Historical Profession

Articles and Essays: (Journal citations by posters):

Jill Lepore, "Historians Who Love Too Much: Reflections on Microhistory and Biography", in the Journal of American History, June 2001. (Found online as PDF)

Mary Lindemann, "Confessions of an Archive Junkie" Essay, 1992. (Located in a collected book of essays, but not as a pdf online.)

Bonnie G. Smith, "Gender and the Practices of Scientific History: The Seminar and Archival Research in the Nineteenth Century," American Historical Review 100, No. 4 (October 1995), 1150-1176.

.

Thank you, Everyone, once again.

10 Answers 2014-09-25

Looking for help to gather a bibliography about history of some specific buildings.

Greetings, I don't know if this kind of question is allowed here but I read the FAQ and didn't see anything related to it that would forbid me to post. Sorry if this is not the right place. Anyway, I have an assignment to my material classes at the architecture course and I need to analyze the technology used on its construction and how the following buildings were erected:

  • Segovia's Aqueduct
  • The Pantheon, Rome
  • Sagrada Familia, Barcelona
  • Hagia Sophia, Istanbul
  • St. Louis Arch
  • Arkansas' Crystal Palace
  • A cable-stayed bridge in São Paulo (this one is more specific)

So far, I've read the book "Why buildings stand up" by Mario Salvadori and I was wondering if you have further recommendations. Thank you.

2 Answers 2014-09-25

What's a good nonfiction book about Slavery (Doesn't have to be related to North American Slavery)

I'm taking my seminar class and I need to find a book on slavery and write a scholarly book analysis on it, but I don't know where to begin. It can feature any example of slavery through out human history. I'm looking for something on the shorter side because I'm currently drowning in reading anyways. So if you know any interesting books on the matter i'd appreciate it if you could let me know what they are.

17 Answers 2014-09-25

At what point would a classical era composer bring in other musicians during the writing of a symphony?

I know that this would be based on personal preference and very between composers, but at what point would a composer bring in the strings and wind instruments intended to play a symphony they had written? Would they bring in strings half way thru to see how it sounds? Or did they just imagine the sounds in there head?

1 Answers 2014-09-25

How much military/political/cultural diversity was there in ancient China? For instance, how distinguishable were the Three Kingdoms from each other?

A perennial question in r/totalwar is "Why is there no Total War: China game?" In the latest go round I spotted this comment:

If they did China alone, it would not be diverse enough. Even with all the different cultures and ethinicities in "China", they all had a single, general cultural, militaristic, and administrative system. If you look at the Qin, the Han, the Manchus, and the Zhuang, they're going to be pretty much the same in everything but ethnicity.

This attitude struck me as rather ignorant, but also made me realize that I am too ignorant to refute it, as I know basically nothing about Chinese history beyond a vague timeline of emperors->mongols->westerners->communists.

Kindly correct my ignorance! How different was the military and political organization of one Chinese state from another? I chose the Three Kingdoms period in the title because it sounds interesting, but I'm open to hearing about any chapter of Chinese history.

1 Answers 2014-09-25

What is the oldest reliable example of mass income inequality within a civilization or city?

1 Answers 2014-09-25

There is a common conception that stress in the modern era is at an all time high. Was chronic stress really ever less prevalent in the past?

1 Answers 2014-09-25

[Archaeology][Arctic History] How much do we know about the demise of Dorset culture.

The only explanation I seen that is that some climate change that caused mass starvation. Do we have any evidence about what kind of climate change took place? Is there any other hypothesis about the demise of Dorset culture?

3 Answers 2014-09-25

What was the natural course of epidemics in the ancient and medieval world? How were they dealt with by the general population before the establishment of structured responses like the CDC or the WHO?

1 Answers 2014-09-25

In history we hear about big people who cause big changes Adolf Hitler,Martin Luther,Alexander the great, Genghis Khan and Suleiman the magnificent are all noted for doing amazing things but would all of the things they are noted for doing not have happened if they never rose up to power?

1 Answers 2014-09-25

Suggested reading on the adoption of Christianity by the Roman Empire and it's effects on both?

Working on a research paper and really not overly familiar with Eastern European/Early Christianity and not really sure where to start my research.

Any advice/suggestions appreciated.

3 Answers 2014-09-25

How did the concept of the nation-state develop in Asia? (More specifically China and Mongolia)

3 Answers 2014-09-25

How many women smoked cigarettes prior to the famous 1929 "Torches of Freedom" marketing campaign by cigarette companies?

From the [wikipedia article on Torches of Freedom] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Torches_of_Freedom), it states that:

"Yet some women who were already smoking were seen as smoking incorrectly. In 1919 a hotel manager said that women “don’t really know what to do with the smoke. Neither do they know how to hold their cigarettes properly. Actually they make a mess of the whole performance.”[1] Tobacco companies had to make sure that women would not be ridiculed for using cigarettes in public and Philip Morris even sponsored a lecture series that taught women the art of smoking.[1]"

What % of women, prior to the 1929 Torches of Freedom campaign, actually smoked? I am sure it was a minority but I would be curious to find out if any of you have specific numbers on this. Thanks!

1 Answers 2014-09-25

6276 / 7255

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