On a visit to a local crypt (Gloucester, England), the cryptkeeper discussed the overfill of burials on their holy grounds. The bodies were exhumed, the skull was collected and moved inside the crypts along with the femur and the rest of the bones were disposed of.

The significance of the skull is obvious, but why the femur? This practise appears to take place across countries, religions even continents. Is it just a measure of approx height of the deceased?

would Hitler still be defeated if the U.S and Britain made peace with Germany? did the allied powers really help that much.

The teacher told me that it had to be something that I could write about without it being too narrative-like. The topic that I have chosen is currently something to do with the KKK. At the moment my question is 'Assess the aims and methods of the KKK established in 1865'. However, the teacher is concerned that there is not enough to this question for it to become an investigation, rather a telling of facts. If anybody could suggest a question I could investigate (preferably on the KKK) I would be very happy as at the moment I'm kind of stressing out about it. Thanks

edit: Forgot to mention that the word limit is 2000

Particularly in the era of democracy in Athens...

The origin of the longterm tensions between France and England are understandable given the two nations' intertwined history, but what's the deal with the enmity between France and Germany (which, like with England, has eased since WWII)?

This is going to be A LOT of ...mostly broad questions. I'd recommend that you find the questions you are best qualified to answer

I've heard they used a sort of corporatism/national syndicalism, I've checked the Wikipedia articles on them but it hasn't helped.

-Lets say I'm a car mechanic. In modern America I work for a company that owns and runs these shops, I work and they pay me for that said work and don't have much a say on what goes on there unless there's a union or if I get promoted. I vote whenever elections come about. How is the economic and political side of things different for me being a mechanic in a fascist nation?

-Do models of national syndicalism or corporatism have any merit? Or can they be tossed into the waste-bin along with Hitler's anti-Semitism?

• Were any sort of constitutional rights ever put in place (then just later ignored)? Were they ever proposed? Would it have been possible to legislate and uphold them? Or did even on pen and paper was the government allowed to be dicks?

• I've heard Mussolini was dismissed by the grand council. What was the Grand Council? Did all fascist nations have an equivalent to this? What were their powers? Were they legislative, executive, or both? How would one become a councilor?

• Were any of the fascist nations what we could call economic successes? Could they have been if they decided not to go to war or did certain things differently? Was social welfare raised with "cooperation between labor and industry" or was it just as coercive and unequal as unbridled capitalism?

• Were all fascist, from its philosophical beginnings to its wartime actualization, such traditionalist/reactionaries? Were there a significant amount that weren't religious, racist, or upholding of "traditional values"?

-How similar are the mixed economies of 40s-60s America and modern western Europe to fascist economies?

• Were any aspects of any of those governments democratic? From what I've read on corporatism its supposed to be multiple bodies deciding on how to make economic policies, but is this a democracy or an oligarchy?

If a single sniper could terrorize and demoralize an entire squad, and rack up triple-digit kill scores, a whole army filled with them must be a nightmare to face for a soldier. The chance of being hit by the first shot from an unseen enemy 400m away would dramatically increase.

Sure, it would increase the cost of the gear for each individual soldier, but a tube with two lenses and a crosshair can't be that expensive compared to the intricate rifles and rest of the gear.

And sure, what really made the snipers so deadly might have been their skill with the weapon, but it feels like every rifleman would greatly benefit from magnified optics in a long range fight.

It seems to me that today's American culture tends to focus solely on the Allied invasion of Normandy when discussing June 6, 1944. My question is what else was happening on that day? What was going on at the eastern front? Italy? The continent of Africa? The Pacific Theatre? What were the Allied governments doing at that time?

How did Switzerland, surrounded entirely by Axis territory, manage not to be invaded throughout WW2? What made the Axis powers not just essentially say "Mine now"?

For example, has the F.B.I. ever investigated the activities of another agency?

California, Wyoming, Texas, Tennessee, Wisconsin, etc...surely all names must have an interesting story of origin?

Hello Ask Historians!

Yesterday, on the thread about the Navajo Code Talkers, I got into the conversation about the Atomic Bomb and comparing it to the fire bombings of Japan and which weapon was more devastating.

I made the remark that no one knew the long term radioactive effects of the bomb in terms cancer and radiation sickness when it was first dropped, and that initially the idea of a Single bomb being that devastating was a bigger deterrent than the radioactive component of the bomb long term. A couple of people questioned that remark, and rather than arguing, I wanted to find out the answer here.

My understanding is that had the US known the radiation component of the bomb, they would have protected their scientists at Los Alamos better. (I have heard that most died of cancer some years later)

So... My question is... did the US know of the Radiation ramifications of the Atomic Bomb prior to using it on the Japanese, and was that knowledge known by Japan and other nations as well when the bomb was dropped?

Thank you!

How did a mythological creature lend itself to become a last name?

Hey Historians!

So here's the deal. I am currently a Masters student who has been working on his thesis for well over a year. Some of that is my fault, and some of it is my adviser's fault. I take total responsibility for being a little lazy with my work, but I was a little discouraged... not that it's an excuse or anything, but I am at that point again.

So I had presented my topic, a proposal and an entire thesis to my adviser. I had done this last April, and now I am still editing it, because my adviser either thinks I need to put more stuff in there, which she should have just told me about on the first round of edits, or she is correcting and questioning things she told me to specifically add, word for word.

I am super frustrated at this point. I am at my 5th round of edits, for a Masters thesis. I know it's not uncommon to have edits, but this is becoming ridiculous. She already took 2 months to edit it, and that's only because I kept emailing her.

I knwo I haven't posted anything about my actual thesis, and maybe I am just venting a little bit, but I don't know what else to do, other than the edits. I have done all of them, every single time, which usually required more research and have added an additional 40 pages since the beginning of the process. She has given me until the 22nd of June, otherwise she will be going on a fellows and then I am stuck!

What do I do? Do I ask for a new adviser? Do I ask to try and defend my paper in an open forum? And option one of my class mates had gotten. I don't want to give up because I am already in debt for this degree, but it just seems so hopeless. I am also done with most of her edits for this round as well... So I am trying.