Who was he, how did the legend develop, and how much of it is based in reality.

I heard from a couple of people that you were approached about this and refused.

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Default status can be the death knell for a small community, at least where quality is concerned, and though I think the mod team here would have the best results out of anyone on the site in keeping things going properly in the face of the default hordes, I wouldn't wish that kind of work on anyone and am not confident that it could be kept up for long.

I like /r/AskHistorians the way it is. I hope it stays that way, or at least very close to it, for a very long time.

Source: Barber, Richard; Barker, Juliet (1 January 1989). Tournaments: Jousts, Chivalry and Pageants in the Middle Ages. Boydell. pp. 134, 139.

I know allied soldiers smoked (and that cigarettes were part of army rations) but what about Nazi soldiers? If they smoked, where did they get the cigarettes, and were they punished if caught red handed?

I've exhausted my Google powers looking for information on the transition from Pagan to Christianity in Wales... Most things I've found are along the lines of "By the withdrawal of the Roman administration in the early fifth century it is likely that Christianity had become the dominant religion throughout the province." Are there any solid accounts of the interaction between Pagans and Christians in this period?

Hello everyone, i am a amateur math and science historian. I only basically know the major figures. But, i want to know more, and i was wondering if there are any historians who know a great deal, on this 'era'. For example like texts to read on the library of Alexandria, and the mathematicians who worked there. Pythagoras, any thing else related. These sorts of text. I have been searching for, but i wonder which you recommend, are the most reliable to get a full understanding.

Just wondering - I dont really see an obvious root.

I have scoured the internet for this point of Portugal's history but I can only find reference to the Peninsular War and what the armed forces were doing.

Was the there a steward? Or was it left to a few courtiers/lords left behind?

I know their army was pretty much put under the command of the British but who was there to sanction these kind of actions and surely someone worked closely with the British in Lisbon?

This is a rather detailed add on question but where would this de facto government be based? In the royal palace?

I'm a native of SWVA and always thought this was curious. While the rest of Virginia was full of large estates and had a large number of slaves, my understanding is the western part of the state (including modern WV and the southwest of VA) was economically and racially distinct - having primarily small-plot farmers and far fewer slaves.

In my experience the Appalachian/Blue Ridge mountains are a bit more rugged in WV than VA, was this part of it? What caused the yeoman farmers of the southwest to throw in their lot with the confederacy?

I was just wondering about the Greek armour, I know most of it was made of bronze, but how would it have been strapped on and how did it work? Would it have been easy to wear and light, or a little heavy? (Perhaps some sort of comparison) How much other armour would they have worn along with this bronze plate, like any chain or leather? Thanks in advanced.

It seems like peasant revolts were unlikely to succeed in most places, but China seems like an exception. The Han were perhaps not destroyed by the Yellow Turban Rebellion, but it was probably one of the biggest factors in their downfall. The Yuan were likewise largely overthrown by popular resistance from the White Lotus / Red Turban rebels, and the Hongwu Emperor himself was from a peasant background.

This seems like it's pretty different from most other places in Eurasia: a Japanese shogun might have worried a little about rebellious peasants, but they didn't regularly pose anything like the potential threat posed by rebellious daimyos. Likewise an English king was more likely to fear rebellion among the baronial class, a Roman emperor feared powerful generals/governors, a Persian shah feared his brothers and perhaps satraps, etc.

I'm not saying that peasant revolts are a complete anomaly outside of China, nor am I saying that the sorts of elite rebellion that seem more common outside of China are completely absent within it (such as the An Lushan revolt), but overall, it seems like in China instability came less from elite rebelliousness and more from popular rebelliousness than elsewhere. Is this perception accurate? If so, why?

I'm pretty sure we have other artifacts from the period say 0-100 AD, but to my understanding there are no Bibles. Wouldn't this give us a more authentic look on the Bible's original message if it ever skewed away from such?

Many of the great rivers of Asia (Indus, Ganges, Brahmaputra, Mekong, Yangtze, etc) developed enormous populations dependent on them. In fact some of these rivers were cradles of civilization. Yet it seems like the Mississippi River was never exploited in this way by Native Americans. Why was this difference?

As an anarchist, I recently got into a Facebook argument with some Maoists over their support for the Shining Path. I brought up the mass killings of villagers, public decapitations, and other assorted atrocities. After initially claiming I was just racist against indigenous peoples, they brought up the anarchist CNT, saying they killed more priests and nuns then the Shining Path killed innocent peasants.

So, who's right? Which organization committed more war crimes?

Hey Reddit historians,

This summer I am taking a course titled "Fascism & Nazism" at a local college in my area to make up for a missing credit. I haven't studied World War II since 9th grade, and I was wondering if you guys could offer some suggestions for a comprehensive or particularly acclaimed book to refresh my memory a bit and prepare me for the material. I'd like to have a head-start before the class begins. What do you think?

So this is sort of silly, considering I'm getting the info from an unsourced George Carlin book (fairly sure it was Brain Droppings, but maybe Napalm & Silly Putty), but he states indigenous Americans are not called Indians because Columbus thought he landed in India. He claims back then, India was called Hindustan, and Columbus called the natives "a people in God" (even though they were considered heathens) which translates to "un pueblo en Dios", and the "en Dios" part is the origin of "Indian" to describe Americans.

So... does any sort of record exist proving this correct? What is the etymology of the word "Indian" or "India"?