I want to know more about what actually living in the various ages of ancient Egypt was like, not just another source on rulers, armies and burial tombs.

What exactly was the reason behind the allies establishing Israel, after the war in 1948? I have seen some articles about how originally, they planned a Jewish state in Madagascar. I would think that Jews having their own state, would put them in more danger, as outside forces could try to push them out like in the multiple Arab Coalition wars, and start a 2nd holocaust.

Why was it so important to give the Jewish people a state, even though the Nazi's were defeated?

What even is the history of lingerie?

I ask this because, it seems to me that the Mughals seem to be the most tolerant of empires even under Aurangzeb among these empires since as Hindus, Jains, Christians were given freedom of religion and their houses of worship protected albeit with the burden of extra taxes. Also, Hindus nobles served in the Mughal empire as administrators and soldiers even under Aurangzeb. I don’t think there is anything comparable to other empires Muslim or European like that. Even the Ottomans lauded for their tolerance forcibly converted Christians who served in the empire like Janissaries. Also, the Portuguese inquisition in Goa seems to be far more severe than anything the Mughals did.

I’ve been watching Vikings recently, and one of the major plot points centers around the belief and warship of the Norse gods, as opposed to the Christian warship in England.

Watching the show now has me wondering, what was the last large civilization that was polytheistic, what gods did they believe in, and when were they in power?

Throughout history there’s plenty of large civilizations that were polytheistic, the Romans and Greeks being the first two that come to mind. Did the monotheistic religions just sort of take over through colonization? I assume that the Crusades were a major part of why so many of these older “pagan” religions went out of style. But I can’t seem to find an exact timeline of when polytheism stopped being prevalent in larger society.

I’m curious as to what the last large polytheistic civilization was and what/who they worshipped

Britain fought the opium wars with China and won some trade and territorial gains. They famously colonized Hong Kong. But why did they stop there? Surely it would have been more beneficial to the empire to completely colonize China so they could dictate trade policies and territorial matters the way they did in other parts of the empire. It seems like China could have been just as much a jewel in the crown as India was. Were they not capable of it? They won the opium wars so they must have enjoyed some level of military superiority. Were the Chinese better prepared to resist colonization than the Indians? Have I overestimated the potential benefits of Chinese colonization?

While I'm aware Greek thought, literature, and sciences were important influences on Arab society even before the expansion, much work seems to have been done in translation, and while Persian texts were of course translated into Arabic, Persian language also became the literary language of elites all over mainland Asia for several centuries. While emirs from Algiers to Bukhara were reading the Shahnameh in Persian, it seems only a few were reading the Iliad in Greek. Why?

Japan was a closed country for most of the Tokugawa shogunate, having very limited contact with outsiders. After Commodore Perry's arrival and the forced end of the closed country policy, did Japan suffer introduced diseases from contact with the outside world?

I could imagine Japan suffering much like the Aztecs did, with Eurasian plagues striking that they were isolated from before. But I could also imagine that those plagues remained endemic in the Japanese population throughout the whole closed period, so reopening contact didn't introduce much new.

Before the adoption of an Arabic script, the Achaemenid, Parthian and Sasanian Empires primarily used Aramaic or even Greek rather than their native Persian as a language for their writings, and even when they used Persian, they often preferred to use cuneiform or the strange Pahlavi script. Why did Persia seem to neglect their native Persian language for written communication?

I can understand why would Clovis do this but why would his heirs and their descendants keep up the practice generations after generations?

Once a king reunified the kingdom by battling his brothers he would divide it upon his death to his children who will then repeat the circle for generations. And in the end since the winning kings needed the support of the magnates to win the crown he give them concessions and little by little the king's power erode and he only become first among equals (if he is still independent and not a puppet).

In hindsight it feels so easy to understand it feels like the natural course of things, did nobody at the time saw it coming?

Basically, when did the death of Jesus become the standard for year zero in Europe? Is there any documentation as to why?

What would the accent used prior to the colonisation of North America have sounded like? Was it similar to what's now known as the British accent or was it an entirely different accent that has evolved on both sides of the pond and now doesn't exist at all anymore?

NATO is not only a defense alliances of various countries with the US but among each other as well. In contrast to this, US allies in East Asia tend to mainly be allies to the US, with weak, if any, agreements with the each other. Why is that?

so I found out yesterday that my grandma's dad was inte the continuation war and I want to know more about it since I can't find very muuch online, maybe someone here knows something about it

my grandma's dads name was Holger Arne Båtman, he was from finland and died in my home town.

I want to make a documentary about Holger but I need more info about the war itself, Holger was inte the Jäger battalion

This is something my father said all the time. Is it true?