I'm currently working on a short story, and I'd like to know more background to flesh out some characters with just a tinge of credibility. The most I know is depicted it in my mind's eye as an Orwellian dead society with every member hiding with bated breath. I'd love to change my stereotype and ignorance with a more accurate picture.

Sorry if this has been asked- I was just wondering because, well, Siddhartha was fairly thin due to fasting throughout his life and in many Asian countries he's depicted as thin (ex. reclining Buddha in Bangkok), but I feel that in American he is most commonly seen a fat, jolly, happy Buddha (which is not really what he was all about). How did this happen?

Everywhere i look for any information based on the Tainos, something is always missing. No one knows where they really are from, or their personalities, how many, etc etc.I'm very interested in these particular Indians and any information that help me understand them better will be greatly appreciated.

I have an ancestor who was born in 1790 in Rapallo, Italy and died in 1850 in Marseilles, France. I have no information beyond that and his name (Ambroise DeBarbieris). Eventually, his family moved on to New Orleans, LA.

Can anyone with French/Italian knowledge in that time period tell me anything that might give me context for his life?

Apparently France captured Rapallo in the late 18th century, annexed it to the Appennins departement in 1805, and then in 1814 the English freed it and it was given to the Kingdom of Sardinia-Piedmont the following year.

I'd appreciate any information, but I'll throw out some questions:

• Would those events have made it easier for people to travel between France and Italy? Would it have been lucrative to make that move?

• Would his moving indicate anything about his level of affluence and/or profession? For example, were there a lot of poor people moving from Italy to France in order to find new opportunities? Were there any jobs in high demand in France that would have been tempting for foreigners to come take?

• Does his moving indicate that he had moderate wealth (I'm assuming it wasn't cheap to just pack up and move)?

• That side of my family is Catholic. I'm assuming he likely would have been as well? Or were Italians in the late 18th - early 19th century predominately another denomination or faith?

Those are only ideas of what I'm looking for. Like I said, I'd appreciate any information. I realize that none of you can give me definitive information about HIM, and that you'd only be using knowledge of the time/area to make educated guesses. That's totally fine.

The Gauls were thoroughly romanised within a few generations, Atallus III bequeathed his kingdom to Rome and the Italian subjects wanted citizenship rather than independence. All of this leads me to wonder, why was the idea of Rome so powerful?

Given that the way we see that region now, being predominantly one of arid landscapes and deserts, and the descriptions you read about in the Epic of Gilgamesh, being one of forests and farmland.

I'm aware that there are still forests in Northern Iraq, and obviously the land is still being actively farmed, but I'm wondering the level of "lushness" of ancient Mesopotamia, and if there's a contemporary region one could compare the ancient landscape to?

Assuming we use Jerusalem as a "ground zero", what are the furthest recorded Christian communities outside of Europe?

One often sees the photos of crazy, bewildered men who are said to have suffered from shell-shock in WWI. Was shell-shock in WWI different from PTSD as it is known today, due to the specific circumstances of the war? And what happened to these men after the war? Was the mental invalidity rate 100% or more like 10%? Does one know anything about the suicide rate.

The shell-shock phenomenon is mentioned so often and yet one never hears a word about what happened after the war, so I am hoping some historian can educate the rest of us :)

I assume that they were themselves convinced that it would happen, I've been told that Lenin only signed the treaty of Brest-Litovsk since he didn't think it would matter anyway as it was only a matter of time before the world-wide revolution that would reshape borders would come. Yet it seems a little presumptious for them to base their plans for the future on this. How likely was this to actually happen? Were other nations afraid that it would?

I'm at a loss as to why anyone besides the Chinese would have seen their fall as a bad thing for the region or the world.

I'm interested to see what many of the rich merchants did during the war, and how they contributed if at all.

Since you can't derive pronunciations from the way Chinese is written down (or can you?), what do we know about how Chinese has evolved and how do we know it?

This question has been at the back of my mind for a long time. Hollywood movies show that they spoke English, which I believe is strictly for convenience. How likely is it to be true?

Christians from all across Europe marched into the Holy Land to retake it from the Muslims. There were speakers of Romance languages (Old/Middle French, Italian, Catalan among others) and also Germanic speakers (Old/Middle English, German, Norse) along with Slavic and Baltic speakers as well.

How did people from such diverse linguistic backgrounds manage to communicate with each other at a time when English wasn't anywhere near as widespread outside of England as it is today?

Did they use Latin, or French (the two widely used languages of the time) or did they invent a pidgin of many languages after years of continuous interaction?

I am asking about no one Crusade in particular, rather about the years between 1095 (first Crusade) to 1272 (ninth and last major Crusade) in general.

I recently read that there was a town where people randomly started dancing and didn't stop for weeks. Some even died from heat attacks and strokes. I was wondering if anyone has some info on this event, like why were they dancing and how it stopped?

Grant mentions in his memoirs during the Battle of Monterrey (I don't remember the name sorry) one commander leading his men through the buildings (rather than the streets presumably) and incurring significantly less casualties.

With the prevalence of firearms and increasing urbanisation from 1700 onwards were any firm military doctrines set down on how to fight in urban areas? And how do they reflect on what is used today?