I mean was there a time where the question was raised of whether Christians should break away from the Old Testament, and if so when was it decisively overruled?

What are the inherent problems and benefits that this school of thought provides? I understand it is an anti-Rankean school of history but are there any massive problems with adopting it as an approach? By adopting Total history is it impossible to provide a historical argument? Are there any massive critics to the school as a historical approach to history?

Guys, I'm hoping to do my post-graduate research on the Habsburg Empire and Central Europe. My German is quite good, I'd say I'm 75% of the way to my ultimate goal of fluency. I'd like to practice reading academic-level German which is quite different from conversational or literary German. I'm looking for notable examples of history written in German. If you know of anything relating to German or Austrian history that would be awesome, but honestly, any well-written or seminal works written in German would interest me. Danke.

Or even just luck.

(... “and what were and are some of the direct consequences?”)

I’ve heard from some that a lot of current conflicts in Africa are the result of colonial powers who almost arbitrarily drew up borders without accounting for groups of ethnicity, religion, and so on.

To which degree is this true, and what are some good stories and sources on the process of delineating the borders? Another way to spin it is to asking how many obvious conflicts we could have avoided with some less arbitrary borders. Not to the size of some of the countries.

Please share as much background information as you want.

Preferably before the twentieth century.

Since their huge army (upon which Britain was counting) was defeated by Germany so quickly, and so early in the war, and it spent most of the war either under total occupation, or occupation/collaboration, why was France given such a place of honor along with the countries that had really fought to defeat Germany? Was it done to give the Western allies a favorable balance of power against the Soviets? (Not that I am discounting the role of the Resistance, and the Free French in London).

I'm taking a course on Middle-High German this semester, and the first week or so, we focused on pronunciation.

The main example I have is from Hilkert Weddige: "Die Diphthonge <ei, ou, ie, uo> und die Umlaute <öu/eu/öi> (für /öu/) und <üe> sind auch als Zweilaute zu sprechen, und zwar wie im Bairischen mit fallender Betonung, z.B. líe-be, gúo-te, br´üe-der. Nur das <iu> ist als im Mhd. ein langer Monophthong [y:], z.B. triuwe." (Mittelhochdeutsch, Eine Einführung, p. 13)

My translation: "The diphthongs <ei, ou, ie, uo> and the umlauts <öu/eu/öi> (for /öu/) and <üe> are to be spoken as two sounds, and, like in Bavarian, with falling stress, for example líe-be, gúo-te, br´üe-der. Only /iu/ is spoken as the long monophthong [y:] (or [ü:]?), like triuwe.

In modern German, for example, /ie/ is pronounced as a long [i:], so how do we know that those were pronounced as diphthongs, while /iu/ is a monophthong?

Mainstream American media and education can still be rather stubbornly anti-communist (whether for good or bad reasons, I can't give a blanket judgment). However, I've always been curious as to how a fair, objective analysis would say about Fidel Castro's leadership and how he's affected Cuba.

Whenever looking at objective measures of how Cuba's doing (ex: educational attainment, health outcomes, level of poverty), Cuba actually seems to be not bad and doing better than many capitalist nations that the US supported during the Cold War (ex: the Philippines, Dominican Republic).

That said, I guess to put my question simply, is Fidel Castro considered to have done a "good" or "bad" job as a leader overall?

While I appreciate that not all Germans supported Hitler, he was clearly very popular at the outset of WW2. Now, though, he is reviled by virtually all Germans. I am curious as to when the majority of Germans stopped supporting Hitler, e.g. was it when the war first began going badly Germany, when Germany itself started being bombed, or later on when the truth about the Holocaust came out?

As a corollary, is there evidence on how most Germans reacted to the news of Hitler's death?

Did either of these theatres contribute significantly to downfall of Imperial Japan?

They're obviously not going to be in-depth scholarly treatises (they come right out and say they're brief), but are they at least factually accurate even if they're condensed and simplified?

It just seems like such a strange connotation, considering most of us in the developed world wouldn't have tried it. "Turtle soup" is not a strange or unfamiliar expression, it's just another cliche that for some reason we've all be brought up with.

When/where did this association first take place?

For example, do churches today (on average) tend to keep a larger share of their offerings for salaries, maintenance, and expansion than in the past? Is there an active dialog concerning this, if it is true?

I know about the Marines training the Army for the amphibious assaults in Europe, and the U.S.S. Texas marines who were going to go and try to help the rangers take the cliff, but were called off at the last minute. But why were there no large units taking part in the land battles like in World War 1? I know most of the Marines were in the Pacific because of the Island hopping campaign, but there was Army there as well, but in Europe it was just Army. So why none in Europe?

It occurred to me that the devastating power of wildfires would make a potent weapon. Has any army ever used large region engulfing fire to any effect in war?

edit: Its amazing to me that throughout history when large scale weapons of mass destruction were few and far between that forest fires didn't come into use very often. I know of crops being burned so I have to believe the knowledge base and tools were there.

Unlike something like churches, most seventeenth and eighteenth century opera houses and theaters I have seen don't have large windows that can admit great amounts of natural light, so how did something like the Teatro di San Carlo work before indoor electric lighting?

Before you go on a voyage of discovery, you need a minimum of the following:

• A rough idea of the area you are going to explore and knowledge of the distance from the nearest supply outpost.

• Enough supplies for the complete trip.

• A vessel and a bunch of crews fit for the journey.

Reading on the internet it seems Polynesians had none (of course I might be wrong), except the part of the crew. Their technology was "primitive" compared to what Columbus had when he set sail---even then he knew(or believed) where he was going. It seems irrational for Polynesians to decide on exploration, with few tools at their disposal since the trip would be akin to a suicide mission. Did they decide to start wandering among the vast stretches of the Pacific Ocean or they sighted land by chance of fate

• So how was such a remote island like Easter Island discovered in the first place? What are the current theories on the topic?

Also what were there social lives like? Were they treated inferior to white people?

One thing that I was quite surprised about is how quick and thorough the Eastern and Western Germans distrusted and disliked one another. It's unbelievable from my standpoint.

How did they both view each other and their contributions to WWII which made them distrust each other so much?

Also, I know that the Nazis were socialists and not capitalists (corporatists is probably what they meant) or communists. The successor nations of Nazi Germany were the E. and W. Germany.

Is it simply because of geography that the Easterners became communists since they were closer to the Soviet Union, and the Westerners became socialist/capitalists like the Western Europeans by dint of geography? Or were the pre-War populations of those areas already intrigued by those economic distribution models the same way that North Eastern Americans like the Progressive Party and the South East Americans tend to like the Conservative Party?

How did the Eastern Germans view their contributions to WWII, and their new Overlords - the Soviets? It must have been awkward to teach the youth that millions died at the hands of the Soviets, yet these Soviets have helped written those same history books. Also, did they view the Soviets as their friends, and the Western Germans as their enemies in your opinion?

Here are my views on this episode: It's almost unbelievable that this even happened. I'm under the impression that the Germans were so upset and apologetic about their defeat that they over-compensated in their defeat. They did absolutely everything and more that their new over-lords wanted from them. It seems that their concessions after WWII were much more deeper than what was asked of them after WWI, at least culturally and (in the east) economically.