Many things I've read about history of baking and brewing mention peoples using yeast for various purposes. I'm curious however pre-modern era how yeast is obtained in the first place. Is it a by product of another cooking process? Is it found naturally in some places and used for food and brewing? Did communities keep small supplies of it or grow it? Did they know of the many different kinds of yeast?

Hi there Reddit,

My son has just recently turned 10, and is currently diving headfirst into the history world. Recently, he's been firing all sorts of questions on Ancient Rome at me - and I'm ashamed to say a lot of the time I'm left without an answer!

So I'm wondering - is there a well known 'catch-all' book on Rome and the Romans that offer a good first dip into the pool for a lay reader? i.e., one that touches on all the major themes and topics (how rome fell, pompeii, who Caesar was, their armies, etc etc) giving readers a very basic yet far-reaching oversight into the Romans.

He is a VERY strong reader, so ideally I'd like an adult oriented book, and we'd read the book together at bed time.

I checked out the FAQ and booklist though a lot of the books there seem too specific/in depth for our purposes so thought I'd give it an ask.

Thanks a lot!

Hey guys, Just wondering if there are any readily available and translated German accounts of life on the western front fighting the allies post Normandy? Cheers

And if possible I'd like to know if the amount of metal increased during the Renaissance due to new methods, mines, and trade.

Erwin Rommel came up in a bar conversation last night. We both wondered how he died, and went to Wikipedia for answers. We were surprised to find that he was forced to kill himself for participating in a plot. The article wasn't clear on that part, and I am curious if it was a case of a tyrant being paranoid or if there was a plot in which the Desert Fox played a role.

Thanks!

Obviously we see many variations of aliens in movies, but I'm curious as to why and when they were seen to be green and look largely human-aside from having a huge head (in popular culture).

From what I understand, the city government of Geneva only wanted to banish Servetus, but the Calvinists demanded that he be burned. Why were the Calvinists so much more opposed to Servetus than say, the Libertines?

When Germany was being split after WWII, why didn't control of the west go to England and/or France? They were instrumental in the allied war effort and are geographically/historically much closer. I know they did collaborate with the Americans to establish the West, but at the end of the day it was the US sector. Was it just because the US and USSR were the main superpowers at the time and thus got first dibs?

And how effective were their methods?

Naturally I have some bias, but it seems to me that AT LEAST in terms of ease of use, the fork and knife are superior to chopsticks. Why didn't China or Japan develop a similar "stabbing" type of eating utensil, but instead adopted chopsticks? And in South Asian cultures, they simply use their hands and different kinds of bread to basically scoop up food. A spoon or a fork seem fairly simple and primitive, yet immensely helpful. So, why didn't more cultures adopt them?

I have a pretty good idea of how North America was divided politically. I have no idea, however, how Central America came to be divided the way that it is.

If it followed the pattern of North America, it would just be one country. What happened?

As far as I have been able to ascertain, there was growing antisemitism in the United States during the Civil War, and in the Union Grant had even expelled Jews from sections of his staff, but I wasn't able to get any sources regarding the confederacy.

I'm looking into this for a character in a tabletop game, and realized there was a severe lack of sources for this. Any help is appreciated.

There have been many empires during our history, some more successful than others. The British Empire seems to have been a very stable empire for most of its time. What is believed by historians to be the reason for its success at the time of its existence?

It still baffles me how such a tiny nation could control such a vast territory.