Both in social, public, political, etc.

Hi reddit,

I’m at a crossroad in my career as a historian where I will have to decide between my two great interests, so I’m curious to any insider pros- and cons. I have to choose between Byzantium ca. 600-900 and The Merovingian/Carolingian realm. I’ve done my masters thesis on Byzantine Africa, but have contemplated shifting focus to the Latin West rather than studying core Byzantine History. I’m particularly interested in the reciprocal relationship between State Structure/Administration and societal change/demography.

-sorry for the terrible english

Best Regards Confused Postgraduate

I know most of the history videos and texts I’ve seen and read talk of Nero as one of, if not the, most evil man in ancient history, along with Caligula. I am learning about Ancient Rome from an architectural point of view so there’s a lot of information that I am not being provided in terms of economic and socio-political context which could very well answer my question plainly.

However, I am reminded of Gilles de Rais, Joan of Arc’s commander in the French army, and how to this day he is called a serial killer, when there’s enough theories that suggest he was innocent but condemned as a criminal in hopes of acquiring his land after his death.

Could Nero be a case of this? The fact that he took land from the people of Rome after the fire of 64AD suggests he’s not (and yet I’ve been told that he was popular with the people), but I do wonder how much of him was really evil, and how much was pinned on to him for convenience in his last years as emperor and after he was forced to commit suicide.

At one point most people in Egypt spoke Coptic, today only the Coptic church uses it. I imagine this was because of the muslim conquests and the influence of arab culture, but how did this change happen?, how long it took?, did people try to take measures to save Coptic?

For example, if I'm dividing up world history into 4 parts would this work:

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Prehistory

Ancient history

Post-classical history

Modern history

So I just finished Stowe’s magnum opus (I ashamedly had never read it before now and just knew it as one of the inciting sparks of the civil war). Before I finished the book I had always known Uncle Tom as an insult used to express the belief that a black person is guilty of selling themselves and their community out to the white power structure.

When I finished the book though I was/am very confused since Uncle Tom seems to be an incredibly morale and righteous man who endured but never breaks to the white power structure. Even his last moments are pursuing justice and freedom.

Where did this transition from Uncle Tom to the insult Uncle Tom come from ?

I've asked quite a few Italians about this, and no one seems to know. I am curious since most people think of italian food being inexorably linked to the tomato, which is obviously a new world food.

So it occured to me while reading this quote that he was probably not speaking of chimpanzees, Gorillas or Orang-Utans. So what apes would he have known and where these animals so prominent that that one could use them in writing?

Are there any books on the reactions of people when other people would just randomly die, and they wouldn't know why? Like a woman dies of breast cancer, but they're unaware of what cancer is? So basically a 30 year old woman just dies for no reason. What was their reaction? What was the general consensus of people randomly dying from diseases unknown?

I've heard many theories that monotheism came after polytheism, but how can that be when the religions of the birthplace of humanity, Africa, are monotheistic? Practitioners of AFR say they are monotheistic, believing in a Supreme Creator with lesser spirits to do His bidding.

Who were they?

How did a civilian react to the war starting, how was the economy, and what did they do to entertain themselves?

For example, say I was a Czech living in the Austro Hungarian Empire in 1910. If someone were to ask me where I was from, what would I respond with?

I hope this question doesn't go into the controversial territory of this subforum, but if it does I apologize in advance.

My question is simple: The Holocaust, which was the extermination of millions of Jews living within and outside Germany, which international laws did it break, thus giving to the Allies a legal basis for the convictions of all the Nazi criminals involved? Did the Hague and/or Geneva conventions make a specific mention about the killing of a group of citizens within a country? If yes, which paragraphs? If not, then the "crimes against humanity" of the Nuremberg trials were based on what principles?

Thanks a lot in advance.

I have recently read a few articles, in conjunction with a large portion of historical readings, discussing how women in European societies underwent persecution and oppression due to the spread of Christianity. For example, one article discussed how women were the primary beer brewers until it was outlawed due to the reformation. Some even attribute how, prior to the reformation which made brewing by women outlawed, women wore clothing we commonly associate with that of witches because when in the marketplace selling beer they wore tall pointed hats so they could be seen and stood next to cauldrons full of beer to sell in the marketplace. Even the association of cats with witches may have stemmed from female brewers preferring cats to kill the mice trying to eat the stored grain. I don't want to make a blanket statement, but it appears that when we look at older pagan or pre-Christian societies, we see that women had much freedom and were treated better. They were even seen and held in such regard as to be goddesses, warriors, as well as homemakers and brewers, etc... They were held in very high regard.

Why does it seem that women became a target under the spread of Christianity? I understand that the Christian religion has strong views on gender roles, but why the oppression and attack? Did the church or Christianity view women as a threat for some reason? It appears there was such an aggressive oppression of women and I'm not sure where it came from.

I know he wanted to create a mandate for Armenia after WW1 but he was unable to convince the US Congress to approve of it. So what was his reasoning and did he have any plans for the other Caucasus states?

Often I hear about the Mexicans oppressing the Texans. I hear three main forms of oppression.

1. Mexico wanted the Texans to speak Spanish
2. Convert to Catholicism
3. Have allegiance to the Mexican government

However you rarely hear anyone talk about slavery!

The Texas revolution happened 5 years after Mexico abolished slavery!

Why isn’t Slavery the main cause for the war with Mexico?

Swedish foreign policy during the first half of World War 2 is seemingly dictated by the idea of national survival. They sent volunteers and materiel to Finland to help avoid the USSR from bordering Sweden (as well as to avoid instability as a result of national popular opinions being in favor of helping Finland). They gave multiple concessions to Germany as to avoid a conflict with the country that basically encircled all of Sweden.

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In 1943 however, a policy shift occurred which started with the Termination of the troop transit treaty Sweden had with Germany. As the war progressed and Germany's situation became more and more dire, not only did Sweden undo a lot of the concessions made to Germany, they also made more overtures to the Western allies with trade agreements, the training of Danish and Norwegian 'Police Troops', and allowing US use of Swedish Airbases.

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Why did Sweden choose this route instead of only ending their concessions and agreements with Germany, and returning to stricter neutrality?

Joseph, Moses, the entire Jewish population enslaved in a foreign land - is there evidence of this?

European aristocratic families used royal intermarriage for hundreds of years to create alliances and it seems at some point all european mayor families were genetically related to each other, which caused some issues.

How bad was the impact of inbreeding among them and were they aware marrying relatives could cause unfit offspring as an outcome?

why did nazi germany never attempt to assassinate general zhukov in world war 2?

and would it have changed anything if they had succeded