This can be either directly or indirectly just a military conflict in which both the USSR and US were on the same side.

Depictions of cavalry from steppe tribes (Huns, Mongols, Turkic tribes, etc) occasionally shows them wearing complex full armor that covers both man and horse. How were nomadic peoples able to get access to this kind of armor? I imagine that it would be very hard to build up manufacturing capability while constantly on the move.

I watched the movie Zulu recently and it made me curious as to what an average day was like on an overseas deployment in the British army. I understand that conflict to that scale was probably uncommon but was there smaller scale skirmish’s on a regular basis or were the days mostly spent doing other tasks? If so what were there duties/days like, how long were they deployed, and what did they do in their free time?

A famously cosmopolitan city bridging Europe and the Middle East, Istanbul was the capital of the Ottoman Empire for nearly 500 years through the end of the First World War. Turkey professed neutrality for the majority of WW2, but what was going in the country's largest city?

Spy capital? Refugee hub? Black market trading port? All of the above?

While I've heard that the Sami domesticated Reindeer and that they did so as early as 3000 years ago, I can't seem to find any good sources on the how. Its a large, powerful animal capable of huge leaping bounds that can run far faster than you -- How would you go about getting such a critter to a state where you can ride them, milk them, etc?

Super Smarties, I just finished reading a fiction book and the details are bothering me.

In the book, the wireless operator lives for at least a year if not two (dates given 1941 to 1943, no months) in one place, operating her wireless under the same roof. She is eventually arrested and tortured, but then sent to a camp and allowed to work in the sewing room. She switches the triangles of some prisoners and gets caught and assigned a hard labor detail. She is in the camp for about 18 months.

This really bothered me. It’s my understanding that wireless operators had to be on the move all the time because they were literally broadcasting their whereabouts. And if they were caught they did not get cushy jobs like sewing where they could engage in acts of sabotage again. In fact, most of them seemed to be executed as soon as they got to a camp. The female SOE agents working in France that survived the war either seemed to have gotten out early, were in and out fast, or were couriers. The wireless operators seemed to be on borrowed time with horrible fates.

I know it’s called historical fiction for a reason, but can you help me understand how realistic or far flung this scenario might be?

My thanks in advance.

The book is >!The Dressmaker’s Gift by Fiona Vaply.!<

I only ask as after doing some genealogy I found that my French Canadian side came to the US due to a family member enlisting to fight in 1775 when the US invaded Canada. I am sure I am butchering the actual terminology but hopefully the period I am referring to is clear.

The family member who enlisted ended up getting promoted and ultimately was killed while still fighting in the revolution, which leads me to wonder what sort of consequences his family would have faced back home in Canada? If it helps, the family lived near Montreal. They also ended up leaving for the US a few decades later trying to claim the land they had been promised in the US for enlisting in the army.

I know, most kids are going to change their mind a million times, but he's said he wants to be a historian for about two years now. He currently reads a lot of books (mid-grade non-fiction, or historical fiction) and watches documentaries about topics that interest him-- primarily WW2, and English history.

I have reached out to the local historical center, and while they do have a children's program, it's closed now for obvious reasons. We live in Central Pennsylvania, so I've taken him to places like Gettysburg and Fort Necessity, among others.

What can I do nownto cultivate this interest, and aid him in his intended journey to being a historian?

I am not even kidding, the kid is already asking me what major he should enroll in at college; while I'm trying to get him to slow down, I do want to help him now with this interest.

I want to attempt to teach King Arthur as an overarching background in my English class. This is easy to do from the literary perspective but rather limiting from the historical/seminal perspective, relating to US history.

One of the subjects we have to cover is Seminal Texts/Speeches/ and Non-Fiction texts. I can branch into the historical background of King Arthur, from Geoffrey of Monmouth's Histories of the Kings of Britian, but I want to try and relate it to current, modern, or contemporary politics. The only place I can see this working is with John F. Kennedy and his connection to the Camelot play.

Are there other U.S. figures that have been compared to, associated with, or along the same lines of Arthurian Ideals, that I can use in my historical area? Focusing on seminal documents and key moments in US history.

Thank you so much.

So, I'm aware that the Ottoman Empire and Russia fought several wars over several centuries, leading up to both countries' exhausting themselves in WWI.

Now, since the two countries had such a long-running enmity, would they even bother having diplomatic relations with one another? I mean, I figure they'd at least need to have some means of communication, if to argue over various political incidents, if nothing else.

Or really, on a vaguely related note, what did the history of diplomacy look like? As I've read about various envoys and ambassadors sent to various royal courts, but was there an established system or tradition in place for such a thing? How did we go from "okay let's send Ben Franklin over to Paris to make some friends" to "this building is U.S. territory."

Thanks for the help!

Hawaii and even islands as far as Easter Island were settled by sea faring peoples. Why is the "ice bridge" hypothesis always the go-to explanation for how the Americas were settled when these sea faring people could have easily settled in Central and South America? I also ask this because the Central Americans had more developed stone working and building skills as they had built large pyramids whereas the North American natives primarily were mound builders as if their architectural expertise devolved.

Thank you!

edit: I don't mean the specific history of "/s" but the general intention of saying "my previous statement was sarcasm in case it wasn't clear".

We see pictures of Iranians in the 70's and the style and lifestyle looks progressive, even in today's western standards. They had arguably some of the world's best universities.

Many of these people would likely still be alive today, is there much of a... reformist party I guess in Iran? Or have these people mostly fled?

so in my interest in strange and wonderful stuff i picked up a translation of what is known as "the Greek Magical Papyri" which also includes translations of some demotic and coptic magical papyri. it is known as a collection of spells which have been compiled from various authors and is considered to come from a tradition of working magicians amongst folk as opposed to the priestly magic associated with temples and mystery traditions.

one of the most interesting things about it (other then a creepy ammount of very specific and severe love spells) is that its pretty common to find the one spell reference abrasax, adonai, helios, osiris, among other various gods from completely different traditions in the exact same spell, sometimes even in the same sentence, detailing something recited or inscribed on an object.

this leads me to think that there are many differences in how these gods, traditions, and spiritual theories were treated when this was written compared to modern times, where a christian performing an appeal to god in the form of prayer, sticks with exclusively christian themes, symbols, and words.

so exactly how different was the conception of religion and spirituality when comparing this 'classical world' to the modern one.

I have wondered for a lengthy amount of time. How people in the middle ages did normal day to day things. Did they have nail clippers like us? If so how similar were they. And if not what is an alternative they used.

We all know the trope 'dead or alive' but how did they find the criminal?

I was thinking about the opioid epidemic recently. I did some research and found that heroin was used in the late 1800s in the US as a medical treatment, and that morphine was used medicinally before that. Was it widespread, though? Could Appalachians get ahold of that stuff?

I've done my own research on medicine in the region, and I know that most Appalachians used folk medicine and herbs for day to day ailments, but I don't know if harder stuff was accessible or even available. If it was, was opioid addiction a thing in the 1800s? Did soldiers come home addicted to morphine? If opioids weren't widespread, was there some other addiction? Or was it just liquor/moonshine?

I've searched the r/AskHistorians back catalogue but I didn't see anything. Maybe I'm phrasing things wrong?

I've heard this a few times, and don't really know how to confirm how authentic it is, but why would Japan have weak anti air weapons? I thought they had one of the best navies, so why would they have such poor anti-aircraft weaponry?

Any book recommendations? I want something fact base and not biased like super anti America or pro America.