Did the surviving peasants just go back to their traditional Chinese beliefs? Convert to other forms of Christianity? Keep their heads down so we don't know?

I've been reading quite a bit about everyday life in Fascist Italy and also a bit on Nazi Germany. It seems that many historians take a top-down approach to discussing what it was like to live under one of these regimes: they quote statistics, provide numerical data, etc (it's all rather quantitative). But since we're talking about something qualitative (experiential and subjective), shouldn't arguments about the lived experience be at least largely based on personal accounts like diaries, letters, memos etc? This then brings up the problem that a majority of people 80-100 years ago did not keep a diary or leave much/anything in the way of written evidence of their life that could then make its way into an archive. For the historians who do consider this qualitative aspect, how do they get around the issue of presumably inadequate primary sources? One historian of Fascist Italy, I forget which one, resorted to using hundreds of police records, but a reviewer commented that he should have found more personal information. As oral history is not much of an option anymore for this time period, what would an 'ideal world' collection of sources for this topic look like? And how feasible would it be in reality?

Jews were generally blamed for anything that would happen all around Europe almost throughout history and anti-semitism was widespread. But was it higher in Germany prior to WW1 or did the backstabbing myth cause more hate for Jews?

Also were there any specific country or region that was a safe haven for Jews in Europe? Where they wouldn't be pogromed or persecuted at every small oppurtunity?

Thanks for the answers/

A point of pride among many Chinese is that life prior to the Revolution was significantly worse compared to the marked improvements in their lives following 1949. But what I wonder is what life was like for those growing up in China? How was government structured and how did it influence the lives of the people?

When the combined forces of Italy, Germany and Hungary invaded Yugoslavia in April 1941 the entire country fell in the space of less than two weeks with only a few thousand Axis casualties (mostly Italian, German casualties do not even amount to 1000 men). However, Yugoslavia had an infamously effective resistance movement afterward, with Axis losses, especially Germans, being many tens of thousands higher than during the invasion proper, and large parts of the country essentially falling out of Axis control due to the effectiveness of various partisan groups. Its said that Yugoslavia essentially liberated itself without need for direct intervention of other allied forces, all this despite major divisions within the country and significant collaboration. What was going on that made a country that seemed to be such a pushover in 1941 such a resistance powerhouse afterward?

It seems that after the expulsion of Jews from Jerusalem in antiquity, most Jewish population centers were located to the west of Israel (around the Mediterranean or in Europe), with the main exception being Mesopotamia, which already had established Jewish populations before the Roman exile. I'm well aware that were also some small Jewish populations to the east in Iran and India as well as to the south in Ethiopia and Yemen, but from my understanding, it seems that the bulk of the Jewish diaspora migrated westward from their homeland. Is there any historical evidence to suggest why this was the case?

Or is it the case that Jewish populations spread outwards from Israel rather evenly, but that hundreds of years of European colonialism and Eurocentrism have changed global Jewish demographics as well as our perception of them in antiquity? In that sense, I'm also curious as to why Ashkenazi Jews are by far the most populous Jewish ethnicity?

If you want a specific date it’s 1890, and I wanted to ask how they worked. Were they located in other parts of the world? Did they work differently than how they work now? Were the initiation rituals the same as they are now? If so, was a regular person able to join the mafia? If so, how would he join the mafia? I can’t really find a lot of information online, and I’m really interested in it.

It's weird how no one seemed to care to venture south to Australia when people got there as early as 40kya (albeit via a land bridge at the time). There was no evidence that the voyages of Zheng He, for example, went to Australia right? Interesting since it wasn't really that far compared to some of the places he went in Southeast Asia, and there's even (dubious) talk of him having made it to the Americas. Or all those boat using, island-hopping peoples in Indonesia and Malaysia... did any of them venture to the Australian continent in pre-modern times? Or the Polynesians?

From what I understand, the Aborigines were pretty much isolated from the world until the arrival of Western Europeans.

There is a lot of information on the perception of how the Ming & Joseon felt toward the Japanese, but not a lot of information on how the Japanese felt towards the Joseon and Ming armies compared to Admiral Yi.

Were the Japanese surprised at the speed they were able to take Korea? Did they expect more pressure from the Korean army? For example; during the battle of Chongju, one Japanese contingent sat aside believing his rival might need assistance against the Koreans, instead he easily defeated the army without much loss.

I understand Hideyoshi himself believed he was going to not only take Joseon, but also the Ming as well and rule from Beijing. But how did his Generals and soldiers feel? What were their impressions of the Joseon and Ming?

How did they feel about the Guerilla warfare tactics of the remaining the Korean army? What were their impressions when the Ming arrived? We know the Ming were still over-confident toward the Japanese, but later on were more careful upon realizing they were a real threat.

Did the Japanese believe they were going to just as easily defeat the Ming army? Did impressions change after the allies retook Pyongyang? And did it change again after the Ming failed to push further and drew a stalemate?

In the wiki, "Li Rusong is often disparaged in Japanese accounts" but not a lot of information in what ways.

Follow up question is what were their impressions of each other in terms of their performance on land?

Any eye opening information would be awesome!

Basically title, but also out of curiosity, how far north were people sighted to be living by English accounts? Were there any cases of ships assuming they were hundreds of miles north of civilization only to be met by indigenous people's?

Most of the easily-available information on Venice and similar states of pre-modern Italy entirely focus on the height of their power, specifically the 15th-16th centuries AD.

However, it seems like Venice was already a powerful state some centuries before this, since they played such a major role in the Fourth Crusade (early 13th century), where they took over half of Greece. Was that their first big break, or was it an exercise of power they obtained from some earlier point?

I know the city of Venice was founded in the very early Middle Ages (697 AD), but it seems to be a long time before they became relevant to history. Prior to the High Middle Ages, the successive empires of the Byzantines, Lombards, Franks and Germans seems to define Italy's history moreso than any indigenous state (besides the Pope of course).

So when exactly did Venice and similar states become a significant regional power, and what were the events that led up to that?

Would a Swivel gun be able to be held and fired by hand? I know that some versions were portable enough on a ship to moved to better firing locations. But would the force of them make it be too much to be hip fired?

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Edit: Thinking of the Nock Gun from the late 1700s and how it could break shoulders of those firing it. Curious how a swivel would compare.

I read an article today that stated Japan has the most powerful passport in the world. I thought to myself of course they do, Who could hate the Japanese?

Then it dawned on me that they had been on the Axis side during WWII. I know Germany and Italy have also recovered well, but I also know that is has been well documented what happened in Germany post war, and that jokes and assumptions are still made about both the Germans and the Italians. I realised I never hear anything of the sort about Japan.

So my question is, how did Japan go from a dangerous and volatile international enemy, to a country literally know for cuteness by most of the world?

Edit: I hope nothing here comes across as xenophobia or anything, I have no problem with any of the above. I am Irish, we're neutral!

I've seen Timothy McVeigh come back on the news after the insurrection with even some news articles speculating that Trump's rhetoric could create a "new Tim McVeigh." The more I dive into what articles I see, there seems to be plenty of White Nationalists and racists inspired by his actions but I find very little about McVeigh's actual views on the topic. The big red flag would be his obsession with The Turner Diaries which seems irredeemably racist but often what's pointed out is the similarity of his attack to the bombing depicted in the book but as far as I can tell McVeigh wasn't interested in starting a race war or even targeting minorities. His gripes seem to be almost exclusively with the Federal Government. At most I've seen claims that maybe he was influenced by the Christian Identity movement but very little to back this up. Anyone have any insights?

Even Germans believe today that Germany was the bad guy of WW2, the things that happened under Hitler were so mind boggling and awful that no sane person could help but say that violently removing him from power was important, but WW2 might have never happened in if WW1 never shook out like it did, and as an American I'm kind of curious if we had some moral reason to fight in WW1 or if it just sorta happened? I don't know enough about the war to say we swung it, probably helped to have a massive injection of manpower, but I know even just before WW2 "European politics is none of our business" was a very popular position in America. So was there some good reason to get involved from a wider human perspective like in WW2 or was it just countries playing politics. If I were an American in 1914 watching the war unfold would I be able to point to something to say "ah, that's why X is the bad guys in this war"?

I recently viewed the historical biopic Lincoln (2012) and noticed the general public forming a line to talk to the President in the White House. I'm not sure how accurate that was, but it seemed very easy to gain access with little security.