Just as a heads up, Oxford University Press are having a sale on their website. There's a promo code (AAFLY6) for added savings.

Which means that my resolution of not adding to my pile of unread books has just gone out the window.

Hi AH! Great if belated news: mrs jschooltiger had our son on Jan. 2, two weeks ago today. All are doing well after bouts with high bilirubin and preeclampsia -- we've been home a week and he's gaining weight like a champ.

Made the horrible mistake of reading too much theory this week. Always leaves me with the sense that history in general and ancient history in particular is a house of cards built from "rational belief" rather than any real knowledge.

sigh I just want the conviction that historical "truth" amounts to more than labored rhetorical justification of ideology. Is that too much to ask?

I have some unanswered questions for last year, and since they didn't receive up votes, reddit now won't let me repost them in this sub.

When and why did it become masculine to not ask for directions?

I heard once in college that "Christianity is the last great invention of the Greeks." How true is that statement?

In Esther and Daniel, it claims a king's decree could not be changed. Was this true in Persia? Other Middle Eastern kingdoms? Anywhere?

How common were unwed pregnancies in the ancient world, say, 2000 years ago? Would an unwed and pregnant Mary have been strange or about as normal as today?

And a new question: How dangerous was the job of cup bearer?

Thanks in advance if I get any answers.

Part II of my discussion of the newly-released Oppenheimer transcripts is up and online. In this part, I discuss what was deleted from the transcripts, and what the record of deletions tells us about the mind of the Cold War censor.

If the site is slow, it is because the blog is getting hammered as a result of being listed as a reference for "uranium screws" on today's Explain XKCD.

Everyone be sure to check out this week's installment of "Better Know an Historian" with /u/AlanWithTea.

So a few weeks ago I made a post on Roman counter insurgency. This week I was l poking through the upcoming BRILL catalog and saw that there is a book with that very title coming out in November. This is not the first time this has happened--a few weeks after I had a discussion on merchant organization my library got a copy of Merchant Communities in the Roman World.

The only logical conclusion is that I am a wizard able to manifest monographs out of reddit posts. Anyone need a topic covered?

What is the worst thing you've read about a historical figure you thought you really liked?

edit: dear mods, could this question be a post?

So with the encouragement of my fellow flairs, I've decided to make a little personal project of compiling a "whaling historiography". I've never attempted something like this before, so I'm excited to the things I will discover and learn (as a constantly admitting amateur) about the historians' craft.

I thought I would try to share my process by posting weekly updates on my findings/developments on the Friday threads. Ideally, a finalized product would be a gathering of "whaling literature" to be posted to our booklist, or at least on my personal flair page. Any input would be greatly appreciated!

I suppose, then, the most appropriate question to ask in this introduction of sorts is this: What is whaling history?

At it's core, Whaling History is the examination of humanity's exploitation and use of whale populations as a natural resource, ranging from before recorded history to the present day. Beyond that, Whaling History encompasses a wide variety of fields and lenses from which to view it from. What this means is that, while it's core might be what I mentioned earlier, it is ultimately, in my view, the history of the relationship between humanity and whale species.

What I mean by this is that, unlike most maritime and fisheries histories, whales have held an important place in human culture throughout history. It has to be one of the most polarizing creatures in human conscious, ranging from radical views of whalers and industry insiders seeing whales as solely an economic profit to the radical views of environmentalists that see it as a near-equal to the human race, and every view in between. It is a literary and artistic animal, a creature that symbolizes many things to many cultures, an animal that ~150 years ago was being written as a foe of man to it's present promotion as a friend of man. The Whale is a cultural animal.

Therefore, the name "Whaling History" is in itself a bit of a misnomer, especially with the development and adoption of environmentalist rhetoric in the 1960s/70s. Whaling History has become as much about the whales as it has been about the whalers. Additionally, Whaling History is as much of an industrial history as it is a cultural history, as much of a social history as it is a natural history.

What does this mean for my attempt at forming and sharing a "Whaling Literature"? Ultimately, it will be incomplete. That I am sorry for, but I made that realization at the start. It is no secret that whaling history is incredibly slanted towards Western industrial practices, with a few exceptions in aboriginal and Asian studies.

While I strive for partiality and the revelation of all information, it is apparent that the current literature has been dominated largely by Westerners regarding Western history, or Westerners discussing other cultural and national histories of whaling. While unfortunate, it also gives me a chance to examine and discuss why this is the case, and also double my efforts to bring non-Euro/American sources to light.

I intend to lay the groundwork of this project and shape the start of this journey around this question: Why whales? Hope you'll stick around!

First week of classes has gone well. This semester I'm taking a class on the social history of the Soviet Union and a lit/history class about Ireland, which is fun. It'll be interesting to learn about them at the same time and see the differences and similarities that emerge.

Going to declare my history major soon!

So, I finally bit the bullet and bought an 8" Samsung Note tablet. I have progressive deterioration that makes proper writing difficult to keep legible, and it's a pain to bring a full-blown laptop anywhere. Has anyone used an active-stylus tablet (not the capacitive sort like the iPad or most Android tablets) for note-taking in archives and the like? What's your experience been? This is a new world for me (and a $200 experiment), so I'm open to advice.

Did anybody here attend the history program in the University of North Carolina- Chapel Hill? Any thoughts/views on your time spent there and the professors there?

Thanks to a strange confluence of dates and official policies, my first teaching of the term does not begin until this evening. It's a class I've taught many times before (even in the same room!), but never in such an uncongenial timeslot. I can rest easy in the knowledge that either nobody will show up or that everyone who does will be very keen indeed.

So a while ago in these comments I promise a fellow redditor I'll translate the epic premonition poem from the great seer king of Kadiri, Sri Jayabaya.

This isn't the full poem, though. This part is the most popular since it contains the prediction.

Here goes.

In the future when carriages move without horses

The island of Java draped with iron necklaces

Ships flying in the sky

Rivers lose their springs

Markets are enveloped by solitude

Hearken, o people, that Jayabaya era has come

.

The Earth shrinks overtime

Every inch of the land shall be taxed

Horses eat what they do not eat

Women dress as men

Hearken, o people, that the era of disaster has come

.

Promises go unfulfilled

People violate their own oaths

Blaming each other

Ignoring the law of Sang Hyang Widhi

.

Villains shall be honored

The pure shall be detested

People shall regard money as the most importance

Forgetting humanity

Forgetting faith and kindness

Forgetting siblings and family

Fathers shall forget their sons

Sons and daughters shall disobey their mothers

Challenging their fathers

Siblings betray each other

Family members become suspicious of each other

Friends become enemies

People forget their origins

.

The king shall punish unfairly

Officials corrupt and vile

Conducts malicious and bizarre

The good hearts are disadvantaged

Working legally shall become embarrassment

.

Deceitful words becomes primary means

Desiring luxurious life

Indulging perverseness, nourishing lustful desires

.

The righteous shall be dazed

The wrongful shall be light-hearted

The kind shall be refused

The vile shall be promoted

The glorious shall be humiliated

The malicious shall be praised

.

Women lose shame

Men lose manliness

Men no longer wish for wives

Women no longer obey their husbands

Mothers sell their flesh and blood

Women hawking their bodies

Couples swing their partners

.

Women shall ride horses

Men shall ride sedan chairs

Two widows worth a penny

Five virgins worth five shillings

Lame widower for nine pennies

.

Knowledge are sold for money

People claim what they are not

White outside, red inside

Pure to be seen, fake within

Deceit and guiles are abound

Rain comes at Summer

Old virgins shall be rampant

Widows shall give birth

Small ones shall look for their fathers

.

Religions are opposed

Humanity becomes nonexistent

Sacred temples shunned away

Immoral houses strewn across

Strumpets are far and near

.

Curses shall go rampant

So shall traitors

Children eat their own fathers

Siblings eat siblings

Friends become enemies

Teachers are despised

Neighbors suspect each other

Wraths shall worsen

.

Whoever knows, burdened

The ignorant blamed

When war breaks

From the East, West, South, and north

The righteous suffering

€The vile becomes happier

.

Hearken, o people, for when that time comes

Ravens shall be called herons

Wrong shall be seen as right

Treachery shall be felt as good

Evil becomes perfect

.

The corrupt promoted

The innocent chained

The noble imprisoned

The foul reigns

The honest suffers

.

Merchants drowned

Gamblers rise

Many things are unlawful

Many bastards being born

Women propose to men

Men disparage themselves

.

Goods are wasted

Although many people are hungry and naked

Buyers haggle with sellers

Sellers play afoul

Good fortune as though winnowing rice

.

The agile escapes

The fallen grumbled

The great becomes lost

The small slips

The haughty stumbles

The coward dies

The daring graced

The craven suppressed

The inconsequent prospers

The careful groans

The insane bountiful

The sensible thinks

.

Farmers are bound

Liars sing

Kings break their promises and lose their authority

Ministers become laypeople

Laypeople becomes aristocrats

The foul becomes great

The honest receives disaster

.

Houses are put on horsebacks

People eat their own kind

Children forget their fathers

Elders forget their age

.

Merchants sell their goods

But lose their treasures

People die hungry next to food

The rich live in sufferings

The insane primps up

The hunchback marries

The fair and sensible shunned

.

War breaks out within

Officials misunderstand each other

Crimes go rampant

Criminals far and near

The kind suffers

.

People die from war

Confused and burnt

The righteous becomes dazed

The wrongful celebrates

.

Treasures vanished untraced

Ranks disappear

Many unnlawful goods, many bastards

Be fortunate o you who forget, be fortunate o consciousness

Yet no matter how fortunate

The watchful shall become the most fortunate

.

Wrath and lust worsen

Confusion breeds everywhere

Merchants become prevented

Laborers challenge employers

Employers become bait

.

The loudest become influential

The smart disturbed

The malicious indulged

The sensible disappointed

.

Treasures becomes disease

Ranks become riveting

The arbitrary wins

The yielding gone awry

The faithless becomes king

His prime minister a gambler

.

The pure hated

The bootlicker glorified

Extortion ripened

Thieves sit fattened

.

Hens roost on yokes

Thieves challenge house owner

Bandits become braver

Robbers are celebrating

Protector slanders protegee

Guards steal the loot

Trustees beg for trust

.

People drunkenly pray

Scurry for winnings

Wraths worsen

Religion challenged

Perverseness exaggerated

Law disobeyed

Humanity stomped

Ethics disregarded

.

People become insane, losing their senses

Small people shunned

Victimized by the great malevolents

.

Hearken, o people, for when this time comes

Shall arrive a mighty king

With his multitude of soldiers

Reigning over a country one eights the size of the whole world

.

Bribe receivers far and near

The vile accepted

The pure hated

Tin are seen as silver

Gold are seen as bronze

Ravens are seen as herons

.

The sinful peaceful

The commoners blamed

The unemployed falls over

The diligent tripped

.

The foul heart hated

Laborers cry river

The rich frightened

The coward becomes aristocrat

.

Happy o you who are vile

Woe to you mere commoner

People blame each other

Human becomes more disgraceful

.

Kings divide kingdoms

Javanese only half the population remains

Dutch and Chinese only a couple left

People become avaricious, people become niggardly

For the thrifty nothing left

The gainer does not save

.

People act foolishly

People become limp

Slow but sure comes the age of disaster

.

Javanese change behavior like a rice winnowed

Which is fake and which is true

Hermits and ascetics becomes frightened

Dare not to spread the teaching

For one wrong word brings death

.

Flash floods happen everywhere

Volcanoes erupt without signs

Ascetics are hated, o those who sleep not and eat not

For people are afraid their true selves be revealed

.

Indeed this is a disastrous era

Witnessing the era of insanity

The sane gains nothing

The wise keeps thinking

Farmers chained

Liars celebrate

How fortunate, o you who forget

Yet still more fortunate those who are watchful

.

King breaks his promise

Loses his authority and glory

Houses built atop horsebacks

Human eats another human

Logs and iron are eaten

Delicious, says he, as if it is a cake

When night falls sleep escapes

.

The insane primps up

The dissenters become able

Building houses and glorious structures

.

Trade flows smoothly yet treasures vanish

People die hungry next to food

The rich suffers while the richness help him not

.

The fair and wise suffers and shunned away

Those who do not steal are hated

The foul befriended

The honest trapped at bay

The wrongful haughty

Treasures vanished untraced

Ranks and offices lost

.

The earth shrinks

Every inch is taxed

Women dress as men

Hearken, o people, for the era of insanity has come

.

Promises go unfulfilled

People break their oaths

People deceive each other

Disregarding The laws of Allah

The malicious praised

The pure hated

.

People lavish money

Forgetting humanity, forgetting kindness

Forgetting siblings and family

Fathers forget their sons

Sons chase away their mothers

Siblings deceive each other

Family members suspect each other

Friends become enemies

Human beings forget their origins

.

Women proposes to men

Little ones beget little ones

Men humiliate themselves

.

Chinese hides, pummeled until they scampered away

Following Javanese who understands

The unaware anxious

Scampering away like a judged thief

Those who stay become hated

People become indolent, people become coquettish

The pitiful nothing left

The gainer wastes away

.

So I just went through and finished the History of Rome Podcast and really enjoyed it. I had a couple questions:

1. What did German Civilization look like at the time of say the third century? Were German cities organized on the level of Roman cities on the other side of the Rhine/Danube?

2. What happened to local Roman landholders in areas that were given over to the Germans? Were they displaced? Murdered? Integrated into the German society?

3. Where was all the gold coming from that the Eastern Empire was paying as tribute to the Huns? Spain was depleted and in the west, trade with the east seemed to be draining gold, and currency was being debased. Was there just a shitload of reserve?

Why in WW1, did commanders continuously send their troops into "meat grinders"? Like the battle of Verdun etc....

After listen to Dan Carlin's Hardcore history I just can't fathom a good response.

David Starkey has made another controversial statement. How respected is he as a historian?

Just learned about the multi-volume History of Private Life. A treasure trove of information about how pretty much every aspect of life was shifted entirely from the public sphere to the private sphere--both how it was done and accepted. The reverse also seems to be true in some cases.