I love stumbling on things that help me visualize the era I am reading about to light (it's a shame I don't spend more time actively search for them) and I found two amazing resources to bring 16th century (especially Spain)

First is this awesome collection of drawings from 1529 by Christoph Weiditz. It consists of men and women (mostly Spanish) in various clothes, dresses and costumes but also features images of American Indians, African slaves, Granadan Moors, and various everyday actions, like farmers ploughing, or people dancing or how horses were secured in ships. The manuscript is digitized and available online, or you can browse the wikimedia commons gallery

The other great find is this collection of breathtaking cityscape drawings by Anton van den Wijngaerde from 1550s and 1560s. They are incredibly detailed and beautiful. Some examples of Barcelona, Valencia, Cadiz, and I can see he also has images of Madrid, London, Amsterdam. It's amazing how accurate it is, and how many details regarding architecture, houses, fortifications, bridges, and ships and ports there are.You can find most of the images in the wikimedia commons gallery

For people wanting to see more 16th century cityscapes you can browse another 16th century work Civitates orbis terrarum, which presents many cities.

I am sure that some already knew about these resources, but for me it was such a nice surprise. If anybody has other similar resources to share, especially about 16th century, please do!

Can you recommend me any books that discuss the metadata of Islam's main sources (the Quran, Quranic exegeses/tafseers, biographies of Muhammad/seerah, and short accounts of Muhammad's actions and statements/hadiths)? When were these books written? Where were they written? What was the background of the authors? Why did they write these books? Are the original manuscripts still extant? If not, then how old are the earliest copies?

So, I've spent the last few weeks fletching like crazy: managed to source some machined tanged-leaf broadheads that are more accurate (and a third of the price!) of a lot of the hand-forged stuff I've seen about. Shafted four of those up on some cheap pine for a bit of practise before doing some proper ones on birch shafts, and now need to have a play with some pine pitch for the feathers. Birch-tar would be more accurate, but no one makes it and its sufficiently carcinogenic to make pine-pitch a necessary substitution. The trick is going to be in learning to be able to reheat the pitch while not also burning the feathers... I'm expecting to lose a lot of turkey feathers in practise... ah well.

I picked up the copy of the Hedeby tri-lobed broadhead (image 10) I commissioned last weekend, and I've just had the pictures off the blacksmith for the Coppergate 12829 and 12831 replicas this morning, so looking forward to getting my hands on those too. So they're in the next pile of arrows to do. Hopefully I'll get a chance to actually shoot all of these at some point!

And my copy of The Great Warbow eventually turned up. 70 pages in, and its already the best source I've seen for early western archery, even though its not really Strickland's focus...

Though it's not all positives: I finally managed to workout how to navigate the records from the Ipswich excavations to discover there are 5-6 arrowheads that could be Norman... but also could be Saxon... there's basically no proper publication or dating however, so there won't be any addition to the small (but growing) number of mid/late Saxon arrowheads

How would one pursue a career in the field of ancient languages, and the research and discovery of them? Where and what would that person study before entering a career path? What other experience is necessary or valuable in the work? What kind of careers are there that pertain to or involve ancient languages? Is it a career that would require supplement income or is it relatively sustainable? Who are some people in the field that I should DEFINITELY know the names of and who are the major innovators/contributors to this side of history? Feel free to answer only one question, i realize there are many.

I'm in Tarragona for Easter. Tarraco was the great city of roman Iberia and until today it houses the ruins of the Amphitheater, the Circus, the Forum... Now, I don't want to be the typical tourist that makes pictures as if saying "hehe, look, stones, I'm so cool", so I'm wondering what would the best approach to it be? Some line of thought that can be applied to any medieval quarter, gothic church, or roman ruins; so whenever I find some arches or an aqueduct I can quickly learn the best of it.

Maybe I'm being too abstract and there's no such thing.

Any recommendations for reading about the early 20th century obsession with glands/gland transplants?

Does anyone know of any good books on the history of modern art in early 20th century Europe (including movements like fauvism, cubism, expressionism, futurism, constructivism, surrealism, etc)?

Are there any threads about the history of the Confederate flag? My MIL posted something on FB about the Christian history behind it. I am fairly sure that someone has asked this question before.

Just curious, as a person who lives in a state where there’s a lot of casinos that never close, and can never imagine them closing for anything, was told by a women I used to work with, who worked at a major casino telling me that the only time the casinos in the state closed was when JFK was assassinated, I just want to know how exactly that day, or the day after he was assassinated was.

What's the deal with JSTOR? They removed the shelf? When did this happen? Is it good or bad?

More importantly, how does everyone find questions they can answer? I saw the IFTTT thing, but I think I messed it up because there were a few that should have pinged me.

Does anybody know of anything good written on the Rhodesian Bush War?