Do we know the origin of why Americans write dates differently than Europeans? Just to be clear, I'm talking about the MM/DD/YYYY vs. DD/MM/YYYY difference.

It seems like a lot of the cases where Americans are different from the U.K., the explanation isn't that Americans chose to do it differently, but rather the U.K. used to do it the same way but changed at some point. Is that the case here?

I once thought that the European way makes sense logically because it goes from smallest increment to largest, but the American way better matches how people say dates in spoken language, e.g. "March 12th", but then I was told that actually that's a specifically American way of saying dates and in Europe it's more common to say "12 March". Is that true? Did the spoken way pre-date the numerical date format, and that's why they're different, or did speech change to match the already established formats?

As an English Literature Major, I took a class on 18th century British Literature. That was a long time ago, but I remember my professor talking about a type of book that was kept by people of the time.

It was a type of reference book where you would write definitions and facts you found interesting. Maybe some interesting quotations. It was an organized repository of new knowledge and ideas you wanted to remember.

The professor had a specific name for it and when I tried to recall it at breakfast this weekend, I couldn't remember. Figured you guys might be the only ones who might know.

Thanks in advance!

Last night I watched the 1947 film The Bachelor and the Bobby-Soxer. Toward the end, a high schooler gets drafted and gives a melodramatic goodbye to Shirley Temple's character, who basically rolls her eyes because "the war is over," and he replies something like, "Anything could happen, I could trip on my bayonet." So it's clear that it takes place, if not in '47, definitely after the end of the war. Were young men still being drafted at that time? Wikipedia indicates the answer is no, but I wondered if there was more to it.

Did Spain's colonies fall under either the Crown of Castille or of Aragon, or were they separate from those entities?

When was the Potato introduced to Patagonia or the Rio de la Plata Basin.

When making certain dome buildings (such as Vittone’s in 1700s) did architects first complete the lower section altogether or did they make the entire structure including said domes?

What makes Entente Cordiale and Triple Entente differ form eachother?

How wide was a typical castle hallway, and were there any specific dimensions favored for bedrooms where royals slept?

I just visited a USA memorial cemetery in The Netherlands, and it occurred to me that a lot of the fallen soldiers were born in north-eastern states such as Pennsylvania and Massachusetts. A lot of them came from Illinois as well.

Were squadrons ‘compiled’ from drafted members from the same area? The question I’m really looking to answer is; why do most of them come from these places, and is there not a more natural distribution?

What’s a NSFW detail about a historical figure that’s normally left out of the history books?

From what I have been told, Wikipedia (at least in American history) is written by universities, policed for inaccuracies, information is taken directly from history books and is the most read history source in the world.

Question: Why is Wikipedia considered an unreliable source?

There was an Eastern European dictator that scraped engineers' plans for a subway system and instead made their own plans (with help from wife). Who was it?

iirc, the engineers' plans included a station/stop at a university, but the dictator or his wife scraped the station because they thought students should have to walk/didn't deserve to be afforded easy transportation to their university.

I'm trying to remember the country or dictator.

D Day was supposed to be a surprise attack, taking the Germans completely off guard. There was a massive misdirection campaign from the allies that the attack was going to take place at Calais instead of Normandy. If surprise was such a big factor, why did they drop paratroopers the night before the beach assault? Wouldn’t that have warned the Germans what they were up to?

I remember reading somewhere on a thread about some sort of doctor in the 19th century who thought he had created anesthesia, but instead just paralyzed the patient, and he felt everything during his surgery. Does anyone know about the validity of this? What is this doctor's name?

how long have long/painted nails been considered a marker of beauty and femininity? i’m growing mine and it always strikes me what a weird part of the body it is to groom this intensely.

also, was this ever a regular thing for men, like so many other “feminine” fashion trends (heels, makeup, earrings etc)?

In the Gospels there are a couple instances of Jesus speaking Aramaic (see Mark 5:41 for instance). Are there any ideas as to why the gospel writers used Aramaic instead of Greek in just a few lines of the whole gospel?

In the 80s A.D. Emperor Domitian redeployed some legions from the Caledonian front to the Dacian front. How long of a journey would that have been?

How were massive 15th century bombards like mons meg or the dardanelles physically gun loaded?

Surely the crews working them weren't just lifting the 3-4 hundred pound projectiles. So how did they get them in there if that isn't the case?

Does anyone have the recording of the State Committee on the State of Emergency (GKChP) documents that were broadcast over the Soviet radio during the August Coup in 1991?

In pre-feudal and early feudal societies, land had a special significance for the population. Land was ascribed a more spiritual significance, in part considered something alive, and had great importance for the identity of groups. Is there any research on whether this kind of relationship between land and population has returned in rural areas (especially Russia) after World War II? Or has this relationship always existed in rural areas in Russia?

Where there any penal colonies in British North America similar to the ones in Australia?

Would anyone be able to find the last formal declaration of war issued by a sovereign nation?

I recall the Mongolian declaration of war against Japan being the last of WW2, but I’d like to know if there have been any since as I know countries largely stopped officially declaring war after WW2.

In most other places in the world, military conscription is just referred to as "conscription," but in the U.S. the colloquial term is "the draft." Why is this?

Growing up my dad had told me it was because in either the colonial period or the revolution they selected people to conscript from bars and taverns by dropping a coin into the bottom of a draft beer. If the patron drank it, they were either told to go to, or dragged out of the bar to the nearest army camp. The reasoning for dropping it in draft beer, I was told, was so the patron wouldn't immediately see the coin sitting at the bottom through the foam, and thus drank it before noticing. I was also told this was why glass beer mugs caught on.

Is there any reality to this? If not, where would this myth have come from?

How important was virginity in the Middle Ages?

It’s a popular conception that virginity is prized in the Middle Ages. But how true is it to real life? If a man or woman had sex with someone but they’re not married to that person, is it a deal breaker for their suitors looking to marry them? And did medieval people think men’s virginity exist?

What are some interesting events that happened 75, 150, 225, 300 and 375 years ago?

What was the first ever kleptocracy? As you know, kleptocracy is a form of government in which the ruler(s) steal from their citizens and use the stolen money/goods for personal gain. What was the first ever example of such system?

I'm just about finishing up Race: The History of an Idea in America by Thomas Gossett and I have two questions that is really for further reading.

First, since this book is decades old, I assume there has been a lot of further research into the subject, including looking at how different social sciences like anthropology and psychology have evolved. Can anyone recommend me a good place to start looking at that?

Second, Gossett spends a great deal of time focusing on Franz Boas, who was definitely awesome, but I'm curious about other people who have worked against racism, both prior to Boas and since. Again, is there a good place to start looking for that?

Thanks!

What's the general consensus about Peter Frankopan re: Silk Roads?

Does anyone have a decent estimate for the populations of France, Aragon, Portugal, and Castille in the 15th century?

I remember reading somewhere that a female writer/philosopher(?) wrote that one of the signs of a failing/dysfunctional society, an omen, is that they become unhealthily self centered/self obsessed, & especially self obsesssed with their gender & sexualities. I remember in this quote she said that the nazis/ww2-era germany was becoming this way, they were becoming a LGBTIQA+ type of society. But then again didnt they send a lot of the LGBTIQA+ community to concentration camps? & murder/torture them? I would like to find this writer, & this quote. I think the writer might have been Camille Paglia. -Thanks.

Besides Oskar Schindler, what other "good Nazis" were there that I may not have heard of?

And what did they do that made them "good?"

So, the Aztecs, Maya, and Inca tend to all get lumped together as one "thing" in pop history, but we know the Aztecs & Inca were thousands of miles away from each other. My question, which so far Google has not helped me with, is this: which peoples/tribes/civilizations lived between them c. 1519, and could trade of any sort have filtered overland or by coast-hugging naval voyages?

Trying to find a specific bloc of text from a non-obscure ancient Greek writer. He wrote about the challenges of diversity in the military. I believe his main topic was Alexander's army and how hard it was to bring together Thebans, Ionians, Macedonians, etc. Thanks.

During the second world war in the East African campaign, when allied troops pushed the Italians out of Ethiopia was it restored then to self rule, or did it have to wait till the end of the whole war to get everything sorted out?

I’m currently reading The Guns of August and it makes numerous references to ambassadors asking for their passports, what does this mean/what did that entail exactly?

I read that in Nazi and pre-Nazi Germany, the military was apolitical, and its servicemen couldn't even vote in elections. Could I get a little more detail on this, and was this common in Europe at the time, or distinct to Germany?

How has Dikötter's The Discourse of Race in Modern China held up? What should I be aware of when reading it?

When Nazi Germany invaded Poland there forces were divided into two Army Groups; North and South. Army Group North, commanded by von Bock attacked into the Danzig Corridor, north of Poznan, and through East Prussia down towards Warsaw. Army Group South attacked from Silesia and Slovakia northwards towards Warsaw.

Between these two army groups lay the German "soft centre" which of course wasn't so soft as it was defended by the heavily fortified Oder Quadrilateral area.

My question is, who commanded this area and which units were defending these fortifications? Can't find anything about it online.

Looking for evidence of “Wait [x] seconds before firing the cannon” in army (?) doctrine that has changed since calvary no longer uses horses as a main way of travel.

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I’m not sure if I heard it from reading a book (maybe by Simon Sinek, Seth Godin, or Malcom Gladwell), watching a documentary, etc. so I hope I’m not making this up. Story goes something like – Member in the army was told to ‘Wait [x] seconds before firing the (weapon) after given the all clear’. When asked why wait, no one knew the answer. After escalating and researching, apparently, they use to wait to give time for the calvary (horses) to ride out of harms way because of the ‘inaccuracy’ of the cannon compared to today’s weapons.

For reference, the story was shared to talk about the importance of questioning what we're doing, why we're doing it (building buy-in), and looking for innovation.

Is there any truth to this?

How much did the non Muslims have to pay their jizya tax in the medieval period?

Some have set forth an idea that non Muslims such as Christians and Jews were oppressed and had to pay large taxes to their Muslims lords in places such as the Holy Land. While others argue that the amount paid is less than the zakat Muslims paid and even if they had to pay, only adult males did while the rest (children, women, elders, etc) were exempted. How much taxes did non Muslims have to pay in say, al-Anadalus (Muslim Spain) and is it considered humiliating and oppressive for the time?

Why did Harry S. Truman have an S that didn't stand for anything?

many authors format their names (or pseudonyms) in the format of two initials for first & middle names, & then the last name. this goes from historical figures like c.s. lewis & h.l. mencken all the way to contemporaries like N.K. Jemisin. does anyone know how or why this convention developed?

(originally posted as a stand-alone but a mod removed it & told me to repost here)