Today:
You know the drill: this is the thread for all your history-related outpourings that are not necessarily questions. Minor questions that you feel don't need or merit their own threads are welcome too. Discovered a great new book, documentary, article or blog? Has your Ph.D. application been successful? Have you made an archaeological discovery in your back yard? Did you find an anecdote about the Doge of Venice telling a joke to Michel Foucault? Tell us all about it.
As usual, moderation in this thread will be relatively non-existent -- jokes, anecdotes and light-hearted banter are welcome.
I posted an update on an immature article, "The Twelve Dancing Princesses”, which I wrote 40 years ago.
The abstract is as follows:
This article is a modified version of an item published in 1983: Analysis of ATU 306, “The Danced-out Shoes,” reveals that Irish versions of the folktale drew from translations of the Brothers Grimm, and these include two instances of plagiarism. This raises questions about other rarely expressed narratives identified in The Types of the Irish Folktale (1968), by Seán Ó Súlleabháin and Reidar Th. Christiansen. Research finds no evidence that several tale types (ATU 51***, ATU 577, ATU 840B*, and ATU 870), represented exclusively in the Irish Schools’ Collection, were ever part of the oral tradition of Ireland. These supposedly Irish folktales nevertheless found their way into Irish and international indexes.
It would be easy to let this old dog remain in slumber, but the record needs to be corrected about this example of plagiarism and its effect on international folklore indexes. Perhaps this post will receive little or no attention, but at least it is available (the original publication is beyond obscure).
I'd like to announce that I have pre-launched my Kickstarter for Dandies & Dandyzettes, a TTRPG handbook set in Regency England! Also doubles as a guide to the setting for writers!
I've probably unlocked my final form by jumping into historical wargaming with both feet - something I always knew was inevitable but had held off on. For the moment it's been all solo-gaming, something I'm hoping to fix this weekend all going well. I've been playing the game Men of Iron by GMT Games which simulates late medieval warfare with a mix of Anglo-Scottish battles, Hundred Years War, and Courtrai just for good measure. I've been having fun with it, although I don't think it's going to make me a diehard hex and counter wargamer, but we'll see! I wrote up my first impressions of the game on my blog, I've since played a second scenario and I'm planning to post that on Monday (and there's a third set up waiting for me to find the time!)
I am stuck inside with the lurgy so have been working my way through an ancient copy of the Penguin Dictionary of Historical Slang (Eric Partridge). Some of my favourites:
Everything in this work is, I think, from British English sources, and almost entirely 18th/19th C (though some entries go back as far as 15th C). The great joy of it is flicking through it, rather than actually using it as a dictionary. With many of the terms/phrases, I wonder whether they were actually ever in currency, as they come from one source and don't show up in ngrams.
Having been pointed towards Green's Dictionary of Slang online, I have now ordered the Chambers Slang Dictionary, which is the affordable one-volume version of his work. From what I can tell, Green seems to cover English slang from around the world, give fuller definitions/etymologies and stick to slang that wasn't just used somewhere once!
Your Weekly /r/askhistorians Recap
Friday, February 25 - Thursday, March 03
###Top 10 Posts
| score | comments | title & link |
|---|---|---|
| 5,198 | 49 comments | My Grandfather who was an NYPD detective in the 50s, 60s and 70s used to drunkenly brag, that sometimes suspects would be killed and their bodies were dumped into the East River. Are there any actual cases or reports of the police doing anything like that, or is my G. Father just a crazy drunk? |
| 4,074 | 133 comments | Why did Russia inherit the Soviet Union's permanent seat on the UN Security Council? |
| 4,069 | 254 comments | [Feature] Megathread on recent events in Ukraine |
| 2,990 | 70 comments | When did sex become “private”? |
| 2,500 | 14 comments | Why did the Italian/Spanish style of fencing with two weapons (a rapier and a parrying dagger) lose favor to the French style of fencing with a single blade? |
| 2,183 | 115 comments | How did the Russians not discover the New World before anyone else when they're so close together? |
| 2,115 | 34 comments | In the Ridley Scott film Kingdom of Heaven, Baldwin IV of Jerusalem is depicted wearing an ornate mask to hide his leprosy. Did the actual King Baldwin feel the need to conceal his condition in this way? How would contemporaries have perceived leprosy, and was this a cause of stigma against him? |
| 1,775 | 43 comments | Why did the UK and Ireland's cuisine not lean heavily towards seafood like Japan, another island nation close to a continental landmass? |
| 1,757 | 61 comments | How frequently did wartime leaders such as Churchill, Roosevelt, or Stalin take days off work during the war, and how did they avoid burnout working >=16 hour days every day for 5+ years? |
| 1,727 | 41 comments | A common narrative is that World War I was the result of cascading mutual defense pacts drawing ever more nations into the war. Yet NATO with its Article 5 was created just decades later. Are there any notable differences between the WWI treaties and Article 5? |
###Top 10 Comments
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So general fun question for historians and history buffs alike, if you could elect any historical figure as the president of the US in 2024 who would it be and why?