This answer from u/J-Force about whether the crusaders ever encountered or mentioned hamsters

There are a few posts that I reference when I tell other historians about how great questions and answers can come from places like Reddit. Here are a few I'll refer to:

Did Socrates Even lift?
Would it have been possible for a Roman citizen around 1 A.D. to obtain everything needed to make a cheeseburger, assuming they had the knowledge of how to make one?
What was really the plan after landing on the Moon?
Italians were considered non-whites until 1945, did the KKK harass them? If yes, did the Mafia ever fight back the KKK?
Why was everybody Kung Fu fighting?

This is a fun idea, OP! Thanks!

So this is pretty biased of me, but one of my all-time favorites is this amazing four part answer to a question I asked, "What's the origin of the sea shanty?" by /u/dgbd

And here, people, is how I earned my flair.

https://old.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/4oyv9n/am_i_a_person_living_in_the_west_currently/d4go640/ - u/commiespaceinvader on Nazi Medical Bullshit
https://old.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/8g1s7n/im_a_knight_in_the_medeival_era_ive_just_charged/dy9ba21/ - u/Hergrim, the Knightly Post
https://old.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/d4pibc/i_am_a_lesser_noble_in_western_europe_circa_1200/ - u/CoeurdeLionne, raising armies in the Angevin Empire circa 1200 AD
https://old.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/cn8dic/how_were_the_logistics_of_raising_an_army/ - u/Goiyon, on the muster of Holland
https://old.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/gtjymt/what_was_a_knight_banneret/ - u/J-Force on knights banneret
https://old.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/dtg01w/how_much_loyalty_did_the_commonfolk_and_soldiery/ - u/Rittermeister on motivations and Anglo-Norman armies
https://old.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/50pywa/in_the_song_of_ice_and_fire_novels_grr_martin/ - u/MI13 on 'hedge knights'
https://old.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/i08fzf/how_did_richard_i_come_to_be_so_fondly_lionized/fzq9suv/ - u/J-Force on the rarity of mutinies in the Medieval Period
https://old.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/bwczhz/how_often_did_medieval_kingdoms_actually_hold/ - u/WhiteOwlUp and u/J-Force examine William Marshal
https://old.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/6u0pms/ama_jousts_tournaments_and_courtly_combat/ - AMA with Tobias Capwell, Curator of Arms and Armour at the Wallace Collection in London
https://old.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/cn2mtw/viking_medicine/ew6oitm/ - u/BRIStoneman on Bald's Leechbook
https://old.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/hc8f9u/why_did_the_major_powers_take_so_long_to_adopt/ - u/Meesus on France's service rifle after WWI
https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/gu1tj5/did_people_realize_they_were_part_of_a/ftb9pet/?context=3 - u/UndercoverClassicist problematizing the notion of a 'Bronze Age Collapse'
https://old.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/dvam8s/im_dr_omar_foda_author_of_the_upcoming_egypts/ - AMA with Dr Omar Foda on the history and culture of brewing in Egypt
https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/6rvusy/is_the_military_worship_of_the_spartans_really/dl8ns8q/?utm_source=reddit&utm_medium=usertext&utm_name=AskHistorians&utm_content=t1_ii4z3qg - u/Iphikrates on Sparta
https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/jsb5my/whats_the_state_of_scholarship_on_the_silk_road/gbyl2uc/ - u/EnclavedMicrostate problematizing the notion of a 'Silk Road'
https://old.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/6x45ai/did_ancientmedieval_parents_love_their_children/ - u/Celebreth on a Roman poem about the death of a young girl
https://old.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/plsibx/surely_the_earl_of_sandwich_wasnt_the_first_guy/ - u/piteog101 on Sandwich and sandwiches

Not this subreddit specifically, but u/anthropology_nerd is a flaired contributor (including being featured on this subs podcast!) and this post conforms to the subreddit standards, so I hope the mods find it acceptable. In any case, I highly recommend reading their nine part series Myths of Conquest. It has absolutely changed my understanding of how colonization in the United States worked, destroyed a lot of misconceptions I've believed since middle school, and really brings the tragedy of the people affected down to an understandable level.

To give another, u/AksiBashi answer to my question a while ago asking, "Were there witch trials in pre-modern Islamic societies?" It's a really thorough and at times, kind of gruesome, answer.

I suppose this is a silly reply, but I'm forever fond of /u/Cenodoxus's answer to the question, "How many 16th century French laying hens would be required to feed Gaston his five dozen eggs?"

Not in a great position to do a full list at the moment, but one of my favorites that typically comes to mind is this thread by u/jbdyer and u/mikedash about the history of Uranus jokes.

The humor in this thread has particularly stayed with me for a while.

There are a lot of answers on this sub that have changed how I think about the world, but this one from u/yodatsracist sticks with me as one of the most interesting.

I’m not even sure the second part would survive the current mods, as it’s a lot of conjecture, but I really appreciate it’s presented as such, with context, from an expert.

I found this comment by /u/kaiser_matias about Soviet restaurants interesting and weirdly, I think about it a lot. There are multiple good answers in that thread on different topics.

There was an answer that explained that WW1's outbreak wasn't inevitable by explaining the other crises that occurred in the decades prior which did not lead to war. The answer went into how the various nations ended up on the side they did, and how easily the combinations in 1914 could have been different.

I can't find it, but it was brilliant. I'll keep looking.

This answer on how Indonesia and Malaysia became muslim majority countries is a classic, and still one of the best answers I've seen from this sub

I'll go with a really old one, the Choose Your Own Adventure answer by /u/heyheymse:

What was dating like in ancient Rome?

I should also like to highlight Flair Profiles. These are curated by each user who chooses to maintain such, typically showing a showcase of their answers. The Newsletter features a randomly-selected flair profile each week, but I thought I'd highlight them as a whole for this thread.

Profiles also help you browse by theme, effectively. People specialise, and if you like a flair's answers, you can see more in the same theme. Iphikrates, for instance, is your one-stop shop for all things Greek Warfare and the tearing-down of Sparta, while crrpit does the Spanish Civil War, or you may want to look at mimicofmodes for clothing history, or EdHistory101 for education history.

This post and answer about how much cheese the average medieval European could expect to eat is really what made me fall in love with this sub.

u/quedfoot reveals that the Dutch weren't the first to discover Australia. The history of Southeast Asian trade with Australia goes way back.

u/jbdyer judges the realism of Homer Simpson's economic status in The Simpsons and u/BullsLawDan does the same for Al Bundy's economic status in Married with Children.

u/mydearestangelica answers whether people used to believe heaven is segregated

Quite recently, u/proserpinasedge goes into detail about ethnic enclaves in ancient cities.

u/ncsuandrew12 explains Satan.

u/tinyblondeduckling explains the curious practice of placing shoes inside the wall of a house, as documented by the very real Northampton Museum’s Concealed Shoe Index.

There are a few answers to this question about samurai in the time of Abraham Lincoln.

One of my favorite contributors, u/itsallfolklore, goes back to the origins of our modern pop-cultural notions of one-horsed towns and one-horned horses. They also attempt to unearth the origin of the "Jinx!" game.

My other favorite contributor, u/toldinstone, offers a lot of insight into the way of life in Ancient Rome, such as their treatment of ruins and their vacation plans.

u/sunagainstgold offers some similarly fantastic insight into the way of life for Medieval people, like more vacation plans.

Oh, and I can't forget the great u/hannahstohelit, who has a great answer about a character in great book, The Great Gatsby. They also don't mince words when dissecting what's wrong with The Boy in the Striped Pajamas.

And finally, various commenters explain the cultural context of... "Baby Got Back."

By post the answers I mean please share the links in the comments below, just in case that wasn’t clear.

I'm going to be self-serving and cite the answer which /u/FRANCIS___BEGBIE gave to my question concerning:

Shakespeare gives directions for some characters to speak Welsh in Henry IV Part 1. Would the actors have said anything comprehensible or would they instead have performed racist mockery of the language?

OMG you can't just ask this question (but thank you for doing it anyway). There are too many great answers from too many great contributors to pick. Even just picking from my own questions!

But that's what I'll do, I guess. Mind, I'm sure I'm missing a ton of great answers from my examples. These are in no particular order of greatness though I do have my favorites. I will organize them by answer author because there are some recurring cast members, with recurring people in this first post and others in a follow-up!

u/sunagainstgold:

u/sunagainstgold breaks down the criminally underrepresented (in pop history) accounts and perspectives of European women vis a vis the Ottoman harem systems and society more broadly, as well as 19th century Western women's travel narratives in: I've come across Western men's (sometimes fantastical and obviously 2nd or 3rd hand) accounts of women in the Ottoman Empire and the harem system. Do we have any examples of Western women's accounts of Ottoman women? Or of elite Ottoman women's accounts of Westerners?

As well as provides insight on the struggles and support methods available to girls and women of various social classes in Let's say a young person in late medieval/very early Renaissance Europe is experiencing a personal crisis and can't/won't approach their family about it. Who else might form their support network? Especially medieval women (of any social class)

u/wotan_weevil

...on scientific paradigm shifts in "Science advances one funeral at a time." Is this an accurate statement for major scientific paradigm shifts of the mid 19th to late 20th centuries? Did modern accepted theories "win over" scientists from competing models, or did the old models' advocates just die?

...and the surprisingly engaging history of watermill access and usage in medieval Europe, and the possible existence of outlaw ovens in I heard a claim that the practice of using watermills for manufacturing, having been "lost" during the fall of the (Western) Roman Empire, was "rediscovered" during the late middle ages, & that the mechanical hydropower they produced helped enable the Renaissance. Any substance to that at all?

u/UndercoverClassicist

...covers growing up in the ancient Mediterranean with Did the ancient Greeks (and Romans and other neighbors) have a concept of adolescence for girls and women?

...as well as convalescence and the role of the patient and caretaker in Modern language assumes a degree of agency when dealing with illness ("fighting cancer"/"don't give up"/"giving up and dying") and that personal will contributes at least a little to healing. Would someone in Mediterranean antiquity or Medieval Europe have thought the same way?. This one features a bonus appearance by u/sunagainstgold and some back and forth between them.

Great idea for a post! :)

On nazi sympathizers in Germany right after WW2. A very enlightening read. https://reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/rwee8b/how_prevalent_was_nazi_sympathizing_in_germany_in/

/u/indyobserver has a great three-part Response about the development of the relationship between Churchill and George VI, but they still owe us a part 4 :)

Not a particular answer, but I do appreciate a lot u/EnclavedMicrostate contributions when it comes to Qing China. As someone who's fond of the Panthay rebellion and other muslim insurrections at the same time than the Taiping revolt, his answers on the latter are really useful to me. I have a lot of respect for being able to be so consistant and involved in this for years !

Also, u/Lubyak contributions on the Japanese military are also amazing (Example). My personal subject of research being the history of Islam in Japan from the Meiji revolution to the end of WW2, knowing about the military system, which was the main proponent of using muslim communities for its own interests (with far-right societies such as the Kokuryukai) is crucial to me.

One of my all time favorite answers is by u/kelpie-cat, responding to the question Why are whales associated with cosmos so much?

I used this answer as the first day’s reading assignment for my large freshman lecture course, Introduction to Visual Culture, in Spring 2021 and 2022. It’s such a fascinating look at how different streams of social behavior across history congeal into unique images!!! And my students loved reading about space whales 🐋

It isn’t a specific post but much of u/BenTresh ‘s post history inspired me to do my own research into ancient Egypt and the ancient near East.

One of my favorite moments on this sub is when a flaired user writes a detailed answer on a subject that has nothing to do with their area of interest. For example, u/EnclavedMicrostate taking a break from Qing history to talk about "slime girls" and everybody's favorite Soviet general u/Georgy_K_Zhukov talking about women's pubic hair with contributions from other flairs

I saw someone else mention this user and I went to check their profile. This AMA is interesting from the first comment. https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1c29lu/wednesday_ama_north_korea/

A few I've liked that didn't necessarily get a lot of attention when they were posted:

Out of the Curiosity of it, what did the Native Americans do to the disabled and sick before Christopher Columbus and the settlers? I don't know, my college professor doesn't know, and Google doesn't know. by u/Kelpie-Cat

Has there been any real progress in deciphering Linear A Language? by u/UndercoverClassicist

Why is there such prevalent stone megalith structures in Europe from the Neolithic period, but not in North America? Were ancient American peoples more nomadic and therefore less likely to erect their version of Stonehenge? by u/Antiquarianism

Question: Travel From Africa to France in the 1880s by u/gerardmenfin

Is there a particular piece of WWI in media that you find absolutely appalling? by u/CrossyNZ

How did the Jewish community of Thessaloniki react to the Greek population transfer into the city, the diminution of the city's Jewish identity, and the loss of their Muslim neighbors? by u/mayor_rishon

So many great threads linked here, alas that I have not time to look through them all! But I cannot avoid the opportunity of recommanding myself, though I will restrict myself to one only (I have a lot bookmarked on my phone, if anyone should be interested they can ask me for recommendations). I think that "Did ancient civilizations have ancient civilizations" by u/Antiquarianism is one of the best answers on the subreddit, and one of my favourite texts on the entire Web!

I think one of my favourite trends has to have been the "hot blooded young man hitting the streets" series/meme from *checks notes* five years ago!?

Anyway you can search up others quite easily but I'd like to highlight the original one that started it all submitted by /u/misyo and answered by /u/tiako and /u/XenophonTheAthenian:

I'm a hot blooded young Roman man of the late Empire hitting the streets of Rome for a night out with my mates and I've got sestertii burning a hole in my purse. What kind of vice and wanton pleasures are available to me?

This anwser by u/BBlasdel on why controlling sexuality became such a major issue for Christians.

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/33x06j/comment/cqpjzyk/

When and why did thespians decide that Macbeth was cursed?, answer courtesy of the fabulous /u/sunagainstgold. I've read so many great submissions on this sub, but this response to my own question is the only one I have ready to hand. The answer goes beyond the original question to discuss the universe of behind-the-curtains mythmaking that rises naturally from theater.

This one is just such a ridiculously oddly specific answer its almost comedic. Also this if we are already discussing east Europe and the internet.

I very recently started writing down important (for me) answers in a note. Here's what it has (descriptions are short because the original ones are in another language). When I did, I tried to remember and hunt down some of the memorable answers, so you can say it's my "best of".

Semantic romantization and exotisation of German armed forces in WWII

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/hd52ng/why_do_english_language_speakers_americans_like/fvjj0gq/

Stonemasons: what were/are they

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/kpy6cq/what_have_freemasons_really_done_and_how_has_it/

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/t955n3/why_were_the_freemasons_so_controversial_in_the/

Nasty myth about Native Americans just "falling over dead" from disease with little blame on settlers who used the "freed" land

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/3ck97r/when_europeans_brought_diseases_to_the_new_world/cswt3wd/

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/a4b4hp/how_much_of_the_native_americans_deaths_were/

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/snxz0a/when_europeans_first_interacted_with_native/hw6a1ev/

Genocide or not

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/ou00l6/did_native_americans_mostly_die_from_diseases_or/

Barrier troops in the Eastern Front: truth or not

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/4x8bzw/ww2_how_prevalent_where_soviet_blocking/

Refusing to shoot in a duel: what it says about duels through history

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/a4uycc/when_aaron_burr_learned_that_alexander_hamilton/ebhz0f6/

Carzy Italitan fencer journalist who challenges world champions to duels

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/4x8elv/floating_feature_historical_or_obscure_national/d6daqzr/

Historical fencing wasn't perfect, and it changed through time

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/t271he/why_did_the_italianspanish_style_of_fencing_with/hyomxkv/

War on drugs: does militarization, media scare, and radicalization help

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/vdslqe/what_are_the_sources_for_ronald_reagan_funnelling/

Book reading among US troops in WWII

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/vgxiaw/the_great_gatsby_was_a_commercial_failure_and_all/

Riots as carnivals. Charivari riots. Harmless riots

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/vdpf8z/i_found_an_instance_of_a_group_of_men_disguising/icy0wk2/

Who was Indiana Jones if not an archeologist

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/vhcl8g/how_many_rules_and_procedures_of_archaeology_did/

Was he actually a decent archeologist

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/9qqmtt/is_indiana_jones_a_good_archeologist_or_is_there/e8bfuaq/?context=3

Contraception in ancient sex workers

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/oo3xte/how_did_ancient_roman_prostitutes_prevent/

Satan/Devil, where did he come from in European culture

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/vq8sc3/i_heard_recently_that_the_majority_of_what_people/

Unions in the US: scarecrows, victims, actual problems

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/ucccr0/why_are_unions_such_a_political_bogeyman_in_the/

Galileo, Bruno, and Co.: what's with the round orbitin earth and the church

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/v6v4j5/how_true_is_it_that_galileo_was_killed_for_saying/

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/vtizja/is_there_amy_truth_to_the_claim_that_humans_have/

Did Nazi / Unit 731 experiments did any good

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/vs0zkb/the_reason_that_the_allies_gave_the_researchers/

https://old.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/4oyv9n/am_i_a_person_living_in_the_west_currently/

Postwar Japanese work culture: working to death or not?

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/w34dnd/postwar_japan_is_well_known_for_its_extreme_work/ihez0md/

Gladiator fights were WWF, not killing cages: how professional was this sport

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/wkk22n/did_gladiators_really_fight_to_the_death_in_the/

How pizza became cool in the 80s

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/wnfcmi/how_did_pizza_come_to_be_associated_with_rad_kid/

Holocaust was profitable, or at least a saving lifeline for a fledgling economy

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/2bv7ha/how_much_did_allotment_of_resources_to_commit_the/cj9alnr/

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/63459w/why_were_the_nazis_killing_jews_at_such_a_rate/

Wehrmacht was intrinsically connected to Holocaust

https://old.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/oedt0m/did_the_wehrmacht_complain_about_the_time_and/

How Holocaust got into full swing

https://old.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/wc7ktm/was_the_holocaust_something_happening_on_the_side/

Deniers and criticisers: Zhukov writes

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/3m4kmi/what_was_hitlers_endgame/cvc2qim/

How much money a labor camp inmate made for his jailers

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/3n4mx8/how_much_did_the_holocaust_cost_germany/

Japanese work ethic

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/nycais/what_led_to_the_development_of_japanese_work/

Booze instead of water in Middle Ages, the myth, the legend

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/ol1h45/prior_to_widespread_access_to_clean_water_was/h5bjn7s/

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/w5b77n/how_did_humans_survive_before_we_understood_that/

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/emn4ea/bad_bad_water/

https://knowledgenuts.com/bad-water-never-made-people-drink-beer-instead/

Fashion in 19th century was hella different and quick-changing

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/6uyexw/why_were_some_womens_dresses_from_the_1800s/

Q'ran as a book

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/vycg0l/bible_is_a_34_million_word_long_epic_prior_to/ikfahd9/

Seedy history of New Orleans sex clubs

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/wzy4mx/can_anyone_explain_this_found_photograph_for_me/

Was Nazi economy stable and strong, or a barely contained bubble?

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/6r3yej/the_weird_stability_of_nazi_currency/dl25cvz/

Also, some cool answer authors

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/wiki/profiles/sunagainstgold

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/wiki/profiles/mimicofmodes

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/wiki/profiles/toldinstone

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/wiki/profiles/georgy_k_zhukov

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/wiki/profiles/iphikrates

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/wiki/profiles/kochevnik81

Website: toldinstone

https://toldinstone.com/did-the-greeks-and-romans-play-drinking-games/

And a couple random answers by me

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/iikeo7/today_there_are_many_preppers_and_survivalists/

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/phtzt8/how_wellknown_were_tolkiens_works_in_the_ussr_or/

u/J-Force answered Is Machiavelli's The Prince actually a Satire?, in arguably my favorite answer on r/AskHistorians.

Remember readers, political treatises are not necessarily endorsements.

One of my favorites was a post about how American history was represented in cold war Soviet school textbooks. The answer went into detail about how Lincoln was portrayed in a much more revolutionary light than he typically is in US textbooks. I didn't save it and have been unsuccessfully looking for the link ever since.

There was another post on cultural/historical relativism and genocide/mass murder that I have also not been able to find. It basically argued that there was never a period of history where people failed to recognize the pain and suffering caused by slaughtering a whole city or social group, even if they justified doing so.

I really liked this post on the difference between saying there have been Kurdish states and saying there have been Kurdish-led states. u/The_Turk2

I also really love this post which asked about divorced US presidents but turned into a really interesting conversation about race, class, gender, marriage law and Andrew Jackson. u/sunagainstgold

Damn i have way too many to choose. Decision paralysis :)

Let's start with this one about ancient copper falsification (and how to spot it!)

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/otxpx2/eanasir_famously_tried_to_sell_subpar_copper/

And this one on Mulan:

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/6z3l43/if_mulan_did_what_she_did_in_ancient_chinawhat/

And this one about ritually concealed shoes in walls:

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/v2ohrp/why_did_someone_put_a_shoe_in_the_wall_of_a_200/

And this one about the local effects of the Tambora eruption:

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/5q9gjd/the_1815_eruption_of_mount_tambora_was_one_of_the/

And one related to the last one, about how much time it took to relate the eruption and the Year without a Summer:

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/irqvs0/in_the_year_without_a_summer_of_1816_did_people/

But my absolutely favorite one is this one from /u/sowser, about the differences between slaves and serfs:

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/8n19s0/suffering_slaves_and_suffering_serfs_whats_the/

u/jbdyer on what made Akira such a groundbreaking movie

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/pc3b81/what_made_akira_such_a_groundbreaking_and/hai2wxn/

The short books that people sometimes seem to write on here can be very cool.

I particularly like this 12 part piece by u/Libertat on ancient Gaulish culture and political organisation, and the twenty-odd part piece, complete with table of contents, by u/PangeranDiponegoro (if I remember his name right, apparently he's since deleted his account?) on the spread of Islam in Indonesia.

For anyone interested in the history of popular music, finding a new post from /u/hillsonghoods is always rewarding