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 drafted fellow community member u/hergrim into chatting to me for the first episode of my podcast Let's Talk About Crossbows. We chatted about the effectiveness of longbows and crossbows in the Middle Ages, particularly in reaction to the recent Arrows vs Armour II video from Tod's Workshop. It was a fun discussion and probably of interest to some people here who might have read any of our posts on this or related topics. You can listen at https://anchor.fm/crossbows. It should also be on Apple podcasts and hopefully elsewhere soon.
I'm planning a 10ish day vacation to southern Germany for hopefully next summer, what are the best and biggest museums that really focus on Holy Roman Empire medieval history?
My rough itinerary is, fly into Frankfurt, up to Aachen, down the Rhine for some castle action, specifically Château du Haut-Koenigsbourg in France before back across the river for cities like Stuttgart, Augsburg, Nuremberg, Regensburg, Munich and finishing off with the big imperial museum in Vienna.
Also, does anyone have experience shipping back souvenirs from Europe to the US during a short stay? I'm also hoping to knickknack it up from antique stores but don't want to lose stuff in the oblivion that is customs.
Had some finals this week - third and last year of law degree, but I'm trying to bamboozle my way towards an History of Law masters degree, by focusing on primarily historical subjects
Wrote up on the weaknesses of the French model of liberties in History of public liberties, then the similarities between the Roman and ecclesiastical justices in History of justice, before finishing today with the crisis of corporations in History of labor relations. Really hoping to be able to continue studying history next year !
Was Welsh Rarebit some kind of early 20th century proto-meme? I have seen at least 2 or 3 American silent films involving rarebit induced nightmares, and it seems there are several comics.
Meanwhile I have never seen or heard of rarebit being sold or eaten anywhere I've traveled in America. I had no idea what it was before I saw these films.
I vaguely recall a trend where people were asking questions like “I am a young man in [location] out on the town and I have a load of [local currency] burning a hole in my pocket, where do I go for some fun?”.
Did that really happen or was it all a dream to me?
Is there a better sub or place to research why this huge rock is engraved at a mill site from tbe 1800's?
The rock is engraved with geometric shapes and carved initials. There are also dates on the rock, the earliest being from 1817, and other engravings from the 1840s and 50s.
A mill once occupied the land that the rock now sits on, directly next to the mill's dam. It could have something to do with the employees who used to work there. The two mills that existed on tne land burned down.
Could the initials represent residents who died or who had maybe even been promoted or retired at the mill?
Your Weekly /r/askhistorians Recap
Friday, December 09 - Thursday, December 15
###Top 10 Posts
| score | comments | title & link |
|---|---|---|
| 3,008 | 56 comments | Until the presidency of Andrew Jackson, the US federal government considered the "American Indian" nations to be independent foreign nations. That being the case, wouldn't the US government's seizure of Native American lands have violated international law, such as the Treaty of Westphalia (1648)? |
| 2,776 | 97 comments | The Lord of the Rings was written in the 50's, but exploded in popularity much later in the 60's. What caused it to suddenly get so much popular? How did that affect other fantasy produced at the time? |
| 2,546 | 74 comments | Being the first to the enemy’s walls during a siege sounds like certain death. What motivated people during the Middle Ages and Antiquity to be the first to climb the ladder or siege tower? |
| 2,258 | 287 comments | [AMA] Voynich Manuscript AMA |
| 2,046 | 45 comments | In "Cunk on Earth", Egyptologist Tyledesly says "I don't think they had many homeless people in ancient Egypt. People looked after each other, I think." Did ancient Egypt (or other ancient societies) not experience homelessness as we know it today? |
| 1,577 | 53 comments | Were long poles with hooked ends really ever used to pull people off stage if they were performing badly? |
| 1,531 | 82 comments | How did Mormonism transition from a rogue, semi-threatening religion against which President Buchanan sent military forces, to a mainstream, non-threatening American religion no one gives a second thought to? |
| 1,336 | 45 comments | Early Irish law texts like the Críth Gablach and Uraicecht Becc say things like ‘[peasants] are not entitled to butter’ but what does that mean? They couldn’t make or possess butter, or that they couldn’t be given butter at a public feast or as alms? |
| 1,085 | 18 comments | US President Franklin Roosevelt received his strongest electoral support from the segregated Deep South. What was going through the minds of southern white voters when they voted for him? |
| 1,065 | 4 comments | When Constantinople was established as the new capital of the Roman Empire, was there a migration of officials and institutions from Italy or did Constantine and his successors rebuild the Roman government from the ground up? |
###Top 10 Comments
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Does anyone know where the phrase "tie one on" (as in to get drunk) could have originated from? Like it doesn't even make sense. What could possibly be being tied on?
I researched this for over seven minutes, and this was the best article I could find. It's from 2010:
It too doesn't have a definitive answer though.
I'm looking for an appropriate place to post about an old book and how to understand what it says. I'm not sure if here is the correct place. The book is the encyclopedia of heraldry by John Burke. Thank you for the help.
I’ve always wandered what happened(like in details) when a city gets sacked after a siege or a battle. Is there some sub or platform which can satisfy my sick wandering?
I have a few questions, my main interest is trying to understand a generalizable model of human society and development including subsistence, organization both societal and land use (as in cities being tall or wide, land reserved for crops or timber or mines), warfare, and relation to geography/climate/environment. My interest is partially fueled from having read the A Collection of Unmitigated Pedantry blog on how wheat shaped society.
Questions:
What was the impact of tree cover on pre-modern or ancient societies? Were dense forests/jungles essentially mountains or deserts in terms of travel and productivity apart from timber? Are a dense forest and jungle interchangeable? A popular image I've seen paints villages in the middle of forests when depicting gauls/germanic tribes, was this an actual thing for societies that lived in those places and what was their subsistence like?
Another question is how did hunting factor into ancient/pre modern society? As in where was it conducted, how was it managed, etc. Was it purely for sport/trade/luxury or did it provide a larger part of subsistence for any societies in Eurasia in comparison to pastoralism and agriculture? This question also extends to fishing, was it a significant part of subsistence or a "luxury" good compared to wheat/rice?
Third question is, what if any are the differences between pre modern European warfare and society and that of India? As I understand it, the difference between Europe and China is mainly one of density caused by rivers vs mountains and rice vs wheat, though I'm not clear if that meant larger villages and smaller cities or larger cities and smaller villages. Apart from having more war elephants, was India just Europe in terms of density, city formation, warfare and organization? Likewise, in sub-Saharan Africa, were there any differences with Europe in terms of warfare and societal development and organization or was it mostly the same with local factors determining extent of density, etc. Were most of these wheat or similar based or did they depend on a different crop with different yields/benefits/limitations?
What are the main factors/aspects that differentiate and serve as models of the differences between societies in Europe/Asia/Africa and those of the Americas especially pre-Colombian? Was Incan land use, organization and warfare really that different to other mountainous regions and how? What were the impacts of potatoes and maize in comparison to wheat and rice? Why didn't Mesoamerica have tightly packed spear/pike formations or did they? What drove society in the Caribbean compared to Indonesia/Greece/Japan/Philippines or the Mediterranean (ex: why were there no Aztec colonies in Florida or Cuba)? Were Native Americans north of the Rio Grande essentially the same as Neolithic Europe minus pastoralism? Did societies East of the Andes have agriculture? What was Amazonian society like (stable and decentralized or unstable and with varying centralization)?