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{ "a_id": [ "dd4ilsy" ], "score": [ 3 ], "text": [ "Clothes in ancient Greece are basically just a variety of rectangles. The most basic garment is a chiton and that is essentially piece of cloth folded around the body in a U shape. The opening fell on one side of the body, under the arm. The garment is then pinned on the shoulder and tied at the waist. If you're really fancy, it might be sewn up on the open side or at the shoulders. Sometimes (especially for women), the garment would be wide enough to make sleeves by sewing/pinning at points along the arm. \n\nThe basic cloak is the himation, again just a giant rectangle of cloth (though usually a wool rather than linen) which men usually wore something like a toga, while women would often drape over their heads.\n\nNow to get on to some of these other questions:\nfor labor or sport a man would either wear a shorter chiton or gird the extra material up into his belt, female huntresses (more myth than reality, though likely there were women who had to do physical labor) also dress like this. Hunters might also wear animal pelts tied around their shoulders or at their belts.\n\nSoldiers wear a distinct short cloak pinned on one shoulder called a chlamys (yes, like chlamydia), a traveler might also wear this as well as a wide-brimmed felt hat called a petasos and might carry a walking stick. Tall, knobby walking sticks appear to be a general affectation of aristocratic city boys as well.\n\nA woman, particularly a higher class one, might wear a peplos, which is essentially the same thing as a chiton, just the top is folded over, creating a kind of ruffle that fell to the waist.\n\nClothes were expensive, so the wealthy had more clothes, more layers, thicker cloths, and more ornament. There's a little uncertainty over use of dyes and the ones they had were likely not very strong, but art suggests that the wealthy probably wore clothes with woven patterns on the edges. The poor would own less clothes and less ornate and shorter. Young children were probably only dressed as much as the weather demanded. Slaves also probably owned little or no clothing depending on what their work required.\n\nIf you're looking for some visuals, I would recommend taking a look at some images on ancient pottery (a lot of museums have pictures of their collection online), some of these tend to the less realistic end of the scale (eg, foreigners wearing animals skin and (!) pants, theatrical costumes idealized naked youths), but they can give you a good idea without the interference of modern aesthetics." ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "ced9smv", "cedatds", "cedazja" ], "score": [ 5, 4, 6 ], "text": [ "For the albeit limited examples of the Holy Orders, the Templars had Sergeants. [Literary Source here](_URL_1_), as did the Hospitallers. [Additional source here, ](_URL_0_) \n\nI do not know about the Teutonic Knights. \n\n", "Your officers and NCOs would almost certainly be noblemen, the sole exception being if you were fighting in a mercenary company. That said, one of the real problems with medieval warfare is that the leaders and the shock troops come from the same pool of individuals, made up of about 2% of the adult male population. If your trained warrior aristocrats are off making heavy cavalry charges, they're not leading the middle-class infantry.\n\nIn the early middle ages, a king has two ways to assemble an army. One is by mobilizing his household knights, who could number in the hundreds. These would be led by his household officers; the marshal, the constable, etc. These experienced, full-time knights could also be used to form a junior officer corps to oversee the feudal levy, as done in the wars of Edward I.\n\nThe feudal levy is classically perceived as the king planting his standard and the lords of the realm flocking to it to perform their 40-days service (and not an hour more, damn you), but this seems to have rarely worked as intended. Later in medieval England, owing to the demilitarization of society and the gross inefficiency of the levee en masse, a system for contracted military service developed. At the bottom of the pile, you've got the simple esquire with four or five archers, contracting directly with the king. At the top, you've got dukes and earls contracting with scores or hundreds of men under them. \n\nIt's a matter of dispute just what authority these men had once the contracts were signed and they were with the army. At Azincourt, a relatively low-ranking nobleman, a household knight of Henry's, was placed in command of the 5,000-odd archers, while dukes and earls soldiered with the 1,000-odd men-at-arms.", "Yes. Here is an earlier [post I did specifically on the ranks of the Eastern Roman Empire (c. 1000).](_URL_0_)\n\n > Well obviously there is wide latitude in ranks as there are any number of Armies from that era. I'll use one that I have a book handy for as an example.\n > \n > For the Byzantine/Eastern Roman Empire circa turn of the millenium, the basic unit was the bandon, which is roughly similar to a company in modern military terms.\n > \n > The bandons were commanded by komes (count). With the infantry, the 256 man unit was broken into sixteen platoons of sixteen men each led by a lochaghos and assisted by NCO ranks known as dekarchos, pentarchos, tetrarchos and ourahos. The first three mean \"leader of ten, five and four\" respectively, while the last means \"file closer\".\n > \n > A 300 man cavalry banda was divided into three hekatontarchia, each commanded by a hekatontarchos. The senior hekatontarchos was the illarches, and the second in command to the komes. Later, the hekatontarchia was eliminated and the primary division was into six allaghia commanded by kentarchos (they were still outranked by the hekatontarchos, who oversaw two allaghia each). Allaghia were composed of five dekarchiai of ten men, and the ranks were the same as the infantry there, with dekarchos, pentarchos, tetrarchos and ourahos.\n > \n > Above the bandon level, came the moirai - moirarchai commanding, or dhoungoi - dhoungarii commanding. The number of banda varied, but they seems to have been made up of anywhere from two to five of them. After that was the turmai or merai, commanded by the turmarchai or merarchai respectively, and were made up of three moirai.\n > \n > Now, my book (Byzantine Armies 886-1118 by Ian Heath) doesn't give modern equivalents, but we can make reasonable comparisons (I'm just guessing here roughly based on the number of men they commanded, so don't take this part as certain)\n > \n > Turmarchai/merarchai - Col./Brigadier General\n > \n > Moirarchai/dhoungarii - Lt. Col./Col.\n > \n > Komes - Captain/Major\n > \n > Hekatontarchos -Captain\n > \n > Lochaghos/Allaghia - Lieutenant\n > \n > Dekarchos - Sergeant\n > \n > Pentarchos - Corporal\n > \n > Tetrarchos - Corporal\n > \n > Ourahos - Lance Corporal" ] }

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[ [ "http://books.google.de/books/about/The_Central_Convent_of_Hospitallers_and.html?id=C5FOrh6O_cEC&redir_esc=y", "http://books.google.de/books/about/The_New_Knighthood.html?id=DhdfTczmwWoC&redir_esc=y" ], [], [ "http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1sbjda/which_were_the_military_ranks_in_a_medieval_army/cdvxkr7" ] ]

{ "a_id": [ "cu2sx7e" ], "score": [ 15 ], "text": [ "It's important to remember that very few (if any) traders travelled the entire length of the silk road- it was more like a relay of different traders.\n\nThe central Asian deserts were already populated by nomadic people with a long tradition of trade, which facilitated the establishment of the greater trade routes in the way that they were." ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "c6urwfc", "c6uvet4" ], "score": [ 2, 2 ], "text": [ "The tales of Hershele of Ostropol are quite entertaining. They're relatively well known amongst some Jews and Ukrainians.", "I'll refer you to [this story](_URL_0_), which isn't even very well known among Russians, I don't think.\n\nThere's also a hagiography (story of a saint) called *The Tale of Peter and Fevronia*, from eleventh century Russia. I don't have my notes for this one and can't even find my original of it (which was from a version made in the early 18th century, I think), but I'll do my best. I also only have the first half of the story (but it's the part with all the action), so if anyone can and wants to add the rest, they're welcome to.\n\nPrince Paul finds out that his wife is being visited in the night by a serpent disguised as the prince. His wife discovers that the only way to kill the serpent is a magic sword owned by the prince's brother, Prince Peter. They go to Peter and ask him to kill the serpent, and he obliges. However, he gets covered in the serpent's blood after he slays it, and where it touches his skin he breaks out into gross and painful scabby sores. They send for all the doctors in the realm, and not a single one can cure (let alone treat) poor Prince Peter.\n\nSuddenly, word reaches Peter of Fevronia, a young peasant maiden who, they say, will know how to cure him. He leaves Murom to go find her in the countryside, carried by a retinue. When they arrive at her hut, he's carried in, laid on a bed, and his retinue leaves. Fevronia agrees to cure him, on one condition: that he marries her. Peter reluctantly agrees, and Fevronia makes up a salve, applies it to his sores, and they heal instantly. Peter then leaves, and instead of marrying Fevronia, promises to send her plenty of gifts.\n\nIt's not long before Peter's body is again covered in those gross scabby sores, and he returns to Fevronia, and he's pretty mad at her. This time, she makes him swear oaths that he'll marry her if she cures him, and he agrees. She heals him, and they return to Murom together. His brother Paul dies not much later, and they become Prince and Princess of Murom." ] }

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[ [], [ "http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/12ci5b/classical_scholars_what_are_your_favorite_obscure/c6u5yp1" ] ]

{ "a_id": [ "cis80ks", "cis93mi" ], "score": [ 2, 2 ], "text": [ "It was infeasible because it was suicidal. The invasion convoys were escorted by several dozen destroyers, frigates or other escort ships with Anti Submarine weapons on board. The RAF coastal command flew numerous patrols over the English Chanel, Particularly the western approaches, near Cornwall. \nDoneitz did send four U-Boats to the waters off of Normandy, but all four were sunk, without accomplishing anything, vis-a-vis the dense concentration of merchant ships the Allies had in that area. \nSamuel Elliot Morrison has the complete order of battle for the US Navy, Royal Navy, Canadian Navy and Polish Navy for D-day in his book \"The invasion of France and Germany 1944-1945\" which is part of his fifteen volume set \"History of US Naval Operations in World War II\" ", "In addition to what /u/davratta said, the U boats were slow and unwieldy, which would lead to less effective patrol areas and lower chance of survival and attack, so [fast attack craft](_URL_2_) were used more as they could cover larger areas and had a better chance of slipping away. For example, a group of nine schnellboot came across a [practice landing](_URL_0_) on the coast of England about a month and a half before the Normandy landing and sank two, killing at least 638 US personnel, with no German losses.\n\nThere was so much Allied air cover that neither Schnellboats (known as E-boats to the allies) or U-boats could venture forth during the day, and German confusion about the invasion (real versus feint) kept the boats away for the first day, but they did deploy and patrol towards the Allied landing the next day. A decent overview is available on the [_URL_3_ site](_URL_1_), which is perhaps a little off topic for your original question, but I suspect of interest if your are looking for German naval opposition to the landings in general. " ] }

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[ [], [ "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exercise_Tiger#Battle_of_Lyme_Bay", "http://s-boot.net/sboats-km-channel44.html", "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-boat", "S-boot.net" ] ]

{ "a_id": [ "cmmyl9f" ], "score": [ 6 ], "text": [ "In 1799, the French Directory was a corrupt political machine that used war to divert attention away from problems within France (such as how corrupt they were) and using war to gain funds for both the government and themselves. The coup of 18 Brumaire would drive the corrupt Directory away and place Napoleon with two other consuls as the head of the French government.\n\nThe first thing that was done was clearing away all the rats that plagued the French government and pushing the corruption out and promoting meritocracy within the government. Further, the Napoleonic Code (Civil Code of France) would be unrolled during the first five years before Napoleon would be crowned Emperor. Overall, Napoleon would drive the French government to one of chaos to one of efficiency and quality.\n\nMost importantly, he was popular. In several plebiscites, Napoleon was overwhelmingly elected as Consul for Life and then Emperor (David G. Chandler states in his *Campaigns of Napoleon* that it seems that it was a democratic and fair election process, although the vote for Emperor was tainted with a few hundred odd votes from members of the military clumped together).\n\nI would say that it goes down to the effectiveness of leadership. Louis XVI was a well meaning and kind man that was not a born leader, Napoleon was a man that took charge and had people work toward his will. Further, the people were tired and wanted peace, which Napoleon brought with an effective government, something Louis XVI didn't and couldn't do." ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "cacar9o" ], "score": [ 2 ], "text": [ "I can't say that this was a re-discovery, but one of the more interesting examples of something like this was when Texas revolutionists attacked and killed General Santa Anna and his army. They stole his wooden leg, and it was held in a museum in what I believe was Illinois. Apparently, Mexico hates him, but the government still wants it back. We just haven't returned it yet. This is very apparent since he died in exile and was buried in a grave in Los Angeles.. But this was after about 150 years or so of having the museum that held the leg decline to give it to Mexico. \n\nReflecting further on this, I believe it may the Illinois State Military Museum, or something to that affect, just don't quote me on it. There is also a second leg that was captured, again from Santa Anna. However, this one is just a peg leg held in what I know for sure is Oglesby Mansion. It is rumored that Lieutenant Abner Doubleday used it as a baseball bat." ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "fjik17g" ], "score": [ 11 ], "text": [ "Serfs were a bit similar to slaves, but a slight bit more well off. While slaves were considered the property of their owners, serfs were not. And while they did not live the luxurious lifestyles of those they served, they still had their place, and had their limited rights (even if these rights may or may not have been actually enforced). Serfs were essentially attached to land, with feudal contracts. The owner of the land could not sell the serf to another and force him to go somewhere else, and if their lord sold the land they lived on to another, the serfs most often followed. \n\nSerfdom was more of a contract. Serfs lived and worked the land that the Lords owned, and in return had the Lord’s protection and a place to live/work. Now a serf could not leave the land without his Lord’s permission, and could not sell the land, they still had a bit of freedom, and a day or two per week when they could work for themselves to raise money. \n\nThis most often began when one accumulated a very large amount of debt. He would then go to a lord, and get into a feudal contract of serfdom. This meant that the Lord would protect the man and slowly pay off his debt, in return for the man living on the land and working the fields for said lord. Then the man’s children became serfs to work off the debt, so on and so forth. \n\nSo unlike slaves, serfs had rights, and actually got something back from their work, even getting paid. \n\nThis actually became an issue for the Lords during the Black Plague, because most serfs died off, allowing the remaining serfs to demand more payment for their work, allowing the serfs more free time to hone crafts skills and move away from their lords, and into the cities for better paying jobs, but that is a whole another story. \n\nTldr: slaves were property and treated as such. Serfs were citizens in contract with their lords, receiving paychecks and actual compensation for their work, as well as having rights, but they were still attached to the land, and leaving serfdom was extremely difficult." ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "djkpcts" ], "score": [ 3 ], "text": [ "I'm going to speak in broad and general terms here, since you've asked a question that concerns a wide area both geographically, as well as temporally and in terms of existing, previous legal practices (conquered Greek or Hellenistic cities, f.e. would have their own extensive bodies of law, while Germans wouldn't, while in other conquered territories local administration was built up *ex nihilo*, f.e. in Germany on the right bank of the Rhine). Roman law is also not a monolithic body, so this is only a general overview.\n\nOften, newly conquered territories weren't directly subject to Roman laws. That was, broadly speaking, the situation of most land that was conquered by Rome in Italy and during republican times until the 1st century B.C. Those lands that didn't directly become Roman territory (*ager romanus*) or were settled by Roman colonies (*colonia civium Romanorum*) were under their own autonomous laws. The allied cities (*civitates foederatae*, *liberae* or *stipendiariae*) were autonomous in internal affairs, while Rome was in control of external matters. \n\nFor the most part, this is also true of the Roman conquest of territories in imperial times, say Gaul, Germany, Britain, the Balkans and Danube region. Roman rule initially was rather indirect, focussed on controlling and integrating the leadership and aristocracy of local groups, generally organized along the lines of *gentes* (peoples) or *civitates*, citizenships or groups centered around ethnic lines. So in newly conquered Roman territories, Roman law wasn't too relevant for most people, since the local *civitates*, client kingdoms, tribes or cities would govern their internal affairs largely after their own fashion. Gradually, they would be more integrated into the Roman polity, or new *civitates* or *coloniae* might be founded. Colonies would have Roman citizenship and generally have municipal laws modelled after the example of Rome, but generally cities retained a degree of local legal autonomy.\n\nIn addition, one thing to understand about Roman law is that it was not so much codified as it was a cumulative body of jurisdiction. There were the famous twelve tables in the beginning in the early republic, but those covered only narrow areas of law and were not applicable to many of the legal questions that would arise later in Rome's history. The most important sources for Roman law - besides the twelve table law and recognized customs - were edicts and judgements arising out of legal practice, as well as statutes or special laws formulated by the public assemblies, the senate or the emperor to deal with very specific circumstances. One of the most important sources for this was the *praetor*, a high ranking office whose responsibility was judging cases between citizens. In the beginning of his annual term of office, the *praetor* would publish an edict in which he stated which types of cases, or actions (*actiones*) he would grant for judication, which remedies he would offer to settle legal disputes, and which not. \n\n*De jure*, he didn't create new law (that wasn't in his powers), but in effect he made what the Romans called *ius honorarium*, by choosing which legal remedies he would grant (or was persuaded to create for unforeseen circumstances), he created a body of legal instruments that could be used and referred to in the future. In the conquered provinces, this role was taken over by the governour similarly to how the *praetores* spoke law at Rome, by their edicts. For the provinces, these edicts by the governour were one important source of law. \n\nA second important source of law for the provinces was the emperor himself, who might either set law by decree, decide to hear cases brought to him by provincials himself or settle legal disputed brought to him by provincials (often the governour himself, of which many examples survive in the letters between Pliny in his function as provincial gouvernor and the emperor Trajan) either by provocation or by letter (*epistula*), to which the emperor gave answer (which was calles subscription, since he wrote his answer below the letter, and later rescript). Appeal to the governour or emperor was one often used example to settle disputes in the provinces.\n\nSo, how were such things made public? Thankfully, we have quite a few examples of these. Usually, they would be inscribed into large bronze tables (many of these legal acts contained a clause that they were to be *in aere incisa*, inscribed into bronze), and hung up in a public place. This is the case for many municipal laws that survive, especially from Spain, for example the municipal law of the *colonia Iulia Genetiva*, modern Urso. [This is one of the tables containing chapter 61-69](_URL_1_), and you can check a translation of the surviving fragmente [here](_URL_0_). Others are known f.e. from Irni, the *lex Irnitana* also being interesting in this context. The lex Irnitana contained a clause that specified up to which amounts in dispute the local magistrates were responsible for judication, and when the case should be brought before the provincial gouvernor, and also (in chapter 85), that the local magistrates were require to put up, in legible writing and in a public place, those edicts of the provincial governour according to which they would judge local cases.\n\nMany of these municipal laws show close parallels to Roman civil law, in the modelling, duties, responsibilites of the magistrates and the political organization itself. Edicts by the senate pertaining to Roman subjects were also published in the same way, the most famous example probably being the *senatus consultum de Bacchanalibus*, which outlawed practice of the Bacchanalian cult throughout Italy (and thus also in allied towns!) and consequently was hewn into bronze tables put up all over Italy, of which one example survives from Tiriolo. \n\nA famous case of imperial judication is well known from several examples found in the Greek provinces. It seems that the provincial governour, the proconsul, had tried to force a Roman senator living in Asia to take a travelling Roman into his home against his will. Against this, the governour petitioned the emperor, and received a harsh reply: \"Sacred letters (from the chancellery of the Emperor, sc. imperial ruling). You seem to us to be ignorant of the *senatus consultum*. For if you had conferred with (your) experts, you would know that a roman senator is not required to take in a guest against his will.\" This decision seems to have been (unsurprisingly) popular with local senators, and so it was put up in inscription in several places such as Antiochia Pisidia, Ephesos and Paros [f.e. CIL III 14203, 8), and surviving examples have been found in urban contexts, so probably close to senatorial estates who thus communicated to possible uninvited guests that they were not really required to house them. They were also put up in latin as well as in Greek, to prevent people from putting the language barrier forward as an excuse.\n\nTo bring this to a conclusion, the Romans were usually quite anxious about having those laws according to which public life was ordered publicly displayed for anyone to see (to read, well, that is an interesting question if you consider that probably only a fifth of people could read, and less comprehend the legalese). Newly conquered people were usually left to govern their own affairs under the patronage of Rome, and cities could be granted their own legal autonomy that would continue throughout imperial times. Relevant laws and legal decisions would be inscribed, either on bronze or sometimes less durable materials like whitewashed wood (which of course do not survive), for anyone to read who was interested and literate. In cases were local law didn't apply, Roman law could be brought in to settle disputes. But since Roman law was a cumulative body of legal decisions, the possibility remained in most cases to petition the local governour or the emperor to pass judgement, and this was done often, and the results (if advantageous), proudly displayed. \n\nSources and further reading:\n\n* D. Johnston, Roman Law in Context (Cambridge 2004)\n\n* D. Knibbe - R. Merkelbach, Allerhöchste Schelte (Zwei Exemplare der Sacrae Litterae aus Ephesos), Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik 31, 1978, 229-232.\n\n* E. Metzger, Agree to Disagree: Local Jurisdiction in the *lex Irnitana*, in: A. Burrows, D. Johnston, R. Zimmermann, eds., Judge and Jurist: Essays in Memory of Lord Rodger of Earlsferry (Oxford 2013) 207–225.\n\n* K. Tuori, The Emperor of Law. The Emergence of Roman Imperial Adjudication (Oxford 2016)\n\n\n\n\n\n" ] }

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[ [ "http://avalon.law.yale.edu/ancient/charter_of_urso.asp", "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/4/49/Lex_Ursonensis_-_tabla_1_%28M.A.N._16736%29_01.jpg/1280px-Lex_Ursonensis_-_tabla_1_%28M.A.N._16736%29_01.jpg" ] ]

{ "a_id": [ "cp4ccb3" ], "score": [ 7 ], "text": [ "Could you please specify more exactly what you're interested in? Antiquity encompasses a period of several thousand years, with myriad peoples and cultures interacting with each other for every moment of that time. Depending on time and place there are vastly different cultural and social attitudes and approaches towards various means of accumulating wealth and various trades. For example, while the mercantile classes appear to have been fairly powerful and prestigious at Carthage, you won't find the same respect for merchants in Rome even as late as the Principate. \n\nIn addition to when and where it might be worth it for you to clarify what you mean by a profession and what you mean by \"sought-after.\" The first is mainly for the purposes of semantic (and rather pedantic, sorry) clarity--members of the senatorial class were not ideally supposed to have a profession, as in a trade, and made their money off of land-trading and rents mostly, which we might consider a profession but not an occupation. The latter is essential to your question, however--do you mean professions that are the most respected or those that are sought after because they provide the greatest opportunity for wealth? Those are not necessarily the same thing--to use my Roman example again, while merchants often could amass large fortunes the occupation was dominated in the Principate by non-*nobiles* and freedmen" ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "cungfg6", "cunmoh0", "cunw6h4" ], "score": [ 38, 706, 49 ], "text": [ "You might consider asking r/aviation too.", "Finally something I can help answer! My senior thesis was done on the A-12 program. \n\nSo firstly, I need to mention that the SR-71 was a variant of the A-12 Oxcart program developed by Lockheed for the CIA. Most of my information is coming from the development of the A-12.\n\nFor your first question. The USSR was aware of the capabilities of the SR-71 as a result over overhead satellite reconnaissance that the Soviet Union carried out over important military installations. In this case being the Nevada Test and Training Range and Groom Lake. Around 1964 the Ambassador to the USSR in Moscow was given a sketch of the A-12's top down silhouette that had been drawn after space based infa-red cameras had gotten a picture on the runway. (Interesting note. The ground crews would draw absurd plane shapes on the runway and heat them up with lamps to mess with Soviet intelligence when the A-12 project was temporarily grounded after this incident) \n\nThe soviets also had a trawler monitoring A-12 reconnaissance flights leaving Japan during overflight of Vietnam and North Korea during the USS Pueblo incident. The Advanced notice of the trawler allowed SAM crews in Vietnam to successfully track the A-12s overflight even though they couldn't engage it.\n\nCan't speak on 2 or 3 because I don't know that much about soviet black projects. But there was an incident before the Gary Powers shoot down where Khrushchev threatened to shoot down the next U-2 that the CIA sent over Russia.\n\nStealth edit while I sit in the waiting room of the dentist. There actually was a nuclear interceptor variant of the blackbird ordered by the air force known as the YF-12 that would have carried 2 nuclear weapons. The initial order of 12 was either included in the first batch or SR-71s or canceled in favor of the 71. Its difficult to find any information on them other than that it was planned.\n\nSources are from the Official CIA release of A-12 program documents. [link](_URL_0_)\n\nI will be happy to answer other questions relating to this wonderful plane. \n\n", "Modified from an [earlier answer on Soviet aerial reconnaissance](_URL_0_)\n\nCompared to the US, the Soviets' recce aircraft were largely converted or modified versions of frontline aircraft. The Yak-25RV, for example, took the Yak-25 interceptor and added a longer straight wing for high-altitude reconnaissance. The resulting aircraft was less than satisfactory; its interceptor engines were too overpowered for the type of high-altitude work and could easily push the Yak-25RV past its safe speed limit. Yet for most of the 1960s the Yak-25RV was the only dedicated reconnaissance aircraft the Soviets deployed. It saw action over the Soviet borders in China, India, and Pakistan and Yak-25RV units were stationed in East Germany and Hungary, although they probably never overflew West Germany. The Soviets also modified Tu-16 bombers to serve as reconnaissance role. Two of the Badgers actually overflew a portion of southwest Alaska in March 1963 which prompted a the US to strengthen Alaska's air defenses. Tu-16s also performed maritime reconnaissance in the Atlantic and over Egypt. The Mikoyan-Gurevich OKB also developed several tactical reconnaissance versions of the MiG-21 with uprated engines. Because of the the limited size, these MiG-21s often had their recon equipment stored in a streamlined belly fairing. These versions of the venerable MiG became some of the backbone of tactical reconnaissance and saw action throughout the 1970s and 80s in the Middle East and in Afghanistan. In the former case, Arab pilots usually flew these missions, but sometimes the job would fall on the shoulders of Soviet advisers.\n\nThe most capable recon platform deployed by the Soviets was the multiple versions of the MiG-25. Unlike the Yak-25RV, the virtues of the MiG-25 as an interceptor greatly enhanced its role as a fast short-range reconnaissance aircraft. Development converting the Ye-155 into a reconnaissance aircraft started in 1961 and the lower nose had a interchangeable payload for different missions like photo recon or signals intelligence. The initial version, the MiG-25R, deployed to Egypt in the aftermath of the Six-Day War to give Egypt a strategic reconnaissance asset. Some commentators claim that early versions of the Foxbat might have flown over the Israeli Dimona nuclear reactor in May 1967. But Michael Oren argues that the aircraft in question were MiG-21s, while the book *Foxbats over Dimona* cites interviews that claim they were MiG-25s. That assertion rests on relatively thin evidence, especially given that had they been Mig-25s, they would have been prototypes of the reconnaissance models as the Soviets were still undergoing flight-testing at this stage. The famous July 1967 Moscow flypast were all relatively new prototypes. The later detachment to Egypt was a dedicated reconnaissance unit, the 63rd Independent Air Detachment (Det 63), and manned by experience Soviet personnel. Det 63 started sorties over Israel and the Sinai in May 1971 and evaded Israeli defenses, prompting a complaint by Israel to the UN about Soviet overflights. Det 63's successes was a vindication for the MiG-25 program and added impetus to developing the MiG-25R into a dual reconnaissance-strike aircraft, the MiG-25RB/K/RBSh. The Soviets would export MiG-25Rs to several client states and they saw action there. Iraq's MiG-25s provided the Iraqis much needed intelligence prior to its invasion of Kuwait. The Soviets also used the MiG-25 as in Afghanistan as well as patrolling the Soviet border and monitoring the Chinese.\n\nDespite these developments, there were a number of factors that mitigated against a manned reconnaissance program on the scale of the USAF and CIA. One problem working against the Soviets was a technological gap in aerospace. Although this narrowed over time, Soviet aerospace could not produce the aircraft with the performance (speed and range) equivalent to their US counterparts. For example, the MiG-25 became the basis for the main reconnaissance aircraft, and while its speed approached SR-71 levels, the MiG's range was quite terrible compared to either the U-2 or SR-71 (and to be fair, the MiG-25 was designed for a different purpose). The Soviets never developed the tanker infrastructure to support the global operations undertaken by the US. \n\nThe Soviets at one point in the early 1960s had an equivalent to the SR-71 in development, the Tsybin RSR. While not quite as bleeding edge as Lockheed's aircraft, the RSR was a large dedicated strategic reconnaissance aircraft. But the Tsybin design bureau ran afoul of both the Tupolev and Mikoyan bureaus who wanted to use the resources demanded by the development of the RSR. The failure of the RSR illustrates a structural hindrance to the development of a manned strategic reconnaissance program: the nature of Soviet military procurement. As it evolved in the 1930s and ossified in the Stalin Era, aerospace design bureaus had become powerful constituencies within the Soviet state. The state compounded this problem further by designating certain bureaus as their go-to for certain aircraft types (Tupolev= bombers, Sukhoi= ground attack/strike, Mikoyan = fighters, etc.). This squashed innovation to a degree, so a Soviet analogue to the Skunkworks had to fight an uphill battle against an entrenched bureaucracy. \n\nFinally, the Soviets, like the US, tended to shift towards satellite reconnaissance for overflights. This was partly because of the Soviet's intensive development of SAM systems rendered overflights very hazardous. Even the SR-71s did not risk direct overflights of the USSR, and while it could handle the SA-2s that downed Francis Gary Powers, the USAF brass was less confident that it could beat the 1970s generation of air defense missiles. In the runup for Operation Eldorado Canyon, there was a serious concern that the Libyan's SA-5s posed a risk to SR-71 operations. Although the SR-71 proved to be more than capable in Libya, there was a persistent concern in the 1980s that a skilled air defense network could defeat the SR-71. \n\n*Sources*\n\nButtler, Tony, and E. Gordon. *Soviet Secret Projects: Bombers Since 1945*. Leicester: Midland, 2004.\n\nCrickmore, Paul F. *Lockheed Blackbird: Beyond the Secret Missions*. Oxford: Osprey, 2004. \n\nGordon, Yefim. *MiG-25 'Foxbat', MiG-31 'Foxhound': Russia's Defensive Front Line*. Leicester: Aerofax, 1997.\n\n_. *Soviet Spyplanes of the Cold War*. London: Pen and Sword Aviation, 2013.\n" ] }

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[ [], [ "http://www.foia.cia.gov/collection/12-oxcart-reconnaissance-aircraft-documentation" ], [ "https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/306pav/what_was_soviet_aerial_reconnaissance_like/" ] ]

{ "a_id": [ "d5t3cre" ], "score": [ 28 ], "text": [ "Pretty well, actually. The costumes, props, sets, everything was pretty meticulously researched and they do a very good job of avoiding anachronisms or introducing stuff that's just flat out fiction. About the only thing that *really* made me raise my eyebrows was the fact that the *Acheron* was supposedly a \"44 gun privateer, Boston-built\". That means it would have construction very similar to the *USS Constitution*, which needed a crew of about 450, including a complement of Marines. That's obscenely huge for a truly independent privateer, unless the term privateer was supposed to be a colloquialism for an actual French warship operating independently in foreign waters. \n\nThe clothes, the battle scenes, and how the men conducted themselves on the ship day-to-day is spot on. They did a great job showing how cramped, wet, dirty, and smelly life aboard a sloop or sixth-rate frigate would be. The little things, like a servant for every officer during the dinner scene in Aubrey's cabin, and how messy and disgusting the surgery scenes in the wardroom were during the battles were excellent. Showing the separate room for the lantern adjacent to the magazine, and the powder room sailors going barefoot were good too. The *Rose* is a replica of the *HMS Rose* of the era, so the construction of the ship is about as accurate as we'll get without using the *Victory* to film scenes, or going back in time. \n\nPeople like to complain about little technicalities, like the amount of live-fire gunnery practice they did halfway through the movie, in the middle of nowhere, with no chance of re-supply. That's a needless and expensive expenditure of shot and powder; the vast majority of gun exercises would have been \"dry runs\", where everybody went through the motions but didn't actually touch off any rounds. However, it's a movie and they needed to fold that \"getting better\" montage in somewhere sensible, so I get it. \n\n**TL;DR-** A few minor, minor quibbles, but the movie is pretty spot. \n\n" ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "dp70376" ], "score": [ 7 ], "text": [ "You may be interested in [this older answer](_URL_0_) from u/PartyMoses on bayonets and their (non)use in warfare, which posits that bayonets were never much actually used for stabbing, but for intimidation. " ] }

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[ [ "https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/5i0pkg/why_were_bayonets_underused_in_the_american_civil/db52r6p/" ] ]

{ "a_id": [ "dwxyx6p", "dwyf3d3" ], "score": [ 7, 4 ], "text": [ " > how much access do Western (English-speaking, primarily) historians have to Japanese primary sources?\n\nAre you asking how easy is it for foreign historians to gain physical access to Japanese primary sources or are you asking to what extent have Japanese primary sources been translated into foreign languages?", "This is a really good question and there are a few things going on here. First of all, I'm not a historian and I don't read Japanese, so this answer will also explain how I go about things as an educator who stumbled on a lot of peoples hunger for reliable answers about Japanese history. I began explaining the academic work I was consuming, and here I am five years later. I'm sure a real Bakumatsu historian could do a better job at answering questions, but I like to think I know *how* to explain and teach.\n\n**i.** The first issue is why so many questions are answered with reference to Western observations. This isn't because there are no Japanese historical accounts, or that English-language historians of Japan don't have access to primary sources. Its because Western observers had very different priorities for what they recorded than did Japanese people. Westerners like Louis Frois or Engelbert Kaempfer were interested in recording everything about the customs of Japan, their clothing, hair, material goods etc. and how they differed from the West. A lot of this is the stuff that their contemporary Japanese counterparts would have seen no reason to document. There is, of course, plenty of evidence in Japanese sources for these subjects, as well as the archaeological record and survival of art and material culture, but these Western ethnographies are a really good eyewitness report of things that often aren't addressed head on. So, for example, Louis Frois wrote\n\n > Because of our buttons and lacings, we cannot easily keep our hands close to our bodies; since Japanese men and women are not thus restricted, they always leave their sleeves hanging empty and pull their hands in close to their bodies, especially in winter.\n\nThis observation of a behaviour that was completely normal to anyone in Japan over most of its history isn't the sort of thing that'd make it into a Sengoku chronicle. \n\nWestern accounts are Japan seen through the eye of a stranger, and may be confused and biased and wrong, but they are really valuable just for bringing that perspective of a stranger.\n\n**ii.** There absolutely is a lack of translated Japanese texts and translations of Japanese historical works. Even if translated, many texts are very diffiult to access. This isn't the biggest problem for historians. To be a real historian of Japanese history, I think you should be able to read Japanese. Professional English language historians communicate with their Japanese counterparts, work together on projects, and learn from each other. International cmmunication among historians has lots of problems, and often the English language and Japanese historians don't communicate as well as they could, but there's not a void between English and Japanese history. If you pick up any English academic book about Japanese history, it'll cite Japanese work, thank Japanese colleagues etc. Respected English language scholars do research in Japanese archives; they don't stay at home and just read translations of Japanese work. Luke S. Roberts, for instance, is a *master* of the Tosa domain archives. \n\nBut for the English-language reader, the gaps in the translations are *huge*. Important Japanese historical work, if it's ever translated at all, is translated many years after. There are so many untranslated primary documents. The amateur history-lover or undergraduate student is definitely restricted. This is my position. I'm in the very lucky position of having access to a university library and its databases, but I only read English. I'm not a historian, though I've had some good training from history professors and a talent for remembering and searching up stuff. Answering questions here to the best of my ability involves using English resources. This can be rather frustrating when I know from conversations or google-translate that there is an easy answer to be found in Japanese materials, but I don't have enough knowledge to properly reference it. \n\nThe translation gap is much more significant for older eras. There is a *lot* of stuff about the Edo Period in English, never as much as I'd like, but translations, analysis of data, amazing articles and books about many subjects. For the Sengoku, on the other hand, good up-to-date English academic work is way scarcer. Historical research in all areas of Japan is proceeding at a fast clip, and I'd say translations are coming out and becoming more widely available (via ebook format etc.) so the future looks bright, but it's still a challenge.\n\n**iii.** There are of course way fewer primary sources as you go backwards in Japanese history, and the type of sources preserved will depend on the era's priorities. Even a Japanese scholar immersed in medieval sources will be very aware of the large gaps in the record. A closer example to our time: we have many, many records of the Late Edo Period, most of which take no interest in the ordinary lives of women. To reconstruct their lives, we have to search for sources, and tease out information from censuses, legal proceedings, satirical literature etc. Writing around the unknown, piecing together clues to construct fragments of an uncompletable puzzle, is the work of the historian. " ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "cpmevmu", "cpmf6j7", "cpmtzv8" ], "score": [ 1187, 74, 22 ], "text": [ "Like most stuff that gets introduced in lecture courses, it's mostly right, but more complicated.\n\nPrior to the decision to drop the bomb, some members of the Japanese political leadership were working behind the scenes to try to negotiate a conditional surrender whose terms did (in many ways) closely resemble the unconditional terms of peace that was later accepted.\n\nBut both the American public and the American government were hostile to the idea of a conditional Japanese surrender, while the Japanese public and military were vehemently opposed to the idea of an unconditional surrender. \n\nSo much so, in fact, that even if U.S. forces had been willing to consider a conditional surrender and it had been a politically feasible option, U.S. military strategists believed that, even if Japan's political elite were acting in good faith during negotiations, they would never be able to convince the Japanese hardliners in the military to accept the negotiated outcome and actually surrender.\n\nSo your prof is right in that there were negotiations and discussions on the table to end the war without the bomb, largely on terms that wound up being acceptable after the bomb. But whether or not that alone made the bomb unnecessary depends on whether or not one believes that those negotiations would have been politically feasible to the people and powers that be on either side of the Pacific without the bomb.\n\nIf you're looking for sources on it, \"Marshall, Truman, and the Decision to Drop the Bomb\" by Gar Alperovitz, Robert L. Messer and Barton J. Bernstein talks about this a bit, as does (iirc) John Chappell's *Before the Bomb*.", "Someone else has mentioned that the Japanese offered conditional surrender before the bombings - the most important condition being that **the Emperor was spared**. The U.S., meanwhile, were adamant about only accepting unconditional surrender.\n\n\"The Potsdam declaration in July, demand[ed] that Japan surrender unconditionally or face 'prompt and utter destruction.' MacArthur was appalled. He knew that the Japanese would never renounce their emperor, and that without him an orderly transition to peace would be impossible anyhow, because his people would never submit to Allied occupation unless he ordered it. Ironically, when the surrender did come, it was conditional, and the condition was a continuation of the imperial reign. Had the General's advice been followed, the resort to atomic weapons at Hiroshima and Nagasaki might have been unnecessary.\" (from a biography about McArthur - \"American Caesar: Douglas MacArthur\" by William Manchester).\n", "Yes, there is some truth to the statement, but as others have already said it was more complicated, and hinged on the question of whether it was a conditional or an unconditional surrender. Despite the fact that the final surrender was unconditional, the terms imposed by the US were rather similar to the conditional surrender that the peace faction of the Japanese leadership had imagined.\n\nSince it is topical, allow me to re-post a more in depth timeline of the surrender decision, cobbled together from some posts that I wrote a while back.\n\nThe best English language book on the Japanese side of the decision to surrender is Hasegawa's [Racing the Enemy](_URL_1_). \n\nHe uses the diaries of key decision makers among the big six, the recollections of people close to them, and the minutes of their meetings, to argue that the Japanese leadership was more concerned with the Soviets declaring war than they were with the atomic bombs. Illogical as it might sound, the Japanese leadership hoped to secure Soviet mediation to gain a more favorable surrender. The goal of this surrender was always preserving the *kokutai* (国体 - national polity / national essence - which can mean anything from the national structure to the mythic godhood of the Japanese Emperor and his unity with the people) Second, they didn't know about the longer term effects of atomic bombs, and Japanese cities being destroyed wasn't a new thing; 1 bomb instead of thousands, but the end result looked similar in terms of death toll and destruction.\n\nHere is a breakdown of the Japanese activity in the final months. Page numbers are from Hasegawa.\n\nAlthough the Soviet Union had renounced the Japanese neutrality pact in April of 1945, and the Japanese ambassador knew that looking for soviet mediation in the surrender was a lost cause, Japanese leaders largely ignored their ambassador's advice and insisted on pursuing the possibility of Soviet mediation. \n\nJune 18th, the [Supreme War Council](_URL_0_) decided to pursue \"option 3,\" seeking Soviet mediation, and Hirohito endorsed this action in a meeting with the Big 6(The Supreme War Council, minus the Emperor) on June 22nd (106). \n\nJune 30th, Sato, Ambassador to Moscow, telegrammed Togo, the Minister of Foreign Affairs, to tell him that the plan \"...is nothing but pinning our hopes to the utterly impossible.\" Togo told him to do it anyway (123). Clearly, they were looking for a way to surrender months before they actually did, but they wanted it on their terms.\n\nJuly 12, Not to be deterred, Hirohito decided that Japan should try harder if negotiations weren't going well, and appointed Prince Konoe special envoy to Moscow to secure Soviet mediation. The same day Togo Telegrammed Sato and asked him to relay their intentions to Molotov, but Sato was unable to contact him before he departed for Potsdam. Even though their ambassador had been rebuffed, the Japanese high command either did not relay the full message up to the Emperor, or they did not understand the gravity of the situation (123-124). Sato's messages of the impossibility of this task continued through the rest of July, and Togo responded by telling him that seeking Soviet mediation was the imperial will (144).\n\nAugust 2nd, Togo continued to reject advice that Japan should accept the Potsdam Procalmation, and told Sato that the Emperor was concerned with the progress of the Moscow negotiations, adding that \"the Premier and the leaders of the Army are now concentrating all their attention on this one point\"(172).\n\nAug. 7, After the Hiroshima bomb, Togo telegramed Sato in Moscow regarding the Konoe mission, stating that the situation was getting desperate and that \"We must know the Soviet's attitude immediately\" (185). Obviously, they still hadn't given up hope on Soviet aid, and the possibility of Soviet mediation still seemed to be an alternative to surrendering unconditionally, even to the peace party. Molotov and Sato met on the 8th, and Molotov read him the declaration of war against Japan. Sato's telegram informing Tokyo never arrived.\n\nAug. 9th, Japanese Domei News intercepted a radio broadcast of the Russian declaration of war and Tokyo learned of it. Early in the morning Togo and top foreign ministry officials met and decided there was no choice but to accept the terms of the Potsdam Proclamation (197). Togo then secured the agreement of Navy Minister Yonai and Prince Takamatsu. Hirohito independently learned of the Soviet entry to the war and summoned Kido at 9:55 am, telling him \"The Soviet Union declared war against us, and entered into a state of war as of today. Because of this it is necessary to study and decide on the termination of the war,\" according to Kido's Journal (198). Prime Minister Suzuki deferred to the Emperor's wishes and convened the War Council. Clearly, among the peace party, Soviet entry to the war swayed them to end the war not through Soviet mediation, but by accepting the Potsdam proclamation. \n\nThe war party was also shocked, as the diary of Army Deputy Chief Kawabe notes considerably more shock regarding the Soviets than it does regarding the bombing of Hiroshima. Nonetheless, Army Minister Amami was not ready to surrender.\n\nAt that meeting, the Big 6 learned of the Bombing of Nagasaki. According to the official history of the Imperial General Headquarters, \"There is no record in other materials that treated the effect [of the Nagasaki Bomb] seriously.\" Similarly, neither Togo nor Toyoda mention it in their memoirs of the meeting (204). In the meeting the war party continued to defend the idea of defending the home islands to force favorable terms, but slowly fell to the peace faction. By the end, they had agreed to accept Potsdam, but still debated 1 condition vs 4.\n\nAfter this, members of the peace faction arranged to meet with Kido urging him to urge the Emperor to support a single condition acceptance (\"preservation of the imperial house\" [peace] or \"preservation of the Emperor's status in national laws\" [war] depending on who phrased it). Kido then met with the Emperor, and afterward the Emperor agreed to call an imperial conference, at which he supported Togo's proposal, saying \"My opinion is the same as what the Foreign minister said.\" All the members, including the war party signed the document in the early hours of August 10th (213). With that, the basic outline of surrendering was complete, although they changed the single condition changed to acceptance \"on the understanding that the Allied Proclamation would not comprise any demand which would prejudice the prerogatives of His Majesty as a Sovereign Ruler,\" which became a sticking point in its potential to preserve the emperor's status as a god and commander of the military (212).\n\nOn the common debate about this \"sacred decision,\" it is true that the Emperor was the deciding \"vote,\" but the deliberations show his decision was shaped by those who were convinced to surrender by Soviet declaration of war to put his weight behind the plan they had laid out. His own statements also show the effect that Soviet Entry to the war was a major concern for him. Similarly, Soviet entry and lack of the possibility of negotiated peace weakened the war party's case. \n\nIn the intervening days between the 10th and the 15th things were fairly chaotic. The war faction got key members of the peace faction to agree that they would continue the war if the conditional acceptance were rejected. However, members of the Foreign Ministry believed they had to accept the Bynes note, informing them of the US rejection of the conditional acceptance, when they got it on the 12th. The army thought it was an unacceptable violation of their understanding of the *kokutai,* leading to a stalemate in the leadership. While leadership argued back and forth, members of the army General Staff plotted a coup on the 12th and 13th. Fearing Military action, Kido met with Hirohito on the morning of the 14th and convinced him to convene a combined conference of the Supreme War council and the Cabinet to impose his decision for unconditional acceptance of the Bynes note. \n\nThe decision to accept was made around 11:00 am on the 14th, starting debates about how to phrase the announcement to the people. Leadership feared that poor phrasing, especially regarding the *kokutai,* might result in army action against the decision. Meanwhile, the coup plotters planned to occupy the imperial palace and prevent the Emperor from informing the nation.\n\nThe Coup took place on the night of the 14th, with forged orders telling the imperial guards to protect the emperor. They occupied the palace and shut down all the communications in and out. Coup members who went to the Eastern Army for help found the army opposed and determined to put the coup down by force, which they apparently did successfully, as the coup was over by morning. When asked to support the coup a final time, Anami informed them that he was going to commit suicide, and did so.\n\nThe Emperor's speech was broadcast on Aug. 15th (planned for back on the 11th). It cited the bombs as a reason for surrender, but that is not sufficient evidence to determine the reasons for ending the war. First, that speech was carefully prepared and edited for public, military, and American consumption. Second, it is only one of several sources. Of the contemporary sources on why Japan surrendered, 3 (Konoe on Aug.9th, Suzuki's statements to his doctor on Aug. 13th, and Hirohito's Imperial Rescript to Soldiers and Officers on Aug. 17th) speak only of the Soviets, 2 (Hirohito's Imperial Rescript on the 15th and Suzuki's statements at the cabinet meeting of Aug. 13th) speak exclusively about the bombs, and 7 speak of both (297-298). Both played a role, but the deciding edge likely belonged to to Soviet entry." ] }

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[ "http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2008/08/hiroshima_hoax_japans_wllingne.html" ]

[ [], [], [ "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supreme_War_Council_(Japan\\)", "http://books.google.com/books/about/Racing_the_Enemy.html?id=iPju1MrqgU4C" ] ]

{ "a_id": [ "d40j76p" ], "score": [ 2 ], "text": [ "Japan comes to mind with their expansion into the Northern region of Hokkaido. That period of history in Japan has many parallels to Western expansion in the states. Right down to the subjugation of the native people who lived in the region. In Japan's case the native people were the Ainu instead of Native Americans." ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "e8q3a7u" ], "score": [ 15 ], "text": [ "We might! \n\nIt's very possible that sharp-eyed observers could have gained clues that the Azores were out there long before their official discovery; many migratory bird species stop there, and anyone watching birds moving northeast from the Azores could have deduced they were coming from islands to the southwest. \n\nThere is a tale from the 18th century that a hoard of Carthaginian coins displayed in Portugal was discovered in the Azores, but the supposed site was never charted and the coins themselves lost. \n\nMice in the Azores are largely descended from ancestors in Iberia; however, [mice on some islands have DNA from ancestors in Scandinavia](_URL_1_). This hints that Norse explorers may have visited the islands centuries before the Portuguese. \n\nMany medieval maps contain [islands in the general vicinity of the Azores](_URL_0_), but there is very little consensus on whether this reflects actual knowledge (passed down from Norse explorations or Iberian fishermen who guarded the location of their most lucrative fishing spots and secluded beaches) or inflated legends which happened to match up with the location. \n\nMost intriguingly, there may be a series of *hypogea*, or underground tombs, on the islands. A team led by Nuno Ribiero excavated there about ten years back and claimed they'd found several sites in natural caves, including Paleolithic rock art. As far as I can tell, though, these claims either haven't stood up to closer examination or are at the very least too preliminary to confirm the findings." ] }

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[ [ "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Azores#/media/File:Corbitis_Atlas_(Azores_detail).jpg", "https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25394749" ] ]

{ "a_id": [ "e06d1b7", "e06o06g", "e06odez", "e06oi24", "e06t6pg" ], "score": [ 117, 124, 69, 1498, 297 ], "text": [ "Hey all,\n\nIf you frequent the sub, you know the drill. If you're here from /r/all, or browse only occasionally, please be aware we have strict rules here intended to enforce the very high bar we expect from comments, so before posting, please read our [rules](/r/AskHistorians/wiki/rules). We remove comments which don't comply, and consider everyone forewarned. If you have feedback or commentary about how things are run here, please don't post it in this thread. We'll just remove it. We love to hear thoughtful, constructive feedback via [modmail](_URL_0_) however.\n\nIt can take time for [an answer to show up](/_URL_2_), so we thank you for your patience. We know you're here because the question sounds interesting, and we eagerly await an answer just like you! While you wait though, there is tons of great content already written, which you can find through our [Twitter](_URL_1_), the [Sunday Digest](_URL_4_), the [Monthly \"Best Of\"](_URL_6_) feature, and [Facebook](_URL_3_). If you don't want to forget to check back late, consider a [Private Message](_URL_5_) to the [Remind-Me bot](_URL_7_) (cc /u/Str0nzo)\n\nAgain though, please remember the rules, and keep them in mind while you browse. If you don't like how this subreddit is run, keep in mind that this method has seen us continue to succeed and grow for years, and isn't going to change, so at least try and make your complaint original. /r/AskHistory exists, so complaining about the rules to us is like going into a fancy restaurant to complain they don't sell chicken nuggets, even though Chick-fil-A is nextdoor.", "I answered almost this exact question a couple months back, [in this thread here](_URL_0_). Which includes links to a number of sources, but the short answer is that cities arose gradually and people didn't stop being nomadic hunter gatherers all at once. It was a slow transition that often looked like a hybrid between settled urban agricultural life and hunting and gathering. The evidence we have can't tell us what exactly they thought about the change but the safest assumption is that the transition was gradual enough that it wasn't seen as too drastic of a departure at the time.", "Follow up/related question: Are there any 'meta' early writings, acknowledging the fact they're an early writing (in any capacity)? ", "In the case of ancient Egypt, the answer is yes. Their mythology and history expressly stated that they were the first civilization. They believed that the universe was created on a \"mound of creation\" (as it's called by Egyptologists), which rose out of the receding flood waters of the Nile. There are various versions of the creation story, but in the most exciting one [Atum or Re-Atum](_URL_2_) created the first pantheon of deities by masturbating them into existence: \"Atum is the one who came into being as one who came [(with penis) extended](_URL_1_) in Heliopolis. He put his penis in his fist so that he might make orgasm with it, and the two twins were born, Shu and Tefnut.\"^1 This mound of creation is called Benben by Egyptologists (Egyptian 𓃀𓈖𓃀𓈖𓉴), and it was a common feature of temples for millennia of Egyptian history, demonstrating the incredible longevity of this idea.^2\n\nMost cultures have a creation myth that puts them at the center, so that doesn't completely answer your question. In Egypt, however, they kept written records of their history, which referenced their understanding of creation. There are frequent allusions to the \"original time\" (𓅮𓏏𓏖) in Egyptian texts, including the Pyramid Texts, and a glimpse of what they understood this to mean is found in the [Turin Royal Canon](_URL_4_).^3 That document records the reigns of kings from the New Kingdom back to the reigns of well-known Egyptian deities, including Seth, Horus, and Thoth. The tomb of the First Dynasty king [Djer](_URL_0_) (also in the Turin Canon, II.13 in the facsimile) was later venerated as the tomb of the god Osiris. \n\nSo not only did they believe that they were the first civilization, created ex nihilo by the gods, they had places where they could go and see those gods' tombs in person. Their official history recorded the descent of their living kings from ancient deities, and they continually referred to these deities in contemporary texts. When they found old things, they knew that those things belonged to their civilization, and that they were directly descended from the people who made them.\n\n\nSources:\n\n1. Translation from: Allen, James P. 2015. *The Ancient Egyptian Pyramid Texts*. See the original texts [here](_URL_3_). This quote is in *PT IV (422-538)*, p. 279. \n\n2. Obviously there is more to be said here. Representations of the mound of creation changed over time, but the central idea was always present. There's a great deal on this in: Kemp, Barry J. 2005. *Ancient Egypt: Anatomy of a Civilization*. \n\n3. The Wikipedia page is actually a great source for this. It has the original text, a transcription, and translation.\n\nEdit: Thanks for the 𓋞!", "This is an answer I gave to a similar question a few years ago.\n\nSo I'm only gonna be talking about the Sumerians here. The only way that we are going to have any knowledge of what the first civilizations knew of their past is through written records. Writing first appears in Sumer in around 3000 BC, this is during the Uruk period (4000-3001 BC). At this time it was very much proto-writing and did not develop into a full written language until the Early Dynastic Period (2800-2500 BC)\n\nIt is not until the end of the Early Dynastic Period (2300 BC) that we see the emergence of the Sumerian King List which documents the kings of Sumer and gives us an insight into what the Sumerians may have believed about their past.\n\nThe King List, a collection of several sources, details the rulers of the cities of Sumer from the first antediluvian rulers to the last dynasty of Isin. The first king was Alulim, first king of Eridu. He ruled for 28,800 years. Now at first glance that may seem an unreasonably long rule and that is because it is. Alulim, the first king after the kingship descended from heaven created by the god Enki is clearly almost entirely mythical. This list of antediluvian kings ends with Ubara-tutu and the coming of the great flood that wipes the world clean.\n\nThe list resumes with Jushur the first of the dynasty of Kish. He ruled for 1200 years. 20 kings and 15255 years later we have En-me-barage-si who is the first king we have archaeological evidence for. He is dated from around 2600 BC from two pieces of alabaster vases found at Nippur which bear his name. Though he ruled for 900 years, a rather long time, it can be surmised that he is indeed real. He is mentioned also in the Epic of Gilgamesh alongside Gilgamesh himself giving credence to the thought that Gilgamesh is a historical figure. The King List continues into the time of rulers that can easily be verified such as Sargon of Akkad who ruled for 40 years and founded the Akkadian Empire. Thus we see the transition of the mythical into the semi-mythical and then verifiable history. But more on that later.\n\nThe Sumerian creation myth is important to note in this discussion. It recounts that the gods Enki among them created the first “black-headed people” (the Sumerians) and settled them in the land giving them the kingship and thus the first cities were created. A large part of the story is missing but at some point the gods decide not to save mankind from a flood which strikes destroying man and cites. Later the world is presumably repopulated.\n\nIn addition there is the “Debate between Summer and Winter” a creation myth from the mid 3nd millennium. This details the creation of the land and seasons by Enlil. In it he is seen to irrigate the land “guaranteeing the spring floods at the quay” and to begin the agricultural tradition of the land “making flax grow and barley proliferate.”\n\nFinally and most interestingly for this topic is the “Debate between Sheep and Grain” another creation myth written in the mid-3rd millennium . The myth details a time in which sheep and grain were unknown to the land. The people “went about with naked limbs in the Land. Like sheep they ate grass with their mouths and drank water from the ditches.” The myth ends with the virtues of grain being extolled “from sunrise to sunset may the name of Grain be praised. People should submit to the yoke of grain.”\n\nTherefore we can see that early history of Mesopotamia, the Ubaid period and before, is in Sumerian text seen in a divine light. The land was created by the gods as were the people and they were given cities and kingship. Enlil gave the people the summer and the winter, he gave them wheat and irrigation as Enki gave them kingship. Only in the “Debate between Sheep and Grain” is there indicated any knowledge of a time before sedentary agriculture. This myth clashes with that of the “Debate between Summer and Winter” though it is part of the same tradition indicating the lack of a unified view of their past. It seems that the Sumerians saw their past as part of a very real mythical tradition. Their kings begin as mythical figures and progress towards the non-mythical. The mythical and the non-mythical are closely linked in the Sumerian view of themselves and their past\n\nI would conclude that the Sumerians did believe themselves to be not just the first civilization but the first people, it is part of their creation myth. In addition there was no knowledge in the way we would think of a hunter-gatherer life preceding their urban civilization. If there is any hint it exists as another facet of the extensive and contradictory creation myth of the peoples of Sumer.\n\n[_URL_0_](http://_URL_0_/)\n\n[_URL_2_](https://_URL_2_/)\n" ] }

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[ [ "http://www.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%2Fr%2FAskHistorians&subject=Question%20Regarding%20Rules", "http://twitter.com/askhistorians", "https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/7s66yf/a_statistical_look_at_askhistorians_in_2017_part_i/", "https://www.facebook.com/askhistorians/", "http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/search?q=title%3A%22Sunday+Digest%22&restrict_sr=on&sort=new&t=all", "https://www.reddit.com/message/compose/?to=RemindMeBot&subject=Reminder&message=%5Bhttp%3A%2F%2FLINK-HERE%2F%5D%0A%0ARemindMe!++2+days", "https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/wiki/bestof", "https://www.reddit.com/r/RemindMeBot/comments/24duzp/remindmebot_info/" ], [ "https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/5dpkvu/z/da6r7yg?context=3&sort=confidence" ], [], [ "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Djer#Tomb", "https://i.imgur.com/Ln9PBDj.png", "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atum", "https://christiancasey.github.io/PT/pt.html", "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turin_King_List" ], [ "etcsl.orinst.ox.ac.uk", "http://etcsl.orinst.ox.ac.uk/", "cdli.ucla.edu", "https://cdli.ucla.edu/" ] ]

{ "a_id": [ "c7q7rz1", "c7q9bs3", "c7qa15x", "c7qa1lg", "c7qbvbb" ], "score": [ 8, 6, 4, 5, 2 ], "text": [ "There might be a few anti-colonial conflicts worth looking at here. The FNLA in Algeria didn't (AFAIK) receive any substantive aid from other countries, nor did the major revolutionary movements in Rhodesia/Zimbabwe. \n\nI'm pretty sure FRELIMO in Mozambique drove out the Portuguese without assistance, whilst the MPLA in Angola only received limited support from Cuba.\n\nFinally, a case might be made for the RPF in Rwanda, although I don't think they could easily be categorised as guerillas in the way the other groups could, as they were largely composed of deserting Rwandan units from the Ugandan army.\n\nOf course, guerilla tactics are ideal for combating colonialism precisely because they stall - by making colonialism economically untenable, they could make granting independence a more attractive choice than staying in control.", "Shivaji who was king of the State of Maharashtra, parts of Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat and Andhra Pradesh (all these states are in India, and geographically these would be bigger than say France and the low countries+Western Germany put together) sucessfully fought Guerilla campaign against the Mughals of Aurangazeb's empire.\n\nIt was classic assymetrical warfare as we know it now. Shivaji and the Maratha's used the thickly forested areas as a base, and struck at Mughal supply lines, tax collectors, vulnerable villages, cities. They even hit mughal garrison's....He used speed, location of attack and most importantly surprise to balance the force equation which was heavily in the side of the conventionally larger and better equiped Mughal force.\n\nHe even used the idea of scorched earth warfare to deny resources to the Mughal army...\n\nA good starting point would be \n_URL_0_", "While not necessarily fitting your criteria of winning with guerrilla tactics, the Finnish Army made great use of guerrilla warfare to block the Soviets from completing their objectives for the initial months of the war. The Finns defence made the Soviets do a complete restructuring of their operations in this war, including a change in command. Under new leadership, they switched from the maneuver warfare of their four-pronged assault into Finland (minimal gains for heavy casualties) to a war of attrition, when they concentrated their forces on the Mannerheim Line following a shift in command.\n\nUntil the concentration of forces, the Finns had effectively halted the Soviets in what to me is an interesting case of (at least) partial unconventional warfare between two conventional armies. \n\nHopefully this is at least sort of what you were hoping for. ", "Define \"without the aid of another country\"? If you mean physical presence within the country then the War of Independence was a largely guerrilla war fought without the aid of another country that ended in the creation of the Irish Free State.\n\nThe Irish Volunteers did however receive their initial arms and ammunition from Germany. After that I believe most arms were taken from storming RIC barracks and military installations.", "I think there is confusion between Guerilla tactics and Guerilla Warfare. But to how about Cuba? I think Castro got some small donations before the war from many different supporters like CIA(if I recall correctly) they were not big or significant to the actual guerilla war. " ] }

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[ [], [ "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shivaji#War_against_the_Mughal_Empire" ], [], [], [] ]

{ "a_id": [ "cpyumzu" ], "score": [ 2 ], "text": [ "Michael Shermer and Alex Grobman's *Denying History: Who Says the Holocaust Never Happened and Why Do They Say It?* is a survey of deniers. \n\nGood luck engaging Deniers though, it's equivalent to yelling at a brick wall. Denialism thrives off of ahistorical arguments and although many deniers style themselves as historians or skeptics, they are not playing by the evidentiary rules of either. " ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "ct7fuen" ], "score": [ 4 ], "text": [ "This is an interesting, but extremely difficult question to answer. The reason for this is that the question transcends more than just a religious group. We have evidence that by 50 to 60 AD, Christianity had spread (although it was incredibly small at this time) to cities all over the Levant, ancient Greece and all the way to Rome itself. We also know, by the quality of the writing, especially in the seven letters of Paul that we know are authentic, and by the style of the Gospels, that the writers were all fairly well-educated. This is significant because it shows that By the time Paul started writing his letters (around 50-55 c.e.) until the time the Gospels started being written (70-90 ce) Christianity had gone from being a small Jewish sect of peasants to having a diverse demographical make up. (For more on this I recommend reading, Ramsay MacMullen's (a Roman Social Historian) book [Christianizing the Roman Empire: A.D. 100-400](_URL_0_) which explains this in quite a bit more detail. \n\nThat said, numbers mean a lot and Christianity needed to spread an awful lot and quickly to go from between 20-30 people (which I recently discovered is the mainstream belief for Early Christianity Historians) at around the time of Jesus' death (around 30 ce, plus/minus 5 years) to being 5% of the population by the early fourth century, which would have been 3 million people. Rodney Stark's book [The Rise of Christianity](_URL_1_) although incredibly controversial and disputed by many scholars, did make one assertion that many scholars either agreed with or didn't oppose. That is, that he believed that, on average, Christianity needed to gain about 40% more followers per decade until the year 300. \n\nSo why do I mention all these numbers? Well, because it shows that A: Christianity started out incredibly small and remained small for quite some time. But B) it did get more progressively popular over the course of the first three centuries CE and that it wasn't limited to just the area around the Levant so again, we aren't just dealing with a specific group of people -- we are talking about different cultures from all over the Mediterranean, most of which had different practices for bearing children.\n\nHowever, it's safe to say a few things demographics wise. On average, typical Jewish peasant who lived an agrarian type of life-style could typically have up to 4-8 children, of course not all would live to be adults. Those who lived in cities or were more wealthy probably had fewer children, but again, we have no exact numbers on this. I am not qualified to answer how many children people in Ancient Greece or Rome would have had, so I digress from answering that aspect of the question. \n\nTLDR: Ancient Hebrew peasant families typically had 4-8 children, yet Christianity had spread to multiple cities and states over those first few decades, so individual studies would be needed to answer the question in more detail.\n\nSorry if this wasn't the exact answer you were hoping for." ] }

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[ [ "http://www.amazon.com/Christianizing-Roman-Empire-A-D-100-400/dp/0300036426", "http://www.amazon.com/The-Rise-Christianity-Religious-Centuries/dp/0060677015" ] ]

{ "a_id": [ "dhdhkjy" ], "score": [ 6 ], "text": [ "By the late-18th/early-19th century the idea of Atomism had been hashed over for literally centuries. They weren't going back to the Ancients at that point. Dalton's own discussions of Atomism were rooted more in the work of Newton (who made various corpuscular assumptions in his work) than they were in Democritus or Epicurus. \n\nIf you go back to the earlier discussions, e.g. Robert Boyle, you get a much more complicated picture. Boyle's Atomism was certainly done with knowledge of the Ancient philosophers on the subject, but his more immediate inspiration were discussions within alchemical theory about the nature of matter (which are more Aristotelian than Democritus/Epicurus; e.g. \"what is matter made of that allows it to be X sometimes and Y another?\"). \n\nThe sort of place where I've seen explicit invocations of Democritus and Epicurus has been in discussions about the vacuum and Plenism (Atomism's antagonist philosophy, which argues for a continuum of matter, and lack of vacuum). The line between the philosophical and the empirical in this discussion, in the 17th century anyway (again, over a century before Dalton), is completely fuzzy. Hence one of the biggest arguments was between Boyle (a \"chemist\" in a modern framing) and Thomas Hobbes (a \"philosopher\"), who both saw themselves as doing semi-empirical, semi-philosophical work. Hobbes deployed Democritus and Epicurus to argue _against_ Boyle's conception of the vacuum, and thus against Boyle's interpretation of his late 17th-century air-pump experiments. Which is just to say: everyone in that time would have recognized that these figures were involved in putting out philosophies of Atomism, but even by the 17th century it wasn't required to go back to them to get the ideas, there were plenty of other sources.\n\nDalton's accomplishment was not in re-inventing or even re-invoking Atomism. It was in trying to give it a strong physical basis and tie that into its possible chemical implications. It is very much the project of someone who has already stopped caring about what the Ancients said about such a matter, which itself is a very late-Enlightenment, post-chemical revolution sort of move. An earlier figure, like Boyle, cared a bit about the Ancients — not so much because he thought everything they said was accurate, but because they formed sort of a bedrock of understanding that he could push back against or build off of. And because he did think that ultimately what he was doing was a form of philosophy, even if he made an argument that new machines (like the air-pump) could serve as a run-around to philosophical quandaries. And the influence of alchemical theorizing on Boyle cannot be overstated — it was core to his understanding of what might have been going on in _all_ of his experimental work. \n\nThis is a big topic and I don't claim to know every in and out of it (I am not an early modernist in the slightest, though I dip a toe into these readings sometimes for teaching purposes, and find the Boyle stuff pretty interesting for its strangeness). On Boyle v. Hobbes, Shapin and Schaffer's _Leviathan and the Air-Pump_ (1985) is the classic text. On Dalton's Atomism, I found this article very useful a little while back: Alan J. Rocke, \"In Search of El Dorado: John Dalton and the Origins of the Atomic Theory,\" _Social Research_ 72, no. 1 (Spring 2005), 125-158. Rocke does a great job of situating Dalton's Newtonism and what exactly he was trying to accomplish. On Boyle's (and others') alchemical atomism (and various other Atomisms at the time), see esp. William R. Newman, \"The Significance of 'Chymical Atomism,'\" _Early Science and Medicine_ 14, no. 1/3 (2009), 248-264. Newman is one of the great scholars of Boyle and alchemy. It is a difficult world to translate into modern physical/chemical terms on the whole — that is just not how they saw it working, and you sort of have to dive in on their own terms." ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "cmr0vy3", "cmr2ksp", "cmr5lpi" ], "score": [ 12, 131, 48 ], "text": [ "Piggyback question: In the show Spartacus they paid the slave gladiators an allowance that increased with good performance. This was portrayed as making the slaves more loyal and eager to fight in the arena.\n\nWas the practice of paying slaves/gladiators a thing? How common was it? \n\nIf a slave was paid an allowance how would they be able to spend it? It's not like a branded slave can just waltz into town, or could they?", "First off, many slaves in the ancient world *did* run away and the possibility was always there. There were also numerous large-scale slave revolts, most famously the one led by Spartacus that had to be put down by a Roman army. To prevent mass escapes, Roman slave owners used either the carrot or the stick. Branding, shackling, abuse, and torture were used to keep many slaves in check, while others in more favored positions were given a stipend (Lat. *peculium*) and much more independence. The most-favored slaves were those belonging to the emperor, who, along with his freedmen, had a hand in administering the empire.\n\nHarper, Slavery in the Late Roman World, AD 275-425 is excellent recent study on the subject. [Here](_URL_2_) he discusses different types of incentives offered to slaves.\n\nTo give just one example of a fugitive slave from a documentary source, [P.Cair.Preis. 1](_URL_1_) (148 CE) ([image](_URL_0_)) is a report of judicial proceedings from the province of Egypt concerning an enslaved woman named Eutychia, who was purchased for 1,160 drachmas (a hefty sum, enough to employ some 40 men for a month). According to the report, \"after she stayed with him (the new owner) for a short time, she ran away taking with her the sale contracts and much of his belongings.\"", "Put yourself in their shoes: you are a slave, let's say the child of two Gauls captured by Caesar. Your Latin is imperfect at best, you know very few people outside of the household and those you do know you are a slave. Where do you run to? You have no property or connections and your speech immediately marks you out. To top if off, there is a reward on your return, and the shepherd you run across may have heard of it as he sees this scraggily desperate looking figure dressed in rags.\n\nOn the other hand, instances of civil strife, such as the wars of Sextus Pompey, Spartacus and provincial rebellions, seem to have been a magnet for escaped slaves. Now they have a place to run away *to*, and it seems those brave or desperate enough did. What is lacking in ordinary times is a destination.\n\nFor your other question, while patterns in slave owning varied enormously, it is difficult to recover actual slave conditions. It is almost certain that the status of slaves varied regionally, but we can't really say how." ] }

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[ [], [ "http://ipap.csad.ox.ac.uk/Preisigke-bw/300dpi/P.Cair.Preis.1.jpg", "http://papyri.info/ddbdp/p.cair.preis;;1", "https://books.google.com/books?id=IPU8ZAcrOtIC&pg=PA239&dq" ], [] ]

{ "a_id": [ "cya6gyv" ], "score": [ 29 ], "text": [ "Initially, one of the main reasons for the German invasion of Russia was food. The Nazi regime wanted to Germany to be able to support itself agriculturally, without having to rely on imports from the Soviet Union. The German administration had perceived the vast plains of Ukraine and southern Russia as the perfect solution to Germany's food issues. The ground was fertile and full of minerals, so crops could be brought back in surplus to the German people (obviously with the sacrifice of the rest of the Russian people, who would be seen as a deficit.) In fact, Hitler envisioned the invading German forces as being able to supply their own food from the lands they captured, meaning less supplies were needed to be sent to the eastern front. Of course Operation Barbarossa was a failure, and the crop yields of the captured lands supplied one third of the food that Germany needed, let alone hoped for.\n\nFrom what I know, the German government sold the idea of an invasion of the Soviet Union through the notion of a 'self-sufficient Germany.' Hitler stated that there would be no food shortages like in the first world war, and some day in the future, people could travel to the new German frontiers in their 'people's cars' (Volkswagons) and spend holidays in the new lands.\n\nSource: The Silk Roads: A New History of the World by Peter Frankopan." ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "djm90iy" ], "score": [ 13 ], "text": [ "You must understand both the writing system and the language(s) in order to claim a decipherment. Most successful decipherments are based on bilingual or trilingual inscriptions (e.g. cuneiform, Egyptian hieroglyphs, and the Cypriot Syllabary) or knowledge of the underlying language(s) (e.g. Linear B and Maya hieroglyphs). In cases where one has neither, such as Linear A, Cypro-Minoan, and the Indus script, decipherment may prove impossible.\n\nLinear B has been deciphered successfully because the language was identified (Mycenaean Greek), and scholars were able to understand words based on their knowledge of Greek. For example, a-ku-ro corresponds to Greek ἄργυρος (\"silver\") and pa-te is instantly recognizable as Greek πατήρ (\"father\"). \n\nThe language of Linear A, however, has not yet been identified, and the grammar and lexicon therefore remains elusive. It's as if someone who speaks French picked up a book written in Hungarian. Since Hungarian uses a modified version of the Latin alphabet, the French speaker would understand the letters of each word and perhaps even be able to read them out loud more or less accurately. The meaning of the text, however, would be incomprehensible without learning Hungarian. " ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "f0ufse4" ], "score": [ 8 ], "text": [ "'Middle Ages' are generally understood as a period of almost 1000 years, so the subject is quite complex. In the following entry I'll limit myself to High and Late Middle Ages, focusing on Germany, Poland and England.\n\nIn general, weapon ownership was quite common. There were no rules preventing anyone from possessing any kind of weapon or armour and anyone could have commissioned any type of weapon at the local craftsman, provided the latter was able to make it (your average rural blacksmiths were usually able to make a spear tip, but not a high-quality sword) and the customer could have afforded the commission, what was not always a given, as peasants had relatively little money to spend, especially in earlier part of the Middle Ages when the weapons and armour were relatively more expensive than in 14th or 15th century. In short, every free man had an access to weapons, although some could not have afforded most of them. With the low social mobility and relatively small size of the settlements, people living in a city district or a village were usually forming a well-knit community, where people knew and often helped each other, as the well-being of community was directly tied to their self-interest.\n\nIn many cases such possession was actually required by law, though. For example, English Assizes of Arms require each free tenant to have a specified weapons and pieces of armour, depending on their wealth. The Assize of Arms of 1181 issued in the name of Henry II stipulates that '*every burgher and every freeman shall have a gambeson, an iron hat and a spear*' what was a bare minimum for all free people (although 'burgher or freeman' usually meant the head of the family), while 'those who have possessions or rents worth at least 16 marks shall have an armour, a helmet, a shield, and a lance'. Clergymen were generally exempt from all such considerations. Assize of Arms of 1242 issued in the name of Henry III stated that '*the citzens, burghers, free tenants, villeins and others aged 15 to 60 should convene and their be assessed what they should bear in accordance to their land and property, to wit: whoever possesses land worth 15 pounds - one armour, iron hat, sword, knife and horse* \\[...\\] *(who possesses) less than 10 marks but more than 40 shillings - falxes, knives, guisarmes and other small arms*' (this section contains ten different wealth classes, I included only first and last for brevity's sake). Given that 40 shillings was a relatively small amount of money when applied to personal wealth, it meant that even relatively poor people were expected to have some form of military weapon, with the wording giving assumption that it was supposed to mean 'any weapon one can afford', including common tools, such as axes or hammers. Enea Piccolomini, later Pope Pius II, who had served as a pastor in several German states noted in 1444 that every 'respectable household', no matter whether rich or poor, was armed adequately to the means available and that Germans show high skill in using said weapons.\n\nIn medieval cities, the defense forces were primarily composed of the militia, and thus the edicts of the city councils often required the burghers to possess weapons. This was usually limited to people possessing a real estate withing the city walls, but the required equipment could have been quite costly (although not excessively so). For example, according to the edict issued by the city council of Wroclaw in 1290, every owner of a real estate within a city should possess 'bow or crossbow) while a Prussian land regulation of 1410 required all Prussian burghers to possess equipment composed at least of mail shirt, breastplate, kettle hat, plate gauntlets and a crossbow. Those who were found to not possess the required equipment were subject to a fine (although one could not borrow their weapons and armour under penalty of confiscation and additional fine). Control was usually conducted by the city councilmen and high-ranking craft representatives (owners of the real estate in a city were largely craftsmen or merchants united in craft organizations). An interesting thing is that some Polish cities required citizens to actively train in the art of shooting (e.g. prince Bolko of Świdnica issued such law in 1286) with shooting contests being a common occurrence, much like in contemporary England renowned for its archers. In 14th and 15th century, winners of such competitions often were either provided with new weapons and armours or were given a monetary equivalent if the already possessed them.\n\nNow, people were able to possess weapons, but in cities they were generally not allowed to carry. Specific regulations varied from place to place, but in German cities in 14th and 15th century councils usually forbade carrying of all 'swords and long knives'\\* either at all or only after dusk, usually under penalty of weapon confiscation on top of a relatively small monetary fine or a jail time of several days. Carrying any form of weapon (even a dagger or a knife) into a church or to any formal meeting (e.g. that of craftsmen in a guildhouse) was often strictly prohibited.\n\n\\*A city council edict issued in 1394 in Koenigsberg stated that no burgher is allowed to carry a knife longer than one ell within the city walls (we also need to remember that German word 'messer' could have meant either a common, table knife, or a large weapon, essentially a short sword)." ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "c4nez8m", "c4nfftv", "c4ng313", "c4ng3ux", "c4nh7k4", "c4nj8t8" ], "score": [ 15, 3, 14, 5, 7, 4 ], "text": [ "It's not just homosexuality - heterosexuality and bisexuality *as modern Western society understands it* would also be a strange idea to a person of that time depending on the nation-state they hailed from. (Greek sexuality is a little early for me but my understanding is that the erastes/eromenos relationship, which I believe is what you are referring to, was by no means a universal social construct within Ancient Greece as a whole, and the norms of the relationship varied from polis to polis.) \n\nRomans, more my speed than Greeks, knew that there were some men who liked other men exclusively, and some women who liked other women exclusively, and some who preferred the opposite sex exclusively, but in general society functioned under strict laws of *pudicitia*, or sexual morality, for the privileged classes, that were more about preserving honor by restricting the types of sex acts that could be performed under a given circumstance. So Roman insults were more about specific acts performed (e.g. *cinaedus* and *pathicus* - which were the equivalent of \"buttfucker\" except in the reverse - maybe \"pillow-biter\"?) rather than the gender with whom the sex was happening.\n\nAdditionally, the idea of democracy as we currently practice it would have seemed really strange and awful - we include women, and poor people, and in some countries they even allow non-citizen residents to vote! Quelle horreur!\n\nThe way we view marriage is a relatively new concept and would have seemed odd to the Romans, for whom marriage was very much about the joining of families rather than the union of two people madly in love. The idea that it was entirely about property is misguided, but it was very much about using procreation to alter the social status of a family, especially among the privileged classes. Even among the lower classes, though, love wasn't really the primary consideration, at least not from the evidence we have, and so when you get beautiful epitaphs extolling a husband's love for his wife (like the Laudatio Turiae, which is totally worth a read), or vice versa, it makes it even more sweet. At least in my opinion.", "Atheism and secularism. If you showed up in any period prior to modern times and claimed that there was no God/gods, and that government and religion should be separate you would most likely be considered totally insane.", "Oh my goodness. So many weirdnesses just in my small scope reading at the moment on early modern London, let alone the entire world in 16th-18th centuries. I mean, the modern nation-state would look insane to anyone in 1500, let alone things like the fact we've had men on the moon and robots on Mars. \n\nIt is actually a favorite sort of mental exercise I do when reading, to imagine a person from the period and region drawn forward into the modern age. I always wonder what the shareholders of the East India Company would think if they saw modern multi-national corporations. Or what a second generation Dutch silk worker living in London would think of our modern immigration issues. Or even what a merchant living in Edo during the Tokugawa shogunate would think of the city today. \n\nI also like to imagine what sort of culture shock I would experience traveling back to that point in time. For example, as a woman of Scotch-Irish descent in her mid 30s, my expected social role would be hugely different than it is today were I to live in 1650s London. And then I remind myself I wouldn't likely be alive, given all the medical issues I've got, and that their treatments didnt exist then. \n\nThe shear scope of modern medicine would likely confound anyone from the past, at any point in time, if they were shown many of the miracles we can perform today. To have eliminated small pox alone! That we can cure diseases that killed people every day, perform surgery that doesn't kill the patient more often than not, and that the vast majority of children in developed countries survive to adulthood: all of these would be mindbogglingly amazing even to someone from 1900, let alone from 1500. ", "Late 1700s - early 1900s colonies - racism. So much blatant, unabashed, even casual racism, the type that'd make /r/SRS blush. It's not just from the Europeans, but every society, even ones that are still fairly racist or xenophobic today, really outdid themselves in the colonial era. Also, the double-standard of it being entirely okay for white men to take up native concubines in the colonies and even to a degree, go native (Sir William Johnson, Col James Kirkpatrick, etc), but the other way around was entirely unacceptable (all the white women who chose not to come back when ransomed in North Africa)", "The idea that 'aristocracy' could be considered immoral or bad. Even in the most democratic of societies like Athens in its phase of 'radical' democracy (as termed by Aristotle), there were aristocrats in positions of high influence. In Rome, the echoes of the Patrician class lasted long after the barriers to Plebian advancement had been removed. The idea was that the aristocrats weren't just major landowners with pedigree and probably a posh accent, it was that they also formed the educated class. Literacy was relatively uncommon, even in places like the Roman Empire. Also, traditionally these aristocrats monopolised religious positions of importance. See for example the fact that Julius Caesar's position of Augur in Rome had been practically guaranteed to him since his birth. And the aristocrats really were expected to be warriors and leaders; many states exclusively utilised their aristocracy as the basis for their cavalry, because the training and the horses were both expensive. In Athens, the aristocracy formed the pool from which the city's generals were selected.\n\nSo, for many ancient societies, aristocrats were the warrior class, the intellectual class, and at times the priestly class, all at once. This multifaceted role means it's rather difficult to imagine many ancient states without aristocrats being entwined in these areas to a greater or lesser degree. The idea that everyone can be equally educated would therefore seem bizarre to them, especially the degree of access to higher education. Our tendency to select on ability and not consider economic background a character trait would also puzzle them. Likewise the idea that many manual professions could be seen as skilled labour, or at least the aristocrats would see that as odd. It's a very odd thing, the results of manual labour would often be seen as beautiful or marvellous, but the people who made the objects and the process behind making them were both regarded as lower class and vulgar.", "E. P. Thompson has a great piece on the emergence of \"work-time discipline,\" or the notion that schedules are regimented by hourly time, rather than by the amount of sunlight in a given day (for example):\n\n[E. P. Thompson, _Time, Work-Discipline, and Industrial Capitalism_](_URL_0_).\n\nSomeone living in a period before the industrial revolution wouldn't have the same parsed concept of time as, say, a factory worker - punch in to work at 6am, lunch at noon, hourly wages, public transit that runs on a timed schedule, etc." ] }

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[ [], [], [], [], [], [ "http://libcom.org/library/time-work-discipline-industrial-capitalism-e-p-thompson" ] ]

{ "a_id": [ "dj9w4jo", "dj9wgm8", "djaa6dj" ], "score": [ 5, 3, 2 ], "text": [ "The circular patches with the \"A\" are the insignia of the US 3rd Army, which in WW2 was under the command of Gen. George S. Patton. The triangular tricolour patches are the insignia of the US 16th Armoured Division. If you look closely, the embroidery below the 16 shows a tank track. The 16th Armoured was established in 1943, and reached Europe in 1945. It saw combat very briefly at the end of 1945 in Czechoslovakia, before withdrawing in accordance with a treaty with the advancing Soviets.\n\nThe patch at the bottom left with the winged star is the symbol of the USAAF, which is a little confusing. Did he transfer to or from the airforce at any point?", "The \"16\" patch is 16th Armored Division, which served in the European Theater from February to October, 1945. The triangle patch without the \"16\" is US Armored Force patch. The red, white, and blue \"A\" patch is Third Army. The red and white \"A\" patch is Ninth Army. The 3-color circle is the US Army Training and Doctrine Command (TRADOC), established in 1973. The patch with wings is the US Army Air Forces.", "The three-color circular patch is the shoulder patch for the Army's Training and Doctrine Command (TRADOC), but during WW2 it was that of the Replacement and School Command, which was charged with the responsibility of training Army personnel. The three stripes are in the colors of, and refer to, the basic combat arms; they also refer to the components of the \"One Army\" concept: Active Army, Army Reserve and Army National Guard. Background The shoulder sleeve insignia was originally approved for the Replacement and School Command on 22 March 1943, and was reassigned to the U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command on 1 July 1973. So it could very easily have been a WW2 patch in this collection. Many soldiers coming back from overseas combat were reassigned to Training and Doctrine command prior to demobilization, and some of them were used as instructors, to take advantage of their experience. The White \"A\" in a Cloverleaf on red is the patch for the 9th US Army, which was a major headquarters unit for the Americans during the invasion of Europe." ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "dw1ab7s" ], "score": [ 3 ], "text": [ "Artists who do not travel with armies or have the chance to see one in a situation other than a parade may improperly display soldiers in battle. For example, many artists during the american civil war will draw every soldier with their knapsack (backpack) on and sometimes wearing gaiters, purely because thats what they saw when a regiment marched out of a city or in a parade. However in actual battle knapsacks were dropped before going in and gaiters were thrown away by most soldiers to begin with as they were very disliked.\n\nBut for the most part, uniforms in art are pretty accurate. They did indeed wear such fancy uniforms back then, and for a variety of reasons. A large one is these complex uniforms make distinguishing a friendly soldier from an enemy easy in battle. Though complex uniforms may be especially fancy for prestige reasons, such as the Imperial Guard of Napoleon or the Russian Leib Guard." ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "cnh544i", "cnhc259" ], "score": [ 4, 2 ], "text": [ "I think you have to remember that Patton, for all his considerable skill, could be a thoroughly infuriating figure. Arrogant, rash, abrasive, impatient, and often intolerant of anything less than an almost reckless abandon for action the best that can be said about him is that he won, and that's probably all he or Eisenhower cared about. And, while it's true many American and British generals disliked him personally, most of even his staunchest adversaries admired his skill and ability. His reputation amongst the Axis forces was because, in many ways, he was the most successful emulation of their type of armored campaign. His ability to conduct brash and often reckless maneuver with great success at the expense of multiple German commanders earned him a thorough and almost universal admiration and respect as the best the Americans had to offer. All in all it was mostly his personal baggage that earned him a foul and sometimes unfair reputation and led many to downplay his professional successes due to personal grievances.", "Mostly because the German high command only got to see a man with many victories under his belt while the US generals had to deal with his actual personality. He was someone who could be easily disliked. especially by his own soldiers and anyone who told him that his strategy wouldn't work. He knew he was good and assumed everyone else was wrong. So it gave him a bad reputation with his fellow generals when he looked down on them and their ideas for strategy on the western front." ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "dd4li5j" ], "score": [ 3 ], "text": [ "Yesugai the Brave, by various accounts, was poisoned at a meal on the steppes, by Tatars who by custom owed even an enemy hospitality. \n\nWe do not know if it was actually poison. This could have been a simple bacterial infection. However, actual poisons were available, such as from poisonous mushrooms.\n\nFecal matter would have been a hit-or-miss matter, depending on the local pathogens and whether Yesugei Baghatur had been exposed to them in the past. " ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "cqltimo" ], "score": [ 25 ], "text": [ "Where does one begin?\n\nTo give a very brief summary of the kind of thing you're asking about:\n\n* The world was not created in 4,000 BC.\n* There was no global flood in the 25th century BC.\n* The world did not speak one language and all live in the city of Babel (Babylon) in the 23rd century BC.\n* The biblical patriarchs (Abraham, Jacob, Moses, etc.) are folklore characters and probably did not exist, at least in the way they are depicted biblically.\n* The biblical exodus of two million Hebrews from Egypt did not occur.\n* The Israelites did not violently conquer the Canaanites. They *were* Canaanites.\n* The kingdom of David and Solomon (if it even existed) was not a mighty empire stretching \"from the Nile to the Euphrates\".\n* Jonah never converted Nineveh to Judaism.\n* The book of Daniel gets the kings of Babylon and Persia wrong. In particular, there was no such person as Darius the Mede.\n* Some of the historical details in the Gospels are implausible; there was no empire-wide census under Caesar Augustus as Luke claims, and the dead did not rise out of the graves and wander around Jerusalem as Matthew claims.\n\nThe real problem is treating the Bible as a history textbook, when it is more of a cultural artifact that includes poetry, mythology, folklore, fiction, allegory, satire, and so on. It is the modern reader who insists that holy books be literally true, not necessarily the ancient one." ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "ddaxi9t" ], "score": [ 8 ], "text": [ "You have a mistaken impression about the Spanish conquest. I don't know much about the Mayans and others, but the Spanish didn't genocide the Aztecs, though in other cases, like with the Pueblo, there's certainly a case to be made for genocide. \n\nThe reasons so many Aztecs died were primarily diseases. It's not really clear how many died, but one estimate made by historians at Berkeley University even puts it at 95% of the Aztec population dying because of repeated epidemics. Admittedly, the early Spanish colonial system was filled with abuse as the conquistadors formed their own fiefdoms with the Indians as their servants, a system called the encomienda system, but that system was abolished relatively quickly and replaced by a much more benign system, where Indians generally were left to rule themselves in their own communities, called pueblos de indios, or at least be ruled by Indian mayors called gobernador de indios, who were in turn elected by the local Indian nobility, the caciques, alongside a Spanish administrator called a corregidor.\n\nMestizos aren't the product of mass rape, they're the product of simply intermixing over the course of several centuries. It's the same reason you have Afro-Indians and Afro-Europeans in Mexico. The early Spanish conquistadors didn't bring their wives along, so they just started marrying native women. Same with slaves and Indians and slaves and Europeans. Though the Spaniards had instituted a racial caste system, race was such a vague system that it was practically useless. Indian nobles were above a poor Spanish farmer de facto, and a village full of black people could be classified as an Indian village simply on basis of location. \n\nIn general, the Spanish king had a very paternalistic view towards Indians, so if they were abused he did try to help them generally, although it was from a somewhat misguided point of view. There are still hundreds of letters in Spain between Indians nobles appealing their cases to the Spanish king. This was one of the reasons the Spanish king abolished the encomienda system, alongside the more practical reason that he didn't want the conquistadors to form independant kingdoms in the New World. " ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "ce9agjv", "ce9bwct" ], "score": [ 2, 6 ], "text": [ "Are you referring to a specific war, or in general?", "Towards the beginning of the war, the French and Germans utilized very similar tactics on the offense. This would involve extremely long preparatory bombardments (lasting days, or even weeks, and firing millions of shells) at enemy positions. The idea was, the bombardment would destroy emplacements, ruin trench networks, and break up wire obstacles. Gas shells (which the Germans pioneered) and Livens projectors (which were actually more like holes in the ground with gas canisters which were opened at the right moment time) would be used during the final minutes of the attack to force the defends to stay in their trenches (or, by the defender, to disrupt the impending attack). As the bombardment began to fade, the attackers would come out of their trenches and cross no-mans land. Ideally, the defenders would be so broken from the bombardment that the infantry could quickly cross and size the first trench line. Then follow up bombardments would allow the attackers to continue until the had broken through the trench network, where Cavalry would exploit the the victory and win the war! \n\nProblem was, the defenders were rarely broken by the bombardments and gas attacks. Frequently, the bombardments would only serve to ruin the battlefield and make the crossing *more* difficult. And the Germans became particularly efficient at creating deep dugouts which were difficult to collapse. The defenders could sit for days underground before the bombardment would stop, and the defenses would be remanned. In these conditions, the infantry attack would be brutalized before it gained much ground. Some improvements, like the Creeping Barrage (which was used by all sides) helped, but not much. \n\nBut in the French army, these problems were all exacerbated by their concept of *elan*. It roughly means dash or eagerness bordering on zealotry. French troops were expected to attack aggressively, push the enemy hard, and overwhelm them in close combat. Thus, the bayonet was an integral weapon for the French. \n\nLater in the war, the French and Germans began to differ in tactics. The French invested heavily in tanks, which they employed with mixed success. After a shorter bombardment, the tanks would advance against German strong points and absorb their fire. The infantry would advance behind these tanks, support them in bad ground, and secure the success that they achieved. But in practice this almost never happened. Heinz Guderian's *Achtung Panzer* goes into detail with French tank tactics, their success, and their critical failures. He argues that the French attacks failed in two major areas: Concentration and support. They failed to employ enough tanks to penetrate the German lines reliably, which ruined their element of surprise, as well as allowed the Germans to concentrate fire on fewer targets. Further, where tanks were successful, Infantry rarely supported them to secure their success. For one reason or another, tanks were often forced to operate without help. This meant they were vulnerable, and isolated if they ran into mechanical trouble (which many did)\n\nOn the other hand, the Germans imported a tactical concept that they first experienced in the East. The German name for it was *Hutier* tactics, and it was a radical departure from the older forms attack. The *Hutier* attack first called on a powerful but short artillery barrage called a Hurricane Bombardment. The issue (as one might expect) with the long bombardments was that they telegraphed the location and timing of an attack. If somebody was willing to burn 1million shells in a sector, it was pretty obvious they were up to something. With the Hurricane Bombardment, the attackers focused more on an extremely heavy, but very short, bombardment. During this bombardment, stormtroopers would already begin crossing no-mans land. They would operate in small teams, and were armed with grenades, flame throwers, and other close combat weapons. When the bombardment ended, the stormtroopers would leap up and immediately attack the defender while they were leaving their dugouts. The hope was, the enemy would be completely overwhelmed by the storm troopers in the transition, and the first line of trenches would be rapidly secured. Obviously this didnt work in *every* place, but where it did, the stormtroopers were quickly reinforced by the regular infantry, who didnt have to contend with heavy resistance. Meanwhile, the artillery was already beginning a bombardment of the secondary trench lines. Not only would that prevent any major reinforcements, but it would serve as a jumping off point for the *next* assault. So the Germans could quickly overwhelm several positions, and the *Hutier* tactic brought the Germans as close to the fabled breakthrough as they would ever get. \n\nAs for your last question, I would direct you to the [Mutiny of the French Army](_URL_0_). I dont have time to elaborate more, but if you have questions, ask away. " ] }

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[ [], [ "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_Army_Mutinies" ] ]

{ "a_id": [ "cjpirnz" ], "score": [ 2 ], "text": [ "In _The Ascent of Money: A Financial History of the World_ by Niall Ferguson, he discusses (among many other things) the history of debt instruments. The truth is, the buying and selling of debt obligations has been around almost as long as debt obligations themselves.\n\nSpecifically, you may be referring to the changing of hands of the *servicing rights* of the mortgage. I have to delve a bit into current events here, but when you get a mortgage today (and this has largely remained unchanged since the sub-prime crisis of a few years ago), the mortgage itself is likely to be sold only once and only once - probably to Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, or Ginnie Mae, depending on the type of loan, but sometimes to private companies (although not nearly as much since the real estate bubble popped). Then, the cashflow from hundreds or thousands of loans is sold to investors in the form of bonds. The company that actually accepts your monthly payment (say, Wells Fargo or Bank of America) does not own the loan. They accept a servicing fee each month to pay for their expenses in servicing the loan (I've seen between 0% and 1.25% of outstanding principal as a servicing fee), and pass the rest of the payment onto the trustee which administers the bond. It is not uncommon for the servicing rights to change hands during the life of the loan, and was quite common during the real estate boom in the US in the previous decade.\n\nAway from current events now, and back to history.\n\nModern securitization as described above is a system that came about with the chartering of Freddie Mac in 1970, and the creation of the first residential mortgage backed security (RMBS) by the US Dept of Housing and Urban Development. But securitization of mortgages had been around since the mid 1800s. It's easier for a small local bank to loan out money when they can sell their mortgages immediately on the secondary market, rather than have their money tied up for many years. However, and getting to your question, even when the mortgage itself was sold, the mortgagor (usually a farmer) still made payments to the same bank that originally made the loan. It was not until the Great Depression and the creation of Fannie Mae that the secondary market included government sponsored enterprises (GSE). Before that, it was large, usually East Coast, banks that bought mortgages on the secondary market.\n\nSo I guess the answer to your question would be around 1970, with the creation of the first government sponsored RMBS, and then the late 80s, with the creation of the first private label RMBS. The RMBS structure allows Bank A to make a loan, Bank B to buy and repackage the loan, and Bank C to service the loan, potentially removing the originating bank (Bank A) from the equation before the first payment is even made (in all three cases, I am using the term \"bank\" loosely, because these are very different kinds of banks). In previous forms of securitization (the ones going back to the 1800s), the originating bank was either the owner of the mortgage, or at least retained the servicing after they sold it (otherwise, they wouldn't have gone to the trouble of originating it).\n\nBesides the above book, my source for the second paragraph, where I discuss modern mortgage servicing, is that I've been in the industry for 10 years, including some very interesting front row seats working as an RMBS securities analyst from 2007-2009. I hope that's ok, and that I answered your question." ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "chakvj5", "chaky26", "chanryd", "chau421" ], "score": [ 41, 18, 9, 4 ], "text": [ "From the New Testament gospels, we can find a portrait of a Jesus wherein he certainly considered himself to be operating within \"Judaism.\" I mean, there are any number of phrases we could select to show this (for a particularly 'conservative' one, try \"Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfill. For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth pass away, not one letter, not one stroke of a letter, will pass from the law until all is accomplished,\" in Mt 5:17-18).\n\nScholars debate the so-called \"parting of the ways\" between Judaism and Christianity; but virtually everything about this is mired in ambiguity. It's probably most useful to talk about the parting of the ways in terms of when separate groups (like some of the figureheads in Rabbinic Judaism) would consider other groups to be \"illegitimate,\" and would attempt to exclude them from their sphere of influence and various normative social practices, etc. Certainly, in the New Testament gospels, words are placed in the mouth of Jesus that were deemed heretical--beyond the pale of \"minimal\"/normative Jewish belief--both by Jewish figures *within* the gospels, and without (and this obviously continues up to the modern day, among Jews). But, in a sense, the ideology behind this was probably thought to be a *corrupt* form of Judaism, rather than a totally separate ideology.\n\nThere were certainly anti-Judaic trends that developed among early Christian theologians--one of the great ironies of history. I mean, although there's an obvious sense in which this is ridiculous, you have some sayings by Paul (and others) that on the surface seem to be diametrically opposed to those positive statements made about the Law by Jesus (like the quote from Mt 5:17-18 earlier). And then you have things like [1 Thessalonians 2:14-16](_URL_0_), which was fodder for anti-Judaism.)\n\n____\n\nAddendum: there is a phenomenally difficult crux underlying everything here (and, really, underlying *many* issues of religion, identity, etc.): who is the person who gets to decide who is or is not a Jew (or a Christian, or a “liberal,” or whatever)? Do we look for a \"normative\" body of belief and practices, find all of those who conform to these, and then exclude all others? Or are the claims of the (supposed) \"outsiders,\" that there are in fact really *insiders* (just as much as any other person), enough to establish their insideness, in-and-of-themselves? \n\nIs Islam the \"perfected\" Abrahamic religion, over against Judaism and Christianity? Are Mormons/LDS \"Christians\" just as much as anyone else is?\n\nThe ambiguities of insider/outsider identity in regard to Judaism/Christianity are probably no more tangible than at the beginning of the 9th chapter of Paul's epistle to the Romans:\n\n > For I could wish that I myself were accursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my own people, my kindred according to the flesh. 4 They are Israelites, and to them belong the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship, and the promises; 5 to them belong the patriarchs, and from them, according to the flesh, comes the Messiah, who is over all, God blessed forever. Amen. 6 It is not as though the word of God had failed. *For not all Israelites truly belong to Israel*, 7 and not all of Abraham's children are his true descendants; but \"It is through Isaac that descendants shall be named for you.\" 8 This means that it is not the children of the flesh who are the children of God, but the children of the promise are counted as descendants. ", "Simple answer: yes, according to the texts of the New Testament, Jesus was a Jew acting as a continuation and a fulfillment of Jewish messianic prophecies.\n\nMy first point is that there are repeated references in the Gospels and the entire New Testament to the Hebrew Bible, where Jesus (and others, like Peter, Paul, John the Baptist, and a bunch more) would quote from Jewish scripture. \n\nJesus was, in the view of the New Testament, the arrived Messiah, properly filling the requirements set forth by prophecies from the Hebrew Bible. Matthew 1:22-23 (that is, the Gospel of Matthew, the very first book of the New Testament), for example, is a quotation from Isaiah 7:14. Isaiah states (depending on your translation) that the messiah would come from a young woman, or more commonly, a virgin. Matthew uses this and Mary as proof that the child here is the one whose coming was foretold in Isaiah. In the second chapter of Matthew, at 2:5-6, we come across a combined quotation from Micah and 2 Samuel stating that the messiah would hail from Bethlehem, which Matthew tells us is where Jesus was born. There are around fourteen references through the Gospel of Matthew alone to various Jewish texts that reaffirm that Jesus fits all the criteria necessary to be the Jewish Messiah, not to mention the significant number of others in the books beyond.\n\nI would contend that the myriad references to Jewish texts were attempts to legitimize him as the Jewish messiah, linking him to Judaism in a profound way.\n\nIt's also tough to ignore the references to Jewish figures alongside Jesus in the text. This quotation from Mark, known as The Transfiguration, is a good example: *\"After six days Jesus took Peter, James and John with him and led them up a high mountain, where they were all alone. There he was transfigured before them. His clothes became dazzling white, whiter than anyone in the world could bleach them. And there appeared before them **Elijah and Moses**, who were talking with Jesus. Peter said to Jesus, “Rabbi, it is good for us to be here. Let us put up three shelters—one for you, one for Moses and one for Elijah.” (He did not know what to say, they were so frightened.) Then a cloud appeared and covered them, and a voice came from the cloud: “This is my Son, whom I love. Listen to him!” Suddenly, when they looked around, they no longer saw anyone with them except Jesus.\"* (Mk 9:2-8)\n\nThen, of course, there's Jesus' \"cleansing of the Temple\" in Jerusalem in John 2:13-24. He angrily addresses the people in the temple selling various goods and changing money.\n\nA second quick point is that, according to the Gospels, Jesus was born a Jew. Luke 2:21 tells us that \"After eight days had passed, it was time to circumcise the child; and was called Jesus....\" To my knowledge, really the only ones circumcising their children at this point in that region were the Jews.\n\nThirdly, there isn't ever really a place where Jesus says anything about creating what I would understand as a new religion. He talks of a new covenant (as does Paul later in the New Testament when discussing the meaning of Jesus' death); he talks about being the \"new Temple\": *\"Jesus answered them, “Destroy this temple, and I will raise it again in three days.” They replied, “It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and you are going to raise it in three days?” But the temple he had spoken of was his body\"*; he even talks about a \"new commandment\" in the Gospel of John. \n\nIn several of the accounts of his death in the Gospels (all but Luke, in fact), Jesus is referred to as the \"King of the Jews,\" and this proclamation, according to the New Testament, is what got him killed.\n\nThe references to Jewish scripture, the details around Jesus' life and ministry as related to Jewish life, and the lack of any statements from Jesus suggesting that he intended to build a new religion all point to an intended reformation, rather than an attempt to break away and build something new.\n\nHope that helped! Post questions if you've got 'em! :)", "Sure, Jesus was trying to reform Judaism, in that he claimed to be the fulfillment of Jewish texts--but the binary nature of the question (\"reform the Jewish faith\" *or* \"trying to begin a new religion\") can be a little misleading.\n\nYour humanities professor said Jesus was a \"Jewish guy trying to reform his church\"--but the really interesting part of that sentence is the beginning. Jesus certainly wasn't claiming to be \"[just] a Jewish guy\". According to the only record we have of his teachings, he claimed to be something way more important than that--so it doesn't make much sense to call him a \"reformer\" if that draws comparison with guys like Martin Luther, who emphatically weren't claiming independent divine authority to speak the word of God.\n\nHe claimed that the Old Testament prophets testified of his coming, that the ruling authorities of contemporary Judaism were out of sync with their teachings--and that he was the Son of God, able to authoritatively interpret God's law regardless of tradition and precedent. That sounds like \"reform\" of a sort, but how radical does a reform need to be before it's something fundamentally new?\n\nTo illustrate--Muhammad also claimed to be restoring the correct interpretation of the Abrahamic tradition, and leaned heavily on the Hebrew prophets, but you would hardly call him a \"Jewish reformer\".", "Thank you so much to everyone for the answers, it is more clear to me now. Now I realize it is a more interesting and involved concept than I had originally thought." ] }

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[ [ "http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1Thess%202:14-1Thess%202:16" ], [], [], [] ]

{ "a_id": [ "d0akusf" ], "score": [ 2 ], "text": [ "A reply to /u/thomasin500\n\nThe situation was different at different periods in different locations. But in the 16th-17th centuries, what tended to happen was that explorers came first, while clergy and administrators came later, and sometimes much later. This is due to the limited extent that the Spanish monarchs were able to control their own agents. Columbus' own efforts at exploration and colonization serve as a good example whereby he had quite a bit of time to truly mess things up before a proper administration was put in place, and clergy sent to ensure the spiritual aspects are looked after. This same pattern repeated itself with each exploration effort. \n\n > small communities existing around catholic churches\n\nSo this is highly vague, I am not sure what you mean exactly. \n\nIn the early phase of exploration in a new area, the church had to catch up with the explorers/colonists. Later on, as the Spanish wanted to stabilize their frontier in the north, the church came first and then built small colonies around the churches. \n\nYou should read /u/RioAbajo 's posts [here](_URL_0_), and /u/anthoropology_nerd 's post [here](_URL_1_). In the northern frontiers, Franciscan missionaries established *missions* that are built around the church, and are run in the *encomienda* fashion. \n\nAs for the day-to-day activities, you may want to look up the *encomienda* system as it provides a starting point that became the effective template in the colonization / extraction phase. " ] }

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[ [ "https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/3hrlno/how_did_the_spanish_defend_their_colonial/", "https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/2acb7w/how_did_the_spanish_mission_towns_in_california/ciwgach" ] ]

{ "a_id": [ "cuee6q1" ], "score": [ 3 ], "text": [ "I can confirm that *Kursk: the Greatest Battle* is a good book, it has a few bits and pieces that could be better. But its a solid work none the less. However another good book is *Armor and Blood: The Battle of Kursk* by Dennis Showalter.\n\nYou can't go wrong with either one." ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "chc78q4" ], "score": [ 5 ], "text": [ "Probably the most high-profile successful insanity defense was probably too late to inspire the literary trope, but was nevertheless very important: the case of John Hinckley Jr., who shot President Ronald Regan in 1981. Hinckley was obsessed with actress Jodi Foster and apparently believed that as an assassin of a president, he would be a public figure and therefore her equal. The jury in his criminal trial found him not guilty by reason of insanity.\n\nThere was a fairly substantial backlash to the verdict--how could a man who shot the president be not guilty? A number of legal reforms resulted. As an example, in 1984, the United States Congress passed the Insanity Defense Reform Act, which applies to federal crimes (for those not familiar with the US legal system--most criminal offenses are state-level, so this doesn't directly control, for example, your average murder trial. A number of states also changed their laws, though). This act required the accused to prove insanity by clear and convincing evidence rather than requiring the government to prove the accused sane, as under prior law. The act also prohibited experts from testifying that the defendant was sane or insane--they can only talk about the mental diseases. Finally, it limited the defense to people who can't appreciate the nature and character of their acts. Under prior law, and the law of some states, people could also make the insanity defense if they essentially knew what they were doing and couldn't stop themselves (so-called \"irresistible act\"). \n\nSpeaking of iressistible acts, one literary example of the defense being used as an escape is the book and film Anatomy of a Murder. I've never read the book, but the film is fantastic and deals directly with the insanity defense generally and the \"irresistible act\" prong specifically. The book was written by then-Michigan Supreme Court judge Paul Voelker, so the story has a lot more legal grounding than the usual courtroom drama. The reason I mention it is that it was based on a real trial defended by Mr. Voelker as an attorney. So while that real trial wasn't necessarily so high profile that it caused the trope because of a general anti-insanity defense fervor it was a real case that inspired one instance of the trope. " ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "ckdepwl", "cke60n9" ], "score": [ 13, 2 ], "text": [ "Someone else actually asked [a similar question](_URL_2_) a few months back. My answer was: there is some evidence that the Soviets attempted to infiltrate and co-opt the civil rights movement — they weren't providing support to the movement out of solidarity, but rather saw an opportunity to foment dissent and attempt to destabilise American civil/political society.\n\nThe KGB's 'Service A' was tasked with carrying out \"active measures\" around the world — these operations varied in nature from misinformation, to political propaganda, to assassinations. In the case of the civil rights movement, the KGB hoped to use MLK and his colleagues as a political weapon against the US. When that effort failed, they instead tried to discredit him, in the hopes of opening the door to the emergence of a more compliant, sympathetic leadership.\n\nThe below is from a book I quote regularly and at length as one of the definitive sources on the history of Soviet foreign intelligence — *[The Sword and the Shield](_URL_5_)* by Christopher Andrew and KGB defector Vasili Mitrokhin:\n\n > King was probably the only prominent American to be the target of active measures by both the FBI and the KGB. By the mid-1960s the claims by the [Communist Party of the USA] leadership that secret Party members within King’s entourage would be able to “guide” his policies had proved to be hollow. To the Centre’s dismay, King repeatedly linked the aims of the civil rights movement not to the alleged worldwide struggle against American imperialism but to the fulfillment of the American dream and “the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence.”\n > \n > [...]\n > \n > Having given up hope of influencing King, the Centre aimed instead at replacing him with a more radical and malleable leader. In August 1967 the Centre approved an operational plan by the deputy head of Service A, Yuri Modin, former controller of the Magnificent Five, to discredit King and his chief lieutenants by placing articles in the African press, which could then be reprinted in American newspapers, portraying King as an “Uncle Tom” who was secretly receiving government subsidies to tame the civil rights movement and prevent it threatening the Johnson administration. While leading freedom marches under the admiring glare of worldwide television, King was allegedly in close touch with the President.\n\nOn the other side, King's opponents sought to cast him as a communist sympathiser and a Soviet stooge in an effort to discredit him as a voice in the US political discourse. This was the height of the Cold War, and the height of J. Edgar Hoover's [COINTELPRO](_URL_0_) operations, by which the FBI attempted to systematically undermine groups they deemed \"subversive\" — particularly the CPUSA, but also the civil rights and black nationalist movements, and others; especially those they deemed likely targets for infiltration by communists. \n\nIn the event, active measures against MLK and the civil rights movement largely failed in co-opting the movement, but it may have contributed to the FBI/Hoover's conviction that King was a communist fellow traveller. But the FBI's efforts to discredit him also proved ultimately unsuccessful; COINTELPRO became a national scandal after Hoover's death, and in the context of the Church Committee investigations.\n\n(As an aside: there's a great deal of scholarship and research on COINTELPRO — you can read [a huge amount of primary source material online](_URL_4_). I'd also look at *[The FBI and Martin Luther King, Jr.](_URL_3_)* by David Garrow and the more recent *[Enemies: A History of the FBI](_URL_1_)* by Tim Weiner.)\n\nWere there communists involved in the civil rights movement? Probably/almost certainly. Were they a prominent force in that movement? No, not really — certainly not as much as the FBI believed, or conspiracy theorists will *continue* to tell you.\n\n*Edit: new link.*", "I don't know much about Soviet involvement, but there was certainly domestic communist involvement in the civil rights and black liberation movements as a minority position. Most notably, this took the form of the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense. The Black Panthers were Marxist-Leninists whose radical black liberation plan was a multi-racial socialist revolution, rather than the black nationalism of other alternative black power groups. In practical day-to-day activity, the BPP was primarily concerned with community organizing and community self-defense (a concept that led to violent clashes with the police). \n\nThe Panthers were one of the biggest targets of the FBI's Counterintelligence Program (COINTELPRO), which saw the FBI infiltrate them with agent provocateurs, distribute false flag materials, pursue heavy surveillance, and carry out political assassinations.\n\nMartin Luther King, Jr. was also a major target of COINTELPRO, in which the FBI spied on him and attempted to coerce him into abandoning his movement (or killing himself, depending on the interpretation). King was never a communist, despite FBI suspicions, though shortly before his assassination, he was organizing the \"Poor People's Campaign,\" in which he was attempting to march a multi-racial army of poor people on Washington. King's rhetoric was also taking a more economically leftist turn, though the civil rights movement had long had ties to the labor movement and other leftists. The mainstream civil rights movement's political and economic positions can better be understood through these links, whereas the Panthers were certainly the most radical element.\n\nAs for international communism, the revolutionary government in Cuba had ties to the black community in the United States ever since Fidel Castro stayed in Harlem during his 1960 visit to the United Nations. Che Guevara, in his 1964 speech at the UN, condemned the abuse of blacks in the United States, along with a condemnation of Apartheid. Pre-revolutionary Cuba was institutionally racist in fundamental ways. After the Cuban Revolution took over in 1959, racial discrimination was declared illegal and effort was taken to bring about racial equality, though the effects were mixed and some racial problems persisted in Cuba with little state concern. Several Black Panthers fled to Cuba to escape arrest in the United States, including co-founder Huey Newton, who returned to the U.S. after a time. Assata Shakur, the only woman on the FBI's most wanted terrorists list, remains in Cuba to this day." ] }

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[ [ "http://vault.fbi.gov/cointel-pro", "http://books.google.co.uk/books/about/Enemies.html?id=fpqq_hATMy0C", "http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/27cclt/did_the_ussr_ever_actually_become_involved/", "http://books.google.co.uk/books/about/The_FBI_and_Martin_Luther_King_Jr.html?id=CtMWAQAAIAAJ", "https://archive.org/search.php?query=subject%3A%22COINTELPRO%22", "http://books.google.co.uk/books/about/The_Sword_and_the_Shield.html?id=9TWUAQ7Xof8C&redir_esc=y" ], [] ]

{ "a_id": [ "cdv1662", "cdv1ikv", "cdv26g4", "cdv2pve", "cdv4c9t", "cdv8tgl", "cdvaaoi", "cdveuks", "cdvg2dj" ], "score": [ 31, 274, 81, 9, 4, 17, 11, 2, 3 ], "text": [ " > as a Soviet military commander later revealed, would have triggered a nuclear war with the Soviets.\n\nIs *this part* sensationalized or factual?\n\nWhy would a Soviet commander want to destroy his own country for the sake of a distant island?\n\nAbout this other point: \n\n > Do we have any firm evidence that JFK would have pulled out of Vietnam in the early 60s had he lived?\n\nWasn't Eisenhower already reducing the military presence in South Vietnam? What did JFK do about Vietnam during the three years he was in the presidency? \n\n", "There is a counter-argument written by Sheldon Stern in *The Cuban Missile Crisis in American Memory* [available here](_URL_1_). Mr. Stern argues, compellingly, JFK was largely responsible for the crisis and its escalation. \n\nBenjamin Schwarz recently wrote a summary in the Atlantic Monthly [here](_URL_0_). \n\nSchwarz concludes Kennedy mucked up the outset, but did help once the catastrophe was there:\n\n > Although Stern and other scholars have upended the panegyrical version of events advanced by Schlesinger and other Kennedy acolytes, the revised chronicle shows that JFK’s actions in resolving the crisis—again, a crisis he had largely created—were reasonable, responsible, and courageous. Plainly shaken by the apocalyptic potentialities of the situation, Kennedy advocated, in the face of the bellicose and near-unanimous opposition of his pseudo-tough-guy advisers, accepting the missile swap that Khrushchev had proposed. “To any man at the United Nations, or any other rational man, it will look like a very fair trade,” he levelheadedly told the ExComm. “Most people think that if you’re allowed an even trade you ought to take advantage of it.” He clearly understood that history and world opinion would condemn him and his country for going to war—a war almost certain to escalate to a nuclear exchange—after the U.S.S.R. had publicly offered such a reasonable quid pro quo. Khrushchev’s proposal, the historian Ronald Steel has noted, “filled the White House advisors with consternation—not least of all because it appeared perfectly fair.”\n\nEdit - clarity", "It's important to note the source on this, RFK Jr. Kind of odd a major magazine would allow an author to try to do a serious story about their own uncle. ", "The Soviet troops stationed around and in Cuba were effectively cut off from the top brass. They threw in their lot with Castro and legitimately admired and respected him and his ideals. The men on the ground were armed with low tonnage tactical nukes that they would have used in the case of an invasion, because as far as they saw, they were on their own. \n\nWith that, there were also nuclear submarines in the vicinity and they came very close to firing on the American blockades, due to provocative actions(such as dropping depth charges and firing tracers). \n\nMeanwhile the Americans are flying sorties all over Cuba so low that the Soviets wete never sure if they were about to get bombed, and AA batteries even killed a pilot as tensions rose.\n\nAll of this was happening without even the military commanders being in control. There were a million and one ways it could have turned nuclear, and it was obvious the longer it went on the less on control Kennedy and Khrushchev were, as is evidenced by Khrushchev's personal letter to Kennedy. \n\nI would very much make the case that any control either leader had was tentative and unstable at best, because even of General LeMay and co. were kept on a leash, there were thousands of men on the ground who could have set things off.", "I don't have any citations handy for this, but I did write a senior thesis on early CIA history and the Bay of Pigs was pretty central to it. I haven't gone any further in academic history, so this isn't much of a credential at all. I can't find my original bibliography at the moment, but I'll keep looking for it.\n\nIn my understanding, the JCS expected the Bay of Pigs to be a starting point. Once committed to the assault, JFK would commit more and more resources until Cuba was fully US-occupied. \n\nOn the other hand, JFK was being told by his own agencies and the JCS that the resources already pledged to the invasion would be sufficient on their own, and repeatedly said he didn't intend to escalate beyond the operation on paper.\n\nFrom my own readings from the outside perspective, related more to the Bay of Pigs than the Missile Crisis, it wasn't exactly that JFK was a peacemonger, nor was it that the JCS were warmongers. It was more a breakdown in communication. The JCS used language they had developed under previous presidencies and thought JFK understood that when they said 5, they really meant 50, so to speak. JFK was stubborn by nature, and so when confronted with that same hypothetically 5:50 ratio would dig in his heels. He viewed it more as throwing good money after bad.\n\nAt the end of the day, that makes JFK seem pretty dovish, but I interpreted that more as JFK not liking anyone trying to control his actions by giving him phony advice.", "While I'm not hugely knowledgeable on the subject, I feel the documentary \"The Fog of War: Eleven Lessons from the Life of Robert S. McNamara\" touches nicely on your question. Definitely worth a watch if you haven't already.", "Political psychological accounts of the event rely heavily upon the idea that the generals were much less of a factor in the CMC because of the role they played in the failed Bay of Pigs invasion. I think this is a complicated issue though so I'm going to start with the Bay of Pigs. It is relevant, I promise.\n\nThomas Preston (2001) argues that the type of Presidential personality Kennedy developed was one that allowed for cognitive flexibility and more importantly, learning. When he came into office, the invasion of Cuba had been planned and set into motion by the Eisenhower administration. Kennedy, not wanting to underwhelm the generals who were heavily pushing for it started to show signs of cognitive rigidity and his inner circle started to show signs of what is called groupthink (Janis 1982). Some signs of groupthink in this case were that RFK had started to suppress other aids who might have spoken out against the pseudo-invasion. Eventually, all of his aids started to tow the line, having relied upon the 'expert advice' of the generals who were advocating for the continued invasion. In this case, these groupthink symptoms overwhelmed JFK's cognitive flexibility and the BoP was a massive failure.\n\nWith the background set, flash forward to the CMC. JFK treated this situation far differently than the BoP as he wanted to avoid more failure. He did what he could to emphasize cognitive flexibility and reduce groupthink. For instance, Kennedy did not really trust the generals as 'experts' anymore. They were policy makers like anyone else. Additionally, Kennedy would intentionally sit out of meetings so that his staff could speak candidly without any real or perceived nudging by the President. RFK stopped acting as a 'mindguard' of JFK and instead offered honest counsel. In general, Kennedy treated the information and advice he was recieving much more critically and was unwilling to rely just on prestige or expertise.\n\nSo at least from the political psychological accounts, the generals played a much smaller role in Presidential decisionmaking than they had earlier in the Presidency. That might be why RFK made that statement.\n\n---\nSources:\n\n[Janis, I. \\(1982\\). Groupthink: Psychological Studies of Policy Decisions and Fiascoes. Boston: Houghton Mifflin.](_URL_1_)\n\n[Preston, T. \\(2001\\). The President and His inner circle: Leadership Style and the Advisory Process in Foreign Affairs. New York: Columbia University Press.](_URL_0_) ", "A related question: \n\nOliver Stone's movie \"JFK\" presents a very similar account to the OP about JFK's handling of the crisis. \n\nIs his movie (but those scenes in particular) generally considered an accurate portrayal? \n", "I can't remember the exact details regarding your question but it is discussed in length in Michael Dobbs' *One Minute to Midnight* if you, or anyone else in the thread, is interested in more on the Cuban Missile Crisis. Dobbs presents the Cuban Missile Crisis from all three countries' points of view and he discusses a lot of the cabinet and brass meetings with Kennedy. " ] }

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[ "http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/john-f-kennedys-vision-of-peace-20131120" ]

[ [], [ "http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2013/01/the-real-cuban-missile-crisis/309190/", "http://www.amazon.com/Cuban-Missile-Crisis-American-Memory/dp/0804783772/ref=la_B001KHJF62_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1386341297&sr=1-1" ], [], [], [], [], [ "http://www.amazon.com/The-President-His-Inner-Circle/dp/0231116217", "http://www.amazon.com/Groupthink-Psychological-Studies-Decisions-Fiascoes/dp/0395317045/" ], [], [] ]

{ "a_id": [ "eyursqs" ], "score": [ 11 ], "text": [ "There are a great number of possible variations on the following, but I'll do my best to give you an idea.\n\n**Tithing**\n\nFirstly, my family are rye farmers. Much depends on what that means. If we're at the bottom of the social pile producing rye for another citizen farmer then we probably get enough food to live but no income of marked coins (either that issued by the state, the manor or the church). Our tithes are taken care of by the farmer whose land/seed/tools we use. If we're running our own farm or, more likely, strips of land then our tithe is one tenth of the rye we produce because that's the literal meaning of tithe. We may have to give more for church ales (think fundraising event, medieval-style). That's not to say that we don't give more to the church for other reasons, but I'll come back to that later.\n\nIf we're a landowner higher up the scale then there's a good chance we're actually collecting the tithes or performing some other important task in the burg or liberty (effectively the town/district), and we're probably not breaking our backs collecting our own rye. That depends on exactly how the church and the district are set up and who they were set up by - it might be our family that built the church and own the chantries, I'll come back to that later too.\n\nOne more possibility of many is that we're actually wards of the church, we might live on church-owned land in which case everything we produce is the property of the church. Again, we'll get what we need to survive (which may be surprisingly little) but we *may* have the added advantage of better medical care. That's not a great improvement to life but it will help some people.\n\n & #x200B;\n\n**The Church**\n\nThe following is all dependent on the size of the church - small village churches would have a high altar and a few additional altars, wealthy town churches would have a high altar, numerous specific chapels and many altars dedicated to particular saints, while cathedrals would have a high altar, any number of chapels and many *many* additional altars. Sizeable stone buildings would be astonishing to most people of the time, even a small-ish church would have been quite something, and cathedrals must have been mind-blowing. \n\nYou'll know that churches can be divided into two main sections: the chancel (where the high altar stands) and the nave. Cruciform churches (in a cross plan) also have a crossing (the centre of the cross) and transepts (the north and south wings of the church). The chancel and the high altar are only accessible to those who have been ordained. Everything that happens in there is hidden by a chancel screen (or \"rood screen\"). The general public can hear the mass being performed, they can smell the mass, but they can not see it. The chancel would have been brightly candle-lit so the effect would be quite theatrical - some churches would have a golden rood (cross) hanging above the rood screen where it would be lit by candles. The ghostly, ethereal singing and the golden cross hovering in the drifting candle/incense smoke would have been deeply dramatic.\n\nAll this heavenly celebration wouldn't just be happening on Sundays, there would be masses all week round and, depending on the size of the church, for most of the day. Nor would the High Altar be the only place where stuff would be happening - the church would have numerous altars (depending on size) and possibly a chantry chapel dedicated to a wealthy benefactor. Chantry chapels would be near the high altar, often to the south with secondary chantries built to the north, and would commemorate a specific deceased person or family. Priests would be employed to perform regular masses in the chantries, sometimes these would alternate with high mass or take place as part of it. During main festivals like Nativity, Annunciation, Assumption and Easter there would be processions of the clergy through the local area and into the church where people could see the service that was being done for them. \n\nThe sides of the church would be lined with additional altars raised by guilds or local families, each of these would be dedicated to a particular saint and tended to by the altar's benefactors. Masses would take place at these on particular days of the week with the regularity depending on the donations. If a church had nave aisles and arcades (the arches that run down the main body of the church) then each arch would be separated into a bay by a parclose (a dividing screen), there may be seating in each to allow more comfortable prayer for the visitor or any priests who were specifically appointed to that altar. With that said, most of us would spend our visit in the nave, probably facing east. The first-millennium tradition was for baptisms in the West end and funerals in the East because in life we travel towards the light. Easter/Oster/Oester (we get the name East from the same root as oestre, or egg, or life) is the most important direction in Christian building and liturgy, a practice that goes back long before Christianity and which was specifically adopted by Sees around the 6th Century. Norman churches continued this tradition - if we were receiving a blessing or communion we would be expected to be facing the East window and altar, even if we couldn't see it through the rood screen. Interestingly, a priest saying prayers or preaching a sermon would also be facing east, not west towards the congregation as is the custom in many churches today.\n\nAlthough we know that some churches had seating in the main body of the nave it was considered unusual and was very rarely fixed in place. The public would stand in the nave and receive blessings or simply replenish their holy goodness through their presence in the house of God - and it's easy to imagine that it really felt that way to somebody in the 1300s. Of course, the public wouldn't just be there to recharge their spirit - we know that all kinds of public matters took place in church naves and porches, meetings, trade, markets, ales (a local festival that also acted as a bit of a fundraiser for churches), and pretty much any public event. In larger churches there would still have been a mass going on in the chancel or chantries.\n\n & #x200B;\n\nBasically, how much we pay for that depends on who we are and our importance in the community. Our visit to the church would be a smoky, sweet-smelling experience with the light of the cross visible from the murky dimness of the nave, and the sound of heavenly (ish) singing echoing around the body of the church.but all in all it must have been a quite magical experience.\n\n & #x200B;\n\n**Sources:** not exhaustive but they cover the above and give a good grounding in Norman medieval Catholic churches in Europe, that particularly covers France and large parts of England\n\n*Prof. English:The Lords of Holderness*\n\n*Prof. Warwick: The Archaeology of Churches*\n\n*Dr. Taylor: How to Read a Church - A Guide to Symbols and Meanings in Churches*\n\n*Hitchcock: History of the Catholic Church: From the Apostolic Age to the Third Millenium*\n\n*Weidenkopf: A History of the Catholic Church*" ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "c6u9mxu" ], "score": [ 12 ], "text": [ "As far as I am aware, the first recorded individual was a ruler named Sargon of Akkad. He apparantly created a standing army of 5400 men:\n\n_URL_0_\n\nKeep in mind we have pictorial evidence of people fighting in organized bodies prior to that, but Sargon was the first individual with whom a military force was *personally* associated with.\n\n" ] }

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[ [ "http://www.au.af.mil/au/awc/awcgate/gabrmetz/gabr0004.htm" ] ]

{ "a_id": [ "cwlv29m" ], "score": [ 2 ], "text": [ "The Roman period is before my period of expertise, so I can't say much about the Lorica Hamata.\n\nHowever, in the Middle Ages there are occasional uses of latten (a copper alloy, generally containing Zinc - basically brass) to make mail. The most common use of this is a decorative border on the edge of a mail garment - the hem of a mail skirt, cuffs, etc. There are a number of examples of this surviving, such as [this example at the Wallace Collection](_URL_2_). This shirt also has a latten 'signature' link identifying the mail-maker - you can see it [here](_URL_1_). In Thom Richardson's description of the Tower of London inventories of the 14th century, he mentions a mail collar ('pizzane') decorated with latten borders and pendants of butted (IE not rivetted) latten links attached to the collar proper. The borders of latten links create a contrasting, decorative border that seems to be made of gold. Similarly 14th and some 15th century plate armour sometimes has decorative applied borders of gilt latten. You can see this in the famous ['Breastplate number 10'](_URL_0_) from Castle Churburg in South Tyrol.\n\nIn the accounts of the Tower of London from the 14th century there is a mail shirt 'of latten' mentioned repeatedly in inventories through the decades (from 1344 to 1362) - probably the same shirt. In one of these accounts it is identified with mail shirts 'for the tournament'. If this was a mail shirt entirely made of latten, it may have been made for early forms of club tournament where whalebone swords were used, and not for battle. In this case protection against piercing by lances/arrows/swords was less important, and a more visually striking but less tough metal could be used." ] }

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[ "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lorica_hamata", "https://www.google.se/search?q=lorica+hamata+bronze&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&gws_rd=cr&ei=y_U0VpOpJuOeygOMmqKwBQ" ]

[ [ "http://www.tforum.info/forum/uploads/post-21950-1309115935.jpg", "http://wallacelive.wallacecollection.org/eMuseumPlus?service=DynamicAsset&sp=SU5mxm4Yx%2FVaV1DPqh%2B3byn7vHPO0vGEbSO2CZa%2FyluWyUdAw6XbIJo%2FXSd3RdPIQGDltaCq%2FweZm%0AHsV76GnM8XFlKwOoejtfLb4rovvvgK7ogYiTww824Q%3D%3D&sp=Simage%2Fjpeg", "http://wallacelive.wallacecollection.org/eMuseumPlus?service=direct/1/ResultLightboxView/result.t1.collection_lightbox.$TspTitleImageLink.link&sp=10&sp=Scollection&sp=SfieldValue&sp=0&sp=0&sp=2&sp=Slightbox_3x4&sp=0&sp=Sdetail&sp=0&sp=F&sp=T&sp=2" ] ]

{ "a_id": [ "dd7a719" ], "score": [ 4 ], "text": [ "The one person who comes to mind is the Roman emperor Julian (360-63), who, though raised Christian, turned back to the Greek religion of the Homeric gods and tried to reestablish that faith as the principal religion in the Roman empire. For that reason the Christian historiography referred to him as \"apostata\". Since he fell in battle three years after his ascension to the throne nothing came of his efforts (and, as Christianity was already quite wide spread at the time, it would arguably be doubtful if that would have been reversible at all). A good overview about Julian and his political and religious aims is given in: Adrian Murdoch, The Last Pagan." ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "dnwv0eu" ], "score": [ 11 ], "text": [ "Kindly release opera from its grave! Just because you don't personally consume something, doesn't mean it's dead. For America in particular, I can comfortably state that you live in the best time of all for consumption of opera. As of today opera is the most accessible and affordable to Americans that it has ever been, every major US city has an opera company, DVDs and Youtubes and albums abound, available at prices almost always lower than a lower or lower-middle class working person's single day of wages, which is virtually unthinkable for most of history. [I expand a bit here,](_URL_1_) unfortunately my link to statistics about American opera consumption died, so [here it is rebirthed.](_URL_0_) Unfortunately they haven't been able to redo that survey to update, but as of 2012, a steady percentage of 2% ish of Americans consume live opera every year. 2% seems small, but it's roughly, by some people's estimates, currently the number of Americans who are vegan, and yet I can get both my opera fix and my LightLife Smart Bacon fix with ease in my city. Of course we can't compare this to 18th century Italy, but to put it in perspective, for the oldest opera house in America, the Met, in 1900 if they sold every seat and standing place in the house (which, no way), it would have accommodated 0.112% of the city's total population on any given night. " ] }

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[ [ "https://www.arts.gov/sites/default/files/highlights-from-2012-sppa-revised-oct-2015.pdf", "https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/2goadq/when_were_classical_music_opera_and_jazz_at_their/ckl2bpg/" ] ]

{ "a_id": [ "ch7h99h" ], "score": [ 5 ], "text": [ "It's important to know that battles are not determined by how many casualties each side takes. Without getting into a lengthy discussion about strategy, in general, the goal is to make the other side withdraw. Whether this be a rout (enemy cohesion breaks, disorderly retreat, time when most casualties occur) or an organized withdrawal doesn't matter in terms of who \"won\" the battle, though it may have very large strategic implications. \n\nThe British commander, Lord Chelmsford was being replaced. The British suffered a humiliating defeat at the Battle of Islandlwana under his command. However, he had some time before his replacement would arrive. Chelmsford used this opportunity to provoke the Zulu forces into attacking in order to claim victory and repair his tarnished reputation.\n\nTo his credit, Chelmsford learned from the lessons of Islandlwana. There, the British were taken by surprise and used standard battle tactics. As seen [here](_URL_0_), the British forces had formed a standard battle line with their flank protected, but the maneuvering of the Zulu forces, and their superior numbers, allowed them to outflank and encircle the British forces. \n\nChelmsford would not let that happen again. For the Battle of Ulundi, he formed a [square](_URL_1_) because he knew the Zulu were aggressive and would try to encircle the British forces. As the Zulu had some firearms, and were able to pick off British soldiers, but not enough to abandon their traditional hand-to-hand fighting. But the British were prepared. The cavalry provoked the Zulu into charging, and the square was 4 ranks deep. The Zulu tried many times to rush the square, but were beaten back by massed rifle, Gatling gun, and artillery fire. \n\nThis goes to my earlier point - they may have only lost a \"small part\" of their force, but the withering fire broke their morale. The British cavalry charged and rode down the fleeing Zulu warriors." ] }

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[ [ "http://www.britishbattles.com/zulu-war/isandlwana/map.jpg", "http://www.britishbattles.com/zulu-war/ulundi/map.jpg" ] ]

{ "a_id": [ "d3fcb3a", "d3fjwww" ], "score": [ 41, 97 ], "text": [ "[Here](_URL_0_)'s a similar question I asked a while ago, and received an amazing reply from /u/sowser.", "For me, being a historian of religion has made me very skeptical of claims that modern people make like \"Judaism teaches x\" or \"According to Christianity, no one may do y.\" Because for most claims like that, the important people associated with the religion said pretty much the opposite at some point in their history. History has taught me that \"Christianity says,\" functionally, means \"Christians say.\" And people have beautiful crazy complicated different lives, so they say beautiful crazy complicated different things. \n\nIt's also helped me really understand that, for most people, religious statements aren't truth-apt propositions. Understanding the all-encompassing nature of medieval religion helped me understand that, for me and the people around me, religion is a way of life, not a system of proofs. I sort of knew that before, but it's easier to understand when you study people who have religious practices that seem kind of absurd to us but that make total sense to them. They're not stupid, they're just having a different conversation. " ] }

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[ [ "https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/4if1dq/is_it_more_of_an_advantage_or_a_disadvantage_for/" ], [] ]

{ "a_id": [ "cyk6g49", "cykevne" ], "score": [ 3, 2 ], "text": [ "Hello - I read this book two summers ago and may I say I found it to be a riveting read. It provides details into the intimate workings of the Reich, and Albert Speer's relationship with Hitler that would be difficult to find elsewhere. In particular I was struck by the inefficiencies and haphazard administration of the Third Reich, and how its politics were administered. \n\nI don't think that Speer's book could be considered biased from the standpoint of being 'Pro-Reich' or anything of the sort. The one thing you could probably criticize him for is shifting blame for the holocaust away from himself.\n\nOverall definitely worth reading but, like all primary sources, should be read with a grain of skepticism.", "Tough question. Speers book is definitely a good source of what Speer wants the world to think about him. On the other hand, it is absolutely a unique insight into the inner workings of the Third Reich.\n\nUltimately, most of the interesting episodes described in his book are personal stories where he is the only source, so it is impossible to fact check a lot of the information.\n\nRead it for what it is: an interesting auto-biography of somebody whose life was defined by the Nazis. For proper historical analysis, go elsewhere." ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "ce4o15n" ], "score": [ 10 ], "text": [ "One thing you have to keep in mind about the Nazis is that from fairly early on they began a program of \"coordination\" which made sure that practically all organizations that had any sort of state connection were rearranged along very linearly hierarchical lines of authority, ultimately leading towards people at the top who were very loyal to the Nazi party line. The university system, then as now (I believe) was a form of civil service employment, operated by the state. So it underwent this kind of \"coordination\" as well. This included, among other \"reforms,\" the immediate firing of all \"non-Aryan\" faculty with the Law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service in 1933, and meant further than Party officials had direct connections to the operation of universities and departments.\n\nThere was very little room for academic discussion of much of anything that had political implications, and what had political implications could be a moving target (some, like anthropology, were obviously related to the Nazi political platform; some, like physics, were not but could be tied into it). There was an enforced conformity with the ideals of the Nazi state, and this enforcement could take many forms, from the very direct (losing jobs, choice of new hires, etc.) to the very indirect (many of the German university student groups were very pro-Nazi and would hold rallies, protests, and the like regarding what was taught). \n\nThe case of German physics is one of the most famous examples of this but also one of the most popularly misunderstood. The basics of the story is this: a number of German physicists had, especially since WWI, campaigned to return to a \"true\" German physics of hard empiricism and experimentalism, rejecting the more abstract physics that was popular in the UK and had many connections with German Jewish physicists. (A connection created out of the circumstances of prejudice — the best physics positions were experimentalist positions and as such routinely denied to Jews. Theoretical physics was originally less prestigious and thus was a place where a Jewish scholar could thrive. By the 1930s the prestige had shifted.) Some of these advocates for \"German/Aryan\" physics were early supporters of the Nazis, and attempted to get the Nazi Party interested in their argument that physics had a \"racial\" component. In the very early years of Nazi rule these physicists had some success in getting various parts of the Nazi government interested in attacking \"Jewish\" physics of relativity and quantum mechanics, but the Nazis never really embraced it as a fundamental part of their operations. They succeeded in harassing a few physicists for awhile (like Heisenberg, though he was able to use personal connections to avoid serious consequences), and they succeeded in making sure a few new academic appointments were filled with like-minded physicists. But by the time of the war their influence had been largely neutralized, the \"Aryan\" physicists thought the Nazis had abandoned them, and the theoretical physicists had gotten insulated by their work on atomic energy. \n\nI like this story both because it points out the way in which the ideology _could be used as a resource_ by people _within the system itself_ — that is, not just a \"top-down\" approach — as a means of trying to enact policies (some academic, some professional, some personal) that they wanted. The Nazi party could sign on to it but also reverse course if they found it useful. In some ways this is comparable to the way that party ideology operated in the USSR as well — sometimes as a doctrine that is handed down from the top, but more often as a resource that some academics could use to attack other academics. (An instinct that any academic will find instantly recognizable.)\n\nI know less about the humanities than the sciences; I would expect that the more explicit the conclusions were with regards to the various parts of the Nazi political/ideological platform, the more obvious the constraints would exist, with the caveat that sometimes the connections between the content and the ideology could be unexpected." ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "cffefzz" ], "score": [ 9 ], "text": [ "Hello, and thank you for this thoughtful and well-worded question! I'm unfortunately not an expert on the Chinese Civil War, but I'll try my best to provide some background.\n\nThe very short answer to everything is that Mao Zedong and the Communists never had any intention to cooperate with the Nationalists or the Americans in the long term. Before George Marshall even set foot in China, the CCP created plans to \"neutralize the United States\" or, as Zhou Enlai later expressed, \"[make] use of the United States... [and] make every effort to delay the onset of civil war.\" Their position is quite understandable, of course: the United States wanted China under a non-communist government, and its policies consistently favored the Nationalists. Chiang Kai-shek, on his part, was initially amenable to negotiations, if only to pacify both the United States and the Soviet Union, even though his advisers warned that Mao would simply exploit the opportunity to consolidate his forces and that the United States would likely blame the Nationalists for any failure to maintain peace. \n\nThe Soviet Union played a major role in these developments, as you suggested. When the Red Army occupied Manchuria in August 1945 near the end of the Second World War, they handed over an enormous quantity of captured weapons and other materiel to the CCP: according to one source, \"700,000 rifles, 1100 light machine guns, 3000 heavy machine guns, 1800 cannons, 2500 mortars, 700 tanks, 800 ammunition depots, and ordnance factories kept by the former Japanese Kwantung Army.\" The Politburo then recommended to the CCP a month later that they adopt the strategy of \"expanding toward the north and defending toward the south\"--that is, secure their position in Manchuria--to which Mao wholeheartedly agreed. In the meantime, while the Red Army allowed the CCP to maneuver freely throughout the region, they prevented Nationalist officials and troops from expanding their foothold. The Soviets finally agreed to withdraw after Chiang protested, but they delayed it until March 1946. This, along with the temporary ceasefire with the Nationalists later brokered by Marshall, bought extra time for Mao.\n\nSo the Marshall Mission never really stood a chance. Marshall himself failed to resolve the fundamental differences dividing the Communists and Nationalists (and I don't see how he could have); on the other hand, while he later reported that \"almost complete, overwhelming suspicion\" between the two parties limited any meaningful chance for mediation, Marshall also complained about the CCP's \"unwillingness to make a fair compromise.\" You might consider this the \"final straw,\" though Truman recalled him in January 1947 so he could serve as Secretary of State (allegedly without Marshall's prior knowledge). As for the military dimension, I'll defer to someone better-versed on the topic. I hope you find this helpful nonetheless! :D" ] }

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[ "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marshall_Mission" ]

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{ "a_id": [ "cnrz9zk", "cns04c6", "cns0aa4", "cns3yxn" ], "score": [ 163, 115, 31, 20 ], "text": [ "Due to the long lifespans and long gestation periods of elephants, breeding them as one does with horses was impractical at best. There are no known acknowledged \"breeds\" of elephants (aside from the Asian and African varieties that we know of today).", "Since /u/BuddHasLittleWarlock has already pointed out the problems with breaking certain traits in elephants. I just want to add that there really wasn't a need for the Mughals to breed selective types of Elephants. The current type of elephant in India already did exactly what the Mughals needed them to do.\n\nThe Mughals used elephants as:\n\nA) pack animals\n\nB) platforms for their generals to observe the battlefield and give commands\n\nThe size and power of the Indian elephant was already perfectly suited to these tasks so they really had no reason to breed smaller ones or even bigger ones. \n\nAs a fun little fact, armies would often use marksmen to pick off the generals on the elephants, or they would target the elephants with artillery sending them panicking through their own lines. ", "It is very difficult to breed Elephants in captivity, even using modern methods such as artificial insemination, as captivity significantly reduces fertility in both males and females. \n\nEven today with modern science it's considered a BIG deal if a zoo can produce a healthy calf from captive elephants. \n\nPre-modern societies that used Elephants would not have been able to selectively breed them, there may have been cases where captive births happened, but they would not have been able to systematically control this as they would have been able to with dogs or horses. Instead they would have relied on replenishing their stock from the wild. \n\n_URL_0_", "While this doesn't answer the question, I would like to add that the Mughals did not use Elephants like Westerners used horses. In fact one of the reasons that the Mughals were successful against the ruling elite of Northern India was that the Mughal's battle tactics were able to frighten the elephants used by them. \n\nAlso, the mughal armies had *Sowar (सवार)* or horse mounted knights just like western ones.\n\n**Source:** *Medieval India: A Textbook of History for Middle Schools*\nBook by Romila Thapar" ] }

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[ [], [], [ "http://nationalzoo.si.edu/SCBI/ReproductiveScience/ElephantBreedRepro/" ], [] ]

{ "a_id": [ "cujk76y", "cujore3" ], "score": [ 50, 14 ], "text": [ "[I have written about this before here](_URL_0_), which might answer some of your questions.", "Hey I got a related question. I asked about this but never got a response!\n\nAre there records of ARVN units continuing the fight after the cease-fire? What happened to the mostly intact ARVN units in the IV Corps area, did they fight on?" ] }

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[ [ "https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1j3p9a/im_a_pretty_standard_southern_vietnamese_citizen/cbaxe7b" ], [] ]

{ "a_id": [ "di8t5cg" ], "score": [ 3 ], "text": [ "This is just one an example of the centuries long trend in modern military history of increasing dispersion in the face of increasing firepower.\n\nElite troops (i.e. Guard Regiments) in Napoleonic times were elite because they were better organized, braver, more disciplined and sometimes physically larger and more intimidating than other units. They could retain their unit cohesion under fire or when entering melee, where it would be decisive. Under Napoleonic conditions, the side with higher morale that sticks together no matter what usually can win an infantry slugfest.\n\nIn modern times, or even the 20th century, the conventional ideas of bravery and a \"stand-up fight\" have disappeared in the face of increased firepower. Under artillery, machine gun fire and aerial bombardment, troops can't outclass their opposition by being bigger, braver, and more tightly organized. Troops have to spread out, conceal their position and use dispersion to avoid being overwhelmed with firepower. Concentrated groups of elite troops would quickly become targets for firepower they can't even necessarily see. Similarly firepower of a large group of troops tends to depend more on the number of artillery tubes and machine guns a unit possesses, and the expertise of it's officers and specialists, rather than the abilities of individual soldiers.\n\nHowever, with dispersion comes a whole different problem. How can units keep fighting and accomplishing objectives if they can't actually see each other or their chain of command? 20th and 21st century militaries have found various ways of training units to deal with this problem in standard military units.\n\nElite units in modern times go into situations where the utmost dispersion is required: At the tip of a fast moving armored column, suddenly appearing by aerial insertion, or infiltrating behind enemy lines or into a country where they can't operate out in the open due to politics. These situations are ones which are more chaotic than normal and where the additional dispersion might be expected to break down communication and inhibit military effectiveness.\n\nIn these situations, extra training is needed to make sure that the individual soldiers can fight under more chaotic than normal conditions. Soldiers need to use more individual initiative and be comfortable fighting in smaller groups and in more unexpected situations. Extreme physical training in modern elite troops is needed not to intimidate the enemy or overpower him but to provide the flexibility to hike over a mountain or into a jungle and still be combat effective when away from motorized logistics.\n\nNapoleon's Imperial Guard was in thus \"braver and brawnier\" than regular troops. Whereas modern elite forces are \"smarter, sneakier and more flexible\" than their regular army counterparts, and the change is due to an increase in firepower and dispersion in the modern era." ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "eergi2v" ], "score": [ 20 ], "text": [ "It's less that the state is named after the city or vice versa, and more that both geographical regions were given Anglicized names at the same time. While the legacy of Native tribes and people can be seen in place names such as Manhattan (based on a Wampanoag or Lenape word used to describe the land mass between the Hudson and East Rivers), name places in New York State reflect the region's appeal to a variety of European colonizers. \n\nPrior to the arrival of Europeans, a collection of Indigenous settlements and communities were spread across what would become New York State, parts of Pennsylvania, and New Jersey. The region, described by many Europeans as \"Iroquoia\", would become the home of the Iroquois League of the Five Nations (Mohawk, Oneida, Onondaga, Cayuga, and Seneca) sometime between 1450 and 1550. Eventually, a sixth tribe, the Tuscaroras, joined what would become the Haudenosaunee Confederacy. Members of the Confederacy traded with Europeans on an individual, village, and nation basis and multiple name places reflect their presence. Counties in Central New York carry the names of the tribes of the Confederacy. Counties in Western New York (e.g. Erie, Chautauqua, Cattaraugus) take their names from tribes from the western part of the state or place-names used by members of the tribes. \n\nDutch colonizers from the Dutch West India Company lay claim to the land inside the Confederacy, on Esopus land along the Hudson, and on Wampanoag, Munsees, or Montauk lands on the state's southern islands and identified it as New Netherlands. In doing so, they basically ignored the early mapping activities of Italian Giovanni da Verrazzano ([more](_URL_0_) on colonial naming practices from /u/sunagainstgold). They identified the region at the bottom of the colony as New Amsterdam and a region about 150 miles north along the Hudson, as Beverwijck. \n\nEngland took over the land 1664 and immediately renamed several key locations.^1 The colony itself and what had become the two largest settlements in the colony were named after the Duke of York and of Albany, who, in 1685, would become James II of England. The settlement on the Hudson would be chartered as The City of Albany in 1686, making it the longest continuously chartered city in America. New Netherlands became \"New York\" and the area that was New Amsterdam also became \"New York.\" The City of Greater New York was established in 1898, bringing together the various boroughs into the city we recognize today as The Big Apple. New York County, which originally included parts of the Bronx and Staten Island, now includes only the NYC borough of Manhattan. \n\nBut to be sure, the problem was noted from the very beginning. One author in mid-1690's noted that England had \"planted seeds of confusion across the path of one who would seek the meaning of a New Yorker. No other state has to deal with such confusion.”^2\n\n____\n1. For more on the transition from Dutch to British rule,[ this article](_URL_1_) from 1901 gives a pretty detailed timeline of events.\n\n2. Reitano, J. (2015).*New York State: Peoples, Places, and Priorities: a Concise History with Sources.* Routledge." ] }

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[ [ "https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/6h3l8z/why_did_the_europeans_like_naming_cities_after/divuowu/", "https://www.jstor.org/stable/1834176?seq=3#metadata_info_tab_contents" ] ]

{ "a_id": [ "dwwrptp" ], "score": [ 2 ], "text": [ "Sorry, we don't allow [\"example seeking\" questions](_URL_1_). It's not that your question was bad; it's that these kinds of questions tend to produce threads that are collections of disjointed, partial, inadequate responses. If you have a question about a specific historical event, period, or person, feel free to rewrite your question and submit it again. If you don't want to rewrite it, you might try submitting it to /r/history, /r/askhistory, or /r/tellmeafact. \n\nFor further explanation of the rule, feel free to consult [this META thread](_URL_0_)." ] }

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[ [ "https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/3nub87/rules_change_throughout_history_rule_is_replaced/", "https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/wiki/rules#wiki_no_.22example_seeking.22_questions" ] ]

{ "a_id": [ "d840698", "d84ghkv" ], "score": [ 5, 4 ], "text": [ "Can you clarify your question? Do you mean when did they consolidate as political entities?", "Do you mean the rise of the modern nation-state? Or are you asking about the transition from hunter-gatherer tribes to organized polities?" ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "cpf2r7y" ], "score": [ 6 ], "text": [ "Neither, or both.\n\nThis is more a linguistics question in the field of contemporary and historical usage, but in the interests of fulfilling your question, let me talk about these terms for awhile.\n\nFirstly, “Fatherland” and it’s cognates has a well established usage across European languages, especially Indo-European and Romance languages. You can see it, if you know Greek and Latin, in the forms *πατρία and πατήρ/patria and pater*. Anyway, ‘Fatherland’ is not really a common English term, and for many English speakers its associations are caught up in the emergence of the term *Vaterland* in propaganda associated with Nazi Germany. Thus, for English speakers, ‘Fatherland’ sounds like an echo of that ideology, even though *Vaterland* is not itself so definitively tied up in Nazism in the German Language, anymore than its cognates in other European languages are *necessarily* tied to nationalist ideas of that kind.\n\nSeveral other countries and languages prefer to use feminine language/language forms, for their nation, most notably Russia, and the term Россия-Матушка, or ‘Mother Russia’. This personification of the nation as a woman is found even in languages that use patri-based terms. For example, even though Latin has *patria, Roma* is still a feminine form and the personification of Rome as a female entity also played a role in civic and national identity-discourse. I would suggest that personification of the nation as a mother figure has to do with the combination of traditional depictions of the ‘earth’ as feminine and the land/nation as the place that gives birth to a people.\n\nTo come back to English, neither of these is ‘more’ correct or appropriate, there does not seem to exist a longstanding tradition of embedding one of these concepts into the language more firmly than the other. “Mother Country” is used sometimes to refer to the UK by emigrants/descendants in colonial situations.\n\nAll of which is to say, neither or both could be viewed as appropriate. I hope this has been at least mildly informative and answered your question. Feel free to ask follow up questions if you’d like more historical/linguistic information.\n" ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "cfwtb02", "cfxcg7w" ], "score": [ 8, 3 ], "text": [ "Do you mean as a way of illustrating an \"average\" person? It's a common thing to 'create' people in order to help children understand more complex ideas from a relatable viewpoint. For instance life in a 13th century English manor-village is more easily understandable if you create a villager who's life the children can follow. \n\nOr do you mean creating someone who had an effect on history as a whole but never really existed, like a fake king or something?", "There really was a Johnny Appleseed, but he was nothing like the myth. Compare the actual Davy Crockett to the character in the TV drama. Do the same with Daniel Boone. And yet, these people were taught as fact in schools in the 60's, and likely later. If you think about it, you can find dozens of examples. They all make very nice propaganda, just like the figures you mention." ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "c63sinl", "c63tv1f", "c63vcqa", "c64cpkd" ], "score": [ 37, 24, 7, 2 ], "text": [ "For much of Korean history, marriage for most was quite like a business arrangement between families. Women as well as men worked in the fields or in craft industries - men and woman with strength and skills were valued. Family leaders looked to marry their sons and daughters to people who could contribute to the well-being of the clan or village.\n\nAs far as parties are concerned, the wealthy would have all-day affairs, with the groom escorted by his friends to the house of the bride and the usual feasts and songs. Both bride and groom would wear silk (often brocaded, if they could afford it) and the bride would get an elaborate tied-up hairstyle. For most people among the local nobility this might be the most expensive outfit they ever owned.\n\n When time to consummate the marriage, close relatives would hide near the room to make sure the deed was done. It's said that the old ladies of the village were permitted to poke holes in the waxpaper doors of the bridal suite to 'check up' on the young ones.\n\nFor most people though, things were much simpler. The bride would move to her new husband's home and help his mother with farmwork and chores. The family might build an addition to the home before the ceremony if possible.", "There is a lively and (comparatively) lengthy scholarship on the history of marriage in the US; it was one of the first topics picked up by women's and social historians, beginning mostly in the 1970s.\n\nThe major transition is from an economic alliance to the model of the \"companionate\" marriage. You can see this transition in the subtitle of one of the best books on the subject, Stephanie Coontz' \n*Marriage, a History: From Obedience to Intimacy, or How Love Conquered Marriage *, now in a newish edition.\n\nThere's lots of other good books on the subject, by Nancy Cott, Glenda Riley, and others. I like Riley and Dunlap's work on divorce in particular. There's also a few books on regional variation; marriage and divorce in the south, or in the colonies.\n\nBy \"parties\" do you mean, like, marriage ceremonies? Because that's dependent on ethnicity and culture, with lots of variation.", "Antony giddens gave a good [description](_URL_0_) of the way the family has changed in the last few centuries.", "You might considered contemporary fiction's view - e.g. Pride and Prejudice, written in 1813, lays out comparisons of different reasons for marriage quite clearly.\n\nCharlotte Lewis marries for financial security, not love, and is content but a little pitied by the POV character.\n\nLydia Bennet allows herself to be carried away by passion and the results are disastrous.\n\nOur heroine and her sister both manage to find the perfect combination of love _and_ financial security, and end up quite happily.\n\nOther fiction of the time backs up the view that while marriage certainly has business elements, the 'ideal' is still to marry for love.\n" ] }

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[ [], [], [ "http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/static/events/reith_99/week4/week4.htm" ], [] ]

{ "a_id": [ "e46doxa" ], "score": [ 83 ], "text": [ "The change to the pledge was part of a broader movement over the past decade in the United States to distinguish Americans from \"godless Communists\" during the Cold War. There was a rise of civil religion—church attendance and profession of belief in general Christian principles tied closely to one's American identity. Which denomination one might attend was far less important than just believing at all; it wasn't, in other words, a competition over theology, rites, or practices.\n\nBilly Graham rose to fame beginning in 1949, a symbol of this notion of civil religion. He frequently denounced Communism and intertwined American democracy with Christianity. Prior to this time, the phrase, \"under God\" was used sparingly by American politicians and presidents. But it was Truman who began to use it more frequently, and like Graham, it was often used to denounce Communism.\n\nThe Pledge of Allegiance wasn't the only thing that was changed. It was during this time that the phrase \"In God We Trust\" was added to paper money. The phrase was also added to the speaker's dais in the House of Representatives, and above the entrance to the US Senate chamber. The National Prayer Breakfast became a larger part of American politics. These movements were often spearheaded by fraternal organizations. It was the Knights of Columbus that pushed to have the pledge amended with the phrase, \"under God.\" Another organization, the Fraternal Order of Eagles, worked with American director Cecil B. DeMille to place monuments of the Ten Commandments across the country. DeMille's film, \"The Ten Commandments,\" was coming out in 1955 and so he readily partnered with the Eagles to have the monuments—monuments that in the last thirty years have been the subject of several court challenges—placed on public land, both because he believed in their mission and because he saw it as an opportunity to promote his film.\n\nIn other words, the changes to the pledge were just one part of a sharp focus in the late 1940s and 1950s on publicly demonstrating, both as a nation and as individual citizens, one's commitment to God, religion, and America. Historian Kevin Kruse has also written about the role of businesses and the capitalist angle in the shift (Kruse, \"One Nation Under God: How Corporate America Invented Christian America) that is excellent.\n\nThere was minor push back on these changes, but nothing that made a dent or gave pause to the shift. Some Jewish organizations wrote letters of protest. There were, of course, actual Communists in the United States as well as atheists who also spoke out, but that was the extent of the protests: speaking out. No large, well-organized or well-funded campaign emerged to offer legal challenges." ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "dp37fgv", "dp3amgq" ], "score": [ 3, 54 ], "text": [ "Forgot to mention in the title, in World War 2 of course", "Choosing a landing site required finding a compromise on a number of factors. The chosen site had to be within aircraft range of the UK, so the beachhead could receive fighter cover and air support. The closer it was to the UK, the better, as less shipping would be needed, and it would be less exposed to attack by U-boats, E-boats, mines or aircraft. It needed to be close to Germany, so that the Allied armies wouldn't have to spend a lot of time fighting across France to get there. There needed to be ports in the vicinity of the landing site, so that the troops could receive the supplies they needed. The landing beaches had to be suitable - shingle would jam tank tracks, while mud would tire men out and immobilise tanks by causing them to sink in, and a long shallow beach would cause the landing craft to beach too far offshore. The landings also needed to be in a place where the Germans were not well dug-in, and had comparatively few troops in the vicinity. If it was too close to Germany, the landing ships would be more easily attacked by the Luftwaffe and Kriegsmarine.\n\nThe Pas de Calais was the obvious area for a landing. It had good ports, at Calais, Dunkirk and Boulogne. It was very close to the UK, close enough that heavy guns from Dover could fire upon it. It was the closest bit of the French coast to Germany. It had good beaches, as shown by the Allied evacuation from the beaches of Dunkirk in 1940. However, all of these qualities were equally obvious to the Germans. The Atlantic Wall was at its thickest in the area around Calais. It had the heaviest coastal batteries on the French coast, the most bunkers, the thickest minefields. The largest concentration of German troops in France lay behind the beaches of the Pas de Calais. All this made a landing there too risky.\n\nLandings further down the French coast, between Dieppe and Le Havre, might have been possible. However, as the 1942 raid on Dieppe showed, the beaches in this region were not good for landings. Many of the beaches were shingle, making them unsuitable for landings with tanks. The coastline was lined with cliffs, making getting off the beaches very difficult. There were also worries that the 1942 raid had alerted the Germans to the possibility of a landing in this area, causing them to strengthen their defences.\n\nGoing much further west, to Brittany, was considered. Brittany had good beaches, and excellent ports, at Brest and Lorient. Taking these would also help reduce the threat posed by German U-boats to the Atlantic convoy routes, as these ports were key U-boat bases. It was relatively undefended. However, it was considered to be too far from the UK. Air support could not be effectively guaranteed, and the shipping requirements for the desired force would be be too large for the Allies to supply. Brittany was also too far from Germany - the Allies would have had to fight all the way across France to reach it, greatly stretching their supply lines.\n\nLanding in Belgium or Holland was also a possibility. The same caveats applied to landings in the west of Belgium as applied to the Pas de Calais. However, landing in eastern Belgium or southern Holland would have advantages. The area had major ports in Rotterdam, and especially Antwerp. It was close enough to the UK, especially for shipping, and less well defended than the areas around Calais. It was also close to Germany. However, good beaches were hard to find, thanks to the estuaries of the Meuse, Rhine and Scheldt filling the area with mud and silt. Landing here might require a number of sequential landings on different islands in the estuaries, further complicating operations. Landing in northern Holland, Germany or Denmark was not ideal, as to do so would be fighting too far from the Allied bases in the UK, and too close to German air and naval bases. \n\nAs such, landing in Normandy was the best possible option. Ports were available, at Caen and Cherbourg. There were good landing beaches across the area. It was within fighter range of the UK, and close enough that ships wouldn't take too long in transit. It was better defended than say, Brittany, but not as well defended as the Calais region. " ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "fkndsaz" ], "score": [ 2 ], "text": [ "[This older answer of mine](_URL_0_) focuses on one of the most popular songs of the Confederacy." ] }

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[ [ "https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/cat2qs/during_the_american_civil_war_did_the_federals/etaw0bt/" ] ]

{ "a_id": [ "ccx4ck1" ], "score": [ 11 ], "text": [ "Public speakers, leaders, and entertainers in the 19th century were almost always trained in elocution. It was an important part of education - search for elocution in this 1857 [McGuffey's Reader](_URL_0_) for an example, and in passing to marvel at what was expected of 19th century schoolchildren.\n\nSpeakers were expected to understand their voice and to speak in a clear, well-modulated voice with varying pitch and cadence. Not everyone got a good education in those days, but anyone who held elected office or made their living as an entertainer in those days had to be an accomplished speaker, physically and mentally capable of talking at length and being heard.\n\nFor many Americans, however, their greatest exposure to public speaking came at sporting events, where announcers shouted through megaphones to be heard over the crowd. The excitement and physical tension in their voices translated to a higher pitch, megaphones reproduce higher voices more easily, and higher voices could be heard more easily over the crowd. \n\nIn the late 19th century, the gramophone was introduced. Like the megaphone, it had a hard time reproducing bass sounds, so any sounds from the gramophone came out high and tinny. Early radios also had a problem reproducing bass. Early talkie film technology raised the voice an octave, rendering a generation of silent film stars instantly ridiculous. \n\nSo there are a number of factors. Artifacts from the era of early recording technologies don't faithfully record the human voice. As time went on, a number of Americans adopted the tinny quality of recorded voices. For millions of people, listening to records and sports announcers were their elocution lessons. A high, nasal voice became a signifier in its own right, a humorous acknowledgement that the speaker was playing to a crowd. It was cutting-edge stuff in the age of ragtime, snappy and a little dangerous, but it was winking parody by the time of Bugs Bunny's introduction a decade or two later. " ] }

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[ "http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OUMwIwOD49g#t=5m27s" ]

[ [ "http://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/15040/pg15040.html" ] ]

{ "a_id": [ "craag59", "craarui" ], "score": [ 2, 3 ], "text": [ "*Travels of Marco Polo,* and for the highly entertaining historical fictional twist, *The Journeyer* by Gary Jennings", "Also, *Foreign Devils on the Silk Road* is a really fascinating and engaging look at history of excavation of the Silk Road." ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "ci5le6s", "ci5m2nl", "ci72u2g" ], "score": [ 5, 5, 2 ], "text": [ "It would rather depend on the nature of the state and its army at the time.\n\nIn Britain, there is no indication of a deterioration in the quality of the army as the Napoleonic wars went on, and I have read at least one suggestion that the turnover in officers was beneficial to the purchase system (The Reason Why by C. Woodham Smith) and also that at Waterloo, after a break of several years, there was dearth of experienced, battle-hardended redcoats.\n\nThe Luftwaffe in WWII is a good example of a force that is initially superior but steadily deteriorates with mounting pressure over several years. On the other hand, RAF bomber command steadily increases in efficacy with better equipment and better training as the war progresses.\n\nThe British army in WWI is a mix of both. It starts off being the best army in the world size for size (arguably), then deteriorates rapidly in 1915 as the old regulars and territorials are killed off. It reaches its nadir in 1916 with large drafts of gallant but semi-trained recruits and then slowly builds up to being the supreme fighting power by summer of 1918. ", "We can look at WWII as an example of the opposite happening for the Allied powers, especially with naval aviators in the Pacific.\n\nAt the onset, the US had few carriers, and few pilots with any real experience. The Imperial Japanese Navy had a number of carriers and rather experienced pilots as of Pearl Harbor. However, this changed dramatically over the course of the war.\n\nThe key difference is that the US rotated experienced pilots back to training positions routinely, which kept new pilots up to speed with new tactics and techniques developed in combat, and it ensured that actual combat veterans were teaching combat lessons to the next set of recruits. The Japanese had no such system, and their experienced corps of pilots dwindled, and was in tatters after the attrition of the Solomon Isles campaign. As a result, their pilots became less and less experienced, and more prone to errors that the increasingly experienced American pilots would exploit. \n\nSimilarly, the state of readiness of the US military was well behind par for the other powers at the time. Again, as the war progressed, new tactics and training methods were developed and brought to bear. For example, after the Sicily campaign, a substantial number of paratroopers from the 82nd Airborne were transferred to the then-in-training 101st Airborne to provide combat experience to the incoming soldiers. ", "I'm going to cross-reference another recent post and suggest that conscription in and of itself was probably not a factor in declining quality.\n\nWhat /u/ThinMountainAir suggests in [this post about the necessity for reform in the U.S. Army](_URL_0_) is that there were a large number of fairly unique societal factors in the United States at the time that collectively contributed to a marked decline in the quality of soldier serving in Vietnam.\n\nThe only cases that come to mind where quality declines directly as a result of conscription are those of doomed nations that expand the scope and relax the standards of conscription out of desperation, having already spent their way through their population of able-bodied men.\n\nNice to see a fellow Reacher Creature though. Love those books." ] }

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[ [], [], [ "http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/27zowe/did_the_us_military_reorganize_itself_after_the/ci650x6" ] ]

{ "a_id": [ "d4haskv" ], "score": [ 2 ], "text": [ "I agree with Bodrk43: it looks like a benchmark or surveyor's mark of some sort. If it's a US Geological Survey benchmark, then destroying it is a crime. If it was set by some other agency or a private party, I don't know what the law says but I would be hesitant about destroying it. \n\nI'm a member of the Geocaching hobby, and some of us also engage in the even geekier sub-hobby of searching for old benchmarks like this. If you could post the GPS coordinates or even the approximate location of this marker, I could look it up on some government databases and other listings of benchmarks to see if there's a record that would tell us what exactly it is." ] }

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[ "http://imgur.com/FX7du7F" ]

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{ "a_id": [ "d7ct10t", "d7dbejj" ], "score": [ 38, 10 ], "text": [ "Follow up question: the Ottoman and various chinese dynasties had harems where concubines competed for political influence, and occasionally one concubine rose to the top of the entire governemnt, fir example Wu Zetian. What happened to the institution of the harem during the these periods? Were all the other concubines exiled/executed or just the ones who posed a threat to the supreme concubine?", "Can I ask another follow-up?\n\nI know that there was a female pharaoh, Hatshepsut, who ruled. While she had a husband (Thutmose II), many pharaohs had \"secondary wives.\" Is there any evidence she had secondary husbands? Is there evidence of secondary husband behaviours among other women who took power in context with secondary wives?\n\n*thank you historians*" ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "evb7c4h", "evc7n24", "evcjszm" ], "score": [ 168, 264, 50 ], "text": [ "Perhaps [this answer](_URL_0_) by u/Mighty_Dighty22 to a similar question can shed some light while we wait for other answers.", "With respect to the Roman period, we have a few clues. *The History of the Later Han Dynasty* *(Hou Hanshu*), compiled in the fifth century, contains a brief passage on trade goods from Da Qin (The Roman Empire):\n\n\"This country produces plenty of gold, silver, and precious jewels, luminous jade, bright moon pearls, fighting cocks, rhinoceroses, coral, yellow amber, opaque glass, whitish chalcedony, red cinnabar, green gemstones, drawn gold-threaded and multi-coloured embroideries, woven gold-threaded net, delicate polychrome silks painted with gold, and asbestos cloth.\" (12)\n\nAn excellent commentary on this list can by accessed by clicking on the [notes linked to this text](_URL_0_). \n\nMost of the products listed by the Hou Hanshu were (unsurprisingly) produced in the Roman east, and traded primarily by the merchants of Alexandria and Antioch. Some of them, like the rhinoceros horn and amber mentioned in the list, were not products of the Empire itself, but were handled by Roman merchants. Others were Roman products: that asbestos, for example, probably came from the mountains of Cyprus. \n\nAnother passage in the *Hou Hanshu* remarks:\n\n\"In the reign of Emperor Huan, king An-tun of Da Qin (Rome) sent an embassy....this offered ivory, rhinoceros horn, and tortoise shell....but their tribute contained no jewels\" (88)\n\nThis was not a real embassy - as far as we know, in fact, the Romans never sent a formal delegation to China. It was almost certainly a party of Roman merchants operating between Alexandria and India, who had either been shipwrecked on, or attempted to trade along, the southern Chinese coast. The ivory and tortoise shell they brought were probably from India, though the rhinoceros horn may have been imported from sub-Saharan Africa via Alexandria. \n\nIn general, however, the Chinese do not seem to have been especially interested in most Roman products; Pliny the Elder remarks in his (admittedly very ill-informed) description of \"the Seres\" (Chinese), \"they shun all intercourse with the rest of mankind, and await the approach of those who wish to traffic with them\" (6.20).", "According to [Dmitry Voyakin](_URL_7_), goods that are known to have traveled East along the Silk Roads include \"frankincense and myrrh, jasmine and amber, cardamom and nutmeg, ginseng and bile of a python, carpets and fabrics, dyes and minerals, diamonds, jade, amber, corals, ivory... gold and silver bullions, fur and coins, bows, arrows, swords and spears\" as well as animals and more abstract elements of culture such as fashion.\n\nChinese pottery was among the Eastern goods that traveled West along the Silk Roads. It may be of interest that some of that pottery may have been produced in the East using a material imported from the West. There is not currently a scholarly consensus around this possible Western export, cobalt blue pigment from Persia. This cobalt would have been used in pottery centres like [Jingdezhen](https://_URL_5_) in Jiangxi province, which produced iconic blue-and-white pottery during the Ming dynasty (CE 1368-1644).\n\nSupport for the idea that the distinctive blue under-glaze was painted using imported Persian cobalt comes from studies which examine the manganese content in blue-and-white Ming artifacts. Chinese cobalt is [normally thought](_URL_4_) to have high amounts of manganese, whereas cobalt ores found in Persia typically don't have manganese. Based on several different studies, [some scholars](_URL_0_) divided the artifacts into two distinct groups. Samples from before CE 1425 have cobalt with very low manganese levels (and high iron), [suggesting](_URL_4_) the pigment was imported from abroad; samples after CE 1425 have cobalt with significant quantities of manganese (and low iron), meaning their pigment was probably sourced from within China.\n\nThose who are skeptical of significant amounts of blue pigment being imported to China from the West generally don't dispute the findings pointing to low manganese levels in the cobalt of some blue-and-white Ming ware. The point of dissension is the conclusion that these samples of cobalt cannot have come from inside China. One author, [Adam T. Kessler,](_URL_1_) supports this view, in part, by suggesting that primary sources from the late Ming dynasty reveal that some cobalt historically mined in China may chemically resemble what is thought to be 'imported' cobalt. Kessler refers to an English translation of the [*Tiangong Kaiwu*](_URL_3_) (originally written in CE 1637 by Song Yingxing), which mentions pigment being sourced from a city in Jiangxi named for its arsenic-richness, as one example of historical evidence contradicting the dominant modern understanding of which materials could have been used in production of wares.\n\nWhile it is difficult to say with absolute certainty that before CE 1425, blue-and-white porcelain produced in Ming dynasty China owed its iconic blue under-glaze to cobalt that traveled along Silk Roads from Persia, it is widely believed to be the likely case. In addition to trade signifying exchange, it may have meant collaboration in this instance.\n\n\\*\\*^(Sources)\\*\\*^(:)\n\n^(Dillon, Michael. \"Transport and Marketing in the Development of the Jingdezhen Porcelain Industry during the Ming and Qing Dynasties.\") *^(Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient)* ^(35, no. 3 (1992: 278-90.)) ^(JSTOR,) [^(_URL_5_)](https://_URL_5_)\n\n^(Du, Feng & Su BaoRu. Science in China Series E-Technol. Sci. (2008 51: 249.)) [^(_URL_4_)](_URL_4_)\n\n^(Juan, Wu, Pau L. Leung, and Li Jiazhi. \"A Study of the Composition of Chinese Blue and White Porcelain.\") *^(Studies in Conservation)* ^(52, no. 3 (2007: 188-98.)) [^(_URL_2_)](_URL_2_)\n\n^(Kessler, Adam T. \"Song Blue and White Porcelain on the Silk Road\" (2012)) [*^(Studies in Asian Art and Archaeology)*](_URL_6_) ^(BRILL: Leiden, Boston. P. 511.)\n\n^(\"The Exploitation of the Works of Nature (Tiangong Kaiwu),\" ^(World Digital Library)) [^(_URL_3_)](_URL_3_)\n\n^(Voyakin, Dmitry, \"The Great Silk Roads.\" UNESCO.) [^(_URL_7_)](_URL_7_)\n\n*^(Edit: formatting struggles.)*" ] }

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[ [ "https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/bz66f2/we_always_hear_about_how_the_silk_road_benefited/eqr8uzo" ], [ "https://depts.washington.edu/silkroad/texts/hhshu/hou_han_shu.html#sec12" ], [ "https://www.jstor.org/stable/20619501", "https://books.google.ca/books?id=FVgzAQAAQBAJ&pg=PA511&dq=xin+jun+is+today%27s+shangrao&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiPicqvuNrjAhUJOs0KHYyUCPMQ6AEIKjAA#v=onepage&q=xin%20jun%20is%20today's%20shangrao&f=false", "http://www.jstor.org/stable/20619501", "https://www.wdl.org/en/item/3021/", "https://doi.org/10.1007/s11431-008-0013-0", "www.jstor.org/stable/3632734", "https://www.google.ca/search?tbo=p&tbm=bks&q=bibliogroup:%22Studies+in+Asian+Art+and+Archaeology%22&source=gbs_metadata_r&cad=7", "https://en.unesco.org/silkroad/content/great-silk-roads", "https://www.jstor.org/stable/3632734" ] ]

{ "a_id": [ "c67v67o", "c67ya14", "c681vz0" ], "score": [ 45, 12, 9 ], "text": [ "I think this is a fair question to ask, given that much of the groundwork of the Jewish state was well in motion by the time of Nazi Germany (Third Reich is a propaganda term they themselves coined).\n\nYour recollection is correct. From the beginning of the mass murder of Jewish people in what became the Holocaust, it was readily apparent that simply shooting every Jew in Nazi-occupied Europe was not a feasible plan. So by the end of 1941, tentative schemes were in motion that would become official policy as of the Wannsee Conference in 1942 (which explicitly outlined the Final Solution - viz. expelling Jews to Eastern European labour and death camps).\n\nPrior to that conference, however, a variety of methods for removing Jews from Europe were explored, including potentially sending them to Madagascar. However, keep in mind this would not have been simply a Jewish state - the SS intended to monitor and control the island, making it more a \"super-ghetto\" than an autonomous Jewish state proper. Their plan was contingent on victory over Britain, which of course did not happen, and when British forces seized Madagascar from Vichy control, that ended that scheme.\n\nIt would be incredibly unlikely that the Nazis would move the Jews to Palestine, given their struggle for North Africa, and thus their attempts to befriend Arab leaders, including Hitler pledging support for Grand Mufti Amn al-Husseini's plan of an Arab state in Palestine. They would in effect be alienating people they regarded as necessary allies, to placate a group they literally saw as on the level of rats.\n\nBut if the Nazis for some reason did see it worthwhile to move the Jews to Israel, I suspect the SS would run the province like a super-ghetto, much in the way they envisioned potentially turning Madagascar.", " > The streets were full of people shouting: ’Juden raus! Auf nach Palästina!’ ” (\"Jews out, out to Palestine!\")\n\nDuring Kristallnacht in 1938 Germany.\n\nYes, they definitely wanted Jews out in any way possible, including establishing a Zionist state in Palestine. There is a fair amount of evidence of Nazi Germany working with Zionists to send German Jews there.\n\nI seem to remember a deal they made that they made in which Jews who emigrated to Palestine wouldn't lose as much property as if they had emigrated elsewhere. I could be wrong on this though. If I remember correctly I got this from ~~*Rise of the Third Reich*~~ ~~*The Third Reich in Power* by Richard Evans.~~ Someone please correct me if I'm wrong here. \n\nEdit: The more I think about it, the less I'm confident in the source. I've read too many books on WWII, they sort of blend together after a while.", "I remember hearing a radio interview years ago... unfortunately I can't remember who the subject was or even what program it was on - but the topic was the cascading nature of evil. The guy was using Nazis as his example, to show that by initially acting on the (relatively) small evil of racism, the Nazis started a ball rolling that boxed them into progressively more evil decisions.\n\nThe logic of it went something like this:\n\n1. Jews are bad.\n2. Let's deny Jews the ability to work or do business, then we'll deport all of them.\n3. All these unemployed Jews are causing problems. Let's round them up and contain them in ghettoes until we can deport them.\n4. We can't deport them, and these ghettoes are causing problems. Let's move them to labor camps.\n5. We don't have the resources for these labor camps to do anything productive, we can't deport these people and we can't let them go. Let's kill all of them.\n\nThe point being that once they institutionalized racism, the Nazis set themselves on a path that led directly to the greatest evil in history. Each step on the path pretty much mandated the next step, incremental steps, each one more evil, but each one dictated by the logic of the situation they'd put themselves in. By starting down that path, the Nazis ended up in a place few of them had intended at the beginning.\n\nIt's a concept that really stuck with me, simply because the question is so common - \"How did a modern, well-educated, reasonable society commit such a monstrous atrocity?\" and I think it provides the best answer. \"A little bit at a time.\"\n\nSome might see that as a rationalization or even a justification. I think it's a powerful cautionary tale." ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "cuj902q" ], "score": [ 33 ], "text": [ "According to Ross Hassig, flower wars were pretty much the same as other conflicts. The exception being is that armies would not make use of projectiles. Part of this reason is that projectiles can easily kill a person, but projectiles are also impersonal in that you cannot easily make claim to a captive. Instead they made more use of shock weapons (Hassig 1988:128-132). \n\nShock weapons included thrusting spears ( *tepoztopilli*), swords (*macuahuitl*), and clubs. The spears were about 1.87m long and could be used to thrust as well as slash and could parry at a distance. The spearhead was a triangular, ovoid, or diamond shaped head with stone blades embedded in the edge forming a nearly continuous cutting edge. \n\nThe sword came in two varieties, one-handed or two-handed. They were usually made of oak and were about 7.6cm to 10.2 cm wide and over a meter long. The sword had two grooves carved on either edge that allowed for stone blades to be placed sometimes being glued in. The macauhuitl can be used for a downward slash as well as a backhand cut. Parrying was probably done with the flat of the blade to avoid damage to the stone blades. \n\nThere were several types of clubs that were used by the Aztec. There were simple wooden clubs, clubs with stone blades (*huitzauhqui*), clubs with a spherical ball at the end (*cuauhololli*), and clubs with protruding knobs of wood much like a morning star (*macuahuitzoctli*) (Hassig 1988:81-85).\n\nAs for general tactics, fighters were grouped into combat units and were rigidly led into or out of conflicts. During battle they would form a solid front against the enemy, but only deep enough into order to maintain that front rather than having large blocks of fighters. This focused the battle into a face to face fight. When the opposing sides met, battle units would skirmish with one another on an individual combat basis while trying to maintain a cohesive front. If a unit's front broke, a rout was likely. The Aztecs tended to either surround their enemies from all sides or attack from the flank while engaged in a frontal assault (Hassig 1988:100-101).\n\nHassig, Ross\n\n1988 Aztec Warfare: Imperial Expansion and Political Control. University of Oklahoma Press" ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "cz82a22" ], "score": [ 3 ], "text": [ "I have a great book called [\"Ontario Place Names\" by David E. Scott](_URL_0_). He has tracked the history and meaning of the name for pretty much every hamlet/village/town/city in Ontario. Some are quite brief and he cannot determine the meaning of the name, but he usually goes into more detail for the larger towns and cities and those with a more detailed history. Gingerbreadman42 is right about the names, but I can give a bit more detail from the book.\n\nFor London, he says that Col. John Graves Simcoe (who later became the governor of Upper Canada) chose London to be the capital of Upper Canada in 1793, and named it after London England. However, his choice for capital city was overruled by governor-in-chief Lord Dorchester, and York (Toronto) became capital. \n\nParis was named by William Holmes, the first settler, who built a mill to grind gypsum, otherwise known as plaster of Paris. Gypsum was (is?) used as a fertilizer and got the plaster of Paris name because its usefulness as a fertilizer was first discovered near Paris, France.\n\nAnd those are just the two biggest places in Ontario named after foreign capitals. Washington, Dublin, Brussels, Copenhagen, Moscow, Warsaw, Athens, Manilla, Delhi, and Cairo are all places in Ontario. And so are Zurich, Adelaide, Ceylon, and Gibralter. \n\nAnd based on my casual reading of this book, I figure that a solid quarter to a third of all place names in Ontario are named after either a place in Great Britain & Ireland, or a 18th or 19th century English, Scottish, Welsh, or Irish person. Think York (formerly Toronto but also York Region, North York, East York, etc.), Stratford, Southampton, Malton, Manchester, Lansdowne, Kilbride, Embro, Dorchester, Cumberland, and Chatham, to name a few.\n\nOh, and Punkeydoodle's Corners. Punkeydoodle's Corners is also the name of a hamlet in Ontario. It's near Stratford and Tavistock. There's not much there. Apparently they have to replace the sign often because it get stolen all the time." ] }

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[ [ "https://www.chapters.indigo.ca/en-ca/books/ontario-place-names/9781551050874-item.html" ] ]

{ "a_id": [ "dmzazzx" ], "score": [ 4 ], "text": [ "I do not believe there were any Confederate Generals who were anti-slavery. In 1861 it was actually quite dangerous for any American citizen to express anti-slavery views while in the South. You will see quotes from men such as Lee which indicate slavery is an evil but Lee is also recorded as voicing the predominant opinion that it was an evil which God inflicts on black people and God will decide to end in his own time.\n\nThe Union side was much more complex of a story. The Democratic Party and the large number of voting public had a long history of agreeing with Southern slave owners. Most enlisted for the Union. Not to end slavery. But very many of those voted Republican in the 1864 election which was clearly anti-slavery.\n\nRoughly two hundred thousand Southerners joined the Union army. Mostly coming from the border states but coming from all of them except SC. as a sweeping statement, they were more motivated in loyalty to their country than to slavery and their state. Many northerners joined the war, many were force conscripted and they joined with no interest to fight and die with the goal of ending slavery. \n\nThere were Republicans and Abolitionists who were the first to join the Union army with the singular goal of ending slavery. The Commander in chief, Lincoln, navigated the slow and steady path of enlisting border states and Union men into the cause. It took time and a lot of blood before the objective of the war changed. The Emancipation proclamation changed it from the preservation of the union to the extinction of slavery and thus permanently end the agitation. Public opinion of Northerns changed greatly with time to the point they ended up arming black men and paying them equally in the army. So, not only did a lot of men vary but they varied in time as well.\n\nI will call out the top Union General of them all as pro-slavery. General McClellan. But I won't critique him. I will let Frederick Douglas do that.\n\nFrederick Douglas wrote \"McClellan, in command of the army, had been trying, apparently, to put down the rebellion without hurting the rebels, certainly without hurting slavery, and the government had seemed to cooperate with him in both respects. \"\n\n\"I, however, faithfully believed, and loudly proclaimed my belief, that the rebellion would be suppressed, the Union preserved, the slaves emancipated and that the colored soldiers would in the end have justice done them. This confidence was immeasurably strengthened when I saw Gen. George B. McClellan relieved from the command of the army of the Potomac and Gen. U. S. Grant\"\n\n\"With this condition of national affairs came the summer of 1864, and with it the revived Democratic party with the story in its mouth that the war was a failure, and with it Gen. George B. McClellan, the greatest failure of the war, as its candidate for the presidency. It is needless to say that the success of such a party, on such a platform, with such a candidate, at such a time, would have been a fatal calamity. All that had been done toward suppressing the rebellion and abolishing slavery would have proved of no avail, and the final settlement between the two sections of the Republic touching slavery and the right of secession would have been left to tear and rend the country again at no distant future.\"" ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "fm69iww", "fm6dehw" ], "score": [ 12, 19 ], "text": [ "NTA. Now, I normally don't support things like stealing and interfering in other people's affairs, but it sounds like good came out of it (the Maroons freeing slaves). Yes, there might have been a lot of deaths, but sounds like the end result was good and that's what's important. Sorry about your burned body, btw.", "ESH. Well, everyone but the slaves. The Spanish sound just *terrible*, you're in this for your own selfish reasons, and you caused a *scorched earth war*? What the hell!" ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "d01nudu" ], "score": [ 2 ], "text": [ "Only insofar as they have the same source: the name of Christopher Columbus.\n\n\"America\" is kind of an odd name, taken from cartographer Amerigo Vespucci. But it caught on, the way things that are kind of counterintuitive will sometimes.\n\nThis left a kind of unsatisfied urge to name it for Columbus, it seems. In 1776, a certain country was very nearly the United States of Columbia, did put their capitol in a District of Columbia, and it remained a tradition to poetically personify the country in the female figure of Columbia (songs like \"Columbia the Gem of the Ocean\" are about the USA).\n\nOn the other hand, there's a lot of use of Columbia (meaning the Americas) in Canada, starting with British Columbia.\n\nColombia (notice spelling), as Gran Colombia, and very different borders, seceded from the Spanish Empire in 1819, but split up by 1830 into New Granada, Ecuador & Venezuela. It was 1863 before New Grenada became the United States of Colombia.\n" ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "c6i4k0d", "c6ia4ik" ], "score": [ 2, 2 ], "text": [ "Could always try /r/mapporn there is loads of useful images there.\n", "_URL_0_ is my goto map website." ] }

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[ [], [ "davidrumsy.com" ] ]

{ "a_id": [ "c4vwkmt", "c4vwnyu", "c4vx5em", "c4vxc73", "c4vxi2s", "c4vxibx", "c4vxv4b", "c4vy06z", "c4vy1gy", "c4vy3cl", "c4vyqey", "c4vyqfy", "c4vytml", "c4w011s", "c4w03qw", "c4w0gv3", "c4w0pyq", "c4w4ruf" ], "score": [ 18, 10, 8, 65, 12, 9, 5, 10, 17, 8, 9, 7, 6, 2, 3, 6, 2, 3 ], "text": [ "Excellent changes. Have you thought about adding more mods to help you enforce them? ", "This is my favorite subreddit and if stiff moderation is needed to remain that way, I approve. ", "Sounds great, looks like you've put thought into this and done it right.", "If I could suggest one addition: downvotes are for bad responces, not for responces you disagree with/that challenge your view of things but are otherwise excellent. ", "Hey, not a historian and not really a contributor in this subreddit (just enjoy reading) and I just wanted to say these policies sound great. It's this type of strict moderation that make AskScience such a fantastic place to visit and I look forward to AskHistorians being similar in the future.", "I haven't really seen too much of these problems as of late, but all of these rules look reasonable. Good job, mods.", "Could we allow AMAs for people who have experience in a particularly interesting line of history? Particularly something you might otherwise assume no one knows much about (thinking along the lines of someone who's tried to decipher Linear A or B, or someone who does a lot of experimental history, anything interesting like that).\n\nAlso, can we allow posts that are requests for comments? I recently made a wax tablet and wanted to get some feedback (if I hadn't already posted about it, I wouldn't bother, but a couple of people were interested). It could also be useful for people who want critiques of something like a paper from others familiar with the subject matter.", "Now could we also ask that non-flaired users wait until a flaired user has responded or, at the very least, not answer with conjecture? It's really annoying to see so many responses starting with \"well, I'm not sure\" or \"I'm not an historian, but\". It also makes it hard for the flaired users to be given precedence because they often take a little while to respond.", "Two things:\n\nPlease, even in non-top-tiered comments, prohibit memes, image-macros, pun-threads, circlejerks, etc. This could escalate quickly otherwise.\n\nAlso, include how to up-/downvote in the rules.\n", "As this comment is simply a compliment, I hope it won't get deleted. But these rules have been sorely needed and signify what I think will be a defining moment for /r/askhistorians. \n\nDare I say, an *historical* moment? ", "I'm not a panelist, but please learn the difference between i.e. and e.g. when trying to look like an authority on an academic subject.", "I do appreciate the first rule you mentioned in this post. When people ask about something that is highly detailed is something I like answering but when some asked if Nixon was good or bad and was entirely subjective and opinionated, I really find a waste of time.", " > You can also be banned for being a spambot, or consistently reposting to downvote-brigade type subreddits, including but not limited to SRS.\n\n\nThis worries me a little. Was this rule designed to specifically counter SRS or was that just the primary focus and you have several more subreddits in mind? Are you including /r/subredditdrama? What about bestof or worstof?", " > 2A. Top-Tiered\nTop-tiered comments should only be answers to the question at hand. Memes, jokes, insults, or other unhelpful words are not permitted (exceptions may be made for jokes if they are only part of an otherwise informative comment). Sources are HIGHLY, HIGHLY recommended, but not absolutely required (other restrictions apply for flaired users—see below).\n\nSo what is the Moderation Teams response going to be to comments that don't meet these standards?\n\nThese new rules are great. I'm glad you are implementing them. It seems like you have not spelled out what exactly your response will be to people that violate these guidelines though. This needs to be done so there is a clear and obvious expectation of what will happen if you do not meet these standards. If you fail to put this to paper it's going to be back to moderators just making arbitrary bans whenever they feel like it. This has caused issues in the past.", "I think these things are for the best and will benefit the subreddit. Thanks for making them and listening to all of us!", "These rules are thoughtful, and I support the decision.\n\nR/askhistorians is one of my favorite subreddits. I learn things here almost every day. \n\nIt's frustrating to come into a comment section, curious, and find the place overrun by jokey bullshit. Then the jokes get upvoted. \n\nLegitimate information can't compete in such an arena, and noise overcomes signal. I'm a big fan of heavy moderation. There are plenty of subreddits that allow jokey BS (99.9% of Reddit); there have to be a few places where this is not allowed.", "I just want to say that, while I seldom comment here (as I don't feel I have the intellectual authority), this is one of the most informative, challenging, and civil subreddits I've come across.", "These seem like good changes for the health of the community!" ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "cexsa98" ], "score": [ 84 ], "text": [ "Part of the answer is that most people stopped being interested in the area. The Egyptians gave up campaigns in the Levant around 1175 until Shoshenq around the early 900s (who is mentioned in 1 Kings 14 although some dispute this), and New Kingdom pharaohs didn't name their adversaries (certainly Shoshenq didn't). The Assyrians never ventured that far either until 853 so are unlikely to make mention before that time, and they like the Egyptians very rarely named those they encountered (no Assyrian source names anyone in Philistia, Transjordan, Israel (north or south) or Phoenicia between 1200-1050).\n\nOf the remaining sources of perhaps lesser powers, most of them are concerned with their own local affairs - the neo-Hittite kingdoms make no mention of Canaan or Phoenicia. No Aramean inscriptions exist from before the 9th century save Tell Dan and Melqart, and no administrative texts either. Phoenician texts tend to mention only their own kings, and they tend to start only around 1000 BC.\n\nThere are a couple of possible mentions of David, Tell Dan (841), Mesha (840), and Kitchen makes a case for the possibility that Shoshenq mentions \"Dwt\" at Karnak which he suggests might be David, but even if it is, it's still only in the 900s.\n\nWhy nothing is found is Israel should be paralleled to \"what have we found in Israel regardless?\" and the answer is \"not very much\". Jerusalem has been heavily rebuilt and destroyed numerous times over the centuries and only a tiny part *can* be excavated, and even those areas are fraught with disputes (cf the Temple Mount). Samaria has produced no official inscriptions and that is from a much later period. The parts of texts we have found have been serendipitous in that they were smashed and used in building rubble.\n\nWe can also ask \"what is found elsewhere in the Levant?\". Aram-Damascus existed for 200 years but left nothing behind. Damascus has revealed no Iron age inscriptions (and I think parallels Jerusalem in that respect). Moab has only left 1 stele (Mesha's) and one other fragment. 3 small pieces exist from the kings of Ammon, none commemorating the Edomite kings. So nobody else has left very much behind." ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "eho3x55" ], "score": [ 33 ], "text": [ "...kind of.\n\nNot \"homosexuality\" as we think of it today, though. That is to say, an outright sexual relationship between two adult men would not have been regarded as acceptable behavior. However, under certain limited circumstances same-gender love and (depending on whom one asked) even same-gender sexual relations could be viewed as normal. Here I'm going to limit my discussion to male \"homosexuality\" in the Ottoman Empire prior to the nineteenth century.\n\n & nbsp;\n\n*Terminology and Law*\n\n\"Homosexuality\" as a category of sexual orientation was not a concept that existed in the Muslim world prior to its importation from the West. Sexually, a man was defined primarily by the acts he performed rather than the gender of the person with whom he performed those acts. Specifically, one adopted either an active or a passive role in sexual intercourse. Men were expected to actively penetrate; women were expected to passively be penetrated, and this basic dichotomy extended to the terminology used to describe male-male intercourse. One wasn't a \"homosexual\" engaging in a relationship with another \"homosexual.\" Rather, one either took on the active role, thus becoming a *lūṭī* (sodomizer) or took on the passive role, becoming a *mukhannath* (Turkish: *muhannes*, catamite). There was no single term to refer to someone who took on both active and passive roles, although in Islamic Law the term *lūṭī* was sometimes used to refer to any man who engaged in anal intercourse. This emphasis on the act as such rather than an abstract \"homosexuality\" meant that non-anal intercourse between men was not condemned to the same degree. That's not to say that the Islamic jurists were fine with men kissing, caressing, or engaging in intercrural intercourse with one another, but these acts did not make one a *lūṭī* and therefore constituted only minor sins (*ṣaghā'ir*). Likewise, there was no legal distinction between engaging in anal sex with a man and engaging in anal sex with a woman. It was the act that mattered.\n\nThe act of anal sex, however, was universally condemned by Islamic jurists. As we will see, some groups have at some times tolerated anal sex between males under particular circumstances, but the Islamic jurists who determined what was and was not lawful were unanimous in condemning it. They nevertheless differed somewhat in how serious of a sin they considered it to be. Of the four main legal schools of Sunni Islam, three regarded anal sex as falling into the category of *zinā*, or illicit sexual intercourse. Punishment differed based on marital status: a married man would be liable for the death penalty by stoning, while an unmarried man would be punished with a hundred lashes. It is worth mentioning in this context that these strict punishments, called *ḥadd* (\"limit\") punishments, required either voluntary confession or the testimony of four reliable witnesses who actually saw the act being committed, while the judge was expected to make every possible excuse for the sake of the defendant, in accordance with the saying of the Prophet Muhammad: \"Ward off *ḥadd* punishments as much as you can.\" We have no statistics, of course, but it seems as though *ḥadd* punishments occurred only infrequently because of the difficulty of actually convicting someone, and the jurists regarded this rarity of conviction as a good thing.\n\nThe fourth legal school of Sunni Islam, the Hanafi school, was the official school supported by the Ottoman Empire, and was predominant in modern-day Turkey, the Balkans, and Syria. This was the only school that did not regard anal sex as an act of *zinā*, simply because *zinā* was technically defined as the unlawful insertion of a penis into a vagina. Therefore, Hanafi jurists regarded anal sex as less of a sin than the other law schools. It could not be punished by the death penalty except potentially in the case of repeat offenders; its actual punishment was up to the discretion of the judge, but it could not be any greater than 39 lashes, one less than the lowest of all the *ḥadd* punishments. Most often punishment entailed some combination of lashes and a monetary fine. On the other hand, since it didn't entail a *ḥadd* punishment, conviction was also easier, requiring only two witnesses rather than four.\n\n & nbsp;\n\n*Sex, Love, and Beauty*\n\nOne of the most striking cultural differences one finds prior to the nineteenth century has to do with the conceptual separation of romantic love and sex, and particularly how this related to the love of boys. Adolescent boys, particularly those who lacked beards (a quintessential element of manhood), were regarded as not yet belonging to the same socio-cultural category as men. Boys were widely regarded as aesthetically beautiful in a sexually neutral sense. One could look upon and appreciate a boy's handsome features without that necessarily implying sexual attraction. One finds this attitude expressed in the works of Abu Hamid al-Ghazali (d. 1111), one of history's most influential Islamic theologians:\n\n(Quoted in Khaled El-Rouayheb, *Before Homosexuality in the Arab-Islamic World, 1500-1800* (Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 2005), p. 54)\n\n > Do not think that the love of beautiful forms is only conceivable with an eye toward satisfying carnal desire, for satisfying carnal desire is a distinct pleasure that *may* be associated with the love of beautiful forms, but the perception of beauty in itself is also pleasurable and so may be loved for its own sake. How can this be denied, when greenery and flowing water are loved, not with an eye toward drinking the water or eating the greenery or to obtain anything else besides the looking itself?\n\nCommon opinion held that observing the beauty of boys was neither sinful nor deviant. Likewise, there was nothing inherently sinful or deviant about forming close relationships with them, or ultimately with falling in love with them. The two males in such a relationship would take on the roles of lover and beloved, corresponding to the older, active, pursuing man and younger, passive, pursued boy - the latter in a sense being conceptually feminized by this relationship. The chaste love of boys for their beauty was not condemned by any aside from the most puritanical of Islamic jurists, and even then not because it was objectionable in and of itself, but because of its potential to inspire unchaste feelings. Indeed, one's ability to properly recognize and praise beauty was part of what made one a cultivated and civilized person; this attitude is what led to the creation of an enormous body of \"homosexual\" love-poetry in Arabic, Persian, and Turkish. Yet most of the authors of these poems would not have viewed themselves as homosexuals even had the concept existed - many of them would have looked upon the idea of actual sex with boys as abhorrent. There was no contradiction between being married and sexually active with a woman while also appreciating the beauty of boys.\n\nOf course, this sharp distinction between romantic love and sexual desire did not hold for everyone. Those jurists who held that it was sinful to gaze upon boys did so because they recognized that the line was so frequently crossed. Because romantic love in this context was widely regarded as normal, so too was a certain degree of physical affection. But there was a line somewhere, in which love and affection ceased to be chaste and started to be sinful. Naturally, there existed a range of opinions on this issue. Kissing appears to have been fairly common, but we do not know to what degree various forms of sexual activity were or were not tolerated and by whom. A fair bet seems to be that sexual activity was more tolerated among groups who derived their religious authority from places other than scholarly Sunni Islam, such as certain Sufi organizations, whose members were endlessly lampooned by their religious opponents for being *lūṭī*s. Indeed, for some Sufis, gazing at beauty was considered one way of increasing one's closeness to God (insofar as all beauty was a reflection of the beauty of the divine), thus giving religious sanction to pederastic relationships." ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "dnhraym" ], "score": [ 2 ], "text": [ "Add on-- which (if any) of the central generals that are not real. I.e. Did Lu Bu exist? Guan Yu? Zhang Fei? Sima Yi?" ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "cbmc4vp", "cbmc8ko" ], "score": [ 2, 5 ], "text": [ "Of course it is! One of the most known scholars of this period in Europe is Professor John Lynch, who is Emeritus Professor of Latin American History at the University of London. He's written several great books on the topic, amongst them the best biography of José de San Martín available in English (in my opinion, that is). ", "Speaking as an American historian, yes, they do study it, but Latin American history is a reasonably small sub-discipline in the US (at least compared to US and European history). It could be that there are not many specialists in late colonial early national South America who are redditors. The other issue is that Latin American history is not covered extensively in US primary and secondary school curriculum meaning few people have enough exposure to even ask a question. \n\nIf you want to know some good scholars of that era I would suggest Lyman Johnson, Peter Blanchard, and George Reid Andrews. " ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "cb3v4e4", "cb44r0p" ], "score": [ 17, 2 ], "text": [ "Roman architecture is a HUGE topic - they tended to borrow bits and pieces from here and there (Etruscan arches, Greek columns...), and adapted their architecture depending on where in the Empire it was.\n\nThere's actually a really good online course here: _URL_0_ which may be worth a look if you are very interested in Roman architecture, and it may help answer your question.\n\nI hope this doesn't break top tier reply rules!", "Agree with below, but just as a brief blurb for more casual observers:\n\n1. Development and improvement of brick and mortar construction\n2. Significant Greek influence in public/monumental building after the conquest of the Hellenistic world. \n3. Conquest also led to expanded use of exotic marble and stone, from around the empire. As an aside, Italy's own major source of Carrarra marble was discovered in the late republic.\n\nRecent work on Late-Imperial architecture has shown that much of the literature in the area is methodologically flawed, and that features such as private bathhouses and alternate dining arrangements were less common/ typical than has been thought. Essentially, it is tough to find good info on the Late Empire." ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "ckt3aq2" ], "score": [ 3 ], "text": [ "Various elements of the modern supermarket arose in different places, mostly in the 1920s.\n\nThe first self-service grocery store is thought to have been a Memphis Piggly Wiggly opened in 1916. The concept was patented and franchised to other operators. Customers entered through a turnstile and made their way through the store to a checkout at the exit. \n\nDrive-in markets that patrons reached by auto began to be built in Southern California about 1923. These were akin to farmers markets (a strong regional tradition) in hosting a variety of independently owned stands, but sellers of packaged goods also set up shops. The low prices and convenience began to set the pattern of weekly shopping excursions by auto—to a single place.\n\nIn the 1920s, Ralphs began to build branch stores in new outlying areas of Los Angeles, and within a few years the branches were every bit the equal of the downtown store. At first, the new Ralphs were organized like other groceries or department stores, with goods called for and presented at departmental counters. But Ralphs displayed produce in ways that made customer inspection easy, and within a few years introduced self-service in other departments, assumed ownership of all the departments in the store, and eventually created a modern \"front end\" of multiple checkstands in one row, allowing one payment at one time for all of a customer's purchases.\n\nTwo Houston food markets, J. Weingarten and Henke & Pillot, began to evolve into similar prototypes about the same time, introducing large parking lots that the stores faced regardless of how that oriented the store's front in regard to traditional retail streets or streetcar lines. Both these markets and Ralphs began to think of their stores as freestanding objects in the landscape, rather than storefronts on an established shopping street.\n\nThese innovations spread rapidly in the early years of the Depression, with King Kullen's in the New York area focusing on major brands at rock-bottom prices, with large stores (some repurposed from industrial spaces) where products were displayed in stacks that, to customers of the time, seemed warehouse-like. Soon it was clear that this new way of food marketing was not a short-lived fad related to the Depression, and established chains like A & P or Safeway began to follow the new model. In 1937, Piggly Wiggly introduced a larger wheeled shopping basket in an Oklahoma City store, and that came to be the iconic representation for the supermarket concept.\n\nI've drawn extensively from Richard Longstreth's 1999 book *The Drive-In, the Supermarket, and the Transformation of Commercial Space in Los Angeles, 1914-1941.* " ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "ccqtpq7" ], "score": [ 5 ], "text": [ "First of all Israel officially came into existence in 1948 when David Ben Gurion declared the birth of the country. \n\nNow to actually address your question. It is hard to get a perfect answer when it comes to this as the idea of an Israeli national identity is closely tied to the idea of a Jewish identity. The belief that Jews should have a Jewish country, not necessarily in Israel, is called Zionism which began to gain traction in the late 1800s. As Jews faced increasingly more difficulties as a result of their religion in Eastern Europe a call arose for the creation of an independent state for the Jewish people. Famous Zionists including Theodor Herzl, Ahad Haam, and A.D. Gordon began popularizing different branches of Zionism in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, drumming up support among Jews across the world and about the same time the first groups of Jews came to Israel to settle.\n\nEarly Zionists most likely did not see themselves as Israelis simply because they weren't, they saw the creation of the State of Israel as a manifestation of a Jewish goal, even though they did not have the support of even close to the entirety of the Jewish community. Zionists thought of themselves simply as Jews. However certain Zionists, like Ahad Haam, believed that the idea of an Israeli national identity grew from a Jewish national identity. You actually ask two different questions in this post, 1. Was there a strong national identity for Israel before it was formed in 1948? Yes however that national identity was a Jewish national identity not an Israeli, it was the idea that Jews should have a country. 2. Was there an Israeli national identity before Israel was formed in 1948? No, prior to the creation of the state of Israel the Zionists saw themselves primarily as Jews not as Israelis. The whole concept of an Israeli national identity has grown out of the existence of the country over time.\n\nToday there exists a divide between Israelis and Jews in the rest of the world, however the original Zionists were much like American Jews today. They were natives of a country that was not Jewish, and their movement to Palestine changed that but they clung to the idea that no matter where they came from they were Jewish. The modern world is a very different place and if you have any more questions or want clarification on something more specific feel free to ask." ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "ccmsoik", "ccmtcsu", "ccmtjtp", "ccmtvey", "ccmusev", "ccmvb29", "ccmxkbw", "ccmxthh", "ccn1cy7", "ccn7kvz" ], "score": [ 58, 37, 14, 12, 11, 24, 7, 25, 3, 5 ], "text": [ "My favourite cult has always been the one created by [Hassan-i Sabbah](_URL_0_) and his assassins, which was adopted by the game Assassin's Creed, where it was loosely based on Hassan's group. It is said that the origins of the whole concept of an \"assassin\" is traced back to Hassan-i-Sabbah, who had an incredibly interesting backstory, as well as his even more interesting ways of creating assassins.\n\nHassan-i -Sabbah, or the Old Man of the Mountain, or the Sheikh of Alamut, was arguably the founder of modern Jihadist terrorist. He was incredibly strict, and ruled with incredible austerity - he banished a man for playing the flute and executed his own son for drinking wine. The way he converted people to work for him was surreal: he built an enormous gardens described as the best the world had ever seen. Within the walls there were conduits that were cut and ran wine, milk, honey and water, while groups of beautiful women danced and laughed. It was used to make people believe that it was Paradise. Marco Polo described how Hassan tricked and manipulated young men to become his obedient slave assassins:\n\n > The Old Man...had a potion given them, as a result of which they straightway fell asleep; then he had them taken up and put into the garden and then awaked. When they awoke, they ...saw all the things that I have told you, and so believed that they were really in Paradise. And the ladies and damsels remained with them all day, playing music and singing and making excellent cheer; and the young men had their pleasure of them. So these youths had all they could desire, and would never have left the place of their own free will.\n\nThey were then promptly drugged again, removed from the garden and returned to their own rooms in Hassan's castle. Hassan then told them that they would return to Paradise if they did everything he asked, as he was the guardian of Paradise. \n\nIt is incredibly chilling and effective, and by far the most interesting historical cult which bred obedient followers with unswerving loyalty. \n\n\n\n", "I already posted this as a response to another question, but that question got little attention, and it seems to fit pretty well here in any case: The Bacchanalian cult and the associated crisis of 186 BC.\n\n* Have there been any real \"secret cults\" throughout history? Around what were they formed, and what did they do?\n\nBacchus is the latinized form of one of the names for the Greek god Dionysos. In the Roman world, Bacchus became associated with the earlier Italian god Liber Pater, also a god of wine, drunkenness and fertility (essentially the kind of God Tyrion Lannister would like to see in Westeros). So essentially, a well established cult for a popular deity. But something changed in how this cult was practiced. Like all the things corrupting the virtuous Romans, this particular evil came out of the East, possibly from Anatolia, \"like a pestilential disease\", Livy tells us, introduced by a Greek - and, as he points out, not one of the great philosophers or scholars, but a simple priest and diviner. And one that conducted his business not out in the open, but performing his services in secret and at night. Who seemed to gather a large following rather quickly. \n\nWhat made this priest out of the east and his interpretation of the Bacchus-cult so appealing? According to Livy, one of the things used to lure new followers into his services was providing wine and a meal, which is of course always popular. After that, the whole thing proceeded into a giant orgy, in which men and women did 'whatever their mind lusted after', not stopping at their own sex or even at small boys. Not content with that, they also forged documents, seals and testaments, and indulged themselves in rape and murder during their secret meetings, sounding drums and cymbals to mask the sounds. \n\nThis evil spread from Etruria to Rome and was finally brought to the attention of the consuls by one young Publius Aebutius. Publius, whose late father had been an equestrian, was living with his mother and step-father. They saw him as an obstacle to inheritance, and decided to remove him, by having him take part in the bacchanals as a victim (his mother had supposedly vowed to let him receive the bacchanalian rite in return for his reconvalescence from illness). However, his girlfriend, a whore but \"noble of spirit\" warned him of the danger that this posed to him. She had taken part in these rites while still a slave (she was a freedwoman by now) with her mistress, and so she knew what happened there - the priest would sound drums and trumpets and lead him to a dark place, where noone could hear him scream, and where he would have to be of service to the men of the cult, who, according to her preferred boys to women. If he didn't consent to his violation, they would have him killed. After she made him promise not to go, he got promptly kicked out of the house by his parents for refusing to let himself be introduced to the bacchanalian cult.\n\nHis aunt told him to bring the matter to the attention of the consuls, who launched investigations. They questioned Publius' girlfriend, Hispala, who reluctantly told them about how the cult had evolved into something that would as well fit into de Sades Justine as just another episode of orgies, homosexual libertinage and general frenzy and bloodlust. The consuls brought the matter before the Senate, and the Senators, shocked by the extent and the actions of this underground cult, saw the Republic endangered and ordered the consuls to destroy the cult, not only in Rome but in the whole of Italy, and furthermore prohibited all cultic meetings of the Bacchanalians in all of Italy. \n\nLivy gives us a rousing speech of the Consuls on the forum to the general populace, informing them about the extent and the crimes of the cult, asking them how men should in the future protect them by the sword who had been sullied by passive sodomy (the *bad* kind of sodomy for a Roman male). He then reports the general panic in Rome, how many tried to flee the city but were apprehended at the gates, and how others were driven to suicide who were involved in the cult. The curule aedils were to apprehend the cult leaders, while the plebeian aediles should prevent the conduction of cultic meetings. A bounty was offered for people involved in these cultic meetings. An edict by the senate was proclaimed that pretty much placed all Bacchanalian worship under punishment unless specifically allowed by the urban praetor. Apparently, the investigations were quite successful. The ringleaders were apprehended, and accused together with 7.000 others. Those who were not involved in murder or rape were imprisoned, the rest, which were the majority, were executed. Bacchanalian shrines were destroyed through all of Italy.\n\nWhat made the Senators and the elite so fearful of this cult that it provoked such a harsh crackdown, often called the first example of religious persecution by the state?\nLivy paints a nice picture, of the grave and ordered senate, concerned for the welfare of the Republic, contrasted with the 'unlicensed', un-public cult, following the dionysian values of seeking personal fulfillment and self-indulgence before duty to the state. The morale is quite clear: Organized religion, in the form of the public cults performed by the elite ensured the wellbeing and success of Rome as a collective. Selfishness and seeking personal satisfaction leads to sexual and moral corruption, and, ultimately destruction. One cannot help but notice that all of the ringleaders are plebeians, Marcus and Caius Atinius; while Lucius Opiternius and Minius Cerrinius were non-roman Italians. Also interesting is that the Greek who supposedly started this whole affair remains unnamed, which to me makes him likely nothing more than a literary device, part of the larger trope of the decadent hellenic influence on Rome so often bemoaned. \n\nThe problem is, there are only two sources on it. There's Livy (as well as later authors copying him, but adding nothing new), and the *senatus consultum de bacchanalibus*, a copy of the Senates edict, presumably once posted all over Italy, from the *ager Teuranus*, near modern Tiriolo. But this senatusconsultum might point to another reason: This edict showed the Italians just how powerful Rome had become. They were able to control the religious life of all the Italians. And controlling religious life back then also meant influence on politics. It is often cited as one of the drops of increasingly overbearing Roman control over the life of the non-Romans of Italy which finally resulted in the Social war of 91-88 BC. \n\nP.S.:The whole affair had a very happy ending for Publius and his Hispala: each was awarded 100.000 As, Publius was freed of military service (one of the higher honours of the state for a citizen), and Hispala was made equal to a freeborn woman in status. ", "There is a very interesting academic article that puts forth the argument that Farinelli (Mr. Big Name Castrato) was a Freemason called [“Farinelli as Queen of the Night”](_URL_2_) (this is a reference to Mozart’s *Magic Flute* which is a big Masonic joke) by Jane Clark. (I as of yet have not had any opportunity to wedge this little idea into a conversation either here or in real life, so this is fun!) It’s an interesting argument, but I have some beefs with it. If anyone has access to the article and is interested I’d love to debate its merits with someone, I’ve never had the opportunity. \n\n1. The main thrust of her argument is that Farinelli’s career was kinda unusual with his early retirement to a pretty unsexy job singing showtunes every night to a crazy Spanish king. She argues he did it to support a political cause, possibly Jacobite. HOWEVER, I find the idea that Farinelli left the stage for secret political reasons other than those he has personally stated in letters pretty specious. I see no reason to doubt his word when he says that he left the stage because he hated both the behavior of the crowds and the hard living. The behavior of the crowds was pretty detestable back then (booing, hissing, claques), and opera singers had a very hard life with all the travelling required. There’s also pretty ample evidence that Farinelli was a wonderful singer, but not necessarily a very good *opera* singer: he couldn’t act for beans according to contemporary reports, and didn’t cut a very dashing figure on stage (big gangly guy). Plus he was making less money towards the end of his time in England, the novelty of opera was wearing off a little on the London upper crust. Why wouldn’t he take a cushy job in Spain (with no travel and no nasty crowds) for the reasons he’s actually written down? WHY DOES IT NEED TO BE A MASONIC CONSPIRACY? \n\n2. She claims there’s Masonic symbolism in Farinelli’s portraits in later life, specifically pugs. I have some big problems with this -- yes, symbolism was a *big* deal back then, but it was more used in satires, not in portraits. And of the three portraits he has with doggies in them, [only one is obviously a pug to me,](_URL_3_) I mean I’m no AKC dog judge but [this is not a pug.](_URL_0_) And maybe Farinelli just frickin’ liked little doggies and was like “Hey, paint my dog in my portrait too.” My family had a little white miniature poodle growing up and we took her to the photo studio and had her posed in our formal family portrait, and if someone tries to read political symbolism into that act in 300 years I am going to be posthumously annoyed. \n\n3. He made some rather strange lies to Charles Burney (the first opera historian) when he was interviewed towards the end of his life. Clark concludes that he is HIDING MASONIC SECRETS but I personally think he might have been being a little shrewd about his legacy -- he was always very good at “leveraging his brand” (before there was such a concept) when he was on the stage, and I see no reason why he wouldn’t continue that when he was older. One lie is that he claimed to Burney he “always meant to return to England” which is countered by letters he wrote during the time period. Masonic political maneuverings? Well I think the simpler explanation was that Charles Burney was English and Farinelli was trying to be nice and not say “I had a rotten time in England and high-tailed it outta there ASAP.” \n\n4. Someone referred to him as a “blazing star” in a letter, which was a Masonic term for the [Garter Star](_URL_1_) which was a Freemason thing. People used a LOT of codes in letters at the time. Frankly, I find this one the most convincing. But it’s the only evidence I’ll really take. \n\nSo, Farinelli the Mason? I say probably not, but it’s a pretty interesting idea! ", "The Hellfire Club!\n\nThis is honestly going to be a short and lazy comment, and I'm going to depend on Wikipedia, as this is not my specialty, but is tangentially related to a lot of eighteenth century figures I study.\n\nThe 'Hellfire Club,' the most famous one, was founded by Sir Francis Dashwood (what a name!) in 1749, and was also referred to by its public name \"Order of the Friars of St. Francis of Wycombe.\" Their motto was: Fais ce que tu voudras, or \"do what you want/will.\" \n\nThe club picked up on an older one, which was basically founded in order to blaspheme religion and the Church. It was notable for accepting women--but many of these were likely accepted for sexual purposes.\n\nFrom Wikipedia:\n\n > According to Horace Walpole, the members' \"practice was rigorously pagan: Bacchus and Venus were the deities to whom they almost publicly sacrificed; and the nymphs and the hogsheads that were laid in against the festivals of this new church, sufficiently informed the neighborhood of the complexion of those hermits.\" Dashwood's garden at West Wycombe contained numerous statues and shrines to different gods; Daphne and Flora, Priapus and the previously mentioned Venus and Dionysus.\n\n\n > Meetings occurred twice a month, with an AGM lasting a week or more in June or September. The members addressed each other as \"Brothers\" and the leader, which changed regularly, as \"Abbot\". During meetings members supposedly wore ritual clothing: white trousers, jacket and cap, while the \"Abbot\" wore a red ensemble of the same style. Like Wharton's Club, rumours of Black Masses, orgies and Satan or demon worship were well circulated during the time the Club was around. Other clubs, especially in Ireland and Scotland, were rumoured to take part in far more dubious activities. Rumours saw female \"guests\" (a euphemism for prostitutes) referred to as \"Nuns\". Dashwood's Club meetings often included mock rituals, items of a pornographic nature, much drinking, wenching and banqueting.\n\n\nThe texts the wikipedia article reference are actually very well-written books, and highly recommended if you're interested.\n\n", "There's a delightful bit of etymological curiosity around the development of the word 'cabal' in English. As one would expect it ultimately derives from the Hebrew 'qabbalah' meaning 'received wisdom' and was often used when referencing mystical interpretations of Jewish scripture. \n\nHowever the modern popular meaning of 'a secret or conspiratorial, politically motivated group' comes from the 1670s and the so called 'cabal ministry.'\n\nThese were five privy council members: Thomas Clifford, 1st Baron Clifford of Chudleigh, Henry Bennet, 1st Earl of Arlington, George Villiers, 2nd Duke of Buckingham, Anthony Ashley Cooper, 1st Baron Ashley, John Maitland, 1st Duke of Lauderdale (aka Clifford, Arlington, Buckingham, Ashley-Cooper, and Lauderdal C...A..B...A...L) who formed a foreign affairs committee and were often accused of acting in their own interests against that of the crown and the nation. \n\nThe parallels between this and the modern conspiracy theories that attach around the CFR are quite bemusing. \n\n", "Hello all! Today I thought I'd share some musings on the Biblical *Book of Esther*. Set in Achaemenid Persia, apparently during the reign of Xerxes, the story recounts how the Jewish girl Esther becomes queen of Persia and how, with the help of her cousin Mordecai, she thwarts a plot by the evil vizier Haman to wipe out the Jews. In the end, Esther and Mordecai emerge as the \"powers behind the throne,\" as they both enjoy the King's favor and gratitude. The mystery, of course, is whether any of this is historical. While many (myself included) think it best to treat *Esther* as a historical novella rather than strict history, others have argued at least for the actual existence of Mordecai. \n\nI initially stumbled upon the debate over Mordecai while studying the so-called \"Fortification Tablets\" from Persepolis (viewable [here](_URL_0_) and, more awkwardly, [here](_URL_1_)). Several of the Fortification texts, dating to the reign of Darius I (father of Xerxes), mention an individual (or possibly individuals) called *Mar-du-ka*, \"man of Marduk,\" from which the name \"Mordecai\" derives. Although overzealous scholars sometimes identify Marduka as *the* Mordecai of the Bible, the evidence is too limited to permit such a conclusion. The issue really seems moot in my opinion, and again I do not subscribe to a literal approach to the Hebrew scriptures. At the same time, I also do not find convincing the equally-dubious (and fallaciously-argued) attempts to cast Mordecai as the figure of Marduk (the Babylonian god) and Esther as Ishtar--but that is besides the point of this post.\n\nSo here's the caveat: I noticed recently that one of the entries in the archive refers not to Marduka himself but rather *Mar-du-ka-be* (PF 273.4-5). Editor Richard T. Hallock hesitantly translates this as \"the Marduka (people),\" presumably because other geographic-gentilic designations from this period feature a similar construction: for example, the *Kur-ka-be* (\"Carians\": PF 123.2), *Par-šib-be* (\"Persians\": PF 871.3), and *Hi-in-du-iš-be* (\"Indians\": PF 1548.5-6) cited in the Fortification Tablets, or the *Mar-ku-iš-be* (\"Margians\": DB 21.3) and *Par-tu-maš-be* (\"Parthians\": DB 35.68) listed on the [Elamite version](_URL_2_) of Darius' inscription at Behisitun. I suppose one could possibly interpret *Mar-du-ka-be* as \"people of Marduk\" (ergo, the Babylonians), but such an explicit connection between a people and a deity is, as far as I can tell, unparalleled within the extant corpus of texts. Conversely, peoples are in a few instances tied directly to individuals: \"the Mišakaš people of Hystaspes,\" (PF 1596.6-8); or \"people of Maušudda and Iršena,\" (PF 1622.5-7) who both appear elsewhere as officials. Moreover, the Babylonians already receive an ethnic identifier in the form *Ba-pi-li-ra* (PF 783.4-5) and its variants.\n\nIf *Mar-du-ka-be* does indeed mean something like \"the Marduka people,\" attention must be drawn to a rather curious line in *Esther*: \"But he [the Persian official Haman] disdained to lay hands on Mordecai alone, for they had told him who *the people of Mordecai* were; therefore Haman sought to destroy all the Jews, *the people of Mordecai*, who were throughout the whole kingdom of Ahasuerus [=Xerxes?].\" (3:6, NASB transl.) The repetition here places unusual emphasis on the phrase \"people of Mordecai.\" (*‘m mrdky*), which then matches the *Mar-du-ka-be* of the Fortification texts. I unfortunately lack the linguistic expertise to say much more than that. \n\nNow, *Esther* also describes a \"Book of Chronicles of the Kings of Media and Persia\" (*spr dbry hymym lmlky mdy wprs*: 10:2; cf. 2:23, 6:1) and even insists upon its own historicity by citing this official Persian account. The existence of similar documents is somewhat corroborated by the Ctesias' claim that he studied the \"royal writings\" (βασιλικαὶ ἀναγραφαί: Diodorus 2.22.5) or \"royal parchments\" (βασιλικαὶ διφθέραι: 2.32.4) during his residency at the court of Artaxerxes II. We have the testimony of Herodotus as well, who reports that Xerxes tasked his scribes with recording the names and origins of his best officers at the Battle of Salamis. (8.90.4) I believe it is possible, therefore, that the formula \"people of Mordecai\" originates from Persian administrative terminology; hence why the author of *Esther* emphasizes Mordecai's role as a representative of his community rather the community itself. Perhaps a historical Mordecai or Marduka really did advocate on behalf of his people, even if his accomplishments fell far short of rescuing them from genocide, which *Esther* then romanticizes based on some short entries in the royal records? \n\nThis is all extremely speculative, of course, and I'm not sure I even buy my own argument; at any rate, I still find it highly unlikely that two well-placed Jews were pulling the strings behind the scenes in fifth-century Persia. But if you got this far, thank you for taking the time to read this post and joining me in some historical exercise. :D\n\n**TL;DR**: The Jews Esther and Mordecai were probably not \"powers behind the throne\" during the time of Xerxes as claimed in the *Book of Esther*, though the story may have some slight basis in reality. ", "Would anyone be able to provide some insight into the Mythraic Cults of Rome? ", "New York City is home to many secret societies, perhaps the most exclusive of which is the fabled Zodiac Club, with only twelve members. Its founder, Major General Edward E. Potter, made a fortune in California during the Gold Rush, and famously led a successful Union raid in North Carolina in 1863. The rules of the club were relatively simple: each member inherited a zodiac symbol unrelated to their birth sign, new members could only be nominated unanimously, they would meet for dinner on the last Saturday of each month from November to May and each month one member was responsible for “catering” the dinner. Only native New Yorkers were permitted in the club, and they had to have a degree from an Ivy League University. Notable members include J.P. Morgan, James W. Clendenin, James Hampden Robb, Frank K. Sturgis, Lewis Cass Ledyard and Nelson Aldrich; they addressed themselves as “Brother” plus their sign. By the turn of the century, the club had less to do with gentlemanly dinners than with propagating negative stereotypes about the city. The club minutes (replicated in a Tiffany & Co. font and bound by Charles Scribner and Sons) include portrayals of “ditzy women, backstabbing Jewish bankers, unintelligible African-Americans, lazy Italians, drunken Irish, orderly Germans and New Jersey, where people are notorious for being loafers;” they blatantly flouted Prohibition. The [magnificent](_URL_0_) Morgan Library includes signs of the zodiac, including a prominent Libra, Morgan’s Zodiac Club sign. \n\nNot much is known about the modern-day incarnation of the Zodiac Club, but its members, some of the city’s most successful, still continue to meet today. One of the current members quite mysteriously notes that the club is “never secret, only private.” ", "In my visits to western Ukraine, I've noticed a strange cultural obsession with Freemasonry. It's my understanding that Freemasons are really only in Britain, France, and North America. How did the region surrounding Lviv acquire this cultural feature?", "Less of a mystery, and more of a secret society comprised of one man: George Starkey and his alter-ego the mythic alchemical adept Eirenaeus Philalethes.\n\nA Bermudan by birth, Starkey (or Stirk, originally) was educated at Harvard in the early seventeenth century. He was interested in natural philosophy and eventually turned his attention to alchemy. He eventually emigrated to England (where it was easier to obtain the necessary materials for alchemical experimentation), becoming a doctor of sorts – an iatrochemist, technically. He ended up having a fairly successful practice, and was even associated with Robert Boyle and other members of Gresham College (which was to eventually become the Royal Society). According to William Newman, Starkey even taught Boyle chemistry (though its alchemical tints might have helped contribute to Boyle's *The Sceptical Chymist*). Eventually, Starkey's focus on alchemy led to the detriment of his fortunes: he was eventually put into debtors' prison, saved by Boyle, fell to the drink, and died during the Great Plague in 1666 as he (along with other iatrochemists like Thomas Vaughan) tried to prove the worth of his alchemical medicine by treating the victims.\n\nNow, what I find fascinating about Starkey is that he invented the mythic adept Eirenaeus Philalethes (translation: peaceful lover of truth), and had pamphlets detailing practices and methods published under Philalethes' name. Later, when he was convinced by trial and error that the method Philalethes expounded simply did not work, he would dismiss the adept's methods while in the company of his fellow enthusiasts and practitioners. After he died, other alchemists claimed that they had seen and spoken with Philalethes, and commented on the generosity of his association with the unworthy drunk Starkey. The distance between creator and creation was so skillfully maintained that it was only relatively recently that Starkey was absolutely identified with Philalethes.\n\nThe precise details can be found in William Newman's work *Gehennical Fire: The Lives of George Starkey, An American Alchemist in the Scientific Revolution*, along with Newman and Lawrence Principe's *Alchemy Tried in the Fire: Starkey, Boyle, and the Fate of Helmontian Chymistry*. These two scholars have gone and cornered the market on Starkey, and while I find their attempts to fit him into a scientific mold a little anachronistic, they have done some absolutely ground-breaking research when it comes to this singular figure. I'm also sorry I don't have the books on me at the moment to go on at greater length." ] }

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[ "http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1ce73h/monday_mysteries_notable_disappearances/", "http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1fl9uw/monday_mysteries_local_history_mysteries/", "http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1gz7ac/monday_mysteries_your_family_mysteries/", "http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1icd0x/monday_mysteries_leastaccurate_historical_books/", "http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1j9zv8/monday_mysteries_verifiable_historical/", "http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1ko1ic/monday_mysteries_missing_persons/", "http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1dcbb3/monday_mysteries_lost_and_found_treasure/", "http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1hfffk/monday_mysteries_contested_reputations/", "http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1mi2xe/monday_mysteries_difficulties_in_your_research/", "http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1itbtx/monday_mysteries_difficulties_in_your_research/", "http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1e9el2/monday_mysteries_ancient_ruins/", "http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1m18cv/monday_mysteries_what_are_the_most_outlandish_or/", "http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1hv6me/monday_mysteries_literary_mysteries/", "http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1dslor/monday_mysteries_decline_and_fall/", "http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1nfzpn/monday_mysteries_astonishing_individuals/", "http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1eoypm/monday_mysteries_unsolved_crimes_in_history/", "http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1k7cmp/monday_mysteries_mysterious_images/", "http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1jqrya/monday_mysteries_the_historical_foundations_of/", "http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1l48li/monday_mysteries_lost_and_found_treasures/", "http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1gj0q2/monday_mysteries_what_in_your_research_is_proving/", "http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1cvbaz/monday_mysteries_missing_documents_and_texts/", "http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1f57b0/monday_mysteries_fakes_frauds_and_flimflammery_in/", "http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1mz6ge/monday_mysteries_suggestion_thread_please_read/", "http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1lkw4j/monday_mysteries_inexplicable_occurrences_in/", "http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1g1we7/monday_mysteries_lost_lands_and_peoples/" ]

[ [ "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hassan-i_Sabbah" ], [], [ "http://g1b2i3.files.wordpress.com/2011/06/jacopo-amigoni-jacopo-amigoni-and-his-portrait-of-farinelli-and-friends.jpg", "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:GarterInsigniaBurkes.JPG", "http://journals.cambridge.org/action/displayAbstract?fromPage=online&aid=346559", "http://img651.imageshack.us/img651/7484/2retratodecarlosbroschi.jpg" ], [], [], [ "http://oi.uchicago.edu/pdf/oip92.pdf", "http://oi.uchicago.edu/research/projects/pfa/", "http://archive.org/stream/CorpusInscriptionsRoyalesElamiteAchemenid/Vallat1977_CorpusInscriptionsRoyalesElamiteAchemenid#page/n0/mode/2up" ], [], [ "http://www.themorgan.org/about/images/eastroom-ceiling.jpg" ], [], [] ]

{ "a_id": [ "cb6uehc" ], "score": [ 4 ], "text": [ "In short, no, at least going off of the definition of terrorism you wish to be used. This isn't, however, to say that terrorist groups do not effect change in the domestic or international scene. There are really two levels of objectives for terrorist groups: short-term and long-term. Short term objectives would be things like raising money by ransoming hostages or robbing banks, gaining media coverage, and recruiting members. This is really the meat and potatoes aspect of any terrorist group. Longer term goals are probably what you're looking for, and they are normally much more significant: regime change, the complete reversal of a government's policy, etc. Terrorist groups are much more successful with the former rather than the latter. Short-term victories are pretty common, with an example being the early 1980s bombings of the US embassy and Marine barracks in Lebanon, which eventually led to the US pulling out of the country. But I honestly can't think of one terrorist group that achieved it's goals strictly through terrorism. Exceptions to this rule would be when terrorism becomes part of a broader military strategy, often guerrilla warfare.\n\nFurthermore, we have to recognize that, despite popular claims that terrorists are radical and uncompromising, their attitudes and objectives *do* change and their views have the potential to become moderated. The Muslim Brotherhood is a good example of this. The decision for moderation, or even the group's renunciation of terrorism, arises because, just like politicians, terrorist groups have their own constituencies. Of course, this discounts terrorist groups who see themselves as a revolutionary vanguard that will spring the masses to action, a la the RAF. In those cases, the terrorists group's views are often so far apart from any mainstream view that they never gain much in the way of any wider following, often because their nihilism alienates the ones they're trying to call to action. But going back to terrorist groups who actively work to form greater constituencies within a society, these groups often have to moderate their views out of necessity if they wish to have any type of political relevance. Sometimes, their constituents may accept that violence is a legitimate course of action, although there are certainly limits. For example, through the 1970s to the 1990s, the IRA and Sinn Fein heeded their constituency's demands by mainly attacking British security personnel rather than Protestant civilians. To have engaged in a wider program of civilian terror would have risked the group losing their legitimacy in the eyes of their constituency. (As a side-note this is not to diminish or marginalize IRA terrorist attacks against civilians, which still constituted roughly 20% of the group's terrorist actions). \n\nLastly, in some cases, a terrorist groups stated strategic objectives may not necessarily be the primary reason why they are committing acts of terrorism. The Weather Underground is a good example of this type of terrorist group. For the Weather Underground terrorism was an end in itself, an action that was a moral necessity against a corrupt and repressive government, no matter the tactic's efficacy. In these cases, the terrorist group's objectives are less important than the individual member's psychological catharsis through terrorism.\n\nSo, the objectives or goals of terrorist groups are multi-layered and constantly changing. Rarely, if ever, do their most radical objectives come anywhere near reaching fruition. When a terrorist group fails to moderate their views there are a few paths through which the group may follow, almost inevitably, to collapse. The group will be dismantled by the state (or a multi-state institution), which can occur through either violent or non-violent means (the Italian Red Brigades are a good example of this). The group dissolves through internal conflict, often arising over a debate as to whether terrorist violence should continue or if the group should moderate its views (the Weather Underground suits this path). The last is for the group simply to slip into irrelevance, fighting for a cause that no one cares about anymore. This final case tends to occur when terrorist groups refuse to adapt to a changing domestic/international scene, for example the RAF in post-unification Germany. \n\nEdit: Wording.\n\nEdit: I forgot to list some relevant sources for further reading if you'd wish to do so. For general histories of terrorism the best single volume is Gerard Chaliand and Arnaud Blin's [*The History of Terrorism: From Antiquity to al Qaeda*](_URL_3_). Bruce Hoffman's [*Inside Terrorism*](_URL_2_) is also a must read. For an excellent look at the ideological motivations of the Weather Underground and RAF you can check out Jeremy Varon's [*Bringing the War Home: The Weather Underground, the Red Army Faction, and Revolutionary Violence in the Sixties and Seventies* ](_URL_0_). Lastly, you may be interested to learn how exactly terrorist groups end. For that, two good books are Audrey Kurth Cronin's [*How Terrorism Ends: Understanding the Decline and Demise of Terrorist Campaigns*](_URL_4_) or Seth Jones's and Martin Libicki's [*How Terrorist Groups End: Lessons for Countering al Qa'ida*](_URL_1_)\n" ] }

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[ [ "http://www.amazon.com/Bringing-War-Home-Underground-Revolutionary/dp/0520241193/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1374362590&sr=1-1&keywords=bringing+the+war+home+the+weather+underground", "http://www.amazon.com/How-Terrorist-Groups-End-Countering/dp/0833044656/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1374362816&sr=1-1&keywords=how+terrorist+groups+end", "http://www.amazon.com/Inside-Terrorism-Bruce-Hoffman/dp/0231126999/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1374362591&sr=8-1&keywords=bruce+hoffman", "http://www.amazon.com/The-History-Terrorism-From-Antiquity/dp/0520247094/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1374362250&sr=8-1&keywords=history+of+terrorism", "http://www.amazon.com/How-Terrorism-Ends-Understanding-Terrorist/dp/069115239X/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1374362732&sr=1-1&keywords=how+terrorism+ends" ] ]

{ "a_id": [ "ccqpei9" ], "score": [ 5 ], "text": [ "There's a great little book called [\"Lenin for Beginners\"](_URL_0_), which I highly recommend. \nIf you're looking for something more standard, give [this one](_URL_2_) a go. \n\n\nIf you ask me, I'd say you can't view Lenin in a proper context without understanding the workings of the Party as well. The [official History of the CPSU](_URL_1_) is the best one for a complete overview as far as I'm concerned." ] }

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[ [ "http://ge.tt/4vmCgvT/v/0?c", "http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/stalin/works/1939/x01/", "http://www.amazon.com/Lenin-Reaktion-Books-Critical-Lives/dp/1861897936/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1351464974&sr=8-1&keywords=lih+lenin" ] ]

{ "a_id": [ "devk1a1" ], "score": [ 23 ], "text": [ "**Part 1**\n\nAh yes, Robert Service, focal point of lots of controversy and yet still somehow getting glowing press reviews for the most part.\n\nTo put it very succinctly: Your impression that Service is biased is completely spot on, at least for both his books *Comrades* as well as for his more recent biography of Trotsky.\n\nSeumas Milne writing for [The Guardian](_URL_0_), characterized *Comrades* as\n\n > firmly in this neoconservative mould. From the first few pages, we are left in no doubt that, wherever it raised its head, communism was a bizarre and horrific historical detour. Unequivocally siding with the \"totalitarian school\" of Soviet historiography against the more even-handed \"revisionists\", his central argument is that, whatever the local variants, communists necessarily relied on dictatorship because of their lack of support, hare-brained socialist economics and reliance on an ideology, Marxism, that was inherently violent and totalitarian.\n > \n > In what often reads more like a polemic than a historical account, Service offers a relentlessly cartoonish portrayal both of communist politics and theory. Marx, Lenin and their followers had promised a \"perfect society\" and a \"workers' paradise\", Service claims absurdly. Revolution is explained as a \"bacillus\", communist leaders as variously \"dotty\", \"foolish\", \"lunatic\" and \"gangsters\" who were guilty of \"rank hypocrisy\". The accumulation of factual errors also scarcely inspires confidence: Allende's 1970s government was not \"communist-led\"; the Malayan communists fought the British not the Dutch in the 1950s; Antonio Gramsci didn't die in prison; and Germany's Spartacist uprising didn't take place in 1918.\n\nMilne further accuses Service of delivering a polemic rather than a scholarly historical account. Dismissing the murder of one million Indonesian communists in a western-backed coup in 1965 in one sentence, Service, he writes \"shows his colours with studied disdain for such policies as job security, narrow wage differentials and \"discriminating in favour of the poorer citizens\".\"\n\nThought one of the biggest shortcomings of Service' book Milne points to is that Service completely overlooks and/or dismisses that communism as an ideology and a political movement did indeed have millions of supporters at one point or another in history. Now, whether one agrees with it or not is not the point when it comes to historical inquiry and so, the failure to distill and answer why an ideology, that as Service is so eager to point out, did take hold in Russia under extreme circumstance and then was exported to a third of the world to result in a number of dictatorial regimes did nonetheless attract millions of people to its cause, is the real shortcoming of the book. Writing about Communism as a project solely pursued and designed by a small number of conspiratorial elites wanting to establish a dictatorship for themselves while ignoring to explore the factors that made it so attractive to literally millions of followers not only demonstrates bias but also failure as a historian.\n\n\"Ok\", I already hear some say, \"Milne is hardly the best person to pass judgement here. After all, he is in the left-wing of the British labor party and recently became an important appointment of Jeremy Corbyn in the party.\" And while that is true (and does not diminish his criticism, especially when factual errors are concerned), Service has also been heavily criticized by people who are less easily dismissed as biased, foremost Bertrand M. Patenaude, fellow at the Hoover Institution and Stanford.\n\nIn 2009 Robert Service published *Trotsky, a biography*, which is attempting to do exactly what the title says. Generally well received by the press, it already started off with a misstatement of fact. Service claimed in his preface this was the first full length biography of Trotsky from someone outside the Soviet Union who is not a Trotskyite. A [claim](_URL_2_) that [is](_URL_3_) patently [untrue](_URL_4_) and inarguably [false](_URL_5_). A fact, none of his reviewers seemed initially to have picked up on.\n\nPatenaude, an expert on Soviet Russia and former teacher of international security at the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, California (i.e. not a Trotskyite) had also published a book on Trotsky, called *Trotsky. Downfall of a Revolutionary* in 2009 and so was awarded the dubious honor of writing [a review of Service' book for the American Historical Review](_URL_1_) in 2011; a review about which one contributor at Inside Higher Education said \"will earn a place in the annals of the scholarly take-down.\"\n\nPatenaude eviscerates Service biography of Trotsky for its numerous factual errors and questionable interpretations. He sets out writing:\n\n > It appears that he set out thoroughly to discredit Trotsky as a historical figure and as a human being. His Trotsky is not merely arrogant, self-righteous, and self-absorbed; he is a mass murderer and a terrorist, a cold and heartless son, husband, father, and comrade, and an intellectual lightweight who falsified the record of his role in the Russian Revolution and whose writings have continued to fool generations of readers—a hoax perpetuated by his hagiographer Isaac Deutscher. In his eagerness to cut Trotsky down, Service commits numerous distortions of the historical record and outright errors of fact to the point that the intellectual integrity of the whole enterprise is open to question.\n\nService main source and main exhibit in his efforts to paint a picture of Trotsky as dark and terrible as possible is Trotsky's autobiography *My life*, which he wrote in 1930 and of which Service claims to have access to a first draft significantly different from the published version. Enter Patenaude:\n\n > Yet neither here nor anywhere else is Service able to provide a single example of a significant discrepancy between the published memoir and the draft. In fact, in his depiction of Trotsky's youth, Service relies almost entirely on the published version of My Life, not on earlier drafts. Service accuses Trotsky the memoirist of being “selective, evasive and self-aggrandizing” (p. xxi) (as if most memoirs do not fit this description), yet he reads other memoirs completely uncritically (for example, those of Gregory A. Ziv and Clare Sheridan) when they show Trotsky in an unfavorable light.\n\nAnd it doesn't stop there. Concerning factual errors, Patenaude writes:\n\n > I have counted more than four dozen. Service mixes up the names of Trotsky's sons, misidentifies the largest political group in the first Duma in 1906, botches the name of the Austrian archduke assassinated at Sarajevo, misrepresents the circumstances of Nicholas II's abdication, gets backward Trotsky's position in 1940 on the United States' entry into World War II, and gives the wrong year of death of Trotsky's widow. Service's book is completely unreliable as a reference. At times the errors are jaw-dropping. Service believes that Bertram Wolfe was one of Trotsky's “acolytes” living with him in Mexico (pp. 441, 473), that André Breton was a “surrealist painter” whose “pictures exhibited sympathy with the plight of the working people” (p. 453), and that Mikhail Gorbachev rehabilitated Trotsky in 1988, when in fact Trotsky was never posthumously rehabilitated by the Soviet government.\n\n\n" ] }

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[ [ "https://www.theguardian.com/books/2007/may/12/featuresreviews.guardianreview8", "https://academic.oup.com/ahr/article-lookup/doi/10.1086/ahr.116.3.900", "https://books.google.de/books?id=q_JoAAAAMAAJ&q=robert+payne+life+and+death+of+trotsky&dq=robert+payne+life+and+death+of+trotsky&hl=de&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwj6p6fJ8NPSAhUBLhoKHYkiB8wQ6AEIGjAA", "https://books.google.de/books?id=cU3yFMLm1voC&printsec=frontcover&dq=ian+d+thatcher+trotsky&hl=de&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwj38ODb8NPSAhXDtBoKHfEQBswQ6AEIGjAA#v=onepage&q=ian%20d%20thatcher%20trotsky&f=false", "https://books.google.de/books?id=FN3UlgEACAAJ&dq=Joel+Carmichael++trotsky&hl=de&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjZkqrt8NPSAhWLfxoKHZuvA4IQ6AEIHTAA", "https://books.google.de/books?id=Im2hAwAAQBAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=Geoffrey+Swain++trotsky&hl=de&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwilgfSG8dPSAhVGrRoKHfU8B9QQ6AEIHTAA#v=onepage&q=Geoffrey%20Swain%20%20trotsky&f=false" ] ]

{ "a_id": [ "d1nmsu7", "d1nqz52", "d1o6csv", "d1qhif3" ], "score": [ 102, 8, 6, 2 ], "text": [ "It is possible, yes, that fossils (not necessarily just dinosaur fossils) did play a role in the development of dragon myths. It's mostly all speculation, really. \n\nMost fossils that people find are either recognizably some smallish organism, like a seashell or a small fish, or a disarticulated bone or piece of a bone. All perfectly laid-out skeletons just don't really happen very often at all, and even then it takes a keen eye to discern what is what.\n\nWe do know that prior to Georges Cuvier's pioneering work in comparative anatomy, people very often tended to assume large fossil bones were the bones of creatures that were still alive at the time, or possibly giant versions of them. In the Western world, it was also frequently assumed they were the remains of animals and people killed in Noah's flood. One particular thigh bone (now known to be from a type of meat-eating dinosaur) was originally thought to have been the thigh bone from a giant antediluvian person, then for the while the fossilized scrotum of said person, then recognized again for a leg and not a ballsack, and finally correctly identified as not from a flood-victim giant human at all.\n\nAlso, prior to Cuvier's work, we really didn't have a concept of extinction. The world at this point was also not fully-explored by any one group, so there was an idea that even though these giant critters may not be around *here* anymore, the might still be found out *there* somewhere. Thomas Jefferson actually gave specific instructions to Lewis and Clark for their westward exploration to try and find a living specimen of a giant ground sloth--an animal known from fossils and which the founding father assumed based on assumptions that were perfectly rational for the time to still be kicking around out *there* somewhere.\n\nThere are some speculations that specific fossils may have influenced certain mythological creatures. For example, some myths of the Griffin describe a four-legged creature with wings, a beak, a horn on the back of the head, and lives in the desert and guards gold. The dinosaur *Protoceratops* has four legs, shoulder blades that to the untrained can look sort of wing-like, a beak, a frill on the back of the head which if the sides break off--which is very common--can look like a horn, its remains are found in the deserts of Mongolia and China in areas where gold deposits are not unheard of. It's possible, maybe even plausible, but not really testable.\n\nStories of mythical beasts, like dragons, grow and change with the times. They ultimately have many sources, some from the natural world, some purely fantasy. Fossils may explain part of the stories, but not all of them.\n\nConsider that if you go to the Roman and Medieval sources, a \"dragon\" is described many different ways, many of them only having a passing resemblance to what we today would agree on is a prototypical \"dragon.\" For example, in some medieval bestiaries based on Pliny the Elder's works, dragons are described as giant snakes that live in the East (i.e. India), live in trees and hunt elephants by dropping on them from the trees and constricting them, and are deathly afraid of jaguars. ", "Hi! fyi, you'll find more info here...\n\n* FAQ section [**Here be dragons**](_URL_0_)", "I wrote about this recently, so I'll just copy and paste my earlier answer. The people of Mesoamerica had discovered dinosaur bones, but they thought that the bones were the bones of giants. This account is from Bernal Diaz, a soldier who fought with Cortes in conquering the Aztecs: \"The Aztecs said that their ancestors told them that a long time ago there were settlements of men and women who were very tall with huge bones; that because they were very evil and of bad behavior, they killed them fighting with them, and those remaining died. And in order that we could see what enormous bodies they had, they brought a leg bone of one of them, and it was very heavy and very large in height compared to a man of average stature. And that leg bone was from the knee to the hip. I measured myself with it and it was as tall as I, although I am of average height. And they brought other bones like the first. Most were already bare and hardened from the earth, and all of us marveled at seeing those leg bones, and we were certain that there had been giants in this country. And our Captain Cortes told us that he would be sending that great bone to Spain in order that His Majesty could see it, and so thus we sent it with the first products that went out.\"", "Hi! Is it OK to expand on a subject, providing (sourced) additional information? While I cannot add to the current answers about specifically dinosaur fossils, I have a bit of knowledge that I imagine might be of interest to the /u/diamond and others here. I'll post the comment, and hope I do not break the rules... if I do, mods, my apologies.\n\n\nI would like to add something on the subject of ancient people interacting with fossils, altought much younger than dinosaurs; namely, fossilized mammoths in Siberia. These animals went extinct in the end of the last Ice Age (more exactly, of the last glaciation), about 20,000 to 13,000 years ago (let's ignore for now the dwarf mammoths of those remote islands in northern Siberia that managed to survive until much later, in fact they were some still alive at the time when early Pharaohs ruled Egypt^1). Moreover, the mammoths were prone to die in bogs or in regions where the permafrost (frozen underground) helped preserve their remains. As a result, there were (and still are) somewhat frequent discoveries of fossilized mammoth bones in Siberia.\n\n\nWhat did ancient people think of them? As for nomadic people native to Siberia, it is hard to say because there is little to no written record of their histories and myths (to my knowledge). We do, however, possess a very fascinating (to my opinion) written record by the Arab traveler Ibn Fadlan. The man was a merchant and an envoy of the Caliph who traveled north from Baghdad in the lands of the Bulghars, the Khazars, the Rus, and many Turkic tribes in the steppes of western Siberia / eastern Europe. I encourage you to read the book: Ibn Fadlan and the Land of Darkness: Arab Travellers in the Far North^2.\n\n\nSorry, I'll get to the point now. Ibn Fadlan recalls being shows bone-like objects that a man claims come from a Rhinoceros. While he (Fadlan) accepts this as good enough of a fact, we now know there weren't any rhinos in this part of Siberia that the bone could've come from. In the Penguin edition of the book (see below), Caroline Stone and Paul Lunde comment that the material could have come from fossilized mammoth tusk...\n\n\n > The three plates of onyx-like material (...) may have been made of the material called *khutu*, fossilized mammoth tusk; this was much sought after to make knife handles, because of its durability.\n\n\n1: Vartanyan, S. L.; Garutt, V. E.; Sher, A. V. (1993). \"Holocene dwarf mammoths from Wrangel Island in the Siberian Arctic\". Nature 362 (6418): 337–349 -- yes, the precise source was fetched from this simpler [wikipedia article](_URL_0_)\n\n2: _URL_1_\n" ] }

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[ [], [ "https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/wiki/faq/religion#wiki_here_be_dragons" ], [], [ "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wrangel_Island#cite_note-Vartanyan1-10", "https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/187609/ibn-fadlan-and-the-land-of-darkness/" ] ]

{ "a_id": [ "d97s0pe" ], "score": [ 3 ], "text": [ "Well, there is Greenwood Press's *Daily Life in ________* series. These are of variable quality, at least the ones I've looked at. One of the strengths is the narrow scope of their focus. Like, there is a \"Daily Life during the Spanish Inquisition,\" \"Daily Life in Renaissance Italy\", AND \"Daily Life in the Reformation\"; \"Daily Life during the Black Death\", \"Daily Life in Chaucer's England\", AND \"Daily Life in Medieval Europe.\" That specificity goes a *long* way towards defeating the tendency to be overly general in accounts of daily life.\n\nThat said, books like that still do a fair amount of smoothing over--they're definitely on the more pop end of things. (Honestly, though, I'd say if you're looking for a starting point for writing historical fiction, you could do a whole lot worse!)\n\nFor the later Middle Ages, and medieval England specifically, there are two fantastic books I would further suggest: Ian Mortimer's *The Time Traveller's Guide to Fourteenth-Century England* (also the later one to 16C/Tudor England) and, more scholarly, Barbara Hanawalt's *The Ties That Bound*, which is about peasant life.\n\nOnce you move into the 19th century, or even the 18th and mayyybe the 17th in some cases, reading primary sources--diaries especially--can offer some really fabulous insight. If you can get ahold of some of the Mormon women's accounts of westward travel (Utah, California, etc), they are really interesting and fun reading. And Samuel Pepys--pronounced 'peeps', legit--is a good time in so many ways." ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "cl28l7y" ], "score": [ 8 ], "text": [ "Rankes 'bloss zu zeigen wie es eigentlich gewesen' is the core for your (and a historians) 'as it was'. Now, calling that an anachronism is in the light of Ranke a bit weird. \n\nIn 'as it was' histories, we are trying to recreate a (not the) picture of the past as best as we can, based on sources from that time. We are not using terminoligy or whatever out of historical context, we are simply holding historical sources to nothing but its own light. That is the basis of historical science and if done the right way, it is not anachronistic." ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "c87pe1v", "c87qac6" ], "score": [ 27, 9 ], "text": [ "**The Early Colonial Example**\n\nLooking at some of the earliest clashes between Colonists and Natives can give some indication of how groups at the \"tribe/complex chiefdom\" level of organization and population would have waged war. The general pattern is of a sort of sustained guerrilla warfare (i.e. [endemic warfare](_URL_8_)) with temporary flare-ups of more intense periods of surprise raids, ambushes, picking off easy/remote targets, and the occasional larger expedition to burn and pillage a settlement. That was the pattern seen in the [Anglo-Powhatan wars](_URL_6_), [the Pequot War](_URL_9_), and even in the largest early conflict, [King Phillip's War](_URL_5_). \n\nThis style of warfare is necessitated by low population densities and loose political control/organization, which both groups were experiencing at the time. The problem, of course, is that these are 17th century accounts, by which time epidemic diseases had either already swept through native populations, or were in the process of doing so. This particular wrinkle makes it difficult to truly say that this pattern of endemic warfare was a product of its time or a long standing and widespread cultural tradition. We do have early reports of contacts with some more established confederations like the Iroquois though, which do seem to indicate that consistent low-level warfare was not only an economic and political act, but also an important cultural institution. In particular the practice of [\"mourning war\"](_URL_7_) has been seen not only as a way to increase/replace population through taking captives, but also as a ritual response to death and a way to strengthen social bonds; sort of like an Irish wake, but with slightly more violence.\n\nSo while we don't (to my knowledge, someone else more knowledgeable is free to jump in) have information on the warfare practices of a large complex North American society like Cahokia, we do have evidence of a particular style of armed conflict from other groups in Eastern part of North America that everyone thinks of when they say \"Native American,\" unless they are watching a Western, of course. On the other hand, we do have detailed accounts of pre-Columbian groups that, while a few cultural removes from the Eastern Woodlands tradition, did conduct large-scale state-level warfare. I speak of course of Mesoamerica, which is technically in North America, and particularly of the Aztecs (because I've got to keeping earning this flair somehow). Let's very briefly go over what a battle in that area would look like.\n\n**The Aztec Example**\n\nThe Aztecs had a sort of universal draft system based on their organization of cities and towns in to neighborhoods called *calpulli*. This system also hosted a universal education system in the form of neighborhood schools called *telpochcalli* which all boys would attend for a few years starting around age 15 to learn the basics of warfare among other things. Through this system, the Aztecs could quickly raise tens of thousands of men in organized units for which to ware war during the dry (i.e. non-harvest/planting) season, which runs roughly from late Fall to mid Spring.\n\nThese neighborhood units would have their own insignia or particular color scheme to identify them and would rally around an experienced soldier denoted with a back-flag (*cuachpantli*), a few examples of which you can seen in the [*Codex Mendoza*](_URL_1_). Interspersed among the raw recruits would be veterans and/or members of military orders marked out by particular styles of dress, decoration, and hairstyle. Elite warriors, for instance, would wear whole body suits of thick cloth covered entirely in feathers for extra slickness and protection, which makes them sound like some sort of condom, now that I read that again. Another military order, the Shorn Ones (*Cuachchiqueh*) would have all but a single braided lock of hair cut off and their faces painted half-blue half-yellow or red. In short, the Aztec military wasn't just intimidating because of their numbers, but also because they had style.\n\nBattle would begin with salvos of projectile fire from common troops armed with bows, but particularly with slings. Ceramic sling-stones of regular size and weight, whether made by the Aztecs or demanded in tribute, were regularly stockpiled. Another soldier equipped with a wooden shield covered in feathers (covering things in feathers was the Post-Classic Mexican equivalent of \"put a bird on it,\" although the feathers did actually serve a functional purpose) would help to block in-coming fire from the enemy. \n\nAs the opposing forces closed and the ammo dwindled, the veteran soldiers would hurl [atl-atl darts](_URL_3_) to disrupt enemies ranks while closing the distance. The most experienced and skilled troops would lead the charge. Pairs of the previously mentioned cuahchicqueh, for instance, would traditionally the first to engage the enemy in melee combat, and the last to leave during a retreat. Rules about breaking rank were strict, the cuachpantli bearing \"captains\" would keep order in their immediate area, while an \"officer corps\" of nobility would signal larger troop movements and attacks using fires, smoke signals, and drums. Anyone fleeing a battle could expected *severe* repercussions.\n\nRoss Hassig, who wrote the book Aztec warfare ([literally](_URL_4_)) and whom I'm drawing upon heavily here, pieced together first-hand Spanish and Native accounts, depictions in artwork, and the basic properties of the weapons used to come up with the accepted formation during melee combat. The ranks would be fairly open and broader rather than deep. Experienced/elite warriors wielding a [*macuahuitl*](_URL_2_) and shield, or a two handed macuahuitl, would form a string of nuclei down the ranks backed up by lesser ranking soldiers wielding *[tepoztopilli](_URL_0_)*, long slashing polearms. Basically you would have a series of duels between the best warriors taking place in the middle of two groups of pikeman/halberdiers who were simultaneously trying to help their duelist while also preventing the opposing group from doing the same. Reserve troops would be cycled in periodically.\n\n\n\n\n\n", "OP and readers: I posted a link four days ago about a [Salish naval battle](_URL_0_) that was pre-colonial, and we have a lot of oral history concerning the conflict. There was, at one point, a huge confederation of tribes that fought a sea battle off Vancouver Island. There were hundreds, perhaps a thousand or more who fought. Some of the canoes were designed for ramming and could hold up to twenty warriors. There is a *lot* of information (probably about or over 1000 words) so that's why I've posted a permalink instead of reposting the story here. I hope many of you get to read it as it is extremely fascinating." ] }

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[ [ "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tepoztopilli", "http://0.tqn.com/d/create/1/0/R/6/B/-/aztec-warriors-Codex-Mend.jpg", "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macuahuitl", "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atlatl", "http://books.google.com/books/about/Aztec_Warfare.html?id=7M1o9g8MARgC", "http://www.militaryhistoryonline.com/horsemusket/kingphilip/default.aspx", "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anglo-Powhatan_Wars", "http://matrix.msu.edu/hst/hst202/docs/richter_war_and_culture.pdf", "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Endemic_warfare", "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pequot_War" ], [ "http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/17fklk/before_the_invention_of_the_cannon_what_was_naval/c8566vn?context=3" ] ]

{ "a_id": [ "cwjvccq" ], "score": [ 7 ], "text": [ " There's a lot of debate on 'what' the war was, which has carried on to today. And revisionism is a hotbed topic between the majority of America and regional nationalists like the *League of the South,* or the *Sons of Confederate Veterans.* (Let alone the overtly racist KKK.) There are more than a few places in the rural south where mentioning \"The Civil War\" will get you into an argument over the 'true' name, \"The War of Northern Aggression\" or \"War between the States.\" \n\n Now putting the context aside...\n\n The answer to your question obviously depends on exactly how 'Civil War' is defined. [Merriam Webster](_URL_0_) defines it as, \"A war between groups of people in the same country.\" As does [Oxford Dictionaries](_URL_2_). \n\n More importantly, we can look at the definition in terms of international law...\n\n > \"The common scholarly definition has two main criteria. The first says that the warring groups must be from the same country and fighting for control of the political center, control over a separatist state or to force a major change in policy. The second says that at least 1,000 people must have been killed in total, with at least 100 from each side.\" ^2\n\n([Edward Wong](_URL_1_), *A Matter of Definition: What Makes a Civil War? And who Declares it so?*)\n \n\nFinally, we can see that it fits the American legal definition...\n\n > Civil war exists when two or more opposing parties within a country resort to arms to settle a conflict or when a substantial portion of the population takes up arms against the legitimate government of a country. Within International Law distinctions are drawn between minor conflicts like riots, where order is restored promptly, and full-scale insurrections finding opposing parties in political as well as military control over different areas. When an internal conflict reaches sufficient proportions that the interests of other countries are affected, outside states may recognize a state of insurgency. A recognition of insurgency, whether formal or de facto, indicates that the recognizing state regards the insurgents as proper contestants for legitimate power. Although the precise status of insurgents under international law is not well-defined, recognized insurgents traditionally gain the protection afforded soldiers under international rules of law pertaining to war. A state may also decide to recognize the contending group as a belligerent, a status that invokes more well-defined rights and responsibilities. Once recognized as a belligerent party, that party obtains the rights of a belligerent party in a public war, or war between opposing states. The belligerents stand on a par with the parent state in the conduct and settlement of the conflict. In addition, states recognizing the insurgents as belligerents must assume the duties of neutrality toward the conflict.^3\n\n(*West's Encyclopedia of American Law*)\n\n\nSummary: It's very clear that though the Confederacy's war aim was not to seize control of the entire government, it's still accurate to refer to separatist movements as 'Civil Wars.'\n\n\n\nSources: \n\n1 - I use to be a member of Louisiana's *Sons of Confederate Veterans* and a serial 'Lost Causer' in my misguided teens. I live in Mississippi now, and I've been in countless arguments with Southern friends over this very topic. \n\n2 - Edward Wong, *A Matter of Definition: What Makes a Civil War? And who Declares it so?*\n\n3 - West's Encyclopedia of American Law, second edition\n\nEDIT: Added Summary" ] }

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[ [ "http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/civil%20war", "http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/26/world/middleeast/26war.html?pagewanted=print&_r=0", "http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/us/definition/american_english/civil-war" ] ]

{ "a_id": [ "c4f2uti", "c4f38v6", "c4f39oa", "c4fj04i", "c4iw28l" ], "score": [ 4, 29, 10, 2, 3 ], "text": [ "Because MAD pretty much makes this kind of thing impossible. \nAlso, define \"World\" war. \nI could, but probably won't argue that the 'Nam war was a \"World\" war. ", "As DrNoFriends said, nuclear proliferation has played a huge role. The world's major powers have been reluctant to engage in war with each other, with the risk of mutually assured destruction looming. Another important thing to keep in mind is that the power distribution throughout the world is drastically different now than before either World War I or World War II. Let's look at them both in order (note: obviously, this isn't by any means a comprehensive overview of things, but I think it touches on most of the major points):\n\nBefore World War I, Europe was populated by several imperial powers, each of which were equal enough in stature that one could not stand alone against an alliance of the rest of them. So, the alliance system that eventually tipped Europe into war gradually took shape. Once one of the powers declared war on another, the dominoes started to fall, and we all know what happened after.\n\nSo, let's look at Cold War Europe now. A system of alliances existed (and still in some ways does exist), but it was structured quite differently. At the turn of the century, each of the major nations had similar levels of power and strength, and they were (mostly) equal partners in their respective alliances. When it came to Warsaw Pact and NATO, however, each of these were dominated by the two superpowers, with other states being largely relegated to junior or even puppet status. While the smaller European nations may have been somewhat belligerent toward each other, they couldn't really move without the support of the US and the USSR, who both, again, feared escalation to nuclear war.\n\nAnother factor prior to World War I was the imperial ambitions of the major empires present, who had claims and counter-claims that conflicted throughout the third world at the time, which also led to escalated tensions. European forces fought over these colonies at the time (though colonial troops played major roles), and several times prior to World War I, wars that began as colonial conflicts overseas the escalated into European wars. Post-World War II, though, most of the imperialist conflicts were fought mostly as proxy wars, with one of the major powers fighting against a native enemy with supplies, weapons, and \"advisors\" provided by their opposite. Again, they were very careful not to let things escalate into open conflict between the superpowers or the major alliances.\n\nOK, so now let's look at the situation leading up to World War II. Again, we have multiple major powers - the Allies, the Soviet Union, and Germany and Italy, each of which had conflicting ideologies, and in the latter two cases, ambitions over the rest of Europe (and in Italy's case, over Britain and France's African and Middle Eastern colonies as well). This is a simplistic view of things, but once Germany became aggressive, both the Allies and the Soviet Union had a vested interest in checking her expansion and escalating power.\n\nNow, going back to Cold War Europe again - as mentioned before, the balance of power was rather different. Rather than three competing groups, we have just two, led by superpowers. Since there's no wild card third power here, they concentrate on each other, control their subordinate nations, and avoid conflict with each other as much as possible.\n\nNow we're in the post-Cold War era. China is considered by many to be a new superpower, and Russian no longer has anywhere near the power that it once did. Will we see a World War III? Possible, but personally speaking, I doubt it. The spectre of MAD still looms over everything, especially with nuclear proliferation spreading further, to India, Pakistan, and other former third-world countries. Proxy wars do and will continue to exist, as it's a lot more economically feasible and safer to fund terrorists, insurgents, and other proxy armies rather than getting directly involved in conflicts. Direct wars between nations probably will continue, but superpowers have a vested interest in avoiding getting sucked too far into them - for example, if war between Pakistan and India breaks out, although the US is nominally Pakistan's ally, and India gets a great deal of aid from Russia, neither country will want to get involved, and will instead try very hard to broker a truce instead. I think it's very unlikely that a true World War III will break out, since there's comparatively a lot more at risk now.\n\n**tl;dr - Fewer superpowers and fewer power blocs, plus the threat of nuclear war, is why there haven't been any true world wars since 1945.**", "Albert Einstein said it pretty well:\n\n\"I know not with what weapons World War III will be fought, but world War IV will be fought with sticks and stones.\"\n\n", "Remember that we went 99 years without wars between major powers between Napoleon and World War I. We're still a few decades from beating that mark.", "I would have to give credit to George C. Marshall. After World War II, everyone wanted to punish Germany again. He said, \"if we help them, then they have nobody to blame and will be our future allies, not enemies.\" So instead of having germany pay off all of world war ii's debts like world war i, The allies tried to help rebuild the country. This is a similar policy that Lincoln wanted to do for the South. Many of the Union's leaders wanted to punish the former CSA states. But Lincoln wanted to rebuild them. But, Lincoln was assassinated, and Johnson took office and wanted to do what Lincoln wanted. But Johnson was very close to being impeached so he decided to not do anything. Then Grant took office and being a Union General who fought the South directly during the war, he definitely did not share the same views as Lincoln and Johnson. So the South did not get entirely rebuilt and 'statistically' has more poverty rates, worse housing, poorer educational systems, etc. Because of this, there's still a little grudge between *some* southerners and northerners. I know from personal experience that if you have a northern state's license plate and you're in some parts of Georgia, it's very wise to take those plates off or your car will be messed with if you leave it.\nEdit: TL/DR: helping to rebuild the loser of a war's nation rather than punish it will generally make them your allies in the future lessening the risk of vengence sparking another war. Sorry for the digression into Reconstruction history" ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "f8olwu7", "f8ouu7p" ], "score": [ 6, 4 ], "text": [ "No. Their general opinion was that the atomic bombs couldn't \"ignite\" the atmosphere (the suggestion was that the bomb might be able to trigger a fusion reaction). The only dissenting opinion was Arthur Compton, who was not convinced of the complete impossibility of it, but he didn't think it likely (he estimated the probability at less than 1 in a million).\n\nSee _URL_0_ for more detail and references.", "I've written a bit about the calculations that were done, and the people who weren't totally convinced of them, [here](_URL_0_). In short: they didn't really believe it was possible, but they weren't 100% sure. So when the bomb did go off, there were a few people who wondered, as the heat increased, if they had really \"done it.\" But the bulk of the technical people had convinced themselves that it wasn't possible for several very good reasons. In the postwar it became very clear how difficult fusion reactions are to start and propagate." ] }

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[ [ "https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/c1jei5/is_it_true_fdr_authorized_a_test_during_ww2_that/" ], [ "http://blog.nuclearsecrecy.com/2018/06/29/cleansing-thermonuclear-fire/" ] ]

{ "a_id": [ "egg2xc7" ], "score": [ 30 ], "text": [ "The simple answer to this is \"No, he did not\". Now, this is not because Engels was a hypocrite,but rather because of the following two reasons:\n\na) Friedrich Engels never actually owned any factories.\n\nThere were plenty of factories within the Engels estate, both in Germany and Britain, but because of Friedrichs radical views, his father decided against Friedrich ever getting ownership of any of the factories. The closest Friedrich got, was when he in 1864 made partner in the enterprise.\n\nb) Throughout all of Marx' and Engels' writings, they never wrote anything about how to manage industries, or how the Socialist mode of production would function. After Marx' death, Engels and Kautsky attempted to do so, but never finished any coherent works on the issue. To this day, Orthodox and Classical Marxism has always been more of a critique of the Capitalist mode of production, than a prescriptive ideology about how society should function\n\nSources:\n\nGreen, John; *Engels: A Revolutionary Life*; 2008\n\nHunt, Tristram; *The Frock-Coated Communist: The Revolutionary Life of Friedrich Engels*; 2009\n\nKautsky, Karl; *Friedrich Engels: His Life, His Work and His Writings*; 1899" ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "cix7ab0" ], "score": [ 11 ], "text": [ "Single combat is mentioned quite frequently in the history of Ancient Rome – the Horatii's defeat of the Alba Longan Curiatii in the 7th century BC is reported by Livy to have settled a war in Rome's favor and subjected Alba Longa to Rome; Marcus Claudius Marcellus took the spolia opima from Viridomarus, king of the Gaesatae, at the Battle of Clastidium (222 BC); and Marcus Licinius Crassus from Deldo, king of the Bastarnae (29 BC).\n\n" ] }

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{ "a_id": [ "c4jv04e", "c4jvibd", "c4jx1yq", "c4jxq3u", "c4jzinf" ], "score": [ 19, 6, 4, 2, 20 ], "text": [ "I am not an expert in pre-Islamic Arabia, but I do have some knowledge of the area; as I recall, the Kaa'ba was already a sacred artifact in the Arabian peninsula centuries before the rise of Islam, and the Koran makes it fairly clear that non-muslims in the area considered it sacred themselves, otherwise they wouldn't have 'profaned' the artifact with idols. So I would conjecture that the reason it is important to Islam is because it was already a prominent feature of Arabian culture and imagination; despite its evangelical intentions there are clear footprints of a distinctively Arabic perspective of the world in Islam. But I would take my own analysis here with a grain of salt, I am only really familiar with Arabian culture through its contact with others such as the Assyrians, Babylonians and Romans. \n\nOr pinch of sand for that matter.", "I'm not an Arabist, but I've spent quite a bit of time reading about the Middle East in general. The truth is that no one knows who built the Kaaba.\n\nOne of the most convincing arguments I've heard is that there was a well in Mecca called \"Zamzam\" which was a holy site before the Kaaba was built. The theory holds that the Kaaba was originally a place to store the relics or objects used in rituals at Zamzam and eventually became a holy site itself.\n\nAnother theory says that it holds astrological significance, perhaps like the pyramids at Giza. There is a meteorite that is still housed in the Kaaba and revered as a holy object. Some speculate that the circumambulation around the Kaaba during the Islamic hajj may have originally been a symbol of the movement of celestial bodies.\n\nI'm going to leave the reason it is sacred to Islam to someone who knows more about the subject. As far as I understand it, the Kaaba is sacred to Islam because it was sacred to Muhammad (meaning, it was already considered an Arab holy site by the late 6th century).", "According to Islamic tradition, the Kaaba was built by Abraham (yes, the same Abraham from the Bible) as a holy site to God/Allah thousands of years before Muhammad was born. When Muslims travel to Mecca to perform the hajj they reenact important moments of their Abraham story.\n\nHowever, again according to Islamic teaching, the monotheistic and correct religion was lost to the Arabic peninsula. Eventually, idol worshippers begun using the Kaaba to store their pagan idols. \n\nSo, when Muhammad and his young Islamic community gained control of Mecca it was very important to them to destroy the idols being held in the Kaaba and (in their minds) return it to its proper use; which was to serve as a tribute to Allah/God. \n\n", "I've heard the central stone is a meteorite. I think if there was an meteor impact long ago, and curious people later discovered the rock at the bottom of an impact crater, it could seem a gift from heaven.", "There is no simple answer to this question, I'm afraid. As has already been posted on here, Islamic tradition - and the tradition at the center of the Haaj - states that it was a construction of the Prophet Abraham, who had traveled there to settle down with Hagar and Ishmael, although some stories even suggest it was a home for earlier Prophets, too. It's primary significance for a Muslim today, though - the events of the Islamic pilgrimage, or Hajj - are largely a reenactment of the events that are purported to have happened during the lifetime of Abraham, as well as the guidance of the Islamic Prophet Muhammad.\n\nThat Mecca was a holy site for quite some time before the coming of Islam is also known, and Islamic tradition itself recognizes this, too. It argues that the Arabs of the region had had their faith corrupted and had become polytheists, and the home of Abraham that had been built in Mecca - the Ka'ba - had become a shrine of veneration to the numerous Gods of the Arabian milieu. Mecca is therefore recorded as having become a holy place among the Arabs, a sanctuary (Arabic: *haram*) where the constant in-fighting and blood feuds that categorized ancient and late antique Arabia were not permitted to occur. This allowed trade to thrive, and it is argued that the worship of the many Arabian deities brought wealth to Mecca and the region. \n\nIslamic traditions also says that once the Prophet Muhammad had established his new religion in the nearby town of Medina. After successfully gaining control of Mecca, he destroyed all of the idols of the Arabian deities that had been placed by the Arabs inside the Ka'ba. The site has been the location of pilgrimage ever since, although that pilgrimage has changed and developed over the near 1400 years since its establishment, of course! The [wikipedia page on the Ka'ba](_URL_4_) is actually quite good in helping to explain some of the events that surround the Islamic hajj, and is a really great starting point for better understanding why it is important to Muslims. \n\nAside from Islamic tradition, we do know that Mecca was a site of Arabian religion prior to the coming of Islam, and work has been done to reconstruct what Arab life would have been like in the region prior to Muhammad's revelation. Robert Hoyland's [*Arabia and the Arabs*](_URL_3_) is an excellent source of information for the pre-Islamic religious traditions if you want to know more. For a more basic introduction, Karen Armstrong's early chapters [here](_URL_6_) are foundational reading that includes much of the information I've mentioned. \n\nThere is also a very clear argument to be main *against* the Islamic tradition for the practical purpose of what became the Hajj. If we can say, for instance, that the Meccan economy was thriving because of its role as a center of religion, and/or if we can say that there were Arabs in the region who were committed to the ceremonies and religious practices that already existed in Mecca, it could have been a very shrewd political move for Muhammad. To incorporate already established religious rituals and traditions into his \"new\" religion would have provided a comfortable transition for those committed to the old ways, while ensuring the local elites remained in an area shielded from warfare and where pilgrims would continue to come and spend money. \n\nAs for specifics on the building itself, we don't have great or reliable details on the condition of the structure prior to the coming of Islam. Not much else can be said there. I've mentioned this in a previous post, but the Ka'ba has actually been raided, damaged, repaired, and significantly rebuilt many times just over the 1400 years since Islam's establishment. This has included combat in the second Islamic Civil war between the Caliph [Abd al-Malik b. Marwan](_URL_5_) and another claimant, [Abd Allah b. al-Zubayr](_URL_0_) where the structure was either completely reconstructed or damaged depending on reports, a raid by the [Qarmatians](_URL_7_) in the tenth century that saw the famed \"black stone\" stolen from Mecca temporarily, and subsequent damage a number of times in the Ottoman period. An excellent source for some of the building work that has taken place around the Ka'ba and the Mosque which was built to surround it - the Masjid al-Haram - can be found [here.](_URL_2_)\n\nLastly, I think it important to mention that the the way most people think the Ka'ba looks is from pictures which almost always include the special shroud which is created to cover it, known in Arabic as *kiswa*. The structure beneath the shroud is quite [plain](_URL_1_).\n\nEdit: Clarity" ] }

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[ [], [], [], [], [ "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abd_Allah_ibn_al-Zubayr", "http://whi-a.wikispaces.com/file/view/kaaba.jpg/101457901/kaaba.jpg", "http://archnet.org/library/sites/one-site.jsp?site_id=8803", "http://www.amazon.co.uk/Arabia-Arabs-Bronze-Peoples-Ancient/dp/0415195357", "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kaaba", "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abd_al-Malik_ibn_Marwan", "http://www.amazon.com/Islam-History-Modern-Library-Chronicles/dp/081296618X", "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qarmatians" ] ]

{ "a_id": [ "cdotz81", "cdouhe9", "cdov3tk", "cdowfty", "cdoz7f2", "cdp00io", "cdp5j6n" ], "score": [ 75, 31, 7, 6, 3, 9, 13 ], "text": [ "Rhetoric scholar here. Cicero and Quintillian wrote extensively about the persuasive use of humor, and at least some of Cicero's reputation as an an orator derived from his wit. \n\nRoman jokes tend to seem [not too funny](_URL_0_) to contemporary taste, though.", "Lysistrata by Aristophones was written in 411 B.C. The title character tries to get the women of Athens and Sparta to deny sex to their husbands in order to end the Peloponnesian War. It's battle of the sexes comedy that holds up very well to modern sensibilities. To be honest, I haven't read it in many years, but when I did it had me laughing. Of course all ancient Greek theatre was divided into comedy and tragedy, both considered crutial to the culture. ", "Aristotle listed \"wittiness\" among the virtues in his *Nichmachean Ethics*, so on that basis I'd think that being funny has been considered important for a long time.\n", "The poetry of Catullus and other Roman poets from Vergil to Horace to Ovid are full of jokes as well; Martial, a bit later, is something of a master of the 'twist ending.' A couple of examples -- many Martial poems are funny, but a couple which stand out include one regarding a man who is actively courting a woman; Martial spends the brief poem listing all of the things that make the woman unpleasant, but finished by saying that her one positive attribute is that 'tussit' -- she had a cough. The joke being that the man was hoping she would die soon after he married her. Another Martial poem pokes fun at another person for 'never dining without a boar,' which is both expensive and far too much food to eat daily, but concludes by admitting that at least he 'has a good dinner-guest' since the host must, therefore, be a pig himself.\n\nPerhaps the most-quoted and beautiful of Catullus's poems is carmen 5, \"Let us live, my Lesbia, and let us love\" which often confuses first-time readers with a bit in the latter half about the number of kisses Catullus demands to avoid being cursed by those who envy his relationship; it seems clear to me that this is all a wittingly lame joke; Catullus showing off his bad pick-up lines -- \"hey baby, we got to kiss like three thousand three hundred times, because otherwise, uh, somebody might cast a spell on us? I don't know, let's make out.\" Many other Catullus jokes are more clear, but these obscure self-deprecating jokes are my favourites of his.", "[Here](_URL_1_) are a few more. According to [Reuters](_URL_0_) the oldest known joke is Sumerian from ~1900BC: \"Something which has never occurred since time immemorial; a young woman did not fart in her husband's lap.\" I'd guess they wouldn't find our jokes (that they understood) funny either. So perhaps humour is relative.", "I'm studying for my PhD in the history of humour, primarily in 16th century Germany, but my research has brought be throughout much of time and many places. I'll keep this short because I've got a thesis' worth of research and I don't have the time to put it all in to comments, but feel free to ask follow up questions and I'll try to answer them if I can.\n\nHumour goes through phases of being valued and reviled. Matthew Innes notes that in Thegan, Louis the Pious only smiled rather than laughed, when his fool interrupted his Easter celebration. Perhaps this was because it was unseemly for an emperor to outright laugh? At the same time Rudolf of Fulda's 'Life of Leoba' notes that Leoba was often cheerful but never went in to fits of extreme laughter. Bursts of uncontrolled emotion were seen as weak willed and unchristian.\n\nIn the 16th century, printing was in full swing, literacy rates in cities boomed, and books such as Schwanksammelungen and Volksbuecher were popular in the Holy Roman Empire, the former were often owned by the emerging middle class. These contain what are essentially small funny stories and anecdotes, usually laughing about how stupid peasants are or how raunchy a priest was.\n\nFor an idea in to the history of humour, look up Guy Halsall's 'Humour, History and Politics in Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages', and Keith Cameron's 'Humour and History'.\n\nEdit: Here's a joke from the 'Rollwagenbuechlin' by Wickram, published first in 1555. Translations my own:\n\n**Of a mercenary and \"Lord God, protect us\"**\n\nIn Switzerland, near Zurich, a mercenary went to an inn, he greeted the host, \nand the host allowed him to stay.\n\nFor supper, the landlord had presented the mercenary with a sour wine,\nwhich turned out to be from a nauseous year;\n\nwhen people drank it, they said “Lord God, protect us, as the wine is so sour!”\n\nso that the wine of this year became known as: 'Lord God, protect us'.\n\nNow when the mercenary sought to eat and have the sour wine, he said:\n\n“By jove! Landlord, this wine is so sour!”\n\nThe host replied “Our wines are such that they are only good in old age.”\n\nThe mercenary said: “Host, if this wine was so old that it was on crutches, it wouldn't do it any good.”", "I have two answers for you. One is very general based on my impressions from studying history (and is mostly personal conjecture), the other quite specific to my area.\n\n**General:** The nature of what is considered humorous changes enormously throughout different regions and time periods, but I don’t think that there has ever been a time in which “being funny” wasn’t valued in day-to-day social interactions, provided that your jokes conform to the zeitgeist of humour for that particular period, decade, year, region, social class, etc. Also keep in mind that day-to-day social interactions are not the same as pieces of art or writing, and there are plenty of instances of satires, plays, or novels being censored despite a large readership finding them funny.\n\n**Specific:** In relation to your question about differences in social classes and whether the “upper crust” is more humourless, my own research on libertines can be illuminating. I’d like to point you to English Restoration and the court of [Charles II](_URL_0_) as an example of a period in which fairly bawdy humour, stuff that we would considered unseemly today, was valued at the highest levels of society.\n\nThe typical historical narrative for this period is that after the oppressive moral Puritanism of Cromwell’s commonwealth, the reinstatement of the English monarchy brought about a period of general social liberalism that allowed for humour to become pervasive in public discourse. Regardless of how true this is, there’s no question that during the Restoration English literature and theater was obsessed with the idea of wit or witticism as being an extremely valuable trait to possess. This strong desire to demonstrate intelligence and humour in speech/writing frequently led to very risqué statements, often mingling politics and sexuality.\n\nThis carried over into the court of Charles II, composed mostly of nobles, who all aspired to win the affection of their peers and the King through displays of wit in speech, poetry, or writing. None were more successful than [John Wilmot, the 2nd Earl of Rochester](_URL_1_), probably the most definitively libertine figure there is.\n\nRochester is best known today for his poetry, which was never intended for publication and usually written on a manuscript that was passed around and copied by members of the court and parliament, something I think makes him a particularly good example of the “day-to-day” humour of the nobility. While he produced excellent works using standardized poetic formats with reference to Greek classics etc. It’s his obscene works that are most notable, and also most topical to the period. They directly referenced members of the courts and their entourage with scathing satire.\n\n\nIt’s difficult for me to describe quite how hilarious, edgy, and crude this guy could be. In one poem he dedicates to Sue Willis, a prostitute who operated around the King’s court, he says:\n\n*Her belly is a bag of turds*\n\n*And her cunt a common shore.*\n\nOccasionally he would even target the King himself and this got him exiled from court repeatedly. One of my favourite lines attacking Charles II is:\n\n*His scepter and his prick are of a length,*\n\n*And she may sway the one who plays with th' other.*\n\nHis life reflects his writing, despite being highly educated and showing bravery in several naval battles, he lived a debauched and hedonistic lifestyle until an early death in his thirties from venereal disease.\n\n\nRochester combined real poetic eloquence with crudity and humour in a way that enchanted and infuriated many members of the nobility and made him infamous. Both his obscene poems and his serious works show genuine brilliance and even depict fairly melancholic human truths, and there’s no question that he embodied the English Restoration's obsession with wit and witticism. Consequently I think Rochester and the court of Charles II is a really good example of humour being a “day-to-day” social function of nobility.\n\nKeep in mind that everything I described in my general answer still applies to Rochester. Only 70 years after his death, moralists like Samuel Johnson decried Rochester as wasting his talents, being a dissolute rake, and someone not suitable to be read, and he was almost entirely ignored throughout the Victorian era. Humour seems to me a product of taste, and subject to the whim of societies that constantly shift and change. But that also means I'm confident there are many other examples of humour being similarly prized by the upper crust of those societies even while in public. The parliamentary quips of Winston Churchill and Lady Astor come to mind. I hope you get lots of responses!\n\nMy information for this post comes mostly from the David Vieth collection of Rochester’s poems, published by Yale University Press in 2002. It’s the most well-researched and thorough collection I’ve found to date.\n\nIf you want to read more about the court of Charles II, Matthew Jenkinson’s “Culture and Politics at the Court of Charles II, 1660-1685” cannot be beat. For more information on Rochester’s contemporaries the book “Libertines and Radicals in Early Modern London: Sexuality, Politics, and Literary Culture, 1630-1685” by James Grantham Turner is your best bet. Turner is the definitive scholar of libertinism and (I’d argue) Rochester.\n\nFor anyone who wants to read more about the Restoration rock-star, Rochester's poems should all be available online. I think the following verses best depict his unique blend of crudity/eloquence.\n\n* *The Imperfect Enjoyment* – about a time he prematurely ejaculated\n\n* *The Disabled Debauchee* – hoping he can cheer on young rakes when he’s old and gross\n\n* *A Ramble in St. James’s Park* – account of a night in London and philosophizing on love\n\n* *A Satyr on Reason and Mankind* – Pokes fun at anyone who would obey reason above nature" ] }

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[ [ "http://www.theguardian.com/culture/charlottehigginsblog/2009/apr/03/classics" ], [], [], [], [ "http://uk.reuters.com/article/2008/07/31/uk-britain-joke-life-idUKL129052420080731", "http://www.theguardian.com/books/2009/mar/13/roman-joke-book-beard" ], [], [ "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_II_of_England", "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Wilmot,_2nd_Earl_of_Rochester" ] ]

{ "a_id": [ "cyjojd6", "cyk7hm9" ], "score": [ 3, 2 ], "text": [ "There's always room for discussion, but perhaps the sections [Drinking Water](_URL_1_) and [Beer](_URL_0_) from our FAQ will answer your inquiry.", "One thing to keep in mind is that Cholera, one of the more severe pathogens spread through contaminated drinking water, isn't believed to have spread out of the Indian subcontinent until the 18th or 19th century, so medieval European peasants had that going for them. (Source: _URL_0_). " ] }

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[ [ "https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/wiki/health#wiki_beer", "https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/wiki/health#wiki_drinking_water" ], [ "http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs107/en/" ] ]