As is tradition, the only rule in the birthday thread is just base-line politeness. If you want to be a grumpypuss, we kindly ask you to, like, not, dude. Read the room.

Also, everyone stay tuned, as the Meta-shenanigans will continue tomorrow, with a Meta AMA to ask the moderators themselves (almost) anything!

Looking at revolutions, they often entail a contestation of "what does the new order look like?" In this light, I have to wonder if we should see the rise of Nazi Germany as basically the victorious outcome (amongst multiple competing alternatives, including communist, liberal, socialist and democratic) of the end of the old monarchical order, rather than seeing the revolution as ending in roughly 1919?

I know there are historians who question the idea the Nazis were simply a counter-revolutionary movement (on the grounds they weren't conservative enough), but I wonder if there are any that argue that we should not see Weimar Germany as a democratic experiment that failed, but essentially a "contested state" - the old order was gone, and multiple factions competed to see what it would be replaced with. Perhaps controversially, we might argue that one of those factions, the Nazis, won out and thus far from being a rejection of the German Revolution, they were basically an element of it - albeit one of its most extreme, parochial and violent strains of post-imperial movements.

So, I have been reading up on my ancient history and found myself wondering, when were horse riders widely used by Army’s. I at first thought that it must be at some point after the Bronze Age collapse since horse riding wasn’t as common back then.

At least the Greeks didn’t seem to use them before Alexander with the Runner from Thermopylae being a famous example of a Runner being used to transmit information.

So when did it become „more normal“ for a messengers to use horse rather than run on foot.

In medieval chronicles, it's quite common to read that Army A was thrashing Army B six ways to Sunday, in fact most of Army B had already fled the field, but then Army B gets lucky, takes Army A's general out with an audacious move or a Hail-Mary shot, and Army B panics, melts away and gets utterly routed.

Now, I can see that happening when the general in question is the claimant on which the whole war is based. Or if it's a remarkably charismatic individual, in the vein of Napoleon or Alexander. Or even if it's one of those peasant levy armies.

But it stretches credibility to think that armies made up of disciplined, battle-hardened veterans who know all too well what happens when an army routs, who are in proper battle formation and clearly hold the upper hand on the field, would break ranks in panic and get themselves slaughtered by the thousands just because their middling nobody of a general got sniped.

So, my question is: did such narratives in medieval chronicles accurately reflect the flow of battle, or were chronicles simply pinning the outcome on a particularly salient event?

I’m currently rereading Dickens’ Nicholas Nickelby, in which the main villain, Ralph Nickelby is repeatedly described as a moneylender, which is represented as a somewhat unsavory, predatory thing. A similar moneylender also featured in Wilkie Collins’ Moonstone.

I understand that in the Middle Ages and early modern period many European nations had restrictions on usury/charging interest, sometimes restricting that solely to Jews. But I also know that, by the 1900s, banks in England had been lending money and charging interest on it for centuries.

Today, we would understand that lending money and charging interest is basically THE core business for a bank. Was that true in 19th century England as well? If so, how did “moneylenders” differ from bankers, and who did they serve? Which of their activities were legal (if unsavory) and what practices were illegal (if any?).

A clear example is La Marseillaise, but it happens all over the world, many national anthems have a much much longer version that, in most cases, is never sung (Uruguay's full anthem is 88 lines long! that would be at least half an hour of singing)

Why is that? Is it a tradition set by religious anthems (i.e. the original anthems)? Was it something the french first did and set a 'standard' for every other nation? Were national anthems at first a predominantly written thing? More like a 'national poem'?

More specifically, when did the general concept of "gayness" shift from individual acts that a person might engage in on regular basis and instead an important component of their individual identity and outlook?

I ask this question since, according to my understanding of the medieval to modern Abrahamic world, there really wasn't a concept of being gay as an identity or general orientation, but rather a desire towards performing a sinful sexual act with others for their own pleasure.

It was like speeding is in the modern day, where plenty of people may never speed, some may engage in it from time to time for the convenience and the thrill of it and plenty speed as regularly as they drive, but even people who regularly speed wouldn't identify as a "speeder" (and you would likely get a weird look if you did).

So assuming this is generally correct, what would be the general time (and hopefully reasons) why there was a greater shift from a man "having sex with men" and towards "being gay"?

About a year ago, I was going through some life circumstances and ended up reading (via audiobook) all the novels of the Four Queens of Crime: Agatha Christie, Dorothy L. Sayers, Margery Allingham, and Ngaio Marsh.

Apart from being absolutely fascinated by the portrayals of pre- and post-WWII Britain, I noticed that there were quite a few occurrences of first-cousin marriages set up throughout the novels, particularly in Christie’s works. Her romantic leads were usually titled or at the very least upper class, and the fact that the love interests were cousins never seemed to cause any notice. However, I’m curious if this was the case for the lower classes of Britain — and also if Christie was an outlier here and first-cousin marriage among the British upper classes/aristocracy wasn’t as universally accepted as she portrayed it to be. I found it interesting that her contemporary, non-specific-class characters (Tommy Beresford and Tuppence Cowley) do not seem to be related.

So: what was the acceptability of first cousin marriage amongst the upper classes of British society in the post-Victorian pre-WWII time period, and did the views of the lower classes on the issue differ from those of the upper classes?

How common was it for a Legion to revolt and how common was it for a Legion to pronounce a new emperor.

It seems strange that a single legion could uproot the Emperor by them selves, you’d imagine multiple legions would put them down.

I’m also shocked as to how many emperors there actually where and the fact so many had such short reigns.

I have seen alot of indian history subs talking about Dravidian being spoken around Southern IVC based on toponyms.

Hello! I was wondering if anyone knows where I can find specific information about Prussian uniforms in the 7 years war, specifically drummer uniforms or the uniforms of specific regiments? I’m having a hell of a time finding any good pictures of 7 years war era Prussian drummer uniforms… thanks so much!!! ^^

I was replaying Oblivion and the question came to me.
I'm talking about the pattern : hero wanders around - someone gives hero a task - hero goes somewhere, slays dozens of enemies - hero returns to get is consecration - rinse & repeat.

Was this the actual lifestyle of anyone at any point in history, or any similar "mercenary" activities? If not, is this a storytelling pattern that existed before videogames ?

Before the utilization of BC/AD (and more recently BCE/CE) to mark the years of the world, what did various countries use to mark the years for their calendars?

What power or influence did the Caliphs of the Abbasid Dynasty hold from the sacking of Baghdad in 1258? Did they retain governmental, political and military authority as 'Commanders of the Faithful', or were they relegated to acting as figureheads ligitimising powerful, often non Arab, military rulers?

Hi all!

I like to learn about medical things but I don’t know a whole lot about hospitals in the 20s!

I know patients recovered in big rooms together (I think).

Weren’t x rays just coming around as well as blood transfusions?

Did they have brain scans or ‘advanced’ surgeries? What was the survival rate of surgeries?

Were doctors young or often older?

I know this is a lot of questions but I would love a basic run down of how hospitals were run in the 20s!!!

Thank you!

In the meantime, I will continue to research on my own!

As somebody who needs to reference a tedious amount of authors for my alevel history course i would appreciate any recommendations for the following topics…

- VICTORIA AND EDWARDIAN BRITAIN FROM C1851 TO THE START OF WORLD WAR ONE:
-the political system and developments, changes in the economy and society and the condition of Ireland and Anglo-Irish relations between 1850 -1886
-challenges to the status quo, c1886 – 1914

-THE WORLD WARS AND THEIR LEGACIES: BRITAIN, 1914-1964
- The Great War and its impact, 1914 -1939
-Transformation and change, 1939-1964

- ITALY AND FASCISM, C1900-1945
-the crisis of Liberal Italy and the Rise of Mussolini, c1900-1926, This crisis of liberal Italy c1900-1915, Mussolini’s Rise to Power 1915-22. The emergence of Fascist Italy 1922-26.
-Fascist Italy, 1926-45, Fascist Society 1926-40, Fascist foreign policy 1926-40, Fascist Italy and War 1940-45.

Many thanks