Humans are superstitious creatures by nature, with many strange habits that seem entirely illogical. We avoid walking under ladders or opening umbrellas indoors in fear of bad luck. We knock on wood to prevent disappointment. We shun the number 13 and we can’t quite decide whether black cats are good or bad omens. None of these actions makes much practical sense, and the same is true for a range of superstitions involving food. Food is a necessity that keeps us functioning and alive, but ...| History Facts
Septuplets are seven siblings born at the same time; a septennium is a period of seven years; and September is the… ninth month of the year. What gives? As you may expect, “sept” is a prefix with Latin roots that means “seven,” and it didn’t end up at the beginning of the word “September” by accident. The month of September was originally part of the Roman republican calendar, which was used in ancient Rome for hundreds of years before the debut of the Julian calendar in 46 BC...| History Facts
Edinburgh Castle, where Scottish monarchs lived for hundreds of years, sits atop an imposing rock outcropping called Castle Rock. Along with the Royal Mile, a hilly thoroughfare gently sloping down one side of the castle, it’s one of Scotland’s biggest tourist attractions. But for a long time, it was just an incredibly convenient rock, from a defensive standpoint, with sheer cliffs along three sides. Ancient people started using it in the Bronze Age, and flattened its top around 900 BCE....| History Facts
As you might imagine, the Austro-Turkish Wars took place between what are now Austria and Turkey. This being between the 16th and 18th centuries, however, the official belligerents were the Habsburg monarchy and the Ottoman Empire. Perhaps the most (in)famous skirmish of that conflict didn’t involve both sides, though. What’s been called “history’s worst friendly fire incident” was officially known as the Battle of Karánsebes and took place in present-day Romania on the night of Se...| History Facts
Most of us, at some point, have probably seen a scattering of strange coins — perhaps at a yard sale or tucked away in a dusty drawer — and asked ourselves, “I wonder if those are worth anything?” For many of us, that’s about as close as we get to the fascinating world of coin collecting, or, to give it its technical name, numismatics. But there are plenty of proper numismatists out there. According to data from CivicScience, 38% of U.S. adults have collected coins at some point dur...| History Facts
Falling between the heyday of the Western Roman Empire and the onset of the Renaissance, the Middle Ages have an unflattering reputation as something of a backward epoch of human civilization. Wars raged across Europe, serfs toiled in backbreaking service to feudal lords, and diseases wiped out villages with little hope of preventing the next outbreak. While the negative connotations may not be entirely fair, few would dispute that medieval citizens lived in more primitive conditions than the...| History Facts
Eminent Domain Part 2: Use in Early AmericaYou are here:HomeHistoryEraOtherEminent Domain Part 2: Use… Eminent domain is the right of the state to seize the private property of an individual for a public purpose with just compensation. This is the second article in a series of three. This article will discuss the use of eminent| The West End Museum – Boston's Neighborhood Museum
| The West End Museum
The Mongol Empire was the largest contiguous land empire in human history. It encompassed 9 million square miles at its peak, with some estimates placing its population as high as 100 million people — about 25% of the world at the time. And while Genghis Khan tends to receive most of the credit for that, he didn’t do it alone. There was also Subutai, a Mongol general who conquered 32 nations. Indeed, many sources claim Subutai conquered more land than anyone else in history, including suc...| History Facts
Although it still exists, the telegraph has been all but forgotten in a world dominated by instant digital messaging, relegated to the archives of 20th-century institutions alongside the corner phone booth and the horse and buggy. Yet there was a time when this form of communication was the best and most efficient way to deliver a message across significant distances. Western Union, the largest provider of the service, logged more than 200 million telegrams sent in its peak year of 1929. Give...| History Facts
War is full of logistical challenges, one of the major concerns — in conflicts both ancient and modern — being how to feed the armies doing the fighting. Whether it’s Roman legionaries, British Redcoats, or modern infantry, soldiers have always needed a reliable supply of food to maintain both their energy levels and morale. As the old saying goes, “An army marches on its stomach.” Military rations have existed since at least the time of ancient Rome, when soldiers received 2 poun...| History Facts
Zhang Xueliang and Chiang Kai-shek, 1930 In 2001, a man named Zhang Xueliang passed away of pneumonia in a Honolulu hospital at the age of one hundred. He was a man most famously known as “th…| Goldwag's Journal on Civilization
The Middle Ages weren’t just shaped by monarchs and wars — they were lived by everyday people whose names appear in the records they left behind. Parish registers, royal charters, tax rolls, and literature give us a glimpse into the history of common names in medieval England and other parts of Europe and what they meant to the people who carried them. Some of the most valuable insights about what people were called, and why, come from medieval books created specifically to record names. ...| History Facts
If you’ve been reading this blog for any length of time, you’ll know that maps and history are two of my favorite things. I love history because I love learning about the vast panoply of the human …| Goldwag's Journal on Civilization
The flag version of the Ukrainian Special Operations Forces cap badge (Wikimedia) In 2019 Ukraine’s Special Operations Command officially adopted a new unit patch featuring the head of a wolf with …| The BS Historian
I’ve just come across this cool piece of art on Facebook (I like the use of the memento mori as used on period headstones) with the following Revolutionary War quote above it; “…the shi…| The BS Historian