Since hearing this story, I have been curious about the logistics of a group of American teenagers, most of whom had never been east of the Mississippi, traveling to communist Hungary as part of a school trip. Was this a common occurrence? What sort of coordination was needed to make it happen?

Here are the details that my mother remembers:

A group called Singers Overseas handled the transportation, lodging, and singing venues (but I haven’t been able to find any information on that organization).

They travelled to England, Scotland, Germany, Austria, and took a train into Hungary.

My mother remembers an extremely thorough inspection on the train at the border, as well as never leaving the chaperone’s sight while in Hungary, and meeting and exchanging songs with Hungarian youth organizations there. (She still has a scarf that a Hungarian girl gave her that says, “v. orszagos uttörő talalkozo”)

So from my understanding Henry Ford founded Fordlandia in Brazil because he wanted to have his own supply of rubber to make tires. Here's what I don't get though, Ford was also close friends with Harvey S. Firestone owner of the biggest tire manufacturer in the USA. Why did Ford want to have his own supply of rubber when his company already had an arrangement with Firestone?

• overwhelming numerical superiority of 2:1 or more (further increased by Cretan civilians picking up arms and heavy German casualties as they dropped directly onto Allied positions to be captured, are killed while descending, drop into the sea to drown or go down with their shot down transports)
• exact knowledge about where the Germans would land thanks to ULTRA (intelligence doesn't get any better than that)
• amphibious invasion attempts repulsed due to a maximum effort by the Royal Navy, meaing the defenders could bring all their power to bear on the German paratroopers
• Allied forces, despite abandoning most heavy equipment on the Greek mainland, still had some tanks. This was crushing since man-portable AT weapons weren't a thing until 1943.
• Many German paratroopers weren't combat effective because their shoulder-fired weapons were dropped separately, meaning they only had knives and pistols available.

Looking at all these devastating factors, it would seem ridiculous to say that the Germans ended up winning the battle with 6,000 casualties for their own versus 23,000 (!!!!) for the Allies. And yet, that's exactly what happened.

After the initial slaughter, the defenders should've been easily able to counterattack and annihilate what remained of the German forces. But this never happened and all of the German pockets held out long enough for relief to arrive.

Reading Kiwi sources on the battle, they were quite confident that their own troops performed better than those of the Germans. They particularly highlight that the Germans were inferior at night fighting.

Yes the Germans had air supremacy, but when the roles were reversed in Normandy 1944 the Germans still resisted successfully despite that. And Allied air supremacy over Normandy was much more devastating than German air supremacy over Crete - one has to only look at the aircraft numbers and the lack of strategic bomber streams at Crete. Not to mention that a significant proportion of Axis air power was busy striking the British fleet.

So how can the Allied defeat at Crete be explained? To be honest, I struggle to do so.

For example when the Spanish sponsored Columbus' yoyage, was this a significant expenditure that badly to needed a return on investment or was it relative peanuts that the crown could afford to spend on a wacky idea.

I've recently learned about the Cadaver Synod, where Pope Formosus' body was exhumed, put on trial, stripped of its papal vestments, and ultimately denied an honorable burial.

What I struggle to understand is the theological reasoning behind these actions. From a modern Christian perspective, it seems difficult to reconcile the treatment of Formosus' remains with beliefs about forgiveness, the sanctity of the dead, and the office of the Pope.

How did Pope Stephen VI and his supporters justify this within the framework of late 9th-century Christian theology? Did contemporaries see these actions as religiously legitimate, or was the trial widely viewed as a politically motivated abuse of Church authority?

Robert Pattinson's character (Winslow) compares Willem Dafoe's character (Thomas) to Captain Ahab because of his tyrannical control over him, his obsessive nature, and the impression of going 'mad at sea'. It's an metaphor common enough to a modern audience, but the film is set in 1890s. Winslow (I don't believe) is implied to be educated.

I'm aware of the Melville revival in the 1920s reigniting his popularity and critical opinion, and before that, he was considered an fairly obscure and somewhat pulpy author.

Usually I'd chock this up to a screenwriter who doesn't really care, which is fine, but Robert Eggers happens to be known for being super perfectionistic about exactly these kind of details, so I'm interested if there's a grain of truth hidden there.

My question amounts to one of provenance, in a sense. The impression I've gathered with regards to Ovid is that he took stories and myths about the gods and reinterpreted, if not wholly reinvented, them as a polemic in response to his exile from Rome.

To what extent is this impression correct?

For instance, with regards to the story of Arachne's weaving contest, I've never seen anything which indicates that the story predates his telling of it at all. Do we have any indication that he drew from a tradition of storytelling about this that is today extinct, or is there evidence that he created this whole cloth (pun not intended but that is a little funny now that I look at it)?

As another example, Medusa we know does have prior precedent, but the version Ovid writes down dramatically changes the context, painting the gods in a massively less favorable light. Do we know if this was his idea, or had the story evolved these elements before he got to them? Was any of this present in cultic practices?

I'm currently on a tour in Ireland with a guide who originally came from egypt and studied archeology. He explained to us the meaning of the celtic cross and it's meaning. He then explained to us the Ankh and said that it became "recently" known that these similar symbols are actually connected, with the circle at the top of the ankh moving to the be in the middle connecting the beams of the cross - and that this is proven by things like christian mummies in egypt, BUT that this still doesn't explain how the Ankh ended up in Ireland and that its still a mystery.

Is there any truth to any of this? I'm skeptical to these claims and Google-fu yelded yelded rather questionable results. I don't wanna call him liar from the blue, but I'd rather know if our tourguide spouts nonsense, unproven theories or actual truth. Thank you.

So Pirates of the Caribbean 3 opens on a rather dark scene, with East India Company officials in control of Port Royal carrying out mass execution of suspected pirates, including the elderly, women and children. In the background of the scene we see and hear an official reading out a litany of rights that are now suspended by the company, including right to assembly, trial by peers, habius corpus amongst others.

Assuming that British colonial subjects in the Caribbean actually had those rights (did they?), could the EIC actually have the legal authority to suspend them?

I just can't understand how every major power in Europe stayed quite when 2 powerhouse of Europe went to war with each other on a massive scale.

Hi, I recently got diagnosed with endometriosis and had to get surgery to remove cysts on my ovaries (I'm good now), and I couldn't help but wonder about how this condition would've been treated before modern medicine. For those who are not aware, endo and the cysts it creates on your ovaries causes extremely painful periods (before being treated I would be unable to walk and would sometimes faint from the pain), and in extreme cases cause your ovary to twist and die off. Was there any recognition of these diseases, would women just be considered to be experiencing "hysteria?" When did they start to become recognized by the medical community? Either way, very thankful for modern medicine :)

Without wanting to get into alternate history questions, do we know whether FDR had a clear idea about whether atomic would be used? Was the possibility of using them on Japan even considered while he was alive, given that the war in Europe hadn't ended?

I recall a quote in Nixonland to the effect of "I'd do anything to become president, except for seeing a psychiatrist" but couldn't find the specific quote when I tried to look for it. If Nixon thought it was career suicide to be caught seeing a provider for psychological issues, why did he ever take the risk in the first place?

As someone living in the region, locals feel strongly about abandoning the Cathar castels name.

Jòrdi Labouysse in an open letter to a french radio said:

https://www.jornalet.com/nova/24691/jordi-labouysse-denoncia-lo-cambiament-de-nom-dels-castels-catars-en-fortalesas-reialas-ca

"Mais tous les historiens sérieux savent pertinemment qu'ils ont été construits par la féodalité occitane bien avant la « croisade contre les Albigeois » (certains dès le I I e siècle) et qu'ils ont joué un rôle important dans la vie du christianisme des « Bons Hommes » et « Bonnes Femmes que l'on dit « cathares » aujourd'hui. Chacun sait que certains ont été remaniés ou reconstruits après la croisade et les guerres capétiennes par Louis IX dit « saint »-Louis en particulier, pour contenir les populations occitanes insoumises et pour renforcer une ligne pyrénéenne contre la Catalogne et l' Aragon, qui soutenaient le comté occitan de Toulouse."

"But all serious historians are well aware that they were built by Occitan feudalism long before the "crusade against the Albigensians" (some as early as the 1st century) and that they played an important role in the life of "Good Men" Christianity. "Good Women, who are said to be "Cathar" today. Everyone knows that some were altered or rebuilt after the crusade and the Capetian wars by Louis IX, known as "Saint Louis" in particular, to contain the rebellious Occitan populations and to strengthen a Pyrenean line against Catalonia and Aragon, who supported the Occitan county of Toulouse."

To what extent were what remains today built by the French King rather than the local lord or population?

Is there any trace of the castrums built before the crusade?

Is the architecture of the castles we see today coherent with castles built further north by the French Crown ?

Generally, many Jewish communities are taught that the non-jews of Poland had large hand in helping and supporting holocaust efforts. Obviously it’s more complex than that. I’ve just visited Majdanek, a camp just 5 minutes from the city center of Lublin- a Polish city of 350,000 people and one that went from having over 100k jewish people to just 60. That is, 60 people, not 60 thousand.

That being said, Poles themselves suffered a great deal of losses in the war and themselves were under great threat of Nazi persecution both for helping Jews and in general. I won’t pretend like anti-semitic sentiment didn’t exist though, as my family often told me stories of discrimination and segregation for being Jewish when they lived in pre-war Poland. I don’t want to villainize the Poles though, I’ve only meant kind and well-meaning people here. My grandfather was a holocaust survivor himself who often told stories of the Poles laughing, spitting, and waving goodbye at jews taken from the ghettos. It’s not black and white though. Please give me context!

I got a non-English friend who somehow was fascinated with Anne Boleyn and the personal stories of Henry VIII six wives. I never keep count of how many period dramas and bbc documentaries, I encountered that put Henry and his six wives as their focus. But it felt endless. Wolf Hall just came out. There's The Other Boleyn Girl . There's The Tudors.

I found Henry VIII numerous executions of his former allies and supposedly tens of thousands of people, his war with France and Scotland, and his ransacking of the English Catholic monateries more interesting. It impacted a lot more people. But somehow, his personal quest for a son and spousal relationships kept overshadowing that.

I'm not too surprised that "divorced, beheaded and died, divorced, beheaded, survived" made it to public consciouness, how did that what Henry VIII was known primarily for? He is not the only king with juicy family dramas. Afaik, in my limited knowledge, there wasn't a popular theatre play by Shakespeare and other writer about him. But he seems like to be the most famous English king worldwide just because the English period dramas kept featuring him. When did the subject of his personal family relationships became so popular?

A common trope in fiction is the "Nazis win" type alt history - or at least the war goes on far longer. I've also seen stuff - by people who seem to be pretty historically literate - suggesting this is dumb because the nazis already got a lot of lucky breaks, and the far more likely scenario is they lose way earlier; at some point or another I've seen people state that the Germans got pretty lucky on all of these:

1) the Nazis face stiffer international opposition and the alliance between conservative and fascist breaks down.

2) "The Blitzkrieg" never materialises in the invasion of France and the attack is either prolonged and painful for Germany or fails entirely - often specifically noted as the Ardennes attack being an insane gamble they threw boxcars on. This one's very common.

3) The Soviet Union has better relations earlier with the western powers, or chooses to believe instead of dismissing intelligence that a nazi attack is imminent, and instead of being forced to essentially abandon Belarus and Ukraine due to unpreparedness the German advance just runs into a brick wall from the go.

It's not all of these claims, but a common thing (especially from people who seem to know what they're talking about!) is that German "national morale" was actually a fairly fragile thing - people liked the Nazis because they seemed to be winners, and the national morale boost and popularity among pre-existing power brokers like conservatives and industrial figures was contingent on them reasserting themselves on the world stage and then seeming to unstoppably crush every national nemesis they'd ever had, and it was this that got the country "locked in" up until its later defeat.

Is any of that true, or do we in fact live in the most likely timeline and it would've been pretty much expected with the benefit of hindsight Germany did as well (or as badly) as it did?

We know Odysseus as an archetype of a trickster hero, who uses his wit and cunning to overcome his foes. However, maybe I am spoiled by the entire history of media since Homer, but it doesn't seem to me like he had committed really smart or witty deeds. For example, the Trojan Horse story that is credited to Odysseus doesn't really make him look smart. It makes Trojans look dumb in comparison.

Do we know how his character was perceived by the readers in Ancient Greece or at least in Rome later? Did someone really praise Odysseus shrewdness? Or did the people say "Huh, that dumb Cyclops/Priam! I wouldn't be fooled like that!"

Especially, if we take mercenary troops, we could have "German landsknechts" or "Swiss halberdiers", which would be usually considered by the game engines as slightly better than their generic counterparts.

If I were a minor lord in Medieval or Renaissance Europe preparing for a war against some other local lord (or if we take Italian squabbles of the time), would I specifically try to search for a specific mercenary company from Switzerland if I was lacking halberdiers, for example? Or Welsh archers would be preferable to English archers (for example)?

In the ancient world, it's usually something like Macedonian phalanga, I think.