#instant history

[kenzan-brainrot-mp4]

I am absolutely OBSESSED with Okita's expressions in this scene

some close-ups :)

[solar-eclipsed]

The Birth of a Star

(The Birth of a Ghost)

[ohwatson]

love when they’re married tm

[anghraine]

I was talking to my students and then some family members about how the death of Elizabeth I and succession of James was necessarily an occasion of upheaval, even when it wasn't necessarily violent or flirting with treason or whatever. For one, the death of a monarch that will lead to a new dynasty (even a related one!) is not quite the same as a familiar figure inheriting the country's rule from their parent or grandparent. It's usually a bigger change, with dynamics of loyalties and affiliations shifting around—that's part of the reason Elizabeth delayed acknowledging James as her heir.

Typically, you'd see courtiers etc deserting a dying monarch in order to signal their loyalty to the new monarch, even if the old one wasn't actually dead yet. Elizabeth's reluctance to share royal power was fundamental to her reign and her public image, so it's not at all surprising that she would be loath to encourage that kind of desertion in any particular direction.

Of course, another thing that complicates the Elizabeth -> James succession is that she had reigned for a long time (44 years iirc). By the time she was dying, a good number of English people had few personal memories of life under any other monarch, and those who did would remember the abrupt and unstable reigns of her predecessors, Edward and Mary. So James's accession came with uncertainty about what exactly it would entail, and a lot of late Elizabethan/early Jacobean drama in English is very concerned with questions of what obligations the governed owe to their monarchs (obedience? loyalty? are those always the same thing?), but also what obligations monarchs themselves have to their people.

This seemed especially pertinent to Lear, in which multiple characters defy capricious orders from a monarch or other authority out of loyalty: Kent challenges Lear and is banished, so skulks around in disguise to continue serving him, Edgar also skulks around in disguise after Gloucester renounces him and ends up offering what comfort he can to his father, and Cordelia returns to Britain with the French army in her ultimately futile attempt to help Lear. Meanwhile, Lear loses everything, is driven to take shelter in a peasant hovel, and starts to contemplate how his own failures as a king resulted in, well, peasant hovels.

Anyway, now I'm thinking about what a wild figure Elros must have been as, specifically, a monarch to the Númenóreans. He lived for five hundred years. Even his own children (also half-Elves! sort of!) and other descendants who benefited from his lifespan didn't live as long, and most Númenóreans during his earlier reign wouldn't have come near to it. Undoubtedly there were Elves who had known Elros in the First Age who were baffled at him choosing mortality and DEATH, and meanwhile on Númenor, there are all these people living out their extended lifespans under the reign of a half-Elf king who was ruling their people at their birth and would still be ruling after they died of old age. We know Elros retained his half-Elvish characteristics as well, so they've got this visibly Elvish, barely-aging, eternal king who looks like Lúthien as part of the fabric of life for centuries.

Yes, he's literally the first king—but for a lot of earlier Númenóreans, he's also the only king they will ever know. It takes him an incredibly long time to weary of the world as other mortals do. By the time Elros finally gets weary of Arda, and willingly lays down his life and passes to the unknown fate of mortals, Tar-Amandil is stepping into some very big shoes.

[marcobodtlives]

My Roman Empire this, my Roman Empire that,

Well they’re my Burning of the Library of Alexandria

[aro-culture-is]

Aro culture is drinking mushroom coffee

Okay, technically the storebought coffee alternative I'm drinking right now is a drink mix made from mushrooms versus actual mushroom coffee. But for simplification sake it's mushroom coffee :]

huh, neat!

[marzipanandminutiae]

i'd love to learn just how victorian rational dress reformists would react at contemporary feminine hairstyles!

...in a similar line of thought do we have any records about their opinions on the Practicality of little girls hair or even the 20's bob (if some lived to see it)?

I'm not sure!

One of their biggest beefs with hair in their own time was often with hairpieces: false buns, curls, bangs/fringes, etc. used to augment one's natural hair. I'm not sure if they felt it weighed the head down or the extra pins were uncomfortable or what, but they didn't like it. false hair still exists, but its popularity has vastly waned. so maybe they'd think we had solved some issues- though long hair worn loose all the time would probably be seen as Hampering to women's daily activity

You do see some advocacy for short hair as an easier and sometimes healthier (??) option, but more often I've seen artistic and/or Dress Reform-oriented women with short hair who said nothing about it. You also have men who are...clearly just into ladies with short hair writing long Ye Olde Thinkpieces about how great it is. I mean, no shame there, I guess- everyone has their Thing. And while short hair on women was unusual, the Victwardians didn't seem to regard it with the same massive distrust and hand-wringing as conservative commentators of the 1920s did. Perhaps because it was less widespread?

The idea that little girls not only could have short hair but should was fairly common throughout the 19th century, obviously with variations. Similar reasoning was in play to that you might expect nowadays: that it was easier to care for, and that an active child wouldn't be hindered by it. there was also an idea, similar to that which led some women's hair to be cut off during serious illness, that short hair kept the head cooler and prevented or lowered fevers. I've actually read an admonition to keep children's hair short for just that reason in a book from the 1830s- The Ladies' Medical Oracle, by Elizabeth Mott. obviously this wasn't universal- see also: the original Alice in Wonderland illustrations, although it's worth noting that the real Alice Liddell had a bob as a child

(yes, little girls were expected to be active to a degree- even more if you're reading a book by someone who has experience with Actual Human Children. some doctors fretted that the uterus would be damaged by too much physical activity, but it seems like in practice, parents' were...again, aware of how real children behave. Longfellow's 1860 poem The Children's Hour describes his daughters storming his office to shower him with affection, quite energetically, and it was a smash hit)

as for how they reacted to 1920s bobs...well, most of the adult adopters thereof had at least lived through part of the Long Hair As Default For Women Edwardian era, and their thoughts ranged greatly on the subject. In fact, essays by Irene Castle (believed to be the originator of the trend in her late 20s c. 1913 or 1914, long before it caught on properly) and Mary Pickford (a late adopter at age 36 c. 1928) on why they had vs. hadn't cut their hair are often paired together as a commentary on how the trend was seen, along with others. sometimes these essays are rather strange- one wonders why these women, who must have lived when adult women all wore their hair up every day, describe the alleged oppression of "long, trailing locks." I guess when what you like has some social unacceptability, you might be inclined to phrase things in black and white thus

Dress reformers of the 1920s were more concerned with the deleterious effects of high-heeled shoes and the general idea that young women were encouraged to be too frivolous- and too loose in their sexual morals, as represented by the "short skirts"- actually about calf-length -and low-backed evening gowns of the era. that sounds kind of weird today, in the era of sex positivity, but earlier dress reform had, with a few exceptions, disavowed ideas of sexual freedom as thoroughly as mainstream society did. and I kind of get it- the notion that they advocated "free love" was often used to discredit genuine women's rights groups. still they weren't totally immune to sexual mores of their time, and some likely genuinely believed what they were saying

and that's not even getting into the Coiffure a la Titus trend of the late 18th-early 19th century, which had advocates claiming it was the best thing ever and detractors insisting it would result in women catching colds all the time. it was ever thus

anyway that's a bit of a long-winded answer, but I hope it helps!

[confusedmothboy]

everyone give it up for the cuntiest half foot this side of kakha brud!!!!!

[i-like-swiss-cheese]

the fact that we turned DEADLY NIGHTSHADE into food like 10ish times and didn’t go extinct is fucking crazy, like imagine some Incan dude deciding to plant the one thing around him that kills people every time they eat it until it behaved while 10 other people did the same exact thing, independent of that one guy, and they ALL worked. And now they’re staples of European cuisine bc wheat sucks that badly

[edwinisms]

constantly thinking about the day edwin reads the works of oscar wilde. good chance he hasn’t, considering his work would be absolutely demonized (if mentioned at all) and inaccessible back when edwin was alive (and in catholic school no less). so. boy. finding all That in the same time frame he’s living his gay awakening would be one hell of a revelatory experience

[takadasaiko]

“So we see how Tony Gilroy structured all of this to be a victory earned by a hundred different contributions. Ordinary individuals, each committing brave acts, each following their hearts, trusting each other. Even leaving their peaceful lives behind… It was a gradual fire that they all fueled in different ways.”

- Erik Voss from the @newrockstarsofficial podcast

[river-gale]

i do want to make it very clear that i think discussions of what is and is not "canon" to greek mythology and literature are often kind of silly. talking about things that are ahistorical or disrespectful usually makes more sense, and obviously if someone makes something up wholesale and pretends that there's historical evidence for it, that's bad, but like—

just as an example, when you're talking about the story of ariadne and the minotaur, what's canon? is it the version recorded in plutarch's life of theseus? the brief mention of her in the odyssey? are we basing it off the cult of aphrodite-ariadne in cyprus? how about the linear B inscriptions that associate her with the Great Goddess of the (much older) minoan civilization as theorized by karl kerenyi and robert graves? which of these is "canonical?" they all contradict each other btw

[cmweller]

Challenge #04563-L179: History Returns

Zack woke up to the sound of the fat Gulgarren Korg dragging in an unknown spacecraft. “Zack, my people found this ancient hunk of junk floating near the outer colonies. After our scientists spot some human symbols I thought I could bring it to you to identify it.” The dish was smashed by space debris and the body eroded by solar winds. Zack place a hand on the only thing relatively intact; a golden record. “Man, this thing was supposed to find you first. Welcome back voyager one.” -- Anon Guest

Technically, it was the rad-alarm that woke Zack from his sleep niche. Which was why he rolled out of bed and stumbled into his livesuit before Korg could knock on his door.

Korg was also in her livesuit, almost blocking the doorway, but also trailing rads all over the hallway.

"Did you even glance at the decon booth on the way here? We have to neutralise a whole slew of radioactive pollution now."

"It's an anomaly in the debris field. Tech... with Human symbols."

[Check the source for the rest of the story]

[odds-and-ends-box]

Castle Craughwell

Co. Galway, Ireland, 2024

[stayawakee]

[sunshinerotting]

forgive me for girl meets world posting the show was bad but the characters. had potential. and it eats away at me in the quiet hours ✌️😔