Peter DID intentionally burn huge swaths of his country on a rather regular basis as part of his strategy to grind Charles XII’s invasions to a halt. Sometimes, it worked. It is always astounding to me how much random crap […] ↓ Read the rest of this entry…
Archive for Chatter
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That house is something of a marvel. It burns and burns and doesn’t seem any the worse for wear except for the flames guttering out of the windows. Anyway, in the absence of anything meaningful to say, here is a […] ↓ Read the rest of this entry…
Catherine did have to get special dispensation from Pope Julius II in order to marry Henry VIII. She had earlier married Henry’s brother but, according to her, he had died before they could formally, well, you know… In the boring, […] ↓ Read the rest of this entry…
There is probably a reason you haven’t heard of the natural philosopher and scientist Paul-Henri Delaflote. A fiery reason. The loss of Delaflote’s manifold contributions to the Scientific Revolution is thematically similar to Stoppard’s Arcadia, but with more explosions and […] ↓ Read the rest of this entry…
My brother has this sweatshirt he found at a thrift store that proudly exclaims, “I’m not only perfect, I’m Italian as well!” The words perfect and Italian are bold and in red and the shirt is laid out in such […] ↓ Read the rest of this entry…
Frederick was historically not a fan of the female gender. Part of this came from the fact that, as a way of getting out of the prison his father had thrown him in, he agreed to marry the woman of […] ↓ Read the rest of this entry…
There is a deli near where I live that has a large sign by their gelato counter proclaiming that “In Italy they have no ice cream… only gelato!” This sort of sweeping statement sticks in a man’s mind while he […] ↓ Read the rest of this entry…
Back when I was in the depths of grad school, I used to come home Thursday nights and attempt to blast all of the day’s tortured attempts at Discussion out of my head by popping open a can of Oranjeboom […] ↓ Read the rest of this entry…
This episode contains a fine example of how we play up favorable coincidences when they exist. In the course of some “research” on the Boleyns and the Iceni, I found out that they both had ties to Norfolk and exploited […] ↓ Read the rest of this entry…
Queen Boudica (or Boadicea for those Representing It Old School Style) had pretty good reasons for being pissed off at the Romans. After her husband died, the Romans beat her and raped her daughters by way of saying, “Nice kingdom […] ↓ Read the rest of this entry…