It was 1658. Agnes Bowker, 27, a spinster and domestic servant found herself with a difficult, but hardly unusual problem ...
Read More »Tag Archives: History
Those ancients weren’t dumb
One of my most surprising, “whow” books of 2004, was The Fossil Hunters, by Adrienne Mayor. Posted on my blog is a reconstruction of the skeleton of a Protoceratops, a dinosaur that lived in what is now the Gobi desert. Below is a Scythian “griffin”, placed into the same stance. …
Read More »The Turks, the start
They’ve arrived. No, I don’t mean the Turks, but the hordes of visitors at Turks: A Journey of a Thousand Years: 600—1600 AD. It was like a rugby game in there today, albeit a very polite one. But the exhibits, if not perhaps the exhibition, deserve the attention. I only …
Read More »Piranesi, a man of many parts
I’ve always thought of Piranesi as a sculptor; when I look several times a week at the giant, spectacular, if rather ugly “Piranesi vase”, which towers above your head in a riot of decorated marble in the Enlightenment gallery in the British Museum, that’s perhaps not surprising, but I’m learning …
Read More »Females everywhere, but no women
From a young age I noticed how certified heroes were mostly male. I failed to notice, before Monuments and Maidens
Read More »The King’s Midwife: great book, great woman
I’ve already found one of my books of 2005, The King’s Midwife: A History and Mystery of Madame du Coudray, by Nina Rattner Gelbart. On my site is the map assembled by the author (from ten years of research, primarily in French provincial archives) of the travels of Mme Coudray …
Read More »Alexander: Refocused Enigma
The time of Alexander draws nigh (November 24 to be precise), Oliver Stone’s epic historical biopic of one of the greatest and most enigmatic figures in history. Click on the above banner for every manner of interactive doo-dad and gizmo relating to the film, starring a blonde Colin Farrell as …
Read More »History
As U.S. and Iraqi forces push through Fallujah in the second day of a major offensive to retake the town from insurgents, there is legitimate and deep concern over the conduct of the war, and certainly the “winning the peace” phase that has been more deadly than the original invasion …
Read More »Talking With Studs
I recall the gut-punch impact Studs Terkel’s book Working had on me when I read it as a teenager: I had never realized so many people actually worked in “menial” jobs, nor that there is dignity and self-respect in dong ANY job well. It meshed neatly with my understanding of …
Read More »Book Review: Greenpeace: How a Group of Ecologists, Journalists and Visionaries Changed the World
In the age of George W. Bush and Al Qaeda, it’s easy to lose sight of what is ultimately the most important conflict of all: the battle to save the environment.
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