tidbits cross time.
Dec. 21st, 2025 04:40 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
marycatelliMost inscriptions to Isis in Italy are made by slaves or freedmen, and more than half have non-Italian names. Scholars believe the cult was chiefly followed by the importation of Egyptians and others whose ancestral cult worshipped Isis, not by native Italians turning to the cult.
Early translations of shapan from Hebrew call it a rabbit rather than a hyrax, a beast the translators did not know of. Nowadays, the usual use of shapan in Hebrew is to indicate rabbits.
Charles I invoked an old law requiring every man meeting property qualifications present himself to be knighted, or pay a fine. This was not to increase the number of knights for war, but to collect money while doing an end-run about Parliament.
Among the Bangwa people of Cameroon, those most frequently accused of witchcraft were children. Even babies were accused, and parents who noticed strange behavior in babies would take this as evidence of witchcraft and let the baby die.
"Morning" and "evening" are present participles at their root. They originally meant "to become morn" and "to become eve."
Julius Caesar had a traveling mint on his campaigns, so he could coin money to pay the legions. His putting his own image on coins, during his lifetime, was one of the marks of danger. But Brutus, after the assassination, coined money for his own troops, and put not only his ancestor Brutus who exiled the last king, but himself on them.
The first English guild to keep records in English was the Brewers.
Among the Maori, food -- all food -- was impure. Homes were pure. Consequently all food had to be eaten outdoors. Unusually pure men had to eat it with a fork to avoid contaminating their hands, and really unusually pure men had to have another (pure) man feed them with a fork -- or else eat it from ground to avoid touching it with their hands.
Between the 10th and 13th centuries, many European clergy wrote of people who claimed to travel at night with a supernatural hunt lead by a woman. They reported that these people were deluded or insane.
In the Code of Hammurabi, a "holy woman" can not enter a tavern or even open its door, on pain of being burned to death.
Alderman and earl come from the same term, originally.
The Lisu of the Thai highlands feared to kill a suspected witch because the witchcraft could transmit itself to the murderer.
Mirrors made in Lohr were noted for their high quality and smooth surfaces. They were said to always tell the truth.
In Latin, soldiers were miles until Constantine took to paying them in his new gold solidus, so good a coin that everyone wanted it, and they eventually become soldiers.
The first typewriter was made for a blind woman.
The term "god" appears to be, at its root, a past participle.
Willikin of the Weald, an Englishman during the War of the Barons, was of great aid to the loyalist cause because he not only harassed the French, he did so in the Weald, which lay between London and France, and so cut off lines of communication.
When Hamilcar went to war with Rome, after the sacrifices, his oldest son, nine years old, begged to go with him to war, and Hamilcar instead had him swear an oath to wage war after if Hamilcar failed, and never make peace with Rome. Or so Greek sources said of Hannibal.
Places where chestnuts grew were held to be good for buckwheat and peaches.
During the Regency, there was no set color for a wedding gown, though pale colors (including white) were popular.
Assyrian kings were exorcised annually, just on general principles, since so prominent and powerful a person was bounded to have been cursed by someone every year.
Roman coins showing the Colosseum are so rare that they might have been coined only to be handed out at special events at the Colosseum itself.
During the Song Dynasty, widows retained control of their dowries and property obtained during marriage, and could return to their birth family with them, giving them good prospects of remarriage. Scholars argued against it, and by the Yang dynasty, widows were forbidden to carry the property to their birth family, or to any family they remarried into.
The first English dukes were the king's sons. The king made them dukes to emphasis they were better than the other barons and earls. (Earls were, in fact, still barons at the time, though not all barons were earls.)
Reed pens were good for writing on papyrus, but not so good on vellum and parchment, where quill pens worked better. Nevertheless, late medieval manuscripts on magic give directions on how to create a reed pen to write out your magic, because magic was highly conservative.
Early translations of shapan from Hebrew call it a rabbit rather than a hyrax, a beast the translators did not know of. Nowadays, the usual use of shapan in Hebrew is to indicate rabbits.
Charles I invoked an old law requiring every man meeting property qualifications present himself to be knighted, or pay a fine. This was not to increase the number of knights for war, but to collect money while doing an end-run about Parliament.
Among the Bangwa people of Cameroon, those most frequently accused of witchcraft were children. Even babies were accused, and parents who noticed strange behavior in babies would take this as evidence of witchcraft and let the baby die.
"Morning" and "evening" are present participles at their root. They originally meant "to become morn" and "to become eve."
Julius Caesar had a traveling mint on his campaigns, so he could coin money to pay the legions. His putting his own image on coins, during his lifetime, was one of the marks of danger. But Brutus, after the assassination, coined money for his own troops, and put not only his ancestor Brutus who exiled the last king, but himself on them.
The first English guild to keep records in English was the Brewers.
Among the Maori, food -- all food -- was impure. Homes were pure. Consequently all food had to be eaten outdoors. Unusually pure men had to eat it with a fork to avoid contaminating their hands, and really unusually pure men had to have another (pure) man feed them with a fork -- or else eat it from ground to avoid touching it with their hands.
Between the 10th and 13th centuries, many European clergy wrote of people who claimed to travel at night with a supernatural hunt lead by a woman. They reported that these people were deluded or insane.
In the Code of Hammurabi, a "holy woman" can not enter a tavern or even open its door, on pain of being burned to death.
Alderman and earl come from the same term, originally.
The Lisu of the Thai highlands feared to kill a suspected witch because the witchcraft could transmit itself to the murderer.
Mirrors made in Lohr were noted for their high quality and smooth surfaces. They were said to always tell the truth.
In Latin, soldiers were miles until Constantine took to paying them in his new gold solidus, so good a coin that everyone wanted it, and they eventually become soldiers.
The first typewriter was made for a blind woman.
The term "god" appears to be, at its root, a past participle.
Willikin of the Weald, an Englishman during the War of the Barons, was of great aid to the loyalist cause because he not only harassed the French, he did so in the Weald, which lay between London and France, and so cut off lines of communication.
When Hamilcar went to war with Rome, after the sacrifices, his oldest son, nine years old, begged to go with him to war, and Hamilcar instead had him swear an oath to wage war after if Hamilcar failed, and never make peace with Rome. Or so Greek sources said of Hannibal.
Places where chestnuts grew were held to be good for buckwheat and peaches.
During the Regency, there was no set color for a wedding gown, though pale colors (including white) were popular.
Assyrian kings were exorcised annually, just on general principles, since so prominent and powerful a person was bounded to have been cursed by someone every year.
Roman coins showing the Colosseum are so rare that they might have been coined only to be handed out at special events at the Colosseum itself.
During the Song Dynasty, widows retained control of their dowries and property obtained during marriage, and could return to their birth family with them, giving them good prospects of remarriage. Scholars argued against it, and by the Yang dynasty, widows were forbidden to carry the property to their birth family, or to any family they remarried into.
The first English dukes were the king's sons. The king made them dukes to emphasis they were better than the other barons and earls. (Earls were, in fact, still barons at the time, though not all barons were earls.)
Reed pens were good for writing on papyrus, but not so good on vellum and parchment, where quill pens worked better. Nevertheless, late medieval manuscripts on magic give directions on how to create a reed pen to write out your magic, because magic was highly conservative.
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Date: 2025-12-21 11:07 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-12-22 05:22 am (UTC)