tidbits cross time
Jun. 3rd, 2026 03:38 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
marycatelliConnecticut was the first American colony to regulate branding animals.
Frontinus, writing a treatise on the aqueducts of Rome, dared anyone to compare the useless Pyramids to them.
During the Napoleonic Wars, the allied opponents of France spoke in their common language: French.
John Henry Belville, working at the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, had a good business whereby he set his watch at the Observatory and then walked around London and let his subscribers see his watch and set their own clocks. His widow and then his daughter continued the business, once they got the Astronomer Royal to let them see the time. (He had prevented access to the general population because it was interrupting too much.)
Venice allowed naturalization only after ten years' residence in the 13th century. In the 14th, this was raised to 25 years, with your family, and even then, you were not quite a full citizen, though your children were.
During the Renaissance, only vivid colors were suitable for the wealthy. Pale hues would indicate poverty because they would be the later dips -- because no one gave up on a batch of dye until it wouldn't color the fabric at all. So pink was straight out as a color for noble maidens.
The introduction of paper to Europe was regarded as useful for temporary and unimportant things. Things were transcribed to parchment if they were regarded as permanent.
The Great Hedge of India was 2500 miles long and thorny. It was established by the British to prevent salt smuggling.
Enver Hoxha did not permit the works of Agatha Christie in Albania during his dictatorship, despite liking them personally.
Venice forbade any citizen to import goods in excess of his tax assessment. The aim was to prevent his using a non-Venetian money-lender -- and sharing the profits outside.
The Confederate General Felix Zollicoffer died at the Battle of Mill Springs because he approached the 4th Kentucky Infantry, giving it orders, and not realizing his error before Colonel Speed Fry shot him. They were a Union force.
Wealthy people had themselves depicted holding rabbits in Renaissance portraits because only wealthy people could afford to own rabbits.
Józef Unrug, a German-born Polish admiral, refused to speak German while held by Germans in World War II, even though his German was better than his Polish.
In 19th-century British novels, upper-class women's wealth would be discussed in terms of how much capital they had, and men's in how much income -- even if their capital was invested in the same thing, so she had the same income, and he had the same capital.
Sennacherib set out to utterly destroy Babylon, not only systemically razing it but flooding it to make it a swamp. It was rebuilt under his successor.
PT-493 was damaged in the Battle of Surigao Strait, but Petty Officer Albert W. Brunelle stuff his life jacket in the hole taking on water and managed to repair the engines enough so they could ground it.
In Bronze Age India, gambling was done with dice made from nuts.
The Visigothic kingdom in Spain had a reputation, during the Dark Ages, of violent plots against kings to an extent that shocked other kingdoms, even those with a great deal of turmoil.
When Parliament got juries to enforce post-Black-Death laws against high wages by remitting taxes by the amount of the fines, the workers turned to demanding good quality food, bed, and clothes.
Many Roman fountains were nymphaea, shrines to the nymphs.
Venice became an early center of the printing press because no city in Europe had a large enough market to justify a good-sized print run, but if you could sell a hundred apiece to merchants to bear on their ships to other cities, it grew practical.
Carlisle and Newcastle are the only railroad stations connecting England and Scotland. It was noted in 1940 that destroying them would interrupt all rail.
During the Hussite Wars, the magnates of Prague described the German king as a terrible enemy of the kingdom of Bohemia and of the Bohemian language.
Roanoke Island was not only the site of an abortive English colony but a significant battle in the early American Civil, allowing the Union to control North Carolina's sounds.
The movie Morgenrot was, among other things, trying to rehabilitate the German Imperial Navy. Because the High Seas Fleet mutiny had triggered the November Revolution of 1918, it was the Navy that was blamed for the "stab in the back."
The Excidio attributed to Dares was treated at a completely reliable account of the Trojan War during the Middle Ages. It completely elided the gods. The War started because the Greek Telamon abducts Laomedon's daughter Hesiona, and they refuse to give her back, despite Priam, Laomedon's son, repeatedly demanding her. His son Paris recounts the Judgement of Paris as a dream he had, and goes to abduct Helen with his father's blessing.
The Confederacy admitted Missouri as a state in November of 1861. It was completely null, because the Union controlled it the duration of the war, despite some early fighting.
Rigunth, a Frankish princess, was sent to Spain to marry Prince Reccared -- only when her father died, her knights robbed her of everything and abandoned her.
The power of the Taborites was broken, and their leader Prokop the Great killed, after fifteen years where their wagon forts had proven able to withstand any charge. The opposing army knew it, and faked a rout, luring the Hussites into pursuit, where they were slaughtered.
The Chinese pilgrim Xuanzang, writing of his trip to India, warned against wearing red-colored clothing in the Himalayas, because it appealed to dragons.
Frontinus, writing a treatise on the aqueducts of Rome, dared anyone to compare the useless Pyramids to them.
During the Napoleonic Wars, the allied opponents of France spoke in their common language: French.
John Henry Belville, working at the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, had a good business whereby he set his watch at the Observatory and then walked around London and let his subscribers see his watch and set their own clocks. His widow and then his daughter continued the business, once they got the Astronomer Royal to let them see the time. (He had prevented access to the general population because it was interrupting too much.)
Venice allowed naturalization only after ten years' residence in the 13th century. In the 14th, this was raised to 25 years, with your family, and even then, you were not quite a full citizen, though your children were.
During the Renaissance, only vivid colors were suitable for the wealthy. Pale hues would indicate poverty because they would be the later dips -- because no one gave up on a batch of dye until it wouldn't color the fabric at all. So pink was straight out as a color for noble maidens.
The introduction of paper to Europe was regarded as useful for temporary and unimportant things. Things were transcribed to parchment if they were regarded as permanent.
The Great Hedge of India was 2500 miles long and thorny. It was established by the British to prevent salt smuggling.
Enver Hoxha did not permit the works of Agatha Christie in Albania during his dictatorship, despite liking them personally.
Venice forbade any citizen to import goods in excess of his tax assessment. The aim was to prevent his using a non-Venetian money-lender -- and sharing the profits outside.
The Confederate General Felix Zollicoffer died at the Battle of Mill Springs because he approached the 4th Kentucky Infantry, giving it orders, and not realizing his error before Colonel Speed Fry shot him. They were a Union force.
Wealthy people had themselves depicted holding rabbits in Renaissance portraits because only wealthy people could afford to own rabbits.
Józef Unrug, a German-born Polish admiral, refused to speak German while held by Germans in World War II, even though his German was better than his Polish.
In 19th-century British novels, upper-class women's wealth would be discussed in terms of how much capital they had, and men's in how much income -- even if their capital was invested in the same thing, so she had the same income, and he had the same capital.
Sennacherib set out to utterly destroy Babylon, not only systemically razing it but flooding it to make it a swamp. It was rebuilt under his successor.
PT-493 was damaged in the Battle of Surigao Strait, but Petty Officer Albert W. Brunelle stuff his life jacket in the hole taking on water and managed to repair the engines enough so they could ground it.
In Bronze Age India, gambling was done with dice made from nuts.
The Visigothic kingdom in Spain had a reputation, during the Dark Ages, of violent plots against kings to an extent that shocked other kingdoms, even those with a great deal of turmoil.
When Parliament got juries to enforce post-Black-Death laws against high wages by remitting taxes by the amount of the fines, the workers turned to demanding good quality food, bed, and clothes.
Many Roman fountains were nymphaea, shrines to the nymphs.
Venice became an early center of the printing press because no city in Europe had a large enough market to justify a good-sized print run, but if you could sell a hundred apiece to merchants to bear on their ships to other cities, it grew practical.
Carlisle and Newcastle are the only railroad stations connecting England and Scotland. It was noted in 1940 that destroying them would interrupt all rail.
During the Hussite Wars, the magnates of Prague described the German king as a terrible enemy of the kingdom of Bohemia and of the Bohemian language.
Roanoke Island was not only the site of an abortive English colony but a significant battle in the early American Civil, allowing the Union to control North Carolina's sounds.
The movie Morgenrot was, among other things, trying to rehabilitate the German Imperial Navy. Because the High Seas Fleet mutiny had triggered the November Revolution of 1918, it was the Navy that was blamed for the "stab in the back."
The Excidio attributed to Dares was treated at a completely reliable account of the Trojan War during the Middle Ages. It completely elided the gods. The War started because the Greek Telamon abducts Laomedon's daughter Hesiona, and they refuse to give her back, despite Priam, Laomedon's son, repeatedly demanding her. His son Paris recounts the Judgement of Paris as a dream he had, and goes to abduct Helen with his father's blessing.
The Confederacy admitted Missouri as a state in November of 1861. It was completely null, because the Union controlled it the duration of the war, despite some early fighting.
Rigunth, a Frankish princess, was sent to Spain to marry Prince Reccared -- only when her father died, her knights robbed her of everything and abandoned her.
The power of the Taborites was broken, and their leader Prokop the Great killed, after fifteen years where their wagon forts had proven able to withstand any charge. The opposing army knew it, and faked a rout, luring the Hussites into pursuit, where they were slaughtered.
The Chinese pilgrim Xuanzang, writing of his trip to India, warned against wearing red-colored clothing in the Himalayas, because it appealed to dragons.