askhistorians

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Is the idea of warfare between a smaller group of guerrillas and a conventional military a 20th century phenomenon, or not? Like Vietnam, Taliban, etc.	15
Thomas Paine sold his revolutionary war pamphlet Common Sense with a goal to make a profit off of its sales. What kind of market was there for selling political pamphlets, and at what point historically did political pamphlets go from being sold to being handed out?	13
The American “Know Nothing” party was founded in 1844 for “native” Americans. Was there any criticism among its contemporaries for being anti-immigrant while there were still people alive who remember the nation’s founding?	10
I’ve heard that empires can suffer from growing too unmanageably large (such as the Romans splitting into two empires). Why? What made it easy for Rome to control Italy, yet hard to control the entire Mediterranean/Europe with far more people/resources to work with and fewer fronts to fight on?	9
When did people realize that the night sky looked different from different locations? Did they realize what was happening relatively soon after or was it a great mystery?	9
I've only known about dinosaurs in a post-Jurassic Park world. Before the film came out, were dinosaurs popular in society? Would the average person know what a Velociraptor or T-Rex were? If so, when did the fascination with dinosaurs start?	9
What was the first article of clothing(shoes, underwear, etc.) that early people wore? Was the first article different depending on where the civilization was located?	7
You can smell from a distance if someone hasn’t bathed/washed clothes in a week. Did medieval Europe burglars/spies/assassins practice much better hygiene than the average commoner to stay stealthy? Would this be suspicious?	4
What was the first recorded beat drop in music history? Wikipedia references the 1970s, but much older songs like In The Hall Of The Mountain King have a very clear “drop” in my mind	3
In medieval warfare, I assume that after one country surrenders, the losing besiged castles remaining are informed and the garrison disbands. Did a besieging force ever fake a surrender to trick the castle garrison into disbanding? How would I as a defender know that the surrender was real?	3

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