/u/best_of_badgers's posts in /r/askhistorians

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Are there any good books on medieval espionage and tradecraft?

27 upvotes

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If a man of Wessex was accused of a crime in the Danelaw in 1000 AD, where would he be tried?

24 upvotes

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In one of Chesterton's Father Brown stories (1911), he comments that village cobblers were frequently atheists. Was there a reason for this or is Chesterton just being a curmudgeon?

19 upvotes

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What were the exploding weapons at the start of the movie Gladiator? Were they accurate? What kind of other awesome weapons did the Romans have access to?

17 upvotes

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During the Seven Years War, British militia notoriously gave used hospital blankets to indigenous people, hoping to wipe them out with smallpox. The germ theory of disease wasn't widely accepted until over a century later. How did they understand what they were doing?

15 upvotes

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In "A Charlie Brown Christmas" (1965), some of the characters treat commercialism as a new, somewhat unsavory aspect of Christmas. Was it actually new in the US at the time?

15 upvotes

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What was Roman mythology like prior to Greek influence?

13 upvotes

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In 1756, British forces attacked and burned the Lenape village at Kittanning (now in Pennsylvania). The Lenape chief had enough gunpowder in his house that the explosion was heard 50 miles away in Pittsburgh. Was this scale of armament typical for indigenous peoples during British colonization?

12 upvotes

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Did the US government use CCTV for surveillance in the 1930s and 1940s?

12 upvotes

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What are these metal things on the sides of buildings in Italy?

11 upvotes

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Title	Upvotes	Mark as read	Favorited	Rating	Add to a list
Are there any good books on medieval espionage and tradecraft?	27
If a man of Wessex was accused of a crime in the Danelaw in 1000 AD, where would he be tried?	24
In one of Chesterton's Father Brown stories (1911), he comments that village cobblers were frequently atheists. Was there a reason for this or is Chesterton just being a curmudgeon?	19
What were the exploding weapons at the start of the movie Gladiator? Were they accurate? What kind of other awesome weapons did the Romans have access to?	17
During the Seven Years War, British militia notoriously gave used hospital blankets to indigenous people, hoping to wipe them out with smallpox. The germ theory of disease wasn't widely accepted until over a century later. How did they understand what they were doing?	15
In "A Charlie Brown Christmas" (1965), some of the characters treat commercialism as a new, somewhat unsavory aspect of Christmas. Was it actually new in the US at the time?	15
What was Roman mythology like prior to Greek influence?	13
In 1756, British forces attacked and burned the Lenape village at Kittanning (now in Pennsylvania). The Lenape chief had enough gunpowder in his house that the explosion was heard 50 miles away in Pittsburgh. Was this scale of armament typical for indigenous peoples during British colonization?	12
Did the US government use CCTV for surveillance in the 1930s and 1940s?	12
What are these metal things on the sides of buildings in Italy?	11