AskHistorians

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Do any historians actually consider World War I and World War II as one big, long war?	3
Whether the heart or the brain (or the liver?) was the seat of thought was debated historically, yes? Did people feel their thoughts as occupying some other location within their body prior to cephalocentrism becoming popularly accepted?	3
Did Romans believe chickens had special prognosticative powers over other birds? Or did all birds have the ability to tell the future and chickens were just convenient?	3
In William Dalrymple's book The Last Mughal, he quotes Bahadur Shah Zafar's father Akbar II's attempt to disinherit him to the British wherein Akbar claims Zafar has committed a crime "against nature too delicate" to discuss. To the sensibilities of 18-19th century Delhi, what would that be?	3
In the Middle Ages, how often did and what proportion of Islamic armies consisted of ghazis i.e. free volunteers fighting for religious purposes?	3
In Eugen Weber's Peasants into Frenchmen, he describes peasant folk beliefs about the magical powers of Catholic priests. Did folkloric beliefs about the magical powers of priests exist in the countries that went Protestant? And what happened to those beliefs after Protestantism?	3
Is post-Roman Britain the only example of Christianity or other organized religion losing territory to paganism or have there been other instances?	2
A professor from John Hopkins recently retired and left a bunch of stuff in her apartment, saying the landlord (a family friend) could have whatever she left behind. This neat-looking bit of what looks like music on parchment was among the stuff she left behind. Does anyone recognize it?	2
Books that cover ideology or political evolution of Congress and the Muslim League up to the Partition of India?	2
The British aristocracy and gentry demolished their castles to build manor houses and then demolished their manor houses to avoid taxes. Did this process occur in other European countries or were castles and manors better preserved?	2

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