Books · Monarchies · Nature

Prince Harry's Book Wrongly Claims That All Royal Corgis Descend from Queen Victoria's Dog

Prince Harry's book wrongly claims that all royal corgis descend from Queen Victoria's dog. In fact, corgis appeared in the royal family only in 1930. The first was a corgi named Dookie. Princess Margaret had a corgi called Jane. All the Queen's corgis descend

Architecture · Geography · Maps · Madrid

Arab and Christian medieval cities in Spain and the Muslim origins of Madrid

The Arab (Moorish) and the Christian medieval city in Spain. An interesting piece of graphic work: the two cities are at once very alike and rather different. The Arab city strongly resembles Madrid/Majrit, whose plan is shown in the second image, and the reason is plain: Madrid is the

In the painting, a nude Adam and Eve recline under a tree, a cat lies at their feet, and goats stand to the right against a landscape.

Art · Observations · Humour

The cat, the goat and the serpent among the details of a painting of Adam and Eve

The Fall of Man, Hendrick Goltzius, 1616. I cannot decide which detail is my favourite: the cat who would rather not witness this disgrace, the peeping goat, or the rosy-cheeked serpent-tempter with the face of Jennifer Coolidge. But it is certainly not Adam and Eve, straight off the

NB! · Paris · People · Humour

What would the French do without Brigitte Macron's carbonara recipe? Probably what humanity has been doing without her views on the Indo-Pakistani conflict

Magazine page with close-up photographs of four Beatles' lips beside their portraits, captioned Paul, George, Ringo and John.

Archive · Observations · Pop Culture · Humour

In 1965, 16 Magazine suggested kissing your favourite Beatle

Kiss your favourite Beatle. 16 Magazine, 1965. My kissing fairy, it seems, has gone off to Ringo Starr. And yours?

NB! · Archive · Cinema · Pop Culture

Sisters Catherine Deneuve and Françoise Dorléac in a hotel room in Rochefort, before the filming of Jacques Demy's "The Young Girls of Rochefort"

Sisters Catherine Deneuve and Françoise Dorléac in a hotel room in Rochefort, before the filming of Jacques Demy's "The Young Girls of Rochefort". In Françoise's hands is a front page mentioning the film about hopeful provincial youth setting off for Paris in search of

Dark ruins of the Colosseum, with glowing blue dots in the night sky tracing its arches and tiers above. A crowd of spectators stands along the fence below.

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The Colosseum at night with a outline of blue lights in the sky above the ruins

Drone lights outline a spire and roof above the ruins of a Gothic building under a dark cloudy sky.

Architecture · Art · Observations

The author is sceptical of drones but respects a light display over Gothic ruins

Light installations by the Dutch creative duo Drift that complete ruined or unfinished historic buildings. I am sceptical of the general infatuation with drones, unless they are used to put out fires. To my mind it is an amusement for people who were in raptures over selfie sticks, only slightly

Faith · Monarchies · People

It follows that on 10 January 2023, with the death of Constantine II of Greece, Europe lost its last* Orthodox monarch

It follows that on 10 January 2023, with the death of Constantine II of Greece, Europe lost its last* Orthodox monarch. Constantine II reigned from 1964 to 1973, died in his 83rd year, and will be buried in Athens *Constantine was the last of Europe's reigning Orthodox monarchs.

Books · Monarchies · Humour

King James I Stuart wrote the Daemonologie, a book on witches and witchcraft, and the Emperor Claudius, of the patrician house of the Julii-Claudii, one on games of chance, but the strangest work ever to come from the pen of a royal…

Two blue books on stands: S. B. Veselovsky's «Clerks and Under-clerks of the 15th–17th Centuries» and L. N. Pushkarev's «Classification of Russian Written Sources on National History».

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Books by S. B. Veselovsky and L. N. Pushkarev on display

Cinema · Books · Moscow · Humour

The famous restaurant guide of Duchemin, France's most authoritative restaurant critic, in the hilarious comedy "The Wing or the Thigh" with Louis de Funès, somehow ended up in Moscow in the same display case as Stepan Veselovsky's…

The famous restaurant guide of Duchemin, France's most authoritative restaurant critic, in the hilarious comedy "The Wing or the Thigh" with Louis de Funès, somehow ended up in Moscow in the same display case as Stepan Veselovsky's reference work on persons who served under

Alexandr Radayev