A man in chain mail and a dark tunic with a white cross stands by a bed, holding a small object. A woman reclines on a couch; draped curtains and candles behind.

NB!

Knight in a cross-emblazoned tunic beside a reclining woman, black-and-white film still

Cinema · Monarchies · Mores · People

Berengaria of Navarre in history and in DeMille’s 1935 film “The Crusaders”

Hollywood diva Loretta Young as the English queen Berengaria of Navarre in the 1935 film The Crusaders. Berengaria is the only English queen who never set foot on English soil. It is held, however, that she may after all have visited England, but only after the death of her husband,

NB! · Observations

But Really, God Forbid, of Course

Four drawings of a centaur with a male torso wearing blue jeans in different ways: on the human part, the horse part, or the whole body. Caption: How would a centaur wear pants?

NB!

How a centaur might wear pants: four digital illustrations

NB! · Archaeology · Museums · Observations · New York · Humour

It seems the Metropolitan Museum's holdings have yielded the answer to how a centaur wears trousers after all, courtesy of a bronze statuette of a centaur and a man from 750 BC

It seems the Metropolitan Museum's holdings have yielded the answer to how a centaur wears trousers after all, courtesy of a bronze statuette of a centaur and a man from 750 BC. Or is this the wrong sort of centaur?

Interviews · Observations · Society · People

Pierre Nora in a 2011 Interview on Regional Languages and the 2008 Constitutional Reform

In 2011 the distinguished French historian Pierre Nora gave an interview to the Russian scholar of identity, Doctor of Historical Sciences Elena Filippova, and touched upon a subject of some interest in present circumstances: the French constitutional reform of 2008. I give an abridged extract: “A good example, which I

Coming Up · Art · Moscow · Museums

Yuri Annenkov exhibition “Revolution Behind the Door” at the Museum of Russian Impressionism, 1 July to 23 August

From 1 July to 23 August, the Museum of Russian Impressionism is holding an exhibition, "Yury Annenkov. Revolution at the Door". It is a rare chance to see in one place paintings from the Tretyakov Gallery, the Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts, the Bakhrushin Theatre Museum, the

NB! · Art · Books · Monarchies

The King of Thule, hero of Goethe's poem of the king who kept to his dying day a golden goblet in memory of the beloved from whom he had parted for ever, vividly embodied by the brush of Pierre Jean van der Ouderaa, could not but have been an inspiration

NB! · Observations · Humour

When One Tries Too Diligently to Keep Pace with the Times

Coming Up · Heritage · Science · Nature · Saint Petersburg

Arboretum Park of the Peter the Great Botanical Garden operates in test mode from 2 July

Incidentally, since 2 July one of Russia's first parks, the Arboretum Park of the Peter the Great Botanical Garden, has been open on a trial basis. The oldest trees in the regular part of the park, laid out in the 1820s, are two hundred years old, but the

Coming Up · Art · Education · Saint Petersburg

Online lecture by Ilya Doronchenkov of the European University on Diaghilev's failure in the West

At 19.30, join the online lecture by Ilya Doronchenkov, Professor at the European University at Saint Petersburg: “Diaghilev's Failure? The Wrong Road to the West”

NB! · The East · Monarchies · Observations · Mores

I do not know what exactly is going on, presumably some seasonal ceremony, but this procession with the King and Queen of Thailand looks very solemn and stylish, apart from the absolute relic of the ryndas with their parasols, of course

Alexandr Radayev