Museums · Science · Education · People
An anatomist's head is precisely what one expects to find in a museum of science. Antonio Scarpa, the foremost surgeon of his day, left behind neither lawful heirs nor any well-wishers after death, and in the absence of a last will his assistant took it upon himself
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Architecture · Books · Museums · People
The third floor of the house is the summit of Victor Hugo's architectural creativity. This is the fully glazed attic with a panoramic view, which, as he put it, took in all of France: from here one can see the island itself and the distant line of the
NB! · Architecture · Books · Museums · Paris · People
The second floor is arranged in the Renaissance spirit. There is an enormous, solemn study with an adjoining tiny library, where Hugo housed the library he had rescued in exile, and a bedroom with carpets and tapestries of every conceivable colour. And a symbolic corridor leading upwards, ending in a
Architecture · Museums · Mores · Paris
On the ground floor are two spacious drawing rooms, the red and the blue, richly furnished with Chinese curiosities, hung with costly fabrics and adorned with unique pieces of furniture. Here the Hugo family received guests. True, not everyone within these walls was as happy as its creator, enchanted by
Architecture · Books · Museums
The house itself recalls one of Hugo's novels. Even in the layout of its rooms and floors: once inside, you find yourself among dark wooden interiors with a great deal of carving and, as you climb, pass gradually into ever more appealing and lighter surroundings, until at last
Architecture · Books · Museums · People
One of Hugo's descendants said of this house that it is an autograph spread over three floors and a poem in several rooms. Resembling a fairy-tale labyrinth, the house presents Hugo as writer, poet, dramatist, draughtsman and decorator, and truly reflects his creative genius. Symbolism pervades Hauteville
Architecture · Books · Society · People
On 2 December 1851, after the coup d'état, Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte banished Victor Hugo from France. The writer fled to Belgium, passing himself off as a printing-house worker, Jacques Firmin Lanvin, and from there he was expelled in 1852. In 1854 he finally settled on Guernsey, an
NB! · Monarchies · Mores · People
Four-year-old little Victoria, the future Queen of Great Britain, in black. Victoria spent nearly half her life in black, from the death of Prince Albert in 1861 to the end of her days in 1901
Observations · Science · Education · People
Natalia Ivanovna Basovskaya, medievalist, popularizer of science, author of many books and a wonderful human being, has passed away. Until her last years Natalia Ivanovna headed our department at RSUH. Students and teachers held her in great respect and, I shall not be afraid to say, admiration. Her learning, her
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London · Museums · Observations · Ethnography · Humour
I don't wish to make diagnoses, but what if Andrey Trubnikov, founder of Natura Siberica, who always wears a toad around his neck, took his inspiration from the old English custom of making an amulet from a dried toad to ward off fits? True, in England the toad&