Archive · Faith · Mores · Society

The Council Code of 1649 prescribed burning for blasphemers

In Rus', blasphemers were burnt locked inside a wooden log cabin. In the Law Code (Sobornoye Ulozheniye) of 1649, burning for blasphemy was set down in the following form: “Should any man of another faith, of whatever creed, or even a Russian, utter blasphemy against the Lord God and

NB! · Architecture · Faith · Art

A Monumental Pulpit in “Rubens’s Church”

A monumental pulpit in “Rubens’s church”. The work of Jan Pieter van Baurscheit the Elder. The angel at the base bears a papal tiara of the fifteenth-century pattern, with three crowns.

Archaeology · Heritage · Society

In the near future the State Duma will consider amendments to the law "On Objects of Cultural Heritage (Monuments of History and Culture) of the Peoples of the Russian Federation"

In the near future the State Duma will consider amendments to the law "On Objects of Cultural Heritage (Monuments of History and Culture) of the Peoples of the Russian Federation". It is evident that the modification of Federal Law No. 73 in respect of abolishing the mandatory State

A reliquary shaped like a figure holding a crowned sphere in its hands, in a glass case on a church column.

NB! · Faith · Art · Museums

Reliquary of Saint Justus, executed at 13, in the form of a cephalophore

The decapitated who carry their own heads as instruments of their passion are called cephalophores. This rare reliquary, in the form of a man holding his own head in his hands, is dedicated to Saint Justus, executed at the age of 13

A staircase down to a basement, beside a column with a black vase, a tray of glass decanters and a glazed display cabinet.

NB! · Observations · Humour

A walk through a basement with a vase on a column, glass decanters and a display cabinet

Nothing special, just a stroll round the cellar. Routine

Open catalogue under display glass, its pages filled with rows of engraved illustrations of corsets.

NB! · Archive · Mores · Humour

Women bought corsets from mail order catalogues in 1889

1889: the great cities are lit by electric lamps, the food industry employs pasteurisation, and women are buying CORSETS from mail-order catalogues!!! Well, why not? It is convenient and, above all, progressive!

NB! · Faith · Art · Humour

Titian, 1533, Magdalene Gives Thanks to the Lord That Telegram Is Working Again

Books · Moscow · Observations · Mores · Humour

Ilf and Petrov on the closed doors of Moscow circuses, theatres and cinemas

Muscovites love to lock their doors. Thousands of grand front entrances are boarded up from the inside, and hundreds of thousands of citizens creep into their flats by the back stairs. The year 1918 is long past, the very notion of a "raid on a flat" has grown

Archaeology · The East · Observations · Mores · Society

Penalties for molesting, kissing and raping a married woman

I found in the Middle Assyrian Laws of the 2nd millennium BC several important norms of a city community that would fit the Slutsky affair perfectly. - If a man has raised his hand against a married woman and pawed her (literally "treated her as a child", that is,

NB! · Society

We Mourn as One

NB! · Observations

The Inscription Beneath the Clock: Silentium

NB! · Coming Up · Art

Alexandr Radayev