Monarchies · Museums · Heritage · Paris

The Louvre to restore a deformed crown of 1855 made for Napoleon III

The Louvre announces a tender for the restoration of Empress Eugénie's crown, dropped by the robbers as they fled the scene of the crime. The crown, set with diamonds and emeralds, was deformed, lost part of its decorative elements and one of its golden eagles. According to the

Books · Heritage · Society · Paris

Digest of January publications on the Mona Lisa, Greenland and Dostoevsky

A brief review of last month's publications. We spoke chiefly of the topical and the pressing, naturally without neglecting the link with the past, which, of course, explains a great deal. And so, the digest for January. 📌 What the Mona Lisa owes its popularity to. The story of

Books · Mores · People · Humour

"Mummy, mummy, they said at the museum that Mayakovsky killed himself because of Lilya Brik." "No, he killed himself because of me."

Veronika Vitoldovna Polonskaya, the last love of Vladimir Mayakovsky

NB! · Archive · Cinema

The Brides of Count Dracula, 1931

Archive · Books · Heritage · Rome

The bombing of Rome on 19 July 1943 and Julien Green's diary entry

It was with a heavy heart that I learned that Rome had been bombed. Yet this was news I had been expecting for several months. Can there really be so many military objectives in Rome? I did not remember it so. Perhaps the railway station is of the utmost importance

Faith · Art · Heritage · Society · Rome

Angel fresco resembling Meloni has its face erased in Rome's San Lorenzo in Lucina

The face of the Italian prime minister has been wiped from a fresco in a Roman church a few days after visitors recognised Giorgia Meloni in one of the cherubs. Urgent restoration was carried out on the orders of the church authorities. On Wednesday morning, visitors to the Roman basilica

Plaster relief of a centauress raising her arms to a leafy branch, with a young centaur pressed against her chest.

Architecture · Art · Paris

Marcel Gaumont made a plaster relief for the Palais de Tokyo in Paris in 1936

A Centaur with a Child. Plaster relief made by Marcel Gaumont in 1936 for the decoration of the Palais de Tokyo in Paris

Art · Books · Observations · Mores

When I first saw this painting by Makovsky, in which a desperate wife tries to stop her husband from stumbling into a tavern, I pictured a scene from the life of the Marmeladov family

Perhaps the figures in Vladimir Makovsky's painting “I Won't Let You!” of 1892 do not quite match the portrait details of Dostoevsky's characters, but perhaps, had Katerina Ivanovna succeeded in restraining Semyon Zakharovich from his ruinous passion, there would be a few more happy

NB! · Moscow · Nature

A Bactrian on Triumphal Square

NB! · Archive · Cinema

Leonid Markov and Kirill Lavrov on the set of the film "A Hunting Accident" in the village of Valuevo in 1977

Faith · London · Monarchies · Observations · Society

The Prince of Darkness

Andrew Mountbatten Windsor has been spirited out of Royal Lodge under cover of night, the official country residence in Windsor Great Park, formerly the residence of Elizabeth II, and has begun his exile at Sandringham. The police are considering allegations from his victims arising from the Epstein files. But, you

NB! · Science · Nature

Alexandr Radayev