Museums · Paris · Ethnography

Falconry hoods and the training of hawks and falcons to wear them

What Do Henpecked Husbands Have to Do with Birds of Prey? The klobuk is not only a monk's headdress: it is also the name of the little cap placed on a hunting bird, covering its eyes completely and its ears in part. The hood is needed to calm

NB! · London · Monarchies · Observations

I did not know that since 2022 Kate Middleton has held the honorary ceremonial post of Colonel of the Irish Guards, one of the elite regiments of the British Army

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Painted or Real?

Architecture · Faith · Observations

Sagrada Família in Barcelona to be completed in 2026 after 144 years of construction

Incidentally, Gaudí's legendary creation, the Sagrada Família in Barcelona, will be completed in just a few months. The longest architectural project in the world has now been under construction for 144 years, and according to the calculations of the foundation managing the works, the building will definitely be

NB! · Society · Paris · Pop Culture

French President Emmanuel Macron Announces Plans to Ban Social Media for Children Under 15

Archive · Books · Moscow · Museums

This book was picked up in the street during the ruin of Moscow by Napoleon in 1812, and presented by Ivan Kulikov - [father of Orlova, the famous actress]

Nikolai [Rogozhin] From the exhibition in the Rare Books Department of the Historical Library

Architecture · Observations · Society · Paris

I remember the summer of 2021, when it was being said that the construction of the Triangle Tower in Paris might rest on unlawful bureaucratic foundations, bound up with corruption and pressure on officials; the prosecutor's office then opened a prelimina

I remember the summer of 2021, when it was being said that the construction of the Triangle Tower in Paris might rest on unlawful bureaucratic foundations, bound up with corruption and pressure on officials; the prosecutor's office then opened a preliminary inquiry into suspected "favouritism" and

Art · Society · Paris

Two antiques dealers found guilty in France of selling forged 18th-century chairs

Two French antiques experts and furniture makers, Georges Pailhaud and Bruno Desnoues, have been found guilty. The dealers stood accused of forging and selling nine copies of eighteenth-century armchairs, which they passed off as genuine. Some of the pieces were represented as having belonged to Marie Antoinette. The swindlers

NB! · Art · Museums

Torso, 1st century BC, from the collection of Pierluigi Farnese in the National Gallery in Parma

NB! · Architecture · Art · Observations

Those eyes opposite, or rather the metal dots where the eyes should be, on the saint's bas-relief in Modena Cathedral

The East · Books · Humour

Viktor Pelevin in “Chapayev i Pustota” on a Chinese communist and his dream of a butterfly

"Ah, Petka, Petka, I once knew a Chinese communist by the name of Zhe Zhuang. He often had a dream in which he was a red butterfly flitting about in the grass. And when he woke up, he could not make out whether it was the butterfly who had

Cinema · Observations · Humour

David Fincher in 1992 and Rex Whistler in 1934

To be perfectly honest, one always felt sorry for the poor Alien, especially in the instalment where he took Ellen Ripley for his mother, and she flew off without him in a spaceship

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