Faith · Art · Science · Nature

In the Middle Ages the rabbit was linked with virgin conception

In the Middle Ages the rabbit was linked with virgin conception. It is no accident that the rabbit appears in the iconography of the Virgin, for instance beside Titian's Madonna. It was believed that a doe rabbit could produce young without mating with a male; this notion in

Faith · Books

When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I thought as a child, I reasoned as a child; but when I became a man, I put away childish things

For now we see through a glass, darkly, but then face to face; now I know in part, but then shall I know even as also I am known. And now abideth these three: faith, hope, charity; but the greatest of these is charity. The First Epistle of Paul the

Painting in a golden arched frame: a radiant sun in a blue sky, two white horses in the air and billowing clouds.

NB! · Observations · Nature · Humour

White horses among clouds and sunrays in a painting with a golden arch

White-maned horses, it turns out. Cloooouds!

Art · Society · People

Human Rights

The artist Vyacheslav Sysoyev (1937-2006)

NB! · Archive · Faith · Society · Ethnography

Members of the Russian Doukhobor sect in Saskatchewan in 1907: the Doukhobors fled persecution at home with the sponsorship of Leo Tolstoy and other benefactors, and founded a prosperous diaspora in Canada

NB!

Glory to Thee, O Lord

Map of the Black Sea region with Russian Empire districts shaded in blue by share of Greek speakers, based on 1897 figures.

NB! · Geography · Maps · Observations · Ethnography

Map of the Greek-speaking population by district in the Russian Empire

An extremely interesting map of the presence of the Greek-speaking population by district in the Russian Empire. Naturally, the greatest numbers are concentrated in the Black Sea provinces

NB! · Archive · Geography · Maps

An Illustrated Map of the Soviet Union, Published in the USA in 1948

Art

Hermes Putting On His Sandals

Sir William Blake Richmond, 1886

Art · Museums · Saint Petersburg

Drive out Cupid's lust with all your might, or Venus will seize your blinded soul

The inscription on Lucas Cranach the Elder's "Venus and Cupid" in the Hermitage collection. Cranach's Venus, painted in 1509, is the first female nude in the history of German painting, Eve excepted.

Engraving of a bearded man in a long robe resting his hand on a globe inscribed EVROPA and ASIA.

Geography · Books · Observations

Strabo and the Eleventh Book of His “Geography”

All men speak different languages because, through their obstinacy and ferocity, they live in scattered groups and have no intercourse with one another. Strabo. Geography. Book XI

Newspaper illustration “What’s Wrong Here?” showing legs in cuffed trousers, checked socks and polished black shoes.

NB! · Archive · In the Press · Mores · New York · Humour

New York Daily News in 1931 on why a gentleman should not wear conspicuous socks

The New York Daily News observes that gentlemen do not wear conspicuous socks. 1931

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