Architecture · The East · Monarchies · Heritage · Society

A cannonball fired by Ottoman troops during the siege of Nice in 1543 is still embedded in the wall of a residential building in the city

A cannonball fired by Ottoman troops during the siege of Nice in 1543 is still embedded in the wall of a residential building in the city. How did it come to be there? The Turkish siege of Nice was one of many operations of the Franco-Ottoman military alliance against

Aristocracy · Books · Society

Pierre Augustin de Beaumarchais's play "The Mad Day, or The Marriage of Figaro", on which the opera was based, was banned by the censors for its social criticism

Pierre Augustin de Beaumarchais's play "The Mad Day, or The Marriage of Figaro", on which the opera was based, was banned by the censors for its social criticism. The play mocked the aristocracy and demonstrated the servant's superiority over his master. With the French

Books · Nature

Ivan Turgenev on the likeness of man and dog in his prose poem “The Dog”

There are two of us in the room: my dog and I. Outside, a terrible, frenzied storm is howling. The dog sits before me, and looks me straight in the eyes. And I, too, look into her eyes. She seems to want to tell me something. She is dumb, she

Faith · Observations · Society

Condolences to victims of a terrorist attack and a call to trust in the Lord

And the Light Shineth in Darkness, and the Darkness Comprehended It Not. Gospel of John 1:5 I offer my most heartfelt condolences to all those affected by this monstrous, inhuman act of terror, and to their families and friends. Hold fast, my dear compatriots, do not lose heart in

Inside a Gothic cathedral, sunbeams fall through a hole in the vault onto columns and rows of wooden chairs; stained glass and debris are visible in the distance.

NB!

Notre-Dame de Paris after the fire: light through a hole in the nave vault

NB! · Architecture · Observations · Heritage · Paris

Notre-Dame de Paris stands firm, and is none the worse for wear

A pale leather shoe on a tall flared platform with rosette patterns, shown against a dark background beside white feathers.

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Chopine, a historic platform shoe with perforated rosette decoration

Mores · Ethnography

Pattens, protective overshoes worn in Europe since the Middle Ages against street filth

Pattens: a special kind of footwear used in Europe since the Middle Ages, chiefly as a means of protecting feet and shoes from mud and urban filth where road surfaces were not good enough. Pattens were made of metal and wood and fastened over ordinary shoes with leather straps or

NB! · Archive · Architecture · Heritage

Ruins of the American Embassy in Berlin, 1957

NB! · Architecture · Paris

The Paris Opera of the architect Charles Garnier, built in 1875

A long queue of visitors with white umbrellas beside the glass building of the Fondation Louis Vuitton, with a Rothko exhibition pavilion on the right.

NB! · Art · Museums · Paris · Reportage

Queue for the Mark Rothko exhibition at the Fondation Louis Vuitton, with online booking

The queue at the Fondation Louis Vuitton for the Mark Rothko exhibition. On the right, those with tickets booked online; on the left, those without

Carved relief in pale stone with a fossil coral pattern showing a nude figure wrestling a lion, held by small prongs against a grey background.

Art · Museums

Heracles and the Nemean Lion, an early 16th-century carving from the Medici collection

A Tiny Fragment of Fossil Coral with an Incredibly Beautiful Engraving. Hercules slaying the Nemean Lion, early sixteenth century, from the collection of the Medici family. Archaeological Museum of Florence

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