Art · Monarchies · People
I Am Not Here to Play the Coward!
The British king George II before the Battle of Dettingen
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Archaeology · Heritage · Nature · Rome
Ruins of the Curia of Pompey, where Caesar was killed, open to tourists and home to cats
Caesar defeated Pompey, and Caesar's partisans disgracefully deprived Pompey of his life. Caesar himself was murdered in an assembly hall attached to the largest of Rome's theatres, the one named after Pompey. And the place survives to this day. The ruins of the so-called Curia
Monarchies · Science · Humour
A resident of the Scottish town of Dunfermline invented a tripod with which one could walk on the surface of water
A resident of the Scottish town of Dunfermline invented a tripod with which one could walk on the surface of water. The three-legged conveyance rested on air cushions and was peerless for hunting. When William Kant was to demonstrate his invention to King George IV and set off across
Art · Moscow · Museums
The Sleeping Princess and the “Dove Book” in the Last Painting of the “Poem of Seven Fairy Tales” Cycle
The poetic and original "Sleeping Princess", completed by Vasnetsov a year before his death, in 1926, is considered one of his finest paintings. The princess has fallen asleep together with the entire sovereign's court; even the bear that was to have danced at her wedding is
Architecture · Museums · Society
Hermitage Amsterdam to become H’Art Museum in September 2023 and change its partners
The Hermitage's Amsterdam branch is changing its name. From 1 September 2023, the city's third most important museum, after the Rijksmuseum and the Van Gogh Museum, will reopen as the H’Art Museum. The Amsterdam museum dates back to 2004, when it began as a few
Heritage · Mores · Society · Rome
Italian authorities to punish man who scratched his beloved's name on the Colosseum wall
Italian authorities will punish a man who scratched his sweetheart's name on the wall of the Colosseum. The Minister of Culture has already expressed his concern (and how could he not!). It is strange that the vandal was not detained at the scene of the crime, given the
Coming Up · Books · Moscow · Society Pages
Why Are Copies of the Manuscript of "Anna Karenina" Displayed on the Fence of the Khrushchev-Seleznev Urban Noble Estate?
Why are copies of the manuscript of "Anna Karenina" displayed on the fence of the Khrushchev-Seleznev urban noble estate? Because in the garden of the State Pushkin Museum the new season of the "Tolstoy" Theatre Festival is being presented. It will take place at Yasnaya
NB!
Porcelain figurine of a rider with scissors on a goat
Aristocracy · Art · Museums · Mores
The Meissen figure “Tailor Riding a Goat” by Kendler and Count von Brühl's tailor
The Tailor Astride a Goat by Johann Joachim Kändler is a rather popular subject in Meissen porcelain of the 18th and 19th centuries. The tailor comes in various versions: sometimes the shears hang from a horn, sometimes they rest on the goat's head, sometimes they are in the
Archive · Faith · Monarchies · Heritage
Private Ivan Babcock of the US Army tries on the crown of Charlemagne in a cave at Siegen, Germany, 3 April 1945
Private Ivan Babcock of the US Army tries on the crown of Charlemagne in a cave at Siegen, Germany, 3 April 1945. The chamber deep inside the mountain at Siegen was filled with treasures, from the golden reliquary holding the relics of Charlemagne and the Cross of Lothair to paintings
Art · Museums · Saint Petersburg
Repin on his 1903 painting “What Freedom!” and Stasov’s view of it
A Wind, but Not of Change. Ilya Repin's painting What Freedom! (1903) symbolises, in the critic Stasov's judgement, Russian youth who had not lost their courage, hopes and joyful expectations amid the misfortunes that beset them. By Repin's own account, he was simply walking
NB! · People · Humour