Archive · Books · People

Lydia Chukovskaya records her meeting with Brodsky in Peredelkino on 18 May

“18 May, Thursday. Peredelkino. <...> He rose, saying something about the time. I got up too. We embraced. I kissed him on his prickly, unshaven cheek. “God keep you,” he said (I should be the one saying it to him!). We went quickly into the hall, and I opened

Faith · Monarchies · Mores · Saint Petersburg

A noblewoman petitioned the Virgin Mary against Catherine II, and the Empress returned her estate

At one solemn service Catherine II saw a woman fall to her knees before an icon of the Mother of God and throw a paper on the floor. When the paper was picked up, it turned out to be a complaint against the Empress, addressed to the Mother of God

Observations · Humour

This is some sort of КЛСОРДТРД!

Why do people have the means to hire ΓΔΛ ΓΔΔΟΤ for their project, yet lack the wit to call in someone acquainted with the Greek alphabet?

NB! · Monarchies · Moscow · People

The Calling of Mikhail Fyodorovich Romanov to the Throne

A long blue swimming pool in a red-brick hall with pointed arches on pale columns, exposed timber roof beams, chandeliers and tall arched windows.

NB! · Archive

Swimming pool in a neo-Gothic hall with brick walls and pointed arches

Architecture · Faith · London · Observations · Heritage

Former chapel of a psychiatric hospital in Redbridge becomes a swimming pool

In England, the problem of preserving an abandoned church has been solved in its own way: a swimming pool and a gym have opened inside a Victorian church. Repton Park in Redbridge is considered one of the most beautiful swimming pools in London. In 1892 the site was occupied by

NB! · Archive · Science

Albert Einstein (E) and Marie Curie (MC) squared, 1929

Cinema · London · Monarchies · People

Crown Prince of Yugoslavia and titular King of Serbia Alexander Karageorgevich to take part in filming a documentary series about his life, provisionally titled “The Crown, the State and the People”

The first scenes of the film were shot back in March, in London, at Claridge's Hotel, where the prince was born in 1945. By the time of the birth of Alexander Karageorgevich, the only son of Peter II, the last King of Yugoslavia, the British prime minister of

NB!

We All Had Different Childhoods

Archive · Cinema · Observations · Ethnography

Hungarian wedding dress: a photo from Mezőkövesd, 1925–1930, and one from modern Hungary

A Hungarian girl in national wedding dress. A colour photograph taken in Mezőkövesd in 1925-1930, and a wedding photograph from present-day Hungary. Firstly, it is fantastically beautiful and delightful that this beauty has survived to our own day. Secondly, we have undoubtedly found the reference for the costumes

NB! · Monarchies · Mores · Humour

Forgive me, sinner that I am, little father Tsar!

Forgive me, sinner that I am, little father Tsar! We have been ordered, whenever we catch sight of you, to cry out

Painted ceiling with geometric ornament and a cat peering out of a round central opening against the sky.

NB! · Architecture · Art · Moscow · Heritage

Ceiling painting with a cat in the summer house at Grimsthorpe estate, Lincolnshire

Charming painted decoration in the summerhouse at Grimsthorpe Castle in Lincolnshire. Especially the cat, peering down like a deity from the summit of the ceiling. Such paintings were to be found in many wealthy houses of the 19th century and earlier. In Moscow they survive in the Stanislavsky house, and

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