Moscow · Museums · Observations
GUM is hosting a rather curious exhibition devoted to archery. What struck me was that many of the instruments on display, Soviet ones at any rate, are handmade. Native archers were left to fashion by cottage-industry methods the holders they needed, rulers for the brace height and the tiller,
Art · London · Observations · Nature · Humour
Trump the pug, dog of William Hogarth. The finest Trump I have ever had occasion to see. Incidentally, how different the pugs of the eighteenth century were from their modern descendants: their legs were longer and their bodies slimmer. And wigs suited them far better, too.
Books · Observations · Humour
A Contraption for When You Have Been Set Far Too Much Homework. Friends are busily sharing a photograph of a device for working with documents dating from as far back as 1580. Something similar can be found in many libraries, and not only in antique versions either: it is a
Architecture · Faith · Observations · Heritage
Another Baroque iconostasis, this time a Russian one, of the 1730s-1740s. Though in a very sorry state, even if the Dormition Cathedral of 1508 in Rostov the Great does belong to the Russian Orthodox Church. A church on this spot was already reckoned old in the 1100s, new cathedrals
NB!
Moscow · Observations · Mores · Society
On the way to the dacha I was told an interesting theory as to why the Rublevo-Uspenskoye Highway has not been resurfaced for the last 15 years and is still in perfect condition. Suslov, it seems, had a bad back and could travel only at 50 km/h, and
Faith · Art · Museums · Humour
They are kept in the White Chamber of the Rostov Kremlin, which houses the delightful display of the Museum of Church Antiquities, which has existed since 1883. These sculptures in the round adorned the bases of the prayer places built for Tsar Alexis Mikhailovich and Patriarch Nikon on the model
NB! · Books · Observations · Humour
Don't even think of inviting me if your book party doesn't look like the gathering in this cupboard. First shelf: the collected works of Charles Darwin. Third shelf: the Halych Gospels of 1144. Mind blown
Museums · Observations · Mores · Pop Culture
The most expensive dolls' house in history is held to be a 2.5-metre fairy-tale palace commissioned by the silent film star Colleen Moore from leading Hollywood designers and architects. The palace is adorned with semi-precious and precious stones, even diamonds, with gold, and with fantastical
Moscow · Observations · Mores · Humour
⚡️1 KILOGRAMME OF STURGEON CAVIAR!!! Have you ever seen the like? A menu fit to be served in the hereafter to Major General Pavel Afanasyevich Afrosimov. Sorry that this post is not quite on the channel's theme, it is just that I have not seen anything so astonishing
Art · Moscow · Museums · Observations · Heritage
Speaking of cultural heritage, an appeal to help save the museum of the sculptor Anna Golubkina keeps turning up in my Instagram feed. The most curious thing is that the appeal comes from the Tretyakov Gallery, hardly a destitute institution, which in theory ought to have the money for this
Archaeology · The East · Heritage · Society
Turkish authorities have confirmed that in October they will flood one of humanity's oldest permanent settlements, the city of Hasankeyf on the banks of the Tigris. The city, where Mesopotamian civilisation, the Romans, the Byzantines, the Turks and the Ottomans have all left their mark, still preserves Neolithic