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Relics of Paul of Thebes in a Byzantine kaftan in the Church of Julian of Antinoe in Venice
Would you believe that this is the body of a 113-year-old elder who died 1677 years ago? These youthful-looking remains are the relics of one of the first Christian hermits, Saint Paul of Thebes, who lived in the 3rd and 4th centuries. The most interesting detail, to
Faith · Monarchies · Society · Ethnography
Persecution of holy fools and soothsayers in Russia from 1636 to Catherine the Great
Soothsayers, Blessed Ones and Holy Fools were not always revered in Russia, in fact. State persecution of them began in 1636, when first the Patriarch and then Tsar Alexey Mikhailovich pondered the harm they did to simple God-fearing folk, the latter issuing decrees expelling these enigmatic wanderers from Moscow
Faith · Art · Observations · Rome · Humour
Masaccio's panel of Saints Jerome and John the Baptist for Santa Maria Maggiore
Tired, or simply out of sorts? Saint Jerome (in a crimson cassock) and John the Baptist (bareheaded). Masaccio, 15th century. I could not pass by a depiction of two Church Fathers with such eloquent glances. Curiously, Jerome holds a reliquary or a model of a church resembling the famous Santa
Observations · Mores · Humour
In 1872 a couple punished a rich bachelor by putting the husband in a dress in the wife's place
An Old Story: He, She and Her Lover... So, the year is 1872. A wealthy bachelor is pursuing a married woman with great persistence, and no refusals have the least effect on him. The spouses resolve to teach the ardent gentleman a lesson: he receives from her a perfumed letter
NB! · Archive · Art · Humour
Let them say there is no such thing as female friendship
Let them say there is no such thing as female friendship. Not for these witches from a fourteenth-century manuscript: while two of them prepare a brew for the devil, their girlfriends have already stolen a baby for him
Archive · Faith · Society · Ethnography
The Podpolniki sect, which arose in the nineteenth century in the Saratov district, recognised only the pre-Nikonian church and came out rather categorically against the everyday manifestations of secular life: proposing not to attend schools and reading
The sect of the Podpolniki ("Undergrounders"), which arose in the nineteenth century in the Saratov district, recognised only the pre-Nikonian church and came out rather categorically against the everyday manifestations of secular life: it proposed not to attend schools and reading huts but instead to live in
Archive · Science · Society
Origins of the Written Form of Protocols in Russian Criminal Procedure from the Statute of 1864
Jurists call the written-protocol form in the Russian, and before that the Soviet, criminal process a relic of earlier preliminary judicial procedures. It turns out that the modern rules for drawing up protocols are inherited from the Statute of Criminal Procedure of 1864, which entrenched the written character of
Faith · Science · Mores · Society · Rome
Pope Gregory XIII and the 1581 ban on Christian women nursing Jewish infants
Pope Gregory XIII was an enterprising persecutor of the Jews. He came up with the idea of compelling Jews to attend Sabbath sermons in Catholic churches, where they were to be imbued with the bright ideas of Christianity. Many, it is true, stopped up their ears with wax. Gregory'
Monarchies · Mores · Paris · Pop Culture · Saint Petersburg
In late 1782 Catherine the Great issued two "fashion" decrees at once, banning French toilettes at court
In late 1782 Catherine the Great issued two "fashion" decrees at once, banning French toilettes at court. The decrees of 23 October and 6 November 1782 limited the width of skirts and the height of the ornaments on gowns, which could no longer exceed two vershoks. Despite its
NB! · Art · Museums
Mirror-clock at Gripsholm Castle in Sweden, 17th century
NB! · Aristocracy · Moscow · Observations · Paris · Humour
Suddenly, on the Diletant website, Moscow's culture chief Kibovsky and Venediktov call Viscount Olivier d'Archiac, Dantès's second in the duel with Pushkin, ARISHAK
Suddenly, on the Diletant website, Moscow's culture chief Kibovsky and Venediktov call Viscount Olivier d'Archiac, Dantès's second in the duel with Pushkin, ARISHAK. The cooks are baking cakes for one another.