Archive · Monarchies · Observations · Humour

Snowmen in the likeness of Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands, her daughter Juliana, and Juliana's dog Mannie in a muzzle

Beside the figures stand the proud creators of this masterpiece in snow. I would say that in execution this sculptural group is no whit inferior to the monument to Her Majesty Queen Wilhelmina in The Hague, or to the one by the church at Apeldoorn that she founded. I adore

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Italy to buy Umberto Eco's library from his family and give it to the University of Bologna

The Italian state will acquire Umberto Eco's library from his family and hand it over to the University of Bologna. Almost five years have passed since the death of the writer and philosopher. Italy's Ministry of Culture has signed an agreement with the scholar's

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The concept of punishment in the 1930 Small Soviet Encyclopedia and in criminal law today

The Small Soviet Encyclopaedia of 1930, in its article "Punishment", offers, besides the definition, a rather colourful gloss:. "bourgeois 'justice' still makes use of the doctrine that punishment, being retribution for guilt, 'atones' for it, although the class task of the capitalist criminal

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Anatomical Pamphlet, 1559

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Wikipedia quotes a very vivid recollection of the People's Artist Isaak Brodsky by Korney Chukovsky, who met him in 1926 to talk about his teacher Ilya Repin: “…Ah, how sumptuously he lives — and how tediously! Already in the hall hang portraits and littl

Wikipedia quotes a very vivid recollection of the People's Artist Isaak Brodsky by Korney Chukovsky, who met him in 1926 to talk about his teacher Ilya Repin: “…Ah, how sumptuously he lives — and how tediously! Already in the hall hang portraits and little portraits of Lenin, fabricated by

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There is a recollection by Vyacheslav Molotov of how, and how much, he was paid in the years of his political activity

There is a recollection by Vyacheslav Molotov of how, and how much, he was paid in the years of his political activity. The account was taken down in the 1970s, when Molotov was already past eighty, from his own words by the Soviet writer Feliks Chuev, and published in the

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A very clear article from 1998, still relevant today, "The Humiliation and Dignity of Man": the struggle for freedom is always a search for dignity, while humiliation is the usurpers' answer

A very clear article from 1998, still relevant today, "The Humiliation and Dignity of Man": the struggle for freedom is always a search for dignity, while humiliation is the usurpers' answer. But in the end, through thorns and malice, good prevails. Amen

Black and white engraving of a woman reclining with a pipe in a glass-sided hearse drawn by a horse, with the driver on the box.

NB! · Archive · Mores · Pop Culture · Humour

An 1871 engraving shows a Quebec woman riding in a hearse along St. John Street with a pipe

A woman from Quebec caused a sensation by driving down Saint John Street in a hearse, reclining where the coffin should be and smoking a pipe». Greetings to Ksenia Sobchak from 1871

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The Baltic Way human chain linked Tallinn, Riga and Vilnius on 23 August 1989

An incredible political statement, an incredible unity. A living chain 670 kilometres long: on 23 August 1989, the fiftieth anniversary of the signing of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, people joined hands to link Tallinn, Riga and Vilnius. More than two million people formed the human chain, named the "Baltic

NB! · Archive · Faith · Art

Design for a cavalry standard from the time of the English Civil War, depicting the Catholic Church as a many-headed monster

Design for a cavalry standard from the time of the English Civil War, depicting the Catholic Church as a many-headed monster. This Gorynych wears a papal tiara on one head, a scarlet cardinal's galero on another, the black birettas of the common clergy on the rest and,

Page of a handwritten register with an illegible entry and the line John Russell, Monzie.

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Illegible handwriting of a visitor to Innerpeffray Library in 1878

When some self-important reception-desk outfit presses too insistently for my passport details, I deliberately write in the same hand as this charming visitor to the Innerpeffray Library in 1878. Kindred spirits find one another even across the centuries

On the poster a man pushes against a door behind which a ghostly figure stands, while a woman, a nurse and a girl stand behind him beneath a wreath.

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Christmas poster of 1918 urging people to wear a mask and wash their hands

Wear a mask, wash your hands, keep a safe distance. Christmas poster, 1918