Archive · Faith · The East · Education

The Mir Yeshiva’s route from Mir through Vilna and Shanghai to Brooklyn and Jerusalem

Pupils of One of the Most Famous Jewish Religious Schools, the Mir Yeshiva in Shanghai. Founded in 1815 in the small town of Mir in the Russian Empire, on the territory of present-day Belarus, the Mir Yeshiva played a key role in the development of Jewish religious education. And

NB! · Archive · Art · Ethnography

Sketches of Lapp Life, Early Eighteenth Century

Aristocracy · Archive · Mores

Russian roots of the Sayn-Wittgenstein-Sayn princes and their living descendants

Princess Yvonne zu Sayn-Wittgenstein-Sayn, aged 13, and her brother Prince Alexander zu Sayn-Wittgenstein-Sayn, aged 12, on holiday in Majorca in 1955. Yvonne sips Dry Sack sherry, Alexander finishes off a cigarette. The photograph is by the models' mother, Princess Marianne, who worked as a professional

Archive · Art · Monarchies · Humour

Dutch provinces as a cow in a 16th-century caricature with Philip II, Elizabeth and William of Orange

The Dutch provinces in the guise of a cow: Philip II of Spain tries to ride her, Elizabeth, Queen of England, feeds her, while William the Silent, Prince of Orange, puts his mouth to the udder to milk her. The Duke of Anjou, who holds the beast by the tail,

NB! · Archive · Ethnography

Cossack Women, the City of Yekaterinodar, the Kuban, 1900s

Archive · Art · Books · People

Alexander the Great in a glass submarine on a French miniature of the 15th century

Medieval legends attribute to Alexander the Great a passion for exploring the natural world, notably in a glass submarine in which he sat with a cockerel, a cat and a dog. In this miniature from a fifteenth-century French book, "The True History of the Good King", an

NB! · Archive · Art · Mores

Terrifying Physiognomic Pictures

NB! · Archive · Art · Mores

A gentleman from a sixteenth-century Book of Hours decided to present his beloved with a small reminder of death

Archive · Monarchies

Group portrait of Queen Victoria's family at the Osborne House fountain, 24 May 1854

Group portrait of the British royal family before the fountain at Osborne House, 24 May 1854. Besides Queen Victoria, her husband Prince Albert and her 68-year-old mother, Princess Victoria, the photograph shows, from left to right, the royal children: Albert Edward, Prince of Wales, Princess Alice, Prince Arthur,

Archive · Books · Mores

Descriptions of male and female appearance and character in the 18th century

Let us remember. The marks of the male character in the eighteenth century: a large head, eyes brown, black-and-yellow or blue and somewhat sunken, a broad belly, long strides and a quiet movement of the body. And above all: men are by disposition diligent, curious, constant, brave, magnanimous

Archive · Cinema · Observations · Pop Culture

Found a copy of Vogue Hommes from November 1994 and spotted a brilliant advertisement on the back cover for Chanel's Égoïste Platinum

Found a copy of Vogue Hommes from November 1994 and spotted a brilliant advertisement on the back cover for Chanel's "Égoïste Platinum". The image is a still from a 30-second film of the same year by the scandalous French photographer Jean-Paul Goude, set to

NB! · Archive · Architecture · Mores · Rome