Faith · The East · Education · Society
10 February 1258 is the day the Mongols took Baghdad. It is a very important milestone in history, whose influence is felt to this day. The battle for Baghdad is held to have marked the end of the Golden Age of Islamic culture. The bloody and devastating engagement put an
NB! · Art · Monarchies · Museums · Education
Cosimo III de' Medici placed the Russian pensioner Ivan Nikitin in the academy of the painter Tommaso Redi. Here Nikitin painted a portrait of Peter I, who had sent him abroad to study; the picture is in the collection of the Uffizi
Archive · Observations · Mores · Education · Saint Petersburg
Fyodor Tyutchev's eldest daughter thought Smolny an unsuitable place for her sisters: "I was struck by the shortcomings of the upbringing given to children in this institution. The education received there was altogether very weak, but the moral upbringing was especially badly arranged." Anna Fyodorovna herself
Observations · Education · Humour
Many people use the expression "how I spent this summer". Honestly, few things in this world put me on edge, but this phrase positively drives me out of my mind. Consider: how (who?) [I] (did what?) [spent] (what?) [this summer]. It is perfectly obvious! "How I spent
NB! · London · Mores · Education · People
Observations · Science · Education
I was a student of Yevgeny Nikolayevich, and I remember his lectures very well. A first-class teacher, after whose course it is hard not to fall in love with the history of science and even with philosophy. One of the finest professors in my memory. I think everything will
Observations · Science · Education
Remember the quadratic equation ax^{2}+bx+c=0? Well, the ancient Babylonians and Greeks knew how to solve it, except that the Babylonians had no negative numbers, so for them it was not one quadratic equation but eight: they had to work through every possible combination of signs. And
NB! · Science · Education · Society · People
Professor Roald Fyodorovich Matveyev, the country's first Doctor of Political Science and an eminent scholar, has died at the age of 89. He was a remarkable teacher and a remarkable man. May his memory be blessed
NB! · Art · Observations · Science · Education
A 1,000-year-old astrolabe sold at Sotheby's for £680,750; a pity that an instrument so popular in antiquity has been forgotten, along with the fundamentals of astronomy, though. How can one be educated without them?
NB! · Archive · The East · Books · Observations · Education
On the Latinisation of the Turkic languages: a page from a Kurdish children's book published in Armenia in the 1930s. I have no idea what it means, but it reminded me of the Captain Second Rank in "Ivan Denisovich".
NB! · Observations · Education · Humour
Archive · Science · Education
Numbers above 1,000 were written by placing, before the letter denoting the number of thousands, an obliquely slanting line crossed twice. Large numbers were written thus: Az (the letter a) in a circle was a tma ("darkness"), or 10,000. Accordingly, Zemlya (the letter z) in a