Books · Monarchies · Mores

The 1398 Ball of the Burning Men in Froissart's Account and Edgar Allan Poe's Story

Jean Froissart describes the horrors of the “Bal des Ardents” of 1398, when a spark set alight costumes and masks made of linen soaked in pitch. Charles VI, dressed as a wild man, managed to save himself by hiding beneath the skirts of the Duchess de Berry; one or two

Books · Mores · Humour

When Ladies Do Not Invite Gentlemen

Illustration from the book "The Art of Bayonet Fencing, or Instruction in the Use of the Infantry Rifle as an Offensive and Defensive Weapon", 1832

Faith · Books · Mores · Ethnography

Ilf and Petrov on the Russian Molokans of San Francisco in 1936

"And here is Russian Hill," said our mighty driver, shifting the lever into second gear. The car whirred and began to clamber up the cobbled roadway. No, nothing here recalled San Francisco! This little street looked more like the outskirts of old Tula or Kaluga. We stopped beside

Architecture · Museums · Mores

Medieval towers of Bologna and French cities built for the sake of prestige

A model of Bologna in the 12th and 13th centuries, with its many towers, resembles the high-rise development of modern cities. At the height of its prosperity the city counted as many as 180 tall structures, of which some 20 survive to this day. The tallest of them is

Archive · Books · Mores · People

The death of John Kipling in 1915 and his father Rudyard Kipling's poem of 1916

A medical board refused 16-year-old John Kipling conscription for the front in the First World War because of short-sightedness. The youth was burning to serve, as earlier he had dreamed of entering a military school. His influential father, by then the world-famous writer Rudyard Kipling, used

NB! · Archive · Monarchies · Mores

A Register of Goods for the Tsar's Treasury Suggests That Alexei Mikhailovich Did Not Favour French Wines

NB! · Aristocracy · London · Monarchies · Science · Mores · Humour

The Sixteenth-Century Poet and Courtier Sir John Harington, Ancestor of Kit Harington, Who Played Jon Snow in "Game of Thrones", Invented the First Flushing Lavatory for the Ageing Queen Elizabeth I

An elderly man in white vestments and a white skullcap laughs at a laid table with wine bottles, bread and carafes.

NB! · Faith · Mores · Rome · Humour

Wine and the Vatican, from the Conclave of 1378 to the Wine Institute's Assessment

The Vatican was flooded with wine when the Romans ransacked the Apostolic Palace during the conclave of 1378. Today the Wine Institute names the Vatican one of the most wine-drinking countries in the world

Aristocracy · Archive · Mores · Paris · People

Countess Virginia La Castiglione and her photograph archive at the Metropolitan Museum

Countess Virginia Oldoini di Castiglione (1837-1899) fell in love with being photographed before it became mainstream. Thanks to the fact that her archive of photographs found its way into the Metropolitan Museum as early as the nineteenth century, dozens of portraits of this society intriguer, courtesan and Parisian fashionista

NB! · Observations · Mores · Humour

A Reminder from Robert Dighton That Any Elegantly Dressed Gentleman Still Has One Foot on the Brink of the Grave

Archive · Art · Monarchies · Moscow · Mores · Society

Apollinary Vasnetsov and the menus of the coronation dinners in Moscow in May 1896

Menu of the dinner for the volost elders, 18 May 1896, at the Petrovsky Palace on the occasion of the coronation of Nicholas II, printed in colour lithography at the Levenson quick-printing house from sketches by Apollinary Vasnetsov, younger brother of t. Apollinary Vasnetsov, like his brother, took part

Books · Monarchies · Mores · Paris · People

How Napoleon handled papers and dictated to his secretaries, according to Andrew Roberts

Napoleon knew perfectly well how to set his priorities. Urgent tasks he took up at once; papers that were important but not pressing he laid in a pile to be dealt with later; and documents he did not consider important he threw on the floor. Whereas Louis XVIII had a