NB! · Archive · Monarchies · Moscow · Mores

Emperor Alexander Pavlovich, having accepted the hospitality of P.A. and P.Yu. Kologrivov

Emperor Alexander Pavlovich, having accepted the hospitality of P.A. and P.Yu. Kologrivov, deigned in their house to take tea from this cup, on the 21st day of January 1818, in Moscow

Dark metal badge showing a figure in a hat with a staff in one hand and a rope in the other, its body shaped like a vagina.

NB! · Archaeology · Faith · Mores · Humour

Pilgrim badge of the 14th century shaped like a travelling vagina

Badges like this were a popular souvenir among medieval pilgrims. True, they say little about the holy places visited, but in every other respect they are eloquent enough. This travelling vulva is from the 14th century

Books · Monarchies · Mores · Humour

Small stature of Marina Mnishek and False Dmitry and the myth of a slender beauty on the throne

Alexei Tolstoy has lines about the pretender (False Dmitry) climbing onto the throne with his bride (Marina Mniszech) and dangling his legs beside her. The first crowned Russian tsarina, Marina Mniszech, and her husband were indeed of very slight stature. And while of Tsar Dmitry it was merely said "

Books · Observations · Mores · Humour

A cloak, a britzka and a girl in Gogol's works and the thousandfold fall in the rouble's value

To feel the real fall of the rouble that everyone talks about, it is enough to imagine it a thousand times cheaper than in Gogol's day. A good lady's cloak cost 80 roubles ("Nevsky Prospekt"), a good britzka 4,000 roubles ("The Carriage&

Aristocracy · Art · Mores

The Cholmondeley Ladies, early 17th century

The Cholmondeley Ladies, early 17th century. The inscription on the painting reads: "Two Ladies of the Cholmondeley Family, who were born the same day, married the same day, and brought to bed the same day." The ladies, portrayed in identical poses and identical attire, with identical infants in

NB! · Monarchies · Museums · Mores · People · Pop Culture

The Slippers of Eugénie, the Last Empress of the French and Arbiter of Fashion across All Europe

Faith · Observations · Mores

The Beliefs of the Brothers and Sisters of the Free Spirit and Their Condemnation by Clement V

The followers of the religious movement "Brethren and Sisters of the Free Spirit" denied the importance of the clergy, rites and divine service, accepting only the spiritual side of Christianity. The Brethren, moreover, held that God is present in equal measure in everything in the world, poured out

Aristocracy · Books · Monarchies · Mores

Though, in the respectable Nabokov family, things turned out melodramatic enough even without "Poor Nastya": Vladimir Nabokov's grandmother was married to his grandfather from the age of 15 and called her husband "a monkey with cold feet", at the time of

Though, in the respectable Nabokov family, things turned out melodramatic enough even without "Poor Nastya": Vladimir Nabokov's grandmother was married to his grandfather from the age of 15 and called her husband "a monkey with cold feet", while at the time of the wedding

NB! · Art · Cinema · Observations · Mores · Pop Culture

Strange as it may seem, the subjects of these vulgar erotic playing cards were borrowed from genuine antique pottery

Strange as it may seem, the subjects of these vulgar erotic playing cards were borrowed from genuine antique pottery. So, too, was a scene from Caligula

NB! · Science · Mores · Humour

In the seventeenth century, dissection tables with a rotating top became especially popular: they allowed the corpse to be turned towards the sun, a great advantage in the absence of good lighting

Archive · Cinema · Mores · People

The earrings episode in Tarkovsky’s “Mirror” and its basis in the 1941 evacuation

In Tarkovsky's "Mirror" there is an episode with the doctor's wife, played by Larisa, Andrei's second wife, with Maria Nikolayevna, played by the director's mother Maria Ivanovna, and with an exchange of earrings. The business of the earrings, it turns

In the Press · Books · Observations · Mores

What the antiques market sells as cocaine boxes and when cocaine became fashionable

Talking of the curious trifles of the past, people often mention cocaine boxes, and their existence surprises hardly anyone: well, what did folk not amuse themselves with in the old days. But if one looks into it, the end of the nineteenth century, say its second half, was nevertheless marked