Detail of an oil painting: a baby in a white bonnet with a blue bow lies in a cradle with floral fabric, holding a red-handled drum rattle. A yellow flower is in the foreground.

NB! · Archive

Infant in a cradle holding a rattle, detail of an oil painting

Painting of an infant in a white bonnet lying in a cradle under a floral canopy, with a woman in a white cap seated beside it.

NB! · Archive · Art · Observations · Mores

Jean Monet, Claude Monet's first son, in his cradle with toys and flowers

What are the advantages of having a celebrated Impressionist for a father? Besides money and fame, there is, for instance, beauty in every detail of one's surroundings. Here is tiny Jean Monet, the first son of Claude Monet, in a cradle amid quite extraordinary toys and flowers.

An elderly man in a dark suit and a green striped tie stands by a window with a white curtain.

NB! · London · Monarchies · Observations · People

Prince Philip admitted to King Edward VII's Hospital in London for observation

Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, aged 99, has been admitted to King Edward VII's Hospital in London. Buckingham Palace reports that Prince Philip felt unwell and is to remain in hospital for a few days for observation. One can only hope that all will be well with him

Two people with a tripod stand in the snow before the illuminated Parthenon, covered in scaffolding, in a snowy haze.

NB! · Architecture · Observations · Nature

The Parthenon in snow and a reflection on global climate change

The Parthenon in snow is very beautiful. Though I cannot quite make out which myth we have ended up in, if global climate change, to all appearances, is no myth at all

Aerial view of the snow-covered Acropolis with the Parthenon on top of the hill during a snowfall.

NB! · Geography · Nature

Snowfall in Northern Greece almost every year, in Athens every five to seven years

Athens today. And the level of snow in Greece on this same day from 2005 to 2020. Heavy snowfalls occur in Northern Greece almost every year, even on the islands. In Southern Greece, including Athens, they are rarer, but in modern times they are still quite usual: snowfalls here come

A dark-haired woman in a patterned poncho and flared jeans stands with a hand raised to her face among tall stone columns under a blue, cloudy sky.

NB!

Woman in an embroidered poncho among the columns of ancient ruins

Round miniature of a hand from the clouds holding a red heart on a thread above a river and town, inscribed Non habet fundum.

NB! · Art · Books · London · Museums

Miniature of a heart from Jacob Hoefnagel's 1634 book in the British Museum collection

This has no end. From the book Gloria Crocodilus of 1634 by the Flemish artist Jacob Hoefnagel, with 82 allegorical miniatures. From the collection of the British Museum

NB! · Art · Moscow · Museums · Education

Lenin in the VKhUTEMAS hostel on 25 February 1921, arguing with the students about Futurism, Mayakovsky and the future of art

Lenin in the VKhUTEMAS hostel on 25 February 1921, arguing with the students about Futurism, Mayakovsky and the future of art. Behind him stands Nadezhda Krupskaya in a pale blue dress. A very beautiful work by Alexey Sotnikov, 1965, from a very rich exhibition marking the centenary of VKhUTEMAS

NB! · Archive · Observations · Humour

With this photograph I would like to inform everyone else who has been snowed under by blizzards and battered by frosts that in February 1957 there was considerably more snow

NB! · Faith · Monarchies · Heritage · People

Eleanor of Aquitaine, mother of Richard the Lionheart, lies beside her second husband, Henry II, in the French Abbey of Fontevraud

NB! · Art · Museums

Cleopatra with an Egyptian cobra, onyx, Milan, turn of the 16th and 17th centuries

Cleopatra with an Egyptian cobra, onyx, Milan, turn of the 16th and 17th centuries. Collection of the British Museum

NB! · Archive · People