NB! · Monarchies

The Children of Nicholas II

Two small boys in light costumes with blue sashes stand before a drapery, one holding a red banner with a cross.

NB! · Aristocracy · Art · Monarchies

Grand Dukes Alexander and Konstantin Pavlovich as Children, Portrait by the Artist Heide, 1790

Portrait of the Grand Dukes Alexander Pavlovich and Konstantin Pavlovich as children. Artist: Heyde. 1790

NB! · Monarchies · Paris · People

Let us pay our respects to the memory of Marie Antoinette, executed on 16 October 1793, ten months after King Louis XVI

A young woman in a yellow skirt and white wrap sits at a dressing table with a mirror, while a man in dark clothes beside her holds a sheet of paper.

NB! · Art · Moscow · Observations · Mores · Humour

A lady at her dressing table in a painting by Nicolas Lancret, early 18th century

Spent half a day with Mamma in the cosmetics halls of TsUM and am already fit to advise Madame Geoffrin on matters of beauty. Nicolas Lancret, early eighteenth century

A hand-painted fan shaped like a bat with outspread dark blue wings dotted with small white stars.

NB! · Art · Observations · Humour

Miniature Hand-Painted Fan in the Shape of a Bat, 1900

Found a splendid gift for witches of my acquaintance. A hand-painted miniature fan with a bat, 1900

NB! · London · Museums · Science · People · Humour

The Mummified Head of Jeremy Bentham, a Man Who Owned a Sacred Teapot Named Dickey, a Walking Stick Called Dapple, and a Favourite Cat, the Reverend Doctor John Langborn

NB! · London · Museums · Science · Mores · People

Jeremy Bentham's Head and Body in One Display Case: He Was a Most Eccentric Man, and This Form of Repose Genuinely Suits His Free-Spirited and Original Ideas

NB! · London · Museums · Heritage · People

For a long time, Bentham's mummified head was kept in the same display case as the philosopher's body, but it was then removed from exhibition and taken to storage, where it is examined for preservation a couple of times a year

NB! · London · Mores · Education · People

The body of the English philosopher Jeremy Bentham (1748–1832) is kept at University College London, seated in the pose in which the scholar liked to sit

NB! · Architecture · Observations

One of the principal rooms of a great country house: the red dining room

One of the principal rooms of a great country house is the red dining room. The rooms on the first floor are laid out in a circular enfilade, with the ballroom and banqueting hall at its centre. One must proceed anticlockwise)

A hand opens a white door, revealing a dark red iron door with a padlock, a bolt and a ring handle.

NB! · Archive · Architecture · Mores

Iron door in a living room leads to a fireproof cabinet for valuables and documents

In one room an iron door came to light. It conceals a so-called fireproof cabinet, a little chamber where valuables, documents and money were kept: when the owners were away, and in case of fire or burglary

Old handwritten land survey plan of Khmelita showing boundaries, fields, woods and inscriptions, hanging on a wall.

NB! · Archive · Maps · Museums · Observations · Heritage

Land survey plan of Khmelita and the 24,000 hectare area of the present-day museum reserve

Survey plan of the lands at Khmelita. Observe that not a single scrap of land went unclaimed: every last inch was made to yield a living. Today the historical, cultural and natural museum-reserve of Khmelita covers 24 thousand hectares