NB! · Observations · Humour

And This Lovely Dialogue

NB! · Observations · Humour

Found, for example, an amusing mention of a particular favourite of mine

Aristocracy · Observations · Mores

A thread on searching for noble roots, where experts meet hostile commenters

Got stuck yesterday in a wonderful thread devoted to the search for noble roots by various inquisitive citizens. It is splendid, in general, that there are places where representatives of noble associations, descendants of famous families, and historians, professional and amateur alike, gather to discuss the origins of this or

Archive · Books · Observations · Nature

Horse censuses of 1882 and 1888 on the number and quality of horses in Russia

I would like to share a curious article on horse-breeding in the nineteenth century from the Brockhaus and Efron Encyclopaedic Dictionary:. Of the approximately 60,456,000 horses in the world, namely 32,253,400 in Europe, 4,125,400 in Asia, 656,000 in Africa, 20,909,000

NB! · Faith · Art · Observations · Humour

John the Baptist and Jesus in the Wombs of Their Mothers

John the Baptist and Jesus in the wombs of their mothers. The subject is slightly alarming, isn't it? When, in the fifth form, I drew something similar, an infant in the belly with a cigarette, for a school wall newspaper on the dangers of smoking, I was censured

NB! · Observations · Humour

Centaurs descend from King Ixion, who killed his father-in-law and, by the will of Zeus, lay with a cloud in the likeness of Hera, whence the centaurs were born

Centaurs descend from King Ixion, who killed his father-in-law and, by the will of Zeus, lay with a cloud in the likeness of Hera, whence the centaurs were born. So a scene of acquaintance without nude selfies is doubly allegorical

NB! · Cinema · Observations · Humour

Tim Roth and Daniel Defoe: There Is Definitely Something There

A hand in a white glove holds a brass astrolabe in front of a wall of tiles painted with minarets and ornaments.

NB! · Art · Observations · Science · Education

Thousand-year-old astrolabe sold at Sotheby's for £680,750

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

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

I can't put my finger on what exactly bothers me about this Latin crib sheet; perhaps it is that the child's abs are better than mine?

Two yellow heraldic figures on a blue field: a stylised toad on the left and a fleur-de-lis on the right.

NB! · Monarchies · Observations

Theories on the Origin of the Fleur-de-Lis from a Toad or Water Iris

There is a version that the king eventually tired of the toads and replaced them with the fleur-de-lis. The flower may be a heraldic adaptation of the shape of a frog, and its origin is sometimes linked to the water iris

NB! · Faith · Observations · Humour

Silver reliquary with a fragment of a garment of Saint Anne, grandmother of Jesus, 18th century, wax seal with threads

Silver reliquary with a fragment of a garment of Saint Anne, grandmother of Jesus, 18th century, wax seal with threads. FOR SALE ON EBAY for $399.9. It raises a good many questions, of course