Faith · Society · People
30 May marks the 595th anniversary of the execution of Joan of Arc in the Old Market Square in Rouen. Today the day is observed in France as a national holiday, and in the Catholic Church as the Memorial of Saint Joan of Arc. Formally, she was charged with heresy,
The East · Monarchies · Observations · Heritage · Society · Humour
The Fund for the Royal Private Collections commissioned an appraisal of roughly a thousand objects. Under suspicion are a golden amulet necklace and historical weapons from Indonesia, acquired in the colonial era. I can just picture how the Dutch East India Company would have laughed at so modest a discovery.
Science · Education · Society
On 25 May the Ministry of Science and Technology announced the penalties awaiting dishonest scholars: the return of grants, a public apology, and an entry recording the violation on the national digital platform. In 2020 it emerged that Vietnam's Ton Duc Thang and Duy Tan universities had been
NB! · Moscow · Observations · Society
Art · Heritage · Society
Know what solution they came up with? Since 2018, a group of artists has been painting murals across Rio with portraits of figures of Afro-Brazilian culture, each placed at a spot where the person in question once lived
Faith · Observations · Society · Rome
Leo XIV invites the reader to choose: are people building the Tower of Babel, or restoring Jerusalem under Nehemiah? The main thing the Pope draws attention to in the encyclical is the passage of technological power from the public sector to the private, as though this had only just happened.
Architecture · Observations · Heritage · Society · Paris
Look how beautifully the exit of La Fourche metro station has been restored in Paris! Officials very rarely, but still occasionally, manage to discharge their duties properly; in this case they needed the direct participation of the residents of the neighbourhood, who proposed precisely this design in place of the
NB! · Archive · Society · Paris
Paris in May 1968. The corner of Boulevard Saint-Michel and Rue Soufflot. Nowadays the spot is occupied by something along the lines of a Burger King
Heritage · Society
A deeply moving people's memorial at Ramsgate to the many "little ships" of Dunkirk, which took part in the evacuation of British and French troops in June 1940 and never returned. Among them were fishing boats, pleasure craft, small coastal cargo vessels, ferries and even private
Architecture · Faith · Observations · Society · Paris
In the Marais, inside the church of Notre-Dame-des-Blancs-Manteaux, vintage clothes are sold at weekends. There are usually plenty of tourists here, eager to capture a thoroughly Parisian combination: Baroque-Classicist architecture and fashionable dress. This is a working church, which shares its premises with a second-
Archive · Society · Pop Culture · Humour
Anti-British propaganda in Japan in 1941 plays on Churchill's initials W.C., the international sign for a lavatory, water closet. The gesture, frequently found in manga, anime and comedy scenes as an exaggerated reaction to something foul-smelling, may in the broader context of visual culture be
Archive · Moscow · Society
On 15 April the Moscow Soviet, sitting in the former Governor-General's House right on Skobelev Square, backed the loan by resolution. Two days later a large rally began beneath its windows, by the monument to Skobelev. The Kadets and the People's Socialists called on the