Taras Bulba's weight of 20 puds and his horse named Chyort

Taras Bulba weighed 20 poods, or about 326 kilograms. What is one to do with such a weight? How is one to manage? Probably only die. But Taras Bulba still contrived to ride on horseback. Then again, if one remembers that his horse was called Chort (Devil), everything falls into place in principle, and the question of how the animal hauled such a load simply falls away. A horse might not be equal to it, but the Devil certainly is, even with a dead man on his back

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Student protest at the Porte des Lions entrance of the Louvre over the education crisis

They did not know how to avoid a robbery, but they used tear gas against us - reads one of the demonstrators' placards at the entrance to the Louvre. Today the student protests in Paris reached the Louvre, and I decided to go to the demonstration at the museum'

Villa Marmottan Library in Boulogne-Billancourt Holds a Collection on the Napoleonic Era

The Villa Marmottan library is a hidden sight of Paris, situated in the suburb of Boulogne-Billancourt. This former mansion of the historian Paul Marmottan has today been turned into a unique public library under the aegis of the Académie des Beaux-Arts. Unlike the popular Musée Marmottan Monet, this

Painting by Rembrandt: a bearded old man reads a book at a table with a patterned cloth in a vaulted room, with a bright window on the right.

Rembrandt, the painting “Philosopher Reading”: an old man with a book in a vaulted hall

Philosopher Reading. Rembrandt Be like this philosopher. Or like Rembrandt, for that matter. As far as your strength allows

Hieromonk Sofontiy of the Kerzhenets, an Old Believer father: his grave, his following and his portrayal by Melnikov-Pechersky

In the Trans-Volga forests on the river Kerzhenets, not far from Semyonov in the Nizhny Novgorod region, stands a cross over the grave of Hieromonk Sophonty, one of the most revered fathers of the Old Believers. Tradition names Sophonty as one of seven Solovetsky monks who fled the monastery

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Student protest at the Porte des Lions entrance of the Louvre over the education crisis

Villa Marmottan Library in Boulogne-Billancourt Holds a Collection on the Napoleonic Era

Rembrandt, the painting “Philosopher Reading”: an old man with a book in a vaulted hall

Hieromonk Sofontiy of the Kerzhenets, an Old Believer father: his grave, his following and his portrayal by Melnikov-Pechersky