Great American Civil War author tour de force was biography of Lincoln , also great 2 volume biography of Abolitionist Senator Charles Sumner ,plus Lincoln Reconsidered

Still not in the "ancient" category, but older than the ship from this post and I've yet to find one more impressive!

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vasa_(ship)

Would be amazing to unearth a greek/roman/phoenician trireme, might need to have sunk in amber to preserve that long though lol.

"It's long been believed that ancient Egyptians used mummification as a way to preserve a body after death. However, an upcoming museum exhibition indicates that was never the case, and instead the elaborate burial technique was actually a way to guide the deceased toward divinity.

Researchers from the University of Manchester's Manchester Museum(opens in new tab) in England are highlighting the common misconception as part of preparations for an exhibition called "Golden Mummies of Egypt" that opens early next year. This new understanding about mummification's intended purpose essentially upends much of what is taught to students about mummies."

"It's a big 180," Campbell Price(opens in new tab), the museum's curator of Egypt and Sudan, told Live Science.

It really sets up the ironic reversal when he signs the emancipation proclamation millenia later.

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I'd agree, China has plenty of artifacts from the times of the "ancients" (e.g. Shang Dynasty bronzeware, from 1600 BCE to 1000 BCE) that are far older than this.

If we're talking archeological eras, then this might be best termed "pre-Industrial", since the Qing Dynasty resolutely resisted industrialization.

However, from the viewpoint of a modern Chinese person, it's also worth noting that in the space of 150 years they had a collapse of a dynasty, the rise and collapse of numerous warlord states, the failure of a new Republic (complete with an abortive attempt by the president to name himself new Emperor), and finally the establishment of a Communist state.

The fact that the Communist government has held power for a (comparatively brief) 70+ years still puts it at one of the more stable forms of government in the past generation or two.

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The US raised a submarine from that time, so yeah it is not ancient by any stretch of imagination.

Do you have any source on the "billions" of aid to Cuba from decades ago? But nevertheless, do you actually think that makes a dent in the argument? Aid for basic necesities, while useful and necesary, won't fix any of the problems caused by not being able to freely trade with the world. Which is what the USA and Israel prohibit Cuba to do. How far do you think Israel (to give an example of a similar sized country) would go with an economic blockade of the extension and duration that the cuban blockade has had?

> and it has nothing whatsoever to do with the systemic political repression that has defined the Communist regime in Cuba since its inception.

First of all, all countries have "political repression". For example, in the US political repression is strictly enforced against communists, and communist parties have historically been persecuted, criminalized and sabotaged by the FBI and the CIA. In many eastern europe "democracies" communist parties are outright outlawed. So don't talk about political repression as if it was something characteristic or unique to Cuba, when all burgouis democracy have it.

Second, economic embargo, and coup attempts in Cuba have everything to do with internal politics. The US has tried, since the inception of Cuba, as you said, to destroy the communist revolution. For that, it has tried assassinations (I guess assassinations are OK when the US does them!), coups, guerrillas, terrorism, propaganda campaigns, economic warfare, etcetera, etcetera.

How should a Country react against such persistent attempts to destroy it? Don't you think that it is necesary, for the survival of the revolution, to identify capitalist attempts at destruction and reactionary counter-revolution?

And the repression in Cuba is purely political. You don't have repression against minorities, against women, against LGBTQ people, racial repression, etcetera. You are free to live your life as you please. Just don't try to coup the government or assassinate the president, that should be simple to do for everyone except CIA agents, right?

Well in that case, if two things are not exactly identical, we shouldn't mention resemblances/similarities, Or even inspirations.

Is there a term used to refer to the period of the French Revolution and Napoleon as a whole?

There's a weird account in Xenophon's Anabasis.

Xenophon intends to board ships to take him men back to Greece (west), but someone starts spreading the rumor that he intends to sail to Persia (east) and give them to the Persians.

So Xenophon has to call a meeting, and he basically says, "You can all clearly see which direction I'm sailing because of the sun, and if I sail east you all can just kill me, so how could that plan even work?"

We don't know a huge amount about how this worked, but it was probably based on their region and their particular customs. These religions are "polytheistic" precisely because there was no single book or doctrine that people agreed on. They did not have the equivalent of a "Bible" to explain these things.

In Greece, each community would have one or more temples with a cult dedicated to a particular god. But they didn't necessarily have temples or cults for every single god, and the teachings of one cult probably didn't exactly match the teachings of another cult in a different city, even if they both worshipped the same god.

I suspect it was a judgment call based on factors like whose temple was nearby, who was considered the patron of a certain city, and which god's offerings had seemed to be successful in the past.

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Person A: "My father told me the story of how he sacrificed a goat to Athena, and he lost that battle. So maybe we should try Ares."

Person B: "I don't think so. The other guy's General claims he is descended from a son of Ares."

Person A: "Okay, so we stick with Athena but we try a cow instead of a goat?"

Person B: "Yeah, that sounds good."

I don’t know it well but the Salonica campaign was regarded by some contemporaries as one of the worst fronts a British soldier could get sent to, generally because of outbreaks of malaria. I can’t really answer any of your specific questions but certainly don’t be under the impression that things were much better there than in other theatres.

My only source on this campaign right now is Patricia Cara’s ‘A Lab of One’s Own’, about British female scientists and suffragettes in the war. There’s not much in there about it, but it does pop up since a number of women were sent to establish hospitals in Serbia and then later in the Salonica front

When I went to the museum about 4 or 5 years ago, I remember someone telling me that part of what helped was also the amount of trash that had been thrown into the fjord over the centuries, which created an anoxic environment down the bottom of the water.

And how many statues did NOT have their hands in the same position? How many parts of the statues were NOT at all similar?

Don't latch onto a trivial detail and give it more meaning than it deserves. Just because you have two examples of things that look similar does not mean those similarities are representative or relevant.

You could pick any feature of the artwork and eventually find SOMETHING on Earth that it resembles, without indicating any relevant connection.

>Or did their mere presence stop any thought of routing?

Let me tell you a secret about warfare: The average soldier has no idea what the hell is going on.

Even with all of our drones and radios, the average infantryman is really clueless about anything he can't personally see or hear. And in battle, 99% of your attention is focused on the enemy.

Now imagine you in the Napoleonic Wars. To your left, right, and rear are just close-packed soldiers wearing tall hats. You're already half deaf from gunfire and all of your attention is focused on the complicated process of loading your musket. If more guys are coming up from behind to help, you probably wouldn't notice.

It is not uncommon to see accounts of soldiers fleeing the battlefield, claiming all is lost, even when their side was actually winning. For example, at Waterloo British soldiers fled from battle and encountered Prussian reinforcements. Rather than being inspired to return to the fight, they told the Prussians the battle was already lost.

Indeed, to the Chinese, if a historical period still have detailed and believable records, it is not ancient enough.

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Agreed - still cool though

It does depend on where the boat is. Like, the Baltic has perfect conditions for preserving the wood and is quite shallow.

Had Vasa sunk over the Marian trench we wouldn't be picking it, is my point.

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This article has an actual picture of the wreck for those who are interested: http://global.chinadaily.com.cn/a/202211/22/WS637c04d0a31049175432b0dd.html

Exactly.. where are the photos of the ship?