Unruly History in the News #96
Oral histories, voting by raised hands, and Transylvania's secret to longevity (it's not blood...is it? 🧛🏻🩸)
Hey everyone,
Back with more history acting unruly in the news this week. Hope everyone is staying cool wherever you live (or if you’re in the Southern Hemisphere, staying warm). My A/C is not giving out yet, but Southern California is really testing its abilities to keep up.
This week, I’m in the LA Times reviewing Charlie English’s new book, The CIA Book Club. It was a fascinating read about how the CIA used book drops and underground publishing to encourage Polish rebels fighting Soviet aggression. You can check out my review here to learn more, or go ahead and order the book. It comes out Tuesday.
Quick poll: I’ve been writing more historical fiction lately. I’m about to start working on my second novel—my first is being shopped to agents at the moment—and I want to know if historical fiction writing is something you all would be interested in hearing more about! I’m not sure how often I’d post about it, but if you’re interested in the process of writing historical fiction, let me know below.
And I know I’m behind on the podcast! I’ve finally gotten my recording issues figured out, now I just need to catch up! I’m working on it. :)
And now, in history acting unruly…
My favorite of the week: Surprising matrilineal family lines discovered at Catalhoyuk. Ancient DNA analysis is revealing a strong tradition of female-centric lineages.
And the runner-up: Why is height so rarely considered in historical texts? Given that it’s usually a gendered feature, differing heights imply differing experiences, meaning it should be considered more often.
The Romans often portrayed the Celts as barbarians, which colored our historical understanding of them. The treasures that the Celts left behind tell us a completely different story.
A Celtic drinking horn decorated with embossed gold leaf and finished with a ram’s head from the 5th century BCE. Source: Erich Lessing Twenty tattered pages were found in a storage box—they detail an enslaved man’s daring bid for freedom and his life on the sea after he self-emancipated.
A personal look at the forgotten history of South Asian cosmopolitanism.
This ancient bone flute discovered in Iran is giving historians new insight into 8,000-year-old musical traditions.
A major archaeological discovery has been made in Turkey! This ancient agora was uncovered in Hyllarima. Excavation will begin soon on the surrounding shops.
I feel like I talk about Alexander the Great every round-up now, and here we go again: What evidence is there that the great conquering king was poisoned?
Interested in Alexander? Check out my interview with Alex Lyras, who wrote and produced the play Aristotle/Alexander, all about the monarch’s young life.
More Alexander the Great content where that came from: I reviewed Meredith Kousser’s new take on the end of the young king’s life: Alexander at the End of the World. Read my review in the LA Times or order it here.
How did early modern news travel? How long did it take people to learn about world events, like the fall of Constantinople?
How did Medieval monks and scribes help preserve Classical culture and lay the groundwork for the Renaissance?
Were there sinister motives behind the founding of Liberia?
The first confirmed Denisovan skull has received a face! Now we finally know what one Denisovan looked like.
Europe’s oldest megalithic structures have been dated with unprecedented precision. New dating techniques have established stone structures in Brittany as the oldest in Europe, making the region “the cradle of megalithic culture in Europe.”
The Carnac Stones in Brittany make up the oldest megalithic site in Europe. Image credit: Bettina Schulz Paulsson An ancient Roman breakwater has been found, well, underwater. Finding it gives us insight into how the Ancient Romans tried to tame the sea.
There have been attempts to rehabilitate Richard III’s reign and reputation. Did they work? Or was Richard III really a bad king?
In the history of play: Europe’s oldest boomerang has been found!
This coffee shop in New Delhi became a key gathering space for opponents to the dictatorial regime in 1975.
Historians once thought that Amarna sat empty after Tutankhamen abandoned it in the 14th century BCE. Recent discoveries have uncovered that not everyone abandoned the former capital of ancient Egypt just because the pharaoh did. Instead, it continued along until it was transformed into a hub of Christian monasticism in the 4th-6th centuries CE.
Two and a half months after Robert E. Lee surrendered, ending the American Civil War, a Confederate raider was still firing shots in the Arctic.
This centuries-old carpet duped art dealers and curators for ages. How did this happen? And how was the truth uncovered?
A rare gold coin from the reign of Justin II was just uncovered in Bulgaria.
Image credit: Sliven Regional Historical Museum With over 700 spoken languages, New York City is the most linguistically diverse city in the world. Can it stay that way?
Poets have always sought help with their writing, but ChatGPT is no divine inspiration.
If you’ve ever felt a bit uncomfortable in a zoo, then it might not surprise you to learn that the founder of the modern zoo with habitat-mimicking enclosures tried out his ideas on humans first.
Speaking of animals in zoos, what was the Scopes “Monkey” Trial?
Looking back on America’s first school shooting, 50 years after the fact.
An oral history of the moment Jaws descended on Martha’s Vineyard.
How did hard rock become associated with the hard right in post-Cold War Hungary?
The “Hungaria Skins” musical group in 1997 in Budapest. Source. No polls, no machines, just hands in the air. How this little Swiss canton still votes the Medieval way.
Transylvania may hold the secret to a long and healthy life. No, it’s not drinking blood.
An attempt to prosecute German war criminals in 1921 went so badly that the trials—the Leipzig Trials—are mostly forgotten today. What went wrong?
