Jan 17, 2021 | Fun Historical Facts
If you’re looking to enrich your fantasy or Medieval fiction, why not mention Cistercian numbers — the forgotten ciphers of Medieval monks? As Tibi Puiu reports on ZME Science, people have employed all sorts of systems throughout history, most of which are now...
Jan 15, 2021 | Fun Historical Facts, Quora
Everyone has heard of Robinson Crusoe. But how many know the real-life inspiration behind the character? As Alex Turner explains on Quora, this would be Alexander Selkirk: Selkirk was a Scottish sailor, born in 1676. He was a rather hotheaded man, who tended to look...
Jan 3, 2021 | Fun Historical Facts
I kick off the new year with a matter close to anyone who’s ever flirted with fantasy writing: witches. I mean, what’s fantasy without witchcraft? Probably a rather boring Medieval existence, that’s what. Of course, there’s a big difference...
Dec 19, 2020 | Fun Historical Facts, Quora
Have you ever wondered where the pointy wizard hat stereotype stems from? Someone on Quora did and Wendy Carolan had the answer. Where Does the Idea of the Wizard’s Hat Come from? As you can well imagine, the question here refers to the stereotypical pointy blue...
Dec 11, 2020 | Fun Historical Facts, Quora
As someone who knows how hard it can be to choose a character name for your fantasy novel, I came across some interesting discussions on Quora (here and here). They concerned the letter Æ and the evolution of old Anglo-Saxon names. I hope you find it as interesting as...
Nov 23, 2020 | Fun Historical Facts
Ivy Panda has created a World Map Timelapse of the spread of the English language from the 5th century to date. You can watch it in its entirety below or click on the links to jump to a specific time period: 0:00 Intro 0:09 5th-15th century 0:26 16th century 0:49 17th...
Nov 13, 2020 | Fun Historical Facts, Quora
Robert Arthurs reports on Quora first seeing this wonder of medieval over-specialization on display in Vienna, Austria: Doesn’t it look awesome? Well, looks can be deceiving. You see that small hole in the top region of the shield? That is where a soldier would...
Nov 10, 2020 | Fun Historical Facts
How old is writing? If we believe the common narrative, writing emerged in Sumeria in the third millennium BC. Others consider the Jiahu symbols from China or the Vinča symbols from Serbia as examples as the first writing. However, new archeological data keeps...
Oct 25, 2020 | Fun Historical Facts
Art and art heists seem to go hand-in-hand. No wonder then that some of the rarest masterpieces of art have disappeared at different points in history under mysterious circumstances, leaving the cognoscenti speechless to date. Only reproductions exist today, thanks to...
Oct 5, 2020 | Fun Historical Facts
Continuing with my last post’s theme on bathing through history, this one deals specifically with bathing in the Middle Ages. While the Crusades are generally blamed for a number of things, they triggered significant advances in the West. Indeed, some scholars...
