What the Barista is Brewing Today
Grab some espresso and dive in for some brewmination
The History and Art of Protest Posters
One of the most common mediums for political art has long been poster making. One of the most common mediums for political art is poster making. From the Mexican Revolution to recent marches infuriated by the Trump administration, posters have continually been used as a powerful form of protest and a symbol of discontent. The[…]
A 20th-Century History of the Raised Fist as a Changing and Cross-Applicable Symbol
The raised fist, or the clenched fist, is a symbol of solidarity and support.[1] It is also used as a salute to express unity, strength, defiance, or resistance. History A raised fist was used as a logo by the Industrial Workers of the World[3] (IWW) in 1917. However, it was popularised during the Spanish Civil War of 1936-1939, when it was used by the Republican faction as a greeting, and was known[…]
A Brief History of the Invention of Musical Notation
The notes and staves we see today didn’t spring fully formed from one person’s mind. Imagine a piece of music. No, not the music, but the written score or sheet. Some of us look at it, and immediately begin translating those symbols into sounds. Others among us might not be able to make sense of[…]
A History of Language, Script, and Symbol in West Africa
West Africa is a place of great diversity – in language, in writing, in the hugely varied means of recording information and passing it on. By Dr. Marion Wallace (left) and Dr. Janet Topp Fargion (right)Wallace: Lead Curator, Africa CollectionsFargion: Lead Curator, World and Traditional MusicBritish Library Introduction West Africa is home to well over[…]
Norse-Viking Symbols and Meanings
The symbols used in Norse mythology had to do not only with supernatural entities but also with the challenges of everyday life. Introduction A symbol is an image or object which represents an abstract concept, often having to do with one’s religious beliefs. Every civilization, from the most ancient to the present day, has made use[…]
Symbols in Ancient Egypt
Symbols in a largely illiterate society serve the vital purpose of relaying the most important values of the culture to the people generation after generation, often changing in form and function. Introduction Religion in ancient Egypt was fully integrated into the people’s daily lives. The gods were present at one’s birth, throughout one’s life, in the transition from[…]
Tru Life: How Truman Capote Became a Cautionary Tale of Celebrity Culture
The ups and downs of a big-time writer. In a life that spanned nearly six decades, Truman Capote wrote stories that remain reliably in print. The short story “A Christmas Memory” is a yuletide classic, and his popular novel, Breakfast at Tiffany’s, is a touchstone for young, restless souls trying to make it on their[…]
The Phantom Punch
Some kind of punch was thrown, and, invisible or not, something powerful had happened. In all the chaos that surrounded the rematch between Muhammad Ali and Sonny Liston, a few things remained quite clear: it was certain that Sonny Liston had fallen. The actor Stepin Fetchit was definitely in Ali’s corner. Some kind of punch[…]
The Eternal City’s 17th-Century Building Craze also Bolstered Urban Planning
“Did the public have a voice in the development of a theocratic city?” As University of Tennessee professor Dorothy Metzger Habel examined architectural archives for seventeenth-century Rome, she started hearing voices. The many participants in the Eternal City’s building boom at that point—when 30 percent of the work force was engaged in the construction industry—came[…]
Historical Perception of Architecture and Cultural History Approach
The holistic nature of cultural history approach makes us consider all factors that may have contributed to the creation of architecture. Introduction The experts and specialists in the field of architecture have had different viewpoints and approaches in defining the concepts of “history” and “the history of architecture”, all through the compiled history of architecture.[…]
Medicine in the Middle Ages
In this period, there was no tradition of scientific medicine, and observations went hand in hand with spiritual and religious influences. By Dr. Rachel HajarCardiologyHamad Medical Corporation Introduction Superstition is the poison of the mind Joseph Lewis “The glory that was Greece and the grandeur that was Rome” ended when Rome fell to Germanic tribes[…]
Medical Treatments in Ancient Egypt
The ancient Egyptians experienced the same wide array of disease that people do in the present day. Introduction The ancient Egyptians experienced the same wide array of disease that people do in the present day, but unlike most people in the modern era, they attributed the experience to supernatural causes. The common cold, for example,[…]
Looking for the Antichrist: The Nortons and Mussolini in 1932
“Do you intend to reconstitute the Roman Empire?” It was a simple question, but Il Duce did not understand. By Sam Gee The question was posed during a 1932 meeting between the American evangelical missionaries Edith and Ralph Norton and the rising Italian dictator Benito Mussolini, also known as Il Duce (The Leader). The Americans[…]
Beatus of Liébana: An Early Medieval Apocalyptic Illustrator
Beatus was an early medieval monk who set down to illustrate a collection of writings he had compiled on the Book of Revelations. In a monastery in the mountains of northern Spain, 700 years after the Book of Revelations was written, a monk set down to illustrate a collection of writings he had compiled about[…]
How Translation Obscured the Music and Wordplay of the Bible
Translators of the Bible have rarely understood the need or made the effort to convey the literary dimension of the Hebrew works. An essential fact about the Hebrew Bible is that most of its narrative prose as well as its poetry manifests a high order of sophisticated literary fashioning. This means that any translation that[…]
Between Gods and Animals: Becoming Human in the Gilgamesh Epic
In short, the new fragment reveals a vision of humanity as a process of maturation that unfolds between the animal and the divine. The Epic of Gilgamesh is a Babylonian poem composed in ancient Iraq, millennia before Homer. It tells the story of Gilgamesh, king of the city of Uruk. To curb his restless and destructive[…]
How Seeing Snakes in the Grass Helped Primates to Evolve
Vision is a window onto the world, its qualities determined by natural selection. Evolution has favoured the modification and expansion of primate vision. Compared with other mammals, primates have, for example, greater depth perception from having forward-facing eyes with extensively overlapping visual fields, sharper visual acuity, more areas in the brain that are involved with[…]
Lucy’s Shattered Bones: Our Ancestors Lived a Dangerous Life in Trees
Humans stand out among all the mammals as being the only species to totter about on two feet. We are the bipedal apes. A ground breaking study of the bones of a 3.2 million year old human ancestor (‘Lucy’) revealed that she died from the crushing impact of a fall from high in the trees. This exciting[…]
Trends in American Conservation in the 19th and 20th Centuries
Many of the protected open spaces that we have today have been inherited from one or more of three traditions. By Ann E. Chapman Introduction – Trends in the 19th Century Conservation thinking has evolved over centuries, often as a response to the profound land use changes that shaped the American landscape after the arrival[…]
Stopping Time to Study History: The Art of Textile Conservation
It has fallen on textile conservators to keep historic textiles preserved, and a surprising amount of science aids them in this quest. Introduction In one of the lower-level exhibition rooms of the Museum of Fine Arts (MFA) in Boston is a large red and blue mantle from Peru made of camelid wool. Stylized faces embroidered in yellow,[…]
Jubilate Agno: An 18th-Century Poet and His Cat
From ‘Six studies of a cat’ by Thomas Gainsborough, 1763–70 The poet Christopher Smart — also known as “Kit Smart”, “Kitty Smart”, “Jack Smart” and, on occasion, “Mrs Mary Midnight” — was a well known figure in 18th-century London. Nowadays he is perhaps best known for considering his cat Jeoffry. Writer and broadcaster Frank Key[…]
“O Uommibatto”: How the Pre-Raphaelites Became Obsessed with the Wombat
Dante Gabriel Rossetti and company’s curious but longstanding fixation with the furry oddity that is the wombat — that “most beautiful of God’s creatures” which found its way into their poems, their art, and even, for a brief while, their homes. In 1857, the English artist Dante Gabriel Rossetti — central figure of the Pre-Raphaelite[…]
Estimating Population in Ancient Egypt
tomb of Rekhmire the vizier, the highest ranking official under the pharaohs Tuthmosis III and Amenophis II (New Kingdom). Working out how many people lived in ancient Egypt is far from an easy task. By Dr. Steven Snape Reader in Egyptian Archaeology University of Liverpool Introduction Working out how many people lived in ancient Egypt is[…]
The Location of Cities in Ancient Egypt
The location of towns and cities in ancient Egypt was dictated by two principal factors. By Dr. Steven Snape Reader in Egyptian Archaeology University of Liverpool Introduction The location of towns and cities in ancient Egypt was dictated by two principal factors; the behaviour of the Nile and the wishes of the king. Royal influence on[…]
Fay Chong and Andrew Chinn: Asian Masters of American Art
Fay Chong and Andrew Chinn were Asian American artists who made major contributions to the two most important movements in American art between 1930 and 1960—Regionalism and Abstract Expressionism. Introduction Fay Chong and Andrew Chinn were Asian American artists who made major contributions to the two most important movements in American art between 1930 and[…]
Fook Shing: Colonial Victoria’s Chinese Detective
Fook Shing spent 20 years as a Melbourne gumshoe. He policed the thriving Chinese community – claiming opium as an expense – but was never promoted above his entry rank of detective third class. On July 25 1882, Inspector Frederick Secretan, the head of Victoria Police’s Detective Branch, shifted uncomfortably in his seat. In the[…]
The Second Opium War and the Treaty of Tianjin, 1857–1859
The United States and European powers had grown increasingly dissatisfied with treaties following the First Opium War. Following the First Opium War in the 1840s, the Western powers concluded a series of treaties with China in an effort to open its lucrative markets to Western trade. In the 1850s, the United States and the European[…]
The First Opium War and the Treaty of Wangxia, 1839–1844
Western powers tried to gain unfettered access to Chinese products and markets for European and U.S. trade. The Treaty of Wangxia (Wang-hsia) was the first formal treaty signed between the United States and China in 1844. It served as an American counterpart to the Anglo-Chinese Treaty of Nanjing that ended the First Opium War in[…]
The Discovery of Infectious Diseases in 2,000-Year-Old Silk Road Feces
How a research team identified parasites in ‘hygiene sticks’ that travellers on the Silk Road effectively used as their toilet paper. Once travelled by famous historical figures such as Marco Polo and Genghis Khan, the Silk Road was a hugely important network of transport routes connecting eastern China with Central Asia, the Middle East and[…]
The Prehistoric Origins and Historic Growth of the Silk Road
The Silk Road provided a conduit not only for silk, but also offered a very important path for cultural, religious and technological transmission. Introduction The Silk Road was an extensive interconnected network of trade routes across the Asian continent connecting East, South, and Western Asia with the Mediterranean world, including North Africa and Europe. These trade routes enabled[…]
