This is the first post in a series discussing the basic contours of life – birth, marriage, labor, subsistence, death – of pre-modern peasants and their families. Prior to the industrial revolution, peasant farmers of varying types made up the overwhelming majority of people in settled societies (the sort with cities and writing). And when … Continue reading Collections: Life, Work, Death and the Peasant, Part I: Households →

The Stoic Perspective

Few monarchs have captured the imagination of a nation as much as King Henry V (r. 1413-22). The inspiration behind hundreds of books, plays, and movies, the nine-year reign of this English monarch is deemed as one of the most successful not just of any English king, but of any monarch in history. Read […]

We’ve been to East London in the 1960s with Tony Hall before, heading down the pub and to the shops. Now we get to see the streets in panoramic pictures taken by his Horizont (Горизонт) camera. Made between 1967 and 1973 by Russia’s Krasnogorsky Mekhanichesky Zavod (KMZ), the 35mm camera had a rotating lens that … Continue reading "1960s London Through A Russian Horizont Panoramic Camera" The post 1960s London Through A Russian Horizont Panoramic Camera appeared first on Flashbak.

Medieval battles were brutal, blood-soaked grind. Clever tactics and strong leadership often mattered, yet true upsets happened only when the weaker side found an edge. Whether better weapons, better tactics, knowledge of the terrain, or an unbreakable esprit de corps. The battles below illustrate moments when determined underdogs defied the odds and claimed stunning […]