Before people learned to extract iron from ore during the Iron Age, meteorites were the only source of the metal. This iron Bronze-age arrowhead found in Mörigen, Switzerland was not surprisingly crafted from a meteorite. It dates to 900-800 BCE.

After closer analysis, however, the meteorite iron source was determined to be most likely from a meteorite that fell in distant Estonia. This distance of 1600 km (almost 1000 miles) from the Baltic area may reflect the extensive trade in Bronze Age Europe.

In 2021, a team of scientists from the institution began studying the relic using noninvasive methods—including electron microscopy, X-ray tomography, and gamma spectrometry—to prevent any damage.

While the researchers initially suspected the material to have come from the Twannberg meteorite, which hit a barley field in [nearby] Twann about 170,000 years ago, the arrowhead’s metal content led them instead to the Kaalijarv meteorite.  

The Kaalijarv meteorite, also known as Kaali, landed in the region of Estonia during the Nordic Bronze Age (c. 1700–500 B.C.E.). 

https://news.artnet.com/art-world/bronze-age-arrowhead-made-from-meteorite-2345756/amp-page

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0305440323001073?via%3Dihub#sec4

The short video above is a really simple  description of how the ancient Greek Eratosthenes from Cyrene calculated the circumference of the planet Earth around 240 BCE.  (This clip is taken from a longer segment below.)

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Eratosthenes had heard from travelers about a well in Syene (now Aswan, Egypt) with an interesting property: at noon on the summer solstice, which occurs about June 21 every year, the sun illuminated the entire bottom of this well, without casting any shadows, indicating that the sun was directly overhead. Eratosthenes then measured the angle of a shadow cast by a stick at noon on the summer solstice in Alexandria, and found it made an angle of about 7.2 degrees, or about 1/50 of a complete circle.

He realized that if he knew the distance from Alexandria to Syene, he could easily calculate the circumference of Earth. But in those days it was extremely difficult to determine distance with any accuracy. Some distances between cities were measured by the time it took a camel caravan to travel from one city to the other. But camels have a tendency to wander and to walk at varying speeds. So Eratosthenes hired bematists, professional surveyors trained to walk with equal length steps. They found that Syene lies about 5000 stadia from Alexandria.

Eratosthenes then used this to calculate the circumference of the Earth to be about 250,000 stadia. Modern scholars disagree about the length of the stadium used by Eratosthenes. Values between 500 and about 600 feet have been suggested, putting Eratosthenes’ calculated circumference between about 24,000 miles and about 29,000 miles. The Earth is now known to measure about 24,900 miles around the equator, slightly less around the poles.

 

interesting to note that Eratosthenes was from Cyrene, noted for its cultivation of the near-mythical plant Silphium (a frequent topic in the past found in the post below).

https://www.aps.org/publications/apsnews/200606/history.cfm

Much has been written about Queen Teuta, “the pirate queen” who fought Rome (see post below). Here is a good article about Queen Teuta:

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Illyrian Queen Teuta is one of the most extraordinary figures of Illyrian antiquity and of Albanian heritage. She was also called the pirate queen, and folklore says that she was wiser than a snake, braver than a lion, and more beautiful than fairies.

Teuta ascended the throne in 231 BC.. After the death of her husband Agron, she ruled in the name of her minor stepson Pinnes, and at that time the powerful Illyrian state stretched from the left bank of the Neretva to Epirus, encompassing all the islands except Vis.

Teuta managed to expand the borders of her kingdom, after defeating the Greek army and taking Phoenicia, the richest and most important city of Epirus. Not only she controlled the Adriatic Sea, but after her military success, she gained control of Ionian Sea. The people started calling Teuta the “Queen of Seas”.

However, perhaps more so even than her powerful navy, Teuta’s most feared forces were the Illyrian pirates that roamed the nearby seas. Interestingly, piracy was completely legal in Illyria and even considered a viable if not respectable profession. Teuta gave her ships free reign in the Mediterranean Sea.

 

https://arkeonews.net/queen-of-seas-who-challenged-rome-queen-teuta/

He may also have been the first to have called the people of Britain “the painted ones” or the “tattooed folk,” derived from a Celtic term.

The recent discovery of several hundred ochre fragments at a 6,500-year-old ceremonial site near Carlisle, England seems to confirm the description of the Celts’ body painting:

https://greekreporter.com/2023/08/26/archaeological-find-supports-ancient-greek-explorers-account-britons/

There have been many previous posts about Carthage (see below). Invicta has produced a wonderful video “Inside the Walls of Carthage—The Rome of Africa.”
 

Here’s an interesting article on the Rus’ attacking Constantinople in AD 860. Constantinople was almost defenseless at that time as the Byzantine Emperor Michael III was with his army fighting in Asia Minor against the Abbasid Caliphate while the Byzantine navy was in the Mediterranean Sea fighting Arab pirates.

The Rus’ were originally Norsemen, mainly from present-day Sweden who settled and ruled the river-routes between the Baltic and the Black Seas from around the 8th to 11th centuries AD (Source: Wikipedia). The Rus’ gave their name to the Russians and Belarus.

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The Rus’ Khaganate, also Russkiy Kaganate was a state, or a cluster of city-states in present-day Russia, comprised of a multi-cultural society consisting of Slavic, Turkic, Baltic, Finnic, Hungarian, and Norse peoples, although the scholarly consensus suggests that the Rus’ originated in eastern Sweden around the eighth century, and that their name has the same origin as Roslagen in Swedish derived from an Old Norse term for “the men who row”.

In AD 860, a fleet of around 200 Rus’ vessels carrying up to 5,000 soldiers sailed into the Bosporus and started attacking the suburbs of the imperial capital. According to an oration written by the ecumenical patriarch Photios I of Constantinople, the attack by the “unknown people” or the “obscure people” was “like a thunderbolt from heaven”, and was as sudden and unexpected “as a swarm of wasps”.

 

https://www.heritagedaily.com/2021/06/the-viking-russ-siege-of-constantinople/139507

For some reason, I never imagined that these Viking ancestors had attacked Constantinople. Here's a good article about the interactions between the Rus' and the Byzantines both as enemies and even allies.

Viking graffiti in the Hagia Sofia 

Globetrotting Vikings: The Quest for Constantinople | HISTORY

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Most of them, even to the present time, sleep on the ground, and eat their meals seated on beds of straw. Food they have in very great quantities, along with milk and flesh of all sorts, but particularly the flesh of hogs, both fresh and salted.

http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/e/roman/texts/strabo/4d*.html

Here’s an excellent article about the suspected pre-Roman Celtic diet:

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The ancient Greek philosopher, historiographer, geographer, Strabo has one of the oldest written accounts of the Celts. While Strabo himself never visited the British Isles, his accounts quote the works of Pytheas who did go to Ireland in 325BC (well before the Roman conquest in 84AD). Strabo and many of his contemporaries describe Celtic agriculture as unsophisticated, but this contradicts the various archeological sites that have been studied. Strabo does say that the Celts cultivated grain, and produced dairy (though not cheese). This is consistent with archeological finds, that show that many if not most agrarian communities in the centuries prior to the Roman invasion were heavily reliant on cattle and all the products it produced. He describes their cultivation of grain in more detail by saying that they simply “cut off no more than the heads and store them away in roofed granges, and then each day they pick out the ripened heads and grind them, getting in this way their food” (Strabo.) The grain could be used for grinding and making bread or porridge, as well as fermented to make ale.

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One of the oldest archeological sites in Ireland, Ceide Fields, is a great glimpse into Celtic agriculture. This site is over 5,000 years old, and has been studied thoroughly by archeologists. Ciede reveals that an agrarian community lived there and domesticated cattle for centuries. This was discovered through cattle bones found on site. Given that cattle is not native to Ireland, it is assumed that it was imported from continental Europe when Celts initially arrived to the British Isles in 7,000BC (Snook, 2020) . The Celts of Ireland and the British Isles grew several kinds of grains and legumes. Generally these grains and legumes were ground into flours and meals to make porridge, bread, and gruel. Ceide Fields also had remnants of grain grinding stones (or Quern stones) to make flour. Archeological analysis of skeletal remains of Celtic people reveals that the method of grinding grains made for extremely coarse flours with bits of stone, which caused people’s teeth to become worn down. 

https://storymaps.arcgis.com/stories/8ced9f818eb94929b90ce2e6c28dfda6

So what did they drink? Studies looking at the organic residues found on Greek ceramic fragments found in Celtic hillforts in pre-Roman France show that the Celts drank imported Greek wines, as well as local beer in these imported ceramic vessels.

https://amp.abc.net.au/article/11218012

https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0218001

Max Miller does a wonderful job preparing a Celtic meal based on Strabo and the other ancient sources in this episode of “Eating History with Max Miller”:

"Since the border war of February-March 1979, there have been negotiations held at irregular intervals between China and Vietnam. 
These negotiations have been held in part to discuss the border problems. But there has been no sign of progress in this area. 
Despite pledges of entering the talks with good intentions by both sides, neither government has made significant efforts to get 
beyond name calling and symbolic attempts to settle the issues."

Hood, Steven J.. Dragons Entangled: Indochina and the China-Vietnam War (p. 117). Taylor and Francis. Kindle Edition. 

That's the very beginning of the book.  Now let's get back to the 0th Indochina war, that is WWII.

WWII started On December 8, 1941, the United States Congress declared war (Pub.L. 77–328, 55 Stat. 795) on the Empire of Japan in response to that country's
 surprise attack on Pearl Harbor the prior day. It was formulated an hour after the Infamy Speech of President Franklin D. Roosevelt. 

Now for the lead up to the war:

Britannica:
When Japanese troops entered northern Indochina in September 1940 (in pursuance of an agreement extorted in August from the Vichy government of France), 
the United States uttered a protest. Germany and Italy, by contrast, recognized Japan as the leading power in the Far East by concluding with it the Tripartite,
 or Axis, Pact of September 27, 1940: negotiated by Japanese foreign minister Matsuoka Yosuke, the pact pledged its signatories to come to one another’s help 
 in the event of an attack “by a power not already engaged in war.” Japan also concluded a neutrality pact with the U.S.S.R. on April 13, 1941.
 
 Aha!  Notice, when this happened, the United States entered a protest.  That's the watershed event.  
 
 But,
 
 FDR limited the American response to Japan’s aggressive moves to extension of another $50 million credit line to China. 
 He ratcheted up pressure on Japan by adding scrap steel and iron,vital to Japanese industrial production, to his list of embargoed exports.

Wortman, Marc. 1941: Fighting the Shadow War: A Divided America in a World at War (pp. 120-121). Grove Atlantic. Kindle Edition. 

I didn't realize we already had an embargo at that point.
 
 After the Japanese invaded southern French Indochina in July, the United States cut off oil exports to Japan. With the conflict in China rapidly consuming Japan’s
  already scarce resources and the trade embargo imposed on the country only tightening, Tokyo was determined to expand deeper into Southeast Asia to secure new 
  sources of oil and other war-making materials.

Kupchan, Charles A.. Isolationism (p. 286). Oxford University Press. Kindle Edition. 

More specifically, from Britannica

On July 2, 1941, the Imperial Conference decided to press the Japanese advance southward even at the risk of war with Great Britain and the United States;
 and this policy was pursued even when Matsuoka was relieved of office a fortnight later. On July 26, in pursuance of a new agreement with Vichy France, 
 Japanese forces began to occupy bases in southern Indochina.
 
Some more Britannica,  
 This time the United States reacted vigorously, not only freezing Japanese assets under U.S. control but also imposing an embargo on supplies of oil to Japan. 
 Dismay at the embargo drove the Japanese naval command, which had hitherto been more moderate than the army, into collusion with the army’s extremism. 
 When negotiations with the Dutch of Indonesia for an alternative supply of oil produced no satisfaction, the Imperial Conference on September 6, at 
 the high command’s insistence, decided that war must be undertaken against the United States and Great Britain unless an understanding with the United 
 States could be reached in a few weeks’ time.
 
 That lead up to the war is awful exciting.  I should really interject something here about the end of World War II.  From the wikipedia

Victory over Japan Day (also known as V-J Day, Victory in the Pacific Day, or V-P Day^[1]) is the day on which Imperial Japan surrendered in World War II, in effect bringing the war to an end. The term has been applied to both of the days on which the initial announcement of Japan's surrender was made – August 15, 1945, in Japan, and because of time zone differences, August 14, 1945 (when it was announced in the United States and the rest of the Americas and Eastern Pacific Islands) – as well as to September 2, 1945, when the surrender document was signed, officially ending World War II.

From Brittanica,

Truman designated MacArthur as the Allied powers’ supreme commander to accept Japan’s formal surrender, which was solemnized aboard the U.S. flagship Missouri in 
Tokyo Bay: the Japanese foreign minister, Shigemitsu Mamoru, signed the document first, on behalf of the Emperor and his government. 
He was followed by General Umezu Yoshijiro on behalf of the Imperial General Headquarters. The document was then signed by MacArthur, Nimitz, and representatives 
of the other Allied powers. Japan concluded a separate surrender ceremony with China in Nanking on September 9, 1945. 
With this last formal surrender, World War II came to an end.

I find the separate peace with China puzzling because if you watch the video, a Chinese general does sign the document.

It's worth noticing that Japan surrenders to several countries in that video including the Netherlands.  

I think this document was a basis for SEATO.  The country obviously left out of the alliance: China.  

Victory over Japan led to the First Indochina War which ended in the battle of Dien Bien Phu.  

The First Indochina War (generally known as the Indochina War in France, and as the Anti-French Resistance War in Vietnam) began in French Indochina on December 19, 1946, and lasted until July 20, 1954. Fighting between French forces and their Việt Minh opponents in the south dated from September 1945. The conflict pitted a range of forces, including the French Union's French Far East Expeditionary Corps, led by France and supported by Bảo Đại's Vietnamese National Army against the Việt Minh,^[30] led by Hồ Chí Minh^[31] and the People's Army of Vietnam led by Võ Nguyên Giáp.^[32] Most of the fighting took place in Tonkin in northern Vietnam,^[33] although the conflict engulfed the entire country and also extended into the neighboring French Indochina protectorates of Laos and Cambodia.

From the footage it looked like the French capitulated rather than surrendered.  There is footage of a British CH-47F performing a rescue operation.

[youtube] Victory at Dien Bien Phu - YouTube [/youtube]

It's worth pointing out that the first Indochina war was fought in the north and won by the communists.  Then American got involved.  And the first thing we tried was an election.  
 
 This information is not available on the wikipedia or Britannica any longer, but in 1954 the United States held a 3 way race for president of South Vietnam, the 
 contenders were Ngo Dinh Diem, Bo Dai, and Ho Chi Minh.  There was widespread accusations of voter fraud.  The result was the Second Indochina War.  
 
 The Vietnam War (Vietnamese: Chi?n tranh Vi?t Nam), also known as the Second Indochina War,[56] and in Vietnam as the Resistance War Against America 
 (Vietnamese: Kháng chi?n ch?ng M?) or simply the American War, was a conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955[A 1] to the fall of 
 Saigon on 30 April 1975.[10]

Some other postulated starting dates for the Vietnam War are the assassination of president Diem 2 November 1963,

the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution August 7, 1964

or the arrival of a marine expeditionary force in March 3, 1965.

It's worth pointing out that the second Indochina war was fought in the south, and once again won by the communists.

If you want to get particular about it you could say WWII wasn't finished until the legal status of Germany (a searchable topic on the wikipedia) was settled

The Treaty on the Final Settlement with Respect to Germany (German: Vertrag über die abschließende Regelung in Bezug auf Deutschland^[a]), or the Two Plus Four Agreement (German: Zwei-plus-Vier-Vertrag; short: German Treaty), was negotiated in 1990 between the Federal Republic of Germany and the German Democratic Republic (the eponymous Two), and the Four Powers which occupied Germany at the end of World War II in Europe: France, the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

World War II was a victory for NATO.  Vietnam was not a victory for SEATO.  The allied casualties for the second Indochina War look rather dreadful on the wikipedia.  And they don't even include the UK or France.  

I am looking for a Vietnam documentary with the acoustic version of Revolution by the Beatles on it - that is older.  The modern one with Ken Burns has it, but that isn't fair.

Saw the above post and now I'm just as curious as the OP who created it. So can anyone give their take about  morale and early gunpowder loudness?

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/travel/article-11894719/Pictured-bizarre-fig-tree-thats-growing-upside-ruins-ancient-Roman-town.html

(Thanks Roman Archaeology @RomanArchable for bringing this to our attention.)

[Scene from the movie “Gladiator” in which the former general Maximus (who has fallen out of favor of the Emperor Commodus) is captured and being sold in a slave market.]
 

The article below made me delve into the controversy whether typical ancient Romans had tattoos, and if they did, how were they accepted by Roman society.

https://antigonejournal.com/2023/03/stigma-ancient-tattoos 

Tattoos were, in fact, common among legionnaires. Modern scholars aren’t certain what the looked like, however, but they probably indicated the unit in which the soldier belonged. They were possibly used to identify those who left a unit without permission.

Below is an old thread from UNRV that dealt with the legionnaires at Hadrian’s Wall who had tattoos. 

(Marc Antony shortly before his suicide after the Battle of Actium.)

For the Romans, tattoos were mostly commonly associated with barbarians and the least respected elements of society.

(Tattoo of the preserved arm of a Scythian chiffon from 500 BCE)

This interesting article below discusses the fact that tattoos were using seen among criminals, slaves, and the military. Everyday Romans and the elites, however, didn’t have tattoos.
 

https://worldhistoryfaq.com/did-the-romans-have-tattoos/

Research suggests that climatic changes may have forced the Huns to leave their homelands and adapt a more predatory behavior.

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The study, published today in the Journal of Roman Archaeology argues that extreme drought spells from the 430s—450s CE disrupted ways of life in the Danube frontier provinces of the eastern Roman empire, forcing Hunnic peoples to adopt new strategies to 'buffer against severe economic challenges'.

New climate data reconstructed from tree rings by Prof Büntgen and colleagues provides information about yearly changes in climate over the last 2000 years. It shows that Hungary experienced episodes of unusually dry summers in the 4th and 5th centuries. Hakenbeck and Büntgen point out that climatic fluctuations, in particular drought spells from 420 to 450 CE, would have reduced crop yields and pasture for animals beyond the floodplains of the Danube and Tisza.

We found that periods of drought recorded in biochemical signals in tree-rings coincided with an intensification of raiding activity in the region."

Recent isotopic analysis of skeletons from the region, including by Dr. Hakenbeck, suggests that Hunnic peoples responded to climate stress by migrating and by mixing agricultural and pastoral diets.

But the study also argues that some Hunnic peoples dramatically changed their social and political organization to become violent raiders.

 

https://phys.org/news/2022-12-drought-attila-huns-roman-empire.html

Ancient makeup was analyzed showing compounds that were synthetically produced.

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One of the most important pieces of the jigsaw of ancient Egyptian chemistry is the discovery of synthetic lead pigments used in the kohl eye make-up worn by ancient Egyptians, dating back to 2000BCE. Published in 1999, chemical analyses carried out by Philippe Walter at the Louvre Museum in Paris, France, showed that the well preserved compounds contained in the Louvre’s collection of ancient Egyptian make-up pots included natural pigments galena (PbS) and cerussite (PbCO3), but also laurionite (Pb(OH)Cl) and the white powder phosgenite (Pb2Cl2CO3). Both are rarely found naturally and are unlikely to be the decomposition products of anything that is.

Egyptian blue is believed to be the first synthetic pigment.

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A close analysis of some of their preparations indicates that Ancient Egyptians were familiar with the principles of oxidation and reduction, could control the pH of a solution and were successful in preparing novel compounds through a controlled technology of chemical synthesis.

Natural deposits of Natron, used to preserve bodies.

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By the pharaonic period, the ancient Egyptians had stepped up their mummification game, largely due to the use of natron, a mineral deposit consisting of hydrated sodium carbonate with additional sodium salts (bicarbonate, chloride and sulfate), found in Wadi Natrun in northern Egypt. Buckley suspects it was first used in solution to preserve organs around 2600BCE, once the Egyptians realised that removing them from the body would aid preservation. Buckley believes that this shows the Egyptians understood that natron was more than just a desiccant, but had more extensive preservative properties.

https://www.chemistryworld.com/features/unwrapping-ancient-egyptian-chemistry/4016457.article

I'm trying to remember conservative criticism and the beginning of the rennaissance is kind of a gotcha question.  They have changed the definition of it a bit, the voyage of Christopher Columbus seams to define the beginning or the end, depending on how you define the eras.  This drops the "high middle ages" era.

Another issue - the dowry - in the rennaissance the bride kept it for life.  Like, duh.  I don't have date for that.

Below is an interesting video showing the world population history starting from 1800s with further projection till 2100.

From the video it appears that the 1800s were rather an exceptional time for Europe, because 4 European countries (UK, Germany, France, Italy) would be listed among the world top 10 by population. Germany would be the last European country off the list in the beginning of 1980s (given that 77% of Russian territory lies in Asia, Russia is hardly to be counted as a fully European country).   

I like to recall this table (see next to the video) from Gregory Clark's book "Farewell to Alms" (the book itself is another complacency myth) that highlights some key world development indices. Back in 1800s Europe seemed inferior only to Asia, but since then the layout has clearly changed.  

The projection till 2100, on one hand, may seem a bit doubtful (noone really knows what awaits us out there in 10-20 years from now), but it shows 5 African countries will be in the top 10 by 2100. So I wonder, first, how plausible you find this projection? Second, how do you think Europe should respond to its diminishing role in the world, and what Europe can do for that? 🙂

English borrows 41% French/Norman words, 33% Anglo Saxon, and 15% Latin (not from Romans), 5% Norse, and 1% Dutch. But words could be 100% borrowed from Bantu click languages and still use grammar ordering from Norse. So English isn't some multicultural rainbow at heart, but has a powerful foundation of simplicity to support orderly growth. And by orderly I mean not falling into the patronizing trap of always referring to places by their foreign rather than English names. Try Bantu-like languages which not only have clicks, but 4 kinds which you may not be able to distinguish unless learned super young.

This idea was presented less stridently in the following video. He, like me and probably you may find it hard to actually judge due to non fluency in Danish + Norwegian + German + English.

One of the more zany spokesmen for this (new world econ) extended it to relate to pax Romana, and I thought it could be an entertaining introduction for here. I guess he is the face of millennial scholardom: smart, wise, informed, but with a style that sounds like puffin da weed in his underwear: "Like, like, y'know, um, [explicative], like y'know". The Roman angle can be found if you drop in late here, bookended with a few scraps of Argentina and China that hopefully tempts you to restart full video https://youtu.be/5ZGnE4ZpUkM?t=1575 .

China is particularly considered fragile in geography and demographics, and has only held together due to recent trade-friendly bubble they say. Drop in here for how it can collapse in a matter of weeks if the US navy switches from protecting it's trade lifelines to sanctioning them https://youtu.be/KSa8096YBXw?t=1076 . For demographic trajectories threatening most developed countries soon, drop in https://youtu.be/jVYvx67lOJA?t=1861 (US) or https://youtu.be/KSa8096YBXw?t=354 (China). I have a little trouble with assumption that ocean/river/canal trade determines all. What about railroads, and so much is moving by air cargo now like even the 150 pound a/c I just replaced.

North America comes out charmed in both war-preventing geography and good demographics IF you consider Mexico part of same economy with youthful, inexpensive workers and consumers. Britain is charmed, at least if the Scots and their oil don't depart. France is a close-run case with it's Belgium border open for invasions, and Portugal being a fortress that can prevent the French Navy consolidating Med and Atlantic halves in a crises. Forgot to mention assumption that prosperity thrives in fertile lands with navigable waterways for internal trade, unchallenged by invaders due to formidable borders. Over time, wars still statistically arise where opportune.

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The famous naval installations at Carthage, namely the vast inner harbour as round as a cup, provided covered slipways, or ship sheds for around 220 warships and all the facilities for their maintenance. This military facility was a restricted area, walled off from the landward side, and its only seaward approach was through the outer mercantile harbour, whose narrow entrance could be quickly closed off by heavy iron chains if danger threatened.

In the centre of the naval harbour was a round artificial island, the Ilôt de l’ Admirauté, on which stood the admiral’s headquarters, rising high above the surrounding facilities and fortifications and enabling him to keep a weather eye on the far horizon.

 

Here is a well-produced video on the Carthaginian navy:

https://weaponsandwarfare.com/2019/01/11/navy-of-carthage/