#i could use my education and interests to write cool historical novels instead I'm posting old maps on tumblr dot com

[propalahramota]

Let's look at some real historical maps together, dear mutuals, and not this piece of shit someone made in Paint to brighten their sad unemployed existence.

These are the maps of Ukraine that were published before and after 1654, since this ugly ass garbage uses this date as a setting point.

Delineatio Generalis Camporum Desertorum vulgo Ukraina by Guillaume Le Vasseur de Beauplan, circa 1648, six years before 1654

This map may seem a little bit confusing at first glance, if you've never really looked at historical maps before, because it's upside down. That's how maps used to be drawn for a long time. The South of Ukraine is on the top. If you flip your phone, you can see that Beauplan's map includes most of what is modern Ukraine, except for the Crimean Peninsula south of Perekop and modern borders in the Southwest of Ukraine. It does, however, include some modern russian territories in the North of Ukraine (that's actually on the bottom of the map instead of the top, as we're used to see nowadays)

But there's more. The early version of this map survived, circa 1639 (it's also upside down), and it's basically the same layout.

During this time period, we also have Ukrania quae et Terra Cosaccorum cum vicinis Walachiae, Moldaviae, Minorisque Tartariae provinciis by Johann Baptist Homann, circa 1719

This one has a normal orientation despite being partly based on the maps above. This is the first edition that had been printed between 1710s and 1740s. Note how Homann also uses the name 'Ukraine' to mark the territory on the map, even though he divides it into sections to mark the jurisdiction of the different states over them. But it is still the map of Ukraine - starting from the Carpathians and cleaving into some regions of modern russia - clearly marked as 'Ukraine'.

Also, if you see any map that claims that Kyiv, Cherkasy, and Poltava were at any point not a part of Ukraine during basically any historical period, starting from like Xth century, and especially, in the early modern period, you have my official permission to ignore it on the basis of it being complete bullshit.

In conclusion, I would like to kindly remind you that many countries, even in Europe, at various times in history used to fall under the jurisdiction of other kingdoms and empires. It's not a gotcha the OP thinks it is. It does not justify military aggression from any neighboring state, and any attempts to do so are looser behavior.

[giantbandgeeks]

That's so cool that you're majoring in history! That's what I'm switching to. I know everyone's experience is different, but would you mind sharing a bit of yours (what you like about it, don't like, if you're doing an emphasis in anything etc.)? Also, since you sort of mentioned it in your tag, do you plan to be a historian? Thank you!

OH MY GOD A FELLOW HISTORY LOVER COME GEEK OUT WITH ME!!! I’ll definitely ramble about my experiences for you! I’m putting it below the cut because wow this got long

I also started out as a different major and then switched to history! I filled every single general ed class that I could with history courses, and when I finally got to a semester where I wasn’t taking any history classes I hated everything and switched majors. I’ve loved every class since.

Ok, so for what I don’t like… I’ve had two bad profs out of about a bajillion. But, even in those classes I’ve loved the material so much that it ALMOST didn’t matter that the profs sucked. Bad profs are sadly unavoidable :( The only other thing I can think of is that it’s a lot of writing. I haven’t had one exam since getting to my upper div classes, instead I’ve written countless essays. Sometimes I have multiple essays due within the space of the week. It’s all about time management; I’m big on outlining essays the day before I sit down to write them so I’m breaking up the work and not having to sit down and write it all at once. Writing essays also means that I don’t have a lot of time to write for fun so fic has taken a back burner. A HUGE negative is that some male profs and all the boys in my classes completely disregard what the females have to say. It makes me so mad, and makes me just want to fight even harder to have my voice heard (which is tough since I’m introverted and shy and have a very quiet speaking voice) and I can talk forever about how angry it makes me lol

Now for the positives… I’m a weirdo but I do love writing essays. I love exploring a topic in depth and finding evidence to prove my point and putting everything together to form a cohesive argument. I absolutely LOVE learning about obscure historical events or people, and itty bitty details about larger events and people. My profs have been such nerds about their fields of study and it’s awesome to see how passionate they are. Also, I love learning about different perspectives on topics that have been thought of as straight forward. I really love most everything about my major omg listing it all would be too hard.

So my school has the history majors take a primary field of study and then two secondary fields to “create well rounded historian,” which I really like. My primary is US history, and then my two secondaries are Europe post 1500 and Asia! I definitely prefer modern history, and my main interests are WWI through WWII and women’s history. I’m also doing an education minor as a complementary study.

My goal is to teach high school history! That being said… This semester I’m taking a seminar in historical analysis and I turned in the rough draft last week of this MONSTER of a paper on Japanese American internment during WWII. I really really really really really enjoyed the whole researching aspect of it, and it felt like I was being a real historian. (Although maybe I’ll just end up writing extremely realistic historical fiction novels. Who knows?) If you want to know more about job options in the field, my seminar prof has talked a lot about them so I can tell you what I know if you want! 

Let me know if you have more questions and feel free to come yell about history with me because I love it so much!