#surprisingly historical

[spanishskulduggery]

You know possibly the funniest/most chaotic thing about the time of El Cid was the Battle of Cabra

Okay so during the time of taifas (Muslim spheres of influence in Spain), the taifas would at some points be paying tribute to the more Catholic north... these were called parias and it's not a constant thing but there were certain treaties in place between cities and city-states between the north of Spain and Al-Andalus which is the south

But make no mistake, El Cid (and many others in this time) were essentially mercenaries and would fight for the Muslims against Christians, or against the Muslims for the Christians depending on the situation even though at this point El Cid was a favorite of Alfonso VI

In fact, El Cid [whose real name was Rodrigo Díaz] got the nickname El Cid from the Muslims where it meant something like "the Lord", and the other term associated with him Campeador from the Christians which meant something like "Battlemaster"

El Cid used to serve Muslim Zaragoza against Aragon, but he also at one point besieges Muslim Valencia and takes it for Christendom

I have to mention this because some people use El Cid as like "the Christian Knight of the Reconquista" like that's a goal to have but he was a mercenary and served with Muslims, under Muslims, and had no problem attacking a Christian or Muslim city if it was his orders/if he was getting paid

So this one time King Alfonso VI of Castile/León/Galicia sends two people out to collect the parias

He sends El Cid to Seville to collect money. And he sends this other dude Count García Ordóñez (who haaaaaates El Cid) off to Granada to get money

While they're out there getting money, it turns out that Seville and Granada are about to fight each other - because the taifas, like the Christian city-states, fight with each other sometimes even though they're both Muslim taifas

So what happens is that El Cid sees it as his right to be protecting the tribute that Granada is probably going to steal if they take the city. And Count García Ordóñez joins with the Granada forces because the whole point of this money is that it's a military contract so he's upholding his end of the military treaty to help them in exchange for money

...In other words, Alfonso VI SOMEHOW sent his own men out to two different places and they end up fighting each other

Seville wins over Granada in the Battle of Cabra, and El Cid captures the Count and ransoms him along with the Christian knights because that's what mercenaries do

And Count García Ordóñez is (perhaps rightfully?) pissed that he got beaten by El Cid but also the situation was messy - and the Count complains to Alfonso VI and that's part of what leads to El Cid being exiled....... The other part being that El Cid ended up in (Mulsim) Toledo which was a vassal state of Alfonso VI which he had no real right to be there doing what he was doing, which is fair because it looks like El Cid was working both sides and possibly acting like a bandit for some of his time because, again, mercenary

But can you imagine sending two of your trusted vassals to two separate places and they end up fighting each other (in your name)? What a shit show

[titaniumions]

undergarment studies? just channeling my love for historical fashion ... i suppose i've tried to do something similar for kakania but this time it's actually more accurate for her. some thoughts and observations under the cut

• isolde's style of dress is remarkably outdated for her time. i recall this being something marcus actually pointed out about her

• that being said, her dresses would likely have been in style in the 1880s-90s, judging from the silhouette and sleeve shapes of the dresses. so it'd make sense for her to wear a corset from that era to shape the silhouette of her body

• in isolde's trailer there was a brief moment where she was shown tying up her own corset from the back. this is what i referenced for her. so i didn't even have to do much to figure her out, bluepoch basically already did it for me

• i suppose i did end up figuring out the front view myself but it's fairly straightforward when you have references and a general idea of how corsets are supposed to look like

• she wears a petticoat to cover her lower half

• kakania's style of dress is more contemporary, so the same should go for her undergarments

• i imagine her wearing "combination" undergarments, which are basically the chemise and drawers (essentially the most important pieces of undergarments at the time) combined into one clothing item. those were popular in the 1910s. (i've drawn her with a corset before but eventually realized that there were other more fitting options for her)

[ashiistired]

More Mary II art, this time in a simpler art style

[cringeborg-moved]

Long Men's Nightshirt

Happy Tuesday! Today you're getting a simple 19th-century style nightshirt, an edit of @historicalsimslife's Edwardian Men's Nightgown. I've finally sort of figured out weight transfers. I did not enjoy it. But the weights are fine, so that's good.

Just the one white swatch this time. Feel free to recolor if you want!

Found in the long dress and robe categories

All LODs

Vertices: 4081

Polygons: 6620

Tagged as masculine

Mesh is required!

Download (SFS)

Alt Download (Mediafire)

[rowzien]

Summer Ensemble

The jacket is linen with many hand done elements including the buttonholes and pockets. I based it heavily on the extant example at Colonial Williamsburg and another at the Kent museum. I was going to draft it myself But I lost my book so I just altered my tailcoat pattern. It was really cool to make a garment more specific to where I’m from. It can be worn with or without a vest.

The breeches are made with cotton with a slight sheen. I think it’s glazed cotton. The buckles I got from Burnley and Trowbridge and I like them a lot.

Both fabrics and the cravat fabric were acquired second hand.

The straw hat is vintage from roughly 1950s

[swordsandflowercrowns]

there are two wolves inside of me. one is yelling that authors have a duty to accurately depict classical cultures in their retellings and not impose modern expectations onto the stories. the other is yelling for them to completely twist the focus and narratives and morals to better convey the current cultural zeitgeist because reception of myths is not only fascinating but actively creating material for me to study. both wolves are historians.

[fictionadventurer]

Potential December Reads

Barchester Towers by Anthony Trollope

Last Christmas in Paris by Hazel Gaynor and Heather Webb

The Unselected Journals of Emma M. Lion: Volume 8 by Beth Brower

Prudence and the Romantic Poet by Nina Clare

A Christmas-related book

The Cricket on the Hearth and/or The Haunted Man by Charles Dickens

The Christmas Blossoms by Priscilla Smith McCaffrey

One of the American Girl books

A religious book

Church Fathers: From Clement of Rome to Augustine by Pope Benedict XVI

Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis

St. Francis of Assisi by G.K. Chesterton

Arriving at Amen: Seven Catholic Prayers Even I Can Pray by Leah Libresco

A middle-grade book

Impossible Creatures by Katherine Rundell

Insignificant Events in the Life of a Cactus by Dusti Bowling

The Happy Prince and Other Stories Oscar Wilde

The Wanderer by Sharon Creech

Mandy by Julie Andrews

[acornminiatureslog]

Breaking from space marines for a sec, here's a model I whipped up for a fate game I'm playing with some friends! No plans for actual mini combat or anything, but this is a good way for me to envision my character.

[variousqueerthings]

I have seen otherwise queer-positive blogs get really angry when asexuality is used as a lens through which to look at historical figures, as if aceness negates being gay/lesbian/bisexual/trans or stands in contradiction to those terms somehow. and I think it's a shame, because there are so many interesting nuances in asexuality that aren't really considered, I think, that is for example that asexuality can walk hand in hand with kink, with sex, with same-gender attraction, with being flirtatious, and for that matter can be a temporal thing, can be related to trauma, or to repression, or to some other outside force (is it a hot take that celibacy and asexuality overlap idk, but i think celibacy has been used to describe many an experience of which asexuality is definitely a major one), and yes, some figures appear to never have had an interest in sex at all and been fine with that, while either still having close romantically read relationships or perhaps arguably being aromantic as well (or indeed, the other way around).

it comes back around I think to the idea that some queer people have that asexuality is a bit.. boring really. a bit less cool and groundbreaking than other ways of challenging the status quo, and (let's be real) a bit less queer. all of which is false of course, and a symptom of ones own internalised queerphobia and policing of acceptable queer behaviours, but I do get a bit sad having followed history nerds in queer spaces, at seeing that unchallenged reaction again and again. it's recreating the need for boxes, as if a. history was ever clear cut enough for modern concepts around the labels we have (if they even used those labels to being with) and b. we're not that clear cut and that's part of the point

let asexuality into your heart and learn its philosophies, the same as any other chapter of queer philosophy enriches our understanding of ourselves and histories

[anglerflsh]

yes my dream job is to be an archivist yes I am planning on getting work experience in journalism as soon as I can yes I am getting a degree in history. I still need to write articles though because I love the sound of my own voice

[icarusbetide]

it's fascinating and frustrating at the same time when historians take one event and get wildly different conclusions. i mean, i guess that's an inherent part of history but wow.

a really arbitrary but striking example of this is in regards to washington apparently being caught off guard when recommended hamilton as secretary of treasury, saying that he had never spoken with him on economics so was not aware of his skill.

many historians (including michael e. newton) seem to take this at face value and make the case that it's clear that hamilton and washington weren't close during the war and constitutional convention. given that hamilton was writing letters about economics to morris years before he was considered for the secretary of the treasury role, this indicates the level to which washington and hamilton must have maintained an absolutely professional relationship.

but i just read john ferling who thinks this is probably a deception on washington's part, and that there's no way they had never spoken about economics (or at least that washington did not know of hamilton's interest in that field) during the war when it's known that he had informal discussion with his aides as a group at the end of the day. especially since it would've been right in line with the army's main struggle with finance and supplies. in fact, ferling goes on to say he thinks it's likely that washington had already chosen hamilton as his secretary early on (he elaborates that they weren't personally close but washington knew exactly what benefits a loyal hamilton would bring to him), but was merely waiting until the department was created, etc.

right now i'm not judging on what interpretation is more likely, just saying how this changes how readers view their relationship and characters. it's a relatively meaningless detail, if washington knew about hamilton's economic skills beforehand, but really interesting.

[nsewell]

idk if i’ll go through with it but i’ve had a lot on my mind about N and parenthood lately and im toying around with writing something where the prospect of becoming a parent in the present with the MC brings back recollections of the past in a verse where they’d already had a family when they were turned. and all the contentions of loving someone again with a brief and fleeting human life as they start a little family anew

[daguerreotyping]

Carte de visite of a young French soldier, c. 1870

[spiritcc]

at this point I don't even know if tag fragmentation in the general russian holmes space is worth addressing. a few years ago I successfully kept the ancient customs intact because I wrote a post so deranged and pretentious it displeased people into doing what I wanted but nowadays what's the point in making a grand return of being terminally online if yall kinda right

[snakegentleman]

I watched the good, the bad, and the ugly the other night with my roommate, and wow, do Trigun and Red Dead reference it a lot. There’s scenes from the manga that are copies of scenes from the movie. The gun sound effects are the same as 98’s gun sfx. Red Dead’s music references the the movie’s soundtrack so often it’s funny. There are entire outfits just copied into the game for the movie. Like, I’m not surprised at all that these two pieces of western media are heavily influenced by the spaghetti western, but it is funny.

[clove-pinks]

Eighteen-Thirties Thursday: Steal His Look

Bill-head of Dublin & London Steam Packet Company, Carriers c. 1830 (British Museum)

1831 fashion plate: English-style frock coat and suit (redingote et habit forme anglaise); walking sticks with holder. (Claremont Colleges).

Ticket for two for a perforance at Vauxhall Gardens for any night of the 1830 season. N.B. Proper attention must be paid to Dress, and Gentlemen in White Hats or Top Boots will not be admitted (Victoria & Albert Museum).

1832 fashion plate: Gentleman's evening costume (and date).