#there was also ancient greek taught by one of the latin teachers but it was at 7 in the morning so no one went

[kissycat]

My school was small so every foreign language except for English French and Latin (those were mandatory for the school) depended on literally one person. I was never able to take Spanish even though I wanted to because the Spanish teacher left and they didn't get a new one while I was there. The Russian teacher went on maternity leave when I was in 9th(?) grade so there was just no Russian anymore. The Italian teacher was a German italophile who gave everyone a 1 and just watched movies with them

[lilislegacy]

Positive Percabeth imagines :))) (though ngl this is mostly about their daughters but still)

I imagine that Percy and Annabeth will have twin daughters, and they’ll choose names based off their loved ones. One daughter is named Zoe Elizabeth, after Zoe the Hunter, and Rachel Elizabeth Dare. The second daughter is named Natalie Grace, after Annabeth’s aunt Natalie (and also bc as einherjars Magnus and Alex will never be able to have kids so it’s also for Magnus’ sake) and Grace bc it’s the last name of both Thalia and Jason obviously but it’s a way to honor Jason especially. Natalie Grace is nicknamed Tali, pronounced Tah-lee, and I’ve always pronounced Thalia as Tah-lee-uh, so that way they’re honoring her too. Zoe has dark brown hair and grey-blue eyes, and Tali has dirty blonde hair and blue-green eyes.

Percy and Annabeth lived in New Rome for several years after finishing college, and they both helped create sacred temples and statues and groves and places for all the gods, as Percy started, Jason expanded, and Apollo basically vowed to complete. Annabeth of course did most of the brainstorming and research and building stuff, but Percy was actually the one who would ask various gods and be like “okay Nereus. These are some ideas we have to honor you. Can you tell me which you like best?” And then that god would send him a dream giving varying amounts of detail and instruction as to what exactly they wanted. So the twins, Zoe and Tali, were raised in New Rome for their first several years.

Meanwhile at Camp Half-Blood, they have expanded to have cabins for legacies, and they also started an academy, called Olympus Heights Academy. As more demigods were claimed and now legacies too, it made sense to start a school. When Tali and Zoe are eight, their parents decide to move back to Camp Half-Blood and become teachers. Annabeth predictably tries to teach too many classes at first but eventually settles on just teaching a couple classes, probably Ancient Greek history and language bc we know she taught Percy and also close combat with a knife. Percy teaches swords fighting obviously.

Tali and Zoe are at this point beginning to learn their abilities. Both of them can breathe underwater. Zoe can control water, ocean water most easily but with some degree of control over fresh water. She is an expert in close combat fighting. She is skilled in strategy and has an affinity for the arts. She is a natural sailor. Natalie can communicate with horses and their cousins. She has siren powers, similar to charmspeak, but water based and music/voice linked. She is an expert at swords fighting. She is skilled in craftsmanship and strategy and has an affinity for academics. She is a natural sailor.

You noticed the siren powers? I headcanon that Sally is a third generation legacy of Venus, and Percy didn’t really get anything from Venus except good looks, extra ability to learn Latin, and extra meddling in his love life, but Tali did. I saw someone make a post about, what if daughters of Poseidon could sometimes get siren like abilities? I loved that idea, and had to include that in one of the twins. Normally a second generation legacy of Poseidon wouldn’t ever have siren abilities, but bc of the distant relation to Venus, Tali did get that ability.

The twins will of course go on their own death defying quests and adventures. Percy and Annabeth will happily be living in Camp Half-Blood, visiting Sally and the rest of the Jackson-Blofis family as much as they can.

Oh I also have another funny idea. I actually woke up one morning earlier this week daydreaming about it. Percy and Annabeth, after college, are trying to plan their wedding. But they keep getting into fights about small random things. And this is so out of character for them. Eventually Annabeth realizes that this is Hera meddling and at first she’s furious but eventually tries to reason with Hera. Hera eventually gives specific instructions on something that she wants to be created at Camp Half-Blood to honor her. I’m not entirely sure what it is yet, but whatever it is, it’s gonna be nearly impossible to create. But Annabeth has to do it if she wants to get married to Percy. So she struggles for months with this building project, finally it’s nearly done. Then Hera says that she will allow them to marry, but they have to be married nearby whatever it is that Annabeth had to create, and their marriage will be dedicated to Hera and will act as the way to consecrate the sacred building thing to Hera. So now Chiron has to allow demigods to get married at Camp Half-Blood, allow the queen of the gods to officiate it, and he can’t keep their mortal family from the wedding! So now there are mortals in Camp Half-Blood. But it all goes well, but now a tradition has begun of campers wanting to get married by Hera’s sacred thing, and now Chiron has to deal with weddings and mortal families and he’s seriously annoyed at Hera but he can’t show it bc she’s the queen of the gods.

Hope you like these headcanons!!! :)))

~wolfyboi

thanks for the ask wolfyboi!

awww, these are all so fun and cute! i love thinking about their future and their kids! it just being me so much joy. they deserve to be happy more than anyone. i do hate hera so the thought of them having to dedicate their marriage to her makes me a little queasy, but the idea of chiron having to deal with a ton of people getting married at the camp made me giggle

this put a smile on my face. thank you!! ❤️❤️

[hassedah]

Do you think anyone is left handed? XD ooh, how does their handwriting look like? I have a hc that Aaron has dysleyia and thus never learned how to read fluently. But he still likes to read sometimes x) What are yours?

How do boys write?

Hi! How are you? I hope you are well! ^^

Here is the headcanon you requested, I hope you enjoy it! ^^

I like the idea of Aaron being dyslexic. What's more, I doubt he learned to read and write as a child. It wasn't common at the time and Aaron was born at a rather complicated time in medieval history (between war, famine and a plague that had been over for a few decades but still had consequences). So I doubt that his little mother would have found the time, money and opportunity to teach him to read and write (although she would have had to know how to read and write herself, and given the literacy rate among women at the time, that's highly unlikely). Aaron must surely have learned to read and write later, perhaps by joining his wolf pack.

Dyslexia would probably not have been detected, not only because the word didn't exist, but also because someone who had difficulty reading and writing wouldn't have seemed surprising.

However, Dyslexia could be detected at the manor. If Ethan has any knowledge on the subject it would be possible. If not, with a dyslexic MC themselves. I think that would be the most coherent because I can't think of any reason why Ethan should have been interested in the Dys disorder.

Take care of yourself and have a nice day! ^^

Vladimir :

Vladimir is right-handed, but he can write with his left hand if necessary. His handwriting is not disastrous with his left hand, but it is even slower than when he writes with his right hand.

His handwriting is beautiful and neat, but he writes very slowly, even when he's in a hurry. This is because he needs to concentrate a lot to have a neat handwriting. If he tries to write faster his handwriting tends to become illegible (something his teachers used to reproach him for when he was a child (while asking him to write faster)).

He writes quite small. As a result, he generally doesn't take up much space on a sheet of paper. His letters are very tight and his handwriting tends to lean to the left of the page. He can write in Braille. He learnt it so that he could talk to Raphaël when they were still exchanging letters.

He always signs with his surname, which is rather unusual for a vampire given that the majority of them only sign with their first name, but Vladimir is incapable of not using his, it's far too important to him to give it up.

He is the one in the manor who masters the most different languages, especially when it comes to the written word (this is due to his education). He can easily read and write texts in French, English and Italian, as well as German, Hungarian and Latin. He makes very few spelling mistakes in these languages and is usually the one to go to if someone has a grammatical or spelling question. He can also read Old English. He also reads Russian and Ancient Greek easily (although with a little more difficulty for the latter).

As he is very clumsy, writing requires a lot of concentration (he probably suffers from dyspraxia but has never been diagnosed for this). But that doesn't mean he doesn't enjoy writing. In fact, he loves writing. The other members of the manor have already offered to buy him a typewriter so that he can continue to write his stories with less fatigue, but Vladimir thinks that the quality of his writing is not worth the expense.

Béliath :

Béliath is right-handed. He can write with his left hand if he really needs to, but in that case he writes very badly, much to his dismay. So if he gets injured and can no longer use his right hand, he will usually ask others to write for him (and the best choice is Ivan or Vladimir).

Béliath writes mainly in cursive and his handwriting is quite ancient. He's not particularly aware of it, because that's how his sister taught him to write, several centuries ago, and he's never thought of changing the way he writes, even less since the people at Moondance have been complimenting him on the beauty of his handwriting. It's true that his handwriting is very pretty and rather neat, and the letters are spaced far enough apart not to be unpleasant to read. He sometimes boasts about it to the others at the manor, and it has to be said that he easily has one of the most beautiful handwritings.

He writes rather quickly (no doubt because of the invitations to his parties, which he has to write by hand since Vladimir refuses to buy a computer and a printer), while keeping his handwriting legible for everyone. His handwriting tends to lean to the right of the page.

Its writing is neither too small nor too large. The letters are easy to read and different enough not to be confused with each other when reading.

Like most vampires and supernatural creatures, he signs with his first name. He doesn't really have a surname anyway, unless you consider Son of Asmodeus to be a family name. His signature is rather complex, with a lot of interlacing around his first name, which makes for a rather complicated signature to reproduce.

He can write in several different languages with varying degrees of spelling ability. He has a perfect command of the demonic language his sister taught him, he can write in Latin and his French and English are not bad (if you ignore the fact that he never uses accents in French). As for the rest, he generally speaks them much better than he writes them.

Ivan :

Ivan is right-handed and can't write with his left hand. It's illegible every time. He tries to practise, though, because he thinks it's cool to be able to write well with both hands, but he can't really do it. If he gets injured and can't write with his right hand, he'll try to write with his left before giving up and asking Vladimir or Beliath for help.

His handwriting is simple, not pretty, but perfectly legible for everyone. It's a quality he really appreciates, because Aaron has already told him that he prefers his handwriting to Beliath's. Ivan has rarely been so proud of himself, after all, everyone in the manor recognises that Beliath's handwriting is pretty.

He can write quickly when he needs to, but this affects the legibility of his handwriting, so he avoids doing so most of the time. He also has a tendency to write quite large, which means that he generally needs a lot more paper to write a text than the other members of the manor.

He has asked Vladimir and Raphaël to teach him to write and read in Braille. He still wants to be able to communicate with Raphaël, even if he leaves the manor, and he would like to be able to read the little stories that Raphaël writes himself and not always have to ask Raphaël to read them for him. He still has a bit of trouble reading quickly, but he's getting better at it, although writing in Braille is still very difficult for him.

He has kept the signature he had before his death, so he continues to sign with his surname, signing with his first name seems strange and… unpleasant. It's not that he doesn't like his first name, but he thought he'd be using his family name signature for decades to come, and having to give it up so soon is still too painful for him.

He can only write in French, although Vladimir persists in trying to teach him at least English (at first Vladimir wanted to teach him Latin). Ivan makes relatively few spelling mistakes (which he's proud of, given that Ethan makes more spelling mistakes than he does in French).

Aaron :

Aaron is normally left-handed, but at the time he was born it was very much frowned upon. So he was forced to learn to use his right hand to work, write and fence, which didn't help his handwriting, which was already difficult to read, and he was much more awkward using his right hand to fight with a sword. Today, he has stopped using his right hand for writing and fencing and has become much more skilful.

He had to concentrate to achieve a beautiful handwriting. The shapes of his letters are simpler than Beliath's because he favours ease of reading over beauty. He also writes quite slowly and never tries to write faster. He knows that writing faster only makes his text more illegible.

Like most supernatural creatures, Aaron signs with his first name. His signature is quite simple, and he sees no point in trying to embellish it with interlacing or lines. For him, it's a waste of time and doesn't fit in with his idea of a signature that should remain legible. After all, with all the interlacing that Beliath puts around his first name, he sometimes finds it hard to read his signature.

Aaron speaks far more languages than he writes, particularly Elvish, and is the only member of the manor to do so. He has a tendency to make a lot of spelling mistakes, but in his defence, between language changes and spelling reforms, he never knows where to turn. He barely has time to understand a spelling rule before humans are happy to change it straight away. He only spells Spanish. For the rest, he always asks Vladimir.

Despite the difficulties, Aaron loves to write and read poetry. Along with Raphaël, he probably owns the largest number of poetry collections. However, he is quite precise about the books he looks for: the text must not be too small and the lines must be spaced far enough apart to be pleasant to read. That's one of the reasons why he doesn't really like Vladimir's old books: the writing is too small and he has a hard time distinguishing between the lines.

Raphaël :

Raphaël is totally ambidextrous, but as a child he was left-handed. His parents insisted that he write with his right hand, but he didn't really want to, so as soon as they weren't watching him he would write with his left hand again. He eventually learned to use his right hand for writing and fencing, but this was only to surprise people who thought he was only left-handed.

When Raphaël was writing in cursive, he loved writing poetry, especially for Margarita and Alessio, who regularly received poetry from Raphaël. He still loves to write, but now he uses a slate and stylus to write in Braille. In fact, he always carries a slate and stylus with him in case he needs to write down an idea somewhere other than his bedroom or the library. The problem is that he always ends up forgetting the paper somewhere.

He found Braille much easier to learn to read than to learn to write. This is because to write braille text, you have to write it the other way round, as the dots are made on the back of the page. It wasn't at all instinctive at first and he got it wrong more than once. Now he's quite happy to be teaching Ivan to write in Braille.

He always signs with his first name and his signature hasn't changed much, but it's still complex to reproduce. There is a lot of interlacing around his first name and the capital R is huge compared to the other letters.

He likes to exchange messages with Vladimir and Ivan, as only the three of them can read them, they usually use them to prepare surprises for the others or to complain that so-and-so has forgotten to clean up again or that Ethan keeps slamming doors.

Raphaël is not bad at spelling and grammar, not as good as Vladimir, but unlike Vladimir, he doesn't read grammar books for pleasure. He can speak more languages than he can read and write. But he reads and writes easily in English, Latin, Italian and French.

He reads a lot, and is one of the biggest readers in the manor. When he first arrived, he only had Braille books, which limited his reading possibilities because they were big books and didn't always cover the subjects that interested him. The arrival of Ivan, introduced him to audio books. He listens to a lot of them now, especially romance novels, and loves the fact that he can listen to books while lying comfortably in bed or cooking.

Ethan :

Ethan is left-handed and he really can't write with his right hand. It has to be said that it never occurred to him to try, and his parents never tried to force him to write with his right hand either. If he gets injured and can no longer write with his left hand, he always asks Beliath to write for him.

Ethan's handwriting is not legible. His "a's" look like "e's" or "o's", his "u's", "i's" and "n's" also look very similar, he never dots his "i's", so they can also be mistaken for "l's", and when he writes in French, he doesn't use the slightest accent, whereas he does in Finnish. It's an ordeal for everyone in the manor to reread what he's written, and Aaron doesn't even try anymore. The only one who manages to read it is Beliath.

He writes very small, which doesn't make it easy to read his handwriting, and he also writes quite quickly. He doesn't like writing anyway, his texts are full of abbreviations and drawings to speed things up, and he's the only one who can decipher the notes he takes. If he can do maths for the sake of doing maths, sitting down to write is an ordeal for him. He doesn't have the patience for it.

Like most vampires, he signs with his first name, a habit he picked up fairly recently after arriving at the manor. His signature is rather simple, with few lines and no interlacing, he framed it with just two lines. The main thing for him was that it was quick to make.

He is quite good at spelling, although his handwriting is not very legible. He writes and reads texts easily in Finnish, English, German and French. He can also read a simple text in Latin… if he has no choice, really, no choice.

He has no idea why everyone finds his handwriting difficult to read. He finds that what he writes is always perfectly legible.

Neil :

Neil is right-handed. He can write with his left hand, he even writes quite well, but he doesn't feel comfortable with it at all. So he will always write right-handed unless he really has no choice.

He's always had a nice handwriting, and that's even truer now that writing has become easy and enjoyable. Before, writing wasn't really something that could be described as enjoyable, given the difficulty of the task. He generally prefers to use a beautiful fountain pen for writing, and doesn't hesitate to buy the most expensive ones. He always has one with him in a small box and several in his desk drawers, and tends to change fountain pens according to his mood.

He always writes in a cursive script that looks rather ancient. There is a lot of curl, especially in the capital letters. His letters are easy to distinguish from one another and the words are spaced far enough apart not to give the impression that the text is cramped. His handwriting always leans very slightly to the right.

His signature is elegant and simpler than his usual handwriting. He always signed with his first name.

He has the impression that the rules of spelling and grammar are constantly changing, as are the meanings of words. He tries to follow them, though, because he doesn't like making mistakes, but he gets tired of constantly having to unlearn what he's learned.

The language he knows best is still Irish, and although he has completely lost the habit of speaking Old Irish, he can still read it easily, as well as Middle Irish and Modern Irish.

He also reads and writes in many other languages without difficulty. The languages he knows best apart from Irish are: English, Greek and Ancient Greek, Latin, French, as well as German, Italian, Spanish and Scottish Gaelic. He can also read and follow a simple discussion in Arabic, Mandarin and Russian. To his dismay, knowing so many languages is more of a problem than anything else, and he tends to switch languages when he can't find the right word in the one he spoke before, which means he loses most of the people he's talking to.

Léandra :

Léandra is left-handed. However, she can write with her right hand if she needs to. Before teaching Beliath to write, she had never written with her right hand. She forced herself to write with her right hand, seeing that it was the one her little brother used all the time; she wanted it to be easier for him to copy her movements that way.

She doesn't really take care of her handwriting. However, if she forces herself, she can have very pretty handwriting, but it's not something that interests her. For her, writing has to be practical before it's pretty; she writes to get a message across or to give information, so she doesn't really see the point of trying to turn it into a work of art.

Léandra is used to writing fast and big. She doesn't think writing should take up too much of her time. In fact, she's never understood how her little brother could enjoy spending so much time writing beautiful letters.

She always signs with her first name and her signature is quite complex. There's a lot of interlacing that surrounds her, like a shield around her signature.

She is quite good at spelling, having taught Beliath to read and write in several different languages, including the demonic one.

She is fluent in several different languages, written and especially spoken. She can write and read demonic, English, Italian and Latin texts with ease. For the rest, she much prefers an oral discussion. This is not to say that she would be unable to write in other languages, just that she sees no point in learning their spelling if she can manage in an oral discussion.

Farah :

Farah is right-handed, but she can write with her left hand if she has problems. However, this affects the quality of her writing, which is harder to read.

Her handwriting is simple but neat. Her brother taught her to write, shortly after they left home. She's happy to be able to read and write, of course, but writing has never been an activity she's been keen on: sitting down for several minutes to write a letter always seems horribly boring to her. Whereas reading, may not be her favourite thing to do, but she'll never turn down a new book, especially a fantasy one.

Her letters are mainly in block letters, as she finds cursive writing too time-consuming. She generally writes fairly large and fairly quickly.

Her signature is very simple: she signs only with her first name, without adding the slightest line or interlacing around it. She clearly doesn't see the point and doesn't want to spend any more time signing than she has to.

As she has travelled a lot with her pack, she speaks and reads a lot of different languages, but this is less the case when it comes to writing. In any case, she doesn't always have the necessary writing materials with her and she always loses her notepads or pens when she does have them. She can write Latin and Spanish fairly easily, but the rest is much more complicated. She rarely masters the written word in other languages, even though she can read them. For example, she can read texts in English, Italian and French without being able to write in those languages. And although she can hold a discussion in Arabic, Swedish and German, she is unable to read or write a text in these languages.

[alatismeni-theitsa]

Hello! I have a random question! What language would Greeks learn as a foreign language? (besides English, if that's a possibility) In the U.S. most schools teach Spanish or Latin(despite it being dead) as a foreign language, but I know a lot of schools that teach French or Mandarin instead. (Italian and Japanese are also possibilities, of course, but they are less common in my experience and I never learned them in class.)

We learn English very early in school and in private lessons and then we opt for either German or French. Most people choose German. Ideally we are expected to speak two foreign languages and have literacy degrees in both.

We also learn ancient Greek since Gymnasio and Latin in Lykeio if one is interested in Humanities. I don't like the phrase "dead language" to be honest, because a language is never truly dead unless it gets extinct. There are multiple languages not spoken the way they were spoken centuries ago but nobody declares all these older versions as "dead". Greek would have 50 "dead" versions already xD But imo that's not a way to speak about a language and I don't like that western teachers treat Greek and Latin like this, especially because Greeks can recognize the largest part of that "dead" anceint Greek.

Aaanyways, outside of school and job requirements, some private classes here teach Spanish and Italian if anyone is interested. These languages are followed by Turkish, Russian and Arabic. In international studies - at university - some of these less popular languages are taught.

[mavrla]

I graduated three years ago from my master’s program. I finished with a straight-A average, got the best grade on the scale from my thesis, and got picked to a research group for a multidisciplinary project from a bunch of qualified candidates. I was told by my supervisor and by the person who graded my thesis that I should continue my studies on PhD level. I wanted to continue my studies on PhD level. So what did I do when I arrived back from Rome?

Started teaching in middle school. 

The reasons were (mostly) financial: COVID shut me the opportunity to return to my old place of work, and I got offered a teaching position after sending applications to practically anywhere I could imagine working. The idea of having a job that I had an education for was alluring, too, even though I never really wanted to teach for a long term.

I have now taught in middle school for 2,5 years. I don’t particularly like the job - I like to teach, yes, and both religion and history are lovely subjects with many opportunities - as the everyday demands with cramped classrooms, students who need more individual support that it is possible for one person to offer (while still teaching all the other kids in the classroom), and the angry parents are quite a lot to deal with. They also create the kind of challenges I don’t particularly want to solve, nor have the resources to solve. On a personal level, I don’t feel like I’m moving forward or learning to be a better teacher, and so, with all this cynicism that is just increasing every day, the entire purpose of my job is to survive for a day, a week, a month, until the next vacay. Which I need to use to gather my strength and rest. The sheer noise of school/classroom makes me want to go directly to sleep after each workday. 

In short, I’m working in a job that could be interesting, but isn’t that for me. I need to find an out before I get even more burnt out than I already am.

The obvious choice, the dream choice, would be going back to the academia. But, as we all know, it isn’t that easy. PhD applications are a challenging project, where you need to stand out as both an excellent scholar and a person that is agreeable enough to work with. And trying to stand out as a middle school teacher who just *wants* to return to academia because she can’t tolerate the idea of staying in the classroom for any more time is... difficult.

I always feel like I’m not enough to apply anywhere. I might have a curious mind, but my imagination is lacking and it has always been very difficult to me to find a fresh angle to any given topic - which, to me, sounds like an essential skill to a PhD student. My English is better than it has been, but I’m still not anywhere near native speaker level, and I have little other language skills to compensate for that. I read French, Italian, and German all to some degree, but I’m not capable of writing or conversing in them. As a historian, my knowledge of ancient languages is lacking, too. My Latin isn’t as good as it should be. My Greek is barely there, as are my Hebrew and Arabic. I know I can study more, I know I *have to* study more, but still, the feeling of being just too incapable of doing anything with these skills lingers.  

I know I can write. The problem is I hate writing. After graduating, I have participated in two different article collections, and it's been an honor, but I still enjoy reading other people’s thoughts far more than I enjoy vocalizing my own. So, this has lead me to think that perhaps I don’t want a PhD, perhaps I just miss the academia - getting to read and converse and enjoy being surrounded by curious people who love the same sticks and stones I do? Maybe academia in itself is my happy place, but taking the next step there isn’t for me? 

So maybe I should leave my job and apply for another master’s. I could do history, as I already have a strong background there, or Islamic studies, psychology or philosophy, as I used to minor in those. I could expand my expertise and study something like gender/intersectionality studies. Or I could just try to apply to some prestigious school and see if the grass is greener in there, if that would make me feel like I was able to conduct original research sometime in the future.

At the same time, I feel like doing a new master’s would not only be a financial suicide but also taking a step back - a step I have already taken and completed relatively successfully. I have ideas that I love, I have willingness to pursue these ideas and see where they would take me, but taking the next step and trying to sell these ideas feels so terrifying that it’s debilitating. I have spent so many days lying in my bed reading fanfiction when I could have sent emails to some professors I know could help me (or ignore me, which probably is the more realistic worst case scenario in comparison to the imaginary derision and laughter I’m expecting in my head).

I feel so tired and confused and alone with all these thoughts and dreams and hopes and fears. Some days, they just hurt me more than they usually do, and today is just one of those days.

[thehellenisticworld]

Georgios Pachymeres: The Life of a Palaiologan Scholar

Georgios Pachymeres' father was part of the large group of Byzantines who fled the capital of the Eastern Roman Empire, Constantinople, after the Latin conquest of 1204 during the Fourth Crusade. He sought refuge with the Laskarid dynasty in Nicaea, one of the Byzantine successor states, where Georgios is believed to have been born around 1242. Here, the Laskarid dynasty prospered, ensuring a pleasant childhood for Georgios. In his historiographical work, nostalgia for this period often resonates in the form of criticism directed at emperor Michael VIII (r. 1261-1282), who neglected the situation in Asia Minor.

Georgios had a wealthy father who could afford to provide his son with a solid and broad education. When Michael VIII recaptured Constantinople in 1261, Pachymeres followed the new emperor to the ancient capital of Byzantium. There, he continued his higher studies, although the details remain unclear. It is generally assumed that his teachers were Georgios of Cyprus and Georgios Akropolites (1217–1282). Akropolites was a gifted writer and diplomat who became a central figure in the revival of higher education in Constantinople. Pachymeres undoubtedly had much to learn from him. Akropolites was a specialist in rhetoric, the quadrivium, and philosophy—fields in which Pachymeres would later excel.

Pachymeres demonstrated an exceptionally strong knowledge of both religious and secular law, which increased his chances of securing a lucrative position within the patriarchate or the court. Indeed, he quickly found his way into imperial circles and joined the ranks of the Constantinopolitan clergy.

His ecclesiastical career began in 1265 when he was ordained as a deacon of the Hagia Sophia, the center of Orthodox faith. His intellectual abilities were clearly appreciated, as evidenced by his appointment in 1277 as didaskalos tou apostolou, a position in which he was responsible for providing commentaries on the letters of the Bible and the Acts of the Apostles. In 1285, he was appointed hieromnemon, a role that made him responsible for various ecclesiastical matters, including priestly ordinations. One of the highlights of his career was his appointment as protekdikos in the same year, an influential role within the ecclesiastical court. Additionally, he utilized his knowledge of secular law to attain the position of dikaiophylax, an imperial judge. These high-ranking positions brought him into contact with several prominent figures, including members of the imperial family, Ioannes Bekkos, Athanasios II of Alexandria, and Theodosios Prinkips.

In addition to these responsibilities, Georgios also demonstrated a remarkable talent for the liberal arts. During this time, higher education and the academic world experienced a flourishing period in the newly reconquered capital, thanks in part to the efforts of the aforementioned Akropolites. The "dark" 13th century gave way to the so-called Palaiologan Renaissance, a revival of the Greek intellectual world and the arts. A significant milestone was the reopening of the Patriarchal Academy which was closed after the Latin conquest.

In other words, Constantinople offered ample opportunities for intellectuals with pedagogical talent. That Pachymeres excelled in teaching challenging subjects is evident from his literary work, which will be discussed in part 2. He earned his living as an instructor at the renowned Patriarchal Academy. More specifically, he held the position of oikonomikos didaskalos until 1275. In this role, he earned the respect of his colleagues and students. His significant contribution to the Palaiologan Renaissance cannot be overstated.

As a professor, he taught philosophy and the quadrivium. It is possible that he also taught rhetoric, although this is not certain. The quadrivium comprised the second and final series of the septem artes liberales: geometry, music, astronomy, and arithmetic. It is often assumed that his work, the Quadrivium (see part 2), served as support for his lessons. In any case, he had a significant influence on the later study of these subjects.

During his philosophy lessons, he covered the two major traditions of antiquity: Plato and the (Neo-)Platonic tradition on one hand, and Aristotle on the other. His autograph manuscripts reveal a particular interest in relatively rare commentaries on Plato and Neo-Platonic scholars. For his courses on Aristotle, he wrote an extensive summary of Aristotle's works in 12 books, the Philosophia (see part 2). He held immense admiration for Aristotle.

According to Pachymeres, Aristotle's genius lay in his apparent anticipation of many Christian doctrines. Specialist Pantelis Golitsis situates this idea within the context of the polemic over the question of how best to reach God.

The monastic movement, which gathered around Patriarch Athanasios (r. 1289-1293; 1303-1309), believed that a monastic lifestyle was the only correct way to draw closer to God. These fundamentalists sought to impose this idea on the rest of the clergy. This movement, better known as Hesychasm, partly originated in the theology of the famous Gregorios Palamas. They stubbornly opposed any philosophical rationalism in the approach to God.

Pachymeres, on the other hand, believed in an alternative path to a divine experience: through philosophy. Understanding God's creation was also a legitimate form of devotion. In this way, he sought to give the ancient philosophy, which he cherished, a more accepted place within Byzantine society.

According to Arnakis, this attitude of Pachymeres is more understandable in the context of the new proto-nationalist trend among the Byzantines, where they no longer considered themselves solely as Romans, but also as Hellēnes, without the term necessarily carrying a pejorative or pagan connotation. The intellectual elite of Constantinople was well aware of the significant contributions of their fellow speakers to world history and was proud of this. Pachymeres’ love for and teaching of Aristotle and Platonism, therefore, according to Arnakis, can be seen as part of this development.

Judging from what has been said, it might be tempting for the sensationalist to unmask Pachymeres, like Plethon, as a pagan in Christian garb. However, this is unlikely. Nowhere in his works do we detect anti-Christian ideas. One of his poems (at the end of his commentary on Aristotle's Fysika) attests to his unwavering devotion to Christ and God. Likewise, in his Quadrivium, he claims that the salvation of mankind depends on God's grace. In his work, we also find other traditional Christian beliefs, such as the salvation found in the sacraments and the inherent weakness of humanity. Interestingly, he often supports the latter claim with references to ancient, pagan authors. This leads us to the next issue: to what extent are these professions of faith sincere? This question may give rise to endless discussions, but a final judgment is beyond the realm of possibility. In any case, Pachymeres sought to present himself as a traditional, orthodox Greek.

Yet, there is something innovative about Pachymeres. His attitude is reminiscent of that of the Italian humanists. By encouraging philosophy, he assigns a greater responsibility to humanity in creation. The idea that the Byzantines were the forerunners of the European Renaissance is a stance defended by many Byzantinists. Indeed, a certain Christian anthropocentrism characterizes Pachymeres, which, although it ends with God, begins with humanity.

We know a lot about his public life thanks to the various autobiographical elements in his works. However, he remains silent about his personal life. It is generally believed that Pachymeres died in the year 1310 at the age of 65. The cause of death remains a mystery. His friend Manuel Philès wrote an epitaph for him, although the date of this remains uncertain. A portrait of Pachymeres has been preserved, but the reliability of its depiction is also questionable.

Olivier Goossens

[miraculousfrenchculture]

The French School System

The School system in France is divided into 4 "subsections" depending on the age. Since 2018, school is compulsory from ages 3 to 16 (previously, it was ages 6 to 16). People in the same batch are mostly born in the same calendar year (e.g. between January and December 2001). The school year lasts from the beginning of September to roughly the end of June - beginning of July depending on the grade.

✔ Maternelle (Preschool/Kindergarten in the US, Nursery/Year 1 in the UK): 3 to 6 year olds, divided in three levels (petite section, moyenne section, grande section). Some schools welcome children one year earlier, in “toute petite section”. If there aren’t enough children of the same level to form a class, a teacher might take care of a mix of two different levels (this is called a “double niveau”, and can also apply to primary school, see below).

The main objective of maternelle is to prepare children for primary school, by finalising the language acquisition, getting the children used to being around peers, and starting to learn how to read, write and count.

Each homeroom/form class is taught by one teacher, who is generally referred to as “Maître/Maîtresse”; the children use the informal you, tu, when speaking to them.

✔ Ecole élémentaire, more commonly called école Primaire (Primary school - 1st-5th grades in the US, Years 2-6 in the UK): 6 to 11 year olds, divided into five levels (CP, CE1, CE2, CM1, CM2). Here, the students learn how to read, write, do maths, and also start studying other topics like History-Geography, Science, Art, Music…

Classes are taught by one teacher, commonly called the maître/maîtresse d'école, except for Art, Music and Physical Education; each school generally has one teacher for each of the latter. The teachers are referred to as “Maître/Maîtresse” or “Monsieur/Madame [name]”, and the students start to use the formal you, vous, around CE2 at the latest.

A typical day in Paris: School starts at 8:30am Mon-Fri, ends at 4:30pm Monday/Thursday, 3pm Tuesday/Friday and 11:30am on Wednesdays. The lunch break lasts from 11:30am-1:30pm, and there are two 15-minute breaks (récréations) in the day, one in the morning and one in the afternoon. After school, students can stay for activities if their school has some (study, rollerblade, theatre…). They go home at the latest at 6pm. Some students may also have activities outside of school (sports, musical instruments…) which can last until later, or be held on Wednesday afternoons.

✔ Collège (ML - you are here; Secondary school - 6th-9th grades in the US, Years 7-10 in the UK): 11 to 15 year olds, divided into 4 levels (6ème, 5ème, 4ème, 3ème, the last one being the ML’s class grade). People in the public system don't choose their collège, they go to the one that’s assigned to them depending on their address. Students in the same homeroom/form (called the classe principale) all have the same teachers (one per subject) and will have all of their classes together, except for second languages (most commonly German or Spanish) and optional classes (e.g. Latin, Ancient Greek…).

Subjects: French (which regroups language and literature), Maths, Sciences (Physics and Chemistry, SVT=Biology and Geology, Technology), PE, Music, Art, Modern Languages (generally English from 6ème + Spanish/German/Italian from 4ème… but it depends on the school)

A typical day: Depending on the day and the school, the day will typically start between 8am and 10:30am. Each class lasts a multiple of 55min with two 15 minute breaks around 10:30am and 3:30pm (depending on when classes started), or a 5-10 minute break between each period. The lunch break lasts for about one hour, and the students generally eat at the school’s cafeteria (cantine). School ends on average at 4:30pm, but ending times can range between 2:30pm and 6pm at the very latest, except on Wednesdays, which are half-days. Like in primary school, extracurriculars can be held at school after hours, or outside, at varying times. It’s common to have at least one extracurricular activity.

The Brevet: At the end of 3ème, students take a national exam called the Brevet, which takes into account coursework, an oral exam (individual or in group, about art history or a project that was conducted during the year) and the final exam results. Everybody gets the same questions in the latter, which can be about anything in the program. Students who work regularly and have good results during the year can get the passing grade (10/20) even if they turn in a blank paper for the final exam (not recommended, but it happens), but then they don’t get a mention, i.e. merits, for which you need a high enough average (assez bien = satisfactory = 12/20, bien = good = 14/20, très bien = very good = 16/20).

✔ Lycée (High school; 10th-12th grades in the US, Years 11-13 in the UK): 15 to 18 year olds, divided into 3 levels (Seconde, Première, Terminale). Students in the public sector sort the lycées in their area (for which they have priority) or further away, in order of preference (reputation, type of baccalauréat…) , and are selected based on various criteria. There recently was a reform concerning the lycée, but assuming that the Miracuclass was in 3ème in 2015, they would have been the last batch to sit the old baccalauréat (a post on the new format is in the works).

Different baccalauréats (“bac”) types that students can take: the general bac (divided into three sections, more on that in a bit), the technology bac (a more hands-on bac, divided into eight sections, the students of which continue into higher education but in specific areas), or the professional bac (it prepares for specific jobs; the students can go straight to work after it). The bac général is the most commonly taken in Paris and in France (about 50% of students take it).

Organisation of the general baccalauréat: Seconde is a foundation year of sorts, where students discover new classes they didn’t have in collège; at the end, they chose their orientation between the Literary/Arts (L - “majors” are literature, language and philosophy), Socio-Economics (ES - “majors” are Economics and History/Geography) or Scientific (S - “majors” are Maths, Physics/Chemistry and Biology/Geology) bac. In Première, all students used to prepare and present a group project that groups two topics, called the Travail Personnel Encadré (TPE), and take the French Literature exam (with a written part early/mid June, and an oral part a little later - note: this is still the case in the new bac). The ES and L students also took the Sciences exams around that time. At the end of Terminale (mid-June), the students sat their remaining exams over the course of one week. There were also oral exams (e.g. for languages) and practical exams (for S students) that took place at various times of the year. The results come out around early/mid-July.

Subjects: French, Philosophy, History/Geography, Maths, Languages, PE (all, with varying coefficients); French Literature, Economy, Physics/Chemistry, Biology/Geology (in Terminale, specific to the different sections), Art, a specific sport, Latin/Greek, Theatre… (optional)

A typical day: a day in lycée is very much like a day in collège, except that the hours are longer - the students tend to start earlier (8-8:30am) and get out later (5:30-6pm). There’s more homework to do, and more tests, with some mock exams scheduled on the Wednesday afternoon if the lycée doesn’t already have classes then, or on some Saturday mornings. The lunch break is still about an hour, it’s not uncommon for some students to not eat at the cafeteria anymore; they might eat at home or buy food from nearby cafés/restaurants/bakeries (which tend to be cheaper around schools). Extracurriculars are still a thing, they just start and end later or take place at the weekend.

[winter-weepingwillow]

Teyvat Nations (and more) and their meanings: a summary

So, I figured I could post here some notes I jotted down, back when I first started the game and did some research after seeing the trailer, then kept on adding studies as I went on.

Hope it'll be useful! And I hope I'm not missing anything. Enjoy!

Mondstadt (German) [Anemo; Freedom]: "City of the Moon" ;

Liyue (Chinese) [Geo; Contracts]: 璃月 Líyuè, "Glazed Moon" ;

Inazuma (Japanese) [Electro; Eternity]: 稲妻 "lightning" ;

Sumeru (Buddhism, Pali, Hinduism, Sanskrit, Jainism, Prakrit, the history of ancient India, Marathi, Hindi) [Dendro; Wisdom]: (सुमेरु) "excellent mountain"; it represents one of the "eight mountains" (parvata) as defined in the Dharma. [See "Truth Amongst the pages of Purana" in the trailer !!! The Purana (पुराण, purāṇas) refers to Sanskrit literature preserving ancient India’s vast cultural history, including historical legends, religious ceremonies, various arts and sciences.] ;

Fontaine (French) [Hydro; Justice]: Fountain ;

Natlan (Nahuatl) [Pyro; War]: "place near where there is abundance of Na" (See also: this) ;

Snezhnaya (Russian) [Cryo; Love? My speculation: rebellion (against one's fate), redeem oneself]: Снежная, "Snowy" ;

EXTRA: KHAENRI'AH and CELESTIA

Celestia: a variant of Celeste, which means "heavenly" or "of the sky" in Latin and Italian. In this case, it can be translated as "Heavenly Land" ;

Khaenri'ah: Norse culture, mostly, but it was a unified nation, so maybe there are other cultures mixed in as well:

Old Norse: "little knower" (from Celestia's perspective?) About this, I found an interesting source (the same as the Old Norse meaning, mentioned just above): here is a summary; however, I wasn't able to draw a clear conclusion from it.                                              Kanna means "explore/inquire" in Old Norse, (kannaðr means "explorer").  Kenna is the common verb for "to know" (this would imply that they seek greater knowledge, which fits their advanced technology and therefore posing a threat to even Celestia. Furthermore, kanna stands more for "to find out") ; Kenna has a version with the agent suffix, kennari, which means "teacher" (note that agent nouns tend to be more specific than just an abstract [verb]+er, for instance ríðari it should mean "rider" but is mainly used to identify knights) ; maybe it was because they taught humanity how to use a "power from beyond"...?

Coptic: "to set free the (God of...?) knowledge from a cell" (source:) ;

Arabic: "Khaen", betrayer; "Ri'ah", winds; "Kha-en-ri-ah" could be the transliteration of خائن رياح ;

Persian: "Kha-en-ri-ah"  خنريه or خانه ریاض  Where ریاض means "training, practice, toil" and خانه (xâne) means "house" (I'm not too sure about this one, so please take it with a grain of salt, since my only source was a dictionary found online. I wasn't able to find out more about this).

 

KHAENRI'AH EXTRA

Art of Khemia: Inspiration from Greek and ancient Egypt culture;

Here we can find some evidence that Khaenri'ah could have been a unified nation with different cultures within, like I mentioned above.

From Genshin Impact Wiki:

Khemia is phonetically similar to several etymological origins for the modern terms alchemy and chemistry. The origin of these terms are uncertain and multiple derivations exist.

• One possible derivation is from the Arabic كيمياء kīmiyāʾ, "chemistry", which comes from Coptic term ⲕⲏⲙⲉ kēme, "Egypt". The Coptic term ultimately derives from the ancient Egyptian word 𓆎𓅓𓏏𓊖 kmt, referring to both the country Egypt and the color black.

• Other possible derivations are from the Ancient Greek χημεία khēmeía meaning "pouring" or "infusion," or the Ancient Greek metallurgical term χυμεία khumeía originally meaning "pouring together," "casting together," "weld," or "alloy."

• In Arabic, "alchemy" translates to خيمياء ḵīmiyāʾ.

So we have Arabic, Coptic, Ancient Egyptian and Greek, the latter of which can also be traced back to Enkanomiya, which, as we know, had a (commercial?) relationship with Khaenri'ah. But this is for another story and yet another (etymological) analysis.

To conclude, other bits of culture could be the Celtic and old Germanic ones, as we can see in the latest world quest in Sumeru (I am not going to spoil it though. I'm just going to say the keyword: Schwanenritter, the Swan Knight), together with the Arthurian legends, scattered EVERYWHERE in the lore regarding the destroyed nation.

And another story will also be the analysis of Dainsleif's name, together with his power, element and role as the boughkeeper.

THANK YOU FOR READING THIS FAR OMG YOU HAVE SUCH PATIENCE! HERE, HAVE A COOKIE 🍪

[whataloadofqueers]

the one where sirius speaks french - part 1

the black family has a lot of ancestors in france, and even some living family, the d'aransac

so of course every child in the most ancient and noble house of black is taught french from a very young age

the very first lesson has always been about the family devise : toujours purs

sirius had always been a school-smart kid, and french, as well as latin and greek, came easy to him

the only muggle books that were allowed in the house were gifts from the eccentric cousin guillaume d'aransac, and written in french

sirius would spend hours in the library, reading those books

he had a particular fondness for a collection of tales written by charles perrault

sirius soon learnt that it was better not to mention anything about cendrillon, le petit chaperon rouge, or la belle au bois dormant in front of his parents

so he would read at night, or hiding between the library shelves, sometimes alone, sometimes reading aloud to regulus

but sirius turns eleven, goes to hogwarts, is sorted in gryffindor, and starts to realise that his family doesn't love him

he stops speaking french, stops playing the piano, stops acting like he's always been taught to

but this year, sirius also meet three kids, one who mutters in hindi while he sleeps, one who can't hide a heavy welsh accent and another one who, when the words seems to be stuck in his throat, uses his hands to speak

they become best friends, and over the years develop a language of their own, that they can speak in front of the teachers without risking to be understood

a language made of posh english and welsh slang, hindi words and secret hand signs..... but not a word in french

they grew up, and one day sirius falls in love with remus

devise : motto

toujours purs : always pure

cendrillon : cinderella

le petit chaperon rouge : little red riding hood

la belle au bois dormant : sleeping beauty

[sherlockisademigod]

Minor Schools around the world: Paris, France, The Flamel Institute

The Flamel Institute is directly within the Flamel mansion, where only the brightest, clearest, honest, and accepting students may set foot. Prospective students are sent a letter upon turning 13. The letter will be grey and black with a wax sealing of the famed Philosopher's stone, and students must undergo a mental test to prove they are who they claim to be. Rather then be separated by houses, students are separated by their strongest subjects. Alchemy and Potions often go hand in hand with muggle science, while Ancient Runes is most commonly taught along with Latin and Greek. English and charms are mandatory classes.

Because students are most likely previous students of another school, the supply list does not change except for one major difference: As of 2004, quills and parchment were replaced with notebooks and pens, and students were invited to a challenge where they must try to find a way to incorporate technology within magic before they graduate. 

Classes offered are: Potions, muggle science, astronomy, maths, Ancient Runes, Latin, English, Charms, Greek, Alchemy, Herbology

----------------------------------

All students are taught either by the Flamel’s (Their portraits as of the early 1990′s), or older students. There is only one astronomy teacher as of 2010. 

Students wake up at 6:00 am by a prescribed bell and breakfast is served until 7:30. The older students start their studies first, during the morning, while the younger students use this time to revise and do homework. Lunch is served from 12:30 to 2:00, and until 4:35, the younger students will be in their lessons and the older students revise and do homework.

Dinner is served at 6:00 until 7:45, and lights out is at 10pm for all students (not including those taking astronomy, who go to bed at 1:00am with the help of a sleeping drought). Between those times are free periods where the students may go wherever they please. However, they are not permitted outside due to the high risk of muggles noticing, although older students may be permitted to apparate to Diagon. 

School starts on the 17th of September. There is a 2 week break starting on December 24th, and a 3 month break starting July 1st and ending August 28th

-------------------

Students are apparated to and from school in specific  apparatian spots, hidden from both muggle and magical sight. In order to see and access it, students must bring the letter with them. Older students will later receive a brooch with the an F that will remain permanently pinned to their uniform until graduation in place of the letter.

Graduation will happen at 18, and there is a small ceremony in which family members are invited to. Students may also stay over breaks within good reason.

[dwellordream]

“...Only a minority of the clergy in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries came from the aristocracy or landed gentry: one expert on the subject estimates that these amounted to about one in five. A much larger number came from families already established in the gentlemanly professions: many clergymen were themselves the sons, grandsons and even great-grandsons of clergymen, while the fathers of others were lawyers, soldiers and sailors. There were also many who had their origin at a slightly lower social level: the sons of apothecaries, successful shopkeepers and farmers. 

On the whole they tended to come from small towns  and the countryside rather than the cities, and commercial backgrounds, such as Sydney Smith’s, were underrepresented. Only a few are known to have come from humble families, but one of these, John Moore, rose to be Archbishop of Canterbury (1783–1805), showing that it was possible for an outsider to rise to the very top of the hierarchy. Most clergymen probably went to grammar schools, but a good many were educated privately like Mr Austen’s sons and the pupils he taught alongside them. 

…Roughly half of all the students at Oxford and Cambridge (the only two universities in England at the time) went on to be ordained as clergy- men, and those appointed to college fellowships were expected to take holy orders. The number of students was not high: the combined total of the two universities averaged under four hundred between 1730 and 1800, although it increased considerably in the early decades of the nineteenth century. Many gentlemen, eldest sons with no need of a career, attended university for two or three years with no intention of taking a degree or seriously pursuing their studies. 

They made friendships with like-minded young men from other parts of the country, and were able to indulge in some youthful indiscretions without embarrassing their parents by doing so close to home. It was mostly from them that the sporting, idling, drinking set came, and they are greatly overemphasized in our idea of student life at the time. Students destined for the Church tended to be poorer, more studious and better behaved. But even these embryo clergymen would not be exposed to much theology or biblical criticism either at school or university. 

All graduates had to subscribe to the Thirty-Nine Articles of the Church of England (which effectively prevented Dissenting Protestants or Catholics from attending either university), but the actual doctrines of the Church received much less attention than the classics or the everyday morality and behaviour expected of a gentleman. Not all clergy had been to university. A substantial minority, particularly in Wales and some of the poorer and more remote parts of England, had attended grammar schools and then studied privately, often while earning their subsistence as teachers. Several bishops in these areas published reading lists to guide such pupils, and some did notably well in the Church despite generally coming from relatively poor families. 

However, this route became increasingly difficult and restricted in the years after 1800. Few formal qualifications were needed to become an Anglican clergyman. In 1804 Parliament imposed a minimum age of 23 for deacons and 24 for priests. Candidates would then be examined by a bishop who would expect them to produce testimonials from their university college, or from a clergyman who had known them for several years, stating that their character and behaviour made them suitable for holy orders. They were required to have some Latin and Greek: at least enough to translate short and familiar passages of scripture into English, although some bishops were considerably more demanding in this respect, and the standard required probably rose over the period. 

Candidates were not expected to have studied much theology, and most clergymen were better acquainted with Cicero, Caesar and other ancient pagan authors than with contemporary biblical criticism. Candidates for ordination had to be respectable, and bishops privately circulated the names of those who were flagrantly unsuitable, for example the young man who had stolen the college silver. A personal interview was important more to check that a candidate was presentable than to test his academic ability. When Henry Austen decided to take holy orders in 1816, following the failure of his bank, he took some pains to brush up the Latin and Greek that he had studied at Oxford 25 years before.

However, the Bishop of Winchester with genuine but possibly misplaced kindness, conversed with him on general subjects for some minutes and then, putting his hand on the New Testament in Greek remarked, ‘As for this book, Mr Austen, I dare say it is some years since either you or I looked into it’. Henry secured his ordination, but if family tradition is to be believed he had been rather proud of his studies and was disappointed not to be able to prove his proficiency. In theory, candidates were expected to have felt an inner calling to the Church, but apart from a few evangelicals, there was little emphasis on a sense of religious vocation. 

The Church was a career like any other, and just as a soldier was required to have courage, a clergyman needed to have faith, and in most circumstances both the courage and the faith could be taken for granted. The truths of revealed religion as interpreted by the Church of England were well established and needed to be expounded and explained to a congregation that already accepted them, not debated with sceptics. A clergyman was also meant to demonstrate religious virtues by the life he led, although in many cases this did not extend far beyond avoiding the most obvious vices and attending to some of the needs of his parishioners.”

- Rory Muir, “The Church.” in Gentlemen of Uncertain Fortune: How Younger Sons Made Their Way in Jane Austen's England

[firstknightss]

GWAINCELOT ESSAY THREE???

[commentary voice] ah yes and this gwaincelot essay.... which turned into a fic was inspired by @nextstopparis and @little-ligi

GWAINE TEACHING LANCELOT HOW TO READ. and thats how they actually CONFESS.

imagine gwaine seeing lancelot trip up reading leon’s plan for the day, seeing him trying to understand it. and gwaines, hes a little in love. Hes. Hes a little hit with feelings for this Noble (tm) knight. So OF COURSE he CANT EMOTION and he tries to show his affection for lancelot without yknow being in ‘loVE’

he comes over with his swishy hair and bantery tone like “oooOhHh LANCELOT! Lancey! Hey! Hello! Can’t read leon’s goddamn awful handwriting huh?”

And Lancelots embarrassed and flushes red and gwaine thinks hes Fucked Up (and he really doesn’t want to fuck this up, this is the first time he’s actually felt emotions this deep for someone) and tries to fix it panickedly, like the Anxiety Clown He Is.

He keeps on saying sorry and apologising, and Lancelot, the EVER CALM KNIGHT GUY, goes “it’s fine, it’s okay. It’s nothing to do with you...” and then he hesitates. He HESITATES. “....it’s just that...” and then he BITES HIS LIP and gwaine thinks he might just faint there and then, “...i cant read.”

and now it hits him, gwaine, gwaine, who thought literacy was something trash and something he didn’t really need, realises how important it is. and so, yknow because hes kind of wrapped in those Emotions (tm), he pulls lancelot’s sleeve after practice, when they’re alone in the changing room. (and if lancelot wasn’t so tired and miserable, he would have easily seen gwaine BLUSH)

And he, shyly asks if lancelot wouldnt mind being tutored by him.

Now Lancelot is OVERJOYED, and he’s borderline CRYING because lancelot, poor old village boy lancelot who’d been kicked out of the knights of camelot, and had to become a MERCENARY and fight for masters who didn’t care for him, has NEVER HAD someone literally CARE about him so much. (Apart from Merlin. He loves merlin <3)

so now imagine lancelot waking up an hour early the next morning, and showing up into gwaine’s room. He knows gwaine literally doesnt sleep with a lock, so he just barges in, and starts shaking gwaine.

Now GWAINE sleeps like a Log (had so much shit going on irl, time to sleep it away) and when he opens his bleary eyes, seeing lancelot in one of his stupid v neck shirts over him, hes like “....h...helo??”

and lancelot’s all like. “We- werent YOU gonna give me reading lessons.” And gwaine nods, yawning (and in that moment lancelot thinks gwaine looks unimaginably cute, so cute that he wants to literally ruffle gwaine’s hair and run his hands through how silky and brown it is.)

THEN gwaine pulls on the dont care-ish mask, and makes his arms into a pillow under his head, as he leans against the wall behind his bed, in some kind of somewhat???flirty??? manner??? [i dont...i dont know what hes trying to do. On the other hand! Not does Lancelot :) ]

Lancelot, does not realise this is gwaine’s poor attempt at flirting - since he’s seen gwaine ACTUALLY flirting and this is like. Nothing. And its also poorly executed. Which is NOTHING like gwaine.

So he pulls gwaine’s arm, and half hauls him out of bed.

As gwaine’s head crashes into lancelot’s stomach, he can smell lancelot’s clothes. They smell of flowers, and cotton and everything so natural and gwaine, who literally smells of wine, and wood and Tavern. (And aftershave, or the 500AD equivalent)

[see here, see im trying to bring themes of dionysis okay. OkayyyyyyyyY. yours truly likes looking at greek mythology. And both these two complete dionysis]

Gwaine, in his sleepy stupor, nestles his head on Lancelot’s hip, who gives a sigh and stands there. One hand clutching gwaine’s, leaving the other free.....

....to rake through his soft, flowy brown hair. And twirl his fingers through its waves, and Gwaine cuddles in further.

And since Lancelot left the door open, Leon (the other bitch who wakes up at 4am to do idk nothing) sees them two...like that, illuminated by the SUNLIGHT behind them, and smiles a little.

And then he trips over the stairs, the moment is lost.

Gwaine and Lancelot pull away at the same time, and gwaine’s face turns back to “ha ha im a Jerk (tm)” and if he wasnt too busy trying to hide how flustered he was, he’d see Lancelot looking at him the way he used to look at GWEN.

They both blink and look at each other, understandingly, neither of them to speak of this again.

And then Gwaine drags himself out of bed, and Lancelot raises his eyebrows as he watches him (totally not checking him out) haul out a book from his cupboard.

Gwaine’s too sleepy for this, he keeps yawning and rubbing his eyes (looking like a cat, Lancelot notes) and Lancelot takes a deep breath, his eyes understanding.

“We don’t have to do this if you don’t want to.”

“Lancelot, I love..” he bites his tongue, cursing his half asleep mind “..doing this, and love hanging out with you...I just cant stay up this early.”

Reading lessons, from now on, are at 1:30am-whenever Gwaine and Lancelot stop rambling about Odysseus and Circe and Telemachus

[i dont know any other ancient books apart from like. Ancient greek/Roman ones. So i guess. Its not historically accurate,,,,BUUIT this is a fanfic for a pair who had like no scenes together SO i think i can take some ✨creative liberties✨]

Lancelot has heard of the journey of Aneas from travelling bards, singing songs in his native old english. Gwaine’s eyes are quick at latin, and he learnt the flaws of Romulus and Remus in his pure latin. Gwaine’s a good teacher, and lancelot is a quick study, and it’s not long before they’re arguing over which Goddess caused the most harm in the Illiad.

Gwaine’s never met someone who he could reveal that he loved reading to, he loved doing.

Lancelot’s never met someone who he could tell he couldn’t read, and ask if they could teach him, love learning.

They make it work.

The other knights notice, of course they notice. Percival notices how Lancelot stumbles into the Gwaine’s room at night, bright eyed. Elyan notices Lancelot and Gwaine’s voices from Gwaine’s room opposite him; sometimes slow, Gwaine speaking slowly and Lancelot following; sometimes heated and passionate.

(They’re arguing. They’re arguing about how to pronounce Minerva)

Merlin finds the two, in the early hours of the morning - when the birds are figuring what song they sing today - on Gwaine’s bed.

Gwaine leaned against the bedframe, his trousered legs splayed over the sheets. Loosely braided, long brown hair fell over his closed eyelids, his mouth in a small smile.

And Merlin follows his arm draped over Lancelot, snuggled beside him, his head on his broad shoulder, every breath of wind pushing against curly black hair, making it almost /bounce/. His eyes are covered by the other man’s hair, and he looks...content. More content than Merlin has ever seen him.

He slips out as quietly as he came in, and smirks, hes gotta tell arthur they finally got their shit together oh GOD

Its no surprise to anyone but them, when Arthur pulls Lancelot out of training, and into his chambers.

“I’m glad you’ve found someone Lancelot.” He starts, his face geniune, his voice giving away hints of relief. (He thought he was never going to see his knight smile again after all the ordeals that had happened to him)

“Oh...” Lancelot’s heart sinks, “...how did you find out, Sire?”

Arthur blinks, taking in the change of mood in Lancelot, maybe it wasn’t anything important, maybe they were trying to keep it casual, hell they didnt want the king knowing.

“I- uh, I just noticed...” Goddamnit Merlin, and Goddamn his need to tell him everything he saw. (Merlin had advised him not to do this, as they sat on his bed after a long night. This was really his fault.)

Lancelot pales, and he places his hands down on the table beside him, palms slapping stone as he did so.

“Well, I guess I should tell you the whole truth then,” his voice is quiet, and Arthur steps closer, “Sire I am not of Noble birth, and was born in a village - as you know.”

Arthur nods, his arms crossed, but his Kingly Bravado fell away at the sight of his knight, and one of his closest friends, being this vulnerable.

“Yes I know, but what does this ha-“

“And we children in the village we-“ he falters, “-we were never taught to read.”

“Yes, no I understand, I-“ he pauses, Lancelot’s words hitting him a bit too late, this was about literacy?

This, this whole conversation was about literacy?

Not being gay?

Merlin was going to have a field day

“Sire?”

“I understand Lancelot, and is this why you feel a little out of place with the other knights?” He carries it on, with a smile, he has a few questions to ask merlin.

“Yes, and that’s why I asked Gwaine to tutor me from time to time, although, the sessions carry through late into the night, which may have been affecting my performance at practice. I’ll have you know that this is a temporary th-“

“It’s fine Lancelot,” Arthur places a hand on his shoulder, “You are still exceptional at practice,”

“Thank you Sire,” Lancelot twinkles.

✨

“Theyre, theyre not together?” Merlin cant stop laughing, tears streaming down his face, “theyre not TOGETHER?? oh my God arthur what did you DO”

They sit together on Arthur’s bed, drinking wine from stemless cups together, with Arthur recounting the events of the day; red faced.

“I mean, it was your idea Merlin.”

“I just saw them, and I assumed...I didnt...I didnt think youd ASK them.”

“What do you think I’d do then?? Let them be on their merry way.”

“Yes!”

✨

“Do you like me?” Gwaine asks, unexpectedly, one night, the moon vibrant against the loud sea.

“You’re...tolerable...” Lancelot says, a smile tugging at his lips, as the silver moonlight falls against his hair, a halo around him.

✨

The knights give them the look every morning, as the two of them stumbled out of the same room, more frequently than ever.

Sometimes Lancelot would throw on Gwaine’s shirt, when he’d crumpled his own beyond repair. Sometimes Gwaine would put some of Lancelot’s hair oil on, when his hair was frizzy.

They gave each other knowing looks when Gwaine and Lancelot started whispering and giggling like a bunch of schoolgirls.

✨

And then Stupid gwaine had to go get fucking stabbed, and their delicate dance was like trying to waltz through a minefield.

Lancelot clutches onto Gwaine’s arm as Merlin feels his forehead with shaking hands.

“He’s burning up.”

“Infection...?” Lancelot sounds broken, and nods, fumbling with his pack to find some bandages.

It was just a simple quest; a save the day, get the girl, do various harmless shenanigans type of quest.

He’d half expected Gwaine to get the girl, and he cant help but give out a half choked laugh. Gwaine had no idea what hit him when she turned out to be the evil one all along.

He tries to forget that Gwaine showed no interest in her, he tries to forget that Gwaine’s been less frequent at the Tavern, he tries to forget that he hasn’t seen Gwaine with anyone since months now.

Gwaine, his beautiful Gwaine was lying on his lap, hot red blood rushing from his side, staining his polished chainmail with dark, sticky blood.

He’s been out for nearly an hour now, and Lancelot remembers carrying him, through the entire forest, forgetting his sword and his helmet and just grabbing Gwaine and getting the shit out of there.

Gwaine’s lack of self preservation was really rubbing off on Lancelot nowadays.

Merlin watches as Lancelot holds back tears, his own eyes stinging. Gwaine can’t die like this, he can’t die like this....

“hælan beorn adl”

Merlin’s eyes flashed gold, and Lancelot could feel warmth coming back into the fingers he was grabbing.

He was coming back.

And then the weight of everything hits him.

He was in Fucking Love.

✨

“Hey.” Gwaine’s voice is rough from disuse, but Lancelot nearly sobs when he hears the voice.

“Don’t fucking do that to me again, amor meus.” He puts his head down on Gwaine’s chest; finding the hammering of his heart calming.

He shimmies onto Merlin’s bed, which Gwaine had been lying in for the past few days.

“Did you mean, ami meus?” Gwaine sounds tired, too tired to be awake.

“Huh? Did i say something else?” Lancelot decides to play dumb, a sparkle in his eyes,

“I thought I heard amor meus,” Gwaine pushes his nose into Lancelot’s hair, taking in the wonderful smell of coconut.

“Well then, at least your hearing’s okay, amor meus.”

Gwaine gulped, and was sure Lancelot could hear his loud swallow.

“Lancelot, I hope this isnt a big joke with me teachin you latin and all,” Gwaine’s voice is a little wobbly from the slee deprivation and the magic and the pain numbers, “because I’ll have you know that I really love you, and I cant go on like this any longer,”

“Its okay Gwaine, I learnt latin from the man I love, of course it’s not a joke.”

“The man you love? Who’s tha-“

Realisation hits him like a brick.

Oh.

Oh.

“Me?” His voice cracks, and Lancelot looks up, a smirk on his face.

“Of course dumbass.”

“Like I’m meant to know that,” Gwaine tries to keep his dont care-ish aura, but they both know he’s too exhausted to keep that up.

“mmm?”

Gwaine kisses him on the nose, and he wraps himself around him.

And thats how Merlin finds them later that day, eyes blinking as he stood there.

✨

“I’m glad you’ve found someone, Lancelot.” Arthur coughs.

“Is that what that whole talk was about???”

“Answer the question.” His words sound harsh, but he’s barely hiding a smile.

“I’m glad too, I’m Glad I found Gwaine too.” Lancelot blushes, turning to gwaine.

“Why are you asking anyway, Princess?”

“Oh just, making sure this time.”

[alatismeni-theitsa]

hello, sorry to bother! I was just wondering what is your field of studies? sorry if you've talked about it before but I missed it 😭 you seem to have a good knowledge of the classics, did you study that?

Hello! You are not bothering me, that's why my ask box is open!

I am not in the classics field. The Iliad, the Odyssey, some ancient plays, and our myths, we analyze them thoroughly (and properly) in elementary, middle, and high school in Greece. (In our mandatory for all History or Ancient Greek lessons). If someone is interested and pays attention, and also continues reading and watching documentaries outside of school, they can get pretty decent. Most importantly, Greek students are taught in a way that conveys the context of the era the texts come from. It's not an exotic/foreign concept to us.

My knowledge is not perfect, I don't remember everything and there are times I need to do additional research. I listen to Greek and xenoi friends if they have found something I don't know. But the foundations have been laid for an interest that it's ongoing for me. So I understand the conventions, and why statements like "Zeus is an asshole" and oversimplifications like "the gods are psychopaths" (hello Madeline Miller) are incorrect. (jokes about Zeus are not bad per se, it's when people actually, seriously mean them then it's weird).

Comment on the Greek education system:

I don't imply that only school education makes you an expert but imo the material is pretty good and if one pays attention can get pretty good knowledge. Plus, our middle and high school teachers have a 4year old diploma in their field + Master's degree most of the time. Things changed a bit three years ago but before that, half or more of the students went attend (plus from the above I mentioned) "theoretical"/"humanitarian" mandatory orientation classes.

A large amount of Greek high school students are able to translate and analyze known and unknown (seeing them for the first time out of the blue in the Panhellenic Exams) ancient texts (Greek and Latin) of all subjects. Most Greek students take intensive classes outside of school, and the "humanities" students see hundreds of ancient Greek texts before reaching 18. Ten years ago you needed to do all that to go to a nursing school.

In the last three years, the Humanities field has been narrowed down and fewer kids take these mandatory classes. Of course, students don't remember everything after they leave school but the exposure to so many texts instills in them an understanding of the ancient Greek society and folklore. (my mum can still recite Aristotle's "Definition of Tragedy" she learned in middle school but that's because it gave her ptsd 😂)

For Greeks who may think I overhype the knowledge the system gives us (ειναι γιατι εχουμε συνηθισει το αγγουρι και μας φαινονται ευκολα), you can go ask all the online experts on mythology discourse (who are usually USAmericans) what they knew on ancient greek societies and what analysis they did on the myths when they were 16.

From the discussions with USians I've done over the years, someone in the US needs to attend University in order to start analyzing such texts to the degree we did in middle school. There are always exceptions, but what exposure and context we get in Greece at a young age cannot be underestimated. Trust me, it can be much, much worse outside of Greece 😂

That's been my experience, at least. You can, naturally, add stuff if you've been through the Greek ed. system and saw something different!

[austenpoppy]

The word "classism" annoys me very much

Sorry, but it's true, and that especially if you use it every time someone from the "upper class" doesn't understand something done in the "lower class". And it's even worse if your characters use it in fanfictions - please stop it.

Look, I've got a unique relationship with "class" because my two parents come from different backgrounds which are almost opposite.

My mother grew up as the third daughter of a working-class family. My grandmother was a cleaning lady who had to stop going to school at 14 because of poverty (though my great-grandmother was very strict and my great-grandfather, nice but alcoholic - my Mum describes my grandmother's background as having come out straight out of a Zola novel), though she liked to learn new words in the dictionary every night. My grandfather was a taxi driver, but he died rather young due to cancer.

My mother never had much. My grandparents sacrificed themselves so that one of my aunts got swimming lessons and my mum, music curses (she plays the accordion). They didn't own their house, which had no toilet inside, and in general had very few possessions. My grandparents wouldn't get on holidays at the same time, just so my mum and aunts could have two weeks of holidays in a small camping. My mother only had hand-me-downs, and she was the first to go to college. I'm the third, because most of my cousins didn't go either (and it's fine, they got incredibly successful at what they do and I'm super proud).

My grandparents never had much, but they shared everything they had. My mum remembers that, when she was young, my grandma would cook for the entire neighbourhood and would invite everybody to dinner and party with my mum's family. My grandma also went helping old people in retirement houses.

In my mum's family, people care most about sharing good times with their loved ones, having fun, loyalty, working hard to get where they want to be, and they value honesty greatly - which is why they're all quite blunt, even though they're sympathetic and compassionate.

And my dad ?

My dad grew up in an upper middle-class family. My grandmother was a university teacher and historian, and my grandather was a teacher in what we call "classe préparatoire'" in France, and a historian as well.

My grandfather didn't come from a particularly rich or educated family (educated meaning "having received a formal education"), but my grandmother certainly did. Her own father was the dean of a university in France, and my great-grandmother could read Latin and Ancient Greek without having to look up the dictionary (and she was a teacher in a high school).

In my father's family, you've got scientists, teachers, professors, researchers, mathematicians...My great-great-aunt is the first French woman to have entered the Académie des Sciences, and she worked with Einstein. Her father was the headmaster of the equivalent of Harvard in France.

Oh, and my dad's family owns properties, too. There's this huge house in the Alps that my family goes to every summer, that we inherited from my great-grandfather whose father owned the entire village (that's why I grew up with my second and third cousins). There's this big apartment on the Côte d'Azur. And this immense house in Normandy that was probably a monastery.

My father's family values culture and knowledge greatly, which is why sometimes the one who ends up being right in arguments is the one who's read a book or an article the other hasn't, and also why some people dismiss others' opinions if they don't think those people's input relies on sources they deem valuable (yep, that's very annoying).

They're also keen on debating everything, and honestly I love that about them, because you can have meaningful and passionate and heated discussions and then just ask what we're going to eat for dinner. They taught me nuance, and the ability to see multiple sides of an argument, see the pros and cons of some issues.

I grew up between those two worlds, between my mum's and my dad's worlds, belonging to either and neither at once.

When the two meet it's often bizarre. At my brother's communion, my dad's family was eating in a quite posh manner, quietly discussing the last books they had read, while on the other side of the room one of my uncles was running after one of my cousin's girlfriend because they were having a water fight, and the rest of my mother's family was loudly cheering and laughing.

There have been tensions sometimes, and misunderstandings. It's true that my mother's family has sometimes felt out of place in my dad's family. My great-grandmother (the one who could read Greek and Latin fluently) made my grandmother (the cleaning lady) cry one day in the house my Dad's family owns in the Alps, because my grandmother wanted to wash the curtains that she found dirty (they probably were), and my great-grandmother belittled her for it.

Many members of my father's family try to reach out to my mother's family (my late grandmother, my aunt), asking about them, praising them for their kindness and their dedication, genuinely saying they're great people. My great-aunt (that I consider my third grandmother) feels like she politically supports the working class and the underprivileged, even though my mother's family doesn't care about politics.

But sometimes, and I'd say even often, they just don't get it. They're a bit awkward in certain circumstances, they can end up being patronizing, they say things they shouldn't have, and I can see that oftentimes, even though my father's family and my mother's family are chatting amicably it feels like they're living on different planets.

But you know what ? My mother's family isn't perfect, either. They've got their own codes as well, their own ideas of what's appropriate or not, and what may seem important or normal in my father's family would be seen as ridiculous in my mother's family, or at least something they would raise their eyebrows at.

And they sometimes end up dismissing those things, because to them it's unimportant. My own mum doesn't understand why my dad hates it when things end up broken, because to her it's just objects, even when the objects in question are things my dad valued - because my mum was raised with the idea objects are just objects, while people matter much more.

She's not wrong, per say, but at the same time my dad has the right to be sad or angry, however trivial it may seem to my mother's family.

My mother had to learn how to work her way through in my father's family, but so did my dad in my mother's family - and to be fair he's somewhat closer to my mum's family than his own.

My mum and my dad had to do a lot of compromises, trying to understand how the other worked, and where they were coming from. My dad is more careful about certain expressions he uses, has stopped asking my mum to explain her reasoning behind her every word, and he's learned how to let some things go. My mum has learned to listen to my dad more about those things that seem trivial to her at first glance (like the idea that we won't be able to afford taking care of any of the properties my dad's family has, not even if we only had to pay a little portion of it), and she does certain things the way my dad wants to.

Sometimes there are still misunderstandings. I vividly remember a fight they had about a water bottle. My brother had helped himself with water without putting water in our glasses first. My dad scowled at him and told him it wasn't the done thing. My mum got angry at my dad, because what my brother did is just normal in my mum's family and she therefore felt insulted by the implications.

And the crazy thing is, many of you would say my dad was being "classist". But no one was wrong or right there.

And that's the thing. It's all about different cultures and different social codes. But for some reason, many of you think it's a sort of one-way street because you throw around words like "privilege".

You know what ? My mother's family doesn't give a flying f*ck about fancy sociological definitions, not least because they don't talk like they've come out of sociology classes. They live their lives, they've got their own problems that they solve by themselves, they stand up for themselves if the need arises, and they don't scowl at my father's family just because my father's family doesn't understand them at times - it's all right, they don't understand some things either.

Yes, sometimes my father's family was patronizing - but it was called out for what it was instead of saying "classism". And if you think my dad never got on the receiving end of things like "that's not how things are done", or "you don't get it" or "you don't know this and that", you are wrong.

The beautiful thing is that I understand both, and it gave me the possibility to think outside of my bubble.

[badmoonyellow]

HP HEADCANON: PARIS UNIVERSITY

𝓵𝓮𝓼 𝓯𝓪𝓬𝓾𝓵𝓽𝓮𝓼 ✯ 𝓊𝓃𝒾𝓋𝑒𝓇𝓈𝒾𝓉𝒾𝑒𝓈

(click here for contents)

There are five different facultés (abr. fac) in Paris, each one called by a number and the name of a famous wizard/witch or a district in Paris. Each fac has its specificities and various pathways that should please most of the young students trying to find what they want to do with their life after they graduate

Paris I — Babel: Modern languages, dead languages, magical languages, magicology, magical literature, theoretical studies of magical and non-magical art

Paris II — Ruggieri: Astrology, astronomy, divination, theology, psychology, philosophy and sociology

Paris III — Nicolas et Pernelle Flamel: Alchemy, occult sciences, arithmancy and mathematics, magical and non-magical medicine, biology

Paris IV — Cluny: Botanics, care of magical creatures, potions, magical geology and crystal healing, elementary magic

Paris V — Kardec: Necromancy, spiritism, divination, transfiguration, illusionism and oneiric magic, hypnosis and psychology

French students either use the number or the name of the uni to refer to it, never both. Ex: “I did my masters at Paris IV”, “I was a teacher at Cluny for two years” or “Flamel has the best course for arithmancy”

Paris universities are known for being selective but welcome students from every social class: there are no tuition fees except for social security which is calculated on the income of the student or their household if they still live with their parents. The more you earn, the more you pay but it is capped to 20 galleons per student (roughly 450€). If you’re doing a joint honour degree in two different fac, you won’t have to pay twice.

Be careful with this because French bureaucracy is kind of a mess, especially when it comes to uni life. Most people working for the administration have a precise timetable they like to stick to and won’t be kind to you if you raise your voice, even if you’ve been waiting for 2h at their door because the only free time you had is during their lunch break. But sometimes, the right owl sent to the right person will be enough, so don’t hesitate to communicate!

Depending on which fac you’re attending, you’ll probably meet a lot of different people but since we’re French (a.k.a. judgmental), each fac has a typical profile of students:

Students from Babel are considered clever and cultivated but most people think they just don’t really know what they want to do with their life yet. They enjoy uni life in Paris and spend time hanging out with a great deal of foreign students from every part of the world, learning and researching for academic purpose. They create more or less harmful spells and like to talk in latin or ancient greek on a daily basis. They make inside jokes about politics and are the first ones to go on strike any time they don’t agree with the government’s decisions. Very diplomatic and charismatic but also kinda conceited since Babel was the first actual French magical faculté in the Sorbonne (this title is also claimed by the Perrault Institute). They love to debate about any topic of the wizarding world and for the most part, they know a lot about the non-magical world too since they study languages spoken by muggles as well.

Students from Ruggieri are more discreet and contemplative. They are passionate and having your astral chart drawn up by one of them feels like becoming an open book, even though knowing about astrology doesn’t always mean being intuitive. They aren’t known for being empathetic though, and they have a tendency to despise divination techniques that aren’t based on what’s written in the stars (students from Kardec can tell). They love mythology, mind games and poetry. They often go to the countryside beyond Paris’ suburbs to escape light pollution and if you’re lucky, they might invite you to their next nocturnal picnic in Seine-et-Marne.

Students from Flamel are hard-working and competitive since medicine studies (and other courses taught in this university) follow the numerus clausus method. You have more chances to see a Flamel student at the BAM (Bibliothèque Académique de Magie, en. Academic Library for Magic) than attending any of the cool parties young French witches and wizards organise throughout the year. Actually, since the BAM is physically part of Paris I, this has created a long-time resentment among students who all claim priority to access the Library. Flamel students are ambitious and passionate by their field but suffer from a great deal of pressure since failing one exam can be  eliminatory. They also have the worst writing ever.

Students from Cluny are seen as the weird hippies of the academic wizarding world. Always down for going on a trip or testing new things. Their shared interest in elementary magic makes them very welcoming and warm since they tend to focus on how a group is stronger than an individual and how you can always seek for help in others (“others” sometimes meaning plants, animals or rocks). They are very genuine and you won’t know for sure if they are really down-to-earth or if they constantly keep their head in the clouds. They love going outdoors and escape the city from time to time but they can also spend hours (days) underground cultivating fungi. Laugh now if you want to, but they get the best kind of psychedelics and liquors for your next party and they won’t bring any if you make fun of them. Also, they throw their own parties in cool speakeasies all over the Mines. Keep your ears open if you want to get the password!

Students from Kardec are actually the real anarchists of the academic landscape, even though Babel tries to steal their far-left thunder. Non-conformists, skeptical and teasing, they love throwing some unpopular opinion in a debate and watch how it takes. You’ll see them at protests and art events since they hang out a lot with students from the ENSBAMO and the Académie de Musique. They generally have no filter whatsoever and are also trying to figure out what they want to do with their life but even though they seem a bit puzzling at times, they’re really sweet. They might know their way around the Mines better than students from Cluny and believe me when I tell you this: they throw the best Halloween party every year — apparently being located in a cemetery helps a lot.

Of course, these are reputations, not distinctive character traits and every student is different from the other so don’t worry: you’ll fit right in wherever you want to go!

[thegrapeandthefig]

The Auloi

This post has been long in the making and kept being pushed back in the favor of other topics. Here we are finally, time to talk about ancient music. I have chosen the aulos, as you will see, it is more relevant to my interests, but hopefully soon, you should be able to read about the lyre on @adri-le-chat 's blog.EDIT: go read it here. 

Brief description

The aulos (plur. auloi) is a wind instrument, often called "double pipe" or "double reed" in English (note that the term is also used for modern instruments of the same category). It is basically a pipe with finger-holes and a reed mouthpiece, that is usually played as a pair: one in each hand. Commonly found from the Near-East to Egypt as early as 2600 BC, the earliest evidence in Greece dates back to the 8th century.

The term aulos means "duct" or "tube" but the latin name "tibia" tells us a bit more, as some instruments were made out of bone. Typically, one would use deer tibia bone, as it is already long and easy to make an even hole in. Other material existed: auloi were made out of wood or reed, ivory and the much older Ur auloi are made out of silver. The mouth piece was exclusively made out of reed. Those are fragile, do not last long and need to be replaced often.

The classical aulos would have 5 finger-holes, sometimes a sixth hole would be added as a vent. However, after 400 BC, there could be much more holes, allowing for more modal scales. An innovation attributed to Pronomus, a musician from Thebes. 

In texts, the auloi have often been translated as "flute". In reality, the instrument is closer to a oboe, technically much closer to bagpipes and the Armenian duduk.

A Dionysian instrument

The reputation of the instrument in Platonic thought is a weird one. Considered disharmonic, unpure, yet impactful, it is an instrument of the populace that has no place in the refined education of the elite youth. Let's list some examples:

Plato, Symposion 215c “Marsyas used to charm everyone with his pipes through the power that came from his mouth, and we are still charmed today whenever we hear his music played. I say ‘‘his’’ because I ascribe to Marsyas the melodies that Olympus used to play, because it was Marsyas who taught Olympus. In the case of Olympus’s music, whether it is played by a great performer or by an ordinary aulos-girl, it takes hold of men in a unique way and, because of its divine origin, it reveals those who are in need of the gods and of initiation rites.”

Plato, Republic 8.561c “And does he not,” said I, “also live out his life in this fashion, day by day indulging the appetite of the day, now wine-bibbing and abandoning himself to the lascivious pleasing of the flute and again drinking only water and dieting;

Plato, Laws 3.700d "In the matter of music the populace willingly submitted to orderly control and abstained from outrageously judging by clamor; but later on, with the progress of time, there arose as leaders of unmusical illegality poets who, though by nature poetical, were ignorant of what was just and lawful in music; and they, being frenzied and unduly possessed by a spirit of pleasure, mixed dirges with hymns and paeans with dithyrambs, and imitated flute-tunes with harp-tunes, and blended every kind of music with every other."

And as a final example, we can cite Plutarch in Alcibiades, who also echos the classical idea expressed by Plato:  

"At school, he [Alcibiades] usually paid due heed to his teachers, but he refused to play the flute, holding it to be an ignoble and illiberal thing. The use of the plectrum and the lyre, he argued, wrought no havoc with the bearing and appearance which were becoming to a gentleman; but let a man go to blowing a flute, and even his own kinsmen could scarcely recognize his features."

I realize that we cannot use Plato’s opinion as being representative of the general ancient Greek world. We should not strike out the possibiliy that Plato’s bias comes from the presence of women in the profession: we do have representations (and archaeological evidence) of professional female players.

However, it does give insight to the association of the aulos to "uncivilized" deities/creatures like Pan and the rest of the satyrs, who are often shown playing the aulos, like here, with Dionysus (Drinking Cup of Makron, Attic red-figure Cup, c.480 BC). Curiously, I have not found representations of maenads playing the aulos (they are most often portrayed with percussions). 

Obviously the myths surrounding the satyr Marsyas and his brother Babys stand out, as the former was described as a master of the instrument and the latter was spared from his brother’s violent death for his lack of skill. 

Reconstruction

I could not possibly demonstrate it better than the researchers of the European Music Archaeology Project. Let’s start wih sound alone, with researcher Stefan Hagel, playing an hellenistic aulos: 

For more technical information, here is piper Barnaby Brown. I will just add here the information he has given in another, older video. This auloi he is playing in this specific video is a reproduction of an original buried at Megara in c. 300 BCE in the tomb of a young woman, who most likely was a professional player. 

As you can see, those two instruments are different in material, size, hand positions, thus making very different sounds. 

Further reading: 

West L. M., Ancient Greek Music, 1992

For more complete information about the different types of auloi that have been reconstructed, as well as various technical information, I recommend going on the blog co-authored by those two researchers as well as other scholars and players of the ancient Greek auloi: https://www.doublepipes.info/

If you have time, consider watching this 50 min lecture on the roman tibiae by Olga Sutkowska