How people get food dictates structure of a society in a major way. “one of the best ways to start thinking about any historical society is to begin with the subsistence foundation it is built on, because how people get… Read More »Collections: How to Raise a Tribal Army in Pre-Roman Europe, Part I: Aristocrats, Retainers and Clients
“Rarely does one get a battle scene in which all of the decisions of import were made at a council of war in the early, pre-dawn hours with the battle then left to simply play out according to plan and… Read More »Collections: Total Generalship: Commanding Pre-Modern Armies, Part I: Reports
Always keep in mind who is writing a history and why. “Herodotus’ work is the construction of a Greek identity. By and large, prior to the Persian wars – and prior to Herodotus’ own writings – the Greeks do not… Read More »Collections: The Fremen Mirage Part IIIa: …by the Princess Irulan
Rome lasted a really long time. “Sallust’s complaints about Roman decadence – which date to the first century B.C. nearly five centuries before its ‘fall‘ – are often quoted as somehow explaining Rome’s eventual demise, but Rome wasn’t even done… Read More »Collections: The Fremen Mirage, Part II: Water Spilled on the Sand
Unfortunately not about Fremen but still great series. “The opposite of Fremenism is almost invariably termed ‘decadence.’ This is the reserve side of this reductive view of history: not only do hard conditions make for superior people, but that ‘soft’… Read More »Collections: The Fremen Mirage, Part I: War at the Dawn of Civilization
It is not that simple. “So again, a vow is a promise to a divinity or other higher power (you can make vows to heroes and saints, for instance), whereas an oath is a promise to another human, which is… Read More »Collections: Oaths! How do they Work?
Games and movies use bad formations. “It is thus worth noting even here – we’ll see it even more clearly in a moment – that the most dense formation was not, in actual battle conditions, generally the best, because soldiers… Read More »Collections: Shield Walls and Spacing: Hollywood Mobs and Ancient Tactics – A Collection of Unmitigated Pedantry
Logistics is fun. “So this army is stopped in what looks to be more or less the middle of the day. From a logistics perspective, this is a disaster. As I tell my students, pre-modern armies are like sharks, they… Read More »Collections: The Preposterous Logistics of the Loot Train Battle (Game of Thrones, S7E4)
Knowing a lot of frameworks helps you also outside of history. “Historians learn a lot of different frameworks because each one exposes the gaps in the others: there is no perfect framework (and no way to proceed without a framework… Read More »Collections: What Do Historians Do? – A Collection of Unmitigated Pedantry
Nice explainer on how (historical) science works. “Consequently it is important for us to remain ‘up to date’ with everyone else’s research, which is why we spend so much time and effort (seriously, writing is hard) packaging our research so… Read More »Collections: How Your History Gets Made