https://www.cesatiecesati.com/una-spettacolare-coppia-di-picchiotti-da-porta/

Explanation: In the US Civil War, fought over the secessionist South’s insistence on maintaining chattel slavery for Black folk, one of the major anti-slavery strains was explicitly religious, based on the idea that we were all children of the Christian God and thus inherently equals - making slavery, and especially racially-based slavery, an abomination.

They made some good tunes with that in mind.

Explanation: The Roman Emperor Caligula once ordered his troops to ‘make war’ on Neptune, the Roman god of the sea, by stabbing the incoming tides and collecting seashells as booty. Interpretations of this act… vary. Some attribute it to Caligula’s supposed madness - others, to him having a bit of a lark by exercising how total his control as Emperor was (“I can make you lot do anything, no matter how stupid or humiliating” sort of thing, very popular amongst tyrants of all ages). Some say it was to humiliate the troops for refusing to go on a supposed campaign to Britannia, which was not yet conquered at that point.

This poor pupper is a prime recruit for Caligula’s next campaign against the brutality of Neptune!

Explanation: The Roman Emperor Caligula once ordered his troops to ‘make war’ on Neptune, the Roman god of the sea, by stabbing the incoming tides and collecting seashells as booty. Interpretations of this act… vary. Some attribute it to Caligula’s supposed madness - others, to him having a bit of a lark by exercising how total his control as Emperor was (“I can make you lot do anything, no matter how stupid or humiliating” sort of thing, very popular amongst tyrants of all ages). Some say it was to humiliate the troops for refusing to go on a supposed campaign to Britannia, which was not yet conquered at that point.

This poor pupper is a prime recruit for Caligula’s next campaign against the brutality of Neptune!

THE AZURE SKY IS DEAD, THE YELLOW SKY WILL RISE

Abstract policies are a notoriously poor way of polling for voting patterns.

But it seems most people don’t have a strong opinion on our New York boy, which is honestly the best we could ask for at this junction. May Zohran the DESTROYER’S enemies be DESTROYED Mamdani succeed and, for our sakes if not necessarily his, go on to national politics after. Gods know we need him.

“I’m not much for sweets.”

“There are FREE-”

[chipmunk cheeks]

Julia Domna just wanted the boys to stop fighting for TEN MINUTES 😭

I hope not, but at the very least, there are recurring themes

It’ll pass in ten minutes. These cultists do not have the same values as people we would consider ‘normal’. This will not sway them any more than the past five dozen fucking times some fundamentally undeniable issue of hypocrisy in ultra-vile evil shite has come up.

What’s going to happen when maga finds out that everything they were groomed to believe in is all about the very people they listened to, trusted in and destroyed for

Nothing, just like the last 500 times this happened.

The future of literature

Fuck the timing of family vacations (but I’d feel bad if I refused to visit my great-uncles who are in poor health and getting long in the tooth)

Ukrainian flag at 87,210, it looks like!

Ukrainian flag at 87,210!

Because they INVENTED THE DOME

More seriously, empires of the past are often fascinating because of the combination of traits they display in tandem with the diverse ways they can be examined, both positively and negatively.

Empires of the past are, typically, relatively well-recorded and demonstrate a wide array of the capabilities of humankind when well-organized. Obviously, for people who like the funny little fellows with weapons and armor, empires are always fun, because you kind of fucking die if you’re an empire which can’t marshal decent military forces; but empires have a vast array of appeal beyond that. The organizational and government complexity of the Inca providing both benefits and obligations; the insistent lawgiving of the Romans; the architectural marvels of the Egyptians; the intense artistic patronage of the Hellenic empires; the rise of theory of government in Han China; the trading instruments of the British Empire; and so on.

And these aren’t limited to the stated, nor does one need to restrain oneself to thinking about one. Think about the architecture of the Romans and the lawgiving of the Inca, or the art of Han China and government theory in the Hellenic Empires - in both cases, you’ll find plenty of fascinating material. There’s always something to learn, with beauty, horror, and most consistently, fascinating insight into the myriad ways human beings see ourselves and execute great undertakings.

It’s funny, because the Greeks and Romans both regarded the Pyramids as exemplary demonstrations of Egyptian architectural ingenuity, and thought it reflected very highly on the Egyptians to have made them - at least on a technical level.

The Roman writer Frontinus, in typical Roman fashion, admits it (and, for good measure, also the works of the Greeks) are impressive but impractical, and thus inferior to GOOD HONEST ROMAN ARCHITECTURE which does practical things like bringing water or giving public spaces for plays (please ignore all the useless Roman monuments).

Very cool pieces of history!

The fall of bespoke letter commissions was a disaster for the human race 😔

I live to serve!

(though honestly I don’t think about the Galactic Empire that much - nice stormtroopers, but that’s about it for me)