That’s an easy question for me to answer!

No.

“Civic neutrality is when the people I want to marginalize are marginalized”, it would seem

https://onlineonly.christies.com/s/maitres-anciens-peintures-sculptures-online/dapres-galeazzo-mondella-dit-moderno-italie-xvie-siecle-107/259988

That would be really terrible if rulers today still made grandiose displays of piety while violating the basic precepts of Christianity, only invoking the actual rules of the religion when it’s time to hurt some people for the crime of being weaker and different than the Christian powers-that-be!

“Okay, you’re ungrounded for precocious political awareness, but just this once”

Explanation: A common topic of debate for medieval history enthusiasts is the superiority of the bow or crossbow over each other.

In practice, the two were widely used together in armies. I’m reminded of a 13th or 14th century part-time London mercenary who owned both a shortbow (as the tradition of the longbow was still developing in England) and a crossbow.

Now, full disclosure beforehand - I love the crossbow much more. I fucking love CIVILIZATION, I love ENGINEERING, I love PROFESSIONAL SOLDIERS

But it was seen as much less of a ‘choice’ of which was superior and more a question of which was available. As the medieval period wore on, the crossbow became preferred for war due to increasing technological refinement increasing power and fire rate, but well into the gunpowder age, very often requirements for vassal call-ups was to equip an archer or crossbowman, rather than a stark demand for one or the other. Clearly, the distinction was not vital for the purposes of most feudal armies. Mercenary groups and some city militias sometimes made demands of one or the other - typically of the crossbow, which was easier to learn and more useful in sieges (besieged or besieging) - but most polities simply required a certain percentage of troops able to harry the enemy at range.

The crossbow, as a more mechanically complex and expensive weapon, was common amongst urban militias (typically made of moderately prosperous artisans) and professional soldiers (who could learn the use of the weapon upon taking up the often-not-respected career of a mercenary), as well as being peerless as a weapon for the defense of castles (due to the ability to aim for a prolonged period without straining the soldier). The bow, as a simpler weapon which requires regular use to be proficient in, but has fairly low maintenance requirements, was more common as the weapon of levies and rural militia, who would use the weapon to hunt for game (rabbits and the like legally; larger game often illegally).

The English use of the longbow - starting in the 13th century AD, but taking some time to become fully established - is a rare exception to the generally lackadaisical “either/or” enforced by most feudal polities of the period. The English use of the longbow required a vast swathe of England to be mandated to train with the weapon regularly, even in peacetime, just to maintain a body of men with the requisite expertise - not always an easy demand to enforce.

Explanation from Original OP:

Context: The Battle of Keresztes was fought in 1596 between Austrian Habsburg forces under Maximilian III and the Ottoman army led by Sultan Mehmed III. The Habsburg army succesfully broke the Ottoman lines, but instead of pursuing the routed forces, decided to loot the Ottoman treasury in the camp. The camp followers defended with everything they could and their sudden attack made the surprised and confused Austrians retreat. The cries of “the Christian enemy is fleeing” were heard by the Ottoman troops still fighting what seemed like a losing battle on the frontline. The boost of morale allowed them to recover the battle. With a major action from the Ottoman artillery cannons, the Ottoman forces started another attack on the Austrians across the front and the remaining Ottoman cavalry outflanked the Austrian-Transylvanian army, routing them.

It really has a strangely poetic cadence.

“Queer up” also sounds like “Gear up”

“We’ll be dry as a bone, I promise!” - Man heading into the water at a 70 degree angle

BILL

Also to be fair, people are creatures of habit, not originality. Much of what we understand as ‘common sense’ is only so because it’s long-established in our culture and taught to us. What is groundbreaking in one era is something even children know in another.

With thanks to @[email protected] for this extremely metal find (I couldn’t crosspost the original because it seems the original picture link is borked by the passage of time)

JESUS JESUS JESUS JESUS

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eruption_of_Mount_Vesuvius_in_79_AD

tbf, the 1920s were like, the poster-child for lassiez-faire bullshit. America’s prosperity in the 20s was largely built on speculation and Europe’s slow recovery from blowing the ever-loving shit out of each other in WW1. Once Europe started to recover, the US had to paper over the increasing problems from US industries trying to act like Europe was still desperate for their product.

It’s actually really sad - Calvin Coolidge, a rare and vocal anti-racist during the 1920s, was really economically progressive when he was a governor, but he had a bizarre view of Federal authority that meant he took the exact opposite position as president.

The 1950s are a better example insofar as we had the same leg-up of “Europe is just getting out of really bad straits and needs US economic contributions”, but a series of sensible domestic economic policies (we don’t talk about foreign policy 😬) enabled by the post-“New Deal” consensus by Truman, Eisenhower, and JFK ensured that US industry increasingly integrated and synchronized with the recovering world economies, in part by taxing the shit out of the rich and investing that money. A really fascinating aspect of the 1950s is that some of the richest investors in the country were actors because of the way Federal taxes had been set up to (partly successfully) stop new ultra-wealthy industrial magnates like Ford et co from rising again.

Not that it did anything against the ultra-wealthy families that already existed, but better a stopgap than nothing.

Public lighting too - London wouldn’t happen on the idea of public lighting until the 17th century.

“Hey, maybe having all the streets pitch black helps crime?”

“idk I like the aesthetic of my night walks”

Also, the professional officers in parts of Chinese history were, themselves, a bit… oddly educated, and having a basic handbook might’ve been useful for some of them as well.

“Ah, General Shang, I see you have mastered the art of lifting large objects! Keep up the good work!” - Song Dynasty Bureaucrat-Scholar Who Is Very Happy To See The Officer Corps Is Not Educated Enough To Overthrow Him

Man, I don’t even know what the source of these are. I don’t keep up with anime all that much. I don’t even remember the most recent anime I watched.

Explanation: The Byzantine Empire, the successor state to the Roman Empire based around the Greek half of the old Empire, was possessed of a curious concoction known as ‘Greek Fire’, an incendiary liquid they would use pumps to spray on enemy ships. The mixture, apparently, burned even on water, though the exact composition remains unknown and widely speculated on.

It was considered a very effective - and terrifying - weapon at the time.

“Racism is when you don’t like the Chinese government”?