an assemblage of artifacts at belowthesurface.amsterdam
Amsterdam drained a canal and put everything they found online, piece by piece, chronologically, and you can see it all ... mygothlaundry's "Under Amsterdam" post is spectacular.
Eat by Thomas Hawk (cc by-nc)
Recently served on Mefi:
Making 4,000-year-old stew | Wiki-Food and (mostly) Women | Let's Cook History vids | Epicurious asked 50 people to do some basic kitchen prep work and filmed the mayhem | Thinking about Chicken tenders | Donug‽ | The popular Budget Bytes recipe collection / blog | Bowl food | A Taste of South Sudan | The Weird and Wavy History of Wine Coolers | Feelings about cottage cheese
Steampunk Pirates cards by Nat Iwata at wopc.co.uk
misteraitch reveals a full house in his post on the World of Playing Cards, "a living encyclopaedia of the history and visual art of playing cards"
Memento Mori Acte (1630-1685) - Acte I _DDC6273.JPG by Abode of Chaos (cc by)
Filthy light thief explores the history, art, tradition, and evolution of the obituary.
riviere_tick_tack_1881 by Art Gallery ErgsArt
What are some songs that tell a story?
What's the oldest painted portrait of a dog?
What did a floral anchor symbolize, in a book by L.M.Montgomery?
What are scientific results or inventions that were famously demonstrated?
When is this wallpaper from?
How can I stop farting so much?
mitred noro blanket by Alex "Skud" Bayley (cc by)
I need a new delightfully tedious hobby!
Can you help with this mystery photo of 1860s woman?
Live video translation by a random person, and telecom in the Faroe Islands
Cakes & Bakes: Bonnag by H is for Home (cc by-nc)
Jane the Brown has a fascinating comment on 19th century home bread making in ShooBoo's fresh, piping hot post "The Rise of Baking Powder"
courage dear heart by distelfliege (cc by)
We've borrowed the quidnunc kid's kind message of love and sharing to all of us to wrap up some touching, interesting, inspiring, educational, fun and/or funny posts to take our minds off certain recent events:
Dear hearts, I should write to you all and each only to say: you are dear, precious, lovely and great hearts. But my words are all worthless, and your honest hearts are greater than my useless words. Persist, I beg you; if we cry together maybe fate will let us halve our tears. But better that you have relief, if the Earth did not make hearts for only weeping.
dance by bambe1964 (cc by-nd)
Put your dancing shoes on and take a trip around the world, in gusandrews's fascinating comment on the myriad ways social dance changes and spreads.
Doroteo Arango II reflects on one night at a famous dance club in London. "In 2002 I made a literal last minute decision, standing at the check-in line at the airport after a visit to my sister, to stay in London and see how long and how far I could make it with 100 pounds and basic English..."
Did you catch the incredible historical find, re-created Afro-Caribbean dance music from the 1600s?
What are some of your favorite transcendent, gives-you-chills performances? (And how about most amazing heart-in-your-throat sports moments?)
Conspire describes how this dancer's sign-language performance modifies lyrics and mixes languages to better serve the intended viewer.
Uneasy Dreams by Celeste (cc by-nc)
Theodolite asks a fascinating question: who are some famous artists, writers, historical figures, etc. whose reputations were revived by a single person?
Okay, so I said I'd tell the full story of the perennially misbehaving student from the 18th-century. Here it is!
Catseye presents a provocative potboiler about a puckish pupil from the past.
My current job is reading novels and what's called "writing coverage" on them. (Coverage is the entertainment industry equivalent of a book report, wherein people like me read things so that more important people can pretend they read them.) I read 2-3 novels per week, mostly self-published genre novels.
Sara C. has an interesting job, and some good advice on context, details, sources and backgrounds for historical fiction, in answer to the question, "what were the details of everyday life in late 16th century Italy?"
All roads lead to Rome series by Nick Kenrick. (cc by)
But what's The Peutinger Map? Also known as Tabula Peutingeriana, it is a Medieval copy of highly stylized 4th Century map of the Roman road network, extending to India.
Kattullus invites us to explore the roads leading to Rome via "The Peutinger Map Reconsidered" with a variety of ways to view this ancient artifact, including overlays and lists of geographical features, while BWA offers What Latin Sounded Like and How We Know, and other linguistic treats from Nativlang.
Lada Niva by Hugo90- (cc by)
daniel_charms tells the story of how my father bought a car when he was a farm worker in the USSR, others share memories of their own Ladas, and languagehat offers some more detail on the process in the Soviet car-buying thread.
It's so hot the railroad tracks are buckling! But not everywhere... vacapinta asks, why are railroad tracks okay in the heat in some places but not others?
oog and others remember driving the Nullarbor Plain (including the longest straight road in Australia): "I did this mind-numbing drive in March of 2005, alone. ... I thought I was prepared..."
1960 Summer Paralympics by brizzle born and bred (cc by-nd)
There has been some good stuff around lately. Hope you didn't miss the inspiring ass-kicking Paralympic athletes...
...or the "spiritual black metal blues" of Zeal and Ardor...
...or this jewelbox of an animated video from the Israeli band Jane Bordeaux....
...or this essay about literature and magic realism in contemporary China...
...or the wide-ranging playlist of music from all over Africa from the 1930s to 1960s...
...or the influential landscapes by once-neglected but newly-renowned African-American painters from Florida.
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