John Theibault

"I read niemöller & solved the trolley problem the omelas way."
Quite the summary.

Interesting atrocity story of the era. Was wondering if it was widely discussed at the time. Found this account: gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/b...

2.8.1625
* von 1.000 Soldaten, die von hier los gezogen, kaum noch 400 mehr im Leben
* diese Sucht [Seuche] hat auch im Pappenheim Regiment stark angesetzt
* deswegen von beiden Parteien nichts mehr gegeneinander unternommen worden
* erwarten beide frisches Volk und neue Befehle

Funny you should bring that up. I recently discovered that a fairly distant relative of mine was involved in a whole bunch of early Sessue Hayakawa silents.

Adolph Stroitz ist Abt der Abtei Marienstatt im Westerwald, als am 2. August 1625 rund 40 (od. 60) Soldaten in die Abtei einfielen: #Marienstatt
Man forderte Verpflegung, die die Mönche ihnen geben konnten. Danach drohten die Soldaten aber, die Mönche gefangen zu nehmen – ...

People interested in British social history, microhistory, rural society, gradual industrialization, and what early modern capitalism looked like on the ground will all be interested in Steve Hindle's new book:
www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

I was in my 20s before I heard the UK version of Rubber Soul. It was disorienting.

Here’s a Q that you maybe covered in 500 songs that I haven’t gotten to yet. Were The Beach Boys albums released in the UK pre-1966 the same as the US versions? Did people at the time ask “why are they so short”? Or was the difference between UK and US records already widely understood?

Here you go! www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/htjjf... Ignore the comments-to-myself, and feel very free to take whatever you want. I think the week on empire is most in need of rejigging at the moment.

The Vimar Curatorial Fellow (Paintings 1600 - 1800) - London (Central), London (Greater) job with THE NATIONAL GALLERY | 9693493 The National Gallery invites applications for the Vivmar Curatorial Fellowship, a 22-month paid position starting in October 2025.

Early career, fixed-term curatorial fellowship focusing on European paintings 1600-1800 at the National Gallery, London. #earlymodern #arthistory
jobs.theguardian.com/job/9693493/...

Happy to send my draft syllabus, though it's very much an overview one, as few come in with any background knowledge. Here are some podcasts gathered for each week:

Early Modern Source Editions Teaching early modern European history is a joy. And introducing students to a diversity of sources from across the Continent is a joy. But finding those sources can be a bit of a headache… I…

Since @onslies.bsky.social went to the trouble to compile this thorough list of #earlymodern published primary sources, it should be more widely known: liesbethcorens.wordpress.com/2019/12/13/e...
And @sharonhoward.bsky.social has this page for online resources: earlymodernweb.org/resources/

And this is why Weistümer are the zaniest genre of primary source.

They don’t explain the methodology very well in this piece, but what it seems it’s based on is the topics of questions that the MS LLM is getting asked—so people ask it a lot about history. This is, of course, concerning, since they’re getting bad information—but people are interested in history!

Deadline is tomorrow! We encourage abstracts for single-papers as well as fully formed sessions for #RenSA2026 @rsaorg.bsky.social #earlymodern #dh #digitalhumanities

📢Handwritten Text Recognition model klaxon📢

Want to give automated transcription a try? See below 👇

#EarlyModern 🗃️

Several good hot takes in this thread.
From the perspective of historical political science, the HRE and PLC get dissed because they ultimately failed in the sphere of International Relations. That has led to their being relatively neglected in the sphere of Comparative Political Development.

A chance for me to pose a question that I've always been curious about but never researched...
Is there a prominent example of the use of a plebiscite in Europe between Rome and Napoleon?

14. People underestimate how many republics there were across history and they also frankly underestimate how much they resembled modern democracy, for no reason other than the influence of the Enlightenment's ideas about itself (i.e. "everyone before us was terrible")

Here’s one for early modernists: what is Norwich holding in this 1622 map (from Drayton’s ‘Poly-Olbion’)? Yes, Norwich had a big cathedral spire, but not two (and these maps usually indicate spires in the figure’s headdress). I’ve been tossing this about, and asking experts, for months. Stuck!

From my own academic research, even pre LLMs there was a huge danger of zombie factoids that begin in a respectable publication by mistake and then get reprinted for decades because no one is backtracing to the original source. Once bad info gets into the system it can take years to clear it out.

That's wonderful news!

People, the Society for Early
Modern French Studies @semfsuk.bsky.social is now on BlueSky! An intellectually rich and really warm group of people with excellent support for graduate students and ECRs- give them a follow!

Den Haag, 28. Juli 1625
* Pest reist in unserem Lager sehr sein, Lager wird aufgeteilt, Volk an die Grenzen gelegt
* Mansfeld noch zu Amsterdam
* Duinkirchner wieder 2 holl. Schiffe mit frz. Wein gefangen
* England: schon etliche bei Hof an der Pest gestorben, ... 1/2

OMG the Rembrandt/Esther exhibit at the Jewish Museum is AMAZING 😍 😍

Detail Stadtplan Augsburg im 17. Jh. - möglicherweise mit dem Heilig-Geist-Spital in der Spitalgasse, in die damals der Blitz eingeschlagen ist (heute Museum der Augsburger Puppenkiste)

Augsburg, 28. Juli 1625
Dänemark mit gr. Macht im Anzug, Tilly ihm entgegen.
Freitag um Mitnacht ein schreckliches Wetter, in den Spitalhof geschlagen und "eine Brunst erweckt" 🔥
Zwar Feria in Italien Acqui eingenommen, kann aber bald wieder von Franzosen erobert werden.

The outpouring of affection has been pretty great.
And I have yet to see a dismissive comment (though there surely must be some people who didn't like his satire).

Early C20th English transfer-ware with scene of Yosemite Valley and floral border.

Reverse of plate ‘Old English Staffordshire Ware’ for Yosemite Nat’l Park.

There’s always that one piece that you have to have but comes in a job lot of things you don’t! I have a guilty sideline in Staffs-ware for the American souvenir market. The cultural mash-up kills me.

Ah, yes, sad news. I never took his courses, but he traditionally offered two a year: a course on statistics open to anyone and a course on American musical theater for which you had to audition.

26.7.1625
Bleiben nur 3 Fähnlein zur Garnison in Prag.
Der von Friedland auch mit Edelknaben, Leibrössern, 38 Rüstwagen, 30 Wagen mit Munition und Kugel etc.
Werden jetzt Landkutschen, Bürger u.a. Fuhrleut Pferde gesucht - werde mit Gewalt genommen.

aus:
brema.suub.uni-bremen.de/zeitungen17/...