Dr. Barry Torch

The beginning of Eicha (Lamentations) which will be read on Tisha B'av, 9th of Av, which starts at sundown on 2nd August.

BL Or 2091; Former & Latter Prophets & Hagiographa; 13th century; Germany; f.343r

How to Read an "AI" Press Release — Sonja Drimmer Every so often someone like Mark Zuckerberg or Sam Altman will dribble out some unadorned text in Times New Roman font, announcing with stentorian certitude the advent of a new world that their latest...

Zuckerberg farted out some nonsense today, and since most media outlets refuse to report critically any time a tech CEO offers them some a pseudoserious press release, I've decided to do it for them.

sonjadrimmer.com/blog-1/2025/7/30/how-to-read-an-ai-press-release

When it comes to writing #history articles and essays, is there still a desire to read narrative? Or is the focus more on good historical #analysis and what can be “new.” Is there a want for a story among other academics? #amwriting

The Roman Girl Rediscovered During the Renaissance - Medievalists.net One of the key features of the Renaissance in Italy was a renewed interest in Ancient Rome. So when the perfectly preserved body…

The Roman Girl Rediscovered During the Renaissance www.medievalists.net/2025/07/roma... #history

Italy to issue half million non-EU work visas over next three years The move is part of a strategy to expand legal immigration channels in response to labor shortages.

I had to read this twice to believe it...Meloni, who ran for office on an anti-immigration platform, has now announced plans to let in hundreds of thousands of immigrants, in order to deal with the Italian labor shortage
www.reuters.com/world/italy-...

historians of sexuality, I have the most unhinged question for you: what is the earliest attestation you know of for "cunt", or indeed any term for vagina, vulva etc being used metaphorically by a man to describe either his or a male partner's anus, particularly in the context of sexual intercourse.

I am once again coming to @jstor.bsky.social with my hat in my hands, begging for Jstor merch so I can support them more. The redbubble “JSTOR and chill” shirts don’t help them, and I absolutely would wear Jstor merchandise. #JSTOR #historymerch

Congrats to @themedievaldrk.bsky.social and Melek Karataş on the publication of Medieval Manuscripts in Bristol Collections, the latest title on our Bristol Studies in Medieval Cultures (BSMC) series with @boydellandbrewer.bsky.social. If you’d like to be next, get in touch! @bristolcms.bsky.social

That’s incredible news!!! I’m so glad to hear that!

An infant has died of measles in Ontario. The government says this was because the baby was born defective so we shouldn't count this as a measles death. As you know, if a child has medical complications they're disposable

This is sarcasm, to be clear. This is a horrible, preventable tragedy.

some notes on exploring Judaism Sometimes people tell me they want to explore the possibility of conversion to Judaism, ask what their first steps should be. Some of this advice also work, in my opinion, for Jews who seek to connec...

Are you Jewish and looking to (re)connect with your tradition for the first time, really, as an adult?

Are you not Jewish and interested in exploring Judaism but not sure how to start?

I wrote up a whole guide on this, here.

And books, podcasts, other resources galore in next skeet.

YouTube video by Joanna Loves History Books! SPACE ARCHEOLOGY! 📚 Booktube #nonfictionnovember - Clickbait Title: It's (definitely) not aliens!

Was just chatting with someone about the great book "Dr Space Junk vs the Universe" because I was selling them on my YouTube channel and they just bought it for their friend who likes space. I'm useful! @drspacejunk.bsky.social

(I did a review you can watch and buy it for your friend, too!)

a rainbow flag is flying in the wind against a cloudy sky Alt: A rainbow flag is flying in the wind against a cloudy sky

Happy #Pride Month, BlueSky!

Giant box containing the Lego Notre Dame de Paris

So I am finally starting to building this beauty 😍
Bought it on sale as a treat for submitting the last book manuscript to the publisher. That was so long ago the book is already out 😅😂
Thought I’d bring you all along for the journey. 34 bags with 4383 pieces

Shavuot begins at sundown on Sunday 1st June and commemorates the giving of the Torah at Mount Sinai. #Shavuot
BL Add 22413; 'Tripartite Mahzor', prayer book for Shavuot & Sukkot; c.1322 CE; Germany, S. (area of Lake Constance); f.3r

A detail from an image of a book shop from Johann Amos Comenius: "Orbis sensualium pictus", pinted in 1658 in Nuremberg. You see a room full of boxes and backwardsbooks and a (tiny) bookseller reading behind a desk waiting for customers.

Let's enjoy a look into book shops of the past. This is a 🧵 especially for #skystorians of #earlymodern Europe, and for #bookhistory, #booksky and #paperhistory nerds 🗃️

Expect, among other bookish stuff, lots of #backwardsbooks, and boxes with paper sheets, and a few sleeping dogs.

1/

Photo of a working desk with loads of papers, and someone working at a laptop.

#skystorians at work in the weeks before Christmas (and in every other week, tbh). 🗃️

Nice @newbooksnetwork.bsky.social chat with Camilla Annerfeldt about @bloomsburyacad.bsky.social Clothing and Identity in #EarlyModern #Rome.
#skystorians #FashionHistory #BookSky 📚💙

newbooksnetwork.com/clothing-and...

I love archives so much. They’re such fascinating and wonderful places!

OK #MedievalSky. Despite the fact that I spent 25 researching the history of medieval ♀️'s medicine, I only wrote 3 pieces specifically on motherhood:
1) “Making Motherhood in Medieval England: The Evidence from Medicine” (2011)
2) "Royal Mothers" (2013)
3) “Statues: A Mother of Gynaecology” (2017)

Engraving of a printer's shop, various people seated to left, type setting, one with glasses checking printed text; at centre, a small boy stretching out to read a book; to right, a printing press and paper hanging out to dry. Part of the Nova Reperta; Philips Galle (publisher), naar: Jan van der Straet (designer)

Fellow #Renaissance #earlymodern #bookhistory #rarebooks #skystorians,

what would you list as the key highlights of early modern book history? Think printing innovations, landmark publications, shifts in literacy, censorship etc.

Curious to hear your (especially lesser-known) takes!
💙📚📜

who, despite their outlier biographies and personhood, participated in wider social behaviours just by nature of living in their world. Cohen's article is a VERY good example of this type of history, and it was a pleasure to read and learn from. Thank you, #RenaissanceQuarterly for publishing this!

Magdalena is of course an outlier - she was wealthy enough to have a lot of property to divvy up among several churches in Rome, stretching from the Trastevere region to the Trinita del Monte in the north - but most good microhistories are of the extraordinary ordinary people ...

Cohen looks at both the document itself and its construction, trying to understand how a Roman deaf mute woman and her allies made the legal system work for them - a legal system not kind to disabled persons - and extrapolates on how disabled people lived in their wider world with their families.

Magdalena's case and the tests she went through - with her mother as an interpreter, her husband on site too, and the notaries hired to help - showed how a wealthy disabled person not only lived in Rome, but also made life (and after-life) work for them in practice and daily behaviour.

It provides context, meaning, and life/behaviour to a woman who normally would not appear in any records - not just because of her gender, but because of her disabilities from birth. Cohen notes that disabled persons in #earlymodern Europe rarely showed up as legal agents in paper/law, so...

Cohen follows the will and testament of Magdalena, a deaf and mute woman in early modern Rome, and the many tests she had to do to prove her competence/intellect to even make a will to distribute her property after her death - to her husband, to a few churches across Rome, and to her family.

I've been lucky to see this article go from source to publication, and after reading it, WOW am I impressed. This is a wonderful work that combines the #history of #disability, #arthistory #bookhistory, and the history of law and agency in #earlymodernRome.

Rather, I want to spend a few minutes gushing about my supervisor's latest article in #RenaissanceQuarterly. Thomas V Cohen's "Magdalena, 'Deaf and Mute,' Makes Her Roman Will (1590)", www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

Hello BlueSky, and especially #earlymodern friends on BlueSky! Now that I've recovered from the conclave and watching it/following it/making sure I followed everything @pontifactspod.bsky.social put out re: the conclave, I have time to post - but this isn't going to be about the election of Leo XIV.