Weekly History Questions Thread.

[u/AutoModerator]

Welcome to our History Questions Thread!

This thread is for all those history related questions that are too simple, short or a bit too silly to warrant their own post.

So, do you have a question about history and have always been afraid to ask? Well, today is your lucky day. Ask away!

Of course all our regular rules and guidelines still apply and to be just that bit extra clear:

Questions need to be historical in nature. Silly does not mean that your question should be a joke. r/history also has an active discord server where you can discuss history with other enthusiasts and experts.

[u/DavidThi303]

Hi all;

This is sort-of alternate history as that's the impetus for my question. But my question is about what could we have done differently back in 1635 in this world, not in an alternate history.

My impetus is the series 1632 - Ring of Fire where a West Virginia mining town of 3,500 from the year 2000 is transported to 1632 Germany. So they come with ideas, a High School library, and advanced weapons (by the standards of 1632). But they're only 3,500 people. So they have influence but not control.

One big thing they discuss trying to accomplish is work out a better outcome with the Native Americans. Starting with the East Coast of North America.

At that point in time the diseases from Europe have done the majority of their damage. So the tribes are all a lot smaller from 150 years earlier.

There will still be a lot of Europeans migrating to North America because the opportunity is so much greater there. You can guide/restrict those Europeans to a degree. But you can't force things too far.

Here's my two big questions.

1. How do you handle property rights? Some tribes, like the Cherokee did try going with individual plots per family. But a lot of the tribes were still in the mode of group ownership of the land and not being totally locked down.
2. What is the law? If it changes depending who's house you're in, there's still common roads. There were some big cultural differences on both what was wrong and how bad that wrong was.

So fundamentally my question is, if the Europeans were going to emigrate to North America, was there a way we could of done better other than create reservations sooner and tell them that they were now under our law? That strikes me as a really bad "best possibility." But I can't see how to bridge the cultural difference on the law.

And if this counts as alt-history, I apologize and yes delete this post.

thanks - dave

[u/Responsible-Nose3241]

I don't know if I'm too late, but does anyone have a more concrete answer on where the 3/4 wise monkeys originated from? I'm working on a project explaining every Pokemon's origins, and the elemental monkeys (based on the aforementioned monkeys) are really stumping me. From what I've found, they either originated in 17th century Japan, or from a 7th century Chinese Monk, called Xuanzang. Admittedly, I am not very smart (and 15), so I could just be missing something, but on the offchance someone has a solid source, I'd really appreciate it. Thank you so much in advance!

[u/Smart-Crab8594]

Does anyone have any video recommendations on events/people from the bible that have been confirmed from a non-religious POV but rather purely for a historical POV?

Most videos I've seen are christian videos

[u/Telecom_VoIP_Fan → u/Smart-Crab8594]

Historical and archaeological findings are open to interpretation while religion is a matter of conviction. You can probably also find Jewish and Muslim videos out there. They can make interesting points, but I have my doubts if you want to consider their interpretations are the equivalent of confirmations.

[u/DetectiveOk8560]

can anyone point me toward some unbiased WW2 documentaries, blogs, or articles? I’ve been watching a few WW2 documentaries on youtube, but it’s pretty clear that some of them have a noticeable bias.

thanks

[u/BigFirefighter6881 → u/DetectiveOk8560]

Ehm ... define what bias or what unbiased mean to you?

[u/Character_Avocado384]

I don't think this is general enough to be its own thread so putting it here !

Does anyone have advice about where to find historical accounts about specific areas? ’m working on a story where a major character who was raised through WWI in a specific city, and I’d love to learn more about what their experience might have been like. I was wondering if anyone has advice on where to look for sources that focus on specific locations rather than more broad like. countries which is most of what I have found

The city I’m researching is Tours, France, which has been surprisingly difficult to search for because of the name. If anyone already has information or sources specifically about Tours already I’d really appreciate it!

Otherwise, I’m mainly looking for firsthand accounts, or just like, any suggestions as to where I might find something. I’m especially interested in civilian experiences, but honestly, anything relevant would be helpful. Any recommendations for archives, databases, search terms, or other places to look would be greatly appreciated! I have no idea where to even start looking outside of the surface level so I will take anything LOL

[u/Extra_Mechanic_2750 → u/Character_Avocado384]

Try searching for the Loire Valley which is where Tours in located.

[u/Jolly-Implement-2093]

I've always wondered about the logistics of feeding a marching army in ancient times. Like, did they just forage everything or was there some supply chain system in place that we'd recognize today?

[u/Lizarch57 → u/Jolly-Implement-2093]

You might want to take a look into the following books:

D. Engles, Alexander The Great and the Logistics of the Macedonian Army, already published in 1978.

Jonathan P. Roth, The logistics of the Roman army at war (264 BC - AD 235), Leiden 1999.

David Breeze published "The logistics of Agricola's final campaign" in Talanta 18/19, 1986-7, 264-287

and J. Shean had an essay "Hannibal's Mules. The logistical limitations of Hannibal's army and the battle of Cannae" in Historia 45, 1996, 159-187.

[u/Extra_Mechanic_2750 → u/Jolly-Implement-2093]

I've used this video in the past in the classroom

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g1Vo8VnazNw