Get up girls we have another day of obsessing over fictional characters to cope with reality ahead of us

TIL of the “Tiffany Problem”. Tiffany is a medieval name—short for Theophania—from the 12th century. Authors can’t use it in historical or fantasy fiction, however, because the name looks too modern. This is an example of how reality is sometimes too unrealistic.

via reddit.com

“Authors can’t use it in fantasy fiction, eh? We’ll see about that…”

–Terry Pratchett, probably

Try to implement anything but a conservative’s sixth grade education level of medieval or Victorian times and you will butt into this. all. the. time.  There was a literaly fad in the 1890′s for nipple rings for all genders(and NO, it was NOT under the mistaken belief that it would help breastfeeding–there’s LOTS of doctors’ writing at the time telling people to STOP and that they thought it would ruin the breast’s ability to breastfeed well, etc). It was straight up because the Victorians were freaks, okay Imagine trying to make a Victorian character with nipple rings. IMAGINE THE ACCUSATIONS OF GROSS HISTORICAL INACCURACY

people just really, REALLY have entrenched ideas of what people in the past were like tell them the vikings were clean, had a complex democratic legal system, respected women, had freeform rap battles, and had child support payments? theyd call you a liar tell them that chopsticks became popular in china during the bronze age because street food vendors were all the rage and they wanted to have disposable eating utensils? theyll say youre making that up tell them native americans had a trade network stretching from canada to peru and built sacred mounds bigger then the pyramids of giza? you are some SJW twisting facts ancient egypt had circular saws, debt cards, and eye surgery? are you high? our misconception of medieval peasants being illiterate and living in poverty in one room mud huts being their own creation as part of a century long tax aversion scam? you stole that from the game of thrones reject bin iron age india had stone telescopes, air conditioning, and the number 0 along with all ‘arabic’ numbers including algebra and calculus? i understand some of those words. romans had accurate maps detailing vacation travel times along with a star rating for hotels along the way, fast food restaurants, swiss army knives, black soldiers in brittany, traded with china, and that soldiers wrote thank-you notes when their parents sent them underwear in the mail? but they thought the earth was flat! ancient bronze age mesopotamia had pedantic complaints sent to merchants about crappy goods, comedic performances, and transgender/nobinary representation? what are you smoking?

Adding my personal favorite: people in medieval Europe took baths.

India had ways of processing iron for weatherproofing that we still can’t match 1600 years later.

Truth is stranger than fiction, and history is weirder than you think.

this post gets better every time it comes across my dash. To provide some more: those Romans also had vending machines, automated puppet plays, doors that opened to the sound of horns when you lit a fire in front of them, and working steam engines. All invented by one dude, Hero of Alexandria.

People generally want to think that the Dark Ages is the sum of the entire history of the world.

Charlemagne had a frigging PET ELEPHANT, sent as a present by the Caliph over in Bahgdad.

Emperor Frederick II. (around 1200) crossed the Alps with his own private zoo, including giraffes, in order to impress and dazzle his Germanic subjects, and it frigging worked. He also introduced legislation that a doctor was not allowed to also sell medicine (to prevent obvious charlatanery), but had to write a recipe for an apothecary to then redeem, which is a system STILL IN USE in Germany and other countries. He spoke several language, was tolerant towards his Muslim subjects in southern Italy (you read that correctly) and was opposed to trial by combat on reasons of it being unfair and irrational. Oh, and he wrote a book on ornithology. 

Ancient Persians knew how to make frozen desserts even in summer, thus basically being the inventors of ice cream.

Medieval monks had an efficient way of testing for pregnacy (by pouring the urine of a woman on a toad, which, if the woman was pregnant, would change colour…).

One of my favorite things to do is to send posts like this to my brother, a historian. He had MANY potential additions to this thread, but my favorite:

This was from around 1020. The more things change … 

The Ancient Egyptians had an efficient pregnancy test as well. They’d get a woman to wee on some barley and wheat seeds, and if they sprouted it would mean that she was pregnant.

There was a study done on this in 1936 and apparently it had a 70% accuracy rate, which isn’t a patch on modern pregnancy tests but is very impressive for a civillisation that hadn’t invented the wheel.

Stone age people took surprisingly good care of each other. There have been skeletons found of people (homo sapiens and neanderthal) with physical disabilities that would have prevented them from providing for themselves who still lived fairly long lives and were buried nicely. Because it turns out even prehistoric humans thought that people had a right to life whether or not they were ‘useful’.

They also had a primitive form of surgery that involved drilling holes in people’s skulls, we think to prevent migraines or something. Whatever it was, it must have worked at least slightly, because we’ve found skulls with multiple healed over patches, meaning that people survived this and then kept coming back.

Not to mention language. I don’t know why this in particular is so hard for people to grasp, but if you’re talking about homo sapiens then there is literally no reason to assume that their language wasn’t as complex and fluent as ours. For that matter, a lot of what we in Europe think of as ‘the stone age’ was happening at the same time as the Ancient Egyptians were building pyramids and having a whole civilisation and shit.

You might as well present them as speaking only in grunts.

There was a long held belief that most peasants were illiterate in the 1500s until literally schoolbooks from the 1500s were excavated in Russia of a 7 year old boy’s learning to read and write.

The the point where we actually have pieces of his writing where he GOT BORED and started drawing pictures about how big and brave he was and drew a picture of himself as a warrior AND wrote his friend (presumably also a 7 year old boy)’s name on it to show him “Hey look at this cool thing I wrote about me fighting a bear”

hold on. *gets up to pull my book from my shelf*

OK! The boy’s name was Onfim because he had to write his name on his spelling exercises. The city was called Novgorod and is the most ancient recorded Slavic city in Russian history. The message to his friend was “Greetings from Onfim to Danilo” and just because he was unsure if the pictures he drew on his spelling homework made sense, he labeled the creature he was fighting with “I am a wild beast!”

Before these types of writing were discovered it was thought that the peasant class was illiterate and that writing was ONLY for the church and the ruling class. But after finding these as well as THOUSANDS of other letters, it became clear even the lowest peasant class in this time period were not only litirate but taught writing and spelling as serious subjects to the point where 7 year old peasant children could read and write.

Oh and in a completely different time period in a completely different country there’s also this fucker.

It’s rusted and its box has rotted away because it was made around 86 BC. So here’s a replica that’s been made of what it use to look like

And here’s a cross section

It’s from Greece and like I said, it’s from roughly 86BC.

It’s a computer.

On the front it calculates with extraordinary accuracy the movement of planets, constellations, moons etc etc and can be used for everything from religious holidays and rites to navigation by ship. The back is used for keeping score in the Olympic games of the various competitors, their athletes and nations etc etc.

Another fun one is the fact that the Steam Engine was first invented in the first century AD, however since it was fueled by wood because it had not been discovered that coal could be used as fuel, it was more a parlor trick to show people because it would cost more to employ a slave to fuel the machine with wood than what power the machine gave.

But that doesn’t change the fact that the steam engine is over 2000 years old.

Oh and the 13th century Syrians had swords made of Damascus Steel and we have no idea how the steel was forged. There have been numerous attempts to replicate it and some have gotten close but still fail to match the durability and ability to stay sharp of the originals. Some individuals have claimed to have replicated the steel perfectly but none of them have been recognised by officials. So we still don’t know how to make these even with all our modern technology.

AND ANOTHER THING!!

The “People believed that the Earth is flat in the past” myth only became a “fact” that people believed in the 1800s. Every scientist since the ancient Greeks knew the world was round and there are even Bible passages referring to the Earth as round.

Quote from Historian Jeffrey Burton Russel:

end quote.

Also here’s a illustration from the 15th century from the book “On the Properties of Things” by Bartholomeus Anglicus, showing the Earth covered in buildings and spires

Here’s one from the 13th century, showing the 4 seasons on a spherical Earth

If there is one thing I want people to take away from this post, I really really  want people to understand that people of the past were, by and large, no less intelligent  than modern people; they were capable of the same problem-solving and pattern-recognition and titanic memorization that we are today. while any individual human may have been more or less capable (and universal education is by no means universal) people in the past were not dumb. not the cavemen, not the Bronze Age men, not the Dark Age men, none of them.

we are not better than them just because we live in the future, and we should remember that.

Just a note, modern damascus steel (and steel in general) is actually way better than old school damascus steel and we totally know how to make it, we just still don’t know how to make it with the tech they had at the time.

History has a lot of stuff.

someone give him a grammy

a little girl who grows up thinking all doors are automatic but actually she’s haunted by a really polite ghost

So chivalry IS dead?!

you win best response to this post 

Num Num Cat TikTok Chain

Reblogging this once more because my mom and I legitimately laughed to tears.

this is my favorite video on the internet

mental health tip: save this video. watch it when you’re sad. it’s the best goddamn thing on the internet

TOMORROW IS HALLOWEEN!!!

Tomorrow is March 28th

a video compilation of me attempting to do anything

I have tears literally everywhere I haven’t laughed this hard in so long. Who thought of this, I want to marry them and shake their hands 

Reblogging this once more because my mom and I legitimately laughed to tears.

this is my favorite video on the internet

mental health tip: save this video. watch it when you’re sad. it’s the best goddamn thing on the internet

when ur parents go out food shopping

Teacher to me (photographer): this is Mohammed.

Me: and last name?

Teacher: -shrug- his name is Mohammed, hes the only Mohammed at this school.

Mohammed: -is in preschool, doesnt know his last name-

Me: -looks up Mohammed in system- Nadir?

Teacher: sure, yeah. Sounds right.

Me: this will come back to bite me later.

After merging my camera data with another photographer: there's two Mohammed Nadirs. -goes to talk it out with secretary-

Me: -shows two photos- which of these kids is Mohammed?

Secretary: -points to the one I did not shoot- that's Mohammed.

Me: I was told this one was Mohammed. -points to my student-

Secretary: well, theres only one Mohammed.

Secretary takes me to the break room to chat with two teachers.

Me: can one of you tell me which one is Mohammed?

Teacher A points to my student.

Teacher B points to not my student.

Both: that's Mohammed.

Teacher B says that her Mohammed is in her class and is definitely Mohammed Nadir.

Me: so who is Mystery Mohammed?

Teachers Aide walks by: who are you trying to find?

Me: -turns laptop around- can you identify this child?

Teachers Aide: oh! That's Mohammed!

So theres two Mohammeds. Secretary cant find data for Mystery Mohammed. No one can find his name. All we know is he's in preschool.

Me: okay! Can you direct me to the teacher?

Teachers Aide: sure.

I have my laptop open to the photo as I'm walking down the hall, updating data as we go looking for this kid. Checking hairstyles and clothes in vase we see him in the hall. Buffalo check shirt. Hi-top fade. Secretary is freaking out a little that she lost all data for entire student.

We pass the library.

A class is exiting.

I see the buffalo check shirt. I see the hi-top fade. Kid is wearing a mask.

Teachers aide taps him.

Me: is this you?

Child: no, that's Mohammed.

Identical child is Mohammed's cousin. They dressed alike for picture day because their mothers thought it would be cute.

Cousin: I dont know his last name. His mom never told me.

Teachers aide leads me to classroom where we see...

MOHAMMED!

Me: Hi, hello Mrs preschool teacher. I need to know the name of this child-

Teacher: that's Moham-

Me: Mohammed, yes. We gathered. What's his LAST name?

Teacher:

Teacher: Mohammed, what's your last name?

Mohammed: -stares at the wall, then points to a picture of a duck-

Teacher: his last name is not 'duck.' I'll go look it up for you.

Five minutes later and the reason we couldn't find his name was because he spells it MUHammad. All of this because the teacher swore he was the only kid in the school with the most common name in the world.

End scene, exit left pursued by a migraine.

This sounds like the EXACT flavor of bullshit literally everyone I know whos' had to deal with the education system in Ohio has told me about. Honestly I'm just glad it didn't escalate to a fistfight in the parking lot somehow.

for context these are the poems

also I almost forgot but the r/ambien Gives Us The Sleep post takes a completely serious third place in my favorite poems list:

and COMING HOT at NUMBER FOUR on my list, it's Fragment 147! an accidental poem created when the original parchment containing a text by Sappho was used to stop a wine jug more than 2,000 years ago- eventually the wine dissolved most of the parchment, leaving just a few words and BOY do they prove that the Universe has a sense of irony.

Tumblr Code.

that way we know we’re from tumblr without revealing anything

I’m just going to say this to strangers until i find a tumblr person

must keep reblogering!! Im going to be so suspicious if any one tells me this now!

Remember the answer is: ”17 cocks”

always reblog tumblr identification

this post makes me want to gouge my eyes out

im laughins so hard who changed it

the phrase “curiosity killed the cat” is actually not the full phrase it actually is “curiosity killed the cat but satisfaction brought it back” so don’t let anyone tell you not to be a curious little baby okay go and be interested in the world uwu

See also:

Blood is thicker than water The blood of the covenant is thicker than the water of the womb.

Meaning that relationships formed by choice are stronger than those formed by birth.

Let’s not forget that “Jack of all trades, master of none” ends with “But better than a master of one.”

It means that being equally good/average at everything is much better than being perfect at one thing and sucking at everything else. So don’t worry if you’re not perfect at something you do! Being okay is better!

These made me feel better

Also, “great minds think alike” ends with “but fools rarely differ”

It goes to show that conformity isn’t always a good thing. And that just because more than one person has the same idea, doesn’t necessarily mean it’s a good idea.

what the fuck why haven’t i heard the full version to any of these 

“Birds of a feather flock together” ends with “until the cat comes.”

It’s actually a warning about fair-weather friends, not an assessment of how complementary people are.

I’ve always felt like these were cut down on purpose.

I really like these phrases and plan on spreading this knowledge.

The early bird catches the worm, but the second mouse gets the cheese.

I want to make designs out of these.

Funny how all the half-finished ones encourage uniformity and upholding the status-quo, while the complete proverbs encourage like…living exciting, eclectic lives driven by choice and personal passion.

i learnt the great minds think alike one years ago from this post and i started saying it and i’m not exaggerating when i say the amount of people i’ve indirectly thought the correct thing who are all amazed at it and some even continue to use it is really cool

@hellsite-hall-of-fame if you don’t have this already, then what are you doing?

I will reblog this every time.

Literally this.

Getting dirty, asking questions, being unapologetically enthusiastic about things, going overboard on projects. These are a few of my favorite things.

This is so heartbreaking, but so true. 

And it’s even more heartbreaking when you see the transition and how performative it is.

I was a camp counselor at a science/nature camp when I was 16, for a bunch of 10 and 11 yr old girls. And one day while we were waiting around for the naturalist to come get us to go on the day’s hike, the boys cabin we were grouped with was exploring the area and overturned a log and found a salamander. One of the boys picked it up and they brought it over.

My girls all went “ewww, gross, keep it away!”

…right up until I said “whoa, cool, can I see it?”

This boy handed me the salamander and all of a sudden my girls were clustering around. They wanted to hold it. They were asking questions about it. They had stories of other times they’d seen a lizard or caught a frog or something. A couple of them went with some of the boys to look under another log and see if they could find another one.

All they had needed was permission to be curious, to show interest instead of disgust. And as soon as someone they were looking to for cues on “how to be a girl” showed interest, as soon as they didn’t feel like they had to perform socially-acceptable girliness and pretend to be grossed out in order to gain adult approval, all that natural curiosity and the fascination most kids have for the natural world just came bubbling right up.

As a female engineer, I have to reblog this.

and its free

@thebibliosphere this is done house that Cthulhu built bs

I can't decide if I'm impressed or distraught that she went through the hole.

I'm impressed that she had the presence of mind to call some friends over, wear a mask, and take a hammer and flashlight first because my dumb ass would have been through the hole thirty seconds after I discovered it.

That jump is the funniest shit

it took me a LONG time to work out that this is “life on a boat” and not like, “physics just said fuck you today”

So THAt’s what sailors mean by sea legs