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  • The Venice time machine

    • January 24, 2018
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      To anyone interested in history this is a truly mind-bending project that has to be seen to be believed. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uQQGgYPRWfs https://www.ted.com/talks/frederic_kaplan_how_i_built_an_information_time_machine https://vtm.epfl.ch/page-109836-en.html '‘The Prologue', and chapters 1 and 2 of 'Casanova in Paris: The Shadows of the King' are now freely available here. 6 long form articles on Casanova's life and times are freely
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  • ‘The Case of the Closely Watched Courtesans’

    • January 6, 2018
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      Fascinating review article on the relationship between the state and elite prostitutes in eighteenth-century Paris: ‘The Case of the Closely Watched Courtesans’.  The painting above, which was chosen to illustrate the article, was a portrait of Marie-Louis O’Morphy, supposedly commissioned by Casanova.  O’Morphy, who was to become one of Louis XV’s favourites, was discovered
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  • The successor problem

    • December 20, 2017
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    From the Emperor Augustus to the Emperor Napoleon one of the biggest challenges to the stability and prosperity of any state was to ensure a peaceful succession.  Transition from one ruler to the next was often a time fraught with danger.  If an incumbent ruler had no clear successor then both domestic and foreign competitors
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