James W. Davidson— In 1492 around 8 million Indians lived in North America. That number is not large, especially for an entire continent. More than 8 million people live today in the city of New York. Still, the number is significant. To compare, the British Isles held 2 to 3
Steve Pincus— America’s Founders created a dynamic and activist government. This contrasts radically with the standard popular interpretation. With an almost unanimous voice scholars have claimed that America’s Founding constituted a revolution against the state. Britain’s government had become too powerful, too intrusive, and too demanding for colonists in British
Paul A. Rahe— It has always been hard for outsiders to get their minds around classical Lacedaemon, or Sparta as it is more commonly called today. Even in antiquity—as a glance at Xenophon’s Regime of the Lacedaemonians, at Plato’s Republic and Laws, and at Aristotle’s Politics will make clear—the Spartans
To mark the release of the latest addition to the Little Histories series A Little History of Religion, we are sharing a short interview with the author – the wonderful Richard Holloway – and an extract from Chapter Two: The Doors. WATCH A SHORT FILM WITH RICHARD HOLLOWAY Richard Holloway—
From our London office: In recent months, the rise of far-right parties in different European countries and events such as the UK’s vote for Brexit have prompted heated debates about immigration and cultural integration across Europe and the world. Tarek Osman, author of Islamism: What it Means for the Middle East and the
Brian Cowan— It should be easy to identify what a coffeehouse was at the dawn of the eighteenth century: a place where people gathered together to drink coffee, learn about the news of the day, and perhaps to meet with other local residents and discuss matters of mutual concern. Yet
Today we’re sharing a blog post from one of our authors, Ann Little, on her new book The Many Captivities of Esther Wheelwright. Her blog, Historiann, will feature a post about the book every Tuesday, and we will feature them here on our blog. “Hey, kids: It’s publication day. Huzzah! The
Libby Murphy— During the Great War, French soldiers struggled to make sense of their experience, both for themselves and for their compatriots. Soldier-writers used fiction to recalibrate civilians’ expectations about the war and to teach them to see through the “skull-stuffing” of the mainstream media—exaggeration, euphemisms, and outright lies. Many of
On September 20th, we will publish Laura Trevelyan’s The Winchester: The Gun That Built an American Dynasty. As Trevelyan leads us through the history of the Winchester rifle, we reflect on the impact of the Winchester Repeating Arms company on our own city of New Haven, Connecticut. Douglas W. Rae—
In Elisabeth de Bièvre’s book Dutch Art and Urban Culture, 1200-1700, the author explains how distinct geographical circumstances and histories shaped unique urban developments in different locations in the Netherlands and, in turn, fundamentally informed the art and visual culture of individual cities. In seven chapters, each devoted to a city, the book