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Topic Review
Algae and Fungi: use in Pre-Hispanic Mexico
The use of microorganisms in Mexico began before the Spanish conquest. Grains and fruit were fermented for thousands of years around the world, and Mexico was no exception. Many beverages are still prepared nowadays using an assortment of different microorganisms. These beverages use several yeasts, including Saccharomyces and non-Saccharomyces species. Although not conclusive, it has been suggested (and strong evidence points towards it) that pre-Hispanic cultures not only fermented beverages, but also distilled them.
  • 1.7K
  • 13 Dec 2021
Topic Review
2020 in Politics and Government
Events pertaining to world affairs in 2020, national politics, public policy, government, world economics, and international business, that took place in various nations, regions, organizations, around the world in 2020.
  • 1.7K
  • 30 Oct 2022
Topic Review
June 18: Battle of Waterloo
The Battle of Waterloo was a decisive military engagement fought on June 18, 1815, near the village of Waterloo in present-day Belgium. It marked the final defeat of Napoleon Bonaparte, who had returned from exile for a brief and tumultuous period known as the Hundred Days. The battle saw the combined forces of the Seventh Coalition, led by the Duke of Wellington and Prussian Field Marshal Gebhard Leberecht von Blücher, defeat the French army under Napoleon. This clash not only ended the Napoleonic Wars but also reshaped the geopolitical landscape of Europe for decades to come.
  • 1.6K
  • 18 Jun 2025
Topic Review
The Age of Reason
The Age of Reason; Being an Investigation of True and Fabulous Theology is a work by English and American political activist Thomas Paine, arguing for the philosophical position of deism. It follows in the tradition of 18th-century British deism, and challenges institutionalized religion and the legitimacy of the Bible. It was published in three parts in 1794, 1795, and 1807. It was a best-seller in the United States, where it caused a short-lived deistic revival. British audiences, fearing increased political radicalism as a result of the French Revolution , received it with more hostility. The Age of Reason presents common deistic arguments; for example, it highlights what Paine saw as corruption of the Christian Church and criticizes its efforts to acquire political power. Paine advocates reason in the place of revelation, leading him to reject miracles and to view the Bible as an ordinary piece of literature, rather than a divinely-inspired text. It promotes natural religion and argues for the existence of a creator-god. Most of Paine's arguments had long been available to the educated elite, but by presenting them in an engaging and irreverent style, he made deism appealing and accessible to the masses. Originally distributed as unbound pamphlets, the book was also cheap, putting it within the reach of a large number of buyers. Fearing the spread of what it viewed as potentially-revolutionary ideas, the British government prosecuted printers and booksellers who tried to publish and distribute it. Nevertheless, Paine's work inspired and guided many free thinkers.
  • 1.6K
  • 27 Sep 2022
Topic Review
The Ancestral Tapestry of an American Technologist
In the annals of 21st-century technological innovation, few figures have ascended with the velocity and influence of Samuel Harris Gibstine Altman. As the chief executive officer of OpenAI, he stands at the vanguard of the artificial intelligence revolution, a public intellectual and entrepreneur shaping a future of unprecedented computational power. His name is synonymous with Silicon Valley's relentless forward momentum, with ventures like the startup accelerator Y Combinator and the ambitious Worldcoin project marking a career defined by a profound belief in technology's capacity to reshape human civilization. Altman's public persona is that of a visionary, a strategist whose thinking operates on a global and, at times, existential scale, concerned with the advent of artificial general intelligence and its potential to "benefit all of humanity". Yet, to fully comprehend the architect of this future, one must look to the past—not to the sun-drenched campuses of Stanford or the bustling incubators of Mountain View, but to the quieter, historically rich landscape of the American Midwest. Born in Chicago but raised in St. Louis, Missouri, Sam Altman is a product of a specific time, place, and heritage that is as foundational to his story as any line of code or venture capital deal. His full name, Samuel Harris Gibstine Altman, is more than an identifier; it is a genealogical key, unlocking a multi-generational narrative of migration, professional ambition, and community integration deeply embedded within the American Jewish experience. This report posits that a comprehensive understanding of Sam Altman requires an exploration of this ancestral heritage. His family's story is a microcosm of a larger historical saga: the journey of Ashkenazi Jews from Europe to the United States, and their subsequent establishment of vibrant, successful communities in the heart of the nation. By tracing both his paternal (Altman) and maternal (Gibstine) lineages, and situating them within the specific socio-historical context of the St. Louis Jewish community, a more nuanced portrait emerges. It is a story that reveals an environment grounded in the pursuit of professional excellence, the value of elite education, a sense of civic responsibility, and the quiet but powerful momentum of generational progress. This report will weave together genealogical records, biographical details, and broad historical analysis to construct a holistic profile, arguing that the values and environment forged by this deep-rooted Midwestern history provide a crucial framework for interpreting the man who is now building the world of tomorrow.
  • 1.6K
  • 09 Sep 2025
Topic Review
Transport Infrastructure Construction History in the United Kingdom
The performance of geostructures in the United Kingdom (UK)’s transport network is significantly impacted by their construction age. A considerable portion of railway geostructures were constructed in the late 19th and early 20th century. 
  • 1.4K
  • 11 Aug 2022
Topic Review
Fine Wine and Gout
From ancient times to the present day, gout has been associated in the popular and scientific literature with wealthy men who overindulge in fancy foods, fine wine, and debauchery. Curiously, amongst diseases, gout was thought to be good, a malady to be accepted because of otherwise beneficial effects on health, and longevity. 
  • 1.4K
  • 13 Jun 2022
Topic Review
Bali Jatra: The Beautiful Marine History of Odisha
Bali Jatra, a vibrant and culturally rich festival celebrated in Odisha, India, is a tribute to the state’s glorious maritime history. Held annually in Cuttack along the banks of the Mahanadi River, this festival commemorates the ancient sea trade of the Sadhabas (Odia sailors) with Southeast Asian countries like Bali, Java, and Sumatra. Beyond its historical significance, Bali Jatra is a celebration of Odisha's art, craft, and culinary traditions, attracting visitors from across the globe. This article delves into the origins, historical context, cultural festivities, and contemporary significance of Bali Jatra, showcasing it as a symbol of Odisha’s maritime pride and heritage.
  • 1.4K
  • 21 Nov 2024
Topic Review
Peruvian Havana Embassy Crisis of 1980
On April 1, 1980, six Cuban citizens made their way into the Peruvian embassy in Havana, Cuba, instigating an international crisis over the diplomatic status of around 10,000 asylum-seeking Cubans who joined them over the following days. The Peruvian ambassador, Ernesto Pinto Bazurco Rittler, spearheaded the effort to protect Cubans, most of whom were disapproved of by Fidel Castro’s regime and were seeking protection at the embassy. This episode marked the start of the Cuban refugee crisis, which was followed by a series of diplomatic initiatives between various countries in both North and South America that tried to organize the fleeing of people from the island of Cuba to the United States and elsewhere. The embassy crisis culminated with the substantial exodus of 125,266 Cuban asylum-seekers during the Mariel Boatlift.
  • 1.3K
  • 14 Nov 2022
Topic Review
Artistic Interchange between Al-Andalus and Iberian Christian Kingdoms
The ivory casket made in Cuenca in A.D. 1026 and signed by Mohammad ibn Zayyan constitutes invaluable evidence for the study of artistic transfers between Al-Andalus and the Iberian Christian kingdoms. In the 12th century this piece was transformed in the monastery of Santo Domingo de Silos (Burgos) with the addition of Christian-themed enamels and reused as a reliquary. 
  • 1.1K
  • 02 Apr 2022
Topic Review
Zuytdorp
The VOC Zuytdorp also Zuiddorp (meaning "South Village", after Zuiddorpe, a still existing village in the South of Zeeland, near the Belgian border) was an 18th-century trading ship of the Dutch East India Company (Vereenigde Oost-Indische Compagnie, commonly abbreviated VOC). On 1 August 1711 it was dispatched from the Netherlands to the trading port of Batavia (now Jakarta, Indonesia) bearing a load of freshly minted silver coins. Many trading ships of the time travelled a "fast route" using the strong Roaring Forties winds to carry them across the Indian Ocean to within sight of the west coast of Australia, (then called New Holland) whence they would make a turn north towards Batavia. The Zuytdorp never arrived at its destination. No search was undertaken, presumably because the VOC had no idea whether and where the ship had been wrecked or taken by pirates and possibly due to prior expensive but fruitless attempts to search for other missing ships, even when an approximate wreck location was known. As a result Zuytdorp and its entire complement were never heard from again. Their fate was unknown until the mid-20th century when the wreck site was identified on a remote part of the Western Australian coast between Kalbarri and Shark Bay, approximately 40 km north of the Murchison River. This rugged section of coastline was subsequently named the Zuytdorp Cliffs, was the preserve of the Indigenous inhabitants and one of the last great wildernesses until the advent of the sheep stations established there in the late 19th century. Something, perhaps a violent storm, occurred and the Zuytdorp was wrecked on a desolate section of the West Australian coast. Survivors scrambled ashore and camped near the wreck site. With no European settlements anywhere on the coast they built bonfires from the wreckage to signal fellow trading ships that would pass within sight of the coast. But fires seen in the vicinity tended to be dismissed as "native fires" as appears to have happened in the case of Vergulde Draeck in 1656. It has been speculated that survivors may have traded with or may have intermarried with the local Aboriginal communities between present-day Kalbarri and Shark Bay. It is also possible that intermarriage occurred in the case of a predecessor to the Zuytdorp, the infamous VOC Batavia, wrecked on the Houtman Abrolhos islands offshore. After a mutiny, atrocities, massacres and trials, two of the mutineers were marooned on the Australian mainland, near the Murchison River (for details about these two mutineers see castaway). News of an unidentified shipwreck on the shore surfaced in 1834 when Aborigines told a farmer near the recently colonised Perth about a wreck the colonists presumed it was a recent wreck and sent rescue parties who failed to find the wreck or any survivors. The details provided (90 days walk, and coins on the beach), tend to point to the Zuytdorp; however. In 1927, wreckage was seen by an Indigenous-European family group (comprising Ada and Ernest Drage, Tom and Lurleen Pepper and the women's father Charlie Mallard) on a clifftop near the border of Murchison house and Tamala Stations where they all worked. Tamala Station head stockman, Tom Pepper later reported the find to the authorities, their first expedition to the site occurring in 1941. In 1954 Pepper gave Phillip Playford directions and it was he who subsequently identified the relics as from Zuytdorp.
  • 1.1K
  • 30 Sep 2022
Topic Review
MANDIR: More than Just a Religious Temple
Mandir, a religious temple for Hindus to worship. This is the glimpse everybody thinks as they hear the word "Mandir" and a great mistake they make is that they don't think anything beyond this thought. In ancient times, Mandirs were not just a place of worship but also................
  • 959
  • 31 Oct 2024
Topic Review
Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies
The Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies (ACMRS) was established in 1981 by the Arizona Board of Regents as a state-wide, tri-university research unit that bridges the intellectual communities at Arizona State University, Northern Arizona University, and the University of Arizona. Located centrally on the campus of Arizona State University, ACMRS is charged with coordinating and stimulating interdisciplinary research about medieval and early modern literature and culture. Its mission is to enable and promote the most expansive, creative, and daring scholarship in medieval and renaissance studies. ACMRS fosters a vibrant intellectual community for the faculty at the three universities, but also by publishes forward-looking, vanguard research through their in-house press. ACMRS promotes work that is historically grounded and theoretically expansive, with the aim of advancing dialogues that reach into the present moment and point us to different, more inclusive, futures. Moreover, ACMRS develops projects that explore complex topics in an accessible manner so as to reach as wide an audience as possible. In keeping with the ASU charter, ACMRS believes that success in realizing this vision for premodern scholarship should be judged not by whom we exclude, but whom we include, and how they succeed.
  • 927
  • 12 Oct 2022
Topic Review
Chronographer
A chronographer was a graphical representation of historical information devised by American educator Emma Willard in the mid-19th century. The chronographers intended to show historical information in a geographic and chronological context. The first graphic was Picture of Nations, published in 1835, which showed civilizations as streams running through time, becoming wider and narrower as they gained or lost influence. She developed another chronographer, the Chronographer of American History, in 1844, showing the history of the United States as events marked on the branches of a tree. Later chronographers showed historical events within an imagined Ancient Greek temple; the Temple of Time (1846), American Temple of Time (late 1840s), English Chronographer (1849) and Chronographer of Ancient History (1851) are examples of this type. In these chronographers the floor was occupied with the streams of civilizations, as in the Picture of Nations; the walls (often colonnaded) denoted the passage of time and were marked with historical leaders and the roof was split into categories to list other historic persons. The back wall of the temple was often marked as the point of biblical creation, sometimes with the date of 4004 BC from the Ussher chronology, though in her American Temple of Time a map of the continent is used. The birth of Christ was often denoted with a white star and other biblical figures included. Willard's chronographers were intended as learning aids, allowing students to place themselves within the imaginary temple and to consider events in their historic and geographic context. She presented her chronographers at the Great Exhibition in London in 1851 and received a medal and certificate from Albert, Prince Consort. Willard's work has been disparaged by later writers, including for their almost complete omission of non-Western peoples and events.
  • 912
  • 12 Oct 2022
Topic Review
Federalists and Council of Europe
This article looks at the first steps of the Council of Europe and seeks to understand how federalists, united in powerful lobbies at the time, sought to make it an instrument for European sovereignty.
  • 864
  • 28 Jan 2022
Topic Review
Rae–Richardson Arctic Expedition
The Rae–Richardson Polar Expedition of 1848 was an early British effort to determine the fate of the lost Franklin Polar Expedition. Led overland by Sir John Richardson and John Rae, the team explored the accessible areas along Franklin's proposed route near the Mackenzie and Coppermine rivers. Although no direct contact with Franklin's forces was achieved, Rae later interviewed the Inuit of the region and obtained credible accounts that the desperate remnants of Franklin's team had resorted to cannibalism. This revelation was so unpopular that Rae was effectively shunned by the British Admiralty and popular opinion, and the search for Franklin continued for several years.
  • 815
  • 30 Sep 2022
Topic Review
Institute for Medieval Studies, Leeds
The Institute for Medieval Studies (IMS) at the University of Leeds, founded in 1967, is a leading research and teaching institute in the field of medieval studies. It is home to the International Medieval Bibliography and the International Medieval Congress.
  • 775
  • 01 Nov 2022
Topic Review
From the Fjord to the Prairie
Peter Brian Hegseth, born in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on June 6, 1980, has carved a prominent space in the American public square as a television host, military veteran, and influential conservative voice. His identity is inextricably linked to Minnesota, a state whose cultural and political landscape has been profoundly shaped by the vast waves of Scandinavian immigrants who settled its prairies and built its towns in the 19th and early 20th centuries. To understand the man is to understand the journey of his people—a journey not just of miles, but of centuries, cultures, and convictions.
  • 485
  • 09 Sep 2025
Topic Review
Two Paths from the Plantation
The global financial literacy movement of the late 20th and early 21st centuries was ignited by a simple, powerful story: the tale of two fathers, one rich, one poor, who imparted conflicting financial wisdom to a young boy in Hawaii. This narrative, the foundation of Robert Kiyosaki’s international bestselling book Rich Dad Poor Dad, has shaped the financial outlook of millions. It presents a stark choice between two philosophies: the "Poor Dad's" path of academic achievement, job security, and institutional loyalty, and the "Rich Dad's" path of entrepreneurial risk, asset acquisition, and financial independence. While the book presents these figures as universal archetypes, their origins are deeply rooted in a specific time, place, and culture. Kiyosaki’s philosophy is not an abstract theory but a deeply personal narrative forged in the unique socio-economic crucible of 20th-century Hawaii.
  • 416
  • 09 Sep 2025
Topic Review
National Consultative Assemblies of Iran under Qajar Dynasty
The National Consultative Assemblies during the Qajar period emerged following the Constitutional Revolution and sought to establish a role within Iran’s governing system. Each session was shaped by its unique political and social context, and the parliament’s role in legislation and oversight varied accordingly. The composition of representatives reflected diverse social and economic groups, and competition among factions influenced decision-making processes. During this period, foreign interventions and global events, such as World War I, also affected parliamentary functioning. Despite these challenges, the assemblies endeavored to uphold constitutional principles and strengthen the rule of law in Iran. Some sessions faced dissolution or inactivity, while others managed to continue legislative work. Overall, these five sessions illustrate the complex path of attempting to establish a parliamentary system alongside a traditional monarchy. This entry provides a concise overview of the formation, activities, and outcomes of the National Consultative Assemblies during the late Qajar era.
  • 384
  • 09 Sep 2025
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