DinkyBingus [he/him]

Where I'm from (Canada), that term is a slur, and although there are some individuals and groups who prefer to go by that term, best practice is usually to use a term that's not viewed by many as a slur. Yeah, some people prefer it, but also many find it outright offensive. In Canada, that tends to be First Nations, which in my experience hasn't ever been viewed negatively, but that might just be a cultural difference between here and the US.

It's important to remember that the indigenous peoples of the Americas are not a monolithic culture, society, or community, and that using a singular term as a catch-all for them isn't even really appropriate outside of specific contexts.

You're close. The Norse settled mostly on the west coast, with the Thule culture mostly way up in the north, having spread there from the Canadian Archipelago. So not only was there a lot of ice, but also most of Greenland, between them. That being said, there were accounts of them meeting, but it wasn't a massive cultural exchange, suggesting that whatever trade or contact existed was relatively limited.

The indigenous folks of Greenland are Inuit, so they're pretty close cousins of the Inuit in Canada. They're part of the same cultural migration that spread throughout that whole region starting in about 1300 CE. It's the fact that the Inuit are relative newcomers to the area that they aren't called First Nations in Canada. It's also why the Norse describe Greenland as being uninhabited - because it largely was uninhabited when they settled the coast there.

It's famous because it's involved in a bunch of heists and attempted vandalisms.

After it was taken to France by da Vinky, it sat around at Versailles as basically unknown curiosity, until the French Revolution, where it was moved to the Louvre (which had been converted to a public art museum) and began to become known as a da Vinky painting. To the general public though, it was basically unknown.

It only really gained popularity in 1911 when an Italian nationalist stole it, and it became a big deal in the international press as they searched for the guy who stole it.

It's been well documented from the 1950s. It was first identified in monkeys in Central and West Africa, where the disease is endemic.

I play 5e because it's a system that works and everyone understands without having to sit down and explain a new ruleset for hours.

You can play any ttrpg without modules, you know. Lots of fun to be had there without your funko nonsense.

Don't forget about Ian McCollum, who steers away from commentary on politics in general except when he tries to publish books by Azov Veterans but then has his fundraiser canceled because the author is an unabashed nazi and Ian didn't bother to check.

As a note of morbid interest, Bomber Harris did bomb innocent civilians fighting for their own liberation - in Iraq in the 1920s. He pioneered the concept of 'Strategic Bombing' by conducting was what then coined 'Aerial Policing' against Iraqi civilians - an attempt to conduct colonial policing (suppressing of independence movements) cheaper than convention methods.

Thanks for the info. Appreciate all the work you do for these threads. :sankara-salute:

Sorry, do you happen to have a link to where I can read more about the Ukrainian attack on the Russian border at Kharkiv?

I like how you have the form factor of an AK-style rear sight where it should be, but it's clear that the modeler didn't know what that was and thought it was a cartoonishly large latch, and so stuck a giant rear sight (and massive front sight to match) way at the back.

Spoken by someone who wants to get chucked in the Moloch pit.

If what I wrote made any sort of sense, I'd recommend Heart of Europe: A History of the Holy Roman Empire , by Peter H. Wilson. It can be pretty convoluted at times though, as he doesn't keep the topics he's covering chronological. It's also very dense, so if you're not acclimatized to that sort of reading, then it might not be for you.

Like most European feudal monarchies, the Middle Ages were characterized by huge power struggles between differing factions of nobles, as well as different tiers of nobles, for power over their respective territories.

The Empire came to be dominated by specific powerful families. They would accrue power, attempting to meld Imperial authority with the power of their family. While today we associate the title of Emperor with the Habsburg family, in the years following Otto I, it was the Salian family that dominated the Empire. When they waned (being unable to produce enough sons through the male line), their place was taken by the Hohenstaufen family. The map in this post is the Empire under the Hohenstaufens, in the mid-12th century. They held territories that were nominally outside the authority of the Empire - the Kingdom of Sicily for example, was outside the authority of the Empire, but was still retained by the same family, so ruled in tandem. Eventually, the Hohenstaufens waned, like the Salians.

The Hohenstaufens did not amass their power uncontested, however. Other power families, who sought to put themselves on top of the hierarchy, contested the succession of these Emperors. Succession was not regulated, outside of all of the imperial princes (each one of these territories on the map is held by a Prince, either a Secular Prince or Prince-Bishop/Archbishop) determining a successor. After every Emperor died, there were periods where jockeying between all of the families occurred, bribing, murdering, and negotiating with one another to determine who the next Emperor would be. This could last years, with the longest lasting 67 years. Of course, this did not stop people from claiming the authority of Emperor (or, more accurately, King of Germany - but these titles were linked and aren't exactly the same. It gets very complicated but to make it simple, the King of Germany was the Emperor-Elect, until he could be crowned Emperor). The Welfs, the House of Luxembourg, and the House of Habsburg all made bids for the Emperorship (as well as many outliers, like the Plantagenets of England, even).

In 1356 the Golden Bull (Bull being a term for a decree, coming from a word for an etching into a metal plate - related to bullion) was proglumated, regulating the succession of the Empire. Instead of a free-for-all with every man throwing their hat into the ring for Emperorship, there were instead just 7 Electors. These were chosen from the 3 most powerful ecclesiastic positions (the Prince Archbishops of Mainz, Trier, and Cologne), the 3 most powerful secular families (the Duke of Saxony, Count Palatine, and Margrave of Brandenburg) as well as the King of Bohemia (who held many special privileges in the Empire as the only semi-independent King. These 7 men would select the Empire, and this was designed to stabilize the election of a new Emperor. For the most part, it worked, and becoming Emperor became a task of bribing 7 men, instead of 700.

By the 16th Century, the Empire fell into the hands of Maximilian von Habsburg. Starting in 1495, Maximilian's focus was on trying to regulate and stabilize the Imperial Government. In 1495, the Imperial Chamber Court - or Reichskammergericht - was created. This court served as the supreme court of the Empire, to be used instead of Princes resolving disputes between them. It was in this period that blood feuds, and feuding in general, was banned. Instead, Princes had to present cases to the courts. If a case was sufficiently dire, the case would be presented to the Aulic Council, which was another court presided over by the Emperor. In 1500 local parliaments (Keistag) were established in the varying regions of the Empire. Six were created in 1500, and another four in 1512. These would represent the Emperor's authority more locally, and would give the region some semblance of self-sufficiency while centralizing power under the Empire (you can think of them like provincial governments).

So. I've talked a bit about how the Empire was consolidating its power - or, at least, attempting to. What happened? And why did they fail where other states (Neighbouring France, for example) succeeded?

The combined stresses of consolidating the legal structure of the Empire and authority of the Emperor, combined with the religious stresses of the Protestant Reformation (a whole other subject that I don't have time to go into) eventually consigned the Empire to a position where the Princes had a high degree of autonomy. This gave rise to states like Prussia, and yada yada Napoleon you know the deal from there.

Other states were going through similar practices at the time. A good example to compare the Empire to is its neighbour France. France spent centuries feuding with its nobility over how much power the King held over his vassals. Some of these vassals happened to hold titles overseas (such as the Plantagenets, who were also Kings of England) - these wars were later drafted into later concepts of Nation-States and Nationalism, becoming categorized as the Hundred Years War between England and France. In reality, the heart of the conflict was really about the King of England not wanting to pay taxes in his land in France (He also wanted to be King of France sometimes, but it's complicated). Long story somewhat short, France whittled away at the authority of its nobility over centuries (ultimately culminating in the French Revolution of 1789, if you follow the through-lines).

It's a bit of an anachronism that we always view the Holy Roman Empire as this vast array of tiny statelets, and her neighbours as single entities, when in reality all of these kingdoms, empires, principalities, etc, were in competition with one another and themselves over which guy with a fancy hat got to have the most power.

You made me make a new account for this you'd better enjoy reading it :)