vestabesta

The Tragedy of Marie Antoinette

Portrait of 12-year-old Marie by Martin van Meytens | Source: Wikimedia Commons In the 200 years since her death, time has skewed her image and many still are u...

Eyewitness Account of the Eruption of Mt. Vesuvius

In Misenum, 17 year-old Pliny the Younger witnessed the effects of the eruption, along with his mother and uncle. It was only until years that he recorded his h...

[Tudor & Stuart England] Trials and Tribulations of Childbirth

Given how risky it is even today for some women in modern societies, very special care was taken at the time to ensure safe delivery for the child, while mainta...

The Peloponnesian War - End of an Era [Part 3]

Athens suffered great casualties in Syracuse in an unwise attempt at conquering. More than 40,000 men perished, while the rest were sold into slavery. This was ...

The Peloponnesian War - Desperate Measures [Part 2]

At the end of the first part, I described how a plague enveloped Athens and killed nearly 25% of the population. The loss was so devastating that citizens neede...

So Goes the Story

It's finals week and soon I will be on break starting Friday. After that, I'd like to continue writing more history posts. I'm so happy I made it through the se...

We Rest Among The Flowers

Another photo taken during my walks around campus. Today I am surrounded in an air of melancholy as it marks a special point in my life. The flowers bring some ...

Here I Am

Yeah this is my bed, and I took this spontaneously while sitting at my desk looking around my room after just waking up. I just moved to a new house so everythi...

Crecemos Juntos

Taken on my way to the library on campus. I was awaiting the results of my Biology exam, therefore I was a bit nervous and needed something to keep me calm. I n...

The Peloponnesian War - Power and Disease [Part 1]

After suffering tremendous losses during Greece's fight in the Greco-Persian Wars, immediate action was needed in order to recover and rebuild. Athens, therefor...

Octavian Augustus: The First Emperor of Rome

Following Julius Caesar's assassination in 44 B.C. a scramble for power erupted. The Republic was never designed to support a "dictator for life", so no formal ...

Did Julius Caesar Deserve to Die?

On January 10, 49 B.C. Caesar knowingly broke the rules by crossing the Rubicon river and plunged Rome into civil war. Mass panic ensued as Pompey, most of the ...

The Urban Signal

This was something I took impulsively, with no real intention to grab anything noteworthy. However looking back on it now, I appreciate that moment of spontanei...

The Ideal Form of Government, According to Plato

http://www.thefamouspeople.com/profiles/images/plato-2.jpg Born in 427 B.C. Plato, actually named Aristocles, was a student of Socrates who came from a wealthy ...

Color Challenge: Saturday Indigo - Hiding in the Grass

I was saving this picture for today since I realized these flowers have a lovely shade of purple/pink. I took this around spring and summer of last year and I r...

The First Triumvirate: A "Three-Headed Monster"

Julius Caesar was moving up in the Roman world and he knew that in order to secure more power, an alliance needed to be made. One that would benefit not only hi...

Some Rotten Roman Emperors

Julius Caesar did pave the way for Rome to almost completely abandon the whole point of the Republic when he was named dictator perpetuo, and later when Octavia...

Glass Tapestry

Although I took this last year, it has been quite rainy today so I thought this was appropriate to share. I wanted to take a little break from writing history p...

How Romans Used The Military for Control

The Republic set various rules in 509 B.C. that very clearly lay out courses of action, and the military is no exception to these strict guidelines. In order to...

How Rome Attempted to Make Reforms

Many problems following the Punic Wars affected Rome tremendously, and few efforts were introduced to fix them. There were five things Rome struggled with the m...