Everything about Scandinavian history is interesting: the Norse religion, the dramatic sagas, the feuding kings, the far-reaching raids of the seaborne Vikings. To top it off, many of the Scandinavian leaders from the Viking Age had really creative and unique names. Here are 10 of my favorite names from the Viking Era, as well as a little history and mythological information where it is relevant. Enjoy!
To keep the well-rounded number of 10, some great names were unfortunately left out of the list. Here are some honorable mentions: Harald Finehair (King of Norway, c. 860-940), Erik Weatherhat (folklorish Swedish King), Harald Hard Ruler (King of Norway, r. 1045-1066).
All images used in the production of this video are Public Domain or appropriately licensed for reuse.
The intro music was written and performed by C. Keith Hansley.
Julius Caesar (c. 100-44 BCE) dominated the Roman Republic with his political acumen and military might. Thankfully for us, he was aware of his own importance and wrote a detailed autobiography about his rise to power. These "War Commentaries" covered the Gallic War, the Civil War, the Alexandrian War, the African War and the Spanish War. Here are ten great quotes from Julius Caesar's War Commentaries or his other biographers.
The edition of the War Commentaries used in this video:
The War Commentaries by Gaius Julius Caesar and Aulus Hirtius, translated by W. A. McDevitte and W. S. Bohn, 2014.
All images used in the creation of this video are Public Domain via Creative Commons.
The intro music was written and performed by C. Keith Hansley for use on this YouTube channel.
The percussion, woodwind and string intstument music throughout the rest of the video is:
Village Consort Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License
Check out our Julius Caesar quote pictures that were hand-tailored for each of the quotes used in the video, HERE.
Take a look at some of our articles about Julius Caesar, HERE.
Join me in a virtual tour of the ancient Siwa Oasis. First, we climb to a high vantage point to see a panoramic view of the oasis. Finally, we check out architectural feats found inside the game, such as the House of Life, the Temple of Amun and the Mountain of the Dead, while also taking a look at actual photographs of modern Siwa, for comparison.
All photographs used in this video are either Public Domain or appropriately licensed for reuse where the image appears.
The intro music, as well as the songs played during the sped-up travel scenes, all was written and performed by C. Keith Hansley for use on this YouTube Channel.
The 1st century BCE was a time of enormous upheaval in ancient Rome, especially during the rise of Julius Caesar and his heir, Augustus. Watch our short video to learn about the tragic fates of a few of the many important people who were caught up in this Roman power struggle. Among the many victims from around 60-31 BCE were the statesmen Cicero and Cato, the members of the First Triumvirate (Julius Caesar, Crassus and Pompey), Caesar's friend turned enemy (Labienus), the plotters against Caesar (Brutus and Cassius), Augustus' rivals (Mark Antony and Cleopatra) and even Julius Caesar's young son, Caesarion.
All images used in this video are either Public Domain or appropriately licensed for reuse on the frames in which they appear.
The intro music was written and performed by C. Keith Hansley for use on this YouTube channel.
The haunting music in the background is:
Ossuary 2 - Turn Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License
Read our article that was the precursor for this video, HERE.
In this video we delve into the world of Assassin's Creed: Origins, which is set in ancient Egypt around 49-48 BCE. Watch the religiously significant Siwa Oasis come to life through the eyes of a troubled Medjay and witness characters based on historical figures, such as Ptolemy XIII, the co-ruler of Egypt along with his sister, the famous Cleopatra VII. Enjoy the history-infused atmosphere and learn a few things along the way, with odd topics such as tomb raiding and falconry making appearances on the first episode of this journey.
The intro music was written and performed by C. Keith Hansley for use on this YouTube channel.
The great English poet, Geoffrey Chaucer, was born in 1342. When he was around fifteen years of age, he managed to gain a position as page to the Countess of Ulster, serving mainly as a servant and messenger. Two years later, in 1359, Chaucer was sent to fight in the long-running Hundred Years War between England and France. He was quickly captured by the French near Rheims, but King Edward III (the Countess of Ulster’s father-in-law) paid the poet’s ransom in 1360.
Literature Chaucer encountered in France may have ignited the poet’s literary interests. He started simple, translating the medieval French classic, the Roman de la Rose (Romance of the Rose), into English. Besides French and English, Geoffrey Chaucer was also known to understand Italian and Latin. Religion was another field of interest for the poet, and he could quote freely from Christian texts that were both canonical and apocryphal.
Eventually, Geoffrey Chaucer was promoted from his position as a page to the countess of Ulster to be a valet to the king of England. Around the same time he received his position as valet (in 1367), Chaucer also married his wife, Philippa de Roet, the sister-in-law of Chaucer’s greatest patron, John of Gaunt. Chaucer continued to ascend in rank, becoming Comptroller of customs and subsidies in 1374, and was then promoted to Comptroller of petty customs. Chaucer was next appointed as Justice of the Peace for the region of Kent in 1385, and became a Knight of the Shire (for Kent) in 1386.
Chaucer likely began his most famous work, The Canterbury Tales, around 1386, an ambitious epic poem in which he planned to include thirty pilgrims telling four stories, each. By the time he died in 1400, he unfortunately had only completed tales for twenty-four pilgrims. In addition to The Canterbury Tales, Geoffrey Chaucer also wrote The Book of the Duchess, ABC of the Virgin, House of Fame, The Parliament of Fowls, Troilus and Criseyde, and The Legend of the Saints of Cupid.
For a more in depth article on the life of Geoffrey Chaucer, see our biography on the poet, HERE.
For a taste of Chaucer's poetry, check out our quote picture selection, HERE.
Intro music written and performed by C. Keith Hansley for use on this YouTube channel.
The atmospheric background music in the video is:
Folk Round by Kevin MacLeod is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)
The number of great minds that operated during the Warring States Period
is simply baffling. There was Confucius and his philosophical
successors, notably Mencius and Hsün Tzu. Also prevalent were the major
Daoist (or Taoist) intellectuals like Lao Tzu and Chuang Tzu. Later,
there were the philosophers of authoritarianism and legalism, such as
Lord Shang and Han Fei Tzu. Also present was the religious wildcard, Mo
Tzu, who preached universal love and told of a personified Heaven that
punished evil and rewarded good. Nevertheless, during this highly
congested time period filled with so many geniuses, there lived a
military strategist who would surpass all others in popularity and fame
(except, perhaps, Confucius and Lao Tzu)—he was Master Sun, better known
as Sun Tzu.
All images used in the production of this video were
Public Domain or licensed for reuse via the Creative Commons or Flickr.
If the image was not Public Domain, the license was included in its
respective slide.
The intro music was written and performed by C. Keith Hansley for use on The Historian's Hut YouTube channel.
The calm and serene sounds in the background of the video is:
River Fire Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/b...
When Emperor Marcus Aurelius (121-180 CE) was not occupied with war, he
attempted to rule his empire in a just and humane way. He was charitable
to provinces in need, and he generally tried to combat corruption and
maltreatment. His greatest flaw in his pursuit of justice was the
persecution of Christians that occurred during his reign. The massacres
during his rule produced numerous well-known martyrs, such as Justin of
Rome and Polycarp of Smyrna.
The emperor was drawn to stoic
philosophy, and was, himself, considered a competent philosopher. Marcus
Aurelius' Meditations are still widely enjoyed and admired, to this
very day.
All images used in the creation of this video are classified as Public Domain via Creative Commons.
The intro theme was written and performed by C. Keith Hansley for use on this YouTube channel.
The calming lute music in the background:
Suonatore di Liuto Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/b...
Enjoy and thanks for watching!
Read our biography on the philosopher-emperor, Marcus Aurelius, HERE.
Check out our hundreds of quote pictures, Here, and the quote pictures specifically featuring the quotes from this video, HERE.
Broadly
speaking, Sun Tzu’s life, death and the recording of his sayings into The Art
of War occurred between the 6th and 3rd century BCE. Most of what is perceived
to be known about Sun Tzu primarily comes from either the Records of the Grand Historian by Sima Qian (145-85 BCE) or The Spring and Autumn Annals detailing
events from around 722-481 BCE in the Zhou Dynasty.
Based on Sima
Qian’s work, Sun Tzu is thought to have been a contemporary of Confucius, living
around 551-479 BCE. He was likely born in Ch’i (or Qi), in the modern Shandong
Province. He eventually found employment in the court of King Ho-Lu (or He Lü)
of Wu (in modern Zhejiang), who likely reigned from 514-496 BCE. On a more
solid historical note, the Kingdom of Wu was a major participant of the Warring
States Period, and King Ho-Lu (r. 514-496 BCE) is widely believed to have been
an actual king of the Kingdom of Wu.
Sun Tzu is
often mentioned in commentary on the Wu-Chu Wars that occurred between 512-506
BCE. In particular, Master Sun supposedly played a major role in Wu’s victory
over Chu in the Battle of Boju (506 BCE), when the strategist commanded Wu’s
forces, along with King Ho-Lu and the king’s brother, Fugai. It remains
historically suspicious, though, that Master Sun’s name is absent from one of
the major prime sources describing King Ho-Lu’s time period—The Zou Commentary.
Nevertheless, by the time of the Han Dynasty (around 206 BCE-220 CE), The Art
of War, and its supposed author, Sun Tzu, were widely known household names in
China.
Sun Tzu had a unique philosophy on war—he was
utterly ruthless, and yet, he would go above and beyond in his attempts to
avoid unnecessary confrontation. Sun Tzu’s ideal victory would involve
deploying spies to discover an enemy’s vulnerabilities, followed by espionage,
sabotage and diplomacy to exploit those weaknesses.He would force the enemy into submission
without raising a single weapon. If war was unavoidable, then Sun Tzu would
rely on a system of military moves and countermoves and rigorous preparation
and training to ensure victory.
All images used in this video are either Public Domain or appropriately licensed for use via Creative Commons.
The intro-music was written and recorded by C. Keith Hansley for use on The Historian’s Hut YouTube channel.
The catchy song throughout the remainder of the video:
Indore Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
At the onset of the war, Germany had
pressed quickly through Belgium into France, but became bogged down well shy of
Paris, and the war gridlocked into WWI’s iconic trench warfare. In early 1916,
however, General Erich von Falkenhayn of Germany believed he knew a way to
crush France and weaken Britain’s will to fight—by seizing the French defensive
position at Verdun.
All images, maps and graphics used in the construction of this video are
licensed as Public Domain in the Creative Commons.
Intro music written and performed by C. Keith Hansley for use on this channel.
During the late 5th century BCE, one of the most bizarre men to have
ever lived was born in the Greek-colonized city of Sinope, located on
the coast of the Black Sea in modern Turkey. His name was Diogenes, and
he would go on to impress and astound many of the great names from
ancient Greece. The renowned philosopher, Plato, supposedly described
Diogenes of Sinope as a “Socrates gone mad” and Alexander the Great
(according to Plutarch) honored the man by saying, “If I were not
Alexander, I would be Diogenes.”
If you like our content, be sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel, HERE.
All images used in creating this video are Public Domain or licensed for public use via Creative Commons.
The intro song was written and performed by C. Keith Hansley for use only on this channel.
Check out our article on Diogenes the Cynic, HERE, for a more in-depth account of this strange, but intriguing, philosopher.
Many of the greatest thinkers the world has ever known were born in ancient China. Confucius (6th-5th century BCE) and his protégés, Mencius (4th-3rd century BCE) and Xunzi (4th-3rd Century BCE), were three of these great minds. Here are 15 wise quotes from the Confucian school of philosophy written by the three above-mentioned men.
Quotes from Confucius were translated by Arthur Waley (Vintage Books, 1989).
Quotes from Mencius were translated by D. C. Lau (Penguin Classics, 2004).
Quotes from Xunzi were translated by Burton Watson (Columbia University Press, 1996).
All images used in creating this video are public domain via Creative Commons.
The intro music was performed and recorded by C. Keith Hansley for use only on The Historian's Hut YouTube channel.
The music playing throughout the quotes is:
Healing by Kevin MacLeod is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)
Source: http://incompetech.com/music/royalty-free/index.html?isrc=USUAN1200048
Artist: http://incompetech.com/
Check out our biographis on Confucius (HERE) and Mencius (HERE).
If you enjoyed the video, subscribe to our YouTube channel, HERE.
In this episode, we journey to the city of Solitude to hunt down the
Daedric ‘Prince of Madness,’ Sheogorath. As we complete the tasks the
mad god gives us, we compare Sheogorath to the Greek and Roman god,
Dionysus (Bacchus or Liber Pater), and the trickster of the Norse gods,
Loki.
The intro music was written and performed by C. Keith Hansley for use on this YouTube channel.
All images used in this video (and its thumbnail) are Public Domain.
If you enjoyed the video, subscribe to our YouTube channel, HERE.
The plots of ‘The Iliad’ and ‘The Odyssey’ can be described as fiction
set in a dubious historical setting. Yet, despite the historical
inaccuracy of Homer’s epic poems, the works provide great insight into
the oral history of ancient Greece that was kept alive by poets and
bards up to the time of Homer, whose ‘Iliad’ was written around 700 BCE.
Though Homer's epics are not technically historical, they are Homer's
interpretation of much older oral history.
All images used in creating
this video are Public Domain or have their appropriate Creative Commons
license displayed on the picture.
The intro music was written and performed by C. Keith Hansley for use on this YouTube channel.
If you enjoyed the video, subscribe to our YouTube channel, HERE.
On a fateful night in 62 BCE, women of the highest caliber in Rome met
together for an evening of festivities in the palace of the Pontifex
Maximus. One man named Publius Clodius Pulcher snuck into the sacred
women-only festival, and the scandal that erupted because of his actions
led him into the employ of Julius Caesar. This is the story of his
bizarre misadventures.
The images used to represent Clodius and
T. Annius Milo in this video are not actual images of these two men,
just ancient Egyptian coffin portraits used as models.
All images and clippings used in this video are licensed as Public Domain in the Creative Commons.
The intro music was written and performed by C. Keith Hansley for use on this YouTube channel.
Read our article about Publius Clodius Pulcher, HERE.
Check out other articles featuring the Roman Empire, HERE.
If you enjoyed the video, subscribe to our YouTube channel, HERE.
In 813 CE, the opposing forces of Khan Krum (leading the Bulgars) and
Emperor Michael I of Constantinople met for the world’s most intense
staring contest. In this battle of patience, one of the two leaders lost
everything.
All images/clippings used in Drawing History (Poorly) are licensed as Public Domain via Creative Commons
The intro music was written and performed by C. Keith Hansley for use on this YouTube channel.
If you enjoyed the video, subscribe to our YouTube channel, HERE.
This video is about the legendary and megalithic poet, Homer. Though his
name and work are universally known, the man, himself, remains quite
mysterious.
All images used in this film are licensed as Public Domain via Creative Commons.
The intro music was written and performed by C. Keith Hansley for use on this YouTube channel.
If you enjoyed the video, subscribe to our YouTube channel, HERE.
In this short silent film (with music), the parable-like story of a
consequential horse thievery is retold based on the account given by the
Byzantine historian, John Skylitzes.
All images and clipping used to make the slides and screens in this film are licensed as Public Domain via the Creative Commons.
The intro music was written and performed by C. Keith Hansley for use on this YouTube channel.
If you enjoyed the video, subscribe to our YouTube channel, HERE.
In this episode, we investigate a woman in Skyrim who has been accused
of witchcraft by a local town. From there, we check out the college in
the north that specializes in teaching magic. Finally, we compare the
magic and witchcraft found in Skyrim compared to what occurred and was
believed during the witch hunts found in history.
The intro music (as well as the small intermission clips) was performed by C. Keith Hansley for use on this YouTube page.
All
of the images in the intro collages are from painting and images
licensed as Public Domain via Creative Commons (as well as the witch in
the video thumbnail).
If you enjoyed the video, subscribe to our YouTube channel, HERE.
Emperor Theophilus (or Theophilos) of Constantinople may not have been a
great war leader, but his reign was filled with interesting events and
adventures. The Byzantine historian, John Skylitzes, wrote about many of
those intriguing occurrences - this video is about a bizarre joust
witnessed by Theophilus.
All images and clippings used to make this film are licensed as Public Domain via Creative Commons.
Intro music written and performed by C. Keith Hansley for use on this YouTube channel.
If you enjoyed the video, subscribe to our YouTube channel, HERE.
In this video, we journey into the rich fantasy world of Skyrim. Though
The Elder Scrolls games are set in a world of magic, elves and monsters,
it is also filled with countless historical inspirations and
similarities. In this episode, we journey into a crypt to seek out the
Scandinavian version of the zombie - the draugr.
The intro music
(and the clips used during the transition scenes) were written and
performed by C. Keith Hansley for use on this YouTube channel.
Check out our biography of Snorri Sturluson, one of the best sources for Norse mythology, HERE.
If you enjoyed the video, subscribe to our YouTube channel, HERE.
Snorri Sturluson (1179-1241 CE) is equally as deep and interesting as
his book of Norse mythology, 'The Prose Edda.' When Sturluson was not
writing the world's most comprehensive book of Norse mythology, he was
busy being the most powerful chief in Iceland.
If you enjoyed the video, subscribe to our YouTube channel, HERE.
Chuang Tzu was one of the many great philosophers to come out of ancient
China. He was a major Daoist intellectual who lived in the time of
Mencius (4th century BCE). One of the characteristics of Chuang Tzu's
wonderful writing was his incredible wittiness and humor. This is one
example of his interesting teaching style.
All images and
textures used in creating this film are licensed as public domain in the
Creative Commons (or just simply made by myself). https://creativecommons.org/publicdom...
The intro and outro song was written and performed by C. Keith Hansley for use on this YouTube page.
If you enjoyed the video, subscribe to our YouTube channel, HERE.
In 1081 CE, Robert Guiscard invaded the Byzantine Empire, ruled by
Alexios Komnenos. Guiscard landed with as many as 30,00o troops on the
shores of modern-day Albania, and laid siege to the fortress of
Dyrrakhion. This is how the resulting battle played out:
Intro and outro music written and performed by C. Keith Hansley.
The dramatic music throughout the video is Liszt's Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2. via the Youtube audio library.
Take a look at our article about this battle, HERE.
Check out more articles about featuring the Byzantine Empire, HERE.
