Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

bookswain.bsky.social @bookswain.bsky.social · 6h

“Hoffman, who represents the region and grew up in Bethel, said its climate has changed, forcing the village of Newtok to relocate.
‘There has been more and more warming that is disrupting lives in the Y-K Delta from the last 25 years that I can tell,’ he said.”
#climatecrisis alaskapublic

bookswain.bsky.social @bookswain.bsky.social · 9h

For Indigenous Peoples Day

bookswain.bsky.social @bookswain.bsky.social · 10h

A sobering page from my first volume of "Transactions of the Historical and Literary Committee of the American Philosophical Society" published in 1819, which includes ‘An Account of the History, Manners, and Customs of the Indian Nations’ by John Gottlieb Ernestus Heckewelder.
📚💙

Above from an over 200 year old book.
“« it, they kill us! There is no faith to be placed in their « words. They are not like the Indians, who are only « enemies, while at war, and are friends in peace." They «will say to an Indian, "my friend! my brother!»
"They will take him by the hand, and at the same mo-« ment destroy him. And so you (addressing himself to « the Christian Indians) will also be treated by them be-«fore long. Remember! that this day I have warned
" you to beware of such friends as these. I know the long
" knives; they are not to be trusted."
Eleven months after this speech was delivered by this prophetic chief, ninety six of the same Christian Indians, about sixty of them women and children, were murdered at the place where these very words had been spoken, by the same men he had alluded to, and in the same manner that he had described. See Loskiel's History, Part III. ch. 10.”

#BookSky #Vastearlyamerica #history Indigenous Peoples Day

bookswain.bsky.social @bookswain.bsky.social · 10h

“11 months after this speech was delivered by this prophetic chief, 96 of the same Christian Indians, about 60 of them women & children, were murdered at the place where these very words had been spoken, by the same men he had alluded to, and in the same manner that he had described.”

ICYMI

bookswain.bsky.social @bookswain.bsky.social · 10h

A sobering page from my first volume of "Transactions of the Historical and Literary Committee of the American Philosophical Society" published in 1819, which includes ‘An Account of the History, Manners, and Customs of the Indian Nations’ by John Gottlieb Ernestus Heckewelder.
📚💙

bookswain.bsky.social @bookswain.bsky.social · 10h

Title page. It’s quite scarce.

Title page of a book published in 1819: TRANSACTIONS
OF THE
HISTORICAL & LITERARY COMMITTEE
OS THE
AMERICAN PHILOSOPHICAL SOCIETY,
HELD AT PHILADELPHIA, FOR PROMOTING
USEFUL KNOWLEDGE.
VOL. I.
Invenies illic et facta domestica vobis ;
Sepè tibi pater est, stepè legendus avus,— OvID.
PHILADELPHIA:
Printed and Published by Abraham Small, No, 112, Chesnut Street,
1819.”

#Booksky 📚💙

bookswain.bsky.social @bookswain.bsky.social · 10h

A sobering page from my first volume of "Transactions of the Historical and Literary Committee of the American Philosophical Society" published in 1819, which includes ‘An Account of the History, Manners, and Customs of the Indian Nations’ by John Gottlieb Ernestus Heckewelder.
📚💙

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bookswain.bsky.social @bookswain.bsky.social · 17h

I of course completely made that up, but who knows? I noticed the angry bird a while ago when I was looking at the full portion of the tapestry depicting the comet of 1066, now know as Halley’s Comet. ☄️
#MedievalSky

The portion of the Bayeux
Tapestry depicting Comet Halley in its 1066 appearance flying horizontally across the sky above buildings and a group of folks staring and pointing at it. A bird is below the group and the way its feathers are depicted it looks like it's giving them the bird.

🪶

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bookswain.bsky.social @bookswain.bsky.social · 19h

Snowing ❄️

bookswain.bsky.social @bookswain.bsky.social · 20h

My owl avatar is an illustration from an 18th century, German children’s encyclopedia. The engraving on laid paper was completely colored by hand.
🪶 🐡 #booksky

A colored illustration of an owl staring at the viewer perched on the branch of a stump above a vegetated landscape.

#sciart

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bookswain.bsky.social @bookswain.bsky.social · 20h

Fantastic

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bookswain.bsky.social @bookswain.bsky.social · 20h

This is a portion of a large plate in my 1789 copy of Transactions of the American philosophical Society depicting the 1769 transit of Venus across the Sun. The pyramid shape in Figure 2 is Venus’s atmosphere as observed and recorded by astronomer David Rittenhouse, who created the entire diagram. 🔭

A portion of a large fold out astronomical diagram depicting Venus at different points as it transited the sun in 1769 as recorded in Norriton, Pennsylvania. There are three separate figures enlarging Venus just as it transited the edge of the sun.

#Astronomy #Celestial #stars #venus #sun

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Reposted

RSPB @rspb.bsky.social · 21h

Lapland Buntings delight in today’s #AutumnArrivalSpotlight! ❄️

These Arctic travellers are a rare and special sight, weaving through our saltmarshes and coastal fields during their migration.

Listen for their twittering flight calls on crisp autumn mornings.

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bookswain.bsky.social @bookswain.bsky.social · 21h

A carnivorous sea snail species depicted in a hand-colored plate from Spécies Général et Iconographie des Coquilles Vivantes by French malacologist Louis Charles Kiener. It was published in parts from 1834-1880.
Coin for scale. 🦑
#MolluscMonday

An illustration of a species from the genus Charonia, carnivorous sea snails in the family Charoniidae. Its body is extended below its highly sculptured, spiral shell. The illustration is colored in mostly brown shades.

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bookswain.bsky.social @bookswain.bsky.social · 21h

Adding to the marine life feed 🦑 🪸 #marinelife

AFP News Agency @en.afp.com · 21h

The world's tropical coral reefs have almost certainly crossed a point of no return as oceans warm beyond a level most can survive, a major scientific report announced on Monday ➡️ u.afp.com/SmDs

File photo taken on March 7, 2022 shows a diver swimming among the coral on Australia's Great Barrier Reef after reports it had again been hit with "widespread" bleaching

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AFP News Agency @en.afp.com · 21h

The world's tropical coral reefs have almost certainly crossed a point of no return as oceans warm beyond a level most can survive, a major scientific report announced on Monday ➡️ u.afp.com/SmDs

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bookswain.bsky.social @bookswain.bsky.social · 21h

The Bayeux Tapestry also has the first recorded depiction of a group of people getting the middle finger, and is why it’s sometimes referred to as “getting the bird”.

A portion of the Bayeux tapestry. A group of people are looking and pointing towards the sky at Halley’s Comet (not in view). Below them a bird is flipping them off, probably for being too noisy or disturbing its nest.
Image via esa.

#Medieval #MedievalSky

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Reposted

Medievalist.net @medievalists.bsky.social · 22h

The Seagull, the Dog and the Cockle: A Hidden Scene in the Bayeux Tapestry www.medievalists.net/2025/07/hidd... #bayeuxtapestry

The Seagull, the Dog and the Cockle: A Hidden Scene in the Bayeux Tapestry - Medievalists.net

One interpretation of a curious scene in the Bayeux Tapestry suggests a seagull using a dog to open a cockle—offering a rare glimpse of everyday life on the Norman beaches before the 1066 invasion.

www.medievalists.net

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Reposted

Max Planck Institute for the History of Science @mpiwg.bsky.social · 23h

The first talk of our Institute's Colloquium series 2025/26 "Rethinking #Time in the History of Science": @helgejojo.bsky.social and François Hartog on "Unsettling the Historiographic Operation." 🗃

🗓️ Nov 18, 2025 (14:00 CET)
📍 MPIWG

🔗 bit.ly/3IApzqX

#HistSci #CulturalHistory @ehess.fr

Poster of the MPIWG Institute’s Colloquium. It features the titles of its five events below an image that shows a colorful mixture of liquids in red, orange, yellow, green, and violet.

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Reposted

Institute of Historical Research @ihr.bsky.social · 23h

The Bibliography of British and Irish History (BBIH) has recently been updated with 5000+ new references. Discover further details about this update in this On History blog blog.history.ac.uk/2025/10/bibl... @brepols.net

Bibliography of British and Irish History October 2025 update - On History

What’s new in BBIH?  The October 2025 update to the Bibliography of British and Irish History adds over 5,000 new publications. The new update includes books, journal articles, book chapters and…

blog.history.ac.uk

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Reposted

🦕Journal of Systematic Palaeontology🦴 @journalsystpal.bsky.social · 23h

In JSP this week, Bisconti 𝘦𝘵 𝘢𝘭. describe a newly discovered fossil from the Late Miocene of Piedmont (Italy), illuminating a long-lost chapter in the evolution of Cetotheriidae 🐋 an extinct lineage of baleen whales within Mysticeti 🐳

Read more: buff.ly/EPHt5wE
#PaleoSky #Fossils #NewSpecies

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bookswain.bsky.social @bookswain.bsky.social · 23h

“In the face of any Pakistan military operations, TTP militants escape to their safe haven over the border, and then just as easily come back.”

The irony. For many years the TB in Afghanistan did the same, but their safe haven over the border was Pakistan.

The Guardian @theguardian.com · 23h

‘An environment of terror’: deadly resurgence of Pakistan Taliban gathers pace

Surge in militancy in region bordering Afghanistan is now one of greatest security threats facing Islamabad Tariq Ahmed never lets his pistol out of his sight these days. Sitting cross-legged on a woven charpai, his face concealed with a scarf, the 26-year-old looks nervously left and right, shifting his gun in and out of his waistband. It was here, just a few months ago in this neighbourhood bordering Pakistan’s north-western border city of Peshawar that his uncle Shehan Shah, 36, was shot dead at point blank range by the Taliban. Continue reading...

www.theguardian.com

bookswain.bsky.social @bookswain.bsky.social · 23h

The mathematics behind the physics of self-righting falling cats and strange shadows of floating insects 🤯
🐈‍⬛ 🦋 🧮

Institute of Physics @instituteofphysics.bsky.social · 23h

that annihilate them, connecting quantum geometry to self-righting falling cats and car parking in a tight space and getting insights into nature’s physics: tidal bores, tsunamis, rainbows, oriental magic mirrors, polarised light in the blue sky, strange shadows of floating insects". (3/4)

Reposted

Institute of Physics @instituteofphysics.bsky.social · 23h

that annihilate them, connecting quantum geometry to self-righting falling cats and car parking in a tight space and getting insights into nature’s physics: tidal bores, tsunamis, rainbows, oriental magic mirrors, polarised light in the blue sky, strange shadows of floating insects". (3/4)

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Institute of Physics @instituteofphysics.bsky.social · 23h

Congratulations to Prof Sir Michael Berry for being awarded the Isaac Newton Medal and Lecture for ground-breaking work on the geometrical ‘Berry’ phase of quantum states in topological physics and seminal contributions to mathematical physics in quantum chaos, catastrophe theory & singular optics.

Image of Prof Sir Michael Berry, recipient of the Isaac Newton Medal and Lecture as part of the IOP Awards 2025.

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bookswain.bsky.social @bookswain.bsky.social · 1d

Came across this in a book I’m reading, so although quite well known, I thought I’d share.

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bookswain.bsky.social @bookswain.bsky.social · 1d

While he was at a school for sculptors set up by Lorenzo de' Medici in Florence Michelangelo carved his first true works in stone. This is one of them, a relief known as the Madonna of the Stairs.
He was around 15 years old at the time.

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