The Death of Cleopatra by Edmonia Lewis, 1876.
Two wooden anatomical figures 17th century
A pair of models with removable chest and abdomen covers. Some religious restrictions on dissection were lifted in the 15th century, which led to the wider study of anatomy, using models like these as extra teaching aids. Both figures show the heart and lungs. One shows a pregnant female with a baby in the uterus, and the other the kidney and intestines in a male.
![triglifos-y-metopas:
Etruscan warrior, bronze.
Todi (Perugia), Italy.
ca. 400 B.C.
[British Museum]](http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lxstnnGU3D1r6upw4o1_1280.jpg)
During the Middle ages, and even in the Renaissance and until the 18th century, eyelashes were not styled. Women, in general, removed eyelashes and eyebrows in order to give more importance to the forehead, which was the most important feature in females’ faces at that time.
Women were not supposed to exhibit their hair in public, and by several ecclesiastical edicts, the Catholic Church condemned that practice as an offense to God and the church, and a sin. It obviously included eyebrows and eyelashes.
image: Petrus Christus, Portrait of a Young Woman (detail), Netherlandish, c. 1470
Jeffrey Hudson (1619 – circa 1682) was an English court dwarf at the court of Queen Henrietta Maria. He was famous as the “Queen’s dwarf” and “Lord Minimus”, and was considered one of the “wonders of the age” because of his extreme but well-proportioned smallness. He fought with the Royalists in the English Civil War and fled with the Queen to France but was expelled from her court when he killed a man in a duel. He was captured by Barbary pirates and spent 25 years as a slave in North Africa before being ransomed back to England.
Virgina Woolf’s suicide letter to her husband, 1941.
Dearest, I feel certain that I am going mad again. I feel we can’t go through another of those terrible times. And I shan’t recover this time. I begin to hear voices, and I can’t concentrate. So I am doing what seems the best thing to do. You have given me the greatest possible happiness. You have been in every way all that anyone could be. I don’t think two people could have been happier ‘til this terrible disease came. I can’t fight any longer. I know that I am spoiling your life, that without me you could work. And you will I know. You see I can’t even write this properly. I can’t read. What I want to say is I owe all the happiness of my life to you. You have been entirely patient with me and incredibly good. I want to say that — everybody knows it. If anybody could have saved me it would have been you. Everything has gone from me but the certainty of your goodness. I can’t go on spoiling your life any longer. I don’t think two people could have been happier than we have been.
Sun and moon horizontal dial for latitudes 46°-50° North. The silvered compass at the centre has the cardinal points named in Latin and an arrow drawn on the compass bowl to indicate the magnetic variation at 10° West of North. The upper section is marked with a scale of latitudes. The base of the compass is engraved with tables of latitudes for different towns and cities around Europe . {early 18th century}
National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London
Abducted from Africa and then shipped from Cuba aboard the schooner Amistad as slaves, fifty-three Africans overcame their captors and gained control of the ship. However, the Amistad would be seized by the Navy off Long Island, New York, and the Africans imprisoned, charged with murder and facing extradition to Cuba. Dated January 7, 1840, this document was submitted on their behalf by a group of American attorneys representing them before the Federal District Court in Connecticut.
Answer of S. Staples, R. Baldwin, and T. Sedgewick, Proctors for the Amistad Africans, to the several libels of Lt. Gedney, et. al. and Pedro Montes and Jose Ruiz, January 7, 1840; Records of the District Courts of the United States; Record Group 21; National Archives.
