So, hi. For the purpose of this blog, I'm Squiggles. Actually, it's what I named one of my fidget critters (the one pictured in my avatar). I just think it's a cute nickname, and I'm not averse to collecting those. But I started out using that here because I'm a very awkward person when this sideblog was completely brand new. I didn't really have a social life growing up. I had books and, later, the internet.
I'm a white US American of mostly western European descent. I don't really have any personal cultural ties to ethnic minorities, especially people of color. However, I am dedicated to being an ally to people different from myself. I know I'll make mistakes, but I'll also do my best to learn from them and grow. Because honestly, that's the best way to handle making mistakes, and owning up to those mistakes is a sign of emotional maturity. Please just be patient with me if I'm struggling with something, because I'm (like everyone else) not perfect.
This blog is dedicated to sharing history. I'm literally a history student in college right now, finishing up my last several classes for my associate's degree. My primary subject of interest as a history student is the history of music within diaspora and ethnic minority communities, especially in the Americas. In particular, I want to focus on indigenous American music prior to colonization.
That said, there will be almost no limit to the subjects I choose. I partially chose history as my major because it gives me a good excuse to study whatever I want, in the name of studying the history of it. I'm eternally curious, so I've found myself regularly annoying people with constant questions. I'm also a voracious reader, which I come by honestly. For better or worse, just think of me as the human equivalent of Curious George.
I do pride myself on the accuracy of any information I provide. If I don't know something, I find literally no shame in admitting it. However, I'm certainly willing to look into something for the sake of accuracy, if nothing else.
I'm obsessed with this chair. The artist takes a flimsy hunk of injection-molded plastic that's been cost-cut to hell and back, and insists that we look at it with fresh eyes and understand its beauty. And they went about it in the most labor-intensive way I can think of.
Absolutely nothing about this design is convenient to execute in wood. Every piece is curved, most have compound curves. This is artisan craftsmanship: it's inherently slow, manual, and skilled. Notice, also, that most features of this chair must be thicker and heavier than on the plastic chairs being imitated. Injection-molded chairs can be produced in this shape in a matter of minutes with far less material at very low cost.
If these flowing, organic curves are so beautiful in polished wood, perhaps they are also beautiful in the mass-produced chairs that are far more accessible. Perhaps we should remember to admire designs that succeed enough to become ubiquitous. I don't know about you, but I'll never see injection-molded chairs the same way again.
I agree with all of this, but YOU HAVE HIT UPON A FORGOTTEN TRUTH OF PLASTIC CHAIRS!!!!!
The standard one-piece injection molded plastic chair is referred to as a "Monobloc", literally just describing it as a single piece. The history of this chair is fascinating, and it all starts back in 1946, with the D.C. Simpson Monobloc.
Douglas Colborne Simpson was an architect mostly active in the 40's and 50's, designing a lot of classic mid-century style buildings in Vancouver, Canada(1). In 1946, as part of a government project to find new uses for materials developed for WWII, he and engineer James Donahue developed the design you see above, simply called the Monobloc(2). Unfortunately, we don't know a lot about this chair as it was only ever a prototype, and no modern examples have survived, nor have most of the records surrounding it(3). To my knowledge, we don't actually know if this was technically injection molded, or crafted some other way. We can't even be sure if it was technically the inspiration for the designs that followed, but no matter the case it has lent its name to the entire genre.
Plastics technology was simply not what it is today back in the 1940's. Most people would have had very little plastic in their homes, most likely just a few pieces of Bakelite (the first commercially viable plastic, made from a formaldehyde based resin in a Bakelizer, the best name for any industrial manufacturing equipment ever). Over the following few decades, however, as a wider variety of plastics were both developed and came down in price to the point of commercial viability, the concept of the plastic chair was revisited, and the first folks to revisit it were Helmut Batzner, in 1964, and Joe Colombo, in 1965.
This, is the Bofinger chair, Batzner's design:
The elements of D.C.Simpson's Monobloc were pretty alien compared to todays mass-manufactured plastic chairs, but here we start to see some more modern elements come into play. The first thing you probably notice is the front legs, which have that characteristic visible 90 degree bend in them for added rigidity, plus a much more comfortably leaned back and slightly scoop-shaped seat. We also see much more support in the back rest, with broad triangles allowing for a more efficient use of materials without losing back support.
Similar to Simpson, Batzner was not an industrial designer, but an architect, and this chair had a very specific purpose. Batzner and his team designed it as part of a project to build a new theater in Karlsruhe, Germany, which required a large amount of additional seating which could be easily packed away into storage or distributed around the theaters rooms by the staff (4). As such, it was designed to be both lightweight and stackable, so several of them could be moved by one person, and they could be stored compactly. This piece of furniture was a huge hit a the theater, and was so popular that 120,000 units would ultimately be manufactured and sold around the world, with each one taking just 5 minutes to produce (4).
Around the same time, Joe Colombo enters the scene with this:
Colombo was an artist in several mediums who, after taking over his families appliance company in the 50's, made the shift towards architecture and interior design, and started designing a wide array of trend-setting furniture(5). The chair shown above is known as the Universale (sometimes referred to as the Chair Universal 4867), designed in 1965. This chair differs pretty greatly from the ones that came after it, it many ways it represents a different path that could have been taken, but it's also very widely referenced as an inspiration for what is broadly considered the origin of the white plastic chair the world over.
Enter: the Fauteuil 300
This is, arguably, the first iteration of the white plastic chair we all know today. Designed by Henry Massonnet in 1972, the Fauteuil 300 and it's imitators are, collectively, the single most widely used piece of furniture in the entire world(6). Before that, however, it was something else entirely: works of art.
What might be hard to recognize in hindsight is that all of these chairs described so far were not everyday objects. They were on the forefront of modern design, they made use of brand new materials and manufacturing processes, and at the time they were each made, they were slick, stylish, and fairly expensive. Despite the speed at which they could be manufactured, these innovative, high-end chairs rose sharply in cost up through the early 1980's due to the sheer demand for them. They weren't cheap spare seating you stuck in the garage, they were placed at dining tables and on fine patios, and they were a wildly popular talking point. That's not to say their expense justified their artistic value, but rather that their expense and popularity was a product of their status as highly contemporary and boundary-pushing designs.
With the price of plastics declining after the 70's, the increasing accessibility of injection molding to manufacturers, and the widespread popularity of these designs, copycats proliferated rapidly, and eventually drove the price down. This era, in the 80's and 90's, is when these chairs became cheap an ubiquitous, and where they became manufactured the world over.
And here is where we reach this piece, "Plastic chair in wood", by Maarten Baas, and a piece of the history I've left out so far. The Monobloc was designed to be made out of wood. Like the the other chairs designed by Joe Colombo, like the chairs that predated the Simpson, the Monobloc was designed with the intention of using laminated plywood, but as the artists and designers behind them began to experiment with new materials they fell in love with the idea of making them from plastic, and so they did. They redesigned and redesigned until they made something that would be impossible to make in wood at a price most people could afford, but which could be made from plastic in mere minutes. The organic curves and thin profiles would take so much time, so much waste material, so much skill and effort to create if made of wood that they could never be furniture, they could only be art. Baas' chair is a perfect, beautiful reflection of that.
That, in brief, is the history of the design of the white plastic Monobloc chair, but it's not all there is to know. In fact, it's kind of just the start. I've linked my sources below, but I would strongly recommend checking out the German documentary Monobloc, by Hauke Wendler. It goes over the history, but it's far more interested with what the Monobloc means, and what it's place is in our world today. The impact it's made, the better and the worse, and what it says about us. It's fascinating, and well worth your time.
When people think of Irish history, they often imagine fair-skinned Celts with red hair. But Ireland has a long and rich history of Black presence, dating back centuries. From African merchants in medieval Ireland to Black Irish revolutionaries, here are ten key facts that highlight the deep and often overlooked connections between Black history and Ireland.
1. Black People Have Been in Ireland Since at Least the 3rd Century
Historical records suggest that people of African descent were present in Ireland as early as the Roman era. The Romans never invaded Ireland, but trade and migration brought people from North Africa and the Mediterranean to Irish shores.
2. The First Known Black Irishman Was a 9th-Century Scholar
One of the earliest recorded Black individuals in Ireland was Firmanus, a scholar who lived in the 9th century. He was described as “a man of Africa” who studied and taught in an Irish monastery. This suggests that Ireland had connections with the wider world far earlier than many assume.
3. Irish Pirates and African Connections
During the 17th century, Irish and African histories intertwined through piracy. Irish pirates and privateers frequently raided North African coasts, capturing people to sell into slavery, while some Irish were also taken by Barbary pirates and enslaved in North Africa.
4. Olaudah Equiano, a Former Slave, Was a Prominent Abolitionist in Ireland
Olaudah Equiano, one of the most famous formerly enslaved Africans and an early abolitionist, visited Ireland in the 1790s. His autobiography, The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, was widely read in Ireland and helped build support for the abolitionist movement.
5. Ireland Had a Role in the Transatlantic Slave Trade
Although Ireland never had large-scale slavery like the Caribbean or the U.S., Irish merchants and settlers were involved in the transatlantic slave trade. Cities like Cork and Dublin profited from goods produced by enslaved Africans, and some Irish individuals owned plantations in the Caribbean and America.
6. Frederick Douglass Found Refuge in Ireland
Frederick Douglass, the famous African American abolitionist, visited Ireland in 1845 to escape the dangers of being recaptured in the U.S. He was deeply moved by the poverty he witnessed during the Irish Famine and found an ally in Irish leader Daniel O’Connell, who was a vocal opponent of slavery.
7. The Black Irish of Montserrat Are Descendants of Irish and African Slaves
The Caribbean island of Montserrat has a unique population of Black individuals who proudly identify as “Black Irish.” This stems from the 17th century, when Irish indentured servants and African slaves were forced to work on plantations together. Montserrat even celebrates St. Patrick’s Day as a nod to its Irish heritage.
8. Phil Lynott, the Black Irish Rock Legend
One of Ireland’s most famous Black figures is Phil Lynott, the frontman of the legendary rock band Thin Lizzy (“The Boys Are Back in Town”). Born in 1949 to an Irish mother and a Guyanese father, Lynott helped shape rock music and is celebrated as an Irish music icon.
9. Emma Dabiri is Leading Conversations on Black Irish Identity
Irish-Nigerian author and academic Emma Dabiri has been at the forefront of discussing Black identity in Ireland. Her books, including Don’t Touch My Hair, explore race, culture, and the often-overlooked history of Black people in Ireland.
10. Ireland Is Becoming More Diverse Than Ever
Today, Ireland is home to a growing Black community, with many people of African descent contributing to the country’s cultural, political, and artistic landscape. The 2022 Irish Census recorded over 70,000 Black Irish residents, showing that Black history in Ireland is far from over—it’s still being written.
Black Irish history is rich, complex, and deeply interwoven with global movements of people, power, and culture. Recognizing this history helps break stereotypes and highlights Ireland’s long-standing connections to Africa and the African diaspora.
No one talks about who did it first and inspired the NAACP to do a publicity stunt in which Rosa Parks did it.
Claudette Colvin
Claudette Colvin is a civil rights activist who, before Rosa Parks, refused to give up her bus seat to a white passenger. She was arrested and became one of four plaintiffs in Browder v. Gayle, which ruled that Montgomery's segregated bus system was unconstitutional. Colvin later moved to New York City and worked as a nurse's aide. She retired in 2004.
Claudette Colvin was so important to the movement but so few people know who she is. Rosa Parks did what she did because Claudette was pregnant and unmarried at the time. The activists who were promoting her case thought that her circumstances would be used to discredit her, and they were almost certainly right. A pregnant unmarried teen would be dragged through the mud today, let alone 1955.
It's so wild that people think that the Civil Rights era was so removed from us. Claudette Colvin is still alive. She was only around 65 in 2004. I was a child in 2004. My mom is only 10 years younger than her. A lot of the people who fought for our rights are still living today. So are the people who tried to stop them.
This is what’s known as a physique film, and it is vintage gay porn. Actual gay pornography was illegal in the 50s, so people created short films like these that existed in a legal gray area - the (paper thin) excuse is that they are about bodybuilding and fitness. No sex happens in physique films, nor any full-frontal nudity, just a lot of the kind of thing you can see in these gifs. The film reels would be ordered by people through the mail (via physique magazines - which were magazines of homoerotic photography along the same lines as these films) and would not have been screened in theatres, so they would not be subject to the Hays Code. These were extremely legally dubious nonetheless. Physique films and magazines were dangerous to make, distribute, and consume because of obscenity laws, and most of the important figures in the industry were arrested at least once.
and a shoutout to the two Māori men who travelled to Vienna in 1859, got themselves apprenticed as printers (and incidentally became accomplished ballroom dancers), and finally had an audience with Franz Josef where they charmed him so much that he sent a printing press to New Zealand….which was promptly used from 1861 to print the newspaper of the Kingitanga anti-colonial movement.
After looking through the evidence, both, but moreso the second.
Ea-Nasir's tablet is dated to 1750 BC, which is coincidentally aligns to the death of Hammurabi. For context, he lived at the end of the Isin-Larsa Period, a time in Babylonia's history where it was a collection of warring city-states. Ur and Larsa were the most powerful of these, since they were farthest south and controlled most of the trade coming up the Persian Gulf. (Isin, near where Hammurabi was from, was in the North and had lost power about 200 years before.)
Right after Hammurabi's death, all the city-states he'd conquered, including Larsa and Ur, decided that they didn't give two squats what the people in the North thought, and started a rebellion.
The tablets in Ea-Nasir's house have been translated. It's very difficult to find them, but the book is called Foreign Trade in the Old Babylonian Period, Leemans 1960, and he makes a series of interpretations that still align with our understanding of the culture today:
Ea-Nasir was hot-headed. 3 tablets note him talking rudely to messengers and traders.
Ea-Nasir sold copper to private merchants AND the temple, which was the government of Ur. The receipt we found is in such a large quantity we can assume the government was likely his primary buyer. The complaint tablets are from notably from private merchants.
Ea-Nasir was an alik-Tilmun; or 'one who travels to Dilmun'.
Where is Dilmun? Good question! Archaeologists spent the next 40 years figuring it out! At this point, they're fairly certain it's in present-day Qatar. The city was used as a midpoint port to bring in copper from Magan and Meluhha (current-day UAE/Oman and India respectively.)
The reason we know this, is because Oman is an old, old copper-producing region. It's an ophiolite (rock from the seafloor that's been uplifted to the surface) that contained a spreading center (think Mid-Atlantic ridge) which forms deposits of copper and other metals as sulfides from the black smoker vents (copper-iron sulfur, lead sulfur, zinc sulfur, etc.)
To produce copper, you have to remove the iron and the sulfur. To remove the iron, you add "flux", which essentially bonds iron to silica, because it likes silica more than copper does. And to remove the sulfur, you add oxygen, which burns off the sulfur as gaseous SO2.
The copper is heavier than the iron and silica, and sinks to the bottom of the furnace. The iron and silica, slag, flow out the side. The resulting ingot looks like the bowl below. And a lot of times, holes remained from gas getting trapped at the bottom.
They measured copper by weight though, so this wasn't too much of a problem. However, if there weren't enough flux, or the fire wasn't hot enough, iron would also get trapped in the copper ingot, making "black copper"; if a merchant wanted the 97% pure copper that could be made using this process, a lot of iron would definitely be considered 'bad copper'.
Switching back to the culture!
Around 1800 BC, the same time as this was going on, the culture of Oman underwent a noticeable decline. Many of their coastal mines stopped producing copper and people moved inland. They also stopped making bronze with tin. This is notable, because tin was scarce in the Bronze Age and insinuates they might've been left out of the trade route. At the very least, they had stopped being Mesopotamia's primary supplier and started doing their best to keep up with the times.
(At this point, I'll point a finger to Cyprus, which was firing up its smelters at the same time. Cyprus is very interesting, but it pertains less to Ea-Nasir, so I'll just wave enthusiastically at their oxhide ingot copper and tin trade domination.)
So we can't know if Ea-Nasir wasn't a chronic scammer, but I think all the evidence outlines a different story.
Ur, a powerful city-state rebelling against a conqueror within Ea-Nasir's lifetime. Ea-Nasir, selling large amounts of copper to the government, and smaller sales to private merchants who complained about being given scraps; a man who was still traveling to trade copper in a state that had lost their monopoly on the copper trade and was possibly producing some less-than-ideal quality.
He mostly sounds like a person with strong ties to his city and culture. Maybe not the best copper merchant, but certainly a passionate one.
References below the cut:
Velde, C. (2003). Wadi Suq and Late Bronze Age in the Oman Peninsula. Archaeology of the United Arab Emirates, 102–113.
Bibby, G. (1970). Looking for Dilmun (Second Edi). Alfred A. Knoff, INC.
Olijdam, E. (2014). From rags to riches: three crucial steps in Dilmun’s rise to fame (poster). Proceedings of the Seminar for Arabian Studies, 44(July 2013), 277–286.
Forbes, R. J. (1950). Metallurgy in Antiquity. EJB. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.207.4426.50
Leemans, W. F. (1960). Foreign Trade in the Old Babylonia Period. Leiden, E.J. Brill.
Kassianidou, V. (2013). The Production and Trade of Cypriot Copper in the Late Bronze Age. An Analysis of the Evidence. Pasiphae. Rivista Di Filologia e Antichità Egee, VII, 133–146. www.libraweb.net
Khol, P., & Bertille, L. (2008). By Land and By Sea: The Circulation of Materials and Peoples, ca. 3500 - 1800 B.C. Intercultural Relations Between South and Southwest Asia: Studies in Commemoration of E.C.L. During Caspers (1934 - 1996) BAR International Series 1826, 1826, 29–42.
Giardino C., (2019). Magan - The Land of Copper: Prehistoric Metallurgy of Oman. Ministry of Heritage and Culture - Sultanate of Oman (2019).
what do you mean elon musk did a nazi salute on live tv at the united states presidential inauguration twice and is now erasing the evidence off the internet by replacing the footage with the crowd cheering instead?
would be a shame if people reblogged this, wouldn’t it?
Ok so, yes, it's a shame we didn't get to see Irish reunification for the year 2024. But also, please consider that the source of The Troubles is not so easy to fix. It's nice to wish Star Trek had predicted reunification (I certainly did), but we need to look at reality without putting on blinders. And really, if we want to live to see Irish reunification, we have to understand how much it's going to take to heal what tore the people apart.
As a reminder from my pinned post, mostly for clarity, I'm an American. I will not speak for a country I don't live in. I've never even visited Ireland (though I certainly would if I could). But I do have Irish ancestors, so I very much consider the Irish of Ireland proper to be my cousins across the Atlantic. And the memefication of reunification has been very fetishistic. I saw it pointed out at some point within the last year or so, and I was never able to see the memes the same since.
I still choose to believe in a future reunification as long as that's what the Irish people themselves want. Just because it doesn't fit a meme, it doesn't mean it can't happen, and it definitely doesn't mean we won't see people celebrating everywhere when it does. I'm always going to be ready to give a great big toast come that day.
All that said, I wish anyone reading this a blessed and prosperous New Year. One step at a time, one day at a time. We'll get there, wherever we're all going. Even a little step is still a step.
has anyone made a post about hayao miyazaki receiving the magsaysay award in the philippines and in letter talking about how japan committed war atrocities and that japanese people should acknowledge this or do i have to do it myself
The Ramon Magsaysay Awards presentation ceremony took place in Manila, the Philippines on November 16.Asia’s premier pr...
The Ramon Magsaysay Awards presentation ceremony took place in Manila, the Philippines on November 16.
Asia’s premier prize and highest honor was awarded to Japanese animation director Miyazaki Hayao, who was not able to attend the ceremony.
Studio Ghibli's director Yoda Kenichi went on the stage and read comments by Miyazaki during the ceremony.
The Japanese people did a lot of terrible things during the war and killed many civilians, the letter said. The Japanese people must not forget this, and it will remain with them forever, it said.
Miyazaki also wrote that he solemnly accepts the fact that the Philippines is presenting the honorable award to him.
The award’s foundation has praised Miyazaki’s films for tackling complex issues such as environmental protection and the protection of women’s rights through his work, and for trying to teach children these complicated issues.
Although there were planes used against the miners in the Battle of Blair Mountain, it is not true that this was the first time planes were used to drop bombs on American soil against Americans.
The Battle of Blair Mountain took place in August and September of 1921. Just a few months prior to that, on May 31 and June 1, planes were also used to help destroy the Greenwood district of Tulsa, Oklahoma, a prosperous black neighborhood nicknamed The Black Wall Street. At least 39 people died during the event, which is known as the Tulsa Race Massacre. Hundreds were wounded, and 6,000 black people lost their homes.
Both of these events were hugely important moments in American history.
Ask yourself why neither was taught to you in school. Also ask your local school board.
Yeah, it really doesn't do the government well to teach children that it's willing to attack its own citizens as such, if they want us to trust them anyway. You have to learn about it elsewhere, or later when you've got a good college or university history professor. Grade school history is more sanitized for various reasons.
One time I was talking about Robin Hood with some coworkers and one guy was like “he was bad because the people he helped learned to expect handouts” and I wanted to be like… okay can you explain how that flawed capitalist propaganda applies to feudalism
That’s an exaggeration. What was invented in the 16th century was mercantilism. Capitalism really dates for the beginning of the nineteenth century, with the rise of industry and cash crops over artisans and merchants. Vulture capitalism, with the notion that companies have no duties other than generating profit, is even younger.
I think a lot of this comes from the fact that most people don’t know the formal definition of capitalism. We all know the word, we’ve all seen the jokes, but very few people bother to actually define it unless they’re talking about political theory and philosophy, so it’s easy to end up with the impression that Capitalism = Money Can Be Exchanged For Goods And Services.
Capitalism is the economic system where most of the means of production (i.e. everything people need to have to make the stuff that everyone wants) are owned by private individuals or corporations, who then hire people to provide the labor necessary to produce things, with the intent of selling the output at a profit. It’s the difference between “you’re a carpenter and you make a chair and you sell it” and “you’re Richard Q. Richington who owns a chair factory, and you pay people to sell the chairs you paid other people to make and then all the excess money goes back to you.” There have been Richard Q. Richingtons on and off throughout history, but that being the norm for every single industry is a pretty recent development.
My teacher explained "anata" is strange to call someone else, as you'll only hear it be said by women to their husbands. But in cases where you have to use a second person pronoun because you don't know the name, it's impossible to avoid (you will see it in video games). It's less so rude and more so strange to hear.
I don't know how accurate it is but he is from Japan
Calling "anata" as their husband is said originally began in Edo period. Daimyo was ordered to live in Edo and their territory regularly (it was intented to cost lots of money by Daimyo not to have stronger power than Tokugawa-shogun)
So many samurai left from their home with their master, then their wife started to call them anata( means faraway) At the same time, there is another second pronoun "sonata" for the person who is in front of the single pronoun person, and it's also an old pronoun.
Now, Japanese wives don't call their husband anata, and it's old fashioned......
Anata is politer than kimi for strangers! My landlady says if any foreign stranger called her "kimi" at first, she may feel what a rude person or which manga or anime he/she chose to learn Japanese. Now she's surprised at that some Japanese language teachers tell a lie about the word "anata". "Anata ha doko kara kimashitaka? "is politer than "Kimi ha doko kara kimashitaka?" as you want to say "Where are you from?" Never use kimi for strangers especially to elder people...
imagine being a totally random dude and all you want to do is catch some fish and then you get stranded in this weird, gigantic foreign kingdom and they make you the utmost authority on your language and literally all you wanted was to catch fish
I plan to do more with this sideblog after my classes end next month, but it'll also be after I've taken a bit of a break to relax. I put way too much pressure on myself and now risk falling into burnout. I'm only a part time student, but I had quite a bit of medical stuff going on just going into the semester. Some of it was scheduled last minute, too. I'll probably just start with some things from my classes, especially since I've been taking Contemporary World History and American National Government this semester.
I'll probably get around to adding my main blog to the pinned post later. That's been the plan for a while.
Fun fact! Water actually turns “blood red” when it is contaminated by sulfur creating sulfuric acid. And scientists have discovered that around the time of the plagues a volcano went off that disturbed Egypt’s environment. So the plagues are scientifically proven. The other parts of the plagues are explained by the sulfuric acid river making the animals leave the river and escaping into the human population.
if anyone wants a full list heres how they happened:
basically they all stem from a massive eruption of a volcano on the island of santorini off the coast of greece. the ash then floated over to egypt which kickstarted the plagues
1) blood: the ash carried the mineral cinnabar, which has the capability of turning water red
2) frogs: the ash also had many toxic and acidic substances so naturally, all the frogs are gonna flee the river
3) lice: given what was going on insects would have burrowed into dead animals/peoples skin and laid eggs, which then hatched
4) beasts: everything is getting poisoned from the ash and toxins, causing animals to freak the fuck out/die
5) pestilence: toxins again
6) boils: the ash would have caused storms that carried acid rain which when it fell, would irritate peoples skin causing boils
7) hail: the storm again
8) locusts: again with the insects and the amount of dead bodies and such which attract more insects. a lotta insects basically.
9) darkness: the ash covered the sky, blocking out the sun
10) slaying of the first born: given that children’s bodies were found in higher numbers than others, some archeologists think they may have been sacrificed to stop all the destruction, but they aren’t 100% sure about that. this is just me but I would say another possibility is that babies/kids are a lot more susceptible to toxins and shit, so while an adult may have been fine or gotten a bit sick, it might have been very dangerous/deadly for kids or babies
the volcano would also attest for the parting of the sea weirdly enough. the red sea was in fact the ‘reed’ sea, and was very shallow, probably waist deep or so. given the amount of shit dumped into the ocean from the volcano, this wouldve caused a tsunami to head towards egypt. the water would get sucked out from the reed sea right before the tsunami hit, letting people pass it easily, then the actual tsunami would hit, fuckin up anyone who tried to follow.
another theory is that the red water was caused by algae, which would cause the frogs and stuff to jump out as well. the algae also carried substances toxic to animals so if they ingested any they’d get sick and die, so more insects. in this theory there was a sand storm coincidentally that caused the rest
The volcano wasn’t ON Santorini - it WAS Santorini, then called Thera. It completely blew away the Minoan settlements on the island and was one of the largest eruptions in human history.
The tsunamis from the Theran eruption devastated Crete, weakening the then-powerful Minoan civilization, leaving them open to being invaded by the Mycenaeans.
The volcanic winter it created devastated crops in China leading to the fall of the Xia Dynasty.
The abrupt and catastrophic loss of the people of Thera may have also inspired the myths about Atlantis.
I love that if you really boil all this information down, what you get is something approximating “the sinking of Atlantis caused the 10 Biblical plagues of Egypt” which is, like, one of the greatest mythological mash-ups I have ever heard of.
