HBA

Today, Vincent van Gogh stands as one of the most celebrated artists of the nineteenth century, and his painting, The Starry Night, completed in 1889, is not only one of his most famous works, but also one of the most famous paintings in the world. Yet van Gogh and his beloved painting were not always as famous as they are today.

Vincent van Gogh painted The Starry Night in 1889 while he was staying in Saint-Paul asylum in Saint-Rémy, France, where he lived for a year following a breakdown and the mutilation of his left ear. Painted with oil on canvas, the artist attempted to capture the view from the window in his room.

Though the painter preferred working from observation, he was not allowed to paint in his room, so he began painting the star he had seen in his studio without the view for reference, applying paint to the canvas directly from the tubes to create the image’s iconic thick lines and intense colors.

Created only a year before his death, The Starry Night is one of the paintings Jo van Gogh-Bonger inherited from her husband. 

Since the MoMA’s acquisition of the painting, viewers have been transfixed by van Gogh’s interpretation of the nighttime view from his window in Saint-Rémy, and The Starry Night now stands as one of the most famous works of Western art.

REF: www.artandobject.com

PIC: Insider, Encyclopedia Britannica, Far Out Magazine, The New York Times, My Modern Met

Children chase after ice cream trucks in the summer, the heartbroken dig into a pint after a break-up, and this frozen favorite fills entire aisles at grocery stores. But even though we all take it for granted these days, the question remains: Who invented ice cream?

This popular dessert wasn’t invented all at once. Rather, the invention of ice cream as we know it today took centuries.

Most sources seem to agree that the earliest “ice cream” came from China around 200 BCE The BBC and Reader’s Digest report that people ate a very early version of ice cream made of ice, rice and milk.

According to the International Dairy Foods Association, ice cream became widely available in the 19th century. And that’s when ice cream developed even more with the invention of “ice cream cones” and “ice cream sundaes.”

As such, the history of ice cream is a rich one. This tasty frozen treat has been in development, in one way or another, for thousands of years. And it’s arguably still being perfected.

REF: Allthatsinteresting.com

PIC: Allthatsinteresting.com, Encyclopedia Britannica, History Today, Reader’s Digest

When most people think of a drinking horn, they picture Vikings dressed in fur clothing and battle helmets guzzling mead after a day of raiding villages. While the Norsemen did use drinking horns, the history of the vessel is far more varied — and begins over 1,000 years prior to the Viking Age.

An ancient account from the Greek historian Xenophon of the Thracian leader Seuthes around the fourth century B.C.E. suggests that the horn was part and parcel of the Thracian way of life. The words Xenophon used to describe its use were “kata ton Thrakion nomon” or “after the Thracian fashion.”

Romans began using their own version of the drinking horn around the same time. Rather than the more primitive animal horns or the metal vessels adorned with the carved heads of animals that the Greeks preferred, the Romans made their version out of beautiful, decorative glass, according to The Vintage News.

Though it originated in antiquity, the drinking horn didn’t remain in the past. In the 19th and 20th centuries, lavish vessels made of ivory, gold, and porcelain emerged as decorative luxuries in Austria and Germany.

With such a diverse history, it’s clear that the Viking drinking horn is so much more than that. A storied item found in countless cultures throughout the centuries, the intoxicating vessel can still be seen today in museums and at dinner tables around the world.

REF: Allthatsinteresting.com

PIC: All That’s Interesting, Strange Ago-, Alamy, Museum Replicas

While Thomas Edison is credited with inventing the first practical incandescent bulb in 1879, the story of who invented the lightbulb is much more complicated. Indeed, Edison’s patent for the lightbulb was referred to as “an improvement” on existing models.

Throughout the 19th century, inventors searched for a safer and more convenient method of producing light to replace open flames or gaslighting. Electricity became the favorite alternative.

Meanwhile, Thomas Alva Edison was working across the pond to solve the same problems. The 31-year old inventor had 169 patents by that time and had established a research facility in Menlo Park, New Jersey.

Edison developed the infrastructure needed to make incandescent lighting a vital part of society. Edison and his team developed electrical plants to power homes at large and power meters to measure its usage.

In the end, it is Edison who is best remembered as the inventor of the lightbulb, in part for his penchant for publicity and his determination to make the lightbulb a common household item. Certainly, credit belongs to Edison as it was his design and his electrical infrastructure that set the tempo for the world’s lightbulb as we know it today. 

Perhaps it is fair to say that Edison’s genius was not so much in his innovation, but rather in his ability to apply practicality to inventions that otherwise may have just stayed in the laboratory.

REF: allthatsinteresting.com

PIC: allthatsinteresting.com, Live Science, www.history.com, Bricsys, Big Visioners-Medium

A medieval map may show evidence of a mythical landscape that is now underwater in what is now Cardigan Bay, Wales

A faded medieval map of Britain may reveal evidence of “long lost” islands detailed in Welsh mythology, a new study finds. 

According to Welsh mythology, the drowned land of Cantre’r Gwaelod had a ruler before the ocean washed it away.

REF: Livescience

PIC: GHIL, Alamy, The Times, History Extra