Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2018 May 29

= May 29 =

(British) Royal Patronage in the Republic of Ireland
Being a follower of Rugby Union, I'm aware of the RDS Arena in Dublin, which led me to read up on the Royal Dublin Society. From this I learnt of the extensive List of Irish organisations with royal patronage, many of which, like the Royal Dublin Society, are extant and continue to operate with a "Royal . . ." name.

Naïvely, I as an Englishman would have expected names alluding to and and associations with British royalty to have been dropped, if not following the creation of the Irish Free State in 1922, then surely after the declaration of the Irish Republic and withdrawal from the Commonwealth in 1948. I can understand such retention in the cases of pan-national organisations like the Royal National Lifeboat Institution whose operations cover both Ireland and the UK, but not for those relating purely to the Republic. Perhaps some of our Irish Editors can enlighten me?

(To forestall suspicions, may I say that I have absolutely no political agenda in asking this question. I like Ireland, have visited the country twice before, will likely do so again next year (for the 77th World Science Fiction Convention) and am genuinely curious.) {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 90.197.26.63 (talk) 02:25, 29 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Well it looks like there was at least one organization that dropped the "Royal" from its name: the Institute of Engineers of Ireland. As for the general question, I presume people just didn't think it was that big a deal. It's not like Ireland tried to erase its history of British rule, and renaming an organization, especially one that's been around a long time, is a big pain, since you have to change everything with the name on it. Some organizations might actually want to keep it, as it connotes that the organization is prestigious and has a long history. --47.146.63.87 (talk) 03:43, 29 May 2018 (UTC)


 * I think that sectarianism may be at play here: From Protestantism in the Republic of Ireland: "Symbols of British influence were seen as an integral part of the Protestant tradition during the interwar period between World War I and II, however the Free State's intent on removing them was viewed by southern Protestants as sectarian". Also Anglo-Irish people: "...a social class in Ireland, whose members are mostly the descendants and successors of the English Protestant Ascendancy". It seems likely to me that the RDS (which organises horse shows etc) and similar organisations are, or have been until recently, dominated by those of a certain background. Alansplodge (talk) 14:57, 2 June 2018 (UTC)

Who lends money to private equity firms' subsidiaries?
When Borders (Asia Pacific) in Australia was placed into administration, the private equity firm which owned it (Pacific Equity Partners) made sure they walked away with the proceeds of the liquidation (by having placed "charges" on all the company's possessions), whilst leaving the creditors to suffer the losses. (To be fair, they offered the creditors 3c in the dollar).

Toys R' Us is another example of the games Private Equity firms play, in this case a leveraged buyout. Basically, a "heads you win, tails we lose" for the creditors who funded the buyout.

This being the standard modus operandi of Private Equity firms, I have an obvious question: Who, in their right mind, is providing the credit to these subsidiaries of the Private Equity firms? If I was approached asking to provide credit to a subsidiary of a private equity firm, I would RUN. Obvious reason being, if the subsidiary fails, the "parent" private equity firm will make sure IT walks away with the proceeds of the liquidation, whilst leaving the unsecured creditors high and dry. Banks are not dumb, I would think. So what gives? Who, for example, provided the credit for the leveraged buyout of Toys R' Us, even if the company was pledged as the supposed collateral? A stupid bank? Dumb bondholders? (My question is not limited to Toys R' Us, but to anyone who provides credit facilities to subsidiaries of private equity firms, without making the "preposterous" demand that the private equity firm itself guarantee the debt).

, just pinging you because you're our corporate expert. Others free to answer too, of course. Eliyohub (talk) 13:53, 29 May 2018 (UTC)


 * It's a good thing you pinged me, because I don't follow this page regularly these days, and this is something I do happen to know a bit about. Broadly speaking, a company like Borders or Toys R Us has three main groups of creditors:  Senior creditors, mezzanine creditors, and trade creditors.  Senior creditors (banks and bondholders, mostly) are secured creditors, and relative rights to security interests are governed by inter-creditor agreements.  So there is no mystery there.  Trade creditors are the suppliers of inventory and other business creditors (sellers of office supplies, fixtures, plumbing services, etc.).  They typically are unsecured and, therefore, junior to all secured creditors.  They would love to be secured creditors, and occasionally they have enough market power to make that happen, but more typically they find that they have to accept unsecured status in order to remain in business.  So there isn't really a mystery there either - a firm financed by private equity is not intrinsically riskier for a trade creditor than a comparable firm with similar credit.
 * That leaves mezzanine creditors (we have a brief article at mezzanine capital). These will be unsecured bonds and notes, and the holders of these, like trade creditors, are unsecured.  Why would anyone buy these?  These will have higher interest rates than the secured debt, and they may also come with equity kickers, such as warrants to purchase the company's common stock or a right to convert the debt into common stock.  These equity kickers can become very valuable if the company performs well.  So the reason why people are willing to buy mezzanine debt is that, over time and on average, the investment can perform very well, even though it can be fairly risky in a particular case.  John M Baker (talk) 15:03, 29 May 2018 (UTC)


 * Eliyohub -- I don't know the details, but from what I've read, the 2005 Toys-R-Us deal wasn't necessarily inherently "dumb" (like some of the packaged mortgage stuff in "The Big Short"), just timed very poorly with respect to the financial crisis which hit a few years later... AnonMoos (talk) 08:25, 30 May 2018 (UTC)

Universities in Middle East offering History program
Which universities in Saudi Arabia, Israel, Iran, United Arab Emirates, Turkey and Qatar offer History programs like so far I know that King Abdulaziz University in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia do? Donmust90 (talk) 15:56, 29 May 2018 (UTC)Donmust90Donmust90 (talk) 15:56, 29 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Most non-technical universities do. Look at Category:Universities in Lebanon, etc. Rmhermen (talk) 22:49, 29 May 2018 (UTC)

Supreme Court vote
I just saw a news article that says


 * The U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday for the second time this month put restrictions on police searches of vehicles, ruling that officers unlawfully searched a stolen motorcycle parked on private property in Virginia because they did not have a court-approved warrant. The 8-1 decision cast into doubt....

However, the article does not give the name of the case (which would have given me a name to search for on Wikipedia), nor does it answer my question, which is who made the one minority vote. Any references? Loraof (talk) 18:26, 29 May 2018 (UTC)
 * The short name is Collins v Virginia. The dissenter was Alito.  http://reason.com/blog/2018/05/29/supreme-court-rules-8-1-against-warrantl --Trovatore (talk) 18:28, 29 May 2018 (UTC)


 * Thanks! Loraof (talk) 20:42, 29 May 2018 (UTC)


 * Scotusblog.com is really good for coverage of the court.  Dragons flight (talk) 20:46, 29 May 2018 (UTC)


 * See article: Collins v. Virginia. -- The Anome (talk) 09:02, 30 May 2018 (UTC)
 * A useful read. The above description made me think the police had reason to believe the motorcycle was stolen before they searched it. While I'm not sure this would have made a difference it wasn't the case here. The police suspected the motorcycle was involved in a high speed chase but did not appear to know it was stolen. Also from reading a source our article used [//www.boston.com/news/politics/2018/05/29/supreme-court-limits-warrantless-vehicle-searches-near-homes], I've now corrected our article. It doesn't seem the search has been ruled unconstitutional/inadmissible. Only the specific exception related to vehicles has been ruled to not apply for constitutional reasons. The courts can still consider whether exigent circumstances were enough to allow the warrantless search. Nil Einne (talk) 10:54, 30 May 2018 (UTC)

Hegesias of Cyrene
Dear Ladies and Gentlemen

I am very interested into the life and teachings of Hegesias of Cyrene and was wondering, if you can give me some internet links and book tips regarding his life and teachings. The Wikipedia article is quite short and the links were not very helpful, so I would be very thankful for any other information and source you can give me.

Thank you for yours answers--2A02:120B:C3CC:FC50:509F:BF0A:1C6A:B882 (talk) 23:11, 29 May 2018 (UTC)
 * A little searching on the Web and in my own books persuades me that our article, Hegesias of Cyrene, together with its links, tells you just about all that's known of his life. As for his teachings, well, no works of his survive. --Antiquary (talk) 09:33, 30 May 2018 (UTC)

That is unfortunate. Have some works of his teachers survived or has everything been lost to the unforgiving sands of time?--2A02:120B:C3CC:FC50:95F9:124:F001:23C2 (talk) 11:27, 30 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Diogenes Laertius tells us he was a pupil of Paraebates, but I think that's the sum total of our knowledge of him, and if Hegesias studied under anyone else then I'm not aware of it. Sorry to be so discouraging but I really don't believe the kind of answer you were hoping for is possible. --Antiquary (talk) 12:04, 30 May 2018 (UTC)

Anyway, thank you very much for your help!--2A02:120B:C3CC:FC50:9D70:B236:49A:EE60 (talk) 13:42, 30 May 2018 (UTC)

Ancient Germanic Clothing and Fashion
Dear Ladies and Gentlemen

I am looking for a realistic and historically adequate visual representation of historically accurate Germanic clothing. I have seen many books on the subject, who only showed a romanticized, 19th century picture (Germanic men were shown with horned helmets and children with neo-gothic armor, despite that these types of clothing were highly anachronistic for the time).--188.60.207.197 (talk) 23:18, 29 May 2018 (UTC)


 * "Germanic" could cover quite a range of dates and places, from archaeological discoveries of Bronze Age clothing in Denmark, to the tribesmen that faced off against Roman legions, down to the early middle ages. For many of those times and places, there's little surviving relevant visual evidence... AnonMoos (talk) 01:06, 30 May 2018 (UTC)

Tacitus says that they were almost naked, which is hard to believe in such cold enviroment.--2A02:120B:C3CC:FC50:95F9:124:F001:23C2 (talk) 11:25, 30 May 2018 (UTC)


 * As I recall there are many cultural history museums in Europe, and some of them have collections of costumes. The only one I remember specifically is the Norwegian Museum of Cultural History. Some of these may have web sites for their book stores and/or their collections. Sorry, but my Google skills didn't find more, and I'm not sure what you classify as Germanic or ancient. -Arch dude (talk) 02:50, 31 May 2018 (UTC)

I mean the fashion of the people who lived across the Rhine, in antiquity (around the time of Gaius Julius Caesar). I apologize for my badly worded question, but I am a mere layman of ancient history.--2A02:120B:C3CC:FC50:C013:E0C6:9C92:77A1 (talk) 18:06, 31 May 2018 (UTC)
 * We have little idea, because we have virtually no documentation from those mostly pre-literate cultures themselves (and any we might have would likely not be much concerned with everyday clothing fashions), and the testimony of the contemporary neighboring culture we do have, i.e. Ancient Rome, was both relatively uninformed and largely propaganda justifying the Romans' agression against them by portraying them as barbarous savages (in the modern senses of those words).
 * One source would be Roman descriptions of Germanic migrants to, e.g., Rome (some of whom formed the Praetorian Guard and the Numerus Batavorum), but one would have to allow for their acculturation to Roman custom: another would be depictions on (the very few) artefacts such as the Gundestrup cauldron, to the extent they are useful in this regard. (Note that the said cauldron, though found in Jutland, is thought to be of Celtic craftmanship, but also that the distinctions between what we now label "Germanic" and "Celtic" may not have been very marked, recognised or consistent in that era.)
 * A third source would be (as mentioned by AnonMoos above) whatever clothing has been preserved on the various Bog bodies from the milieu, allowing for their large span of time and space, and their possible atypicality where their deposition might have been ceremonial or judicial.
 * Some of the illustrated volumes produced by Osprey Publishing, though militarily focussed, include depictions of more everyday clothing of the period dealt with, which will be as historically accurate as the volumes' researchers could manage; there are doubtless other similar publications of varying levels of scolasticism. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 90.202.160.23 (talk) 20:14, 31 May 2018 (UTC)