Royal Jewellery: From Coronations to Keepsakes

 

From Write Royalty:

Royal Jewellery: From Coronations to Keepsakes will feature “more than 300 pieces of jewellery from the 16th century to the present day, around two thirds on display for the first time,” the press release stated. “This unprecedented exhibition will bring together some of the most important and spectacular royal jewels in British history, many never exhibited publicly before,” explained Caroline de Guitaut and Kathryn Jones, co-curators of the exhibition, in the press release. “Each jewel carries with it a human story: of love and loss, power and politics, family and faith. Together, they have borne witness to the defining moments of royal lives and offer a deeply personal insight into the individuals and relationships that have shaped the monarchy across generations.”

As if to prove the exhibition’s bona fides, the Royal Collection accompanied that announcement with photos of 12 items that will be in the exhibition, which opens in June 2027. Some of the items are famous and have been publicly exhibited, such as the tiny diamond crown that Queen Victoria frequently wore perched on top of her head. (Read more.)

 

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Turn in the Fraud, Collect the Check

 From Tierney's Real News:

Today President Trump and Vice President JD Vance launched a new program called WHIP, the Fraud Whistleblower Incentive Program.

Here’s how it works. The Department of Justice is setting aside $25 million. If you send in a tip at fraud.gov and it leads to a conviction or a major enforcement action, you can get up to $30,000. The goal is simple: get ordinary people to report fraud in federal programs. Vance has led the administration’s fraud task force since March.

Trump also talked about a bigger idea. If a tipster helps recover a huge amount, like $1 billion or $10 billion, they could get a 1 percent “commission” cut, as long as they can prove the tip came from them. He said citizen journalists could qualify too.

Trump handed a $10,000 check to citizen journalist Nick Shirley for his work on Somali fraud. In 2025, Shirley made videos about Minnesota childcare centers that were getting federal money. His work led to investigations and arrests. Trump called the fraud in Minnesota a “horrible plague” in a “once beautiful state” and criticized Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, Peggy Flanagan and Ilhan Omar. I’ve been reporting on Somali election and immigration and welfare fraud in Minnesota since 2018 - I wish I could collect for that! I’d be a multi-millionaire!  (Read more.)

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New Light on Mysterious Rohonc Codex

 From The Greek Reporter:

A 16th-century letter has revealed new clues about the mysterious Rohonc Codex, a centuries-old manuscript whose unusual writing system puzzled scholars for generations. Dated June 28, 1571, the document offers evidence about the manuscript’s origins, its possible author, and its age. The discovery also challenges longstanding theories that the codex was a 19th-century forgery.

The findings come from research led by Benedek Láng, who examined the historical letter and four previously overlooked manuscript pages preserved in the Hungarian National Archives.

The Rohonc Codex contains 224 leaves and more than 80 illustrations, many depicting biblical scenes. Its unfamiliar symbols run from right to left. Like the mysterious Voynich manuscript, the Rohonc Codex attracted attention because of its unusual writing. It entered the Hungarian Academy of Sciences’ collection in 1838 through the Batthyány family library. (Read more.)

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A Most Controversial Queen

A review of Daughter of the Caesars from History from a Woman's Perspective:

Marie Antoinette is one of history’s most controversial queens. In this Catholic biography of Marie Antoinette, Mrs. Vidal states that by killing both Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette, the revolutionaries were killing the Catholic kingdom that they represented. This is because the goal of the French Revolution was to get rid of the Catholic church. The reason for this is because many Catholics were killed, especially those who were unwilling to convert. She also argues the popular misconceptions of Marie Antoinette that have been passed down for centuries and have been reinforced in Hollywood primarily the Marie Antoinette film starring Kirsten Dunst. 

     While many biographers highlight Marie Antoinette’s flaws, Mrs. Vidal emphasizes Marie Antoinette’s good traits. She grew up as a devout Catholic under Maria Theresa. She was a young girl who loved her family and when she was forced to move to France, it traumatized her so greatly that it took the French Revolution for her to mature. Marie Antoinette esteemed to be a moral woman and the reason for her conflict with Madame duBarry stemmed from her morals.  

    When Marie Antoinette became queen, she had many charities and adopted many peasants, including an African boy. She promoted women artists and women writers. She also sought to reform her corrupt court, making rules to uphold her morality. Mrs. Vidal also concludes that Marie Antoinette did not have an affair with Count Fersen and that she was faithful to Louis XVI. This is because Marie Antoinette wanted to be a moral queen. Also, if she did have an affair with Count Fersen, it would be considered an act of treason. It would also be impossible for her to conduct an affair because she was a public figure and everyone was watching her. 

    Not only did Ms. Vidal give a good portrait of Marie Antoinette, but she also gave a good insight into her husband Louis XVI. Louis XVI was also a devout Catholic. Unlike the myth of Louis XVI being a simpering fool, he was one of the most intellectual kings during his time. He knew many languages and had an acute understanding of politics. He agreed to help America because he was thinking of a long-term alliance. He thought that when France needed help, America would in turn help France in dire need. Contrary to popular opinion, Louis XVI was not opposed to change. He would have welcomed reform, just not the French Revolution. 

    Mrs. Vidal also overturned the popular misconceptions about Marie Antoinette’s friends, especially Princesse de Lamballe and the Duchesse de Polignac. The Princesse de Lamballe was one of the most intelligent people at Marie Antoinette’s court. She read a lot and was deeply involved in the politics of her time, which sometimes bored Marie Antoinette. She also had liberal leanings. Louis XVI feared Lamballe’s political influence on his wife so he steered her toward the Duchesse de Polignac, who had no inclination towards politics. The Duchesse de Polignac preferred simplicity and was a devoted mother to her children. She did not want to leave Marie Antoinette’s side during the French Revolution, but only did so when Marie Antoinette told her to think of her children. Throughout the Duchesse de Polignac’s days, she remained faithful to Marie Antoinette. When she learned of Marie Antoinette’s death, she died shortly thereafter because she was so heartbroken over her queen’s death. (Read more.)

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What Do Progressives Really Want?

 From The New Criterion:

It goes without saying that the socialists want everything free: free housing, free healthcare, free childcare, free pre-K; at the least, below-cost groceries. All this freeness will be paid for by “the rich.” Alas, there seems to be no plan for what happens when the money spigot runs dry because you’ve just confiscated all the assets of the people who made your society tick over. Repeated back-of-the-envelope demonstrations that “the rich” don’t have the wherewithal to pay for everything even if you suck up their last sou never faze these people. No, if only the “oligarchs” stopped picking everyone’s pockets, we’d all live on easy street. “Medicare for all” is also appealingly catchy. Yet Medicare reimbursement rates for hospitals average 10 percent below the break-even point; without overpayment by private insurers, the entire U.S. health system would collapse. Progressives aren’t big on math. Conservatives care about what works; leftists care about what should work.

This stuff is socialist same old, same old. More intriguing for me is the dsa’s proposition to eliminate the U.S. Senate, the presidency, and the Electoral College; axing ice is a mere kicker. Such a drastic revision of the Constitution would require an incalculable number of amendments, all approved by two-thirds of the House of Representatives and two-thirds of a Senate that would be voting for its own demise, as well as three-quarters of state legislatures to ratify them all. Really? In truth, the proposal is to rip up the Constitution, a prospect that would presently require nothing less than an armed popular uprising, perhaps a war between the New Mamdani Army and the federal government. Not that these folks are taking responsibility for promoting such a thing. After all, nearly every revolution other than the rather civilized American one has ended in catastrophe.

Yet these are also people who, despite rabble-rousing rhetoric, don’t really enjoy conflict. Ask any conservative podcaster how difficult, even impossible, it is to entice progressives to participate in a conversation with someone who actually disagrees with them. Trans activists reliably back out of media opportunities that would involve confronting their terfy critics face-to-face. Progressive views—on climate change, Palestine, dei, reparations, no-bail laws, men in women’s sports, abortion, welfare, and immigration—are a set menu. Individual leftists almost never deviate from this ideological rubber chicken. So progressives don’t only avoid conflict with their antagonists; they also avoid conflict with each other. (Read more.)

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An Exhibition of the Pink Diamond

 From Château de Chantilly:

From October 17, 2026, to January 3, 2027, the Condé Museum at the Château de Chantilly, in partnership with L’École des Arts Joailliers, is presenting an exhibition tracing the history of a legendary historical diamond: The Pink Diamond.

Known as the “Grand Condé,” the Pink Diamond is a historic stone weighing over 9 carats, documented in the collections of the Princes of Condé since the 18th century. This jewel, renowned for its exceptional color and provenance, was stolen in October 1926 but recovered shortly thereafter, hidden inside an apple.

A century later, the Pink Diamond is once again on public display as part of this special exhibition. To mark the occasion, the Musée Condé and L’École des Arts Joailliers have undertaken an extensive interdisciplinary research project—the first of its kind for a diamond of this caliber. Thanks to wide-ranging gemmological and historical analyses, all of its secrets are now being revealed. (Read more.)

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The Conservatism of Beatrix Potter

 

From The Bridgehead:

Paul Kingsnorth has been grappling with the question of how to live in this revolutionary age on his Substack “The Abbey of Misrule,” noting at the outset that: “The storm is here and an age is ending, but new and old hearts stay steadfast on the margins. God is not mocked, and reality bats last. In an age of Big Everything, small remains beautiful and shall, in the end, inherit the Earth.” In his concluding essays, he suggests that becoming rooted in “people, place, and prayer” are key parts of the answer.

Kingsnorth’s proposal reminded me of Potter, who was the sort of conservative who knew precisely what she wanted to conserve—and how. Potter was born in 1866 in Kensington, London, to Rupert and Helen Potter, joined six years later by a little brother, Walter Bertram. She spent her childhood cultivating a deep love of art and nature. She and Walter populated their home with a menagerie of pets, including rabbits, mice, frogs, lizards, snakes, salamanders, and a rotund hedgehog. Walter even had a pair of long-eared bats that he left with Beatrix when he went to boarding school. She painstakingly painted and sketched them all with astonishing skill.

 Potter’s pets and artwork turned into tales for children and in 1901 at the age of 36 she self-published the first edition of The Tale of Peter Rabbit after publishers turned her down due to her insistence that the price must be kept low to keep the story affordable for children. The following year, Warne & Co. published an abridged version to an enthusiastic public reception, and several sold out editions. They asked Potter for more, and a series of stories were published in swift succession. There would eventually be 33 in all, and Potter became one of the most famous children’s authors of all time. (Read more.)

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How Tens of Thousands of Somalis Were Resettled in Minnesota

 From The New York Post:

Two church non-profits have taken in at least $62 million to build the Somali community in Minnesota — leading to the rise of Ilhan Omar and the fraud scandals that have gripped that state, The Post can reveal.

Catholic Charities and Lutheran Social Services were at the forefront of reshaping the frigid Land of 10,000 Lakes thanks to generous government contracts stemming back generations.

“This is a very big pile of government money and a whole bunch of different groups have come to get their own slice of it,” Parker Thayer, an immigration expert at the Washington, DC-based Capital Research Center, told The Post. (Read more.)

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The Return of a Lost Tradition

 From Alan Liang:

For centuries, the Dominican Rite has stood as one of the most venerable and distinctive liturgical traditions in the Western Church. In the mid-13th century, as the story goes, and as highlighted by Fr. William R. Bonniwell, O.P. (A History of the Dominican Breviary, New York 1945), the young Dominican Order, scattered across Europe, wished to possess a uniform liturgy across their houses. After various attempts, the fifth Master-General of the order, Humbert of Romans, commissioned a new standard and imposed it on the order, and at the request of his successor, Bl. John of Vercelli, was confirmed by Pope Clement IV in 1267.

The Prototype manuscript Humbert commissioned miraculously survives to this day, originally kept at the convent of St. James in Paris, smuggled out during the tumultuous revolution, before being again acquired by the Dominicans in 1841, and now kept in the mother church of Santa Sabina in Rome. (Read more.)

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