51吃瓜

Porcupines are being hunted for onion-shaped masses of undigested plant material in their gut known as bezoars …. Demand is predominantly driven by China, where some believe that bezoars, which accumulate in the digestive tract, have potent medicinal properties, including the ability to cure diabetes, dengue fever, and cancer. No scientific evidence exists for any curative properties of bezoars.

Arabian doctors had been using bezoars since the 8th century, and brought them into western medicine in the 12th century as an antidote to arsenic, a favorite poison used to assassinate European nobles. By the 16th century, use of bezoars was widespread among the very rich鈥攖hey were valued at 10 times their weight in gold. Queen Elizabeth I even had a bezoar set in a silver ring.

Nationalist historians … wrote in a spirit of respect for their forefathers. Others went far beyond them and created another school of interpretation in which respect became a form of reverence. They inspired critics to coin a new word: 鈥�filiopietistic,鈥� having an excess of filial piety .鈥� In some of its forms, filiopietism was benign and highly constructive. It stimulated interest in early American history and supported serious scholarship on the American Revolution .鈥� But in other ways filiopietism could become malignant, when it shifted from celebration of one鈥檚 forebears to execration of others.

Since Lin-Manuel Miranda鈥檚 musical became a Broadway sensation and made the 1804 Burr-Hamilton duel 鈥渙f the moment,鈥� the field of Revolutionary and early republican American history has found itself caught in the crossfire. For those who prefer it that way, the men in powdered wigs are no longer dead white guys; they鈥檙e streetwise. It all sounds new, but it鈥檚 not. Every generation has refashioned the Founders in its own image, mixing patriotic lore with filiopietistic tales to enshrine America鈥檚 cherished ideals.

The singing Babushkas of Buranova have made a name for themselves, first as an Internet sensation and then at the Eurovision competition this year .鈥� Babushka is Russian for grandmother and these women are mostly in their 70s and 80s. Their story is sadly familiar in Russia. Many of these elderly women lost their husbands years ago to alcoholism or hard work. Searching for companionship, the babushkas of Buranova turned to one another and to music.

My own Siberian-born babushka, it must be said, does not go to the trouble of stewing short ribs for eight hours when she makes borscht. Nor does any babushka in my circle incorporate delectably astringent homemade garlic mayo into her spin on herring under a fur coat, an already laborious dish that involves prepping and layering potatoes, carrots, hard-boiled eggs, and beets atop pickled herring.