run, he has a gun © Lilly Schwartz 2012

This is a picture of my screen again. I had an illustration open from the book called “Latium” published by Athanasius Kircher in the 17th century. I think, this book is actually about architecture in a certain region of this name in Italy – my Latin is a bit rusty – and this strange scene is a little detail in a much bigger picture showing a palace or something. I was really surprised, because it not only looks oddly out of place, but it actually also looks like one of them has a gun. Immediately I wondered whether at that time they even had guns and it turns out that yes, but not for a very long time. There had been fought already one battle with pistols before this book was published. Very odd.