Nevertheless, old beliefs die hard, and in spite of rational explanations, the belief that lanternists could summon spirits persisted.

A gasser night than oxygen [recte Oxegen] 🐮 #ASolidAgCrew #AMess

Sir Richard Burton explored far into the African interior.

[W]e may surmise that there was a strong sense of Iranian unity lending solidarity to the eastern half of the empire. It is only in the generations after Alexander, in Eudemus and in Eratosthenes (ap. Strabo), that we find mention of the concept of a greater nation of Iran (Arianē) stretching from the Zagros to the Indus; but the sense of unity must have been there, for Herodotus tells us that the Medes were formerly called Arioi, and Darius I (followed by Xerxes) in his inscriptions proclaims himself an Iranian (Ariya) by race - he speaks of himself in ascending order as an Achaemenid, a Persian and an Iranian (Naqsh-i Rustam).