Mysteries of Montreal

Holmes statue in Edinburgh. I know this is outwith the normal bounds of my blog, but it is covered by the general mystery theme. There has been a new Sherlock Holmes Story discovered. I post the transcript here, as I'm pretty sure that the copyright on Holmes has long ago passed into the public domain. The story is less mystery, and more a peculiar little coversation between Holmes and Watson, clearly written to appeal to the guid-folks o' Selkirk. Anyway without too many spoilers, here is the full transcript of 'Sherlock Holmes: Discovering the Border Burghs and, by deduction, the Brig Bazaar'. The story of how it was found can be read here : 'We've had enough of old romancists and the men of travel, said the Editor, as he blue-pencilled his copy, and made arrangements for the great Saturday edition of the Bazaar Book. 'We want something up-to-date. Why not have a word from "Sherlock Holmes"?' Editors have only to speak and it is don...

I have previously posted on the Masks of Nyarlathotep campaign companion , as written by the good people over at yog-sothoth.com . Well, it seems the pdf of that companion is no longer available through the site directly. This is not the bad news it first seems however, as the reason it has been taken down is so that the book can be published through funding raised on this Kickstarter project , with the very generous support of Sixtystone Press . As of this post, there are 19 days left to go on the campaign, and the project has been easily funded (within 3 hours of launch), and marched through all but one of its (rather unadventurous) stretch goals. I have yet to place my support, but I will do, very shortly. One good thing about the lack of stretch goals is that the deadlines given for the project should be relatively easy to keep to, which is a good thing. If I were in charge though, I would change the artwork on the cover page. Not that it's bad, I just feel it's not gre...

Sir William Dawson 1884 My eye was drawn to this article as it passed my facebook feed the other day, as one that certainly requires more study, and fits well within the remit for this blog, so lets have a look at it then! Of course, the title of this article suggests a burial ground , but the reality is both more mundane, and, in other ways more exciting than that. This story is about the Dawson Site . Found in 1860, the Dawson site, so named due to the work there by John William Dawson ; it was an Iroquoian village and thousands of artefacts were found there, as listed in the link above for the site, most of which were concurrent with a village. Yes, 25 burials were also found, with a possibility of over 100 still in place.  Hochelaga, circa 1535 I heard an interview with a local  archaeologist on the radio yesterday evening, (so no source to link to, but it was likely the same one quoted in the above article) that suggested that, yes, there was the possibility o...

The Canadian maple leaf flag (or l'unifolié apparently) is 50 years old (well, it was yesterday, but really, who's counting). Famous for being carried proudly around the world by Canadian backpackers (and Americans claiming to be Canadians, to avoid getting shit). I find it completely weird that the maple leaf flag is only 50 years old. I guess it's just one of those things you take for granted in Europe, that your flag's history is pretty old. I mean, 50 years isn't that much older than me, at least in flag years! Take, for example, the Scottish Saltire . That thing has been around in Scotland in various official ways since 1180s, with the Union Flag being a modern addition to the flag world, being introduced in it's current form in 1801. So, for all those running a game based in Canada, during non-modern eras, beware of anachronistic flag usage. Make note of the flag that would be used during the time you base your game . Out of interest, the flag ...

The Internet says so, so it must be true! via The Watch House .