Hélio Pires
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heliuspirus.bsky.social
Hélio Pires
@heliuspirus.bsky.social
Viking Studies Historian (MA, PhD), author, polytheist, Buddhophile, Pratchett & Python fan, biker, hiker, road & trail runner, ecophile and linguaphile. Astronomy & dinosaur curious. Boomerang thrower and origami maker.

Posts in 🇵🇹 & 🇬🇧
This year's IMC was fun. No travel issues, no cancellations. Went straight to the bookfair Monday morning, enjoyed others' papers, found folks from last year, met new people, and discussed future projects. An overall positive experience.

And I still can't eat an English breakfast 😅
July 14, 2025 at 3:26 PM
Unusual of me to be doing this so late, but it's in the making and should be ready by Friday 🫡

Leeds IMC 2025 is just around the corner and I sure hope my flight does not get canceled like last year's...
July 1, 2025 at 11:54 PM
Não sei se estão a oferecer doces ou se quer tudo muito ir para a praia, mas eu estou habituado a ter 300 e tal votos ao final do dia e neste momento são já quase 200 dentro da urna.

Ainda nem sequer é meio-dia.

#legislativas2025
May 18, 2025 at 9:51 AM
That time I explained folks that Snorri's Edda is a poetry manual, not a work on Norse mythology, using as an analogy modern self-taught books 😅

Skaldic poetry for dummies. Learn to be an old-fashioned poet.

Skaldic poetry: learn to construct it on your own.
January 30, 2025 at 10:19 PM
The longest paper I've written thus far is thirty one pages long (including four of bibliography) and has ten maps.

And I just submitted it for publication.
January 30, 2025 at 8:40 PM
Feliz Solstício de Inverno!
Happy Winter Solstice!
Glad Vintersolstånd!
Hyvää Talvipäivänseisausta!
December 21, 2024 at 11:15 AM
In a not-so-distant-future, Europeans travelling to the US will be advised to have their shots in order & US Americans coming to Europe will be required to have theirs.

Congrats, US! You voted yourselves into underdevelopment.

www.reuters.com/world/us/tru...
Trump to discuss ending childhood vaccination programs with RFK Jr.
U.S. President-elect Donald Trump in an interview published on Thursday said he will be talking to Robert F. Kennedy Jr., his nominee to run the Department of Health and Human Services, about ending childhood vaccination programs.
www.reuters.com
December 13, 2024 at 1:42 PM
Começa na quarta, vai até sábado. Quatro dias sobre uma prática antiga e multifacetada (mas nem por isso menos atroz).

Eu vou falar na manhã do primeiro dia, mas se puderem vão a todos, que vai haver muita comida para a mente.
December 9, 2024 at 7:25 PM
🇵🇹 Serviço púbico... público!
🇬🇧 Pubic... public service!

🇵🇹 E a inscrição referida no terceiro skeet é esta – transcrita, transliterada, normalizada e traduzida para português.
December 9, 2024 at 11:56 AM
Cheguei à mesma conclusão ao ler artigos académicos brasileiros.

Não é só o sotaque e as expressões: é a própria estrutura da língua que está a mudar e a separar as duas variantes. Se não são dois idiomas distintos, caminham para tal. E isso não tem de ser uma coisa má.
Hoje deixei de defender o novo acordo ortográfico.
E, na verdade, estou pronta para aceitar que o Português de Portugal e o Português do Brasil já não são a mesma língua e que devem ser tratadas como línguas diferentes.
É incrível eu estar a adoptar uma opinião tão oposta daquela que sempre defendi
December 8, 2024 at 9:26 AM
Hyvää itsenäisyyspäivää, suomalaiset! 🤍💙🤍

(Hope I'm not forgetting a grammatical case ending)
December 6, 2024 at 2:50 PM
Topographic map of downtown Lisbon. The red cross signals the castle, the blue one the old inlet of the Tagus (nowadays part of the urban plot), the purple the low-lying area of Santos.

I may or may not be using it in a viking-related way.
December 6, 2024 at 1:23 PM
Se celebramos o 1° de Dezembro, também devíamos celebrar o 13 de Fevereiro. O primeiro foi o golpe que depôs o governo espanhol em Portugal, o segundo o tratado que pôs fim à Guerra da Restauração.

Ou pelo menos devia ser assim pela lógica dos celebrantes do 25 de Novembro ¯⁠\⁠_⁠(⁠ツ⁠)⁠_⁠/⁠¯
December 1, 2024 at 9:56 AM
This is a very niche skeet, but Montpellier maples (Acer monspessulanum) are native to Portugal and they're beautiful, yet very rare these days. Even finding them in tree nurseries is a challenge.

So it makes my morning a little better to see c.20 of them in a corner of Lisbon
November 30, 2024 at 11:20 AM
Isto é um skeet muito de nicho, mas a zelha (Acer monspessulanum) é uma espécie autóctone em Portugal e é linda, mas rara nos dias que correm. Até em viveiros é muito difícil encontrá-la.

Por isso, a minha manhã fica um pouco melhor quando eu encontro c.20 num recanto de um parque em Lisboa 💚
November 30, 2024 at 11:18 AM
It's like a Christmas card, only it's not, but it's just as good.

It's mostly red in colour, it's a treat offered by the IMC organizers, and I'll be talking about a Norwegian saint. All very much on Christmas topic.
November 29, 2024 at 7:17 PM
This is true. Man-made extinction of wildlife goes back thousands of years. The issue is much deeper than capitalism versus marxism (or whatever folks want to replace the former with).

Solving the ecological crisis requires a much wider and structural transformation.
To me this doesn't go deep enough. Ms Rooney mentions several times "the inhabitants of this shared Earth", referring only to humans: #anthropocentrism! We were responsible for the extinction of megafauna a long time before capitalism set in bsky.app/profile/jcsv.... Let's also examine root causes!
"Global ecosystem breakdown and soaring temperatures require us to think outside – and against – the framework of our current political system. If we want the children of today to have a future on this planet, we cannot keep obediently colouring inside the lines."

www.irishtimes.com/life-style/p...
November 25, 2024 at 4:17 PM
Eu ainda me lembro de à esquerda ter-se elogiado o Gouveia e Melo por, durante a pandemia, ter dito algo como "a democracia não se faz de homens providenciais."

Até se comentou que o 25 de Abril fez escola. E acho que foi o @danielolivalx.bsky.social (que me corrigirá se estiver errado).
November 24, 2024 at 6:13 PM
[A Portuguese thread on the link between Portuguese and Urdu, following a fact-checking report on public services in Portugal supposedly being offered in Arabic]

A migrar para o Bluesky um fio que eu publiquei no inferno do Moscão sobre uma notícia de instruções "em árabe" numa loja do cidadão.
November 24, 2024 at 1:23 PM
Optimist: the cup is half full

Pessimist: the cup is half empty

Thor while visiting Utgarða-Loki: what do you mean, the damn cup is still full?
November 24, 2024 at 12:25 AM
I have this small, personal project of nature restauration where I'm turning c. 1100 m2 of a family plot into a native grove, making use of naturally-grown Portuguese oak trees already in situ.

Been adding oak, maple, hawthorn, pine, laurel, strawberry, holly, carob, yew, poplar and pine trees.
November 23, 2024 at 2:39 PM
When I was like 8 years old, my grandparents gave me a History of Portugal in comics. Been hooked ever since.

Vikings came later in college.
November 19, 2024 at 12:34 PM
Accurate! 👌
What’s becoming clear after spending less time on Twitter is that the people who made it miserable think it’s their god-given right to make others miserable, and that you should be thanking them for the privilege
November 18, 2024 at 11:51 AM
So I'm writing the bibliography of a paper I'm finishing & there's a book with four places of publication. Four!

Seriously, is that info still relevant? It dropped out of use for journals & I've seen style guides telling authors to mention just one place of publication when there are two or more.
November 17, 2024 at 12:17 AM
O Paulito está de volta ao céu azul! Deem-lhe muito amor para ele ficar de vez!
Vamos lá trazer um bocadinho de História a esta rede:

Corrupção no império! Corria o verão de 1492 quando D. João II descobriu que um seu funcionário andava a meter dinheiro ao bolso há quase 12 anos! Vamos lá dissecar o caso de Diogo Fernandes, o escrivão que aldrabou o Príncipe Perfeito 🧵👇1/8
November 15, 2024 at 1:24 PM