I’ll warn you ahead of time: today’s post is going to be a little different than my normal posts. Instead of blogging about history, I’m going to blog about history bloggers. If your eyes are beginning to glaze over, you can leave now and my feelings won’t be hurt. But you’re going to miss out on some good stuff. Honest.

Last week I was pleased to have a fellow Genghis Khan fan tag me for a Liebster* blog award.  For those of you who haven’t heard of it,** the Liebster award is a little like a blog chain letter. Someone nominates you.  You nominate another five blogs with (presumed) small readerships***.  In theory, they nominate five more. The idea is to introduce new readers to blogs you enjoy and hopefully give those blogs an increased readership.  Everyone wins.

First stop: The blogger who tagged me is novelist Bryn Hammond.  Her blog Amgalant is a treasure trove of information about Genghis Khan, the Mongols, and steppe culture in general.  If Central Asia fascinates you, she’s your girl. If it doesn’t fascinate you yet, she might give you a shove in that direction.

And now, drum roll please,  my nominations:***

1.  I loved Nancy Marie Brown’s The Abacus and the Cross: The Story of the Pope Who Brought the Light of Science to the Dark Ages so I was thrilled to discover her blog God of Wednesday.  She blogs about Vikings, Norse myth, Iceland, and miscellaneous things medieval.  I learn something new from her all the time.

2. Donna Segers’ Streets of Salem is local history at its best.  She uses the history of Salem, Massachusetts, as a jumping off point for topics large and small, from historical ephemera to world historical events.  Great photos and interesting commentary.

3.  My guess is that Two Nerdy History Girls, the blog home of novelists Loretta Chase and Susan Holloway Scott, has too many followers to really qualify for a Liebster. I’m including it anyway.  After all, what female history nerd can resist eighteenth century fashion and mores, historical hotties, and tough broads from the past?  Not me, ladies.

4. I don’t collect vintage clothing and I don’t know much about it, but Lizzie Bramlett’s The Vintage Traveler has me hooked.  She talks about the clothes, and does it in an interesting and intelligent way.  More important to me, she talks about the context for the clothes: the fashion industry, clothing manufacturers, cultural norms.  Smart stuff, and great pictures.

5.  Jack el-Hai tells stories about fascinating people from the past, well-known and obscure,  at Jack’s Blog.  There are some common threads (medicine, hypnosis, psychology, and the FBI come to mind), but the main thing that holds them together is Jack el-Hai’s formidable intelligence and wide-ranging curiosity. I learn something new even when I think I know the subject.

Five very different blogs. Go check them out.

*From the German for favorite

** Including me, up to a week ago.

***The rules I’ve read vary about how small is small, ranging from 200 to 3000 readers.

**** I going to limit my nominations to history blogs, which leaves out lots of other great blogs that I read, including some written by dear friends.  Sorry, guys.