I would say that anyone in salon is non-representative for the population at large when it comes to interest in history. ;)
I work in tech, a place famous for people with no interest or background in the humanities, and my baseline idea of "how much people know about history" is calibrated by having had to explain who the Medici were to someone who'd been to Florence and yet never heard of them (apparently the Italy trip was mostly for drinking), to explain that yes, Catholicism and Protestantism are kind of a big deal in Ireland, and to tell my boss recently that no, this 18th century history that I'm studying these days is not in fact the Renaissance.
At that point, I was stumped. "What exactly happened in the 18th century that he *has* heard of, that I can use to orient him?" I ended up saying, "American Revolution--but my friends and I aren't studying that, we're doing European history, and uh, gosh...Catherine the Great? Have you heard of her? Voltaire?"
I did not get the sense that he knew any of these names. Then he went,
"Yeah, I don't know anything about history, but my friend who's joining the company soon said the Romans invented slavery. That's not true, right? I don't know much, but I think I know that."
I do not foresee any of these people going, "But Hadrian didn't have mistresses!" in a movie theater any time soon. ;)
Re: Iconography
I work in tech, a place famous for people with no interest or background in the humanities, and my baseline idea of "how much people know about history" is calibrated by having had to explain who the Medici were to someone who'd been to Florence and yet never heard of them (apparently the Italy trip was mostly for drinking), to explain that yes, Catholicism and Protestantism are kind of a big deal in Ireland, and to tell my boss recently that no, this 18th century history that I'm studying these days is not in fact the Renaissance.
At that point, I was stumped. "What exactly happened in the 18th century that he *has* heard of, that I can use to orient him?" I ended up saying, "American Revolution--but my friends and I aren't studying that, we're doing European history, and uh, gosh...Catherine the Great? Have you heard of her? Voltaire?"
I did not get the sense that he knew any of these names. Then he went,
"Yeah, I don't know anything about history, but my friend who's joining the company soon said the Romans invented slavery. That's not true, right? I don't know much, but I think I know that."
I do not foresee any of these people going, "But Hadrian didn't have mistresses!" in a movie theater any time soon. ;)