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History Thread!


Jace, Extat

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3 hours ago, dmc515 said:

Not a big fan of history, don't think there's much to learn from it.

Dad jokes aside, I've always been acutely interested in 17th century England.  Politically, that's when the Western world was changed - from Hobbes to Locke.  When reading Hobbes' Leviathan I've always wondered about his weird capitalization.  Never seen that, even with Locke who was later nor Shakespeare which was earlier.  I dunno, maybe someone here can lend some insight on that.

I suspect the change came with Samuel Johnson's English dictionary, published in 1755. Before that there were  no standards in spelling or capitalization.  I guess Hobbs wanted to emphasize certain words and as there were no formal rules he figured this was  a good a way as any to do such.

There is also the fact that the 'great vowel shift' occurred when Hobbes was writing and  that may have had some influence also. Daniel Dafoe was writing around this time also. Do early editions of Robinson Crusoe or Moll Flanders show capitalization of certain words? 

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Considered posting something from local history (Menominee River and the Green Bay area), theres the War of 1812, but most of that narrative is East of here, a lot interesting shipwreck stories.

But the overwhelmingly significant story (to me) for most of history here is the overlooked (imo) 9000 yrs of indigenous peoples that first habitated this area, The First Peoples. I favor the Peoples History. 

 

Watched this Documentary last night- 

The Canary Effect is a documentary that looks into the effects of that the United States and its policies have on the Indigenous peoples (Native Americans) who are residents. It premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival  ...

 

 

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1 hour ago, DireWolfSpirit said:

 

The Canary Effect is a documentary that looks into the effects of that the United States and its policies have on the Indigenous peoples (Native Americans) who are residents. It premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival  ...

 

 

Going to have to watch this, I love Indigenous histories in any area.

The heart-breaking history in North America is the introduction of smallpox. :(  I'm so so sooooo grateful that it doesn't exist any more. More or less 100% fatality rate among people who had never had it, because centuries of our immune systems versus the virus' adaptability made it a superbug once it came into contact with Indigenous Americans.

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5 minutes ago, DireWolfSpirit said:

Yukle, I definately reccommend it, its a powerful, gripping and emotive documentary.

Sounds amazing!

Once the kids are asleep it's next on my list after Stranger Things

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Is anyone else kinda bummed out that we never got to see Phillip II and Alexander go ham on the Persian Empire at the same time?

Like, Alexander doing it is an all-time great. But what would both of them have looked like? Two of the greatest commanders of all time, and we were kind of historically cheated that we didn't get to see that.

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11 minutes ago, A True Kaniggit said:

Hannibal Barca says those Macedonian punks are lucky he wasn't born a century earlier, or else he would've had to show them what's what. 

Yeah, severe alcoholism and a lingering chest wound robbed us of seeing Macadonian Phalanxes conquering Carthage and then fighting the burgeoning Roman Republic!

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The one what event that wasn't to be that I kinda wish I could have read about was Caesar's planned campaign against the Dacians.

Dacia was ruled at the time by Burebista, who had, over the years, managed to subdue most of his kingdom's neighbors. Beat the shit of the Boii and other celtic tribes from central Europe, subdued the Greek colonies at the Black Sea, made alliances with others, and often raided Moesia. But the main reason why Caesar was planning a campaign against Burebista was to punish him for supporting Pompey in the civil war. 

Now some claim that Burebista could raise an army 200k strong. Whether that is true or not, I think the argument could be made that Burebista's kingdom was way stronger than the Gauls under Vergigentorix. So there is a debate among some historians about who would have won this war. Crazily enough, Burebista wasn't very popular with his nobles either, and he got assassinated the same year Caesar did, but a bit later, if I recall correctly. His kingdom fell apart after his death, never to reach such power again.

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For those who think history and the knowledge thereof don't matter -- and aren't even interesting, or have anything to do with politics -- for pete's sake there's even an entire exercise of the discipline that is called "political history" for a reason.  Also why the rethugs and technocrats sneer at the very idea, while still determined to own it.

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/02/books/review/arthur-m-schlesinger-jr-multiculturalists-monoculturalists.html?

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/02/books/review/arthur-schlesinger-biography-richard-aldous.html?

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Visited Budapest for a few days last week and the Hungarian national museum was spectacular...learned a good deal about Hungarian history and their archaeology collections are great!!! Lots medieval stuff :o that and my current medieval modules I'm taking for my masters is really heightening my love for medieval history and making me regret dropping it as an A level when I was 16 (and stupid)

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On 05/11/2017 at 0:07 AM, A True Kaniggit said:

Hannibal Barca says those Macedonian punks are lucky he wasn't born a century earlier, or else he would've had to show them what's what. 

Barca's rag tag army of mercenaries (even more so before the conquest of Hispania) against Philip's creation, the best combined arms system of its time? What has Hannibal done to you?

edit: keep in mind this is the time period Syracuse could stand against Carthage.

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3 minutes ago, Seli said:

Barca's rag tag army of mercenaries (even more so before the conquest of Hispania) against Philip's creation, the best combined arms system of its time? What has Hannibal done to you?

It could still go either way though... Not trying to start off a discussion, but while the hammer and anvil tactic is undoubtedly powerful, it is also quite formulaic. As long as Hannibal manages to take the companion cavalry out of the picture, Alexander would be essentially screwed. And Hannibal is the go-to guy to pull any kind of insane ambush or crazy awesome terrain usage out of his ass to achieve just that. For comparison, the Romans usually made piecemeal out of any lone phalanx at their time because Alexander's successors lacked the cavalry.

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8 minutes ago, Toth said:

It could still go either way though... Not trying to start off a discussion, but while the hammer and anvil tactic is undoubtedly powerful, it is also quite formulaic. As long as Hannibal manages to take the companion cavalry out of the picture, Alexander would be essentially screwed. And Hannibal is the go-to guy to pull any kind of insane ambush or crazy awesome terrain usage out of his ass to achieve just that. For comparison, the Romans usually made piecemeal out of any lone phalanx at their time because Alexander's successors lacked the cavalry.

Yes, and the phalanx had gotten heavier, losing the flexibility of the original Macedonian historical accident. If the time-transposition would have been the other way around I would rate Hannibal a lot higher.

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46 minutes ago, Seli said:

Yes, and the phalanx had gotten heavier, losing the flexibility of the original Macedonian historical accident. If the time-transposition would have been the other way around I would rate Hannibal a lot higher.

Wait. You don't think time travelling Hannibal is going it alone do you? He brought his army with him. The vets from Italy. Not the sorry SOBs he had with him at Zama after the Numidians switched sides. He's planning another invasion of a Mediterranean peninsula, and we'll see if the Macedonian Greek allies stay as loyal as the Roman Italian ones did. 

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1 hour ago, A True Kaniggit said:

Wait. You don't think time travelling Hannibal is going it alone do you? He brought his army with him. The vets from Italy. Not the sorry SOBs he had with him at Zama after the Numidians switched sides. He's planning another invasion of a Mediterranean peninsula, and we'll see if the Macedonian Greek allies stay as loyal as the Roman Italian ones did. 

That is not the original premise :P

But Rome was weird so that is unlikely. On the other hand the western Mediterranean Greeks had been fighting Carthage for centuries at that point, on the gripping hand even during the Persian wars many Greeks in Hellas were happy to side with the Persians (and of course Sparta was happy to take Persian money for fighting the Athenian empire). 

Oh on the next butterfly, does Alexander have all the wealth of the former Persian empire at his disposal, and advice from the people used to wielding it? Because in that case the very deep pockets are likely to harm any opponents.

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3 hours ago, Seli said:

That is not the original premise :P

But Rome was weird so that is unlikely. On the other hand the western Mediterranean Greeks had been fighting Carthage for centuries at that point, on the gripping hand even during the Persian wars many Greeks in Hellas were happy to side with the Persians (and of course Sparta was happy to take Persian money for fighting the Athenian empire). 

Oh on the next butterfly, does Alexander have all the wealth of the former Persian empire at his disposal, and advice from the people used to wielding it? Because in that case the very deep pockets are likely to harm any opponents.

Yeah, if Hannibal gets all these shiny toys, then Alexander can call on like 90000 Persians to supplement his 30 to 40 thousand Greeks.

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18 minutes ago, Pony Queen Jace said:

Yeah, if Hannibal gets all these shiny toys, then Alexander can call on like 90000 Persians to supplement his 30 to 40 thousand Greeks.

Hannibal says bring it. He figures if Alexander can beat 90,000+ Persians, then he shouldn't have a problem. 

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