ICYMI, Tuesday's links are here, and include the man-sized cages hanging from a medieval German Church steeple, the 732 Battle of Tours, beer that helps menopause symptoms, and wi-fi balloons for Puerto Rico.
If the Normans are disciplined under a just and firm rule, they are men of great valor, who... fight resolutely to overcome all enemies. But without such rule they tear each other to pieces and destroy themselves, for they hanker after rebellion, cherish sedition, and are ready for any treachery.
~ William the Conqueror (wiki) (deathbed speech, reported in Orderic Vitalis, Ecclesiastical History)
A French bastard landing with an armed banditti and establishing himself King of England against the consent of the natives, is, in plain terms, a very paltry rascally original.
~ Thomas Paine (1737-1809) (on the Norman Conquest, Common Sense)
William next invented a system according to which everybody had to belong to somebody else, and everybody else to the king. This was called the Feutile System, and in order to prove that it was true, he wrote a book called the Doomsday Book (wiki), which contained an inventory of all the Possessions of all his subjects; after reading the book through carefully William agreed with it and signed it, indicating to everybody that the Possessions mentioned in it were now his.
Today is the anniversary of the Battle of Hastings (wiki) in 1066, in which William the Conqueror (wiki) initiated the Norman conquest of England by defeating the forces of the Anglo-Saxon King Harold, who was killed in the conflict (although there's been recent speculation that Harold survived). William, Duke of Normandy, had been promised the English throne by his cousin, Edward the Confessor (reigned 1042-1066), and Harold, earl of Wessex, had sworn agreement to that succession. However, with the death of Edward, Harold crowned himself king, leading William to mount a sea-borne invasion to assert his own right.
Landing his army on the south coast of England, he confronted Harold at Hastings, routed the Anglo-Saxon army, declared himself King William I, and ultimately established Norman hegemony over all of England.**
By establishing a network of castles and strong points, including the Tower of London, William brought order to the country and reigned until 1087, when he was succeeded by his son William II. The Norman invasion and the events leading up to it are exquisitely portrayed on the Bayeux Tapestry (actually an embroidery 75 yards long), which was made within a few years of the Conquest, likely in southern England.
On the ceremonial gateway to the World War II British military cemetery for the dead of Normandy at Bayeux, one finds the apposite Latin inscription,
NOS A GULIELMO VICTI VICTORIS PATRIUM LIBERAVIMUS
(We, once conquered by William, have now set free the Conqueror's native land.)
* N.B. Subtitled, "A Memorable History of England, comprising all the parts you can remember, including 103 Good Things, 5 Bad Kings and 2 Genuine Dates." Still amusing after 80 years.
** It is not often remembered that just prior to Hastings, Harold and his hard-pressed army had been forced to repel a Norse invasion in the north of England, and it required a forced march to the south for them to meet the Normans.
Shortly after the Normans conquered England in 1066, their monarch, William, seized all of the lands, then divvied up control among those soldiers and nobles who helped him defeat the Anglo-Saxons (and keeping a fair bit for himself). However, as dramatic as that was, it is even more shocking that today, most of Britain remains in the hands of the descendants of those early Norman conquerors.
Croatian cellist Ana Rucner performs the 'Ode To Joy' from the fourth (and final) movement of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony(wiki). It was based on a poem by the same name by German poet, playwright, and historian Friedrich Schiller (wiki). An English translation of the adaptation used by Beethoven is below the video.
If you grew up as a Protestant, you'll probably recognize the music from the hymn "Joyful, Joyful, We Adore Thee" (also known as The Hymn To Joy) by Henry van Dyke. The lyrics were written by Van Dyke with the intention of setting them to this particular music. A performance at the Royal Albert Hall in London is at the bottom of this post.
Watch the whole thing as the tempo and joyful nature of the images increase. Watch full screen, and, if at home, with the volume turned up.
In 2011, a giant puppet merrily loitered around the village of Dromore West in Sligo, Ireland, interacting with passers-by in a drunken stupor. Called ‘Arthur’, the character was controlled by a man on stilts, who would have perhaps also been under the influence of alcohol to pull off that convincing drunk walk.
The video was taken at Fleadh Cheoil, an Irish music and arts festival wherein musicians from different counties compete to become All-Ireland champion.
This 2 minute film was directed by French filmmaker Georges Melies (wiki). It starts off with a fat woman and a lean woman wrestling but then they morph into a fat man and a lean man (played by Melies). Obviously the standards of what is considered fat has changed since then.
The special effects are surprisingly good - Melies was a pioneer in the use of stop edits, dissolves, and double exposures in motion pictures. There are a couple of sequences, in which one of the men gets flattened or decapitated/dismembered before being brought back to life, that demonstrate some of these techniques.
Here's one of his most famous films, A Trip to the Moon (Le Voyage dans la lune) from 1902 - it will make more sense if you read Wikipedia's plot summary before watching:
ICYMI, Monday's links are here, and include and include nose hair extensions, body organs you can live without, Columbus Day, the 4.5 million pieces of undelivered mail that piled up in the Washington, D.C. Dead Letter Office during the Civil War. and some remastered and colorized images from the Civil War era (including Lincoln and Mark Twain).
A victorious line of march had been prolonged above a thousand miles from the rock of Gibraltar to the banks of the Loire. The repetition of an equal space would have carried the Saracens to the confines of Poland and the Highlands of Scotland; the Rhine is not more impassable than the Nile or Euphrates, and the Arabian fleet might have sailed without a naval combat into the mouth of the Thames.
Perhaps the interpretation of the Koran would now be taught in the schools of Oxford, and the pulpit might demonstrate to circumcised people the sanctity and truth of the revelations of Mahomet.
Modern historians have constructed a myth presenting the victory as having saved Christian Europe from the Muslims. Edward Gibbon, for example, called called Charles Martel the savior of Christendom and the battle near Poitiers an encounter that changed the history of the world... This myth has survived well into our own times... Contemporaries of the battle, however, did not overstate its significance. The continuators of Fredegar's chronicle, who probably wrote in the mid-eighth century, pictured the battle as just one of many military encounters between Christians and Saracens - moreover, as only one in a series of wars fought by Frankish princes for booty and territory.
~ Tomaz Mastnak (b. 1953) (Crusading Peace: Christendom, the Muslim World, and Modern Europe)
Charles Auguste Steuben, The Battle of Poitiers*
It produced Charles Martel, the soldier who turned the Arabs back at Tours, and the supporter of Saint Boniface the Evangelizer of Germany. This is a considerable double mark to have left on the history of Europe.
October 10 is the anniversary of the battle of Tours* (wiki) in central France in 732 A.D., when a Frankish army under Charles Martel (wiki)** defeated the Muslim Ummayad invasion of Gaul under Abdul Rahman Al Ghafig. Having conquered virtually all of Spain following their initial crossing from North Africa in 711, the Ummayads sought to extend their holdings farther northward and reached what might be called the "high-water mark" of Islam in Europe, only to be turned back at this encounter. Estimates vary, but it is believed that several tens of thousands fought on each side, with perhaps 12,000 Moorish losses, including their leader Abdul Rahman.
The battle of Tours has long been considered one of the most influential events in medieval history and is said to have "saved" Western Europe from Islamic conquest. Although many modern historians have minimized the importance of this battle in the final outcome, there's no doubting that it firmly established the descendants of Charles Martel - the Carolingian dynasty (wiki) - as the most powerful rulers in the region.
* N.B. The battle was fought between modern-day Tours and Poitiers, and thus is also known as the battle of Poitiers.
** Charles Martel (A.D. 686-741) was the Duke and Prince of the Franks and the Mayor of the Palace, which made him the effective ruler of Francia from 718 to his death. As a result of his victory, he was henceforth known as "the Hammer" and was succeeded by his son Pepin. Pepin's son - and hence Martel's grandson, was Charlemagne (wiki), the first Holy Roman Emperor.
The Battles of Tours was not a war of nations, but rather a battle of civilizations between Islam and Christian Europe. The Muslims had been conquering the remains of the Roman and Persian empires and were heading toward modern day France to continue their expansion. The Frankish King Charles (“The Hammer”) Martel wasn’t about to let that happen, so he gathered his forces at Tours as Abdul Rahman Al Ghafiqi, Governor-General of Moorish Spain, led his Army northward.
The army that Charles amassed was very different from the Arab fighting forces. It was also unlike the Barbarian horde the Muslims had engaged the last time they attacked the area, and had no doubt had expected to encounter again. Previously, the only thing standing between a Frankish soldier and death was a heavy shield – they were now sporting full body armor. Their army boasted a full infantry unit that was quite a contrast to the lightly armed Arab horsemen who relied upon their speed, mobility and fearsomeness to win the field.
Here's a concise description of the events leading up to the battle, and of the battle itself:
ICYMI, Friday's links are here, and include a UFO detector, a collection of vintage ads you would never see today, Hitler's boxers bought at auction, and how nutmeg, cinnamon, and black pepper set off bloody conflicts and the discovery of the New World.
