Wholesome History Reads Group discussion
What I'm Reading
'Aussie Rick' wrote: "The author of "The Great Mortality" mentions a chronicle complied by Agnolo di Tura, a resident of Siena in 1348. Agnolo journaled the start and spread of the plague in Siena:"In many parts of Si..."
I had the good fortune to be able to visit Siena almost exactly three years ago. I remember the spectacular cathedral very well, and always wondered why it was never finished. Thanks for enlightening me, AR!
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'Aussie Rick' wrote: "That would have been a great experience Elliot! I am keen to visit this area and walk the streets."Siena was one of the best places I visited in Italy (maybe even my favorite). It's a spectacularly preserved medieval city and it's not as touristy as many other Italian cities (like its rival Florence or Venice, for example). I would highly recommend it if you get the chance!
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The Latins in the Levant: A History of Frankish Greece by William Miller
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In one chapter the author mentioned the establishment of twelve baronies and that; " ... the Franks were a military colony in the midst of an alien and possibly hostile population, spread over a country possessing remarkable strategic positions. later on, after the distribution of the baronies, strong castles were erected in each, upon some natural coign of vantage, from which the baron could overawe the surrounding country. The main object of this system may be seen from the name of the famous Arkadian fortress of Matagrifon ("Kill-Greek," the Greeks being usually called Grifon by the French chroniclers), built near the modern Demetsana by the baron of Akova, Gautier de Rozieres, to protect the rich valley of the Alpheios."
The fortress of Matagrifon:
https://www.mythicalpeloponnese.gr/?p...
https://www.kastra.eu/castleen.php?ka...
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http://byzantinemilitary.blogspot.com...
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http://www.hellenicaworld.com/Byzanti...
https://byzantium.gr/battle.php?byzba...
Dipanjan wrote: "
Just started this one.."
Looks interesting Dipanjan, keep us updated?
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Just started this one.."
Something different, I hope its an interesting account Dipanjan.
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Shooting Through: Campo 106 escaped POWs after the Italian Armistice by Katrina Kittel
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William...
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_...
https://byzantium.gr/battle.php?byzba...
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morea
https://frenchofoutremer.ace.fordham....
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chronic...
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http://www.camrea.org/2017/02/13/roge...
The Turks with the Grand Catalan Company, 1305-1312 by Frances Hernandez:
http://www.dlir.org/archive/archive/f...
'Aussie Rick' wrote: "I found the story of the Catalan Grand Company in Greece quite an amazing story:http://www.camrea.org/2017/02/13/roge...
The Turks with the Grand Catalan Company, ..."
I wrote a (not-yet-released) novel set in the Catalan Duchy of Athens. The history of the Grand Catalan Company is fascinating!
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'Aussie Rick' wrote: "Hi A.L., it is indeed quite fascinating! This period of history, of the Franks and others expanding their dominion in Greece after the fall of Constantinople during the Fourth Crusade is a period r..."It's always fun to learn about a new area of history!
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"Seldom had even Frankish Greece seen a braver sight than that of the martial duke and his mailed warriors, the flower of Western chivalry, with the lion banner of Brienne waving above them. But before the horses had reached the centre of the plain, they plunged all unsuspecting into the morass. Their heavy burdens and the impetus of their charge made their feet sink deeper into the yielding quagmire; the shouts of 'Aragon! Aragon!' from the Catalans added to their alarm.
Some rolled over with their armoured riders in the mud; others stuck fast in the stiff bog, stood still, like equestrian statues, powerless to move. The Catalans plied the helpless horsemen with showers of missiles; the Turks, who had hitherto held aloof from the combat, for fear the Catalans and the French would join in attacking them, seeing that the battle was no mere feint, rushed forward and completed the deadly work. Still, despite their desperate situation, the French fought bravely, and the struggle was keen to the last. So great was the slaughter, that, if we may believe the Catalan chronicler, more than 20,000 foot-soldiers and all the 700 Frankish knights save two perished that day."
The Battle of the Kephissos:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_...
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Monastery of Daphni:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daphni_...
Panagia Gorgoepikoos:
https://www.athenskey.com/panagia-gor...
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" ... His successor, Clement VI, anxious to form a coalition against the Turks, charged the patriarch with the task of making peace between the Catalans and Walter of Brienne, gave them absolution for three years, and invited Prince Robert of Achaia and his mother, the Empress Catherine, to contribute galleys to the allied fleet. The crusade had small results, but the reconciliation between the Catalans and the papacy was complete. Henceforth, those 'sons of perdition' were regarded as respectable members of Christendom. Unfortunately, soon after they became respectable, they ceased to be formidable."
The Latins in the Levant: A History of Frankish Greece by William Miller
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https://www.greecetravel.com/meteora/...
https://www.athenstourgreece.com/mete...
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"The cost of keeping up the fortifications, which are still one of the most picturesque sights of the beautiful gulf, was defrayed out of the valuable fisheries of Anatoliko. For ninety-two years Lepanto remained in Venetian hands, and its 'triple tiara' of walls was called by a Venetian historian 'the strongest bulwark of the Christian peoples'."
The Fortress of Lepanto:
https://www.romeartlover.it/Lepanto.html
(looks like another place on my bucket list to visit!)
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Welford Chapman Bridwell:
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/9...
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https://tombstoneweb.com/
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"But the Albanian colonists were resolved that he should not leave the Morea without feeling the weight of their arms. They gathered at Davia, near Tripolitza, under a general of their own race, and prepared to attack. They paid dearly for their daring, many were slain, about 800 were captured and massacred, and towers of Albanian skulls, such as that which still stands near Nish, marked the site of the battle."
The Skull Tower of Nish:
https://theculturetrip.com/europe/ser...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skull_T...
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"Mohammed treacherously seized this unguarded moment to attack the place, which thus fell into his hands. The ancient feudal castle of Akova was taken by storm; the fortress of Roupele, in which a number of Albanians and Greeks had taken refuge with their families, after two days' desperate fighting, during which the Turkish losses were such that the sultan ordered a retreat, surrendered just as he was departing. Mohammed sent the inhabitants to colonise Constantinople, with the exception of some twenty Albanians who had surrendered at Tarsos and had broken their parole not to fight against him again. As an awful example he ordered their ankles and wrists to be broken—an act of cruelty commemorated by the Turkish name for the place—' Tokmak Hissari,' or 'the castle of ankles'."
Tokmak Hisar (castle of the hammer):
https://www.kastra.eu/castleen.php?ka...
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"Having thus wiped the province of Demetrios from the map, the sultan turned his arms against Thomas. Bordonia was abandoned at his approach by its cowardly archons; but the strong fortress of Kastritza, built on a sheer rock, and approached by a single entrance, and that fortified by a triple wall, for a time defied the assault of the janissaries. Urged on by promises of plunder, they returned to the attack, drove the garrison back into the Akropolis, and forced them from sheer exhaustion and lack of water to surrender on terms. In flagrant violation of this solemn convention, Mohammed beheaded or impaled all the male survivors, to the number of 300, ordered the local chief, Proinokokkis, to be flayed alive, enslaved the women and children, and levelled the castle with the ground. Leondari he found deserted by its inhabitants, who had taken refuge in the almost impregnable stronghold of Gardiki. After in vain offering them terms, he ordered his men to attack the place, which resisted for no more than a single day, for the heat was intense and the crowd of fugitives was so great that both water and provisions ran short. Here, again, Mohammed violated his oath to spare the lives of those who surrendered; he collected the men, women, and children together in a small plain to the number of 6000, bound them hand and foot, and then ordered them to be massacred in cold blood."
The Latins in the Levant: A History of Frankish Greece by William Miller
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This politic act had the desired result; most of the forts round Patras hastened to surrender ; and when the sultan arrived there almost the only place which still held out was Salmenikon, a very strong mountain fortress between Patras and Vostitza defended by Graitzas Palaiologos, who if not a genuine son of the imperial race, proved himself far worthier of the name than the two miserable Despots. This courageous soldier paid no heed to the sultan's summons to capitulate ; in vain the Turkish gunners bombarded the place, in vain the janissaries marched to the assault. After a seven days' siege, the enemy, however, cut off the water supply, and the lower town, crowded with Greek and Albanian fugitives, then surrendered ; some 6000 captives swelled the train of the conqueror, who set aside the promising boys for his corps of janissaries, and distributed the others among his captains. Still Palaiologos held the Akropolis of the town, and declined to yield unless the sultan would move a stage away from it. Mohammed agreed, and marched down to Vostitza, leaving Hamsa Zenevisi, whom he had appointed in Zagan's room, to take over the place. But, after the lesson of Santameri, the Greek commander had little confidence in Turkish oaths; he therefore resolved to make a preliminary trial of Hamsa's sincerity, and sent out a detachment of the garrison laden with baggage, to see whether the Turks would allow them a free passage. The temptation to attack and plunder them proved too strong for the Pasha; he broke his sovereign's pledge, with the result that Palaiologos refused to surrender. The angry sultan now re-appointed Zagan governor of Thessaly and the Morea, but Salmenikon still held out. At last, in 1461, after a year's siege, the gallant commander capitulated, and made his way, with all the honours of war, into Venetian territory at Lepanto. Such was the admiration which he inspired in his opponents, that the Grand Vizier Mahmoud was heard to exclaim: "I found many slaves in the Morea, but this was the only man." The Venetian senate received with gladness so courageous a soldier, and appointed him commander of all the light horse of the republic.
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https://byzantineoplomachia.wordpress...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stratioti
I'm making a start on the second part of my goal of reading three trilogies this year, with
The Tragedy of Liberation: A History of the Chinese Revolution 1945-1957
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[book:The Tr..."Keep us posted on how you go Jonny as I have a copy of this book somewhere that I am yet to read.
Strangely that doesn't entirely surprise me Rick! Will do.
I've finished The Tragedy of Liberation: A History of the Chinese Revolution 1945-1957 yesterday - it was a very good description of the insanity of the first years of Communist rule in China. I'm moving on to the middle book in the trilogy,
Mao's Great Famine: The History Of China's Most Devastating Catastrophe, 1958-62
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I just finished reading William Shirer's, The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich. I started reading The Last Nizam.
I've finished Mao's Great Famine: The History Of China's Most Devastating Catastrophe, 1958-62; terrible but, I think, important; bit of the usual musing to be found here; https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...Moving onwards with the final volume in the trilogy,
The Cultural Revolution: A People's History, 1962―1976
I'm also reading David Olusoga's The Kaiser's Holocaust: Germany's Forgotten Genocide and the Colonial Roots of Nazism. This description is of a German concentration camp; not 1940's Poland but Namibia in the early 20th century:"Heinrich Vedder had only recently arrived in the colony when he was given the task of setting up a mission among the prisoners in Swakopmund in early 1905. Young and energetic, Vedder became one of the most vocal of the missionaries. His letters– and the responses from missionaries working in other camps– tell us not only about the Swakopmund camp but about the whole concentration- camp system. In an entry in the Swakopmund Missionary Chronicle of December 1905, Vedder painted a vivid picture of the conditions in the Swakopmund camp. He tells us that the Herero
were placed behind a double row of barbed wire… and housed in pathetic structures constructed out of simple sacking and planks, in such a manner that in one structure 30– 50 people were forced to stay without distinction to age or sex. From early morning until late at night, on weekends as well as on Sundays and holidays, they had to work under the clubs of the raw overseers until they broke down. Added to this food was extremely scarce. Rice without any necessary additions was not enough to support their bodies, already weakened by life in the field and used to the hot sun of the interior, from the cold and restless exertion of all their powers in the prison conditions in Swakopmund. Like cattle, hundreds were driven to death and like cattle they were buried. This opinion may seem harsh or exaggerated… but then I cannot suppress in these chronicles the wanton brutality, the lusty lack of morality [or] the brutish sense of supremacy that is found among the troops and civilians here. A full account is almost not possible."
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There were a good few characters amongst the Herero and Nama;"During the Nama War, Jacob Morenga became a legendary figure among the black peoples of southern Africa, known as ‘The Black Napoleon’. His status was boosted by tales of his cunning and audacity. When he and his men stole the horses of a German patrol – who were sleeping around a campfire only yards away – he left a letter addressed to the German commander, thanking him for the horses and asking if the Germans might consider feeding their horses better in future as he had ‘no use for emaciated nags like these’. Despite the humiliation they suffered at his hands, some German officers were willing to admit that Morenga was a formidable opponent. In Im Kampfe gegen die Hereros (The War Against the Hereros), Captain Maximilian Bayer described Morenga as a ‘towering personality … an astute soldier’ and ‘an enemy who deserved our respect’."
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The Siege of Smerwick in 1580:
https://neverfeltbetter.wordpress.com...
Walter Ralegh: Architect of Empire by Alan GallayA few letters from The Irish Times in regards to this incident:
https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/le...
https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/le...
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katheri...
https://www.ancient-origins.net/histo...
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The Story of Greece and Rome by Tony Spawforth
I have finished reading both
Imperial Spain, 1469 - 1716 and
The Revolt of the Catalans: A Study in the Decline of Spain, 1598-1640 by J.H. Elliott. I will soon read his other scholarly work which is
The Count-Duke of Olivares: The Statesman in an Age of Decline. I'm impressed at the amount of informations regarding the various constitutional differences and its subsequent effects within the Spanish Habsburg monarchy. The Imperial Spain covered an overview of how the Spanish Monarchy was founded (which was the result of the union between the Crown of Castile and the Crown of Aragon), the rise of the Habsburg dynasty to become the ruler of Imperial Spain and vainly exploited all Castilian resources for their foreign wars thus allowing the Spanish monarchy to crumbles later in the seventeenth-century. Interestingly enough, since the union was merely the union of their sovereign (not the union of their laws and governments), the Spanish Habsburg rulers couldn't quite exploit the Crown of Aragon's resources since their political power was obstructed by the many constitutions in Aragonese realm (Aragon, Valencia and Catalonia).
The decline of the Imperial Spain is actually described better in the Revolt of the Catalans despite the latter was written first before Imperial Spain book.
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Wholesome History Reads Group
Books mentioned in this topic
The Fate of the Day: The War for America, Fort Ticonderoga to Charleston, 1777-1780 (other topics)A Campaign of Giants—The Battle for Petersburg, Vol. 2: From the Crater's Aftermath to the Battle of Burgess Mill (other topics)
The Secret Expedition: The Anglo-Russian Invasion of Holland 1799 (other topics)
Saipan: The Battle That Doomed Japan in World War II (other topics)
Defeat In Detail: The Ottoman Army in the Balkans, 1912-1913 (other topics)
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Authors mentioned in this topic
Rick Atkinson (other topics)A. Wilson Greene (other topics)
Geert van Uythoven (other topics)
James H. Hallas (other topics)
Edward J. Erickson (other topics)
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"Templar knight Gerad de Pasagio testified that after his arrest he was tortured by the 'hanging of weights on his genitals and other members.' Other Templars were strapped to the rack, their ankles and wrists dislocated by a winching device that - slowly - pulled joints from sockets. Another popular torture was called strappado. The prisoner was pulled to the ceiling by a rope that suddenly went slack, his fall broken at the last moment by a violent jerk. Sometimes weights were attached to the testicles and feet to make the jerk more violent and painful. One Templar, Bernard de Vaho, had his feet smeared with fat and placed on an open flame. A few days later, when de Vaho tried to walk, 'the bones in his feet dropped out.' Other popular tortures included yanking teeth and tearing out fingernails one by one.
The Trials of the Knights Templar:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trials_...