History

tværpostet fra: https://feddit.dk/post/20987772

A trend of claiming ownership of letters that have dropped from heaven.

Pagan Survivals, Superstition and Popular Culture In Early Medieval Culture has a chapter on this.

In the mid 8th century, a certain Aldebert of Gaul enjoyed a considerable following, claiming that his mom saw prophetic dreams before his birth. Himself he claimed to have divine powers, relics given to him by angles and a letter, written by Jesus, that was dropped from heaven. His actions included worshiping angles, setting up roadside crosses and shrines performing miracles and giving away clippings of his hair and nails. Fancying himself equal to the apostles, the shrines he made was dedicated to himself.

A condemnation of the phenomena, written by Charlemagne:

Likewise, both pseudepigrapha and dubious narratives—or anything entirely contrary to the Catholic faith—and that most wicked and false letter, which some misguided individuals last year claimed had fallen from heaven, should neither be believed nor read, but rather burned, lest the people be led into error by such writings. Only the canonical books, Catholic treatises, and the sayings of the holy authors should be read and handed down.

I recommend reading the chapter. It contains other accounts and details. >

Samuel Pepys’s journals are an invaluable record of British history. A new book reconsiders his infamous sexual exploits.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/45348900

https://oll.libertyfund.org/quotes/thomas-jefferson-slavery-wrath-of-god

This is so true, that of the proprietors of slaves a very small proportion indeed are ever seen to labour. And can the liberties of a nation be thought secure when we have removed their only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people that these liberties are of the gift of God? That they are not to be violated but with his wrath? Indeed I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just: that his justice cannot sleep forever: that considering numbers, nature and natural means only, a revolution of the wheel of fortune, an exchange of situation, is among possible events: that it may become probable by supernatural interference! The Almighty has no attribute which can take side with us in such a contest.

Podcast discussing the virgin soil theory in America and how the impact of introduced diseases is often vastly overstated while colonial violence is vastly forgotten.

Tel Aviv attacked. Bahrain bombed. Dhahran struck. You might think this refers to a modern conflict involving the United States, Israel, and Iran but it doesn’t. These same places were targets in a very different war: World War II.

Today, warfare in the region often involves ballistic missiles and drones. But in 1940, destruction came from the sky in the form of bomber aircraft. And while today threats are often described as coming from the east, in 1940 the attacks came from the west launched not by Germany, but by Fascist Italy.

Italy’s dictator, Benito Mussolini, was eager to expand his influence. Seeing Germany’s rapid success against France in the summer of 1940, he joined the war on June 10, hoping to claim a share of the victory. When France surrendered on June 22, Britain stood alone against Axis ambitions in the Mediterranean and North Africa.

At the time, Britain controlled vast territories across the Middle East. An Italian colonial plan proposed targeting British economic infrastructure especially oil facilities critical to the war effort. One key region was the British Mandate of Palestine, which included present-day Israel and Palestinian territories.

The port city of Haifa, home to major oil refineries and infrastructure, became an early target. Italian bombers, flying from bases in the Dodecanese Islands, launched long-range strikes across the eastern Mediterranean. On July 15, 1940, five Savoia-Marchetti SM.79 bombers hit oil installations in Haifa, igniting fires and damaging vital facilities.

A second raid on July 24 was far more devastating. Ten bombers dropped around 50 bombs, killing 43 civilians Arabs and Jews and a British police officer. Fires raged, and refinery operations were halted for weeks. The attacks exposed the vulnerability of British-controlled territory in the region.

More raids followed through August and early September, though with less impact. Then, on September 9, a formation of Italian bombers attempted another strike on Haifa. Intercepted by British fighters, they diverted to Tel Aviv. Aiming for port facilities, they instead struck residential neighborhoods. The result was catastrophic: 117 Jewish civilians, seven Arabs, and one Australian soldier were killed.

In response, Britain reinforced local defenses, recruiting Jewish residents into anti-aircraft units marking the beginning of larger-scale Jewish participation in the British Army, including what would become the Jewish Brigade.

The campaign expanded beyond Palestine. On October 19, 1940, Italian bombers carried out a remarkable long-range attack on Bahrain’s facilities, then under British protection. Flying over 4,000 kilometers, the aircraft struck oil installations, causing damage but no casualties.

Though often overlooked, these Italian air raids marked one of the first sustained bombing campaigns in the Middle East. Later, German and Vichy French forces would also conduct operations in the region. But Italy’s early strikes especially the daring mission to Bahrain remain a little-known chapter of World War II history.

Today, as some of these same locations again find themselves under threat, the echoes of that earlier conflict serve as a reminder: the Middle East has long been a strategic battleground, where control of resources and geography shapes the course of war.

In 1940, as the Wehrmacht marched through Paris, France was humiliated. But Charles de Gaulle’s “Free France” held a trump card—hundreds of thousands of soldiers from the colonies. The “Senegalese Tirailleurs” (Tirailleurs Sénégalais)—hailing from Senegal, Mali, Guinea, and Burkina Faso—became the fist that helped the French reclaim their homeland.

They fought in the jungles of Gabon, the deserts of Libya, and finally landed in Provence, liberating Toulon and Marseille. Thousands of them endured the horrors of German prisoner-of-war camps, where the Nazis treated Black soldiers with the same brutality as Jews and Slavs.

But when victory arrived, instead of gratitude, they were met with “whitening” (blanchiment). By order of the high command, African soldiers were hastily replaced by white conscripts so that in the photographs and newsreels of liberated Paris, the army would look “European.” The heroes who had carried the burden of the war were simply loaded onto ships and sent back to Africa.

The tragedy unfolded at the Thiaroye transit camp near Dakar. Soldiers returning from German captivity and the battlefields discovered that the French administration refused to pay their back wages for years of service and their discharge bonuses. Furthermore, they were offered an exchange of their accumulated francs at an exploitative, predatory rate.

On December 1, 1944, veterans, outraged by this injustice, staged a protest. It was not an armed mutiny, but a non-violent, albeit loud, demonstration. They even blocked the car of a French general inside the camp, demanding a dialogue.

The general promised to pay their hard-earned wages. However, instead of money, French colonial units and gendarmes surrounded the camp at dawn. Under the cover of armored cars, they opened machine-gun fire on their own rescuers—the very men who had fought beside them in the trenches of Europe.

The official report at the time claimed 35 deaths. Later historical research points to figures as high as 300 or more. Those who survived were sentenced to prison terms and stripped of their medals and pensions.

For decades, France sought to forget this incident. It was only in 2014 that President François Hollande officially recognized the massacre and handed over copies of archival documents to Senegal.

It was a bitter paradox of history: the people who helped France cast off the chains of Nazi occupation received a bullet from “Free France” for attempting to defend their rights.

The Thiaroye massacre became the spark that later ignited the flame of the African colonies’ struggle for independence.

Key Facts for Context:

Economics: Historians believe the French treasury was empty, and colonial authorities decided to save money on payments to those who, in their view, “could not stand up for themselves.”

Memory: In 1988, the film Camp de Thiaroye (dir. Ousmane Sembène) was released. It was banned from being screened in France for many years.

On August 15, 1945, the world celebrated victory. World War II had ended, and across the globe, transport echelons began their long journeys: hundreds of thousands of American, British, and Soviet soldiers were returning home from the camps. Families waited for miracles, and those miracles often came true.

In China, however, the anticipation turned into national mourning that did not end with the signing of the surrender. When the time came for the official repatriation of prisoners of war (POWs), Tokyo announced a figure that sounded less like a clerical error and more like a death sentence. Out of the millions of captured Chinese soldiers who had fought against the Japanese army for eight years, Japan officially returned alive only… 56 people.

That is not a typo. Fifty-six. Against the backdrop of millions of prisoners and casualties, this figure looks like a statistical error.

Behind this number lies the darkest chapter of the Pacific War. Unlike the Western Allies, who were formally covered by the norms of the Geneva Convention (though it is well known how poorly the Japanese observed them), in the eyes of the Japanese command, Chinese soldiers had no right to live.

For the Imperial Army, raised on the Bushido code, surrender was the ultimate disgrace, and a surrendered enemy was a creature that had lost the right to be called human.

What happened to the rest? The answer is scattered across the mines of Manchuria, the secret laboratories of “Unit 731,” and the nameless pits of Nanjing. Chinese POWs were used as “logs” (maruta) for biological weapons testing, burned alive during the “Three Alls” policy — 三光作戦 (1. Burn all, 2. Kill all, 3. Loot all) — or simply executed on the spot to avoid wasting resources on their maintenance.

The 56 “lucky” ones who managed to return were more than just survivors. They were living witnesses to a system that purposefully and methodically ground millions of people to dust, leaving behind not even their names on prisoner lists.