Rameses the Great
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Posts posted by Rameses the Great
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I thought the Mediterranean had their own way of making fish. Cooking dried fish is something that is usually found deep in Africa. I can only speak of the Middle East but how we do it is we usually bread the fish and cook it in oil. Perhaps you should check Food Network's homepage.
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I believe some type of racism had existed throughout every civilization in some way. The Egyptians believed they were the perfect race not to dark, like Ethiopians, and not to light, like Semites. The Persians, although did not use slavery to much, believed other cultures were below them such as the Greeks. The Greeks believed anyone who wasn't a Hellenic was a 'barbarian' albeit not racist in our modern sense but certainly nationalistic. I wouldn't say that the Romans were the first to start ancient racism because it had existed well before they arrived on the scene. Whether they took it to a whole new level is very debatable.
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I, for once in my life, agree with MPC. The Romans held stereotypical views. In gladitiorial fights, they believed Africans and northern barbarians were brutes who used strength to win. They thought people from the East: Egyptians, Carthaginians, Assyrians, Phoenicians, etc. would use some type of magic from the gods. They believed Greeks, and other Balkan peoples, were intellects and would use their minds to win battles. They designated some peoples to be slaves such as Slavs and other barbarians. They did however know when there was a superior method to doing things and did borrow ideas from other cultures so they didn't think of others completely inferior.
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Just wondering if anyone at all has heard from Gaius Octavius - either by PM or e-mail? He hasn't been seen here since 2nd May and his spate of e-mail Round Robin jokes to me has stopped too. I hope he is OK.
Does anyone have any news?
You get those jokes to?
Don't worry he usually goes off for a long while and comes back. I sent him a pm before saying I wondered where he was and I missed him and he hadn't been on the forum for three straight months. It's ok if you're a little bit concerned but this is not the first time he's done this. Give it a bit more time, I'm confident he'll show up. 
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Russell Peters. I'd post a couple of vids but they've been taken out of Youtube. He's still an absolute legend though.
I was able to salvage his best ones though:
Russell Peters Outsourced - English Accent (For our English members)
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RtG:
Stick this in you ear: The suprising truth behind the construction of the Great Pyramid
"A year and a half later, after extensive scanning electron microscope (SEM) observations and other testing, Barsoum and his research group finally began to draw some conclusions about the pyramids. They found that the tiniest structures within the inner and outer casing stones were indeed consistent with a reconstituted limestone. The cement binding the limestone aggregate was either silicon dioxide (the building block of quartz) or a calcium and magnesium-rich silicate mineral.
The stones also had a high water content-unusual for the normally dry, natural limestone found on the Giza plateau-and the cementing phases, in both the inner and outer casing stones, were amorphous, in other words, their atoms were not arranged in a regular and periodic array. Sedimentary rocks such as limestone are seldom, if ever, amorphous...."
I don't care for this, 'hey we discovered and are probably right about the pyramids' theory. If I can take you to Egypt with me you will seriously see all these theories and ideas with all their 'information' placed in them and we'll still be clueless. Your criticizing of Hawass and your idea that we know more then what is actually presented to us is somewhat confusing to me. This is his life and he has had a hard time defending his job from outsiders who pop up with new 'theories' and ideas of the pyramids.
If you want to listen to this go ahead but I'll reserve my ideas until after the facts are presented more then just an obscure article with an agenda tagged unto it. I really wonder why people try to develop new ideas and why they are held so valued to people if an accomplished Egyptologist(s) speak out against it.
Prove me wrong, prove me wrong.
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Happy Birthday Augustus Caesar!
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For a while now I've watched an advert on global warming. Its a frightening prospect. All those greenhouse gases polluting our atmosphere and raising temperatures that render our world a very inhospitable place. You need only log on to www.climatechallenge.gov.uk to join the effort to save our planet.
Except for one small point...
IT'S RUBBISH!
Sorry, but it is. The advert is blatant propaganda designed to pander to our current fad for enviromental concern and recruit well meaning citizens to the government cause by frightening their poor little socks off.
So why is this advert propaganda? The current popular belief is that greenhouse gases are causing global warming. False. Global warming is powered by the sun. As the sun becomes more active, so our temeratures rise. The action of sunlight on the worlds oceans creates far more CO2 than we do. True. Pollution from volcanoes is currently the worst offender. True. Cosmic rays are responsible for the extent of cloud formation, not CO2. True. We also blame industry for the rise in geenhouse gases yet during the period from 1940 to 1975 when industry increased in leaps and bounds - the mean world temperature dropped. Its ironic therefore that greenhouse gases are caused by global warming. True. Serious climatologists have uncovered a time lag between mean temperatures and the amount of greenhouse gases resulting from it amounting to around 800 years.
But what about the ice caps? Surely we have to stop the sea level from rising? Well it would be a neat trick but changes in sea level are nothing new. It happens all the time and always will. One of the reasons for the saxon incursions into england was rising sea levels that inundated their coastal settlements. The current perception also ignores the fact the dry land rises and falls too. Britain is rising out of the sea (slowly) after the collossal weight of ice from 10,000 years ago has now gone. London is sinking because the land mass we call Britain is slowly tipping over. The northwest is rising, the southeast falling. Why? Because tectonic movement is pushing Britain aside as it opens the Atlantic wider. Something similar is true of the Mediterranean. We know that the Meditteranean coast is rising and falling as it buckles under the strain of the African plate as it moves northward. The Alps are the result of it, and the sea is shrinking. Thats what powers volcanoes such as Etna, Vesuvius, and the reason why the island of Santorini blew up in distant antiquity.
The fact is global warming is a natural event. The Medieval Warm Period was warmer than today. Where they beset with droughts and disastrous weather and flooding? No. In fact they benefitted from bumper harvests. Wine was produced in the now chilly north of england. When you consider the 800 year time lag between temperature and greenhouse gases we are in fact now receiving the 'tax bill' for the Medieval Warm Period. If you go further back, there are long periods in earths history where the world is significantly warmer than our predictions of doom. Only once in earths past, the late Permian period, was the temperature so high as to seriously affect life on earth. For those that don't know, that was before the dinosaurs. We're at the mercy of a ball of hydrogen undergoing a nuclear reaction 93,000,000 miles away.
So what the heck is going on? Basically the study of climate has been hijacked by those people with agendas. Remember all those campaigners who tried to stop the deployment of nuclear weapons? The ones who played cat and mouse with whale hunters? Now their holy grail is global warming. The failure of governments around the world is that they now adopt the same attitude for popularity. These days if you mention global warming doors open. Point out that its all nonsense and you're a pariah. Its become a mantra of our time, and its based on misconceptions.
One of these misconceptions is that we can predict what will happen. Although the current trend is for warmer temperatures, it might swing the other way with a vengeance if our ocean currents change too far. The computer models designed to make these predictions are based on the premis that global warming is down to greenhouse gases, and we already know thats incorrect. But because the global warming industry is in full swing no-one wants to hear that the statistics are based on mistakes. They only want to hear the answers that suit their purpose.
So what can we do about global warming? Unfortunately, the answer is almost nothing. Really. We are literally helpless in the face of nature. But then nature has always insisted that survival of the fittest is the prime directive of life. Species survive because they adapt to changes. Species that become specialised can do well, like us, but ultimately their enviroment will change faster than their ability to change with it. Our attempts to be greener are laudable but it won't stop climate change. Like King Canute, we stand there trying to order back the tide.
I wholeheartedly agree. It's just made with people who have an agenda and nothing better to do in an attempt to change our lifestyle. I'm worried about the environment and the rate we are destroying it but to say that global warming will kill us all is just stupidity. Shifts in the temperature of the Earth is nothing new it's a natural process. No matter what we do the Earth will warm and cool according to its time.
They're just like the guys who come up with daylights savings time, they have nothing better to do so they enforce it upon the people.
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The forces of the Second Triumvirate (Lepidus, Octavius, and Antony) were the defenders of Rome out to try and defeat the conspirators who to part in Caesar's death (Brutus and Cassius.) Although the first day of Philippi was a stalemate, with Brutus defeating Antony and Octavius defeating Cassius, the ultimate fate was decided when Cassius committed suicide from miscommunication. Although Cassius killed himself the battle was still in full reach of Brutus' hand and I have to think that had he been more strategic he could have easily won. He tried to lead both armies but was utterly destroyed on the second day of the battle. I can't help but wonder why the death of Cassius effected the men if they were in full control of their battle.
I just have a question for you to ponder about, had Cassius and Brutus won do you think they would have marched on Rome or set up a capital elsewhere? If they had marched on Rome do you believe the Senate would have raised another army to fight them or concede to them and have them rule Rome with the execution of Lepidus?
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I've actually visited Fort Pitt out in Uniontown but I've never seen any remnants of Fort Duquesne. It's also fair to point out before Fort Duquesne was erected George Washington built a fort in the are before it being taken by the French.
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That's true to an extent, considering that the Mamelukes were suffering an economic crisis during the early years of the sixteenth century, and therefore they were much easier to conquer. The Safavid Persians on the other hand were a much greater threat, and possibly as equally dangerous to the Ottomans as any European power.
On another note, here's the photogrpah (sorry for the quality) of the Ottomans using catapults during the First World War.
Ottoman NCOs and greande thrower
However, the Mamelukes had artillery and fire power whereas the Sufavid's did not. In many battles against the Ottomans the Sufavid's refused to use artillery, believing it was cowardly, thus leading to numerous defeats before they realized change was imminent. Many times the Ottomans conquered Istafan but decided to turn their attentions to Europe not wanting to attack anymore of their Muslim brothers, giving the Sufavids the oppurtunity to reconquer lost lands.
BTW, DC the link isn't working.
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Nis was also an area that was dominated by the Ottoman after the fall of the Byzantive Empire. Interesting article thanks P-P.
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For those who are interested I found a series of great documentaries made by PBS:
I would've liked it to go more but it only talks about the early history of the Ottomans until the end of their dominance as Europe would emerge more powerful than the Ottomans after the failed Siege of Vienna. It talks from the rising of Osman, to Mehmet the Conquerer, then ends with Seuleiman.
The thing I don't understand is that the Turks were said to come from Central Asia around the Aral Sea, how does that translate into being a European power if you weren't even from Europe?
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Really should come as no real big surprise. The Egyptians were probably the fathers of medicine but the Greeks improved upon the advancements.
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Why do you play sports? Herm Edwars will tell you,
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I just want to bring in a new element to the discussion. At the time of Egypt's modernization, of economy and military, led by Mohammed Ali his modern Europeanized forces proved to much for the Ottoman Empire to handle. He decisively defeated them in many battles, in spite of being vastly outnumbered. The Ottomans had to depend on a European coalition to remove the threat of Egypt conquering Istanbul. Can this somewhat be used as an example of how the Turks in many ways failed to modernize?
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Definantly good to have the Imperator back at the helm!
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Rameses the Great, I mentioned technologically advanced because of the number, standard use and even the design superiority of the Ottomans. It was the muskets of the Janissaires that drove the Hungarian right wing back, despite being caught making camp. In essence, the Hungarians were fighting a medieval battle against a more advanced foe. Despite their bravery, the Hungarians had essentially doomed themselves before the start of the battle and were acting in desperation. The Ottoman combination of numbers and technology sealed the day.
And yes, massing of troops was a standard advantage employed by the Ottomans. Good and/or clever opponents could easily take advantage of this but if the opponent had no choice but to go head-to-head, it gave them a very strong hand. That's why seige was so very important to the Ottomans. Seal the opponents up in strongholds and have enough men left over to raid the country. Even as their technology stagnated, numbers still told for the Turks.
I see, I'm just thinking if Hungary was closer the European powers who had the advanced technology how come the Ottomans had the better technology? Did they modernize and hire Europeans to help teach the army, if so whom? I also recall Hungarian playing a large part in helping the Ottomans create cannons.
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I wouldn't necessarily call it a blessing. They did however gain a chance to develop their own customs, though not immediately, building strong empires and kingdoms. Had Constantinople fell the West would be a bit more reliant on the East. When the Ottomans conquered Byzantium it pretty much severed relations between the East and West thus creating Western European powers to arise. Also Russia can be used as an example.
Off the record, for us the fall of Constantinople was an awful day and Tuesday is still to the Greeks the unluckiest day of the week.
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Mohacs (1532) displayed a technologically advanced and victorious Ottoman army (even if their discipline was rough), killing the king of Hungary and ending it as a country for quite some time, and ultimately setting up circumstances that put a Hapsburg king on the throne of Bohemia (Ferdinand).
I wouldn't say Mohacs was a win for the Ottomans out of technology rather then sheer numbers. The Ottomans usually outnumbered their opponents and was ultimately why they won. They needed all the troops and reenforcements they can get and before the reenforcements arrived they were doing badly. Also the Hungarian reenforcements didn't arrive in time for the battle.
Had the Hungarian Empire concluded their alliance with the Habsburgs I highly doubt the Ottoman would have won.
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Happy Birthady Tobias!
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I think I unerstand now. The Ottomans Golen Age, before the extensive use of guns and canons, they were able to have a formidable navy and army. Later when guns and canons became important the Ottomans needed European help and methods in order to keep up. They relied on modernizing the army by hiring generals and reformers from industrialized European nations. They did not have the generals or tactics of European armies but in many ways their style of warfare could be used to defeat their armies in certain circumstances. They used their moernized weaponry to bully nations in the Balkans and Middle East thus building an empire.
Hope that's right, I very much appreciate the info DC!
Mamlukes of Egypt and Circassian cavalrymen were still armed and armoured like Medieval warriors in chain and plate mail, armed with swords, spears and bows, even towards the early years of the nineteenth centuryI know the Mamlukes of Egypt did use guns and canons particulary during the Napoleonic invasions. They had several small pistals to shoot from their horses and had swords. They also had canons but of course their tactics and brilliant general Ibrahim Bey was no mach for the well disciplined Napoleonic army of France.
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Thank you guys, it helps an awful lot. In World War I the weaponry the Ottoman were using were probably German weapons that were mechanized far beyond any Ottoman weapons. The supplying of these weapons to keep up and be able to defeat other European powers probably came from Germany or am I wrong? Did the Ottomans throughout the course of their history learn to modernize and create advanced weapons or did they hire Europeans to teach them?
BTW, DC can I get these books at a library or do I have to buy them?
As far as aircraft are concerned, the Ottomans did have to get them from Germany to begin with. Most of the Ottoman pilots were made up of Germans, but towards the end of the war they began recruiting men from other provinces of the empire (and from neutral territories) including Arab and Iranian units who formed the observation squadrons. These planes were usually flown from Germany to Ottoman airfields.
As far as the navy was concerned, it was not up to scratch by 1914 although attempts had been made to update the fleet from 1908. The Ottoman ship builders could construct small light boats at yards in Izmir, Samsun, Beirut and Basra although they were no match for Allied Ships. The Ottomans had put in orders to France and Britain before the start of the war to construct battleships and gunboats, which shows their lack of knowledge concerning "modern" ship building techinques. The sea mines used to blockade the Dardanelles were usually Russian or French type taken from Trabzon or Izmir.
After a treaty of 1917, many Turks were sent to Germany to begin training on European techniques as the 500 or so German officers who had supported the Ottomans in 1914 were expanded with new recruits. These Turkish and Arab officers resented the Germans.
Most weapons were constructed by the Ottoman's allies rather than the Ottomans themselves. The Ottomans had captured German, British and French artillery after the Balkan wars, and the Germans added to this force by manufacturing more guns for the Turks. Krupp - a German and Austro-Hungarian supplier was the most popular weapons manufacturer among the Ottomans. During the Gallipoli campaign a lack of artillery meant that the Ottomans had to use century old mortars taken from the Istanbul museum. The machine guns used were European types, usually the Maxim and Hotchkiss types. The Turks even modelled their uniforms on German types, and made use of British maps, captured after Gallipoli. Before this, the Ottomans had used tourist guide maps instead of the military cartographical charts.
On another note...
I brought those books many years ago, although i'm sure that you can find a few of them at a good library. Another book I forgot to mention that's worth looking out for is Constantinople: City of the World's Desire, 1453-1924 by Philip Mansel. It's basically a social history of the empire, and it concentrates on many diverse subjects, from the lives of the Sultan's concubines through to those of ambassadors and Janissaries.
Would you say that the Ottoman from the 1700s and on, depended mainly on help from European nations to keep up? Clearly the Turks were the ones able to defend their own nation but was it perhaps on the fact that, as the case with many other countries, the gained modern weaponry from allied nation i.e. Germany? I'm guessing Germany had to help out Austria-Hugary but not to the same extent as the Ottoman Empire.
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If you want great info on this funny subject go to china history forum where you can see all the biased opinions on this subject,i think on the china history forum the thread is like 90 pages or something like that.All you have to do is click on Han and it should be there the thread is called rome vs han,for the most part all the pro china people say everything about han was far better than rome ever was and some people go as far as saying the infantry of han was better than the legions i find that very funny,i wish i knew how to copy and paste there funny comments on this thread it would be very funny and biased,im not joking the people over there think evey thing about han china is vastly superior to rome and i mean everything,i joined that thread just to annoy them.
No offense, but I don't think this forum is anything close to unbiased. I've read the arguments in both this forum and theirs, and I find theirs alot more in line with proper academic pursuit(as biased as some of them might be). At least the China history forum cite cross comparison academic sources in their arguments. All this forum threw around was statements. Also, if you actually bothered to read the whole thing, they did not think China was superior in every aspect. The "funny" quotes that you are looking for would be this one:
"Here is Chao Cuo's quote:
"Where there are rolling hills, wide open spaces and flat plains, there chariots and cavalry find their use, and ten foot soldiers are not as good as one horseman. Flat places intersected with gorges, and abrupt declivities affording wide outlooks - commanding positions such as these should be held by archers and crossbowmen. Here a hundred men armed with hand-to-hand weapons are not equal to one archer. When two forces oppose one another on a plain covered with short grasses they are free to manoeuvre back and forth, and then the long halberd is the right weapon. Three men with swords and shields are not as effective as one so armed. Among reeds and rushes and thickets of bamboo, where the undergrowth is rich and abundant, short spears are needed. Two men with long halberds are not as good there as one with a spear. But among winding ways and dangerous precipices the sword and shield are to be preferred, and three archers or crossbowmen will not do as well as one swordsman."
The only terrain that Romans gladius is going to have an advantage seem to be winding ways and dangerous precipices. In another word, compressed terrain. While in all other area,(flat plain, thick grassland, mountainous gorges) Han has the tactical advantage in weaponry. "
This is coupled with the fact that Han had superior metallurgy skills and more powerful missiles(crossbows) which led many to the conclusion that it had the superior infantry.
Pardon me, but I failed to see the humor.
They provided both primary and secondary sources for their arguments, which is more than can be said for you. Or do you want to challenge that with your source rather than assumption? Or do you find citing sources as something humorous because it is not based on complete baselss statements on your part?
And just curious, what is your name on that forum? Because I'm pretty sure all your claims were already refuted one by one in that thread with academic sources.
Could it perhaps be that we don't care? I've been to the Han China forums and this topic has been discussed to death and without resolve all to prove something that can never be proven. Here we don't care and try to avoid the subject, sometimes people bring it up and they are usually those who are new and don't understand the atmosphere here. As far as I'm concerned Rome was the rulers of the known world and the masters of the Mediterranean.
The Ottoman Empire
in Historia in Universum
Posted
I really don't understand why other Middle East empires at the time were reluctant to employ firearms into their army. The Sufavids and Mameluks, although the Mameluks did use artillery in their encounters with the Ottomans, refused to employ it on a large scale througout the army. The Ottoman however, saw this as a great oppurtunity and used it to their advantage setting up a large and powerful empire. Had the Mameluks or Sufavids used firearms perhaps the history of the Ottoman Empire may have been different. Who's to say they could have become the imperialist powers of the Middle East, Eastern Europe, and Crimea instead of the Ottomans?
A sliding door moment in history I suppose.