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#and hereditary aristocracy as well
elbiotipo · 9 months
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Quick worldbuilding hack, if you want to make a coherent political system for your fantasy world:
Basically, between the fall of Rome and early modern times, in Europe* most political organization wasn't actually kingdoms ruled by One True King like it's usual in fantasy, but something like this:
Feudalism: here, the center of power was not the nation (there was little concept of such thing) or the state, and not even the King, but the landowners (from kings to dukes to counts...) and their network of vassalages to each other. There were no "countries" but rather hereditary titles, and the people who held them. There was little of a true state besides what individual rulers did; they didn't even have formal armies as such, but rather the vassals who provided them, they and could have multiple allegiances. Examples are of course the Holy Roman Empire (neither holy, etc. etc.) France (note that the 100 Years War was a dispute about titles rather than France vs. England), Spain (actually a bunch of kingdoms and crowns rather than a country), etc...
"Empires": A state where a central goverment exerts power over other territories and peoples. These are rather familiar to us, because a formal state exists here, and the ruler is more powerful and often does have a standing arming and administration instead of relying on vassals. Here, there is a bureacracy and a claim to rule a territory, and while they might have vassals and prominent artistocratic families (everyone did) their administration was state-based, not allegiance based. The Roman Empire is the most imperial empire, as well as its cringefail successor the Byzantine Empire, but note that the great Islamic empires also had this kind of administration, with governors appointed and confirmed by the imperial court.
City-States: Basically a powerful city (though they were often the size of small towns, still, very rich) ruled by a local aristocracy, sometimes hereditary, sometimes elected from a few families or guilds, or a mix of both, and in some cases ruled by religious authorities. These could be independent or organized in alliances, but were often vassals of more powerful goverments such as above. Cities are in many way the building brick of larger states; of note, in the Ancient Mediterranean before Rome conquered it all, leagues of city-states were the main powers. Medieval and Early Modern independent city states were the Italian city states of course, and a famous league was the Hansa (many of its members themselves vassals of other powers)
Tribes and Clans: Every culture is different with this, but basically here the centre of power is the relationships between families and kinship. If this sounds familiar to Feudalism, you've been paying attention; Feudalism is what happened when the Roman empire and administration fell, and it was replaced by landowners and their ties of vassalage and allegiances.
Now, besides the history lesson, why is this important? Because there are reasons why rulers had their power, and you should know that.
A king never ruled alone. He was only the head of nobles tied by vassallage (feudalism), or the head of a inherited state bureaucracy and army ("empire"). If you killed the king, another one would rise from the prominent families. Often by bloody civil wars or conquest yes, but the system overall would stay. A king did not reign by its own power or virtue, but because the system itself supported him, and of course, he maintained the system.
A new king who wants to replace the bad old king (a common fantasy storyline) needs to also deal with the allegiances of all its vassals (who would probably rather kill him and take the throne themselves) or build a bureaucracy and an army, supremely expensive endeavors in those times, which took decades if not centuries to build. In fact, the Byzantines and the Arabs inherited most of their state aparatus, in one way or the other, from the Romans.
This is also why these systems lasted so long, too. The appearance of modern republics and other systems of goverment needed the coordination of people and revolutions that did not just kill the king, but also replace it with something else, and for that you need literacy, economic changes, an empowered populace... But that's for another time.
I hope this is fucking helpful because I don't want to spell allegiance ever again.
*I would love to do more about goverments outside Europe, especially Precolombine American ones like the redistrubitionist state-based economy of the Incas, or the Mesoamerican city-states. But that's for another time.
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Is there anything support the populat interpretation that old valriya and valryians in general are more feminist, and progressive than the rest in Asoiaf?
Anon, thank you! I've been wanting to address this for awhile, so I'm going to actually answer this really fully, with as many receipts as I can provide (this ended up being more of an essay than I intended, but hopefully it helps)
I think there's in fact plenty of evidence to suggest that Valyria and the Valyrians in general were anything but progressive. Valyria was an expansive empire with a robust slave trade that practiced incest based on the idea of blood supremacy/blood purity. All of these things are absolutely antithetical to progressivism. There is no way any empire practicing slavery can ever be called progressive. Now, the Targaryens of Dragonstone have since given up the practice of slavery, but they certainly still believe in the supremacy of Valyrian blood.
And I'll see the argument, well what's wrong with believing your blood is special if your blood really is special and magic? Which is just-- if anyone catches themselves thinking this, and you sincerely believe that GRRM intended to create a magically superior master race of hot blondes who deserve to rule over all other backwards races by virtue of their superior breeding which is reinforced through brother-sister incest, and you've convinced yourself this represents progressive values, then you might want to step away from the computer for a bit and do a bit of self reflection.
And remember-- what is special about this special blood? It gives the bearers the ability to wield sentient weapons of mass destruction. It's also likely, according to the most popular theories, the result of blood magic involving human sacrifice. So there is a terrible price to pay for this so-called supremacy. Would any of us line up to be sacrificed to the Fourteen Flames so that the Valyrians can have nukes?
And if you are tempted by the idea that a woman who rides a dragon must inherently have some sort of power-- that is true. A woman who rides a dragon is more powerful than a woman who does not ride a dragon, and in some cases, more powerful than a man who does not ride a dragon, but that does not make her more powerful than a man who also rides a dragon. Dragonriding remained a carefully guarded privilege, and Targaryen women who might otherwise become dragonriders were routinely denied the privilege (despite the oft repeated "you cannot steal a dragon," when Saera Targaryen attempted to claim a dragon from the dragonpit, she was thrown into a cell for the attempted "theft,"words used by Jaehaerys). The dragonkeepers were established explicitly to keep anyone, even those of Targaryen blood, from taking them without permission. Any "liberation" that she has achieved is an illusion. What she has gained is the ability to enact violence upon others who are less privileged, and this ability does not save her from being the victim of gender based violence herself.
Politically speaking, it is also true that Valyria was a "freehold," in that they did not have a hereditary monarchy, but instead had a political structure akin to Ancient Athens (which was itself democratic, but not at all progressive or feminist). Landholding citizens could vote on laws and on temporary leaders, Archons. Were any of the lords freeholder women? We don't know. If we take Volantis as an example, the free city that seems to consider itself the successor to Valyria, the party of merchants, the elephants, had several female leaders three hundred years ago, but the party of the aristocracy, the tigers, the party made up of Valyrian Old Blood nobility, has never had a female leader. Lys, the other free city, is known for it's pleasure houses, which mainly employ women kidnapped into sexual slavery (as well as some young men). It is ruled by a group of magisters, who are chosen from among the wealthiest and noblest men in the city, not women. There does not seem to be a tradition of female leadership among Valyrians, and that's reflected by Aegon I himself, who becomes king, rather than his older sister-wife, Visenya. And although there have been girls named heir, temporarily, among the pre-Dance Targaryens, none were named heir above a trueborn brother aside from Rhaenyra, a choice that sparked a civil war. In this sense, the Targaryens are no different from the rest of Westeros.
As for feminism or sexual liberation, there's just no evidence to support it. We know that polygamy was not common, but it was also not entirely unheard of, but incest, to keep the bloodlines "pure," was common. Incest and polygamy are certainly sexual taboos, both in the real world and in Westeros, that the Valyrians violated, but the violation of sexual taboos is not automatically sexually liberated or feminist. Polygamy, when it is exclusively practiced by men and polyandry is forbidden (and we have no examples of Valyrian women taking multiple husbands, outside of fanfic), is often abusive to young women. Incest leads to an erosion of family relationships and abusive grooming situations are inevitable. King Jaehaerys' daughters are an excellent case study, and the stories of Saera and Viserra are particularly heartbreaking. Both women were punished severely for "sexual liberation," Viserra for getting drunk and slipping into her brother Baelon's bed at age fifteen, in an attempt to avoid an unwanted marriage to an old man. She was not punished because she was sister attempting to sleep with a brother, but because she was the wrong sister. Her mother, the queen had already chosen another sister for Baelon, and believed her own teenage daughter was seducing her brother for nefarious reasons. As a sister, Viserra should have been able to look to her brother for protection, but as the product of an incestuous family, Viserra could only conceive of that protection in terms of giving herself over to him sexually.
Beyond that, sexual slavery was also common in ancient Valyria, a practice that persisted in Lys and Volantis, with women (and young men) trafficked from other conquered and raided nations. Any culture that is built on a foundation of slavery and which considers sexual slavery to be normal and permissible, is a culture of normalized rape. Not feminist, not progressive.
I think we get the picture! so where did this idea that Valyrians are more progressive come from? I think there are two reasons. One, the fandom has a bit of a tendency to imagine Valyrians and their traditions in opposition to Westerosi Sevenism, and if Sevenism is fantasy Catholicism, and the fantasy Catholics also hate the Valyrian ways, they must hate them because those annoying uptight religious freaks just hate everything fun and cool, right? They hate revealing clothing, hate pornographic tapestries, hate sex outside of marriage, hate bastards. So being on Sevenism's shit-list must be a mark of honor, a sign of progressive values? But it's such a surface level reading, and a real misunderstanding of the medieval Catholic church, and a conflating of that church with the later Puritan values that many of us in the Anglosphere associate with being "devout." For most of European history, the Catholic church was simply The Church, and the church was, ironically, where you would find the material actions which most closely align with modern progressive values. The church cared for lepers, provided educations for women, took care of orphans, and fed the poor. In GRRM's world, which is admittedly more secular than the actual medieval world, Sevenism nevertheless has basically the same function, feeding the poor instead of, you know, enslaving them.
Finally, I blame the shows. While Valyrians weren't a progressive culture, Daenerys Targaryen herself held relatively progressive individual values by a medieval metric. She is a slavery abolitionist, she elevates women within her ranks, and she takes control of her own sexuality (after breaking free from her Targaryen brother). But Daenerys wasn't raised as a Targaryen. She grew up an orphan in exile, hearing stories of her illustrious ancestors from her brother, who of the two did absorb a bit of that culture, and is not coincidentally, fucked up, abusive, and misogynistic. He feels a sexual ownership over his sister, arranges a marriage for her, and even after her marriage, feels entitled to make decisions on her behalf. It is only after breaking away from Viserys that Dany comes into her own values. Having once been a mere object without agency of her own, she determines to save others from that fate and becomes an abolitionist. But because Game of Thrones gave viewers very little exposure to Targaryens aside from Daenerys, House Targaryen, in the eyes of most show watchers, is most closely associated with Dany and her freedom-fighter values. And as for Rhaenyra in House of the Dragon, being a female heir does not make her feminist or progressive, although it is tempting to view her that way when she is juxtaposed against Aegon II. Her "sexual liberation" was a lesson given to her by her uncle Daemon, a man who had an express interest in "liberating" her so that she would sleep with him, it was not a value she was raised with. In fact, she was very nearly disinherited for it, and was forced into a marriage with a gay man as a result of said "liberation." She had no interest in changing succession laws to allow absolute primogeniture, no interest in changing laws or norms around bastardy despite having bastards; she simply viewed herself as an exception. Rhaenyra's entire justification for her claim is not the desire to uplift women, bring peace and stability to Westeros, or even to keep her brother off the throne, it is simply that she believes she deserves it because her father is the king and he told her she could have it, despite all tradition and norms, and in spite of the near certain succession crisis it will cause. Whether she is right or wrong, absolutism is not progressive.
And let me just say, none of this means that you can't enjoy the Valyrians or think that they're fun or be a fan of house Targaryen. This insistence that Targaryens are the progressive, feminist (read: morally good) house seems by connected to the need of some fans to make their favorite characters unproblematic. If the Valyrians are "bad," does that make you a bad person for enjoying them? Of course not. But let's stop the moral grandstanding about the "feminist" and "progressive" Valyrians in a series that is an analogue for medieval feudalism. Neither of those things can exist under the systems in place in Westeros, nor could they have existed in the slavery based empire of conquest that was old Valyria.
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I understand the story of marat and his assassination event
But who is lepeletier?
Because I saw a drawing for him by louis David and I learned about his death which happen to be the same as Marat so yeah .. I wanna know about him.
According to the biography Michel Lepeletier de Saint-Fargeau, 1760-1793 (1913), its subject of study was born on 29 May 1760, in his family home on rue Culture-Sainte-Catherine, a building which today is the Bibliothèque Historique de la Ville de Paris. His family belonged to the distinguished part of the robe nobility. At the death of his father in 1769, Lepeletier was both Count of Saint-Fargeau, Marquis of Montjeu, Baron of Peneuze, Grand Bailiff of Gien as well as the owner of 400,000 livres de rente. For five years he worked as avocat du roi at Châtelet, before becoming councilor in Parliament in 1783, general counsel in 1784 and finally taking over the prestigious position of président à mortier at the Parlement of Paris from his father in 1785. On May 16 1789, Lepeletier was elected to represent the nobility at the Estates General. On June 25 the same year he was one of the 47 nobles to join the newly declared National Assembly, two days before the king called on the rest of the first two estates to do so as well. A month later, during the night of August 4 1789, he was in the forefront of those who proposed the suppression of feudalism, even if, for his part, this meant losing 80 000 livres de rente. Four days later he wrote a letter to the priest of Saint-Fargeau, renouncing his rights to both mills, furnaces, dovecote, exclusive hunting and fishing, insence and holy water, butchery and haulage (the last four things the Assembly hadn’t ruled on yet). When the Assembly on June 19 1790 abolished titles, orders, and other privileges of the hereditary nobility, Lepeletier made the motion that all citizens could only bear their real family name — ”The tree of aristocracy still has a branch that you forgot to cut..., I want to talk about these usurper names, this right that the nobles have arrogated to themselves exclusively to call themselves by the name of the place where they were lords. I propose that every individual must bear his last name and consequently I sign my motion: Michel Lepeletier” — and the same year he also, in the name of the Criminal Jurisprudence Committee, presented a report on the supression of the penal code and argued for the abolition of the death penalty. After the closing of the National Assembly in 1791, Lepeletier settled in Auxerre to take on the functions of president of the directory of Yonne, a position to which he had been nominated the previous year. He did however soon thereafter return to Paris, as he, following the overthrow of the monarchy, was one of few former nobles elected to the National Convention, where he was also one of even fewer former nobles to sit together with the Mountain. In December 1792 he started working on a public education plan. On January 20 1793, he voted for death without a reprieve and against an appeal to the people during the trial of Louis XVI (Opinion de L.M. Lepeletier, sur le jugement de Louis XVI, ci-devant roi des François: imprimée par ordre de la Convention nationale). After the session was over, Lepeletier went over to Palais-Égalité (former Palais-Royal) where he dined everyday. The next day, his friend and fellow deputy Nicolas Maure could report the following to the Convention:
Citizens, it is with the deepest affection and resentment of my heart that I announce to you the assassination of a representative of the people, of my dear colleague and friend Lepelletier, deputy of Yonne; committed by an infamous royalist, yesterday, at five o'clock, at the restaurateur Fevrier, in the Jardin de l'Égalité. This good citizen was accustomed to dining there (and often, after our work, we enjoyed a gentle and friendly conversation there) by a very unfortunate fate, I did not find myself there; for perhaps I could have saved his life, or shared his fate. Barely had he started his dinner when six individuals, coming out of a neighboring room, presented themselves to him. One of them, said to be Pâris, a former bodyguard, said to the others: There's that rascal Lepeletier. He answered him, with his usual gentleness: I am Lepeletier, but I am not a rascal. Paris replied: Scoundrel, did you not vote for the death of the king? Lepelletier replied: That is true, because my confidence commanded me to do so.Instantly, the assassin pulled a saber, called a lighter, from under his coat and plunged it furiously into his left side, his lower abdomen; it created a wound four inches deep and four fingers wide. The assassin escaped with the help of his accomplices. Lepeletier still had the gentleness to forgive him, to pray that no further action would be taken; his strength allowed him to make his declaration to the public officer, and to sign it. He was placed in the hands of the surgeons who took him to his brother, at Place Vendôme. I went there immediately, led by my tender friendship, and my reverence for the virtues which he practiced without ostentation: I found him on his death bed, unconscious. When he showed me his wound, he uttered only these two words: I'm cold. He died this morning, at half past one, saying that he was happy to shed his blood for the homeland; that he hoped that the sacrifice of his life would consolidate Liberty; that he died satisfied with having fulfilled his oaths.
This was the first time a Convention deputy had gotten murdered, and it naturally caused strong reactions. Already the same session when Maure had announced Lepeletier’s death, the Convention ordered the following:
There are grounds for indictment against Pâris, former king's guard, accused of the assassination of the person of Michel Lepelletier, one of the representatives of the French people, committed yesterday.
[The Convention] instructs the Provisional Executive Council to prosecute and punish the culprit and his accomplices by the most prompt measures, and to without delay hand over to its committee of decrees the copies of the minutes from the justice of the peace and the other acts containing information relating to this attack.
The Decrees and Legislation Committees will present, in tomorrow's session, the drafting of the indictment.
An address will be written to the French people, which will be sent to the 84 departments and the armies, by extraordinary couriers, to inform them of the crime against the Nation which has just been committed against the person of Michel Lepelletier, of the measures that the National Convention has taken for the punishment for this attack, to invite the citizens to peace and tranquility, and the constituted authorities to the most exact surveillance.
The entire National Convention will attend the funeral of Michel Lepelletier, assassinated for having voted for the death of the tyrant.
The honors of the French Pantheon are awarded to Michel Lepelletier, and his body will be placed there.
The president is responsible for writing, on behalf of the National Convention, to the department of Yonne, and to the family of Lepelletier.
The next day, January 22, further instructions were given regarding Lepeletier’s funeral: 
On Thursday January 24, Year 2 of the Republic, at eight o'clock in the morning, will be celebrated, at the expense of the Nation, the funeral of Michel Lepeletier, deputy of the department of Yonne to the National Convention.
The National Convention will attend the funeral of Michel Lepeletier in its entirety. The executive council, the administrative and judicial bodies will attend it as well.
The executive council and the department of Paris will consult with the Committee of Public Instruction regarding the details of the funeral ceremony.
The last words spoken by Michel Lepeletier will be engraved on his tomb, they are as follows: “I am happy to shed my blood for the homeland; I hope that it will serve to consolidate Liberty and Equality; and to make their enemies recognized.”
In number 27 (January 27 1793) of Gazette Nationale ou Le Moniteur Universel, the following long description was given over Lepeletier’s funeral, held three days earlier:
The funeral of Lepeletier Saint-Fargeau was celebrated on Thursday 24 with all the splendor that the severity of the weather and the season allowed, but with such a crowd that it could have been the most beautiful day of the year. At ten o'clock in the morning his deathbed was placed on the pedestal where the equestrian statue of Louis XVI previously stood, on Place Vendôme, today Place des Piques. One went up to the pedestal by two staircases, on the banisters of which were antique candelabras. The body was lying on the bed with the bloody sheets and the sword with which he had been struck. He was naked to the waist, and his large and deep wound could be seen exposed. These were the mournful and most endearing part of this great spectacle. All that was missing was the author of the crime, chained, and beginning his torture by witnessing the sight of the triumph of Saint-Fargeau. As soon as the National Convention and all the bodies that were to form courage were assembled in the square, mournful music was played. It was, like almost all those which has embellished our revolutionary festivals, the composition of citizen Gossec. The Convention was ranged around the pedestal. The citizen in charge of the ceremonies presented the President of the Convention with a wreath of oak and flowers; then the president, preceded by the ushers of the Convention and the national music, went around the monument, and went up to the pedestal to place the civic crown on Lepeletier's head: during this time, a federate gave a speech; the president dismounted, the procession set out in the following order: A detachment of cavalry preceded by trumpets with fourdincs. Sappers. Cannoneers without cannons. Detachment of veiled drummers. Declaration of the rights of man carried by citizens. Volunteers of the six legions, and 24 flags. Drum detachment. A banner on which was written the decree of the Convention which ordered the transport of Lepeletier's body to the Pantheon. Students of the homeland. Police commissioners. The conciliation office. Justices of the peace. Section presidents and commissioners. The commercial court. The provisional criminal court. The department’s fix courts. The electorate. The provisional criminal court. The department's criminal courts fix. The municipality of Paris. The districts of Saint-Denis and the village of L’Égalité. The Department. Drum detachment. The seal of the 84, worn by Federates. The provisional executive council. National Convention Guard Detachment. The court of cassation. Figure of Liberty carried by citizens. The bloody clothes worn at the end of a national pike, deputies marching in two columns. In the middle of the deputies was a banner where Lepeletier's last words were written: "I am happy to shed my blood for my homeland, I hope that it will serve to consolidate Liberty and Equality, and to make their enemies known.” 
The body carried by citizens, as it was exhibited on the Place des Piques. Around the body, gunners, sabers in hand, accompanied by an equal number of Veterans. Music from the National Guard, who performed funeral tunes during the march. Family of the dead. Group of mothers with children. Detachment of the Convention Guard. Veiled drums. Volunteers of the six legions and 24 flags. Veiled drums. Volunteers of the six legions and 24 flags. Veiled drums. Volunteers of the six legions and 24 flags. Veiled drums. Armed federations. Popular societies. Cavalry and trumpets with fourdines. On each side, citizens, armed with pikes, formed a barrier and supported the columns. These citizens held their pikes horizontally, at hip height, from hand to hand. The procession left in this order from the Place des Piques, and passed through the streets St-Honoré, du Roule, the Pont-Neuf, the streets Thionville (former Dauphine), Fossés Saint-Germain, Liberté (former Fossés M. le Prince), Place Saint-Michel and Rue d'Enfer, Saint-Thomas, Saint-Jacques and Place du Panthéon. It stopped front of the meeting room of the Friends of Liberty and Equality; opposite the Oratory, on the Pont-Neuf, opposite the Samaritaine; in front of the meeting room of the Friends of the Rights of Man; at the intersection of Rue de la Liberté; Place Saint-Michel and the Pantheon. Arriving at the Pantheon, the body was placed on the platform prepared for it. The National Convention lined up around it; the band, placed in the rostrum, performed a superb religious choir; Lepeletier's brother then gave a speech, in which he announced that his brother had left a work, almost completed, on national education, which will soon be made public; he ended with these words: I vote, like my brother, for the death of tyrants. The representatives of the people, brought closer to the body, promised each other union, and swore on the salvation of the homeland. A big chorus to Liberty ended the ceremony.
According to Michel Lepeletier de Saint-Fargeau, 1760-1793 (1913), civic festivals in honor of Lepeletier were celebrated in all sections of Paris, as well as the towns of Arras, Toulouse, Chaumont, Valenciennes, Dijon, Abbeville and Huningue. Lepeletier’s body did however only get to rest in the Panthéon for a little more than a year, as on February 15 1795, the Convention ordered it exhumed, at the same time as that of Marat. It was instead buried in the park surrounding Château de Ménilmontant, the properly of which the ancestor Lepeletier de Souzy had purchased in the 17th century and that still remained in the family.
One day after the funeral, January 25, Lepeletier’s only child, the ten and a half year old Susanne, who had already lost her mother ten years before the murder of her father, was brought before the Convention by her step-mother and two paternal uncles Amédée and Félix. It was Félix who had held a speech during the funeral and he would continue to work for his seven years older brother’s memory afterwards too, offering a bust of him to the Convention on February 21 1793, (on the proposal of David, it was placed next to the one of Brutus), reading his posthumous work on public education to the Jacobins on July 19 1793, and even writing a whole biography over his life in 1794 (Vie de Michel Lepeletier, représentant du peuple français, assassiné à Paris le 20 janvier 1793 : faite et présentée a la Société des Jacobins).
The president announces that the widow of Michel Lepelletier, his two brothers and his daughter, request to be admitted to the bar, to testify to the Convention their recognition of the honors that they have decreed in memory of their relative. It is decreed that they will be admitted immediately.
One of Michel Lepeletier’s brothers: Citizens, allow me to introduce my niece, the daughter of Michel Lepelletier; she comes to offer you and the French people her recognition of the eternity of glory to which you have dedicated her father... He takes the young citoyenne Lepelletier in his arms, and makes her look at the president of the Convention... My niece, this is now your father... Then, addressing the members of the Convention, and the citizens present at the session: People, here is your child... Lepelletier pronounces these last words in an altered voice: silence reigns throughout the room, with exception for a couple of sobs.
The President: Citizens, the martyr of Liberty has received the just tribute of tears owed to him by the National Convention, and the just honor that his cold skin has received invites us to imitate his example and to avenge his death. But the name of Lepelletier, immortal from now on, will be dear to the French Nation. The National Convention, which needs to be consoled, finds relief to its pain in expressing to his family the just regrets of its members and the recognition of the great Nation of which it is the organ. The Nation will undoubtedly ratify the adoption of Michel Lepelletier's daughter that is currently being carried out by the National Convention.
Barère: The emotion that the sight of Michel Lepeletier's only daughter has just communicated to your souls must not be infertile for the homeland. Susanne Lepelletier lost her father; she must find now find one in the French people. Its representatives must consecrate this moment of all-too-just felicity to a law that can bring happiness to several citizens and hope to several families. The errors of nature, the illusions of paternity, the stability of morals, have long demanded this beautiful institution of the Romans. What more touching time could present itself at the National Convention to pass into French legislation the principle of adoption, than that when the last crimes of expiring tyranny deprived the homeland of one of its ardent defenders and Susanne Lepelletier of a dear father! Let the National Convention therefore give today the first example of adoption by decreeing it for the only offspring of Lepelletier; let it instruct the Legislation Committee to immediately present the bill on this interesting subject. I ask that the homeland adopt through your organ Susanne Lepelletier, daughter of Michel Lepelletier, who died for his country; that it decrees that adoption will be part of French legislation, and instructs its Legislation Committee to immediately present the draft decree on adoption.
This proposal is unanimously approved.
Susanne being adopted by the state would however lead to a fierce debate when, in 1797, this ”daughter of the nation” wished to marry a foreigner. For this affair, see the article Adopted Daughter of the French People: Suzanne Lepeletier and Her Father, the National Assembly (1999)
Right after Barère’s intervention, David took to the rostrum:
David: Still filled with the pain that we felt, while attending the funeral procession with which we honored the inanimate remains of our colleagues, I ask that a marble monument be made, which transmits to posterity the figure of Lepelletier , as you clearly saw, when it was brought to the Pantheon. I ask that this work be put into competition.
Saint-André: I ask that this figure be placed on the pedestal which is in the middle of Place Vendôme... (A few murmurs arise)
Jullien: I ask that the Convention adopt in advance, in the name of the homeland, the children of the defenders of Liberty, who, for similar reasons, could be immolated in the vengeance of the royalists.
All these proposals are referred to the Legislation and Public Instruction Committees.
On Maure's proposal, the Assembly orders the printing of the speeches delivered yesterday at the Panthéon, by one of Michel Lepelletier's brothers, Barère and Vergniaux.
If it would appear David never got to make a marble monument of Lepeletier, on March 28 1793, he could nevertheless present the following painting of his to the Convention, which isn’t just a little similar to his La Mort de Marat.
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(This image is an engraving of the actual painting, which has gone missing)
After Marat on July 13 1793 (on the very same day the plan for public education Lepeletier had been working on was read to the Convention by Robespierre) became the second assassinated Convention deputy, we find several engravings etc, depicting the two ”martyrs of liberty” side by side.
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In the following months, even more people would be join the two, such as Joseph Chalier, a lyonnais politician executed on July 17 1794 and Joseph Bara, a fourteen year old republican drummer boy killed in the Vendée by the pro-Monarchist forces.
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Lepeletier’s murderer, 27 year old Philippe Nicolas Marie de Pâris, a man who the minister of justice described as  "former king's guard, height five pieds, five pouces, barbe bleue, and black hair; swarthy complexion, fine teeth, dressed in a gray cloak, green lapels and a round hat” on January 21, went into hiding right after his deed. In spite of his description being published in the papers and a considerable sum of money being promised to whoever caught him, Pâris managed to flee Paris and settled for a country house of an acquaintance near Bourget. He there ran into a cousin of one of the owners. When Pâris asked for food and a bed, he was refused and instead disappeared into the night again. In the evening of January 28 he arrived in Forges-les-Eaux and stopped at an inn, where he came under suspicion once he started cutting his bread with a dagger after which he locked himself into his room. The following morning he woke up with a start as five municipal gendarmes came bursting into his room and told him to come with them. Pâris responded that he would, but in the next second he had picked up his hidden pistol, placed it into his mouth, and pulled the trigger. Searching the dead body, the gendarmes found Pâris’ baptism record (dated November 12 1765) and dismissal from the king's guard (dated June 1 1792), on the latter of which had been written the following:
My certificate of honor. Do not trouble anyone. No one was my accomplice in the fortunate death of the scoundrel de Saint-Fargeau. Had I not run into him, I would have carried out a more beautiful action: I would have purged France of the patricide, regicide and parricide d’Orléans. The French are cowards to whom I say: Peuple dont les forfaits jettent partout l'effroi,  Avec calme et plaisir j'abandonne la vie.  Ce n'est que par la mort qu'on peut fuir l'infamie Qu'imprime sur nos fronts le sang de notre roi. Signed by Paris the older, guard of the king, assassinated by the French.
Learning about what had happened, the Convention tasked Tallien and Legrand with going to Forges-les-Eaux and making sure the dead man really was Pânis. Having come to the conclusion that this was indeed the case, the deputies briefly discussed whether the body ought to be brought back to Paris, but it was decided it would be better if it was just buried "with ignominy.” It was therefore instead taken into the nearby forest in a wheelbarrow and thrown into a six feet deep hole.
Finally, here are some other revolutionaries simping for honoring Lepeletier’s memory just because I can:
…a tragic event took place the day before the execution [of the king]. Pelletier, one of the most patriotic deputies, and who had voted for death, was assassinated. A king's guard made a wound three fingers wide with a saber: he died this morning. You must judge the effect that such a crime has had on the friends of liberty. Pelletier had an income of six hundred thousand livres; he had been président à mortier in the Parliament of Paris; he was barely thirty years old; to many talents, he added the most estimable of virtues. He died happy, he took to his grave the idea, consoling for a patriot, that his death would serve the public good. Here then is one of these beings whom the infamous cabal who, in the Convention, wanted to save Louis and bring back slavery, designated to the departments as a Maratist, a factious, a disorganizer... But the reign of these political rascals is finished. You will see the measures that the Assembly took both to avenge the national majesty and to pay homage to a generous martyr of liberty. Philippe Lebas in a letter to his father, January 21 1793
Ah! if it is true that man does not die entirely and that the noblest part of himself survives beyond the grave and is still interested in the things of life, come then, dear and sacred shadow, sometimes to hover above the Senate of the nation that you adorned with your virtues; come and contemplate your work, come and see your united brothers contributing to the happiness of the homeland, to the happiness of humanity. Marat in number 105 (January 23 1793) of Journal de la République Française
O Lepeletier! Your death will serve the Republic: I envy your death. You ask for the honors of the Pantheon for him, but he has already collected the prize of martyrdom of Liberty. The way to honor his memory is to swear that we will not leave each other without having given a constitution to the Republic. Danton at the Convention, January 21 1793
O Le Peletier, you were worthy to die for your homeland under the blows of its assassins! Dear and sacred shadow, receive our wishes and our oaths! Generous citizen, incorruptible friend of the truth, we swear by your virtues, we swear by your fatal and glorious death to defend against you the holy cause of which you were the apostle; we swear eternal war against the crime of which you were the eternal enemy, against the tyranny and treason of which you were the victim. We envy your death and we will know how to imitate your life. They will remain forever engraved in our hearts, these last words where you showed us your entire soul; ”May my death,” you said, “be useful to the homeland, may it will serve to make known the true and false friends of liberty, and I die content.” Robespierre at the Jacobins, January 23
Wednesday 23 [sic] — We went to Madame Boyer’s to see the procession. I saw the poor Saint-Fargeau. We all burst into tears when the body passed by, we threw a wreath on it. After the ceremony, we returned to my house. Ricord and Forestier had arrived. I was unable to stop my tears for some time. F(réron), La P(oype), Po, R(obert) and others came to dinner. The dinner was quite fun and cheerful. Afterwards they went to the Jacobins, Maman and I stayed by the fire and, our imaginations struck by what we had seen, we talked about it for a while. She wanted to leave, I felt that I could not be alone and bear the horrible thoughts that were going to besiege me. I ran to D(anton’s). He was moved to see me still pale and defeated. We drank tea, I supped there. Lucile Desmoulins in her diary, January 24 1793
…Pelletier's funeral took place this Thursday as I informed you in my last letter (this letter has gone missing). The procession was immense; it seemed that the population of Paris had doubled, to honor the memory of this virtuous citizen. The mourning of the soul was painted on all the faces: it was especially noticed that the people were extremely affected, which proves that they keenly felt the price of the friend they had lost. Arriving at the Pantheon, Lepelletier's body was placed on the platform prepared for it; his brother delivered a speech which was applauded with tears; Barère succeeded him. Then the members of the Convention, crowding around the body of their colleague, promised union among themselves, and took an oath to save the country. God grant that we have not sworn in vain, that we finally know the full extent of our duties, and that we only occupy ourselves with fulfilling them! In yesterday's session, Pelletier's daughter, aged eight [sic], was presented to the National Convention, which immediately adopted her as a child of the homeland. Georges Couthon in a letter written January 26 1793
How could I be so base as to abandon myself to criminal connections, I who, in the world, have never had more than one close friend since the age of six? (he gestures towards David's painting). Here he is! Michel Lepeletier, oh you from whom I have never parted, you whose virtue was my model, you who like me was the target of parliamentary hatred, happy martyr! I envy your glory. I, like you, will rush for my country in the face of liberticidal daggers; but did I have to be assassinated by the dagger of a republican! Hérault de Sechelles at the Convention, December 29 1793
For a collection of Lepeletier’s works, see Oeuvres de Michel Lepeletier Saint-Fargeau, député aux assemblées constituante et conventionnelle, assassiné le 20 janvier 1793, par Paris, garde du roi (1826)
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empirearchives · 7 months
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Ceres-Diadem / Ears of Corn Tiara, France
Early 19th century
Featured in an exhibition at Schmuckmuseum Pforzheim about jewelry during the Napoleonic era: A Newly Ordered World – Treasures from the Napoleonic Era
Currently located at: Albion Art Collection, Tokyo
Napoleon Bonaparte reorganized the European world in many respects… Back then, the Neoclassical “style of the Revolution” and the decorative Empire style spread all over Western Europe well into Russia. The moral concepts developed during the Enlightenment called for an aesthetic inspired by reason, which met the taste of an increasingly powerful, self-confident and educated middle class, and influenced all areas of culture – starting from architecture, painting, furniture, garments and jewellery all the way through to literature and music. The visual arts were expected to lead to the emergence of an intellectual aristocracy to break with the tradition of hereditary aristocracy. Over the course of Napoleon’s imperial reign, the Empire style unfolded its representative splendour to perfection.
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goodqueenaly · 1 year
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This is kind of a weighty what if question, but the marriage making in Fire and Blood, sucks, like really sucks. If you were in Alysanne's position who would you have married Alyssa, Daella, Saera, and Viserra too?
I think the answer depends on what Jaehaerys and Alysanne - which is to say, the author’s characterization of Jaehaerys and Alysanne - wanted, in a politico-dynastic sense, out of the marriages of their daughters. The problem I have with the marriages or planned/speculated of these daughters in Fire and Blood Volume 1 (among others, anyway) is that it seems like either there was no politico-dynastic motivation at all - a bizarre idea when we’re talking about a land ruled by its feudal hereditary aristocracy - or that motivation was counterintuitive to the information being presented.
So, for example, I’m not completely against the idea of Baelon and Alyssa marrying - but I am confused as to why their marriage wasn’t taken as an opportunity for the crown to reaffirm the relatively recent Doctrine of Exceptionalism (and, by extension, the crown’s draconic power and influence over the Faith). Theirs was not just the first incestuous marriage of the new generation, but also the first made in a post-Doctrine world; Jaehaerys might have found success sending the Seven Speakers around the kingdom, but it remained something like an untested theological theory so long as no more incestuous marriages were made after its promulgation. So wouldn’t the marriage of Baelon and Alyssa have been a perfect opportunity to really underline the Doctrine as an affirmative, well-accepted tenet within the Faith of the Seven? Maybe Jaehaerys and Alysanne could have had the marriage presided over by the High Septon, or at least have had notably pious and respected figures within the Faith give blessings and sermons supporting the Doctrine - how wise Jaehaerys had been to have enlightened the Faithful about it, how clearly the Mother had blessed this union with all the children given to Jaehaerys and Alysanne, how glad the Father clearly was to have a just king like Jaehaerys to rule them in king years of peace, that sort of thing. (That the author wrote Alyssa and Baelon’s relationship as virtually exclusively sexual is a separate failing I’ve already discussed.)
Likewise, I’m not against the idea of Daella Targaryen marrying Rodrik Arryn (albeit a Daella who isn’t completely infantilized by the narrative and a Rodrik who isn’t a complete fucking creep). But the way the narrative presents the marriage, Daella effectively plays a game of Westerosi Bachelorette, where her mother handpicks the contestants and Daella decides the winner of the rose ceremony on nothing more than personal preference. There is no greater or even simply different gain, apparently, in the crown having one of its princesses marry the Lord of Storm’s End versus the heir to Casterly Rock versus the Lord of the Eyrie, even though the three are not remotely similar in geopolitical power and consideration or dynastic background; indeed, Jaehaerys quite explicitly didn’t care whether she married “a hedge knight or a merchant or Pate the Pig Boy … so long as she pick[ed] someone” (emphasis in original). Why can't we see Jaehaerys and Alysanne looking to use Daella's marriage to Rodrik Arryn as a way of healing the breach made by their father's inaction, when Aenys had left it to Maegor to handle Jonos Arryn's rebellion and Lord Ronnel Arryn had lost his life in the process? Why can't we see Jaehaerys and Alysanne also looking to explain this first marriage of a Targaryen princess to a non-Targaryen (not counting Rhaena's disastrous marriage to Androw Farman) by using the ancient blue-blood and pious spirit of House Arryn - that the Arryns who had come from Andalos to bring, so it might be said in-universe, the light of the Seven to Westeros would be a fit marriage with the unquestionably Faith-following royal dynasty (and by seizing on the religious legacy of House Arryn, the Targaryens might retroactively put that ancient stamp of approval on the Doctrine of Exceptionalism)?
Viserra's marriage considerations in F&B are even less understandable than Daella's, a point I've spoken to before. Again, I'm not against a Manderly marriage - but not with Theomore, who in dynastic standing makes absolutely no sense for the husband of a royal princess beyond the disturbingly large age gap. If the Starks did not want to play ball with the Targaryens (and there is at least some suggestion of this), then I could absolutely see where Jaehaerys and Alysanne might have wanted to subtly remind the Starks of their power. By planting a daughter in White Harbor, and reemphasizing the friendly feeling between the Targaryens and Manderlys, the king and queen might have wanted the apparently anti-Targaryen Starks that they would be wise not to resist royal power when their wealthiest and most powerful bannerman was firmly on the royal side. (Again, none of this fixes Viserra as a character, but that's a separate issue.)
Saera's story is so fundamentally broken, in my opinion, that I don't think it can be fixed, and that goes for any marriage making for her (indeed, her marriage arrangements are even more bizarrely treated than Daella's - Jaehaerys apparently didn't care whether a royal princess married a vassal of the Tullys, a vassal of his own half-brother in the Stormlands, or a vassal of a vassal in the Reach). I think any rewrite on Saera would need to start completely from scratch, so I can't even begin to speculate on any marriage
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black-performer-blog · 11 months
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Hi-Fi Rush fantasy AU
First of all, forgive me for my English. Secondly, I will be incredibly happy if one of you can tell about your vision of this, adding or correcting some elements. I'm just wondering what other people could think about it.
Let's go.
Okay, Hi-Fi Rush fantasy AU. Almost-like-middle-ages, maybe with inclusions of steampunk and magical technology. In this variant, lost limbs can be replaced with the power of alchemy, just as they can be modified. Corporations could be replaced by guilds, manufactories also could be used. The robots here could be represented as golems, and they could be less common. And maybe I don’t have a good idea of the locations, but I think I know who the characters in this AU could be.
Chai - I think he would always want to be a wandering minstrel or maybe a bard? In instruments he might have a lute or a vihuela, heck, maybe another stringed instrument that I've never heard of. Is it possible that his hand was damaged and did not grow together properly? So when he could afford to start his own life and get a lute, it would be useless for him. So yes, he still doesn't know how to play, but he probably has a bunch of sketched notes for his songs at home.
808 - a golem, or maybe a spirit, capable of summoning people for a short time through a portal. It seems to me that in this version it could have had much more patterns, as well as visible joints in the limbs and any bending parts. Can roll into a ball and roll/levitate. In theory, it would be an indication that Pepermint is associated with the upper strata of society - the aristocracy or alchemists, because the golem is complex. But Chai is still a bit of a dumbass, so he's unlikely to think about this detail.
Peppermint - I'm not sure, she may come from an earl or baronial family, famous for its alchemical activities and inventions. Her image could be similar to a classic D&D rogue with a small light crossbow that could be enchanted. Her knowledge of alchemy may help her deal with magical seals and locks, but she in her position may clearly lack the materials in this version.
Macaron - former head of the Alchemy Guild, whose arms are not replaced but modified to give him more physical strength. It could be his own project, which he experienced for himself. I imagine him wearing goggles and an apron with many pockets where amulets or potions can be crammed to aid and enhance. And of course de a small grimoire on the belt.
Korsika - captain of the guard! I'm sure leather armor and double clubs (or maces) enchanted with electricity would suit her. She worked hard and for a very long time, it can be assumed that she is either just a hereditary guard, or it was her family's business to once receive the honor of standing at the head of the guard of their city.
CNMN - a golem, obviously. However, I have no idea how it is possible to keep a joke and pun with his name in this AU.
Rekka - should be in charge of manufactories. She dresses simply, but with high quality, and her clothes are reinforced, which seems strange to others, but it gives her certain advantages. Rekka would suit the personality of something similar to a berserker by DnD standards, but more tamed (I may be wrong due to lack of knowledge). Her hands have the most demonic appearance of all the characters, and as such, she wears gloves so as not to scare people even more.
Kale - comes from an earl or baronial family, obviously. In fact, he modified his entire body with alchemy, but these changes are only visible when he needs to manifest them (hell, imagine if he changed completely into something similar to the demonic form of Dante from DMS 5).
Roquefort - the head of a Merchant Guild or just a merchant's house? His near-death state could be anything, but I find the lycanthropy option interesting. What if his fading and approaching end would be associated with a beast that would take over him every day, so that his death could be both from the loss of his personality, as a human, and literally from monster hunters. Kale could then offer him a risky option that would rely heavily on luck (perhaps because Zanzo, who was already on Kale's side, suggested such a fucked up idea). And yet it not only worked, but also gave Roquefort full control over his beast... which is very bad for his enemies, especially since this form was later enhanced many times and brought to something almost demonic.
Mimosa - I'm not sure, but something like a court minstrel, managing heralds? She seems to me to come from a relatively noble family, but she is the hardest thing for me to see here. But I just see that her wings have very strong peacock motifs.
Zanzo - current head of the Alchemy Guild. Could have been expelled from there earlier due to his dangerous experiments and curiosity for darker sides of alchemy. It is possible that he is too fascinated by this science and the possibilities it provides, especially for him, to pay attention to what someone considers too dangerous. Definitely does not see sympathy for golems, as well as for robots in the original, perhaps even worse. His arms and legs were replaced with artificial ones, most likely due to a accident during his experiments. He wears an alchemical cloak with pockets and a special belt. As for Zanzo's head - I thought about it for a some time, but it could be something like a hoop helmet with ropes extending from it from some kind of magical material, around which alchemical inscriptions are wrapped. Maybe here they would gives greater sensitivity to magic or let keep more knowledge in mind without constant looking into the grimoire.
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albrechtstarkarm · 20 days
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I love that Battletech/Mechwarrior coasts entirely on the audiences' inurement to all its formative stereotypes. These are both hilarious and so far-removed from any kind of modern focus-grouped PC™ norm that dissected with candor they look like the product of some edgelord "triggered you" studio if handled badly and when actually managed well are extremely funny (also, there is a canon pedophilia scale between these feudal caricatures I did not think I could assign with so much authority):
The Free Worlds League are 'murcans in love with their fREEEEEEEEEEEEEEDUM (to be poor and starve for an aristocracy, mostly) who literally will let the entire Inner Sphere die for money but their king Hereditary President-for-Life will cut a deal with the next guy to save his son. They'll fuck kids if there's cash in it for someone.
The Federated Suns are Franco-British chivalry fops in dumbass costumes who also fuck little boys and definitely have no place for broads except on their backs. They're led by the aforementioned Louis XIV motherfucker who will indeed let your son die from leukemia if you won't give him what he wants (he'll probably also fuck your son).
The Lyran Commonwealth are arrogant firepower-obsessed Germanic brutes with Russian imperial competence and implicitly greet each other with arms raised at forty-five degrees. They will use an entire regiment of 100-ton war machines to solve a slapfight between six-year-olds. They'll then fuck these six-year-olds but I think mostly to prove a point.
The Draconis Combine are Meiji samurai. That's it. They hate wimmin, will disembowel themselves hon'r'bly, and love swords. And Tennō, of course. Notice me, Tennō!!!! They are often described as a yellow peril by the Federated Suns and Lyrans both (and briefly by the union of Lyran and Federated Suns). They'll probably also fuck your son, but only because it will toughen him up as a true warrior in shudō's finest tradition.
The Capellans are wily chinamen led at one point by a Fu Manchu emperor named Sunzi, also treat women like chattel, and are Communist-because-we-say-we-are Dengists. No official word on whether they'll fuck kids. Probably. I guess.
The Afro-Caribbean Canopians are all loose easy fast-dancing matriarchal sluts who have legalized prostitution for some reason despite owning men as sexual property and having ton-for-ton one of the most menacing militaries in the Periphery. I don't think there's much boy-fucking on Canopus but again- mileage varies.
The Marian Hegemony are Ireland and Italy if they banded together to live their people's worst stereotypes. The Mick-Wop Alliance will do anything for money, power, and liquor, and no I am not making up any of this. They're all Irish-Italian Turbocatholic. Do you really need to ask about the, well, y'know?
If you see anyone who looks like a Jew, they want money. Except money is called C-Bills and actually a currency made from FTL communication time on the galactic media network they monopolize in an obscurantan Protocols of The Elders of Zion-ish company named Comstar. Comstar is a front operation for an insane death cult named the Word of Blake. The Word of Blake will do anything if it will mean more Blakists. Anything.
If you see anyone who's even vaguely Arab, they will have black-eyed slave girls and preside over feral desert planets where they scheme against one another like Levantine monarchs circa 1100. Listen, boy-fucking is just implicit when there are seraglios out of a XIX century Orientalist painting.
The Clans, which are national-socialist tribal warbands with Mongol organization, manage to be mostly eviler than anyone else in the Inner Sphere but (of course) everyone's favorite special little meowmeows in Clans Wolf, Ghost Bear, and Hell's Horses are actually better than most because of reasons that go unspecified but are Vitally Important. Clanners are an oppressive legalistic culture where children- thank God- are kept isolated from most adults. No word on whether these adults fuck the kids but outside of the aforesaid three, probably.
Especially Clan Jade Falcon. Fuck those guys (just not if you're a kid, ohmygod).
Somehow this is still one of the best franchises still running in tabletop and electronic games. We really need some competition.
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hookedonapirate · 1 year
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Lady Cassidy's Lover
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Summary: 1919 England, Emma Cassidy, wife of a baronet, finds herself trapped in a loveless marriage after the war leaves her husband, Neal, paralyzed from the waist down and unable to produce an heir.
Despite the obstacles, she sticks by her husband's side at Goldby Hall, his family's estate, but when she meets former army lieutenant and Neal's aloof gamekeeper, Killian Jones, she feels curiously drawn to his distant blue eyes and quiet demeanor.
At first, she seeks him out for reprieve from her soulless, mundane existence at Goldby Hall, but what starts out as purely physical quickly turns into more than either of them expects.
But Emma is a baronetess, wife of an aristocrat and Killian is a working class servant. Their love affair is frowned upon, and she risks losing her title, her wealth and her position in the world by being with him. But she is determined to get her happy ending with the man she loves. Even if it means losing everything else in the process.
A/N: Despite Emma's last name and marriage to Neal, this NOT a swanfire fic! This definitely ends with Captain Swan so if you're expecting swanfire, this is not for you.
This is the Lady Chatterley's Lover au no one asked for. I had never read the novel but when I watched the newest movie adaptation (there are 4 that I know of), I simply had to write this for CS even though I already have a mountain of wips in my doc. This fic will mostly be following the 1981 and 2022 versions. If you haven't watched the 2022 version, I highly recommend it, if no other reason than to watch Jack O'Connell.
This fic deals with mature themes (some of which the book was banned for back when it was written), adultery, postwar, language, smut.
Hope you enjoy!
Catch up: Ch 1 I Ch 2 I Ch 3 I Ch 4 I Ch 5 I Ch 6 I Ch 7 I Ch 8 I Ch 9 I Ch 10 I Ch 11 I Ch 12 I Epilogue
We've got to live, no matter how many skies have fallen—D. H. Lawrence, Lady Chatterley's Lover
Chapter One
Emma releases a heavy sigh as she slumps down onto the sofa, relieved the ceremony is over with. If only the day were done too, so she wouldn't have to be subjected to dancing and all the other useless traditions of a wedding reception. Now she has to listen to dreadful toasts and her and Neal's family drone on about how perfect she and her new doting husband are together.
"So, how does it feel?" One by one, her sister, Mary Margaret unbuckles Emma's shoes and pulls them off her tired feet.
Emma shakes her head. "I don't know. Ask me tomorrow." Perhaps then she'll feel differently about exchanging vows with a man she barely knows.
She and Neal had met and courted shortly before he was shipped off to war, and during his leave, he had confessed he'd hated being without her and asked her to marry him. She had said yes and they were quick to get married before he returns to the front. Their fathers may have had a hand in rushing things along as well. Britain declared war with Germany three years ago, heightening Sir Rumpelstiltskin's long-held desire to see his only son marry and produce heirs to their fortune.
Emma's father, Sir Leopold, wants her to have a stable husband, and who better than a man with a hereditary rank and title? She and Mary Margaret were raised in Kensington by Sir Leopold, a royal academician and their mother, Eva, a well-educated socialist, and had what one might call an aesthetically unorthodox childhood. They had been taken to Paris, Florence and Rome to breathe in art, and to the Hague and Berlin for socialist conventions where the speakers spoke in every civilized tongue.
Emma comes from wealth and Neal from aristocracy, so some could say it's the perfect match, except for the fact she has not known him long enough to truly love him. But from her perspective, this marriage is the perfect arrangement. The perfect way to get her father off her back about finding a suitable husband like her sister's. Furthermore, she does not have to worry about getting hurt by someone she does not love. She has experienced what it's like to lose someone she loves. She lost her mother ten years ago to illness and had to witness her father almost become a shell of a man without her. Emma made up her mind long ago she would never give her heart to a man. She would never submit to him emotionally.
She has been with men before, of course, but none she had loved.
A man is like a child, and if he doesn't get what he wants, he whines and fusses, exposing an unpleasant side of himself. But a woman can yield to a man without yielding her inner, free self. A woman can take a man without truly giving herself away. Certainly, she can take him without giving herself into his power. Rather, she can wield the power over him.
"You need to eat something."
"I need to get out of this dress first." She doesn't quite care for the high-waisted empire line, the tiered skirt made of dreadful lace or the sleeves that fall to her elbows. It reminds her of a tablecloth rather than a dress. Don't get her started on the extravagantly large bouquet of flowers that nearly touched the ground when she held it. And she'd tossed away the Juliet veil as soon as she had returned to the bridal suite.
Mary Margaret agrees as she takes her hand and pulls her up, helping Emma out of her wedding gown and into a simpler dress for the reception.
"How do I look?" Emma asks once she's in it, twirling around in the green dress to give her sister the full effect.
Mary Margaret smirks. "Well, I doubt Neal will want to stay long at the reception."
Emma's cheeks warm as she stands in front of the mirror and removes her earrings, replacing them with emerald ones that will match her dress. She and Neal have not even had sex yet, so tonight will be their first time. "You don't think his mother would've approved?" Neal's mother was the daughter of a viscount before she died.
"Well, I'm not entirely sure I do."
Emma rolls her eyes at her sister as she recoats her lips in red lipstick. "Are we talking about the dress...or the wedding?" Not everyone can find their prince charming as she did. Mary Margaret's marriage to David was definitely not forced or rushed. They are true love, as she always likes to boast. "We had to marry quickly before he returns to the front in the morning."
"Yes, but couldn't you have just had sex with him instead of marrying him?"
Emma laughs. "Mary Margaret! Be serious." She studies herself in the mirror, turning and running her hand over her dress, deciding to leave her blonde hair braided into a crown atop her head. She looks like herself, but somehow different now that she's married. She had honestly never thought this day would come.
"I am. It's much less commitment, and it's all Neal will want anyway."
"Neal's not like that. He's kind and thoughtful. He makes me feel safe."
"You mean safe from getting hurt?"
Emma looks up to see Mary Margaret's reflection in the mirror as the brunette narrows her eyes. But Emma knows she can't lie to her sister. Mary Margaret would see right through her. Emma stands and turns around to face her. "Precisely."
Mary Margaret places her hands on Emma's shoulders. "See, that's just it. If you never open that heart of yours up to anyone, you'll grow old and gray without ever experiencing the wonderful things life has to offer."
"I do experience the wonderful things life has to offer." Not that sex is really that wonderful. It has always been merely a way to let off some steam.
Mary Margaret tilts her head. "I'm not talking about sex. I'm talking about love."
The clearing of a throat interrupts their conversation when Neal steps into the room with a tray of three wine glasses. "I brought reinforcements."
The two women blush when they realize he must have heard the tail end of their conversation.
Mary Margaret goes over to Neal and grabs one of the glasses, taking a sip. "You read my mind."
"I nearly drank yours on the way up," he tells her, chuckling as he hands one to Emma and takes the other one for himself. Setting down the tray, he clinks his and Emma's glasses together. "Cheers."
"Cheers." Emma smiles at her new husband and takes a sip.
"Our fathers are preparing their toasts."
Emma groans, not looking forward to going downstairs. "Can we face them together?"
"Of course." He smiles at her, and she has to admit, Neal is not the worst man she could've chosen for a husband. He's handsome and charming, his eyes crinkling at the corners when he smiles. She can tell he cares for her. "You look beautiful, Ems."
She offers a smile in return. "Thanks."
After they finish their wine, she takes his offered hand, allowing him to lead her downstairs, where their fathers give speeches and announce their hope for a new heir to Goldby.
~*~
Two years later
Dearest Mary Margaret,
I knew the war would change us all, I just didn't know how much. It feels as though it ended half a lifetime ago, not half a year. Neal and I have already moved away from London, and we've just arrived at Goldby, his family estate. Once we get settled in, I expect to write to you often.
Your loving sister,
Emma
Lady Cassidy gazes vacantly through the window as the motor-car winds through the park of oak trees. The sky is about as gray and murky as the future, for who knows what tragedies it may hold. Clouds of smoke rise from the chimney of the pit in the distance where Misthaven village struggles to stay afloat beyond the park gates.
The car pulls up in front of the eighteenth century home made of brown stone that sits on the top of a knoll, overlooking the park. This is her new home in the smoky Midlands where she and Neal will finally begin their married life at Goldby Hall, the family seat. His father had died of heart failure, and Neal is now baronet. But he claims his father died of chagrin since he and Emma are without a child. And they most likely will be childless forever. Not only did they never get the chance to consummate their marriage the night of their honeymoon since she had been too exhausted and he had been too anxious about returning to war, they never will.
The chauffeur opens Emma's car door and grabs her luggage.
"Thank you." She steps out, taking in her new home. This place is nothing like her childhood house in London. Goldby certainly needs a lot of work.
The housekeeper, Mrs. Potts, who worked for Rumpelstiltskin, approaches with her husband to greet them. "Welcome, Sir Neal. We've been praying for you."
Mr. Potts helps him out of the car, picking him up and placing him into his wheelchair. An explosion during the war left Neal paralyzed from the waist down, and the doctor said he may never be able to walk again.
Emma tries not to think about that, however. She tries not to think about how she may never get pregnant or be able to give birth to a child as long as she's with Neal. She will never get to raise children or watch them grow up and run around the park at Goldby. She can't think of herself anymore though. She is married to a baronet, whom she vowed to have and to hold, for better and for worse, for richer and for poorer, in sickness and in health until they are parted by death. After he returned from war, he told her he could never lose her, and she promised he never would.
She will spend the rest of her life keeping that promise.
"Mr. and Mrs. Potts, this is my wife, the new Lady Cassidy."
Mrs. Potts turns around to greet her with a curtsy. "It's so nice to meet you, milady."
Emma smiles, bows her head and steps toward her. "Nice to meet you."
Neal wheels himself over to his wife, and the four of them avert their attention to the worn-looking house towering over them. "There's plenty of work to be done," Neal comments. "Hire back all the workers we can, Mrs. Potts. Old girl's seen better days."
Emma places a hand on the back of his chair and tries to be optimistic. "We'll bring her back to life."
~*~
"Killian Jones." Sir Neal looks up from the application in his hand from where he sits at the other side of the desk. "You, uh, worked for my father before the war?"
"Aye, sir. For two years." When he returned, he heard Rumpelstiltskin had passed and that Neal would be taking over and hiring new staff.
"And you were an army lieutenant?"
Killian nods. "I was very sorry to hear about your father. My condolences, sir." He wishes he could say Sir Rumpelstiltskin was a good man, but that would be a lie. He was ridiculous, chopping down trees in the forest and weeding men out of his colliery to shove them into the war while he, himself, was a coward who stayed safe at home and buried his country in heaps of debt while claiming to be patriotic.
"Thank you." Neal looks at him skeptically. "Do you honestly believe returning to gamekeeping will be satisfying after your time as an officer?"
Killian shrugs, his fingers drumming along his wool cap. If he could, he would leave. Every night, he dreams of escaping to a new place where a new voice says his name with warmth, where eyes filled with love look at him instead of ones filled with hatred and betrayal, where he is not dismissed. There is no freedom here, there never will be. Milah doesn't love him, but nevertheless she holds him close. One more possession.
"Bit of quiet would do me good. I've seen enough of what war does to men." Not only had he seen men brutally die in battle, but his brother had been one of them. Every day, he tries to push away the horrific images that have plagued him since the war. Every day he tries to forget. About the war, about her. Being a gamekeeper, tending to the animals, breeding them, enjoying the quiet of the forest while protecting it will be therapeutic for him.
"Hmm. As have I." Sir Neal has learned firsthand what war can do to men. He himself was paralyzed from the waist down.
Rumors about his injury had spread before Neal came to Goldby.
Neal sets the application down and joins his hands on the desk. "Very well then. Welcome back, Mr. Jones."
"Thank you, Sir." Killian turns around and heads out of Neal's study, moving past the long line of men seeking employment. He was lucky the baronet had hired him so quickly, and he is grateful. Killian receives a monthly war pension, but since he and Milah are still legally married, she's entitled to half of it. So now he is stuck in Misthaven, barely skimming by to make ends meet while Milah prances around with various menfolk of the village, spending the money he had earned by going to battle and risking his life.
Now he spends restless, lonely nights in his cottage, thinking about his brother and the war and everyone else he has lost.
But at least he has Jolly to keep him company.
He returns home to his cottage, where she's waiting for him at the door. His lips crack into a big smile when he sees her. "There's my good lass." He kneels down to ruffle a hand through her fur as she yaps, wagging her tail excitedly.
She truly is a good dog and the best companion he could hope for. She's loyal and trustworthy and always appreciates his affections, unlike his wife who betrayed him to be with other men.
After everything that's happened, Jolly is the one good thing in his life.
All he has left.
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lepreuxchevalier · 1 year
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Some illustrations of pike-and-shotte infantry and gunpowder-based, siege artillery that I have officially designed for “Hohenbiermann Der Markgrafschaft Brannenborg” or “House Biermann of The Margraviate of Brannenborg,” the newest of the four secular, hereditary “Kurfürsten Des Selbst Kaiserreich der Menscheit” or “Prince-Electors of The Empire of Mankind Proper.” Both these artworks and their associated “faction iconography” were officially designed for a low-fantasy setting of my original conception with technology and material culture roughly equivalent to European History during the compounded advents of The Italian Renaissance, The Protestant Reformation, and The Discovery of America. Where formations of heavily armoured and mounted, aristocratic and noble knights in either suits of full plate armour or heavy coats of chainmail fight alongside professional armies of pikemen and matchlock musketeers. Where medieval-style stone castles are gradually being outsourced in favour of both lavish country estates and devoted military fortifications, or “bastions,” due to the technological advancements being made in gunpowder-based, siege artillery. And Where fledgling nation-states in the form of both kingdoms and empires look beyond the great oceans and the frontiers of “The Known World” in search of exotic riches and virgin lands. In context to the canon lore of my “homebrew” medieval fantasy world, “Hohenbiermann Der Markgrafschaft Brannenborg” or “House Biermann of The Margraviate of Brannenborg” is the newest of the four secular, hereditary “Prince-Electors” or “Kurfürsten” within The Imperial College of “Das Selbst Kaiserreich der Menscheit” or “The Empire of Mankind Secundus.” “Die Markgrafschaft Brannenborg” or “The Margraviate of Brannenborg” is loosely inspired by “The Mark Brandenburg” or “The Electorate of Brandenburg” within “The Holy Roman Empire” during the Medieval and the Early Modern periods of European history. “Hohenbiermann Der Markgrafschaft Brannenborg” is at once the newest, and the most reluctant, constituent member state of, and territorial addition to The Empire of Mankind Proper, or “Das Selbst Kaiserreich der Menscheit.” As well as the newest secular, hereditary “electoral principality” or “Kurfürstentum” within The Empire of Mankind since the official appointment of Markgraf Friedrich II Von Biermann to The Imperial College during The Electoral Reforms of Emperor Vespasian VII as the 96th Emperor-Elect of The Empire of Mankind Secundus. Over 150 years prior to the contemporary events of my medieval fantasy setting, the lands of “Hohenbiermann Der Markgrafschaft Brannenborg” was originally part of “The Former Kingdom of The Midlands” under “The Late House Bartholemew” before the untimely extinction of the legitimate, male bloodline of their dynastic household and the subsequent collapse of their hereditary state. As the territorial part of The Former Kingdom of The Midlands most heavily afflicted by the wholesale peasant uprisings agitated by the religious indoctrination and the systematic, mass conversion of the local populace by the hut shamans hailing from “Erdøk,” or “The Great Forest” directly east of The Empire of Mankind Proper. The illegitimate son and the heir apparent to the last King of The Midlands born to House Bartholemew originally pawned, and then permanently transferred the future lands of “Die Markgrafschaft Brannenborg” to “The Imperial Household,” the direct descendants of Prinz Heinrich von Nymphenburg as The First Crowned Imperator of The Empire of Mankind Secundus, as well as the hereditary, dynastic, “great house” of “Imperial Princeps” or “Imperial Magnates” for “Der Reichstaat” or “The Imperial Demesne,” in order to fund his equally desperate and futile war effort against the recalcitrant great houses of feudal aristocracy and nobility in The Former Kingdom of The Midlands. Who had universally rejected his lawful and legitimate succession to The Former Kingdom of The Midlands due to his birth as an illegitimate issue to the last King of The Midlands from The Late House Bartholemew. Due to it’s polar, geographic distance and territorial dislocation from “Der Reichstaat” or “The Imperial Demesne” as the hereditary, dynastic lands of “The Imperial Household” or “Der Kaiserliche Haushalt,” as well as it’s constant affliction by the wholesale peasant uprisings agitated by both the religious indoctrination and the systematic, mass conversion efforts of the local populace by the hut shamans indigenous to “Erdøk” or “The Great Forest.” Friedrich Biermann, one of the most seasoned, battle-hardened generals within “The Imperial Army” mostly levied, and later conscripted from the hereditary, dynastic lands of “The Imperial Household” seated at “Nymphenburg.” As well as one of the few commoners within the recorded history of The Imperial Army to be promoted to an office of military command by sheer virtue of merit, was officially awarded hereditary, dynastic enfeoffment over “The Southern Imperial March” or “Die Sudetenmark” for his years of meritorious service as a domestic, household general in service to The Imperial Army. As the local populace of The Southern Imperial March or “Die Sudetenmark” were longtime apostates from The Conservative Church of The New Gods who would never acknowledge the newly enfeoffed and anointed “Friedrich Von Biermann” as their liege lord and princeps. Friedrich Von Biermann as “Der Markgraf Der Sudetenmark” officially petitioned to Archpatriarch Cassadorian XIV seated at The Holy Sept of Romulus to prosecute an “errantry war” or a “great crusade” against the religious apostates of Die Sudetenmark, who were largely religiously subscribed to the druidic, cult worship of “Erdøk” or “The Great Forest.” Manfred Von Lichtenstein, Bishop-Prince of Garyalburg, one of the three ecclesiastical, invested, “prince-electors” or “Kurfürsten” of The Empire of Mankind Proper and Archpatrichal Legate to Cassadorian XIV for this new “Albic Crusade,” officially preached and prosecuted “The Albic Crusade” at a holy synod of Bishop-Princes and Grand Abbots at Die Universität Wörtzburch in Das Herzogtum Solingen, one of the leading centres of church-sanctioned, academic research on both The Canon Theology of The New Gods, as well as Cosmopolitan, Classical Romulan Civil Law and Jurisprudence north of The Olympian Mountain Valley. In addition to the retinues of crusading, aristocratic and noble knights and the peasant levies hailing from the multitude, or the plethora of minor “Austere” or “Northern Imperial” states as well as the constituent states of “The Borderlands Confederacy” directly south of “Der Reichstaat” or “Nymphenburg.” This “Albic Crusade” was generally only heeded by a minority of the baronial magnates from Das Herzogtum Solingen as the native, electoral principality of Markgraf Friedrich Von Biermann’s birth and origin before his formal enlistment into The Imperial Army based in “Der Reichstaat” or “Nymphenburg,” as well as their domestic, household retinues of aristocratic, noble knights and their feudal levies of men-at-arms. Knowing that the odds were still highly unfavourable towards Friedrich Von Biermann as the titular “Markgraf Der Sudetenmark” leading at the forefront of The Albic Crusade, despite it’s formal and official preaching and prosecution by Manfred Von Lichtenstein at The Holy Synod of Die Universität Wörtzburch as Bishop-Prince of Garyalburg and Archpatriarchal Legate to Cassadorian XIV. Maximillian IV as the 94th Emperor-Elect of The Empire of Mankind Secundus and the hereditary, dynastic, “Imperial Princeps” or “Imperial Magnate” for “Der Reichstaat” or “The Imperial Demesne” offered to permanently transfer to Friedrich Von Biermann fulltime command over a mighty host of professional, Imperial Army men-at-arms regiments and knightly retinues in return for acceding to an official “Imperial Act of Incorporation.” Where Friedrich Von Biermann and all his hereditary, dynastic successors as “Die Margrafen Der Sudetenmark” would both acknowledge the feudal, hereditary, “Imperial Princeps” or “Imperial Magnate” of “Der Reichstaat” or “The Imperial Demesne” and the dynastic patriarch of The Imperial Household as their liege lords and suzerains for “Die Sudetenmark,” unconditional to their formal election as the preferential candidates for the title of Emperor-Elect of Mankind. As well as subsequently incorporating Hohenbiermann’s hereditary lands of Die Sudetenmark as the newest, and perhaps most reluctant, constituent member state of, and territorial addition to The Empire of Mankind Proper. Bolstered with permanent, fulltime command over a mighty host of professional, Imperial Army men-at-arms regiments and knightly retinues hailing from “Der Reichstaat” or “The Imperial Demesne” in joint partnership with Bishop-Prince Manfred Von Lichtenstein as “Archpatriarchal Legate,” or the pontifical representative to the person of Cassadorian XIV as “The 269th Bishop of Romulus” and “The Head of The Conservative Church of The New Gods” for this “Albic Crusade” formally preached and prosecuted against the apostate, Albic tribes religiously subscribed to the druidic, cult worship of “Erdøk.” The Albic Crusade had concluded in overwhelming triumph for both Markgraf Friedrich Von Biermann and the crusaders with the final conquest of the greatest Erdøki cultist stronghold of “Brenna.” With the stunning and the official conclusion of The Albic Crusade at The Siege of Brenna, The castletown of Brenna as the final and greatest site of Erdøki cultist resistance was formally consecrated by Bishop-Prince Manfred von Lichtenstein as The Archbishopric of Brannenborg-An-Der-Havel. Where Manfred Von Lichtenstein was formally invested, with Archpatriarch Cassadorian XIV’s explicit blessing, the awesome and prestigious ecclesiastical office of Bishop-Patriarch of Brannenborg in order to facilitate the systematic, mass conversion of the apostate, Albic tribes autochthonous to Die Sudetenmark back into the fold of The Conservative Church of The New Gods officially seated in The Holy Sept of Romulus as the civilizational kernel, historic capital, and titular namesake of both The Cosmopolitan, Classical Romulan Republic and “The Empire of Mankind Primus.” Friedrich Von Biermann as the first and only “Markgraf der Sudetenmark” would thus subsequently rule from the newly consecrated Archbishopric of Brannenborg-An-Der-Havel, or the former Erdøki castletown of “Brenna,” as his official seat of power. formally restyling himself as “Der erster und herrshend Markgraf von Brannenborg und Der Gründungschef von Hohenbiermann.” With the next two and a half decades spent as “Der erster und herrschend Markgraf von Brannenborg und Der Gründungschef von Hohenbiermann,” Friedrich I Von Biermann would award hereditary, dynastic enfeoffment to the most arable lands, titles, and estates that had not been previously claimed as the official property of The Conservative Church of The New Gods first and foremost to the conquering, crusading knights directly involved in The Albic Crusade, and secondly to the regimental colonels of the former Imperial Army men-at-arms regiments who had distinguished themselves with meritorious service, valour, and skill at arms. This new class of landed, hereditary, feudal aristocracy and nobility, or “junkers,” would come to “characterize,” or otherwise “engender” the entirety of the reign of Markgraf Friedrich I Von Biermann with a significant degree of military fortification in the form of stone castles and city walls in order to protect both themselves and their loyal subjects against the outrage and the predations of the apostate, Albic tribes, who had both stubbornly resisted, as well as deeply resented their forced, mass conversion back into the fold of The Conservative Church of The New Gods. These “great houses” of “junker” princeps and magnates, paying feudal homage to “Hohenbiermann Der Markgrafschaft Brannenborg,” would collectively facilitate the gradual and effective resettlement of skilled, moneyed, and educated settlers and immigrants hailing from the “Austere” or “Northern Imperial” cultural and linguistic hemisphere of The Empire of Mankind Secundus. Most notably into the newly established castles and fortified cities established directly by Friedrich I Von Biermann as Der erster und herrschend Markgraf von Brannenborg und Der Gründungschef von Hohenbiermann, as well as any castles and fortified cities constructed under the princely, “great houses” of “junker” aristocracy and nobility paying feudal homage to Hohenbiermann Der Markgrafschaft Brannenborg. The culturally and ethnically “Austere” or “Northern Imperial” settlers and immigrants settling within these newly established castles and fortified cities, as well as the most lucrative and arable rural estates of attached countryside, would form base of commercial, industrial, cultural, and scholastic life in the new “Markgrafschaft Brannenborg” in the form of the urban “burghers” or bourgeoisie, merchants, artisans, and professionals, as well as the rural “kollmers” or country gentlemen. The gradual and effective resettlement of culturally and ethnically “Austere” or “Northern Imperial” settlers and immigrants into the newly established castles and fortified cities of Die Markgrafschaft Brannenborg and the rural estates of their attached countryside, as well as the systematic, mass conversion efforts with the subsequent and complimentary cultural assimilation of the autochthonous, apostate, Albic tribes by the culturally and ethnically “Austere” or “Northern Imperial” Conservative clergy, with their traditional monopoly over knowledge, learning, and education in general, would characterize “The Sudsiedlung” in Die Markgrafschaft Brannenborg as the last, and undoubtably the most reluctant, constituent member state and territorial addition to be officially incorporated into The Empire of Mankind Secundus. “Die Markgrafschaft Brannenborg” alongside neighboring “Königreich Middenland” based uniquely beyond the southernmost frontiers of The Empire of Mankind Proper well over a century after the stunning and final conclusion of The Albic Crusade at The Siege of Brenna, would collectively form “Die Sudkreuzritterstaaten,” “Die Teutogenstaaten,” or “Die Sudentscheidenstaaten.” A “Teutogen” or “Southern Austere” cultural and linguistic bloc born of the complimentary events of “The Southern Crusades,” or the religious warfare and the territorial conquests of the lands of the apostate, Albic tribes religiously subscribed to druidic, cult worship of “Erdøk” or “The Great Bastion” across the easternmost frontiers of “Das Selbst Kaiserreich Der Menscheit” or “The Empire of Mankind Proper,” and “The Sudsiedlung,” or the gradual and effective resettlement of settlers and immigrants from the “Austere” or the “Northern Imperial” cultural and linguistic hemisphere of The Empire of Mankind Secundus with the synonymous, complimentary, and systematic, mass conversion and the thorough cultural assimilation of the apostate, Albic tribes religiously subscribed to the druidic, cult worship of “Erdøk.” As implied by both it’s historic and it’s present strategic value as the last, and undoubtably the most reluctant, constituent member state of and territorial addition to The Empire of Mankind Secundus through Emperor Maximillian IV’s “Imperial Act of Incorporation” officially brokered with Markgraf Friedrich I Von Biermann in return for his military contributions in both manpower and resources against the apostate, Albic tribes indigenous to “Die Sudetenmark” during The Albic Crusade. “Hohenbiermann Der Markgrafschaft Brannenborg,” since the historic reforming of “Die Sudetenmark” around the church-sanctioned consecration of The Basilica of Brannenborg-An-Der-Havel over the site of the former Erdøki castletown of Brenna, has been deprecated by both nobles and plebeians alike throughout the entirety of The Empire of Mankind as “The Imperial Sandbox.” Such an epithet implying the generally meagre, base economic and industrial yield and value that has come to characterize Die Markgrafschaft Brannenborg ever since Markgraf Friedrich I Von Biermann had finally asserted his de jure rule over the region with The Albic Crusade and the subsequent and complimentary “Sudsiedlung.” Long before the final collapse of The Former Kingdom of The Midlands beginning with the untimely extinction of the legitimate, male bloodline of The Late House Bartholemew. The lands of the future “Markgrafschaft Brannenborg” were already characterized by an overabundance of swamps, marshes, and thick, wild, impenetrable forests. What little economy, industry, material culture, and infrastructure that had previously existed within the region had largely been ecologically “reclaimed” by the Albic tribes religiously subscribed to the druidic, cult worship of “Erdøk” or “The Great Forest.” With Friedrich I Von Biermann’s de jure assumption of power and authority over the region, any apostate, Albic tribes who had both violently and openly resisted their systematic, mass conversion back into the fold of The Conservative Church of The New Gods by the culturally and ethnically “Austere” or “Northern Imperial” clergy had faced systematic, mass genocide at the hands of both the fledgling, yet highly competent professional army of Hohenbiermann Der Markgrafschaft Brannenborg, as well as the feudal, aristocratic levies of knightly retinues and men-at-arms regiments paying military service and direct homage to the princely, “great houses” of “junker” aristocracy and nobility. This equally stubborn and violent resistance put up by the Albic natives religiously subscribed to the druidic, cult worship of Erdøk would subsequently and consequently result in a significant depopulation of their number in the region by either the professional, armed forces paying direct homage and military service to Hohenbiermann Der Markgrafschaft Brannenborg, themselves, or the feudal, aristocratic levies of knightly, heavy cavalry and men-at-arms regiments paying direct homage and military service to the princely, “great houses” of “junker” aristocrats and nobles paying feudal homage to Hohenbiermann Der Markgrafschaft Brannenborg as their liege lords and Imperial Princeps. Friedrich II Von Biermann as the second Markgraf von Brannenborg born to Hohenbiermann had only and finally achieved official appointment for Hohenbiermann Der Markgrafschaft Brannenborg into The Imperial College as the newest of the four secular, hereditary “Kurfürsten Des Selbst Kaiserreich der Menscheit” or “Prince-Electors of The Empire of Mankind Proper” as a reward for acceding to the obligatory call to arms by his unconditional feudal overlord and suzerain Vespasian VII against the official partisans of his political and military opposition for his lawful and legitimate election as the 96th Emperor-Elect of Mankind. Under the hereditary, dynastic rule of Albrecht Von Biermann as “Der herrshend Markgraf von Bannenborg,” “Der momentan Chef von Hohenbiermann,” and secular, hereditary “Kurfürst des Selbst Kaiserreich der Menscheit” has the fortunes of Hohenbiermann Der Markgrafschaft Brannenborg changed exponentially for the better. With the advent of the theological reforms to the religious establishment of, and the institutions of organized religion within The Conservative Church of The New Gods officially seated within The Holy Sept of Romulus as the civilizational kernel, historic capital, and titular namesake of both The Cosmopolitan, Classical Romulan Republic and “The Empire of Mankind Primus” formally preached and published by Karl Von Luxembourg at Die Universität Wörtzburch as one of the leading centers of church-sanctioned, academic research on The Canon Theology of The New Gods and Cosmopolitan, Classical Romulan Civil Law and Jurisprudence north of The Olympian Mountain Valley, as well as the original site of the church-sanctioned preaching and prosecution of The Albic Crusade by Bishop-Prince Manfred Von Lichtenstein at The Holy Synod of Wörtzburch. Has Albrecht Von Biermann taken the opportunity to confiscate the lands, property, and treasuries of any ecclesiastical and the monastic clergy of The Conservative Church of The New Gods who had both openly resisted and protested against the formal renunciation of his spiritual ties of fealty to The Holy Sept in Romulus in order to enrich both the state coffers of “Hohenbiermann Der Markgrafschaft Brannenborg,” as well as any aristocratic, noble, “great houses” of “junker” princeps and magnates in Die Markgrafschaft Brannenborg personally sympathetic to the theological reforms officially preached and published by Karl Von Luxembourg. Albrecht Von Biermann as “Der herrschend Markgraf von Brannnenborg,” “Der momentan Chef von Hohenbiermann,” and secular, hereditary “Kurfürst des Selbst Kaiserreich der Menscheit” had formally decreed state legislation to officially renounce the old, Classical Romulan rite and liturgy of The Conservative Church of The New Gods originally formalized and decreed under the religious reforms traditionally attributed to The Cosmopolitan, Classical Romulan Imperator of Mankind “Cassadorian the Great” in favour of “The Luxembourgian Reformation” with it’s theological emphasis on both the vernacular translations and the strict, universal interpretation of The Holy Canons of The New Gods by all social classes outside the ecclesiastical and monastic clergy and the feudal aristocracy and nobility. With Albrecht Von Biermann’s legislative decree to officially convert to The “Reformed” Faith of The New Gods based on the theological reforms officially preached and published by Karl Von Luxembourg at Die Universität Wörtzburch on behalf of both his dynastic household and his hereditary subjects, has Albrecht Von Biermann officially become both the second hereditary, dynastic ruler in both the recorded histories and the geographic expanse of “The Known World” after Friedrich I as “Der erster und herrschend König von Middenland und Der Gründungschef von Hohenrotbart” based uniquely beyond the southernmost frontiers of The Empire of Mankind Proper, as well as the first hereditary, dynastic, “Imperial Princeps” or “Imperial Magnate” to formally and officially annul his spiritual ties of fealty to The Holy Sept in Romulus as the historic capital, civilizational kernel, and titular namesake of both The Cosmopolitan, Classical Romulan Republic and “The Empire of Mankind Primus.” With Hohenbiermann Der Markgrafschaft Brannenborg’s spiritual ties of fealty to The Holy Sept in Romulus formally annulled, has Albrecht Von Biermann finally assumed supreme authority over matters of religion in Die Markgrafschaft Brannenborg. And in the process making himself the effective and virtual “Supreme Head of The Reformed Church of The New Gods in Die Markgrafschaft Brannenborg.” As a direct consequence of his formal assumption of supreme authority over matters of religion, as well as the formal renunciation of his spiritual ties of fealty to The Holy Sept in Romulus, has Albrecht Von Biermann effectively endowed himself with full control over the state investiture of new bishops and abbots for “The Reformed Church of The New Gods in Die Markgrafschaft Brannenborg.” Including state investiture over the venerable and prestigious ecclesiastical office of “Bishop-Patriarch of Brannenborg-An-Der-Havel” since it’s original establishment with the church-sanctioned consecration of The Basilica of Brannenborg-An-Der-Havel over last and greatest Erdøki cultist stronghold of “Brenna” by Manfred Von Lichtenstein as it’s Seminal Bishop-Patriarch. In addition to his formal assumption of supreme authority over matters of religion in Die Markgrafschaft Brannenborg, as well as his systematic confiscation of the lands, property, and treasuries of any ecclesiastical and monastic clergy of The Conservative Church of The New Gods who had openly refused to submit before the formal renunciation of his spiritual ties of fealty to The Holy Sept in Romulus. Albrecht Von Biermann as “Der herrschend Markgraf von Brannenborg,” “Der momentan Chef von Hohenbiermann,” and secular, hereditary “Kurfürst des Selbst Kaiserreich der Menscheit” has actively pursued an extraimperial personal union with “Hohenrotbart Des Königreich Middenland” based uniquely beyond the southernmost frontiers of The Empire of Mankind Secundus. Using their shared background as the earliest religious converts to The “Reformed” Faith of The New Gods based on the theological reforms of Karl Von Luxembourg to the religious establishment of, and institutions of organized religion within The Conservative Church of The New Gods officially seated at The Holy Sept of Romulus as the historic capital, civilizational kernel, and titular namesake of both the Cosmopolitan, Classical Romulan Republic and “The Empire of Mankind Primus.” As well as his paternal, dynastic ties to Friedrich I as “Der erster und herrschend König von Middenland und Der Gründungschef von Hohenrotbart” originally established through the marriage of the younger sister of his late father and predecessor Markgraf Friedrich-Albrecht Von Biermann to “Der erster und herrschend König von Middenland und Der Gründungschef von Hohenrotbart” shortly after the stunning and official conclusion of The Midlands Crusade with the climactic “Battle of The Godswoods” as “the pretext,” or otherwise “the rationale” for a prospective personal union. Has Albrecht Von Biermann actively pursued the agenda of merging Die Markgrafschaft Brannenborg with Das Königreich Middenland into an extraimperial composite state united by their shared heritage as “Die Sudkreuzritterstaaten,” “Die Teutogenstaaten,” or “Die Sudentscheidenstaaten,” or cultures and states born of the subsequent and complimentary events of “The Southern Crusades” and “The Sudsiedlung.” As well as their shared background as the earliest religious converts to The “Reformed” Faith of The New Gods based on the theological treatises of Karl Von Luxembourg questioning both the spiritual and cultural legitimacy and moral infallibility of “The Bishop of Romulus” or “The Archpatriarch” as well as his spiritual, cultural, and moral power and authority as “The Last of The Classical Pontiffs,” or the sole, anointed representative to The Entire Canon Pantheon of The New Gods in the world. Within the subsequent “Treaties of Marienburg and Brannenborg-An-Der-Havel” officially brokered between the state-sanctioned, court representatives of “Hohenbiermann Der Markgrafschaft Brannenborg” and “Hohenrotbart Des Königreich Middenland,” respectively. Has Albrecht Von Biermann as “Der herrschend Markgraf von Brannenborg,” “Der momentan chef von Hohenbiermann,” secular, hereditary “Kurfürst des Selbst Kaiserreich der Menscheit,” and nephew to Friedrich I offered to establish mutual heredity between Hohenbiermann and Hohenrotbart for both Die Markgrafschaft Brannenborg and Das Königreich Middenland, should either dynastic house officially grow extinct through the male bloodline. Friedrich I as “Der erster und herrschend König von Middenland,” “Der Gründungschef von Hohenrotbart,” and paternal uncle to Albrecht Von Biermann, in direct response to his nephew’s introductory proposition, elaborated upon the opening proposition. Only agreeing to the outlined terms under the conditions that Das Königreich Middenland never be incorporated into The Empire of Mankind Proper as both a constituent, member state and a territorial addition. As Imperial law had officially “restricted,” or otherwise “excluded” all constituent, member states outside “Hohenluxembourg Des Königreich Schönbrunn” and “the hereditary state” and “the dynastic house” of the Emperor-Elect, himself from endowing the reigning patriarch of their dynastic household with royal titles. That Albrecht Von Biermann and all of his prospective successors as “Die Markgrafen von Brannenborg” officially convert to The “Reformed” Faith of The New Gods by the time of their formal inheritance to Das Königreich Middenland from the then extinct, male bloodline of Hohenrotbart. So as to simultaneously protect and preserve the religious liberties of all subscribers to The Reformed Church of The New Gods in Das Königreich Middenland, while also encouraging both the spread and the proliferation of The Reformed Church of The New Gods in Die Markgrafschaft Brannenborg. And that Albrecht Von Biermann and all of his prospective successors as “Die Markgrafen von Brannenborg” officially serve as both regents and godfathers to Friedrich I’s infant son Kronprinz Friedrich-Albrecht Von Rotbart in the event and the occasion of his untimely passing. As Friedrich I as Der erster und herrschend König von Middenland und Der Gründungschef von Hohenrotbart had only and finally succeeded in producing a surviving male heir by his late 70′s. Albrecht Von Biermann, in response to his paternal uncle’s diplomatic elaborations, both sweetened and concluded the subsequent and complimentary “Treaties of Marienburg and Brannnenborg-An-Der-Havel.” Outlining within his ultimatum the final condition that Friedrich I and all of his prospective successors as “Die Könige von Middenland” officially hold the title of “Der Markgraf von Brannenborg” plurally with the title of “Der König von Middenland” upon inheriting Die Markgrafschaft Brannenborg from the then extinct, male bloodline of Hohenbiermann. As opposed to incorporating Die Markgrafschaft Brannenborg as a constituent province of Das Königreich Middenland uniquely situated within the southernmost frontiers of “Das Selbst Kaiserreich der Mensceit,” so as to simultaneously preserve and retain the awesome power, authority, and privilege traditionally associated with the title of secular, hereditary “Kurfürst des Selbst Kaiserreich der Menscheit” that had been both traditionally, and synonymously tied with the hereditary, dynastic title of “Der Markgraf von Brannenborg” since The Electoral Reforms of Vespasian VII as the 96th and official Emperor-Elect of Mankind. With this diplomatic agenda of finally merging Das Königreich Middenland and Die Markgrafschaft Brannenborg into an extraimperial composite state based on their shared heritage as “Die Sudkreuzritterstaaten,” “Die Teutogenstaaten,” or “Die Sudentscheidenstaaten” born of the subsequent and the complimentary events of “The Southern Crusades” and “The Sudsiedlung,” as well as their shared background as the earliest religious converts to the theological reforms of Karl Von Luxembourg to the religious establishment of, and institutions of organized religion within The Conservative Church of The New Gods. Albrecht Von Biermann actively pursues the dynastic ambition of acquiring hereditary, dynastic control over lands, armies, and wealth for his dynastic household that is virtually and effectively beyond the power, authority, influence, and jurisdiction of “Der Kaiserliche Haushalt” or “The Imperial Household” officially seated in “Der Reichstaat” or “The Imperial Demesne,” known colloquially as “Nymphenburg.” While also finally breaking away from his ancestral obligations of unconditional feudal homage to The Imperial Household seated at distant Nymphenburg in return for their historic military contributions in both manpower and resources officially granted to “Der erster und herrschend Markgraf Der Sudetenmark und Der Gründungschef von Hohenbiermann” for his church-sanctioned crusade against the apostate, Albic tribes indigenous to Die Sudetenmark that formed from the northernmost part of The Former Kingdom of The Midlands under The Late House Bartholemew. In terms of both the hereditary, dynastic military traditions of Hohenbiermann in particular, as well as the culturally ingrained, provincial, military traditions of Die Markgrafschaft Brannenborg in general. Die Markgrafschaft Brannenborg under the hereditary, dynastic rule of Die Markgrafen von Hohenbiermann arguably possesses the single, most competent, professional military of any constituent, member state within The Empire of Mankind Secundus. Despite it’s official status as the last, and arguably the most reluctant, constituent member state of, and territorial addition to The Empire of Mankind Proper. Linear descendants of the military traditions of the professional, Imperial Army men-at-arms regiments and knightly retinues permanently transferred to the fulltime military command and the direct supervision of Friedrich I Von Biermann in order to bolster his gradual and eventual pacification of the apostate, Albic tribes indigenous to “Die Sudetenmark” during, and in the wake of “The Albic Crusade.” And steeled by many decades of quasi-perpetual warfare against the apostate, Albic tribes who had both violently resisted and openly protested against their systematic persecution and the legislative marginalization of their religious liberties at the hands of a culturally and ethnically “Austere” or “Northern Imperial” Conservative clergy. Die Markgrafschaft Brannenborg under the hereditary, dynastic rule of Die Markgrafen von Hohenbiermann possesses a highly formidable, professional, disciplined, and skilled-at-arms corps of elite pike-and-shotte infantry regiments. One whose professional quality and numeric quantity are both significantly disproportionate to the meagre, base economic and industrial yield and value of Die Markgrafschaft Brannenborg. With the sudden, recalcitrant uprising of over half of the princely, “great houses” of “junker” aristocrats and nobles who had both openly resisted and violently protested against Albrecht Von Biermann’s legislative decree for his official conversion to The Luxembourgian Reformation on behalf of both his dynastic household and his hereditary subjects, as well as the subsequential and consequential annulment of his spiritual ties of fealty to The Holy Sept in Romulus. Most notably the formidable, provincial power and authority of the junker princeps and magnates of “Hohenlictenstein” as the hereditary, dynastic household of Bishop-Patriarch Manfred Von Lichtenstein as the church-sanctioned, Archpatriarchal Legate to the person of Cassadorian XIV for The Albic Crusade, as well as The Seminal Bishop-Patriarch of Brannenborg-An-Der-Havel. Has Albrecht Von Biermann officially responded to the political, religious, and military opposition for his formal assumption of supreme authority over matters of religion as “The Supreme Head of The Reformed Church of The New Gods in Die Markgrafschaft Brannenborg” by investing a significant portion of his state treasury into the latest technological advancements made in the novel design of gunpowder-based, siege artillery in order to effectively nullify the formal opposition of both the recalcitrant, princely, “great houses” of “junker” aristocracy and nobility, as well as any burgher and kollmer enclaves openly opposed and resistant to The Luxembourgian Reformation, by reducing their respective castles and fortified cities to ash and rubble.
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notsodarkages · 6 months
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The Carolingian Dynasty
The Carolingians were a family of Frankish aristocrats; the name derives from the large number of family members who bore the name Charles. The most notable here is Charlemagne.
The family came to power as mayors of the palace of the kingdom of Austrasia. An office they made hereditary, as well as that of dux et princeps Francorum. By the time Pippin II became maior domus they had reduced the nominal Merovingian kings to mere figureheads, and had themselves become the de facto ruler of the Franks.
In 751 the Merovingian dynasty was overthrown with (and this bit is really important) the consent of both the aristocracy and the Papacy, and so Pepin III (also called the Short or the Younger), son of Charles Martell, became the first Carolingian king. He reigned from 751-24 September 768, and was succeeded by his sons Charles, and Carloman.
Pippin’s III son Charles would later be known as Charlemagne (Charles the Great or Latin: Carolus Magnus), who was King of the Franks from 768, King of the Lombards from 774, and Emperor of the Romans from 800. He united the majority of western and Central Europe and was the first recognised emperor to rule from Western Europe after the fall of the Western Roman Empire.
Further reading:
Breternitz, Patrick and Ubl, Karl (Hrsg.). Pippin der Jüngere und die Erneuerung des Frankenreichs (Relectio. Band 3) Ostfildern 2020.
McKitterick, Rosamond. The Illusion of Royal Power in the Carolingian Annals, in: English Historical Review 115 (2000) pp. 1-20
McKitterick, Rosamond. Charlemagne: The Formation of a European Identity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. (2008) pp. 57n.
Fouracre, Paul. The Age of Charles Martel. Harlow: Pearson Education Limited. (2000)
Fouracre, Paul. The Long Shadow of the Merovingians, In: Story, Joanna (ed.). Charlemagne: Empire & Society. Manchester: Manchester University Press. (2005) pp. 6, 10–11.
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naturalrights-retard · 11 months
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“It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society.” – Jiddu Krishnamurti, Asian Indian philosopher
Last weekend, I talked my two grandsons into joining me to watch The Fifth Estate, the new feature film about WikiLeaks and its founder Julian Assange. The movie is being marketed as an “action thriller” and is reportedly having a hard time competing, revenue-wise, with two current blockbuster movies, Gravity and Captain Phillips. (I don’t doubt that fact because, at the end of the Saturday afternoon screening, we were the only ones left in the theater; folks who had been in the audience at the beginning had bailed out, presumably for more mindless, more entertaining fare elsewhere in the multiplex theater.)
For those readers who are not fully aware of what WikiLeaks really is, here is a good definition from a supporter:
The final sentence of that quote explains why tremendous courage is necessary to be a whistleblower and why most of us are too frightened to speak out when witnessing injustice. The last phrase summarizes what is a major component of what constitutes “a profoundly sick society”.
I brought my grandsons to see the WikiLeaks film because I thought it was important to expose them to a movie about a historically important movement that was trying to respond to Krishmamurti’s concerns (about the western society he had witnessed in the first half of the 20th century). My busy, “wired-in” grandsons, like most distracted, computer game savvy, over-entertained adolescent students their age, seem to be relatively oblivious to pertinent past history – and even current events. I see the eternal truth of George Santanana’s powerful truism about the mistakes made by sick societies who are historically illiterate: “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” Whistleblowers, who are all motivated by their consciences, might be our only hope.
At this point, it would be a good idea to step back to explain the title of the film [which will also illustrate the importance of Santayana’s quote]. A little background about the history of the French Revolution of 1789 is important.
Up until 1789, France had been ruled by a hereditary monarchy for centuries. French society was regarded at the time as having three groups that were subservient to the king. The three classes were known as the Three Estates. The first two “estates” represented the parasitic ruling classes that never paid taxes or contributed to French society’s economy in any significant way. The First Estate was the clergy, the Second Estate was the aristocracy/nobility and the Third Estate was comprised of the common people who did all the work. These commoners were, of course, the largest group and were also the taxpaying group, while the First and Second Estates (ruthlessly protected by an obedient, well-trained and indoctrinated professional military) never did any labor nor did they participate in the production of food or other consumer goods.
Much later in history, elsewhere in the world, the media was given the title of The Fourth Estate, and journalists deserved the label when they were actually doing good investigative journalism by exposing the unethical behaviors and crimes of the ruling classes.
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The title of the film, “The Fifth Estate”, refers to the hundreds of whistleblowing groups like WikiLeaks, Occupy Wall Street, Catholic Worker groups, Democracy Now, Courage to Resist, antiwar groups, anti-nuclear groups, the 9/11 Truth movement, Earth First, etc., etc., all of whom have found themselves altruistically and courageously doing the dangerous investigations and protests in order to expose corrupt governments, corrupt militaries, corrupt law enforcement agencies, corrupt churches, corrupt national security institutions, corrupt financial institutions and other secretive planet-damaging corporations that the “disappeared” and virtually non-existent Fourth Estate has forsaken or been scared away from.
Here is a small sampling of courageous and often severely punished whistleblowers – some famous and many that we don’t know or care about. The list includes Jesus of Nazareth, Paul of Tarsus, Martin of Tours, Martin Luther, Henry David Thoreau, Leo Tolstoy, Smedley Butler, Dorothy Day (and the entire Catholic Worker movement), Gandhi, Martin Niemoller, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Martin Luther King, John Paul Vann, Ronald Ridenhour, Daniel Ellsberg, the Catonsville Nine, Frank Serpico, Gary Webb, Karen Silkwood, Mordechai Vanunu, Karen Kwiatkowski, Colleen Rowley, Sibel Edmunds, Greg Boertje-Obed, Julian Assange, Bradley Manning, Edward Snowden, Pope Francis, etc, etc. See Wikipedia for a list of some of the others who are less well-known: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_whistleblowers
The movie was instructive and well worth seeing, although the Collateral Murder video (google it) was severely shortened and therefore its impact weakened. Still, I would recommend the movie for anyone, although, for those interested in a more thorough treatment of the historical impact that WikiLeaks has had, it would be better to watch the documentary Underground: The Julian Assange Story, which is, I am told, the best factual documentary about WikiLeaks.
The Fifth Estate probably won’t have enough entertainment value to interest those who aren’t very curious about why the White House, the Congress, the NSA, the FBI, the CIA and the Pentagon are so freaked out about Assange, Manning and Snowden. Others who won’t appreciate this movie include those who desperately want to believe what they are told and who therefore trust the commercials on TV, trust the talking heads on the mainstream media and trust the official Pentagon, State Department or White House pronouncements.
Folks who aren’t very curious about what are the motivations behind the 9/11 Truth or the Occupy Wall Street movements probably won’t be interested in this movie either, now will those who don’t much care about the war, peace and justice issues that drive the multitudes of lesser-known anti-establishment folks to action.
Whistleblowers, in a nutshell, are, in one way or another, trying to resist, expose and perhaps turn around the sickest parts of our globalized, colonized, corporatized, militarized, economically oppressed, and increasingly totalitarian surveillance state before the quasi-fascists who are working the levers behind the curtains destroy the planet and its inhabitants.
Please study the following inspirational quotes that keep the whistleblower folks that are our most courageous neighbors working hard at attaining justice for all:
“Individual citizens have the duty to violate domestic laws to prevent crimes against peace and humanity.” — The judges at the Nuremberg trials that tried and condemned as war criminals many upper echelon Nazis (whose actions were defended by their lawyers as totally legal and constitutional according to the rule of law in Nazi Germany)
“In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act.”— George Orwell
“Anyone who trades liberty for security deserves neither.”— Benjamin Franklin
“Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities.” —Voltaire
“We can either have democracy in this country or we can have great wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, but we cannot have both.” — Justice Louis D. Brandeis
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“A great war leaves a country with three armies: an army of cripples, an army of mourners, and an army of thieves.” — An anonymous German saying
“Only the dead have seen the end of war.” — George Santayana
“Anyone who has proclaimed violence his method. must choose lying as his principle.”– Mikhail Gorbachev
“There comes a time when silence is betrayal.” — Martin Luther King, Jr.
“It may well be that the greatest tragedy of this period of social change is not the glaring noisiness of the so-called bad people, but the silence of the so-called good people.”–Martin Luther King. Jr.
“The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing”– Edmund Burke
“To sin by silence when they should protest makes cowards of men.” — Abraham Lincoln
“The hottest places in hell are reserved for those who, during times of great moral crisis, maintained their neutrality.” — Dante
“Wars throughout history have been waged for conquest and plunder. It is the ruling class that declares the wars, and it is the working class who fights all the battles and furnishes the corpses. The ruling class continually talks about “patriotic duty”, but it is not their duty but your patriotic duty that they are concerned about. There is a decided difference. Their patriotic duty never takes them to the firing line or chucks them into the trenches.” — Eugene V. Debs
“We’re not made by God to mass kill one another, and that’s backed up by the Gospels. Lying and war are always associated. Pay attention to war-makers when they try to defend their current war; if they’re moving their lips they’re lying.” — Phil Berrigan
“Aggressive militarization under the rubric of defense against terrorism threatens to provoke a chain reaction among nuclear nations, big and small, that, once set in motion, may prove impossible to control. No military confrontation anywhere in the world is free from this ominous and ever-present danger.” — Helen Caldicott, in The New Nuclear Danger
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“Globalization is but another name for colonization – nothing has changed but the name. And, just as the East India Company was the instrument for colonization, today’s corporation is the instrument for globalization. And, corporatization is but another name for Fascism.”— Urban Kohler
“Those who take oaths to politically powerful secret societies cannot be depended on for loyalty to a democratic republic.” — John Quincy Adams
“Certified lunatics are shut up because of their proneness to violence when their pretensions are questioned; the uncertified variety (of lunatic) are given the control of powerful armies, and can inflict death and disaster upon all sane men within their reach.” — Bertrand Russell
“Slavery is the legal fiction that a person is property. Corporate personhood is the legal fiction that property is a person.” — Anonymous
“The President is merely the most important among a large number of public servants. He should be supported or opposed exactly to the degree which is warranted by his good conduct or bad conduct, his efficiency or inefficiency in rendering loyal, able, and disinterested service to the Nation as a whole. Therefore it is absolutely necessary that there should be full liberty to tell the truth about his acts, and this means that it is exactly necessary to blame him when he does wrong as to praise him when he does right….To announce that there must be no criticism of the President, or that we are to stand by the President, right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public.”– Theodore Roosevelt
“A patriot must always be ready to defend his country against his government.” — Edward Abbey
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ruki--mukami · 1 year
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your eyes are identical to your mother's, how cute~ ♡ she must have been a pretty woman.
"Shut up. That woman and I share nothing in common aside from anything hereditary. You'd do well not to utter another word about her, or anyone in my former family, from here forward. Is that understood, Livestock? Those days I spent as a human are dead to me, just as the former me from the aristocracy died in that orphanage, so I'd advise against provoking me before I rend you asunder."
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neige-leblanche · 1 year
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tell the people about mica? 👀 saw the tags of ur last reblog and i am Intrigued
aaaaaaaaaaa 🥺
mica is a character from a novel idea im proooooobably gonna try to do for nanowrimo! they are a young adult faery with white eyes, dragonfly wings, and a vein of shimmering silver running down the right side of their face. they are a hereditary general of the fey military (Swarm), and so they've never been called anything other than Mica (civil + military officials in this story all have stone names; they can be granted them as a marker of their entrance into the aristocracy, or born with them like mica). they were raised in the swarm, and take their duty very seriously, and in spite of having already seen many battles by the time the story opens and, well, hangining around soldiers their whole life, they are very introverted, ideologically sheltered, and know little outside of their warrior's way of life.
there's a bit of a romance between them and one of the soldiers from their unit, a faery named Tamias; tam is very extroverted and romanticizes everything, including mica, and when mica defects from the swarm and tam vows to follow them, this solidifies mica's viewing him as a possible special someone/person with feelings for them. after they are assigned by the puppet fey queen's evil advisor to go oversee the massacre of a human town, they start losing faith in their obedient lifestyle and the validity of the crown. they stall for a while, before being lured through the forest to an ancient cursed spear (potentially belonging to a backstory villain, idk yet lol). the spear slowly begins to ideologically twist mica into someone who is more aggressive, less obedient, and much more willing to take risks, and they then resolve to defect from the swarm and face the villain head on. they and tamias break into the faery queen's midsummer revels, believing her to be an imposter, and almost succeed in killing/capturing her before another character, the queen's childhood friend, convinces them that it's her and she's being puppeted. they escape with the queen, but are caught by the villain, and placed into a psychological prison. the spirit of the cursed spear goes with mica, and they have violent, bloody dreams until tamias successfully brings them to a brief moment of peace and wakes them from their dream. my current plan for the ending is for some other characters to bring down the bad guy, but for mica, seized by the spear's violent spirit, to deliver the killing blow, and then repeatedly stab the corpse until the spear breaks, taking a part of mica's own soul with it in destruction. tamias then goes to the queen and attains what he's been looking for the whole plot (officially recognized honor for his dead sister + a courtly stone name of his own); mica begs him to let them stay with him for the rest of their lives, but instead, in their broken state tam picks them up and takes them back to their parents, the swarm generals who birthed them into a military life.
originally i had planned for a really sweet and fluffy ending to mica + tam's story hahaha; im honestly Still debating whether i wanna go w this kinda-tragic one but i think i might like it better this way; mica's position is above tamias for most of the plot + i like the switcheroo @ the end; also i rlly love the "oh my god it was unrequited THE OTHER WAY" trope and want to see how well i can write it myself lol. on a more personal level i think they kinda are a metaphor for what its like as an introvert growing close to an extrovert lol, like so much of the time it feels Really Special but its just another friendship to them which i think has a rlly tragic quality that i'd like to convey w mica's story :')
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What do you mean by aristocratic egalitarianism?
well, it's what it sounds like. the egalitarian quality of an aristocratic society.
i know it sounds like an oxymoron. but what i mean is ancient indo-european societies had an aristocratic egalitarianism to them. these ancient societies were composed of aristocratic warrior elites, right? everyone acknowledges this. but what they tend to acknowledge less is that these tribesmen viewed each other as equals, as peers.
obviously this isn't to say there weren't social hierarchies. there definitely were. but this was an honor based society. from the lowest to the highest, each individual was afforded a basic level of respect and dignity and legal protection. you had to. because if you didn't it could start a blood feud, not to mention the kinship ties. no one wants to dishonor or kill their own kin. throughout indo-european societies "freemen" and "nobility" and "kinsmen/companion" were all deeply intertwined. the word "aryan" is emblematic of the interconnectedness of these concepts, literally having connotations of all three.
that was the character of these societies. you and your kin/companions were free and noble and you, as peers, recognized each other's freedom and nobility. nobility and freedom were virtually synonymous in fact. if you weren't "noble" (a freeman) you were a slave (captured foreigner) or a servile peasant (conquered foreigner) and the law didn't protect you. law was between equals.
so freedom, nobility, kinship/brotherhood, and law. these were important, interconnected features in ancient indo-european societies. even kings weren't "above" you. they were more like public servants, first among equals. only holding power as long as they kept the trust of their followers (consent of the governed). there weren't lieges ruling over vassals by divine right. you weren't perpetually bound to some lord (and neither were your offspring). your primary loyalties were to your family and tribe.
there were definitely patron-client relationships but these were totally voluntary and temporary. a charismatic warrior might call upon some worthy companions to form a warband and do some raiding for a season. afterwards? they may part ways (kinda sounds more like a temporary employment contract than a perpetual vow of fealty and submission). the tribal assembly was open to all freemen (read: citizens). anyone could become a "leading man" by virtue of their own ability (meritocracy).
do you see where i'm going with this? this sounds a lot more like an egalitarian republic of free and equal citizen-soldier-farmers than discretely-subdivided caste-based divine-right hereditary feudalism. i think the fact that this same thing happened in india tells me that this feudal, hereditary, caste-based "aristocracy" is a degeneration of the original and natural "aristocratic egalitarian" character of indo-europeans. the vedic age was aristocratic-egalitarian and the caste-system didn't come about until the post-vedic age.
and that's what i mean. that's what i believe in. and that's why i consider myself a republican. i see my fellow-citizens as my kith and kin. this is my tribe. these are our laws. this is our land. these are my people. and i recognize that my people, my peers are free and noble. that's what republicanism is, just a bit more organized and structured.
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classicschronicles · 2 years
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Hi lovelies,
In class the the other day we were discussing the Aeneid and somehow we ended on the topic of Cicero’s name really meaning ‘Chickpea’ and, well obviously, I had to know more about how on earth he even got that name, and so todays entry is about nomenclature in the Roman Republic and Empire, otherwise known as the ‘Tria Nomina.’
At first glance the Tria Nomina is an extremely convoluted system- why does one man need SO many names? Why are there a million men in one family with the same name? Well, it wasn’t always like this. In pre-republican days when the Roman Empire was still under the control of the Etruscan overlords, most Roman-male citizen just had the one name but the naming process became increasingly complicated as time went on. By the time of the Republic all aristocratic men had three names- split into praenomen, nomen and cognomen.
Marcus | Tullius | Cicero
Praenomen | Nomen | Cognomen
Gaius | Julius | Caesar
The praenomen was the first part of a name and was the ‘personal name’ chosen by the parents of a young Roman child and given to the child during a naming ceremony, which was later reaffirmed at your marriage ceremony. The praenomen was used primarily within the family or by close intimates but was usually abbreviated in inscriptions. Shockingly, there were a very limited number of praenomina and the same name was often used multiple times within the same family. The eldest son was often named after his father with second and third sons being names after an uncle or other male relatives. Sometimes boys were named after male relatives from their maternal family- brining a new name into the gens (clan). The naming of a son after his father served to emphasis the continuity of a family across many generations, and also to distinguish one gens from another. Roman men were usually known by their praenomen to members of their family and close friends, whilst by those outside of the this circle, they may be referred to by their nomen or cognomen.
During the time of the Empire, the praenomen became increasingly confused with practices of the aristocracy, with emperors often using ‘Imperator’ was their praenomen, whilst at the same time retaining their own praenomina. But, due to the fact that most early emperors were legally adopted by their predecessors, and formally assumed new names, even these were subject to change. Many members of the Julio-Claudian dynasty would swap their initial praenomen for a cognomen, or would receive their cognomen instead of the praenomen at birth. Due to the complicated nature of these practices, the uses of the praenomina to distinguish between men went into decline, only propped up by tradition. Over the 3rd century, written records of the praenomen became increasingly sparse and from the 4th century onwards it became almost entirely obsolete.
The nomen was the name which belonged to the gens and was hereditary- it’s what we today would consider the equivalent of a surname. The gens consisted of your extended Roman family, all of whom would share the same nomen, and would claim its origin from a common ancestor. To Romans, the gens were almost like a state within a state, consisting of its own scared rites and establishing family laws (which were binding on its members). It was used to refer to the man in informal conversation and between friends if the man had no cognomen.
The cognomen was the third and (at last!!!) the final element of the tria nomina, and acted as an addition of the personal name. In the early years of the republic, some aristocratic Romans had as many as three cognomen (bc ofc three names wasn’t already enough). The cognomen could arise from any number of factors (characteristics, place of work/ birth, looks personality etc…) and were often used as nicknames. My favourite example of a cognomen was that of Cicero- meaning chickpea- either because of his dappled skin or because an ancestor of his had a nose that resembled a chickpea. Unlike the nomen, the generational name, a cognomen could appear and disappear almost at will and were usually not chosen by the person they referred to- which would account for the presence of harsh or unflattering cognomina. Under the empire, the use of the cognomina increased dramatically and where previously only distinguished houses had multiple names- it was now commonplace for all Romans to have multiple names. For the majority of the Republic the usual of distinguishing someone was via the nomen, but as the praenomen began to lose value, the cognomen began to replace it.
Whilst the nomen was a required element of the tria nomina down to the end of the empire, its usefulness declined over the course of the imperial times and an increasingly larger number of people became known by their nomina, which gradually shifted to become akin to the cognomina. By the 3rd century the cognomen became the most important part of Roman nomenclature. By the 6th century, as Roman institutions began to vanish, the differences between the nomen and the cognomen ceased to have any importance and by the late years of the empire, the western empire reverted to single names- which were indistinguishable from the cognomina that they replaced.
As per usual, the women in this have faded into obscurity and we largely assume that the tria nomina refers to men. The case with women was that they would adopt the family nomen, but with a feminine ending. For example, the women of the Julio clan would be referred to as Julia, and women in the Claudio clan would be referred to as Claudia. Notice how I say women, plural. Meaning your first daughter would be Julia, your second daughter would be Julia and your third daughter would be (you guessed it) Julia. Rather confusing if you ask me.
Hope you all enjoyed learning about Roman nomenclature- or the tria nomina. Have a lovely weekend!
~Z
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collymore · 2 days
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There are many more skeletons in the Windsor familial closet than in the average burial crypt!
By Stanley Collymore
This so-called monarchical family of yours are who they are, really because of the vile scheming, plotting and barbarous murders, by their similar ancestors of their specific rivals. Thus as such, they essentially achieved their power, as well as, the undoubtedly enforced ownership obviously, of those lands, which they evidently barbarically acquired; but sensibly, in order, to curry favour, and literally maintain the power they'd quite evidently, brutally acquired they actually bribed friends and others simply like junior family members with significantly, the obviously distribution of lands, and invariably, forcibly stolen from their previous and obviously rival owners their now crucially deprived of feudal titles but not uncommonly also invented, made up ones - like the 21st Century equivalent one of Liz Windsor quite narcissistically, creating William basically, the Duke of Cambridge that previously naturally never existed and that's undoubtedly, rather distinctively how this unquestionably very useless and actually pointless Windsor family very evidently, live their feudal lives in this the 21st Century while equally as asininely, in their choice of behaviour, utilizing their criminal Dark Ages M.O.
Behaviour that has bugger all, in effect, to essentially do with any honourable tradition as your evidently demented, and rather idiotic serf sycophants are gullibly led to believe. And now as formerly in the past; the status quo, clearly obviously naturally, with this crucially dishonest simply deceitfully monarchical bunch is to actually maintain the status quo, at all cost; and with themselves quite fittingly sitting really pretty financially sound, especially self-entitledly while privately among themselves, actually literally laughing their heads off from their discernibly luxurious comfort at the top of their hierarchically created and quite privileged enforced tree; at you unquestionably idiotic; fatuously dimwitted morons, amply supported by food banks aptly crowded around clearly sycophantically, in obeisance to these vile Windsors at the bottom.
(C) Stanley V. Collymore 26 March 2024.
Author's Remarks: This very laughably outstanding Windsor monarchical family, with no outstanding educationists, scientists, entrepreneurs, state of the art, quite discernibly medical professionals, technologists, inventors or psychologists, and I could carry on with a plethora of crucially important things that they aren't and haven't the skills or equally the intellectual acumen to achieve - quite obviously what rife incestuous inbreeding does to any family - and the only distinctly evident and highly questionable asset they do have, and even then, simply specifically rand risibly regarded as such exclusively by no one else but their surfeit of vile, odious and quite thoroughly, fatuous sycophants, is hand waving and cutting ribbons! Quite far from being relevant assets in a simply modern 21st Century! Those two features factored into their rather delusional notion that they're in situ self- evidently by Divine approbation!
Yet this basically useless Windsor family between them have 2e enormous palaces, castles and grand mansions, while clearly additionally between them literally control over 800,000 of land, A privileged situation boosted by in excess of 700 servants each at their back and call, while they and quite obviously the rest of the hereditary and so-called aristocracy actually own over half of England. And should you or any other vile peasant or subject die, have some wealth of your own which you honestly earned but didn't leave a will or have a known heir, all of that quite simply, automatically goes to this monarchical family - now Charles and William principally - and quite tax free! It's a feudal system called Bona vacantia! Just go and check it out!  Quite additionally, this very same monarchical family, undeniably automatically owns all the assets on the seabed around the entirety of the UK!
Meanwhile, you 21st Century feudal serfs and peasants live in essentially and clearly compares to the Windsors in housing that could simply be very obviously realistically compared to rabbit huts while undoubtedly many of you have to rely on food banks.
But what the heck you love your monarchy and love having your asses basically sorely whipped by them. Just like the idiotic wife or partner who has the shits knocked out of her by a narcissistic, psychopathic and a very misogynistic partner - their male or female; and when sensibly questioned why she doesn't leave that brute her response is: "He/she loves me, that's why they do it. It's to show me they care for me!" Ring any bells with you morons?
Having trained and worked previously as a psychiatric nurse I would simply normally have suggested you get your head tested. But as you know full well Maggie Thatcher who you cunts also worshipped distinctly closed down all the mental hospitals and pocketed the wealth from the sale of these very profitable properties for herself and her Tory colleagues! Stating that you quite odious nutcases could be dealt with in the community.  And accounts for why clearly large numbers of you are let loose on the streets of the UK.
By which time I'd long quit to pursue my primary and from childhood lifelong ambition: my Academic Career!
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