History Questions Not Worth Their Own Thread VII

[kiwitt]

Why should the Exodus story be any different?

Well I thought because it was relatively recent only ~3,000 or so years ago, that some evidence should have been found about such a significant event in Egypt's history.

 

[Domen]

We know there was no Noah's flood. We know there was no Adam and Eve some 6000 years ago.

There were some N.N. floods, though:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Storegga_Slide

The three Storegga Slides are considered to be amongst the largest known landslides. They occurred under water, at the edge of Norway's continental shelf (Storegga is Norwegian for "the Great Edge"), in the Norwegian Sea, 100 km (62 mi) north-west of the Møre coast, causing a very large tsunami in the North Atlantic Ocean. This collapse involved an estimated 290 km (180 mi) length of coastal shelf, with a total volume of 3,500 km3 (840 cu mi) of debris.[1] This would be the equivalent volume to an area the size of Iceland covered to a depth of 34 m (112 ft).

Based on carbon dating of plant material recovered from sediment deposited by the tsunami, the latest incident occurred around ~6225–6170 BCE (...)

(...)

At, or shortly before, the time of the last Storegga Slide, a land bridge known to archaeologists and geologists as "Doggerland" existed, linking the area of Great Britain, Denmark and the Netherlands across what is now the southern North Sea. This area is believed to have included a coastline of lagoons, marshes, mudflats, and beaches, and to have been a rich hunting, fowling and fishing ground populated by Mesolithic human cultures.[6][7][8]

Although Doggerland was physically submerged through a gradual rise in sea level, it has been suggested that coastal areas of both Britain and mainland Europe, extending over areas which are now submerged, would have been inundated by a tsunami triggered by the Storegga Slide. This event would have had a catastrophic impact on the contemporary Mesolithic population, and separated cultures in Britain from those on the European mainland.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viking_Bergen_Island

A more recent hypothesis is that much of the land was inundated by a tsunami around 8200 BP (6200 BC), caused by a submarine landslide off the coast of Norway known as the Storegga Slide. This theory suggests "that the Storegga Slide tsunami would have had a catastrophic impact on the contemporary coastal Mesolithic population. [...] Following the Storegga Slide tsunami, it appears, Britain finally became separated from the continent and, in cultural terms, the Mesolithic there goes its own way."

We know there was no Adam and Eve some 6000 years ago.

There was Y-DNA "Adam" and mtDNA "Eve", though.

Why should the Exodus story be any different?

Probably it wasn't.

As for archaeological evidence - the Israelites in Egypt numbered some 35 thousand people.

And Egypt had around 4 million inhabitants (see Appendix B), so they were a tiny minority.

some evidence should have been found about such a significant event in Egypt's history.

Significant in Egyptian history?

From Egyptian perspective, a bunch of slaves escaped them. Not that significant. And Egyptian propaganda either stayed silent or lied about their failures, just to mention Ramesses II and his inconclusive campaign against the Hittites.

 

[r16]

I know the United States and the Ottoman Empire were on opposite sides during World War 1, but did they ever fight directly against each other on the battlefield? If so, can someone name any of the battles they had against each other?

I don't recall hearing of any. The US entry into the war was so late that they weren't involved everywhere. The US was still ramping up for the war when it ended. The Army and Marines were in France. The Navy in the Atlantic.

I think they did declare war on the Ottomans, though, and were offered a mandate in Armenia after the war, so it's possible. I agree it was unlikely, though.

Did they have any involvement in the Pacific?

ı would say they declared only on Germany , but were involved in numbers against the Austrians in the air , no doubt due to the sizeable Italian presence in the US . La Guardia , a future mayor of New York was an airman in Italy and he called Italian assistance to units there as a racket . A USN airman was awarded with the Medal of Honour , the destroyer named after him was sunk in Midway .

no clashes with the Ottomans , the mandate question arose from the thing that it was to be about all the Ottoman lands . Wilson , to placate the Allies aka the Colonialists , tried to limit it to a location that would be cheaper and do useful work in stopping the possible expansion of Communism while the US Military was an early "admirer" of the coming thing on Greeks and their puppetmasters . USN detachments clashed with Turkish advance guards in September 1922 , around Izmir . Aiming to discourage from entering the city , it has been reported as providing an escape route to Greek refugees , by mutual consent . Though at the height of this recent "secularism" it was reported that it was the USN that protected Greek landings on the islands during the Balkan Wars .

 

[JohannaK]

There were some N.N. floods, though:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Storegga_Slide



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viking_Bergen_Island

I didnt know that the Israelites were in Scandinavia in Noah's time.

 

[Arakhor]

Well I thought because it was relatively recent only ~3,000 or so years ago, that some evidence should have been found about such a significant event in Egypt's history.

You'd think so, yes.

 

[Louis XXIV]

I think the closer it got to the time it was written, the more authentic it becomes. But certainly all of Genesis and even through Joshua have a feel of an origin myth more than something based on reality. However, there's archaeological evidence that supports David and Solomon's existence and there are corroborating accounts by the time you get to Sennacherib's siege of Jerusalem. The Assyrian accounts differ, but they at least make it clear we aren't talking about a fictional event.

 

[Domen]

I didnt know that the Israelites were in Scandinavia in Noah's time.

At that time all people were foragers, and hunter-gatherers are often very mobile groups of people (especially if they hunt large fauna).

For example famous Kennewick Man died near Kennewick, some 400 km from the nearest ocean (Pacific), yet while examining his bones scientists found out that during most of his life, his diet was rich in marine mammals. The nearest place where he could eat marine mammals was the Pacific coast.

So he was buried far away from the place where he was born, or where he spent most of his life.

BTW - old rumours that Kennewick Man was "European" are false. A closer examination shows similarities to the Ainu people of North-East Asia:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ainu_people

In seems that in Eurasian prehistory south-north and north-south back and forth migrations were frequent, cyclical, and depended on climate.

When climate got warmer, they migrated north, when it got colder, they went back south. For example the Y-DNA haplogroup which is typical for modern South Indians (Dravidian-speakers) - R2 - descends from R. And a sample of R was found in Russian Siberia in a burial from ~24,000 years ago.

So I would not be surprised if some part of ancestors of Near Easterners came down south-east from Doggerland, after it was flooded.

By the way:

The myth about the "great flood" is not Israelite in origin. Already the Akkadians and the Sumerians recorded that myth:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gilgamesh_flood_myth

The Gilgamesh flood myth is a flood myth in the Epic of Gilgamesh. Many scholars believe that the flood myth was added to Tablet XI in the "standard version" of the Gilgamesh Epic by an editor who utilized the flood story from the Epic of Atrahasis.[1] A short reference to the flood myth is also present in the much older Sumerian Gilgamesh poems, from which the later Babylonian versions drew much of their inspiration and subject matter.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atra-Hasis

Atra-Hasis ("exceedingly wise") is the protagonist of an 18th-century BCE Akkadian epic recorded in various versions on clay tablets. The Atra-Hasis tablets include both a creation myth and a flood account, which is one of three surviving Babylonian deluge stories. The name "Atra-Hasis" also appears on one of the Sumerian king lists as king of Shuruppak in the times before a flood.

Sumerians were the first people who invented writing, and one of first things which they wrote down, was the "great flood" myth.

So it had to be a very ancient oral tradition, which was later written down.

 

[Plotinus]

Having watched the films "The Ten Commandments" and the more recent "Exodus: God and Kings", I was led to believe that the Exodus was an actual event (frogs, plagues, locusts, etc. excluded). However, in reading Wikipedia: The Exodus, no archaeological evidence has been found c.a. 1250 BCE. Does this effectively place the entire Old Testament's historicity into question?

The Old Testament isn't a single document. The historicity of one book doesn't really bear on that of the others. Certainly there's little reason to think that the Exodus was a real event, and indeed most of the material in the Pentateuch seems to be legendary, but that doesn't necessarily impinge on the historicity of other texts e.g. the books of Chronicles. However, all texts of this kind are going to have question marks over their historicity to some degree or another.

 

[Arakhor]

However, there's archaeological evidence that supports David and Solomon's existence

I think that the non-Israeli considered opinion is that whilst David and Solomon may indeed have existed, they probably didn't exist in the fashion that the Bible describes, as that is more of an Arthurian style tale rather than what was more likely in existence at the time.

 

[Lohrenswald]

Alright, so I know this is pretty low-brow history BUT

Why did Hitler serve in the german army in the first world war if he was an austrian citizen?

 

[kiwitt]

Hitler received the final part of his father's estate in May 1913 and moved to Munich where he earned money painting architectural scenes. He may have left Vienna to evade conscription into the Austrian army. Hitler later claimed that he did not wish to serve the Habsburg Empire because of the mixture of "races" in its army. The Bavarian police sent him back to Salzburg for induction into the Austrian Army but he failed his physical exam on 5 February 1914 and returned to Munich.

He was 25 years old in August 1914, when Austria-Hungary and the German Empire entered into the First World War. Because of his Austrian citizenship, he had to request permission to serve in the Bavarian Army. Permission was granted.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_career_of_Adolf_Hitler

 

[Domen]

Why did Hitler serve in the german army in the first world war if he was an austrian citizen?

Hitler explained this in "Mein Kampf" - here is an excerpt (my translation):

"(...) In relatively early adolescence I had an opportunity to take part in a nationalistic struggle in old Austria. We had a school organization and we expressed our views using cornflowers and black-red-gold colours. We were saluting each other with 'Heil' and instead of 'Kaiserlied' we were singing, despite warnings and punishments, 'Deutschland über Alles'. This way, we young people were educating ourselves politically (...) I was not among the indifferent people and soon I became a fanatical German nationalist, but not in modern party-related understanding of this word. Development in this direction was in my case very fast, so fast that already when a 15 years old boy I could distinguish between dynastic 'patriotism', and national 'nationalism'. I understood the latter much better. Already as boys we knew, that this Austrian state did not show any affection for us, Germans. Our knowledge about methods of conduct of the Habsburgs was being confirmed each day by daily experiences. In the north and in the south the poison of alien races was devouring the flesh of our nation and even Vienna was gradually less and less resembling a German city. 'The Emperor's House' was becoming Czech where only that was possible; finally the hand of the goddess of everlasting justice and unrelenting vengeance killed the greatest enemy of the Germanness of Austria - Archduke Franz Ferdinand. He was killed by a bullet whom he had personally helped. After all, he was the main patron of the movement the goal of which was to turn Austria into a Slavic country. The embryo of the World War and indeed the total ruin of Germany were caused by fatal alliance of the young German Reich with the Austrian artificial state. (...) Since my earliest adolescence I was convinced, that the destruction of Austria is the necessary condition for the security of the German race. (...) The misfortune for the German race was especially the ruling House of Habsburg. The consequences of that was my passionate love of the German Austria and my deep hatred of the Austrian State. (...) Because the domination of the ethnic German element had been broken, the system served for games between particular nationalities. Generally the line of development was established against Germans. Especially from times when the Archduke, Franz Ferdinand, began to grow in strength, and he supported Czech ambitions. The future ruler of the monarchy attempted with use of all means to cause the process of De-Germanization. This is why often German settlements were being slowly but efficiently subjected to influence of foreign-speaking nations. In Lower Austria the process was much faster and many Czechs considered Vienna to be their own city. The main idea of that new Habsburg, whose family spoke Czech (wife of the Archduke was an ethnic Czech countess and in her family there were strong anti-German traditions), aimed at establishing in Central Europe a Slavic state with Catholic religion as a counter-weight to Orthodox Russia. That's how religion became once again involved in serving political concepts, which was frequent in Habsburg policies. (...) After the war of 1870 the House of Habsburg slowly, with premeditation and determination, started an effort leading to rooting out the dangerous German race - it was the goal of the Slavophile family of the emperor. (...)"

In short - he despised Austrian monarchy and considered it an artificial state.

 

[Louis XXIV]

^ Huh, I don't necessarily disagree with Hitler (at least on the broad point).

I think that the non-Israeli considered opinion is that whilst David and Solomon may indeed have existed, they probably didn't exist in the fashion that the Bible describes, as that is more of an Arthurian style tale rather than what was more likely in existence at the time.

Which is still better than what can be said about Exodus.

 

[daft]

Because he didn't have Polish Winged Hussars.

Only the intelligent are capable of being truly funny, characteristics you obviously lack.
I leave this dumb comment/answer of yours without further reprisal.

Moderator Action: Infracted for flaming.
Please read the forum rules: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=422889

 

[Domen]

^ Huh, I don't necessarily disagree with Hitler (at least on the broad point).

What do you mean?

 

[Louis XXIV]

The Austrian Empire was a very artificial state held together by pretty much the monarchy alone. Note, I'm not saying modern Austria is artificial, just that the Habsburg Empire was.

 

[poom3619]

The Austro-Hungary Empire in WW1 (with many people not mentioned) is ruled by
Francis Joseph I, by the grace of God Emperor of Austria; Apostolic King of Hungary, King of Bohemia, Dalmatia, Croatia, Slavonia, Galicia, Lodomeria, Illyria; King of Jerusalem, etc.;

Spoiler :

Archduke of Austria; Grand Duke of Tuscany, Crakow; Duke of Lorraine, Salzburg, Styria, Carinthia, Carniola, the Bukovina; Grand Prince of Transylvania; Margrave of Moravia; Duke of the Upper & Lower Silesia, Modena, Parma, Piacenza, Guastalla, Oswiecin, Zator, Cieszyn, Friuli, Ragusa, Zara; Princely Count of Habsburg, Tyrol, Kyburg, Gorizia, Gradisca; Prince of Trent, Brixen; Margrave of the Upper & Lower Lusatia, in Istria; Count of Hohenems, Feldkirch, Bregenz, Sonnenberg, etc.; Lord of Triest, Kotor, the Wendish March; Grand Voivode of the Voivodship of Serbia etc. etc..

 

[jackelgull]

Does anybody know why patriarchy has been the rule for most of history rather than an exception?

 

[Cutlass]

Because men are usually bigger and stronger than women. And so can enforce it.

 

[Cheezy the Wiz]

Does anybody know why patriarchy has been the rule for most of history rather than an exception?

Because once property was established as a principle, the basis of the family was reoriented to center on father-right instead of mother-right, meaning that family identity, and thus right of inheritance, became centered on decent from a male, not decent from a female (a notable exception to this rule is Judaism, which has persisted due to explicitly religious reasons. Thus, women lost control of property, and thus wealth, and thus socio-economic power.

It doesn't have so much to do with "lol menz r strongr" because that's not always the case, nor have women been kept in physical bondage for such an argument to matter. Men, in being the established power in society, have always in turn had a decisive hand in the formation of new social forms, and thus new forces of production have always given women the inferior role. Engels calls women "the first underclass" in Origins of the Family and this name is apt. In each social formation, women have been given, either by design or simply by male-centered indifference, the short end of the stick, and this has kept them down.

It's only with the dawn of capitalism in the last 500 years or so that we've seen the rise of any kind of remotely coherent "feminism" arguing that woman are, should be, or are capable of being, equal to men in either physical or mental capacity. The growing strength of this movement has less to do with the growing strength of women during that period than it does the fact that increasing numbers of men found themselves part of the exact same political class as working women (which is a misnomer - women have always worked, and often harder than men): the proletariat, and thus found common cause where they would not have before. This gave the cause of women's liberation the breathing room it needed to adequately understand itself and mature into a socio-political force rather than the musings of a few rebel philosophers in their spare time.

But even within capitalism, the manner of women's oppression is unique compared to both men as well as earlier periods of patriarchy: women are responsible for the reproduction of labor-value, both on the immediate as well as generational levels. However, they are also workers, and thus a constant battle ensues between capitalism's need to maximizer her labor for profit, but also the need to have the capacity to perform labor, both by her and her man, to be continually renewed so that it can be re-harvested. This renewal comes in the form of house-work, or all the things that are necessary in life in order to be able to return to work renewed for a new shift of adequate work: food, cleaning, laundry, upkeep, child care and rearing, etc.

So the forces keeping women down are far more complex than "men be stronk." There are real material forces in both this and in past political systems that restrain women from ever breaking free from patriarchy as a sex while those systems remain intact.