History Questions Not Worth Their Own Thread VIII

[Gen.Mannerheim]

I would assume on that statue of Augustus pictured painted, the breastplate would have at least a gold background, and his skin painted an attempt at fleshtone...

Statues of divine or semi-divine subjects often used ivory or white paint to give their skin a bleached/pale look. It would make sense that an image of the Emperor would also be given this appearance.

I'm not sure why, but I assumed ancient cities would be much more crowded.

The slow movement of people and goods within a city would highly encourage dense living conditions, something only strengthened by the high cost of building and the intrinsic crampness of city walls.

Cities should be shown bustling with people, but I feel like most artists aim is more about presenting the architecture or spacing of the buildings than the accuracy of the streets.

You also rarely see people bringing in agricultural goods or trade goods in these kind of paintings either.

 

[schlaufuchs]

Statues of divine or semi-divine subjects often used ivory or white paint to give their skin a bleached/pale look. It would make sense that an image of the Emperor would also be given this appearance.



Cities should be shown bustling with people, but I feel like most artists aim is more about presenting the architecture or spacing of the buildings than the accuracy of the streets.

You also rarely see people bringing in agricultural goods or trade goods in these kind of paintings either.

You also rarely see them littered with detritus and human excrement.

 

[Traitorfish]

I'm not sure why, but I assumed ancient cities would be much more crowded.

The slow movement of people and goods within a city would highly encourage dense living conditions, something only strengthened by the high cost of building and the intrinsic crampness of city walls.

These are both locations of public rituals, religious or secular (and that's not a hard line in this context), so they'd probably reserve at least the option of clearing out a bit of space.

 

[Traitorfish]

Why do we call it the "Yellow River" and not the "Huanghe"?

The Yangtze, I understand, has been called a dozen things by Europeans, none of them quite right, but usually an attempt to replicate the Chinese. So why is the Yellow River, which has been translated more-or-less accurately, not known by its Chinese name?

 

[Lohrenswald]

Lot's of people call it Huanghe

 

[Cutlass]

Why do we call it the "Yellow River" and not the "Huanghe"?

The Yangtze, I understand, has been called a dozen things by Europeans, none of them quite right, but usually an attempt to replicate the Chinese. So why is the Yellow River, which has been translated more-or-less accurately, not known by its Chinese name?

Names tend to stick. Once a name becomes established, no matter how wrong it may be, the effort needed to correct it is often prohibitive.

 

[Ajidica]

Why do we call it the "Yellow River" and not the "Huanghe"?

The Yangtze, I understand, has been called a dozen things by Europeans, none of them quite right, but usually an attempt to replicate the Chinese. So why is the Yellow River, which has been translated more-or-less accurately, not known by its Chinese name?

I would guess because attempts to transliterate Chinese names into Latin characters/English was (and is) a hot mess.
Plus, do you really want to imagine some Victorian Empire Builder whose xenophobia is matched only by his stupendous facial hair trying to pronounce Chinese words?

 

[Lexicus]

Why do we call it the "Yellow River" and not the "Huanghe"?

The Yangtze, I understand, has been called a dozen things by Europeans, none of them quite right, but usually an attempt to replicate the Chinese. So why is the Yellow River, which has been translated more-or-less accurately, not known by its Chinese name?

I've always sort of wondered this too.

 

[Absolution]

Why not call it the Yellow River? This is a convenient English name.
I don't see the point of being accurate, because either way, when talking to a Chinese person, one of you will have to know the other's language.

Why do you say Egypt and not Mysre or something like that? Why Tigris river and not Dicle? Because you speak English, it has a different vocabulary and those words are part of it.

If you don't have an different name, then even just a heavier Romanisation can be better, just like Euphrates instead of Perat and Xerxes instead of Hashiaresh.
I don't even know how to read Huanghe. How do you expect it to catch against the simple Yellow River? It should at least be Romanised as something like Aunger river (actually sounds too Germanic ), or Changie, or whatever experts can come up with.

 

[Traitorfish]

It's not the English name that confuses me, so much as the contrast with the Yangtze. We're apparently comfortable attempting a Chinese name for one of the regions great rivers, however badly we messed it up in practice, but for the other, we don't even bother. I expect Cutlass is right, there's no real reason for it, at some point it just became the standard, and it's too late too change.

(And I would tend to read "Huanghe" as "hwang-hee". That's incorrect, of course, but nobody expects us white devils to get it right.)

 

[Gen.Mannerheim]

I always thought that part of the problem was that much of the Anglophone speaking world has been sticking with Wade-Giles system of Chinese transliterations where as the Chinese themselves have moved to Pinyin. Just look at how confusing writing Chiang Kai-shek's name has become in Western histories compared to the East.

 

[Traitorfish]

I take the Dynasty Warriors comprise, and read Pinyin as if it was Wade-Giles.

 

[JohannaK]

Jiang Jieshi, not Chiang Kai-Shek. Mandarin over Cantonese!

 

[Gen.Mannerheim]

When I was TA-ing for a Chinese history class, one of the most constant struggles was convincing students that Chiang Kai-Shek = Jiang Jieshi and that Kuomintang = Guomindang because the textbook used pinyin but all the assigned articles used Wade-Giles.

 

[JohannaK]

Yeah, it's such a pain. When I wanted to research a bit on my own and grabbed a Cambridge History of China everything was Wade-Giles, but grabbing more modern and specialised books were on Pinyin. I do think Chiang is sometines an exception just because he's about the best known Chinese name.

 

[Absolution]

Why did West and Middle Francia evolve into Latinised societies, while East Francia retained the German culture?

 

[schlaufuchs]

What do you mean by Latinized society, and what do you mean by German culture?

If you mean linguistically, it has to do with the fact that a Frankish (Western Germanic family) noble society was introduced to Gaul as a superstrate to an already-existent Vulgar Latin/PRom.-speaking substrate. The rest of what today constitutes Modern Germany and Austria existed then as assorted substrata of Germanic languages and dialects.

Generally language doesn't shift unless there is a specific reason for that shift to occur, usually owing to some kind of prestige or social advantage.

If you're talking legally, that's a more complex question which would require quite a bit more time to answer.

If you're talking in strict cultural terms, I'm not so convinced the distinction exists as clearly as you seem to think it does. Certainly not if you're talking broadly over a Medieval period stretching from ~500 CE to, say, 1500 CE.

 

[Hrothbern]

Why did West and Middle Francia evolve into Latinised societies, while East Francia retained the German culture?

The current cultural border is more or less still the old border of the Roman Empire.
More or less
For example the southern part of Germany, currently the state Baden-Wuertemberg, was in the Roman sphere, but got enough Germanised afterwards.
Also the Netherlands north of the river Rhine, the Roman border, kept their Germanic culture and "germanised the southern part of the current Netherlands to a high degree, but the cultural difference between north and south of the Rhine is still significant.

 

[Absolution]

What do you mean by Latinized society, and what do you mean by German culture?

If you mean linguistically, it has to do with the fact that a Frankish (Western Germanic family) noble society was introduced as a superstrate to an already-existent Vulgar Latin/PRom.-speaking substrate. In the rest of Modern Germany existed then as assorted substrata of Germanic languages and dialects.

Generally language doesn't shift unless there is a specific reason for that shift to occur, usually owing to some kind of prestige or social advantage.

The most prominent is the Romance language issue, and I got some impression that the socio-political structure of High Middle Age "Germany" was a bit different than what was going on in the French (or Capetian Frankish) realm, as well as in Burgundy.
I may be wrong, but I am quite convinced that there are some differences, even if I may not be able to put my fingers on them precisely, right?

*Didn't notice your edit while quoting, now what would you think about the non-linguistic part?

 

[Mouthwash]

I've heard it claimed several times that the Crusades were actually an attempt to remove a violent class of warriors from Europe by giving something to do besides war with each other (it was originally Steven Runciman's idea?). How is that claim regarded these days?