Comments on: Memorial Day, 1453

By: FinermanWorks » Blog Archive » Saturday Sundry - Crafting Words with Impact

Sat, 29 May 2010 21:24:53 +0000

[...] Let’s not forget the historic significance of this day: http://finermanworks.com/your_rda_of_irony/2009/05/29/memorial-day-1453-2/ [...]

By: Eugene Finerman

Eugene Finerman — Fri, 29 May 2009 18:32:59 +0000

You are referring to “Kingdom of Heaven” which is quite a good film–despite the dubious presence of Orlando Bloom. He is so thin that he could slip through chain mail. The Byzantines would have been in the background of the story. In fact, a few of the extras were dressing in such refinement that you might that conclude that they were from Byzantium. The Crusader states had diplomatic relations with Constantinople; some were nominally fiefs of Byzantium.

The Kingdom of Heaven takes place before the Third Crusade; indeed the film recounts how Saladin regained Jerusalem. It was the Fourth Crusade–some 25 years later–that sacked Constantinople and destroyed the Byzantine Empire. What the Greeks eventually regained were the city itself and a few fragments of territories of the once great empire.

By: Bob Kincaid

Bob Kincaid — Fri, 29 May 2009 18:15:26 +0000

P.S. Does anyone ever view the fall of Constantinople as payback for Troy? You and I being students of irony, I couldn’t help noting the inverse similarities.

By: Bob Kincaid

Bob Kincaid — Fri, 29 May 2009 18:14:05 +0000

Thanks, Eugene.

You do the Byzantines proud in upholding their memory. You’ve written some witty stuff, some funny stuff and always smart stuff. This, however, stands apart: a beautiful memorial to bygone greatness. It reads like the treatment to a movie far better than that thing from a few years back that had the guy who played the Tolkien elf singlehandedly almost saving the Outremer

By: SwanShadow

SwanShadow — Fri, 29 May 2009 18:03:09 +0000

That’s nobody’s business but the Turks’.