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September 30, 1399:  Henry of Bolingbroke Gets a Job

Henry of Bolingbroke (1367-1413) had been frustrated.  First, he had the worst title in the royal family.  The other Plantagenets had more distinguished identifications like Lancaster, York or Cambridge.  Bolingbroke sounded like a skin condition.  Worse, Henry had nothing to occupy him.  Keeping his rich wife in a continual state of pregnancy was at most fifteen minutes’ activity a year.  War was the family business but France and England were at peace.  Apparently the French had won the Fifty-Two Year War, and King Richard II did not want to round it off to the nearest hundred.  Henry was not even free to indulge in vices.  If he had tried womanizing, people would have said that he was competing with his father (John of Gaunt, the Plantagenet stud muffin).  Bolingbroke did not possess the blithering smugness to be an upper class twit; besides, the King was setting was standard for that.

So in 1390 Henry decided to travel.  (His wife Mary stayed home, gestating her fourth duke.)  Bolingbroke might have gone to Italy where the artists were experimenting with a remarkable innovation called perspective.  (Actually the Romans used it but there had a 900-year-long memory lapse.)  But he preferred to go to Lithuania where he joined in the local crusade.  The Lithuanians were the last remaining pagans in Europe, so any pious Catholic was free to slaughter them.  With a Papal blessing, German knights had conquered  and forcibly converted the territories we’d recognize (vaguely) as Estonia and Latvia; but the Lithuanians successfully resisted two centuries of crusades.  Henry’s assistance to the Teutonic Knights did not turn the tide of battle but he survived unscathed, and he probably was relieved that any word in German sounds worse than Bolingbroke.  The following year he returned to England and another impregnation.  One daughter later he was off to Cyprus and Jerusalem, returning in 1493 and the ensuing pregnancy finally killed his poor wife.  The widower felt obliged to stay on the same island as his six children. 

He now took up the family’s other business: politics.  Richard II had proved an appalling king; he had the rare distinction of being both unethical and incompetent.  Anyone could have done a better job and every one of the Plantagenets was trying.  No one was actually planning to overthrow Richard, just relegate him to a powerless figurehead.  The two chief contenders to be the royal ventriloquist were the king’s uncles:  Thomas of Woodstock and John of Gaunt.  However, Richard did not appreciate their concern.  In 1397, he had Uncle Thomas imprisoned, where he promptly died.    Uncle John avoided the king’s tantrums, but cousin Henry was not so adroit.  For  questioning the case of his uncle’s death, Bolingbroke was exiled from England for ten years.         

John of Gaunt died–without help–in February, 1399.  Henry of Bolingbroke should have inherited his father’s titles and estates; the terms of his exile had not barred him from the succession.  However, contrary to the laws and basic decency, Richard confiscated the entire estate.  As King, he might commit a crime; but Richard was not strong enough to get away with it.  He commanded little loyalty.  The progressive nobles despised his blundering misrule. The conservative lords loathed his personal conduct; Richard was a bit too poetic and he practiced hygiene before it was fashionable.  (The next generation of Plantagenets was not springing from his loins.)  So, in July 1399, when Bolingbroke returned to England it was to popular acclaim and armed support.   

Bolingbroke justified his rebellion, claiming that he was only interested in the restoration of his father’s estate.  But he was making promises and alliances that indicated that he expected more than just the Duchy of Lancaster.  Richard buckled and capitulated; whether he made some superb speeches, you only have Shakespeare’s word for it.  Paraded as a prisoner on the way to London, Richard was “persuaded” to abdicate.  As of September 29, 1399: England had no king.  The following day, Parliament offered the Crown to Bolingbroke.  The wily Henry may have even acted surprise.  He now was Henry IV of England and (an unwilling) Wales.

Richard was dead within a year; someone forgot to feed him.  And Henry found that “uneasy lies the head that wears a crown.”  Usurpation can set a tempting precedence.  The Plantagenets were a large and underemployed family.  All of Henry’s cousins tried to wrest the throne for themselves; they did not succeed–at least for another two generations–but the intrigues and struggles would last 85 years and 8 plays.

September 27, 1540:  The Church’s Secret Weapon

What if James Bond had a MBA as well as a license to kill?  The very idea may be too horrifying for you, but it wasn’t for Pope Paul  III.  On this day in 1540, the Pontiff gave his authorization-and evidently his blessing-to the Society of Jesus. As we now know, the founding of the Jesuits was a major event in the history of exorcism. Finally, there were priests as literate as the Devil. At the time, however, the Pope was interested in only one exorcism: a certain Professor Luther.

Upon becoming Pope, Paul III had attempted reconciliation with the Protestants. His approach was reassuring, saying in effect, “You now are dealing with an adult. At least, I am not a de Medici.” His holier-than-them attitude was in the highest standards of hypocrisy. Born Alessandro Farnese, he had become a Cardinal at the age of 25 because his sister was the mistress of Pope Julius II. And the young Cardinal never lacked a social life, either. As Pope, he appointed two of his grandsons as Cardinals. Nevertheless, he was an improvement over his predecessors. Paul III viewed the Church in a global role. The de Medici Popes had shown the political perspective of Florentine aldermen.

To his disappointment, however, Paul III was not the answer to the Protestants’ prayers. The Princes of Northern Europe-and that extrovert in England-had discovered a profound spirituality in confiscating the Church’s wealth and they were not ready to repent a penny. (One family of minor princes in Brandenburg, Germany had subsisted on the salaries and graft of Church offices: a bishopric here, a priory there, a Grand Master of this and that. Then the Reformation inspired them: why settle for a tithe of a tithe when you can wring the entire archdiocese. After that, the Hohenzollerns would not be so minor.)

Since Paul III could not coax the Protestants into reconciliation, he would scheme them into oblivion. The Pope proved a dynamo of plans and plots. He cured France’s Francis I of his Protestant leanings by a form of faith-healing called bribes; the Church lost income but kept France. The Pope also negotiated a peace between the usually warring France and the Holy Roman Empire; Catholic nations should not slaughter each other when there were Protestants to kill. Acknowledging that the Church’s miserable reputation had incited the Protestants, the Pope summoned the Council of Trent to undertake desperately overdue reforms. (The Farnese would condemn nepotism by other families.)

And the Jesuits certainly fit into the Pope’s scheme of things. Here was a religious order that reflected the best of the Renaissance’s virtues and vices. The brilliant and highly trained Jesuits could convert, subvert, charm and kill with equal aplomb. Yes, they were fanatics-what else could you expect from an organization founded by Spaniards-but they were fanatics with taste. They dismissed the Inquisition’s wholesale persecutions as just a vulgar waste of kindling. The Jesuits preferred knowing the right people, whether to cultivate or eradicate them.

Their sinister charm proved successful in preventing further defections to Protestantism. Confiscating the Church’s wealth had an obvious appeal to the aristocracy of Poland and Hungary, but the Jesuits made themselves irresistible and indispensable to the ruling classes. And if the nobles remained Catholic, so did their peasants.

Of course, the Jesuits also had their failures but they were always spectacular. They never did manage to assassinate Elizabeth I or foist Mary Stuart on to the throne of England. The Jesuits did succeed in overthrowing Tsar Fedor II in 1605, but one coup was insufficient to convert Russia. They also backed the wrong side in a Japanese civil war in 1600. The winning warlord, taking over the Shogunate and rule of the country, proved very vindictive. Of course, the Jesuits were expelled from Japan but so were all Europeans. The Jesuits’ interference would result in two centuries of Japanese isolation.

Today, the Jesuits are generally regarded as benevolent activists. Given their erudite reputation, they are often considered liberals. Yet, there remain traces of their notoriety and you can find them in high school literature. Would “The Three Musketeers” have faced such perils if Cardinal Richelieu had been a Franciscan?

September 25, 1513:  Balboa Discovers the Pacific Ocean

The geezers among us (40 years old or worse) will remember being taught that Vasco Nunez de Balboa (1474-1519) discovered the Pacific Ocean.  We now realize that reflects a slight European bias.  The Chinese may have noticed a mass of water to their east.  The Japanese could hardly ignore it; in fact, they appreciated the ocean’s isolating charm.  (It kept out Mongol cavalry.)  Even if we only count Europeans, then Marco Polo discovered the Pacific Ocean.

So today’s school textbooks–at least the ones that don’t attribute everything to Jesus–now credit Balboa as being the first European to see the Pacific Ocean from the American shore.  It happened this day in 1513.  At the time, he was touring the area we know as Panama, introducing himself to the local tribes and charging them all their gold and gems for the privilege.  For a conquistador, Balboa was considered quite humane.  He rarely attacked without warning, and he did not regard the natives’ attempt at self-defense as a personal affront or as a justification for genocide.  Once he had thrashed any resistance, he was willing let the remnants of the tribe become his “allies”–a better social standing than slaves but not quite as dignified as toadies.

While making new allies, Balboa heard reports of a great sea to the south and west.  His interest was not merely academic; the coastal tribes were said to be rich in pearls.  A rumor is as good as invitation, and what more did a conquistador need?  With 190 Spaniards and 1000 native levies, Balboa proceeded on his quest.  The distance from the Spanish base on the Caribbean to the Pacific would not seem very great; but that narrow isthmus had hostile tribes, dense jungles and steep mountains.  It was nearly four weeks before Balboa came within sight of the southern sea, and it would be another four days before he was standing in its waters.

Balboa claimed the ocean on behalf of Spain; but it would be at least three centuries before the Chinese and Japanese learned that they were trespassing.  However, the conquistador was far less audacious in coming up with a name for Spain’s new waterworld.  When in doubt, a prudent Spaniard would think of something impeccably Catholic.  As far as the Inquisition was concerned, the whole world should be named for the Virgin Mother.  A clever courtier might have gratified the Church and the King:  the San Ferdinand Ocean?  But, at his moment in history, all Balboa could think of was “Mar del Sur”:  the South Sea.  (Seven years later, Ferdinand Magellan offered a Pacific alternative.)

Balboa then returned to the Caribbean and the far greater dangers of Spanish politics.  The conquistadors were not a corps of civil servants or even army regulars; they were an assortment of cutthroats and sociopaths tolerated by the Crown so long as they remembered that the King received 20 percent of the loot.  The quickest way for a conquistador’s promotion was to oust his superior.  That had been Balboa’s path.  A younger son of a minor noble and a failed pig farmer fleeing his debts, Balboa joined an expedition whose commander intended to overthrow a provincial governor.  Balboa instead ousted him, organizing a mutiny and then arresting the commander for embezzlement against the Crown.  Embezzlement was an useful charge because it was usually true, and the King was always ready to believe it.  So the arrested officer was off to Spain, and now Balboa was the commander.  As for the expedition’s original mission, Balboa soon was governor of Panama too.   Of course, to justify his usurpations, he had to send ample loot to Spain.

King Ferdinand appreciated  a lucrative rogue like Balboa; but the Crown still had to protect the dignity of its governors.  So Ferdinand came up with a compromise, appointing a new governor but elevating Balboa to be Admiral of the South Sea; the two were expected to cooperate and rule together.  The new governor was an elderly aristocrat; how long do you think that he would last against the younger adventurer?  Wrong!  It was Balboa who proved the guileless dupe.   The wily courtier bided his time and encouraged the marriage of his daughter to Balboa.  Over the next few years, Balboa launched expeditions in the South Sea searching for a fabulously rich empire.  However, none of the ships evidently reached Peru; and the Admiral’s repeated failures were accumulating as evidence to justify his ouster.  Unfortunately, the governor also wanted Balboa out of the family.  In 1519, Balboa was arrested for treason and beheaded.  So it seems that aristocrats can be cutthroats, too.  After all, that is how they first got their titles.

As for that fabulously rich empire to the south of Panama, the rumors persisted.  And one of Balboa’s soldiers was an illiterate ruffian named Francisco Pizarro.

September 22, 1792: France Produces a New Calendar

Most of you are celebrating the Autumnal Equinox, but to a 200 year old Frenchman it is New Year’s Day.  You didn’t think that the French Revolution would spare the Gregorian Calendar and the Anno Domini chronology.  Having read Rousseau, the French knew that they could do better.

In 1792, a government commission was assigned to redesign and rename the calendar.  Since the earth seemed committed to orbiting the sun, the length of a year was not very malleable; however, just about everything else could be changed.  There still would be 12 months, but each would be 30 days long.  (That did leave an extra five days before the year ended; they could designated as holidays.)  With equal symmetry, a week now would be ten days.  The New Year would begin with the Autumnal Equinox, but that would no longer be September 22nd.

All the months had been renamed.  The government commission had assigned the poet Philip Fabre d”Eglantine to create the new nomenclature.  The first month of the new year would be Vendemiaire;  referring to the grape harvest, it corresponded (at least to royalist reactionaries) to the period from September 22nd to October 21st.  The following months made a plausible weather report:

Brumaire–foggy

Frimaire–frosty

Nivoise–snowy

Pluvoise–rainy

Ventoise–windy

Germinal–seedy

Floreal–flowery

Prairial–meadowy

Messidor–harvesty

Thermidor–hot

Fructidor–fruity

But that was but the beginning of Fabre d’Eglantine’s assignment.  He had to bestow a name for each day of the year, and repetitions were not allowed.  In keeping with the esprit de Rousseau, the names were to be drawn from nature:  plants, animals and minerals.  The weekend would be designated by the name of a tool or implement.   For example, the first week of Vendemiaire would be grape, saffron, chestnut, autumn crocus, horse, yellow balsam, carrot, amaranth, parsnip and–for your day of rest–tub.

The French citizen would be expected to memorize that and 355 other botanic and zoological tags.  People were probably begging to be guillotined.  (Fabre d’Eglantine apparently did–in 1794).  However, the government was so pleased with this calendar–introduced this day in 1792 or year I— that it next decided to reorganize the time of day.  According to the French Revolutionary clock, there would be ten hours in the day, 100 minutes in a hour, and 100 seconds in a minute.  The symmetry was charming but it did leave the French day almost four hours longer than everyone else’s unless you reduced the length of a French second; and that may have been a bit much for 18th century technology.   That Revolutionary Clock lasted from 1793 until 1795.  The Revolutionary Calendar remained in effect until 1805, when Napoleon decided that his birthday should be August 15th rather than the Day of the Sheep.  The Emperor restored to France the Gregorian Calendar and 22 more weekends.

So, even if I am 200 years too late, Happy Grape Day and Happy New Year.

September 20, 1586:  Chidiock Tichborne Becomes a Public Spectacle

Anyone named Chidiock Tichborne would be used to martyrdom. He certainly did not improve his prospects by plotting to assassinate Elizabeth I. Basketball had yet to be invented so Catholic Youth organizations sponsored extra-curricular competitions to put Mary Stuart on the English throne. Chidiock signed up with the Babington team, a group of conspirators who would have inspired the Keystone Kops. The Babington gang had mastered the game of trash talk; they let everyone know that they intended to kill Elizabeth. They put in it writing–tactless and incriminating messages to Mary.  They probably had press releases in Loyola University alumni newsletters.  Believe it or not, they even put it in painting. The Babington boys commissioned a group portrait. They refused to be ignored.

Of course, that is not the best approach to a conspiracy. The Babington boys were arrested, tried and executed in 1586.   In their case, execution might be an euphemism.  When you are hanged, drawn and quartered, death is almost an afterthought.  The public castration is only socially fatal; while vivisection and disembowelment  can be done at a very leisurely pace.  So much for the Babington boys:  all they managed to accomplish was to incriminate Queen Mary; she was tried and executed the following year.  (She was merely beheaded.) 

While awaiting his death, the 28 year-old Tichborne proved that he was a better poet than plotter. His only known work, it is all too appropriately called “Tichborne’s Elegy.”

My prime of youth is but a frost of cares,
My feast of joy is but a dish of pain,
My crop of corn is but a field of tares,
And all my good is but vain hope of gain;
The day is past, and yet I saw no sun,
And now I live, and now my life is done.

My tale was heard and yet it was not told,
My fruit is fallen, and yet my leaves are green,
My youth is spent and yet I am not old,
I saw the world and yet I was not seen;
My thread is cut and yet it is not spun,
And now I live, and now my life is done.

I sought my death and found it in my womb,
I looked for life and saw it was a shade,
I trod the earth and knew it was my tomb,
And now I die, and now I was but made;
My glass is full, and now my glass is run,
And now I live, and now my life is done.

The Elizabethans did have a superior way of saying “Hey, dude. Bummer.”

In my meanderings through the internet, I came across a reference to the Roman poet Ovid. Since he is assigned reading in Classics 101 and merits an occasional question on Jeopardy, the man obviously has achieved immortality. That might have been some consolation to a man who was condemned for immorality in ancient Rome. To earn that kind of distinction, one might have had to debauch every vestal virgin and the entire Praetorian Guard, probably on the same night. (Imagine that Viagra Commercial!)  Unfortunately, Ovid really was the victim of guilt by association. At worst, he simply was the poet laureate of certain orgies, those of the daughter of Augustus.

But Augustus didn’t approve of family scandals. The Emperor couldn’t prosecute everyone at his daughter’s orgies–that would have been a class action suit–but he could punish the most conspicuous participants. And a celebrity poet made a great example. So Ovid ended up exiled, spending his last years on the Romanian coast of the Black Sea.

Think of the irony: a Roman’s idea of punishment is a East European’s idea of vacation. Imagine if Dostoyevsky had been exiled there instead of Siberia. How would his outlook have changed….

“Crime and Punishment“: In an attempt to demonstrate his superior will, Rodya steals an apple pie from the nice lady baker. Can he live with the guilt, and will he get a tummyache from eating too much?

“The Brothers Karamazov“: Dad and Dmitri are vying for the affections of Grushenka, an adorable stray puppy. Ivan and Alexei debate the existence of Santa Claus; Ivan has serious doubts.

“The Idiot“: Prince Mishkin is so nice that he makes everyone wish that they had epilepsy.

p.s.  And from last year, a birthday greeting to the “Worst Englishman of the 17th Century”: https://finermanworks.com/your_rda_of_irony/2008/09/15/a-scoundrel-ahead-of-his-time/

September 14th (really!), 1752:  Great Britain Finally Admits That the Catholics Are Right

 When the truth is inconvenient, and the facts are incriminating, one can find great solace in ignorance. There are times and societies where stupidity is a dogma. For example, in 16th century Spain the Inquisition regarded the practice of reading on a Saturday as suspiciously Jewish. And you know how the Inquisition dealt with suspicions. People can be as flammable as books.

Now lest I be picketed by the Knights of Columbus, I must mention an example of willful ignorance by Protestant liberals. In 1582, the Catholic Church presented an updated and far more accurate version of the calendar. However, Protestant England refused to acknowledge the improvement, as if there were a Jesuit lurking behind every page of the calendar. Of course, naming the calendar for Pope Gregory was not exactly ecumenical either. Rather than give a Catholic credit for anything, England adhered to the old Julian calendar. (Apparently, an inaccurate pagan was preferable to an accurate Catholic.) 

 For almost 170 years, Britain chose dogma over science.   But in their Protestant zealotry, the British were making the Sun into a Catholic.  It was scheduling equinoxes and solstices in compliance with Rome rather than Canterbury.  The fact that British farmers would miscalculate spring plantings by ten or eleven days cannot be the sole excuse for English cooking, but it hardly helped.  Science, commerce and common sense demanded the correction, and by 1751 Parliament was ready.

The British Calendar Act began by acknowledging a few problems but not any fault.  According to the legislation, the problem with the calendar dated back to 325 A.D. and the Council of Nicea.  So, according to this Protestant logic, it actually was the Church’s mistake.   Having exonerated itself, British Protestantism now was willing to make the necessary adjustments. 

Britain would adopt the “common” calendar.  The legislation did not mention “Gregorian”, preferring any verbal evasion to that Catholic noun.   To correct the chronological errors, in 1752 September 2nd would be followed by September 14th.  Finally, in keeping with “the usage of other nations”, the New Year in Great Britain would now begin on January 1st rather than the Olde English quirk of March 25th.

So, on this day in 1752, Great Britain adopted the “Common” Calendar, and Protestantism somehow survived.  The Stuarts were not restored to the throne and the American Colonies did not revolt (yet).  If any English resented this capitulation to Papism, they could alway take it out on the Irish.

September 13th: 533:  King Gelimer Picks a Bad Time to Lose His Mind

Battles do require a name.  History prefers a more specific nomenclature than “Was Grant Drunk Again?” or “Those English Archers Are Really Good, Part I.”  Geography usually obliges with some form of identification: the nearest town, the bordering river or, on this day in 533, a signpost.  Today is the anniversary of the battle of “Ten Miles From Carthage.”  It sounds more dignified in Latin, “Ad Decimum”, although neither of the armies spoke that language.  One army took orders in Greek, the other in a German dialect, but the signposts of North Africa were in Latin. 

North Africa had been part of the Roman Empire for almost six centuries, the consequence of losing all those Punic Wars.  In the early fifth century, however, the territory had been acquired by a group of entrepreneurs known as the Vandals.   They had first migrated from Spain where they had been among the first German tourists to loot Roman Iberia. Unfortunately for the Vandals, the Visigoths also heard about Hispania and migrated there, too. Preferring to be the sole barbarians on the peninsula, the Visigoths began wiping out the Vandals. Half of the tribe was gone when the Roman governor of North Africa saved the Vandals. He was rebelling against the Emperor and needed mercenaries, so he transported the tribe to North Africa.Ironically, the Roman governor called off his rebellion, but the Vandals didn’t. They soon occupied the territory extending from Libya to Morocco. (Yes, Rommel’s Afrika Korps was actually the second German invasion there, and the less successful of the two.) 

Their rule in North Africa was relatively benign. They restored the stability and prosperity that the disintegrating Roman Empire had failed to maintain. The Vandals’ most conspicuous failing was religious intolerance. Like many of the Germanic tribes, they were Christians but did not subscribe to the theological convolutions of the Nicene Creed. To the Germanic mind, God was Odin and Jesus was Thor. However, while the Goths were tolerate of the more sophisticated interpretations of Christianity, the Vandals were not. They persecuted the Church–and earned their ever-lasting infamy. (More savage tribes such as the Franks and the especially barbaric Angles and Saxons eventually converted to the Nicene Creed and received a baptism in history’s whitewash.)

The Vandal kingdom in North Africa lasted until 534. To the Vandals’ surprise, the Byzantine army had stopped cowering behind city walls and now was on the attack, intent on restoring the lost western half of the Roman Empire.  The Emperor Justinian had meticulously planned the campaign, using a superior army and insidious–dare I say “Byzantine”– diplomacy to overthrow the barbarian kingdoms.  He would use the Ostrogoths against the Vandals, the Franks against the Ostrogoths, the Visigoths against the Franks, and the Visigoths were always fighting among themselves.  (Justinian apparently did not consider Britain worth reconquering; otherwise he would have pitted the Angles against the Saxons.)  The Emperor’s Grand Scheme did not quite work because no one could rely on the Franks–and how little has changed–but it proved successful in North Africa.

To distract the Vandals and divide their forces, the Byzantines subsidized a rebellion on the northern-most possession of the kingdom, the island of Sardinia.  With the Vandals’ fleet and sizable portion of their army conveniently distant, the Byzantine fleet sailed from the friendly ports of Ostrogoth-ruled Sicily and disembarked a 15,000 man army in North Africa in 533.  Having forgotten Roman corruption, and not yet acquainted with Byzantine bureaucracy, the North Africans welcomed the imperial forces as liberators.  The troops’ usual inclination to pillage was checked by a commander of remarkable rectitude:  Belisarius.  The young general had demonstrated some ability in fighting the Persians, but he had especially impressed the Emperor by massacring rioters in Constantinople.   Now he was to defeat an army of 30,000 and overthrow the Vandals’ kingdom.    

Marching to Carthage, the capital of North Africa, the Byzantines were ten ten miles from the city when they found the Vandal army in the way.  The Vandals’ King Gelimer had an excellent plan for the battle; he would outflank and envelop the invaders.  Of course, such manuevers do require some coordination; otherwise you are simply fragmenting your forces in front of the enemy.  Guess what happened.  The Vandal troops that were so supposed to block the Byzantines arrived in installments, and that is how the Byzantines slaughtered them.  Among the casualties was Gelimer’s brother.  Then the Vandals’ flank attack began–but without any support from the no longer living vanguard or the yet- to-arrive main force under Gelimer.  Worse, they ran into Belisarius’  Hun mercenaries–who did not believe in taking prisoners. 

Gelimer finally showed up on the battlefield and his fresh, larger force seemed to be gaining the advantage over the Byzantines; but then the king  found the body of his brother and had an emotional collapse.  In the midst of a battle, he insisted on his brother’s burial.   This was definitely the wrong time for Vandal sensitivity.  Belisarius did not wait for all five stages of Gelimer’s grief to rally the Byzantines and counterattack.   The disoriented Gelimer even led his retreating troops in the wrong direction, not back to Carthage but into the desert.  The gates of Carthage were opened to the Byzantines, and Belisarius would enjoy a dinner that had been prepared for Gelimer. 

The refugee king did attempt to rally his forces but never quite succeeded in reviving his sanity.  For a man who had killed his cousin for the throne, Gelimer really was too sentimental for the job.  He was finally captured in 535 and presented as a trophy to the Emperor Justinian.  Gelimer sang dirges to himself and had an inexplicable,  disconcerting laugh.  He was allowed to live the rest of  his fragile life in a peaceful retreat.    Belisarius was on his way to Italy, and in a few years he would be presenting another but reasonably sane king to Justinian.

As for the Vandals, they evidently made some impression on the natives of North Africa. The blond hair and a possible tendency to goosestep would seem conspicuous. Almost two centuries later, when those North Africans conquered Spain, they remembered that the Vandals had come from there.  So the Moors referred to this realm as “Andalusia”.

September 12th, 1683:  The Ottoman Empire Begins Its Retreat to Oblivion

First, the official version: Vienna is besieged by the Ottomans but an army led by Poland’s King Jan Sobieski routes the Moslem horde and saves Western Civilization.

Once you have dispensed with the grateful tears and a few bars of Chopin (how else do you thank Poland), I will give you the actual history.

Yes, the Ottomans did besiege Vienna in 1683.  However, this was not the Ottoman Empire of 1483 or 1583, but the bloated parody of its martial glory. Uma Thurman had become Shelley Winters. This Ottoman army was no longer led by warrior kings; the Sultans–now cretins by birth or choice–rarely could find their way out of their harem. The army was now led by whichever courtier had bribed or connived the command.

The commanding pasha at Vienna was Kara Mustafa. He had an army of 140,000 men, but only a third of them were actual soldiers and their weapons were outdated. The other 90,000 men were basically support staff–and the pasha was enjoying the best coffee and cushions. Setting off from Constantinople in April, the Ottoman army lumbered upon Vienna in mid-July. Since an Ottoman horde was hard to ignore, Vienna had ample time to evacuated the civilian population. There was only a garrison of 18,000 left behind the walls of Vienna.

Even with their geriatric armaments, by sheer force the Ottomans could have taken the city. However, that would have been unprofitable for the Pasha. If Vienna were taken by storm, the Turkish soldiers would be entitled to whatever they could loot. On the other hand, if the city were besieged and starved into submission, then the Pasha would receive Vienna’s treasures. Guess which strategy Kara Mustafa preferred?

There are worse places to siege than Vienna in the summer. The Ottoman army enjoyed a pleasant two months of pillaging the Austrian countryside. However, their vacation ended rather abruptly–on this day in 1683–with the arrival of an allied army led by Jan Sobieski. The Pasha evidently had overlooked that possibility. Worse, although Sobieski’s force was half the size of the Pasha’s, the Christian army was composed of soldiers rather than servants. It turned out that the Turkish army was much faster when retreating than advancing. And, indeed, the Ottoman Empire now would be retreating for the next 250 years.

(Yes, in their haste, the Turks left behind sacks of coffee beans.  The Poles were entitled to the pick of the loot but were not interested in a sober beverage; so they gave the Turks’ caffeine to the Viennese who made it into an art.)

For his role in the debacle, Kara Mustafa did not receive the Medal of Freedom. He was strangled and then beheaded. So the Sultan was not a complete cretin.

And was Christendom saved? Well, it never was in danger. The Ottoman Empire had no plans for mosques in Moscow or Turkish baths in Bath. This was simply a turf war between Turkey and Austria, and the winner would get Hungary. Furthermore, if this had been a clash between Islam and Christendom, then Turkey had a very strange ally: the leading power of Western Civilization. You see, the Hapsburgs were fighting on two fronts: in the East against the Turks, and in the West against France. Yes, France and Turkey were allies of long-standing, with over a century of coordinated attacks against the Hapsburgs.

Indeed, while Austria was marshalling and mortgaging its resources against Turkey, there was little left to defend the west bank of the Rhine from Louis XIV. Perhaps the French victories offered some solace to the Turkish Sultan. He may have lost Vienna and then Hungary, but his French buddy now owned Alsace and Lorraine.