Re-establish Byzantium?

[Keygen]

Originally posted by CharlesBHoff

Any proof of this. It is easy to say than they ate babies for dinner also.

I read a printed article about it long time ago and unfortunatelly I can't remember where exactly. There was a large library in Constantinople and its content - around 1.500.000 manuscripts - was used in fires set to warm the large Turkish army. They lasted for 6 months. That is what was written in the article...

It is not a rare thing that written knowledge get burned.
The Arabs - according to a theory - burned some hundred of thousands of manuscripts in Alexandria in the 7th century. The Spanish burned over 40.000 Mayan manuscripts back in 16th century.

Originally posted by CharlesBHoff

The Roman actural believe that the early Christian ate human meat and drank human blood in their religious practive that what the jew told then. To the Roman eating human fleash and drinking human blood was one of the worst crime any person can do, and they fellt it was they duty to crack down on the Christian Religion in the persuteion of Christian.

I am refering to crimes against history. That is destroying works of the past - buildings, sculptures, manuscripts etc. - that could help us learn about our ancestors and their contribution to civilization.

[Az]

and don't inhale fumes from burning linoleum.

that was a brilliant attack!

[Ancyrean]

Originally posted by Keygen

On the other hand Turkish seems to dream of a new sort of Ottoman Empire and desire Greek lands up to our times

Well, though Eastern Roman Empire is quite acceptable name in our days I can't really think of any reason why the Byzantine Empire isn't a suitable name too or even better. The transformation of the Roman Empire - the eastern part - into something different from Constantine the Great and after with a monotheistic religion playing a major role in society and state affairs, the aboption of the Greek language and being a trully multinational empire with no national discrimination and no dominant nation - for the first time in history - are strong reasons to name it to something different, and why not after its center, Constantinople - Byzantium as originaly named - a city that in an essence was the empire itself.

But wouldn't it also be true if one says that Eastern and Western parts of the Empire were both monotheistic after Constantinus the Great and that there was also no dominant nation or national discrimination in the Roman Empire proper, anyway?

If the extra qualities became the gradual dominance of Greek over its Latin counterpart and the Orthodox interpretation of Christianity that necessitates a renaming, would that not be an attempt to distinguish the Eastern Roman empire as a Greek one? So can we say the Byzantines were Greeks?

They also burned around 1.500.000 books of Constantinople's library to simply warm their soldiers when the winter came. Possibly the worst crime against history...

Mehmet the Conqueror was one of the most enlightened rulers of his time, maybe not paralelled in Ottoman history. He was profoundly interested in Europe and European culture as well as Christianity (when the last Orthodox Patriarch of the "Byzantines" became also the Ottomans' first, he ordered him to write a treatise on Christianity to explain in detail its theme and tradition, for example). By empathic deduction, I'd say burning of such a treasure would run contrary to his character.

If we leave aside empathy, AFAIK such an event is also not widely mentioned in the mainstream history of "Byzantines" and Ottomans.

[Ancyrean]

I hardly beleive that the Christian families would gladly give away their children to grow and live as Turkish and muslims. What you've got here is probably an exemption to a rule and in later times. Use some common sense...

Well common sense of this day and year, (particularly if one agrees with a sense of history that highlights an epic struggle against Turks who were the epitome of evil) is what exactly would lead one to be abhorred by the suggestion here (I'm not implying you do agree with such a perception).

Instead, to the extent possible, it's better to try to imagine the context of the time. It's not that everybody got in line to turn over their kids, but that it was more than an exceptional situation for Christian families to volunteer their kids to the Janissaries, with reasonable reasons, as was mentioned here before.

And how sure are you that the Janisaries were permitted to see their families again or at list before they had completed their long training?

Many kept in touch, over years as they rose in rank and office. Here’s a striking example (I quote from "Constantinople: the City of the World's Desire", by Philip Mansel, p. 18-19):

"The presence of the Janissaries meant that many of the soldiers-and the great mosque builders and viziers- in Constantinople were Slavs. In 1542, according to a French traveler, in the palace 'Sclavonian' (Serbo-Croat) was the language 'most used and understood of all…all the more since it is common to Janissaries'. Contrary to what historians used to believe, slaves of the Gate [the devshirme, that is] were also able to straddle two worlds, maintaining contact from the capital with their family in the provinces. The Grand Vizier Mahmud Pasha, for example, conducted negotiations with Serbia in 1457. If they led to a favourable peace and a higher tribute for the Ottoman Empire, it was no doubt because the highest official in the Serbian court, the Grand Voivode Michael Angelovic, was his brother" .

Check this out, from p.19 again:

"Some slaves of the Gate formed a Serb lobby in the capital, often in conflict with the Greek-dominated Patriarchate. The most prominent Constantinople Serb, and one of the most prominent figures of Ottoman history, was born Bajica Sokolovic in 1505, fifty years after the conquest, in the small town of Visegrad on the Serbian Bosnian frontier. A man of imposing presence, with black beard and a hawk nose, he rose swiftly through the ranks of the devshirme, occupying successively the posts of falconer, Grand Admiral, vizier, Viceroy of Europe. Finally, from 1564 to 1579, Sokollu Mehmed Pasha, as he had become Grand Vizier. Courteous, prudent, avaricious, he was a stateman with a world view. From his palaces in Constantinople he planned canals between the Don and the Volga and the Red Sea and the Mediterranean, in order to help Muslim states against Russia and Portugal respectively, sent munitions to Sumatra, helped select a new king for Poland, ordered pictures and clocks from Venice and arranged a successful peace with Spain, Venice and the Papacy, despite the Ottoman naval defeat in Lepanto in 1573.

Yet he kept links with his Serbian roots. He placed relations in the Ottoman central government and in 1557, at his insistence, the Serbian archbishopric of Pecs was revived, against the wishes of the Patriarchate, his brother was the first Archbishop. Himself destined for priesthood when 'gathered' for the Sultan, he is said, on occasion, to have accompanied his nephews to church, on their visits to Constantinople."

He was not an exception. Compare this with the folk tales around .

[CharlesBHoff]

Originally posted by Keygen


I read a printed article about it long time ago and unfortunatelly I can't remember where exactly. There was a large library in Constantinople and its content - around 1.500.000 manuscripts - was used in fires set to warm the large Turkish army. They lasted for 6 months. That is what was written in the article...

It is not a rare thing that written knowledge get burned.
The Arabs - according to a theory - burned some hundred of thousands of manuscripts in Alexandria in the 7th century. The Spanish burned over 40.000 Mayan manuscripts back in 16th century.



I am refering to crimes against history. That is destroying works of the past - buildings, sculptures, manuscripts etc. - that could help us learn about our ancestors and their contribution to civilization.

When the Arab conquest Alexandria there where not hundred of thousand of manuscripts in it libary. In the 5Th century than framous female pagan philopher was murber by than Christian mob in Alexandrria which burn down the library which never recover from this fire. Only one scource ever mention the Arab destory the library there. Than reliabilty of that scource is very questionable as it was said by than person in Europe in the 11th century.

[CharlesBHoff]

In fact fire breaking out in the cities of the ancient world was very hight an they abilitity to fight fire was not that good. Fire can break out acidently too. In fact even to day it hard to fight than big fire or firestorm with our moderm equipment to fight fire.

[chequita guevara]

Originally posted by Keygen


I read a printed article about it long time ago and unfortunatelly I can't remember where exactly. There was a large library in Constantinople and its content - around 1.500.000 manuscripts - was used in fires set to warm the large Turkish army. They lasted for 6 months. That is what was written in the article...

It is not a rare thing that written knowledge get burned.
The Arabs - according to a theory -

In the first case, I think you are mistakenly refering to the destruction of the library of Buda. In the second case, it was the Christians who destroyed the greatest repository of human knowledge in the ancient world.

[CharlesBHoff]

To have than Holy War the Church want against Islam in the 11th century thought 9 crusade you must whip the people up into than frenzy. You get than questionable scholar to claim they burn the Libarary of Ales destorying all these books, they nothing but book burner, then you say they eat baby meat and drink baby blood, then you say they convert people to their hearthen faith by the sword and so on.

[Heresson]

Again, when it comes to Armenian question - even if Armenians did some harm to rhe Turkish people, they didn't do it to the extent that happened to them later. It's hard to say Armenian started the spiral of murderings then - mass killings of them date since end of XIX century and have to do with anger of Muslims for defeats of hand of Christian europeans and losses in Europe. Turks were afraid that after Greeks, Serbs, Bulagarians, the Armenians would be next - and they made it happen.
I don't say Armenians were faultless. But they weren't an organised state, and Turks were. Turks had natural advantage here, and when I'm able to agree that it's rather a result of kind of a civil war or riots on these grounds, blaming it on the owner of this land is imo more right than blaming it on Armenians. Also, the result is that all the disputed lands were annexed by Turkey, and it's the Armenians that had much larger losses. If a marriage would quarrel and eventually the wife would get thrown out of the house severly injured, and the husband scratched, who'd you rather blame? While it's wrong to blame the Turks ONLY, it's not right to blame Armenians to the same extent as Turks. Oh, and calling those actions in Baku ethnical cleansing is not quite right. You see, e.c. occurs when You get rid of citizens of some land to claim it. Armenians never had any claims towards Baku or Gandza. If such facts occured they were result of outbirst of anger or revenge for earlier persecutions, not e.c. it's the same wrong, but important when it comes to discussing the political side of conflict. The same I wouldn't call massacres of Armenians in lands never claimed by it by a name of e.c.

[Wernazuma III]

Keygen: I guess the "fact" that the Arabs burnt the library of Alexandria (which didn't happen, and if, there wasn't too much left as at first it burnt down in a Roman attack and then by Christian zealots etc.) is the reason why the Arabs preserved many of the ancient classical texts while the Christians lost 95% of those texts because they were so ignorant, excuse me, enlightened...
But the Mongols threw the contents of the library of Baghdad into the Tigris. Historical sources (surely biased, but after all, most texts back then were) say that the river turned black because of the ink.

The story with the books of a library burning for warming an army seems to be very bad propaganda. The Ottoman rulers weren't at all that dumb and uncultural that they didn't understand the value such knowledge would have.

[chequita guevara]

Originally posted by Wernazuma III
The story with the books of a library burning for warming an army seems to be very bad propaganda. The Ottoman rulers weren't at all that dumb and uncultural that they didn't understand the value such knowledge would have.

The Ottomans weren't always enlightned. I recall reading in my studies of the Ottomans that Buda was sacked pretty thoroughly, and I find it entirely plausible that the troops that were left garrisoning Buda would have burnt the library for warmth.

[chequita guevara]

Originally posted by Heresson
Oh, and calling those actions in Baku ethnical cleansing is not quite right. You see, e.c. occurs when You get rid of citizens of some land to claim it. Armenians never had any claims towards Baku or Gandza.

Wrong, ethnic cleansing is when you expell/kill a particular ethnicity in a particular reason in order to remove thm from that region. Even if Armenians had no claim on Baku, if they were slaughtered there to make it a Azeri/Turkish only city, that constitutes ethnic cleansing.

[Heresson]

Originally posted by Wernazuma III
Keygen: I guess the "fact" that the Arabs burnt the library of Alexandria (which didn't happen, and if, there wasn't too much left as at first it burnt down in a Roman attack and then by Christian zealots etc.) is the reason why the Arabs preserved many of the ancient classical texts while the Christians lost 95% of those texts because they were so ignorant, excuse me, enlightened...

It is true that the Great Library was destroyed by Romans. On the other hand, I've heard that great Christian library in Al-Qaysariyya (Cesarea Maritima, nowdays in Israel) was destroyed by Muslims after a long siege of the city (640 I think)

[Heresson]

Originally posted by chegitz guevara

Wrong, ethnic cleansing is when you expell/kill a particular ethnicity in a particular reason in order to remove thm from that region. Even if Armenians had no claim on Baku, if they were slaughtered there to make it a Azeri/Turkish only city, that constitutes ethnic cleansing.

Yoy mean to make it Armenian only city, and I agree with You. But I doubt Armenians could think they can make it Armenian only city. They must have been nuts to think so, and therefore I think that there was no particular ideology behind it and none organised action.
Baku is surrounded by Azer - inhabited lands.

[Wernazuma III]

Originally posted by Heresson
It is true that the Great Library was destroyed by Romans. On the other hand, I've heard that great Christian library in Al-Qaysariyya (Cesarea Maritima, nowdays in Israel) was destroyed by Muslims after a long siege of the city (640 I think)

Well, such things happen in many wars. After taking Baghdad, the US troops did nothing to prevent that the national library burnt to the ground because they needed to secure the Oil Ministery...

PS: No wonder that the opposition against the US presence there took that to compare the USA with the Mongols (a very frequent comparison in Iraq).