Archive for March, 2009

William Wallace Birthplace: Elderslie, Renfrewshire Scotland Died: 23-Aug-1305 Location of death: Smithfield Elms, London, England Cause of death: Execution Remains: Missing, Quarters sent to Berwick, Newcastle, Perth, and Aberdeen William Wallace Born: 1272 Gender: Male Race or Ethnicity: White Sexual orientation: Straight Occupation: Military, Activist Nationality: Scotland Executive summary: Basis of fictional biopic Braveheart The popular national hero of Scotland is believed to have been the second son of Sir Malcolm Wallace of Elderslie and Auchinbothie, in Renfrewshire. The date of his birth is not certainly ascertained, but is usually given as 1270. The only authority for the events of his early life is the metrical history of Blind Harry. That authority cannot be implicitly relied on, though we need not conclude that the minstrel invented the stories he relates. He lived about two centuries later than Wallace, during which a considerable body of legend had probably gathered around the name, and these popular “gestis” he incorporates in his narrative. At the same time he professes to follow as his “autour” an account that had been written in Latin by John Blair, the personal friend and chaplain of Wallace himself. As Blair’s account has perished, we cannot tell how far the minstrel has faithfully followed his authority, but some comparatively recent discoveries have confirmed the truth of portions of the narrative which had previously been doubted. At best, however, his authority must be regarded with suspicion, except when it is confirmed by other and more trustworthy evidence. Only for a period of less than two years in his life — from the beginning of the insurrection in 1297 to the battle of Falkirk — does Wallace come before us in the clearest historical light. With the exception of one or two glimpses of him that we obtain from authentic historical documents, the recorded events of his later as of his earlier life rest on no more certain authority than that of Blind Harry. In his boyhood, according to the usual accounts, he resided for some time at Dunipace, in Stirlingshire, with an uncle, who is styled “parson” of the place. By this uncle he was partially educated, and from him he imbibed an enthusiastic love of liberty. His education was continued at Dundee, where he made the acquaintance of John Blair. On account of an incident that happened at Dundee — his slaughter of a young Englishman named Selby, for an insult offered to him — he is said to have been outlawed, and so driven into rebellion against the English. Betaking himself to the wilds of the country, he gradually gathered around him a body of desperate men whom he led in various attacks upon the English. In consequence of the success of these early enterprises his following largely increased, several of the more patriotic nobles — including the steward of Scotland, Sir Andrew Moray, Sir John de Graham, Douglas the Hardy, Wishart, Bishop of Glasgow, and others — having joined him. His insurrection now became more open and pronounced, and his enterprises of greater importance. An attack was made upon the English justiciar, Ormsby, who was holding his court at Scone. The justiciar himself escaped, but many of his followers were captured or slain. The burning of the Barns of Ayr, the quarters of English soldiers, in revenge for the treacherous slaughter of his uncle, Sir Ronald Crawford, and other Scottish noblemen, followed. The success of these exploits induced the English king to take measures for staying the insurrection. A large army, under the command of Sir Henry Percy and Sir Robert Clifford, was sent against the insurgents, and came up with them at Irvine. Dissensions broke out among the Scottish leaders, and all Wallace’s titled friends left him and made submission to King Edward I, except the ever faithful Sir Andrew Moray. The treaty of Irvine, by which these Scottish nobles agreed to acknowledge Edward as their sovereign lord, is printed in Rymer’s Foedera. It is dated the 9th of July 1297, and is the first public document in which the name of Sir William Wallace occurs. Wallace retired to the north, and although deserted by the barons was soon at the head of a large army. The vigor and success of his operations was such that in a short time he succeeded in recovering almost all the fortresses held by the English to the north of the Forth. He had begun the siege of Dundee when he received information that an English army, led by the Earl of Surrey and Cressingham the treasurer, was on its march northward. Leaving the citizens of Dundee to continue the siege of the castle, he made a rapid march to Stirling. Encamping in the neighborhood of the Abbey Craig — on which now stands the national monument to his memory — he watched the passage of the Forth. After an unsuccessful attempt to bring Wallace to terms, the English commander, on the morning of the 11th of September 1297, began to cross the bridge. When about one half of his army had crossed, and while they were still in disorder, they were attacked with such fury by Wallace, that almost all — Cressingham among the number — were slain, or driven into the river and drowned. Those on the south side of the river were seized with panic and fled tumultuously, having first set fire to the bridge. The Scots, however, crossed by a ford, and continued the pursuit of the enemy as far as Berwick. Sir Andrew Moray fell in this battle. The results of it were important. The English were everywhere driven from Scotland. To increase the alarm of the English, as well as to relieve the famine which then prevailed, Wallace organized a great raid into the north of England, in the course of which he devastated the country to the gates of Newcastle. On his return he was elected guardian of the kingdom. In this office he set himself to reorganize the army and to regulate the affairs of the country. His measures were marked by much wisdom and vigor, and for a short time succeeded in securing order, even in the face of the jealousy and opposition of the nobles. Edward was in Flanders when the news of this successful revolt reached him. He hastened home, and at the head of a great army entered Scotland in July 1298. Wallace was obliged to adopt the only plan of campaign which could give any hope of success. He slowly retired before the English monarch, driving off all supplies and wasting the country. The nobles as usual for the most part deserted his standard. Those that remained thwarted his councils by their jealousies. His plan, however, came very near being successful. Edward, compelled by famine, had already given orders for a retreat when he received information of Wallace’s position and intentions. The army, then at Kirkliston, was immediately set in motion, and next morning (July 22, 1298) Wallace was brought to battle in the vicinity of Falkirk. After an obstinate fight the Scots were overpowered and defeated with great loss. Among the slain was Sir John de Graham, the bosom friend of Wallace, whose death, as Blind Harry tells, threw the hero into a frenzy of rage and grief. The account of his distress is one of the finest and most touching passages in the poem. With the remains of his army Wallace found refuge for the night in the Torwood — known to him from his boyish life at Dunipace. He then retreated to the north, burning the town and castle of Stirling on his way. Wallace resigned the office of guardian, and betook himself again to a wandering life and a desultory and predatory warfare against the English. At this point his history again becomes obscure. He is known to have paid a visit to France, with the purpose of obtaining aid for his country from the French king. This visit is narrated with many untrustworthy details by Blind Harry; but the fact is established by other and indisputable evidence. When in the winter of 1303-04 Edward received the submission of the Scottish nobles, Wallace was expressly excepted from all terms. And after the capture of Stirling Castle and Sir William Oliphant, and the submission of Sir Simon Fraser, he was left alone, but resolute as ever in refusing allegiance to the English king. A price was set upon his head, and the English governors and captains in Scotland had orders to use every means for his capture. On the 5th of August 1305 he was taken — as is generally alleged, through treachery — at Robroyston, near Glasgow, by Sir John Menteith, carried to the castle of Dumbarton, and thence conveyed in fetters and strongly guarded to London. He reached London on the 22nd of August, and next day was taken to Westminster Hall, where he was impeached as a traitor by Sir Peter Mallorie, the king’s justice. To the accusation Wallace made the simple reply that he could not be a traitor to the king of England, for he never was his subject, and never swore fealty to him. He was found guilty and condemned to death. The sentence was executed the same day with circumstances of unusual cruelty. The cause of national independence was not lost with the life of Wallace. Notwithstanding the cruelty and indignity amid which it terminated, that life was not a failure. It has been an inspiration to his countrymen ever since. The popular ideas regarding his stature, strength, bodily prowess and undaunted courage are confirmed by the writers nearest his own time — Wyntoun and Fordun. And indeed no man could in that age have secured the personal ascendancy which he did without the possession of these qualities. The little we know of his statesmanship during the short period he was in power gives proof of political wisdom. His patriotism was conspicuous and disinterested. He was well skilled in the modes of warfare that suited the country and the times. That he failed in freeing his country from the yoke of England was due chiefly to the jealousy with which he was regarded by the men of rank and power. But he had a nobler success in inspiring his countrymen with a spirit which made their ultimate conquest impossible. Father: Sir Malcolm Wallace Brother: Malcolm (older) Brother: John (younger) Wife: Marion Braidfute

Popularity: 11% [?]

Lucius Tarquinius Superbus (also called Tarquin the Proud or Tarquin II) was the last of the seven legendary kings of Rome, son of Tarquinius Priscus and son-in-law of Servius Tullius, the sixth king. The historian Dionysius of Halicarnassus may have divided one historical figure named Tarquin into two separate kings because of problems with dating their legendary events. Traditionally he was of Etruscan descent and ruled between 535/534 BC and 510 BC, in the years immediately before his expulsion and the founding of the Roman Republic

Tarquin’s reign was characterised by bloodshed and violence; his son Sextus Tarquinius’ rape of Lucretia laid the seeds for the revolt, led by Lucretia’s kinsman Lucius Junius Brutus (himself a member of the Tarquin dynasty) and Lucretia’s widowed husband. The uprising resulted in the expulsion of most of the royal family, after Tarquin had reigned for twenty-five years, and Brutus became one of the first consuls of the Roman Republic.After his exile, Tarquin attempted to gain the support of other Etruscan andLatin kings, claiming that the republicanism would spread beyond Rome. Even though the powerful Etruscan lord Lars Porsenna of Clusium (modern Chiusi) backed Tarquin’s return, all efforts to force his way back to the throne were in vain. He left two older sons, Titus Tarquinius and the Aruns Tarquinius, who was killed in 509 BC in one of his father’s wars to regain the throne. Tarquin died in exile at Cumae in Campania in 496 BC. Tarquin’s death ended the time of the Kings; the Roman people would no longer trust sole power in one ruler and so a Republic was formed.

Popularity: 18% [?]

The World After World War I

Three major powers had been dissatisfied with the outcome of World War I. Germany, the principal defeated nation, bitterly resented the territorial losses and reparations payments imposed on it by the Treaty of Versailles. Italy, one of the victors, found its territorial gains far from enough either to offset the cost of the war or to satisfy its ambitions. Japan, also a victor, was unhappy about its failure to gain control of China.

Causes of the War

France, Great Britain, and the U.S. had attained their wartime objectives. They had reduced Germany to a military cipher and had reorganized Europe and the world as they saw fit. The French and the British frequently disagreed on policy in the postwar period, however, and were unsure of their ability to defend the peace settlement. The U.S., disillusioned by the Europeans’ failure to repay their war debts, retreated into isolationism.

The Failure of Peace Efforts

During the 1920s, attempts were made to achieve a stable peace. The first was the establishment (1920) of the League of Nations as a forum in which nations could settle their disputes. The league’s powers were limited to persuasion and various levels of moral and economic sanctions that the members were free to carry out as they saw fit. At the WASHINGTON CONFERENCE, (q.v.) of 1921-22, the principal naval powers agreed to limit their navies according to a fixed ratio. The Locarno Conference (1925) produced a treaty guarantee of the German-French boundary and an arbitration agreement between Germany and Poland.

In the Paris Peace Pact (1928), 63 countries, including all the great powers except the USSR, renounced war as an instrument of national policy and pledged to resolve all disputes among them “by pacific means.” The signatories had agreed beforehand to exempt wars of “self-defense.”

The Rise of Fascism

One of the victors’ stated aims in World War I had been “to make the world safe for democracy,” and postwar Germany adopted a democratic constitution, as did most of the other states restored or created after the war. In the 1920s, however, the wave of the future appeared to be a form of nationalistic, militaristic totalitarianism known by its Italian name, fascism. It promised to minister to peoples’ wants more effectively than democracy and presented itself as the one sure defense against communism. Benito Mussolini established the first Fascist dictatorship in Italy in 1922.

Formation of the Axis Coalition

Japan did not formally adopt fascism, but the armed forces’ powerful position in the government enabled them to impose a similar type of totalitarianism. As dismantlers of the world status quo, the Japanese military were well ahead of Hitler. They used a minor clash with Chinese troops near Mukden in 1931 as a pretext for taking over all of Manchuria, where they proclaimed the puppet state of Manchukuo in 1932. In 1937-38 they occupied the main Chinese ports.

Having denounced the disarmament clauses of the Versailles Treaty, created a new air force, and reintroduced conscription, Hitler tried out his new weapons on the side of right-wing military rebels in the Spanish civil war (1936-39). The venture brought him into collaboration with Mussolini, who was also supporting the Spanish revolt after having seized (1935-36) Ethiopia in a small war. Treaties between Germany, Italy, and Japan in 1936-37 brought into being the Rome-Berlin-Tokyo Axis. The Axis thereafter became the collective term for those countries and their allies.

German Aggression in Europe

Hitler launched his own expansionist drive with the annexation of Austria in March 1938. The way was clear: Mussolini supported him; and the British and French, overawed by German rearmament, accepted Hitler’s claim that the status of Austria was an internal German affair. The U.S. had impaired its ability to act against aggression by passing a neutrality law that prohibited material assistance to all parties in foreign conflicts.

In September 1938 Hitler threatened war to annex the western border area of Czechoslovakia, the Sudetenland and its 3.5 million ethnic Germans. The British prime minister Neville Chamberlain initiated talks that culminated at the end of the month in the Munich Pact, by which the Czechs, on British and French urging, relinquished the Sudetenland in return for Hitler’s promise not to take any more Czech territory. Chamberlain believed he had achieved “peace for our time,” but the word Munich soon implied abject and futile appeasement.

Less than six months later, in March 1939, Hitler seized the remainder of Czechoslovakia. Alarmed by this new aggression and by Hitler’s threats against Poland, the British government pledged to aid that country if Germany threatened its independence. France already had a mutual defense treaty with Poland.

The turn away from appeasement brought the Soviet Union to the fore. Joseph Stalin, the Soviet dictator, had offered military help to Czechoslovakia during the 1938 crisis, but had been ignored by all the parties to the Munich Agreement. Now that war threatened, he was courted by both sides, but Hitler made the more attractive offer. Allied with Britain and France, the Soviet Union might well have had to fight, but all Germany asked for was its neutrality. In Moscow, on the night of Aug. 23, 1939, the Nazi-Soviet Pact was signed. In the part published the next day, Germany and the Soviet Union agreed not to go to war against each other. A secret protocol gave Stalin a free hand in Finland, Estonia, Latvia, eastern Poland, and eastern Romania.

An article from Funk & Wagnalls® New Encyclopedia. © 2005 World Almanac Education Group. A WRC Media Company. All rights reserved. Except as otherwise permitted by written agreement, uses of the work inconsistent with U.S. and applicable foreign copyright and related laws are prohibited.

Popularity: 3% [?]

Servius Tullius was the sixth legendary king of ancient Rome and the second king of the Etruscan dynasty. The traditional dates of his reign are 578-535 BC. Described in one account as originally a slave, he is said to have married a daughter of Lucius Tarquinius Priscus, and succeeded him after the latter’s assassination in 579 BC. He was the first king to cometo power without the consultation of the plebeians, having gained the throne by the contrivance of Tanaquil, his mother-in-law. In this account (found in Livy) Tullius was anointed as a young child to become king, after a ring of fire was seen around his head. He was then raised as a prince.

Incidentally, Livy did not believe that Servius Tullius was born a slave. Livy postulated that Tullius’ mother was a queen of an Etruscan city which had been sacked by the Romans. His mother was captured and to pay homage to her regal origins she was allowed to live in the palace. Another version, quoted in a speech to the Senate by Claudius, represented him as a soldier of fortune originally named Macstarna, from Etruria, who attached himself to Caelius Vibenna. After various adventures Caelius was beaten but Macstarna came to Rome with the remnants of his army. Macstarna named the Caelian Hill after his deceased friend, but some suppose Caelius Vibenna to have placed a settlement there.

King Servius Tullius, according to the Roman historians, initiated the first census. The noun comes from the participle of the Latin verb, censere, “to judge” or “to estimate”. The census was an estimation of the total personal assets of Rome. Servius Tullius used it as a gauge of military capability.

The Roman census as practiced by Servius was quite different from our census, which aims at counting and locating people. Servius made sure those functions were performed, but he was primarily interested in property assessments. Dividing the populace into classes according to their wealth, he used the census to determine the number of potential soldiers and the amount of arms and equipment they could provide to Rome, as the army at that time was primarily funded by private, not public resources. Servius wanted to know who could fund what, who was bearing an unfair burden, and who may have been shirking their responsibilities to the kingdom.

Neither the census nor the classification significantly altered social status in Rome. Servius ordered that Roman senators must own at least 800,000 sesterces to sit in the Senate, although the senators already all owned that and much more. Similarly, Roman equites or knights, needed to own at least 400,000 sesterces, but there is no record of equites being disenfranchised because of a lack of property or assets.

Popularity: 7% [?]