The History Thread!

Thank you for the post. Very detailed. I'm willing to listen to different historical and political perspectives from other Brazilian tropers here as well, naturally (since I try to be as neutral as possible in these matters).

Well, he gets a slightly bad rep around here for leaving the country during the Napoleonic invasions, even if, at the time, there was the Empire at his disposal. He's also seen as either a sort of lazy, corrupt and incompetent administrator/ruler, or a fairly nice, kind, but still a bit incompetent administrator/ruler (again, here. I know that his reign coincided with a lot of progressive changes in Brazil, especially in regards to trade, but which also had (lots of?) moments which make his portrayal to be controversial in and of itself).

By contrast, I assume Pedro I (IV of Portugal) gets a much better reputation on both sides of the Atlantic. He certainly gets treated better here, especially due to the way he dealt things during the Liberal Wars.

edited 2nd Aug '15 4:15:49 PM by Quag15

Wow man, you guys still remember my post series? Aw, man, thanks guys.

One nitpick though, the post series I did had Dom Pedro the first (Dom Pedro II's dad) as a central player. This is a important distiction because Dom Pedro I has a much worse reputation (rigthfully so) than his son, and they were, curiously enough, complete opposites in terms of personality (Dom Pedro I being a thundering, hot-headed and brash man with little patience for politics while Dom Pedro II was a calm, level-headed man extremely skilled at politics)

@Quag:

Getúlio isn't much of a divisive figure, actually. He was a dictator, yes, but most people see him as a benevolent despot of sorts. Even I, who am quite quick to remind people just how much brutality occured in his government, have to say he was one of the most important figures in Brazilian history.

Lula, however, is immensely divisive. The usual portrayal of him is either a champion of the poor and oppressed who raised Brazil's economy and living conditions to an all-time high or he's a corrupt-to-the-bone thief who tricks the population with false promises. Or, in a more outlandish manner, a closeted communist who seeks to install a Cuba-like dictatorship in Brazil (I'm not joking, there are people who actually believe this).

I know, right ? Though his name isn't pronounced like the Italian one (which is pronounced Medichi, with emphasis on the di, while President Médici's name was pronounced Médi-see with emphasis on the Me).

I'd personally recommend you to read it. It's one of my favorite times to read about, for how dark of a time was (the early to mid-70's being probably Brazil's Darkest Hour in several ways).

@Victin

This...isn't a statement I'd agree with. While I don't want to be rude or impose my opinion on you by any matters, I'd be able to accept any period of Brazilian history being "the less worse" except the military dictatorship. Seriously, it's pretty horrible both in humanitarian terms and economic terms (being an all-time high of the wealth gap in the Brazilian 20th century).

But onto the crucial matters:

Weeelll...no. (deep breath)

In the grand terms of WWII, Brazil's participation was, of course, secondary. We weren't exactly storming the beaches of Normandy here, but make no mistake: Brazil's participation was pretty damn important, it not crucial, to the conduction of the war effort in Italy.

First off, we entered the war for a simple reason. Germany attacked us, is what people forget. Donitz's U-Boots sank several ships off the coast of Brazil in 1943, several civilian ships, causing about (if I am not mistaken) about 700 deaths and bringing maritime commerce to a halt. That's more than enough reason to enter a war, don't you think?

The Brazilian navy provided valuable support to Americans in the Atlantic Theater of the war, not to mention Brazil's ports (particularly the one found in Natal) were absolutely crucial as an Allied HQ, due the relative proximity with Africa. The Allied Forces would have a much harder time transporting equipment without this port, so that's a very important thing.

And that's without going in the Brazilian participation in Italy, most important part of the situation. Italy wasn't, of course, the main theater of the war in 1944, the main Allied efforts were dedicated to Western Europe. But as secondary as it was, it was still a Nazi stronghold with all the weaponry and fierceness it could bring to bear to both terrorize the Italian population under its iron boot, slaughter Allied troops and, if the fighting weren't fierce enough, provide support to the main theater in Europe. So keeping them fighting in Italy was a very important mission, and defeating them in Italy, even more so.

I could talk eons about the battles and great sacrifices and deeds of bravery the Smoking Snakes had in Italy, but I will just mention their greatest: The Battle of Montese. Montese was the last great defensible position the Nazi army could hold in Italy, so this would be where the Germans would win or die. The Brazilian Army was tasked with providing the main attack while the American Division would do a flanking maneuver.

In this attack the Brazilian Army received the most intense bombing of the entire Italian campaign (barring Anzio). having about 1,800 shells dropped on them in a single night. And yet, the Smoking Snakes took Montese and broke through the Nazi defenses, the greatest breakthrough of the Italian theater in 1945. Brazilian Expeditionary Force lost 400 men in a single night.

General Crittenberger, the man in charge of that part of the war, said this: “The Brazilian Division was the only great unity that fully fulfilled its designated mission. The others (92ª American Division, 1ª Armored Division, The 10ª Mountain Division and the 6ª South American Armored Division) had little proggress and suffered heavy losses. The Brazilian Division suffered, in Montese, in a single night, more grenades than all other divisions combined, without retreating from its positions.” (emphasis mine).

It is said for two days straight after the battle American soldiers would greet Brazilians with cheers and applause for their bravery in Montese, the battle that tore a hole in the Nazi defense in the Italian theater.

And that is only an example of how interesting Brazil's participation was in WWII. It's truly fascinating stuff. You should read about it, Victin. BUT IF YOU BADMOUTH THE SMOKING SNAKE AGAIN SO HELP ME GOD.

@If Wanderer:

I'm glad to know we agree! Brazil isn't any better about it, I'm afraid. We're all in the same boat, it seems.

edited 2nd Aug '15 4:13:46 PM by Gaon

"All you Fascists bound to lose."

@Quag: Just remember all changes and any progress Brazil had when Dom João VI came to Brazil was because he needed a new home for his Empire, not because he finally decided to take Brazil out of the colonial condition just because.

@Gaon: I didn't mean to imply anything during the Dictatorship was good, only that it was so awful the best you can get out of it is something "less worse" than anything else.

I knew why Brazil eventually joined WWII, despite Vargas' initial refusal. I didn't know anything else you said, though, so thanks for the explanation. And I just think the snake is silly for a militar symbol. We could have had something cooler, like a three-headed dragon, because why not?

@Gaon's post series: I bookmarked it. I'll read it. Someday.

@Victin: OO Ooh. Alright then, that seems fair.

You're welcome. If you wanna hear more about it, just let me know. Aw man I like the snake. Dragons are good but kind of overused, the snake though? It's not just a snake, it's a goddamn smoking snake, like it doesn't even give a shit about anything. And it has a cool story behind it ("It'd be easier for a snake to smoke than Brazil enter WWII" was a common saying, attributed to several people, but popular enough for the logo of Brazil to be a smoking snake. It's like making an army's logo a flying pig).

Snakes slither in the grass, appearing harmless, and then emerge to strike. You could say this was the Brazilian Expeditionary Force's shtick, despite being underestimated at every turn, it provided to be a fearsome foe.

"All you Fascists bound to lose."

@Gaon: I know the story behind the logo, I just don't like it XD Usually, I hear it was President Vargas who said that... saying. Maybe if the art style was another, I'd actually like the snake...

@Santos That's Quebec right? Yeah are Canadian history course was stuff about how the French ruled, than the British how the First Nations dealt with it, we mostly focused on you guys in Ontario and Quebec at first, but than we went West and learned about the Red River Settlement and Louis Rielle and Saskatchewan and Manitoba and the Orange Order. And of course B.C. since we lived there and the Gold Mining days, and the Trans Canada railway and how that exploited Chinese labour and all the horrible conditions they worked under. All my high school teachers really liked Canada a People's History, I don't know if this was a general B.C. thing or even a general Canada thing.

The high school I attended actually had 2 history syllabi run in parallel (the Chinese private high school and the standard government high school).

As to what world history was taught in both, the Chinese private high syllabus mainly focused on prehistoric, ancient and Imperial China. Ancient Greece, the Indus Valley civilization, Ancient Egypt and the Romans were included as well. An introduction to the Enlightenment, American Revolution and French Revolution was in the book as well. World War I and II were covered briefly in one chapter as well, but everything post-1945 was compressed into one chapter.

The standard government high syllabus' world history started with Ancient Greece, Ancient Egypt, the Indus Valley civilization and Ancient China, before moving on to a brief description of the Roman Empire and Imperial China. The founding of Islam, the historic Caliphates and the rise of Islam in South East Asia were a major part of the syllabus. World War II was only featured as the invasion and occupation of the Malayan Peninsula, Singapore and Borneo. 1945 and beyond mentioned the founding of the UN, Non-Aligned Movement, Organisation of Islamic Cooperation, ASEAN and their founding principles and what they achieved (not terribly much :P). That was stuffed into one chapter as well.

I have disagreed with her a lot, but comparing her to republicans and propagandists of dictatorships is really low. - An idiot

Oh I should also mention we did 20th century which of course focused a great deal on World War I and World War II especially World War I. Though World War II did lead us to learning a great deal about our leader at the time (he was an antisemite who had a tendency to blame it on his immigration minister who was also prejudiced, when he rejected any of the Jewish immigrants from Germany. He tended to go with public opinion).

deleted -incomplete post.

edited 3rd Aug '15 8:09:36 AM by FluffyMcChicken

Last WWII Dambusters pilot dies aged 98 in New Zealand. Farewell, Les

I have disagreed with her a lot, but comparing her to republicans and propagandists of dictatorships is really low. - An idiot

Man, educational systems seem to really change even a few miles southwards from your general place in southern California (Pasadena).

During elementary, fourth grade was spent learning fairly straightforward Californian history - I particularly was fascinated at the relatively overlooked chapter dedicated to the Russians at Fort Ross, which I actually dedicated my end-of-the-year project in constructing a model thereof.

However, we spent the next year in fifth-grade learning actual US history until Reconstruction, which by all means was simply a watered-down version of what US History in eighth grade would be.

Sixth grade was spent learning the ancient history of the world from the origin of humanity up to the collapse of the Roman Empire and the rise of the Byzantines. It was one of the most enjoyable classes I have ever taken, as the teacher noticed my fondness for the topics and virtually allowed me free rein in taking home as many armfuls of her stockpiles of National Geographic magazines and maps as I liked - she retired just as I entered high-school.

Seventh grade picked up from where sixth grade left off and revolved around the medieval history of the world until the Elizabethan age. Most of the class focused on Europe and the Middle East, but Africa, China, and Japan were also given their own respective chapters.

Eight grade US historywas basically a much more detailed version of fifth grade history, and for a person much more interested in the histories of other nations, sufficient enough for me to swallow. It's worth mentioning that my history teacher this time around descended from a Confederate veteran from Oklahoma, who supposedly got fed up and disillusioned with the Cause once the tide of the war changed and promptly deserted.

Freshman year of high-school (ninth-grade) featured a social studies glass of AP Human Geography instead of a definite history course. Here, I was introduced to the concept of globalization and various related sociological subjects such as cultural hearths, neolocalism, and placelessness.

In tenth grade, I took AP European History, which was a blast in terms of the classmates and teacher and also due to the simple fact that I was already well-versed in most of the subject matter - modern history set during or after the Industrial Revolution has traditionally been my source of passion. I in fact continue to keep all of my classmates' semesterly seminars - each presentation had to be printed out and mass distributed to each student - while the Crowning Moment Of Awesome in that class was my honor of presenting the very last seminar of the school year on the Soviet Union and the relationship between it and its satellite states.

Eleventh grade was basically US History from Reconstruction to the Vietnam War - we didn't get enough time to finish at the War on Terror.

4th grade California Missions project is still my favorite school event. We all went to San Juan Capistrano then chose one of the missions to recreate in model.

"What a century this week has been." - Seung Min Kim

RIP: British historian Robert Conquest.

Charlie Stross's cheerful, optimistic predictions for 2017, part one of three.

In Grade 11 world history, we did a project where we had to choose a profession in Medieval Europe and explain how they contributed to change, cumulating in a debate where we took on their roles and debated over which figure contributed more to change.

Halper's Law: as the length of an online discussion of minority groups increases, the probability of "SJW" or variations being used = 1.

I would be amused if the guy playing the Knight randomly threw a glove in the ground and challenged everybody to a trial by duel.

"All you Fascists bound to lose."

I still can't believe that actually was considered a legitimate form of trial back in those periods. :o

I'm a (socialist) professional writer serializing a WWII alternate history webnovel.

Since we're speaking about trial by duel, here are a few things I've found. They seem to have been more common in the Germanic areas.

Here's a translation of a section (which comes from a plate by a guy named Hans Talhoffer, who made plates depicting judicial duels) between a man and a woman.

Also, here's something from the Teutons:

Sydney Smith, 'Ancient Laws of the Scandinavians', Edinburgh Review, August 1820, p197. (Available on Google Books.)

These Germanic customs seemed to have a very long history, as Tacitus can attest to it. It was basically rooted in old Germanic laws in some (most?) German and Scandinavian lands.

Honestly, all of New York history I learned in school was how NYC was originally New Amsterdam before the British wrested control of it from Stuyvesant and a brief mention of the Battle of Long Island. Everything else, like how the outer boroughs were incorporated into the city over the course of the 19th Century, or how upstate was settled I learned on my own.

Eating a Vanilluxe will give you frostbite.

Complimenting this, there's this curious study about the concept of a Trial by battle. It's a nifty little paper that explains the reasoning, culture, costs, history, rules and general proceedings of a trial by battle bit by bit, and in fact, is apparently a defense of the concept as a valid form of justice.

Really odd but fascinating read.

"All you Fascists bound to lose."

Anyone know where I can read about the linguistic history of the Philippines, especially in English?

edited 5th Aug '15 5:15:07 AM by HallowHawk

So looking up Japanese's track record during WWII got me thinking:

Maybe Japan would have benefited more from the war if it just avoided provoking America and sold weapons and other war supplies.

I'm a (socialist) professional writer serializing a WWII alternate history webnovel.

Considered that invading China was what led to the US sanctions that ultimately led to Pearl Harbor and beyond, they'd have to have not begun the Second Sino-Japanese War to begin with.

I have disagreed with her a lot, but comparing her to republicans and propagandists of dictatorships is really low. - An idiot

Ah, China. Completely forgot about that bit. Silly me. XP

I'm a (socialist) professional writer serializing a WWII alternate history webnovel.

Nitpick: "Byzantine" is a historiographical term that was first used in the mid 1500 by German historian Hyeronimus Wolf, specifically to separate the "Byzantines" from the idea of Rome. There was never a Byzantine Empire, it was politically, culturally and socially the Roman Empire, and while it existed, if you had asked anyone about it, people would have called it the Roman Empire, Romania (no relation to the modern country with the same name) or maybe Greece. And there also wasn't a "rise" of the Byzantines, since the roman empire was just divided in two halves for ease of administration, and the western half fell.

1 2 We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be. -KV

You could argue that there's a revival of sorts around the time of the Komnenos, but I doubt that's quite what was meant.

Western historiography on the Eastern Roman Empire has been pretty lackluster, to be honest, despite it being a huge regional player for more than a millennium. Looking at popular Western histories you'd think it was a full millennium of slow decline.

Charlie Stross's cheerful, optimistic predictions for 2017, part one of three.