PiptheFairFrequently not in boats.Registered Userregular
reminder that this is the letter those lads were penning
Zaporozhian Cossacks to the Turkish Sultan!
O sultan, Turkish devil and damned devil's kith and kin, secretary to Lucifer himself. What the devil kind of knight are thou, that canst not slay a hedgehog with your naked arse? The devil shits, and your army eats. Thou shalt not, thou son of a whore, make subjects of Christian sons; we have no fear of your army, by land and by sea we will battle with thee, fuck thy mother.
Thou Babylonian scullion, Macedonian wheelwright, brewer of Jerusalem, goat-fucker of Alexandria, swineherd of Greater and Lesser Egypt, pig of Armenia, Podolian thief, catamite of Tartary, hangman of Kamyanets, and fool of all the world and underworld, an idiot before God, grandson of the Serpent, and the crick in our dick. Pig's snout, mare's arse, slaughterhouse cur, unchristened brow, screw thine own mother!
So the Zaporozhians declare, you lowlife. You won't even be herding pigs for the Christians. Now we'll conclude, for we don't know the date and don't own a calendar; the moon's in the sky, the year with the Lord, the day's the same over here as it is over there; for this kiss our arse!
I bet there is an alternative translation and really interesting cultural context regarding "cant even kill a hedgehog with your ass"
Sultan Mehmed IV to the Zaporozhian Cossacks: As the Sultan; son of Muhammad; brother of the sun and moon; grandson and viceroy of God; ruler of the kingdoms of Macedonia, Babylon, Jerusalem, Upper and Lower Egypt; emperor of emperors; sovereign of sovereigns; extraordinary knight, never defeated; steadfast guardian of the tomb of Jesus Christ; trustee chosen by God Himself; the hope and comfort of Muslims; confounder and great defender of Christians – I command you, the Zaporogian Cossacks, to submit to me voluntarily and without any resistance, and to desist from troubling me with your attacks.
I think that may be the animal, given that “arse” is used later.
Which maybe makes sense, asses probably don’t care for tiny scurrying things they can’t see well and probably come all over all hoof-smashy and don’t calm down until things have been ground to red paste.
sarukun on
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Shortytouching the meatIntergalactic Cool CourtRegistered Userregular
1) so what I want to know is, who was right?
2) I like that they used that painting for the Wikipedia entry on Cossacks
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PiptheFairFrequently not in boats.Registered Userregular
"Either he doesn't get what just happened or I don't" frowned the Cossack chief
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valhalla13013 Dark Shield Perceives the GodsRegistered Userregular
I know the Romans built aquaducts from the mountains to their towns and cities to carry water to their citizens, but what would it look like once it got to the city?
How would your average Roman citizen get water from the aquaduct at street level? Or was it all piped at that point?
meanwhile in the background there's one low-ranking messenger who's just like
Oh, fuck me
A trap is for fish: when you've got the fish, you can forget the trap. A snare is for rabbits: when you've got the rabbit, you can forget the snare. Words are for meaning: when you've got the meaning, you can forget the words.
meanwhile in the background there's one low-ranking messenger who's just like
Oh, fuck me
"don't kill the messenger" is one of my favorite proverbs because these days it's like, yeah of course you wouldn't kill the messenger, they didn't cause the bad news, haha what a silly idea
when originally it was the actual messenger being like "no please seriously don't kill me i'm begging you" and then the messenger gets killed
Houk the Namebringer on
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FandyienBut Otto, what about us? Registered Userregular
thanks! i haven't posted in SE++ in nearly 11 years but randomly came back and saw a history thread, and, having gotten an MA in history in the time since I was last on this forum, felt compelled to make a post.
*Great posting*
Oh shit, it’s Fandyien, what’s up! How good is it to post?
it's hella good to post, I'm actually delighted that I still recognize so many names here after all this time. It's funny, though, when I posted here I was a dumb teeanger and now I'm a 30 year old megadork so it's a little surreal but I guess everyone here is old now. all the threads seem really good, it's nice to be in a forum with actual good posts that isn't overwhelmed by white noise and tedium. plus like i mentioned earlier i spent these years acquiring useless, poorly-remunerated skills that are perfect for Posting and little else!
when I moved into my apartment with my girlfriend she remembered that I told her the first thing I'd want in a proper apartment would be a framed painting of this and ordered me one. it's the best piece of decor i own and it'd be a conversation starter if I hadn't moved in here early in the pandemic and have thus had nobody to start conversations with, but golly, it's gonna be nice when i can
I actually love the painting not just because the above-posted letter owns so much (it does) but because it also fits into a really fascinating context that isn't immediately apparent looking at it. Ilya Repin was an incredibly important Russian painter and a lot of his paintings specifically depict nationalist mythologies in a hagiographic way and fit into a larger nation-building discourse that was going on in Russia throughout the 19th century, and that it was directed at the sultan of the Ottomans adds another layer to that, since the Ottomans were the chief antagonist of Russian aspirations in the near East/central Asia / (most importantly) the Balkans. so the painting is both a depiction of a cool event and specifically designed to perpetuate the notion that the Ottoman Empire, relative to the Russian empire, was weak, decadent, and chiefly characterized by delusional Oriental despotism in the classic orientalist model
the other layer isn't just the competing nationalist mythologies and attempting to characterize them as immemorial, either, but was relevant to a very real geopolitical dispute happening in the Balkans. the Ottoman empire, from the mid-19th century onward, was engaged in a massive "modernization" (though that's a super loaded term) scheme designed to fundamentally alter the way the Ottoman state functioned with the goal of successfully adopting Western administrative, technological, and military practices without compromising the basic character of the Empire as a multicultural Muslim state. this meant lots of changes to land tenure, major changes to the legal system including a lot of secularization, territorial movements, reforms in the army, and all kinds of other stuff in service of creating a central national narrative to suppress all the various independence-related sentiments that were cropping up all over the empire, which had gotten really bad with Ali Pasha and Egypt becoming an almost completely independent and powerful state earlier in the 1800s. notably, this is basically the same process the Russian empire was engaged in, and Repin's painting was directly part of building those nationalist discourses needed to subsume independently minded groups into the metropole.
anyway, this "modernization" campaign, Tanzimat was a big deal, and it was creating massive waves across the Ottoman empire, which in turn fomented exactly the dissent and inter-ethnic conflicts it was meant to suppress, mostly in the European part of the Empire. since huge swathes of these places were Orthodox Christian, or at least Christian, and the Russian empire had always assumed the title of the protector of the Orthodox faith, when Serbia and Montenegro declared war on the Ottomans in an attempt to secure independence (and were rapidly crushed), the Russians saw an opportunity to manufacture a conflict and reassert their influence over parts of Eastern Europe. In 1877 Russia kicked the Ottomans out of most of Europe, leaving them Bulgaria as an autonomous (Christian) territory, forced them to concede parts of the Caucasus, and imposed a major war indemnity on them, really fucking them over financially for years. it would be fair to say this conflict contributed greatly to the financial problems and social failures that precipitated the Young Turks movement and eventually the destruction of the empire in WWI, so there's a direct line between a reassertion of Russian national sentiment and the end of the 'Great Game' in 1918. so it's fun to imagine, for me, at least, Repin painting in the middle of all this in the 1880s or whatever, sitting there the whole time thinking "yeah fuck these guys, remember when we called them all these names"
that's a rough and not-very-thorough outline up there, but i think it adds a little bit of context as to why the painting is both super cool and super interesting - the actual response owns and is one of my favorite historical quotes, but it's also kind of the equivalent of a painter in the United States painting a big picture of Commodore Perry opening Japan and sending it to Roosevelt, where the real point would be less commemorating the particular act and more manipulating historical memory to serve a specific sociopolitical agenda
You mention The Great Game - I wonder if parallels could be drawn between the novels of Kipling and Buchan in relation to said Game, and the painting above?
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StraightziHere we may reign secure, and in my choice,To reign is worth ambition though in HellRegistered Userregular
I feel like I wouldn't be able to have that painting hung in my home unless I had memorized the letter they are writing and could recite it off the top of my head
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Donovan PuppyfuckerA dagger in the dark isworth a thousand swords in the morningRegistered Userregular
I feel like I wouldn't be able to have that painting hung in my home unless I had memorized the letter they are writing and could recite it off the top of my head
Ah yes well you see the tip there is to have a painting of the letter framed and hung right next to it.
So I got to reading about jelqing which lead me to historical hog abuse and
A kynodesmē (English translation: "dog tie") was a cord or string or sometimes a leather strip that was worn by some athletes in Ancient Greece and Etruria to prevent the exposure of the glans penis in public. It was tied tightly around the akroposthion, the part of the foreskin that extends beyond the glans penis.
That sounds distracting
A penile fibula is foremost a ring, attached with a pin through the foreskin to fasten it above the glans penis. It was mainly used by ancient Roman culture, though it may have originated earlier.
Brutal
Fibulas were frequent subject of ridicule among satirists in Rome.
It did immediately make me think of those bikinis that are just two tiny pieces of fabric over the nipples and a small piece barely covering the front bum. Same energy imo
I wonder if that affected how the Romans saw cultures that practiced circumcision? Were they extra naked?
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DepressperadoI just wanted to see you laughingin the pizza rainRegistered Userregular
Well it's good to know I have an excuse to not be naked when I time travel back to Rome
"Sono circonciso! Sono circonciso! Lascia miei pantaloni!"
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DepressperadoI just wanted to see you laughingin the pizza rainRegistered Userregular
edited December 2020
wait holy shit did I say that properly?
somebody who speaks Italian, lemme know what I fucked up
edit: I did have to look up the Italian word for "circumcised" but besides that, it was straight from the dome.
Depressperado on
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StraightziHere we may reign secure, and in my choice,To reign is worth ambition though in HellRegistered Userregular
edited December 2020
Rome was very anti-circumcision
Like, it was made a crime that was arguably punishable by death under Hadrian (really it was more the Judaism that was punishable by death, but the two were hand-in-hand at that point in time)
Indeed apparently sometimes Jewish people in Roman provinces would rig up a fibula like arrangement to conceal their circumcisions
Oh it's more than that
There were surgical procedures to try and restore the foreskin
Or, if you don't want someone cutting at your dick with second century equipment, you could wear the Pondus Judaeus, a device that attached weights to the skin below the glans in an attempt to stretch it out in such a way as to resemble a new foreskin
Indeed apparently sometimes Jewish people in Roman provinces would rig up a fibula like arrangement to conceal their circumcisions
Oh it's more than that
There were surgical procedures to try and restore the foreskin
Or, if you don't want someone cutting at your dick with second century equipment, you could wear the Pondus Judaeus, a device that attached weights to the skin below the glans in an attempt to stretch it out in such a way as to resemble a new foreskin
I recall reading some years ago about a group of dick grippers who wish their parents had not circumsized them. It's my own belief that groups like those were predecessors to MRAs, but whatever. In any case, many of them, when not suing their parents, would wear device that I guess were similar to the Pondus Judaeus.
Like, I get that no one's home life is perfect, and we all wish we were different than we are in one form or another. But that just seems like an odd duck to quack at.
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JedocIn the scupperswith the staggers and jagsRegistered Userregular
Oh no! My dong was mangled without my consent! Well, time to re-mangle it on my own terms.
Posts
Hmm yes all absolute snacks
Just as I thought
translation, you ain't shit bro
Which maybe makes sense, asses probably don’t care for tiny scurrying things they can’t see well and probably come all over all hoof-smashy and don’t calm down until things have been ground to red paste.
2) I like that they used that painting for the Wikipedia entry on Cossacks
they defeated a ottoman force in ukraine and mehmed IV asked them to submit to his rule after
they declined
"Either he doesn't get what just happened or I don't" frowned the Cossack chief
How would your average Roman citizen get water from the aquaduct at street level? Or was it all piped at that point?
I can only assume I will scream it at passers-by when I am old and senile in the convalescent home.
The Cossack missed your butt by at least a thousand miles, grats!
Like they keep a scribe around just to write insult letters
-Indiana Solo, runner of blades
Oh, fuck me
"don't kill the messenger" is one of my favorite proverbs because these days it's like, yeah of course you wouldn't kill the messenger, they didn't cause the bad news, haha what a silly idea
when originally it was the actual messenger being like "no please seriously don't kill me i'm begging you" and then the messenger gets killed
it's hella good to post, I'm actually delighted that I still recognize so many names here after all this time. It's funny, though, when I posted here I was a dumb teeanger and now I'm a 30 year old megadork so it's a little surreal but I guess everyone here is old now. all the threads seem really good, it's nice to be in a forum with actual good posts that isn't overwhelmed by white noise and tedium. plus like i mentioned earlier i spent these years acquiring useless, poorly-remunerated skills that are perfect for Posting and little else!
when I moved into my apartment with my girlfriend she remembered that I told her the first thing I'd want in a proper apartment would be a framed painting of this and ordered me one. it's the best piece of decor i own and it'd be a conversation starter if I hadn't moved in here early in the pandemic and have thus had nobody to start conversations with, but golly, it's gonna be nice when i can
I actually love the painting not just because the above-posted letter owns so much (it does) but because it also fits into a really fascinating context that isn't immediately apparent looking at it. Ilya Repin was an incredibly important Russian painter and a lot of his paintings specifically depict nationalist mythologies in a hagiographic way and fit into a larger nation-building discourse that was going on in Russia throughout the 19th century, and that it was directed at the sultan of the Ottomans adds another layer to that, since the Ottomans were the chief antagonist of Russian aspirations in the near East/central Asia / (most importantly) the Balkans. so the painting is both a depiction of a cool event and specifically designed to perpetuate the notion that the Ottoman Empire, relative to the Russian empire, was weak, decadent, and chiefly characterized by delusional Oriental despotism in the classic orientalist model
the other layer isn't just the competing nationalist mythologies and attempting to characterize them as immemorial, either, but was relevant to a very real geopolitical dispute happening in the Balkans. the Ottoman empire, from the mid-19th century onward, was engaged in a massive "modernization" (though that's a super loaded term) scheme designed to fundamentally alter the way the Ottoman state functioned with the goal of successfully adopting Western administrative, technological, and military practices without compromising the basic character of the Empire as a multicultural Muslim state. this meant lots of changes to land tenure, major changes to the legal system including a lot of secularization, territorial movements, reforms in the army, and all kinds of other stuff in service of creating a central national narrative to suppress all the various independence-related sentiments that were cropping up all over the empire, which had gotten really bad with Ali Pasha and Egypt becoming an almost completely independent and powerful state earlier in the 1800s. notably, this is basically the same process the Russian empire was engaged in, and Repin's painting was directly part of building those nationalist discourses needed to subsume independently minded groups into the metropole.
anyway, this "modernization" campaign, Tanzimat was a big deal, and it was creating massive waves across the Ottoman empire, which in turn fomented exactly the dissent and inter-ethnic conflicts it was meant to suppress, mostly in the European part of the Empire. since huge swathes of these places were Orthodox Christian, or at least Christian, and the Russian empire had always assumed the title of the protector of the Orthodox faith, when Serbia and Montenegro declared war on the Ottomans in an attempt to secure independence (and were rapidly crushed), the Russians saw an opportunity to manufacture a conflict and reassert their influence over parts of Eastern Europe. In 1877 Russia kicked the Ottomans out of most of Europe, leaving them Bulgaria as an autonomous (Christian) territory, forced them to concede parts of the Caucasus, and imposed a major war indemnity on them, really fucking them over financially for years. it would be fair to say this conflict contributed greatly to the financial problems and social failures that precipitated the Young Turks movement and eventually the destruction of the empire in WWI, so there's a direct line between a reassertion of Russian national sentiment and the end of the 'Great Game' in 1918. so it's fun to imagine, for me, at least, Repin painting in the middle of all this in the 1880s or whatever, sitting there the whole time thinking "yeah fuck these guys, remember when we called them all these names"
that's a rough and not-very-thorough outline up there, but i think it adds a little bit of context as to why the painting is both super cool and super interesting - the actual response owns and is one of my favorite historical quotes, but it's also kind of the equivalent of a painter in the United States painting a big picture of Commodore Perry opening Japan and sending it to Roosevelt, where the real point would be less commemorating the particular act and more manipulating historical memory to serve a specific sociopolitical agenda
Ah yes well you see the tip there is to have a painting of the letter framed and hung right next to it.
That sounds distracting
Brutal
Very good
The Greeks had a very fucked up sense of morals.
It did immediately make me think of those bikinis that are just two tiny pieces of fabric over the nipples and a small piece barely covering the front bum. Same energy imo
Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better
bit.ly/2XQM1ke
"Sono circonciso! Sono circonciso! Lascia miei pantaloni!"
somebody who speaks Italian, lemme know what I fucked up
edit: I did have to look up the Italian word for "circumcised" but besides that, it was straight from the dome.
Like, it was made a crime that was arguably punishable by death under Hadrian (really it was more the Judaism that was punishable by death, but the two were hand-in-hand at that point in time)
Wouldnt they be speaking some form of ancient Latin? And not Italian?
Oh it's more than that
There were surgical procedures to try and restore the foreskin
Or, if you don't want someone cutting at your dick with second century equipment, you could wear the Pondus Judaeus, a device that attached weights to the skin below the glans in an attempt to stretch it out in such a way as to resemble a new foreskin
I recall reading some years ago about a group of dick grippers who wish their parents had not circumsized them. It's my own belief that groups like those were predecessors to MRAs, but whatever. In any case, many of them, when not suing their parents, would wear device that I guess were similar to the Pondus Judaeus.
Like, I get that no one's home life is perfect, and we all wish we were different than we are in one form or another. But that just seems like an odd duck to quack at.
Bring forth the cock skin weights