Now and then, we like to host 'Floating Features', periodic threads intended to allow for more open discussion that allows a multitude of possible answers from people of all sorts of backgrounds and levels of expertise.
Today, we wanted to give everyone a nice, lighthearted and open ended topic! History is full of neat little occurrences which we come across in our research. Some of them might be well suited to a question asked on the sub, but some you might be just waiting for a chance to share which never comes up. This is that chance! Feel free to share interesting historical events that you've learned about, whether humorous, unexpected, tragic, or just bizzare. Do keep in mind that we expect responses to still meet the standards of the subreddit however!
I am just the son of a humble shoemaker, so a lot of rich Athenians like to make fun of me. Some of them lord it over me that they have long and illustrious family histories and I have nothing of the sort. Once, Harmodios, the descendant of Harmodios the tyrant-slayer, was mocking me about this, all in public, as if the fat bastard's ever done anything to benefit his city. So I told him, "My family name begins with me. But yours ends with you."
Everyone likes to talk about what a terrible, vain, capricious man I am; that I cause offense for no reason, start duels with dumb Frenchmen (justified), insult fellow musicians while on stage (only the shitty ones!) and I once made Carlo Goldoni throw his first opera libretto into a fire (it’s called constructive criticism crybabies, and clearly it worked since he’s rich and famous now, he should write me a thank you letter.) These things are, of course, all true. But I shall tell you about ONE NICE THING I DID.
It’s 1771. Napoli. Middle of the opera season. I’m at a salon. Let me set the scene for what life was like at this time: Music is, frankly, in an absolute shambles. I am long retired, all the singers working in Napoli are crap, these singers today wouldn’t have lasted 15 minutes in 4th rate provincial theater back in the 1730s. Over-ornamentation is rampant, good taste is dead. Nothing is new, everything is derivative. Audiences are uneducated and ill-appreciative swines to the few pearls that fall before them. A generally sad state of affairs. But one man stands before the Neapolitans, standing for genuinely interesting and novel composition. His name is Niccolo Jommelli. You maybe don’t know his name now, if so that’s because you are stupid, because he was great, and you should be embarrassed. Educate yourself.
However his last operas in the city were not well received by the Neapolitans, and the salon goers are razzing on him. I know what the real problem is: his primo uomo for the season is some young weany moon-calf who’s never sung at the San Carlo before called Gasparo Pacchierotti (who has no stage name! Why even bother castrating yourself if you’re going to get listed in the libretto naked like some no-name tenor) and the San Carlo is a massive opera house and it takes a strong, experienced singer with a big voice to know how to work that acoustic space. (I sang there for years, and grown men wept openly at my retirement.)
Anyway one salon-goer calls Jommelli “crazy,” and am so incensed I just pop off and slap the shit out of him! Not really, but I did jump up and start yelling. Someone at the salon was apparently so impressed by me (understandable) that they wrote this down in a book so I will quote myself:
Crazy eh? These are not singers: oh for the days of my youth! But have no doubt: you will know your error. You will see this music adored, venerated, played on every harpsichord, and enduring as long as there is a taste for harmony.
Unfortunately Jommelli would die a couple of years after that, he was very ill, and sad after his wife’s passing. He actually was younger than me, but died before me. But anyway I got a few punches in for him in 1771. Maybe you don’t think this is ONE NICE THING I did, but I do, so if you care to disagree kindly reply with full name, address, and choice of weapon, and I will fit you into my schedule.
In these days in which the corrupting influence of eastern luxuries consumes the people, causing the wealthy to flaunt their wealth in ever new and innovative ways, inflaming resentment in the poor, who drive themselves deeper into debt to hide from the world what should shame nobody, it is most simple to forget that our great empire, the cause of our moral demotion, was won by great moral strength. And yet examples of the virtue of our forebears are as multitudinous in the stories of history as examples of vice and meanness are today. Marcus Atilius Regulus was a leader in our first war against the Punics, defeating them in Sicily and North Africa, until brought down by the armies lead by the Greek mercenary Xanthippus in a battle outside the very walls of Carthage. He was captured in that battle and brought to Carthage, until the Africans decided he could be of use to them, and released him to Rome under condition that he negotiate a favorable peace--so we can see the dishonorable cannot recognize the honorable! Regulus, however, provided stern and wise council for the Romans to refuse these terms, and swiftly extinguished any desire for surrender in the hearts of the listeners. This was met by great acclaim in the Senate, which turned to dismay as Regulus announced his intention to fulfill his oath by returning to Carthage, which he did so over the objections and lamentations of the people. Upon returning the Africa, the Punics, incensed that they could not make the man bend, killed him in a manner most cruel.
I conclude this story, conscript fathers, by stating that Carthage must be destroyed.
Joseph Petrosino is the only NYPD officer to be killed in the line of duty whilst outside of the USA. He was slain in 1909 by the Mafia after he had travelled to Sicily to investigate them. His death caused an uproar, was commented on by the President and many thousands attended his funeral in NYC. There is a small park in the city still named after him.
There are numerous books/TV shows/sites about Petrosino and the reason for his murder, but one piece of information is often overlooked: there was a very small story in a 1909 New York Times about how Petrosino had dragged an important Mafioso into a street in New York and hit them them publicly.
The problem is that the story was not repeated in any other newspaper, and the fight had only been witnessed by a couple of local people, so most historians have rightfully not given the story much weight.
Several years ago I was reading some Secret Service reports from around 1910. They were spying the NYC Mafia gangs due to their involvement with counterfeiting and had an informant present at some of their meetings. After one particular meeting the informant was walking back to the train station when one of the Mafiosi happened to mention that Petrosino was killed 'not for being a policeman, but for striking one of us, and heaping personal abuse on one us without having any right to do so'. So, it turns out that little story in the NYT was most likely true after all.
This story is already famous, but like other old men, I will indulge myself in repeating myself.
My father started by backing King Stephen, but then betrayed him to join Matilda the Empress. Stephen besieged Newbury Castle. My father handed over me, his son, maybe six years old, as a gage and hostage for his new oath for a truce and surrender of the castle. But my father used the time to warn the Empress. Stephen then threatened to have me killed, as was his right. Did my father repent? Did my father plead? Did my father, moved by love of his son and fearing for the slightest harm to my head, move all the arguments he could to soften the heart of my captor?
"Go ahead! I still have the hammer and the anvil with which to forge still more and better sons!"
King Stephen's heart was already soft as a rotting tree-trunk (Shrewsbury Castle excepted). He kept me safe by his side and raised me nobly.
They have marveled that I was unstintingly loyal to king after king. Believe me, even King John looked like a saint after that treacherous bag of dicks I had to call "Dad".
This anecdote regards the North Korean Famine that occurred from 1994-1998.
North Korea's agricultural minister So Kwan-hui was executed in September 1997 after being accused of intentionally sabotaging the country's crops and acting as an agent for the United States. This is altogether not very surprising. However, North Korea went one step further. So's mentor and previous agriculture minister, Kim Man-kum, had died a few years prior and was buried in the Patriot's Cementary. His body was subsequently exhumed and subjected to a ritual execution by firing squad. They were then held out as examples in public to show what the government will do to 'traitors'.
Source: Under the Loving Care of the Fatherly Leader: North Korea and the Kim Dynasty By Bradley K. Martin, pg 575.
The F-11 was a short-lived fighter in the US Navy. Even so it has at least one interesting story to its name. In flight testing, test pilot Tom Attridge fired its cannons while in a dive. Because of the laws of physics, the cannon rounds naturally fell and slowed down as they went...and hit the aircraft as it pulled up again. Attridge was able to land the plane largely intact, but it's still regarded as one of few, if any, known incidents where a plane has shot itself down.
There is no doubt that no man has ever lived who was more renowned for his wit than Marcus Tullius. I have it on good authority, from his brother Quintus, who was my legate in Gaul (and whose action against the Nervii was most well-conducted), that before Publius Clodius set out for his quaestorship in Sicily he was the subject of an amusing private joke. I am told that Marcus Tullius, while on his way to the forum in the morning, was accompanied by Clodius, who was then his neighbor (as Marcus Tullius' regrettable exile and the demolition of his house had not yet occurred). Clodius made some remark about patronizing the Sicilians at the games, and mentioned that his sister, the husband of Metellus who was then consul, was so cheap that she would only give him a couple feet of space in the arena to seat his many friends and dependents. To which, Quintus was told by his brother, who also sent a letter to his friend Titus Pomponius^1, Marcus Tullius responded:
noli de uno pede sororis queri; licet etiam alterum tollas.
For the barbarians and provincials who may not have control of the Latin tongue, the joke is "Do not worry about one foot of your sister's; for you can always just raise the other." Given the accusations of incest that were then on Clodius' head, the rather crude joke, whose meaning I think should be obvious enough even in other tongues, was quite well-timed. It is a pity, however, that Marcus Tullius was so poor at restraining his wit, for his sharp tongue angered many a great man and wounded the pride of my magister equitum Antony, who would become a Triumvir
Cuban novelist and intellectual, Alejo Carpentier, was in Barbados as a part of his research for a novel when he came across the tomb of Ferdinando Paleologus. Paleologus was related to the last dynasty of Byzantine emperors, overthrown when the Ottoman Turks captured Constantinople.
He had been a member of the secular clergy in English colonial Barbados before his death.
The discovery of the tomb of a member of that family in a forgotten corner of the Caribbean is part of what inspired his literary idea of "real maravilloso" (real marvels), which postulated that the Americas were so magical on their own that you didn't need to add magic to them in order to awe readers. This is most famously present in The Kingdom of This Earth, where Carpentier plays with the Haitian beliefs in supernatural transformations but does so in a way that it can be explained away as mass delusions or misunderstandings.
I recall Carpentier discussing this in his introduction to The Kingdom of this Earth (El Reino de Este Mundo, 1949) but here are references to it in a book in English that I found online:
WE SPARTANS ARE FAMOUS FOR OUR ECONOMY OF WORDS. YOUR LANGUAGE HAS THE WORD "LACONIC" TO ENSHRINE THE NOBLE HABITS OF THE LAKONIANS, WHICH IS ANOTHER NAME FOR MY PEOPLE.
ONCE, WHEN I WAS A YOUNG MAN, THE PEOPLE OF SAMOS CAME TO SPARTA TO ASK FOR AID IN THEIR WAR AGAINST THE TYRANT POLYKRATES. THEY MADE A LONG SPEECH TO US ABOUT THEIR NEEDS AND WANTS. WE DO NOT ENJOY THIS SORT OF LONG-WINDED IONIAN BABBLE, SO WE TOLD THEM THAT WE HAD FORGOTTEN BY THE END OF THE SPEECH WHAT THE BEGINNING WAS ABOUT. THEY LEFT.
THE NEXT DAY THEY TRIED AGAIN. THEY BROUGHT INTO THE ASSEMBLY AN EMPTY BAG, POINTED AT IT, AND SAID, "THE BAG NEEDS FLOUR".
WE REPLIED THAT THEY COULD HAVE LEFT OUT "THE BAG", AND AGREED TO SUPPORT THEM.
Well now, and you didn't hear it from me, but Price Charles' campaign in '45 was so ill-advised that even his most loyal supporters hestitated to come out.
There was a guy in Cologne,
who made his grievance well known,
he punched his book-seller
right in the patella,
so they threw him out of the dome.
Sorry for that. I started my post with "There was a guy in cologne", so I had to do it. The story is better than the dreadfull poem:
In 1561 a certain Tilman Isenhaupt(or Iserhäupt) got into a fight with his bookseller. He followed the bookseller into the dome and beat him up good. This widened into a brawl and five to six people were injured. Considering that he incited a fight in a church, Isenhaupt was indicted. As he clearly was guilty, two maidens came up and promised to marry him, to save him from the gallows. Isenhaupt declined both.
When he ascended the scaffolding, the populace pleaded the judge for mercy, as two virgins had offered to marry the condemned. The judge, however, ordered the executioner to do his job. The executioner replied "Ich kans net doin und ich darfs net doin." "I cannot do it and I may not do it." The populace began to throw stones and lumps of earth at the judge and the executioner. This nearly turned into a riot, but was resolved as a farmer simply cut the rope and Isenhaupt escaped through the crowd.
It's not known what happened to Isenhaupt or the virgins or the bookseller afterwards or which book the origin of the fight was.
壬戌之秋，七月既望，吾與客共游於赤壁之下。舉酒屬客；須臾明月出山，四週皆美，欲稱美之，恐言不達意。吾與客誦詩，客有吹洞蕭者，其聲慟然，如悁，如穆，如淒，如愬。吾問客曰：何為其然也？客述曹孟德之功，而今其跡不在。又曰，與漁樵雜處，往往為醉人所駡推，漸不為人識。於時飲酒樂甚，不欲其慟傷客，故撫之。然今已忘何所言！ 所以忘何所言者，蓋飲醉也。
嗟乎！今吾言止於達意，未能稱文。待吾復書如此，必可達有文之言。
Strong language below
The Princess Palatine Elizabeth Charlotte, who married Louis XIV's brother Philippe of Orléans , was not shy when it comes to say what her thoughts were. You have to imagine an overweight lady with a very strong German accents in the middle of the Sun King's court. She never really liked court life, especially the difficult French etiquette. She disliked many courtesans even more. For exemple she called the count of Toulouse ( one of the king's illegitimate sons ) " mouse shit ".
She also was very angry over her son's poor choice of wife. Indeed, the future regent married one of Louis XIV's illegitimate daughter, Françoise-Marie de Bourbon ( so they were close cousins! ). The Princess Palatine disliked her so much that she slapped her son in front of the entire court ! About Françoise-Marie, she said :
My daughter-in-law ressembles an arse like two peas in a pod look the same ! ( imagine this with a German accent )
No wonder she and Saint-Simon got along quite well. Both were masters at slandering courtesans.
One time, somewhere in the South Pacific while I was aboard my flagship the U.S.S. New Jersey, I decided to take a break from some meetings I was having in the operations room and treat myself to some ice cream. The great thing about serving aboard a massive ship like the New Jersey is that your galley has access to far more resources and goods to provide you and your crew with a greater variety of meals and desserts to get you through a long cruise.
Anyhow, I make my way down to the Gedunk bar and wait in line for my ice cream behind all the other mainly enlisted men who were already waiting in line. I may be an admiral who can invoke the privilege of rank to cut the line but I try to be as fair as I can be, conditions permitting.
Suddenly, two junior officers, I want to say they were lieutenants, start elbowing their way through the line of mostly enlisted sailors while muttering something about pulling rank. I decided that after having spent the previous nine hours planning out operations in a enclosed room, that I wasn't having any of this and loudly barked at them to get to the back of the line on the double.
One of the lieutenants had the audacity to turn around and begin to lecture on the importance of respecting the rank before he realized that I was no common sailor or chief rating, but the "old man" himself. He quickly shut up and proceeded to the back of the line with his compatriot without further complaint.
20 minutes later after enjoying a nice bowl of chocolate ice cream, I returned to the operations room to continue planning out operations. It was a good day.
