Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2009 June 25

= June 25 =

Army inflation/deflation
I have noticed that many historical works seem to offer gross exaggerations when discussing army sizes in battles of the middle ages and such. Is this caused because most people of that time sucked at counting, or were poorly trained in arithmetic, or were they lying, or didn't care about accuracy or what? 65.121.141.34 (talk) 13:10, 25 June 2009 (UTC)
 * It's because times may change, but human nature doesn't. It's about spin. Josephus is one of the most notoriously unreliable reporters of figures. "History is written by the winners" and the winners wanna look good. --Dweller (talk) 13:25, 25 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Indeed. And its not even clear which direction a leader may inflate his numbers.  In one case, a leader may inflate his army size to intimidate his opponents or impress later historians "Look at how good a leader I am, I command an army of millions".  In other cases, one may inflate the numbers of ones opponents OR deflate the size of ones own army to give an even greater sense of ones personal contribution to the battle, see Battle of Thermopylae or Battle of Agincourt.  Certainly, these were lopsided engagements, but they were probably not as lopsided as the original stories go.  The concept of "history as journalism", that is the purpose of history as being to record the facts of a situation, is a fairly modern concept.  Most of the time, it was "history as propaganda".  --Jayron32. talk . contribs  13:52, 25 June 2009 (UTC)
 * We just had a similar question recently, on April 22. Adam Bishop (talk) 14:37, 25 June 2009 (UTC)

As I said in response to the army-size-in-the-Bible question directly above, "once the numbers go above a thousand or so, then the vast majority of reports of the sizes of military forces found in ancient and medieval sources are quite unreliable. Ancient rulers almost always propagandistically inflated or deflated the numbers of their forces in their inscriptions, in order to make themselves look better, while almost everybody else was pretty much just guessing".

In ancient times, some specialized scribes had a highly-quantitative accounting mentality with regards to such matters as land-surveying and tax-collecting, and there were a few scientists (mainly astronomers) who routinely handled fairly complex mathematics involving fairly large numbers. However, the vast majority of the population generally simply didn't care about distinctions between large numbers -- they lacked the skills that would be necessary to determine whether 10,000 or 100,000 would be the more accurate estimate of the size of an army, and they weren't too interested in that type of numerical accuracy.

For the propagandistic aspect of official royal inscriptions, see Battle of Kadesh, where (unusually) we have accounts from both sides of a battle. However, the Egyptian and Hittite accounts are difficult to reconcile, and some scholars were reduced to arguing that there must have been two battles of Kadesh. Some of the accounts of Biblical events where we have testimony from both sides are similar; Sennacherib's account of his campaigns and the Biblical account in 2 Kings chapter 18 agree on the one single fact that Sennacherib did not capture Jerusalem, but otherwise the details are different, and Sennacherib's inscription presents his campaigns as an unqualified glorious victory. Similarly, the account in the Mesha stele has a somewhat boasting tone, and it's difficult to fully reconcile all its details with the Biblical account of Mesha... AnonMoos (talk) 15:44, 25 June 2009 (UTC)

Fidel as Roadkill?

 * http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B7zf3cUPAa8
 * 638 Ways to Kill Castro

From 01:29 to 01:46:


 * Ike: 38 failures.
 * JFK: 42 failures.
 * LBJ: 72 failures.
 * Dick: 172 failures.
 * Carter: 74 failures.
 * Reagan: 197 failures.
 * Bush (dumb): 16 failures.
 * Clinton: 21 failures.
 * Bush (and dumber): 6 failures (as of 2006).
 * The Mighty O: Who knows?

Did Gerald Ford ever made even ONE decent attempt to kill Fidel Castro? The attempts known to this movie are counted only according to the date of the attempt. In addition to CIA sponsored tries, an assassin sent by an unrelated party (e.g., Britney Spears) is counted as one under then current U.S. administration. Didn't anyone try to kill the cigar smoker during the 1974-1977 period? -- Toytoy (talk) 16:38, 25 June 2009 (UTC)


 * I would be keen to see the evidence that Britney Spears attempted to assassinate Fidel. 65.121.141.34 (talk) 16:51, 25 June 2009 (UTC)
 * 1) You're assuming that a 30 second YouTube video is a reliable source 2) You're assuming that the attempts listed are exhaustive. If you listen to the related Fox News discussion (yes, Fox News is considered reliable compared to this documentary) then they are clearly including attempts that were "thought of". DJ Clayworth (talk) 16:53, 25 June 2009 (UTC)


 * There are very few situations in which I would consider it 'decent' to attempt to murder someone and I certainly do not consider this as one. Hopefully Obama will also be a wimp by your standards. Dmcq (talk) 20:38, 25 June 2009 (UTC)


 * With Fidel now, why bother trying to kill him? He is pretty irrelevant.  Now Chavez...  65.121.141.34 (talk) 20:43, 25 June 2009 (UTC)


 * I'm put in mind of Tito's letter to Stalin '"Stop sending people to kill me. We've already captured five of them, one of them with a bomb and another with a rifle... If you don't stop sending killers, I'll send one to Moscow, and I won't have to send a second.", which seemingly stopped that tyrant's attempts. Dmcq (talk) 21:18, 25 June 2009 (UTC)


 * Well, Uncle Joe still got Trotsky in the end...or was it really Stalin behind that? Rhinoracer (talk) 10:32, 26 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Well from the above I'd guess the only reason Uncle Sam didn't try killing him was because Uncle Joe wanted to. Dmcq (talk) 11:49, 26 June 2009 (UTC)
 * United States policy seems to prohibit assassination except under certain circumstances. See here: . 10draftsdeep (talk) 14:36, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

Photo composite
Hi I'd like to know what this process is called. Imagine a page filled with lots of small head shots " pictures of human faces" when you squint your eyes your see another image. This is image is made up by using the highlights and shadows of the smaller head shots. The image could be a company logo or another face or icon of some sort.

Best!
 * Photomosaic. Algebraist 19:17, 25 June 2009 (UTC)

First Queen of Jordan in public
Who was the first queen of Jordan to have played a public role in society? In the mid 20th-century, queens in muslim countrys started to lay a public role: there was Soraya Tarzi in Afghanistan (1920s), Tadj ol-Molouk in Iran (1930s), and queen Farida of Egypt (1940s). Who was the first queen in Jordan to play such a role? --85.226.40.64 (talk) 20:15, 25 June 2009 (UTC)
 * By the way: I understand Lalla Salma is the first royal consort to play a public role in Morrocco?--85.226.40.64 (talk) 20:15, 25 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Hard to say without a precise definition of what constitutes a public role, but in Queen Alia, the third of King Hussain's four wives you will find a likely candidate. Princess Muna al-Hussein, his second wife, was and still is involved in promoting nursing in Jordan and Queen Noor, his last wife, continues to work on a wide range of issues, but it was Alia who really began to develop the public role of the Queen of Jordan. She helped secure women's suffrage in Jordan in 1974 (though implementation was delayed until 1989), was a benefactor of the arts and the poor - with a particular focus on women and children - and, after her death in a helicopter crash in 1977, Hussein continued to implement various humanitarian and cultural programmes on which she had started work. She is somewhat later than the examples you give above, but Jordan has only existed as a country since 1946 and Hussein ruled from 1952. Fouracross (talk) 12:26, 26 June 2009 (UTC)
 * By the way, the OP is correct about Lalla Salma. However, King Hassan II's daughters, especially the eldest Lalla Meryem, played a public role for years in Morocco, including charity work and acting as hostess for visiting first ladies. They are the ones who established a precedent for a female member of the royal family having a public profile. --Xuxl (talk) 13:16, 26 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Thank you very much! So the queens before queen Alia lived more secluded? Queen Zein al-Sharaf Talal seem to have been very influential and is called modern in her article, but perhaps she did not show herself in public, but rather worked from behind the scenes? (She is said to have given "full rights" to women, but it does not precise eaxctly what rights?)Thanks for the clearifying of Morrocco, I was not sure! What about the queen of Iraq? Iraq was a kindgom until 1958, I believe? --85.226.44.143 (talk) 11:06, 27 June 2009 (UTC)
 * This is the problem I was talking about in defining a public role for the Queen. Zein al-Sharaf Talal was certainly influential in Jordan's political development (probably more so than her husband) and worked for charitable causes both before and after Talal's short reign, but whether that established a public role for what you might call "the office" of Queen of Jordan comes down to your definition. She certainly didn't live a life of seclusion. Fouracross (talk) 13:04, 27 June 2009 (UTC)

Yes, that is true of course. A "public role" can also be defined simply as a person visible in official ceremonies and events: in muslim countries, the royal consort traditionally lived hidden from the public eye in the private home of the monarch, and did not show herself to the people, even if she had influence in politics and engaged herself in various matters, and therefore, to merely show herself unveiled in public at public events would be quite a big difference from how it was before. Did Queen Zein ever do this?--85.226.40.22 (talk) 10:41, 29 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Yes. She wasn't at all retiring - she was the chairman of the Regency Council that bridged the end of Talal's reign to the majority of Hussein and she was also involved with the previous regency after the assassination of Abdullah. By the second definition you have given, Zein would be a better fit than any of Hussein's wives, though whether any of Abdullah's wives fulfilled this type of public role, I couldn't tell you (that we don't hear much about them suggests not). Fouracross (talk) 13:32, 29 June 2009 (UTC)
 * I see. If she did live a visible ad official life, then she would be the first Queen in Jordan to have played a public role. This should perhaps be mentioned in her article. Perhaps she was the first to have been seen withouth a veil? If so, it is significant enough to be mentioned in her article. If she was the chairman of the regency, she could be counted as regent, which is not made fully clear in the article, so that should also be added. Thank you very much, your answers are most helpful! --85.226.44.117 (talk) 10:18, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Nobility and royalty in witch trial
Are there any example in Europe of royalty or high nobility to have been openly accused, trialed (and, perhaps, executed) for sorcery? --85.226.40.64 (talk) 20:15, 25 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Joanna of Navarre wife of Henry IV of England was found guilty. Who then was a gentleman? (talk) 20:39, 25 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Jacquetta of Luxembourg, mother of Elizabeth Woodville, was tried for using witchcraft to force Edward IV of England to marry her daughter. She was found not guilty.  Who then was a gentleman? (talk) 20:40, 25 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Athenais de Montespan, mistress of Louis XIV of France, was accused of witchcraft, but I don't know if she was actually tried. Who then was a gentleman? (talk) 20:43, 25 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Anne Boleyn Who then was a gentleman? (talk) 20:48, 25 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Anne Boleyn wasn't convicted of sorcery. Tempshill (talk) 23:03, 25 June 2009 (UTC)
 * The question concerned trial, not necessarily conviction. Who then was a gentleman? (talk) 21:58, 26 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Our article Anne Boleyn doesn't mention any trial for sorcery, either. Tempshill (talk) 22:35, 26 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Eleanor Cobham. AndyJones (talk) 21:24, 25 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Among his crimes,I believe Giles de Rais was accused of sorcery...Rhinoracer (talk) 10:34, 26 June 2009 (UTC)
 * There was the Poison Affair in France that involved many several members of the nobility and other important individuals in the French court. (Poisoning and sorcery were closely related in the public mind). La Voisin wasn't herself noble, but many of her clients were. - Nunh-huh 22:45, 26 June 2009 (UTC)
 * During the reign of Christian IV of Denmark (who was nuts about witch trials), the noblewoman Christenze Kruckow was executed for witchcraft. --Saddhiyama (talk) 22:49, 26 June 2009 (UTC)
 * How interesting! I did not realise they were so many, I had the impression that it was extremely unusual for someone of rank to be oppenly trialed for such a thing. Though it seems that people of rank was at least given milder sentences? Or perhaps there are royalty to have actually ben executed for sorcery as well? --85.226.44.143 (talk) 11:14, 27 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Jacques du Molay, that Baphomet-worshipping miscreant, got a good dose of French justice: his own barbecue.

holocaust denial
holocaust denial has often been associated with neo-Nazism, but what surprises me slightly, is that one doesn't see neo-Nazis who have such a complete absence of common humanity that they don't deny the holocaust but think it was a good thing. Are there sick individuals like this? Is there a name for it? Porch goat (talk) 21:12, 25 June 2009 (UTC)


 * they certainly exist. "Fascist", or "inhuman" are the only words I've ever heard used to describe such people --Saalstin (talk) 21:26, 25 June 2009 (UTC)


 * You obviously haven't looked closely at their stuff, which I suppose is no bad thing. They often deny the holocaust and say it was a good idea and the Jews deserved it at the same time. There's no special term for it because it is extremely common amongst neo-Nazis. Dmcq (talk) 21:28, 25 June 2009 (UTC)


 * Irrational philosophies like neo-Naziism are not necessarily internally consistant. Don't expect people who adhere to such irrational philosophy to suddenly find a problem when such consistancies are pointed out.  "You cannot reason someone out of a conclusion they did not actually arrive at via reason."  Or something like that.  --Jayron32. talk . contribs  21:43, 25 June 2009 (UTC)