Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2018 March 13

= March 13 =

The religious affiliation of Albrecht Dürer
Dear all

I am very interested into the works of brilliant German painter Albrecht Dürer. I tried to find out what his religious affiliation was, but I failed. The information on the internet is confusing, with some sites claiming that he was a hardcore Catholic, and others claim that he was a passionate Lutheran. Are there reliable data about his religious views?

Thank you for your answers! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2A02:120B:2C02:5DD0:1C25:B578:7810:4149 (talk) 11:33, 13 March 2018 (UTC)
 * Albrecht Dürer should answer your questions. --Wrongfilter (talk) 11:40, 13 March 2018 (UTC)

Thank you for your answers, but I have allready read this part of the article. It says the very same thing: he may have been a Catholic or a Protestant. The article also does not make it clear what exactly he was.--2A02:120B:2C02:5DD0:7065:B9D5:4A56:905E (talk) 14:30, 13 March 2018 (UTC)


 * Well, Dürer began life as a Catholic. The protestant movement began only 10 years before he died; he was 46 when Luther published his theses. The German wikipedia article claims Dürer was a convert (Die Maler Albrecht Dürer, Lucas Cranach d. Ä. und Lucas Cranach d. J. schlossen sich der Reformation an.) without a source. The only source I've found in google scholar is this one, which says It is commonly acknowledged that Albrecht Dürer, both as a concerned Christian and as a thinking artist, was deeply affected by the Protestant Reformation. From his early naïve interest in Luther to his death as a firmly converted “good Lutheran” Dürer showed a consistent involvement with the spiritual turmoil of his times.. You can ask at WP:RX if you need to read the entire article to check its sourcing.70.67.222.124 (talk) 15:46, 13 March 2018 (UTC)


 * I found Albrecht Dürer's Renaissance: Humanism, Reformation, and the Art of Faith by David Price. I can only see a brief preview, but this passage on p. 226 says:
 * "A few have questioned whether Dürer really was a Lutheran. There are, however, no grounds for supporting Wilhelm Braunfels's categorical statement, published in the Catholic Lexikon für Theologie und Kirche, that "Diiter himself remained ... a Catholic until his death." Unfortunately, the existence of these sorts of positions in Dürer scholarship has allowed scholars, especially those who are not particularly interested in church history, to accept a high degree of fuzziness in statements about Dürer and the Reformation...
 * "Jane Hutchison claims that Lutheranism is a 'pseudo-issue' on the grounds that it is impossible to speak of Lutheranism before the Augsburg Confession of 1530".
 * Alansplodge (talk) 16:08, 13 March 2018 (UTC)

"Foggy Bottom" Reference in News Article
In the following news article, Trump ousts Tillerson, will replace him as secretary of state with CIA chief Pompeo, it mentions something about "Foggy bottom". This is the 26th paragraph by my count.

Foggy Bottom was also acutely aware — and chagrined — that Pompeo did not cite Tillerson when he appeared on television shows Sunday to explain the North Korea developments.

What is "foggy bottom"? Is this a typo? Vandalism? It's the only reference to "foggy bottom" in the article. This seems like a mistake. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 18:19, 13 March 2018 (UTC)
 * First sentence in the second paragraph of our appropriately title article Foggy Bottom.... Fgf10 (talk) 18:22, 13 March 2018 (UTC)
 * I saw that. How does it relate to the news article?  I don't get it.  A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 18:27, 13 March 2018 (UTC)
 * As noted in the second paragraph of Fgf10's link, "Foggy Bottom" is slang for the US State Department. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 18:28, 13 March 2018 (UTC)
 * Ah, thanks! A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 18:30, 13 March 2018 (UTC)

Do countries that sell land for money ever buy it back? Or part of it?
Excluding peace treaties. And complete sovereignty transfer, not just buying an embassy site or something. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 23:29, 13 March 2018 (UTC)
 * Not quite clear what you mean. Are you thinking of something where a whole region gets transferred, such as the Gadsden Purchase, or do I misunderstand?  Nyttend (talk) 23:32, 13 March 2018 (UTC)
 * If whole regions have been bought back the question can be restricted to whole regions. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 23:46, 13 March 2018 (UTC)
 * Land sold in the Louisiana Purchase or Sewards Folly were obviously not bought back. Otherwise, the full transfer of sovereignty by selling probably was not all that common. Another 'sale' of land i can think of were the Mexican Cessions, but that area obviously was not bought back either. Which countries or regions made you think of the question? 91.49.78.120 (talk) 23:51, 13 March 2018 (UTC)
 * Apparently being from a country that got half its land in your examples gave me the wrong idea land for money isn't rare. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 01:24, 14 March 2018 (UTC)
 * Keep in mind that in most places there just were no huge areas of land to sell voluntarily without weakening oneself while strengthening a neighbour and potential enemy(imagine the Spanish Empire willingly selling a quarter of their posession to the Kingdom of France, impossible due to strategic interests and prestige reasons). And even the purchases by the US were agreed upon by the other countries out of lack of strategic interest in the areas and/or monetary need. Or at gun point in case of the Mexican Cession. And not that numerous, four i can think of. But as i am european my knowledge of US history is not the best so there perhaps are more. The main page currently has something related to the topic in OTD by the way, the queen of cyprus was forced to abdicate and sell the administration of the island to Venice in 1489. Did not buy it back of course. Small sales, out of necessity or duress, pawning land, as mentioned below, or as part of peace treaties, like the Mexican Cession, did happen in europe or between colonial powers. But of course nothing remotely on the scale of the Louisiana Purchase, at least as far as i can think of. And if land was voluntarily sold/pawned, it was inside the realms and not to neighburing powers. Although even in regards to that there may have been exceptions. 91.49.78.120 (talk) 02:22, 14 March 2018 (UTC)
 * There was some pawning of land and/or castles in medieval europe though. But i am not sure how much that is actually selling it. And there were no countries doing it either. Or if it was 'whole regions'. But those were sometimes 'bought back'. It did give up sovereignty and right to tax collection of the individual title holder for money to another until repayed. 91.49.78.120 (talk) 00:00, 14 March 2018 (UTC)
 * By the Adams–Onís Treaty of 1819, the US abandoned claims west of the Sabine River to Spain, for the uncontested title east of there. Depending on where you say the US claims extended to, some would say the Pacific, the US arguably bought back some of that land with the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo in 1848 (the US took the position it was not paying for Texas).--Wehwalt (talk) 02:45, 14 March 2018 (UTC)
 * If you count in Annexation and Cession in connection to some compensation this actually happens surprisingly frequently when a government wants to build a road, pipeline or help some big important(tm) company or industry sector to use, exploit, build or expand in some area they like. One often overlooked example are the oil pumps, exploration drills and fracking stations build in masses on private land owned by farmers in the united states. --Kharon (talk) 10:33, 14 March 2018 (UTC)


 * Hmmm... what about land owned by the national government, and sold to private individuals (for example, land sold under the Homestead act in the US)? Blueboar (talk) 11:05, 14 March 2018 (UTC)


 * The most recent example I can find of outright purchase dates from 1917, when the USA bought what is now the US Virgin Islands from Denmark for 25 million dollars. More recently there have been some exchanges of land: after WW2 Switzerland and Germany exchanged a few parcels of land to get rid of some inconvenient small enclaves, while India and Bangladesh have done the same quite recently for the same reason {Cooch Behar} and a much larger area was swapped between Jordan and Saudi Arabia to enlarge Jordan's coastal area around Aqaba. I can find no indication that these involved any additional financial payments. I also cam across a mention that in 2011, China agreed to increased investment in Tajikistan in exchange for sovereignty over 1,000 square km of territory in the Pamir Mountains, including some 5,000 inhabitants. The only cases where land has been returned involved leases rather than purchases (like the New Territories in Hong Kong). Wymspen (talk) 14:08, 14 March 2018 (UTC)


 * Christian I of Norway and Denmark pawned his interests in Orkney and Shetland to Scotland, then the Danes repeatedly tried to redeem them, but were ignored: History of Shetland. Warofdreams talk 01:19, 15 March 2018 (UTC)
 * The Chamizal dispute between the US and Mexico was eventually settled, and money did change hands, though not directly between the governments.--Wehwalt (talk) 03:28, 15 March 2018 (UTC)