Wrong historical definitions
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Category: All Empires Community
Forum Name: Historical Amusement
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URL: http://www.allempires.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=4600
Printed Date: 14-May-2024 at 04:21
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Topic: Wrong historical definitions
Posted By: Komnenos
Subject: Wrong historical definitions
Date Posted: 24-Jul-2005 at 18:15
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In a discussion elsewhere on AE on the term “Indo-Germanic”, it came to me that there are quite a number of historical misnomers in circulation, terms for historic ages or processes that are either antiquated, simplistic or simply factually wrong.
As proud and knowledgeable historians, members of AE should take up the task to set things right, to re-name the wrongly used terms and confront the world with the truth. As an example, the “Age of Discoveries”, you know when Vasco da Gama, Columbus and the like had to run away from the bailiffs, set out on their scurvy infested nut-shells and stumbled by accident on a couple of tiny islands, and everybody got terribly excited afterwards and celebrated those guys as great explorers and declared that “America” had been finally “discovered”. “Discovered”, gimme a break, surely America had been discovered before, by the Native Indians to start with, not to mention the Lost Tribes of Israel, the Egyptians, the Polynesians, a couple of Irish monks who had got lost on the way home from the pub, and the Vikings of course, in search of new victims, after they had nicked everything in Europe that couldn’t be nailed to the floor, and so on. So what exactly was discovered, that hadn't been around for ages, known to everybody but some uneducated and uncivilized scholars in Europe? See my point? Anyway, another great misnomer is “The Dark Ages”. I mean, what the heck, does that mean? It doesn’t really explain anything! So, my first challenge is, let’s find a better definition for the latter half of the first millennium! My suggestion would be: “The Age when the barbarian Germanic hordes trampled around Europe and chased the Romans before them”, but that isn’t really catchy enough. Can you come up with anything better? ------------- [IMG]http://i71.photobucket.com/albums/i137/komnenos/crosses1.jpg"> |
Replies:
Posted By: cattus
Date Posted: 24-Jul-2005 at 18:24
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Posted By: Winterhaze13
Date Posted: 24-Jul-2005 at 18:45
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I agree that Columbus did not really discover the Americas. The indigenous people had already discovered it during that ice age. That is why 50 million were living there. Also, it's very possable that the Chinese landed in south America in 1421. Likewise it's even possible that the Romans had knowledge of the new world in some circles. A Roman artifact was found near Mexico City. ------------- Indeed, history is nothing more than a tableau of crimes and misfortunes. -- Voltaire French author, humanist, rationalist, & satirist (1694 - 1778) |
Posted By: Maju
Date Posted: 24-Jul-2005 at 21:23
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Age of Discovery and Dark Ages are not that bad, always considered from
an Eurocentric or more precisely West-Eurocentric point of view. If you want misnomers you have to go to things like: - nation-state: few states that claim that name are identical to the nation it pretends to include and represent - Newfoundland: precisely the piece of America that Europeans had known and visited from much earlier (Vikings, Basques) - freedom fighters: to narco-paramilitar mafious terrorist groups whose only ideology is money or, sometimes, fascism - humanitarian (military) intervention - America: when applied to the USA, just a little part of that continent(s) - Ghana: modern Ghana has no relationship with the historic state of that name is like Belgium calling itself "Rome" - Greenland: I have read that Red Erik named that island with such name with publicitary intentions, hoping to increase inmigration - etc. |
Posted By: Anujkhamar
Date Posted: 25-Jul-2005 at 06:29
| Native Americans.......not Indians!!! |
Posted By: Komnenos
Date Posted: 25-Jul-2005 at 06:36
Sure, my apologies to all the Iroquois, Sioux, Mescalero Apaches( my personal favourites!) and the rest out there! ------------- [IMG]http://i71.photobucket.com/albums/i137/komnenos/crosses1.jpg"> |
Posted By: Perseas
Date Posted: 25-Jul-2005 at 11:50
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I was thinking exactly the same about the term "Anti-Semitic" and the wrong wide-spread use of it as a kinda synonym of Jew-hater. Lets see its historical background... Se·mit·ic (sə-mĭt'ĭk)
and Ar·ab (ăr'əb)
In other words the term anti-Semitism is refering to sentiment against all Semites, had they be Arabs or Jews or both, none the less people who speak Semitic languages and have Semitic Origin. So accusing Arabs of being anti-semitic is another misnomer. The right term should be anti-Jewish. ------------- A mathematician is a person who thinks that if there are supposed to be three people in a room, but five come out, then two more must enter the room in order for it to be empty. |
Posted By: Paul
Date Posted: 25-Jul-2005 at 12:53
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That is a misnomer in itself. It's well known Asiatic siberians weren't the first people on the continent. How Migrant-Americans as an alternative?
For the dark ages, how about we call it the Renaissance. ------------- Light blue touch paper and stand well back http://www.maquahuitl.co.uk - http://www.maquahuitl.co.uk http://www.toltecitztli.co.uk - http://www.toltecitztli.co.uk |
Posted By: Komnenos
Date Posted: 25-Jul-2005 at 13:45
Very good point! The Nazi "Anti-Semites" had no problem in enlisting a Semite, the Arab Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Amin al-Husanyi, for their Anti-Jewish cause. About his collaboration with the Nazi regime read http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amin_al-Husayni - Wikipedia on the Grand Mufti , but here's a photo of Hitler having tea with his Semite friend.  ------------- [IMG]http://i71.photobucket.com/albums/i137/komnenos/crosses1.jpg"> |
Posted By: Maju
Date Posted: 25-Jul-2005 at 14:13
Self evident but excellent ocation of a true misnomer. |
Posted By: Guests
Date Posted: 25-Jul-2005 at 15:37
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The Dutch War - We didn't start it, so it should be called the English French Colonian and Munsterian War.
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Posted By: Paul
Date Posted: 25-Jul-2005 at 17:34
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That's a desicable lie. You shot back when we attacked you. If you hadn't it would have been the Dutch Massacre. You made it a war. ------------- Light blue touch paper and stand well back http://www.maquahuitl.co.uk - http://www.maquahuitl.co.uk http://www.toltecitztli.co.uk - http://www.toltecitztli.co.uk |