Rabid Bogling

Good conversation though!

As far as the contempory strength of Denmark goes.. gah! I have no idea. I think Sweyn might just have been playing it safe.. waiting to see who the victor was, while harbouring the intent to invade. If I recall rightly, St. Canute was about to make a go of it when he was killed, and that can't have been too long afterwards.

Ta'Samsca'Rial

I was under the impression that Denmark falls into civil war soon afterwards.. or by soon, in the next 40-50 years or so. They then go and become a Baltic power without eyeing England.

Although obviously a different outcome at Hastings may effect it down the line.

I think the same is true of Norway.. atleast I don't think either ever launched an attack on England which had a real chance of success, unless I am mistaken?

As for a peaceful England.. its relative. The Welsh/Scots will continue to raid and push the border whenever it is weak, but its unlikely to be something to threaten the king. The Welsh didn't unite under one leader untill middle 1200's if I remember right? Untill then Harold and his sucessors should be able to just leave things to their Earls unless they are treacherous/useless.

Rabid Bogling

Good points, and you're right - the last (successful*) Scandinavian invasion of England was that of 1066. There wasn't really any Anglo-Scottish hostility at this point though. That was assured, at least during Malcolm's reign. Afterall he had held strong relations with England for some time, and spent much of his early life in Edward's court.

* = As in acctually leaving their own coasts and managing to seize territory.

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Gorthyn

Viz a viz the effectiveness of the Norman knights its important to remember that in terms of equipment they were not as formidable as what later developed.

Ie. they didnt have the heavy armour and just as importantly the heavy couched lance and supportive saddle that enabled later knights to be so effective in the charge (in the right circumstances) - rather they had what was basically just a long spear which had far less shock and impact power.

As far as an conquered Saxon England - its golden age had past by 1066 and while still rich was vulnerable to external threats and civil strife so am inclined to believe that it may have faced slow decline until either another invasion or a strong king bent on reform.

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Rabid Bogling

New topic time, methinks..

I recently stumbled across a suggestion that the concepts of good, evil, and even the idea of conquest came from the faith and culture of Sumer. Is there any truth behind this? I know very little about the period, it being so far back in time, but it's certainly of great interest.

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Kaelith

I don't no anything about the sumerians other than they were the very first "civilised" people to become a major power in known history.. i think?

would be interested to hear if someone does no more on this area? but i suspect this may not be a very discussable subject i'm afraid

maybe someone can suggest another?

Wilfred Owen

The Napoleonic Wars?

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Stewan Seagull

Sumer, eh? I guess it?s because they were the first (or very close) to write things down is why they?re credited with so much (laws, writ, astronomy, heck even Poker and beer ). Maybe things were invented earlier elsewhere and we just don?t know?
But if anyone knows more about them i?d be happy to hear.

Ta'Samsca'Rial

*Shrugs*

Its rather difficult to calculate what is true and what isn't about really ancient history. Further more its kind of difficult to calculate what is a civilisation. After all, its not as if the rest of the world was without humans beforehand or during.

I kind of doubt they invented faith though. Sun worship in some form of another seems almost universal.

War again seems a fairly innate human concept. Its possible they invented the idea of wars over land, since many cultures had no idea about that untill introduced to it, but even that seems a stretch.

I am fairly confident a concept of good and evil is universal in humanity as well. Good is essentially what aids you/others and evil is what harms you/others.

Still who can say.

angels_and_daemons

"Further more its kind of difficult to calculate what is a civilisation."

I believe its considered by anthropologists and historians to be when humans moved on from Hunter Gatherer groups. Hunter gatherers wouldn't need most "inventions" and even their language would be limited by a lack of need for anything more. So when people started to congregate in larger numbers and started to do other things - builders or farmers for instance they'd need things they never needed - barter, new words for new concepts, and perhaps even things to DO while not building or farming (hence poker). As for war, well it's not really considered war if a dozen people on each side turn up and have a bit of a barney... Only when territory is permanently fixed by building your home, and having numbers to back things up does war come about. First it starts with a group of people in the settlement fighting of nomadic tribes, or animals, then they become more numerous, then as the settlement grows they decide the next town should be theres as well and suddenly you have war - given how dependant that is on civilisation it could be guessed that the first civilisation invented it - but deciding on the first civilisation would be difficult.

Stone circles would have required masses of man power to move let alone lever upright into position... and there are stone cicrles dating back ludicrous amounts of time... they've also discovered the remains of cities carved from rock in which north american indians may have lived again a huge amount of time ago. Then of course there are nomads... civilisation as such doesn't need to be fixed in position as such, it just needs to contain numbers coming together, and some form of communications as well as being "more advanced" than hunter gatherers... nomads level little evidence of thier passing today - goat droppings and maybe a fire pit - add in 20,000 years say and evidence could be very scant indeed, and possibly overlooked (a goat dropping could just be from a wild goat or from a domesticated one).

So while possible to define what civilisation might be, even with that it's difficult to say who got there first.

Even writing - the Sumarians wrote on stone, which by its very nature tends to last a long time... not much that was written on papyrus survived from the egyptions though, if papyrus was used prior to the sumarians it's also possible it simply rotted away before we could get our greedy mits on it. If writing predated them, perhaps other things like laws predated them also... we'll never really know for certain, but it's fun guessing

Ta'Samsca'Rial

Well that makes sense I suppose.

Although I am not convinced that fighting over land is a definate product of civilisation. I can remember an example, vaguely, of where the Dutch attacked an island in South East Asia. When they did so the population of the town/city fled into the mountains, assuming that the Dutch would depart since they only went to war to aquire captives and never land.
So ofcourse the Dutch aquired the town/city with nary a shot fired.

Ofcourse I can't remember the details.. it may have been the Portuguese. Either way the concept is there that just because your agricultural doesn't nessasarilly mean you fight over the land. What of the early Indian civilisations who fought over cows?

Kaelith

Morning people.

I'm back at work now and more in need of intelligent conversation again.

Here's a small topic which we could discuss. The pike!

The pike first seems to be developed in ancient warfare, "perfected" by the macedonians, but then seems to fade into non-existance for a good millenia and then appears again in various parts of europe.

Now, I know there are some obvious answers to this, but I'm interested to hear peoples opinions on why they think the pike disappeared in the first place? or did it disappear? the romans didn't seem to ever use it throughout their empire and the european barbarians didn't use it as far as I know and after the greeks were conquered by the romans they stopped using it I think.. and then out of the blue it appears again in medieval europe!

discuss!

Wilfred Owen

I think the pike first disapeared due to the Romans use of the short sword the "Gladius" (I think its what it was called) and their almost non existent use of cavalry. They could just march up to the hoplites and knock their big long stick aside and walk up to them and stab them. Basically. The pike was only useful against cavalry.
Somewhere along the lines of history, knights on horseback came back into fashion therefore the pike naturally came back. Probably.

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Kaelith

well i know the persians like using chariots, but for the most part i thuoght the macedonians used their pikes against infantry and cavalry alike?

i spose what the romans did differently that defeated the pikes was the use of their tower shields and mass discipline, which I can imagine effectively neutralises the pike, to a certain extent.

If I remember rightly, the macedonian tactic was to form a long battle line brissling with pikes and then advance on their foe at a jog and with their greater reach and tight formation the foe would be scewed or be pushed back and put into disarray at which point cavalry would charge down the disarrayed enemy.

where as the medieval application of the pike seems more of a static cavalry defence, although the swiss pikemen are reputed for charging with their pikes to great effect. the scots also tried it, but against the longbow they got slightly... abliterated. although they did manage one victory at bannockburn using the pike.

Wilfred Owen

Have ye ney played Rome Total war? Pikes are rubbish against infanrty!

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