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Empress Theonora
Feb 19, 2001

She was a sword glinting in the depths of night, a lance of light piercing the darkness. There would be no mistakes this time.

HEY GAL posted:

So, Animal and I were talking in PMs and he mentioned that I haven't done a lot of talking about the women of the 17th century. In part this is because the women of the Mansfeld Regiment left fewer records than the guys, which is the case for most women of the period. But there is no lack of female badasses in this period, like Julie d'Aubigny, who seems to have screwed/swordfought her way through most of France and the Netherlands.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julie_d%27Aubigny

If you click on that link, don't skim the entry, or you'll miss things like this:


Her entire life was like that. She died at 33.

#lifegoals tbh

Well, hopefully I live past 33.

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PittTheElder
Feb 13, 2012

:geno: Yes, it's like a lava lamp.

ALL-PRO SEXMAN posted:

Did she just happen to have a dead nun on her when that happened? I hope she didn't have to go out and "obtain" one.

Well, she was already in the convent...


e: VVVV presumably they'd notice if there weren't any body bones either. It just doesn't seem like the best thought out plan in general, but I guess it worked?

PittTheElder fucked around with this message at 06:42 on Mar 11, 2016

Chamale
Jul 11, 2010

I'm helping!



PittTheElder posted:

Well, she was already in the convent...

Presumably they'd notice if there were two missing nuns, but just one charred dead body.

Squalid
Nov 4, 2008

Cyrano4747 posted:

They set up for a big landing in the Gulf during GW1. Lots of support vessels, all sorts of transports steaming back and forth. It was really just a feint to draw a shitload of Iraqis over to defend against what they thought was going to be Overlord 2.0. Still, that's probably the last time they pulled out all the toys and put them on the board.


I'm going to guess that it's supposed to be an anus.

They got to play with a lot of toys during operation Restore Hope in Somalia. I found the power displayed by the U.S. forces in that operation totally mind blowing, especially the organisational and logistical capabilities.

On November 25 1992 President H.W. Bush authorized the intervention. On December 1st the carrier USS Ranger arrived off Mogadishu. On the 3rd America pushed through Security Council Resolution 794 gaving member states permission to "use all necessary means to establish as soon as possible a secure environment for humanitarian relief operations in Somalia.” On the 6th the amphibious assault ship USS Tripoli arrived. On the 7th the US had lined up over 13,000 international troops to participate. On the 9th US forces invaded, and by the 24th they had occupied all objectives including all the major urban areas of south Somalia. The mission took a mere month from conception to completion.

It involved amphibious assaults into hostile territory in which an active defense was a real possibility. Of course the various Somali factions took one look at the Americans, made this face :catstare: and decided it would be better just to park their technicals in clearly marked depots while they waited to see what the Americans were planning.


Pictured: Marines playing with their sweet hovercrafts near Mogadishu airport

Squalid fucked around with this message at 07:11 on Mar 13, 2016

lenoon
Jan 7, 2010

Trin Tragula posted:

Both sides allowed families to send letters and parcels to prisoners via the Red Cross, which is the most likely route.

For some reason that didn't cross my mind at all, despite the fact that the organisation was full of objectors.

George Rouncewell
Jul 20, 2007

You think that's illegal? Heh, watch this.
Holy crap

Hogge Wild
Aug 21, 2012

by FactsAreUseless
Pillbug
Better versions:





And yeah, that is the best hat. I'm a fan of pickelhaube too:

Hogge Wild fucked around with this message at 10:00 on Mar 11, 2016

Hazzard
Mar 16, 2013

Hogge Wild posted:

Better versions:





"Franz, are we the baddies?"
And it just occurred to me that Nazi's hadn't ruined skull insignias, like the rest of all sorts of iconography that makes metal heads look like Nazis.

On mobile, so I can't be bothered to find the exact question about France, but there were marines in the Old Guard, but supposedly Napoleon hated the navy and the marines by extension, because of Trafalgar.

Nevermind that the whole invasion seems about as unachievable as Operation Sealion to me. Perhaps it would have spread a revolt in Ireland? Hopefully someone knows more than me about Napoleon's invasion plan.

my dad
Oct 17, 2012

this shall be humorous

Hazzard posted:

"Franz, are we the baddies?"
And it just occurred to me that Nazi's hadn't ruined skull insignias, like the rest of all sorts of iconography that makes metal heads look like Nazis.

Strangely enough, despite his cartoon villain look, he's actually remembered in Serbia as the only Central Powers general who fought against us and wasn't a bloodthirsty civilian-massacring maniac. I mean, he got a lot of Serbs killed, but that's a function of his capability as a military commander rather than one of genocidal intent.

Kemper Boyd
Aug 6, 2007

no kings, no gods, no masters but a comfy chair and no socks
My favorite 17th century lady is Ann Cunningham, the Marchioness of Hamilton. She commanded a mixed-sex cavalry troop at Berwick, and threatened to kill her son, the Duke of Hamilton, on account of the duke having the bad taste to side with Charles I.

"Her son, James Hamilton, 1st Duke of Hamilton, had sided with Charles I. When he attempted to land an army on the Scottish Coast in 1639, she organised the defences and came forth with pistol which she vowed to discharge upon her son if he offered to come ashore."

feedmegin
Jul 30, 2008

Hazzard posted:

Nevermind that the whole invasion seems about as unachievable as Operation Sealion to me. Perhaps it would have spread a revolt in Ireland? Hopefully someone knows more than me about Napoleon's invasion plan.

Why so, assuming the Royal Navy had been defeated? The British Army was not and never has been the top-tier army in Europe and Britain is too small for defence in depth. If Napoleon had got ashore in sufficient numbers he'd have wiped the floor with them.

Quinntan
Sep 11, 2013

Hazzard posted:

On mobile, so I can't be bothered to find the exact question about France, but there were marines in the Old Guard, but supposedly Napoleon hated the navy and the marines by extension, because of Trafalgar.

Nevermind that the whole invasion seems about as unachievable as Operation Sealion to me. Perhaps it would have spread a revolt in Ireland? Hopefully someone knows more than me about Napoleon's invasion plan.

They tried invading Ireland in 1798. It was a total fiasco.

feedmegin
Jul 30, 2008

Quinntan posted:

They tried invading Ireland in 1798. It was a total fiasco.

With a whole 1,000 troops (one demi-brigade, i.e. regiment, plus a handful of cavalry and artillery) and without command of the sea, so not surprising really. They were hoping to spark/sustain an uprising by the Irish as a distraction, not seriously take the place over themselves.

xthetenth
Dec 30, 2012

Mario wasn't sure if this Jeb guy was a good influence on Yoshi.

Kemper Boyd posted:

My favorite 17th century lady is Ann Cunningham, the Marchioness of Hamilton. She commanded a mixed-sex cavalry troop at Berwick, and threatened to kill her son, the Duke of Hamilton, on account of the duke having the bad taste to side with Charles I.

"Her son, James Hamilton, 1st Duke of Hamilton, had sided with Charles I. When he attempted to land an army on the Scottish Coast in 1639, she organised the defences and came forth with pistol which she vowed to discharge upon her son if he offered to come ashore."

drat. It seems like that time had a huge sampling bias for women who were high achievers in being loving awesome.

KYOON GRIFFEY JR
Apr 12, 2010



Runner-up, TRP Sack Race 2021/22

Elyv posted:

Would Napoleon have used Marines for his Old Guard :v:

Before Napoleon became emperor, but how were the French revolutionaries able to assemble and organize a large and effective army in the early 1790s, capable of fighting much of the rest of Europe while under an unstable government and after executing/exiling most of their nobility(who I assume were their pre-Revolution officer corps)?

The premise is a little flawed, because the officer corps wasn't completely reduced by the revolution. Jourdan, Kleber, Moreau, and Kellermann were all vital to securing the Republic. Kellermann was a marechal-du-camp, Moreau was a light colonel, Kleber had been an officer in the Hapsburg army, and Jourdan had been an officer in the Royal army. The Revolutionnary army also benefitted from expansion and lack of battalion level officers since they largely ended up promoting on battlefield merit. Calvary units and officers had the highest concentration of Ancien Regime supporters; some of these defected en masse. But really, cavalry is the least important battlefield arm, especially when fighting defensively on own territory.

Major factors:

1. French border fortifications slowing down allied advance and the advantages of interior lines
2. Lack of coordination among the Allies and basically rank incompetence allowing significant formations to be defeated in detail
3. Levee en masse
4. A shitload of minor nobility in the officer corps stuck around (this was not a very clear-cut thing of officers being executed). Really only around 40,000 people were executed, and a lot of that was internecine denouncing of revolutionaries.
5. Most of the equivalent of the General Staff staying around, and Carnot being a loving genius
6. Invasion by foreign powers motivating factors
7. France was really loving good at wars in general so it's not like that magically disappeared - Carnot mixed former regular army formations with levies in brigades for stiffening.
8. Superior artillery makes up for a lot of the issues with a conscript army.
9. The National Guard was resoundingly supportive of the revolution and provided another body of fairly decent troops.

KYOON GRIFFEY JR
Apr 12, 2010



Runner-up, TRP Sack Race 2021/22

xthetenth posted:

drat. It seems like that time had a huge sampling bias for women who were high achievers in being loving awesome.

People tend to write about poo poo that is abnormal.

Tevery Best
Oct 11, 2013

Hewlo Furriend

TO ARMS! Join the Polish Army! Recruitment Department, Civilian Authority of Eastern Territories

Bij bolszewika!
Episode 5: Emergence


Episode 0 Episode 1Episode 2 Episode 3 Episode 4

Last time we were at the point where both sides found themselves in a fairly lengthy spell when they could not wage the war really effectively. The Soviets were drawing down their forces, fearful of White Russian armies surging against them, while the Poles, roaring to exploit the advantage, could not do so due to German rumbling from Versailles and their own shortage in forces. But in early July, the Polish offensive was restarted.

Let's stop for a second here and consider something that will be very, very important for pretty much the entirety of the war: its scale. Right now, the Polish-Soviet front is some 500 kilometres long. It stretches from the Lithuanian border to the Pripyat marshes, pretty much impossible to cross in any militarily meaningful way. Further south, the two sides are divided with a buffer of rapidly-diminishing Ukrainian and currently rapidly-growing White Russian territory, so it doesn't count. On July 15, the Polish Lithuanian-Belarussian Front numbers 43,5 thousand troops total, of which 19,7 thousand are combat-ready in frontline units. With this, it garrisons some 300 kilometres of the Polish-Soviet Front and another 200 kilometres parallel to the Foch line against the Lithuanians (although this line requires far less of its capacity). How much is that?

Well, it is the less important front for the Poles now, who have concentrated twice as many troops in Galicia. Still, even counting all troops (even those not in frontline units) as garrisoning the Soviet front, it means we are looking at one soldier every seven kilometres. And - you know what? Those 40 thousand men have 56 artillery pieces between them. 400 machine guns. 10 aircraft. It is simply not possible to create a strong fortified line and wage war the way it was during the Great War. Just for comparison: the lean, small, compact, expeditionary, fairly lightly equipped British Expeditionary Force in August 1914 had 118 thousand men, 480 guns and 168 machine guns. And - foreshadowing! - not everyone fully grasps that. For now, the important point is that any defence can be flanked, any strongpoint bypassed, and the front line is mostly lines of small outposts dealing mostly in intelligence gathering to prevent the enemy from a surprise attack.

Given the huge distances and limited forces, railroads were absolutely crucial. We've already had a taste of that when the Poles tactically inserted a battalion of infantry into the middle of Vilnius using captured rolling stock. And the Poles current marching orders include the capture of Maladzyechna (pol. Molodeczno). The place is a fairly large town, located halfway between Vilnius and Minsk, and one of the main rail hubs on the rail line between the two cities, which currently runs parallel to the front and allows the Soviets to move their troops from one endangered sector to another.

The Polish forces moved towards the city from the northwest and the southwest and numbered a total of about 8 thousand. The general idea was to move battalion-sized groups of infantry and cavalry through woodlands, trying to avoid detection and slip through the cracks in the enemy line, then attack with the element of surprise. The first town to be secured was Vileyka, a smaller, but still notable railway station. The Poles hoped to attack at dawn, destroy the enemy, try to catch a train and roll a battalion into Molodeczno before anyone realises what is going on. However, the columns were spotted early, and local engagements alerted the general Soviet forces in the area. The train raid was cancelled, although Vileyka fell on time.

Molodeczno was a Day 2 objective, but the Soviet resistance grew harder, while heavy rain turned the horrible Belarussian roads into a mess of mud. Moving in an armoured train, they disrupted the Polish movements, slowing them down. But with Polish threatening encirclements of one town after another, eventually the fighting moved into the railway hub, which fell on July 3 after some fierce fighting.

Kapitan S. Rostworowski, 2nd Legionary Infantry Division posted:

Our battle goes on. The bolsheviks fight well, these aren't bands, but rather regular, well-led troops. Two of their battalions, with artillery, flanked, tried to get out of the trap the chief of staff set for them. They looked for a way out for two days, finally, cornered, they fought well and lost a hundred men before the rest surrendered alongside their artillery (3 guns and 4 MGs).
(emphasis mine)

In the end, the Poles routed two brigades, took over 800 prisoners, captured 8 guns, 20 MGs and a lot of rolling stock. A WWI general on the western front would call it a nice haul for two hours of an offensive. Here, it was a monumental score. And, more importantly, the Soviets lost the parallel line, making the defence of Minsk - which was bound to happen - much more difficult. Their planned counter-offensive never materialised due to a shortage of troops. The Poles instantly started planning for an offensive against the city itself.

First, the Polesie Front started to attack in the northern part of the Pripyat marshlands, hoping to reach the Luninets (pol. Luniniec) train station and cut the Minsk line in the south as well. Due to the horrible terrain, it took nearly a week, but ended with a success. The Polesie Front was then dissolved, replaced with the Polesie Group, subordinated to the Lithuanian-Belarussian Front, and commanded by Colonel Wladyslaw Sikorski, a talented commander, of whom we'll hear more in the coming months.

Second, POW groups in the Minsk area were activated to provide intelligence on enemy positions and perform guerilla operations against them. This assured that the Polish forces had abundant data for planning on pretty much all levels of their offensive.

Third, they brought up reinforcements. These consisted mostly of the Poznan Army, relieved from guarding the German border after the Versailles treaty, and included the 15th Uhlan Regiment, led by Wladyslaw Anders, a brilliant cavalry commander with a penchant for mobile warfare.

On the Soviet side, the string of defeats suffered by the Red Army led to its commander, Ioakim Vacetis, being replaced by Sergei Kamenev, who had, until then, commanded the Eastern Front against Kolchak. Kamenev commanded a regiment in WWI, then joined the revolution in 1918 and became a Red Army division commander. He will fall victim to Stalin's purges in the 1930s.

Individual armies in the Polish sector also saw their commanders replaced. Of note here is Avgust Ivanovich Kork, who will lead the 15th Army until 1920. The West Front also received a new commander - Vladimir Gittis - but he will be replaced fairly soon.

The Poles knew that the Soviets gathered their forces around the principal rail lines towards Minsk. Most of their troops were part of the Western Polish Red Army Division, now renamed the 52nd Rifle Division, even though the core of its troops are still Polish communists. Davies suggests that one of the unstated goals of the Minsk offensive was to shatter that unit, both to gain its strategic positions and to burn out the nest of vipers it represented.

In any case, the offensive began in early August. The Polesie Group attacked from the south, enveloping the city from that direction, while Anders's uhlans manoeuvred northeast, cutting the rail line to Moscow. Although the fighting was hard, its result was never in doubt: flanked, cut off from reinforcements, the Soviets could only withdraw after a week of combat, with an elite Polish stormtrooper battalion (350 men strong and made up of choice companies from several legionary regiments) seized the city. Three divisions were routed or forced to withdraw, with 25 000 square kilometres falling into Polish hands, including several important towns and minor cities. Of note is the Soviet use of armoured cars in the city itself - the Poles learned that they could be fairly easily dispatched with grenades if not supported by infantry.

On August 8, a company of the 2nd Legionary Regiment moved to cut off the local railway station when they noticed a passenger train leaving the city. Lacking sappers, Porucznik (Lieutenant) Stawarz decided to stop it anyway:

quote:

I assembled all the stormtroopers and told them to stand very close to the track and throw grenades throw windows into the rail cars, but every grenade had to hit and land inside, or otherwise it would explode amongst us.

The train rolls, the windows of compartments and cars move quickly, one, two grenades land in each. Great amounts of luggage can be seen in the compartments, the passengers hid behind their trunks. The train had two locomotives and one armoured car, which did not fire a single shot. The train moved on. The train left towards Borisov.
The passengers of the train were - according to historian Lech Wyszczelski - the commanders of the 17th Rifle Division, military commanders of the city and the local Cheka.

From Minsk, the Poles continued their offensive, reaching Berezina river and pushing the Soviet 16th Army back. The line stabilised near Daugavpils in the north and alongside the Dvina, although it will occasionally be pushed east over the next months. However, generally speaking, Pilsudski reached the line he wanted to reach, capturing all major cities in areas with substantial Polish populace. Vilnius was now protected from the Soviets by 200 kilometres of land. He was ready to talk peace - on his own terms, different from those of the Soviets, those of the Entente and those of other Polish politicians. Secrecy was crucial.

But next time, we won't deal with that just yet. Today or tomorrow I'll post a few maps (I need to get home to make them), some new bio blurbs and a few words on a subject I feel we should deal with about now. Then we'll discuss what happened in the part of the front south of the Pripyat marshes. Then we'll need to discuss politics, for a second, and what place exactly did the Polish-Soviet war take in the minds of Western politicians.

SeanBeansShako
Nov 20, 2009

Now the Drums beat up again,
For all true Soldier Gentlemen.

feedmegin posted:

Why so, assuming the Royal Navy had been defeated? The British Army was not and never has been the top-tier army in Europe and Britain is too small for defence in depth. If Napoleon had got ashore in sufficient numbers he'd have wiped the floor with them.

Remember Ireland had a pretty nasty uprising recently too, and the British Army at the moment is still trying to rebuild after the disasters on the continent. It certainly is more a sane and realistic plan than loving Sealion.

Also, yay more Poland stuff!

Phanatic
Mar 13, 2007

Please don't forget that I am an extremely racist idiot who also has terrible opinions about the Culture series.

Squalid posted:


It involved amphibious assaults into hostile territory in which an active defense was a real possibility.

And then in the Battle of Mogadishu in which the mission objective was actually accomplished, 18 US soldiers died and that was enough to get the whole shebang called off and everyone went home.

Tias
May 25, 2008

Pictured: the patron saint of internet political arguments (probably)

This avatar made possible by a gift from the Religionthread Posters Relief Fund

Phanatic posted:

And then in the Battle of Mogadishu in which the mission objective was actually accomplished, 18 US soldiers died and that was enough to get the whole shebang called off and everyone went home.

While you're technically correct( though US casualties totalled 102) it was a pyrrhic victory in the tactical sense, and neither the marines nor the US public were prepared to keep fighting that kind of war.

Tias fucked around with this message at 17:42 on Mar 11, 2016

HEY GUNS
Oct 11, 2012

FOPTIMUS PRIME

Kemper Boyd posted:

My favorite 17th century lady is Ann Cunningham, the Marchioness of Hamilton. She commanded a mixed-sex cavalry troop at Berwick, and threatened to kill her son, the Duke of Hamilton, on account of the duke having the bad taste to side with Charles I.

"Her son, James Hamilton, 1st Duke of Hamilton, had sided with Charles I. When he attempted to land an army on the Scottish Coast in 1639, she organised the defences and came forth with pistol which she vowed to discharge upon her son if he offered to come ashore."
if she's not the bastard daughter of someone important, whose flag was a naked hanged man on a tree, there's two women cav captains in that war

edit: anyway, my favorite 17th century women/nonstandard men are Catalina Erauso, Elena/o de Cespedes, and Capt. Hendrich.

My favorite 15th/16th century lady is Caterina Sforza. You owe it to yourselves to click that link.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caterina_Sforza

She also invented the barracks, because having your mercenaries sleep somewhere other than shantytowns outside your walls / "that part of town" was apparently an idea that someone needed to invent.

HEY GUNS fucked around with this message at 18:12 on Mar 11, 2016

HEY GUNS
Oct 11, 2012

FOPTIMUS PRIME

xthetenth posted:

drat. It seems like that time had a huge sampling bias for women who were high achievers in being loving awesome.
the early modern period is not only radder than we imagine, it's radder than we can imagine.

Armyman25
Sep 6, 2005
So, can anyone tell me if this book on the Soviet use of the M4 is any good?



I quite liked it, apparently the Shermans were used as tractors after the war instead of being sent back to America.

Other anecdotes were the Shermans were shipped to Russia with bottles of whiskey in the main gun's breech, which the Russians quite liked, and with Thompson machine guns as well, which the Russians didn't have much use for.

chitoryu12
Apr 24, 2014

HEY GAL posted:

if she's not the bastard daughter of someone important, whose flag was a naked hanged man on a tree, there's two women cav captains in that war

So the Marchioness of Hamilton may have been the bastard orphan daughter of a whore?

Ensign Expendable
Nov 11, 2008

Lager beer is proof that god loves us
Pillbug

Armyman25 posted:

So, can anyone tell me if this book on the Soviet use of the M4 is any good?



I quite liked it, apparently the Shermans were used as tractors after the war instead of being sent back to America.

Other anecdotes were the Shermans were shipped to Russia with bottles of whiskey in the main gun's breech, which the Russians quite liked, and with Thompson machine guns as well, which the Russians didn't have much use for.

Yeah, that's a good memoir. Just remember the limitations of memoirs.

Trin Tragula
Apr 22, 2005

100 Years Ago

Time for another battle in Africa. Time for another frontal attack, this one enforced by the situation. Do I even need to say what happens next, or can you just colour the picture in for yourselves? E.S. Thompson is right in the middle of it, too. And from there it's straight to Fifth Isonzo...which has been put back 48 hours for bad weather, which is about the closest to "good news" we can ever expect from that front.

We've also got a shitload of other detailed personal testimony. It's all very interesting and very relevant and just so happened to come up today. We start with Grigoris Balakian's accounts of his conversations while riding down the road with Captain Shukri of the Yozgat Jandarma. Apparently Shukri felt the need to unburden himself to Balakian about the things he's seen and the things he's done to carry out the Armenian genocide. At the Siege of Kut, Edward Mousley and chums are keeping themselves from despair with some amazingly good jokes, considering; Henri Desagneaux moans about the practice of rotating units about the front to stop them falling into a rut; and after all that we do need to end on a positive note.

So here's Private Louis Barthas, as he is now, in the rear. He's curious to know exactly why he's just been demoted. So he consults the regiment's official book of punishments. He finds a downright lie about his conduct in the trenches, which is only to be expected from the likes of Captain Cros, and he's just about to literally close the book on the whole thing when he sees an extra note from the commandant...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4XNr-BQgpd0

Nebakenezzer
Sep 13, 2005

The Mote in God's Eye

Should I know what a Bangalore torpedo is?

KYOON GRIFFEY JR
Apr 12, 2010



Runner-up, TRP Sack Race 2021/22

Phanatic posted:

And then in the Battle of Mogadishu in which the mission objective was actually accomplished, 18 US soldiers died and that was enough to get the whole shebang called off and everyone went home.

The tactical objective was accomplished but the strategic objective was poorly defined and peripheral to US core interests, so it's not surprising the whole thing got called off.

KYOON GRIFFEY JR
Apr 12, 2010



Runner-up, TRP Sack Race 2021/22

Nebakenezzer posted:

Should I know what a Bangalore torpedo is?

Long rear end sectioned pipe with explosives in it. Useful for poking explosives under things like barbed wire. Variable length so you can stay behind cover and prod the explosive part forward.

Trin Tragula
Apr 22, 2005

Probably not. Apparently I forgot to slip the explanation in anywhere, and it's been too long since I last heard of them being used to expect them to be remembered. It's a big long flat bomb that you send forward on a series of tubes (there's got to be a joke in there somewhere), so you can blow something up without having to stand next to it; they were designed in India for detonating enemy landmines.

hogmartin
Mar 27, 2007
Demonstrated in Saving Private Ryan, used for clearing a path through barbed wire and obstacles to get off the beach:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q-b7K4UEUds

Koesj
Aug 3, 2003
Yeah I half-read the Loza book and it's p. decent.

HEY GUNS
Oct 11, 2012

FOPTIMUS PRIME

PittTheElder posted:

It just doesn't seem like the best thought out plan in general...
Well it is the 17th century.

Other notable early modern women:
Ana Mendoza, Princess of Eboli.


Depending on whom you ask, she lost the eye either in a mock duel at the age of twelve or in a horseriding accident at the age of fourteen. Considered the most beautiful woman in Spain in her youth. Joined a convent, left the convent, and arrested for betraying state secrets in 1579. Died in prison in 1592.

Comrade Koba
Jul 2, 2007

HEY GAL posted:

My favorite 15th/16th century lady is Caterina Sforza. You owe it to yourselves to click that link.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caterina_Sforza

"Wikipedia posted:

The fortress of Ravaldino, a central part of the defensive system of the city, refused to surrender to the Orsis. Caterina offered to attempt to persuade the castellan, Tommaso Feo, to submit. The Orsis believed Caterina because she left her children as hostages, but once inside she let loose a barrage of vulgar threats and promises of vengeance against her former captors. According to a legend, when they threatened to kill her children, Caterina, standing in the walls of the fortress exposed her genitals and said: "Fatelo, se volete: impiccateli pure davanti a me... qui ho quanto basta per farne altri!" ("Do it, if you want to: hang them even in front of me...here I have what's needed to make others!").

Shocked by this response, the Orsis didn't dare to touch the Riario children.

:shlick: :black101:

I love that they actually included this scene when they filmed The Borgias.

Vincent Van Goatse
Nov 8, 2006

Enjoy every sandwich.

Smellrose

Comrade Koba posted:

:shlick: :black101:

I love that they actually included this scene when they filmed The Borgias.

She's the Renaissance Italian version of Dr. Venture

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E3LOB_GZagA

HEY GUNS
Oct 11, 2012

FOPTIMUS PRIME
So, since a lot more people were literate during the 30yw than had been earlier (in Western Europe), a bunch of the big generals or political figures were media personalities, almost in the modern sense. (The most famous was Gustavus Adolphus, of course. For those of you who get JSTOR: http://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/24417366.pdf?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents ) Deteriorata and I posted some propaganda, but there was also a trade in art objects related to various causes or various famous people. I've seen a little metal figurine of Gustavus Adolphus in his coffin, but I can't find a picture of it anywhere.

There was also this thing.
http://www.sciencemuseum.org.uk/online_science/explore_our_collections/objects/index/smxg-155317



Memento mori, Wallenstein's bust/skull. Materials: brass, ebony, ivory, stones from his tomb (the original one, not the ones the Nazis put up). Who owned this? Someone in favor of him, to remind them that everyone is mortal? Someone opposed to him? Neutral? And what do you do with something like this once you have one?

HEY GUNS fucked around with this message at 02:21 on Mar 12, 2016

Koramei
Nov 11, 2011

I have three regrets
The first is to be born in Joseon.
that thing owns

FAUXTON
Jun 2, 2005

spero che tu stia bene

HEY GAL posted:

And what do you do with something like this once you have one?

You put that son of a bitch in your foyer to greet everyone.

HEY GUNS
Oct 11, 2012

FOPTIMUS PRIME
the Baroque is full of really weird art objects

(Platonic solids, one inside the other, of carved ivory)

(A drinking vessel depicting Daphne in silver and coral)

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FAUXTON
Jun 2, 2005

spero che tu stia bene

HEY GAL posted:

the Baroque is full of really weird art objects

(Platonic solids, one inside the other, of carved ivory)

(A drinking vessel depicting Daphne in silver and coral)

Goddamn, that is some poo poo you expect to get described in a William Gibson book, one is the residence machine of some special AI and the other transforms into a gun.

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