#Alexiad

[historynavigator]

Anna Komnene, Princess and Historian

Anna Komnene is one of our only sources on the First Crusade from the Byzantine perspective. She was a Byzantine princess, historian, and intellectual. Read more about her life here! #history #crusades #womenshistory #AnnaKomnene #historian #writer

“For even the greatest of deeds, if not haply preserved in written words and handed down to remembrance, become extinguished in the obscurity of silence” -Preface, The Alexiad Anna Komnene is one of the first female historians and one of the most valuable primary sources of the Middle Ages. Her written account of her father’s reign, The Alexiad, is our only source of the First Crusade from a…

[song-of-roland-alexiad]

HIST131C: Martyrdom and Barbarism

Martyrdom and barbarism are two among the many themes that both the Alexiad and the Song of Roland share. This project hopes to explore, through this Tumblr blog I started, such themes in a multifaceted way. Throughout our class, we have worked toward gaining an "unflattened" understanding of history: to avoid falling into binary or monolithic historiographies. Instead, we have constantly sought to relate our historical Crusades content to contemporary "Crusading mentalities,"

All the sources beyond sources posted on Sakai are linked in the posts, and images are hyperlinked to their sources -- so just click on them. Tumblr puts the most recent posts first (and clearly I didn't think that through until I realized I made a good call on writing the introductory post last). I didn't plan out the posts in a particular order, so I'm sorry if you need to do a bit of scrolling! Padlet would've also been useful, but I feel like Padlet's presentation appears more crammed, and that I can only write shorter captions. Not only is Tumblr nostalgic for me, I can also write long, detailed posts -- which is always satisfying after you do a lot of research into something!

Working on this project has unveiled a lot more about the Song of Roland and the Alexiad to me -- in how they relate to maps, contemporary politics, music, manuscripts, material culture, old French poetry, and even art. I always enjoy learning about all these different aspects beyond the conventional historical events timeline or statistics, and I have learned many new things in the process of doing this.

Of course, for music, the most obvious song to me has to (undeniably) be from my secondary school history teacher's favorite album: Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon.

Enjoy the blog!

-inq

[incorrectbyzantines]

There is something very special to me about the Alexiad.

[alalumin]

ROUND ONE

Vefa Alexiadou is a food specialist and TV show host. Her books have been widely successful and translated in multiple languages, two have even won awards.

Hypatia of Alexandria was a philosopher, astronomer, mathematician and and taught in the neoplatonic school of Alexandria.

[bechdelexam]

Poetry, Sappho

Analects, Confucius

Histories, Herodotus

Aeneid, Virgil

The Twelve Caesars, Suetonius

Shakuntala, Kalidasa

Quran, Muhammad

The Pillow Book, Sei Shonagon

Alexiad, Anna Komnene

The Knight in the Panther’s Skin, Shota Rustaveli

Nibelungenlied, Anonymous

The Book of Dede Korkut, Anonymous

Journey to the West, Wu Cheng’an

The Prince, Niccolo Machiavelli

Pawns of a House, Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz

A Vindication of the Rights of Women, Mary Wollstonecroft

Meditations on First Principles, Rene Descartes

Paradise Lost, John Milton

Moby-Dick, Herman Melville

Middlemarch, George Eliot

Les Miserables, Victor Hugo

Anna Karenina, Lev Tolstoy

The Pate Chronicle, Anonymous

The Metamorphosis, Franz Kafka

my reading list for next year. subject to change at any point before 12:00 am january 1st, 2023.

[bethanybeatdowns]

something abt fate's glamorization of historical figures (including giving them tits) seems so epic at first glance, then u skim thru their wikipedia page and they're like... *lives after the Great Schism of the Catholic and Orthodox church*, "which Council of ____ are we following?", *invaded by an empire that just disbanded 100 years ago*, political marriage and matchmaking is hard, "our city was terribly ransacked after the fourth crusade back in 1204, we can't ask help from the West!", *civil wars in neighboring states probably*, *Istanbul (Not Constantinople) by They might be giants playing in the background*, the Habsburgs family tree is dangerously getting close to being a vine, Margaret of Anjou girlbossing her way thru England, maybe another chapter of the Hundred Years War.

constantine xi was like existing with by social and political forces of their time. sucks to be him though! imagine being a legit heir of capital R=Rome, only for the austrians to like rebrand themselves as the Holy Roman Empire which according to Voltaire is neither holy, nor Roman nor an Empire while u, the legit remnant of the glory that is Rome is shrinking with forces beyond your control.

the city has fallen and you're still alive, you stand singular against the invaders. the glory that was Rome is in you and you'll perish with it.

[lesbianlanval]

I’m against the fandomification of history but I am for the babygirlificstion of Anna Komnena because it is funny

[goodqueenaly]

Feel free to wait to answer until after you finish up the posts on Jaehaerys's reign: if GRRM did a book(s) on J&A's reign in the style of ASOIAF, who would you like to have as the POVs?

How about not a freaking misogynistic sex-obsessed creep of a maester writing two and a half centuries after the fact?

No, honestly I don’t know why, if GRRM was so set on making a “historical” book about Jaehaerys I’s reign, he could not have written from the perspective of Princess Maegelle. He doesn’t even have to have made her a POV character (although I wouldn’t have said no to that, of course): he could so easily have written the majority of Jaehaerys’ reign as Maegelle’s chronicle of her father, somewhere between the Alexiad of Anna Komnena and the excerpted writings of Princess Irulan peppered throughout the Dune series. Why not have Maegelle comment not just on what could have been historically known about her father, but also her own experience with her brothers, sisters, and the other members of the Targaryen court? Why not have Maegelle inspired by the maesterly tradition of histories at the Citadel but also want to prove her own intelligence and insight?

Or if he wanted to go just straight POV, then the character I would have wanted to read most is Alysanne. Maybe I’m biased (lol), but I honestly think she would be the most interesting single figure from whose perspective to tell this story. I think I’ve said before, the point (IMO) of having a raging violent misogynist (like, say, Randyll Tarly) in the story isn’t to just simply say “gee, doesn’t life suck for women of Westeros”, but to explore how those attitudes affect women (not to mention men who do not perform according to the standards of that society, like Sam). Having Alysanne, ostensibly the perfect Targaryen queen, experience and react to that attitude from the man who proclaimed to love her but was in fact a cruel, sexist man would be, I think, the way to allow for Alysanne’s feelings and make her the central figure of focus and sympathy as F&B very much does not.

[drlinguo]

New episode of the #Register -Podcast #SFB1412 is online! About #Adjectives, #MiddleEnglish and register variation diachronically observed. With Artemis Alexiadou und Tom McFadden

[kchasm]

Ryu Number Chart Update: Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition

Age of Empires II is the second installment in the Age of Empires series, a line of real-time-strategy games putting the player in control of various historical civilizations during various historical scenarios that play out portraying various historical events that occurred historically. Almost historically, anyway—real life doesn't care much for narrative arcs, so there's some conflation and approximation and whatnot for ludicity's sake. Imagine a movie adaption of some famous historical event—Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition is usually at least that historically accurate.

The game abounds with a historical figures you can command around a map, but that's really just the tip of the enchilada. Occasionally, other historical figures who don't actually have a presence on a given historical map poke their heads out to toss dialogue your way—which also counts as appearances. Then there are the interstitial bits that provide context for the playable scenarios, and include illustrations of even more historical characters that don't otherwise appear in levels at all. That counts, too.

Admittedly, the appearances aren't always so straightforward. Take the following screenshot, for example. (You might have to click to zoom in on it. Sorry.)

(Credit: blasteg)

At first glance, it's some questionable meat—sure, it says "Byzantine Emperor," but which Byzantine Emperor? There were a lot of them!

Do a little look-into-ing, though, and it turns out there weren't that many Byzantine Emperors who were personally irked by Freddie "Barrel Boy" Barbarossa's local stopover—just the one, mostly. That almost definitely counts! Though, if you disagree...

Well, actually, it's totally fair if you disagree. Ryu Numbers can get a lot more arbitrary than you'd expect. I'm not changing my chart, though.

I'll be real: I went through approximately two hundred playthrough videos, so it really wouldn't surprise me to hear I've missed a uniquely-named unit or two (or three, or a handful, or a league). If you see anything I'm missing, please hoot and also holler.

(It doesn't help that various updates of the game have mixed things up—for example, a Soomra unit you had to kill in Prithviraj's campaign was at one point named "Dodo Soomro"—a real dude who ruled from about 1181 to 1195—but has since been retconned in subsequent updates to the generic "Raja." Do I count him? I guess not.)

(And of course there's the regular complications, like the research I have to do whenever a name appears to make sure they're a historical figure and not not a historical figure. An example of the latter is Togortac, who appears a few times in Kotyan Khan's campaign. There was a real Cuman figure of historical note named Togortac...)

(Komnene, A. (2009). The Alexiad (E. R. A. Sewter & P. Frankopan, Trans.). Penguin Group. (Original work published ca. 1143-1153 CE))

(... but he was active around a hundred years before when the setting of this campaign takes place, which suggests to me that the game character isn't supposed to be the Togortac and is more likely an original character created for the game that the writers named after the historical Togortac because coming up with non-anachronistic names for historical figures is really friggin' hard.)

As for Ryu Numbering yourself through that topologist's nightmare, though, it's not nearly as complicated:

What's a Teppen? Teppen (stylized "TEPPƎN" because somebody in Nigeria is shouting at you I guess*), is a mobile card game, except instead of numbers, the cards have Capcom characters. And also numbers.

This creates something of a quandary. Do you count (and I'm pickin' a random character here; don't at me) Zangief as appearing in Teppen if it's allowable (even strategically advantageous even) to have a hand stuffed with hella Zangiefy (He's Russian, so I think that's the pluralization)? Sure, he's in the game, moving about within the borders for his card, even... but he's no longer unique. In fact, you could argue that he's on the same level as a generic recurring video game enemy.

Teppen clarifies and complicates the issue by classifying certain cards as "Heroes," which means that you're only allowed one in your deck. These are easier to swallow as unique, Ryu-Numberable characters. Ryu is one Hero (natch), but Oda Nobunaga... isn't.

(Side note: Yeah, Oda Nobunaga—the Japanese dude frequently credited with revving up the unification of Japan after its collapse into a bunch of warring clans—counts as a Capcom character, owing to Capcom's Sengoku Basara video game series. If you've never heard of Sengoku Basara before... well, I can't help you, actually, because neither had I. Judging from a random minute of game footage I hauled up from YouTube, though, it looks a lot like something in the same ilk as Samurai Warriors.)

(... And suddenly, I strongly suspect I've pissed someone off.)

Anyway, the whole point is moot, actually (American definition), because for most of the Heroes, Teppen also has "Hero Stories," wherein the characters are characters, and not cards at all, and Oda makes a cameo in Amaterasu's story leading a demon army alongside Nōhime and Mori Ranmaru.

I have wasted your time.

*The Venn diagram of "People Reading This Post" and "People Who Understand This Joke" has an intersection that is at most the size of an atom, within which is fully contained a third circle titled "People Reading This Post Who Understand This Joke and Additionally Find This Joke Humorous." The population of this third circle is 1.

The Genpei War* was a late 12th-century civil war between the Taira and Minamoto clans over which one of them would be the power behind the Emperor of Japan. There was a lot of drama involved, but the end result was that the Taira lost, the Minamoto won, and the Japanese Emperor effectively became a figurehead with the shogun—Minamoto no Yoritomo, at this point—being the actual dude wearing the boss shoes (which is what you call a "shogunate").

Unfortunately, according to the Namco game Genpei Tōma Den, Yoritomo's tyrannical rule resulted in Japan becoming overridden with demons, and ultimately required the resurrection of previously deceased Taira samurai Taira no Kagekiyo in order to put the land (violently) to rights.

... Maybe forget that last paragraph before you take your history quiz or your teacher will be very annoyed at you.

But anyway that's why Minamoto no Yoshinaka/Kiso Yoshinaka appears in Namco × Capcom.

*Who was Genpei? Nobody was Genpei. If you take "Minamoto," i.e. "源," and "Taira," i.e. "平," and mash 'em together, you get "源平," which is pronounced... "Genpei." This is because kanji often have multiple pronunciations, including what's descended from the native Japanese pronunciation(s) they used and assigned that character to, and what's descended from the Chinese pronunciation(s) of that character.

Oh and Rollo was a Viking who did attacks on France. Then Charles the Simple (i.e. Charles the Straightforward, from the misleading Latin "simplex") of West Francia (sort of the precursor to France) was all, "Look, if I let you have Rouen (and you swear allegiance to me) will you quit it with the ruckus?" and Rollo was all, "'Kay," and that's how the Duchy of Normandy became a thing. He's also known as "Hrólf the Walker" (or "Hrólf the Ganger," which means "Hrólf the Walker"), and he's a skin in the Norse Mythology Mash-Up Minecraft DLC.

Look, sometimes it's not complicated.

There are a few points of curiosity attached to this game and the historical population within, that deserve attention, though. For example, there's the oddly overachieving Mr. Motamid of the Moors.

If you play through the El Cid campaign, the relevant bits go something like this:

King Alfonso takes advantage of the instability caused by a political assassination in Toledo, sending in his army—headed by El Cid—to fold the locale into his empire. While on the scene, El Cid meets Motamid of the Moors, who can only react with gratitude when he hears that the Emperor of Spain has come to restore order to the land.

On a side note, the primary function of the superior rectus muscles is to effect elevation of the eyeballs.

It turns out that Motamid is actually the lord of Zaragoza, which means that El Cid has somewhere to serve when he's exiled by King Alfonso. El Cid, ever-loyal to King Alfonso, eventually convinces Motamid to ratify a treaty that makes Zaragoza part of King Alfonso's empire as well, since, uh… well, the story doesn't actually give a reason for Motamid to have done that, but rest assured that it was a Good Thing That Happened!

Keep working those superior rectus muscles!

King Alfonso is still pretty leery about Motamid and El Cid being the cool kids in Spain, though, so he ends up sending an army down to Zarazoga anyway. El Cid, still loyal to King Alfonso for some reason, cannot fight against his lord/former lord/it's complicated, and so avaunts, forcing Motamid to seek help from the Almoravid Dynasty just past Gibraltar instead.

El Cid comes to King Alfonso's aid, driving back the Almoravid forces, and Alfonso recognizes El Cid's loyalty by, uh, exiling him again. El Cid, once more needing somewhere to hang out, ends up conquering Valencia for himself—Motamid's no longer in the picture, unfortunately, as when the Almoravid folks moved in, they sent Motamid on his own bout of exile into the desert.

When a piece of media gets adapted, it's not uncommon for characters to be simplified for the sake of narrative ease, but it feels a little hinkier when it's real history it's happening to. In this case, Motamid is an amalgamation of at least a coupla different folks:

Yusuf al-Mu'taman ibn Hud, the actual ruler of Zaragoza who was served by the mercenary troops of El Cid, and

Al-Mu'tamid ibn Abbad (note the name), the ruler of Seville and vassal to King Alfonso until the taxation got onerous, at which point he stopped paying and also asked the Almoravid folks for help to keep not paying. This ended up being a Very Bad Decision, as the Almoravid folks decided that the best way to help was by making Al-Mu'tamid ibn Abbad not the ruler of Seville anymore and exiling him to Morocco.

That said, the in-game character is at least named "Motamid," which I've ultimately arbitrarily decided means he's a vagarious portrayal of Al-Mu'tamid ibn Abbad rather than being a fictional character created by the writers to serve the function of multiple non-fictional characters. Don't at me.

Ludovico Trevisan and Pietro Giampaolo Orsini appear in Francesco Sforza's campaign, except for the fact that they don't appear in Sforza's campaign at all. What an apparently self-contradictory statement! Don't you feel the piquing of your interest?

If you've never heard either of these names before—which, fair—suffice to say they were a coupla folks around during the time when the Italian Peninsula was a buncha states jockeying amongst each other for power. Trevisan was a Catholic bishop, serving the Papal States—the Pope was basically another king, back then, with his own kingdom and whatnot—while Orsini was a condottiero, which is Italian for "worked for whoever paid him." Both men participated in the Battle of Anghiari in 1440, a battle immortalized by Leonardo da Vinci...

Or at least it woulda been. Unfortunately, da Vinci's The Battle of Anghiari was infamously unfinished and also infamously lost. The most notable remainder we have of the work is actually a drawing by Peter Paul Rubens (who, you might have noticed, is a totally different person)—a copy of a copy of the central portion, which would have featured, among other elements, a bunch of horses having a very bad time.

Now, I'm really not that learned in Italian history, or Italian art (or non-Italian of either of those, for that matter), but I've been informed by The Art Books that those two folks in the upper right hand portion of the sketch are, in fact, Trevisan and Orsini.

(Metropolitan Museum of Art. (2003). Leonardo da Vinci: Master draftsman (C. C. Bambach, editor). Metropolitan Museum of Art. Zöllner, F. (2000). Leonardo da Vinci: 1452–1519 (F. Elliott, trans.). Benedikt Taschen.)

Names are different, but those are the same guys. I'm pretty sure.

(Also, before anyone chimes in, I'm aware Wikipedia says the rightmost guy is Giovanni Antonio Orsini del Balzo instead, but the Wikipedia pages have no sources for that. If I'm gonna be wrong, I'm gonna be wrong post-doing-the-research, dammit.)

So why is this relevant at all to Ryu Numbers, considering that neither of these folks appear in Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition at all, even plotwise? It's relevant because of the dude just to the left of those two, who, if you've read those little snippets rather than just taking my word for it, you already know is Niccolò Piccinino, who does appear in the campaign and the plot of the campaign. And when it came time to illustrate Piccinino...

(Credit: ClearSights)

(You could argue the faces look different enough to throw identification into doubt past the margin of error, and you know what? That's fair. I wanna give you the option, at least.)

Yes, Joan of Arc is in Warriors Orochi 4 Ultimate.

(Credit: Xaldin)

That might seem weird, but it's already a game about significant historical and pseudohistorical figures from Japan's Sengoku period and China's Three Kingdoms Period getting isekaied into a temporary crossover thanks to the shenanigans of Greek deities et al., so sure, why not? She's actually in from a previous Koei game, Bladestorm: The Hundred Years' War, which I'm given to understand is a Hundred Years' War musou and which I really have to watch at some point. It's on my List. I'll get to it. Eventually. Probably.

Point is:

Something something but it's weird that it happened thrice, right?

Wait, isn't Robin Hood in Fate/Grand Order?

No, he's not.

Yes, I know it says his name is—

Okay, listen. I know what it looks like, but this isn't Robin Hood. This is a totally unrelated guy who lived in a forest, dressed in green, used a yew bow, and fought against the local feudal lord.

If you're thinking that that sounds pretty Robin-Hood-like, you're not the only one who noticed. He ended up being another guy to bear that name, and was eventually betrayed (Robin-Hood-like) and shot one final arrow to mark his burial preferences (Robin-Hood-like!) before dying. All this Robin-Hoodedness was apparently enough such that when the Character Gacha Device went rummaging for any Robin Hoods it had in stock this guy met all the qualifications and got the moniker all slapped up on into him once more.

Look, I don't make this stuff up.

Speaking of Fate/Grand Order lore, Attila the Hun is—okay, actually, this is gonna need another tangent. Like, more than that Robin Hood stuff did. You know that part in Captain Underpants where the narrator's all, "But before I can tell you that story, I have to tell you this story"? Steel yourself.

In Fate/Grand Order lore, the "Velber" is an observational device created by an ancient alien race. It works on a set orbit, passing through the Milky War Galaxy once every fourteen thousand years, selectively targeting and destroying all intelligent life in its path. Why? lol aunno.

Inside the Velber are "Anti-Cells," organic life forms developed from the data of destroyed civilizations, which are specifically designed to be deployed and actually do the intelligent-life-destroying until there isn't any intelligent life left to destroy, at which point the Anti-Cell effectively starves to death.

One such Anti-Cell was deployed to Earth in 12,000 BC, where it proceeded to destroy much of Earth's earlier civilizations, including Atlantis. Fortunately for us (but unfortunately for you, since you have to read this explanation), the Anti-Cell was killed by a human wielding of Excalibur—yes, that Excalibur, the one King Arthur would end up lugging about later. It was made by fairies, but that's not important right now. Don't worry about it.

Bits and bobs of the Anti-Cell remained on Earth, giving rise to a number of mythological characters and mechanisms. One particular piece of the Anti-Cell was discovered by the descendants of the Xiongnu people, woken, and—yeah, you see where this is going by now—dubbed "Attila." Attila, acting on instinct beyond understanding, went on to destroy civilizations until expiration.

Also she was a girl, because Type-Moon keeps doing that. We probably can't stop them anymore.

Oda Nobunaga was a girl, too. That's right, scroll up. Bet you thought that was just a bishounen aesthetic, right?

Anyway, the only problem with counting Fate/Grand Order's Attila as Attila—okay, the only relevant problem—is: Does this count as "Attila," or does this count as "the Anti-Cell that already had a distinct identity, but was referred to as 'Attila' by the Huns"? (That is a difference, as far as The Chart is concerned.) Is this still the Anti-Cell? Would this be more like a piece of the Anti-Cell given its own ego? Does that make her a different character than the original Anti-Cell?

lol aunno.

But of course, you can neatly sidestep that entire issue by just going through Age of Empires instead.

I have wasted your time again!

Here's a question: Can we use Tamerlane to get to Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem?

Context: Roberto Bianchi's level in Eternal Darkness starts off with him captured by a warlord and to ordered to apply his architectural knowledge to a monument the guy is having constructed. Spoilers: Things get worse for Bob.

The armor the warlord and his folks are sporting have a real Timurid inspiration about them, but the most Tamerlaney resemblance comes at the scenario's ending cutscene:

(Credit: NineWheels)

This admittedly awesome quote didn't come from anyone at Silicon Knights—it's a thing the real-life Tamerlane/Timur/whatever he wants to be called said himself, according to Bertrando de Mignanelli (and the guy who translated him in 1956):

(Fischel, W. J. (1956). A New Latin Source on Tamerlane's conquest of Damascus (1400/1401): (B. de Mignanelli's "Vita Tamerlani" 1416). Oriens, 9(2), 201-232. https://doi.org/10.2307/1579274)

Also an issue of Nintendo Power straight up says he's Tamerlane, so.

(Nintendo of America Inc. (2003, January). Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem. Nintendo Power (164), 134-137)

There's kind of a serious issue here, though, which is that Timur died in 1405 (at nearly 70 years old), and Bianchi's level takes place in 1460. A couple of years off is one thing to overlook, but fifty plus is more than a little difficult.

"But you know, K.C.," I hear the version of you I made up entirely within my own imagination say and also it is past midnight so I am not feeling very gracious toward the construction of imaginary-you right now, "Eternal Darkness is a game where reality Gets A Little Wonky, including potentially time. Is there a possibility you can count this as Tamerlane nevertheless?"

And the answer remains a definite no for the most important reason of all: Whether this warlord is supposed to be Timur or not, it doesn't change the fact that—and spoilers, here—he doesn't exist. The dramatic irony, unbeknownst to Bobby (but beknownst to us), is that this warlord is just another identity taken up by Pious Augustus, who technically isn't the Big Bad of the game but is the closest thing the player has considering that his direct boss is one of three of four (of five?) eldritch Lovecraftian ancients. So no, that's not Tamerlane, even if it is Tamerlane. At best, that's Pious Augustus Who Has Taken On The Name of Tamerlane, and as far as The Chart is concerned, that's Different.

... I mean, not that you can't still get to Eternal Darkness anyway. You just can't use Tamerlane. You can use Charlemagne instead, since there's a whole level about catching up to him before he can get hit with All The Curse.

(Credit: Super Best Friends Play)

Spoiler: You fail, and he gets hit with All The Curse. Route still works, though!

Also you don't need Age of Empires in the first place. Just use Civilization.

I continue to waste your time!

(A non-Ryu-Number-related tangent, for a sec: Maximillian Roivas was voiced by the great William Hootkins, who appeared in the flesh in a bevy of supporting movie roles, but who you might especially remember as one of the many doomed X-wing pilots going through the Death Star run at the end of the original Star Wars. Specifically, he plays Porkins, who actually gets identified by name shortly before becoming unidentifiable. If you still can't recall (or if you're stuck the sound off and no subtitles), he's the pilot who, if you already knew one of the pilots was named "Porkins," you'd expect to be the one named "Porkins." Someone in production was mean.)

Finally, at the bottom of this post, I want to talk about a particular connection through Minecraft and The Cursed Crusade that isn't on the chart, actually, because it is Very Iffy At Best and iffy on two fronts besides. Why bring it up, then? Because this is my post, and I'm allowed to ramble fuddy-duddily about the things that interest me if I want.

Anyway, this one depends on two particular appearances: the "Grim Reaper" skin from the Minecraft Halloween Mash-up DLC, and, uh... this other guy from Cursed Crusade.

(Credit: LoadingReadyRun)

Right, so, who exactly is this guy? Well, the game calls him "Death," and he calls himself "Death," subtitled with a capital D and everything, but can you really say an armor-clad depiction of the personification of Death and the Grim Reaper are the same character? Yeah, they're both incarnations of Death, but are they really the same?

(Credit: LoadingReadyRun)

It doesn't help that The Cursed Crusade is so irritatingly vague when it comes to its own lore. For those who have never had the misfortune of experiencing this game, The Cursed Crusade takes place during the Fourth Crusade to Jerusalem, i.e. the one where they ended up sieging Christian cities for money. The protagonist of the game, Denz de Bayle, is Cursed, which effectively means that every now and then someone sets the "Hell" layer to visible in Photoshop and the guy with the slightly techno armor in the screenshots there starts hunting Denz down.

Alright, so that's the big obvious symptom of Being Cursed. But what is the Curse actually doing?

Game doesn't say.

Why is Denz Cursed in the first place?

Game doesn't say.

What is the nature of the knight of Death that seeks to drag Denz to Hell (if he has any nature, beyond simply "Death"), and what tasks him to this duty?

lol aunno.

... Yeah, no, that really doesn't work (hence the asterisk, which usually marks ungrammaticality, but which has taken a part-time job here). If you want to Ryu Number your Cursed Crusade, you have to get in the other way around:

The Cursed Crusade ends in a very And-The-Adventure-Continues! fashion, with the protagonist on his way to Egypt to find his father and said father in Egypt being confronted cliffhangerily by the game's primary baddie. It's all very Hinting At A Sequel, but considering that the game came out in 2011 and, more importantly, Wasn't Very Good, I seriously doubt explanations are forthcoming anytime soon. Or just "anytime," really.

Still, speaking as the dude who made a monstrous Historical Figures Ryu Number Chart in the first place, it's kind of a loss. The Cursed Crusade had a bevy of historical figures, and I can only imagine that a sequel would have done similarly—

(Credit: LoadingReadyRun)

On second thought we are all worse off for this game's existence.

... Wait, am I done? Hey, I'm done! This post took a lot longer than I thought it would to put together, and I thought it was going to take a long time in the first place. Watching two-hundred-plus Age of Empires II videos will make anyone's brain melt, even with the Firefox extension that lets you play YouTube videos at quintuple speed.

But you know what this means, right? It means I never have to watch an Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition video again. Thank goodness.

... Sorry, what's a "turnarome"?

"Return of Rome"? What's "Return of Rome"—

Oh.

Oh huh.

Motherf—

[katharinepar]

Hey do you have any book recs for Byzantine history in general or for people just starting to learn about it?

Hello – so sorry this took so long! I'm finishing up a research project and haven't had a chance to log into Tumblr. While I have always, and will always, love the Byzantines, my job dictates that my focus is on the Tudors, all the time, so I apologize if some of these aren't completely up to date. Nevertheless, I'm happy to provide clarification on any of my suggestions and would be open to answering any questions you might have.

Bear in mind that the history of the "Byzantine Empire" spans a thousand years, and encompasses varying periods that differ significantly. It would probably be beneficial to nail down which period you're interested in studying/learning more about and going from there (though for a comprehensive overview I recommend the Cambridge History or Byzantium by Cyril Mango, both of which I've cited below).

Also, I was really delighted by this question – thank you!

Books

Cambridge History of the Byzantine Empire (2009)

Byzantium: The Empire of New Rome by Cyril Mango

The Fall of Constantinople 1453 by Steven Runciman (though 1453 by Roger Crowley is also a great start)

Byzantium: The Early Centuries by John Julius Norwich (a good introduction, as is A Short History of Byzantium)

Women in Purple: Rulers of Medieval Byzantium by Judith Herrin

Byzantium: The Surprising Life of a Medieval Empire by Judith Herrin

The Last Centuries of Byzantium by Donald Nicol (the edition I read is dated, some 30 years old; I don't know how recent publications have fared – more academic than the others)

Lost to the West by Lars Brownworth

Byzantium: The Bridge from Antiquity to the Middle Ages by Michael Angold

Streams of Gold, Rivers of Blood: The Rise and Fall of Byzantium, 955 A.D. to the First Crusade by Anthony Kaldellis

Biographies

Anna Komnene and the Alexiad: The Byzantine Princess and the First Crusade by Ioulia Kolovou

Podcasts

The History of Rome Mike Duncan

History of Byzantium

Primary Sources

Anna Komnene's Alexiad

Further research

Historia Civilis, last I checked, has a fairly decent catalogue on Rome and Byzantium on Youtube.

If I think of any more to suggest I'll tack them on in a reblog.

[song-of-roland-alexiad]

...it is bad for generals who in a time of universal peace purposely excite their neighbours to war. For peace is the end of every war, but tho choose war in every case instead of peace for the sake of anything... this is the characteristic of senseless generals and demagogues and men who are working for the destruction of the state.

The Alexiad, Book XII, translated by Elizabeth Dawes, 2000. (220)

Concepts of war versus peace, "us" versus "them," and morality resonate across the Song of Roland and the Alexiad. Here, Anna Komnene criticizes the senselessness of instigating war without a cause, or inflicting violence for the sake of disrupting peace and one's own personal gain.

[abigail-pent]

The Alexiad of Anna Comnenos slaps, actually

"[That braggart Robert Guiscard was] notorious for his power-lust, born in Normandy, but nursed and nourished by manifold Evil"

[alalumin]

OK we are actually doing this! Here I have listed the contestants of the greek tumblr sexywomen poll, complementary to @sugaroto 's sexyman polls. This polls is more accurately the "greek iconicwomen of tumblr" lol. I will be updating this list and providing links when a new poll is posted

Round 1

Aliki Vougiouklaki (old actress) vs Aggela Ioakimidou (tv show: Στο Παρά Πέντε/ In the Nick of Time)

Aspasia (Pericles' wife but great in her own way) vs Vicky Kaya (tv presenter)

Sappho (poet) vs Medusa (mythical gorgon)

Xena (tv show: Xena: Warrior Princess) vs Katerina Sakelaropoulou (judge/greek president)

Eleni Vlachaki (tv show: Κωνσταντίνου και Ελένης/Konstantinou and Eleni's) vs Maria Solomou (actress)

ZoePre (YouTuber/podcast host) vs Zoumpoulia Abadjidou (tv show: Στο Παρά Πέντε/ In the Nick of Time)

Matina Mantarinaki (tv show: Κωνσταντίνου και Ελένης/Konstantinou and Eleni's) vs Σαββατογεννημένες/ Women-born -on-Saturday (tv show cast) (yes I am putting them all as one entry 'cause we couldn't decide)

Aglaia Karagiozi (shadow puppet theater) vs Aglaia (tv show: Το Καφέ της Χαράς/ Hara's Caffe)

Eleni Foureira (singer) vs Sophia Hadjipanteli (part of the GNTM jury)

Amalia Antonopoulou (tv show: Στο Παρά Πέντε/ In the Nick of Time) vs Sophia Laskaridou (painter)

Eleni Menegaki (tv presenter) vs Eleutheria Karadimou (goddess amateur author, director, screenwriter, actress ect)

Arleta (singer) vs Maria Lekaki (actress)

Mimi Denissi (actress) vs Empress Theodora (byzantium empress)

Katerina Lehou (actress) vs Laskarina Bouboulina (greek independence fighter)

Mascot of Papadopoulou biscuits vs mascot of Nounou milk (greek enough i think?)

Soso (tv show: Εγκλήματα/ Crimes) vs Vicky Georgiou (tv show: Ευτιχισμένοι Μαζί/ Happy Together)

Jenny Karezi (old actress) vs Christina Markatou (tv show: Dolce Vita)

Angeliki Nikolouli (tv presenter, researcher about crime cases) vs the head builder's wife (character in the Bridge of Arta story)

Bessy Argyraki (singer) vs Manto Maurogenous (greek indepence fighter)

Vefa Alexiadou (tv presenter/food specialist) vs Hypatia of Alexandria (philosopher, astronomer, mathematician)

Petroula Kostidou vs Sofia Vempo (old singer/actress)

Maria Callas (singer) vs Helen of Troy (mainly the Illiad)

Penelope Delta (author) vs Melina Merkouri (old actress/activist/politician)

Marina Diamandis vs Rena Vlahopoulou

[lilyseverina]

@just-late-roman-republic-things

I think for the women section in Byzantine, you can add Aelia Eudoxia, the wife of Arcadius, Aelia Pulcheria (problematic though, not sure if you want to include her) Aelia Eudocia, the wife of Theodosius II and Galla Placidia.

Anna Komnene who is the author of the Alexiad, a biographical work that accounts Alexios I Komnenos' reign, her father.

Her mother Irene Doukaina.

Empress Theodora, wife of Justinian the Great (I) (for obvious reasons and a famous one, not sure if you include her in your list.)

[barbiegirldream]

What's so fun about the Alexiad is Anna knew these people. She can write about Imperial Prince Constantine the son of a deposed Emporer and describe him as she knew him when she was a girl because they were engaged and grew up in the same house. She can throw in that she remembers him golden and statue like and then laugh at herself for being sappy and move on. Because she's an old woman looking back in time at Constantine telling us how he moved and walked and talked. Nothing about the day he was born where he was born or the list of things he did. Historians peering through the curtains at the Imperial family could never