I'm not sure you can really state that thesis with certainty.

The world's top two religions are indeed monotheistic.

However, that could just be explained due to them both arising in the same region.

The third and fourth largest religions, Hinduism (1 billion adherents) and Shenisim (about 400 million), are both polytheistic.

The fifth, Buddhism (also about 400 million) either has no gods or is polytheistic as well, depending on how you want to look at it.

None of these really seem to be in any current danger of being replaced by a monotheistic faith.

One can also make a case that the two large Monotheistic religions were primarily spread by the sword, so its debatable how much their modern success has to do with their own internal qualities.

Nearly all countries where Islam is prevalent are either Afro-Asiatic-speaking countries, or were conqured/colonized by Afro-Asiatic speakers during the period they ran the trade routes to the far east and sub-Saharan Africa (and all such countries lie along those trade routes).

Nearly all countries where Christianity is prevalent are either Indo-European speaking, or were conquered and/or colonized by Indo-Europeans during their imperialistic age.

So if I were to have to put a time on this...

For Islam it would be the 8th to 11th centuries along the spice routes, and the end of that time for sub-Saharan Africa.

For Christianity there would be two major periods of expansion: one from the time of Constantine (4th Century) to the end of the Roman Empire (5h Century), some slow progress in Europe after that, and then another that started with the Age of Discovery in the late 15th century, and ended (most likely) with decolonization in the late 20th Century.

One of the main common tenets of Monotheistic worships, is the inherent assertion, that there is only one God; that those who consider otherwise are wrong.

Hence, its a motivation that followers should make efforts to bring those who don't recognise their one God, under Him,because they are under the influence of wrong.

Hence, monotheistic religions all over the world, made the efforts to get more and more followers, and hence they got more and more followers.

Polytheistic religions, most often, did not see differences as problems, unless there were steep cultural disparities.

People with new Gods, meant , to polytheists, most often, new Gods to be worshipped and added to the pantheon.

Simple

It's odd no one has mentioned Judaism.

Arguably the source of both Christianity and Islam

, it has (despite occasional attempts) never been very imperialistic.

Also, Sikhism, another monotheistic religion, has not (that I know of) been particularly imperialistic.

On a slightly different topic, if members of two different monotheistic religions discover that they have no major doctrinal differences, can it be said that the religions are truly different?

Therefore, isn't it likely that multiple monotheistic religions have merged into just a few over the millennia, especially in the pre-Christian era?

Not getting into the WHY.

But take a look at Egyptian religion and history.

They were polytheism ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient_Egyptian_religion ) transformed into monotheism ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atenism ) and then changed back.

Looking at those details and might provide some insight as to the how.

Almost every religion or spiritual belief system in the world has at least some expression of a single god or an underlying force that permeates everything.

God in that sense is usually described as omnipresent, unchanging, eternal - that which has always been, always will be and from which everything is created.

For Hindus that would be Brahman , Christians would call that God , in Islam it's Allah , Taoism teaches of Tao and the list could go on.

Even in shamanic traditions there is almost always something that is recognized as the underlying force of all existence.

Modern physics has also observed and recognizes such a concept.

Physicists nowadays call it the Unified Field Theory .

In polytheistic belief systems the various gods are usually expressions of different aspects of existence.

Monotheistic religions speak of a direct connection that an individual can achieve with god.

Perhaps this makes the proposed final reward of monotheistic religions very appealing and the ultimate punishment very frightening.

Psychologically this is a far more powerful form of mind control.

Polytheistic religions don't speak of such grand rewards or punishments.

The different gods govern various aspects of the world and the believer is left to barter with the gods for good fortune.

If you look at the European area alone, there is a distinct shift towards a more 'modern' monotheistic religious in the rise of the Mystery cults in Greece and Rome.

Mithras, Sol Invictus, were somehow different and beyond and more exciting than the old pantheon.

Even in standard Paganism, individuals tended more and more to identify with a smaller set of gods as patrons - Jupiter and Hercules for Diocletian and the Tetrarchs.

Julian the Apostate's supposed return to Paganism was in a form that standard mythologies would find puzzling, as he imposed a single heirarchy for all pagan gods with one god at the top.

In the midst of this, Christianity gained traction as it also could offer a more personal, active relation between men and the gods than standard Paganism.

It won out in this case, but the other cases indicate that Paganism was becoming unsatisfying in general, and an opportunity for a new religion was open.

I would not consider Atenism a new religion, as it was a personal construction of one man and dropped when he died.

Even his son dropped it as soon as possible.

Question: In the world at the moment, the most popular religions seem to mostly be religions that worship only one "God", such as Christianity and Islam.  However, in the past there were many religions that worshipped a vast number of "Gods", such as Norse, Greek, Roman, Chinese etc.  Is there a historical reason why these older, multi deity relgions were replaced with religions that worshipped a singular god, and if so, when did this occur?

When and why did single deity religions become more popular than multi deity religions?

A lot of mono deity religions were spread by wars and colonisation.

One reason why monotheistic religions grews could be due to military conquest as Christian and Islamic kingdoms expanded and spread their religion accordingly. The spread of Islam could also well be linked to the spice routes.

One possible reason why monotheistic religions grew in popularity was because their spread was linked to military conquest.

The spread of Islam could also be related to the spice routes.


Most noteworthy would be Hess' flight to England in 1941, although that was not quite a defection.

Defection rather implies changing sides in a conflict.

None of the senior Nazis seem to have done that:

Hess seems to have wanted to persuade the UK to make peace with Germany, but his idea of how to do this was hopelessly wrong.

He seems to have assumed that the UK monarchy of the 1940s worked like the pre-WWI German Empire.

Himler was trying to preserve his existing position as head of the SS and Police, and add the leadership of Nazi Germany to it, by getting the Americans, British and French to join the German side in the war against the USSR.

This was considered treason by the existing Nazi government, but was not a defection to the Allied side.

Surrendering yourself, or the forces under your command is not defection.

If German forces in Italy had switched sides and made war against Germany, that would be defection, but they didn't do that, and the Allied side wouldn't have been interested anyway.

Willy Lehmann was a spy, but spies aren't usually considered defectors unless they visibly change sides, or flee to the side they've been working for.

Paulus might be considered a defector, at the point when it was starting to become clear that the Germans weren't going to win, but he was a military officer rather than a politician.

Ernst Hanfstaengl quit the cause before the outbreak of war, but it's hard to call him a senior Nazi.

Operation Sunrise led to the surrender of all Axis forces in Italy on 2 May 1945, 5 days before VE day.

Several high ranking officers were involved in the negotiations and the story is complicated, but Field Marshall Albert Kesselring, the Commander in Chief of the Mediterranean Theater, knew of the negotiations and ultimately approved - I would call this a 'noteworthy defection.'

Allen Dulles' book 'The Secret Surrender' tells the story.

In April 1945, toward the end of the Nazi regime, Heinrich Himmler , the head of the Gestapo (Secret Police) and "SS" military units, left Berlin against Hitler's orders, and began negotiations with representatives of neutral Sweden, as an attempt to surrender Germany to only Britain and the United States, while allying with them against the Soviet Union.

He did this on his own authority, without the consent of Hitler (who expelled him from the Nazi party), in fact, against Hitler's express instructions to stay in Berlin.

His overtures were rejected, but he was basically the highest-ranking Nazi (fourth after Hitler, Goering and Goebbels) to try to negotiate with the Allies without authority from Hitler.

(Admiral Doenitz, who did surrender to the Allies, did so with authority vested in him by Hitler's last will and testament.)

I'm not sure whether being captured blunts the definition of "defection" at all, but after Field Marshal Friedrich Paulus' capture, he cooperated with the Soviets completely, even making anti-war propaganda statements for the Soviet Union .

How about (for an EARLY example) Fritz Thyssen ?

He was a wealthy industrialist who gave large contributions to the Nazis from 1923 to 1932.

He was one of the major characters who urged von Hindenburg to appoint Hitler chancellor and was elected as a member of the Reichstag.

However he soured on the Nazis (and Germany) at the beginning of WWII and took his family to Switzerland (and then France), after which he was expelled from the party and his company was seized.

Later he made the mistake of going to Belgium right as the Germans invaded and he ended up in a concentration camp, but managed to survive the war.

Try to consider Willy Lehmann.

He was recruited in 1929, before Hitler came to power, initially for money, but when the War became expected to start, his collaboration became more ideological as he was strongly against it.

He headed the Gestapo department that was doing counter-intelligence against Soviet industrial espionage.

He transferred over a lot of very important info to the Soviets, that on German weapons, rocket technology, submarines, Gestapo cryptographic codes, and even the exact date for the invasion of the USSR.

When the USSR had lost link to him, he conducted a risky step, and in 1940 put a letter into a post box of Soviet embassy calling for continued collaboration and said his work in Gestapo would lose any meaning if the USSR would not resume contacts.

In 1941 after invasion of the USSR the connection with him was lost.

In 1942 the Soviets tried to reestablish contact, but the Germans captured the sent communicators and executed Lehmann afterwards.

Question: During WWII, before it became clear the Nazis were going to lose, is there any especially noteworthy examples of a member or members of the Nazi party defecting to the Allies?  I'm aware  noteworthy  is fairly ambiguous, but I'm not really sure how else to phrase the question.

What is the most noteworthy defection of a member of the Nazi party to the Allies during WWII?

None of the senior seem to have defected. Himmler did leave Berlin against orders at the end of the war.

No senior Nazis appear to have done this, however, depending on the definition of 'defection', some might fit the description, including Hess, Himmler and Hanfstaengl. There were also a number of captured Nazis who went on to work for their captors. Willy Lehmann might also be an acceptable answer.

No senior Nazis appear to have done this.

There are number of potential candidates to be described as 'defectors', including Hess, Himmler and Hanfstaengl.

If capture is relevant, Paulus and other captured Axis forces would be relevant.

Another potential candidate is Willy Lehmann.


Leather was probably the most common material.

The most basic transportation technology of the medieval era was the foot ...

Those who did not go barefoot ... wore simple shoes.

These shoes were made from leather, including the flat sole.

- Wigelsworth, Jeffrey R. Science and Technology in Medieval European Life.

Greenwood Publishing Group, 2006.

Medieval shoes in general were typically made of leather, and for the simplest designs it was little more than a piece of leather strapped on to the ankle with drawstrings or some similar mechanism.

For footwear, men and women both wore similar styles of leather shoes and low boots; the latter were particularly favored by working folk.

The dominant style of the twelfth century relied on drawstring thongs laced around the ankle to keep the shoe on the foot; surviving thirteenth-century shoes are sometimes fastened with lacings up the inner side or with toggles.

The sole was flat with no additional heel.

As the sole wore out, it might be patched with another piece of leather .

- Forgeng, Jeffrey L., and Jeffrey L. Singman.

Daily life in Medieval Europe .

Greenwood Publishing Group, 1999.

One popular method of manufacturing shoes led to what is called turnshoes , so named because it was sewn inside out, then turned upright when finished.

These used only a layer of leather and while primitive, remained in use for a long time.

The type of shoe made throughout medieval Europe was that known as the 'turnshoe' in which the upper, often of supple goatskin, was sewn onto the sole, normally of cow-hide, and then the whole turned inside out so that the sewn seam was concealed.

- Clarke, Helen.

The Archaeology of Medieval England.

British Museum Publications, 1984.

In addition, some shoes were made with wooden soles , which allowed for footwear with hard soles (turnshoes could only be made with soft ones).

This mainly took the form of pattens , and were effectively wooden slippers.

[A]t least a few pattens were made with thin, flat wooden soles supported on iron braces instead of wooden arches ...

Interestingly, pattens seem to have been the only wooden footwear in the Middle Ages.

Clogs with wooden soles and leather uppers and shoes made entirely of wood such as those traditionally associated with Holland do not appear to have come into common use until some time after the Middle Ages.

- Newman, Paul B. Daily life in the Middle Ages.

McFarland, 2001.

One kind of shoe not mentioned in the other answers are those using bast soles.

"Bast" is fiber from tree bark.

Bast shoes or lapti, were once worn by poorer members of Northern European cultures.

These were usually made from birch or linden.

They are woven like a basket, and so are quite distinct from the wooden clog or hard wooden-soled shoes mentioned in the other answers.

In Spain (especially Catalonia) and France (especially Occitania), espadrilles , soled with jute rope, have been worn since at least the 14th century .

Jute is also a bast fiber.

Unlike the woven bast shoes of Northern Europe, espadrilles generally only make use of jute in the soles.

Thanks to @MartinArgerami for mentioning espadrilles.

In Europe, different demands were placed on shoes based on different climates.

People around the Mediterranean tended to wear sandals with wooden soles and leather thongs due to the warmer climate.

If complete coverage was required, the entire foot might be encased in leather.

In some places or situations, a clog would be worn, particularly if one was working in muddy or damp conditions.

The clog could be entirely wooden, like the iconic clog of the Netherlands, or a typical leather shoe with a wooden base.

Of course, you can compare this with footwear in other parts of the world, like the moccasins of America or the sandals of eastern Asia.

Fashion also comes into play, like the shoes of royalty or a jester.

As others have mentioned, leather has been to preferred choice of material for the soles of footwear for thousands of years.

An interesting fact is that one of the technologies that gave the Romans such an advantage was their hardened leather sandals which allowed them to march 20 miles a day, every day.

Untreated leather and animal skins would wear out after three or four days at that pace slowing an enemy army down and giving the Romans an advantage.

The technology to harden leather was lost with the fall of the Roman empire and does not appear to have been recovered until the late medieval period.

Leather for sure.

My boots are all leather except for a piece of rubber at the bottom of the heel.

"Tough, firm, resistant to wear" exactly describes traditional leather use.

The soles and any other parts are replaced as needed; my "cheap" boots as a teen lasted 10 years, and my current Ostrich ropers are 15 years old and "like new".

Nylon/rubber/synthetic shoes last less than a year of use.

Leather was "perfected" in ancient times, and can be manufactured with variable properties to suit the specific part.

Different leathers and other material are laminated to form what we call composites today, but ancient people already mastered that concept.

It's also important that the boot can be disassembled, using reversable hide glue , nails, and stiching, so individual components can be repaired and replaced.

My brand-new 15-year-old boots were torn down and rebuilt on the original last (wood form).

Question: Today, nearly all commercial footwear has a sole made of either rubber or plastic with rubber-like qualities.  It's a great material for the job, but it comes from a tree that's native to the Americas, and thus was unavailable to the Old World before Columbus.  What did they make shoe and boot soles out of in earlier ages?  Ideally, it would have to be something relatively tough, firm and resistant to wear, in contrast to the rest of the shoe which should ideally be relatively soft and flexible.

What were shoe soles made from in previous ages?

The soles of shoes would probably have been made out of leather for areas around the Meditarranean or be clogs with a wooden base for the north of Europe.

There were a number of different materials used to the soles of shoes before the advent of rubber, however, the most popular was probably leather. Alternatively, some cultures were known to use wood, bast or string to make the soles of shoes or boots.

Leather was probably the most common material used to make shoe and boot soles.

In some countries around Europe, wooden soles were popular.

Some cultures used woven or string soles.


The question is illogical because there was no such thing as a viking in the days of the undivided Roman Empire or of the Western Roman Empire.

A viking is defined as a Scandinavian pirate or sea raider during the period of about 795 to 1100 AD at the widest.

It is always incorrect to capitalize viking and use it as an ethnic word instead of an occupational word.

Thus it is impossible for western Romans before 476 AD to ever encounter vikings since no Scandinavians ever went on viking raids to Roman territories until after the western Roman Empire fell.

But Roman citizens and subjects and Scandinavians did meet sometimes.

For example, Roman artifacts have been unearthed from Scandinavian Roman era sites.

Each artifact was either transported to Scandinavia in stages, passing from one trader to another, or else was transported to Scandinavia in one long trip.

In the latter case, either Scandinavians acquired Roman artifacts in Roman territory, thus meeting Roman citizens and subjects, or else Roman traders and/or diplomats transported them to Scandinavia, thus meeting Scandinavians.

And there were Saxon sea raiders who raided the "Saxon Shore" of Roman Britain and Gaul during the late empire.

In those days the Romans used the word "Saxon" to refer to not only Saxons, but other northern Germanic peoples who raided Roman lands by sea.

Thus it is possible that some of those "Saxons" were Angles, Jutes, and other Scandinavians.

If there were any Scandinavians among those "Saxons" making proto-viking type raids on Roman lands, they might have used the word "viking" to describe their occupation.

Of course modern historians would not approve of using the word "viking" to describe such raiders centuries before the age of vikings.

And as written in andejons' answer, the Roman battles with the Cimbrians may have been with migrants from Scandinavia.

There were a lot of Germanic mercenaries in the Roman army, and SOME of them MIGHT have been Scandinavians.

Radagaisus, a Gothic King, led a horde of barbarians in an invasion of Italy in 405-406 before being defeated by Flavius Stilicho.

The invaders included Alans, Sueves, and Vandals.

I have read that some of the barbarians came from far north, and thus it is POSSIBLE that SOME of them were born in Scandinavia.

And considering that there were contacts between Romans and Indians and Chinese, there could have been some unrecorded contacts of various types between Romans and Scandinavians.

So the answer is vikings no, Scandinavians yes.

I presume you're not talking about the Byzantine half of the Roman Empire here.

Those ties are well known.

So, taking the subject line of your question, Romans of the western half of the Roman Empire meeting Vikings would be impossible because Rome fell before the label Viking was generally applied to Scandinavians.

Taking the text of your question, the answer regarding trade is yes, but mainly through intermediaries .

Regarding seriously scouting for invasion, I don't think so, but one cannot prove a negative.

Leaving aside the questions whether Scandinavians during the first centuries CE could be called "vikings", the answer is that they did encounter them.

The Cimbrians were a people who invaded Italy and fought the Romans about 100 BCE.

The Cimbrians are said to have come from the Cimbrian peninsula, identified with Jylland in Denmark.

As for Roman invasions of Scandinavia, there was really no way or point to it since they could and would not control continental Germania following the battle of Teutoburg forest.

No they did not.

The romans, I suspect, never came up that far north.

They did, however deal with the similar goths.

The Roman Empire, that is to say, the Western half of the Roman Empire, had fallen /collapsed around 476 AD/CE, approximately 325 years before the first Viking ships set sail from Scandinavia.

When the Vikings emerged on the world historical stage, Rome, as well as much of the Italian peninsula, were slumbering through "The Dark Ages".

So chronologically speaking, it would have been impossible for The Romans to have had any type of encounter with The Scandinavian Vikings.

Geographically speaking, as far as we know, the Romans never traveled towards Scandinavia; the most Northern city within The Roman Empire was Cologne in Northwest Germany/

The Rhineland-(or

if you prefer, York, in Northern England).

The last architectural Roman remnant in Northern Europe, is Hadrian's Wall, located in the North of England-(though you could also include the Antoinne Wall in Southern Scotland).

In short, the Romans, even during the final years of their Empire, would probably have not known of the existence of Scandinavia or its indigenous peoples and certainly would have not known of or encountered The Vikings.

Question: Did the Romans ever scout Scandinavia for possible conquest? Or was trade ever done between them?

Did the Romans ever encounter the Vikings?

The vikings were not around at the same time as the Romans. However, Romans and Scandinavians did meet each other.

It would have been impossible for the Romans to come into contact with the Vikings as they existed during very different periods of history. However, there is disagreement as to whether or not the Romans interacted with Scandinavians, though they may have done or at least traded through intermediaries.

It is unclear whether Romans came into contact with Scandinavians as it would be geographically rather difficult and possibly without much point.

It is possible that Romans came into contact or traded with Scandinavains through intermediaries.


Some examples from WW2: Poland was on the winning side but lost the eastern half of the country to the USSR.

Yes they got compensated by German territories, but we could have some fun debating the relevance of that.

Britain came out a winner but it's impoverishment

was a significant factor leading to withdrawal from the Empire .

I have read your question as "Has a country ever won a war, and still "lost" territory, and if so, why?"

One example was the Austro-Sardinian War, otherwise known as the Second War of Italian Independence.

Sardinia (Piedmont) won the war.

She did so with the help of France, under Napoleon III.

She had to cede her holdings of Savoy and Nice to France to obtain this help, (thereby "losing" territory to France).

She was "compensated" by getting Lombardy from Austria in a winning war.

Shortly thereafter, Piedmont's enhanced military and diplomatic stature enabled her to annex other parts of northern and central Italy, and ultimately unite all of Italy under her rule.

Such scenario is not uncommon during the decolonization-related wars of the 20th century.

The colonial power is often able to defeat the other side militarily, but for political or other reasons had to withdraw.

Some examples: Indonesian National Revolution (1945-1949), was considered to be a Dutch military victory, since Dutch military forces were able to defeat the Indonesian republicans and maintain control of Indonesia's major towns, cities and industrial assets.

However, diplomatic pressure as well as the continuing guerrilla warfare forced it to accept the independence of Indonesia, formerly its colony since the 17th century.

Suez Crisis (1956).

Egypt nationalized/seized the Suez Canal (which was previously held by the British) in 1956.

Britain, France and Israel subsequently attacked and defeated Egypt, but political pressure forced them to withdraw and accept Egypt's control of the canal.

Despite being outnumbered and outgunned Finland managed to repel a Soviet invasion in the Winter War of 1939-40 although they lost 11% of their land area.

India had won some territory in the 1971 Indo-Pakistani war , which was a victory for India and newly independent Bangladesh.

However, India ceded the territory in the 1972 Simla agreement as a gesture of goodwill.

War between Chile and the coalition of Peru and Bolivia During this war, Chile payed with territory (Patagonia territories) to Argentina in order to prevent Argentinian intervention in the war against Chile.

Thanks to this deal , Chile won the war and several territories from Peru and Bolivia.

But Chile lost any demand over territories on the Patagonia east of Los Andes mountains, territories twice the size of Germany.

Would British Empire loosing most of its colonies within 10 years after winning WWII count?

Although the loss was not immediate, it was triggered by the loss of geopolitical positions due to expenses of WWII and rise of Britain's WWII allies.

How about all the little German principalities that were on the winning side of the Wars of the Umpteenth Coalition from 1792-1815 but were wiped off the map nonetheless?

Also, considering that same conflict, Austria was ultimately victorious, but lost Belgium.

Question: Has any country won a war, but lost a non-trivial amount of its territory? For example, 10% or 20%. It doesn't matter whether this country still exists or not.

Has any country won a war, but lost a non-trivial portion of its territory?

During the second world war, Poland and Finland were on the winning side but lost a portion of their land area. The second war of Italian independence was another example.

There are some examples of winning sides losing territory in the process, particularly during the Second World War. Another example of this occurred during the Austro-Sardinian War. It could also be said that the colonies lost following the 20th-century wars may count as lost territory.

Winning countries did lose territory on a couple of occasions during the Second World War.

Such a loss of territory did occur during the Austro-Sardinian War.

Many victory countries in the 20th century wars did subsequently lose colonies, which could be classed as lost territory.


Let' just say that it was highly discouraged.

First, unlike "regular" prisons, guards at concentration camps did not go home every day because it was a quasi military function.

Even when "off duty," they would be either in or near the camp most days, getting a few weeks of "leave" each year.

Second, many were too shocked by the horrors of what they saw to discuss it with their families.

One "exterminator" (not guard) on the eastern front reportedly wrote in his diary, "How I can tell my parents I kill babies every day?"

Third, their work gave them a first hand insight about what happened to "dissidents" or "undesirables" or just people who talked too much.

No one would want to go from being a guard to being an inmate at one of these camps.

As noted by Tyler Durden, you need to differentiate between concentration camps and extermination camps.

So far as the former were concerned, they were not only well known but needed to be well known.

Prisons can hardly serve as effective deterrents if their existence is kept a secret!

According to Robert Gellately, the Gestapo never had more than about 32,000 employees.

Since there were approximately 60,000,000 people in Germany alone, they were only ever going to be effective if people knew precisely what would happen were they to be arrested.

Such was not the case when it came to extermination camps, the existence of which needed to be kept secret for more than one reason.

For a start, it was imperative

that victims not know where they were going and what was going to happen to them when they got there.

The SS went to great lengths to preserve the mystery around these places, telling people to bring luggage with them, changes of clothes, cutlery and a small amount of money - and even, in the case of Jews from Iannina in Greece, purchasing tickets.

Secondly, the Nazis also wanted to ensure that the outside world would know as little as possible about the purpose of these installations.

Battling against the Russians on the Eastern Front, the last thing they wanted their enemies to know was that being captured would involve being subsequently murdered.

To win this war, the Nazis needed the Russians to surrender.

When word got out about the wholesale murder to Soviet POWs (some 2,000,000 - approximately), the Russians knew that it was in their best interests to die fighting.

Finally - and most germane to your question - the Nazis did not want their general population to know.

With all that was going on (rationing, power shortages, allied bombing), they counted desperately on the continued support of their own population.

It is one thing for people to look the other way when they see people being persecuted, even violently; it is quite another to know that entire communities of people are being murdered through an impersonal, industrial process.

That said, while guards were under strict orders not to speak about what they saw and what they did, people always speak about what they see and what they do.

When given time away from work (which was every so often), people not only spoke about what they had seen, they did so in great detail.

Some guards had personal photo albums that related to the times they had spent in individual facilities - and, of course, the same thing goes for shooters.

(Most of the so-called "Einsatzgruppen" photos were taken by perpetrators, and many were sent home to their families by post).

I don't personally know of any instances of people being punished for revealing information to their families and friends, although that may have happened.

They certainly weren't supposed to.

No, they weren't.

Even concentration camp inmates who were incarcerated temporarily were required to sign a paper that they would never tell anybody about what they saw in the camp.

This information was secret for many reasons.

Not only to hide the Holocaust, but to hide other abuses as well (of non-Jewish prisoners), to hide information on who were the prisoners (there could be important figures inside), on the ethnic composition of prisoners, on the jobs the prisoners were occupied with (this was war secret), on the medical experiments performed and so on.

You are confusing two different things: extermination camps and concentration camps.

There were dozens of Nazi concentration camps, but only six extermination camps.

The guards at the extermination camps were a small number of fanatical SS soldiers who were dedicated to carrying out their tasks in the most secretive way possible.

Himmler, the boss of these men personally selected them and trained them to be secretive and there were express policies in place that made it a serious offense to be any way discussing extermination procedures or events with anyone, including girlfriends and wives.

Camp guards were not permitted to disclose anything that went on in the camps and were held to a secrecy code.

There were rules in place also for camp guards about treatment of prisoners and misappropriation of Jewish property and of course we know all about the atrocities that occurred there.

In the many interviews I read with former prison guards they mostly felt they were just doing their duty and did not deserve further punishment for what happened in the camps.

Question: In a  forum  a holocaust survivor reckoned that most Germans did not know about the killing of Jews and others in concentration camps.  Others objected  and said that people at least knew that Jews were disappearing and not coming back.  My question: Were the guards or anybody who worked in a concentration camp and able to leave on a regular basis allowed to talk about the things they did or saw?

Were concentration camp guards allowed to talk about their work at home?

The concentration camps and extermination camps were not the same places. They were highly discouraged from discussing what went on in the camps. However, people always end up talking about what they see and what they do.

The question has confused concentration camps with extermination camps. However, it is generally agreed that workers in extermination camps were expected to keep their work secret. Despite this, it is quite likely that some did discuss their work at home.

The question has confused concentration camps with extermination camps as Jews were not killed in concentration camps.

It is generally agreed that workers at extermination camps were expected not to talk about their work.

Despite being expected not to talk about their work, it is more than likely that they did so.


The longest retreat is the Long March

The retreat lasted over a year and went almost 10,000 km.

The Communists, under the eventual command of Mao Zedong and Zhou Enlai, escaped in a circling retreat to the west and north, which reportedly traversed over 9,000 kilometers (5600 miles) over 370 days

Most people are familiar with the outline of this retreat - essentially,

the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) had establish an un-recognized governance over parts of Jianxi and Fujian .

The GMD attacked, and the CCP fled to join with communist forces in north China.

They settled in Baoan

Napoleon in Russia is the longest clear retreat.

Its the longest regular army retreat, at least 490 miles.

The Anabasis is considerably longer, but it is not corroborated.

There are a few massive countries like Canada or Australia, but they haven't had major wars on their territory.

The only other countries to even approach that kind of length are China and India, neither of which seem to have any notable retreats across their length - besides insurgencies like the Long March, as the other answer has already found.

List of Chinese wars and battles List of Indian battles

You could also consider situations like the defeat of the Africa Korps to be a retreat, but it was more of a delaying action and doesn't clearly qualify.

The reason why Napoleons' retreat was unique was, firstly, because his army was much larger and better supplied than medieval and ancient militaries, and secondly because Russia was late to industrialize and did not have the logistical ability to pursue him.

This is an unusual combination that does not happen often.

The retreat of the Nez Perce under Chief Joseph in 1877 is a good candidate: a fighting retreat in good order, covering a distance that is variously described as anything from about 1,150 to 1,500 miles (1850 to 2400 km).

(I have seen claims that this was taught to US Army and Marine officers, at least as recently as the Vietnam War era, as an exemplar of a well-conducted fighting retreat.)

There's also the march of the Czech (or Czechoslovak) Legion in 1918, after the October Revolution and the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk.

The Legion was formed as a unit in the Russian Army composed of Czechs and Slovaks interested in freeing their compatriots from Austro-Hungarian rule.

When the Bolsheviks started making peace with the Central Powers, the Czech Legion decided to rejoin the war on the Allied side, which basically meant getting to France.

Since getting through the German-controlled Baltic looked dubious, they decided to exit Russia via Vladivostok, in the Siberian Far East.

The march started as a retreat in the face of German and Austro-Hungarian forces invading the Ukraine (part of a move to pressure the Bolsheviks into agreeing to the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk), and effectively ended 6,000 miles (9,700 kilometers)

later in Vladivostok, which makes it a little bit longer than the Long March.

All the same, I'm not sure how much of this qualifies as a retreat per se, since for much of the time they were more on the offensive than anything else (seizing control of multiple cities along the railway route, for example).

It's probably more an example of a (very extended) march through hostile territory.

Consider Anabasis of Cyrus, described by Xenophon.

If we are talking re regular troops then the British Commonwealth retreat to the Japanese on 1942 should be considered.

I can't find an exact distance but History learning site gives this as 1000 miles.

This would have been equalled by the 1944-5 campaign that saw the Japanese retreat that distance although that retreat ended with the whole army destroyed and the British forces being able to go further which the Japaese weren't able to do in 1942, Map from United States Army Center for Military History

Question: What is the longest sustained retreat by a military force in history, by total length? Not counting naval examples, as they can be much longer.  When I search for it I get a lot of results to the  Battle of the Ch'ongch'on River , which is the longest retreat in  US history , but at 120 mi (190 km) it is dwarfed by a more famous retreat, of the  French from Moscow .  Still, that may not be the longest in all history. Which one is the longest?

What is the longest retreat?

They are lots of candidates for the longest retreat in history: the Long March, Napooleon in Russia, the Anabasas of Cyrus, Nez Perce in 1877, the Czech Legion in 1918 after the October Revolution and the British retreat to the Japanese in 1942.

It is unclear which is the longest retreat in history, but strong contenders include The Long March, Napoleon's retreat from Russia or the retreat of Anabasis of Cyrus.


In 1976, Emmanuel Todd published La Chute finale .

The book states that the Soviet Union had been stagnating since 1970 and that its economy was collapsing (

its main novelty, which made it justly famous, is the use of demographic indicators, and especially infant mortality, to pierce through the obfuscations of Soviet statistics).

It predicts the decomposition of the Soviet sphere in 10 to 20 years because of the centripetal forces exercised on the politically dominated european periphery of the Soviet sphere by a new generation of educated individuals well-aware of the much higher standards of living in Western Europe (the precise mechanism described, involving economic stagnation, then ideological decomposition and finally the decomposition of the state system is well-worth reading).

The book was well-received and was a publishing success.

It favorably cites Amalrik's work in numerous occasions and in fact claims multiple times that its core thesis, though controversial, is not at all uncommon in the West, so that in addition to providing a clear example of a prediction of the final dislocation of the USSR in a timeframe and manner reasonably close to actual events, it is also a testimony of the fact that many people in the late 70s had come to the conclusion that the USSR would collapse within one or two decades.

There is a once famous book written in 1970 by Andrei Amalrik, titled"Will Soviet Union survive until 1984?"

English edition: Harper and Row, NY, 1970.

(I don't think it was ever published in Russian.

The author is an emigrant fromSoviet Union).

The date of his prediction is slightly incorrect, but in 1970s this wasa very unusual prediction, people did not believe him.

The details and reasonsof collapse that he describes are all wrong.

When it actually collapsed, I tried to find whether there is any published textof 1970s or 1980s which predicted this, and I found none, except this book.

Neither I could find any convincing explanation of reasons of this collapse.

Why China does not collapse?I lived in Soviet Union, and talked to many people.

Nobody could see thisbefore 1989.

Pemark.

The other answer mentions decline of oil production.

This does not logically imply a dissolution of Soviet Union.

(Cuba and N Korea have little oil, but they still exist).

Decline of revenues from export may mean an economic crisis.

But I believe that dissolution of Soviet Union had other reasons.

Most countries which experience economic difficulties do not fall apart as a result.

In his book „The Grand Failure: The Birth and Death of Communism in the Twentieth Century“ , Zbigniew Brzeziński , National Security Advisor to U.S. President Jimmy Carter, refers to several own predictions about the collapse of Communism in general and the „Soviet Union“ project in particular.

The earliest reference is to his master's thesis of 1950 (I could not find the references on the Web).

In his newer predictions of late 1980's, he suggested five possibilities: Pluralization and „democratizing“ of the Communist regime; Protracted crisis; Economic stagnation; A KGB coup; The explicit collapse of the Communist regime.

As we know, in 1989-1991 the collapse took place, gradually changing into the KGB coup in 1999-2000.

So, the direct answer to your question would be, Certainly, it was not a surprise for officials.

However, the topic was not very popular in media, so it may become a surprise to average citizens in the West.

Further reading: The Wikipedia article Predictions of the dissolution of the Soviet Union lists quite a few similar predictions by other politicians, analysts, and thinkers.

Hélène Carrère d'Encausse, probably the greatest French writer on the history of the USSR predicted the fall of the USSR in her book "L'empire éclaté" in 1978.

She thought it would fall because of the faster growing demography of the Muslim republics of Central Asia (the soviet "stans").

M. King Hubbert predicted that Soviet oil production would decline as it did, thus implying an economic collapse.

It seems that the CIA took Hubbert’s methodology seriously and applied it to the USSR (Anonymous 1977).

This report predicted that Soviet oil production would peak in the early 1980's.

In fact there were two peaks, the first in 1983, at 12.5 million barrels per day and the second in 1988 at 12.6 barrels per day.

Since then production has declined steadily.

It seems likely that the Reagan administration, which took office in 1981, bearing in mind the economic havoc produced when US production peaked in 1981, followed by the Arab oil embargo and the "oil crisis" of 1973-74 and the deep recession that followed, decided to use the "oil weapon" to destabilize the USSR.

Reagan embarked on a major military buildup, putting the Soviet Union under pressure to keep up.

Meanwhile, declining prices after 1981 forced the USSR to pump more oil to supply its clients in Eastern Europe and to sell in world markets for hard currency.

Then in 1985 Regan persuaded Saudi Arabia to flood the world markets with cheap oil.

Again, the USSR had to increase output to earn hard currency.

This led to the second peak in 1988.

Two years later the USSR imploded (Heinberg 2004)

pp 40-41.

The same methodology could be applied to predict the collapse of the Shah's government, the 1970s stagflation in the US, and the fate of oil producers in general.

Hubbert published his method in 1956.

I'd argue that Ronald Reagan, or someone in his administration or amongst his influencers did.

Whether one might like the character or not, methinks he deserves credit for great Soviet Russia jokes and for having reversed the policy of deescalation of his predecessors.

He basically smashed the accelerator to the floor and proceeded to militarily outspend the USSR to death.

It ended up very costly for the US but by 1985 the Soviet Union was spending 25% of its GDP on its military - which is completely unsustainable, and indeed led it to its collapse a few years later.

In this sense one could argue that his contribution to ending the Cold War was quite significant, if not key, and I can't imagine him moving forward with this without

at least some of his surroundings or influencers thinking - or outright predicting - it might work.

Question: This claim was made by  Foreign Policy  in  2011 :   In the years leading up to 1991, virtually no Western expert, scholar, official, or politician foresaw the impending collapse of the Soviet Union   I was wondering if the above claim is true. Would the eventual collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 have been a huge surprise to Western intellectuals and politicians in, say, 1985 (before Gorbachev)?

In the 1980s, did any Western expert, scholar, official, or politician predict the impending collapse of the Soviet Union?

The collapse was not a surprise for officials. Ronald Reagan and his advisors certainly expected it. Hélène Carrière d'Encausse predicted the fall in her 1978 book.

It is unlikely that the collapse of the Soviet Union was a surprise to western officials and some people who are considered to have foreseen it include Hélène Carrère d'Encausse and Ronald Reagan.

It is considered unlikely that the collapse of the Soviet Union was a surprise to officials.

People who are generally considered to have predicted the fall of the Soviet Union include Hélène Carrère d'Encausse and Ronald Reagan.


is their any other place that could have held this moniker prior to that time?

Yes.

Washington

(population 67,000) is a town in historic County Durham in England.

The earliest extant references to it appear in Old English and date to 1096.

As your question didn't specify that the place had to be within the United States, this would be the oldest place with this moniker, and the origin of the surname.

Washington Old Hall is the family home of George Washington's ancestors.

According to this article from the Free Lance-Star (referencing American Philatelist), there were seven other US towns called "Washington" that were established prior to Washington D.C.

It indicates that Washington, Virginia was the oldest to be surveyed and populated in 1749 (although it only achieved 'town' status in the 1790s) and Washington, North Carolina was the first to achieve town status (e.g. a population over 200) in 1776.

The very George Washington's surname suggests that his ancestors originated from a similarly called place in England .

There is a village called Washington in West Sussex, England.

According to the Washington Parish Council: Its name – first recorded in 947 AD – means, in Old English, ‘Homestead of Wassa’s people’.

This etymology (home of Wassa) is also the etymology of the name of President Washington and thus also Washington DC.

The fact that the etymology is the same, however, does of course not imply that George Washington himself originates from this particular village. .

history.stackexchange.com/users/17083/Revetahw says Reinstate Monica

Washington, Georgia claims to be the "first city in the nation to be established in the name of George Washington, 1780".

This is a very interesting discussion!

Here is a place you may not be aware of:

Washington Bottom, a rural community in present-day Wood County, West Virginia, was land granted to George Washington for his service in the the French and Indian War.

Washington visited the area in 1770, and saw "he saw a bottom of 'exceeding good land' and thought there might be two or three thousand acres of bottom and flat land together."

He had his agent

Col. William Crawford survey it for him in the summer of 1771.

Washington received a grant for this survey from the governor of Virginia in Dec 1772.

Col. Crawford reported at the time that they were having a hard time keeping squatters from settling on the land, and recommended hiring men to live on it.

Col. Crawford and his brother Valentine became Washington's agents to start a settlement there.

They started clearing/building on it for Washington late in 1774, but with the onset of the Revolutionary War, the few who had settled there were driven out and structures burned.

Raids by Indian allies of the British kept them out until the end of the war.

The area began to be settled again after the end of the war, although not intensively due to continued raids by Indians until 1793.

However, there was a permanent settlement by 1785.

A blockhouse called Neal's Station was built south of the Little Kanawha River, at the north end of Washington Bottom, in that year.

And, "In a letter written to Thomas Freeman in 1785, he referred to it as the tract 'commonly called and distinguished by the name of Washington Bottom.'

" Settlement picked up after General Wayne's ruthless campaign of extermination in 1793 drove the Indians out of the area.

The land was bequeathed to an heir of George Washington after his death, Betty Carter; she sold it to associates of the Washingtons from the Loudoun/Fairfax County Virginia area, who moved their whole extended families there.

So when would you say this place was started, or named?

And was it named for George Washington, or by him?

Information from History of Washington Bottom, http://www.wvculture.org/history/agrext/washbott.html

Question: It is pretty common knowledge that Washington, DC was named after the United States' first President, George Washington, and founded in 1791.  However, is there any other place, in the United States, that held this name prior to that time?    Inspired by  this question on another Stack Exchange .

Was any city/town/place named "Washington" prior to 1790?

There were seven other towns called Washington, inlcuding towns in Georgia and West Virginia.

Yes, prior to the founding of Washington D.C. it is agreed that there were seven other US towns called Washington in the USA, including Washington, Georgia. There is also Washington Bottom, a rural community in Wood Country, West Virginia.

Washington Bottom, a rural community in Wood Country, West Virginia, supposedly pre-dates Washington D.C.


As the Metropolitan museum's article on armor notes, it took several centuries from the first introduction of gunpowder on the battlefield to the elimination of armor for the infantry man.

The decline took the form of a gradual shedding of armor from the arms and legs and then finally from the body.

The main reasons for this decline were weight and cost.

In theory it was possible to make armor capable of stopping a musket bullet.

However, as firearms became more powerful (thanks to better manufacturing, which reduced windage, and improvements in the formulation of gunpowders)

the armor required for protection got thicker and, therefore, heavier and more expensive.

Heavier armor meant that your soldiers were less mobile and would suffer fatigue more quickly, neither of which is an advantage on the battlefield (or even getting to the battlefield).

Ultimately, of course, no amount of personal armor would be capable of stopping a cannon ball (or even something as small as a 1-pound grape-shot) so even a bulletproof armour was no guarantee of safety.

One of the advantages of the musket was that it required relatively little training (compared to a bow or a sword) to be an effective weapon.

This meant that armies could be raised from lower-class men with comparatively little training (who were free to work on the land in times of peace).

These men could not have afforded to equip themselves with armor, so this cost would have fallen on whomever was raising the army.

The sad fact is that it became cheaper to replace the soldier than it was to provide armor to protect him from the enemy's small arms fire.

I agree with the answer of Steve Bird, but I want to mention one more aspect of this.

Body armor was not suddenly eliminated.

It was still widely used in 17th century, and later.

Here is the Polish hussar armor of late 17 century, very long time after theintroduction of firearms.

But body armor was EXPENSIVE.

With increase of the size of the armies, and general social changes, the soldiers could not be expected anymore to buy it for themselves, and giving it to them was prohibitively expensive.

It is not surprising that body armor first disappeared in infantry, and remained in cavalry.

There was some limited use of body armor even in WWI (it can really protect you from shell splinters which were a major cause of combat deaths and wounds.)

Here is an example .

You can find many moreon the internet.

But it was too expensive to provide soldiers with it.

So they limited themselves with helmets.

Notice that nowadays when the armies became much smaller again, the body armor (bullet proof vests) is widely used.

Why wear it when you can ride it?

Just look at all these lumbering hunks of armour on the battlefield: Source Source

Over time, people began to realise that riding vehicles with armour served way much better than having each person wear armour as a person can only carry so much armour.

Vehicles (or even a massed groups of people) on the other hand, can carry way more armour which can stop gunpowder-fired projectiles.

It is not that soldiers quit using armour, the armour changed platforms.

history.stackexchange.com/users/15897/SMS von der Tann

Because armour that would protect the whole body from muskets would be so heavy you could barely move.

This would put you at a severe tactical disadvantage.

Lighter missile troops could pepper you until they found a weakness and if you try to attack them they'll run away.

Repeat until you're exhausted.

By dropping some, and eventually all, armour you become fast enough to close before they can get too many shots off.

Even as far back as the Battle of Agincourt in 1415, in pre-firearm times, metal body armor turned out to be a drawback, not a benefit.

Thanks in part to the sea of mud in the battlefield, the armored French knights on foot were slowed up, and the powerful Welsh longbow could penetrate main armor at 20-30 yards, or appendage (arm, leg) armor at up to 200 yards.

The slow moving French foot soldiers were slaughtered because they couldn't get close enough to Henry's longbowmen to employ their swords.

The French mounted cavalry wearing very heavy armor often drowned in the mud when the arrows hit their horses and they fell off.

A mounted knight, once dismounted, was pretty much immobile, due to the extreme weight of their armor.

The key here was the introduction of a powerful weapon that could strike at a distance with enough force to penetrate wearable metal armor, thus invalidating the primary reason for armor: protection against a sword or spear at close range.

As Agincourt showed, a fast moving unarmored soldier with a long range weapon handily bested a slower moving armored soldier.

The introduction of the musket, that could do what the longbow could do but with far less training, finally obsoleted metal body armor.

However...

personal armor has made a comeback in the last 30 or so years, thanks to lightweight composite armor that can resist the typical rifle bullet.

Most of the advanced militaries today equip their foot soldiers with body armor, and that is one reason that casualties have dropped for the more modern militaries.

Question: I have wondered this question for a long time. The metal armor has enjoyed its heyday through the early human warfare history right into the renaissance. Then guns and cannons entered the fighting scene and all the sudden, soldiers were only wearing uniform onto the battle field. Compare with cotton fabric, metal armor can withstand more damage. Compared to arrows and sword cuts, bullet and cannon balls were more devastating, weren't there even more reasons for soldier to wear metal armor?

Why was metal armor phased out after gun powder was weaponized?

Armored vehicles are more effective than equipping soliders with armor individually. This reduces weight and cost. Metal body armor was so heavy it turned out to be a drawback, not a benefit.

The main reason that armour was phased out after the advent of gunpowder was likely that the armour required to withstand gunfire was heavy and expensive. Additionally, armour had already long been considered something of a hindrance on the battlefield.

One reason why armour phased out was because any armour which could withstand musket fire was likely to be very heavy.

The armour required to withstand musket fire would likely have been very expensive.

Armour had already long been considered something of a disadvantage in combat.


I would say it is the flag of Deventer.

It's a city towards the east of the Netherlands, that prospered by trading with the various cities around the North and Baltic Sea coast as well as Scandinavia.

It is situated at the river IJssel, which feeds in the Zuiderzee (back then, before Afsluitdijk changed it).

The port of Amsterdam (depicted on the painting) also is connected directly to the Zuiderzee .

Both cities being big trading cities, with easy access to each other, you can imagine many ships from either city visited the other.

Below is a picture of the facade of the Deventer City Hall, showing the single headed eagle on a golden shield, similar to the flag in the OP's question.

Deventer was part of the Hanseatic league, and part of the Holy Roman Empire in the Middle Ages.

It was granted Free Imperial City rights before 1250, which explains the single headed eagle, as the emperor Frederick II adopted the double headed eagle around 1250 (according to the Chronica Majora by Matthew Paris ).

Source of the picture and additional renditions of the coat of arms.

I don't think it's an eagle.

It looks more like a Gryphon.

In that case, it could be from a number of Baltic states or areas, especially Pomerania .

But I'm pretty sure it's actually a lion, or more specifically,

the Flemish Lion, indicating that the ships are from Flanders , which is the Dutch-speaking part of Belgium nowadays, or from the Netherlands in general:

That looks a bit like the flag of Prussia.

At the time, Prussia was a duchy vassal of Poland, and had been given as a standard an Eagle.

There were a lot of Baltic port cities in Prussia, most notably Danzig (now Gdansk )

The only problem is that the eagle is facing the wrong way.

Looking through their flags , it looks like there were a couple of iterations where the eagle was facing to the right instead of the left, but those were both in the 20th Century (and both known as "The Free State of Prussia").

So either this is close, but not it, or the artist was painting from memory and got the facing direction of his Prussian eagles wrong.

I found a site which might lead to the answer.

Sadly I couldn't find the territory named Keizer (Emperor?

Maybe is it a royal ensign for the Emperor himself?), the sixth from left, third from top: Very exact match by color and shape.

check out this link for greater resolution: Very RARE 18th Century Table of all ship's flags in the world - Gerard van Keulen .

In the painting as a whole I see a lot of Dutch flags.

In the enlarged part of the painting there is what looks like a Dutch flag with letters on it (East or west India Company?).

I also see what looks like a yellow flag with something red on it, and possibly horizontal stripes.

A building in the background has what looks like the Amsterdam coat of arms.

I suppose it is a Dutch port and there are Dutch and foreign ships in it.

I think that looking up the 17th century flags of Dutch and foreign provinces and seaports would be useful.

I note that the flag of Flanders in France & Belgium was yellow with a black lion on it

but those look like eagles and not lions.

Most of the north German ports had red and white flags.

The Holy Roman Emperor and the Tsar of Russia had yellow flags with black 2 headed eagles.

And some of their subjects might have flown such flags.

Just as a stone slab with a carved 2 headed eagle was excavated from the site of the Hanseatic offices in London.

The king of the Romans and future emperor used a yellow coat of arms with a single headed eagle but that ship in the painting is unlikely to have used his banner.

A coat of arms yellow with a single headed eagle was sometimes also used for the kingdom of Germany and

so some German ships MIGHT possibly might have flown a flag with that coat of arms.

You should look in 17th century flag charts for similar flags.

In my experience flags with eagles were rare.

There was no law against a shipowner having a personal coat of arms and banner of yellow with a black eagle, so it could have been a private flag.

What type of ship flew the eagle flags and how far was it likely to travel?

It looks like a small ship to me.

Putting banner like flags on staffs at the end of diagonal booms is an unfamiliar practice to me.

Are there specific occasions or types of ships that would be done on?

Here is a site for flag identification questions: http://www.crwflags.com/fotw/flags/ufe.html[1]

Added 04-02-2018 -

I note that the eagle flag looks square, like a banner, while most of the other flags seem rectangular, like flags normally flown by ships, which may be a clue.

This looks like the coat of arms for the duchy of Holland.

A red lion on a yellow background.

This would make sense because Amsterdam, the city thats depicted in the painting, was one of the most important cities of Holland.

Question: I'm doing research on a painting ' Koppertjesmaandag ' by Adriaen van Nieulandt in 1633. In the right corner of the painting you can see a couple of ships with their flags. One in particular is a gold flag with a black eagle. This flag seems to be used a lot for the Holy Roman Empire, although usually double-headed. This particular flag is single headed.   Anyone here with knowledge on European flags?Thank you.

What is the flag in this 17th century painting?

It could be the flag of Deventer, Prussia or the coat of arms for the Duchy of Holland.

The flag in the picture could potentially be the flag of Deventer, the flag of Prussia or the coat of arms of the Duchy of Holland.


The Ottoman Empire was not an Arabian empire , but a Turkish one.

So they had no reason to uproot their capital from Turkish lands and move it to an Arabian region.

In addition, Constantinople Istanbul was way better than Damascus, Cairo, and Baghdad at everything.

It had a strategic position on the Bosphorus Strait, and was also close to Europe, which allowed for better coordination of war and trade.

It was the crown jewel of the Eastern Roman Empire in terms of culture and wealth, and it was even close to the previous Ottoman capital, Edirne.

It was well-defended with two sets of famous walls.

Location: it is a strategic point, the central point for which Black Sea trade must pass.

If you are under siege and you have a fleet, you can get supplied indefinitely; if the enemy assaults the walls you can flee to the Asiatic mainland.

To illustrate this point, think how much did the Byzantine Empire did resist while being just that city.

And even then, the final conquest was not easy.

Infrastructure:

The Byzantines did a lot of work in the city.

From Hagia Sophia to the walls.

It also had well developed merchant colonies that ensured a nice income.

After the sack of Baghdad, there were few comparable cities in the entire world, and none of those under Ottoman control.

So, you leave the city to any governor, and suddenly that governor acquires a lot of power and wealth.

Turkish is not Arab!!

While both were Muslims, they certainly did not feel part of the same group.

Ottoman conquests in Egypt and Persia 1 were as bloody and contested as any of their European campaigns agains Christians.

Certainly, you do not want to put your throne in a city far away from your power base.

A well-timed (or badly-timed, if you are the ruler) insurrection and your head is at the stake.

Which by the way were not Arabs, either.

Two more factors:

The Ottoman Turks considered themselves to be the successors of the Roman Empire.

Before they captured Constantinople, their territory was known as the Sultanate of Rum .

After capturing Constantinople, Mehmed II called himself the Caesar of Rome

( Kayser-i Rum ).

Constantinople had been the capital of the Roman Empire for more than a thousand years.

So moving the capital would amount to abandoning that claim.

Although the Balkans had not been ruled for long by Moslems, they were better watered and hence more agriculturally productive and valuable than most of the Arab world.

So it made sense to have a capital near that area.

The Ottoman Empire saw itself as a blend of Western and Eastern history.

Most of the Ottoman sultan's ambitions were to be the "Alexander the Great" (Check Süleyman the Magnificent).

Ottoman rule and ideology was somewhat based on this view point.

The Ottoman Empire never had the ambition to expand eastward.

The main expansion was done westward, Italy being the main source of attraction.

After the reign of Yavuz Sultan Selim, eastern expansion was done in 6 years - which changed the viewpoint of the empire from being a western renaissance one to an eastern-western mix.

This mix was always repeated in various important ferman.

Check the Tanzimat Fermanı for the importance given to this way of life.

Also you need to check Namık Kemal, who was a key figure in formation of the ottoman constitution.

Check the ideology of Ottomanism too.

After the conquest of Istanbul, probably the most important figure of renaissance, Fatih Sultan Mehmet, looked westward and had ambitions towards Italy.

He was the most popular figure in Italy back then, even people of Rome established coins in Latin in his name.

Ottoman science flourished in his reign, most of the Latin/Greek books were translated to Arabic (not Turkish since Arabic is considered as the language of science).

However, after his reign, this western concentration turned into the west-eastern blend as I've told above.

Why move the capital to Damascus?

Has nothing to do with the empire's ambitions...

Apparently these ambitions HAVE failed (as it failed in Hellenistic times), and the founder of the Turkish Republic moved away from east and turned their faces towards west.

Now this is how Turkey has been for some time now (almost 100 years).

Basically, the Ottomans were "Turks" first, and Moslems second.

Hence, they felt no need to cater to their Arab subjects by adopting one of their cities as a capital in a way that the Mongols might have felt with say, the Chinese.

Even today, "Turkey" is not really part of the "Arab" world, even though they are both Moslem peoples.

Besides its political implications (e.g. as the "second Rome"), Constantinople was an ideal capital for the Ottoman Empire.

That's because it had aspirations to the north, as well as the south.

The fact that the Arabs had been conquered earlier was "incidental;" again, unlike the Mongols, the Ottomans were not headed in a primarily southerly direction.

The Ottomans had interests in the Balkans, and also took the Crimean Khanate under its wing, thereby involving itself in "Russian" politics until the twentieth century.

Also, Constantinople guarded one of the three key "straits (the Dardanelles) in the Mediterranean.

The other two were the Strait of Gibraltar (outside Ottoman domains) and the Suez Canal (not built until the late 19th century).

Apart from Constantinople's strategic location, it was easy to defend, largely protected by water (as the British found out at Gallipoli in 1915), and accessible by land only through narrow corridors.

Question: As of 1517 A.D., the Ottmans have acquired the whole Levant, Egypt and they've largely become Muslim. Why they did not move their capital to a historically Islamic city like Damascus, Baghdad, or Cairo? Did any discussion on the topic ever take place?

Why did the Ottomans not change their capital to an Arab city?

The Ottomans were Turks first and Constantinople was an ideal capital. They conisdered themselves successors to the Roman Empire so wanted to stay close.

The Ottoman Empire was a Turkish empire, not an Arabic one. It would have made little sense for the empire to located its capital so far from its true power base.

The Ottoman Empire was a Turkish empire not an Arabic one and, as such, its power base in Constantinole was ideal.

It would not have made sense to place their capital so far from where their power base was.


The French revolution was truly revolutionary , it replaced the monarchy with a regime based on popular support.

A king had to hire mercenaries, the revolutionary regime could draft patriotic citizens in a levee en masse .

(Sure, not all draftees were entirely enthusiastic.

But it made a notable difference.)

In some parts of Europe, anti-monarchist patriots were inclined to support the republican/revoutionary French.

In others, they were merely inclined to not give their utmost in the support of their king.

The French Revolution was more empowering than debilitating.

Put another way, it awoke a sleeping giant.

At the time of the Revolution, France was the second most populous country in Europe (after Russia), and potentially the richest and strongest.

The reason it failed to live up to this potential was the burdens placed on the French people by the various King Louis, especially the last one (XVI), and his wife, the extravagant Marie Antoinette.

The French Revolution eliminated these monarchs (and an oppressive nobility that ruled side-by-side with them) and thus freed a lot of resources for other purposes, including war.

The Frenchmen were empowered by their newly-won freedoms, and their citizen-soldiers, led by a relative handful of veterans, fought bravely and well for many of the same reasons as newly empowered American revolutionaries some ten to fifteen years earlier, when led by many of these same professional soldiers, including one Marquis de Lafayette.

Put another way, the French had a natural quantitative superiority of resources against one or more coalition powers, and the French Revolution ensured that the quality of these resources would be at least equal, if not superior to the others.

The French Convention decreed a levée en masse on 23 August 1793 to resist the anti-French coalition: From this moment until such time as its enemies shall have been driven from the soil of the Republic, all Frenchmen are in permanent requisition for the services of the armies.

The young men shall fight; the married men shall forge arms and transport provisions; the women shall make tents and clothes and shall serve in the hospitals; the children shall turn old lint into linen; the old men shall betake themselves to the public squares in order to arouse the courage of the warriors and preach hatred of kings and the unity of the Republic.

This state of total war marks a historic turning point.

Never before in history had all men, women, children, and elderly in an entire country been requisitioned for war.

This caught the coalition completely off guard.

Armies until then - and for years to come still, in the rest of Europe - were the affair of professionals (and mercenaries).

France overwhelmed the rest of Europe to the point where they had to expand their troop counts far beyond their ability to pay professional soldiers At least a few historians (e.g. J.M. Roberts) emphasize the introduction of total war by France as one of the major breaks with the past that opened the modern era.

The introduction of conscription was a direct result of the dissolution of the monarchy.

All the other monarchies saw France as a threat to their way of order, as they feared similar uprisings.

In March 1793, France was at war with Austria, Prussia, Spain, Britain, Piedmont and the United Provinces.

A professional army was woefully inadequate for this, in terms of both manpower, and having to pay for it.

Desertion was fairly common but the sheer number of eligible males who were conscripted and slowly trained while fighting alongside veterans resulted in a huge, competent army of both NCO and COs.

However support grew due to the popular overthrow of the monarchy, the subsequent success in defending France, and the Napoleonic wars which leveraged this somewhat-bloodened army (and the spoils of war).

More directly to your question - the original text of the levee en masse gives some insight as to how this was accomplished (for example, the conversion of national buildings into barracks, etc.)

Complex question.

Resources.

France was large, rich and Populous country.

Around 40 million to Austria's 20 million or Prussia's 10 Million, Russian was about the same 40 million, but well behind in wealth.

And France was richer than these countries.

And once France had established an empire, French advantages increased.

Politics and Diplomacy.

For a lot of the period France was only opposed to 1 major land power.

Even in the Early period, Russia, Prussia were much more concerned with the partition of Poland than dealing with france.

the Revolution - patriotism.

Initially the revolutionary armies were able to be mobilised essentially by patriotism, and calling for volunteers was responded to in very large numbers, the revolution mobilised more of the French society, this did not last and conscription replaced volunteers.

But in critical period the volunteers and enthusiasm The Empire.

Once the Revolutionary armies occupied areas, Netherlands, Rhineland, Italy much of the costs of supporting the armies was able to be imposed on the Empire.

as much as half the military expenditure of France came from the Empire.

Question: During revolutions or civil wars, countries usually suffer enormous economic losses along with much civil unrest. These things would seem to make it impossible for a nation to operate a huge army and go on major wars of conquest.  But France did that in the Napoleonic Wars, and conquered almost all the other European Empires. How? Did France somehow not suffer economically? Did France somehow recover very quickly in time for the Coalition Wars?

During and right after the French Revolution, how did France maintain and operate such a big army all over Europe?

The French Revolution was more empowering than debilitating. It mobilised large numbers of soldiers. France was also a large and rich country. They were also able to impose the costs on the Empire is occupied.

The French Revolution was very popular, so it was relatively straight forward to find volunteers or conscripts for the army. Additionally, France was already one of the richest countries in Europe and able to impose many costs on the countries that it conquered. Another potential consideration is that the cost of combat may not have been high since they were mainly fighting a single land power at any one time.

The French Revolution was highly popular so it was relatively straight forward to find volunteers or conscripts for the army.

Franch was one of the richest countries in Europe and so could afford the costs.

France was able to impose many costs on the countries that it conquered.

The costs of combat may not have been very high as France was rarely fighting with more than one major land power.


The only reference similar to what you ask would have been in Operation Corona , when some British planes carried German speaking radio operators to give wrong directions to nightfighters.

That said, I doubt this would have been tried beyond tactical, immediate level in air combat, because: The setup was not easy (including finding radio operators who spoke the enemy language well enough to confuse the enemy).

Land troops would intensively used campaign phones, and the operators would be probably able to recognize who they were talking to (between communications would usually be from HQ to subordinate units).

Non-urgent messages would have been coded, or even delivered personally.

Even if you had the enemy codes, letting the enemy know that you have the codes for a small tactical advantage is just the thing you should not do.

The situation would be less fluid.

Even if you gave an unit an order to abandon the positions, that order would take some time to comply; during that time the ruse could be discovered.

If you gave the enemy time to discover the ruse, things could be wrong.

One thing with deception is that you are giving away your intentions (tell the enemy to remove their forces from one position and, if the enemy discovers you, now the enemy knows which is your objective).

During WW2 the British used an actor who bore a striking resemblance to Montgomery , to throw off the Germans as to British intentions on invading France.

M. E. Clifton

James was noticed when he appeared as 'Monty' in a British stage production, and was recruited by fellow actor David Niven to actually impersonate Montgomery, to the edification of German intelligence sources.

The goal of Operation Copperhead was to hint to the Germans that Monty was actually interested in southern France in early 1944.

The effort appears to have been at least partially successful.

A classic example would be the pre-D-day deception aimed at making the German's believe that the actual invasion was to take place at the Pas de Calais.

An entire fake army, the First United States Army Group was invented as part of Operation Fortitude South .

To help sell the effect and convince the Germans that this was the main invasion force, a large deception operation created fake equipment, such as camps, dummy landing craft and airstrips, to look like a real army was being prepared.

This was supplemented with wireless traffic between these fake units to simulate real operational communications.

In addition notable senior staff, such as General Patton, were (supposedly) attached to the army to give it some credence.

When the Americans landed at Salerno, loudspeakers blared out in the best Hollywood style, "Come out with you

're hands up.

We've got you covered."

Not spies, exactly, but certainly "voices."

The Americans refused to surrender, and won the battle.

Most (in)famous (and most controversial) use of voice actor was Norman Shelley's impersonation of Winston Churchill in some of his most important and most famous speeches.

Allegedly, Churchill had very unpleasant high-pitched voice, and he could not be bothered to record his speeches.

Therefore, voice actor took his role and recorded 'We shall fight them on the beaches', 'Their finest hour' etc .

Later, in 1949.

Churchill re-recorded those speeches with use of new equipment.

This topic is still hotly contested, with various claims and counter-claims, but as you could see from links below, there is physical evidence(records) that Norman Shelley indeed did record some of Churchill's more famous speeches.

Finest hour for actor who was Churchill's radio voice Norman Shelley Churchill's voice - 1909

Question: I am mostly referring to WW2 and cold war when embedded spies could have impersonated officials on low levels to carry out orders which were never issued.

Have voice actors ever been used to impersonate military or political officials to trick the enemy into doing something?

Norman Shelley is said to have impersonated Churchill in some of his most important speeches. The British also carried German radios to give the wrong orders to nightfighters.

It is widely believed that actor Normal Shelley was the true voice of some of the Winston Churchill's war-time speeches. However, whether this was done to deliberately mislead the enemy is another matter. Additionally, during the second world war, British planes may have carried German-speaking radio operators to try to deceive German fighters. It is also claimed that an actor played the role of General Montgomery in an attempt to mislead German forces about British movements in France.

It is believed that some British planes carried German speaking radio operators during the Second World War to mislead German fighters.

Durring the Second World War, the British used an actor to play a general in order to mislead the Germans about British manoeuvres in France.

It is widely believed that actor Norman Shelley was the true voice of some of Winston Churchill's speeches.


There is a text written by Luther called "an den christlichen Adel deutscher Nation" (exact spelling!).

So the word "deutsch" is very old.

However, even from the 1848 revolution on (short-living foundation of a German Democracy that was supposed to overcome the small monarchies ("Kleinstaaten")) or from 1871 on (Foundation of the 2nd Reich), Germans didn't consider themselves as Germans at once.

Yes, it was the same German Empire, with the "Kaiser der Deutschen" from 1871 on, but people still identified themselves strongly with their Land and their respective King (Württemberg, Sachsen, Bayern, Hessen ...) or City (Hamburg, Bremen, Lübeck) that constituted the federally organized Reich.

One interesting source is the author Karl May: In his adventure stories, he gave Germans mostly positive roles, but among them, all German heros were Saxonian (as the author himself).

Maybe it is similar for Americans form the US:

Being American but being Texan (etc.)

as well.

So there was a slow transition that was not equally fast.

This transition came to an end in the years around 1933.

I once read that from that time on German mountaineers wrote "deutsch" as their nationality in the summit logs much more often.

Previously, they preferred "bayrisch" or "sächsisch" etc.

This is an interesting source because summit logs are for the voluntary mountaineering community only, so it is not influenced by the authorities claiming their citizens.

The word Deutsch itself has deep roots.

The name Dutch is a cognate.

If you're willing to reach way back, the word's ancestry can be traces to the proto-Indo-European word tewtéh [1] meaning people, tribe or the ruler of a tribe.

Its English cousin would be the word thede, also meaning people or kinfolk.

In Irish Gaelic you can find 'tuath,' with the same meaning.

The word Teuton arose from this root as well.

The question, in my view, isn't when the word Deutsch started to be used as much as when did it take on this particular spelling and become imbued with a modern understanding in the sense of nation states.

The other answers here seem to clarify that question.

[1] https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/tewt%C3%A9h%E2%82%82

The term has evolved gradually, with the root phrase being listed in Wikipedia :

Theodiscus is a Medieval Latin term literally meaning "popular" or "of the people".

Later in the same entry it states: However, in German, the use of the term referring to Germans specifically as opposed to people speaking Germanic languages in general evolves during the Early Modern Period and it is in the late 17th and 18th century that the modern meaning of Deutsch is established.

L. Weisgerber, Deutsch als Volksname 1953

The term must definitely have been in common use by 1863, at the very latest, as it is used in the inscription on the floor of the Hall of Liberation .There, it was still spelled Teutsche , however.

I am a german student and the theme in history last semester was the founding of Germany.

In the war against France, before 1871 students and poets started saying that we the Germans have to fight together against France (they wore black, red and gold which became the colors of the flag).

This was the time when most people called themselves German. Before they used the state name and being German was more defined about the language (Luther translated the Bible to german therefore the german language got more equality in this time) than the border.

King Ludwig (806-976), now called "der Deutsche" in modern german history-books, was labeled as ruling "Teutschlandt" in the year 1500.

So, the word was in use as early as this.

But at this time it probably meant the land of the people who spoke "teutsch".

When Otto the great became holy emperor of Rome

the Italians began calling the ethnic group comprised of German people "teutsche" jokingly

and they adopted the name.

Question: Up to 1871, ancestors of today's Germans lived in different states.   What did they call themselves in those times? What did Germans call themselves in the 18 th  century?  Did they call themselves "Deutsche" or did they use names derived from names of states like Prussians, Bavarians, Saxons, et cetera?  When did Germans start to call themselves "Deutsche" en masse?

When did Germans begin to call themselves "Deutsche"?

The word "Deutsch" is very old. It was in common use at least as early as 1863.

The term "Deutsch" is very old and, at the latest, was in use by 1863 because it is inscribed on the floor of the Hall of Liberation.


Over the years I've read many accounts where people stated that they were told by a judge that they could spend X months in jail or they could join up.

This could never hold up as a law in any state, but is more of an informal use of a judge's discretion.

It's probably a lot less common today with today's very professional military.

A simple Google search turned up only this one case on the first page of results: https://www.stripes.com/news/judge-said-army-or-jail-but-military-doesn-t-want-him-1.44417

This was much more possible during World War II when America needed "every man."

Some years ago, I knew a man (born in 1925) who was arrested for "carjacking" who was sentenced to two years, with sentence to be suspended if he would volunteer for two years in the Army (and they would accept him.)

That, in fact, did happen.

The judge probably figured that the rehabilitative impact of the one would be as great as the other, but the Army offered the more productive outlet for both the convict and for society.

My father punched one of his high school teachers.

Justifiably, IMO, based on the story as he told it.

This occurred a few years before the end of the Korean "conflict".

He was given the choice that day to go with the police or go with his parents (he was under 18) to an Army recruiting office.

It's not as easy to join the military these days

so this tactic is no longer viable.

A modern analog would be the courts sending people to AA meetings in return for a lighter penalty - they can't force anyone to go so they manipulate them into it.

This is intriguing because it's usually a "don't ask, don't tell" military thing.

I was in the US Army for 2 years (2003 - 2005) and over time I've learned it definitely happens but probably a low percentage of military recruits.

The compelling issue is what the exact percentage is.

When I was in Army AIT, my AIT Drill Sergeant actually told us he was forced to join the Army via court order (a drug type of charge).

Ah, but see Drill Sergeants are considered elite members of the military and so the Army successfully rehabilitated him.

My roommate in Germany informed me he was also forced to either join the Army or go to Jail.

He didn't tell me what charges he had

but he had a serious criminal record/history.

Even in basic training, they had a marching cadence:

"Got a letter in the mail:

Go to War / Go to Jail".

Once in the Military, the secret is that the expendable criminals get the military equivalent of the death penalty as illustrated (but implied) in some war movies.

My dad even once told me that this is the way it's always been and the way it always will be.

He was retired Army having served 30 years and served in Vietnam (safe areas).

Only the worst criminals get sent to the violent areas where low life-expectancy is expected.

And from what I saw, this is incredibly true.

Soldiers are expected to eventually have the choice to choose the Army as a life-long career, because anyone who served knows that after basic training stages, the military recruit is like a civilian and many work civilian-equivalent jobs.

Just to point out one more example:

remember the movie "Platoon"?

There was, for example, a brief scene showing US Army soldiers raping indigenous children and remember when Taylor tried to break it up?

So ... what happens to those rapists?

They get sent to a very specific area with the only intention is to make them suffer or get killed and buried in a pile of corpses as if to imply not even worth an official burial.

Okay, one more example.

In the movie "Full Metal Jacket," there was a part when the Drill Instructor said: "Marines are not allowed to die without permission."

This is 100% true in other military branches as well.

The answer to the original question is YES.

In 2007, it published information obtained through the Freedom of Information Act that found the number of convicted criminals enlisting in the US military had nearly doubled in two years, from 824 in 2004 to 1,605 in 2006.

In that period, a total of 4,230 convicted felons were enlisted, including those guilty of rape and murder.

On top of this, 43,977 soldiers signed up who had been found guilty of a serious misdemeanour, which includes assault.

Another 58,561 had drug-related convictions, but all were handed a gun and sent off to the Middle East.

The fact that the military has allowed more than 100,000 people with such troubled pasts to join its ranks over the past three years illustrates the problem we're having meeting our military needs in this time of war," said Aaron Belkin, director of the Palm Center.

" ( https://www.alternet.org/2012/10/dark-secret-us-military-neo-nazis-and-criminals-are-filling-its-ranks/ )

Question: Was it ever possible to join the US military instead of going to prison for a crime?

Local Prosecutors and judges can do whatever they like.

They can tell someone to join the army or face prison, etc.

There are plenty of stories of these kinds of things occurring, especially in Korea and Vietnam.

However; that doesn't mean the army willingly accepts folk as an alternative to prison.

army recruiters are forbidden to participate in such arrangements and all branches of service will disqualify such candidates if they find out.

The Army's Recruiting Regulation , 601-210, paragraph 4-8b:

Any "applicant who, as a condition for any civil conviction or adverse disposition or any other reason through a civil or criminal court, is ordered or subjected to a sentence that implies or imposes enlistment into the Armed Forces of the United States is not eligible for enlistment."

Still one can image that it has happenned and still happens.

The army will make a man of him, kind of thing.

Jimmy Hendrix was given the choice of prison or military service .

Wikipedia his name.

During the early to mid-1970s, I knew many young men at the Naval Base in Rota, Spain, who joined the Navy only to avoid jail (and departed at the earliest opportunity.)

Question: It is pretty clear that today the US military is an all volunteer force and it is not allowed to take people who are joining to avoid going to prison. Was there ever a time when a judge could sentence a criminal to prison or military service? If so, how did it work? Was it for a fixed time and what happens if the criminal was found not fit for duty and separated from the military?

Was it ever possible to join the US military instead of going to prison for a crime?

There have been many examples of people over the years being offered military service instead of prison time. Jimi Hendrix was one such famous example. It was definitely a common practice in the 1970s and before that in WWII they needed every man they could get. It still happens now occasionally, at the descretion of the court judge.

It is generally considered that this has happened throughout recent history, although it is likely to be at the discretion of a judge rather than relating to any particular legislation. Such choices were likely handed down during the Second World War but may have continued beyond this and even still happen today.

It is generally considered that this has happened on many occasions.

This is not considered to be related to any particular law but is more likely to be related the judges discretion.

Such things would likely have occurred during the Second World War but may have continued for a significant period of time after this.


Not that I know of, but in 1712 in Sweden, February had 30 days .

Sweden, being a Protestant country, was initially suspicious of the "papist" Gregorian calendar, but decided to adopt it in the early 18th century.

However, there was an idea to do so gradually, by simply skipping all the leap days until the calendars were in synch.

This was done in 1700, but then, the Great Northern War broke out and people seemed to forget about this, so 1704 and 1708 had 29 days in February.

Then someone realized how silly it all was, and decided to go back to the Julian calendar by adding an extra leap day in 1712.

Sweden eventually shifted to the Gregorian calendary in 1740, but then all in one go.

It seems the Julian calendar had a month with 32 days on leap years at one point: An inscription has been discovered which orders a new calendar to be used in Asia to replace the previous Greek lunar calendar.

According to one translation "Intercalation shall commence on the day after 14 Peritius [a.d.

IX Kal.

Feb, which would have been 15 Peritius] as it is currently constituted in the third year following promulgation of the decree.

Xanthicus shall have 32 days in this intercalary year."

This is historically correct.

It was decreed by the proconsul that the first day of the year in the new calendar shall be Augustus' birthday, a.d. IX Kal.

Oct. Every month begins on the ninth day before the kalends.

The date of introduction, the day after 14 Peritius, was 1 Dystrus, the next month.

The month after that was Xanthicus.

Thus Xanthicus began on a.d. IX Kal.

Mart.

, and normally contained 31 days.

In leap year, however, it contained an extra "Sebaste day", the Roman leap day, and thus had 32 days.

From the lunar nature of the old calendar we can fix the starting date of the new one as 24 January, a.d.

IX Kal.

Feb 5 BC in the Julian calendar, which was a leap year.

Thus from inception the dates of the reformed Asian calendar are in one-to-one correspondence with the Julian.

Of course it depends whose months you look at.

Part of the decimalization project in revolutionary France was Claude Boniface Collignon's proposals for decimalizing time.

He called for ten "solar months" per year, each of 36.5 days.

See page 168 of his Decouverte d'etalons justes, naturels, invariables et universels .

I think his long months only exist conceptually and never became national law.

In 46 BC, as part of the introduction of the Julian calendar, Caesar first had to wrench the existing calendar back into alignment with the solar year.

It had drifted so far out of alignment that harvest festivals were separated from the harvest by several months.

As part of doing this, he introduced two special one-time intercalary months between November and December that added a total of 67 days to 46 BC.

I haven't been able to find information concerning how the 67 days were split up, but at least one of the months had to have a length of at least 34 days.

Nowadays, the Tamil calendar 's month ஆனி (Āni) has 32 days.

I guess there Is and it happened in 1978 October.

It had 32 days. :-)

Question: As the title says. I  believe  (and correct me if I'm wrong) that with our modern Gregorian calendar, no month will ever be longer than 31 days.  But have there been any times in the (perhaps recent) past where we had 32 days in a month?

Has there ever been a month with 32 days?

The Julian calendar had a month with 32 days as well as the modern Tamil calender.

The answer to this question will depend on which culture's calendar is used. The Julian calendar and the modern Tamil calendar both contain months with 32 days. There is another claim that October 1978 had 32 days.

It appears that the Julian calendar had a month with 32 days.

The answer will depend on which culture's calendar you use.

The Tamil calendar contains a month with 32 days.

There is a claim that such an event took place in October 1978.