Comments on: War criminals during the Hundred Years’ War

By: fugstar

fugstar — Thu, 30 Oct 2008 13:26:52 +0000

348pm? nearly finished counting beans?

By: Chris E

Chris E — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 17:10:15 +0000

I have not been able to take Bernard Cornwell seriously ever since shoulder surfing on a train and seeing the following:

“Did you ever see the lance that Sir Geoffrey brought back from France?” He asked.
“No”, she said, her eyes widening.

With talent like that, a career writing dialogue for porn films beckons.

By: alembique

alembique — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 14:48:18 +0000

poor old fugstar – 3.00 am man; the bitter insomniac with a sticky keyboard.

By: billy

billy — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 11:43:19 +0000

its no stupider in time-space cluelessness than most of what passses for comment on this blog

Don’t be so hard on yourself, fugstar. You don’t have to feel so ashamed and publically repentant for your contributions.

By: fugstar

fugstar — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 02:02:00 +0000

its no stupider in time-space cluelessness than most of what passses for comment on this blog and in this country’s press.

By: Vasey

Vasey — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 23:57:15 +0000

Accusing a nation of commiting war crimes during the middle ages is like accusing a bear of shitting in the woods. The only way they didn’t do it is if they didn’t exist to do so.

Someone behind this announcement had a budget they needed to justify and to justify quickly, I think.

By: persephone

persephone — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 21:08:14 +0000

@ 15 Touche

By: billy

billy — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 21:00:15 +0000

With such gloomy forecasts of a recession we may have to look back at past successes to cope with it all. We donâ€™t need someone to also rain on our agincourt parade.

It almost makes me wish we could still go to war with the French and Germans.

By: persephone

persephone — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 20:59:57 +0000

Amrit @ 13: Oui & merci

By: Amrit

Amrit — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 20:45:13 +0000

Enfin, il y a quelque chose qui m’implique directement sur ce site!

Nice to have a ‘different’ article on PP for once.

@ Rumbold:

‘speaking of war crimes, hundreds of crossbowmen were killed by their own side, the French, because they failed’

Failed at what, sorry? At killing the English?

‘This conference strikes me as being largely about Monsieur Gillot and colleaguesâ€™ desire to use history to reinforce some sense of French nationalism.’

I would agree with this – it’s also another way to express bitterness about the constant threat to the French language that is posed by English, I suspect.

People say that Britain need to accept its newly-diminished status in the modern world, but France is in even greater need of that self-introspection if you ask me…!

@ persephone:

Though I eagerly await to see what evidence they do have to support their claims – perhaps an arrow with the french equivalent of `we woz robbedâ€™ etched on.

HAHA. Une flÃ¨che avec la phrase ‘On nous a volÃ©!’ y gravÃ©, you mean?

By: persephone

persephone — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 20:39:56 +0000

With such gloomy forecasts of a recession we may have to look back at past successes to cope with it all. We don’t need someone to also rain on our agincourt parade.

By: billy

billy — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 20:30:41 +0000

OK Persephone. It’s difficult to argue against trampled pride. In the face of their assault upon the very ovaries and testicles of England, these putain Frenchies must be dismantled. Have they no shame, fiddling with Anglo-Saxon honour through revisionism of this 600 years old triumph? As Shakespeare wrote in Henry V — To thy own nature be true, dauphin, thou art of your tribe, thou cheese eating surrender monkey.

If we don’t have Agincourt, what do we have?

By: persephone

persephone — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 20:21:04 +0000

Billy,

At times things raise a certain amount of my own national pride. This was one of them. And no it does not worry me that:

“We have historians arriving from all over France, and all will produce hard facts concerning the battle, rather than rumours and speculation.”

Though I eagerly await to see what evidence they do have to support their claims – perhaps an arrow with the french equivalent of `we woz robbed’ etched on.

By: billy

billy — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 19:54:17 +0000

But Persephone, who is raking it up? Who are ‘they’? A group of French historians? They don’t represent the totality of French consciousness of history. Anymore than a gang of British historical nationalists or revisionists represent the totality of British historical consciousness, reappraisal, or even the collectivity of Britain as an entity today.

By: persephone

persephone — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 19:46:28 +0000

Billy @ 6 which makes it more absurd as to why they are raking this up.

By: persephone

persephone — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 19:42:35 +0000

I do accept that, even then, there would have been some PR spin in a war but nonetheless I do believe the British possess military prowess, which they demonstrated many times in many battles… perhaps they just forgot to use it when faced with the french…

By: billy

billy — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 19:36:04 +0000

There’s no shortage of French introspection about Robespierre and the terror, Persephone.

By: persephone

persephone — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 19:32:45 +0000

Don’t most countries, if they looked far back enough, have something in their closet that would look untenable in modern times?

I wonder if these french historians will also re-visit a more recent time in their history. Namely the deeds committed as part of the French Revolution. Or are they too busy eating cake. Even better these historians need to re-visit madame guillotine…

By: Roger

Roger — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 19:15:35 +0000

The literary critic John Sutherland wrote an essay also arguing that Henry V was a war criminal. You can make your own emphasis with Shakespeare- contrast Branagh an Olivier’s films and recent stage productions.

By: billy

billy — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 19:13:53 +0000

I just finished reading Amitav Ghosh’s Sea of Poppies, which was shortlisted for the Booker Prize. It is set against the background of the filthy truth of Britain’s colonial escapades during the Opium War, and their shameful cultivation of poppies in India, and all the rest of it. This is real subaltern history, about the moral evil and swamp of British colonialism, rendered into literary art. A rip roaring swashbuckling narrative set on a boat full of people escaping from places and people, set to go off and join in the Opium War. First part of a trilogy. Anyone interested in historical fiction, and a good old fashioned slap in the face of British nationalist historical discourse should read it. I personally can’t get enough of this kind of thing. Even if you’re an old fashioned Colonel Blimp and you’re afraid of reading about anything that doesn’t project the British colonial enterprise as anything other than the sun shining out of Queen Victoria’s asshole, you can still enjoy it as an action adventure, although it may give you high blood pressure.