Some events in history are so obscured by legend that hardly anybody knows how things really happened. Some legends are self-perpetuating and facts get ignored by certain authors or are unknown to them. In chronicling history, it appears to be sufficient to parrot what somebody else said to the point that the truth just appears as footnotes.
Some events in history are so obscured by legend that hardly anybody knows how things really happened. Some legends are self-perpetuating and facts get ignored by certain authors or are unknown to them. In chronicling history, it appears to be sufficient to parrot what somebody else said to the point that the truth just appears as footnotes.
From the Great Library of Alexandria to the airplane, from Alchemists to Engineers and from Nero to Catherine the Great, Alf B. Meier examines facets of history deeply sunk in the fog of legends... and comes to funny results at times. He shows that one should question things that are generally accepted as history, recommending readers to investigate themselves.
Excerpt
On October 14, 1440 de Rais was formally charged with murder, additionally the Inquisition investigated for devil worship but did not find any conclusive evidence. These charges were never brought to a tribunal.
On October 15, 1440 de Rais, without being tortured, confessed for several days to the fact that he was a pederast and that he enjoyed killing, after sexually abusing, children. De Rais was hanged on October 26, 1440 in Biesse. Under the gallows he made a cynical speech about how parents should protect their children from guys such as himself.
On October 27, 1440 a traveling tumbler spread the rumor on the Biesse marketplace about de Rais sacrificing children to the devil. Shortly after some members of the guild of traveling quacks were selling instructions for the ritual of Gilles de Rais, and these instructions have been around ever
since.
The footnote here is that if de Rais had kept his fortune together instead of robing and making roads insecure he, as a member of the upper class, would have gotten away easily with killing a few peasant children.
Professional Reviews
Travelrat's Travels
Footnotes in History
Alf B. Meier (www.alfbmeier.com )
e-book published by Smashwords.
‘History is bunk!’ (Henry Ford)
‘History is propaganda written by the winning side’ (Keith Kellett)
Alf Meier writes:
‘ … it is the recording of events that happened in the past. More accurately, it is the events of the past that somebody wanted to have recorded’
***
This is in the foreword of his e-book ‘Footnotes in History’ in which he sets out to tell the real truth behind some of the simplified folk-tales, vaguely based on fact that is generally accepted as ‘history’
We all ‘learnt’ at school that ‘Captain Cook discovered Australia’ or ‘Christopher Columbus proved the world is round’ … both statements inaccurate and untrue, and Meier sets out to reveal a few more ‘well-known facts’ of history that are, on only slightly deeper investigation, no ‘facts’ at all.
The tone is generally light and friendly, and easily readable. There are one or two quaint and unusual turns of phrase in the book, for the writer’s first language is not English. But, for me, that adds to the charm of this little book, and makes it more personal.
It’s an interesting read, but in no way academic and schoolmasterly. It will, if nothing else, give you a few real, little-known facts, with which, if you’re still at school, you can really annoy your history teacher!
Keith Kellett (25.04.2011)
http://travelrat.wordpress.com/2011/04/25/footnotes-in-history-review/
If you think you know Delaware, think again. Pirates? Quakers fighting with Pennsylvania? Towns so ugly no one would settle there? With stunning pictures and straightforward storytelling, Dave Tabler opens hidden passages and describes defining momen
