I prefer speculative fiction to military science fiction. I am learning that the latter includes a lot of accounts of military activities both on and off battlefields but that should not surprise me! Like CS Lewis and Brian Aldiss, I want to leave Earth to find the Unearthly.
I will not describe the unsanitary living conditions of the barbarian mercenaries in SM Stirling's and David Drake's The Forge but I will ask:
Would any barbarians live in such conditions?
Would it be possible to survive in such conditions?
Would regular armed forces tolerate such conditions so close to their own camps?
We have a universe to win - although not to conquer.
10 comments:
Oh, God, yeah.
That stuff was taken from actual first-hand accounts and archaeology.
Keep in mind that the Skinners are nomads, who normally solve the problem of filth and mess simply by moving, that that's an all-male warband in a culture where women do most of the routine camp work, and that the Skinners are an analogue of the Huns; they're working as mercenaries but they're hired on as a group under their own chiefs. Their employers can give the -chiefs- orders, sorta, but they can't give individual Skinners orders -- they're not formally part of the Civil Government's military and they're not in the chain of command.
This sort of thing is why vastly more soldiers died of disease in every war in history up until the 20th century (including the Boer War, btw.).
It was typhus that destroyed Napoleon's "Grande Armee" on the retreat from Moscow, for example -- it's spread by lice, and crowding and wearing a lot of unwashed clothes against the cold provide ideal conditions, combined with malnutrition weakening the immune system.
The Western Front in WW1 was the first large-scale conflict in the history of the human race where most casualties -weren't- from disease, or starvation, or a combination of the two.
Incidentally, it wasn't until the late 19th century that large cities stopped being demographic sinkholes that killed more people than were born in them -- London had about 5 burials for every baptism throughout most of its existence.
The reason was the same: filth.
The best-disciplined armies (Roman, Byzantine) had the lowest disease rates because they enforced things like digging latrines in camp and washing bodies and clothes, but even so disease was a terrible, terrible problem. Your average feudal host or peasant levy was a shambling disease farm of stink and fever, and got much worse if it stopped for any length of time -- sieges wee often contests on who'd die of plague first.
Mr Stirling,
Thank you. I expected a more than adequate reply and that is what I got.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul and Mr. Stirling!
Paul: I'm flattered my inadequate comments about Tipler's THE PHYSICS OF CHRISTIANITY interested you enough to order a copy of that book. I don't know how other readers reacted, but I thought it a very provocative, mind expanding, or even mind dazing book. Tipler's arguments, suggestions, and speculations were in many ways stunning!
Prof. Tipler discussed things like multiple universes, physics can be used to argue in defense of Christian beliefs, resurrection will be via ALL of us becoming emulations in fantastically advanced quantum computers (which reminded me of Gaia's emulations in GENESIS), the baryon annihilation process, Our Lord was virginally conceived of the Blessed Virgin because He was an XX male, and much more.
Mr. Stirling: ditto, what Paul said!
Sean
Sean,
You know the textual explanation of the virginal birth idea? The OT passage was a prophecy addressing an immediate situation, a siege of Jerusalem. The prophecy was "A young woman will give birth..." "...young woman..." was translated into Greek as "virgin" in the Septuagint. The NT authors not only wrote in Greek but also read the OT in Greek. Thus, a slightly mistranslated phrase was interpreted as referring to a miraculous birth for the Messiah.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
Yes, but I also believe in the SUPERNATURAL origins of Christianity. Which means, as Anderson had one of the characters in "A Chapter of Revelation" says, that some of these prophecies were literally what they said.
Also, given the standards, customs, and mores of Isaiah's time, the "almah" he used was understood to mean young, unmarried, and a VIRGIN. So it was reasonable of the LXX to translate the word as "virgin."
And not THAT many generations ago that was also the case in most Western nations. Many, even perhaps most, young and unmarried women were virgins.
Sean
Sean,
Like "maiden." A young unmarried woman was (supposed to be) a virgin.
But I understand that that prophecy was uttered because the king asked the prophet for advice or guidance during a siege and the prophecy was meant to relate to that current situation, not to any future event. And the child to be born was to be called "Emanuel," not "Jesus."
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
Yes, but a prophecy understood one way at the time it was uttered or written could have been LATER seen to have been much mote truthfully fulfilled. And that is what we see in the NT.
Sean
I should have added this above to avoid any confusion: "...could have been LATER seen to have been much more truthfully fulfilled IN A DIFFERENT WAY."
Sean
Sean,
Earlier written passages can be very applicable to later events but not in the sense that they were originally intended as such.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
Which more clearly restated what I tried to say.
Sean
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