Giaour

And chase the Giaours flying night and day, not giving rest,

For that which was our trouble comes again out of the west.
-copied from here.

See Giaour.

"...with the locks at Giaour Falls, down past the border, you could navigate the Drangosh all the way to the Colonial Gulf."
-The Forge, CHAPTER TWELVE, p. 216.

All day family outing starting soon but please accept this short post about a single word. The image shows the Battle of Lepanto.

An Old Friend

"...a Balwyn had gone over the walls of Jerusalem in 1099 behind Godfrey de Bouillon, wading ankle-deep in blood on his way to the loot with the Pope's blessing on it all."
-SM Stirling, The Sky-Blue Wolves (New York, 2018), CHAPTER FOUR, p. 57.

Poul Anderson introduced us to the Nine Worthies who, we learned, included Godfrey de Bouillon;

we remembered Godfrey in GK Chesterton's Lepanto, then in James Blish's Cities In Flight;

now Godfrey was accompanied by an ancestor of a noblewoman in Change Year 46/2044 AD;

and the Internet provides the attached image of Godfrey on the wall of Jerusalem.

We never know who is going to drop in.

Why does the demonic enemy in the Emberverse merely want to destroy? I am not summarizing the plot of the novel. The plan is that blog readers read the book while I post about interesting details like Godfrey de Bouillon and demonic motivation.

The Implications Of The Saracen

Three Hearts And Three Lions, CHAPTER SIXTEEN.

Holger meets the Saracen who has been looking for him and who is an old albeit forgotten friend.

Is this Carolingian universe one where the Christian God exists and Allah does not or where both exist? GK Chesterton's militaristic poem, Lepanto, describes the Prophet marshaling giants and genii against the Crusaders. Alternatively, is there a Muslim universe where Allah is the Creator and Jesus is a prophet of Islam?

Presumably, the Norse universe, which is visited in Operation Luna, is complete with gods and giants arising in Ginnungagap, Odin and his brothers killing the giant Ymir and making the world from his body, dead warriors fighting and feasting in Valhalla and fighting for the last time at Ragnarok etc? The multiverse gets complicated if it incorporates every possibility.

I am still doing some other reading that might impact on the blog but later. Meanwhile, rereading Three Hearts continues...

Mahound

In a divergent timeline, Time Patrolman Keith Denison meets yet another man with a grandiose title:

"'...his Venerability, Albin Archcardinal Fil-John, Grand Duke of the Northern Provinces, graciously consents to see you,' the friar intoned."
-Poul Anderson, The Shield Of Time (New York, 1991), PART SIX, 1980alpha A. D., p. 291.

Denison had already wondered what kind of rank "archcardinal" was. In our timeline, the cardinals are the electoral college for the Papacy but there are no "archcardinals." Again we notice a church-state fusion. This (arch)cardinal is also a Duke and kings, if they still exist, are subordinate.

Denison's approach to Albin is sufficiently impressive. From his cell:

in a closed carriage to a palace on a hill;
sumptuous corridors;
a grand staircase;
a gilt bronze door showing Biblical scenes;
a high white room;
sunlight streaming through stained glass;
an Oriental carpet;
a man on a throne, robed in scarlet and gold;
a chair twenty feet from the throne;
a bellpull by Albin's right hand.

However, what led me back to this scene was something else. There are two disparaging references to the Prophet of Islam. First:

"'...black Mahound...'" (p. 289)

Secondly, Albin tells Denison that some "Avenging Jews," skilled craftsmen and engineers, quite possibly commanding black arts, escaped when Europe was cleansed on their kind and:

"'settled among the worshippers of Mahound...'" (p. 292)

This recalls Chesterton's Lepanto:

Mahound is in his paradise above the evening star,
-copied from here.

(Here is our evening star yet again although this time in neither a pagan nor a Christian context.)

Demons gather:

They gather and they wonder and give worship to Mahound.
-copied from (see above).

OK, Chesterton. The Prophet is not called "Mahound" and is not worshiped. However, I appreciate the fantasy narrative in which he summons to his Paradise:

Black Azrael and Ariel and Ammon on the wing.

Giants and the Genii,

Multiplex of wing and eye,

Whose strong obedience broke the sky

When Solomon was king.
-copied from (see above).

Diversity

Arinnian defends the defensive war recently waged by Avalon:

"'...our society or culture or what you want to name it, has a life and a right of its own.
"'...if communities didn't resist encroachments, they'd soon be swallowed by the biggest and greediest. Wouldn't they? In the end, dead sameness. No challenges, no inspirations from somebody else's way. What service is it to life if we let that happen?
"'And, you know, enmities needn't be eternal.'" (Rise Of The Terran Empire, p. 661)

Three Observations
(i) We can organize the production and distribution of wealth in such a way that everyone has access to far more than they need and thus that "greed" ceases to motivate anyone. (But that is not the situation at the time of the border dispute between Terra and Ythri.)

(ii) In how many works does Poul Anderson rightly dramatize the point that sameness is bad and therefore diversity is good?

(iii) He mentions Lepanto but there are many other historical examples of former enemies becoming allies and friends. See here.