Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2009 December 22

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December 22

Archduke Ferdinand assassination

Hello,

I could use some direction regarding a historical matter. I understand that my brother-in-law's mother attended what became the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand in Sarajevo. A Bosnian national, she was chosen by her school to present the Archduke with flowers during the motorcade through the city. My understanding is that she was able to complete the honor a short while before the assassination.

I have done some photographic research and I have not been able to locate many photos that feature children. Do you know of a resource rich in common photographs of the motorcade?

Any help you can give me with this matter is greatly appreciated!!! Thanks so much —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.132.100.77 (talk) 04:45, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

There was a documentary on the assassination on the History Channel, one of those timeline things, which counts down, like the Final 24 series. It may have been one of those Crimes that Shook the World episodes, with actors and photos of Gavrilo Princip. Perhaps the History Channel's website might help. C.B.Lilly 13:15, 22 December 2009 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Christopher1968 (talk • :contribs)

The Google/Life/Time image archive actually has quite a few of Ferdinand and the assassination. I don't see any of children, but in this one his wife seems to have roses, which she doesn't in any previous photos that I saw of the day. --Mr.98 (talk) 15:49, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

I'm not seeing any photos of the actual assassination, just some of the assassin being taken in. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 18:39, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

I'm amazed someone whose previous generation was directly involved with a 95-year-old incident is writing to Wikipedia. The incident in question happened before any of my grandparents were born. I hope I don't offend anyone, but going by normal assumptions (without any specific information about the people in question) I guess the OP must be over 70 years old. If that's the case, I offer my congratulations for still being so active. JIP | Talk 21:10, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the help, I will continue the search. To answer the previous post, my brother-in-law will be 60 this year and he is the youngest of 13 children. His mother passed some time ago. I assure you this is legitimate.

Geography question

What are the possible locations that fit the following ctiteria

1. There is a quick-to-flood body of water (river or lake) directly to its east, 2. From here one can visit an amazing structure that all of us should visit at least once in our lifetime.

I have done enough search on Wikipedia nd other search engines but could not get the answer which fits the above

I would appreciate any help —Preceding unsigned comment added by 59.93.77.45 (talk) 17:11, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

The Nile is famous for its floods and has one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World near it. --Tango (talk) 17:16, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

It might fit Lake Amadeus, east of Alice Springs and close to Uluru, if one considers the latter to be a structure. 87.81.230.195 (talk) 17:48, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

I thought it might be the Taj Mahal, but that is on the South bank of the Yamuna river. Tango is probably right. DJ Clayworth (talk) 18:22, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

Judaism and Death

What are commonly-held beliefs among Jews regarding the afterlife? What is the consensus opinion on what happens after death among practitioners of Judaism?

65.203.61.73 (talk) 18:19, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

Surprisingly little in the Judaism article, but the last of the thirteen principles of faith is relevant. DJ Clayworth (talk) 18:29, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

There are many articles on the internet in that regard, including these three: [1], [2], [3]. --Omidinist (talk) 19:53, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

Historically, in the religion of the Biblical period, there wasn't yet a firmly developed belief in afterlife rewards or punishments, but rather a shadowy realm known as Sheol. AnonMoos (talk) 21:31, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

A principle of Judaism laid down in the Talmud is that all Jews receive a share of the world to come. In fact, an entire chapter is named after this principle. Those Jews who believe in the traditions of the Oral law would assert that this does date from the Biblical period. Typically for the Talmud, it contradicts itself, by enumerating certain Jews who do not.

Non-Jews can also have a share of the world to come - they need only fulfil the seven basic laws given to Noah and his sons. If you're not Jewish and like celestial insurance policies, this one's a dandy, because 'if the Jews were right all along', you're probably going to be OK.

It's curious to see where the seven laws differ from the 10 Commandments - which Jews don't really place that much emphasis on (they're in the Bible, but they're just 10 of 613). --Dweller (talk) 18:28, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

Re the original question, traditional Jewish belief holds that the dead will be resurrected at the beginning of a future Messianic Age. There's no consensus on what happens to the dead between now and then with many holding that it's simply beyond human understanding. See Jewish eschatology. —D. Monack ^talk 23:05, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

I have known Jews, including devout Jews, who don't believe in an afterlife at all. Their belief is that one should live a moral life because it's the right thing to do, not because it will somehow result in an after-life reward of some kind. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 00:27, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

How did Athens benefit from the discovery of silver in the mines at Laurium?

In a book review on Amazon (for Lords of the Sea: The Epic Story of the Athenian Navy and the Birth of Democracy by John Hale), I read the following quote:

Financed by the windfall of silver from the nearby mines at Laurium, the Athenians soon constructed a fleet of over 300 triremes, the most advanced naval vessels in the eastern Mediterranean.

This is interesting, because it would seem that the only way silver could help is if there were a sufficient level of international trade. I'm assuming that the discovery of a precious metal, used as currency, can only alter the fortunes of those who acquire it if they trade with outsiders. I cannot see, for example, how a discovery of gold today could make the world as a whole richer, although it would certainly help an individual country. Am I right, and if so, what were the primary conditions of international trade that enabled Athens to benefit from its windfall? It's been emotional (talk) 20:26, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

They imported grain (much of it from the Black Sea coast area), which freed some peasants to be rowers. In ancient times, Greece proper had a relatively small amount of useful agricultural land, which could only feed a limited number of people using ancient agricultural methods, and if you went beyond those limits without importing food from outside, then somebody starved. That's why the Greeks were constantly establishing colonies outside Greece, and why infanticide was very common. AnonMoos (talk) 21:25, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

First off, in the economic theory of Mercantilism (and most theories prior to it), precious metals *are* wealth. More gold equals more wealth, by definition. Mercantilism doesn't really have any followers anymore, primarily because such a simplistic view of wealth doesn't really work in practice. Secondly, even without international trade, there is domestic trade. If need a trireme, you need someone to build it for you. This means you have to pay them (or if they are slaves, pay their owners or buy the slaves from their owners). This requires money. To get the money, the state needs to either increase taxes (never popular, and likely to reduce overall productivity due to opportunity costs), or needs some other source of income - for instance the new silver. The state can take that silver, mint new coins, and pay the boat-builders with the "free money" (seigniorage) of the new coins. You see this even today, where central banks create new money in response to economic demands. It's easier with fiat currency than with precious-metal backed currency, as the banks don't need to find new gold and silver deposits to make more money. You can't keep creating money, though, as with too much new money you run the risk of inflation. On the reverse, by not creating new money you run the risk of economic stagnation, as the money supply doesn't increase with economic growth. -- 128.104.112.94 (talk) 21:19, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

At a more basic level, if the area within which precious metals have a recognized economic exchange value is growing in population and economic activity, yet the supply of precious metals is not growing (or is not growing in proportion), then there is a deflationary tendency. This was observable in the 19th-century, when increases in the stock of precious metals (caused by gold rushes etc.) partially kept in check long-term deflationary trends.. AnonMoos (talk) 21:43, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for those answers so far. I'm interested to hear more. Is it accepted that the deflationary trend is sufficient to correct the market, or is it possible that people will resist the deflationary pressures for too long, leading to stagnation? It's been emotional (talk) 21:50, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

Deflation is generally considered to be a bad thing, since it encourages people with wealth to sit on their money and hoard it, in anticipation of it growing in value in future, so decreasing trade and economic activity. However, my second remark was offered solely as an addition to 128.104.112.94's remarks, and not because I thought it had any real relevance to the situation of ancient Athens.

What does actually have relevance to the situation of ancient Athens is that ancient Greek communities were faced with a basic choice -- use frequent infanticide and/or periodic colony-founding emigration to keep the population at or below the level which can be supported by local agriculture during one of the relatively commonly recurring bad-harvest years (in which case you can manage to feed your inhabitants with locally-grown food); or import food from overseas to support a larger population, a strategy which also require maintaining a navy to guard the food shipments (because if your population has grown far beyond what can be fed by local food, and the food imports are cut off, then you're really screwed). At various historical stages, Athens went in for the maritime strategy in a big way... AnonMoos (talk) 22:45, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

Back to the original question of international trade in ancient times; Athens and other Greek states likely did have a robust international trade. Remember that the Silk Road was very active during this time. The Bagram Treasure (sadly a redlink right now, mentioned briefly in articles on Bagram and Alexandria on the Caucasus) dates from before the time of Christ, and features a wide array of luxury and trade goods from Greece, Egypt, China, India, etc. etc. I'm looking at a book right now that indicates that Chinese silk dating from the 8th century BC has been found in the Greece, and B.C.E. era silk has been found as far as Colchester. It also states that Ancient Greek goods could be found as far away as Japan. While the Greeks may not have had direct contact with far east asians, such evidence points to the existance of robust trade across Eurasia. So yes, Athens did have the international trade availible to take advantage of the silver, as the OP asked originally. --Jayron32 05:02, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

However, that almost entirely refers to the Hellenistic period, and has relatively little direct relevance to the motivations for pre-Hellenistic independent Athens in deciding to build up its navy. At that time, the Phoenicians dominated Mediterranean trade, and Greeks had few opportunities to directly trade with places more remote than Crimea and the Nile delta... AnonMoos (talk) 09:26, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

This article shows the Greek origins of the Japanese wind god. International (and even global) trade was definitely present much earlier than most of us would imagine. TomorrowTime (talk) 08:32, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

That's quite an interesting discussion, and I'm glad I posted the question. Given the range of cultural evidence people are using, I might add something to the answer myself. I remember reading somewhere that the proto-Indo-European language from which the Indo-European family emerged carried its influence via trade, with evidence being based on the number and type of words that penetrated the various other languages. That is, from what I was reading, the common Indo-European parent language didn't simply develop into other languages, it rather leached into them, carrying words and perhaps some grammatical influence. Many of the words were related to waterborne trade, so the theory is that it was the language of a people who traded along canal routes, and its vocabulary was adopted in matters of commerce, and from there entered into the fabric of each langage. I frankly don't know if there is any truth in this, since I couldn't find it in our article on Indo-European languages. I think it was from An Invitation to Old English and Anglo-Saxon England by Bruce Mitchell, but this is going back a few years. If true, it would be further cultural evidence of the importance of trade in the region around the Mediterranean. I would be curious to know if anyone can confirm or refute this. It's been emotional (talk) 19:26, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

Parme and Plaisance

Who were the father and mother of Charles-François Lebrun, duc de Plaisance and who were the father and mother of Jean Jacques Régis de Cambacérès, duc de Parme? Also did Charles-François Lebrun married anyone else besides Sophie de Marbois and when in 1804 were Sophie and him were married?--Queen Elizabeth II's Little Spy (talk) 20:53, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

According to the French wikipedia, Charles-François Lebrun was the fourth son of Paul Lebrun and Louise Le Cronier. Jean Jacques Régis de Cambacérès was the son of Jean-Antoine de Cambaceres and Marie-Rose Vassal (source). I hope this helps. JW..[ T..C ] 21:13, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

Also according to the French wikipedia Charles-François Lebrun was previously married to Anne Delagoutte. They had a son named Anne Charles Lebrun. I've checked all of my books and I can't find when in 1804 Charles-François Lebrun and Sophie de Marbois were married. I hope this helps. JW..[ T..C ] 22:09, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

This may help as well. JW..[ T..C ] 22:21, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

Pindus Principality

I can't find a good map of the Pindus Principality. Actually, I can't find any acceptable map of it anywhere (yes, I googled for it). It would be amazing to find a map with towns marked. I'd like also to find out if the Pindus Principality had one or more official languages.--151.51.3.183 (talk) 23:01, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

Obama and Schmidt

[Renamed section from "Pharaoh Obama and Semite Schmidt"]

I heard this characterization after Howard Schmidt's appointment spoken by a non-Arab individual, stating the real motive behind the appointment was to enhance computer eaves dropping capability on Islamic culture. Are such characterizations fair or justified or true? 71.100.6.206 (talk) 23:56, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

Such characterizations basically exist to solely disparage the recipients. Namecalling is generally the last resort of people who have no other concrete rational reason to criticize someone. If there were valid criticisms of these people, then their opponents would not have to resort to base playground tactics to degrade their character. --Jayron32 00:18, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

Those who have nothing to hide, have nothing to fear. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 00:59, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

Will Rogers expressed the same idea a bit more colloquially: "Live your life in such a way that you wouldn't be afraid to give your parrot to the town gossip." ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 02:12, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

I'd assume you're being ironic, but I'm never sure when it's you. 86.176.191.243 (talk) 21:33, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

Cor, where does one start with that question? It's worth stating from the outset that your heading includes some objectionable (and frankly odd) terminology that doesn't make people want to respond to you kindly.

It's frankly bizarre to allege that anyone would want to (or could) eavesdrop on "Islamic culture". America would, on the other hand, be extremely interested in eavesdropping on various political and religious elements in the Islamic world, because America would perceive that they pose notable threats to the country's security (see Axis of evil for a handy snapshot in time of American thinking about regimes they feared at that time).

This is fairly obvious and probably indisputable. So, I'm puzzled by your question.

Furthermore, what one man's appointment does to make this stronger or weaker is debatable.

Finally, irrelevantly labelling someone with an ethnicity or religion ("Semite") merely reveals undertones of (or the "non-Arab" you spoke with) unpleasant prejudice. What would you think if someone talked about Negro Ali? I assume this appearance of racism was unintended, so I'm sure you won't use that type of labelling again. --Dweller (talk) 18:02, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

Hang on, Dweller. I understood the OP to be quoting that language and asking whether it was justified or true. While this might be a naive question, I don't think you can castigate the OP for quoting what they were specifically asking about. --ColinFine (talk) 00:33, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

Consider: would it be OK if someone posted here saying they'd heard someone refer to "Nigger X" or "Slitty-eyed Y" and asking if it were justified? --Dweller (talk) 07:18, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

The question is about the validity of the characterization of the individuals and their relationship being valid. i.e. to focus on the relationship in that context is not different than asking if Pontius Pilate's characterization of Jesus Christ as a "wine bibbler" was fair, justified or true. The question is not whether a person who refers to someone as "Nigger X" can be assumed racist and therefore the reference invalid but whether the comment is fair, justified or true on any possible terms since for example Pontius Pilate may have been inundated by wine bibblers prior to making the comment he made. 71.100.6.153 (talk) 00:31, 26 December 2009 (UTC)