The Oral Tradition Gets It Wrong. Again.

So. I am listening to a performance of the Highland ballad The Bonnie House of Airlie, which is sad and moving in a George R. R. Martin sort of way. There is sex and violence and bloodshed. The bit of historical grit in the pearl of the drama was a conflict in the 1640s when Archibald Campbell, Earl of Argyll, raided Airlie Castle, the home of James Ogilvy, Earl of Airlie.

But the earliest version preserved was a printed broadsheet from 1790, and Child collected oral versions in the 1870s.

And the surviving versions transmute the historical Ogilvy support of Charles I to support for "Charlie" who is "awa'", referring not to Charles I of England but the young pretender Charles Edward Stuart a century later.

The oral tradition is slippery and undependable. If the Song of Roland can't even get the enemy right....

Relic of a Distant War

My father's father serve in France in WWI, in the Artillery. He brought home cartridge boxes for the 2.5 inch mountain howitzer, a deeply obsolescent piece at that time. I still have one today. It was the screw-gun of Mr. Kipling's army. The barrel screwed into the breech so you could take it apart into bits suitable for packing on mules. Kipling wrote a poem about them, first published in 1890:

Screw-Guns

Smokin' my pipe on the mountings, sniffin' the mornin' cool,
I walks in my old brown gaiters along o' my old brown mule,
With seventy gunners be'ind me, an' never a beggar forgets
It's only the pick of the Army that handles the dear little pets --
'Tss! 'Tss! For you all love the screw-guns --
the screw-guns they all love you!
So when we call round with a few guns,
o' course you will know what to do -- hoo! hoo!
Jest send in your Chief an' surrender --
it's worse if you fights or you runs:
You can go where you please, you can skid up the trees,
but you don't get away from the guns!

They sends us along where the roads are,
but mostly we goes where they ain't:
We'd climb up the side of a sign-board an' trust to the stick o' the paint:
We've chivied the Naga an' Looshai, we've give the Afreedeeman fits,
For we fancies ourselves at two thousand,
we guns that are built in two bits --
'Tss! 'Tss! For you all love the screw-guns . . .

If a man doesn't work, why, we drills 'im an' teaches 'im 'ow to behave;
If a beggar can't march, why, we kills 'im an' rattles 'im into 'is grave.
You've got to stand up to our business
an' spring without snatchin' or fuss.
D'you say that you sweat with the field-guns?
By God, you must lather with us --
'Tss! 'Tss! For you all love the screw-guns . . .

The eagles is screamin' around us, the river's a-moanin' below,
We're clear o' the pine an' the oak-scrub,
we're out on the rocks an' the snow,
An' the wind is as thin as a whip-lash what carries away to the plains
The rattle an' stamp o' the lead-mules -- the jinglety-jink o' the chains--
'Tss! 'Tss! For you all love the screw-guns . . .

There's a wheel on the Horns o' the Mornin',
an' a wheel on the edge o' the Pit,
An' a drop into nothin' beneath you as straight as a beggar can spit:
With the sweat runnin' out o' your shirt-sleeves,
an' the sun off the snow in your face,
An' 'arf o' the men on the drag-ropes to hold the old gun in 'er place --
'Tss! 'Tss! For you all love the screw-guns . . .

Smokin' my pipe on the mountings, sniffin' the mornin' cool,
I climbs in my old brown gaiters along o' my old brown mule.
The monkey can say what our road was --
the wild-goat 'e knows where we passed.
Stand easy, you long-eared old darlin's!
Out drag-ropes! With shrapnel! Hold fast --
'Tss! 'Tss! For you all love the screw-guns --
the screw-guns they all love you!
So when we take tea with a few guns,
o' course you will know what to do -- hoo! hoo!
Jest send in your Chief an' surrender --
it's worse if you fights or you runs:
You may hide in the caves, they'll be only your graves,
but you can't get away from the guns!

Just the thing for carrying up a mountain and demolishing a mud brick Afghan fort one mountain over. It used black powder, first served in the field in 1879 and was muzzle loaded. It was still used in WWI, but only in peripheral campaigns where it was better than no howitzer at all. I surmise that my grandfather met someone from a British battery that used to use them, was still using the cases to pack things in, and gave them away when he went home.

The past is a different country.

Joss Whedon Delivers Commencement Address

..."you are all going to die."

Those That Rush Towards Danger

We have those that rush towards danger
Some wear badge or uniform
And some only are discovered
In the moment of alarm.

A Staggering Saga of Epic Sock-puppetry

Eric Naiman's detective work uncovers a web of academic and literary sock-puppetry stretching across three decades, featuring bad sex scenes, fake footnotes, a drawer full of sock-puppets, faked death, a faked car accident, nipple descriptions as a sock-puppet diagnostic, an invented meeting between Dickens and Dostoevsky, lies, revenge, pirates and sword fights. Well, probably not the last two.

It's like an academic and literary version of the rat bastard click farmers who create a network of bogus interlinked sites to improve their Google rank.

The Barnes Foundation in Philadelphia

This Friday I visited the collection of the Barnes Foundation in its new home in Philadelphia. Thank you, oldest daughter.

I visited this wonderful collection many times when it was in its original home in Merion, PA.  I think the transplant was a success.

First of all, the new location will allow many more people to see the art. In Merion, local zoning severely limited the number of visitors per week. It looks like about four times as many will be able to visit in Philadelphia. Based on my experience, the current number of visitors does not significantly degrade the experience for visitors.

Second, the new location provides more space for both conservation and the educational mission of the foundation.

Third, the new location faithfully recreates the arrangement of the art in individual rooms at Merion at Barnes' death, with great respect for Barnes' quirky juxtaposition of high art and what are often considered the lesser crafts of metalwork and furniture. The most significant differences are better lighting and the replacement of tape on the floor warning you not to stand too close to the paintings with wood inlay. Also, the new site makes it easier to appreciate the Matisse Mural The Dance II in the main hall.

While the new location retains the laconic labels of the original collection, each room also makes available folders with more information based on more recent scholarship. Barnes was sound on the impressionists and later art, but less so on earlier works. For works prior to the 19th century, he often accepted erroneous attribution, accepted copies as originals, accepted 20th century forgeries as authentic and missdated authentic pieces by more than a century.

If impressionistic or post-impressionistic art gives you joy, go to this place.

Comforting the Afflicted

Today Pope Francis washed and kissed the feet of twelve prisoners, two of them women and two of them Muslims. He then gave each one an Easter egg.

This is contrary to the canonical but optional Holy Thursday mandatus liturgy of washing the feet of twelve men.

So much the worse for canon law. There's never a bad time or way to comfort the afflicted. I'm sure St. Francis would approve, let alone the man who started the Christian foot-washing tradition. Charity is not limited by the liturgical calendar.

And the Easter eggs were a joyful touch.

Mid-Century Modern Dream Homes of DEATH

Projectophile has a morbidly funny collection of the lavish opportunities Mid-Century Modern homes offered for children to plummet to their DEATH, alternating with opportunities to drown in the conveniently available reflecting pools or tumble into the blaze in the convenient open fireplace.

Do you do poison? Do you do staircases? Quite steep ones without a railing? Next to a water cascade from a reflecting pool so they are covered with slippery moss? Next to a steep drop with pointed rocks at the bottom? Could the fall kill a woman? Say, a 50 year old woman who looks LIKE THIS?

Nimona

Lord Ballister Blackheart has a point to make, and his point is that the good guys aren't as good as they seem. He makes a comfortable living as a supervillain, but never really seems to accomplish much - until he takes on a new sidekick, Nimona, a shapeshifter with her own ideas of how things should be done. Unfortunately, most of those ideas involve blowing things up. Now Ballister must teach his young protégé some restraint and try to keep her from destroying everything, while simultaneously attempting to expose the dark dealings of those who claim to be the protectors of the kingdom - including his former best friend turned nemesis, Ambrosius Goldenloin.

History for Music Lovers II

The Trojan War
The Mahabharata
Illuminated Manuscripts
The Divine Comedy
Black Death 

I would rather discover one true cause than gain the kingdom of Persia

That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

The Hedgehog's Not For Burning

Apparently hedgehogs like to crawl into unlit bonfires. Bear this in mind on Guy Fawkes Day. This message brought to you by the British Hedgehog Preservation Society.

Flashmob Beethoven

Joy.

Some Study That I Used to Know

This made me laugh. In which the Gotye parody's former high school teacher becomes justifiably annoyed. And naked.

When I was in high school I hated being made to learn Latin, which I was sure would be useless. And now I use it regularly.

Mozart Is Dead. Papageno Isn't.

I heard him last night.

Think about that, my fellow memory-binding bipeds. An imaginary creation, over 200 years old, still lives.

We are richer than emperors. If given a chance to trade places with Hadrian or Trajan, I'd refuse without hesitation, because I'd need to give up The Magic Flute. And other things.

It's a great life if you don't weaken. Or destroy the world.

So let's not do that.

Paintings of Blooming Grove

Clouds Over Lake Giles 1 by ~WillMcLean on deviantART


Clouds Over Lake Giles 2 by ~WillMcLean on deviantART


Beauty Pool by ~WillMcLean on deviantART

Battleship Sushi

Nomnomnom. Gunkan Maki, the style typically topped with salmon roe, translates as battleship roll. Artist Mayuka Nakamura executes the idea literally.

Stop SOPA and PIPA

Here's why.

Status Competition among English Lit Professors

(This has been a trend for years--sometime around 1993, I recall a professor telling me that there was a sort of boomlet in dissertations on Spencer's Faerie Queen. When I asked him why, he raised an eyebrow and said, "Well, you know, no one's actually read the whole thing, so there's a lot of unexplored territory there.")

So says Megan McArdle

Religion and Culture are Complicated

Whenever you read or hear phrases like "The Arab mind is...", substitute a similarly broad cultural group you are more familiar with. For example, "The Anglophone mind is..." Unless hedged with qualifications, could you confidently say much that was both useful and true?

If you can't, treat simple, unqualified statements about other cultures with suspicion.

Likewise, "Islamic ideology..."

Substitute "Christian ideology..."

I would hope, if you either are a Christian or know many, that you would respond that self-described Christians hold very diverse beliefs, and generalized statements without qualification should be made with caution.

I believe that Muslim belief is equally diverse.