Dean Swift

Separatism for all!

I am becoming all fired up with enthusiasm for the Pandora’s Box of separatism. In Cataluña, Catalunya and Catalonia, Mr Arthur More y More says Cataluña etc. is a Nation, speaking its own language, and must therefore be free of Spanish shackles. In the Basque Country terrorists have been murdering people for years because someone told them assassination was the best way to achieve secession. In Scotland, Mr Alexander Scottish-Salmon is all for independence because of the 1997 devolution referendum, and because the bloody Sassenachs have bullied the Scots since the Romans, though the latter were not actually Sassenachs. (more…)

By Dean Swift| 2012-02-07T18:30:56+00:00 February 7th, 2012|Humour, Philosophy, Today, World History|0 Comments

Anti-Semitism

My inspiration to write more on this spiny subject came from one of the published Comments on this site. The Comment can easily be found under the subject heading Jewish History. One of my previous posts dealt with statistics connected with The Holocaust. The commentarist restricted himself to using American terminology inviting and requiring intimate oral relations. One assumes that the expression used – “Suck my dick” – indicates a certain disinclination to accept the usual 6-million-dead holocaust statistics. They were I admit wrong, because I had inadvertently left out figures of murdered Jews in Poland and many Soviet satellites, leaving a final figure that lacks substance and does not add up to 6 million. (more…)

By Dean Swift| 2012-02-06T11:28:35+00:00 February 6th, 2012|English History, French History, German History, Jewish History, Philosophy, Russian history, Spanish History, Today, US History, World History|0 Comments

Three Tsars – Three Alexanders

Alexander I, Tsar of Russia was born in 1777, and was Tsar (King, Kaiser, Emperor etc.) from 1801 when he was 24 until 1825. His father was promisingly known as ‘The Mad Tsar’, but when Paul I was murdered, there exists proof that his son was not very far away. (more…)

By Dean Swift| 2012-02-04T11:27:48+00:00 February 4th, 2012|German History, Jewish History, Russian history|0 Comments

The unfortunate House of Stuart

Stuart James VI of Scotland (and Ist of England) / luminarium.org

Genealogy: The Stuart dynasty was important in the shaping of Britain and brought little luck to the family; they started as Stewards of Dol in Brittany around the end of the 11^th century. Two of them became Stewards-Guardian of Scotland in the 13^th century. Roberts I & II and David II were kings. James I of Scotland married Joan Beaufort, a granddaughter of John of Gaunt: their son James became IInd of Scotland. The English connection thus began, because John of Gaunt was a younger son of an English King (Edward III), and father to another English King (Henry IV). (more…)

By Dean Swift| 2012-02-03T11:20:56+00:00 February 3rd, 2012|Dutch History, English History, French History, Today, World History|2 Comments

Renaissance

Painting of cardsharpers by Caravaggio / fotos.org

This difficult word represents something more than merely being a favourite in the fevered mind of a history examiner. Without the Renaissance the world would now be a different place –not necessarily better or worse – but different.

What we know as the Renaissance flowered intellectually and artistically in Italy in the fourteenth century, and was in glorious full bloom in the sixteenth. The rest of Europe was profoundly influenced by it. The word is French, of course, and means ‘rebirth’. It indicates a revival of those values of the classical world that appeared lost in the rough and tumble of the ‘Dark Ages’. (more…)

By Dean Swift| 2012-02-02T11:07:32+00:00 February 2nd, 2012|Italian History, World History|0 Comments

Two very different Retz (or) Rais (or) Rays; Gilles & Paul

Gilles de Rais (or Retz etc) / deviantart.com

These two Frenchmen are joined by their blood, as in family ties, but there is a major difference in their characters. Gilles de Retz lived and died in the fifteenth century. His family owned more castles in France (especially in Brittany) than even the Capets or the Orlèans. Gilles was therefore very rich indeed, young, brilliant, untrustworthy (though Joan of Arc trusted him enough), and unusually fond of the boys.

Paul de Gondi Retz lived and died in the seventeenth century. He became a cardinal, and was so pushed by personal ambition he wished to replace Mazarin as chief minister of France. He left a priceless book of memoirs for students of personalities and intrigues of 17^th century France. (more…)

By Dean Swift| 2012-02-01T10:50:18+00:00 February 1st, 2012|French History|4 Comments

Four Murdered Monarchs

Regicide is the killing of a ruling king by his subjects. In a multitude of events throughout history the regicide has been perpetrated by members of the ruler’s family. This was especially the case in Roman history. In some South American Indian cultures the king was deliberately sacrificed in order to please Gods. In Europe, where our four subjects were killed by the people in one guise or other, kings have been removed because their politics were unsound, or because their politicians felt there was no other way.

Feminists will complain because a woman does not appear in our list. Many important queens have indeed been eliminated by their own subjects, Mary Queen of Scots springs to mind, though it was an English queen and cousin who ‘took her out’, very much persuaded by her councillors. General-history.com will examine prominent examples of female regicide soon. (more…)

By Dean Swift| 2025-03-06T21:37:10+00:00 January 30th, 2012|English History, French History, Russian history, World History|0 Comments

The War of 1812 (USA versus Britain)

The British burn the White House, Washington DC, 1812 / nytimes.com

This was a brief war between Britannia and Uncle Sam that many Americans and Britons know nothing about. Still it happened, and it contained at least one significant event: a British army burnt the new city of Washington, DC.

The Americans were greatly annoyed and frustrated in 1812, when the British restricted trade as a retaliation against Bonaparte’s ‘Continental System’. This was nothing more or less than a total blockade of British ports, planned by Napoleon to starve the island kingdom. Not even the Royal Navy was able to do much about the blockade. (more…)

By Dean Swift| 2012-01-29T18:21:28+00:00 January 29th, 2012|English History, US History, World History|3 Comments

1805 – 1815

Here for students of history is a plan of events between the naval battle of Trafalgar and the final battle in the European conflict against Napoleon Bonaparte at Waterloo. The career of Arthur Wellesley, the boy from Eton who became Duke of Wellington marches alongside the campaigns. (more…)

By Dean Swift| 2012-01-28T18:17:04+00:00 January 28th, 2012|English History, French History, German History, Russian history, Spanish History, US History, World History|0 Comments

Social Democracy

Definition: a social democrat is a usually suscription-paying member of a left-wing, ex-communist or centre-left political party that combines basically socialist aims with constitutional methods, plus a general acceptance (or tolerance) of some of the basic tenets of the capitalist system. The present system in China springs to mind as an unequalled example of an ex-communist country embracing a good many of the principles of social democracy. A bad example would be Cuba, where the system is wholly totalitarian, and the methodology of early sovietism in Soviet Russia is commonplace. (more…)

By Dean Swift| 2012-01-28T11:38:41+00:00 January 28th, 2012|English History, German History, Russian history, Spanish History, US History, World History|2 Comments

admin

About Dean Swift