6. Under a cloak of terror: violence and armed conflict in Europe. - History Lab

The Declaration of War against Cleopatra

ad_hlab_min — Thu, 01 Dec 2022 12:48:38 +0000

The War of Actium (32–30 BC) was the last civil war of the Roman Republic, fought between Mark Antony (assisted by Cleopatra and by extension Ptolemaic Egypt) and Octavian. In 32 BC, Octavian convinced the Roman Senate to declare war on the Egyptian queen Cleopatra.

The post The Declaration of War against Cleopatra first appeared on History Lab.

Colonial War in 1st Person

ad_hlab_min — Thu, 01 Dec 2022 12:48:38 +0000

The Municipality of Chamusca presents the first episode of the project “Guerra Colonial na Primeira Pessoa”, a documentary series that records on video the stories and memories of former combatants in the Colonial War (1961-1974) in the municipality of Chamusca.

The first episode features the testimonies of Augusto Zibreira, Emídio Cegonho, Manuel José Aranha, Sérgio Carrinho, Manuel João Serrasqueiro and António José Costa, as well as the wives of former combatants Guilhermina Correia and Helena Queimado.

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Sword

ad_hlab_min — Thu, 01 Dec 2022 12:48:38 +0000

Bronze; leaf-shaped; imperfect at point; three rivet holes in each wing, four with rivets; two rivet holes in the hilt plate also with rivets; two rivet holes in the extremity of hilt plate which is doubly hooked.

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The Prehistory of Warfare: Misled by Ethnography

ad_hlab_min — Thu, 01 Dec 2022 12:48:38 +0000

Since the 1970s, most archaeologists working on hunters and gatherers have moved beyond ethnographic analogies for making inferential statements about the nature of hunting and gathering societies. However, the realm of warfare is the one glaring exception to this understanding of a major disconnect between past and present hunters and gatherers. Archaeologists, anthropologists, and other social scientists studying the origins of warfare have found the archaeological record somehow lacking in their efforts to understand the beginnings of warfare in the ancient past. To fill in the perceived gaps, they have turned to the historic record of hunters and gatherers, and in doing so have fallen into the trap of ethnographic tyranny. This chapter argues that the biggest problem with using historical ethnographies to make inferences about patterns of past human behavior is that they burden us with pictures only painted in the light of the modern, dense, colonial world of nation states. Another problem with the major studies based on ethnographies is that lots of other scholars take them as gospel. Declaring that warfare is rampant amongst almost all hunters and gatherers fits well with a common public perception of the deep historical and biological roots of warfare. The fact that there is extremely limited empirical evidence of any warfare among past hunters and gatherers is pushed to the wayside as an intellectual inconvenience.

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The Battle of Aljubarrota

ad_hlab_min — Thu, 01 Dec 2022 12:48:38 +0000

Detail of a miniature of the King of Portugal fighting at Juberotes.

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War Lesions From the Famous Portuguese Medieval Battle of Aljubarrota

ad_hlab_min — Thu, 01 Dec 2022 12:48:38 +0000

The corpses of the warriors of the famous battle of Aljubarrota, 1385, were laid in disorder in a common burial ground at the battlefield. The material was excavated in 1958 and then transferred, at least partly, to the Department of Anthropology of the Coimbra University (Portugal). The sample consists of 400 individuals represented mainly by their long bone fragments. Complete bones are an exception which implies that it is not possible with this material to reconstruct the different skeletons.

In the preliminary anthropological analysis of these individuals, the majority of them males who died between 20 and 60 years old, the bone injuries were the most relevant observation.

In this paper we refer to the most striking lesions due to violent and aggressive actions during fighting such as cuts, fractures, infections and eventual amputations. The probable causes of those wounds are also approached.

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‘It Still Makes Me Shudder’: Memories of Massacres and Atrocities during the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars

ad_hlab_min — Thu, 01 Dec 2022 12:48:38 +0000

This article looks at a number of French testimonies of massacres during the Revolutionary and Napoleonic wars committed by combatants, for the most part against civilians.

The post ‘It Still Makes Me Shudder’: Memories of Massacres and Atrocities during the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars first appeared on History Lab.

Following the drum: British women in the Peninsular War

ad_hlab_min — Thu, 01 Dec 2022 12:48:38 +0000

Examines the lives of British women, soldiers and officers wives, for the most part, who followed the British army on campaign in Portugal, Spain, and Southern France during the Peninsular War (1808-1814).

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Timeline of Portugal’s Liberal Wars

ad_hlab_min — Thu, 01 Dec 2022 12:48:38 +0000

Timeline of the Portugal Liberal War, since 1815 up to 1838.

The post Timeline of Portugal’s Liberal Wars first appeared on History Lab.

Topographic map of the Porto Lines

ad_hlab_min — Thu, 01 Dec 2022 12:48:38 +0000

Topographic map of the Porto Lines / created and published by Coronel Moreira.

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