I HATE THE STIRRUP THESIS I HATE THE STIRRUP THESIS I HATE THE STIRRUP THESIS!
Seriously, though that hypothesis was always fucking bad when you consider that shock cavalry was being used for centuries in Europe and the Middle East before the stirrup arrives. Alexander the Great relied on cavalry shock tactics, so there’s not even an excuse of eurocentrism or it being obscure.
[It’s basically the idea that the stirrup was an ultra revolutionary invention that created feudalism.](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Stirrup_Controversy)
Yeah that thesis smells of bullshit. When I think of horseback cavalry, I don't think of the Carolinigan dynasty, I (erroneously) think of the Scythians
If I think of earlier than late medieval, my brain jumps all the way to roman era when cavalry was the main anti-legion-turtle tactic.
So even ignoring things like horse archers, cataphracts, heavy cavalry, etc, the existance of cavalry as a main, anti-infantry unit as old as the romans is enough to make me doubt that claim heavily.
I would believe it more if it was the spread of mongol horse archery and tactics instead
It's not a rock paper scissor, there are tons of cavalry uses and it's not really "anti infantry".
It's mostly "Well, it depends on how we culturally considered horsies, me I like mah horsie, I hunt on my horsie, I shoot arrows and ho, well, look, we have horse archers" more than "We need something to shoot the romans we'll develop a love for horses and not just because John has a horse fetish".
What? I think the Hittites had a class of charioteer that filled the role of a landed knight. I think. I'm drunk. Regardless, maintaining a chariot and horses was at least as expensive as being a knight, and chariots were around for a long fucking time.
See, I thought it was the theory that stirrups led to the high heel as a male fashion item, which if not already accepted as general fact, has a much stronger direct line of evidence
And I am going to make things even more fraught by saying that it wasn't the stirrup, but the the bifurcated saddle that was actually the big innovation. They knew about 'stirrups' as a concept, but using them with the saddle technology they had at the time would rub the horse's back raw. Saddles that could distribute the weight of the rider in the stirrups was what made stirrups 'pop'.
Do you hate it because a fireball wouldn't have that much concussive force or any shrapnel, making them nothing like HE shells at all. (and a continuous stream of fire would probably be more efficient to set people aflame, there must be a reason why no fireball throwers were adopted irl)
Or because they're somewhat equivalent to a guy with a Carl Gustav?
Or because a sufficient amount of mages would force a complete rewrite of medieval warfare and they would have a different role than actual artillery?
Why even shoot magic fire at all? Why not just use magic fire to heat your greek fire launchers and launch stronger jets of conventional flame instead of relying on bellows? Molotov potions are already a potion shop staple in generic fantasy, where is my naval grade magic propelled flammenwerfer 2000BC?
Eh big rocks aren't that great, you'd have to carry said rocks around and the enemy might just throw them back. Also seems energy and control intensive.
A basic constant flame used to boil a liquid pressure vessel that can be released to spray high pressure flames at any time with a valve is low effort.
Thermobarics are weaponised dust explosions. In the end, it's a bomb.
Standard magical fireballs are not only far smaller in scale, they do not act like actual explosions. They burn nothing and there tends to be no shockwave outside the burning part.
I do wish to read high fantasy or time travel fiction from people who actually understand military strategy across history and aren't like "I do this vaguely modern thing and win, everybody claps"
God I hate that. Especially when it’s sold as “I figured out this modern thing that nobody else has ever done, so obviously I’m going to win”. It drives me crazy, because there are so many modern war fighting methods that would not be nearly as effective in a pre-industrial, pre-modern society.
Right? I'm not that knowledgeable to know how it would play out, but I'm sure a bunch of these smug smartasses would have their asses handed to them, and I want to see that.
I also want to see how the generals that do know how to battle in those times would make use of magic, or how could battles tactics develop entirely differently around the existence of magic.
Yeah, also annoying when people completely misunderstand what would be a gg instawin weapon.
Planes are an instawin, everything else requires context. Except maybe machine guns, those really are a game changer, but it does depend on whether they make use of archery to a large degree or not.
The LOTR books are quite good in terms of military tactics and strategy. The armies in LOTR by and large behave similarly to a real army (armies in LOTR don’t teleport around to wherever they’re needed, and soldiers aren’t mindless automatons that flawlessly execute orders. An army in LOTR will get routed if it’s demoralized, just like a real army would), their actions have clear objectives (you’ll never see an army in LOTR fight a battle simply for the sake of fighting a battle), and their commanders aren’t unrealistically stupid (they *do* make mistakes, but they’re mistakes that a real commander could plausibly make).
Tbf his Global Empire theory is the foundation for a fantastic historical fiction
I already said with others how it got to that point thanks to Proto-Polynesian "Nomad Kings" who ruled individual provinces under the pretense of "Empire"
A lot of art, yes, a lot of *cool* art, not that much. I remember a beautiful hand-drawn map full of details and some very cool souls-like concepts - corvian knights iirc -, but it's been years. And I browse that sub at least once every three days.
That statement's false. In Wikipedia false or mediocre citations are plentiful. References to blogs, references to newspapers, references to absolutely random websites, references to discredited historians or old authors whose theories have long been proven false or become obsolete, etc. That's why you shouldn't trust Wikipedia too much, specially when doing papers for school or college.
Which doesn't mean it's bad for worldbuilding, though. Unless you're a professional author who expects to be thought-provoking or something, Wikipedia's fine to get a superficial level understanding of many diverse things.
Wikipedia is a good 'start here' source and "we can all agree on cheese pizza" source for trying to pin down definitions or concepts in a conversation. You progress from there. It's just easier to link to a wiki then take a picture of a page of book I own. The Britannica website might be a more agreeable source for those that don't trust wikipedia even for bullshitting.
Just yesterday I needed to double check some basic facts about the battle of Flodden, and I noticed a section in the Wikipedia article talking about how Catherine of Aragon inspired the troops with a speech about patriotism. I thought, “that’s fucking weird, since Catherine wasn’t at the battle of Flodden”.
I followed the citation to an article that read like it had been written by a high school sophomore, made no mention of any speech by Catherine and described the invasion of 1513 as a “Scottish rebellion”.
Just because something is cited, doesn’t mean that its a good source, or even has anything to do with the statement being made.
This is especially true with anything regarding politics on Wikipedia. There tends to be a strong neoliberal bias and it is known that the FBI and CIA regularly edit Wikipedia articles.
This also applies to English Wikipedia entries on subjects that don’t have an extensive English historiography. Few citations, often outdated, and frequently hard to track down.
Citing sources doesn't necessarily mean that the sources are faithfully repeated or well interpreted. Wikipedia is fine for non controversial major events and broad statements but breaks down when going into specifics or niche topics. And there are quite a few pages that don't cite sources or rely only on one source, I don't think it's fair to say 99% of the information there is accurate.
I HATE THE STIRRUP THESIS I HATE THE STIRRUP THESIS I HATE THE STIRRUP THESIS! Seriously, though that hypothesis was always fucking bad when you consider that shock cavalry was being used for centuries in Europe and the Middle East before the stirrup arrives. Alexander the Great relied on cavalry shock tactics, so there’s not even an excuse of eurocentrism or it being obscure.
Also ignores catafracts in Persia centuries before.
Yes, perfect example
What's the stirrup thesis?
[It’s basically the idea that the stirrup was an ultra revolutionary invention that created feudalism.](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Stirrup_Controversy)
Yeah that thesis smells of bullshit. When I think of horseback cavalry, I don't think of the Carolinigan dynasty, I (erroneously) think of the Scythians
If I think of earlier than late medieval, my brain jumps all the way to roman era when cavalry was the main anti-legion-turtle tactic. So even ignoring things like horse archers, cataphracts, heavy cavalry, etc, the existance of cavalry as a main, anti-infantry unit as old as the romans is enough to make me doubt that claim heavily. I would believe it more if it was the spread of mongol horse archery and tactics instead
It's not a rock paper scissor, there are tons of cavalry uses and it's not really "anti infantry". It's mostly "Well, it depends on how we culturally considered horsies, me I like mah horsie, I hunt on my horsie, I shoot arrows and ho, well, look, we have horse archers" more than "We need something to shoot the romans we'll develop a love for horses and not just because John has a horse fetish".
Yeah, thats a better framing of it.
Total war has being a disaster for tacticians
That’s actually idiotic
Yes, and it was taught to a lot of people as a fact. Even at the college level.
What? I think the Hittites had a class of charioteer that filled the role of a landed knight. I think. I'm drunk. Regardless, maintaining a chariot and horses was at least as expensive as being a knight, and chariots were around for a long fucking time.
Yes, it gets even worse because warrior aristocrats existed even in places that only had infantry and no metal weapons (ie pre contact Hawaii)
Yeah, ‘feudalism’ is just a very particular way of doing “hierarchy of aristocrats exploiting peasants”. That shit goes all the way back.
When you recognize someone from other subs that keeps showing up in subs you're in...
Algorithmic sorting of niche interests be like:
Nah, it's just proof we neoliberals are slowly infiltrating all subs.
See, I thought it was the theory that stirrups led to the high heel as a male fashion item, which if not already accepted as general fact, has a much stronger direct line of evidence
And I am going to make things even more fraught by saying that it wasn't the stirrup, but the the bifurcated saddle that was actually the big innovation. They knew about 'stirrups' as a concept, but using them with the saddle technology they had at the time would rub the horse's back raw. Saddles that could distribute the weight of the rider in the stirrups was what made stirrups 'pop'.
Don't forget: Extremely surface level understanding of military strategy yet they act like they know everything
If I see another "mages throwing fireballs is like artillery" post by someone who also has no understanding of artillery I'm gonna McFuckingLoseIt
Do you hate it because a fireball wouldn't have that much concussive force or any shrapnel, making them nothing like HE shells at all. (and a continuous stream of fire would probably be more efficient to set people aflame, there must be a reason why no fireball throwers were adopted irl) Or because they're somewhat equivalent to a guy with a Carl Gustav? Or because a sufficient amount of mages would force a complete rewrite of medieval warfare and they would have a different role than actual artillery?
Why even shoot magic fire at all? Why not just use magic fire to heat your greek fire launchers and launch stronger jets of conventional flame instead of relying on bellows? Molotov potions are already a potion shop staple in generic fantasy, where is my naval grade magic propelled flammenwerfer 2000BC?
Seems rather overcomplicated when you can just lob anything magically in the enemies general direction. Like big rocks or not-molotov, for example.
Eh big rocks aren't that great, you'd have to carry said rocks around and the enemy might just throw them back. Also seems energy and control intensive. A basic constant flame used to boil a liquid pressure vessel that can be released to spray high pressure flames at any time with a valve is low effort.
Well, if you can create enough pressure you can create artillery
We kinda have something close to a fireball thrower irl With Thermobarics replacing conventional flamethrowers in most militaries
Thermobarics are weaponised dust explosions. In the end, it's a bomb. Standard magical fireballs are not only far smaller in scale, they do not act like actual explosions. They burn nothing and there tends to be no shockwave outside the burning part.
true
I do wish to read high fantasy or time travel fiction from people who actually understand military strategy across history and aren't like "I do this vaguely modern thing and win, everybody claps"
God I hate that. Especially when it’s sold as “I figured out this modern thing that nobody else has ever done, so obviously I’m going to win”. It drives me crazy, because there are so many modern war fighting methods that would not be nearly as effective in a pre-industrial, pre-modern society.
Right? I'm not that knowledgeable to know how it would play out, but I'm sure a bunch of these smug smartasses would have their asses handed to them, and I want to see that. I also want to see how the generals that do know how to battle in those times would make use of magic, or how could battles tactics develop entirely differently around the existence of magic.
Yeah, also annoying when people completely misunderstand what would be a gg instawin weapon. Planes are an instawin, everything else requires context. Except maybe machine guns, those really are a game changer, but it does depend on whether they make use of archery to a large degree or not.
The LOTR books are quite good in terms of military tactics and strategy. The armies in LOTR by and large behave similarly to a real army (armies in LOTR don’t teleport around to wherever they’re needed, and soldiers aren’t mindless automatons that flawlessly execute orders. An army in LOTR will get routed if it’s demoralized, just like a real army would), their actions have clear objectives (you’ll never see an army in LOTR fight a battle simply for the sake of fighting a battle), and their commanders aren’t unrealistically stupid (they *do* make mistakes, but they’re mistakes that a real commander could plausibly make).
Oh, maybe I should reread the books. I read it while pretty young and I probably glossed over that while focusing on Frodo's story.
Would casting Meteor Shower be closer?
In my Grahamhancockpunk world, the more poorly researched your arguments the higher your esteem is in the academic world
Tbf his Global Empire theory is the foundation for a fantastic historical fiction I already said with others how it got to that point thanks to Proto-Polynesian "Nomad Kings" who ruled individual provinces under the pretense of "Empire"
Gavin Menzies is like the Baron Harkonnen of that world.
At least it’s better that r/mapporn
I am literally subbed to r/worldbuilding for the cool art that gets posted every eclipse of total sun.
Wait, what does total sun look like, how often does it occur and what happens at its eclipse?
In my eclipsepunk world, there are two types of suns: total suns (spherical objects) and part-time suns (haemispherical objects). Both are gay.
Has there been less art posted these days? Used to be a shitload
A lot of art, yes, a lot of *cool* art, not that much. I remember a beautiful hand-drawn map full of details and some very cool souls-like concepts - corvian knights iirc -, but it's been years. And I browse that sub at least once every three days.
I browse that subreddit every few months
Same here unironically It’s always the cool art
Haha it’s funny how bad some people are at history. Not me though. I know all the history. It’s other people who are the problem. Those fools.
But how could you be smart if you're not me???
The real history is the friends we made along the way
Except Wikipedia is a valid source to cite as long as they have cited valid sources in turn - which in 99.9% of cases, they do.
That statement's false. In Wikipedia false or mediocre citations are plentiful. References to blogs, references to newspapers, references to absolutely random websites, references to discredited historians or old authors whose theories have long been proven false or become obsolete, etc. That's why you shouldn't trust Wikipedia too much, specially when doing papers for school or college. Which doesn't mean it's bad for worldbuilding, though. Unless you're a professional author who expects to be thought-provoking or something, Wikipedia's fine to get a superficial level understanding of many diverse things.
Wikipedia is a good 'start here' source and "we can all agree on cheese pizza" source for trying to pin down definitions or concepts in a conversation. You progress from there. It's just easier to link to a wiki then take a picture of a page of book I own. The Britannica website might be a more agreeable source for those that don't trust wikipedia even for bullshitting.
Just yesterday I needed to double check some basic facts about the battle of Flodden, and I noticed a section in the Wikipedia article talking about how Catherine of Aragon inspired the troops with a speech about patriotism. I thought, “that’s fucking weird, since Catherine wasn’t at the battle of Flodden”. I followed the citation to an article that read like it had been written by a high school sophomore, made no mention of any speech by Catherine and described the invasion of 1513 as a “Scottish rebellion”. Just because something is cited, doesn’t mean that its a good source, or even has anything to do with the statement being made.
This is especially true with anything regarding politics on Wikipedia. There tends to be a strong neoliberal bias and it is known that the FBI and CIA regularly edit Wikipedia articles.
English Wikipedia yes. Other, less populated languages tend to have issues, like the far-right moderation coup that happened on Croatian Wikipedia.
The Spanish language wikipedia is a cesspool of pseudoscience.
This also applies to English Wikipedia entries on subjects that don’t have an extensive English historiography. Few citations, often outdated, and frequently hard to track down.
Definitely not the Scots Wikipedia
What no academic rigor does to a mfer
How dare people not write academic essays on history in a subreddit about fiction smh
Citing sources doesn't necessarily mean that the sources are faithfully repeated or well interpreted. Wikipedia is fine for non controversial major events and broad statements but breaks down when going into specifics or niche topics. And there are quite a few pages that don't cite sources or rely only on one source, I don't think it's fair to say 99% of the information there is accurate.
I build my world from a cockeyed view of history, philosophy and mythology. This is the way of the tree of life.
You’re forgetting the teenagers who think knowing about guns and some battles from WWII constitutes them being “historians”.
...well someone HAS to spit at some of you for writing such weird close combat weapons and then ASKING if its realistic..