Archaeologica.org

Notice the lightening rods atop Monks Mound at Cahokia:
http://www.legendsofamerica.com/il-cahokia.html

I am not going to try to explain Eastern Native American beliefs to you here, but I will note that just because you are used to exploitative religions, you're making the assumption that all religions are exploitative.

Why the hell you expect different peoples to use European language and concepts to describe physical phenomenon is beyond me.

Apparently South American religions were an even bloodier bunch of bastards than the Spanish, though.

I just can't get all warm and fuzzy about any religion, EP. I thought you knew that?

Minimalist wrote: Apparently South American religions were an even bloodier bunch of bastards than the Spanish, though.

I just can't get all warm and fuzzy about any religion, EP. I thought you knew that?

Yes, that's why you are a "minimalist", and not only that, but a minimalist who tries to ignore contemporary documents pre-dating the writing of the Old Testament.

That's not a good way of working with any culture, of doing ethnography and anthropology.

While I can't comment on South America, due to my ignorance of the details of their religions,
over on the aztlan list, many are in love with the Aztec, who were genocidal and cruel.

The Aztec make Hitler and the Nazis look good in comparison.

I suppose the important thing to determine is how such belief systems occur, because they have occurred, and repeatedly among different peoples at different times.

Contemporaneously, we all have a duty to see that such belief systems do not take hold.

Oh, I disagree with you. There were plenty of documents written before the OT. Quite a few seem to have been incorporated into it as a matter of fact, albeit with some name changes to make it more palatable to the target audience.

However, I don't know what that has to do with the price of tea in China.


Agree about the Aztecs, though.

Minimalist wrote:Oh, I disagree with you. There were plenty of documents written before the OT. Quite a few seem to have been incorporated into it as a matter of fact, albeit with some name changes to make it more palatable to the target audience.

However, I don't know what that has to do with the price of tea in China.

Its so nice when someone finally concedes a point to you, while at the same time misstating your initial position:

http://archaeologica.boardbot.com/viewt ... =10&t=2247

Minimalist wrote: Agree about the Aztecs, though.

Thanks, min. That makes me feel all warm and fuzzy.

Now imagine if you will the effort that has to be made to climb into the minds of those bloody bastards. There's one historical job where you'd earn your money: studying a people you really and truly despise.

while at the same time misstating your initial position:

Just because someone "writes something down" does not make it true, E.P. The Sumerians attributed their "flood" to the gods, too. So what?

studying a people you really and truly despise.

Yeah - just like the Nazis. In fact, history is full of bad examples.

Minimalist wrote: Just because someone "writes something down" does not make it true, E.P. The Sumerians attributed their "flood" to the gods, too. So what?

So what you have to ask yourself is why did they write it down, why did they make that effort, and exactly what the hell was it they were trying to say, and exactly who was the "they", and who were "they" working for?

studying a people you really and truly despise.

Minimalist wrote: Yeah - just like the Nazis. In fact, history is full of bad examples.

Funny how we don't have a general institute that's devoted to the study of genocides.
If there's one topic less studied than impacts, its genocides.
Take a look at the recent ones in Africa; no one wants to read about them.
Or the one in Cambodia under Pol Pot.
The only one we read about is the Holocaust, and it has a certain fascination, as an advanced people descending into genocide.
I don't think that there's a journal; and I don't know of any bbs.
No articles in any popular magazines.

I stopped my own history of the first peoples at Spanish contact; it covered the topics I set out to cover.

Or the one in Cambodia under Pol Po

Australia, Tasmania, New Zealand, The Carribs plus the occasional one during the 20C of course.

Mao Ze-Dong (China, 1958-61 and 1966-69, Tibet 1949-50) 49-78,000,000
Jozef Stalin (USSR, 1932-39) 23,000,000 (the purges plus Ukraine's famine)
Adolf Hitler (Germany, 1939-1945) 12,000,000 (concentration camps and civilians WWII)
Leopold II of Belgium (Congo, 1886-1908) 8,000,000
Hideki Tojo (Japan, 1941-44) 5,000,000 (civilians in WWII)
Ismail Enver (Turkey, 1915-20) 1,200,000 Armenians (1915) + 350,000 Greek Pontians and 480,000 Anatolian Greeks (1916-22) + 500,000 Assyrians (1915-20)
Pol Pot (Cambodia, 1975-79) 1,700,000
Kim Il Sung (North Korea, 1948-94) 1.6 million (purges and concentration camps)
Menghistu (Ethiopia, 1975-78) 1,500,000
Yakubu Gowon (Biafra, 1967-1970) 1,000,000
Leonid Brezhnev (Afghanistan, 1979-1982) 900,000
Jean Kambanda (Rwanda, 1994) 800,000
Saddam Hussein (Iran 1980-1990 and Kurdistan 1987-88) 600,000
Tito (Yugoslavia, 1945-1987) 570,000
Sukarno (Communists 1965-66) 500,000
Fumimaro Konoe (Japan, 1937-39) 500,000? (Chinese civilians)
Jonas Savimbi (Angola, 1975-2002) 400,000
Mullah Omar - Taliban (Afghanistan, 1986-2001) 400,000
Idi Amin (Uganda, 1969-1979) 300,000
Yahya Khan (Pakistan, 1970-71) 300,000 (Bangladesh)
Benito Mussolini (Ethiopia, 1936; Libya, 1934-45; Yugoslavia, WWII) 300,000
Mobutu Sese Seko (Zaire, 1965-97) ?
Charles Taylor (Liberia, 1989-1996) 220,000
Foday Sankoh (Sierra Leone, 1991-2000) 200,000
Suharto (Aceh, East Timor, New Guinea, 1975-98) 200,000
Ho Chi Min (Vietnam, 1953-56) 200,000
Michel Micombero (Burundi, 1972) 150,000
Slobodan Milosevic (Yugoslavia, 1992-99) 100,000
Hassan Turabi (Sudan, 1989-1999) 100,000
Jean-Bedel Bokassa (Centrafrica, 1966-79) ?
Richard Nixon (Vietnam, 1969-1974) 70,000 (Vietnamese and Cambodian civilians)
Efrain Rios Montt (Guatemala, 1982-83) 70,000
Papa Doc Duvalier (Haiti, 1957-71) 60,000
Rafael Trujillo (Dominican Republic, 1930-61) 50,000
Hissene Habre (Chad, 1982-1990) 40,000
Chiang Kai-shek (Taiwan, 1947) 30,000 (popular uprising)
Vladimir Ilich Lenin (USSR, 1917-20) 30,000 (dissidents executed)
Francisco Franco (Spain) 30,000 (dissidents executed after the civil war)
Fidel Castro (Cuba, 1959-1999) 30,000
Lyndon Johnson (Vietnam, 1963-1968) 30,000
Hafez Al-Assad (Syria, 1980-2000) 25,000
Khomeini (Iran, 1979-89) 20,000
Robert Mugabe (Zimbabwe, 1982-87, Ndebele minority) 20,000
Rafael Videla (Argentina, 1976-83) 13,000
Guy Mollet (France, 1956-1957) 10,000 (war in Algeria)
Harold McMillans (Britain, 1952-56, Kenya's Mau-Mau rebellion) 10,000
Paul Koroma (Sierra Leone, 1997) 6,000
Osama Bin Laden (worldwide, 1993-2001) 3,500
Augusto Pinochet (Chile, 1973) 3,000
Al Zarqawi (Iraq, 2004-06) 2,000

I think some of the above are not genuine attempts at genocide, but I'll leave that for you to interpret.

Roy.