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Wingsofwrath
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| Joined: 11 Oct 2005 |
| Posts: 87 |
| Location: Romania, Europe |
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Posted: Mon Nov 07, 2005 11:11 pm Post subject: Egyptian Elite - the Pharaoh Guard |
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| I found today's installment especially funny, since, as most of you can tell, I'm an avid military historian, and the etrogenous uniforms and "moddified" marching song just cracked me up... |
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SlothPaladin
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| Joined: 24 Oct 2005 |
| Posts: 27 |
| Location: Moses Lake |
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Posted: Tue Nov 08, 2005 7:58 am Post subject: |
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This strip made me think of Rome: Total War
_________________
My friends, can your heart stand the shocking facts about...
GRAVE ROBBERS FROM OUTER SPACE! |
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Wingsofwrath
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| Joined: 11 Oct 2005 |
| Posts: 87 |
| Location: Romania, Europe |
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Posted: Tue Nov 08, 2005 4:59 pm Post subject: |
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| Probably because of the the shields.... |
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The Author
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| Joined: 24 Sep 2005 |
| Posts: 998 |
| Location: too close to the monitor |
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Posted: Wed Nov 09, 2005 10:56 am Post subject: |
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Ah, yeah. If you look carefully, there's a SLIGHT resemblance...
But actually, my inspiration rested more with Asterix... |
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Alexander
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| Joined: 29 Sep 2005 |
| Posts: 320 |
| Location: athens greece |
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Posted: Thu Nov 10, 2005 8:19 pm Post subject: |
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Gods... You killed Frech garmmar with a panel... (Well I sometimes do that too, but still I do not publish it...) However the fact that you were inspired by Goscini, makes you a bit forgivable. By the way: DO NOT BUY THE LAST ASTERIX.
_________________
Creator of cranberry. :p |
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glassheart
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| Joined: 29 Sep 2005 |
| Posts: 39 |
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Posted: Thu Nov 10, 2005 8:24 pm Post subject: |
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| Alexander wrote: | | Gods... You killed Frech garmmar with a panel... (Well I sometimes do that too, but still I do not publish it...) However the fact that you were inspired by Goscini, makes you a bit forgivable. By the way: DO NOT BUY THE LAST ASTERIX. |
why ??? (not buy the last assterix)
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Wingsofwrath
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| Joined: 11 Oct 2005 |
| Posts: 87 |
| Location: Romania, Europe |
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Posted: Fri Nov 11, 2005 3:49 pm Post subject: |
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| Alexander wrote: | | Gods... You killed French garmmar with a panel... |
If you ask me, that's probably because Rutentuten tried to learn French during Napoleon's stay in Egypt. Normally, it would have worked quite well, since the french ended up staying for a while after their fleet was sunk at Aboukir, but he forgot one tiny detail: He was still burried in his tomb at the time, and it's well known that long tunnels distort sounds....
I bet that if Rutentuten knew how to speak proper French the phrase would have sounded more like "Ma garde meurt, mais, comme toujours, elle ne se rend pas" (My guard is dying, but, as always, it's not surrendering)
Also, as Glassheart said: What's wrong with the last Asterix?
Later edit: In fact the Egyptians knew quite a lot about mathematics, as did the ancient Babylonians. I don't know why we tend to consider ourselves superior in inteligence just because we have aeroplanes and flushing toilets while they didn't. The brain size was the same, and while advanced mechanics and electronics do need centuries to develop, you can certainly dicover that the ratio of a circle's circumference to its diameter is a constant just by drawing one and then thinking about it for a bit...
As for the pyramids, while some of them do make use of natural constants like the 3:4:5 triangle and Kufu's does incorporate the value of PI (2XPIXheight of the Great Pyramid = its perimeter) as well as 2 others (the one belonging to Snefru at Meidun and Neuserre's at Abusir), it is still unclear if this deliberate act was carried out in the quest to build the "perfect pyramid" or it was meant to confuse modern day archeologists...
Jokes aside, in fac the misconceptions over the "abnormal" knowledge of mathematics displayed by the ancient Egyptians stem from the fact that the Great Pyramid also seems to incorporate the "Golden Ratio", an irrational number used to slove the quadratic "fi+1=fi Squared".... Now there isn't any possible way that the Egyptians ever managed to calculate this neither any proof that they did. And after all, if they actually did find a way to do it, why didn't they incorporate it in more than one pyramid? (remember, there are 3 pyramids out there that contain PI) The only possible answer is that it was all just a big coincidence.
Also, another "mystery" is how the Pyramids were perfectly aligned to the four Cardinal Points, when the Egyptians didn't have magnetic compasses, and one such instrument would have been off by a few degrees anyway, since the Magnetic North does not coincide with the gegraphic one.
In fact there is a really easy method to find true north: all you need is a stick, a piece of string, and 12 hours... First you put the stick in the ground, making sure it's vertical (a plumb line would take care of that, and it's clear from the drawings inside worker's tombs that they used the above mentioned instrument) and with the string tied to its end draw a circle with rougly the same radius as the exposed lenght of the stick. Wait around all day, and mark the two points where the shadow of the stick's tip intersects the circle. Make an angle using the sun path intersections and the circle's center, and then bisect it (it's also clear that they knew how to do that). The bisector should give you the direction of true north. |
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The Author
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| Joined: 24 Sep 2005 |
| Posts: 998 |
| Location: too close to the monitor |
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Posted: Sat Nov 12, 2005 6:56 pm Post subject: |
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I admit my French is awful, but that's at least one trait I share with Napoleon, whose native tongue was actually Italian, and who never fully mastered the language of the people whose emperor he later became.
I'm not denying that Ancient Egyptians had advanced mathematical knowledge and achieved astounding precision in many of their architectural undertakings. it's just that so many kooks and pseudo-scientists completely overstretch that argument.
One, it's only rigthfully called precision if something has the precise dimensions it was supposed to have, not if something is precisely as long as it ended up being.
And second, a precise result does not necessarily require a precise manufacturing process. When a carpenter makes a table, the old-fashioned way, he'll seldomly end up with all four legs having precisely the same length, he'll just file them down until they match up. (If all fails, he can use the 'Book of the Living') |
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Wingsofwrath
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| Joined: 11 Oct 2005 |
| Posts: 87 |
| Location: Romania, Europe |
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Posted: Sat Nov 12, 2005 9:34 pm Post subject: |
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| The Author wrote: | | Napoleon, whose native tongue was actually Italian |
And I thought Napoleon was from Corsica... 
The language spoken there does have some similarities to the Tuscan dialect (and amazingly it's pretty close to my native Romanian, as wel as to the Catalan tongue), but call a guy from Corsica "Italian", and boy will you be in trouble... (the same goes with people from Sardinia or with Sicilians.... and I've heard Sicialians talk.. they don't sound remotely like italians!)
I completely agree with you there, eventhough precision is something the ancient Egyptians did fancy. Even now, the blocks of stone that make up the great Pyramid are so acurately cut to match each other, that you can't slip a piece of paper between them... Quite impressive, and as commonly stated this level of rigor would be impossible in the modern world... But not because the technology lacks, but rather because modern constructions focus more on "getting it done FAST" (as ever the western docrine of "time is money) then "getting it done flawlessy". Not to mention it should be pretty easy to get something right when you have lots of time and manpower... |
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The Author
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| Joined: 24 Sep 2005 |
| Posts: 998 |
| Location: too close to the monitor |
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Posted: Wed Nov 16, 2005 11:23 am Post subject: |
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Corsica and Sardinia are indeed pretty unusual, as far as idigenous population and language are concerned. According to the newest genetic atlas, Sardes are genetically farther removed from continental Europeans than Iranians are.
Corsica was occupied by a variety of powers over the centuries, Romans, Genoese (until 1768, that's why Napoleon spoke Italian) and finally French, but occupation generally only covered the small strips of coastal plain, the mountainous interior was mostly untouched up into the 19th. Century.
And Sicily changed hands so often it's almost impossible to keep track...Celts, Greeks, Phoenicians, Romans, Vandals, Arabs, Vikings, Germans, English, French...finally Italians. And that's just from the top of my head. |
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Alexander
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| Joined: 29 Sep 2005 |
| Posts: 320 |
| Location: athens greece |
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Posted: Fri Nov 18, 2005 4:58 pm Post subject: |
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The reason for you not to buy the new asterix: I tried to comune with the spirit of Goscini out of late, via 6 mediums. They all died from his uncontroled rage over the sacrilage commited in the last Asterix. I myself was in intense care and thus could not post anything for some time... As for Corse, all the info anyone needs can coincidentaly be found in the Asterix in Corse.
_________________
Creator of cranberry. :p |
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The Author
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| Joined: 24 Sep 2005 |
| Posts: 998 |
| Location: too close to the monitor |
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Posted: Fri Nov 18, 2005 9:11 pm Post subject: |
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| Alexander wrote: | | all the info anyone needs can coincidentaly be found in the Asterix in Corse. |
That's true for sure, although I think the part about the smell of Corsican cheese could be a bit exaggerated.
I wouldn't know, however, because after reading that volume, I would never dare get anywhere near that Island.  |
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