Great Growing Cucumbers! Columbus Returns To Coast: On The Second Voyage: end of March,1494

After starting another fort in the interior of this place, Columbus, according to his son, needed more food and set off again to return March 21, 1494 to Isabel. On the way back he passed a helpful troop of mules, headed south, sending his forces more food. But rains had swelled the banks of a river and he was delayed for some days. He looked for another place to ford the river, and while there, ate the produce some of the locals offered, like peppers and casavas. In the end it took him eight days to return.

In the meantime, seeds sown at the beginning of the year at Isabela had already borne fruit.

"On Saturday, 29 March, he came back to Isabela, where they had grown melons ripe enough to eat, although the seed had only been sown two months before. Cucumbers also were grown in twenty days, and a wild vine of the country though not fully grown had produced good, large bunches of grapes.

The next day, 30 March, a farmer gathered ears from wheat which had only been sown at the end of January. They also gathered chick-peas bigger than the stock from which they were grown. The seeds of all the plants they sowed came up in three days and on the twnty-fifth day were ready to eat. Fruit stones produced seedlings and vine shoots produced tendrils, both in seven days, and unripe grapes could be gathered in twenty-five. Sugar cane germinated in seven days also. All this was attributable to the mildness of the climate, which was much like that of our own country, being cool rather than hot, but also to the rains in these parts, which are very cold, light and good for growth."

The Admiral was delighted with the climate, the fertility and the local people. This list of times he gives when crops came up is significant for two reasons. One, his men could be quickly fed with seeds they brought and they could probably continue to grow foods his men knew and could easily digest. Significant for morale as well as self-reliance. But also, this meant that future expeditions and settlements in this land could also hope to sustain themselves in much the same way. This ease of growing produce also turned into part of the fantastic allure of the entirety of this exotic and abundantly fruitful place. One of many stories inflated to spread the news about this new world.
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pp 164-5:  The Four Voyages, Christopher Columbus, edited, translated and with an introduction by JM Cohen, for The Penguin Group, London, 1969

Noah, Giants, Cannons, Pantagruel: Rabelais; Telling Facts From Fiction

After a long list of the kinds of abnormalities that developed from eating medlars, Rabelais explains that Pantagruel was one that came from a line of giants who had abnormally large bodies. The giants, before the great flood were part of the giant list of genealogies that Rabelais claims was the source for so much knowledge on the subject. Using Biblical, Greco-Roman, Medieval romance characters and purely fictitious members of his own invention for his genealogy line, Rabelais turns confidentially to his audience again.

"I understand well enough how, in reading this passage, a reasonable doubt may well arise in your minds. You may ask how it is possible that things should be so, in view of the fact that, at the time of the flood, everybody perished except Noah and seven persons who were with him in the ark; in which number the Hurtaly [a giant] above mentioned is not included. The point is, undoubtedly, well taken, and quite obvious; but my answer shall satisfy you, or else my brain is badly calked. Seeing that I was not there at the time, and so am not in a position to give you an eye-witness account, I will cite for you the authority of the Masorites, those well hung lads and fine Jewish bagpipers, who assert that, in reality, the said Hurtaly was not in Noah's ark at all. He had not been able to get in, for he was too big; instead he sat a-straddle of it, one leg this way and one leg that way, like little children on their wooden hobbyhorses, or like the big bull's-horn-blower of Berne who was killed at the battle of Marignano, and who had for a mount a  huge rock-throwing cannon which is a beast with a jolly nice ambling gait, I may tell you, and one with which no one could find any fault."

Noah had a giant, Hurtaly that sat astride his ark: and not just any giant, but the father of Nimrod who was father of Goliath, etc. Masorites were intent Jewish scribes of the 5-10 CE who worked to fix grammar, pronunciation and even cantillation standards for the Jewish canon. But attribution to them concerning Hurtaly riding astride Noah's ark seems ridiculously unfounded, and a clear Rabelaisian invention.

On the other hand, the battle of Marignano was something that at least happened in our yarn-spinner's lifespan. There, in mid September 1515, near modern-day Melegnano, Italy the Old Swiss Confederate troops on service to the Emperor were defeated by the French forces of King Francis I. The Swiss previously had taken Milan two years before. This time, 21 year old Francis brought a cannon and some very skilled German landesknechts, as well as promises of troops from Venice. Within a few weeks, Francis sat in the throne in Milan and Ludovico Sforza's son, Maximilian was sent to France. But, for many it was the cannon that was remembered as siezing the day that time: that big instrument of terror that Rabelais says his bullhorn blower sat astride.

Both of these examples show how Rabelais plays his game. He mentions authorities or notable events, famous personages, fine-sounding words and phrases and then, with attention peaked, tells you another convolution of balderdash. Of course, he goes on!

"In this manner, I swear to God, Hurtaly saved that ark from shipwreck, for he would give it a shove with his legs and turn it whichever way he chose with his foot, as one does the helm of a ship. Those that were inside sent him up plenty of victuals through the chimney, being grateful for the good turn he was doing them, and sometimes they would converse together as Icaromenippus did with Jupiter, according to Lucian's report.

Do you think you have all this through your noodles? Drink up then, a good stiff drink without a chaser, for if you don't believe it, neither do I, said she."

Never mind that sitting astride even a rowboat or canoe, the smallest of water-born vessels, and using one's feet and legs to help steer, or 'kicking the helm' as he slyly injects, are both terrible ways to actually steer a boat. But to assert that a giant could do this, fed up through the chimney, conversing like Icaromenippus listened to prayers sent to Zeus, Rabelais has drawn us into a very strange scene.
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from pp 232-34: Samuel Putnam: Portable Rabelais: Viking Portable Library: Second Printing: The Colonial Press Inc. USA, 1955

Bernal Diaz in Mexico: The Market of Tlatelolco ~c.1520

Bernal Diaz tells us that Cortes let it be known he wanted to see their great temples, their adoratorios. Moctezuma agreed but essentially wanted to go first and have other of his chiefs escort Cortes and his men. Diaz then reminds us that he and others on horseback were all armed and 'at the ready' as many local chiefs accompanied them to Tlatelolco.

"When we arrived at the market in the large plaza, Tlatelolco, as we had not seen such a thing, we were astonished at the multitude of people and quantity of merchandise and at the good order and control they had everywhere. The chieftains who were with us went along showing it to us. Each type of merchandise was by itself and had its place fixed and marked out. Let us begin with the merchants of gold, silver, rich stones, featherworks, cloths, embroidered goods, and other merchandise, including men and women Indian slaves; I say that they brought as many of them to sell in that great plaza as the Portuguese bring blacks from Guinea, and they brought them tied to long poles with collars around their necks so they could not flee, and others they left loose."

Diaz says there are slaves but sees this as a measure of control and power. Another comparison with the markets as he knew them "... where the fairs are held..." in the Medina del Campo region of Spain shows how impressive he thought they were.

"... where ... each type of merchandise has a street for itself; so they were in this great plaza and those who sold cloaks of maguey fiber, ropes, and sandals, which are the shoes they wear and make from the same plant; and from the same tree, they make very sweet cooked roots and other sweet things. All were in one part of the market in their designated place. In another part were skins of tigers, lions, otters, jackals, deer and other animals, badgers and mountain cats, some tanned and others untanned...." [p. 208]

"Let us go on," he invites us,

"... and talk about those who sold beans and sage and other vegetables and herbs in another part. Let us go to those who sold hens, roosters with wattles, rabbits, hares, deer, and large ducks, small dogs, ... in their part of the marketplace. Let us talk about the fruiterers, of the women who sold cooked food, corn pudding, and tripe, also in their own part. Then every sort of pottery, made in a thousand ways, from great earthen vessels to small jugs, which were also in a place by themselves; also those who sold honey and honey paste and other delicacies like nut paste. Then those who sold wood, boards, cradles, beams, and blocks and benches, all in their own part." [pp. 208-9]

Diaz explains, with apologies how the locals saved human excrement 'for making salt or tanning skins'. They also made paper and sold goods made of bronze, copper and tin. There were other local items.

"... some reeds with the scent of liquid amber, filled with tobacco, and other yellow ointments and things of that sort ... they sold much seed under the arcades of that great marketplace.... those that made flint blades ... fisherwomen and others who sold some small cakes that they made from a sort of ooze they got from that great lake, and it curdles, and they make bread from it that has a flavor like cheese... some gourds and some jugs painted all over, made of wood.

I would like to have finished talking about all the things that were sold there, because there was so much and of such different types, but in order to see and inquire about all of that, as the great market was full of so many people, all of it surrounded by arcades, it would not be possible to see everything in two days." [pp. 209-10]

Leaving the market and moving on to what he calls the cu, the temple complex, Diaz seems to describe accountants making records of transactions who used goose quills that were filled with gold. Or this is what he was told.

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from ch xcii in Bernal Díaz de Castillo: The True History of the Conquest of New Spain translated with an introduction and notes by Janet Burke and Ted Humphrey, Indianapolis, Hackett Publishing Co, Inc. 2012

some news late March 2014

UPDATE: a couple great songs I heard this week:

Amazing song! great recording on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon: Passenger: Scare Away the Dark on @hulu http://t.co/1NZLoquX8j
— neditsimple (@neditssimple) March 30, 2014

I REALLY liked this!! Lake Street Dive Plays "I Want You Back" On a Boston Sidewalk: http://t.co/jfxy0NIGUz via @YouTube Looks like fun!
— neditsimple (@neditssimple) March 28, 2014

It has been a busy week in current news. In the US there were some California Democratic politicians arrested by the FBI after an investigation lasting several months. Also a Charlotte, NC mayor accused of corruption was arrested.

Maddow also looks again at the problems in testing of Air Force officers involved in the nuclear weapon launch program [8 min video]. Nine were fired, dozens will be investigated.

A massive avalanche near Oso in Washington state has destroyed a square mile of prime real estate. Twenty-five people at least are dead and 150 more are still missing. Some blame logging industry for triggering the landslide.

The BP oil spill in Lake Michigan is twice as large as they first reported.

Embattled New Jersey Governor Chris Christie had a press conference announcing the retirement of the Port Authority chief David Samson and touting his own innocence as stated in a report and press conference made by his own lawyers. [71 min video] In that report they lay most of the blame for the #bridgescandal on his former chief of staff Bridgett Kelly. That same night her lawyers attacked the report as 'venemous' and demeaning to their client and later she was reported to have announced she would speak only to US Federal prosecutors who are currently investigating the many claims against Governor Christie. The timing of the retirement of Samson, the Christie picked Port Authority chief, seems suspicious to many as he, acording to emails was aware of the traffic problem on the bridge and in the town of Fort Lee, New Jersey that lasted for four days last September. It is also clear that Gov Christie wants to move on from the scandals as he went to Las Vegas today to try to get donations from wealthy Republican casino king, Sheldon Adelson. At heart of #bridgescandal is the question who and how would anyone benefit from bottling up one of the most heavily trafficked bridges out of Manhattan. All this has been near the top of the news for months as he is seen as a possible presidential contender for 2016. But Christie's Friday pressconference, Samson resigning and the Brigett Kelly responses have pushed this again to the forefront of the media shows.

POTUS Barack Obama spent the week in Europe, mostly discussing the ongoing crisis in Ukraine and Crimea and ended his trip with a visit to pope Francis in Rome. They gave each other gifts.

NSA chief steps down but doesn't mention Snowden at ceremony. POTUS says there should be changes at the agency including stopping the phone dragnet. We'll see what this means or maybe they will say they will stop it and just trim around the edges.

Meanwhile everyone is tense over the standoff in Ukraine. Last week's vote annexed Crimea to Russia, according to the Russians. Rest of world is not accepting this vote as valid. Military exercises continue in the east of and around Ukraine.

Turkey's PM ordered to shut down twitter and youtube ahead of elections Sunday in that country.

Really remarkable twenty segment audio collection of sights, sounds & stories from Mexico-US border, from npr

Bernal Diaz in Mexico: Garden View c.1520

Bernal Diaz in recounting the days he spent in the company of the great Motecuhzoma, gives us some of the best most detailed descriptions we have of the man, his court, local practices and what must have been the huge market in the great capital city. Much of it unfortunately has scant contemporary or corroborating accounts. So when Diaz goes on at length it's worth noting, even though he soon grows tired of it and changes the subject.

Diaz gives us a clear description of the man himself, as well as how Moctezuma ate his food, how his servants dealt with him, and even how much cacao was delivered at certain times. He gives us tours of temples and gardens, a zoo and aviaries. One is worth noting for its picturesque quality.

"Let us not forget the gardens of flowers and sweet-smelling trees and the many kinds he had of them, their arrangement and the walkways, the ponds, and reservoir of fresh water, how the water comes in at one end and goes out by the other, the baths he had within, the variety of small birds that nested in the branches. The medicinal and other useful herbs he had there were something to see, and for all of this many gardeners, and everything made of masonry and well whitened with lime, baths as well as walks, and other private rooms and apartments like summer houses and also places where they danced and sang."  [p. 206]

There were so many different kinds of artisans and architects and advisers, Diaz gets tired listing them all. The great market at the plaza of Tlatelolco was another great wonder.
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 quote from ch xci, Bernal Díaz de Castillo: The True History of the Conquest of New Spain translated with an introduction and notes by Janet Burke and Ted Humphrey, Indianapolis, Hackett Publishing Co, Inc. 2012

Procession On Feast Of Annunciation: March 25, 1493

The Catholic Church celebrates the Feast of the Annunciation of the Blessed Virgin Mary on this day. In 1493, the pope as part of the festivities went in formal procession to the Church of Santa Maria sopra Minerva and then to the Church of Santa Maria del Popolo. Through the chronicling of Johann Burchard, papal Master of Ceremonies we can get a glimpse of what Master Burchard did, what a pope normally did and a little of what this pope Alexander VI did differently.

The day before, Burchard tells us he had heard that the pope wanted to ride through the city for the procession. Burchard advised Cardinal Ascanio, the current vice-chancellor not to allow men-at-arms or other security to march ahead or behind the pope and the cardinals. If there were concerns about security,

"... he should send them on in advance and station them in particular places and streets that he thought dangerous. This Cardinal Ascanio agreed to do in fact carried out, by ordering and only permitting the soldiers to stand at those points he selected, whilst retaining about forty infantry with sheathed swords to escort the pope, and a further hundred foot soldiers with halberds and swords but no lances, to march as usual in front of the cross." [pp 57-58]

In these early days of the Borja papacy, these two men wanted to work together. Cardinal Ascanio of the Sforza family, and brother of Ludovico, the effective Duke of Milan, had seen how lucrative the office of vice-chancellor had been for the former Cardinal Borja. Such a position could be very beneficial for the Sforza's in Rome. But this amicable arrangement would not last long and Cardinal Ascanio would align himself with Cardinal della Rovere by the next year.

Burchard detailed the clothing and sacred symbols the pope wore on this occasion. It was Cardinal Piccolomini who held the cross that the pope kissed before he entered the sanctuary. The friars sang and the pope entered, prayed, took of his cloak, put on a white cope, and 'made his confession with the celebrant'. Then he sat in the throne and was "... reverenced by the cardinals in turn, while everything else in the service was correctly conducted." [p. 55]

This is how Burchard reveals divergence from established protocol and processes. Through slight omissions and addition. A list of seating arrangements comes next from Burchard, beginning with proximity to the pope and radiating out. But a space was made in the pope's choir so that women in the church could see while a number of bishops were seated in the monk's choir. One of these was an ambassador from Spain, the bishop of Pavia who complained at length to Burchard about the empty space on the bench wishing he and other envoys could have sat there. Burchard afterwards says he agreed with this bishop but doesn't admit who gave such an order for arrangement or that it was necessarily wrong, but that it would be more fitting to do as this visiting bishop said, since there was plenty of room. [p.56]

Still this church did very well as many rich donations were offered to this church on account of the pope and so many other visitor's visit on this festal day.
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from Johann Burchard: At The Court of the Borgia translated for english, with introduction by Geoffrey Parker, The Folio Society, Ltd, 1963

Cortes Tells How Moctezuma Was 'Captured', ~circa 1520

On top today is a brief quote from Hernan Cortes in his second letter to the new Spanish King and Emperor Charles V. Once Cortes and his faction and their followers had entered the great city of Tenochtitlan and met Moctezuma in November, scant details of their time there over the winter were set down. Further, neither Cortes or Bernal Diaz payed much attention to dates as they had before, except rarely in their continued chronologies. Much of what they talk about is the reception in Spain to the embassy sent by Cortes and reactions by Governor Velazquez and the subsequent arrival of more Spaniards on the Mexican coast. That came later.

But Cortes spent very little time talking about how they actually apprehended or contained the person who was Montezuma. It probably happened some time after they had been there awhile, and not the six days that Cortes implies, as Moctezuma, by other testimony, was to have a great deal of freedom to direct others and move around his city. Even so there is, as a consequence this relative lack of first hand information of these months where such a monumental change in the current realm occurred there. Questions of all kinds arise. But this is what Cortes had to say, addressing Charles V.

"Most Invincible Lord, ... I decided from what I had seen that it would benefit Your Royal service and our safety if Mutezuma were in my power and not in complete liberty, in order that he should not retreat from the willingness he showed to serve Your Majesty, but chiefly because we Spaniards are rather obstinate and persistent, and should we annoy him he might, as he is so powerful, obliterate all memory of us. Furthermore, by having him with me, all those other lands which were subject to him would come more swiftly to the recognition and service of Your Majesty, as later happened. I resolved, therefore, to take him and keep him in the quarters where I was, which were very strong.

Thinking of all the ways and means to capture him without causing a disturbance, I remembered what the captain I left in Vera Cruz had written to me about the events in the city of Almeria, and how all that had happened there had been by order of Mutezuma." [p. 88]

Cortes had heard that a cacique of a town neighboring Vera Cruz had asked for an escort of Spaniards to protect him as he prepared to visit with the Spaniards. When this escort arrived, the cacique, Cortes tells it, had two of them killed yet covered it up and the others escaped. When that captain heard of this he marched on this town Almeria with 'fifty Spaniards, two horsemen, two guns and eight or ten thousand of our Indian allies', and captured it, killing many of the inhabitants. This cacique, it was deduced and reported back to Cortes, had acted in this way on orders of Moctezuma. [p. 87]

When Cortes had a moment, he went to speak with Moctezuma, and after exchanging pleasantries and gifts told him he knew what had happened in Nautecal, the local name of what the Spaniards called Almeria. At once Moctezuma sent his people to bring this cacique and the others implicated back to have them questioned. Cortes priased him for handling it so well but then made a request. Moctezuma should stay in the same place with Cortes, anywhere he liked, but near each other, "... until the truth were known and he [Moctezuma] was shown to be blameless." [p.89] Implied threats of the wrath of the far away King Charles were given as reason for this request.

"I begged him not to take any of this ill, for he was not to be imprisoned but given all his freedom, and I would not impede the service and command of his domains, and he should choose a room in those quarters where I was, whichever he wished. There he would be very much at his ease and would certainly be given no cause for annoyance or discomfort, because as well as those of his service my own men would serve him in all he commanded. In this we spent much time reasoning and discussing, all of which is too lengthy to write down and too tedious and too little pertinent to the issue to give Your Highness an account; so I will say only that at last he said he would agree to go with me. Then he ordered the room where he wished to stay to be prepared, and it was very well prepared. When this was done many chiefs came, and removing their garments they placed them under their arms, and walking barefoot they brought a simple litter, and weeping carried him in it in great silence. Thus we proceeded to my quarters with no disturbance in the city, although there was some agitation which, as soon as Mutezuma knew of it, he ordered to cease; and all was quiet and remained so all the time I held Mutezuma prisoner, for he was very much at his ease and kept all his household." [pp. 89-90]

The locals remembered the story differently, as did Bernal Diaz. Our translator of Cortes, Anthony Pagden has some additional notes that can be given while relating the longer version of this story told by Bernal Diaz.
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quotes and pagination from The Second Letter from Hernán  Cortés: Letters From Mexico, translated, edited and with a new intro by Anthony Pagden, as a Yale Nota Bene book, Yale University Press, USA 2001

The View From Forli: Troops Begin To Arrive In Bologna: 1494

The view from Forli after the King of Naples died was troubling as well. The Countess, Caterina Sforza may have known that the aged king Ferrante had also kept Alfonso, the duke of Calabria, the heir in Naples from attacking Milan himself. This was regarding the advancement of the uncrowned acting duke in Milan, Ludovico 'il Moro' and his son. Over the years bit by bit Caterina's uncle was taking over all matters in Milan, slowly taking the place of Caterina's little brother Gian Galeazzo Sforza, the rightful heir. He was husband to Isabella, the daughter of that same Alfonso, duke of Calabria. He now, with the death of his father became the new uncrowned king in Naples.

If it sounds messy it was. Caterina in Forli, had sent dignitaries and gifts when her uncle Ludovico had married Beatrice d'Este and then when he married her sister Anna to Alfonso d'Este, the heir of the duchy of Ferrara. Caterina hadn't gone to the weddings of her little brother to that Isabella either, though she was the Aragonese daughter of duke Alfonso of Calabria in Naples. That was in 1489 but Caterina had a good excuse then.

When Ludovico in 1492, sent his new wife Beatrice as ducal ambassador to Venice, Isabella was outraged at what she saw as a clear breach of her own position and standing and wrote, complaining furiously to her father in Naples. This is a part of the story that Elizabeth Lev tells, which sums up her prelude to the looming invasion [ p. 172-73], as well, in her biography of Caterina Sforza.

Others, like near contemporary Francesco Guicciardini point to letters sent from Piero de Medici of Florence to Alfonso in Naples, pledging future support. In the past, Piero's father, Lorenzo de Medici maintained a more neutral stance toward Naples and to King Ferrante which was reciprocated over the years. With this new generation, changes in the former balance among the various powers sprang out into the open.

Stories, that the young French King would come to Italy himself and claim his rightful title to Naples, an inheritance that he gained through the House of Anjou, spread that spring of 1494. In Bologna, Lev tells us, just up the road from Forli, Caterina could well know that troops were amassing [p. 174]. Horsemen, archers and all manner of folks began arriving and milling. The locals remarked how well behaved they all seemed, leaving the women and fields and homes in peace. It must have been some relief to Caterina as she pondered her options.

It was plain as the men gathered up the road that the region she lived in was the natural crossroads for forces coming from the north and for those coming up from the south to meet them. The Romagna-Emilia plain was the perfect spot for a grand contest. But wars brought bloodshed and worse, financial ruin. Soldiers and their trains did not always stay so well-behaved. Her uncle in Milan sent dignitaries asking for promises of loyalty to him and her birth city of Milan. The pope Alexander VI sent letters and dignitaries and promises to her as well, asking her to help in their support of Naples. Through the year, Caterina maintained an uneasy neutrality to either side. On the one hand she owed her freedom to the aid and support she had gained from the papcy, when her husband was killed. The pope sent Cardinal Rafaello Riario, this time to try to gain her pledge of assistance. He was met with the same resolute neutrality by her while under the gaze of the always present Giacomo Feo.

This hands-off neutrality by Forli allowed the forces to grow in the region all summer until Charles VIII the French King arrived himself,  in September.

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all notes, pagination from Elizabeth Lev, The Tigress of Forli: Renaissance Italy's most courageous and notorious countess, Caterina Riario Sforza de'Medici : 2011, USA, Houghton, Mifflin, Harcourt Publishing Company

Columbus Treks Inland: On The Second Voyage: March 14-20, 1494

Pushing on from the Yaque del Norte Rio, Columbus & this group, marched inland for several miles (and a couple days), often in rocky terrain, passing large unfortified villages, frightened inhabitants and heavy undergrowth. They came to a stop in the middle of nowhere and decided they needed more food.

"... about eleven leagues beyond the first mountain pass [Los Hidalgos] he had come to. The land is on the whole flat and the general direction of the road is to the south... they followed a track along which the leading horses had difficulty in passing. From this place the Admiral sent some mules back to Isabel to fetch wine and bread, for they were already running short of food and the journey was proving long. Their hardships were increased by the fact that they were not yet accustomed to eating the food of the Indians, as people do now who live and travel in these parts." [p. 162]

They did get used to eating local food, though Hernando Colon, our author here, the son of Columbus, reminds us in the old manuscript of the Life of the Admiral, that the local food wasn't as nutritious as that brought from Spain. It's just these kind of impossible but provincial asides that seem to show the authenticity of  this account. Provenance here has been disputed of this text in the past. But JM Cohen in his 1969 intro to this english translation (of a 1947 Spanish text), explains that he's convinced that only the son as author could make such hyperbolic, and sometimes petty claims about a father. Many of the details are also much more full of certain periods than other eyewitness accounts, like de las Casas. Here, our translator tells us that The Life of the Admiral appeared as an Italian published work in 1571, supposedly from a now lost Spanish original.  Cohen says:

"Though one nineteenth century scholar actually suggested that it was no more than the compilation of an Italian bookseller, its authenticity is supported, in my opinion, by the son's exaggerated claims for his father's noble descent and scholarly education - in which no objective critic will believe - and, more strongly still, by his frequent quotations of his father's log-book and other writings, which agree with those of Las Casas and with such originals as survive. None of this material would have been available to an Italian hack working for the book trade." [p. 23]

None that one might guess, Cohen would find nutritious. But I have no other evidence.

So they sent people back to the fortress at La Isabela. On Sunday 16 March, Colon the son says, the men returned with food and Columbus set off inland again. It was rough going, but after a while they came to a place where they found grains of gold in a mountain stream. Here Columbus said, they would build Santo Tomas in honor of St Thomas, but also refuting those 'doubting Thomases' who said there would be no gold.

"The further they went, the rougher and more mountainous the country became, and in the streams they found grains of gold. For, as the Admiral says, the rain washed it down from the mountain tops in small grains. This province is as large as Portugal and throughout there are many gold-fields and much gold in the rivers. But generally there are few trees, and these are found on the river-banks. The majority of them are pines and palms of various sorts." [pp. 162-63]

The critics were mostly right and Columbus, as usual, mostly wrong. But that didn't stop his drive. In a footnote here, Cohen helpfully reminds us, there were no goldfields. The account of Dr Chanca who went along also seems, Cohen says, to have taken this report of rich goldfields 'on trust'. And he tells us that Colon goes along with the exaggerated claims, as well, reporting as though it was Columbus . Cohen explains in a footnote.[p. 163]

"In fact, Hispaniola was rich in nothing but potential slaves and it was on the slave trade that Columbus, espite the disapproval of the Catholic sovereigns, founded his hopes. He had already made a proposal in the letter that he entrusted to Antonio de Torres for the importation of slaves captured in war."

The locals came and brought food and grains of gold - since that's what they heard he wanted, says his son - and after 'eighteen leagues', Columbus decided to build another fort, Santo Tomas. There he stationed Pedro Margarit with fifty-six men. There they 'sowed seed' and found stones like eggs, packed in straw and mud and also marble of various colors and pieces of jasper. [pp. 163-64]
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pp 159-61:  The Four Voyages, Christopher Columbus, edited, translated and with an introduction by JM Cohen, for The Penguin Group, London, 1969

Beware The Ides of March: twitter 2014

The weather looks nice out today, but you never know. This might be a nice time for a mini-vacation brought today by twitter. Every so often, the constant flow of information gets to feeling weird. As any time, it's hard to explain. Many very serious, troubling things are happening. The missing Malaysian plane, for example, has been missing for over a week. But with so much going on, tumultuous crises, wars, impending wars and disasters of all kinds and bad news and times of lots of change, where technology and even governments buckle under the weight, it somehow seems right that many will just blank out and be silly. It's what works, if you can get a chance to laugh.

Photos: India celebrates Holi, the Festival of Colors http://t.co/4Q6Wj3bdSd pic.twitter.com/NUJQHBAGKq @ajam
— Matt Brown (@Colchester1891) March 15, 2014

• Sen Mitch McConnell of KY made an ad with no speaking, just music. So the comedy geniuses @TheDailyShow with Jon Stewart made a bit about how easy it is to put a song to it. It seems any song does the trick. My favorite was uploaded to you tube. They called it McConnelling Everybody Knows, using the Leonard Cohen song. It's perfect!

#mcconnelling Instructions: http://t.co/WjFEAesqAy; favorite example: http://t.co/vguxekLWjS What are you waiting for?
— neditsimple (@neditssimple) March 15, 2014

• A San Francisco radio station 105.7 last night played a single twelve year old song over and over for five or six hours ... and it seems a lot of people heard about it. Play it three or four times and you get the idea. Makes people itch like a springtime thing. #Nelly1057
• In 2009 Kansas state legislature passed a Net Metering law that limits who can and how much a resident might collect solar power - you know, from the sun, to use instead of the local dominant electricity supplier. Residents aren't allowed to exceed 25kw unless you apply to the electricity supplier. My local example is linked here. On the face of it, what they say looks to be great, if you can make sense of the paperwork and requirements.
• A brief look at what the CIA did this time: Senator Dianne Feinstein, Chairwoman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, someone who never tells agency they screwed up, comes right out and says it.
• Texas Senator John Cornyn tweeted this: 

Beware the Ides of March http://t.co/z541PYwSTj
— JohnCornyn (@JohnCornyn) March 15, 2014

and digby tweeted this almost at the same time:

In Texas, it's totally legal to murder a black kid if he's sleeping with your daughter, by @DavidOAtkins http://t.co/wxv8I2B7XV
— digby (@digby56) March 15, 2014

and this NY Congressman reminds us that national tax day is a month away and we can get free help from the government.

Tax day is in one month — have you filed? Get started at http://t.co/T4TAV282Wu to learn how you can file your federal taxes for free.
— Paul Tonko (@RepPaulTonko) March 15, 2014

•  Tomorrow a vote is expected to be held in Crimea to decide how it will return to Russian Federation. This photo was snapped this morning of Ukraine's interim PM flying back from a few days in Washington : 

Просто премьер Украины Яценюк в самолете Цюрих-Киев. pic.twitter.com/0UryOwQV8F
— ЄВРОМАЙДАН (@euromaidan) March 15, 2014

• POTUS Barack Obama agreed to be asked inane questions by an imbecile acting like a pompous tv person, for several minutes.
• Seeking words of wisdom (?)  from Lady Gaga at SXSW in Austin, TX this week. The night before she came out on a roasting spit, like she was the pig being roasted for barbecue.
• Houses in Portofino, Italy ... it would be fun to see floorplans of these places. But with a quick google search you can realize they are very skinny houses built on a cliff. This is a town probably much like the one young Felice della Rovere was sent to, just on the other side of Genoa on the Ligurian coast.

Villas near Portofino, Italy pic.twitter.com/L89ZiUwntf
— Maria Boedeker (@MariaBoedeker) March 15, 2014

Just a few more pictures of the town harbor up the street. The music on this clip could be played all day here and I wouldn't mind a bit. This clip from the six minute mark on will show these houses in particular, but the music gets very surreal...

• And a not so random bit of Domestic! Virgin Line video and song selections from Feb2006 Tokyo Jihen performances as the day drifts away.

• On a more serious note: banksy has an animation #withSyria

Felice della Rovere Sent to Savona: Spring 1494

As Felice della Rovere lived out her childhood years, likely in Rome, her actual father Cardinal Giuliano della Rovere had become a chief advisor to the pope, Innocent VIII. After many failures, setbacks and disappointing notes, the Rome of Innocent VIII had begun to fall into old patterns of violence and crime. Unpaid debts made creditors anxious, the debt Naples owed to the papacy would not come in and two of the pope's chief advisors could not agree. The vice-chancellor Cardinal Rodrigo Borja was at odds with Cardinal Giuliano della Rovere over whether the pope could bequeath certain benefits to his own family members. The story told is they had this fight in the same room with the dying pope.

From this point on, and for the next twenty months, the two would disagree, publically over this same issue of how a pope could treat his issues. It would be Cardinal Borja who was elected to be the next pope, Alexander VI and within eight months he would have two of his children betrothed in order to solidify those children as alliances with prominent houses. Cardinal della Rovere would protest and Rodrigo, now pope would make a bigger occasion out of it than last time.

A year after becoming pope, Alexander VI submitted a list of names of persons he wanted to be received as cardinals into the college. One of them was his own 18 or 19 year old son, Cesare. It was told this had set Cardinal Giuliano into such a  rage that he had to spend several days recuperating from fever after refusing, along with ten other cardinals to attend the consistory and vote on such a measure. Through the winter della Rovere tried to drum up support to have this Borja pope thrown out. He would not succeed.

With the news in 1494 that the King of Naples had died, tremors of more changes spread throughout Europe.  By spring of that year, Cardinal della Rovere had decided to leave Rome after nearly a dozen years, in the center of it all and return again to France. It is also likely he sent his daughter Felice out of the city for her own protection. Despite the good home she was living in, Cardinal Giuliano had taken a public stance against the current pope, who simply knew everyone and had enough money to get to anyone in Rome. And this not only put himself in danger, he thought, but the life of his daughter as well. If Guiliano was to have a chance to secure his daughter in a useful alliance, as this Borja pope was blatantly doing, she would have to be kept far away.

So she was sent to Savona, a distant fishing town on the way to Nice, near Genoa, to her father's sister's house. There Felice would go through adolescence with a heightened sense of self in a backwater town run by merchants. The sophistication and excitement of Rome was far away. Her relatives including a female cousin would not likely be as impressed with her, since her mother had never married her father. This pychological take on Felice's adolescent life is briefly [chs 8-9], but compellingly made in Caroline Murphy's book.
_____________________________________________
Caroline P Murphy: The Pope's Daughter: the Extraordinary Life of Felice della Rovere ; Oxford University Press, New York, 2005

Columbus Leaves Isabel: On Second Voyage: March 12, 1494

Christobal Colon returned to the Caribbean Sea in late 1493 on his second voyage to the region. He was looking for gold and 'rich lands'. Still operating under the delusion that he had discovered a new route to India, what he found gave him evidence of what he was seeking. What was actually discovered, of course, was more than he had hoped for, even if it was not what he thought it was.

Over the course of the winter and into March 1494, they would continue to sail and stop and build fortresses and move on, taking samples, writing things down, making temporary allies, discovering Puerto Rico, and Jamaica. More evidence of Colon's hard form of leadership surfaced as the men tried to mutiny and were harshly put down. A list of discoveries was compiled along with a fresh batch of demands that were sent to the King and Queen back in Spain. Columbus got ill and stopped writing his diary, as his son tells us, so a few items about this part of the trip had to be filled in by him.

While recovering at Isabela the fort they were building on the north coast of Hispaniola, Colon had sent Alonso de Hojeda with fourteen men to look for 'the goldfields of Cibao.' Cibao was a local Taino name for that rocky, mountainous region of northern Hispaniola. Along the way he met friendly locals, saw some panning for gold and affirmed it was rich in gold. With this news, Hojeda came back after a few days to tell Columbus.

"On receiving this news, the Admiral [Columbus], who had now recovered from his sickness, was greatly delighted and decided to land in order to examine the nature of the country and decide on a course of action.

"On Wednesday, 12 March 1494, he left Isabel for Cibao in order to see those goldfields with all his men that were fit, both foot and horsemen, leaving a good guard on the two ships and three caravels, all that remained of his fleet. He had had all the shot and weapons of the other ships put aboard his flagship, so that no one could raise a revolt in the others, as many had plotted to do while he was ill. For many had come on this voyage with the idea that the moment they landed they would load themselves with gold and would immediately be rich men (though in fact where gold is found it takes pains, time and industry to seek and collect it) and as things had not succeeded for them according to their hopes they were discontented. This exasperated them, as did also the labour of building the town [Isabel]; they were exhausted too by sickness due to the nature of this new country, the climate and the food. They had been plotting in secret to renounce the Admiral's authority and after taking the remaining ships to return them to Castile."

The leader of this plot, said Columbus' son, was the accountant sent along by the Monarchs in Spain. A court official named Bernal de Pisa was found out with written libels and then left, imprisoned onboard ship while the adventuring continued.

They took all the tools needed to build another fort and as many men as possible to show a good force of numbers, in order to intimidate any locals who might consider attacking them.

"As a greater display of his might, on leaving Isabela and all the other places he came to, he drew up his men in military formation as if marching to war, fully armed with trumpets sounding and banners displayed."

They crossed a pass up in the hills and found beyond a great open plain which they went down into and camped beside a river he caled Rio de las Canas. On the first voyage he had seen the same river from the sea and called it Rio de Oro. Today it's called Yaque del Norte.
_____________________________________________
frompp 159-61:  The Four Voyages, Christopher Columbus, edited, translated and with an introduction by JM Cohen, for The Penguin Group, London, 1969

The US Has A Special Friend In Israel: Rare Dissent Unveiled

The US has a special relationship with the state of Israel. The reasons are many as are the consequences. Carved out of Palestine at the end of WWII, Israel has been in existence as a sovereign state since 1948. This is not a history of Israel but a few brief points can be made. In 1967 Israel went to war with its neighbors and expanded its territory, into the Sinai peninsula and north and south of Jerusalem into the area now known as the West Bank.

Every few years there are seemingly endless negotiations for peace, but then, the war returns. After the historical peace accords in the late 1970's brokered by the US and cementing relations between Israel and Egypt, conflict again broke out. In the 1980's there was war with Lebanon, the neighbor to the north. In the '80's and '90's conflict with Palestinians within Israel intensified, further hardening the barriers between the portion of Israel known as the Gaza strip and the rest of the country. Another major peace accord between Palestinians and the Israeli state seemed to be coming to conclusion in 1999-2000, only to fall apart.

In the early 2000's conflict was resumed and massive destruction of Palestinian neighborhoods in Gaza and the West Bank became policy for Israel. Random bombings, assassinations and establishment of 'border terrorist-checkpoints' became common. For generations the US has been supplying Israel with billions of dollars in aid and military equipment. Despite official denials and unlike the rest of their neighbors, Israel has nuclear weapons. A great wall began being built to separate inhabitants in  the West Bank from the rest of Israel. Any aid that goes to Gaza or the West Bank is controlled, filtered and combed through by Israeli Defense Forces. Anything else must be smuggled there.

Since September 11, 2001 a policy of the US Government has been to starkly define friends and enemies. Isreal and the UK are called friends, Syria and Iran were called enemies. Iran and Syria supplied arms to allies in Lebanon and Gaza to be used against Israel. The posturing, propaganda and escalation of tactics are regular symptoms of the instability and tension on both sides. There is a quick discussion of the current state of negotiations over the acknowledgement of Isreal as a 'Jewish state' in today's news, on NPR.  In the US the language is so consistent regarding our special friendship with Isreal that dissenting opinions are rarely heard here.

Cultural, intellectual and commercial ties with Israel and the US are strong and deep. In business, in education, in entertainment, engineering and the media, American Jews have been unquestionably necessary in the 20th century for American progress and advancement. In movies, in music, in physics, the humanities and all other arts, imagining an American 20th century without those Americans of Jewish heritage at the forefront of all these fields and more, is impossible. But to hear a dissenting opinion about policy generated by the Israeli state or the US, remains rare.

Willingness to criticize US or Israeli policy can and has led to professional marginalization by one's peers and even, in some cases, clandestine surveillance. So it is with some surprise that last week a number of Americans, who have had reason to criticize Israel or the US with regard to Israel, came together to spend a day presenting their evidence to the public. It was filmed and aired on CSPAN March 7, 2014. The eight hour video is here. I include it here because it shows the kind of transparency that while very rare, is available and possible. It also details the kinds and depth of support the US has for its special friend in the middle east in ways that are seldom heard. This is also one of those few but dramatic differences in attitudes between the west now and the west during the European Renaissance.

Uprising In Friuli: Sanudo Diaries: March 1511

It was the first week in March of 1511, and there were tensions in Friuli. Since 1420 the larger than usual subalpine region of the Patria of Friuli had been protected by Venice. Considered an essential member of that necklace of numerous cities that continued to be effectively held in orbit by Venice in stasis as separate client city-states, Friuli had split into factions.

Our Editors for Sanudo refer us here to Edward Muir's 1993 book Mad blood stirring: vendetta and factions in Friuli during the Renaissance from Johns Hopkins University, for their brief introduction of the topic. It was the time of the War of the League of Cambrai where a number of forces in the larger world had decided to put some limits on the power and prestige of Venice. This time it was the Germans massing their army, riding into the plain. And just then the troubles boiled over as,

Editor's note: "... two Friulan clans, the della Torre and the Savorgnan, erupted in a vendetta of pillage and bloodshed, which the Venetian authorities attempted, with varying degrees of success, to control." [p. 97]

The dutiful luogotenente, or lieutenant of the Patria of Friuli sent letters, Sanudo tells us, that were read for the council of Ten at the Collegio in Venice, and it was awful news. The head of the della Torre clan don Alvise and a number of relatives and castellan had been killed, eight in all. Twenty-two houses of the family and their partisans were  pillaged and burned. The Signoria had brought the heads together at one point to work out their differences, but to no avail.

Now, 200 German cavalry and 500 infantry were closing in on Udine, the center of the Friulian plain. But when the people were arming themselves and readying to guard the gates of the city, something was said against pasrtisans of the Savorgnan and a fight broke out. The deaths and fires then took place. Property of don Antonio Savornan was also destroyed, according to the lieutenant's report. The Editors remind us in a footnote [p. 98] that the chronology of events isn't entirely clear as Sanudo himself continues to report on events and backstory for the next several days. And they refer us again to the book of scholarship of Edward Muir again.

Sanudo Diaries: March 1, 1511 (12:5-6): "The luogotenente writes that all of Udine was armed and involved in the uprising, that public artillery was used to knock down the door of the house...".

The lieutenant had sent for infantry to come from nearby to help guard the city.The Council agreed to reconvene later in the day and the debate then went on for hours. At last they decided to send one of the Ten to discharge orders given him. This person was Andrea Loredan, former luogotenente, selected by ballot.

Sanudo Diaries: March 1, 1511 (12:8): "Some would have preferred someone else, saying that he is a friend of the Savorgnan, but it seems to me that his friendship with Savorgnan is probably the chief reason why he was chosen."

The situation got worse as more letters were received in ensuing days. Two more castles of the della Torre clan, outside Udine had been taken and the matron of the family - the recent widow of don Alvise - was captured and tortured to reveal the locations of her children. If the opposition could find and kill or capture their children, then the leaders no longer would have to worry about retribution from that family. The Collegio talked at length again about this and decided to send a notary to the State Attorney's Office along to help with Andrea Loredan. A notary could write down official agreements and proclamations, to ensure their legality. Also a constable was selected to go with 200 local infantry gathered locally. And with a marvelous detail, the picture in Venice is completed.

Sanudo Diaries: March 3, 1511 (12:15): "Thus the drummer went around the town..."

Which meant literally that a drummer was sent from place to place in the city to announce and recruit volunteers to go and help stop the conflict in Friuli. Apparently this is what they did in these situations.  Fluid bands of men were gathered up and in short order sent to restore order. Their payment, it was understood in those days, would come, if possible through what they might pillage in heroic deeds of valor. More letters arrived.

Most of the peasants had been sent away from that area, one imagines to keep them out of harm's way, but as it turns out, because some "...wanted to sack the Jews." The leogotenente in the name of the Council and the Signoria of Venice told them all that this should not be allowed. But apparently the peasants would not listen. Today, this turn of events may be difficult to understand.

The reality is far simpler. Christians could not charge interest in transactions or loans in the market. It was considered a Catholic sin (until the 20th century, after WWI) for Christians to charge interest on loans. Jews were not forbidden by the Torah from that as an activity and thus became essential to those markets. As a result, they became wealthy when others in a community like the peasants toiled without such gains. In just a few generations, by their own vigor, education and good sense, a Jewish community could flourish in an amenable village or city in Italy, or the rest of Europe. With the sudden upheaval of these old local houses - the record doesn't call them Jews - the pillaging that took place in those houses excited the locals into thinking they too, could have a chance at some loot. The other houses nearby, that the peasants knew where wealth might be hid, often was those of Jews who worked in the markets and helped with loans. It really is an old story showing deep disparity of wealth and the desperate means which people were willing to go to secure it. Especially during uncertain times of larger war. In this case with foreign armies just over the horizon.

Then more letters were received, this time from ser Loredan detailing where he had stopped other peasants trying to sack a castle and again south of Udine, were more doing the same.

Sanudo Diaries: March 7, 1511 (12:31): "Yet the entire Patria is in arms. On March 5 he entered Udine and was met by the leogotenente and don Antonio Savorgnan and all the others... He [Loredan] will try to hold the trial and to complete the return to peace, which he has been commissioned to do."

These were the days that Leonardo Loredan was doge. Another reason why a Loredan might be sent to tighten things up in Friuli. A certain Andrea Loredan was also responsible for this building, designed by Mauro Codussi, to be built some thirty years before. This temporal distance makes it unlikely it is the same Andrea as the Ten member who went to Friuli in 1511, but Leonardo did help pay for construction. That would be the house that Richard Wagner would die in, in 1883 and which now houses the Wagner Museum in Venice.
______________________________________________\

notes from 'our editors' and Sanudo Diaries from Venice, Cita Excellentissima, Selection from the Renaissance Diaries of Marin Sanudo translated by Linda L Carroll,  editors: Patricia H LaBalme and Laura Sanguineti White, published by Johns Hopkins University Press, 2008

Francois Rabelais: De Origine Pantagrueli

Little is known of the life of Francois Rabelais, neither the year of his birth or death. Only the general contours of his many professions can be outlined. The names of patrons, schools, churches, monasteries, locations, even names of friends do remain, however, concerning his record, along with probable dates of those changes and associations. Much of his life has been gleaned from his own writings, but mostly through hints thrown out by his own fictional characters. Not that his own life wasn't interesting.

Rabelais was a doctor as well as an author, a Franciscan novitiate, as well as a Benedictine monk, for awhile. He travelled widely for his day, studied in Paris, grew up near Poitiers, worked in Lyon as a doctor and latin editor for new published books. He also long studied ancient Greek, wrote humorous pamphlets, got out of obligations, went to Rome a number of times with a cardinal friend Jean du Bellay, and after publishing books of fantasie, even hid out in Metz to avoid being harassed by the authorities. But lacking so many details of his life, it is tempting to forego the normal methods of determining the shape and direction, or purposes of his life. Those can come later after a quick dunk in the smelly ocean of Rabelais' own words. A surer and more certain way to get to know the guy and what he thought of his world can't be found, than by just getting right to the meat of what he will always be known for.
In a forward 'To the Readers':

"My friends, who are about to read this book,
please rid yourselves of every predilection;
You'll find no scandal, if you do not look,
For it contains no evil or infection.
True, you'll discover upon close inspection,
It teaches little, except how to laugh:
The best of arguments; the rest is chaff,
Viewing the grief that threatens your brief span;
For smiles, not tears, make the better autograph,
Because to laugh is natural to man."

Gargantua and Pantagruel came out in several parts. It was popular, then banned, withhheld from publication, praised and shunned, laughed at, hidden from view, read widely, grossly impugned, cut up, misinterpreted, picked over fondly, memorized by ideosyncratic surrealists and called father of the modern novel. Its characters laugh and lust and drink, tell the worst stories and break out into song, for no reason but to forget the always present lack of whatever it is that people always thirst for. It makes fun of everything, especially when audiences are not supposed to laugh. And it drinks deeply of the profound changes that thinking and acting and believing were making in the years that Rabelais lived, roughly 1483 - 1555. Thirsty days.

"It may not be a useless nor an idle proceeding, in view of the fact that we have plenty of leisure on our hands, to refresh your minds regarding the primary source and origin of our friend, Pantagruel. For I notice that all good historians do this in their Chronicles, not only the Arabians, the Barbarians, and the Latins, but also the Greeks and Gentiles, who were endless drinkers. It is fitting here, that you make a note of the fact that, at the beginning of the world -- I am speaking from a long way off, for it is more than forty times forty nights, calculating according to the method of the ancient Druids -- at the beginning of the world, shortly after Abel had been killed by his brother Cain, the earth, imbued with the blood of the righteous, was one year so very fertile in all the fruits that are produced from its flanks, and especially in medlars, that that year has been known from time immemorial as the year of the great medlars, since three of them make a bushelful."

So begins the Second Book of Pantagruel, the one beginning the story of his life. The chronology of the story being interrupted to give the backstory here, the genealogy of the 'son of ' Gargantua. The story itself is backwards as well as the chronology, showing that none of this matters more than a carriage that can only go forwards by driving headlong in reverse. In a comfortable chair, such a sight is laughable only from a fair distance, especially when too much furniture is piled on top, and many fine rugs full of extended yarns, bad puns, split hairs, all cut on the stump of ecclesiastic non sequiturs and official sounding pomposity.

Rabelais always seems to be winking and licking his chops, wiping his eyes, falling in the mud. Starting off well, verging wildly off somewhere (that you hadn't expected) and then clapping you on the back, wiping that mud off onto your coat, and then laughing all over again, but at you, for letting him. If he seems too close, he was there long before us and will be there again, whispering in your ear, before you were born, delivering the baby and while attending the funeral being, too drunk to sing, but doing it anyway, making a scene.

If this makes too little sense, then you might be in the neighborhood but not drunk enough on him yet. The thing is to let go and just laugh and not worry about it. A postmodern midievalist, a rake in a swan's coat, a stand-up comedian that takes his audience very seriously, but won't need to beg you to stay, just for one more. In no time at all, you'll find your thirst dry again, but the appetite renewed, richer in the bacterial cultures lining your gut as well as the rest of humanity. No longer a stranger to all of them, excepting the views of one's former self. But less finicky. He goes on.

"That was the year the Calends were discovered by the Greek almanacs. The month of March fell in Lent, and the middle of August was in May. In the month of October, as I recall, or perhaps it was September (if I am not mistaken, for I wish to guard carefully against that), there came the week so renowned in History, that is known as the Week of the Three Thursdays. There were three of them that week, on account of irregular leap years, as a result of which, the sun stumbled a little to the left, like a bandy-legged person, the moon varied from its course more than five fathoms, and there was clearly to be perceived a movement of trepidation in that part of the firmament known as Aplanes, or the heaven of fixed stars."

Certainly, Samuel Putnam deserves so much credit for this translation. He makes it present and accurate, it is said, rather than longer and divergent, like the older and more famous adaptation by Thomas Urquhart who probably loved it all a bit much. I will quote liberally from this Putnam translation in English, as often as there is time. A Cervantes scholar of the early-mid 20th century, Putnam took the time to make this amazing work accessible - and for the 'everyman' - of the Viking Portable Library series in 1946. Just in time for the hordes of GI's home from WWII looking to learn and laugh and even, get over themselves after so much bloodshed and cultural upheaval.

"You may very well imagine that people were glad enough to eat those medlars I was telling you of, for they were very good to look at and delicious to the taste, as well. But like Noah, that holy man (to whom we are all under such obligations for his having planted the vine, from which we get that nectar-like, delicious, precious, celestial, joyous, and deific liquor called wine) -- just as Noah was deceived in drinking the wine, being unaware of its great and powerful virtues, so the men and women of that day took great pleasure in eating this fine large fruit. But many varied accidents came to them as a result of it, for all of them experienced a most horrible swelling of their bodies, though not all in the same place."

These medlars turn out to be one of the oldest of known cultivated fruits, coming from the near east or Asia Minor. They also, acccording to wikipedia could be a euphemism - for Chaucer and Shakespeare no less - for prostitutes or gaping anuses. The swelling bodies in Rabelais' tale, affected different people differently but all came as a result from eating these fruit. Some in the belly, some in the back, some in the groin, this swelling phenomenon seemed most often in reality to stem from the frequent occurrence of plague in those days. Plague and gout and boils, carbuncles, syphilis and various other forms of disease and disfigurement would be common ailments to many, then. All without an effective treatment or cure. The best thing a doctor might perscribe would be for the victim to learn to laugh and maybe, have another drink.

Russia Assumes Control of Crimea, East Ukraine: March 2, 2014

As of this morning, it's being reported by Ukrainian Pravda (pravda.com.ua) that the Crimea is currently held by pro-Russian supporters, and cities in Eastern Ukraine are being quietly overtaken. Sometimes building by building. As in Kharkov, in NE Ukraine via @ukrpravda_news

#Ukraine: #Kharkiv: #Russia backed insurgents taking buildings by force, hunting pro-Unity Ukrainians on streets pic.twitter.com/JhpKzfg4Kt
— East of Brussels (@EastOfBrussels) March 2, 2014

The military bases, airports and other important sites, yesterday were likewise assumed control of, and Russian forceswere  mobilized in the East. The major naval base in Sevestapol with its submarines and other naval forces were also secured by Russian support. Military trucks and tanks etc. have also mobilized throughout the region. The demonstrations that have characterized the last several monthsall over Ukraine have cooled  for several days but today, Sunday they have quietly resumed as a show of unity in the west. Kiev has quieted down significantly since President Yanukovych fled the capitol 22February. But on Friday 28Feb, he appeared for the press in Russia saying that he had not been deposed and the existing parliament in Kiev had not successfully removed him from power. Both US Secretary of State Kerry and the US President have strongly condemned the actions, yesterday, saying Putin is effectively invading a foreign country. Putin and Obama reportedly spoke on the phone yesterday for 90 minutes and did not find a resolution. Putin claims his intent to secure the safety of ethnic Russians from attack by what he calls a fascist putsch of the Ukrainian parliament.

Of course the effects spread far and wide. This tweet from this morning, apparently in Minsk, the capitol of neighboring Belarus, saying, 'Russia this is war!' shows how other former Soviet states are seeing this weekend's actions. Via the Ukrainian Pravda twitter feed:

Россия - это война! Минск, сегодня. pic.twitter.com/JXmFhoYxxg
— Maxim Pushkin (@mc_maxim) March 2, 2014