the war in Ukraine

Ukrainian flag with clenched fist

Like most of us I’ve been watching the news for the last few days with my heart in my throat.

Nothing I can say is really adequate. I’m not a foreign policy expert, and while I’m a history buff I don’t have fancy letters after my name. All I can offer are a collection of vague thoughts:

  • This feels like the beginning of WWIII and I really hope I’m wrong about that.
  • We do not need a world war with nukes. I think this is why Biden is insisting the U.S. won’t send active troops into Ukraine itself- one nuclear power in direct conflict with the other nuclear power (run by a dictator who has already threatened to use them) makes an already horrific situation worse.
  • It is a horrific situation. I can’t imagine what the people of Ukraine are going through, either hiding and hoping they don’t get shelled or fleeing to another country. I gather that the Russian invasion wasn’t expected until the very last minute so it’s not like most of the country was sitting around with a gun or go bag.
  • The Ukrainian people are badasses on so many levels. You’ve read all the stories (the Snake Island defenders, the granny with the sunflower seeds) so I won’t repeat them here. I think what amazes me most are people signing up for militias despite no experience and real risk.
  • These new Ukrainian militias make the U.S. militia movement look like a bunch of frat boys looking for a fight over petty grievances. Not to say homegrown militias aren’t dangerous (they are) but no Americans within living history have experienced a land war in their own country (Pearl Harbor and 9/11, as terrible as they were, were not full scale invasions by a foreign power). While the Oath Keepers and 3 Percenters get wound up over the culture wars, Ukrainian militias are fighting for their lives.
  • Zelensky is the biggest badass of them all. The sensible thing to do would be flee and set up a Ukrainian government in exile a la de Gaulle but instead he’s chosen to stay and fight for his country. George VI’s refusal to leave London during the Blitz and Elizabeth I’s vow to “live or die amongst you all” in the face of the Spanish Armada spring to mind (look, British history is my wheelhouse – these may not be great comparisons but they’re what I’ve got).
  • Ukraine has won the media war, hands down.
  • Biden’s sanctions may seem weak/vague in comparison to sending in troops but see above re: a war between two nuclear powers. I don’t think Putin will be deterred by sanctions, but without resources he can’t do very much.
  • I think this is largely Putin’s war. Based on the huge number of Russians protesting despite the risks it appears most of them aren’t in favor.
  • No idea what the oligarchs thought they would get out of invading Ukraine, if they were consulted at all. As their assets dry up I imagine they’re going to be less and less keen to support Putin’s war, if they ever were to begin with.
  • No idea how to discuss the war with Ukrainians, so I just…haven’t.  I’m thinking particularly of an acquaintance who was born in Ukraine but grew up under the Soviet system, so I don’t know what to say or how to say it.
  • Too many Republicans are still kissing Putin’s ass but I’m pleased that at least a few are condemning his actions. They’re trying to paint Biden as “weak” but as usual don’t have much to back that up.
  • Yes, this is the definition of “witnessing history”, being aware of seismic changes even as they’re happening. I’m not sure I like it. History feels safer when viewed through a buffer of a few decades. Day to day waiting to see if Zelensky has survived the night or whether Putin still has his nukes on alert isn’t all that fun.

the unnecessary forgery: the Vinland Map

So I stepped into this one:
Post to my author Facebook page: Good news! Finally got my blog working again. Taking suggestions for post topics. Comment: Your favorite biblio fakes and forgeries.
I’m not (currently?) writing about biblio fakes but given my enduring fascination with the Voynich manuscript they’re not completely outside my wheelhouse. My favorite is the one I first encountered on my Dad’s bookshelf as a kid: the Vinland map.

Vinland Map HiRes

Purported to be the earliest documentation of pre-Columbian Viking presence in America, its written on 15th century parchment and bound with a genuine 15th century document (the Tartar Relation). Yale University acquired the map in the 1960s and was sufficiently convinced of its authenticity to write the academic tome I found in my Dad’s library, though experts had doubts from the start. After multiple studies and analyses over the years, Yale confirmed it as a fake just this past fall: the ink is dates to the 1920s at the earliest.

As (bad?) luck would have it, Yale published their book in 1965 at about the same time that archaeological finds in L’Anse aux Meadows confirmed a pre-Columbian Viking presence in the Americas.

In my rush around the internet to put together this post, I didn’t find anything on on who specifically forged the Vinland Map or why.  I can only guess that someone in the 1920s was so desperate to prove the Vikings got to America first they were willing to invent evidence to “prove” it. So what we wind up with is a forgery created to prove something…that turned out to be true anyway. I love the irony.

Even so, I keep my Dad’s battered copy of “The Vinland Map and the Tartar Relation” for sentimental reasons.

My dad's copy of The Vinland Map and the Tartar relation, worn slipcover and all

Analysis unlocks secret of the Vinland Map — it’s a fake (search Google News for “Vinland Map forgery” and you can find a dozen articles in the same vein)
The Vinland Map and the Tartar Relation 1996 reissue – despite all doubts Yale University released a 30th anniversary version of their 1965 study that you can still buy from their website
Those of you who want to dive down the rabbit hole can watch all 6 hours of the 2018 “Vinland Map Rediscovered” symposium [YouTube] describing the research findings.

Link dump 10/13/2021

A little clutch of links for your midweek perusal:

biweekly links 5-2-2018

I’ve been on a bit of a Southern history jag since coming back from a trip to my home state of Georgia. Turns out I know very little about where I grew up. Some of my stranger findings:

old fashioned map of the northwest three-fourths of the state of Georgia
Lionel Pincus and Princess Firyal Map Division, The New York Public Library. (1859). Map of the State of Georgia Retrieved from.

Mary Shotwell Little Vanishes at Lenox Square-Well, We Think!: how had I never heard about this 1965 unsolved disappearance? A woman disappears from the biggest shopping mall in Atlanta. Her car is found with 40 unaccounted for miles on it… but the last sightings of her were six hours away in Charlottesville NC. Was she kidnapped or did she fake her own death–and in either case, why? See (or listen) also here and here.

Disappearance of Dannette and Jeannette Millbrook: I’d not heard of this one and no surprise – back in 1991 the authorities wrote off the Augusta, GA teenagers as runaways on no evidence whatsoever. Though re-opened in 2013 the Millbrook sisters’ case still didn’t get much attention until The Fall Line podcast focused on it for an entire season. A sad, frustrating cold case hopefully soon to come to a resolution.

The Georgia Guidestones: not hours away from my hometown yet I’ve never been (never been to Rock City or Ruby Falls either – yes, I am a slacker). A still anonymous “Small Group of Americans Who Seek The Age Of Reason” commissioned these in 1979 and they’ve inspired speculation and conspiracy theory ever since. Project Archivist covered these in one of their early episodes; their guest Raymond Wiley co-hosted Out There Radio back in 2005 based out of the University of Georgia radio station WUOG (where back in the early 1990s I hosted the dance music show during my student days).

And finally a whole blog of Georgia Mysteries for my future rabbit hole needs.

the cutting room floor

As I’ve discussed before, history isn’t tidy. I made some strategic cuts to the story at the outset, mostly for my sanity. Now I’m cutting even more as they don’t add to the story I’m trying to tell, which is a damn shame as Dee and Kelley generated So. Much. Weird. that begs exploration. Just not by me:

Dee and Kelley’s possible ties to Shakespeare – interesting if true, but not relevant to my story

Nuances of alchemical process and symbolism – you’ll get your furnaces and flasks but not painstaking detail because I’m not a chemist.

Dee and Kelley’s sojourn in Poland courting the patronage of Stephen Bathory (yes, cousin of that Bathory). It’s not the story I’m telling and someone already has anyway.*

A series of incidents in which Kelley apparently conjures demons and poltergeists outside of his actions with Dee – and this breaks my heart because I so, so want to play with what was going on here! I found this delicious story in the footnotes of part 9 of I.R.F. Calder’s thesis but it’s so divided from the rest of the spiritual actions that I can’t justify including it.**

The possibility that Jane Dee was from a recusant family. I could only find one reference (since removed), and there’s more narrative tension if Jane is solidly Protestant in Catholic Bohemia.

And there’s probably more. What are you cutting, and why?

animated gif of little girl and men in suits sawing/drilling away on a piano
Hacking away. Courtesy gfycat.

*Looking forward to reading this after I finish the WIP.
**Actually, I might do a short story based on this.