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Amazon ^ | March 2004 | Anatoly T. Fomenko

[SunkenCiv]

History: Fiction or Science? by Anatoly T. Fomenko

[SunkenCiv]

I thought this stealthy topic might be of interest, due to your postings in:

Viking sagas read through the lens of climate change
EurekAlert | March 9, 2005
Posted on 03/10/2005 8:19:28 AM PST by Squawk 8888
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1360081/posts

[Prost1]

Thanks for the ping.

I think the Phoenicians are historically enigmatic. If one subscribes to Atlantis, then there may be a tie in, but as a people by themselves, they are a mystery.
I tell my SO who is Spanish descent that she is Phoenician! I'm sure I'm right.

[SunkenCiv]

People from Spain probably have Semitic ancestors, way back, from the 800 year Moslem occupation, and the Phoenicians were Semites, so probably there is some kind of connection there. :')

[SunkenCiv]

I was searching for a book by/about the recently deceased former heavyweight champion, Max Schmelling, and didn't find one. But the ever-helpful search engine at Amazon turned up this title. Your guess is as good as mine for the "why", but in any case, this looks like another title that is good for some laughs.

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Israel and the Pharaohs: Israel, Egypt, and Canaan in the Bible and Near Eastern Texts by Stephen H. Sanders

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[ml/nj]

This book is a great big load of crap. Among other things, the author claims that Thucydides was medieval, that King Arthur was Russian, and that none of the historical medieval British kings existed per se. IOW, he's an a-hole.

When you pinged me on this thread I had Fomenko's History on order, but it had not yet arrived. I received it Monday and have had a look.

IMHO, calling it a "big load of crap" and calling the author names diminishes you, not him. This is a serious book by a scholarly author. He seems to have interested many other serious people in his work, and so what he has to say deserves attention.

I might be a bit biased, as my degrees are in Mathematics (as are Fomenko's), and I have long had the felling that we really don't know too much about what happened before the American colonies were established. (E.g. Did Leif Erikson even exist? The evidence is pretty flimsy.)

BTW, others might be interested to know that among the "serious people" paying attention to Fomenko's work is (former) World Chess Champion Gary Kasparov. Many will know that Kasparov doesn't restrict himself to chess, and is among other things a regular contributor to the Wall Street Journal.

ML/NJ

[SunkenCiv]

"E.g. Did Leif Erikson even exist? The evidence is pretty flimsy"

Did George Washington exist? Unlike Lenin's, his body isn't on display for our viewing. The book is a great big load of crap, and saying that (or saying it again) doesn't diminish me, it merely points out that the book is great big load of crap.

[ml/nj]

Did George Washington exist?

Ever hear of Gilbert Stuart? Maybe he didn't exist either? Who was Leif Erikson's Gilbert Stuart?

Ever go to the Natural Bridge in Virginia? There's initials carved in the rock there. Did Leif Erikson carve his initials anywhere?

the book is great big load of crap

And Gary Kasparov is an idiot, or a charlatan, or both?

ML/NJ

[SunkenCiv]

I'm not concerned with Kasparov, who is a chess player, or whether he believes Fomenko's load of crap. For a few years now I have been aware that he does believe it, and in a way that is a good thing, because the Arabs, who would normally lap up this Fomenko "New Chronology", rejected it because Kasparov is Jewish.

Paintings can't be faked? Paintings are never done of figures who never existed? Inscriptions exist for everyone who has ever lived *apart* from Leif Erickson?

Fomenko's need for Leif Erickson to not exist is the same as the motivating force behind the rest of Fomenko's load of crap -- the Varangians, who served as mercenaries in the armies of the Byzantine Empire -- an empire that Fomenko claims did exist, because it's part of what he regards as the roots of Russia and therefore all of Europe -- were among the many Scandinavians who wandered through during the Middle Ages. This also included the Rus, a Swedish group, which gave its name to Russia. According to Fomenko, the Russians are the successors to the Byzantines, and all other European history was fabricated based on the Byzantine succession etc.

Fomenko's astronomical "evidence" consists of his saying that there's repetition over long periods in the eclipse cycle, and therefore the Great Fomenko is justified in saying that ancient eclipses documented in surviving ancient accounts aren't ancient, but must have occurred during much later times.

He also claims that early English sources record the term "Years of Grace" which is really "Years of Greece", blah blah blah.

http://www.romancoins.info/

[SunkenCiv]

View of Garry Kasparove
Mathematics of the Past
by Garry Kasparov

The monumental work The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, written by English historian and scholar Edward Gibbon (1737-1794), is a great source of detailed information on the history of the Roman Empire. Before commenting on this book, let me remark that I cannot imagine how - with their vast territories - the Romans did not use geographical maps, how they conducted trade without a banking system, and how the Roman army, on which the Empire rested, was unable to improve its weapons and military tactics during nine centuries of wars.

With the use of simple mathematics, it is possible to discover in ancient history several such dramatic contradictions, which historians don't seem to consider.

The Romans had no public school system, no postal system... they also didn't have fax machines. The Romans used maps, although very few examples are known to have survived, due to the fragility of the materials used. The Romans did improve weapons and tactics, but stuck with things that worked. Vespasian (the future emperor, at this time a general) used artillery during the conquest of Britain -- but it wasn't barrels, balls, and gunpowder. There are no "contradictions", and obviously no dramatic ones.

Kasparov builds a straw man argument (and there's much more straw on that page) to conclude that the Roman Empire as such never existed. I regard Tom Van Flandern as a very smart man, but he also insists that the "Face on Mars" is an artifact, when the fact is it isn't there at all -- it was an artifact, but only an artifact of the Viking orbiter camera's low resolution (the "Face" is only 30-some pixels in size). This results in Van Flandern's having to believe that NASA is trying to hide The Truth. Kasparov, like Van Flandern, didn't invent the respective foolishness and stupidity involved, merely lends his name to it. If he never repudiates the Fomenko nonsense, that will be his reputation in posterity.

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[ml/nj]

Paintings can't be faked? Paintings are never done of figures who never existed?

Of course they can be. But the provenance of Stuart's works is well established. Contemporaries saw both Stewart's portraits and George Washington, so even if the curators of the NGA have been deceived they at least have a copy of a real painting of a real man.

Fomenko's need for Leif Erickson to not exist

I haven't reached this "need" yet in the book. It's common knowledge that the whole idea of Leif Erikson reaching North America before Columbus is thin gruel.

Fomenko's astronomical "evidence" consists of his saying that there's repetition over long periods in the eclipse cycle

This is certainly the conventional wisdom, though I admit to being a skeptic here. The whole uniformity concept is one that I do not accept, so if that's all Fomenko offers I'll be on your side before long. But that isn't the impression I get from the opening pages of his book.

ML/NJ

[SunkenCiv]

"It's common knowledge that the whole idea of Leif Erikson reaching North America before Columbus is thin gruel."

uh, no.

L'Anse aux Meadows National Historic Site of Canada
http://www.pc.gc.ca/lhn-nhs/nl/meadows/index_e.asp

"The reconstructions of three Norse buildings are the focal point of this archaeological site..."

Fomenko starts out with the belief that all history is Byzantine / Russian; any artifact (such as the Roman imperial road system, Hadrian's Wall in Britain, coins, the topic I've linked below) has to be either coopted into this hijacking of history, or rejected as not proved, or something more recent that has been misinterpreted by everyone before Fomenko. References to Jesus in Josephus and the Koran, or in fact any kind of surviving writing from the ancient world has to be either placed in more recent times (by Fomenko) or tossed as a forgery.

I've got some pretty wild interests myself, and love to plunge over the edge of the fringe from time to time. But I think you'll see what I mean as you read it. Here's a topic related to Roman rule in Europe.

Bernheze Roman Bronze Hoard from the Netherlands
Minerva: the International Review of Ancient Art and Archaeology
Last Updated: Friday, 9 July, 2004 at 3:10:29pm | Ruurd B. Halbertsma
Posted on 03/23/2005 11:56:02 PM PST by SunkenCiv
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1369464/posts

[ml/nj]

L'Anse aux Meadows National Historic Site of Canada http://www.pc.gc.ca/lhn-nhs/nl/meadows/index_e.asp

"The reconstructions of three Norse buildings are the focal point of this archaeological site..."

I'm not impressed by reconstructions. I went to the site you suggested and found nothing there.

I'm reading more and I have come to AF's trouble with Hebrew texts which consist only of consonants. (This is mostly true but there a couple of "silent" letters which imply some vowel; and the oo and the oh are frequently represented.) He (or the translator) foolishly makes analogies to English where BLD could be blood, build, etc., but does not describe where in Hebrew, which has many fewer words than English, this could lead to significant ambiguities. I sometimes agonize over translations but I don't ever recall it being because one word in the Torah could be construed as some other. Also AF makes it seem as if this non-use of vowels is some ancient artifact when in fact most publications in Israel today do not use vowels (e.g. see http://www.haaretz.co.il/).

But that said, his placement of the cities of the Bible in Italy is at least interesting. (Yes, I know there are problems.) I would note that Mel Gibson choose Italy as the place where he filmed most of the Judean scenes in his Passion.

The notion that a lot of the "ancient" manuscripts are frauds interests me. I see the recent "discovery" of the James Ossuary as typical of what would have passed for truth 500 years ago. The bias is that so long as it fits in with the accepted history it must merit strong consideration, and bring credit to the "discoverers."

I do believe, as does most everyone else, that the reference to Jesus in Josephus is an insertion by transmitters. But if AF is going to argue that the references to Jesus in the Koran are insertions, then I think I am going to have a big problem with that.

I'm continuing to read. Thanks for the discussion.

ML/NJ

[SunkenCiv]

now *this* is a ping. ;')

Electric Arcs in Planetary Science
Thunderbolts Picture of the Day | 3/7/2005
Posted on 03/07/2005 11:19:39 PM PST by Swordmaker
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1358256/posts

Martian "Blueberries" in the Lab
Thunderbolts Picture of the Day | Mar 25, 2005
Posted on 03/28/2005 9:58:11 PM PST by Swordmaker
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1372790/posts

When Dust Storms Engulf Mars
Thunderbolts Picture of the Day | Mar 24, 2005 | Mel Acheson
Posted on 03/28/2005 10:19:07 PM PST by Swordmaker
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1372800/posts

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/user-posts?name=swordmaker

[SunkenCiv]

The notion that a lot of the "ancient" manuscripts are frauds interests me. I see the recent "discovery" of the James Ossuary as typical of what would have passed for truth 500 years ago. The bias is that so long as it fits in with the accepted history it must merit strong consideration, and bring credit to the "discoverers."

The James Ossuary has never been proved to be a fake. The "report" itself is the pretense. And I am not a Believer.

There's an entire literature of this kind. One can still find "Piso Theory" -- the claim that the entire Bible was hoaxed by members of the Piso family. One forum devoted to the "Piso theory" used to have a sister forum which claimed that the entire Roman Empire was hoaxed in order to justify the "empire" of the Venetians.

Maybe they also hoaxed all the cities of the Bible as well. ;')

Joseph Smith, founder of LDS, and author of the Book of Mormon, built an entirely fraudulent "history" of the Americas. The "cities" he names as precolumbian are actually lifted from the placenames found near where he grew up. A few were taken as-is, most were altered slightly.

[SunkenCiv]

The new one is coming. The previous two are found at message 88 (the "in reply to" link here):

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Pyramid Quest: Secrets of the Great Pyramid and the Dawn of Civilization by Robert M. Schoch, Ph.D. with Robert Aquinas McNally

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[SunkenCiv]

the author's website should be checked before buying this book, because there's a wild mixture, including Edgar Cayce. But the chapter hosted on the Schoch website suggests the book is worth a look at least.

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Moses in the Twelfth Dynasty Egyptian Literature: A Reconstruction by Aris M. Hobeth the website "Sinuhe as Moses" (Robert Schoch's website)

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[SunkenCiv]

see message 33 (saw your interest in the "Electric comet" topic SwordMaker started).

Predictions on Deep Impact
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1435997/posts

[Fred Nerks]

Thanks for the links to your reviews SunkenCiv. USF, you might find these interesting.

[Fred Nerks]

sorry, I meant post #33. SunkenCiv reviews Velikovsky.