Professional Documents
Culture Documents
JAMES
AMERICAN
OUTLAW
EGYPTIAN JUSTICE
CRIME AND PUNISHMENT IN
THE NEW KINGDOM
KILLING
CICERO
DEATH OF THE
ROMAN REPUBLIC
PRINCE OF
THIEVES
HUNTING DOWN
THE REAL ROBIN HOOD
PLUS: JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2019
But the “noble outlaw” myth does not stand up to scrutiny. James’s
“rebellion” was not generous: Fueled by greed and a lust for revenge,
James stole from the rich and gave to himself. James was driven by self-
interest, what Jefferson called “the sole antagonist of virtue.” Woven into
the fabric of American identity, a little rebellion can be good, but when
fueled by ego, it’s dangerous, shortsighted, and destructive.
PRINCE OF
THIEVES Contributors
HUNTING DOWN
THE REAL ROBIN HOOD
JOHN BARRASS, IRENE BERMAN-VAPORIS, VICTOR LLORET BLACKBURN, SUSAN BROWNBRIDGE,
PLUS:
Birth of the Big Screen MARC BRIAN DUCKETT, GRACE HILL, SARAH PRESANT-COLLINS, NICHOLAS SHRADY,
The Cinématographe THEODORE A. SICKLEY, JANE SUNDERLAND
Consumer Marketing and Planning RICHARD BROWN, STEPHANIE CASTELLANO, PAULA COMMODORE,
MORGAN L. DECKER, ANDREW DIAMOND, SUSAN DIDONATO, KEVIN FOWLER, JASON GALLIGER,
SUZANNE MACKAY, KATHERINE M. MILLER, WILLIAM H. MCBEE, CHRISTINA OLNEY, ROCCO RUGGIERI,
KATE SCOTT, MARK VIOLA
COPYRIGHT © 2019 NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC PARTNERS, LLC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC AND YELLOW BORDER DESIGN ARE
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VOL. 4 NO. 6
Features Departments
Today, some three billion people speak a language on the Indo-European Packed with bones and artifacts,
family tree, whose mysterious origins go back to the dawn of civilization. a lakeside cemetery in Kenya
is revealing insights into the lives of
22 Justice of the Pharaohs ancient Africans nearly 5,000 years ago.
A trove of legal documents found near the Valley of the Kings reveals the
ins and outs of ancient Egypt’s legal systems, from crimes to punishments. 6 PROFILES
THIRTY-SIX BURIALS OF
ANCIENT HERDERS WERE
EXCAVATED FROM A TEST
PIT AT LOTHAGAM NORTH,
KENYA. THE FLAT CENTRAL
AREA IS BELIEVED TO HOUSE A
MUCH LARGER CEMETERY.
I Kenya’sMonumental
CityoftheDead
ENY The first glimpse of an ancient culture surprised archaeologists with a rich
trove of carefully crafted artifacts found in a necropolis near Lake Turkana.
A
LOTHAGAM NORTH is n international team suggest that this mysterious team excavated a small sec-
the largest of several of researchers has complex of rings of boul- tion (just 43 square feet of a
ancient herder sites opened a land- ders, small stone pillars, and 7,500-square-foot site) and
located near Lake mark explora- cairns functioned as both uncovered 36 sets of hu-
Turkana, Kenya. tion of the Lothagam North a cemetery—the earliest man remains. The dig site
Known as “pillar sites,” Pillar Site near Lake Turka- monumental site in East concentrated on the circular
they are distinguished na in Kenya. Based on their Africa—and a landmark for esplanade ringed with boul-
by small monolithic initial research published in African herders between ders, but as many as 500 more
structures built more the Proceedings of the Na- 4,000 and 5,000 years ago. burials may lie within the
than 4,000 years ago. tional Academy of Scienc- Partly funded by a Na- necropolis. Remains of men,
es (PNAS), their findings tional Geographic grant, the women, children, and the
4 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2019
LEGACY AT THE LAKE
FIVE THOUSAND YEARS may seem like a long time
ago. The 5,000-year-old Lothagam North necropolis
certainly seems ancient, but the region around Lake
Turkana (the world’s largest, permanent desert lake)
has been home to communities that extend back to the
dawn of humanity itself. In 1994 National Geographic
explorer-in-residence Maeve Leakey unearthed a fossil of
a hominid (Australopithecus anamensis) who lived around
elderly were among this small carved colored stones. Re- unusual.Future explorations In the coming centuries, the
sample; evidence suggests searchers were intrigued of the larger site will need to climatechanged,andthelake
that generation after gener- to find an ornate headpiece delveintotheimplicationsof began to recede.As the land-
ation of herders returned to decoratedwith405gerbilin- these initial finds. scape transformed around
this place to bury their dead cisors. The grave goods were the community, herding
over hundreds of years. evenly distributed among Winds of Change replaced fishing as a source
The team also found a the bodies, with no sign of Analysis suggests that the of food. To the local peoples,
cache of remarkable artifacts social hierarchy. Most mon- mound may have been built the communal cemetery at
at the site, including pieces umental ancient burial sites some 5,000 years ago, when Lothagam North would have
of pottery, bracelets made of were reserved for the elite, Lake Turkana was much stood as a beacon of conti-
hippo tusks, and intricately whichwouldmakeLothagam larger and rainfall abundant. nuity in a changing world.
The Lumières:
Sires of the Cinema
Brothers Louis and Auguste Lumière created the world’s first motion picture in 1895 with their
revolutionary camera. The Cinématographe lent its name to a new form of art and entertainment
that would forever change modern culture.
Bright Lights
of the
Big Screen
1870
A vented a camera that could
record, develop, and project
film, but they regarded their
creation as little more than a
curious novelty. Shortly after the public
premiere of their film, Louis was said to
have remarked: “Le cinéma est une invention
1881, the 17-year-old Louis began taking
a particular interest in the photograph-
ic plates that their father manufactured.
Chemists had already introduced a
new type of “dry” photographic plate
that was coated with a chemical emul-
sion. Unlike previous “wet” photo-
Antoine Lumière arrives in sans avenir—Cinema is an invention with- graphic plates, these did not need to
Lyon with his family. He opens out a future.” be developed immediately, freeing the
a photographic studio, where This prediction was the Lumières only photographer to travel farther from his
two of his sons, Louis and
Auguste, will one day work. scientific miscalculation, for this sibling darkroom. Louis improved upon the
pair created an unprecedented form of art dry plate technology, and his success
1881 and entertainment that radically influ- with what became known as the “blue
enced popular culture. Their Cinémato- plate” prompted the opening of a new
Louis’s new, improved graphe introduced a crucial innovation: By factory on the outskirts of Lyon. By the
dry plates are a runaway
success. Lumière will projecting moving images onto a large mid-1890s the Lumière family was
soon be Europe’s biggest screen, it created a new, shared experience running Europe’s largest photograph-
photography brand. of cinema. The first movie audience ic factory.
was born.
1895 Pioneers in Motion
The Lumière brothers patent A Family Tradition In 1894 Antoine attended a Paris exhi-
the Lumière Cinématographe In 1870, as France reeled from invasion bition of Thomas Edison and William
and hold the first ever public in the Franco-Prussian war, Antoine Dickson’s Kinetoscope, a film-viewing
film screening at the Grand Lumière moved his family from the haz- device often referred to as the first mov-
Café in Paris.
ardous eastern border of the country to ie projector. However, the Kinetoscope
1903 the city of Lyon. A portrait painter could show a motion picture to only one
and award-winning photographer, person at a time. The individual viewer
The Lumières patent he opened a small business in pho- had to watch through a peephole; An-
plates to produce color tographic plates in his new home. toine wondered if it were possible to de-
photographs, which
Two of Antoine’s sons, Auguste velop a device that could project film
they call autochromes.
The plates go on the and Louis, grew up immersed in and onto a screen for an audience. When he
market
in 1907.
The Cinématographe could project
its images onto a screen, creating a
new, shared experience—cinema.
CINÉMATOGRAPHE PATENTED BY THE LUMIÈRE BROTHERS IN 1895
SSPL/GETTY IMAGES
DOUBLE
FEATURE
THE TWO ELDEST sons of Antoine
Lumière—Auguste (born in 1862)
and Louis (born in 1864)—shared
a deep interest in science. Brotherly
solidarity even extended to mar-
riage: The men’s wives were sisters.
Louis was the driving force behind
both the improved dry plate and the
Cinématographe. After both men
developed the color autochrome
in 1907, their interests began to
diverge. Louis continued his work
in photography while Auguste
increasingly focused his time on
medical studies, researching and
publishing extensively on asthma,
tuberculosis, and renal conditions.
Auguste died in 1954, six years af-
ter the death of Louis.
returned home from Paris, Antoine more slowly than the Kinetoscope’s 46 The Bigger Picture
encouraged his sons to begin working on frames per second, creating a quieter The Lumières held the world’s first pub-
a new invention. machine and one that made the images lic movie screening on December 28,
One year later, the brothers had suc- appear to move more fluidly on screen. 1895, at the Grand Café in Paris. Their
ceeded, and the Lumière Cinémato- In addition to expanding Edison’s directorial debut was La sortie des ouvriers
graphe was patented. With its perforat- one-person peephole view to an audi- de l’usine Lumière (Workers Leaving the
ed, 35-mm-wide film that passed ence, the Cinématographe was also Lumière Factory). While today this pre-
through a shutter at 16 frames per sec- lighter and portable. The bulk of the Ki- miere would be considered rather prosa-
ond, the hand-cranked Cinématographe netoscope meant that films could only ic viewing—as its title suggests, the mov-
established modern standard film spec- be shot in a studio, but the Lumières’ ie simply showed workers leaving the
ifications. Similar to the mechanics of invention offered operators the freedom Lumière factory—the clarity and realism
a sewing machine, the Cinématographe and spontaneity to record candid foot- of the black-and-white, 50-second film
threads the film intermittently and age beyond a studio’s walls. created a sensation.
COME ONE,
COME ALL
THE LUMIÈRES not only invent-
ed the very first night at the
movies, they also pioneered
the use of the movie post-
er. In the Paris of the belle POSTER PROMOTING
THE LUMIÈRE
epoque, posters were the CINÉMATOGRAPHE
best form of advertisement. PHOTOS: ORONOZ/ALBUM
Describing the street-life scenes that chaos. Everyone wondered how such a A moving picture was a shock to the sens-
appeared on the screen before him, result was obtained.’’ Legend has it that es, revolutionary to behold.
Georges Méliès, the renowned magician when audiences viewed the Lumières’
and director of the Théâtre Robert- film The Arrival of a Train at La Ciotat A Legacy of Light
Houdin in Paris, remarked, “We stared Station in 1896, the sight of the approach- In 1896 the Lumières opened Cinémat-
flabbergasted at this sight, stupefied and ing train sent viewers running away in ographe theaters in London, England;
surprised beyond all expression. At the terror. In such lore lives truth, however, Brussels, Belgium; and New York City,
end of the show there was complete and the legend echoes Méliès’s reaction: showing the more than 40 films that they
had shot of everyday French life: a child
looking at a goldfish bowl, a baby being
fed, a blacksmith at work, and soldiers
LA VIE EN ROSE marching. Footage of the French Photo-
graphic Society marked the
IN 1907, when the Lumière brothers launched the first newsreel, and the Lyon
autochrome plate for taking color photographs, Fire Department became the
New York critic Alfred Stieglitz gave his verdict: “All subject of the world’s first
are amazed by the . . . wonderful luminosity of the documentary. Audiences
shadows, that bugbear of the photographer in mono- were riveted, fascinated by
chrome; the endless range of grays, the richness of seeing life’s moments unfold
the deep colors. In short, soon the world will be color- on the big screen.
mad and Lumière will be responsible.” The day after the first pub-
lic screening of the Lumières’
PACKET OF LUMIÈRE AUTOCHROME PLATES
SSPL/GETTY IMAGES
8 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2019
THE FIRST
PICTURE SHOWS
Customers gather
outside a Lumière
theater in France,
1897, as cinema was
becoming a part of
everyday French life.
RUE DES ARCHIVES/ALBUM
film in 1895, a local gazette trumpeted, than 1,400 films, many of which have was flipped and exposed to light, the re-
“We have already recorded and repro- been preserved to this day. sulting image could be developed into
duced spoken words. We can now record a transparency.
and play back life. We will be able to see The Quest for Color The autochrome remained the most
our families again long after they are As the cinema grew popular, the brothers widely used photographic plate capable
gone.’’ Indeed, the Lumières not only began to turn their attention to new proj- of capturing color for more than 30 years.
made history with their culture- ects. They focused their ever present Magazines like National Geographic sent
changing camera and new photographic curiosity on tackling another technical its photographers to capture the world
processes; they preserved it. challenge: color photography. with autochromes, the relative portabil-
The Lumières trained camera opera- Color photography did exist, but the ity of which made documentary field-
tors to use the invention and then travel process of creating it was complicated work easier. The success of the brothers’
all over the world. They showed the Lu- and time-consuming. The Lumière invention is reflected in the archives of
mières’ films to new audiences and also brothers’ solution had a profound effect the National Geographic Society, which
recorded their own footage of local events on the emerging field. Patented in 1903, house almost 15,000 autochrome plates,
in the places they visited. Gabriel Veyre their process, called Autochrome Lu- one of the largest collections in the world.
set out for Central America, the veteran mière, involved covering a glass plate This family of inventors lived up to
soldier Félix Mesguich filmed in North with a thin wash of tiny potato starch their name—lumière means “light” in
Africa, and Charles Moisson headed for grains dyed red, green, and blue. This French—illuminating life as they ar-
Russia, where he filmed the pomp and granular wash created a filter, and gave chived the past, captured the unseen, and
splendor of the crowning of the last tsar, autochromes the soft, pointillistic qual- created filmmakers and audiences alike.
Nicholas II, in 1896. Between 1895 and ity of a painting. A thin layer of emulsion
1905, the Lumières would make more was added to the filter, and when the plate —Pedro García Martín
The Violin:
From Fiddle
to First Chair
BRIDGEMAN/ACI
Strummed, plucked, or bowed, violins have been
making music for centuries, whether backyard
A VIELLE, AN ANCESTOR OF THE MODERN VIOLIN, APPEARS
bluegrass or classical concertos. IN A 1330 FRESCO. MUSEUM OF NAVARRA, PAMPLONA
T
he violin is arguably the world’s the 11th century, and the three-stringed spruce, the two types of wood most fa-
most popular instrument. Its rebec, which appeared in Spain between vored by violin makers then and since,
expressive tones suit a variety the 11th and 13th centuries, likely as a re- were readily available in the Lombardy
of musical styles, from fast and sult of the Crusades, is also reflected in the region. The city of Brescia, located at the
furious to slow and sanguine. modern violin. The French vielle, like the foot of the Alps, was the earliest to excel
Becoming popular in the 16th century rebec, was usually supported on the chest in the crafting of violins, but Cremona,
with both commoners and nobles, the or under the chin and was widely used home to the world’s most famous luthi-
violin has remained a democratic instru- by troubadours in the 13th to 15th centu- ers, Giuseppe Guarneri, Antonio Stra-
ment, universal and versatile. ries to accompany singing and dancing. divari, and the Amati family, became syn-
The development of the modern violin Stringed instruments have a long history onymous with the art of violin making.
was gradual and complex, evolving from in folk music, but the violin became more
a variety of other stringed instruments. standardized after it went to court. Lombardy Luthiers
The pear-shaped lira, found in Europe as Most historians agree that today’s vi- In February 1539 master craftsman An-
early as the ninth century, was played in olin emerged in the early 16th century drea Amati leased (and later bought) a
an upright position and bowed. The influ- in northern Italy, an area which would house and workshop in Cremona that re-
ence of the two-stringed rabab, an Arabi- maintain the violin-making tradition mained in his family’s possession for 200
an fiddle introduced to western Europe in over the coming centuries. Maple and years and became one of the premier mu-
sical instrument workshops in Europe.
In the early 1560s, Catherine de Médi-
cis, the French queen regent, commis-
sioned Amati to make a variety of string
instruments for the Royal Ensemble.
How many Amati made and delivered
remains unknown, but it is thought that
the scale of work required ultimately es-
tablished the basic form and construc-
tion of the modern violin. Amati’s cre-
ation had a wooden sound box with two
F-shaped apertures. Tuned to perfect
fifths, four strings stretched along the in-
strument’s neck, where they were tight-
ened with pegs. Amati’s workshop was a
family venture, as he shared the secrets
MASTER VIOLIN MAKER ANTONIO of his craft with his two sons, Girolamo
GRANGER/ALBUM
10 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2019
Scroll
FIRST AMONG
INSTRUMENTS
Pegbox
CIRCA 1510
Andrea Amati is born. His work will
establish Cremona, Italy, as the center
for violin making in Europe.
1523
CHARLES IX VIOLIN Records from the Alpine region of
Made by Andrea Savoy notes payment for the services
Amati for the French of “trompettes” and “vyollons.”
king Charles IX. CIRCA 1535
Dated to 1564, this
Gaudenzio Ferrari paints one of
violin is considered to
the first depictions of a violin in the
be one of the oldest
Saronno Cathedral in Lombardy, Italy.
surviving examples
Neck of a modern 1644
violin. Ashmolean
Museum, Oxford Master violin maker Antonio Stradivari
is born. His instruments will become
BRIDGEMAN/ACI
treasures, valued for their acoustics.
Strings
Nicolò, who became the maestro to two
ofthemostcelebratedviolinmakers:An-
drea Guarneri and Antonio Stradivari.
F-holes The violin’s sound continued to ex-
Bridge
pand through the centuries, embraced
by fiddlers and virtuosos alike. During
the 17th century, the violin became an
important instrument in the orchestra
as composers like Claudio Monteverdi
incorporated it into their compositions.
Around 1786, François Tourte created
the modern bow, standardizing its length
and weight. The invention of the chin
rest around 1820 made the instrument
easier to hold and increased its range of
Tailpiece play. The neck and fingerboard were both
lengthened and tilted in the 19th century,
allowing the violinist to play the highest
notes, and the bass bar was made heavier
to produce a bigger, more brilliant sound.
—Josemi Lorenzo
O
ne of the most popular stories in the Old Testament,
the Tower of Babel takes place during a time when“the
whole earth had one language and the same words”
(Genesis 11:1). The proud people of Shinar, identified
by scholars as Babylon, began building a city with a
tower so tall that it scrapes the heavens. Angered by their arrogance,
God takes away their common tongue, removing their ability to com-
municate. The workers abandon the tower and scatter across the land.
Their incomplete city becomes known as Babel “because there the
Lord confused the language of all the earth” (Genesis 11:9). Beneath
the primary lesson of humility, the Tower of Babel delivers crucial
insight into ancient people and a desire for a unified language.
THE PERSIAN VERSION
WRITTEN Modern scholars share this desire with their
IN STONE Inscriptions in Old Persian are carved in
ancient ancestors. They have continued the cuneiform script on the royal Achaemenid
An episode from search to find the earliest languages spoken by tombs at Naqsh-e Rostam, Iran.
the Mahabharata,
ancient people,hoping in earnest to find a com- ERIC LAFFORGUE/CORBIS/GETTY IMAGES
a great Indian epic
written in Sanskrit, is mon mother tongue. While academics debate
depicted on seventh- about the existence and spread of a single uni-
and eighth-century fying language,it is known that many languages
A.D. rock reliefs
today—spoken from the Americas to the Bay of Indo-Iranian branch, which includes Persian,
(above) carved at
Mahabalipuram, Bengal—comefromtheIndo-Europeangroupof Urdu,Bengali,and Romani.Most European lan-
India. languages. Modern scholars have identified 10 guages (with a few exceptions such as Basque,
STUART FORSTER/CORBIS/GETTY IMAGES different Indo-European branches: Anatolian, Hungarian,Finnish,and Estonian) are also Indo-
Indo-Iranian, Greek, Italic, Celtic, Germanic, European in origin, but they belong to differ-
Armenian, Tocharian, Balto-Slavic, and Alba- ent branches. Spoken in Greece since at least
nian. These 10 groups have become the foun- 1600 B.C., Greek is a language family all its own,
dation for linguists to trace modern language while Latin and the Romance languages belong
development and for anthropologists, archae- to the Italic. English, German, and Norwegian
ologists, and historians to study humanity’s are a few that hail from the Germanic branch.Of
distant past. all the Indo-European languages spoken today,
Around the world today, there are roughly the most popular in terms of active speakers are
440 living languages that descend from Indo- Spanish, English, Hindi, Bengali, Portuguese,
European. More than 300 of them belong to the and Russian.
ALL IN
THE FAMILY
Languages in the 10 primary CIRCA 1900 B.C. CIRCA 1600 B.C. CIRCA 1000 B.C. CIRCA 900 B.C. CIRCA 500 B.C.
branches of the Indo- Anatolian Greek Indo-Iranian Italic Celtic
European tree began to be Old Hittite Mycenaean Vedic Sanskrit Old Latin Lepontic
widely spoken in different eras. (above) (above) (above) (above) (above)
PICTURES: ALBUM. EXCEPT TOCHARIAN: BRIDGEMAN/ACI
14 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2019
FINDING THE WORDS
STRIKING
COMPARISONS
I
n Calcutta (Kolkata), India, on February 2,
1786, Sir William Jones addressed the
Asiatic Society of Bengal and made a now
famous remark on the common origins of
Latin, Greek, and Sanskrit: “The Sanscrit [sic]
language, whatever be its antiquity, is of a
wonderful structure; more perfect than the
Greek, more copious than the Latin, and more
exquisitely refined than either, yet bearing to
both of them a stronger affinity, both in the
roots of verbs and in the forms of grammar,
than could possibly have been produced by
accident; so strong indeed, that no philologer
could examine them all three, without believ-
ing them to have sprung from some common
source, which, perhaps, no longer exists; there
is a similar reason, though not quite so forc-
ible, for supposing that both the Gothic and
the Celtic, though blended with a very differ-
ent idiom, had the same origin with the San-
scrit; and the old Persian might be added to
the same family.”
CIRCA A.D. 500 CIRCA A.D. 500 CIRCA A.D. 600 CIRCA A.D. 600
Tocharian Balto-Slavic Germanic Armenian
(above) Old Church Slavonic Runic Classical Armenian, Tosk dialect
(above) (above) Grabar (above) (above)
BRIDGEMAN/ACI
BIG SKIES SOAR OVER THE PONTIC-
CASPIAN STEPPE IN MODERN-DAY
UKRAINE, THE SITE THAT SOME BELIEVE
IS THE INDO-EUROPEAN HOMELAND.
O. MITIUKHINA/ALAMY/ACI
16 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2019
A STRIKING THEORY
THE POWER
OF THREE
W
hile researching ancient
cultures of the Caucasus,
French linguist Georges
Dumézil (1898-1986) rec-
ognized a theme common across Indo-
European cultures, which he termed “tri-
functionality.” Aspects of life—sacred, so-
cial, or economic—tended to be divided into
threes. Dumézil discovered tripartite struc-
tures in most Indo-European peoples, such
as the three original castes of ancient India:
Brahmans (priests and scholars), Kshatriyas
(nobles and warriors), and Vaishyas (mer-
chants). Many religions often feature tripar-
tite structures, such as the Hindu trinity of
gods (left). In Greek myth there are many
triads, such as the Moirai, better known
today as the three Fates, who determined
the beginning, middle, and end of each
mortal’s life. The Holy Trinity of Christianity
may also be an echo of deep, Indo-European
belief systems.
they have reconstructed a picture of what PIE custom from ancient Romeinvolvesthesacrifice DIVINE TRIAD
culture might have been like and how it could of a racehorse and presentation of its tail to the Flanked by Vishnu
have spread with the language. Critics consider Regia, wife of the sacred king. In another cus- the preserver and
this type of linguistic“paleontology”controver- tom, parts of a sacrificed horse are brought to the Shiva the destroyer,
the Hindu god
sial because it is subject to interpretation and king in the ancient Indian rite of Ashvamedha. Brahma the creator
vulnerable to drawing conclusions supported In a third, an ancient Irish tradition, the king is smiles in this late
by weak evidence. symbolically wed to a slaughtered horse. Ritual ninth-century A.D.
After many years of sifting through languages links like these, in such different societies, sug- sandstone sculpture
(above). Musée
that developed out of PIE, linguists reconstruct- gest a shared significance across them.
Guimet, Paris
ed an approximate word list of key terms. These ERICH LESSING/ALBUM
root words convey traits, figures, practices, and Spreading the Word
symbols that had high significance across cul- Studying protolanguages also has geographical
tures. Sheep would have been important to all implications, as scholars strive to locate where
herders, and the PIE word for“sheep”is a root of PIE culture began. Among academics, there are
that word in Sanskrit, Latin, Greek, Lithuanian, a number of theories, but two leading contend-
German, and English. To support theories like ers are the Kurgan and the Anatolian hypotheses.
this one, scholars have used archaeological evi- These two draw on a multidiscliplinaryapproach
dence to establish the importance of sheep in a and utilize diverse supporting materials
shared culture. and evidence.
The word“king”is believed to derive from the The Kurgan hypothesis was put forward by
PIE word meaning “to extend one’s arm,” a ges- the Lithuanian-born American archaeologist
ture that connotes giving a command. Scholars Marija Gimbutas in the 1950s. She believed that
tied these roots together by comparing similar the Indo-Europeans were associated with the
kingship rituals across disparate cultures. One Yamna culture that lived on the Pontic-Caspian
CHARIOT (ABOVE) WITH WINGED VICTORY, DEPICTED MATERNAL GODDESS (RIGHT) ASSOCIATED
ON A SILVER DECADRACHM MINTED IN THE CITY OF WITH RAISING CHILDREN. ARCHAIC GREEK ART. NY
SYRACUSE. FIFTH CENTURY B.C. CARLSBERG GLYPTOTEK, COPENHAGEN
DEA/ALBUM PRISMA/ALBUM
STEPPE-ING Steppe, north of the Black and Caspian Seas. Asia. As they moved outward, they spread ag-
STONES Making the most of the domestication of hors- riculture and language with them.
Some associate the es, the nomadic herders expanded throughout In recent decades advances in genetics have
Indo-Europeans with Europe in several different waves of migration made it possible to analyze ancient DNA as a way
the Yamna culture of
the Pontic-Caspian starting around 6,000 years ago. As they moved to study human migrations and make deeper as-
Steppe, located north south and east, they subjugated the peoples they sessments of these two theories. More recent-
of the Black and encountered while spreading PIE language and ly, Italian geneticist Luigi Luca Cavalli-Sforza
Caspian Seas. These culture. Gimbutas expounded the contrast be- examined genetic data from these regions and
distinctive Yamna
tween the warrior nomads, who buried their dead stated that Renfrew’s and Gimbutas’s theories
statues (below) were
carved in the third in kurgans (burial mounds), and the more peace- do not so much contradict as complement each
millennium B.C. able Neolithic agriculturalists they displaced. other:“Genetically speaking, peoples of the Kur-
Archaeological In 1987 British archaeologist Colin Ren- gan steppe descended at least in part from people
Museum, Kerch, frew proposed what became known of the Middle Eastern Neolithic who [had] im-
Crimea
as the Anatolian hypothesis, migrated there from Turkey.”
which dates the spread of PIE The question as to which theory is the
to a much earlier time, roughly more likely, however, is a heated debate among
8,000 to 9,500 years ago. Ren- scholars. Yet there is, at least, a degree of con-
frew also sees different motiva- sensus that the root of scores of languages
tions behind the migrations and scattered across a swath of the globe originated
theorized that farmers were not in Asia between 6,000 and 9,500 years ago,
displaced due to war. Rather they and is closely connected with agriculture in
peacefully expanded out of Ana- the Neolithic period.
tolia (modern-day Turkey) west
SANSKRIT SPECIALIST ÓSCAR PUJOL IS A PROFESSOR AT THE DEPARTMENT OF
through Europe and east to Central FOREIGN LANGUAGES AT THE BANARAS HINDU UNIVERSITY, VARANASI, INDIA.
PRISMA/ALBUM
Religion
God: In Indo-European it is *déiwo-s, from which is derived the
Sanskrit GHYi the Old Irish día, the Latin GHXV (from which, the
English GLYLQHGLYLQLW\), the Spanish GLRVand the French GLHX
Animals
Livestock: In Indo-European the term is
SpNX The Sanskrit is
páŋX the Gothic, IDtKX (related, also, to money). The German is
YLHK³which, continuing the money association, is also the root
of the English word IHHThe Latin for livestock, SHFX is the root
of the English SHFXQLDU\
Transportation
Wheel: One of the Indo-European words for wheel is *kwHO
the root for English, Dutch ZLHO and some other languages.
Another Indo-European word for wheel,
URWRis the root for the
Latin URWD Spanish UXHGD German UDGand French URXH
words.
Examples above can be found in the 18TH-CENTURY MANUSCRIPT (ABOVE) OF THE SIKH
Encyclopedia of Indo-European Culture, SCRIPTURE THE DASAM GRANTH, WITH TEXTS IN HINDI,
edited by J. P. Mallory and D. Q. Adams. PERSIAN, AND OTHERS, ALL IN GURMUKHI SCRIPT
AKG/ALBUM
Homeland in the
Kurgan culture of
the steppe
(Marija Gimbutas)
spi an
C
- ea
n tic tepp
o S
P
B l a c k Se a
as
pi
an
An at o l ia
Se a
Me
dit
err
ane
an S
ea PERSIA
Homeland in
Anatolia INDIA
(Colin Renfrew)
0 300 mi
Kurgan hypothesis
n tol
olia
i n hy
ia hypo
p th
hes
e iss 3 0
THE HOMELAND OF THE INDO-EUROPEANS. There are two main out farther north, in the Pontic-Caspian Steppe. Recent ge-
theories regarding the original place from which the Indo- netic studies have complicated the picture, suggesting that
Europeans spread in successive waves. One theory argues the people who spread from the steppe were of Anatolian ori-
MAP: EOSGIS.COM
that they originated in Anatolia in the Neolithic period. The gin. It may be that there was no single homeland and that the
other theory, the Kurgan hypothesis, posits that they started Indo-Europeans were not a homogeneous people.
Englis
Af
rik
aa
h
ns
Frisian
Linguists identify 10 main branches that
Ge
sprang from Indo-European, in turn leading
Dan
rma
Du
to multiple subbranches, many of which
tc
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Ice
are shown here. Like any ancient tree, some
lan
Swed
branches still thrive, while others have
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withered and faded.
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oder
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thi ian
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di
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Goth
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gali
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Ben T
IAN
KRI
SANS
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ni
IN
IRAN
SIC
DO
ta
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Sanskrit R
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Nu
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GERMANIC
Celt
iberian
uli
IN
sh
EEK
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aelic Lep
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CE INE
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TA
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Scottish Gaelic
IA
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GA
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We l s h INS
LT
C IC
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O-
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Breton B RY T
H H it ti te
T
L IC
A
Pala ic AN
AT O B AV
SL
s h
Picti LIAN
Luw ian
To c h a
ri an A
N
CEL Principal branch of Indo-European TOC HAR IA
Welsh Living language
Tocharian B
Hittite Dead language
20 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2019
INDO-EUROPEAN
IN 1815 EUROPEAN POWERS HELD COLONIES IN LANDS FAR FROM
HOME. IMPERIALISM SPREAD INDO-EUROPEAN LANGUAGES—
ESPECIALLY ENGLISH AND SPANISH—ALL OVER THE WORLD.
Cat
n
Spanis
ia
lic
alan
e
Ga
ues
h
c
tug
en
Fr
Por
n
lia
ta
I
IN V U LG A R L ATI N
LA
T
a nsh
A
L Rom
IC
S
S Romanian
LA
C
Oscan
N Um bri an
CA
S
Life and Death of Languages
O
n e
ve
Slo Of the 10 main branches that spring from
n
tia Indo-European, two are extinct: Anatolian
roa
Serbo- C n and Tocharian. The latter was once spoken in
ar ia
B ulg the Tarim Basin, today in northwestern China,
n
and represents the easternmost reach of this
nia
Macedo Polish prodigious family of languages. Texts written in
Anatolian, Indo-Iranian, and Greek are among
ak
E slov the oldest of Indo-European languages that
have been found on artifacts by archaeologists.
H S L AV I C
ES IC
W AV ssian
SL
Ru which in turn sprouted with numerous
n
in ia languages now spoken across swathes of
U kra
modern-day India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and
EAS
T S L AV I C Iran. Other principal branches, such as Albanian
ian
Beloruss
IC
E
SYMBOLS gypt’s first laws emerged when the in Mesopotamia, ancient Egyptian law was not
OF JUSTICE Upper and Lower kingdoms were uni- set in stone, and although power always flowed
A bas-relief from the fied, according to tradition, under King from the pharaoh, Egypt’s laws were rather
New Kingdom shows Menes around 2950 B.C. From then on, like the Nile: fluid, organic, and changing with
Maat (above), the different pharaohs would bring their the times.
goddess of order and
justice, wearing her own approaches to law and order. Although rul- In Egyptian cosmology, the goddess Maat em-
distinctive ostrich ers would change, the unifying principle of the bodied the concepts of order, truth, and justice.
feather headdress. monarch’s sovereignty did not. Pharaohs held Viziers often wore a pendant in the form of the
Archaeological supreme authority in settling disputes, but they goddess, who is often shown with an ostrich
Museum, Florence often delegated these powers to other officials feather on her head. Egyptians believed that liv-
SCALA, FLORENCE
such as governors, viziers, and magistrates, who ing according to her precepts—honesty, loyalty,
could conduct investigations, hold trials, and and obedience to the king—would keep chaos at
issue punishments. Unlike the legal Code of bay. Egyptian kings were not exempt from living
Hammurabi, developed in the 18th century B.C. by Maat’s principles. They too were expected to
uphold order through wise rule, just decisions, the archaeological site of Deir el Medina, across
and humility before the gods. This belief united the Nile from Thebes. Located there was a vil-
commoners and kings in the responsibility for lage of artisans and workers, who labored in the
maintaining balance and harmony in society, Valley of the Kings and the Valley of the Queens,
which may have led to fewer periods of civil un- building tombs for pharaohs and their families.
rest in Egypt’s long history. Digs at Deir el Medina have yielded more than
Crimes in ancient Egypt tended to be divided 250 papyri and some ostraca (fragments of stone
into two categories: crimes against the state and and potsherds) containing detailed accounts of
crimes against individuals. Desertion, treason, legal matters at all levels of society.
and slandering the pharaoh fell into the first,
while acts such as homicide, injury, robbery, and Divine Justice
theft fell into the second. Much of what is known The texts reveal the different ways that people
about ancient Egypt’s legal system comes from could seek justice. One of the most popular was
the New Kingdom period (ca 1539-1075 B.C.) and the use of divine oracles. In and around Thebes
A land dispute document details An early 20th-dynasty The Judicial Papyrus details a
the workings of New Kingdom document, the Papyrus Salt trial of conspirators targeting
courts, known as kenbets. Local 124, presents the charges Ramses III. Despite the harsh
kenbets passed serious cases to against a corrupt Deir el justice meted out, the plot is
a higher kenbet. Heading up the Medina worker to the vizier, part of a series of succession
system was the vizier, second only revealing the power wielded by crises heralding the decline of
to the pharaoh. the pharaoh’s deputy. the New Kingdom.
CAUGHT IN the oracular voice was attributed to a deceased present its case or question, either verbally or
HER COILS pharaoh, Amenhotep I, the focus of an impor- in writing. The god’s answers were interpreted
A sandstone tant Theban cult. The second king of the 18th by its swaying movements.
statue of the cobra dynasty, Amenhotep I consolidated Egyptian The workers consulted the statue for cen-
goddess Meretseger power following his father’s expulsion of the turies. One fragment from the Deir el Medina
(above) depicts the
fearsome deity who Hyksos invaders from Lower Egypt. Although site dates to the 20th dynasty. It records the re-
punished wrongdoers his own tomb has not been found,Amenhotep I quest of a workman, Nekhemmut, who asked
and guarded the is believed to have started the tradition of rulers the statue to reveal the identity of a person who
craftsmen’s village being buried in the Valley of the Kings. He and was stealing from him. From the records found
near Deir el Medina his mother,Ahmose Nefertari,are also credited among the ostraca, most inquiries were similar,
during the New
Kingdom. Brooklyn with founding the village at Deir el Medina and mundane matters, centering on real estate and
Museum, New York were worshipped as patron gods there. personal property.
BROOKLYN MUSEUM, NY/ACI Although it was common for especially re- Oracular statues were also consulted in other
nowned pharaohs to become the center of cults partsofEgyptduringtheNewKingdom.Located
after their death, Amenhotep’s is among the close to Thebes, a statue of the god Amun was al-
most popular and enduring. Egyptians believed so consulted on legal matters. Sometimes, those
that his spirit resided in his oracular statue and accused by an oracle would protest against the
proper ceremonies could summon it.Residents verdict, and ask for the matter to be put before
oftenturnedtothestatuetosettlelegaldisputes. another oracular statue for a second opinion.
Bearing Amenhotep I’s statue on their shoul- Inscribed during the reign of Ramses III, papyrus
ders, priests would carry it out of the temple 10335 (now in the British Museum) recounts the
during processions and on feast days. A crowd theft of five dyed tunics from a temple store-
would gather around it,and litigants would pre- house. The crime was brought before an oracle.
sent their cases to the statue. Each side would The statue’s answers fingered one suspect from
26 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2019
JUDGE AND
PHARAOH
A lintel from the Temple of
Amun-Re at Karnak depicts
Amenhotep I, the second
ruler of the 18th dynasty. This
warrior king expanded the
borders of his realm and was
deified after his death. His
cult consulted his statue on
questions of justice.
DEA/GETTY IMAGES
ARTISANS’ VILLAGE
On the west bank of the Nile, the site of Deir
el Medina was home to the New Kingdom
masons and craftsmen who built the tombs
in the Valley of the Kings. Systematically
excavated from the early 1900s, it has
yielded much information about the
workings of justice under the pharaohs.
UWE SKRZYPCZAK/AGE FOTOSTOCK
CRIME RING
I
nvestigations of serious crimes often involved interroga- second and then a third opinion. After his last
tions by court officials, and in ancient Egypt, these inter- request, the patience of the gods, and the crowd,
views could turn brutal. Confessions were often elicited ran out. He was found guilty, beaten on the spot
under torture, but ancient Egyptians were frank about us- as punishment, and forced to restore the stolen
ing physical pain to extract information. Texts, like the Ab- goods to the temple.
bott Papyrus, describe how officials tortured suspects when
questioning them. At this time, toward the end of the 20th Trial by Jury
dynasty, looting royal tombs hands and feet were twisted. In addition to the oracles, there was another,
had become an increasing They confessed to breaking more formal method of resolving legal disputes
concern to local officials. In into tombs, including a royal during the New Kingdom. The kenbet (secular
the 16th year of the rule of burial, and stealing objects. court) most closely resembles the approach of
Ramses IX (around 1100 B.C.), When the tombs were ex- modern trials by jury. Two major kenbets were
a well-organized network of amined, several had been located in Memphis and Thebes and functioned
criminals in Thebes was un- disturbed, but many were like a high court. The major kenbet juries con-
covered. They were known still intact. sisted of higher-ranking members of society,
for looting tombs, some of such as scribes of the vizier of Thebes or police
THE ABBOTT PAPYRUS (ABOVE), HELD BY
them belonging to eminent THE BRITISH MUSEUM, IS ONE OF SEVERAL chiefs. There is evidence that access to the ken-
government officials and PAPYRI CONTAINING DETAILS ABOUT
INVESTIGATIONS OF A SERIES OF TOMB bet service was surprisingly democratic, and
royalty. During their inter- ROBBERIES IN THE THEBAN NECROPOLIS,
that petitioners of higher social status were not
THE VALLEY OF THE QUEENS, AND THE
rogations, the accused were VALLEY OF THE KINGS. given preferential treatment.
beaten with a stick and their BRITISH MUSEUM/SCALA, FLORENCE
The kenbet typically handled civil issues such
as nonpayment for goods or services, disputes
30 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2019
OFFICIALS PUNISH A WRONGDOER.
THIRD-MILLENNIUM B.C. RELIEF ON
THE TOMB OF MERERUKA IN THE
NECROPOLIS OF SAQQARA
BRIDGEMAN/ACI
and quarrels between neighbors, theft, injuries, not only the cup but also goods missing from JUSTICE FROM
and calumnies. The kenbets were empowered the temple of Amun. Theft from a temple was ON HIGH
to administer punishments for the minor of- a more serious crime. The kenbet found Heria A silver statuette
fenses that came before them, which usually guilty of stealing the cup and then passed the of a New Kingdom
entailed the guilty party suffering a beating. In a matter of the stolen temple goods to be judged by pharaoh (below)
holds an icon of Maat.
few cases, when a kenbet could not reach a deci- the vizier. When passing off the case, the kenbet In dispensing justice,
sion, it would recommend that the question be sent a letter to the vizier noting its thoughts: the king mediated
submitted to the oracular statues for resolution. “Heria is a great fraud who deserves to die.” between heaven
Lesser kenbet councils sat in the region’s and earth. Louvre
smaller towns, like the builders’ village. They High Crimes Museum, Paris
BRIDGEMAN/ACI
would hear complaints of local residents and The vizier was one of the most powerful officials
decide their cases. Scholars believe that juries in Egypt. Second in power only to the pharaoh,
consisted of craftsmen and artisans, who would he oversaw the administrative functions of the
sit in judgment over their fellow workers. If a government. For serious crimes, the vizier
serious crime originated in the lower kenbet, it served as judge and could dole out
would be moved up the legal system to the major punishments or grant pardons.
kenbet councils, which reported directly to the A papyrus known as Salt 124
vizier, the pharaoh’s principal minister. details a case from the 20th
Famous among historians, one case originated dynasty that was heard by the
in the local kenbet near Deir el Medina. The ac- vizier. The case was brought by
cused, a woman called Heria, was initially charged Amennakht, a worker at Deir el Medi-
with stealing a cup from a resident. The lower na, against another worker, Paneb. The list of
kenbet ordered that Heria’s house be searched crimes was long: Amennakht charged Paneb
for the missing property. The search revealed with theft, looting tombs, death threats, bribery,
CAPTIVE CRIMINALS
L
ong periods of imprisonment as punishment for crimes blasphemy, and murder. Paneb defended himself
was not practiced in ancient Egypt. Texts do mention by claiming that Amennakht was seeking revenge
the kheneret, an institution originating during the Old because he felt Paneb had stolen a job from him.
Kingdom (ca 2575-2150 B.C.). All traces of it had dis- The case most likely came before the vizier
appeared by the start of the New Kingdom, which began because of the charges of tomb raiding. Stealing
around 1539 B.C. Scholars debate the exact function of the from one’s neighbor was a crime for the kenbet.
kheneret; many believe them to be forced labor camps. As of Stealing from the royal dead or from Egyptian
this writing, archaeologists must be put to work in the temples was a much graver offense.
have not positively identified stone quarry.” Workers in
any sites as being a kheneret, these camps could have been Facing Punishment
so all information about them criminals as well as prisoners When people were convicted of crimes, the pen-
comes from inscriptions and of war. During the Middle alties depended both on the severity of the of-
texts. Depending on the Kingdom people were sent fense and their level of involvement. The typical
gravity of the crime, the ac- to the kheneret when they penalty for stealing was returning the stolen ob-
cused were sometimes sent shirked the tasks they were ject and paying its rightful owner double or triple
to forced labor camps situ- obliged to do for the pharaoh. its value. If someone stole from a temple, how-
ated in other countries or on ever, the punishment was more severe: it could
PRISONERS OF WAR DEPICTED ON THE
Egypt’s borders. A decree MORTUARY TEMPLE OF RAMSES III AT include paying a hundred times the value of the
dating from the 5th dynasty MEDINET HABU (ABOVE) WERE “BOUND
FOR LIFE” AND BECAME THE PROPERTY OF object, corporal punishment, or even death.
states: “You must send him THE PHARAOH AFTER CAPTURE. Little evidence has been found for imprison-
to the Great Mansion and he AKG/ALBUM
ment in ancient Egypt. Criminal punishment
tended to be administered immediately rather
32 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2019
than by means of a long sentence. Forced labor in the wide-ranging conspiracy, who held posi- LOOKING
was common, and criminals were also threat- tionsatalllevelsofRamsesIII’scourt,fromharem THE PART
ened with exile to Nubia, where scholars believe officials to servants.Penalties ranged from death In his mortuary
they were put to work in mines. Corporal pun- to mutilation.Tiye’s chief conspirator received a chapel in the
ishment was also common in the form of public harsh sentence: Theban necropolis,
the 18th-dynasty
beatings, brandings, or mutilations. vizier Rekhmire is
The most serious crimes, like treason, were The great criminal Paibekkamen . . . had been depicted with the
punishable by death. One of the most famous in collusion with Teye [sic] and the women accoutrements of his
occurrences of the death penalty resulted from of the harem; he had made common cause office: a long, white
the harem conspiracy against Ramses III in the with them . . . He was placed before the great tunic (a shenep, which
reaches from his
early 12th century B.C. The Judicial Papyrus of officials of the Court of Examination; . . . his chest to his ankles)
Turin documents the plot and how the king’s crimesseizedhim;theofficialswhoexamined and a scepter known
secondary wife, Tiye, conspired to kill Ramses him caused his punishment to overtake him. as an aba.
and install her son, Pentawere, on the throne. ARALDO DE LUCA
Part of Tiye’s plot succeeded: Analysis of How the law dealt with Queen Tiye is unknown,
Ramses III’s mummy revealed that histhroathad but her son Pentawere was allowed to commit
been slashed, and he did not survive the attack. suicide.Scholars believe the lesser conspirators
The other part of Tiye’s plot failed: The con- were put to death by impalement.The pharaoh’s
spiracy was uncovered before Pentawere could justice was unrelenting because his role in keep-
take the throne. Ramses IV quickly shoreduphis ing order, according to Maat’s principles, was
power as the new king and turned to punishing critical to preserving the well-being of Egypt.
his father’s assassins.
The Judicial Papyrus extensively details the EGYPTOLOGIST IRENE CORDÓN HAS WRITTEN EXTENSIVELY ON THE ANCIENT TOMB-
charges, trials, and punishments of thoseinvolved BUILDING COMMUNITY OF DEIR EL MEDINA IN EGYPT.
THE LAST
WORDS OF
CICERO
In 43 B.C. two Roman soldiers stopped a litter
near the port of Gaeta. Inside sat a 64-year-
old man: Rome’s greatest orator, the republic’s
last champion, and the recipient of a death
sentence from Mark Antony.
63 b.c. 49 b.c.
CHAMPION
Cicero’s speeches are crrucial Julius Caesar crosses the Rubicon
in dismantling a conspiraacy withh his army and starts the civil
OF THE led by Catiline, an aristoccrat
who wanted to bring dow wn
warr against his rival, Pompey the
Great. Cicero, who regards Caesar as
REPUBLIC the republic. Catiline is laater an eenemy, flees Rome along with a
killed, and Cicero is hailed as majority of senators and withdraws to
“father of the fatherland ” his country retreat.
JULIUS CAESAR. FIRRST-CENTURY B.C. BUST, VATICAN MUSEUMS
38 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2019 DEA/ALBUM
in his nose resembling the cleft of a chickpea. He tried his first case in 81 B.C., and then success- CAESAR’S HEIR
Cicero’s family was wealthy but did not be- fully defended a man accused of parricide—a Part of the Cross
long to the patrician class, the aristocracy of bright beginning to Cicero’s public life. of Lothair, a cameo
Rome. His family belonged to the equestrian Marriage at age 27 into a wealthy family (below) depicts
Octavian after he
class, which sat below the patricians and above brought him the necessary funds to continue became emperor
the plebeians, the working class of the republic. to rise. After he wed in 79 B.C., Cicero’s career of Rome. Circa
His family had strong military connections, but took off, and he rapidly rose through h the ranks.
ranks A.D. 1000,
1000 Aachen
not the political ones necessary for the career in He was elected quaestor in 75, praetorr in 66,and Cathedral Treasury
E. LESSING/ALBUM
government desired by Cicero. consul in 63, the highest political offfice in the
Educated in Rome and in Greece, Cicero aimed republic. Cicero was one of the younggest ever to
to scale the political ladder as quickly as pos- reach that high office.
sible. He would do so as a novus homo, new man,
a term which signified that his family did not Consul and Conspiracy
come from the ruling class. Cicero served briefly Wielders of imperium, Roman autho or-
in the military before turning to a career in law. ity, consuls held executive power iin
A LONG LEGACY
F
or some scholars, the Renaissance started when
Petrarch discovered Cicero’s letters to Atticus in
1345. Overjoyed with his find, Petrarch was one of
the first to worship at the altar of Cicero, whose
orations and defenses of liberty against tyranny would
inspire generations of philosophers. Perhaps no generation
would be as inspired as the Enlightenment thinkers, like
John Locke, David Hume, or Thomas Jefferson drew on
Montesquieu, who stated Cicero’s ideas when draft-
that “Cicero is, of all the an- ing the Declaration of In-
cients, the one who had the dependence in 1776. John
most personal merit, and Adams idolized Cicero and
whom I would most prefer his powerful words. In his
to resemble.” He was also a 1787 A Defence of the Con-
guiding light for the Found- stitutions of Government of
ing Fathers who took En- the United States of America,
lightenment ideals and put Adams cites Cicero’s ideals
them into practice in North as support for this new gov-
America. In 1744 Benjamin ernment: “As all the ages
Franklin published M. T. of the world have not pro-
Cicero’s Cato Major, or His duced a greater statesman
Discourse of Old-Age, the and philosopher united than
first classic work translated Cicero, his authority should
and printed in the colonies. have greater weight.”
FOUNDING the republic. There were two consuls who each a political opponent, Catiline. The plot called
FATHERS’ served a one-year term. They held equal power for assassinations and burning the city itself.
FAVORITE as political and military heads of state. Consuls Widely considered the best orator of his time,
Benjamin Franklin’s controlled the army, presided over the Senate, Cicero had attempted to warn Rome about Ca-
1744 edition of and proposed legislation. On paper, the Senate’s tiline’s treasonous intentions through dramatic
Cicero’s “Cato
Major” (above) was
job was to advise and consent, but because the speeches in the Senate, but his pleas fell on deaf
the first classic to body was made of roughly 600 elite and pow- ears. After the plot had been exposed, Catiline
be translated and erful patrician men, it gained much power and escaped. Five of his conspirators were caught,
printed in North influence. Legislative authority rested with as- however, and Cicero advocated for their imme-
America. semblies, most notably the Comitia Centuriata. diate execution, without trial.
GRANGER COLLECTION/AGE FOTOSTOCK
Plebeians could belong to this body, whose pow- Most senators agreed with Cicero, with one
ers included electing officials, enacting laws, and major exception—Julius Caesar. He advocated
declarations of war and peace. for imprisoning the men, but his recommenda-
In the same year Cicero clinched the consul- tion was overturned. The conspirators were ex-
ship, he exposed and defeated a rebellion led by ecuted, and Catiline died later, fighting alongside
his men while making one last stand. The defeat
of the Catiline conspiracy was a high mark for
Cicero, whom his supporters proudly called pater
Defeating the Catilinarian conspiracy patriae, father of the fatherland.
earned Cicero praise and the honorific Julius Caesar and his patron, Marcus Licinius
Crassus, were both formidably rich, and had each
pater patriae, father of the fatherland. used their wealth to gain popular support over
the course of their political careers. In the chaos
that followed the conspiracy, Julius Caesar and
40 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2019
Crassus joined another general, Gnaeus Pom- FIGHTING hostility between Julius Caesar and Pompey, who
peius Magnus, also known as Pompey, to take WORDS were headed toward an unavoidable confronta-
control of the government in 60 B.C. Announced Depicted in a tion that would explode into civil war in 49 B.C.
when Caesar began his first consulship, the First fresco by Cesare
Maccari (above),
Triumvirate would rule the republic for six years Cicero denounces The Republic Falls
until the death of Crassus in 53. the Catilinarian Striving for control of Rome, neither Caesar nor
At first Cicero refused to support the trium- conspiracy in the Pompey wanted Cicero for an enemy, and both
virate and fled from Rome. In 57, with Pompey’s Roman Senate. men appealed to him for his allegiance. Cicero
Palazzo Madama,
backing, he returned to the city and tried to per- chosetosidewithPo ompey.Rome’scivill warlast-
Rome
suade Pompey to break his alliance with Caesar. ORONOZ/ALBUM
ed five years, and Caaesar emerged victorious. In
Pompey refused. Cicero begrudgingly gave the 46 B.C.Caesar was declared Dicta-
triumvirate his approval despite recognizing that tor perpetuo,dictator for life.
the triumvirate was unstable; each of the three Despite siding with
w
men wanted to increase his own power while Pompey, Cicero was
keeping his two other “allies” in check. No one pardoned by Caeesar,
in the First Triumvirate would be the champion who allowed him to o re-
for the republic for whom Cicero hoped. turn to Rome. Ciicero
Disgusted by this turn of events, Cicero left began another period of
politics for a few years. During this time, he intensivewriting,crreating
penned some of his most influential works be-
POMPEY THE GREAT. MARBLE CO OPY OF
fore returning to office in 51 B.C. He accepted the A BRONZE STATUE THAT ONCE STOOOD IN
governorship of Cilicia, a province located in THE THEATER OF POMPEY, UNDERR WHICH
CAESAR WAS MURDERED. NY CARRLSBERG
present-day Turkey, and then returned to Rome GLYPTOTEK, COPENHAGEN
in late 50. Crassus’ death in 53 had increased AKG/ALBUM
BITTER ROWS
CICERO VERSUS
MARK ANTONY
C
icero unleashed all his rhetorical forces against
Mark Antony in the form of 14 written speech-
es that he entitled Philippics. This name al-
ludes to the speeches made by the Athenian
orator Demosthenes against another “tyrant,” Philip II
of Macedon, when he looked set to conquer Greece in
the fourth century B.C. The second of the Philippics is
scathing. In closing the are living. Be reconciled to
speech, Cicero proclaims the republic. However, do
that despite knowing the you decide on your con-
risks, he is determined to duct. As to mine, I myself
fight for liberty as he had will declare what that shall
done years previously be. I defended the republic
when the senator Catiline as a young man, I will not
had attempted to bring abandon it now that I am
down the Senate. “Con- old. I scorned the sword of
sider, I beg you, Marcus Catiline, I will not quail be-
Antonius, do some time fore yours. No, I will rather
or other consider the re- cheerfully expose my own
public: think of the family person, if the liberty of the
KING FERDINAND I OF NAPLES COMMISSIONED of which you are born, not city can be restored by
THIS 15TH-CENTURY COPY (ABOVE) OF CICERO’S of the men with whom you my death.”
PHILIPPIC ORATIONS.
BRIDGEMAN/ACI
many works defending republican values. Dur- ET TU, BRUTE? Although he could probably not have brought
ing this time, a group of conspirators decided Brutus, depicted in a himself to commit the violent act himself, he
to take a more proactive stance against Caesar’s second-century A.D. wrote: “All honest men killed Caesar . . . some
bust (below), was a
ambition. Although the plotters were close as- close ally of Cicero lacked design, some courage, some opportunity:
sociates of Cicero—including Marcus Brutus but did not involve none lacked the will.” He was hopeful that by
whom Cicero had mentored—they kept their the statesman in removing the ambitious Caesar, Rome could set
plans secret from the great orator. the assassination. itself back on the path to a republic. A few days
Cicero was not involved in Caesar’s assassi- Hermitage Museum, after the murder, he advocated amnesty for the
St. Petersburg.
nation during the Ides of March in 44 B.C. In his SCALA, FLORENCE
assassins in the Senate.
writings he expressed horro or at the violence
but supported the actions off the assassins: Rise of Anto
ony
The wake of Caesar’s
C death left Cicero and
Our tyrant deserved his death for hav- Antony stand ding as the two main powers in
ing made an exception of the
t one thing Rome.Cicero h had the backing of the Senate, but
that was the blackest criime of all . . . Antony had thee power of Caesar’s legacy. To take
here you have a man whow wasambitious advantage of his position, Antony orchestrated
to be king of the RomanPeeopleandmas- a spectacular ffuneral for the fallen leader. His
ter of the whole world; and he achieved stirring eulogyy roused the passions of the crowd
it! The man who maintaiins that such an and turned pub blic opinion against the assassins.
ambition is morally rightt is a madman, Fearing for his life, Brutus fled from Rome. Ci-
for he justifies the destrruction of cero also left tthe city and bewailed ever more
law and liberty and thinkss their bitterly the iinactivity of“our heroes”the con-
hideous and detestable su
up- spirators,, who, in his view, had not acted
pression glorious. swiftly enough.
e
42 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2019
Cicero remained convinced that he had a part Cicero wrote, with misplaced optimism, to his CICERO’S
to play in the survival of the republic. He knew friend Atticus:“This lad has landed a heavy blow FINEST HOUR
that his close political associations with Bru- to Mark Antony.” It was in the Forum
tus and other conspirators would hurt his cause, Beginning in September and continuing (above) that Cicero
so he needed a strong political ally to counter into the spring of 43, Cicero delivered scath- addressed the people
of Rome in 63 B.C.,
that factor. He thought he had found just the ing speeches against Antony in the Senate that congratulating them
person—a youth of 18, who was in the early days fanned outrage against him. These 14 orations for the defeat of
of what would turn out to be an impressive career. were called the Philippics because they were Catiline’s plans to
That young man was Octavian, a great-nephew modeled after warnings that the Athenian De- topple the republic
of Julius Caesar. Caesar had named Octavian as mosthenesdeliveredaboutPhilipofMacedonin and establish a
dictatorship.
his heir in his will. Octavian received news of the fourth century B.C. Perhaps harkening back MASSIMO RIPANI/FOTOTECA 9X12
Caesar’s death while in Apollonia (in modern- to his famed orations against Catiline, Cicero
day Albania), and at once set out for Rome. He argued for the restoration of the republic, ad-
arrived in April and attempted to gain the trust vocated for Octavian, and framed Antony as a
of the veterans of Caesar’s legions and of influ- tyrant. Eventually the new consuls declared war
ential figures like Cicero. He convinced Cicero
to return to Rome, and the elder statesman was
extremely flattered to have Octavian“totally de-
voted to me.” He became convinced that an alli- “All honest men killed Caesar . . . some
ance with Octavian might help to destroy Anto-
ny’s political aspirations. Cicero was encouraged
lacked design, some courage, some
to observe later in Rome, Octavian presented opportunity: None lacked the will.” —Cicero
himself, unaccompanied by Antony, to the vet-
erans of two legions and reiterated their rights.
MISSED
OPPORTUNITY
I
n his correspondence, Cicero criticizes Brutus for
letting Mark Antony take the initiative after the
death of Julius Caesar. He believes that the subse-
quent power struggle is a consequence of the con-
spirators’ lack of determination. He writes to his friend
Atticus: “Do you remember me crying out on that first
day on the Capitol that the Senate should be sum-
moned to the Capitol by Brutus also receives a
the Praetors [Brutus and reproachful letter from
Cassius]? Immortal gods! the orator: “I can in no
What could have been sense admit the justice of
effected then to the re- the distinction you draw,
joicing of all good men . . . when you say that more
Do you remember how vigor should be used in
you cried out that the preventing civil wars, than
cause was lost if he had a in wreaking vengeance
state funeral. But he was against the vanquished.
even cremated in the fo- I strongly differ from
rum and given a pathetic you Brutus . . . You will
eulogy, and slaves and be crushed, believe me
paupers were sent against Brutus, unless you take
our houses with torches.” proper precautions.”
ON THE on Antony, who was away besieging the city of of pursuing Antony, decided to claim the va-
ROSTRA Mutina (modern-day Modena) where one of cant consulship for himself. When the Senate
Orators would Caesar’s assassins was holding out. refused, Octavian lost no time in crossing the
address the public Octavian and Rome’s two sitting consuls, Rubicon—asJuliusCaesarhad before him—and
from this platform
Gaius Vibius Pansa and Aulus Hirtius, led the marched on Rome with his legions. The sena-
known as the rostra
(rostrum) beside the Senate’s forces against Antony in April 43.After tors were powerless to resist, and had to give in
Temple of Saturn in Pansa’s death in battle, they were able to secure to his demands. Cicero saw how his trust had
the Roman Forum. It a decisive victory against Antony. When news been misplaced, as his alleged protégé used the
was here that Mark of the victories reached Rome there was jubila- power of his troops to trample the rule of law.
Antony displayed the
severed head and tion in the Senate. Cicero, the man of the hour, Historians believe the relationship between the
right
gh hand
a doof C
Cicero
ce o was borne in triumph from his home on two started to sour after Octavian found out that
SCALA, FLORENCE Capitoline H Hill to the Forum. There Cicero wrote that“the boy [Octavian] must be
he mounted the rostrum and de- praised, honored, and removed.”
liveredd an exultant address to
the people
p of Rome. Death of an Orator
Cicero’s joy was short-
C Devastated that the republican cause was now
liv
ved. Antony managed to lost,Cicero withdrew from Rome to spend time
saalvage a sector of his le- in his rural retreats in southern Italy. From there
giions. Octavian, instead helookedonpowerlesslyas Octavian, reconciled
withAntony,eventuallyformed the Second Tri-
A SILVER CISTOPHORUS, MINTED IN
EEPHESUS IN 40 B.C. TO COMMEMORATE
umvirate with him and Lepidus. Not only did
TTHE WEDDING OF MARK ANTONY TO Cicero feel this was a step backward politically,
O
OCTAVIA, THE SISTER OF OCTAVIAN.
BBRITISH MUSEUM, LONDON it also posed a serious personal threat to his life.
SSCALA, FLORENCE The triumvirs put together a long list of senators
and other citizens who should be“proscribed,” of Gaeta from where he hoped to escape. The A BRUTAL END
orcondemnedtodie.ThevengefulAntonyman- soldiers, led by Herennius, a centurion, and Po- “The Death of
aged to include Cicero’s name, despite Octavi- pilius, a tribune, who had once been prosecuted Cicero” by François
an’s initial reluctance. for parricide and defended by Cicero, found his Perrier (above) re-
creates the moment
Cicero was at his villa in Tusculum with his villa already abandoned but a slave called Philo- when Cicero was
brother Quintus when he found out that they logus showed them which way Cicero had gone. intercepted by two
were both on the“hit list.”Fearing for their lives, They had no trouble catching up with him and of Mark Antony’s
they left for the villa in Astura, from there in- performing their murderous deed. soldiers before the
orator lost his life.
tending to sail to Macedonia and be reunited Antony ordered that the severed head and
17th century. Bad
with Marcus Brutus. But at one point, Quintus right hand be displayed as trophies on the ros- Homburg, Staatliche
retraced his steps in order to pick up provisions trum in the Forum so that all Rome could con- AKG/ALBUM
for the journey. Betrayed by his slaves, Quintus template them. The rostrum was the very plat-
was killed a few days later along with his son. form from which Cicero had been acclaimed by
Cicero, by now in Astura, was wracked with the crowds for his oratory.The force of arms had
fear and doubt as to what he should do. He set prevailed over the power of words.
off by boat but after just a few miles he amazed
JOSÉ MIGUEL BAÑOS IS PROFESSOR OF LATIN
everyone by disembarking and walking toward AT THE COMPLUTENSE UNIVERSITY IN MADRID.
Rome in order to return to his Astura villa and
from there be taken by sea to his villa at Formiae.
Learn more
There,he planned to rest and gather his strength
BOOKS
before the final push onward to Greece.
Toohesitant.Toolate.RealizingthatAntony’s SPQR: A History of Ancient Rome
Mary Beard, Liveright, 2016.
soldiers were about to catch up with him, Cic- Cicero: The Life and Times of Rome’s Greatest Politician
ero headed through the forest toward the port Anthony Everitt, Random House, 2003.
46 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2019
DEEP ROOTS
English painter Edmund George
Warren’s 1859 painting of Robin Hood
and his Merry Men in Sherwood
Forest. The outlaws gathered in the
greenwood under the great tree
reflect a set of idealized symbols of old
England many centuries in the making.
CHRISTIE’S IMAGES/SCALA, FLORENCE
England’s Enduring Outlaw
ROBIN HOOD
just as capturing robin hood frustrates the
sheriff of nottingham, pinning down the origins
of a folk hero challenges scholars. appearing
in ballads, poetry, and folk tales, the prince
of thieves took on new guises and forms as he
changed with the times.
S
BOOKS OF tealing from the rich to give to the poor, the English map: Robin Hood’s Cave and Robin
BALLADS Robin Hood and his Merry Men are Hood’s Stoop in Derbyshire; Robin Hood’s Well
Published in 1769, a permanent part of popular culture. in Barnsdale Forest, Yorkshire; and Robin Hood’s
The Exploits of the Set in England during the reign of King Bay, also in Yorkshire. When the story is traced
Renowned Robin Hood
Richard the Lionheart, the adventures back to its 14th-century beginnings, the figure
(above) tried to trace
the lineage of Robin of Robin Hood follow the noble thief as he woos of Robin Hood changes with time. The earliest
Hood and included the beautiful Maid Marian and thwarts the evil versions would be almost unrecognizable when
prose stories as well Sheriff of Nottingham. The story has been compared to the green-clad, bow-wielding Rob-
as ballads about the around for centuries, but its most familiar ele- in Hood of today. As the centuries passed, the
outlaw and his band.
ments are also the most recent additions. tale of Robin Hood evolved as England evolved.
BRIDGEMAN/ACI
Like the roots of Sherwood Forest, the ori- With each new iteration, the Robin Hood leg-
gins of the Robin Hood story extend end would absorb new characters, settings,
deep into English history. His and traits—evolving into the familiar
name can be found all over legend of today.
HOOD!
tales, which are emerging at burst into the open with the
this time in oral form. Peasants’ Revolt of 1381.
SEAL OF KING JOHN OF ENGLAND, 1200. NATIONAL ARCHIVES, PARIS
50 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2019
BRIDGEMAN/ACI
ILLUSTRATIONS: ALAMY/ACI. COLORED: SANTI PÉREZ
Maid Marian Friar Tuck Will Scarlet Sheriff of Nottingham
Starting in the 16th century, Marian Presented as a friar expelled from Also known by the nickname “Sheriff” is from the Old English
appears in Robin Hood ballads, his order for his love of wine, he Scathelock or Scadlock, Will Scarlet scirgerefa, meaning “representative
although she already existed as first appears in a Robin Hood ballad figures in the oldest ballads about of royal authority in an shire.” As
a figure in English folklore. In one in 1475. Growing out of the stock Robin Hood. Despite his pedigree, Robin’s nemesis, he is a constant
17th-century ballad, she disguises medieval figure of the corrupt cleric, Will rarely appeared in May games, presence in the story from the
herself as a boy, fights Robin, and he later became a popular character probably because he did not have a earliest ballads to the recent film
then reveals her true identity to him. in England’s annual May games. clearly defined character. adaptations of the tale.
interest in the figure of Robin Hood and the band of outlaws”—believed to be the
question of whether or not this “King of Out- same person. In 1354, farther north in
laws” was based on a real person. Northamptonshire, there is a record of
ROBIN’S HAUNT
Beech trees in Sherwood Forest near
Nottingham. Extending over some 450
acres today, the former royal forest still
contains numerous veteran oaks of
around 500 years old.
DAVE PORTER/AGE FOTOSTOCK
A
CCORDING TO THE BALLADS, the place where most of most scholars came to agree that there was prob-
the adventures took place was not Sherwood Forest. ably no single person in the historical record
It was Barnsdale Forest, which is in South Yorkshire, who inspired the popular stories. Instead, the
England. Over time, the legend became more closely moniker seems to have become a typical alias
associated with Sherwood, a forest lying to the north of the city of used by outlaws in various periods and locations
Nottingham and belonging to the king, whose sheriff was Robin’s across England.
great enemy. In the Middle Ages the area then known as Shire-
wood (County Forest) underwent substantial deforestation and
the dense oak and beech became interspersed with grassland,
A Popular Hero
heather, and villages. But what defined the forest went beyond When historical records failed to yield a de-
the trees and extended to the laws governing it. These laws, which finitive personage behind the noble outlaw,
were tightened following the Norman conquest of England in scholars than turned to the popular culture of
1066, included extreme penalties for cutting down trees or hunt- medieval England: folklore, poetry, and ballads.
ing the king’s deer. The forest was a prime royal hunting ground, These three formats all grew out of an oral tradi-
and locals were being shut out, which led to the unpopularity tion. Some theorize that they originally derived
of the forest laws among large portions of society. Because the from troubadours’ songs that reported news
lands were protected from clear-cutting, the woods remained and events.
a wild place, making it the perfect setting where outlaws could The first known reference in English verse
hide and adventures could be spun. to Robin Hood is found in The Vision of Piers
Plowman, written by William Langland in the
second part of the 14th century (shortly before
52 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2019
Geoffrey Chaucer wrote The Canterbury Tales). ROYAL known members of the band of Merry Men. In
In Langland’s work a poorly educated parson re- BLESSING the tale Robin Hood ignores the advice of Little
pents and confesses that he is ignorant of Latin: A relief (below) from John and leaves the safety of the forest. He trav-
Nottingham Castle
els to Nottingham to attend Mass and pray to
shows Richard the
I kan noght parfitly my Paternoster as the preest Lionheart joining the the Virgin Mary. At church Robin is recognized
it syngeth, hands of Robin Hood by a monk who turns him over to the sheriff.
But I kan rymes of Robyn Hood . . . and Maid Marian in The monk then sets off to tell the king of the
marriage. outlaw’s capture, but before he can arrive, Little
C. HOGGINS/AGE FOTOSTOCK
The Middle English translates roughly to “Al- John and Much, another of Robin’s men, over-
though I can’t recite the Lord’s Prayer (Pater- take the monk on the road and murder him and
noster), I do know the rhymes of Robin Hood.” his servant.
Putting Robin Hood’s name in an uneducated Posing as the monk and his page, Robin’s
character’s mouth demonstrates that the men deceive the king. They deliver the news
legend would have been well known to most of Robin’s capture to him and are reward-
commoners, regardless of whether they could ed with money and titles. They return to
read or write. Nottingham and free Robin from prison. The
By the 15th century the Robin Hood leg- sheriff is humiliated but survives the story,
end took on its first trappings of rebellion while Robin, Little John, and Much return to
against the ruling class. One of the oldest the forest with the forgiveness of the king.
known written ballads about the forest out- In this story the monk—not the sheriff or
law, “Robin Hood and the Monk,” dates to the king—is the true villain. The monk is a
around this time. It is the only early ballad to corrupt figure who violates the sanctity of
be set in Sherwood Forest near Nottingham, the church by betraying Robin’s presence
and it features Little John, one of the best to the sheriff.
T
HE SHERIFF OF NOTTINGHAM is
not Robin Hood’s only enemy in
the medieval tales. Sir Guy of Gis-
borne plays the part of the villain
in many Robin Hood stories. Originating
around the 15th century, Robin Hood and
Guy de Gisborne describes an encounter
with Sir Guy in the forest of Barnsdale. Not
recognizing Robin, Sir Guy asks him for di-
rections through the wood and tells him
he is hunting for the outlaw Robin Hood.
Traveling with Sir Guy, Robin suggests that
they have an archery contest. Robin bests
Sir Guy before revealing his true identity
to him. The two men brandish knives and
fight. Robin kills his adversary, sticks his
severed head on the end of his bow, and
disfigures the face with his knife. ”There
you stay, good Sir Guy,” he says, and then
he disguises the dead man’s body in his
own clothes of green.
This version of the legend visits extreme vio- FAMILIAR originates during this time. In this work is one
lence on the villain, delivered by Little John and SIGHTS of the first iterations of Robin Hood’s edict of
Much. The killing of the monk is justified be- Five hanged men in a stealing from the rich to give to the poor. In the
cause of his corruption, while the death of the detail (below) from poem Robin says, “If he be a pore man, Of my
Antoine Vérard’s
monk’s page, to avoid leaving a witness, is also 1493 illuminated good he shall have some.”
accepted, despite the page’s innocence. Later manuscript, Grandes In these tales Robin belonged to the lower
versions of Robin Hood stories would move Chroniques de France. classes and was considered a yeoman. The me-
away from these deaths that appear as collateral The prevalence dieval English ballads use this term to describe
of executions and
damage, but medieval audiences did not seem brutality in medieval
a status higher than a peasant but lower than
overly troubled by them. Europe seeped into a knight. In its original sense “yeoman” meant
Medieval crime and punishment often cen- the ballads and a young male servant, applied to servants of
teredaroundbrutalityandviolence.Kings,lords, poems of the times. standing within a noble house.In the Gest Robin
and their representatives used it often to punish ERICH LESSING/ALBUM is depicted as a Yeoman of the King who,despite
rebellious peasants.Bodies hanging from his privileged position,misses the forest
the gallows or displayed as a warning at and so chooses to abandon the court.
crossroads were familiar sights during Robin Hood takes on a role as an ad-
this time. These early Robin Hood bal- ministrator of justice for the underclass
lads begin to show a turning of the ta- in the Gest. When Little John consults
bles, in which the lower classes are able to his leader for guidance on whom to beat,
punish the upper classes through trick- rob, and kill, Robin Hood provides him
ery and violence. with a code divided along the lines of
In the 15th century more ballads about rich and poor. No peasants, yeomen, and
Robin Hood spread across England. One virtuous squires were to be harmed. On
of the longest, A Gest of Robyn Hode, the other hand, the Merry Men were
54 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2019
allowed to “beat and bind” bishops, archbish- and order. In the 14th century the Black Death LEGENDS IN THE
ops, and, above all, the loathed Sheriff of Not- and Hundred Years’ War with France placed a LANDSCAPE
tingham. In the Gest the type of villains has wid- huge burden on the lower classes, who, in 1381, The permeation of
ened to include more figures at odds with the launched the Peasants’ Revolt. the Robin Hood story
lower classes. throughout English
folk culture is reflected
The Robin Hood legend also takes a bloodier A Class Act in the numerous
turn than in previous versions as vengeance is In the 16th century Robin Hood lost some of his landmarks bearing
delivered to villains. In the Gest Robin shoots the dangerous edge as he and his men were absorbed his name across the
sheriff with an arrow and then slits his throat into celebrations of May Day. Every spring, the country, such as
Robin Hood’s Cave in
with a sword. In a 15th-century manuscript of English would herald in the spring with a festival
Derbyshire (above),
Robin Hood and Guy of Gisborne, Robin is not that often featured athletic contests as well as where the bandit is
content with just killing his opponent, Guy. He electing the kings and queens of May. As part of said to have sheltered.
also mutilates the corpse with a knife, a deed he the fun, participants would dress up in costume CHRIS HERRING/AGE FOTOSTOCK
carries out with considerable relish. as Robin Hood and his men to attend the revels
Scholars sometimes explain these recurring and the games.
themes of duping and punishing corrupt people It is during this period that Robin Hood also
in power as reflecting a struggle between dispos- became fashionable among the royalty and even
sessed Saxons of the countryside and the power- associated with nobility. One story from 1510
ful Norman rulers in the cities. In the centuries claims that Henry VIII of England, then barely
when the Robin Hood legend was taking shape, 18, dressed up like Robin Hood and burst into
the English government was beset by a number the bedchamber of his new wife, Catherine of
of crises that upended the social order. A civil Aragon. There, accompanied by his noblemen,
war in the 12th century, later known as the An- he entertained the queen and ladies-in-waiting
archy, led to a catastrophic breakdown in law with his exuberant dancing and high jinks. In
T
HE ROBIN HOOD LEGEND was a perfect fit for the silver screen Several more characters begin to appear in the
in the 20th century, when more than 40 films were shot fea- Robin Hood stories at this point. One is Maid
turing the noble outlaw with a heart of gold. His most iconic Marian, and the other is Friar Tuck. The two en-
moment on film came in the 1938 Technicolor movie The ter into the legend at around the same time. Like
Adventures of Robin Hood, the Warner Bros. classic packed with sword Robin Hood, these two were also popular figures
fights and medieval costumes. Errol Flynn’s Robin is an impoverished at the May games, and they begin appearing in
nobleman and honest-speaking Saxon “cockerel,” chafing under the
literary works as well.
taxes of corrupt Prince John and Guy of Gisborne—who is wooing
One of Friar Tuck’s earliest appearances is in
the beautiful Marian, played by Olivia de Havilland. Closely modeled
on the novelist Walter Scott’s version of the noble Sherwood Forest the play Robyn Hod and the Sheryff off Notyngham,
outlaw, Robin takes on the prince and the greedy Norman barons in which dates to approximately the late 15th cen-
a guerrilla war, redistributing wealth from the rich to win over both tury. His popularity grew in the coming years,
the poor of Nottinghamshire and the heart of Lady Marian. Unlike and he appeared more frequently in later works,
medieval versions of the story, which revel in rebelling against royal such as Robin Hood and the Friar from the 1560s.
authority, Flynn’s Robin is no anarchist; he fights against corruption. This work features an episode where the monk
The illegitimate ruler Prince John must be humbled by Robin to make bests Robin Hood and tosses him in a stream.
way for the return of the king, Richard the Lionheart. Robin emerges In the Elizabethan era Robin Hood became a
as a noble outlaw, rising above the feuds of Norman-versus-Saxon popular presence in plays staged for the upper
to declare: “It’s injustice I hate, not the Normans.” classes. Several playwrights, such as William
Shakespeare, featured him in their works. Most
notable was Anthony Munday, who wrote two
56 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2019
plays centered around Robin Hood. Munday re- their own times over the centuries.Walter Scott THE RETURN
invents the outlaw as an aristocrat: Robert, Earl repackaged Robin Hood for Ivanhoe in the 19th OF THE KING
of Huntington, whose uncle disinherits him. century, while Howard Pyle most famously An 1839 painting
Robert flees to the forest where he becomes Rob- re-created the legend for a children’s book, The by Daniel Maclise
in Hood. There he meets Maid Marian, and the Merry Adventures of Robin Hood of Great Renown (above) shows Robin
Hood and his Merry
two fall in love. No longer was Robin Hood a yeo- in Nottinghamshire, in 1883. Pyle’s work gained Men entertaining
man; he had been gentrified for new audiences. a new audience for Robin Hood in the United Richard the Lionheart
Munday sets his works during the reign of States, which seemed to hunger for more tales in Sherwood Forest
Richard I, the Lionheart. The king has left Eng- of the Prince of Thieves in years to come.In 1917 on his return from
captivity and
land to fight in the Holy Land, and his younger author Paul Creswick teamed up with notable the Crusades.
brother John rules in his stead. Although Mun- illustrator N. C. Wyeth to create a colorful Robin Nottingham City
day’s Robin Hood plays are regarded by modern Hood, one of the most visually striking rendi- Museums and
critics as poorly constructed and a bit dull (most tions of the tale. Galleries
BRIDGEMAN/ACI
of the action had to be written out to avoid cen- In the early 20th century Robin Hood mi-
sorship), their influence has been considerable. grated from the page to the cinema, and the tale
Setting the tale during King Richard I’s reign was reinvented and retold time and again with
became popular with other authors when they stars like Douglas Fairbanks, Errol Flynn, Sean
interpreted the legend for themselves. Munday’s Connery, and Daffy Duck all taking their turn
decision to make Robin Hood a nobleman also in the lead role. In each version, glimmers of
recurred in later tellings. the original ballads and poems remain visible
as each new version adds more to the legend of
For the Ages the Prince of Thieves.
Drawing on the medieval foundations, authors
J. RUBÉN VALDÉS MIYARES TEACHES CULTURAL STUDIES
would continue to reinvent Robin Hood for AT THE UNIVERSITY OF OVIEDO, SPAIN.
LEFT TO RIGHT: GRANGER/AURIMAGES; BRIDGEMAN/ACI. ARROWS: GARY OMBLER/DK IMAGES. BACKGROUND: BRIDGEMAN/ACI
The Sheriff’s cook arrives, scolds him for his After a celebratory feast the two men return
gluttony, and springs upon him. together to plunder the Sheriff’s treasury.
Lytell Johnn drew a ful gode sworde, They toke away the silver vessell,
The coke [cook] took another in hande; And all that thei might get;
They thought no thynge for to fle[e], Pecis [cups], masars [bowls], ne sponis [spoons],
But stifly for to stande. Wolde [did] thei not forget.
They go out into the street and fight. Little John Also they toke the godë pens [money],
notes the cook’s combat skills and invites him to Thre hundred pounde and more,
join Robin Hood’s band, promising him an annual And did them streyte to Robyn Hode,
salary of 20 marks. Under the grene wode hore
RELIGIOUS CONVICTIONS
Wearing penitential tunics and conical
hats, or tied to a pillory, the condemned in
Eugenio Lucas Velázquez’s “An Inquisition
Prison” are exposed to the scorn of a
fanatical mob. The picture was painted in
the mid-19th century, only decades after
the Spanish Inquisition was abolished.
Musées Royaux des Beaux-Arts, Brussels
BPK/SCALA, FLORENCE
BRIDGING FAITHS
A gate in the walls of
Toledo in central Spain,
leading to the 13th-
century Bridge of San
Martín. A medieval center
for Jews, Christians, and
Muslims, the city was
the scene of intense
persecution by the
Inquisition, starting in the
16th century.
DOMINGO LEIVA/AGE FOTOSTOCK
L
asting more than 350 years, the Spanish Inqu i-
sition left behind a legacy of cruelty, intolerance,
and inhumanity. The rulers of Spain arrested, torr-
tured, and executed thousands of their own peo o-
ple in pursuit of power and national unity. The stoo-
nd
ries of the Inquisition’s victims reveal a climate of fear an
m.
paranoia that took root in a time devoid of religious freedom
The Inquisition’s medieval origins can be traced the grand inquisitor. In 1492 Ferdinand and Is- ISLAMIC ART
back to the 12th century when Pope Lucius III abella issued an edict that ordered Spanish Jews IN SPAIN
instructed bishops to root out heresy in their to convert or be exiled; historians believe that A 10th-century ivory
dioceses. Across Europe, agents of the Inquisi- more than 160,000 Jews“chose”exile.Jews who pyx (casket) bears
the name of the son
tion had the power to accuse, arrest, imprison, converted were typically viewed with suspicion;
of the caliph Abd
torture, and execute suspected heretics. some were accused of being Marranos,Jews who ar-Rahman III.
The Inquisition officially came to Spain in feigned baptism and covertly practiced Judaism. His capital, the
1478.Pope Sixtus IV authorized Isabella of Cas- In the 16th century Spain began targeting its Andalusian city of
tile and Ferdinand of Aragon to identify heretics Muslim community in earnest. In the 1520s Córdoba, was, at the
time, the largest city
to strengthen Catholic orthodoxy in Spain. The Muslims became subject to forced conversions. in Europe.
two Catholic monarchs had recently conquered As with the Jewish community, Muslims who WERNER FORMAN/GTRES
territory in Andalusia, in southern Spain, the had converted, the Moriscos, were often per-
outposts of a Muslim presence that had endured secuted. By 1614 approximately 300,000 were
for more than seven centuries. It had produced exiled from Spain.As the Inquisition continued,
one of the most sophisticated scholarly and ar- the Holy Office also targeted sinners,free think-
tisticculturesinmedievalEurope.Tosecuretheir ers, the mentally ill, and homosexuals.
holdonthese“reconquered”lands,themonarchs The testimonies of the people who lived
founded the Holy Office of the Inquisition. The through the Spanish Inquisition reveal the per-
office was overseen by the grand inquisitor sonal dimension of living in a climate of para-
whose jurisdiction included Spain and all of its noia, desperation, and fear. From 1478 until the
territories, including those in the Americas. Spanish Inquisition’s official end in 1834,Span-
The Spanish Inquisition aimed to create spir- iards across all social classes were vulnerable to
itual and national unity through the Catholic the expanding reach of the Holy Office. They
Church. In addition to large numbers of Mus- could be labeled heretics, lose their property, be
lims, 15th-century Spain was home to a strong imprisoned and tortured, and even be executeed
Jewish community, one of the first targets of —all in the name of faith.
1530
Leonor Barzana
Daughter of the Burned Man
L
eonor Barzana was a native When she became an adult, All these episodes came to light
of Toledo in central Spain, Barzana was known as a beata, un- at Barzana’s first trial in 1530. She
a city that once held a vi- married Christian women who often was accused of boasting of her Jew-
brant Jewish community. took vows of chastity and poverty ishness and engaging in magical
Her ancestors were Jewish, but she but did not belong to a specific order. practices—charges she said were
was living as a Christian. Her father, Her dedication to the Christian faith fabricated by malicious neighbors.
a money changer, was burned at the should have protected her, but her She received 100 lashes and was re-
stake, accused of secretly practicing spirituality became conflated with leased. Six years later she was arrest-
the Jewish faith. Her paternal uncle supernatural powers. ed again when new rumors surfaced.
was convicted of the same offense She developed, it was said, a rep- Witnesses said she had “created”
but ordered to wear a penitentiary utation for being able to tell people’s souls by consulting a magical book,
tunic. She lived in the same medi- fortunes with a talent for predict- “following which, a sound of crying
eval town of her ancestors and was ing the future of newborns. When could be heard.” Again, she denied
often referred to as the “daughter of a pregnant neighbor went into la- the charges and received a lashing,
the burned man.” bor, Barzana is said to have come to but then she was imprisoned.
As she grew older, Barzana at- the door with a lit candle. She had Barzana may have been a vision-
tracted the attention of Toledo’s a prophetic vision in which she saw ary or she may have been a victim of
network of spies and Inquisition the sky open, lightning flash, and a malicious informers. She would not
informers: A neighbor testified that bird brush past her nose. When the so easily have fallen under suspicion
she had heard Barzana say several baby boy was born, Barzana insisted if she had come from a Christian
times that the inquisitors who had that he should be called Gabriel and family. The hatred of Jewishness ex-
killed her father were “scoundrels predicted that he would be a wise, tended into later generations, and its
and traitors.” religious man. stigma proved difficult to escape.
64 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2019
The chilling scrutiny of the Spanish Inquisition
becomes plain when reading of the pain and
suffering inflicted on those living under its sway.
From 1478 to 1834, the people of Spain feared
not only the inquisitors but also their neighbors,
their colleagues, and their families.
GURES IN AN AUTO-DA-FÉ, A
TAIL FROM A 1493-99 PAINTING
PEDRO BERRUGUETE
ALLBUM
FORBIDDEN READING
A painting by 19th-century Belgian
artist Karel Ooms depicts a Spanish
Jew and his daughter fearful of
being caught reading prohibited
Jewish books. Palace of the
Forgotten, Granada, Spain
MANUEL COHEN/AURIMAGES
María Páez
Limpati
Betrayer of
Her People
I
n 1606 an official of the Holy
Office convinced a 19-year-old
woman, María Páez Limpati, to
betray her friends, her neighbors,
and her family. Páez belonged to the
Morisco community who remained
in Spain after the Catholic Monarchs
conquered the Nasrid kingdom in
Granada, one of the last Muslim
strongholds in Spain, in 1492.
Muslim converts to Christianity
were forbidden by law from wearing
their traditional dress and speak-
ing Arabic. Despite converting to
Catholicism, the Moriscos contin-
ued to be persecuted and targeted by
the Inquisition.
In 1568 a violent uprising in
a m o untainou u s region south of
an caused the mon-
t punish the pop- reference to the typical soil in the In 1606 María Páez Limpati was a
latio
i Moriscos were region. In the 16th century, howev- 19-year-old Morisca living in Alma-
depo
de po r t ed to various er, the city’s Christian identity was gro. Documents from the time reveal
partss of central Spain, being strongly asserted through the that pressure from the inquisitors
whee re they formed building of churches and schools. led her to make numerous accusa-
new
ne w communities. tions against those in her communi-
nee of them was in Targeting Moriscos ty. Páez’s statements triggered cru-
magro, about 100 In an atmosphere of paranoia and el interrogations, torture, seizure of
mi es south of To- continued zeal for religious purity, property, and loss of life. Her claims
e do. Almagro’s inquisitors would often show up to culminated in an auto-da-fé, the
name means “red surprise towns with sizable Moris- ceremony in which the inquisitors
clay”
c in Arabic, a co populations. These raids would pronounced their judgments, in To-
quickly swoop in to investigate if Is- ledo later that year. Her relatives and
A MUSLIM CONVERT, A DETAIL lam was secretly being practiced. In neighbors would be burned at the
OF AN ILLUSTRATION OF GRANADA,
PUBLISHED IN CIVITATES ORBIS the early 1600s a raid befell Almagro, stake, while others were sentenced
TERRARUM, A 1572 ATLAS OF and a wave of fear and betrayal broke to life imprisonment or to servitude
WORLD CITIES
PRISMA ARCHIVO over the community. in the royal galleys.
COV
COVER
OVER
ER OF
O THE 1612
12 PUBLICATION
P BLIC
PUB L ATI N JU
AT ON JUSTA
JUS
USTA EXP
EXPULS
EXPULSIÓN
ULS DE
LOS MORISCOS DE ESPAÑA (THE JUST EXPULSION OF THE
MORISCOS FROM SPAIN) BY FRANCISCO DE CASTRO.
BIBLIOTECA NACIONAL, MADRID
0RONOZ/ALBUM
Under Torture
The accounts of the interrogations
are not for the faint of heart: In one
case, a Morisca was tied to the rack,
and after“several turns of the rope,”
CRITICAL MASS the excruciating pain made her
A 16th-century painted wooden say what her inquisitors wanted to
altarpiece by Felipe Bigarny depicts the hear: “That she had never believed
mass baptism of Muslims in Granada,
following the Christian conquest of the in God, nor in Our Lord . . . and that
city in 1492. Granada Cathedral, Spain how could God be three persons?”
PRISMA/ALBUM Other confessions, extracted under
similar torture methods, revealed
to the scandalized inquisitors that
Páez named her loved ones and observing Muslim fasts and con- the accused regarded sacred objects,
neighbors. She admitted to having ducting sacred ceremonies. A wit- such as statues of saints, as of no
practiced Islamic rites, accused her ness testified that he gathered with more value than wooden sticks.
neighbors of keeping the Ramadan other Moriscos to dine after fasting Not even the elderly were spared
fast, and observing the guadoc (a fa- during Ramadan. They said he had from the Spanish Inquisition’s bru-
cial ablution) “in observance of the paper with Arabic words written on tality. Isabel de Cañete, 78 years old,
sect of Muhammad.” To save their them in his house. He was sentenced was accused of conducting various
lives, community members followed to confiscation of all of his proper- Islamic ceremonies and divinations.
suit, incriminating others in turn. ty. After refusing to confess, he was After being tortured, she was sen-
Páez’s family suffered greatly as burned at the stake. Páez’s uncle tenced to confiscation of her proper-
a result. Her father was accused of suffered the same fate; her sister, ty and imprisoned for life. Another
elderly woman was tortured on the
rack until she fainted. Nearly all the
After “several turns of the rope,” the excruciating accused had their property confis-
pain made her say what her inquisitors wanted to cated or faced heavy fines—a pro-
cess that must have considerably
hear: that she had never believed in God. added to the Holy Office’s coffers.
Jerónimo de Liébana
Clever Conman and
So-called Sorcerer
J
erónimo de Liébana was a Born around 1592 in south-
self-declared sorcerer, a claim western Spain, Liébana lived an
that repeatedly brought him itinerant life from a young age, trav-
to the attention of the inquisitors, eling around the Iberian Peninsula,
who were ever attentive to any de- sometimes under the pseudonym
viance from the path of orthodoxy. Juan Calvo. Sometime during his
Today Liébana might be regarded travels, he was allegedly initiated
asaconman,buthisstoryreflectsthe into the magic arts.
extent to which the dark arts were In 1620 Liébana was put on trial by
deeply feared as a very real phenom- the Inquisition, which accused him
enon in the 16th and 17th centuries. of holding black masses and distrib-
This belief was found not uting pieces of paper with“char-
only in the general pop- acters” on them to make the
ulation but also in edu- bearerinvisibleorwinatgam-
cated sectors of Spanish bling. Twenty-nine people
society, including writ- testified against him at the
ers, clergymen, and trial, during which he was
m e m b e rs o f t h e tortured on the rack.
Inquisition. Following this
A Dramatic Tale
But the inquisitors had not seen the
last of the self-styled magus. Helped
by forged documents, and—so he
claimed—the assistance of a noble-
man, the Count of Zabellán, Liébana
escaped.He remained free for a short
68 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2019
TEMPTING FATE
A palm reader tells a client’s future in
a 17th-century painting by Pietro della
Vecchia. Fortune-telling and other
occult practices were targets of the
Inquisition. Civic Museum, Palazzo
Chiericati, Vicenza, Italy
DEA/ALBUM
I
n its zeal for religious uniformity, Reports describe how his calm
the Holy Office not only spied on speech and sweet voice earned him
Spain’s lay population, but also a reputation as a holy, virtuous man.
closely monitored the activities of But he was not quite all he seemed.
the priesthood and religious orders. During his visits, the monk en-
Clerics who abused their authority gaged in pious talk with the local
were duly punished. But, as this tale people, explaining the theology be-
of a wayward monk reveals,the seri- hind the Lord’s Prayer and telling
ousness of a crime in the eyes of the them that all men are brothers before
Inquisition could often be less about God and that they should love one
the acts committed than the hereti- another. On this pretext, he started
cal thinking behind them. visiting a 35-year-old married wom-
Juan Elías was a lay brother in the an,Francisca.After gaining her trust,
Monastery of San Pedro Alcántara he began to hold her hand and then
in Seville,and he was about 50 when placed it on his thigh. On the next
the Inquisition turned its attention occasion, he even embraced her in
to him around 1730. Juan Elías’s du- her bedroom,reassuring her that his
ties consisted of collecting alms in intentions were pure and that he was
the city’s different neighborhoods. thinkingonlyaboutGodduringtheir
times together.
A later meeting fol-
lowed, in which the committing a sin:“If I or anyone else
sources suggest that does this, holds your hands and em-
Francisca started to dis- braces you, since we are in God as we
courage the monk’s ad- are, it is no sin or bad thing.”
vances. Juan Elías turned
his attention instead to a Rival Faith
neighbor, a single wom- Tortured by remorse about what had
an of 25, named Teresa. occurred, Francisca, his first victim,
Records from the time reported the alms collector to the Se-
describe how he as- ville Inquisition. In her statement,
sured her that they could Francisca revealed her own and Tere-
be intimate without sa’s encounters with the rogue monk.
The court summoned Teresa, and
A SPANISH MONK based on the testimony of the two
17TH-CENTURY PAINTING BY
FRANCISCO DE ZURBARÁN women, the calificadores—members
ORONOZ/ALBUM of the inquisitorial tribunal who
72 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2019
THE TOWER AND THE GLORY
The Spanish Inquisition set up an office
in Seville in 1481. In the foreground is the
dodecagonal Tower of Gold, built in the
13th century by the city’s Arab rulers. In the
background is Seville Cathedral, the largest
cathedral in the world, and the resting place
of Christopher Columbus.
SEBASTIANO SCATTOLIN/AGE FOTOSTOCK
determined the type of offense com- mystic Miguel de Molinos.Quietism was found guilty of heresy in 1687,
mitted—wrote a report about the taught that one could achieve grace and Pope Innocent XI condemned
accused, his deeds, and the ideas he through passive contemplation rath- his teachings that same year. Moli-
espoused to the women. er than active prayer. Although Mo- nos died in prison in 1696.
Whatthewomendidnotknowwas linos’s thinking was well regarded Juan Elías’s “seductions” brought
thattheideasJuanElíashadexplained for a short time, the church turned to light what was—in the eyes of the
to them reminded the inquisitors of against it, and arrested its initiator in Holy Office of the Inquisition—a far
a heretical doctrine: quietism, a phi- 1685. During the investigation, Mo- greater crime: evidence that he was
losophy with medieval roots, later linos was accused of deviant sexual a follower of Miguel de Molinos and
refined by the 17th-century Spanish acts that he claimed were sinless. He therefore a heretic. He was found
guilty and imprisoned. As disgrace-
ful as Juan Elías’s actions appear to
According to the inquisitors, Juan Elías was a modern eyes, the inquisitors feared
disciple of the mystic Miguel de Molinos, accused of the doctrine he preached more than
the actual violations he committed
teaching that sex outside of marriage was not sinful. against two women.
Cayetano Ripoll
The Inquisition’s
Final Victim
B
orn in a small cathedral city
in Catalonia around 1778,
Cayetano Ripoll was a dil-
igent pupil and a loyal son of the
Catholic Church. A scholarly, and—
by many accounts, selfless—man,
Ripoll’s life somehow ended on the
gallows in 1826, the last person in
Spain executed for heresy.
From young adulthood, Ripoll’s
life was deeply marked by the con-
vulsions of European politics, and
the bitter struggle between new En-
lightenment ideas and old Catholic
traditions. In 1808 Spain was occu-
piedbyNapoleon,whosereformsin-
cluded suppressing the Inquisition.
The Peninsular War broke out be-
tween Spain (and her allies) and Na-
poleon in 1808. In the course of the captured by the French. He was tak- port of Valencia. Ripoll’s work gar-
war,Ripoll,then in his early 30s,was en to France as a prisoner where it is nered him a reputation as an ideo-
believed he learned about deism,the logical teacher, who even shared his
Enlightenment belief that the path meager salary with the poor.
to fulfillment can be found through In the decade following the war,
reason without church teachings. Spain was in ideological turmoil as
After the war ended in 1814, Na- Enlightenment reformers struggled
poleon’s troops were expelled from with Catholic traditionalists over
Spain.KingFerdinandVIIreturnedto control of Spain. Ferdinand VII, a
the throne,and Ripoll was freed from fervent Catholic, reinstated the In-
France and sent back to Spain. He quisition in 1814, much to the op-
settled in Ruzafa and began working position of liberal reformers. Liberal
as a teacher near the Mediterranean and conservative forces clashed for
years, trading blows back and forth.
CAYETANO RIPOLL IS LED TO THE GALLOWS. Reformers gained power in 1820 and
19TH-CENTURY ENGRAVING forced Ferdinand to shut down the
PABLO LINÉS/MUSEO DEL ROMANTICISMO
74 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2019
“FALSE PHILOSOPHY,” FRONTISPIECE OF A 1774 SPANISH
COMPENDIUM OF TEXTS CONSIDERED HERETICAL,
INCLUDING THE DEIST WRITINGS TO WHICH CAYETANO
RIPOLL SUBSCRIBED. BIBLIOTECA NACIONAL, MADRID
ORONOZ/ALBUM
D
escribed as a “radiantly beautiful woman” in her
youth, Zerelda James Samuel (1825-1911) stood
nearly six feet tall. More imposing than her height,
though, was her personality. At a time when women
were expected to tend to the children and keep their opinions
to themselves, the strong-willed Zerelda didn’t hesitate to
speak her mind. It was said she was “not afraid of the devil
himself.” It was also said that Jesse James took after his mother.
Zerelda’s life was filled with half brother, Archie Samuel,
tragedy, but the hardest of causing a fatal wound. Anoth-
all to bear occurred on Jan- er piece mangled Zerelda’s
uary 26, 1875. In the dark of right wrist so badly that her
night, a small force of men arm had to be amputated just
employed by the Pinkerton below the elbow. As she did
Detective Agency attacked in the face of other hardships,
her farmhouse in the belief Zerelda carried on. In her last
the James boys were home years, Zerelda sold 25-cent
(they weren’t). The Pinker- tickets to tour her home and
tons forced an incendiary visit her son Jesse’s grave.
device through the kitchen “Much trouble has come to
window that unexpectedly me there,” she told a reporter,
exploded. A piece of shrapnel “but I love the old place and
struck Jesse’s eight-year-old want to live there ‘til I die.”
SURVIVOR’S n the dozen years from 1869 to 1881, a devoted mother, coming of age in a land torn
STRENGTH Jesse James may have taken part in as apart over slavery and divided loyalties.
An undated many as 19 robberies—banks, trains, Jesse’s parents, Kentucky natives, met in the
photograph of and stagecoaches—stretching from summer of 1841. His father, Robert, was a stu-
Zerelda James Mississippi to West Virginia to Min- dent at Georgetown College.His mother,Zerel-
Samuel (above),
nesota. Nearly 20 people died as a result of this da Cole, attended a Catholic school in nearby
mother of Frank
and Jesse James, outlawry,including seven of Jesse’s cohorts,yet Lexington. A classmate remembered Robert as
reveals the toll thebrazenholdupscontinued.Lawenforcement exceptionally bright, but“his awkwardness and
that life had and private detectives failed repeatedly to cor- gawky appearance caused him to be the victim
taken on the ral Jesse and his gang, and Missouri earned the of many practical jokes.”The easygoing Robert
resolute Zerelda.
epithet the“Robber State.” took the jokes in stride, however, and soon be-
PRINT COLLECTOR/GETTY IMAGES
But before there was the bold and bad and came one of the most well liked men at the col-
brave Jesse,and long before there was the mythic lege.ZereldaseemedtohavediscoveredRobert’s
Jesse of song, dime novels, and films, there was charms as well, and they were married in De-
a blue-eyed boy, son of a Baptist minister and cember. The groom was 23 and his bride was 16.
78 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2019
THE HOMESTEAD
The Missouri farmhouse where James was born
in 1847 (the gabled wing to the right was added
after his death). After James’s 1882 murder,
his body was interred here on the wishes of
his mother, and later moved to nearby Mount
Olivet Cemetery. Today the house is part of the
Jesse James Birthplace historic site.
MARK LEE GARDNER
that farm that Jesse Woodson James was born two years earlier, dreams of quick ffortunes had
on September 5, 1847. A daughter, Susan, fol- lured thousands over land and by b sea to the
lowed in 1849. new El Dorado. For Robert Jamess, though, an
I
t sounded simple and fair: The people of Kan-
sas Territory would decide if it became a free or
slave state. That was the intent of the Kansas-
Nebraska Act of 1854. But neighboring Missouri,
which had entered the Union 33 years before, was largely
settled by people from slave states. The state’s central
Missouri River corridor, from St. Louis to Kansas City,
became known as Little Dixie. Pro-slavery Missourians
poured into Kansas to sway Pottawatomie Creek. The
the vote. Parties of North- violence of Bleeding Kan-
ern abolitionists—includ- sas, as this series of events
ing John Brown—did the is now known, continued
same. Open warfare soon for four years, resulting in
followed between the Mis- the deaths of more than 50
sourian “border ruffians” Americans. Kansas was
and the Kansan “jayhawk- admitted to the Union as a
ers.” A small army of Mis- free state in 1861, but the
sourians sacked Lawrence, Civil War would ensure
Kansas, a Free-Stater that the conflict between
stronghold, in May 1856. bushwhackers and jay-
Brown and his followers re- hawkers continued, leaving
A COLOR MAP OF THE U.S.A. taliated by murdering five the border region in up-
IN 1854 ILLUSTRATES THE pro-slavery settlers near heaval for much of the war.
KANSAS-NEBRASKA ACT.
NORTH WIND PICTURE/ALAMY/ACI
even greater dream may have been the saving of EARLY Samuel, a doctor and fellow Kentuckian, whom
men’s souls. DEVELOPMENT she married in 1855.
A story handed down in the family tells how This photograph The woods and fields of Clay County were
of Jesse James
littleJesseclungtohisfatherandbeggedhimnot (below), taken when
the James boys’ playground, but there was a
to leave. Once on his westward journey, Robert he was around 15, dark underside to life at that time and place.
dutifully wrote home.“Give my love to all in- was made using Slavery was everywhere in western Missouri,
quiring friends,”he ended one letter to Zerelda, the ambrotype with its numerous tobacco and hemp farms.
“& take a portion of it to your self & kiss Jesse for technique on a Clay County counted 2,742 slaves in 1850, and
fragile glass plate,
me & tell Franklin to be a good boy & learn fast. which has cracked in six of those belonged to Reverend James (Rob-
I must close by saying live prayerful & ask god several places. ert sold a young slave to help finance his trip
to help you to train your children in the path of THE JESSE JAMES BIRTHPLACE/
MARK LEE GARDNER
to California). Only one of those six was an
duty. Fare-ye-well till my next letter.”That fall, adult, a 30-year-old woman named Charlotte,
those loving letters stopped. Robert James had whose work was likely confined to household
succumbedtoanunknownillnessinaCalifornia chores and caring for the children, both free and
mining camp. enslaved.
Despite the severe hardship of Robert’s death,
and a brief second marriage to a man who was The James Brothers’ Civil War
not fond of the children (he died after falling Although living less than 40 miles from the
from his horse), Zerelda made sure that Jesse Kansas border, Jesse’s family was fairly in-
James and his siblings were well taken care sulated from the violence over whether the
of on the family farm—and that the farm Kansas Territory would enter the Union as a
remained under her control. She went so free or a slave state. The outbreak of the Civil
far as to insist on a prenuptial agreement War in 1861, however, was another matter.
with her third and last husband, Reuben “The people were all mixed up and
80 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2019
everybody was a spy for his side,” Frank James Quantrill. The guerrillas, also known as bush- WAR CRIME
recalled about the atmosphere in Clay Coun- whackers, acted as irregular cavalry, generally A chromolithograph
ty during the war. “You were for the South and operating independently of the Confederate (above) depicts
your neighbor was for Lincoln.”As slave owners army and devising their own objectives as their Union soldiers
with Kentucky roots, there was little question leaders saw fit. They supported themselves torturing Reuben
Samuel, Jesse
which side Jesse’s family would take. A neigh- through raiding and help from their kin, which James’s stepfather, in
bor recalled that when news of the war came, is why Federal militia appeared at the James May 1863. Severely
18-year-old Frank James “was wild, shooting farm soon after Frank joined the guerrillas. injured, Samuel
his pistol and hallooing for Jeff Davis.” The militia believed Frank was hiding nearby agreed to reveal the
whereabouts of his
Jesse was far too young to enlist. Frank joined with other bushwhackers and ordered young
stepson Frank and a
the pro-Southern Missouri State Guard and in Jesse to tell them where they were. When Jes- bushwhacker camp.
less than five months’time fought in two major se refused to talk, the soldiers mercilessly beat MARK LEE GARDNER COLLECTION
Missouri battles, Wilson’s Creek and Lexing- and whipped him. Next they tortured Jesse’s
ton, both Confederate victories. But that win- stepfather, Reuben Samuel, stringing him up by
ter he was a patient in a military hospital, laid the neck until the poor man agreed to lead them
low not by a bullet but by measles. Captured by to the bushwhacker camp. The militia had not
Federal forces, Frank was subsequently paroled come to take prisoners and immediately opened
and sent home, bound by an oath not to take up fire on the guerrillas, killing two of them. Frank
arms again against the Union. Yet as the war in ran like hell, barely escaping as bullets whizzed
Missouri devolved into bloody atrocities and around him.“After that day,”Frank would recall
reprisals, it was impossible for any able-bodied years later, “Jesse was out for blood.”
young man to stay out of the fight. But Jesse’s vendetta ride would have to wait
In May 1863 Frank joined the command until the next year. He was only 15 and, more
of Southern guerrilla leader William Clarke importantly, a valuable tobacco crop on the
RAIDERS
W
ILLIAM CLARKE QUANTRILL
(1837-1865), a teacher
who turned to banditry be-
fore the outbreak of the Civil
War, began forming a guerrilla force after
deserting the Confederate Army in 1861. On
August 21, 1863, Quantrill swooped down
on Lawrence, Kansas, with more than 400
men, among whom were Frank James and
Cole Younger. This attack was claimed to be
in retaliation for the deaths and maiming of
several young women, guerrilla supporters,
who were being held in a makeshift prison
when it collapsed. In what became known
as the Lawrence Massacre, Quantrill and
his followers slaughtered more than 150
men and boys, most of them civilians. “We
knew he was not a very fine character,” re-
called Frank James, “but . . . We wanted to
destroy the folks that wanted to destroy us,
and we would follow any man who would
show us how to do it.”
family farm required tending. Jesse raised and RAIDERS’ shot spies. So does everybody. If we hadn’t we
harvested that crop with the help of a slave. REUNION wouldn’t have lasted a week.”
The following winter months found most of In the decades Jesse was wounded twice that summer. The
the Missouri guerrillas encamped in Texas, but following the Civil more serious of the two injuries came when he
War, veterans would
they were back in the spring and looking for re- gather at annual tried to steal a seemingly unattended saddle.
cruits. Crops or no crops, nothing was going to reunions. Quantrill’s The saddle’s owner, a German Unionist farmer,
stop Jesse from enlisting this time. Like his big Raiders (below, circa saw what was happening and got off a quick shot
brother Frank before him,he“went to the brush.” 1920) began holding from the doorway of his home,hitting the young
theirs in 1898 and
The James boys began exacting their re- continued for more thief in the right chest. Jesse didn’t need a sad-
venge in June 1864. Accounts vary, but Jesse than 30 years. dle for the next few weeks. The second wound
is reported to have killed Brantley Bond, one STATE HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF MISSOURI occurred as Jesse was cleaning one of his revolv-
of the militiamen who had whipped him and ers. The gun suddenly went off, blowing away
hanged his stepfather. Bond surrendered to the tip of the middle finger on Jesse’s left hand.
the bushwhackers and begged for As blood squirted everywhere, Jes-
his life, but Jesse, the story goes, se cried, “O, ding it! ding it! How
reminded Bond of his deeds and it hurts!” From that day forward,
then shot him dead. Another mi- Jesse James was known to family
litia member, Alvis Dagley, was and close friends as “Dingus.”
found the next day working in a September found Jesse and
field near his home. The guerrillas Frank riding with guerrilla lead-
marched him to the road, where er “Bloody Bill” Anderson, whose
Frank put a bullet in him. “We men became infamous for tak-
did burn the houses of Yanks,” ing the scalps of dead enemy sol-
Frank admitted years later. “We diers. On the 27th, Anderson’s
82 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2019
bushwhackers sacked the town of Centralia, Jesse’s family claimed he was on his way to DEATH COMES
Missouri, and murdered 24 Federals on furlough surrender when his party was attacked. Re- TO LAWRENCE
who had the misfortune of being on a train that gardless, surrender he did after being wound- A colored woodcut
arrived at the depot during the mayhem. Later ed again. A week later, as he lay on a Lexington (above) depicts the
that day, Anderson’s guerrillas routed a force hotel bed slowly recuperating from the gunshot, 1863 massacre in
Lawrence, Kansas.
of 115 Federals that had come in pursuit of the Jesse James swore his allegiance to the United Led by William C.
bushwhackers. Jesse, on a fleet horse at the head States. Brother Frank surrendered in Kentucky Quantrill, it left
of the charge, galloped to within a few feet of on July 26. more than 150
the Union commander and knocked him out of civilians dead in
its wake.
his saddle with a pistol shot to the head. Only a After the War
AKG/ALBUM
handful of the Federals survived. Jesse’s injury required several months to ful-
Jesse’s feat would become famous, but Cen- ly heal. When he returned to Clay County, he
tralia would be the bushwhackers’ last bloody found many of his Unionist neighbors weren’t
hurrah. Anderson died in a skirmish with militia willing to let bygones be bygones. So, too, the
the next month. After another winter in Tex- Radical Republicans who made up the Missouri
as, the guerrillas returned to Missouri in the legislature. They drew up a new state constitu-
spring for more looting of towns and killing of tion in 1865 that forbade slavery. It also forbade
Unionists, but the Confederacy was finished. So any citizen from voting, holding public office,
was Jesse’s part in the war. In a May 15 firefight or teaching school unless they took the noto-
with a Federal patrol near Lexington, Missouri, rious “Ironclad Oath.” This pledge was entirely
a pistol ball ripped through Jesse’s right lung, different from the oath of allegiance required
in nearly the same place as his wound of the of former Rebel soldiers. A person taking the
previous year. This time, however, the injury Ironclad swore that he or she had never fought
nearly killed him. for, supported, or even sympathized with the
wouldbenamedinseveralbankand John was killed in a gun battle with Frank by one year, dying in 1916.
South. Because former guerrillas and their fam- was threatened daily,”Jesse later told a journalist CRIME SCENE
ilies could not legitimately make that pledge, about his return to the Clay County farm,“and The Missouri bank
they were, for a time, left with no voice or place I was forced to go heavily armed.”Frank argued, of Jesse James’s first
in postwar Missouri. “We had as much chance of settling down, till- confirmed crime was
a shoe store in 1904,
Not unlike their old leaders Quantrill and ing our farms and being decent as a tallow dog when Gallatin’s early
Bloody Bill, a few of the disenfranchised chose chasin’an asbestos cat through hell.” residents (above)
to make their own rules. On February 13, 1866, Another answer Jesse and Frank might have gathered there for a
10 to 12 men rode into Liberty, Missouri, and given, perhaps one more readily believed, was photograph. Seated third
robbed the Clay County Savings Association that robbing banks and trains was easy money, from the left is Samuel P.
Cox, whom James
of $60,000 in gold, currency, and government and they were good at it. mistakenly believed he
bonds (largely the savings of Unionists) and shot killed in the robbery.
dead a bystander. The local newspaper reported Jesse’s First Robbery LIBRARY OF CONGRESS/GETTY IMAGES
that the robbers were believed to be “a gang of There are many robberies in which Jesse was
old bushwhacking desperadoes.” Jesse wasn’t named as a participant, but hard evidence of
involved in the holdup, but brother Frank likely his participation is often as elusive as the out-
was, along with another former guerrilla by the law was himself. The first bank job in which
name of Cole Younger. Jesse James can positively be identified came
Why the Jameses and Youngers took up ban- three years after the Liberty affair, although the
ditry following the Civil War when thousands of “robbery”may have actually been a planned as-
their fellow soldiers returned to their homes and sassination.On December 7,1869,two men en-
pursued peaceful occupations has always been tered the Daviess County Savings Association
a question. The answer endlessly put forth by in Gallatin, Missouri, killed the cashier for no
Jesse and Frank was that their enemies wouldn’t apparent reason,and then grabbed a small metal
allow them to resume their old lives.“[M]y life box and fled. One of the robbers’horses threw
JOHN NEWMAN
EDWARDS its rider, forcing the two to escape on a single
MARK LEE GARDNER COLLECTION
mount. During their flight through the country,
the robbers boasted to more than one person
they met how they had slain Gallatin resident
Maj. Samuel P. Cox. Cox was the commander
of the militia that had killed Bloody Bill Ander-
son, and he was targeted so as to avenge their
former leader.
Unfortunately for the dead cashier, it was a
case of mistaken identity. Instead of Cox, the
robbers had killed John W. Sheets. There was no
mistake, however, in identifying the fine mare
abandoned by the bandits: It was a champion
racehorse named Kate, and its owner was one
Jesse James.
A grand jury indicted both Jesse and Frank
James for the murder of John W. Sheets the fol-
lowing May, prompting Jesse to write to the
state’s governor to defend his case. In his letter,
Jesse denied that he or Frank had anything to
do with the holdup, and he assured the gover-
nor that he could prove his whereabouts on the
day of the robbery by “some of the best men of
Missouri.” “Governor,” he continued, “when I
86 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2019
think I can get a fair trial, I will surrender myself CAPITOL them teenagers as well, Jesse became numb to
to the civil authorities of Missouri. But I will CRIME the bloodshed and fixated on revenge. He killed
never surrender myself to be mobbed by a set The deeds of Jesse men, and men tried to kill him. He learned to
of bloodthirsty poltroons.” James and his steal and pillage, justifying his actions with his
partners in crime
Jesse James, age 22, was now an outlaw. Over are immortalized own skewed moral code. Such are the things
the next 12 years there would be more hard rid- in Thomas Hart that make an outlaw.
ing, more robberies and more innocent victims, Benton’s 1936 mural Newspaperman and James brothers’defend-
more letters denying involvement, and more cycle “A Social er John Newman Edwards conceded that Jesse
History of the State of
offers of surrender in return for the guarantee Missouri,” displayed and Frank were“bad citizens.”But,he explained,
of a fair trial. Jesse, his brother Frank, and their at the Missouri State “they are bad because they live out of their time.”
brothers in crime became the most wanted, the Capitol (above). More than 150 years later, Jesse James seems to
most despised, and the most celebrated outlaws MARK LEE GARDNER. have escaped time altogether, for the life and
©BENTON TESTAMENTARY TRUSTS/UMB
in the nation. But on a spring day in 1882, Jesse’s BANK TRUSTEE/VEGAP, BARCELONA, 2018 deeds of the Baptist minister’s son turned out-
run finally came to an end. With the promise of law appear to be forever etched in the American
a large reward from Missouri’s governor, gang consciousness.
member Charlie Ford fired one momentous shot
into the back of the outlaw leader’s skull.
MARK LEE GARDNER, A MISSOURI NATIVE, IS AN AWARD-WINNING
But the bullet that killed Jesse James had AUTHOR AND HISTORIAN LIVING AT THE FOOT OF COLORADO’S PIKES
PEAK. HE IS CURRENTLY WRITING A DUAL BIOGRAPHY OF LAKOTA
been fired years before Ford pulled the trigger LEADERS CRAZY HORSE AND SITTING BULL.
on his revolver. While still a youth, Jesse’s life
was dramatically upended by the violence of a Learn more
horrendous civil war, which in turn had been BOOK
brought about by the tragedy and violence of Shot All to Hell: Jesse James, the Northfield Raid,
and the Wild West’s Greatest Escape
slavery. Like his fellow bushwhackers, many of Mark Lee Gardner, William Morrow, 2013.
F
rom far away, the In the seventh and eighth
Lalibela church enturies the Aksumite
complex is invisi- tate went into decline af-
ble, blending into the r Persia conquered south
highlands of north- rabia, disrupting trade
ern Ethiopia. To see the im- outes through the Red
pressive medieval churches Sea and cutting off the re-
carved from igneous rock gion’s access to the Medi-
centuries ago, visitors must terranean. Only in the 12th
move in closer and venture century did the fortunes of
high into the hills. Ethiopia revive under new
Zion, first built urth rulers, the Zagwe. Their
Moving Mountains century and rebuilt several capital city was founded in
Christian roots in Ethiopia times since then. Today the center of the country, THE HOUSE OF
run deep, extending as far it is one of the world’s surrounded by a protective St. George, Lalibela,
was hewed from the
back as thefourthcentury A.D. oldest churches. ring of mountains.
surrounding rock in the
Two missionaries, Sts. Fru- TheAksumdynastyruled In 1185 Gebre Mesqel Lal- early 13th century. It is one
mentius and Aedesius, are a powerful kingdom from ibela began his rule as the of the site’s more recently
credited with bringing the first to the eighth cen- new Zagwe king. Lalibela is built structures.
TONI ESPADAS
Christianity to Ethiopia. tury. Commerce increased credited with building the
They converted a king of the their power and the ability 11 remarkable monolithic
powerful Aksumite
A em- to spread their faith north churches in the mountains.
pire. The young faith to Egypt and east to Yemen. Ethiopian chroniclers say
took k hold, and Archaeologists have found Lalibela had visited Jerusa- Ethiopian king would create
houuses of wor- Aksumite coins bearing lem shortly before its fall to anewoneforhisownpeople
sship were built crosses, making them the Saladin’s Muslim forces in tovisitaspilgrims.Hiscapi-
including first to put the Christian 1187. When the Holy Land tal city (later named for him)
St. Mary of symbol on their currency. became inaccessible, the would be a New Jerusalem.
4 cent. a.d.
4th 1185 1500s 1978
Two missionaries travel The Zagwe king Lalibela Portuguese envoys search Lalibela becomes a UNESCO
o Ethiopia and convert
to begins his rule. He is for a legendary Christian World Heritage site. The
th
he king of the powerful credited with building kingdom in Africa and are churches are an important
Aksum dynasty to
A the 11 rock-cut churches awestruck by Lalibela’s place of pilgrimage for
Christianity. in his capital city. monolithic churches. Ethiopian Orthodox Christians.
16
6TH-CENTURY PROCESSIONAL CROSS FROM ETHIOPIA. METROPOLITAN MUSEUM, NEW YORK MET/SCALA, FLORENCE
DIVINE INSTRUCTIONS
LEGEND SAYS THAT the greatness of the future
king of Ethiopia was evident from the beginning:
A swarm of bees surrounded the infant prince,
but he emerged unharmed. He was named
Lalibela, which means
Ethiopian tradition cred- the massive Biete Giyorgis
“the bees recognize his
sovereignty.” Lalibela’s
its King Lalibela with build- (House of St. George), date
older brother ordered
ing all 11 structures, but it is from Lalibela’s reign.
that his sibling (and rival)
more likely that he expand- Two kinds of volcanic
be poisoned. Lalibela fell
ed and adorned an existing basalt make up the church-
into a deathlike sleep and
complex. Archaeologists es. Unlike most structures,
had a vision. He saw ex-
have found that the site was which are built from the
traordinary buildings and
not built all at once. Sever- ground up, the rock-hewn
heard the voice of God
al of the structures predate churches were carved from who instructed him to
Lalibela’s rule. They may the top down. Workers build them in the capital.
have originally been forts most likely used chisels and
or civic buildings carved as other bladed tools to sculpt GOD RECEIVES PRINCE LALIBELA, IN
A 19TH-CENTURY MANUSCRIPT.
early as the seventh centu- each building. LEBRECHT/AURIMAGES
Biete
Medhane YORDANOS R. /
Alem / House JORDAN R.
of the Savior
of the World
N
Lalibela’s Rock
and Salvation
THE YORDANOS RIVER winds through the massif
where the rock-cut churches stand, strengthening
the connection to the Holy Land intended by King Lal-
ibela. The church complex is organized in two main
concentrations: The first centers around the Biete
Medhane Alem (House of the Savior of the World) and
the Biete Maryam (House as well as tombs where
of Mary); and the second deceased priests were
around the Biete Amanuel laid to rest. The interior
(House of Emmanuel). The of the churches are noted
Biete Giyorgis (House of for rounded arches, some
St. George) is located covered with ornate geo-
by itself a short distance metric patterns. Some of
away; its distinctive cru- the best preserved exam-
ciform structure makes it ples with bold, vivid colors
easy to spot from above. are found inside the Biete
The complex is linked to- Maryam (right), which
gether by a series of tun- also features paintings
nels and trenches whose of biblical scenes. On the GEOMETRIC DESIGNS ON
walls have been exca- outside of Bet Maryam is ROUNDED ARCHES OF BIETE
MARYAM (HOUSE OF MARY),
vated over the centuries. afriezeofhorsemen,inter- LALIBELA
These niches may have preted by some to depict DANITA DELIMONT/ALAMY/ACI
92 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2019
DISCOVERIES
94 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2019