Pics: Howard Phillips Lovecraft, in all of his resurrected glory.
Intro: The 2nd part of the notes on HPL's 1st issue of The Conservative.
Mostly focused on Howard's racist essay "The Crime of Crimes."
And, some corrections for future records...
16. Rome did decline with time, as the Empire got too large & unwieldy to easily govern.
It underwent large social, cultural & organizational changes that led to the division of the Empire into Eastern & Western regions.
But, it's the migrations of the Huns, Germans & Slavs that brought about the end of the Western half.
The 1st sack of Rome, in 390 BC, was due to Brennus & his Gauls.
A 2nd sack, in 410 AD, was by Alaric & the Visigoths.
In the 3rd sack of the Eternal City, in 455 AD, the Vandals under Gaiseric were to blame.
Finally, in 472 AD, Western Roman General(!!) Ricimer sacked Rome with help from his Burgundian allies & Odoacer, a German warrior.
After a 5 month siege, Rome & the whole Western Roman Empire fell.
But, Rome would still be sacked 5 more times in its future!!
The Empire might have declined some but, not to its death.
It could have risen again - if it wasn't outright conquered.
Pics: On the left, the division of the Roman Empire.
On the right, invasion routes into the Western Roman Empire. The reddish arrow without a name is the route of the Slavs.
17. The 'revivifying' elements actually looted Rome & set fire to the remains - several times!
They had little use for Roman culture - just land, gold & slaves.
Most kept pushing South, into Spain & the northern coast of Africa.
Strangely enough, the Vandals finally settled where Carthage once stood.
They would become the pirate states of Tripoli.
Pic: Basically, the new Western nations were isolated & grew into empires thru violence against each other.
18. Political & social vitality fled the conquered nations of the West - due to the destruction left behind by the migrating tribes.
It took some 250 years before Charles Martel unified the German Kingdom of Francia (now France & Germany).
19. That Teutons were the founders of all modern Latin states seems factual.
A. Spain was scientifically invigorated by the Arab invasion - not the Visigoth conquest.
However, Pelagius (who started the reconquest of Spain) was half Iberian & half Visigothic.
He was the ancestor of the kings of Spain & Portugal.
B. In the case of France, Clovis (a German Frank) is the 1st king of what would later become royal France.
C. Rome, of course, was founded by the Romans, one of many Italic nations.
After Rome's fall, the Byzantine (Eastern Roman) Empire tried to reconquer Italy.
So did the Burgundians, Ostrogoths, Lombards, Franks & Normans.
But, nobody could hold all of Italy for long.
The land fragmented into city states & Papal states.
And, Italy wouldn't be totally reunited until 1870, when the Papal states were finally captured!
Italy's royal family came out of the Savoy House - northwest in France.
They soon ruled Sardinia & led the push for Italian reunification.
In all cases, the Germanics tried to maneuver themselves into positions of power.
But, some of these same 'royal' families met with violent ends - or, were replaced by others.
20. That Latin nations declined "after the Teutons were reabsorbed" is something that can only be known by a close comparison of DNA results & historic records.
But, actually, this sounds like more of Lovecraft's racial BS - probably arising from his whole "Western decline" belief...
21. That "Teutonic lands show striking proof of their qualities" can best be shown by a look at central Rome - after the Teutons came thru...
Pics: As an example, the Coliseum is still a ruined building today.
It didn't matter that a Teutonic family controlled Italy for so long.
Truly, a lot of lives & culture have been lost due to German barbarism.
Not to mention those 2 World Wars...
22. Belgians' virile virtues?
I think Howard is writing about the virility of soldiers.
This idea was formed by the ancient Greek citizen-soldier during war time.
In Medieval times, the 'work' of a virile hero soldier was reserved for knights.
It took until the French Revolution for regular soldiers to be considered virile.
New laws allowed brave, but regular, soldiers to climb the ranks no matter what social class they came from.
This gave regular soldiers a greater initiative in battle.
For any soldier to die at the front of a battle was further glorified.
This cult of military heroes spread the idea of war virility thruout European societies.
And the Romantics further magnified warlike virility thru their stories.
Colonial conquests were described as a form of national virile regeneration!
During the late 1800s, Garibaldi the Italian & Bismark the German were thought to embody the virility of nations that won their unity thru war.
Theories about war even bestowed this virility upon certain brave foes.
Like the British praise for the warlike qualities of the Highlanders of Scotland.
During WW1, this idea was reinforced by glorifying the sacrifice of citizen- soldiers as part of a virile patriotism...
It's funny that HPL thinks that the tyranny of kings is a sort of 'freedom.'
But, then, he didn't like the American Revolution...
24. As we now know, the Vikings actually made it as far as maritime Canada in the West & Persia (now Iran) in the East!
Leif Eriksson named this still unknown "wine" land somewhere on the eastern coast of Canada.
It is considered to be the northern cape of Newfoundland, called L'Anse aux Meadow.
Mostly because it's the only surviving Norse settlement known.
26. That Teuton lands are "only" under Teutons is, now, almost impossible.
(The U.S., for instance, has had a distinguished Black President.)
Lovecraft was probably right - unless we count colonial conquests.
After all, we successfully freed our- selves from the madness of the British King...
27. German jealousy? Intellectual zeal? Unnecessary war?
The real reason Germany entered WW1 was to expand their land in Europe & so gain influence against France, Russia & Britain - which we're expanding their world wide empires.
A strong nationalist pride in German superiority helped fuel their military ambitions.
The Germans took a gamble when their ally, Austria-Hungary declared war - on Serbia only!
Germany opened up the war to other nations...
Pics: Images of Woden - from the Middle Ages & more 'modern' times.
28. Woden was the chief God in old Anglo-Saxon beliefs.
He was known as Wotan in Teutonic myth & Odin in Scandinavia.
As leader of the Wild Hunt, Woden observed humans - in the guise of an old wanderer!
He was the 'complicated' god of runes, magic, battle, war & poets.
Woden's totemic animal was the wolf.
Pic: The Slav expansion from 100 AD outwards...
29. The Proto-Slavic people (Indo- Europeans from western Asia) migrated to eastern Europe in 2000 BC.
Their current culture started in what is now Ukraine.
Some scholars believe them to be Vikings from Scandinavia.
The word slave comes from Slav, as Spanish Muslims took many Slavs as slaves...
30. Mongolia is a landlocked country in East Asia.
Bordered by China & Russia, it is a vast area of rugged plains & nomads.
High usage of tobacco & alcohol is the main reason for their men's short life- spans.
Founded by Genghis Khan, in the 1200s, they conquered the largest kingdom ever known on Earth.
This might be why Lovecraft had some small respect for them.
(The Mongolia map is mistakenly in Part 1 of these notes. Sigh...)
Next: More content from Howard's The Conservative.
