Word With a Past
From the Archives: Word With a Past: Mausoleum
Among other things, I’m currently working on the story of Artemisia II, the widowed queen in the story below. I’m ashamed to realized that I did not mention her by name: my own small contribution to erasing women from history. (I’ve corrected that in this re-run.) While we don’t know a great deal about Queen…
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Word With A Past: Guerrilla Warfare
Guerrilla tactics are probably as ancient as war itself. The word itself dates from the Napoleonic wars, a product of the Peninsular War of 1808-14 in Spain—the most prolonged and, with the exception of Napoleon’s invasion of Russia, most destructive campaign of the period. Napoleon’s invasion of Spain had its official roots in long-simmering tensions…
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Word(s) With A Past: Left and Right as a Political Metaphor
As some of you may have noticed, here in the United States we’re coming to the end of a long, weird election season. A lot of labels have been thrown about with little reference to what they mean or why. At some point, when I had become almost numb from the rhetoric, it dawned on…
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