The joys of numismatic research

Reid Goldsborough wrote:

Rather than protract the discussion by dissecting peripherals, allow
me to come close to the key problem:

RG Writing as a medium of tyranny. More contrarian bologna.

Well, it is not my idea.
Deborah Tarn Steiner is the author of THE TYRANT'S WRIT.
See for instance:
Deborah Tarn Steiner is Associate Professor of Classics at Columbia
University. She is the author of The Crown of Song: Metaphor in
Pindar, and The Tyrant's Writ: Myths and Images of Writing in Ancient
Greece (Princeton).
http://pup.princeton.edu/titles/7162.html

with another write-up of Steiner's recent works at:
http://www.virginia.edu/topnews/rele...t-16-2001.html

and a review of her book by classics professor Hillary Susan Mackie
referenced at:
Hilary Mackie, "Deborah Tarn Steiner, The Tyrant's Writ: Myths and
Images of Writing in Ancient Greece," Mythosphere, 1 (1997). Book
Review
http://dacnet.rice.edu/Faculty/?FDSID=673

And the book referenced for a class called
INSCRIPTIONS AND THEIR READERS
at the University of California Santa Cruz:
http://humwww.ucsc.edu/classics/hedrick/epigraphy.html

Basically, the theme here is that writing, tyranny, coinage, the
hoplite formation, and more, all of it was a matrix in the 8th and 7th
centuries BC.
Coins, as semata, were part of the writing revolution. Tyrants used
coins to pay mercenaries.

You should do more reading and less glomming.

Michael
"Ancient coins show: they knew it was round"

Reid wrote:

"Of course individualism and democracy were appreciated in Athens!. But they
weren't regarded as we regard these concepts TODAY. It's taken more than two
thousand years for what the ancient Greeks first experimented with to evolve
into the beliefs and practices of 21st
century America."


You're hilarious.


Anka ---- a laff riot, in fact

Ankaaz wrote:

Reid wrote:

"Of course individualism and democracy were appreciated in Athens!. But they
weren't regarded as we regard these concepts TODAY. It's taken more than two
thousand years for what the ancient Greeks first experimented with to evolve
into the beliefs and practices of 21st
century America."

You're hilarious.

Anka ---- a laff riot, in fact

Democracy was widely feared in Athens. It was not a 'preferred
governmental form', it was just a step shy of anarchy. Read Plato's
"Republic". Search for greek utopias and you'll find benevolent
dictatorships, enlightened despots.

Athens brief descent into democracy was held up for most of the two
thousand years since as a cautionary tale, "how not to run a city".

Social Darwinism is a fairly dead concept, Reid. And evolution leading
to 'more perfect forms' or having direction is simply flat wrong.
American government owes far more to the Enlightment than to the 'Golden
Age of Greece'. Read the American State Papers, the Federalist papers.
Forget what they taught in high school Western Civ. classes. It was
mostly a convenient way to tie a text book together.

HTH.

Alan
'one deme's dime is another's denarius'

(Ankaaz) wrote:
You're hilarious.
Anka ---- a laff riot, in fact

It's great to be back here in THEBES, folks, it really is. Sort of
reminds me of Athens with its individualism AND democracy...

[[ har har tee-hee-hee GUF-aw guf-FAW!! yuck tee-hee-hee
guf-FAW!! yuck yuck har har tee-hee-hee GUF-aw yuck yuck yuck ]]

No but seriously folks, I was out at the Assemby the other day, and
who do you think I met? Alcibiades. He had just been banished,
ostracized, and he was being frog-marched out by the Scythian guards,
and he was yelling that the ballot boxes had been STUFFED. And they
said, "Tell it to CHAD!" (get it)?

[[ har har tee-hee-hee GUF-aw guf-FAW!! yuck tee-hee-hee
guf-FAW!! yuck yuck har har tee-hee-hee GUF-aw yuck yuck yuck ]]

I know, I know, but really, folks, say, here's an idea: I think we
ought to let anyone do whatever they want, as long as they don't
interfere with the equal rights of others.

[silnece]

Ahem, well, ok, ok, ok, let's try this, let's not run things
ourselves, cause there's so many of us, let's pick other people to run
the government for us.

[ booo! booo! hissssss! Throw him out!! booo! booo! hissssss!]

Wow, how quickly they turn on you. Now come on, don't you think women
and ex-slaves should vote like the rest of us? Wait! Wait! No!!!
DON'T!!!!

[enter the Emcee] "OK, well, that's gonna be a tough act to follow,
but we have some jugglers from Thrace..."

Michael
Moving right along.

Michael E. Marotta wrote:

(Ankaaz) wrote:

You're hilarious.
Anka ---- a laff riot, in fact


It's great to be back here in THEBES, folks, it really is. Sort of
reminds me of Athens with its individualism AND democracy...

[[ har har tee-hee-hee GUF-aw guf-FAW!! yuck tee-hee-hee
guf-FAW!! yuck yuck har har tee-hee-hee GUF-aw yuck yuck yuck ]]

No but seriously folks, I was out at the Assemby the other day, and
who do you think I met? Alcibiades. He had just been banished,
ostracized, and he was being frog-marched out by the Scythian guards,
and he was yelling that the ballot boxes had been STUFFED. And they
said, "Tell it to CHAD!" (get it)?

[[ har har tee-hee-hee GUF-aw guf-FAW!! yuck tee-hee-hee
guf-FAW!! yuck yuck har har tee-hee-hee GUF-aw yuck yuck yuck ]]

I know, I know, but really, folks, say, here's an idea: I think we
ought to let anyone do whatever they want, as long as they don't
interfere with the equal rights of others.

[silnece]

Ahem, well, ok, ok, ok, let's try this, let's not run things
ourselves, cause there's so many of us, let's pick other people to run
the government for us.

[ booo! booo! hissssss! Throw him out!! booo! booo! hissssss!]

Wow, how quickly they turn on you. Now come on, don't you think women
and ex-slaves should vote like the rest of us? Wait! Wait! No!!!
DON'T!!!!

[enter the Emcee] "OK, well, that's gonna be a tough act to follow,
but we have some jugglers from Thrace..."

Michael
Moving right along.

Can I take it that you are somewhat in disagreement with what Reid has
uttered?

Ian
(speaks English...in an old fashioned way)

On 23 Mar 2004 16:56:40 -0800, (Michael E.
Marotta) wrote:

RG Writing as a medium of tyranny. More contrarian bologna.

Well, it is not my idea.

That this wasn't your idea makes it a great deal more plausible, but
it's still a ridiculous concept, at least the way you presented it. I
strongly suspect though that the rendering of this subject by the
authors you cited was a great deal less simplistic than yours. Of
course writing can be used to further tyranny. But your blanket
statement that writing is the medium for tyranny is no less absurd
than cars are the instruments of death or blue-eyed people are Nazis.

And please lose this equally ridiculous, and *continued,* implication
that you're the only one who reads history. You made the same mistake
in your Alexander the Great article, a mistake that had disastrous
results for you. You read very selectively and with an agenda, and you
make these grand extrapolations that have little or no logical,
historical, or numismatic support. Then you present your contrarian,
"paradigm-smashing" flakiness as blanket statements, as if they're
written-in-stone truth.

And now you're not saying that writing AND coins were instruments of
tyranny. It's too funny. But hardly worth even this effort talking to
you about it.

--

Email: (delete "remove this")

Coin Collecting: Consumer Protection Guide: http://rg.ancients.info/guide
Glomming: Coin Connoisseurship: http://rg.ancients.info/glom
Bogos: Counterfeit Coins: http://rg.ancients.info/bogos

[Reid Goldsborough's opinions about the relationship between tyranny
and writing been recorded. This is my post; therefore, only I can
request that it be "nuked" from Google's Archives. Michael "Advocate
for History" Marotta]

From: Reid Goldsborough )
Newsgroups: rec.collecting.coins
Date: 2004-03-24 22:59:02 PST Reid Goldsborough wrote in message . ..
On 23 Mar 2004 16:56:40 -0800, (Michael E.
Marotta) wrote:
RG Writing as a medium of tyranny. More contrarian bologna.
Well, it is not my idea.
That this wasn't your idea makes it a great deal more plausible, but
it's still a ridiculous concept, at least the way you presented it. I
strongly suspect though that the rendering of this subject by the
authors you cited was a great deal less simplistic than yours. Of
course writing can be used to further tyranny. But your blanket
statement that writing is the medium for tyranny is no less absurd
than cars are the instruments of death or blue-eyed people are Nazis.

And please lose this equally ridiculous, and *continued,* implication
that you're the only one who reads history. You made the same mistake
in your Alexander the Great article, a mistake that had disastrous
results for you. You read very selectively and with an agenda, and you
make these grand extrapolations that have little or no logical,
historical, or numismatic support. Then you present your contrarian,
"paradigm-smashing" flakiness as blanket statements, as if they're
written-in-stone truth.

And now you're not saying that writing AND coins were instruments of
tyranny. It's too funny. But hardly worth even this effort talking to
you about it.

Reid wrote of Michael: "You read very selectively and with an agenda...."


This is ludicrous, even coming from you.

Michael is a voracious reader. He also has a photographic memory, so it's not
surprising that his knowledge of history, especially ancient history, is
amazing. Not only can he very quickly retrieve the most arcane of -facts- from
that data warehouse of his, he is able to synthesize those facts into
constructs, relationships and (yes!) extrapolated, paradigm-smashing opinions.
Contrast his method of operation with yours, Reid. What was it you did when
you researched James I/VI? Thumbed through a dictionary, I believe...




Anka ---- used to love to watch Mike THINK

(Ankaaz) wrote:
Michael ...
Matt Dubey and Harold Karr to the contrary notwithstanding, Alphonse,
working with you was an ennobling experience. You are patient,
determined, and meticulous. And you lug heavy books long distances!
Who could ask for more in a collaborator? That IHOP on I-40 will be
the Aswan of the New World to future generations of Alexander
worshippers.

Michael
"We met at nine. We met at eight.
I was on time. No, you were late."

Michael E. Marotta wrote:

"Matt Dubey and Harold Karr to the contrary notwithstanding, Alphonse,
working with you was an ennobling experience. You are patient,
determined, and meticulous. And you lug heavy books long distances!
Who could ask for more in a collaborator? That IHOP on I-40 will be
the Aswan of the New World to future generations of Alexander
worshippers."


Ah, yes... I remember it well...



Anka ---- it was the Bob Evans on I-71 ;-)