The Cowboy

Movie Trailers ~ The Nice Guys

You know, in a movie climate which seems to be non-stop world-is-going-to-end, super hero movies (if I was to be completely honest I can't remember which Avengers Movie is which) its nice to see something different.

The clip of the dude on the pot, with a gun, dropping his cigarette in his pants while reading a magazine had me...

Drunk Hoplites

I'm reading a book, The Western Way of War. Its about the Greek way of war between the years 800-300 BCE. Its a fair book, with some interesting concepts. It poses the question as to why the Greeks alone of the peoples of the ancient war shifted their methods of fighting form one of hit and run, ranged weapons, ambushes, evasions etc to one of heavily armored, citizen soldiers who mass in deep ranked units with little use of missile units or light horse and slam into each other.

The first part is good but the book posed an interesting concept. Drunk hoplites.

He begins the chapter by commenting that there is no evidence in the records, written or archaeological, that hoplites went into battle drunk, however, he says, that doesn't mean that didn't. He then goes into a short discussion of how everyone drank wine in ancient Greece and gives two examples where the sources say something about drinking in the noonday meal. Neither of which say the hoplites were drunk, and only vaguely imply it. Out of 400 years of war, two drunk units does not a habit make.

And at any rate I can't image the hoplites drunk, that was a pretty tight formation and if the soldiery were drunk...well I don't know about you, but when I drink it gets hard for me to walk with hand in my pocket much less carrying a full array of battle armor.

Mermaids

I keep getting enraged comments about why there are not more mermaids on the blog....

Word of the Day -- Machicolation

A machicolation is a floor opening between the supporting corbels of a battlement, through which stones, or other objects, could be dropped on attackers at the base of a defensive wall. The design was adopted in the Middle Ages in Europe when Norman crusaders returned from the Holy Land. A machicolated battlement projects outwards from the supporting wall in order to facilitate this. A hoarding is a similar structure made of wood, usually temporarily constructed in the event of a siege. Advantages of machicolations over wooden hoardings include the greater strength and fire resistance of stone.

The word derives from the Old French word machecol, mentioned in Medieval Latin as machecollum, probably from Old French machier 'crush', 'wound' and col 'neck'. Machicolate is only recorded in the 18th century in English, but a verb machicollāre is attested in Anglo-Latin. The Spanish word denoting this structure, matacán, is similarly composed from "matar canes" meaning roughly "killing dogs".

Daily Cosplay

Can you Do the Thing???

Imaginarium ~ Birth of a World

From the World of Aihrde

At first he sought to teach them a language, but their minds were too lazy and they could not easily learn. However, the Oanthiul could mimic sounds they heard and parrot them back, so the Red God opened their minds and taught them to take names for themselves. This they did, but they as often mimicked the names of their fathers and mothers, for these they readily understood and heard often. All this mimicry made their language, if it could be called such, confusing and incomprehensible to any but the most clever. The people learned to mimic with more than just their voice, but learned to change the shape of their bodies and reorder their minds.

The child of an Oanthuil was born with the memories of the father and thus in some respects the Oanthuil lived forever, though the memories blurred with time and were supplanted by new memories so that the father became entangled with the son. The women of the Oanthuil were rare, but born with the full range of the mother’s memories and often the fathers and with this they wielded great power over their people.

All this was to Ornduhl’s design, but it was a design filled with malice and his words unlocked the lazy minds of the Oanthuil and enhanced their natural proclivities toward being clever and merciless, so that that people became powerful without wisdom and strong without remorse. And Ornduhl was proud of what he had wrought, for he saw in them a poison to men of whom he had only distant rumor. He left them to their own devices.

Excerpt from Shades of the Red God, A Tale of Two Worlds

TLG Christmas Sale

In case you missed it we've launched our annual Christmas Sale! Get almost all the goodies at up to 40% off! If you have other discounts or coupons they'll stack!

Join the Crusade! The Castles and Crusades that is!

Movie Trailer ~ Band of Robbers

Once every few years a movie comes along that breaks the conventional movie tropes and you just know its going to be awesome.

This is that movie.