On Annoyingly Erroneous Bumper Stickers
You know, usually I'm all about taking it easy and not letting things bother me. I'm not a party pooper or a killjoy. But I got really annoyed yesterday. By a bumper sticker.
It read "If you're so Goth, where were you when we sacked Byzantium?"
Ha ha, right?
NO.
Allow me to put on my Pedantic History Nerd Hat for a moment. First of all, the Goths (either the Ostrogoths OR the Visigoths) never sacked "Byzantium". They sacked ROME, and they did it in 410 AD. By that time, "Byzantium" didn't even exist, as it had been known as "New Rome", or Constantinople since around 330 AD, when Emperor Constantine I built a new city around ancient Byzantium, which was founded sometime around 660 B.C.
Secondly, Constantinople wasn't sacked until nearly a millenium after the fall of Rome, when the Fourth Crusade came a'knocking in 1203. It can't even be said that Goths had anything to do with that sacking, either, as the Fourth Crusade was comprised mostly of Venetians, Flemish, and the French.
In conclusion, it is a stupid bumper sticker, I am a huge nerd, and anyone visiting Constantinople immediately after 1203 would probably have seen something like this:
It read "If you're so Goth, where were you when we sacked Byzantium?"
Ha ha, right?
NO.
Allow me to put on my Pedantic History Nerd Hat for a moment. First of all, the Goths (either the Ostrogoths OR the Visigoths) never sacked "Byzantium". They sacked ROME, and they did it in 410 AD. By that time, "Byzantium" didn't even exist, as it had been known as "New Rome", or Constantinople since around 330 AD, when Emperor Constantine I built a new city around ancient Byzantium, which was founded sometime around 660 B.C.
Secondly, Constantinople wasn't sacked until nearly a millenium after the fall of Rome, when the Fourth Crusade came a'knocking in 1203. It can't even be said that Goths had anything to do with that sacking, either, as the Fourth Crusade was comprised mostly of Venetians, Flemish, and the French.
In conclusion, it is a stupid bumper sticker, I am a huge nerd, and anyone visiting Constantinople immediately after 1203 would probably have seen something like this:
coughed this up at 1:42 PM
8 El Commentos:
silly English ka-nigits
So *that*'s what a Pedantic History Nerd Hat looks like. I've always wondered. Oddly similar to a piece of armor.
Carroll
cat: boil your bottom
carroll: yes, that's a pretty close representation. mine actually has a propeller, though
Why am I envisioning this bumper sticker on a Pontiac Aztec driven by a Creative Anachronist? Because I can.
It's been a while, Hobo. How are things?
-justin
(not currently using his birdmonster email because he is lazy)
you're ALMOST correct. it was on a shitty old Saturn covered with a bunch of hemp-related stickers.
also...i...i have a confession. there was this one time....when i was in high school....when i went to a few Society for Creative Anachronism events.
I WAS TRYING TO FIND MYSELF, DAMNIT!
things are pretty good...glad to see that you guys are playing with giant drag! probably going to try to make it to one of those shows.
have you been keeping up with your biscuit-throwing duties?
I can throw a biscuit from here to Kansas City. Know this.
Also, as much as I'd love to mock you for your Ren Fair phase, that was probably around the time I was playing Magic: The Gathering with an embarrassing regularity. I am thereby disqualified from even politely insulting you.
...and by "giant drag" i of course meant "superdrag". i was just listening to giant drag and was thus confused. thanks for not correcting me.
i've never played Magic: The Gathering...the d20 is how i (used to) roll
Belatedly:
I too owned a 20-sided die, though my interest in D&D was fleeting at best. I remember a friend having a 100-sided die and remember that the insanity of that turned me off the idea completely.
Similarly, one day, at the tender age of thirteen, I entered a Magic tournament, did pretty well, and ended up in the semi-finals against a corpulent facsimile of the Simpsons' Comic Book Guy. I lost. But I remember being so saddened by the thought of me become that guy that I never really played again. The power of negative reinforcement, that is.
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