Oh man, this is a dark joke, but I still laughing. I think you reached Monty Python-esque level of comedy with this one. I can see this as a Monty Python skit (If Monty Python still group still exist).
It’d be easier to go to the highest point in town, the church steeple/bell tower, during a thunderstorm. My understanding is that numerous bell ringers (ringing the church bell was supposed to make the storm swerve away from the town) experienced death by lightning strike.
BRILLIANT title, first of all! Well done!
However, I feel compelled to point out (oh no, I’m one of THOSE guys) that catapults would have been rather expensive for a mere serf to obtain. Unless he just snuck onto the property of his local Lord and used his. That would work, I suppose.
Anyhow, this made me LOL as always and I will have a much brighter day today once again because of this lovely strip, which I always save for last in my group of online comics I read daily.
By chance I happen to be study some historical econometrics e.g. the measurement of the relative value of things in the past. In once source they said that during the 1600s the typical field cannon (the kind that fought on battlefields and not forts or ships) cost as much to field as 800 men infantry.
That’s why you read about armies having 4,000 foot, 2000 horse, and three guns (cannon). Those three guns were worth 2,400 foot. That’s also way combatants tried so hard to capture cannon and bragged so loud when they did. Capturing one gun could make a battle profitable.
A lot of battle reports well up to the Napoleonic era list the outcomes as lost five nobles and one gun, killed or captured 8 of there nobles and 4 guns. Oh, and some of the foot and horse got killed or ran away.
Catapults would have just as costly and likely more for they were used in a time when iron was more costly. The wooden components could be built on sight (expensive skilled labor) but the iron bracing and axles wouldn’t have been.
It was the beginning of what military historians call capital intensive warfare, i.e. substituting expensive equipment and weapons systems for human beings.
It was also the start away from sheer mass of numbers being the major controlling factor on the battlefield. If an army of 10,000 and no cannon went against an army of 2,000 and 10 cannon. There were in theory equal in cost and firepower. In reality, the 10 cannon would be killing the other side in huge numbers before that side got close enough to shoot at the cannons.
It’s gotten to the point to day where some can say, “I’ve got an army of 1 million men right there, what do got.” and the other guy can say, “One nuke.”
Uh… I’m not sure this is at all correct. Most ideas of a shift in warfare to capital-intensive conflict stem from Geoffrey Parker, who dates it to the seventeenth century, long after catapults had left the scene. Also, cannon were incredibly ineffective until long after that; they weren’t really battlefield weapons at all until the eighteenth century, and only had some degree of prominence in the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.
Capital intensive warfare was in fact mostly about having larger armies than ever before; I’m not sure where your interpretation comes from, but my understanding is that the period in question saw a massive increase in the size of armies, quite the opposite of what you seem to indicate. Larger armies mean they can’t really just survive off the land, and need logistics and so on; equally, said armies need to be increasingly professional, because they need to be projected all around the world. It’s not really about the equipment at all until at *least* the twentieth century; even in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, relatively ill-equipped masses of people, so long as they weren’t utterly completely outmatched technologically, could still defeat smaller vastly more expensive armies, with the Napoleonic wars being a case in point.
[/historymajormoment]
Hard to commit suicide in the medieval ages? Are you kidding? To commit suicide in the pre-industrial age, basically all you had to do was stop trying to stay alive.
The average serf back then spent 90% of their time just growing food 75% they were under nourished, 25% dangerously so and the average individual would experience at least two famines in 3 score and ten average life span.
Not mention plagues and warfare modes that made Hitler look not so bad.
Staying alive in the per-industrial age was like swimming with a lead weight tied to you weighing a quarter or more of your body mass such that if you kick and swim as hard as you can you can just keep your head above water but the moment you ease off just a bit…bloop…bloop…bloop.
“Suicide” in the medieval ages was just some guy waking up one morning and thinking, “I just tired of all this %$#@! Not even gonna try today.” He’d be dead by noon.
Why do you think all the old religions made up (religion of present company excepted of course) such horrific afterlife punishments for suicides? Where your life was already pretty much hell, you needed an extra double think layer of creamy double hell icing on top the sh*t cake to keep people from offing them selves.
Staying alive in the per-industrial age was like swimming with a lead weight tied to you
Pre-industrial and post-agricultural, of course. Nomads and foragers had it a lot easier. Hunter-gatherers living in reasonably pleasant climates (and, if you’re a hunter-gatherer and you’re NOT living in a reasonably pleasant climate, what are you even doing there in the first place? Move somewhere else!) spend something like twenty-three hours a WEEK doing anything remotely like “work”. Hunting, gathering, making useful weapons and tools and clothes and stuff, repairing stuff, cooking stuff — all that adds up to barely over three hours a day.
Nomadic pastoralists tend to have a lot more work to do, but also tend to eat pretty well. You rarely ever see a fat nomad, but you’ll only see skinny ones well after all the farmers have already starved to death.
Upon further thought, I think killing your self with a catapult is a bad idea.
Think about it, your so depressed you wanna die, so you climb in, cut the rope…and I’m flying! Flying through the air like bird! This is the most fantastic thing I’ve ever experienced! Life is great I want to live forever. Forever do here m….splat.
It’s like P.J. O’Rourke once observed, “Never use recreational drugs to commit suicide. You might miscalculate the dosage and just have a good time.
If language reflected reality the word, “Noble” and the phrase “to behave “nobly” would have entirely different meanings.
Okay, this is my really, really last thought.
They did used to execute people during sieges by catapulting them in or out of cities. It was a common way to execute hostages, “Oh, want us to release you son? Sure, catch!”
The mongols catapulted something like 800 live-screaming civilians into a middle-eastern city during one siege. It wasn’t just a terror weapon, they hoped to spread diseases as well… or they just ran out rocks. Hard to tell with old Ghengis.
There are those who merely comment and then there are the Shannon Loves of the world, who not only comment, but comment and enlighten. Even happier now not to be living in the Dark and or Middle ages.
Serf’s up!
Dammit, you beat me to it.
You got serfed.
It’s raining men (or in this case, bugs)!
What about castle towers?
You would first need a permit to crenellate. And those are expensive.
this is CLEARLY wrong on so many levels… but JUST AS HILARIOUS… check out the tv tropes page on “rule of funny”
(yes, I just infected MORE people to tv tropes….. MUAHAHHAHAHAHAH)
NOT GOING! I have WAY TOO MUCH to do today!
It’s also a gateway drug- how I discovered The Dragon Prince. Yay for time-wasting!
Oh man, this is a dark joke, but I still laughing. I think you reached Monty Python-esque level of comedy with this one. I can see this as a Monty Python skit (If Monty Python still group still exist).
It’d be easier to go to the highest point in town, the church steeple/bell tower, during a thunderstorm. My understanding is that numerous bell ringers (ringing the church bell was supposed to make the storm swerve away from the town) experienced death by lightning strike.
BRILLIANT title, first of all! Well done!
However, I feel compelled to point out (oh no, I’m one of THOSE guys) that catapults would have been rather expensive for a mere serf to obtain. Unless he just snuck onto the property of his local Lord and used his. That would work, I suppose.
Anyhow, this made me LOL as always and I will have a much brighter day today once again because of this lovely strip, which I always save for last in my group of online comics I read daily.
By chance I happen to be study some historical econometrics e.g. the measurement of the relative value of things in the past. In once source they said that during the 1600s the typical field cannon (the kind that fought on battlefields and not forts or ships) cost as much to field as 800 men infantry.
That’s why you read about armies having 4,000 foot, 2000 horse, and three guns (cannon). Those three guns were worth 2,400 foot. That’s also way combatants tried so hard to capture cannon and bragged so loud when they did. Capturing one gun could make a battle profitable.
A lot of battle reports well up to the Napoleonic era list the outcomes as lost five nobles and one gun, killed or captured 8 of there nobles and 4 guns. Oh, and some of the foot and horse got killed or ran away.
Catapults would have just as costly and likely more for they were used in a time when iron was more costly. The wooden components could be built on sight (expensive skilled labor) but the iron bracing and axles wouldn’t have been.
so those pepole was used instend of iron to ammunition.
It was the beginning of what military historians call capital intensive warfare, i.e. substituting expensive equipment and weapons systems for human beings.
It was also the start away from sheer mass of numbers being the major controlling factor on the battlefield. If an army of 10,000 and no cannon went against an army of 2,000 and 10 cannon. There were in theory equal in cost and firepower. In reality, the 10 cannon would be killing the other side in huge numbers before that side got close enough to shoot at the cannons.
It’s gotten to the point to day where some can say, “I’ve got an army of 1 million men right there, what do got.” and the other guy can say, “One nuke.”
Uh… I’m not sure this is at all correct. Most ideas of a shift in warfare to capital-intensive conflict stem from Geoffrey Parker, who dates it to the seventeenth century, long after catapults had left the scene. Also, cannon were incredibly ineffective until long after that; they weren’t really battlefield weapons at all until the eighteenth century, and only had some degree of prominence in the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.
Capital intensive warfare was in fact mostly about having larger armies than ever before; I’m not sure where your interpretation comes from, but my understanding is that the period in question saw a massive increase in the size of armies, quite the opposite of what you seem to indicate. Larger armies mean they can’t really just survive off the land, and need logistics and so on; equally, said armies need to be increasingly professional, because they need to be projected all around the world. It’s not really about the equipment at all until at *least* the twentieth century; even in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, relatively ill-equipped masses of people, so long as they weren’t utterly completely outmatched technologically, could still defeat smaller vastly more expensive armies, with the Napoleonic wars being a case in point.
[/historymajormoment]
Cool! I love to learn stuff when I read Bug Martini! Thanks a lot 🙂
Hard to commit suicide in the medieval ages? Are you kidding? To commit suicide in the pre-industrial age, basically all you had to do was stop trying to stay alive.
The average serf back then spent 90% of their time just growing food 75% they were under nourished, 25% dangerously so and the average individual would experience at least two famines in 3 score and ten average life span.
Not mention plagues and warfare modes that made Hitler look not so bad.
Staying alive in the per-industrial age was like swimming with a lead weight tied to you weighing a quarter or more of your body mass such that if you kick and swim as hard as you can you can just keep your head above water but the moment you ease off just a bit…bloop…bloop…bloop.
“Suicide” in the medieval ages was just some guy waking up one morning and thinking, “I just tired of all this %$#@! Not even gonna try today.” He’d be dead by noon.
Why do you think all the old religions made up (religion of present company excepted of course) such horrific afterlife punishments for suicides? Where your life was already pretty much hell, you needed an extra double think layer of creamy double hell icing on top the sh*t cake to keep people from offing them selves.
Staying alive in the per-industrial age was like swimming with a lead weight tied to you
Pre-industrial and post-agricultural, of course. Nomads and foragers had it a lot easier. Hunter-gatherers living in reasonably pleasant climates (and, if you’re a hunter-gatherer and you’re NOT living in a reasonably pleasant climate, what are you even doing there in the first place? Move somewhere else!) spend something like twenty-three hours a WEEK doing anything remotely like “work”. Hunting, gathering, making useful weapons and tools and clothes and stuff, repairing stuff, cooking stuff — all that adds up to barely over three hours a day.
Nomadic pastoralists tend to have a lot more work to do, but also tend to eat pretty well. You rarely ever see a fat nomad, but you’ll only see skinny ones well after all the farmers have already starved to death.
Upon further thought, I think killing your self with a catapult is a bad idea.
Think about it, your so depressed you wanna die, so you climb in, cut the rope…and I’m flying! Flying through the air like bird! This is the most fantastic thing I’ve ever experienced! Life is great I want to live forever. Forever do here m….splat.
It’s like P.J. O’Rourke once observed, “Never use recreational drugs to commit suicide. You might miscalculate the dosage and just have a good time.
Okay, once last thought I swear.
Say, I’m your typical medieval noble and I’m looking at the serfs flying in the air in panel three. Do I think, “what a horrible human tragedy?”
Nope, I’m thinking “I’ve invented skeet shooting, Lackey! fetch my bow!”
If language reflected reality the word, “Noble” and the phrase “to behave “nobly” would have entirely different meanings.
Okay, this is my really, really last thought.
They did used to execute people during sieges by catapulting them in or out of cities. It was a common way to execute hostages, “Oh, want us to release you son? Sure, catch!”
The mongols catapulted something like 800 live-screaming civilians into a middle-eastern city during one siege. It wasn’t just a terror weapon, they hoped to spread diseases as well… or they just ran out rocks. Hard to tell with old Ghengis.
There are those who merely comment and then there are the Shannon Loves of the world, who not only comment, but comment and enlighten. Even happier now not to be living in the Dark and or Middle ages.
One final fling.
Pull! I love my peasants! Thank you Mel Brooks!
Wow. Didn’t mean to start anything. Just making an observation . . .
And This morning I had a friend post on his reading of Anglo-Norman suicide data, hum small world