Great History

My opinion on the way history is being taught today.

2021-01-29T15:04:00.001-08:00

History , since the begininng of times , was taught in schools of all kinds to scholars and students of all ages to remind them of their roots and to teach them about the origins of other people of different civilzations all around the world .

It is a powerfull tool that could unify humans by showing the similarities between them and by concluding with lessons that could benefit us all and the generations to come like :

- how declaring wars is easy and how making long lasting peace is hard .

- how we should learn from the mistakes of the past only and not get stuck in it.

But instead , nowdays history is nothing but a way of spreading the propaganda of the states , the lessons need to match their narrative and their political and social ideology .

The student isn't allowed to think or question anything or else he gets judged by his social circle , he is there only to absorb the information given to him and follow the guidlines .

The goal is to spread nationalism and patriotism and although nothing is wrong with the idea of loving the soil we were born in , too much of that leads to extreme ideas of egoism , isolation from the world , hatred towards other people of different countries , and most dangerous of all , developing illusions of superiority.

To conclude i believe that history should be taught in a more objective manner , show the positives of your nations's past as well as its negatives so that everyone gets the real big picture , that's the way we properly learn from historic lessons .

What happened on january 25th in history ?

2021-01-24T15:31:00.003-08:00

Find out what happened 25th january this day in history ! :

- 1964: The Beatles get their first number one with "I Want To Hold Your Hand" on the Billboard Hot 100 chart.

- 1924: The first Winter Olympics games took place in the French Alps on this day. Two of the primary sports that took place on this mountain were bob sled and ski jump competitions. In all, 12 events featuring the play of six different sports were scheduled.

- 1942: Thailand declared war against the United States, England, and other World War II allied forces on this day. Thailand was very much controlled by Japan at that time, and Thailand was considered one of Japan's "puppets".

- 1947 : Al Capone dies of pneumonia and heart failure after fearing all his life he would suffer a gangsters death.

- 1959 : American airlines begins first use of Jets for internal US flights from Los Angeles to New York on a Boeing 707 one way ticket costing $300

The Battle of 4 May 1823

2021-01-24T04:34:00.002-08:00

The Battle of 4 May was fought in open sea near Salvador, Bahia, on 4 May 1823, between the Brazilian Navy, under the command of a former admiral of the British Royal Navy, Thomas Cochrane, and the Portuguese Navy during the Brazilian War of Independence.

During the period of Portuguese control of Brazil, commerce had been largely restricted to Portuguese ships with Portuguese crews; so few Brazilians had the opportunity to become proficient sailors. Following the Brazilian Declaration of Independence from Portugal in September 1822 , Brazil began assembling a fleet of warships; but had difficulty finding trained sailors to man those ships. In December 1822 Brazil solicited English mercenaries with the offer of Portuguese prizes. Thomas Cochrane, who ended Spanish control of Chile with the capture of Valdivia in February 1820, was offered command of the Brazilian fleet.

Cochrane arrived on 13 March 1823 with several officers and seamen who had served with him in Chile. After some negotiation about terms of compensation, Cochrane assumed command of the Brazilian fleet aboard the flagship Pedro Primeiro on 21 March 1823. On 29 March he received orders to blockade Bahia and destroy or capture any Portuguese shipping he found there. Cochrane sailed on 3 April with the frigate Piranga and the American clippers Liberal and Maria da Glória which were armed as corvettes. The brig Guarani and schooner Real accompanied the squadron for use as fire ships; but they were unprepared for combat. The frigate Nitherohy joined the squadron on 29 April.

On 30 April, the Portuguese prepared to battle the Brazilian squadron. Shortly after sunrise on 4 May 1823 the Brazilian squadron detected the Portuguese line of battle as thirteen sail to leeward. To compensate for the numerical inferiority of Brazilian ships, Cochrane attempted to cut the Portuguese line to engage the rearmost four ships before they could maneuver the van ships to prevent localized numerical inferiority. Cochrane signaled his squadron to follow him as he maneuvered Pedro Primeiro to cut the Portuguese line astern of the frigate Constituição and ahead of the Portuguese troopship Princesa Real. Pedro Primeiro opened fire on Princesa Real at noon, in anticipation the remainder of the Brazilian squadron would engage the other three Portuguese ships.

At that point the underpaid Portuguese sailors aboard the Brazilian ships demonstrated loyalty to Portugal rather than Brazil. Piranga, Nitherohy and Liberal failed to follow Pedro Primeiro into gunnery range of the Portuguese ships. Two Portuguese sailors assigned to the powder magazine aboard Pedro Primeiro imprisoned the powder boys sent to carry the gunpowder to reload the cannon. Only Maria da Glória, with a crew of Brazilians trained by their French Captain Beaurepaire, was effectively engaging the enemy. Cochrane successfully disengaged upon recognizing the inability to obtain even localized advantage; and prevented the Portuguese crew of Real from surrendering their Brazilian ship to the enemy.

Cochrane retired to Morro São Paulo where he organized a blockade with Pedro Primeiro and Maria da Glória. The remaining Brazilian ships transferred their best sailors to the two blockading ships; and were left in the care of Captain Pio and men of unquestioned Brazilian loyalty.[3] When Brigadier General Inácio Madeira de Melo and his Portuguese soldiers left the capital on the morning of 2 July 1823, Cochrane pursued the fleet to Portugal, managing to capture seven ships during the chase. Salvador was taken by Brazilian troops joining the Empire of Brazil.

Sources : 1. MAIA, Prado. A Marinha de Guerra do Brasil na Colônia e no Império (2a. ed.). Rio de Janeiro: Cátedra, 1975, p.72

2. MAIA, Prado. A Marinha de Guerra do Brasil na Colônia e no Império (2a. ed.). Rio de Janeiro: Cátedra, 1975, p.73

3. Cochrane, Thomas (1859). Narrative of Services in the Liberation of Chile, Peru, and Brazil from Spanish and Portuguese Domination. II. London: James Ridgway. pp. 5–33.

The powerful impact of footage restoration

2021-01-20T13:08:00.003-08:00

In 2018 , a ground breaking documentary about the first world war (1914-1918) was released.

directed and produced by Peter Jackson , the footage that was used was extracted from the Imperial War Museum's archives , now i know you want tell me "well mehdi , a lot of documentaries use old footage , what was so ground breaking about this one in specific ?"

The answer would be : high resolution recreated audio and colorization , we are used to watching black and white moving images with no sound all the time , but this documentary is something else , some reviewers went as far as saying it's the closest thing to a movie .

Here are some images that show the transformation of the footage :

I came , i saw , i conquered.

2021-01-20T12:17:00.001-08:00

These are words of greatness that broke the barrier of time and are still known till this day by a whole lot of people , but they are not as famous as the name of the person who said them.

Born in the 12th of july BC , Gaius Julius Caesar was a Roman general and statesman who played a critical role in the events that led to the transformation of the roman republic to a very powerful empire that had no match in its era.

Although he's mostly famous for being a genius in the fields of strategy and war planning , the man was before everyrthing a politician , in 60 BC, himself along with crassus and pompey ( two other roman statemen ) formed the first "Triumvirate" , a political alliance that dominated Roman politics for several years.

He Truly started rising to become one of the most powerful politicians in the Roman Republic through a string of military victories in the Gallic Wars against the celtics and the gauls , one of the most amazing and memorable battles he won in this campaign was the "Siege of Alesia" .

This video from Historia Civillis describes the battle accurately and with more detail :