I'm just glad whoever this is is selling his book on Kindle for three bucks instead of being a billionaire or else we might have another Schliemann on our hands running around Cornwall blowing up historical sites to find Camelot.
And also that the Roman general one was the weakest because it's based solely on records stating a man named Artorius served as a centurion for a cavalry unit?
But sure, go ahead Amazon historian author person, please tell me about the real-life historical totally real battles that absolutely were positively commanded by the real King Arthur...
Maybe I'm out of date, but I thought it was pretty much decided that the idea of "King Arthur" wasn't literally true as in there was one historical person named Arthur who was king but rather the myth was an amalgamation based on various real-life people which possibly included a couple of English and Welsh nobles and also a Roman general?
While searching for history books on Amazon, I ran across one called The Battles of King Arthur. So I figured it was just miscategorized and was a mythology/folklore book (sometimes they end up in history by overzealous posters) and...
...no. No, the author claims the book is about battles of the real-life King Arthur.
Which...okay...but...can you prove that King Arthur actually existed first?
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BTW, it took until 2003 for the English government to even acknowledge the Great Upheaval (Le Grand Dérangement) actually happened and very specifically did NOT apologize for it.
Anyway, despite being Cajun and living the majority of my life in Southeast Texas on the Louisiana border with a large Cajun population, I had to learn this at the age of 43 from a year-old issue of Archaeology Magazine.
Peyroux didn't do this out of the goodness of his heart. He may have been trying to get in good with Spain to hedge his bets (he was accused of being a spy for Spain) and at the very least was financially exploiting the people he helped relocate.
Oh, and the English didn't send them to Louisiana. Louisiana was a Spanish colony at the time, so the Acadians figured out on their own to head there. With the help of French politician Henri Peyroux de la Coudrenière who worked out a deal with Spain to allow them to resettle there.
The English military officer showed up, seized all their lands and livestock, and ordered them moved into other English colonies or back to Europe. They also split up families and placed thousands in indentured servitude.
Almost half of those displaced - 5000 of the 11,500 - died in the process from disease, starvation, or shipwreck.
By 1755, the English fully claimed Canada and took one look at the group of Catholics who were hanging out and intermarrying with the local native peoples and said "Peaceful co-existence? We can't be having that!" and English military commander for the region Lieutenant-Colonel John Winslow forcibly relocated everyone.
In fact, cross-culture exposure combined with the removal of the strict French social structure meant the Acadians moved to a more collectivist, classless society who just wanted to be left alone. To try to maintain neutrality during the conflicts between colonial powers, they'd swap out French and English flags on buildings and forts depending on which gunboat showed up to check on them.
So the Acadians were chill. They used levies to reclaim the majority of the farmland they used so didn't come into conflict with the local indigenous population (specifically the Mi'kmaq) as other European colonists did fighting over resources - the land they claimed was reclaimed land so they didn't steal it from the indigenous population.
Version I was taught: The English took over Canada and many of the residents of Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Quebec didn't want to convert to Church of England, so they migrated to Louisiana to remain Catholic.
Yeah, that skips a couple of steps...
I'm often angry and frustrated when I learn the history I learned in school was not only wrong but wrong with an agenda...but I'm Cajun in an area with a large Cajun population...and I just learned that I was only taught half the story about the Acadian migration to Louisiana...
Spoilers: The English were dicks.
Mitch McConnell lays on his back, his belly baking in the hot sun, beating his legs trying to turn himself over, but he can't. Not without your help. But you're not helping. Why is that?
Also, I get annoyed when those books are out of date (and most of them are) because of recent excavations and analysis. Like we know that warhorses through most of the medieval period weren't the huge giant Clydesdale like steeds and were more the size of ponies. Makes sense, they require less food while on campaign and were likely bred for maneuverability rather than size.
Freelance columnist on tabletop games and roleplaying games (credits: EN World, Ain't It Cool News, Zombie Orpheus), video producer/streamer (Gamer's Tavern Media), and podcast editor/producer (EN Live, Scary Basement, Gamer's Tavern). Opinions are my own. Pronouns: He/him