[ssf] Iceland Re: [sheffield-anti-war-coalition] Bread and circuses!
john
john at truth009.titandsl.co.uk
Thu Apr 9 09:04:23 BST 2009
> john wrote:
(obviously not original email label).
Adam, no I didn't write that. Why do people say I wrote this or that when for people's consideration, I forward messages or links to webpages? No, I didn't write that and although I can agree with some of it, I don't have to agree with all of it.
Apparently the idea of moving people to live out on the sea is inspired of the Venus Project - look the Venus Project up in Google (or a search engine of your choice). But whether I agree that would be a good idea or not, it wasn't the reason I posted a link to 'Bread and Circuses'. I do however, think that people living in cities on the sea is a better idea than having the world's population culled through wars, famine and disease, as is happening through corporate greed at the moment.
----- Original Message -----
From: "adam" <adam at diamat.org.uk>
To: "john" <john at truth009.titandsl.co.uk>
Cc: "ambiguities" <ambiguities at yahoogroups.co.uk>; <PeaceEfforts at yahoogroups.com>; "GPC" <globalpeacecampaign at yahoogroups.com>; "sheffield-anti-war-coalition" <sheffield-anti-war-coalition at yahoogroups.co.uk>; "SSF" <ssf at lists.aktivix.org>
Sent: Wednesday, April 08, 2009 11:44 AM
Subject: Iceland Re: [sheffield-anti-war-coalition] Bread and circuses!
> john wrote:
>
>> http://www.strike-the-root.com/4/wasdin/wasdin10.html
>
>> Space may be the final frontier, but the ocean is the frontier that can actually be populated now, and for less money. Living in international waters has a few distinct libertarian advantages: no government, taxes, or stupid laws. This would help to assure that the really nasty people (government, police, prosecutors, clergy, and god) would not want to join us, as they would not have the thieving, oppressive police state to help them with their plunder.
>
> "I must tell you now
> briefly how
> these people cognate
> to our own dominant race
> got to their Isle of Refuge,
> and then say
> a little of the character
> of their literature,
> but really only as
> a kind of introduction to the subject.
>
> I have said before
> that a kind of native feudalism
> developed of itself in Norway as in England:
> a certain number
> of the old tribal chiefs yielded,
> generally very sullenly,
> to the claims of the overlord,
> but the bolder spirits
> could not stomach it
> and resisted King Harald Fairhair,
> with whom indeed
> history in the North begins,
> with all their might:
> this resistance culminated
> in the great battle of Hafrsfiorð (Goat-firth)
> on the Norway coast
> in which the king was triumphant,
> and the malcontent chiefs
> had to submit
> or seek their fortunes elsewhere:
> Russia,
> Normandy,
> England,
> Ireland,
> the islands of Scotland
> felt the effects
> for good and for evil
> of the emigration which followed:
> but where the Norsemen
> settled themselves
> amongst important populations
> whom their desperate courage had overcome,
> as notably in Normandy,
> they gradually mingled
> with the native population
> and soon lost their language and traditions.
>
>
> With the settlers in Iceland
> it was different:
> the land was uninhabited,
> they brought with them
> their tribal customs and traditions
> and kept them for long
> together with their language:
> this of course
> was the deliberate intention
> of the emigrants:
> the chief who fled before
> 'kings and scoundrels'
> as we are told
> the pillars of his high-seat
> on which Thor,
> the favourite God of the North was carved,
> and when they neared the land
> threw them overboard
> for the wind and tide to carry:
> then when he landed
> the chief went along the coast
> till he found the spot
> 'where Thor was come aland'.
>
>
> And there once more
> the home was founded,
> the chief claiming the land he needed
> by going around it with fire:
> of course
> many adventurers came out
> who had so such pretensions
> to leadership as these
> besides the freemen and freedmen
> who went out with the chief
> and his thralls
> many of whom he freed
> and gave land to
> on his coming to the new country;
> all these would form
> a kind of following to the chief,
> who presently on settling
> formed a priesthood
> as it was called
> and undertook the necessary religious rites
> and the care and guardianship of the thingstead,
> the place of meeting,
> over which he presided,
> and which
> was what
> would now be called
> the seat of government,
> the parliament,
> and the law court of the district:
> there about the middle of June
> all the freemen of the district met,
> and quarrels were prosecuted
> or arranged, fines imposed,
> and offenses taken note of
> and dealt with,
> all in the open air;
> no court being allowed
> to be held within doors
> or on cultivated ground
> (ne en akri nè engi).
>
>
> All this sounds very systematic and orderly;
> and indeed in many of the sagas,
> whereof more hereafter,
> there is a great deal
> of law-quibbling of course
> always founded on custom and precedent.
>
>
> ... I may finish
> by saying a word
> on the present condition of Iceland:
> they have suffered very much there
> from bad seasons of late:
> but I cannot help thinking
> that in spite of that
> they could live there very comfortably
> if they were to extinguish individualism there:
> the simplest possible form
> of co-operative commonwealth
> would suit their needs,
> and ought not to be hard to establish;
> as there is no crime there,
> and no criminal class
> or class of degradation
> and education is universal:
> and unless by some special perversity
> should the question of politics stand in the way:
>
> the only persons
> who would be losers by it
> would be the present exploiters
> of this brave and kind people:
> and if these men were all shipped off to --
> well to Davy Jones,
> there would be many a dry eye
> at their departure.
>
> I speak of this
> from the sincere affection
> I have for the Icelandic people
> who treated me so kindly when I was among them,
> and who are the descendants,
> and no unworthy ones,
> of the bravest men
> and the best tale-tellers
> whom the world has ever bred."
>
>
> One thing you must remember however,
> that though our present Society
> is founded on a state of things
> very like this,
> this state of things was really
> so very different from ours
> in spite of our using
> the same words as our forefathers,
> that many people find it
> a difficulty even in conceiving of it.
>
> Political society
> was not yet founded;
> personal relations between men
> were what was considered
> and not territorial:
> when a priest or chief
> moved as sometimes happened,
> many of his thing-men accompanied him,
> there was no political territorial unit
> to which loyalty was exacted.
>
>
> --
> http://www.marxists.org/archive/morris/works/1887/iceland.htm
> The Early Literature of the North - Iceland
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