Darwin recipes for Christmas

Original recipes from the wife of Charles Darwin have been brought together in a new book to offer an insight into a Victorian Christmas. Mrs Charles Darwin’s Recipe Book by Dusha Bateson and Weslie Janeway includes 40 dishes from the notebooks of Emma Darwin, including Lady Skymaston’s pudding, cranberry sauce, and compote of apples and Italian cream. Cambridge University Library, which houses Emma Darwin’s original notebook in its archives, released the recipes to the authors. A proportion of the book sales will go towards the University’s Darwin Correspondence Project.

Dr Alison Pearn, assistant director at the Project, stated: ‘Darwin built up an impressive network of correspondents who provided him with data about plants, animals, and peoples from all over the world, and with whom he discussed his ideas as they were developing. The letters are a remarkable window onto his life and mind, and a chance to eavesdrop on conversations between some of the leading thinkers of the 19th century.’

See History Today articles on Charles Darwin at www.historytoday.com/Darwin

Glimmer of Sudan’s rich cultural history

by Kathryn Hadley

Three ancient statues engraved with a little understood sub-Saharan language have recently been unearthed at the archaeological site of el-Hassa, approximately 120 miles north of the Sudanese capital, Khartoum. For the past six years, since the beginning of the conflict in Darfur in February 2003, Sudan has tended to feature in the news primarily as an area of war and atrocities. The recent discoveries provide, however, an insight into the richness of the country’s past and cultural history.

The statues represent three rams symbolising the god Amun and are engraved with a royal dedication in Meroitic script. The Meroitic script is possibly the oldest written sub-Saharan language, dating from the Meroe period, between 300BC and AD450. The language is relatively unknown and experts are now attempting to decipher the inscriptions. The excavations, which are being financed by the French foreign ministry, began in 2000 and have since revealed substantial information on the reign of the king Amanakhareqerem, who is also mentioned in the inscriptions on the rams.

In the words of the French archaeologist Vincent Rondot, the leader of the project:

It is one of the last antique languages that we still don't understand. We can read it. We have no problem pronouncing the letters. But we can't understand it, apart from a few long words and the names of people... It is absolutely essential to understand it... We only need to read the last words remaining on the inscription

The Meroitic kingdom of Sudan was situated around the Sixth Cataract of the Nile. It developed independently of Egypt, which had previously exerted considerable influence on the region. At the height of its power, during the second and third centuries BC, the Meroitic kingdom extended from the Third Cataract of the Nile to Soba in the South. The rulers of Meroe appear to have remained, however, influenced by the Pharaonic tradition. They erected stelae to commemorate their achievements and constructed pyramids to contain their tombs.

In the first century BC, however, they gradually changed their writing style from hieroglyphs to the Meroitic script, which was adapted to the indigenous Nubian language. The Meroitic kingdom gradually declined in the fourth century as the Ethiopian kingdom of Aksum in the East expanded; by AD350, King Ezana of Axum had captured and destroyed Meroe city.

The project is described on this website, from the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

The History Today archive has featured Sudanese history in its latter stages, most notably in articles on the 1888 Fashoda Incident, and covering the British General and Victorian hero Gordon's raid on Khartoum.

Wine consumption then and now

by Kathryn Hadley

Motoko Hori’s study The Price and Quality of Wine and Conspicuous Consumption in England 1646-1759, published in the December issue of The English Historical Review, provides a fresh insight into the consumption of wine in England in the later 17th and early 18th centuries. There were set patterns of wine consumption and consumption increased despite rising prices. The rise in consumption was primarily caused by a general rise of wealth in England. His study is particularly timely in the light of the Christmas festivities and the current financial crisis.

Hori’s research is based on a treatise written in 1723 by John Oxenford, clerk to the inspector general of imports and exports, about the balance of trade in England between the Christmas of 1698 and 1719. Oxenford notably observed that:

‘near as much wine [is] drank now as formerly at double the price to the consumer by reason of the high duties’.

According to Oxenford this rise in the consumption of luxury goods (despite higher prices) could be explained by a general increase in wealth amongst the English population. Hori’s study aims to assess the extent to which wine consumption was sensitive to prices and incomes and thus how far Oxenford’s explanation carries conviction.

Detailed and systematic studies of prices and price movements for the period are relatively few. Hori attempts to expand upon existing studies by examining account books kept by gentry, London merchants and members of professions which cover the period from 1646 to 1759. He compares these account books with the account book of Latham, a yeoman, in an attempt to uncover evidence for the purchase of wine in England from 1646 to 1759.

The figures reveal three general trends. The duties on wine, first of all, increased over the period: between 1600 and 1714 customs duties multiplied threefold. The volume of wine that was also imported increased over the period; nevertheless, prices also continued to rise. This thus suggests that rising prices were a result of increased demands for wine. Lastly, rising prices of wine in the second half of the 17th-century did not lead to a decrease in consumption. It thus appears that there were relatively set patterns of wine consumption, which were independent of price variations and fashion trends.

According to Hori, wine consumption was undoubtedly affected by cultural factors. Wine consumption was fashionable and, as an expensive imported good, was a sign of social status. Consumption by the new rich, especially in London, was particularly visible and was consequently given particular prominence in contemporary accounts. The author argues that what mattered the most was, nevertheless, landowners’ consumption and expenditure on wine because they remained the wealthiest population group in England.

Wine consumption amongst the landowning group responded to set patterns of consumption. Hori thus reaches the same conclusion as Oxenford: increased consumption of increasingly expensive wine was the sign of a general increase in wealth in England.

In the context of the current economic difficulties and festive season, it is interesting to consider the extent to which the reverse is true. Does wine consumption today, in particular over the festive season, follow similarly set patterns? Will wine consumption, this Christmas, fall as a result of the current economic difficulties?

Motoko Hori is a Professor of economic history at Reitaku University situated in the outskirts of Tokyo.

For more information about the history of wine consumption, read our article
Wine & Adulteration

For more information about the consumption of whiskey over the Christmas period, read our article
Scotch Comfort and Joy

Rare coloured pictures of the Holy Land unearthed in Yorkshire

by Kathryn Hadley

Nineteenth century books containing the first detailed coloured images of the Holy Land ever to be published in the West, in 1842, have recently been found in the Yorkshire Museum Library. The books were found by volunteers whilst they were cataloguing the museum’s library. They consist of a complete version of The Holy Land, Syria, Idumea, Arabia, Egypt and Nubia by David Roberts. The volume contains hand-coloured lithographs of Bethlehem, Nazareth and Jerusalem, which he took during his visit to the Holy Land in 1938-39.

Roberts (1796-1864) was born in Edinburgh and was the first person to travel to the Holy Land with the specific intention to paint Christian sites, such as the Church of nativity in Bethlehem and the ancient city of Jerusalem, with a view to thereafter selling them in Britain.

The book was first published in 1842 and Roberts’s works were reproduced on a large scale and in colour. They were considerably expensive to produce and only 400 copies of the first edition were made. His project was, nevertheless, very successful and there was considerable demand for his books. Both Queen Victoria and the Tsar of Russia notably purchased copies. It was edited a second time in New York in 1855.

In Andrew Morrison’s words, Curator of Archaeology at the Museum:
‘David Roberts was one of the first “photo journalists” and his incredibly detailed paintings of the Middle East gave British society a fabulous insight into the everyday life of people in a world completely different from theirs […] Complete copies of the first edition of this books are extremely rare because so few were published and also because many were often taken apart, so that the prints could be sold separately.’

The museum is now working to trace the provenance of the books.

New museum in memory of Pinochet

by Kathryn Hadley

The Pinochet Foundation Museum in Santiago, Chile, was inaugurated on Friday December 12th, two days after the second anniversary of Pinochet’s death, by family, friends and supporters of his regime. The museum was officially opened to the public today. More than 150 people have already registered to visit the display of the dictators’ medals, sabers, books, his collection of toy soldiers, his desk and uniforms, which include the last uniform that he wore as commander in chief of the Chilean Army. The museum is devoted to the memory of the dictator. Its construction was sponsored by the Pinochet Foundation, which includes supporters and former aides to Pinochet, and was to a large extent financed by private donations.

Its inauguration has, however, sparked considerable controversy and opposition from victims of the dictatorship. In 1973, General Augusto Pinochet led a military coup against the socialist government of Salvador Allende ushering in 17 years of dictatorship. According to official reports, 3,197 suspected leftists were assassinated before he left power in 1990 and approximately 28,000 were tortured. Pinochet died on December 10th, 2006. Shortly before his death, he recognised the human rights abuses committed during his rule. He never issued an official apology, however, and was never put on trial.

Tito Tricot, an academic who was tortured under Pinochet’s regime condemned the inauguration of the museum:

"Any monument to a dictator is shameful to the memory of all those who fell in the fight against the dictatorship […]. It is a reflection of what is going on in this country, of a negotiated, agreed transition, in which justice has not been done […]. It is offensive to me. Shameful."

Supporters of the former dictator still claim, however, that Pinochet saved Chile from being transformed into a communist dictatorship and credit him for successfully rebuilding Chile’s allegedly broken economy following Allende’s presidency.

For more information on the memory of Pinochet's dictatorship read our article

Coming to Terms with the Past: Chile

Evidence of Early Contact with Islam

by Derry Nairn

Antiquity, an Archaeology quarterly, reports in its December issue on the often under-reported historical incidences of contact between Britain & Ireland and Islamic cultures. In a fascinating article, Andrew Petersen documents the different types of archaeological finds which suggest interaction through the centuries.

Pottery, glass and ceramics originating in the Middle East, Moorish Spain, or merely bearing the influence of Islamic art have been found in sites throughout both Ireland and Britain. These can date from as early as the ninth century. Arab dinars are among the coins that have been found in Scandanavia, a relic of Viking raids on these shores.

However, perhaps the most surprising element of the brief review to the non-specialist reader is the indirect but strong influences which Islam held over early modern British and European architecture as a whole. The author traces a line from seventh-century Palestine (the Gothic arch) and ninth-century Iraq (the Tudor four-centre pointed arch) through to prominent Mughal-influenced British buildings such as Brighton's Royal Pavillion.

Petersen quotes no less an authority than Christopher Wren as saying:

'what we now vulgarly call the Gothick, ought properly and truly be named Saracenick Architecture refined by the Christians'

(Wren, C. 1750. Parentalia: or memoirs of the family of Wrens, taken from Sweetman, J. 1991. The Oriental obsession: Islamic inspiration in British and American art and architecture, 1500-1920. Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press)

The content of the article is all the more interesting given the prevailing interests expressed in the media on relations between resident Islamic communities and European society as a whole. Also of note, next year, 2009, marks the 120th anniversary of Britain's first purpose-built mosque: the Shah Jahan mosque in Woking, Surrey.

Read these free articles from our archive :


Friends or Foes? The Islamic East and the West
Christopher J. Walker asks whether the two religions that frequently appear locked in an inevitable clash of civilizations in fact share more than has often been thought.


Veiled Politics
Zephie Begolo discusses the symbolic power of the veil in Iranian politics, and its consequences for women, before and during the Islamic Revolution.

Remains of ‘disappeared’ victims of the Argentine dictatorship uncovered

by Kathryn Hadley

On Tuesday December 9th, a group of forensic anthropologists confirmed that almost 10,000 bone fragments found in the ‘Arana pit’ in La Plata were those of victims of the Argentine military dictatorship under General Videla, from 1976 to 1983. The pit is situated on the site of a once-secret detention centre where dissidents were imprisoned, tortured and executed in what has become known as the Dirty War. A wall with over 200 bullet marks was also found bordering the grave.

It is the first time that remains of victims of the dictatorship have been found en masse in an illegal detention centre and the discovery marks a considerable step in the fight for justice for the victims of the dictatorship and their relatives. In the words of Maria Vedio, a legal chairwoman for the Permanent Assembly for Human Rights La Plata:

"This is the first time there is proof that Arana wasn't only a detention and torture centre, but also a centre of elimination."

It has confirmed the testimonies of survivors who, for the past thirty years, have claimed that political opponents were tortured, killed and burned. However, the military authorities consistently eliminated any evidence of their crimes and the victims’ bodies were never found. They consequently became known as ‘the disappeared’. Whilst official records estimated that there were 13,000 victims, human rights groups put the figures up to 30,000 victims. It is now believed that the military and the police operated approximately ten detention centres in the university city of La Plata, where the repression of students was particularly severe.

The bone fragments were unearthed between February and September this year, following testimonies of survivors who claimed that the site had served as a detention centre. The Asociación de Ex Detenidos Desaparecidos initially filed a legal complaint in 2000 in an attempt to push forward an enquiry into the fate of the victims of the Dirty War. An enquiry eventually began in March 2003.

Work will now continue in an attempt to determine the minimum number of bodies buried in the pit. It will, however, be extremely difficult to identify the victims because most DNA evidence was destroyed in the fire. The local government authorities plan to convert the site into a museum dedicated to the memory of the victims of the dictatorship. The governor of La Plata Daniel Sciolo made an official announcement yesterday that it would be transformed into ‘a site of memory and reflexion’.

The discovery was notably reported in the Argentine newspaper La Nacion
https://www.lanacion.com.ar/nota.asp?nota_id=1079192

For more information on the dictatorship and its official memory read our article
Argentina’s Coup: Social Myth, Memory and History

Magnificence of the Tsars

by Kathryn Hadley

In this dazzling exhibition, which opens today, over forty costumes and uniforms worn by the Tsars and court officials of Imperial Russia, from the collections of the Moscow Kremlin Museums, go on display at the Victoria and Albert Museum. The lavish ensembles include the coronation uniforms of seven Russian emperors from Peter II, who reigned from 1727 to 1730, to the last emperor, Nicholas II, who was crowned in 1896. The display ends with the five metre long ermine-trimmed mantle worn by Empress Alexandra at the coronation of Nicholas II, which weighs 13 kilos. The costumes are richly decorated with intricate gold and silver embroidery, lace and silks. They have survived wars and revolutions. They have been preserved in the Armoury Chamber of the Kremlin and reflect, to this day, the glamour and luxury of the Imperial Russian court. Many of the uniforms have never been on public display before. In the words of Svetlana Amelekhina, the curator of the exhibition and senior Research Officer and Curator of the Imperial Dress Collections at the Moscow Kremlin Museums: ‘it is a miracle that they have survived’.

Their preservation is a miracle, moreover, because they are tangible relics of tsarist politics. Displayed side by side and in chronological order, the evolution in the design of the costumes offers a deeper insight into almost two centuries of political changes in Russia. Peter II’s wardrobe reveals, first of all, the continued influence of Peter the Great’s programme of Westernisation on imperial dress. Peter I was the first Russian prince to visit Europe in 1697. He sought to modernise Russia by emulating aspects of social, political and cultural life in the West and issued a series of decrees, which notably made Western European dress compulsory for Russia’s urban population and stipulated that all men should be clean-shaven. The majority of Peter II’s coats and waistcoats were thus made in France and mirror French fashion of the time.

Peter I’s reforms were, however, challenged from the onset and debates about the path that Russia should follow ensued throughout the nineteenth century. The costumes of the succeeding six emperors are, to a large extent, testimony to such questioning and gradual moves away from Western influences. In 1796, Paul I was the first emperor to be crowned wearing a Prussian military style uniform. Alexander II’s accession to the throne, in 1855, saw the introduction of further reforms in accordance with the imperial policy of ‘official nationalism’. He notably gave the Russian name polucaftan to a skirted coat already worn in Western Europe. His successor, Alexander III, pursued similar reforms and designed a new military uniform, which he wore for his coronation and other public functions, which closely resembled the Russian national costume.

The costumes also reflect, however, a number of paradoxes and Western influences were not cast aside altogether. Although the polucaftan was given a Russian name, it remained a Western European style coat rather than a Russian creation. Paul I’s military style coronation uniform was also similar to that worn in Britain by the Prince of Wales, the future King George IV. Lastly, Nicholas I, who ruled from 1825 to 1855, introduced new elements of French military fashion to the uniforms worn by generals in the Russian army since 1808, despite the fact that Russia and France had been at war between 1805 and 1807 and, again, in 1812, following Napoleon’s invasion of Russia.

A series of talks, seminars, study days and film screenings will be held as a complement to the exhibition.
Film screenings notably include
Ivan the Terrible, Sergei Eisenstein, 1994, on January 2nd
Catherine the Great, Marvin J. Chomsky, 1995, on January 9th
Nicholas and Alexandra, Franklin J. Schaffner, 1986, on January 16th

For more information on the exhibition read our article

Magnificence of the Tsars

For more information on Peter the Great's programme of Westernisation read

The 17th Century 'Renaissance' in Russia: Western Influences on Art and Architecture

For more information on British influences in nineteenth century Russia read

Scottish Architects in Tsarist Russia

For more information of the Russian Tsars read our articles

The Reforms of Tsar Alexander II

Alexander III, Tsar of Russia, 1881-1889

John Milton - poet and freedom fighter

Simon Heffer in The Telegraph says 'on the 400th anniversary of John Milton's birth, we should remember him as a pamphleteer who set up the struggle for English liberty.'

See the article in the History Today December 2008 issue, the Birth of John Milton.

China, Archaeology, Xinjiang & Oil

by Derry Nairn

A fascinating article over at Archaeology Magazine's blog covers how ancient discoveries can have meaning for the present and deep ramifications for the future. The author, Heather Pringle, eloquently describes how she sometimes has to justify her study of objects and times past, a sentiment common to those of us in history publishing:

People often ask me why I write about archaeology. I can see from their puzzled looks that they think of archaeology as something irrelevant, so musty and obscure and distant from modern life that it scarcely warrants serious attention from a journalist. Indeed, whenever I have a conversation with my older brother, a successful lawyer, about book ideas I have, he looks at me with genuine concern. “Do you think anyone will be interested in that?” he asks in bewilderment

The article then goes on to describe how mummies excavated in Xinjiang, a predominantly Muslim and separatist Chinese province, have been seized upon by locals as proof that their ethnic grouping has ancient claims to the land. Unsurprisingly, the Chinese government is reluctant to admit to anything which would challenge their established territorial claim over oil-rich Xinjiang province. And so requests to release the mummies for DNA tests have been refused.

Read the full article at Archaeology Magazine's blog.

Read about the grand imperial history of Islamic central Asia in Francis Robinson's A Forgotten Region

Morrill, Microwave History & the debate over education

by Derry Nairn

Professor John Morrill (pictured) was interviewed this year by the Institute of Historical Research's Making History project about the current state of the discipline. Among topics that included his personal biography and depictions of Cromwell, Morrill commented that

Now [in history teaching] there’s far less encouragement to read around... it’s what I call microwave history. Everything’s pre-packaged, student are given specific things to read and specific tasks to perform. The exam papers are far more prescribed – they know with much more certainty what they will be examined on.

A related controversy has emerged this morning over a new government study which proposes radical changes to the way in which history is taught in the English curriculum.

Apparently, the government is considering recommendations to teach history alongside geography and religious studies in 'cross-curricular themed classes' (The Guardian). More stress will be lain on the teaching of technology, with skills like 'podcasts and PowerPoint' being taught at primary level, as reported by the Times.

These latest reports reflect a general anxiety expressed in the media about the way children are educated about shared identities, history and heritage. A typical such article in today's Telegraph reports on how a new children's dictionary has 'eliminated words associated with Christianity and British history'.

A full recording and transcript of the Making History interview with Prof John Morrill is available here. The accessible interview section also includes excellent, full-length interviews with such prominent names as Ian Kershaw, Eric Hobsbawm and David Cannadine. You can read a 1982 History Today article by Morrill on historiography of the English Civil War here.

Looking forward, History Today's February 2009 issue has a feature on ways in which today's educational landscape is being changed by the progressive and holistic ideas of, among others, Rousseau, Steiner and Montessori. The author, Richard Wallis, is a lecturer in the history of education at the Froebel College, University of Roehampton.

Our homepage will also feature debate on the topic in the coming months.

Lectures & Readings mark Milton Celebrations

by Paul Lay

This weekend sees the 400th anniverary of Milton's birth. The anniversary will be marked at Christ's College Cambridge by a series of lectures. In a related event, all-day readings of his masterpiece Paradise Lost were read recently by members of the English faculty and recorded in a series of podcasts. They are available on this special website.

As the site notes:

The studio [where recording took place] is a large black cube in the basement of the building. Some books were therefore read with an absolute minimum of visual stimulus, allowing listeners to remember Milton's own blindness and to relate it to the kinds of darkness - moral and visible - which he imagines in the poem.

While the hums and blips that emerge on the recordings suggest the soundman's set-up was created in the dark too, by and large the content of the podcasts are of an excellent quality, and well worth delving into for those unfamiliar with the book.

The Lady Margaret lecture series this year was devoted to Milton and featured, among others, Quentin Skinner and Geoffrey Hill. Podcasts of the lectures along with lots of other information about the celebration are available here.

The Richest City Under the Sun

by Derry Nairn

Two centuries before Alexander the Great was born, a pre-Islamic Persian empire was the largest the world had ever seen. Its capital, Persepolis, was known as 'the richest city under the sun', and today is still revealing ancient treasures to archaeologists. George Mason University's History News Network website reports on the news of the recent unearthing of a workers' district outside the city walls. Called Parsa, this 'gritty working-class district' was where the artisans who served Persepolis' rulers may have lived.

One of the directors of the joint Iranian and Italian teams responsible for the find said:

one of the trial trenches yielded a kiln for pottery making, while the other was characterized by the presence of a large number of successive dump pits extremely rich in pottery shards, bricks, charcoal, and bones

The story was first published by Juan Cole's Informed Comment blog, where you can also find an excellent clip from the Persepolis Recreated documentary.

Archive Awareness Campaign 2008

by Kathryn Hadley

Throughout the year, exhibitions, workshops, talks and other activities have been organised by the national and local archives across the UK to celebrate the wealth of their collections and highlight their importance as guardians of history. This December is the last chance to make the most of the some of these events...

Two online exhibitions of parts of the collections from the National Archives and Parliamentary Archives:
Human Rights
A National Archives online exhibition which draws on original documents to provide the historical background to some of the rights that we take for granted today.
www.nationalarchives.gov.uk
Parliament and the British Slave Trade, 1600-1807
A database of digitalised archival material, which provides evidence of the issues, processes and people at the heart of Parliament’s relationship with the slave trade.
www.parliament.uk

A talk organised by the Guildhall Library:
Searching for Black and Asian Londoners in the Parish Registers of the City of London
December 10th, 14.00
Guildhall Library
Aldermanbury
London EC2V 7HH
Telephone: 020 7332 1863
Since September, the University of the Third Age and the Manuscripts Section of the Guildhall Library have collaborated in a project to search the parish registers of the city, from the 1530s until 1837, for evidence of Black and Asian Londoners. In this talk the project’s participants will discuss their work and present the results of their research.

It is also the last chance to see a couple of the exhibitions organised for the campaign:
Take Your Place in History
Until December 31st
Museum of Science and Industry
Collections Centre,
MOSI Main Building
Liverpool Road
Castlefield
Manchester M3 4FP
Telephone: 016 1606 0127
This display of the museum’s archive collections reveals Manchester’s trading links with other countries, notably in Asia, Africa and the Far East, and tells the story of the people who left their own countries to live and work in Manchester, contributing to the diversity of Manchester’s population.

‘The Boys’: Triumph over Adversity
Until January 31st
Camden Local Studies and Archives Centre
Holborn Library
32-38 Theobalds Road
London WC1X 8PA
Telephone: 020 7974 6342
An exhibition on loan from the Jewish Museum, which tells the story of the 732 young Holocaust survivors, who became known as ‘The Boys’, who Britain agreed to take in following the Second World War, of their survival and attempts to rebuild their lives and to integrate in the London community.

For more information on the campaign visit
www.archiveawareness.com

Chris Patten on History & Identity

by Derry Nairn

Former Governor of Hong Kong Chris Patten wrote a thought-provoking piece in the Lebanese Daily Star yesterday about the connections between history, collective memory and national identity:

A little more sharp-eyed honesty about Britain's real weight in the post-war world might have enabled us British to play a more central role in Europe's affairs, molding the emerging European Union more closely to our own national interests...

...Russia stumbles over Stalin and his legacy of evil. China turns away from a reappraisal of Mao or an honest account of what happened at Tiananmen Square in 1989. Some Japanese still want to write or believe fairy tales about their pre-war and wartime history, which has hugely complicated Japan's efforts to find a confident and lasting reconciliation with China.

Read the full article here.

Or read David Lowenthal considering how self-image affects nations' history-writing and identities, in Distorted Mirrors, from our archive.

International colloquium sheds new light on denunciation in France during the Second World War

by Kathryn Hadley

On November 27th and 28th, an international colloquium was organised at the Caen memorial in Normandy to discuss, for the first time, denunciation, known in French as délation, in France during the Second World War. Approximately twenty historians from France, Belgium, Germany, Italy and the United States presented their various studies in an attempt to dispel common popular myths and gain a deeper understanding of denunciation in occupied France. The discussions aimed, above all, to define the phenomenon, highlight geopolitical and institutional characteristics specific to occupied France and to compare denunciation in France with similar cases in fascist Italy, for example. Did the specific political situation in France during the Second World War, where French and German ruling authorities coexisted, encourage acts of denunciation by multiplying the number of potential recipients of letters of denunciation?

In contrast to Germany, Italy and the ex-Soviet Union, where research began twenty years ago, there is a considerable lack of historiography on denunciation in France. In fascist Italy or the USSR, where denouncement was an integral part of state policy, specific bodies and institutions existed to deal with letters of denunciation. The existence of such institutions with their own archive bases consequently made historical research considerably easier than in France, where a multiplicity of bodies existed. This multiplicity of different authorities that received letters of denunciation (the French and German police, the Gestapo, as well as the various authorities which specifically dealt with the Jewish population) was one considerable obstacle to historical research in France. Laurent Joly, a French historian at the Centre de Recherche d’Histoire Quantitative and the organiser of the colloquium, also stressed the restricted access to archives as a further explanation for the lack of French historiography. He further argued that there was a necessary time lapse before the topic could be studied from a more distanced and scientific point of view.

Délation is often, and has for a long time, been perceived as a mass phenomenon which primarily targeted the Jewish population. Until recently, the main authority on the subject was the journalist and author of La délation sous l’Occupation (1983), André Halimi. Recent research has, however, brought to light a far more complex reality. Whilst André Halimi estimated that there existed between three and five million letters of denunciation; recent figures have been reduced to between 150,000 and 500,000 letters. Moreover, denunciations were, above all, family affairs and the result of family disputes, rather than motivated by anti-Semitism and racial hatred. In a local study of the Calvados region in Normandy, Julie Chassin thus revealed that one quarter of letters were written by family members denouncing one another.

Her study, based on 1302 cases of délation which were brought to courts in Calvados at the time of the liberation, also revealed that ‘offenders’ were, for the most part, accused of hiding weapons or of anti-German behaviour. In Calvados, the denunciation of Jews represented only 2.1% of all cases. Although statistically the majority of informers were women, women were overrepresented because many young men were absent at the time. Thus, amongst the population over the age of 36, the majority of informers were men. Further local studies of the Maine-et-Loire region and Belgium revealed similar trends.

There remains, however, considerable work to be done. In an interview for the French newspaper Libération, Laurent Joly stressed the need for further local and specific studies of denunciation in the ‘free zone’ and of the denunciation of communists and the black market, for example. It is also necessary to consider sources other than legal complaints at the liberation, which are not entirely representative, notably because the Jews who were denounced never returned to file their complaints. Sources should not be restricted to the archives of the French Commission aux Questions Juives, which focus solely on denunciations of Jews, and cases of oral denunciation should also be considered.

A report on the colloquium is due to be published by CNRS Editions in 2010.

For more information on collaboration on Vichy France, read our article Spying for Germany in Vichy France

Romania’s 90th birthday

by Kathryn Hadley

Yesterday, Romania celebrated the ninetieth anniversary of its foundation, on December 1st 1918, when the northwest region of Transylvania joined the rest of Romania following the fall of the Austro-Hungarian Empire during the First World War. Some 2,000 members of the military participated in a parade in Bucharest and President Traian Basescu laid a wreath at the capital’s triumphal arch.

December 1st, known as Union Day, is the Romanian national holiday in commemoration of the assembly held in Alba lulia (Transylvania) on December 1st 1918, during which the ethnic Romanian delegates from Transylvania and Hungary passed a resolution calling for the assembly of all Romanians in a single state. Union Day also celebrates the unification of the provinces of Bukovina and Bessarabia with the kingdom of Romania. The date was declared a national holiday following the Romanian revolution in 1989.

The history of Romania, from the fifteenth to the nineteenth century, is one of successive domination under both the Ottoman and the Austro-Hungarian empires. In 1848, the revolution against foreign domination was defeated by combined Russian and Ottoman intervention. Russian forces withdrew from the region following the Crimean War from 1854 to 1856 and were replaced by Austrian troops. In 1856, in accordance with the Treaty of Paris, Moldavia and Wallachia were established as principalities under Ottoman rule. In 1859, the two principalities were united under a common leader, the prince John Cuza. Three years later, they joined to form the principality of Romania, the capital of which was established at Bucharest. Romania became independent as a result of the Treaty of Berlin, which ended the Russo-Turkish War in 1877-78, but ceded southern Bessarabia to Russia. Romania was proclaimed a kingdom in 1881.

Modern day Romania came into being in the aftermath of the First World War. Following its initial declaration of neutrality, Romania eventually joined the war in August 1916 on the side of the Allies. Its military campaign was, however, unsuccessful: two thirds of the country was conquered and majority of the army was captured within four months. Following the fall of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, however, Transylvania, Bukovina and Bessarabia were allowed to unite with the kingdom of Romania: the Treaty of Saint Germain in 1919 ratified the union of Bukovina; in accordance with the Treaty of Paris, Bessarabia joined the kingdom of Romania in 1920.

For more information of the construction of the Romanian nation read our article

The Return of Dracula

Discovery of 5,500-year-old human settlements in Peru

by Kathryn Hadley

El Comercio newpaper reports that recent excavations have revealed evidence of 5,500-year-old human settlements in the Palpa Valley region on the South coast of Peru, approximately 400km South of Lima and just North of Nazca. The group of homes and nineteen graves are believed to represent the first evidence of human settlement from the late archaic period, approximately 3,500BC, ever discovered in southern Peru.

The remains are suggestive of simple houses with walls and roofs constructed of branches and sticks. Some of the graves include sculpted bones and snail shells as well as necklaces and bracelets. No concrete evidence of offerings to the dead or to deities was found, however, and researchers have consequently concluded that there were not significant social distinctions amongst the inhabitants. One of the graves was, however, different: it included the body of a child younger than one year old, which appeared to have been mummified.

The findings are part of a large scale research project led jointly by the two Peruvian archaeologists, Johny Isla Cuadrado and Elsa Tomasto, and by the German archaeologist Markus Reindel from the Deutsches Archaologisches Institut. The project aims to research the cultural history of the Palpa region from its beginning until the end of the pre-Hispanic period, at the time of the Spanish conquest in 1532, which saw the downfall of the Inca civilisation.

Although the southern coast of Peru has been investigated archaeologically since the early twentieth century, systematic excavations and the number of scientific publications on the area remain scarce.

The region is also the site of the mysterious Nazca lines, the series of geoglyphs which cover approximately 450 square kilometres and depict living creatures, imaginary beings, as well as geometrical figures. The figures are scratched in the surface of the desert and are believed to date from the Nazca civilisation, from approximately 200BC to 800AD. The longest line is 12 kilometres long and the drawings are only visible from the sky. Their purpose and meaning remain a mystery; various theories suggest that they were created as astronomical observation lines or were used in religious rituals.