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On This Day In History, The Battle of Lepanto
Alex's Military History ^

Posted on 10/07/2003 7:04:41 AM PDT by Valin

Don John's hunting, and his hounds have bayed--
Booms away past Italy the rumour of his raid.
Gun upon gun, ha! ha!
Gun upon gun, hurrah!
Don John of Austria
Has loosed the cannonade.

In 1571, Don John of Austria commanding the fleet of the Holy League, met the Ottoman Turks in the waters at the mouth of the Gulf of Patros. Here,where the Peleponnese meets the Morea, the basis of Western civilation had been laid thousands of years before in the city states of ancient Greece.
When the smoke cleared after a hard fought naval engagement, thousands of men would be dead, the Turkish fleet broken and the Christian powers freed from the fear of the Mediterranean ever becoming a Muslim lake.

(Excerpt) Read more at geocities.com ...


TOPICS: Extended News; Miscellaneous
KEYWORDS: history; militaryhistory; westerncivilization
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1 posted on 10/07/2003 7:04:41 AM PDT by Valin
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2 posted on 10/07/2003 7:06:36 AM PDT by Support Free Republic (Your support keeps Free Republic going strong!)
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To: Valin
Lepanto 

By G.K.Chesterton 
 

White founts falling in the Courts of the sun, 
And the Soldan of Byzantium is smiling as they run; 
There is laughter like the fountains in that face of all men feared, 
It stirs the forest darkness, the darkness of his beard; 
It curls the blood-red crescent, the crescent of his lips; 
For the inmost sea of all the earth is shaken with his ships. 
They have dared the white republics up the capes of Italy, 
They have dashed the Adriatic round the Lion of the Sea, 
And the Pope has cast his arms abroad for agony and loss, 
And called the kings of Christendom for swords about the Cross. 
The cold queen of England is looking in the glass; 
The shadow of the Valois is yawning at the Mass; 
From evening isles fantastical rings faint the Spanish gun, 
And the Lord upon the Golden Horn is laughing in the sun. 

Dim drums throbbing, in the hills half heard, 
Where only on a nameless throne a crownless prince has stirred, 
Where, risen from a doubtful seat and half attainted stall, 
The last knight of Europe takes weapons from the wall, 
The last and lingering troubadour to whom the bird has sung, 
That once went singing southward when all the world was young. 
In that enormous silence, tiny and unafraid, 
Comes up along a winding road the noise of the Crusade. 
Strong gongs groaning as the guns boom far, 
Don John of Austria is going to the war, 
Stiff flags straining in the night-blasts cold 
In the gloom black-purple, in the glint old-gold, 
Torchlight crimson on the copper kettle-drums, 
Then the tuckets, then the trumpets, then the cannon, and he comes. 
Don John laughing in the brave beard curled, 
Spurning of his stirrups like the thrones of all the world, 
Holding his head up for a flag of all the free. 
Love-light of Spain--hurrah! 
Death-light of Africa! 
Don John of Austria 
Is riding to the sea. 

Mahound is in his paradise above the evening star, 
(Don John of Austria is going to the war.) 
He moves a mighty turban on the timeless houri's knees, 
His turban that is woven of the sunsets and the seas. 
He shakes the peacock gardens as he rises from his ease, 
And he strides among the tree-tops and is taller than the trees; 
And his voice through all the garden is a thunder sent to bring 
Black Azrael and Ariel and Ammon on the wing. 
Giants and the Genii, 
Multiplex of wing and eye, 
Whose strong obedience broke the sky 
When Solomon was king. 

They rush in red and purple from the red clouds of the morn, 
From the temples where the yellow gods shut up their eyes in scorn; 
They rise in green robes roaring from the green hells of the sea 
Where fallen skies and evil hues and eyeless creatures be, 
On them the sea-valves cluster and the grey sea-forests curl, 
Splashed with a splendid sickness, the sickness of the pearl; 
They swell in sapphire smoke out of the blue cracks of the ground,-- 
They gather and they wonder and give worship to Mahound. 
And he saith, "Break up the mountains where the hermit-folk can hide, 
And sift the red and silver sands lest bone of saint abide, 
And chase the Giaours flying night and day, not giving rest, 
For that which was our trouble comes again out of the west. 
We have set the seal of Solomon on all things under sun, 
Of knowledge and of sorrow and endurance of things done. 
But a noise is in the mountains, in the mountains, and I know 
The voice that shook our palaces--four hundred years ago: 
It is he that saith not 'Kismet'; it is he that knows not Fate; 
It is Richard, it is Raymond, it is Godfrey at the gate! 
It is he whose loss is laughter when he counts the wager worth, 
Put down your feet upon him, that our peace be on the earth." 
For he heard drums groaning and he heard guns jar, 
(Don John of Austria is going to the war.) 
Sudden and still--hurrah! 
Bolt from Iberia! 
Don John of Austria 
Is gone by Alcalar. 

St. Michaels on his Mountain in the sea-roads of the north 
(Don John of Austria is girt and going forth.) 
Where the grey seas glitter and the sharp tides shift 
And the sea-folk labour and the red sails lift. 
He shakes his lance of iron and he claps his wings of stone; 
The noise is gone through Normandy; the noise is gone alone; 
The North is full of tangled things and texts and aching eyes, 
And dead is all the innocence of anger and surprise, 
And Christian killeth Christian in a narrow dusty room, 
And Christian dreadeth Christ that hath a newer face of doom, 
And Christian hateth Mary that God kissed in Galilee,-- 
But Don John of Austria is riding to the sea. 
Don John calling through the blast and the eclipse 
Crying with the trumpet, with the trumpet of his lips, 
Trumpet that sayeth _ha_! 
    Domino gloria! 
Don John of Austria 
Is shouting to the ships. 

King Philip's in his closet with the Fleece about his neck 
(Don John of Austria is armed upon the deck.) 
The walls are hung with velvet that is black and soft as sin, 
And little dwarfs creep out of it and little dwarfs creep in. 
He holds a crystal phial that has colours like the moon, 
He touches, and it tingles, and he trembles very soon, 
And his face is as a fungus of a leprous white and grey 
Like plants in the high houses that are shuttered from the day, 
And death is in the phial and the end of noble work, 
But Don John of Austria has fired upon the Turk. 
Don John's hunting, and his hounds have bayed-- 
Booms away past Italy the rumour of his raid. 
Gun upon gun, ha! ha! 
Gun upon gun, hurrah! 
Don John of Austria 
Has loosed the cannonade. 

The Pope was in his chapel before day or battle broke, 
(Don John of Austria is hidden in the smoke.) 
The hidden room in man's house where God sits all the year, 
The secret window whence the world looks small and very dear. 
He sees as in a mirror on the monstrous twilight sea 
The crescent of his cruel ships whose name is mystery; 
They fling great shadows foe-wards, making Cross and Castle dark, 
They veil the plume graved lions on the galleys of St. Mark; 
And above the ships are palaces of brown, black-bearded chiefs, 
And below the ships are prisons, where with multitudinous griefs, 
Christian captives sick and sunless, all a labouring race repines 
Like a race in sunken cities, like a nation in the mines. 
They are lost like slaves that sweat, and in the skies of morning hung 
The stair-ways of the tallest gods when tyranny was young. 
They are countless, voiceless, hopeless as those fallen or fleeing on 
Before the high Kings' horses in the granite of Babylon. 
And many a one grows witless in his quiet room in hell 
Where a yellow face looks inward through the lattice of his cell, 
And he finds his God forgotten, and he seeks no more a sign-- 
(But Don John of Austria has burst the battle-line!) 
Don John pounding from the slaughter-painted poop, 
Purpling all the ocean like a bloody pirate's sloop, 
Scarlet running over on the silvers and the golds, 
Breaking of the hatches up and bursting of the holds, 
Thronging of the thousands up that labour under sea 
White for bliss and blind for sun and stunned for liberty. 

Vivat Hispania! 
Domino Gloria! 
Don John of Austria 
Has set his people free! 

Cervantes on his galley sets the sword back in the sheath 
(Don John of Austria rides homeward with a wreath.) 
And he sees across a weary land a straggling road in Spain, 
Up which a lean and foolish knight for ever rides in vain, 
And he smiles, but not as Sultans smile, and settles back the blade.... 
(But Don John of Austria rides home from the Crusade.)

3 posted on 10/07/2003 7:08:55 AM PDT by Pyro7480 (“We are all born ignorant, but one must work hard to remain stupid" - Benjamin Franklin)
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To: Valin
LEPANTO!

Give me an army praying the rosary and I will conquer the world.

4 posted on 10/07/2003 7:23:00 AM PDT by Cap'n Crunch
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To: Cap'n Crunch
Just reading this week that the wheel was almost unknown in the Muslim world at this time (think of the implications of THAT!). When told about the loss of his fleet, the Sultan asked how much it would cost to replace it, and his vizier said, "Sire, we could outfit a whole new fleet with silver anchors and silken riggings." He missed the whole point---he was beaten by European cannons, and the Muslims could not steal or buy new cannon designs in sufficient quantity or with the latest innovations.
5 posted on 10/07/2003 7:48:26 AM PDT by LS
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To: Pyro7480
Thank you for posting the whole poem, it made my day to read it in full.

Lepanto! The West, Christendom, and indeed America--all have forgotten their birthright, their heritage, and the sole means of their salvation.

6 posted on 10/07/2003 7:57:09 AM PDT by d-back
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To: Pyro7480
GK Chesterton's works on the web
7 posted on 10/07/2003 8:05:32 AM PDT by Salman (Mickey Akbar)
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To: LS; Valin; Cap'n Crunch
The work of giants, to serve well the guns.
8 posted on 10/07/2003 8:10:12 AM PDT by Cannoneer No. 4 (There are very few problems that cannot be solved by judicious application of high explosives)
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To: Valin
Thanks - this was a welcome antidote to the biased crap the History Channel had on last night about Richard the Lionhearted.
9 posted on 10/07/2003 8:10:20 AM PDT by skeeter (Fac ut vivas)
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To: d-back
Lepanto! The West, Christendom, and indeed America--all have forgotten their birthright, their heritage, and the sole means of their salvation.

Well said.

10 posted on 10/07/2003 8:11:59 AM PDT by Aquinasfan (Isaiah 22:22, Rev 3:7, Mat 16:19)
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To: LS
Just reading this week that the wheel was almost unknown in the Muslim world at this time
No flame, BUT I'm gonna need a source on that.

the Sultan asked how much it would cost to replace it
I recall reading this also. If memory serves it was shortly after that the Sultan and the ruling elite started asking why they lost and why they were falling behind the west. At least according to Dr. Bernard Lewis.

11 posted on 10/07/2003 8:12:16 AM PDT by Valin (I have my own little world, but it's okay - they know me here.)
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To: Valin
Hahah. You already have your source! It was Lewis, "The Middle East," toward the end (I have the book at school, so I can't give you the exact page now.)
12 posted on 10/07/2003 8:20:18 AM PDT by LS
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To: d-back
Necessary Instructions For a Sea-Gunner
13 posted on 10/07/2003 8:39:17 AM PDT by Cannoneer No. 4 (There are very few problems that cannot be solved by judicious application of high explosives)
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To: LS
It's just something that I find a bit hard to believe given that it was in the middle east that was where it was invented.
IF it's not too much of a bother could you find the quote?
I've read a number of Dr. Lewis's books and don't recall see this.
Thanks in advance.
14 posted on 10/07/2003 8:41:50 AM PDT by Valin (I have my own little world, but it's okay - they know me here.)
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To: LS
You know it might help IF I actually read a reply. I've got that book so it'll give me something to do. I'm an idiot!...feel free to disput this point.
15 posted on 10/07/2003 8:45:20 AM PDT by Valin (I have my own little world, but it's okay - they know me here.)
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To: Valin
Well, I did not say in my post that it was from Lewis, so stop beating yourself up. I thought it was funny that you were already citing the book where I got my info.
16 posted on 10/07/2003 9:09:26 AM PDT by LS
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To: Valin
Actually, think about it and it makes sense, regardless of where the wheel was invented: the desert sands do not make for wheel-friendly surfaces.
17 posted on 10/07/2003 9:11:10 AM PDT by LS
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To: Cap'n Crunch
What's this about "Cap'n Crunch" praying a rosary, some may ask?

A little history......

At the time of the Battle of Lepanto, St. Pius V reigned as Pope. He called for a crusade of sorts by urging the Catholic peoples of Europe to pray the Rosary for a Christian victory over the Turks in the coming naval battle. To this day, and in commemoration of the subsequent victory, the Catholic Church observes October 7 as the feast of Our Lady of the Rosary in its liturgical calendar.

Never understimate the power of prayer, especially with a new "Turk" in our midst: the Muslim terrorist.
18 posted on 10/07/2003 9:16:26 AM PDT by Ebenezer (Strength and Honor!)
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To: Salman
More on Chesterton:

http://www.chesterton.org
19 posted on 10/07/2003 9:18:39 AM PDT by Ebenezer (Strength and Honor!)
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To: Valin
"It has always seemed to me possible, and even probable, that there would be a resurrection of Islam and that our sons or our grandsons would see the renewal of that tremendous struggle between Christian culture and what has been for more than a thousand years its greatest opponent.

Why this conviction should have arisen in the minds of certain observers and travellers, such as myself, I will now consider. It is indeed a vital question, "May not Islam rise again?"- Hilaire Belloc 'The Great Heresies' 1938

20 posted on 10/07/2003 9:33:52 AM PDT by Cap'n Crunch
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