Tea at Trianon: In Search of the Tomb of Alexander the Great

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Tuesday, August 15, 2023

In Search of the Tomb of Alexander the Great

From The Greek Reporter:

For over fifteen long years, Greek archaeologist Calliope Limneos-Papakosta has been searching for the Golden Fleece of Greece’s ancient history, namely, the priceless tomb of Alexander the Great. For all these years, she and her team have dug tirelessly in the Shallalat Gardens in Alexandria, Egypt, the city named after the great conqueror. Battling water which constantly floods the dig, she and her colleagues have dug through layer upon layer of Alexandrian history. Now, they have reached down to the bedrock of Alexandria, locating the first roads built in the city, as well as the foundation of an enormous public building over two hundred feet long, which she has yet to fully uncover. Historical records indicated that after his death in Babylon, Alexander the Great‘s body was mummified and buried in Egypt, specifically at the temple of Zeus Ammon in the Siwah Oasis. (Read more