Terry Prone: Nothing beats money as catalyst, controller, and social stimulant
Commodities tell us about poverty and privilege, their use marking the uncrossable line between peasant and aristocrat
Originally published in the Irish Examiner.
Dates, battles and betrayals. Those three just about summed up history when I was at school.
The dates were a problem for me. Still are. I have to check by taking off my wedding ring to make sure I got married when I think I got married, and I have to ring my sister to find out when my son was born, even though — perforce — I was there at the time.
So, dates can be a memory challenge. It didn’t matter if you could accurately recount the Papal humiliation of Henry IV if you couldn’t nail when it happened. It was 1077, according to Google, which is something of an equaliser between generations who faithfully learned off dates and techno-determinists who figured something like Wikipedia would rescue us.
Battles and betrayals were somewhat easier to remember than dates, when studying history, back in the day. Particularly betrayals. Starting with Diarmuid Mac Murrough, the lads who sold us down the river were memorable. They always are. Every nation cherishes its quislings and its Benedict Arnolds as counterpoints to the virtuous majority.
Of course, concentrating on battles and military campaigns didn’t take account of the bugs that, in real terms, usually decided which side won a war.
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