Even were it not for the contemporary academic historical focus on areas previously ignored or marginalized, to which Hobit refers, there is another basically naive error in stating that the victors write history. Mores and standards change over time (quite rapidly, in historical terms), and what we condemn in a nation's actions from long ago was not necessarily considered a bad thing then. We have much of our evidence for actions which we condemn from the people who instigated the incidents.
In the mid-sixteenth century (1564?), French Protestants founded a colony at Cape Canavarel in what is now Florida, naming it Fort Caroline. The Spanish were not about to start a war with France, but made the astute estimation that France as a primarily Catholic nation would no got to war over the destruction of Protestants. A man named Nunez was sent out to destroy Fort Caroline and its inhabitants. Arriving during a terrible storm--probably a hurricane--they were able to overcome the scattered French, who would otherwise likely have defeated them. When confronted with a band of the Frenchmen, still armed, they would negotiate for the surrender of the French on favorable terms, and then, having bound their hands, execute them immediately as heretics.
This is behavior we condemn. That we know about it in order to condemn it results from Nunez' pride in having done a thing which was considered laudable by the Catholic monarchy of Spain. He recounts in detail what he did.
History comes from many, many sources. As often as not, the evidence we have available to use we have because "the victors" left a record of their bloody deeds. In other cases, we have good records because a genuine curiosity lead people to describe the cultures which they were about to obliterate, usually unintentionally. Statements such as that of history being written by the victors are naive oversimplifications. As with any other discipline which requires a detailed examination of evidence from many sources, nothing about history is simple.
Setana.
Thank you for your reply and I agree with your statement that I would be in the majority.... unfortunately like the majority, it was never explained to me that history was rarely written by the person that was there at the time but was, in most cases word of mouth at the best.. Like the rest of uneducated masses ( I assume you are not one of us ) we were expected to "believe" what we read and were told ( by the educated minority like yourself ) . Further to that I fail to see how my statement could be construed as " came here to object to history " but then being who I am, how would I know. but since reading what you have said so far on this thread, I'm glad you're not... as you say... going to waste any time explaining how, seeing how easily you are offended by the uneducated.
