Second Long Comment, Second Longer Post

In Response to a Long Comment, a Longer Post · Second Long Comment, Second Longer Post

I am not answering all, because some things, I don't disagree with, some things I already answered, I get the feeling, and some things, I don't know. My main contention is only that Romanides (whom I have read, or perhaps it was the summary by Metallinos), is inaccurate in stating the earliest Roman Patricians spoke Greek.

"All Roman histories were in Greek by earlier Greek historians first. Latin written histories came WAY later."

Well, because Latin literature, even to the Patricians, was not a known concept before they met the Greeks and before they had had a taste of Greek literature.

If the Patricians had known Greek all along, why didn't they give Rome a Greek literature?

"Archaic Greek (Mycenean) is found all over Italy as far north as Rome."

Found? Epigraphically? I missed out on that one!

"The 12 Tables are written in Latin for the plebs. The Patricians knew their laws by heart, since childhood, and spoke perfect Greek since childhood, in their homes, etc. Julius Caesar spoke mostly Greek, says Seutonius!"

Suetonius. Twelve Tables are earlier.

449 BC - 100 BC = 349 years before Caesar was born.

"Latis is also believed to be an Aeolism, and this was believed to be a fact by the people who lived 2000 years ago. I think they knew more about their own history and culture than today's so called language experts and linguists."

Greeks were not usually great linguists. Compared to Persian, Latin actually sounds more Greek, like it has -os (which became -us only later) in the masculine main declinsion, where even Old Persian may have dropped the -s and changed the -o- to -a- ... and of all the Greek dialects that the Greeks had available, the Aeolian was closest.

Feminine main declinsion has α not η and this rules out Attic and Ionian. Leaves either Doric or Aeolic. While Persian has "kê" for "who" the Latin "quis" (and some close by languages even pis) is closer to Greek ... again, what dialect? Attic and I think Doric too has "τις" but Aeolic has "πις"

"But the 12 Tables are based on earlier, much older, Greek laws, written in Greek, in Athens and other city states, the Eraoi Deltoi, as Romanides quotes this from Dionysius and Livy both confirming this."

I look up Livy, you are right that at least Athens was involved.

Livy 3:31

[8] the patricians, who would propose measures advantageous to both parties, [p. 197]and such as might tend to the equalization of liberty.” This proposal the patricians did not reject. They said that “no one should propose laws, except some of the patricians.” When they agreed with respect to the laws, and differed only with respect to the proposer; ambassadors were sent to Athens, Spurius Posthumius Albus, Aulus Manlius Publius Sulpicius Camerinus; and they were ordered to copy out the celebrated laws of Solon, and to become acquainted with the institutions, customs, and laws of the other states of Greece.

Livy 3:32

[6] The ambassadors had now returned with the Athenian laws; the tribunes pressed the more urgently, that a commencement should at length be made of compiling the laws.

Livy 3:33

[5] Next to these were considered the three ambassadors who had gone to Athens; at the same time that the honour might serve as a recompence for so distant an embassy; at the same time they considered that persons acquainted with the foreign laws would be of use in digesting the new code of regulations.

But to get laws from there, ambassadors would have needed to speak Attic, not Mycenaean.

"The true spirit of Rome and all of its legacy is bilingualism in Greek AND Latin (modern forms of course)."

This is true, but I am afraid that this is not so from day 1.

Rome has two faces, like Janus. It is both "the fourth beast of horrible aspect" (Antiochus IV Epiphanes was a vassal of the Republic) and (probably) "ο κατεχων" (possibly even) "το κατεχον".

The latter starts with Julius Caesar, a more normal monarch than the decemviri ("ten horns" in the Apocalypse).

That Greek is used in the Latin liturgy (not saying Bergoglio has a business celebrating it, he could be invalidly ordained even as priest), is normal. Christ was born in the bilingual Roman Empire of the Caesars, not in the Republic of the Ten Men. Or of Scipio Africanus and Asiaticus (who made Antiochus' father a Roman vassal).

Hans Georg Lundahl
Paris (Nanterre, actually)
Monday after Trinity
5.VI.2023

Job Revisited

I have found one word in Job's own words, which can have been the one he considered a folly.

Early on in chapter 7 verse 20, and following, watch this, this is Job speaking:

I have sinned: what shall I do to thee, O keeper of men? why hast thou set me opposite to thee, and I am become burdensome to myself Why dost thou not remove my sin, and why dost thou not take away my iniquity? Behold now I shall sleep in the dust: and if thou seek me in the morning, I shall not be.

So, not only did God reprove Eliu for having called Job a sinner, in his words to Job, He refused to even answer Eliu, but also, Job reproved himself for having called himself a sinner. Or at least for having called himself a sinner going to perdition.

This is the meaning of the beginning of Job 42:

Then Job answered the Lord, and said: 2 I know that thou canst do all things, and no thought is hid from thee. 3 Who is this that hideth counsel without knowledge? Therefore I have spoken unwisely, and things that above measure exceeded my knowledge. 4 Hear, and I will speak: I will ask thee, and do thou tell me. 5 With the hearing of the ear, I have heard thee, but now my eye seeth thee. 6 Therefore I reprehend myself, and do penance in dust and ashes.

Jesus confirmed that God was able to save Job:

And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of heaven.

Job started out as a rich man, even so God could save him./HGL

Revisité "Abraham né dans une famille païenne"

Je n'ai pas lu les sourates sur lesquels Nicolas de Cues se prononce. Selon elles et selon la lecture qu'en fait Nicolas de Cues, Abraham aurait été d'abord idolâtre. Et il en aurait blâmé son père Thar pour le mauvais example donné. Ceci dans Le Coran Tamisé, libre III, chapitre XII.

Or, Nicolas de Cues nie cette accusation, et il le nie pour Thar et Nachor aussi. Là, il le base probablement sur une lecture de la seule Genèse, car Josué 24:2 le successeur de Moïse dont le nom s'écrit aussi Jésus, dit aux Israëlites que Thar et Nachor (imprécis si "Nachor" c'était le frère ou le grandpère d'Abraham ou les deux) servaient des "dieux étranges" en Mésopotamie. Mais, Josué ne le dit pas sur Abraham lui-même. Nicolas va trop loin en le niant pour Thar et Nachor.

Bon, pour ce qui est de traçage, de ce qu'il appelle une erreur, au minimum elle peut l'être à propos d'Abraham, Nicolas de Cues dit que Mahomet avait cette mauvaise information d'une explication par un Juif, qui s'était trompé et dont l'avis ne fut pas partagé par, par exemple, Flave Josèphe.

En vérifiant, Josèphe ne nie pas que Thar et Nachor étaient idolâtres au moins à temps partiel, et il n'affirme pas qu'ils servaient toujours le vrai Dieu, la mention est sommaire.

Tout d'abord, est-ce que Sarug était idolâtre? Il y a des gens qui non seulement disent que l'idolâtrie est née dans les jours de Sarug, mais que Sarug y contribuait lui-même en prônant des images des bien-faiteurs de l'humanité (genre comme les images des saints dans les églises ou les images de "grands hommes" dans les rues), ce qui a pu précéder l'idolâtrie sans d'être en tant que tel déjà ce péché. Donc, non.

Ensuite, Abraham, a-t-il connu Sarug? Selon la lecture immédiate de Genèse 11:26 il paraît que Thar avait 70 ans à la naissance d'Abram, le premier nom d'Abraham. Par contre, d'autres disent que 70 est quand Thar commençait d'avoir ses fils, et que le premier n'était pas Abram, qu'il est énuméré en premier par dignité, et non par primogéniture temporelle. Actes 7:4 dit qu'Abraham quitta Charran quand son père était mort, or, Thar est mort en Charran à l'âge de 205 ans. Mais Abraham quitta Charran à l'âge de 75. Or, 205 - 75 = 130. Donc, Abraham était né quand Thar avait 130, non quand il avait 70. Dans ce cas, il n'aurait pas pu connaître Sarug.

Supposons Abraham né quand son père physique avait 70, son arrière-grand-père Sarug avait covécu avec lui jusqu'à ce qu'il avait 50. Mais 130 = 70 + 60, donc, si Abraham était né quand Thar avait 130, il aurait loupé Sarug par 10 ans.

D'abord, ceci n'est pas ce que disent les chronologies de Georges le Syncelle ou de St. Jérôme, qui présume un Abraham né quand Thar avait 70 ans, comme l'affirme au moins en apparence très forte Genèse 11:26.

Mais ensuite, St. Étienne ne dit pas "quand Thar fut mort" mais "quand son père fut mort" en Actes 7:4. Or, si Thar tombait en idolâtrie et Sarug pas, et si Abraham héritait la spiritualité de son arrière-grand-père, mais pas de son père, alors, ce père mort avant qu'Abraham quitta Charran peut bien être Sarug, non ?

Donc, plutôt que de dire qu'Abraham était né quand Thar avait 130, donc qu'il aurait connu un père et un grand-père idolâtres mais pas l'arrière-grand-père non idolâtre, il convient plutôt que supposer qu'il avait connu son arrière-grand-père et que celui-ci avait été son père spirituel. Et son propre âge de 50, à la mort de Sarug, était avant son propre âge de 75, à la vocation par Dieu.

En plus, on ne peut pas affirmer sans ambiguité quelconque si le gran-père d'Abraham était idolâtre, peut-être seulement le frère l'était. Nachor avait selon la Vulgate de Genèse 11:25 49 ans et selon les LXX 55 ans à vivre avec Abraham. Mais si Nachor le grand-père n'était pas idolâtre, alors il a pu être le père spirituel d'Abraham.

Pourquoi ça importe ? Je suis Chrétien, pas Musulman ou Juif, et je n'ai pas à croire qu'Abraham avait commis idolâtrie, non plus que le crut Nicolas de Cues (même s'il était trop généreux avec Thar). Par contre, j'ai rencontré des Catholiques qui prétendaient qu'Abraham était idolâtre. Il aurait grandi comme idolâtre, donc sans de connaître le vrai Dieu.

Je ne suis pas d'accord, bien entendu. Mais encore une fois, qu'importe ? Or, le contexte de la conversation était, j'avais affirmé que Moïse connut la matière historique de Genèse 1 à 11 ou au moins 2 à 11 (chapitre 1 jusqu'à 2:4 semblent être une vision accordée à Moïse au mont Sinaï), par l'intermédiaire d'Abraham, qui l'aurait reçu de manière orale, mais les aurait préservé en écrits gardés chez son tribu de nomades. Car les tribus à partir de Genèse 12 jusqu'à ce que Jacob va en Égypte ont eu suffisamment d'espace de bagage pour garder des écrits pas plus larges que la Genèse ensemble. Ou que la Genèse moins les chapitres écrits en Égypte et moin chapitre 1, réservé à Moïse.

Mais encore, supposons qu'Abraham aurait réellement pas connu avant sa vocation un quelconque fidèle du vrai Dieu, ça prouverait que les traditions ne seraient pas fiables ? Non. Il y a trois autres possibilités.

• les traditions auraient pu être faussées dans leurs théologies jusque dans le texte des chapitres, ensuite corrigés par Moïse - les idolâtres ne sont pas* automatiquement des fausseurs d'histoire;
• elles auraient pu être faussées dans leurs théologies en ajoutant d'autres dieux qui n'en sont pas, mais en dehors de ces textes;
• et les idolâtres auraient pu garder une tradition textuelle dans laquelle ils avaient cessé de faire confiance - Abraham aurait pu devenir un fidèle à partir de la connaissance de ces textes, malgré le scepticisme d'un entourage entièrement idolâtre, si c'était le cas.

Mais, puisque St. Étienne ne dit pas verbatim que Thar était mort quand Abraham allait vers la Terre de Promesse, mais "son père" la question d'un Abraham né dans une famille entièrement païenne ne se pose même pas. L'idée de ce Catholique (prêtre ?) était donc une très mauvaise excuse pour nier que Moïse connût les histoires antérieures à Abraham par intermédiaire de et Abraham les ayant reçues de Sarug.

Hans Georg Lundahl
Paris
Lundi de Pentecôte
29.V.2023

PS, en plus d'une mauvaise excuse, aussi un flagrant délit de concessions excessives aux Juifs et aux Musulmans./HGL

PPS, autant que la mort physique d'un père spirituel, comme je viens d'argumenter, ça peut aussi avoir été la mort spirituel de son père physique direct, si c'est quand Abraham avait 75 ans, à Charran, que Thar tomba dans l'idolâtrie. Charran se trouve en Mésopotamie, à l'Est de l'Euphrate./HGL

* Comme je viens de dire l'article précédant, en anglais:
In Response to a Long Comment, a Longer Post

In Response to a Long Comment, a Longer Post

In Response to a Long Comment, a Longer Post · Second Long Comment, Second Longer Post

Under my post Is Romanides accurate?, I found a comment by one greco roman knight. To reply belatedly to his greetings, I tried to post a long comment, longer than his, but alas the blogger comment field found it too long. Hence, I post it instead here as a post, extending it even a bit further,

"These are all just myths and legends, but based on history."

If you admit "based on history" you are a little inconsequential in saying not just "these are myths" but saying "these are all just myths and legends"

As far as I can say "legend" has two main meanings, namely:
a) a hagiography reading or collection of such, like the martyrologies or Legenda Aurea or Prologue from Ohrid, this is the primary but less usual meaning, since "legenda" means "things you ought to read"
b) orally recorded and transmitted ... guess what? ... history.

"To be Greek, Hellenic, or Hellenized implies culture, and not nationhood."

Romanides specifically spoke about language, when it came to Rome.
Also, the Luwian culture is a different one from the Mycenaean Greek one. They merged in the times leading up to Homer. His epic is in Greek, because by his time, all Luwians at least understood Greek there. It is balanced, because it is making compliments to all nobles, whether of Greek or Trojan descent.

"The Romans didn't become Greek "lovers" after the conquest of Greece proper, for why would Roman historians writing history of Rome centuries before the Greek "conquest" be writing in Greek and NOT Latin."

Where do you get this fake news from?

Polybius wrote in Greek because he was from Greece, he came to Rome as a guest or a hostage. He was also not centuries before the conquest of Macedonian / Hellenistic Arcadian League, but in that time, and he was also not centuries before but rather centuries after the conquest of Magna Graecia.

The last pieces of Magna Graecia to be conquered were Sicily, and that was in the First Punic War, Polybius arrived after the Second Punic War was over, if I recall correctly.

But perhaps you refer to Homer as the first Roman historian? Seven cities dispute the honour of being his birthplace, but Rome is not one of them. He mentions several cities that are part of the Roman Empire, like Athens and Corinth and Troy, but Rome isn't one of them.

"Emperor Claudius refers to Greek AND Latin as "our 2 languages", and he was fluent in Etruscan!"

Etruscan did not die in Rome until the death of the last augur. It is obvious why Greek was one of the two languages, namely in his time Romans had long since become bilingual.

In Romulus' time, bilingualism in Etruscan too could be expected, but hardly bilingualism in Greek. Like Helsingfors / Helsinki in the early Modern Ages would have been speaking Swedish, Finnish, to some degree Livonian and Estonian, but hardly English or French.

"The special thing about Greek is that it remained thus even after the full Latinization of Rome and the eradication of the other cultures like Etruscan and Punic, many centuries later."

Etruscan culture was never eradicated, only the language was replaced by Latin. Latin culture is basically a sub-branch of Etruscan culture, just with another language. Like Styrian culture in Austria is a sub-branch of Slovene culture, just speaking Austrian German instead of Slovene.

Rome itself never had Punic culture, as an indigenous feature.

And "Latinisation of Rome" is an oxymoron. The best I can say for Romanides is, Latin may have owed lots of traces of Greek grammar due to a Sprachbund in the Terramare culture c. 1200 BC the genetics show complete dominance by the immigrants. Castione Marchesi is 480 km by modern roads away from Rome, somewhat less as the bird flies.

"The mob were latin speaking, the plebs were latin speaking, but the patricians and ruling class almost ALL spoke Greek, handed down in their homes, parentally, educationally, or learned later out of necessity and station."

No trace of this in any writings prior to the conquest of Magna Graecia.

The first Greek city to be absorbed into the Roman Republic was Neapolis in 327 BC./blockquote>

Before 327 BC you don't find many full length texts from Rome. Inscriptions are in Latin, not Greek. Carmen Saliare is in Latin, not Greek. Twelve Tables?

Parts of the text of the Twelve Tables were preserved in the brief excerpts and quotations from the original laws in other ancient authors. All Roman sources quote the Twelve Tables in a modernised form of Latin. ... Cicero claimed that he learned them by heart as a boy in school but that no one did so any longer.

Crawford, Michael H., 1996,Roman Statutes, vol. 2, London: Institute of Classical Studies, 571.
Cic. Leg. 2.59

If the Patricians in 449 BC spoke Greek, why were the Twelve Tables so obviously in Latin?

Cicero could easily have learned them in Greek, he was from a time already bilingual, why did he learn them in Latin?

"And eventually, after Rome's fall, Constantinope New Rome would continue to be ROMAN,"

What do you mean by "Rome's fall"? Constantinople did not continue to be Roman after 1918, when West Rome lost Charles I to exile, when he left Hofburg, and East Rome lost Nicolas II to czaricide. If you meant after 476 instead of after 1918, that's ridiculous to speak of it as "Rome's fall" even if English historians have long had this bad habit. They are a bit allergic to principalities ruled by clergy, like Iona in Scotland or like Montenegro on the Balkans prior to 1826. Or, as in this case, Papally ruled Medieval Rome.

Or they can state that because they find Collosseum stately and Collosseum in ruins serving as shelter for the poor really too poor style. It was so much better when it served to martyr Catholics and was in well polished marbles, wasn't it? You know, aesthetics over morality or an anti-pauper type of morality. Also, like absence of Emperors and presence of spiritual rulers, definitely NOT an argument to speak of Rome as fallen in 476.

"Evander is a Roman cult hero from Arcadia, the Peloponnese, from where the Palatine hill was founded as a Greek colony, Pallation, BEFORE the arrival of Trojans, which means Greeks had already established colonies in Italy."

Evander would certainly have spoken Greek, in Arcadia. This does not mean he spoke so in Italy. Here is the notice in the Greek mythology section:

Evander of Pallantium, the wisest among the Arcadians, emigrated to Italy where he founded a city Pallantium. He was the son of Hermes and Carmentis, a nymph skilled in the art of divination.

Hermes being also called Mercury, as Paul the Deacon says "Gotan" would not have been there in the time of the Vinniles, since "Gotan" is Mercury, a Greek mage who lived 1000 years earlier. In fact, Hermes, Carmentis and Evander seem to have been a whole family of magicians and sibyls. Here is from a notice dedicated solely to him:

was a culture hero from Arcadia, Greece, who was said to have brought the Greek pantheon, laws, and alphabet to Italy, where he founded the city of Pallantium on the future site of Palatine Hill, Rome, sixty years before the Trojan War.

I have a suspicion, he could be an excuse the Greeks sought for not calling the Roman conquerors Barbarians. How so? Strabo and Dionysius disagree about who were his parents. Hermes and Carmentis being the version in Strabo, and Apollo and Themis are the names in Dionysius. However, there is some hope for the historicity of the person:

Dionysius of Halicarnassus also mentions that some writers, including Polybius of Megalopolis say that Lavinia was the daughter of Evander and had a son with Heracles who was named Pallas

Hercules was indeed a generation before the Trojan war ... however, the oldest mention of Evander in Polybius certainly makes him an inlaw of Aeneas via Lavinia, but even your Romanides (there are reasons not to call an Evolution believer "father"!) says Aeneas met Latinus, a more common version of Lavinia's father. And Latinus would be a descendant of the Cretan god-king Zeus' banished father, Saturn. Minoan Crete or more properly pre-Minoan Crete, had communications with Greece, but a distinct culture, slowly getting more Greek. Saturn would not have transmitted knowledge of Greek to Picus or to Latinus. If anything, knowledge of Plaeo-Cretan.

So, to return belatedly your greetings, I close here, on the Roman Catholic day of Pentecost, in Paris.

Hans Georg Lundahl
Paris, 28.V.2023

Mariés avant 16, le couple martyr et leurs ancêtres

Mariées (et mariés) à quel âge, premières noces? · Et encore, pour son mari? · Mariés avant 16, le couple martyr et leurs ancêtres

En général, le nombre total de femmes va inclure Marie Antoinette de son côté mais exclure Louis XVI du sien, et enversement pour le nombre d'hommes.

Plus qu'un homme a été marié plus qu'une fois, ce que j'ai compté. D'où 38 ancêtres et connexes y compris Marie Antoinette du côté féminin.

Femmes :

21 ancêtres (ou connexes) féminines de Marie Antoinette (et elle-même)
dont mariées avant 16
14 * 3 ou 14 * 2 + 15 * 1

17 ancêtres (ou connexes) féminines de Louis XVI
dont mariées avant 16
12 * 1 + 14 * 1 + 15 * 1 ou 12 * 1 + 14 * 2 + 15 * 1

38 ancêtres (ou connexes) féminines
3 + 3 ou 3 + 4 mariées avant 16

6/38 = 15,789 %
7/38 = 18,421 %

une mariée à 12, minimum canonique
1/38 = 2,632 %

Hommes :

15 ancêtres masculins de Marie Antoinette
dont mariés avant 16
14 * 1

16 ancêtres masculins de Louis XVI, y compris lui-même
dont mariés avant 16
15 * 4

31 ancêtres masculins
5 / 31 = 16,129 %

dont un à 14, minimum canonique
1/31 = 3,226 %

Unclarity of the French Language - Or of His Memory?

Assorted retorts from yahoo boards and elsewhere: "Martyn Iles presents Living in Babylon" · Φιλολoγικά/Philologica: Unclarity of the French Language - Or of His Memory?

Sometimes French is unclear.

Not all of the time, but at more than one occasion, where English isn't.

Here is Ezechiel 26:7, in English:

For thus saith the Lord God: Behold I will bring against Tyre Nabuchodonosor king of Babylon, the king of kings, from the north, with horses, and chariots, and horsemen, and companies, and much people.

Now look at this French one:

Car ainsi parle le Seigneur, l'Eternel: Voici, j'amène du septentrion contre Tyr Nebucadnetsar, roi de Babylone, le roi des rois, avec des chevaux, des chars, des cavaliers, et une grande multitude de peuples.

Now imagine a truncated memory of this:

j'amène du septentrion contre Tyr Nebucadnetsar, roi de Babylone

Or even:

j'amène du septentrion contre Tyr le roi Nebucadnetsar, de Babylone

Do you analyse it as God bringing against Tyre from the North someone who is "le roi Nebucadnetsar, de Babylone"?

Or is "le roi Nebucadnetsar" being brought "du septentrion contre Tyr ... de Babylone"?

In English, this confusion is impossible. The second would have been "from Babylon" and the former is, what we also have in the text, "of Babylon" ....

Edward Camps used this, confusing "of" with "from" (makes me wonder if he's French or has been living in France for very long) to prove that "from Babylon" is designated as "from the North" even if Babylon is actually East of Tyre, and somewhat further South. Tyre is 33°16'15" N, and Babylon is 32°32'33" N. However, the city never says that God brings Nebuchadnezzar on this occasion "from Babylon" the only direction given is "from the North" and Babylon is in the genitive of relationship : Nebuchadnezzar is king of Babylon, and Babylon is city and Empire of Nebuchadnezzar.

Edward Camps clearly admitted that when Nebuchadnezzar arrived, he actually approached Tyre precisely from the North. So, "from the North" means "from the North" - and this is relevant for another city with the same name, Nimrod's very pre-Classical Babel. Why? Because it says "they removed from the East" - and I believe "from the East" means precisely "from the East" ... This is what Edward Camps pretended to disprove by citing Ezechiel.

Most places suggested for the landing place, anything West of Nagorno-Karabakh, given this is historically Armenia (whatever the claims of recent Armenian and Turkish population), and that has never been suggested, as far as I know, going to Classical Babylon would be going TO the East, not FROM it. But even from the Westernmost place actually suggested, Mt Judi, just East of the Tigris, going to Göbekli Tepe is going FROM the East, and that is what Genesis 11 actually has.

38°55′21″E for Göbekli Tepe
42°20′39″E for Mount Judi

To Göbekli Tepe from Mount Judi actually is, precisely, from the East.

Now, the actual text in Louis Segond (I took a Protestant text, because I think Edward Camps is a Protestant), it is sufficiently long to get clearly around this unclarity.

Nebucadnetsar, roi de Babylone, le roi des rois, appears as a block, and "de Babylone" inside it, so it must be part of how Nebuchadnezzar is described, an attribute, and can't be part of how the direction is described, can't be an extra spatial adverbial of direction. But the whole verse is also further away from everyday French. This hints, in order to make French clear, making descriptions long and not totally idiomatic for everyday use, is an asset. That's possibly one complaint some have about my French. But I try to be clear, and I spend quite a lot of time reading more colloquial texts, like comic books, JW tracts (I avoid Watchtower, but sometimes enjoy Awake!), free newspapers like "20 minutes" or earlier also "CNEWS Matin" ... so my French doesn't, in my pursuit of clarity, stray too far from what French people understand without reading it twice.

Spanish also has "de" both for spatial adverb of direction meaning origin of a removal, and for prepositional periphrase of the genitive case. But Italian has "da" for "from" and "di" for "of" ... and here is the Italian text:

Perché così dice il Signore Dio: Io mando da settentrione contro Tiro Nabucodònosor, re di Babilonia, il re dei re, con cavalli, carri e cavalieri e una folla, un popolo immenso.

Got it? It's "re di Babilonia," whereas the only direction is "da settentrione" .../HGL

Réplique en un détail pour Vincent Reynouard, Madame Rouffanche

Aux contradictions s’ajoutent des impossibilités manifestes. En particulier, la fuite de Mme Rouffanche hors de l’église, en se hissant jusqu’à un vitrail puis en sautant de quatre mètres de haut sur un plan fortement incliné sans s’occasionner la moindre blessure, un exploit impossible pour une femme de 46 ans.

Dans un livre sur la survie en situations critiques, lu quand j'avais entre 7 et 25 ans, et relu, et relu, appelé en suédois "Rädda livet!" la hauteur où la survie reste possible sur terrain plutôt que dans l'eau est 10 mètres, à condition de toucher le sol incliné latéralement et non purement verticalement. Ça aide aussi qu'on se pousse vers le côté. Le sol incliné a donc aidé à sauver la femme. Pas empêché.

Pourvu, bien entendu, que le témoignage soit autrement correct.

Mais Vincent Reynouard ne vient pas d'analyser en premier le témoignage, mais les faits matériels.

Rouler latéralement correctement pour s'épargner demande bien entendu une certaine élasticité. Combien en reste à une femme de 46 est par contre variable.

En plus, je ne sais pas d'où Vincent prend "sans la moindre blessure" ...

C'est possible que les corps déchiquetés et non calcinés parlent pour la version de Vincent, mais ce n'était pas le propos ici.

Pour l'expertise, j'aimerais avoir l'avis d'un expert du sport parkour. Si l'exploit sera faisable ce ne sera peut-être pas la première fois que des révisionnistes commentent une impossibilité qui n'en est pas une. L'autre fois que j'ai commenté est la situation d'Anne Frank. C'est possible de faire de la bruit tout en censant ne pas faire de la bruit, parce qu'on peut à tout moment être trahi, si un village (ou quartier ou semblable) fait bloc de protéger un homme ou une famille cachée. Ceci peut bien entendu changer du jour à l'autre./HGL

PS Bien entendu, j'aimerais que le débat soit plus libre - pour les deux côtés et pour ceux qui se trouvent quelque part dans le milieu./HGL