Dane McAfee

Anglo-Texan PhD at @CSNS_UK, neo-Ghibelline, political animal, all things Henry II, Federico II and Machiavelli, Wagner, Brahms and Shostakovich

[Dane McAfee @DaneMcAfee]

I’ll never give up my sentimental love for Tolkien, within very particular parameters… but by Zeus and all the Olympian gang, how grating it is that, in many ways, it’s also just a big tent for under-baked, pulled-out warmish, re-baked-and-burnt, then fried-in-last-week’s-grease “analyses.”

And that’s my Cromer-ist proconsular verdict for the day.

[Centre for Statecraft & National Security @CSNS_UK]

📝 ICYMI | In his book 'The Visionaries', James Holland explains how ethics and morals were once the guiding principles of leadership.

Read Prof John Bew's recent review for @ObserverUK below 👇
https://t.co/Zooc444NMy

[Dane McAfee @DaneMcAfee]

The powerhouses of European history. How many dynamos are of their lineage: the Conqueror and his family (which includes the Angevins, like Henry II and the Lionheart) or the Hautevilles (from nothing to the very center of the Mediterranean, and eventually the medieval Empire itself with Frederick II). In sum, their legacy is a big part of little thing called Western Civilization.

[Dane McAfee @DaneMcAfee]

Except this is so inaccurate it’s laughable. The years after Becket’s death would see the great Angevin Caesar lay the stones for the Common Law, triumph over a massive rebellion from Scotland to southern France, and preside as the greatest statesman in Europe and arbiter of Christendom.

[Dane McAfee @DaneMcAfee]

@DrDStarkeyCBE Now for the next big UFC event to be hosted at the new Number 10 in Manchester.

[Dane McAfee @DaneMcAfee]

@Medievalhtybuff 1250 — the inexorable decline of the Western Empire along with the imperial papacy with the ultimate demise of the Hohenstaufen after the death of Frederick II, arguably the last Caesar of the West

[Dane McAfee @DaneMcAfee]

@Ereborgar Oooo, out and about again, mother’s basement charging rent? Having a worthwhile take is very difficult for you obviously, just gutter-sniping 🤣

Cheers

[Dane McAfee @DaneMcAfee]

@RoyalApostolic If only Rory could make one of his grippingly prescient prophecies, saying that the film would be bad, it would thereby end up being just fine.

[Dane McAfee @DaneMcAfee]

Agree wholly — just didn’t have enough space to put all of them, so I focused on the absolute biggest fish. An almost unparalleled trajectory: from backwater minor gentry, to the epicenter of the Mediterranean, and their ultimate scion being arguably a civilizational figure. Astonishing… or *stupefying* - if you will.

[Dane McAfee @DaneMcAfee]

Needs to be a some kind of miniseries on this. Just consider how many medieval luminaries the Hautevilles produced:

Robert Guiscard and Roger Bosco, the dynamic brother duo; Roger II, who builds a powerhouse kingdom from nothing; and then… the most incandescent of them all, Frederick II - Stupor Mundi, arguably the last true Western Caesar

[Tom Holland @holland_tom]

"We order you to hold a free election, but nevertheless forbid you to elect anyone except Richard my clerk, the archdeacon of Poitiers."

Henry II to the monks of Winchester

[Dane McAfee @DaneMcAfee]

@holland_tom Now that’s what I call an election. Isn’t the great Angevin Caesar long due TRIH treatment? Genuinely a political genius and dynamo whose legacy underwrites English-speaking democracy itself (Common Law). Should most assuredly be a friend of the show.

[Dane McAfee @DaneMcAfee]

@MemoryMedieval Fair enough. Writing a book on falconry that in its own way presages the empiricism of the 17th century and even Darwin in the proper perspective… is the very epitome of bookish 🤣

[Dane McAfee @DaneMcAfee]

@MemoryMedieval Really? A papal partisan? 🤣

[Dane McAfee @DaneMcAfee]

It looks promising, but I’m just now delving into it. Also, I’d recommend Prof Fulvio Della Donne’s new book on Frederick II as well. I found it in Italian, but if that’s an issue, I’m sure there’s an English translation coming. Much needed too. We’re in dire need on more works on great Holy Roman Emperors, since the HRE is so shamefully misunderstood.

[Dane McAfee @DaneMcAfee]

An American empire underwritten by little thing called the British Royal Navy around a slightly bigger thing called the Monroe Doctrine, by way of George Canning. Benjamin Franklin actually essentially predicted as much when he spoke with his erstwhile friend Lord Shelbourne after the Treaty of Paris in 1783.

[Dane McAfee @DaneMcAfee]

No… “sorry, all of that is true” is, in the face of near unanimous scholarly rebuttal of the last few decades, an extraordinary and universal claim, so it requires extraordinary and universal evidence. You claim it, you prove it. The case for Richard’s reevaluation has long since been made. The burden of proof is yours.

[Dane McAfee @DaneMcAfee]

@Vidor1 @MemoryMedieval Did Angevin finances essentially weather the whole ordeal, and did not Richard return and totally put Philippe II on the defensive? Given another ten years, it’s pretty difficult to see how Richard wouldn’t have been *at least* as great and titanic a king as his father.