Page II

Perception Of Open - Ended Time

 Discovery Of Dante

Falsification Of Classical Texts

Recommended Books

 
THE PERCEPTION OF OPEN-ENDED TIME
 by Dr. Yaroslav Kesler

 "One of the main achievements of 12th century scholarship proved to be that it made use of oral testimony and oral tradition.
Another great undertaking of 12th century historians, perhaps the most difficult, was the mastery of time. As a result of a hundred years of evolution, the entire West, finally, agreed to position every year in a continuous series from the birth of Christ, and everything, without exception, began finally to relate that very Christmas to one and the very same year - regardless of the doubts and hesitations they had. Then, after universal agreement had been established relative to the Christian Era, the historians had to resolve another complex problem: to indicate the year from the birth of Christ for various dates where the texts reported to them and to assign on one and the same chronological scale facts relative to which neither written sources nor human memory reported a precise time. Experts on church calendars, virtuosos in the area of chronology, and 12th century monks coped with this problem so successfully that even today it arouses amazement in us." (Bernard Guenee. "Histoire et culture historique dans l'occident medieval." Moscow, Yazyki Slavyanskoy Kul'tury (Languages of Slavic Culture), 2002, page 411).

 "In half a century of vigorous activity, Benedictine scholars salvaged, considering their capabilities, everything from the past that could be salvaged. It so happened that their successors did not find an incentive for new investigations in this area. They simply continued to talk about their own time. The 12th century historians were above all researchers. The 13th century historians were, first of all, witnesses" (ibid. page 412).

Much more profound information about the perception by mankind of such a notion, it is possible, as TIME is hiding behind these lines of the prominent modern French historian, Bernard Guenee. And about the essence of a chronology.
Two completely different things are understood by the term "chronology." (1) A chronology as a succession of events in time and (2) a chronology as a science about the measurement of time. At the same time, by "historical chronology" they understand a subordinate historic discipline which studies the systems of a method of numbering the years and the calendars of various peoples and states, and also helps to establish dates of historic events and the beginnings of historic sources.
A chronology (1) is a retrospective reconstruction, inasmuch as the only, sliding, point of counting time backwards -- present time, as a result, is conventional. This in full measure relates to historical chronology.
A chronology (2) is a natural science discipline, inasmuch as it is based on recurring measurements of oscillating and rotating natural cycles. This in full measure relates to astronomical chronology.
 
Observation of the surrounding environment does not give man an absolute "point for the start of time." The counting of time from the "Big Bang" is just as conventional as, let us say, from the "Creation." But an observation of the environment renders the ability of a comparison of ensuing events with natural cycles. And these observations also underlay the numerous variants of calendars long before the appearance of a chronology (1).
Which natural cycles has mankind been observing? The shortest - the daily cycle - of the rising and the setting of the sun. But this cycle, from the point of view of an observer from Earth, is uneven in the course of a day itself within the limits of one cycle (up to the Arctic Circle), and beyond the Arctic Circle the solar year generally degenerates into one day which consists of one day and one night.
Second in increase of relative duration is the "tidal" cycle (connected, as we now know, with the moon, but they didn't know this earlier.) The English word tide "flood" is the same as the German Zeit, the Swedish and Norwegian tid "time" (also compare the Dutch tij = flood and tijd = time), inasmuch as the coastal, and indeed, even more so, the island inhabitants, naturally, measured their activity with the high and low tides.
The somewhat prolonged lunar (monthly) cycle is most convenient because of the ability of counting two-week (English fortnight) intervals between the first and third quarters (the "growing" and "aging" moons) - phases of the moon, and also, considering the full moon and new moon - the determination of a weekly cycle and the establishment of a connection between daily and monthly cycles.
Still longer is the yearly cycle, subdivided into the "time of the year," it is settled only later - with the aid of devices which allow the determination of the equinox, and then also the solstice. This then relates also to the seasonal flooding of rivers (for example, of the Nile), and to the onset of a season of monsoons in the tropics.

The "Metonic Cycle" (19 years) and the "Solar Cycle" (28 years) are the next stage in the mastery of the natural cycles for a local, but more wide-scale, tie-in for time against the background of a starry sky. Observation of the planets is a qualifying factor of the second order relative to these fundamental cycles. (Weather conditions are a complicating factor, but which do not exclude observations of the heavenly bodies.)
All the cycles mentioned are observed over the course of a human life. But not one of them assumes the need of man in some kind of open-ended chronology (1), inasmuch as from an everyday point of view the tie-in to some kind of them simultaneously is both essential and sufficient.
The only irreversible process which may induce man to an open-ended chronology is life itself. Only two dates are struck on grave stones: birth and death. All the remaining biography is secondary. Yes, a definite continuity of generations exists, which is realized in descendants, but not one of them (not with the cyclical gene of protozoa) is a precise replica of an ancestor. And over the course of a lifetime, people confront situations when the everyday counting of time is difficult ("a prisoner in solitary confinement without windows.") But sunset even beyond the Arctic Circle is not so fatal for man as for a one-day butterfly. The most ancient words, which reflect the notion of some kind of a final segment of time, characterize the relativity of the notion "open-ended time" for a man absolutely.
 
I think hardly anyone will not see a clear connection between, let us say, the English year, the German Jahr and the Russian Yar(a) = spring (compare also with the Greco-Roman ora = "hour, time," and finally, era!) And so even the word, denoting a year in the Russian language ("god") began to designate the notion "year" only in the 16th century, and before that this word was connected with the notion "holiday," a "good (= suitable) time" (as the Serbs have now).
The Ukrainian "godina" means "hour" (in Russian - "chas") but the Czech "chas" means simply "time." English week, German Woche mean "week," whereas the Russian derivative word - "vek" - initially meant "some elapsing period" (compare, for example, "40 years is a woman's lifespan"), but now it also is "100 years."
That is, initially some period is implied, and therefore, in Ukrainian we have rik (plural roki, derived from "srok") which, again, now means "year," and so on. The Greek "chronos" still also means "time," and "year," and "duration" (compare also the Russian "krug.", and even English "ring" - from ancient "hring" ) The variety itself of the tie-in of words which reflect the notion of some defined time interval, for a CONCRETE period says in so many words that these notions have been fixed, according to historic measurements, quite recently.

In this connection, we turn attention to the fact that the Greek word ENH meant the "last day of the MONTH" (ENIAYTOC which has existed up to now means "year, a large time interval, a cycle, a period." But the Latin word ANN(US) = year and the Greek ENH - are twin brothers! Therefore, in OLDEN times, most likely, they counted by months (naturally, lunar.)
Here, for example, is what the Central Asian historian al-Biruni (traditionally dated to the 11th century) writes: "They say that when a warning of a flood came to Tahmuras, and this happened 231 years before the flood, he gave an order to select in his kingdom a place with wholesome air and earth. The people did not find a place more worthy of such a name than Isfahan. Then Tahmuras ordered the preservation of all knowledge and the placing of it in the safest place. This is confirmed by the fact that in our time in Jay, [near] the city of Isfahan, they have discovered hills in which they, when they excavated them, found facilities, full of stacks of wood bast called "tuz" with which they cover the swords and shields. The bast was covered with some kind of characters, and no one knew anything about these characters and what in particular was inscribed."

It is obvious that it is possible to warn someone about a catastrophe approaching in 231 years, but to expect practical actions in the near future in order to avoid grave consequences is senseless even in our time: if he who both listens seriously and begins to engage in this problem - of a future far away from the closest descendants, then there will be an insignificant minority of them - even if it is to create excitement artificially. But, let us say, a warning 231 months before, that is, approximately 19 years - that is a fully realistic period for a predicted determination of fate both at the given moment of the living and of the generation immediately following. And this does not require bringing in such a religious notion as "prophecy."
Those OLDEN times ended when annual counting replaced monthly.
 When, then, was this able to happen?
For designation of the calendar year, besides ENIATOC, the Greeks also have other words: ???NOC which already has been mentioned, and ETOC, the same as in the Russian "summer" for the designation of years in the plural. The presence itself of several words for the designation of one and the same notion (according to Emile Benveniste) says that in the past they had a somewhat different meaning. (But, as it is thought, in the works of Homer the words ENIATOC and ETOC were used as synonyms. At the same time, it is difficult to judge whether ENIAUTOC is connected with ENH-AUTOC - "this period, that same period," compare also he = that, or, let us say, directly with ENH-ETOC, that is period = year.)
Both that and the other respond to the notion "end of the counting." But it is important that the word ENH has one more, at first glance, meaning not connected with the first: "the day after tomorrow." We shall add that for the designation of a month there is the all-European MHN(AC). On consideration of the Russian "month" in the meaning of the "crescent of the moon," MHN takes on the meaning "rise of the moon after the new moon," in contrast to ENH - "the day before the death of the moon," that is, "the end of counting," "the end of the period" besides. Therefore, the meaning "the day after tomorrow," most likely, arose as "the night after the new moon."

We note that up to now not one religious basis for the motivation of the aforesaid has been brought in - there just had been no need.
Now we shall examine the evolution of such "historic" notions as "century" and "millennium," which have no direct relationship to the life or the natural cycles. (It is obvious that these notions were able to evolve only after the adoption of a universal decimal counting system.)
They translate the Latin word saeculum as "sort, generation, a human lifetime" and as "century." However, this word initially was in no way connected with the notion of a "hundred" (the number.) But a human lifetime and the change of generations, as we see, is connected directly with the notion "life cycle," in which connection the word "cycle" is considered everywhere as adopted from the Greek kyklos "circle."
 
In this connection it is somewhat logical to examine this "Greek" circle in comparison with the Slavic "kolo" = circle (cf. also with Eng. "coil"). (Compare "se kolo" with the Rumanian secol "century," Italian secolo, Portuguese seculo, French siecle, Spanish siglo, and also with the Spanish sequelo = consequence.) In other words - it is a GENERATION, a rotation of life in changing generations. A generation according to "Constantine's Indiction" is 15 years, the recurrent taxation on inheritance in an indicated order. The "Chinese," it is but the "Aztec" (!) period for a generation - 20 years (3 generations for a 60-year calendar cycle. We note that if the Chinese calendar is connected with the conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn, then it could not have been created earlier than 1323.)

For comparison: right now a change of regular generations in the military occurs approximately over 12 - 15 years (and even, for example, in the Osman military 500 years earlier from a beginning recruit to a veteran it was 2 generations: 25 - 30 years.) The elite bureaucratic civil system of a "progression to administrative bosses" is also approximately once in 15 years. Not only does life span play a role in the determination of an average statistical term of a generation, but also simply the onset of fertility (14 - 18 years). Then follows a period of personality formation, the mastering of professions and the acquisition of families (up to 30), the most productive, the "adult," period is approximately from 30 to 45 years, the "mature" period is 45-60, the "pension" is 60-75, and further there is only the gerontological. He who has advanced so far. But on average, the number which characterizes the change of generations clearly is close to that same 15-year "indiction" - that is, to some average conventional term, but defined by experience.
 
 "Constantine's Decree" is, per se, a consolidation of some statistical data which had been collected by the time of its appearance. And what is more, this is not religious, but fully "civil," that is a "worldly" rotation, that is a "secular age": a notion, which, probably, was being well preserved even under the circumstances of a religious demarcation and attempts at the establishment of a universal CHURCH calendar all the way up to the Gregorian of 1583. In other words: approximately to the end of the traditional 15th century, it is possible, there WAS NO accounting for centuries at all.

The word "seculaire" (the spelling since 1611) in the French language assumed the meaning of "centuries" for the first time in the form "seculare" in 1549. Before this, the word "centenaire" (from 1370) was used in the meaning of "centuries." The latter is derived from "hundred" (cent) and "a hundred" (centain). And "seculaire," as too "siecle" (century, epoch, the present) is not! And this is direct evidence that the introduction of the notion "century" as a chronological cycle is connected not only with religiously-based calendar reform, but also directly with "secularization" (secularisation, from 1567), that is, with the establishment also of new "worldly" (in French, seculier, from 1260) rules.

Here is what the historian Apollon Grigor'evich Kuz'min writes ("The Beginning of Rus." Moscow, Veche Publishers, 2003, page 201): "We note that the literal meaning of the word "vek" in ancient times is the age of an object, a phenomenon, a man. This is well known and confirmed by a large quantity of sources (Sreznevskiy, etc.). This word was most used for the designation of the life of one generation. The MAIN meaning of the Latin conformity to the Slavic vek is saeculum - exactly a "GENERATION," "a HUMAN age," (Anan'ev et al.) The Complete Latin Dictionary. 1862, page 761)." Further, Kuz'min talks about Russian sources in which it follows from context that "vechi" = generations and not centuries. (The same thing regards, for example, also the "ancient Icelandic" old - "generation, time, century" (compare with Russian leto = summer.)
Even more amusing is the English century, which is borrowed from the French, but centurie never meant "century" in French, but only a military element - "a hundred"! It is then the "Roman century" (noted for the first time in 1284). And the time of the appearance of English "century" which stands by itself as the designation of a hundred years is direct evidence to the time of the introduction of counting by centuries - simultaneously with the French seculaire, and with the appearance of the notions of Trecento and Quatrocento and the like. The likely time of the origin of the idea itself of counting by centuries is no earlier than the end of the 15th century and most likely - the first half of the 16th century.
 
It is important that the definition "century" (saeculum) = 100 years is axiomatic, that is, not requiring (and even not having) proof. The meaning of the word saeculum = "100 years" was not able to disappear from use after its legendary establishment for more than 1,000 years. There really are no natural reasons for maintenance of this axiom. And there couldn't be.
What is more, the maintenance of the meaning saeculum = "century" simply is inconceivable without the PRECEEDING notion "decade" in a denary system. The numeral 100 in a denary system occupies a wholly definite place in the hierarchy of this system relative to the base 10. The very word dekada "decade," which designates "decade," was noted for the first time only in 1385.
 (And the legendary "decennalia," supposedly introduced by Augustus and which came to light in 1540, has no relationship to the continuous counting of time.)
If one looks at the traditional dates enumerated above, then the oldest of them is 1260. This hardly is an accidental coincidence, as will be shown below.

Even the Greek notion of "chilieterida" as "millennium" is traced back no further than that time. Etymologists are trying to connect the Greek "chilia" = 1,000 with the word "chera, cheri" - hand, having in mind that one can look at both it and the other as a certain "end of counting." We note that the word "chilia" is in no way connected with the common Indo-European word "hundred" (Greek hekato.) Just as even the Greek "miriada" = 10,000 designates simply "many," and the Old Russian designation 10,000 = "t'ma." And the Latin mille - this is originally also simply "many," and only later is "thousand." In the Balto-Slav-German linguistic habitat the situation is completely different, inasmuch as the compound word "tysyacha" (English thousand, German tausend and the like) initially designates "a rich hundred," that is a "great hundred." Here, in contrast to the Greek and Romance languages, the reflection of a denary system of counting to a thousand is completely clear.

Chilia - the origin of this Greek word is just as vague in Greek itself as it is transparent in the Arabic: "The broad notion of guile (CHILIA) was used, in particular, for the name of techniques which we at the present time would relate to the category of applied mathematics and mechanics. Ilm al-khial - the "science of skillful techniques" (literally "the science of guile," author's note) is discovered in the medieval classifications of the sciences. To outwit God - and some medieval Moslems posed such a problem to themselves." ("A Comparative Study of Civilizations." A reader. Moscow, Aspect Press, 2001, pages 289-290. Aristotle, Omar Khayyam, Iskhak as-Sabani, Ibn Ketiba ad-Dinuri and Ibn al-Irabi developed "ilm al-khial." "Al-Mundji," Beirut, 2000). And the Jewish cabalists posed exactly the same problem to themselves, in which connection everyone developed their ideas in that same 13th century ("The Zohar"), and in the 16th century they were picked up even by the Protestant mystics (Jakob Boehme).

At the same time, the word "chilia" is fully comparable with the Baltic-Slavic-German words which reflect besides a certain interval, a cycle: Ukrainian khvilina "minute," Czech chvile, Polish chwila; Lithuanian valanda "a time interval," English while, Dutch wijl, German Weile; Swedish vila "a rest, repose, to lie, to rest", Norse hvil (rest), hvile "to rest;" English while, whilst "for the time being, meanwhile," Dutch wijl, German weil, and also wave: Ukrainian khvilya, Byelorussian khvalya, Bulgarian v"lna, Czech vlna, Latvian vilnis, Dutch zwalp, German Welle, Swedish svall, Norwegian svalk, English swell "choppiness, surge" and so on. We note again that in the Book of Psalms literally side-by-side is the referenced "millennium" as derived from "chilia" (90:5), and "flood" (90:6). We again draw attention to the fact that the word "wave" is now also used as a certain indication of time.
 
But what did "millennium" mean until the appearance of an open-ended chronology? From where in general was the interpretation by the Biblicists of the duration of the "day of creation" as a millennium? Or, if one follows the ilm al-chial, NOW could one just as successfully interpret "day of creation" as a billion years, while bringing into it, besides, the physicists, too? (This arbitrariness is the same type as "render unto God what is God's, unto Caesar what is Caesar's"... well, and unto the locksmith what is the locksmith's.)
What really happened in 1259/1260, actually, is known today to the one Lord God, but there is real physical and chemical evidence of the extraordinary NATURAL events of the time. The historians write that in expectation of the end of the world, people who had gone mad ran into the woods and committed suicide.
The traces of a catastrophic event are observed everywhere in the Arctic glacial core samples in the form of exceptionally powerful and keen (in the assessment of time) acidic and sulfate spikes in the investigation of samples of native ice which relate to this year. Over the course of 5,000 years before this, and also after this, up to now nothing of the kind has been noted.
As vulcanologists think, it was the hugest eruptive event, the discharge of which was transported from the source throughout the whole world. (Langway C.C.Jr., Clausen H.B., Hammer C.U. An inter-hemispheric time-marker in ice cores from Greenland and Antarctica /Ann. Glaciol., 10, 1988, p. 102-108.) In which connection, a sign of this eruption is noted in the ice cores both of the northern and of the southern hemisphere, which can are evidence not only of the great power of the eruption, but also of the fact that it happened more likely in the lower latitudes than in the middle or especially in the upper.
 
 Nonetheless, there has been no success in tying the sulfate and acid spikes of "1259" to a concrete volcano. There also is the opinion that this catastrophic event was able to act as a trigger for the start of the Little Ice Age owing to the pollution of the atmosphere with the solid and flying products of the eruption.
One can evaluate the catastrophic effect of the 1259 event in the power of the spewing of sulphuric acid into the atmosphere in comparison with the eruption of the Tambora volcano (1815), the total aerosol discharge of which into the stratosphere was then in the estimates of Rampino and others on the order of 200 megatons. [Rampino M.R., Self S., Stothers R.B. Volcanic winters.- Annual Review of Earth and Planetary Sciences. Lett., 16, 1988, p.73-99.]. The works [Raynaud D. The total gas content in polar ice core. - The climatic record in polar ice. Cambridge, 1983, p.79-82.; and Gerlach T.M., Graeber E.J. Volatile budget of Kilauea volcano. - Nature, v. 313, N6000, 1985, p.273-277] estimate the discharge into the stratosphere of aerosol sulphuric acid as a result of an eruption of the Toba volcano (nearly 75,000 years ago) to be from 9?10^14 to 5x10^15 grams, at that time as a total aerosol discharge, and according to Rampino for this eruption - from 1,000 megatons and higher. From this it follows (with an assumption of an equivalent proportion of the components of the discharge for Toba and the event of 1259), that in 1259 from 3.6?10^14 to 2x10^15 grams were discharged, that is, on the order of 1,000 megatons of aerosol, which contained not less than 100 million tons of sulphuric acid. Plainly speaking, so much sulphuric acid came out in 1260 that a little would show up even now.
Such an abrupt impact on the environment was not able to occur without very serious damage for the flora and fauna.
The fact that nowhere are there any records about a specific, gigantic eruption of a volcano (and it clearly should have taken place in the inhabited part of the Ecumene), speaks of the fact that this had to be NOT a volcanic, but an extraterrial event, that is, a catastrophe caused by an extraterrestrial source.

From the end of the 14th century a natural climatic fall of temperature actually began in Europe - as an undulating attenuation of a cataclysm, which was expressed in two minima - the Maunder, and afterwards also the Sporer. In the 14th century, seafaring in the Atlantic practically ceased due to constant storms. From that same time, people began to build levees and dams - as in Moscow, so it was in Holland. The tides in the enclosed Adriatic Sea were an order stronger than now. Traces of the so-called "Dunkirk Transgressions" are well preserved to this time in northern Germany - covered with the sand and silt of the woods and countryside. There is no Aral Sea on the maps of the 14th-17th centuries - it is simply an arm of the Caspian, which because of this is oriented length-wise not from the south to the north, but from the west to the east. (According to the information of the geographer A.V. Shnitnikov, the Caspian Transgression fits exactly at the 13-15th centuries.) And what is more, a huge lake existed at the location of the Baraba Steppe, and the present Karakum and Kyzylkum deserts were densely populated.

All of this may be explained by the consequences of the Earth's relaxation after an impulse excitation from the outside. The migration of rats and the spreading of the plague in the 14th century may be looked at as a direct consequence of the cataclysm. And not only one disease - the common plague, but also the bubonic plague, and tuberculosis, and scurvy and so on. The "Time of the Plague" - as a generalized description - ended in the middle of the 15th century.
In this connection, the designation itself of the Middle Ages is typical too in 15-16th century sources.
The Latin expression "media tempestas" (1469) is recorded for the first time, where the word "tempestas" means not simply time, but "a time of tempest, a time of cataclysms," (compare, for example, the English tempest - "storm"), that is, it communicates a clearly negative characterization of the events of this temporary interval. Later the formulation "media antiquitas" (1494) appears, that is, "middle antiquity, that is, an interval approximately from the middle 13th century through the middle 15th century is considered as the time of the "middle antiquity." Later the expressions "media tempus" and "medium aetas" (1531), that is, simply, "a middle time, a middle epoch," were noted. And in 1596 alone - "saeculum medium," simultaneously with "medium aevum" - as early as after the fact that the word saeculum "vek" was associated with the notion "century." However, the expression "middle ages" finally took on the modern meaning only at the end of the 17th century.

It also relates to the notion of antiquity. The word antique was noted in the French language in the 13th century. It is thought that it was made from the Latin antiquus. But in Latin, "antequos" means "until some kind of events." Until just which events? The Italian word antico came into use in the second half of the 15th century. And here is what Vasari (1511-1574), the greatest art historian and critic of the 16th century, who introduced in turn the term "Gothic" writes: "This style was invented by the Goths, because after that, as the ancient buildings were DESTROYED and wars ruined the architects, the SURVIVORS began to build in this style, raising vaultings on lancet arches and filling all Italy with the Devil knows what kind of structures."
 
A catastrophe caused by an observed extraterrestrial source, was unable not to leave traces too in the mentality of mankind. An earthquake or flood does not give directly grounds for connecting such natural cataclysms with "divine punishment" - for this a visual observation of cosmic and atmospheric phenomena is needed - that is, a sign. In which connection, the sign is perfectly unordinary: It is not lightning, the northern lights, solar and lunar eclipses which are observed not infrequently and do not bear perceptible harm. Comets and huge meteors come much closer to this role if their debris reaches Earth.
In particular, danger which occurs from the sky is the strongest religious motivation. In this connection a phenomenal occurrence of a prophecy is typical. If, let us say, the catastrophe was connected with the disintegration of a comet passing close by, then it was supposed to occur in not fewer than two phases, and this explains a lot: those who have survived a catastrophe and connected the appearance of a comet with it have told their children and grandchildren about it. One need not be a genius to grasp that a comet that is going behind the sun, which unfurls a tail sideways, opposite the start, has promised in so many words to return. But when it returned, there were no such catastrophic events as there had been the first time, although the sky grew red and once again a torrent of stone fell and so on. Therefore, the descendants decided that the fears of the ancestors were too exaggerated, and at the same time they simply put some prophets to death ("witch-hunts" and the like.)

When the witnesses to the catastrophe died out, the opinions of the descendants were divided: some considered that the coming of the Messiah had taken place, and they became Christians, others decided that the scale of the catastrophe was not that and they still had to await the Messiah - as the Orthodox Jews were educated. A third, the least literate, decided in general to do away with prophecy: they declared that the last of the prophets - Mohammed - will remain the last forever. But even subsequent generations continued to break off relations: Moslems split into Sunni and Shiite exactly on the grounds of prophecy, and part of the Christians preferred to have a permanently acting prophet in the person of the Roman Pope.
 The most paradoxical is that the "ancient Jews" were split last - in the 18th century the Hasidic movement arose, again on the grounds of the recognition of Saddic prophets! Such a model of development of present monotheism seems by no means groundless.
Purgatory is another religious notion, whose origin one may connect directly with catastrophe. The origin of the notions of "paradise" and "hell," as interconnected alternatives in the idea of what happens at the end of life, is fully natural. And here "Purgatory" is the idea of a procedure, with the aid of which the Supreme Being divides the "pure" and the "impure": he who has endured trial - they are the pure, those who have been lost were the impure, and for that they are punished. The traditional historiography says that the idea of "Purgatory" was born in the 3rd century: (Jacques Le Goff. The birth of Purgatory. The University of Chicago Press. Chicago, USA. 1984) in the works of Clement, Origen and Cyrprian. Saint Augustine (4th century) in the treatise "The City of God" uses the term "poenae purgatoriae" for the first time, from which also arose Purgatory.
However, after this - all the way up to the 12th (!) century - the topic of Purgatory disappears from the sources. in order to reappear for violent discussion by the "fathers of the church," a list of whom is extremely impressive and includes Albert the Great, Bonaventure and Thomas Aquinas. It is thought that the canonization of Purgatory occurred in 1274 at the Council of Lyons. (At the same time the Pope supposedly in fact recognized Purgatory as a canon as early as 1254 in his own correspondence.) The apogee of the development of the purgatory topic is Dante's "Divine Comedy." However, the doctrine of Purgatory was introduced only in 1439 (!) and was confirmed in 1562, inasmuch as Martin Luther resumed the polemics about Purgatory at the start of the 16th century. (At the same time, the Russian Orthodox Church never recognized the existence of Purgatory!)
It also is significant that at the turn of the 12th - 13th centuries, in a sense a "French Jesus" appears on the historical scene - Francis of Assisi (Latin Franciscus Assisiensis, traditionally 1181/1182 - 1226), the founder of an order of "destitute" monks - the Franciscans, an advocate of the ideals of the "early faith." The most zealous guardians of the teaching of Francis of Assisi are the so-called "Spirituals," that is, "non-money grubbers," who are called upon to feed on only the "Holy Spirit."
 The "Joachimites" - the followers of another teacher - Joachim of Floris (1132-1202) - also spread the "heresy" of the French Jesus. He advanced the following ideas:
1) The TRINITY as the triune of freedom, love and peace;
2) CHILIASM (from the Greek "chilia" = thousand, and not from the Latin mille!), that is the future coming of the "thousand-year" era of the "Holy Spirit." (Where a certain MILLENIUM appears for the first time as a measurement which extended traditional history, "chiliasm" itself later was ascribed to those 1,000 years backwards and was condemned as heresy!)
The economic "foundation of freedoms," in French Franchise Assise, fully was able afterwards to be transformed into the "father of the Roman Catholic Church," Francis of Assisi, whom they called an Umbrian monk from the town of Assisi (or this town was named after him later on), canonized and raised in honor of him a memorial complex (traditionally in 1228), however, the biography of Saint Francis was composed by the general of the Franciscan Order, Fra Bonaventure only in 1290, when the social movement of the "destitute monks" already had been placed under firm control!
The movement for the purity of the "early faith" reached its apogee in 1251 with the publication of a book by Gerard of Borgo-San-Donino with the title "Evangelium Aeternum." According to the calculations of the Joachimites, Franciscans and Spiritualists, the fateful 1260 was supposed to arrive soon. Somewhat later the works of Peter John Olivi (1248-1298) appeared, who understood the history of Christianity thus: on the 13th day, the child Jesus was shown to the three wise men, in the 13th year he left his mother and appeared in the temple, and in the 13th saeculum (cycle, generation, epoch) after the death of Christ, Francis, who established an "Evangelical order" was sanctified.
 
In parallel with this, repressive structures arise which are created by the advocates of a strict hierarchical church authority. The fathers of the Roman Catholic Church, Albert the Great (1206-1280) and Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274) become the ideologues of this trend, which prevailed in the second half of the 13th century.
Let us enumerate some other events which are ascribed to the 13th century according to the traditional historiography. In Western Europe they smash the Cathars, who were damned in 1215: in 1216, the order of militant "God's Dogs" - the Dominicans - is created for the struggle with the "heretics" (the aforementioned Albert and Thomas have left the bosom of this order.) The church's hirelings cruelly punish free peasants who do not wish to pay tribute to the clergy (for example, the Steding slaughter of 1234.) In response, in 1260 the militant "Apostolic Brethren" headed by Gherardo Segarelli appears which speaks out against the church's authority. In Paris, Siger of Brabant preaches the teachings of Ibn-Rushd (Averroes), generally denying God as Creator (he was killed as a heretic in 1284.)
In 1261, the "Latin Empire" fell, and in the same year Prince Daniel is born, starting from whom Moscow started to rise in Rus. In that same interval, the "first parliament" (1258-1264) appeared in England.
 
Before the middle of the century, the Jews who had appeared on the islands in approximately 1210, enjoyed the patronage of the king, which is why practically all England was in hock to them by the middle of the century, but in 1290, they banish them completely from the islands. for 350 years!
 
In Northwestern Europe the "new" Hanseatic League of self-governing cities is formed (finally formed in 1370.)
In the south in Egypt, the Mamelukes came to power, the "Reconquista" were victorious in the Pyrenees, and the Arabs left Europe (except Granada).
In the East, with the death of the "heathen Khans" Batu and Mongke, a struggle begins in the Horde for church influence on the military leadership, which ends with the introduction by Uzbek of Islam in 1317, after which the Horde began to fall apart and underwent other fundamental changes.
It is obvious that everywhere a change of ideologies is occurring. Religious monotheistic structures assume real power. For example, Pope Boniface VII (1235-1303, ruled from 1294) at first used to the maximum the Franciscan movement, and afterwards destroyed their ideologists: in particular, Segarelli was burned at the stake in 1300 - exactly, as the Roman Catholic Church historians write, in the first "jubilee" year declared in history by this same Boniface. (Let us note that "1300 A.D." is an elapsed 13 hundred years, that is, their number is not too precisely equal, and especially, is not "apostolic." Further below, dates from the "birth of Christ" are cited inside quotation marks," except for dates in references.)

All these events have some central temporal point, a turning point - all that same year "1260." Despite the fact that traditional dating of these events was established much later than the 1260 catastrophe, the coming into being of dating was vastly drawn out in time, and the change of the nature of the events described BEFORE and AFTER the catastrophe cannot fully conceal the fact itself of the catastrophe.
"1260" is a key year which, per se, can be the start of counting the modern chronology. According to Joachim of Floris, exactly 12 saeculi = indicta = generations, that is 15x12 = 180 years from the ascension of Christ were supposed to pass and the 13th started, that is, the first in the coming thousand-year reign (era) of the Holy Spirit, universal freedom, peace and love. (At the same time, the "Passion" relates to the end of the "11th" century.) Moreover, in "1260" the third era-wave-"chilia" was supposed to set in, inasmuch as the first two were characterized according to Joachim of Floris as the "Era of the Father" and the "Era of the Son." In other words, before "1260," conceivable history had been continuing only 24 (= 2x12) generations, that is, 360 years from the start of the "first wave" - approximately from "900."
 
As an illustration of the defined chronological gap of 100-150 years after the catastrophe of the 13th century in the geographic and demographic plan (in the "Time of the Plague"), we shall examine the appearance in the sources in the French language of references about people who lived up to the present (according to "Le Petit Robert.") It is extremely noteworthy. For example, at the 1080 level, when the French traditionally had become aware of themselves as French (Français, see that Gallic they became much later: Gallican - 1355, Gaulois - since the 15th c.), are referenced: Allemand, Flamand, Normand, Danois (the Danes), Saisne (Saxons), Romain (Romans), Arabe, Judeu, Sarassin, Pers(ien), Espan (now - Espagnol, and at that Hispanique is only since 1525). The "Easterners" are Levant (but Levantine is only from 1575, and Arameen is only since 1765!) Further: Hebreu - 1119. Anglais, Maure (Mor), Dalmatique - 12th century. Grec - 1165, Latin - 1160. Bourguignon is the end of the 12th century. Roman(s) = a common language - 1135. Mamelukes: mamelos - 1192 (but mameluk is 1611, the modern mamelouk is 1808.)
The Bolgars also are mentioned in the 12th century. - as the Bogre (1172, Bougre is 1450, Bulgare is from 1732!) And the inhabitants of Crete are the Cretoise (1165). At the beginning of the 13th century - Egyptien (in which connection, this word is also used in the designation of Gypsies) and the Venetien are the Venetians. In the 13th century, the Druide (they will call them Celts much later), Brabançon, Macedonien and Tartarin appear. And right here the word "antique" - "ancient" also appears. Then there is Italien (1265), Assyrien and Indien (1284). The Albigensians-Albigeois and the Dutch-Hollandais are known from the 13th century (but at the same time, the word Hollande is only from 1598, and the "ancient" Batavi are from 1740!) In 1300, the Turks are mentioned for the first time - Turc. And here for the first time the Phoenicians also are noted: as Punicians (Punique, as Phenicien is only in 1557!) The Scots (Ecossaise) are in the 14th century. (1350).
 
Further, after a large gap: the Goths are Gothique - 1440, the Serbs in the form Serve - 1441 (in the 16th century - Servien, now - Serbe.) The Catalans (Catalan) - 1452. The Hungarians: Hongre - 15th century, Hongrois - 1470. Inhabitants of the modern Czech Republic, earlier Bohemia are Bohemien and Morocco (Maroquin) - in 1490. Here too is Suisse (the Swiss, in which connection the "ancient Helvets" - Helvetique - is only in 1636!) The main mass of medieval peoples are in the 16th century: Basque, Portuguese (the Portugese) - in 1500 (in which connection, the more "ancient" Lusitanians-Lusitanien are only in 1584!) The Austrians (Autriche) in 1515. The Castillians (Castillan) in 1517, the Frisians (Frise) in 1520, the ancient Belgie-Belgians - in 1528. Etruscans in 1534(!) "The Lithuanians are Lithuanien" (that is the Russians of that time) together with the Prussians (Prussien) and the Georgians (Georgien) - in 1540. Napolitain is 1549, Sicilien is 1550. Ib'ere is in 1552, at first in reference only to the aboriginals of the Caucuses and North Africa. At the same time, the Armenians are Armenien (one of the peoples who are considered the most ancient!) only in 1575. The Genoese (Genois) are in 1567. The inhabitants of Slavonia are Slavon - 1575, and the Savoy are Savoyard - in 1580. (It is interesting that in particular at this time the word which designates both the notion "Slavs" and the notion "slave" - Slave - 1575 is noted in the form Sclave - 1573. That is, slavery as a concept, from the point of view of the French - this is in the 16th century!)

In the second half of the 16th century the rest of the northern and eastern community also appear: Czechs-Bohemien (1558), Irish - Irlandaise (1567), Norwegians-Norvegien, Chinese- Chinoise (1575), Japanese-Japonaise, Swedes-Suedois, Muscovites-Moscovite (Russian - Russe only in 1715! At the same time the Scyths-Scyhien - 1580, in the form scytic - somewhat earlier in the same century), Poles-Polonais - 1588. At the same time Hellenes and Chaldeans came to light (1580).
Somewhat later the Sardinians-Sarde - 1606, the Albanians-Albanais - 1612 and the Uzbeks in the form Usbeke - 1613, Uzbec is from 1765, and now Ouzbek. In the middle of the 17th century - Croatians-Croate. Algerien - 1677, inhabitants of Siam (Thailand) - Saimois - 1686. Ethiopians - Abyssin - 1704 (although the word abysse "chasm" is from 1080). The Congolese-Congolais in the form Congois - 1721, the Ukrainians-Ukrainien - 1731, the Czechs in the form Czekhes - 1762 (Tcheque - 1842), Finns- Finnois - 1772, Koreans-Coreen - 1797. Estonians-Estonien - in 1819, Slovenes-Slovene - 1825, Rumanians- Roumain - 1836, Slovaks-Slovaque - 1841, Latvians-Letton - 1845.

It is typical that the affiliation of peoples with parts of the world in the modern meaning (besides Australia) is noted in the 16th century: Asiatique, African, Americain - 1556, Europeen - 1563.
The vanished 100 years from the point of view of the appearance of new references is clearly striking: from the middle of the 14th through the middle of the 15th century. If the reference itself of the Scots is considered an isolated point (having in mind a possible delay with their reference relative to the English), then two groups are formed: those mentioned through the 13th century inclusive (ending with the Turks) and the rest, mention of whom appears from the middle of the 15th century. And it is significant that the mention of some "predecessors" of today's peoples appears later than the mention of them themselves - the Batavi, the Frisians, Helvets, Etruscans, Phoenicians, Aramites and so on.
 
Now about the religious and monotheistic component. The word "catholique" is noted for the first time in the 13th century in the form "chatoliche"! It really had to be used in order to reflect the Greek "katholikos." And the word "orthodoxe" - in 1431. And this is similar to the truth - it is the time of the Ferrara Council. It is funny, however, that "chatoliche" has something suspiciously in common too with château (castle), 1175 (from castels 1080), that is "one sitting in a castle"or in a tent, that is châtelain, 1190 - "castellan" - a stock keeper who controls property. The Polish name of a Catholic temple also is typical - kosciol, that is, the same as "castle-castel."
And with which "non-believers", infidels, did the French crusaders fight? They did not know the word "mosque" (musquette, from the Arabic Masdjid, that is, a place for prayer) before 1351 (today's mosque'e generally is from 1553). It is typical that in the Rumanian language "mecet" not only is in essence a mosque, but even a Turkish cemetery and a spiritual consistory (!) in general, that is, an administrative and housekeeping service in the institution of any Christian Church. They did not note minarets (minaret) until 1606, muezzins - in the form maizin - until 1568 (today's muezzin is from 1823). Imam (in the form iman) is from 1559. And even the notion itself of a "Musulman" appeared with the French only in the 16th century (from the Arabic "muslim" = true believer, fidel).

It already has been said that the word "Saracen" (sarrasin) was noted in the French language simultaneously with the word "synagogue" (1080), although, according to traditional history, these same Saracen-Moslems (!) intruded on the territory of France as early as the 8th century. At the same time, this word from the Arabic is "charqiyin," that is, literally: "eastern". that is, Saracens are EASTERN people with regard to the Arabs themselves!
 
Now we turn to how the presently adopted dating was formed. Here is a fragment of history of the papacy (S. Lozinskiy): "Owing to internal dissensions, Rome from the end of the 9th century went through a time of severe crisis, during which the papal crown went from one pope to another, depending on who was the stronger. In "877," Pope John (VIII, traditionally pontiff in "872-882") was even in the prison of one of the feudal rulers, and after his freedom he left Rome and tried to convoke a council in France for the punishment of his "oppressors." It did not happen: The pope wrote "we expected. the light, but received the darkness." This John, according to a chronicler from Fulda, became a victim of his own personal policy: they gave him poison, and since he didn't die right away, the blow of a hammer on the skull put an end to his mortal existence. That was the first in a long line of murderous events in the middle ages of "God's deputy on earth."
We note that during this time, there is not in a single source any mention about the start of a new "Great Indiction," according to which the Roman Catholic Church now lives and which was supposed to begin exactly in "877" - if they had known by that time that the preceding, "Constantinian," had begun in "345." But they clearly still didn't know this then. But you see, this is the basis of the calculation of the Easters!
 
The further history of the papacy with its depravity and murders by no means reflects neither the earnest piety ahead of the future, it would seem, great holiday - the "millennium" (that is, the 1,000 years from the birth of Christ), nor the awe of the coming of a new "thousand years of Christ" - all the way to the selfless devotion of the hermit Pietro Damiani ("1007-1072") and the Pope-Reformer Gregory (VII, Hildebrand, traditionally pontiff in "1073-1095). But the distain for the "millennium" is typical not only for the Roman Catholic Church: the "newly converted" Kievan Rus (traditionally, Christian from "988") also in no way celebrates this event.
Here is a characteristic example. A Papal Bull dated by historians and archivists from 1002 after the birth of Christ is considered the oldest original document of the richest archive of the city of Dubrovnik (Croatia). However, the year after the birth of Christ in the text of the Bull is not entered - there is only "indictum." In that way, the direct dating of the Bull is absent, inasmuch as the indicta are repeated every 15 years, and the Bulls, which traditionally relate to the 11-13th centuries, are dated in accordance with the Popes of Rome. And, for example, the referenced Bull is date according to Pope Benedict VIII. But the point is, that there is no number "VIII" in any form in the text of the Bull - there is just some kind of pontiff Benedict, and the circumstantial dating "according to the Popes" was done much later than the writing of the Bull itself. If one is to date the Bull according to material in comparison, let us say, with materials on which are written papal documents of the start of the 15th century which are found in that same archive, then the Bull can relate successfully not to the time of Benedict "VIII," but to the time of Benedict "XIII." (True, in 1409 this Benedict was deposed at the council in Pisa, but the deposed "antipope" resisted for yet a long time, until they finally dismissed him in 1417 - at the council in Constance.)
And the English churchmen already are using the "Dionysius tables" and the first date after the birth of Christ in England appears right at "675"! And the chronicler, the Venerable Bede, in "731" already is using dating from the birth of Christ, and the fist document of the papal chancellery with dating from the birth of Christ appears only in "1431"! Thus it turns out that the English are more pious than all the Roman popes in 700 years combined.
 
 It is thought that the first official document in France with dating from the birth of Christ appeared in "742." But from the end of the 9th century until the second half of the 11th, there were no such documents anywhere! And no kind of millennium is noted besides. They begin to compile lists of the kings and registers of popes only in the 14th century. The numbering which appeared at the same time of those of the same name often is confusing - look at one story alone of "Pope Joan" (supposedly a former pontiff either in the middle of the 9th or at the start of the 11th century), who emerged, as is thought, in the middle of the 13th century: this pope herself was still happily counted among the popes in the lists of the 16th century too, until in the 17th century the humanists forced the Roman Catholic Church to remove this shameful page from their and in any case sham history.
At the same time, no one had yet mentioned this female pope in the 10th-12th centuries. However, according to the traditional history, in the first half of the 10th century a certain "Marusia" ran the affairs of the Roman Catholic Church - Morozia Theophylact, who lived with Pope Sergius and gave birth not only to the future Pope John (XI) from him, but also Alberic, the son of whom, that is, Marozia's grandson, was named. Octavian, and he afterwards is also a pope, John (XII). This isn't just a joke - it is simply an adventurous romance: that is, literally, "Roman history."
 
The hijra era of the Moslems, as is thought, was introduced during the time of the Caliph Omar near the middle of the 6th century. In the 20th century they suddenly discovered an Egyptian papyrus with dating of the 22nd year of hijra ("644/645" A.D.) and an epitaph with the date of the 31st year of hijra ("652/653" A.D.) That is, the datings preserved according to the hijra are earlier than the datings according to the birth of Christ! At the same time, the written fixation of the first suras of the Koran is the start of the 14th century (according to N. Morozov - in "1318." According to an assumption of V. Polyakovskiy - in "1321," during the coordination of the calendars, inasmuch as the start of the lunar and solar calendars practically coincided in this year in particular.)
Leonard da Vinci directly writes in his diary at the start of the 16th century that Mohammed prayed. to Jupiter, that is, at first he was a heathen. Then, according to the chronicle of Giovanni Villani, published in that same 16th century, Mohammed sides with one of the Christian sects and only later with the aid of a certain apostate monk, Sergius Georgius, organized his own spiritual pursuit. The historian Mikhalon Litvin writes approximately the same thing in the 16th century.
And in the Koran there is a direct reference to the Gospel (Sura 57:27): "Then We sent other messengers to follow in their footsteps; and We sent Jesus, son of Mary, and GAVE HIM The GOSPEL; and We filled the hearts of his adherents with kindness and compassion. But MONASTICIM THEY PRACTISED." In other words, the apostles (= those who followed Him) are noted in the Koran, but their "Acts" are not. There are fragments of the Protogospels and the Apocrypha, but not of the canonical Gospels.
According to traditional history, the monastic orders arose not earlier than the turn of the 11-12th centuries. (the St. John, Cistercians, Templar, etc.)
 All the history of the Benedictines, the order of which is considered in existence since the 5th century, is imaginary, the order's structure was defined only in "1128.") Per se, until the 12th century there was not even a notion of "order" as a structure. (The word "order" itself designates "sequence," just as does the word "horde." It is not an unorganized crowd.)
Further, in that same Sura of the Koran: "We ordained it not for them - We ordained only seeking Allah's accord, though they did not foster it as they should have." What does it mean here? The quoted sura of the Koran is called the "iron." The only monastic order which was destroyed officially before the middle of the 14th century  is the order of the Knights Templar (that is, the keepers of the Temple) in "1312" (in fact - in "1307"): for refusing to submit both to the kings and to the Pope of Rome. Namely, all metallurgical and weapons production was under the control of the richest order of the Knights Templar (according to the official version founded in "1118"), which had a branch ("brotherhood") around all of the Ecumene. The Temple of Solomon, alongside of which was situated the headquarters of the Knights Templar - is today the Mosque of Omar. The very same during the time of which, as is thought traditionally, the hijra was introduced.

We see that immediately after the destruction of the Knights Templar in the "14th" century in the traditional historiography there follows also the appearance of the Islamic Vulgate (the prototype of the Koran) in the time of Sultan Osman, and the acceptance of Islam in the Horde in the time of Khan Uzbek ("1317".) And immediately after this follows the "Avignon Captivity of the Popes" ("1309-1377") with all the popes and antipopes, a multi-papacy muddle - all the way until the real appearance of the papal chair in Rome in "1377," not at the Vatican, as it still didn't exist, but at Lateran! (By the way, Petrarch openly called this captivity not "Avignonian," but Babylonian.) Pope Pius (the Second) called himself Roman Pope N 9 - and he was right...
A universal struggle for power with strong religious overtones breaks out also at the same time - here too is the destruction of the Capetians, and the coming to power of the Osmans in Turkey, and the insurrection of the Zealots in Greece, and the Hundred Years War, and the insurrection of Wat Tyler in England and the "Ciompi" in Italy, and battles at Kulikovo and Kosovo Fields and so on. And all this occurs against a background of that very universal plague. Naturally, in such conditions the acceptance of a single open-ended chronological scale and the coordination of calendars in the 14th century was difficult.
In this connection, the legendary story is curious of "Cola di Reinzo" - Nicola di Lorenzo, who at first opposed one of the popes and led an uprising of the "popoplano" - in "1347," that is, at the height of the Plague (!), and then on behalf of another pope, in "1354," they welcomed him to Rome as a victor and there and then. they put him to death. We note that "Nikolai" is Greek, and is a "victor of the peoples," so it is possible the legendary "Nicolaites," who are denounced in the Gospel, are in actual fact followers of "the popular tribune Nicola". And we shall add that Petrarch in his own sonnets numbers 3 and 78 speaks about 6 April "1327" as the date of the Crucifixion.
It is significant, one and the same interval of time - 430 years - is indicated in the Old Testament as a time of the "Egyptian captivity" before the Exodus of Moses (Exodus 12.36) and in the New Testament (Galatians 2.12) - as the time from the Exodus of Moses to Christ. It is not inconceivable that between Moses and the Christ-Messiah there was no particular difference, and the figure cited simply reflects the continuance of history, which really is known by the middle of the "14th" century. In the Koran it speaks about the fact that Jesus on his mother's side was the nephew of her brothers Moses and Aaron, that is, one generation separated them. And they called Moses' father-in-law, a priest of the "Midianites," that is of the "inlanders," Jethro (Exodus 3.2), that is in Greek "God bearer." Approximately at this time the demarcation of the recognized and unrecognized "coming of the Messiah" begins.

And only approximately by "1430" does a series of events occur which consolidate society. Firstly, the rights of the popes were limited by the council after the stormy administration of John XXIII ("1410-1415"), true, since "1958," the Roman Catholic Church no longer considers him a pope.
Secondly, the Roman Catholic Church made short work of the "Hussite Heresy" (we note that now the Russian Orthodox Church no longer finds any ideological differences between the Protestant teachings of Huss and Orthodoxy.)
Thirdly, Sultan Mehmet (I, Mohammed), finally was through with his rival brother Musa (Moses, "1413"), by which in fact the construction of the Osman empire was begun.
In China the great and powerful emperor Zhu Di, who had destroyed the authority of the "Mongols" and who gathered for his coronation, according to the Chinese chronicles, all who had earned his attention (from the Persian shah to the Eskimos). besides the remote kings of England, France Spain and Portugal, the Roman pope and the Byzantine emperor, was crowned.
Subsequently, no less impressive meetings of the world's strong took place: On the one hand, in the East of Europe - in Trakai, on the jubilee of Vytautas-Alexander, on the other hand, in the West - at the wedding of Philippe Le Bon and Isabella de Portugal, where the founding of the Order of the Golden Fleece was announced (on the pluvial of the order were embroidered the portraits of all of its cavaliers - sovereigns from Japan to Gibraltar.)
The apogee of the temporal consolidation is the Ferraro-Florentine ecumenical negotiations (from "1431") and the creation of the union ("1439.")
 In the West, this became the real basis for the production of a single open-ended method of counting the years and the beginning of the expression of a traditional history. Only at this time did the Latin notion of Anno Domini finally absorb into itself the idea of chiliasm. And instead of "from the coming of the Lord's thousand-year era" there appeared "the year from the incarnation of the Lord a thousand. such-and-such." Thus the idea of chiliasm gave birth to more than a thousand year space for the writing of history.
Here is what Bernard Guenee writes, referring to the works of Jean Mielot (Jean Mielot, ibid., pages 369-370): "In 1409 at the end of the 'Golden Legend,' which he had completed several years earlier, Nicola de Custura, a canon in Senlis, outlined in Latin on the reverse side of a sheet 3 decades of chronological inscriptions, to which, very likely, for him all world history had been reduced. At that same moment, Thomas Marest, a former student of a Paris university. cites the continuance of some time segments which mark the history of the world from its creation to the birth of Christ. This somewhat chronological data show how the knowledge of the clerics who were somewhat interested in history, was restricted.

In the Orient, the lunar calendar remained popular, in which Mohammed's flight from Mecca to Medina was adopted for the counting point - the same as the Old Testament exodus of the "true believers."
There simply was no term "Julian calendar" before the 16th century. The "Byzantine" accounting, as also other attempts at a method of counting the years "from the Creation" continued to compete with the "new eras" (from the birth of Christ and hijra): the "Byzantine" accounting lasted in Russia until "1700"), the "Usher" Judaic calendar existed in England along with the Christian until the middle of the 18th century. The concordance of the "Byzantine" accounting with the Christian calendar (which Kepler in "1601" still called the "era of Dionysius"!) happened even later than the Gregorian reform - approximately by "1620," inasmuch as only then was the present difference of the years from the Creation until the birth of Christ adopted - 5,508 years, and not 5,500 as it was before this.
The unified "Julian cycle", proposed by Joseph Scaliger and named by him in honor of his own father (Julius Caesar Bordoni, the founder of classicism) represents the product of the duration of the lunar cycle (19 years), times the duration of the solar cycle (28 years) and times the length of the indictum (15 years) 7,980 = 19?28?15 years. This cycle begins 706 years before the Creation, and even now has not ended. But this artificial technique has allowed the expression of the traditional chronology's framework by means of a compromise between the interests of the church and secular authority which were struggling for supremacy as early as the whole 17th century.
The restoration of real events earlier than the "17th" century and the extension of a continuous chronology represents deep down an extremely not-simple problem. But a partial reconstruction, nevertheless, seems possible if the catastrophic year of "1260" is taken as a reference point.
The 12 cycles-generations-indicta, counting backwards from it, give the "time of the Lord's Passion" "1260" is 12x15 = 1,260 - 180 = "1080." However one counts the "birth of Christ" from here, it would not fit either at "0," or at the year "1000," because there still is neither a "first millennium" nor documents with dates "from the birth of Christ" around this point UNTIL the assumed birth of the prototype of the Savior near the real year "1050," and the imaginary documents with the earlier datings "from the birth of Christ" are absent more than 100 years before this.

Now is the very time to recall "Zhabinskiy's sine curve." Aleksandr M. Zhabinskiy ("Another History of Art, Moscow, Veche, 2001) has shown convincingly that graphic art was developed continuously from the "9th" through the "17th" centuries, with a single glitch - right in the "13th" century, and "ancient" art is the result of an imaginary chronological reflection of the middle ages in the past. The "starting" level of this "sine curve" is exactly the traditional "9th" century. The extent of the fundamental ascending half period of the "sine curve" is from the "9th" through the "17th" centuries. According to the "Byzantine" sharp curve, the "sine waves" of the "9th-11th" centuries duplicate exactly the real "13th-15th" centuries (the remaining offshoots - the "Egyptian," "Roman," Indochinese," "Ancient Babylonian" - are derived from these two key positions.) In other words, all "ancient" history of our civilization, which is reflected in graphic art, numbers only 300-400 years to the middle of the traditional "13th" century.
The history of the written language also is confined to this same period: according to the equation of civilization's pace: hieroglyphic writing is the turn of the "9th-10th" centuries (according to the interval of a civilized event - the year "900" ± 100 years), writing in letters - the end of the "11th" century (according to the interval of a civilized event - the year "1080" ± 80 years.) In other words, there simply were no written sources of OUR civilization earlier than the "9th" century.
In the real history of our man-caused civilization (the Technogenesis epoch) two stages, in the first approach, can be examined: The "pre-catastrophic" approximately from the traditional "9th" century through the middle of the traditional "12th" century, and the "post-catastrophic" - from the second half of the traditional "12th" century and up to the present time.
Thus, below the "12th" century it simply is not suitable to talk about a Technogenesis epoch. Any civilization before this could only be "naturally economic." Essentially, we even see this in the example of the aboriginals of South America, Africa, Australia, Oceania and the Far North.
One may conceivably connect the turn of the "9th" century with the "Dardanelles flood," that is the bursting of the Dardanelles strait and the flooding of the Sea of Marmora and the Black Sea. This correlates with the conclusions of the work of the hydrobiologist, V.V. Polishchuk, regarding the changes of the flora and fauna and the deposits of the Black Sea. On the basis of the analysis of a sharp change of the nature of the sedimentary deposits, Polishchuk concluded that the level of the Black Sea before this catastrophic wave was approximately 12 meters lower than now, then the water rose by 80 - 100 meters and stayed thus for approximately 20 years, after which the level of the water began to do down to the modern level. In accordance with the traditional chronology, this event was dated as the 8-7th centuries B.C. (V.V. Polishchuk. On the Significant Late Holocene Rise of the Level of the Black Sea and the Origin of Northern Elements in its Fauna. Hydrobiologic Magazine. Volume XX, No. 4, 1984; V. V. Polishchuk. On the Boreal Elements of the Fauna of the Black Sea Basin. Hydrobiologic Magazine. Volume 14, No. 4, 1978). Some archaeological data also support this hypothesis (M.I. Artamonov. The Role of Climatic Changes of the 8th-7th Centuries B.C. in the Transmigration of Cimmerites and Scyths to Asia and their Return to the Steppe of Eastern Europe in the 6th Century B.C., in the book: "Ethnography of the Peoples of the USSR. Leningrad, Science, 1971, pages 45-60).) Datings in these works are naturally traditional and not absolute. Taking into consideration "Zhabinskiy's sine curve," according to which the "8th" century = the "11th" century, and the "7th" century = the "10th" century, the Dardanelles Flood can be ascribed to the "9th" century.
The proposed concept allows a somewhat different interpretation also of the results of the mathematical and statistical work of Anatoliy T. Fomenko, leading to the construction by him of the "Global Chronological Chart." Tradition history according to Fomenko up to the "13th" century is composed of a combination of six main elements, which are duplicated with shifts of 330 - 360, 1,000 - 1,050 and 1,750 - 1,800 years. One of the main elements of the Global Chronological Map (T) in principle is distinguished from the rest by the fact that it marks the "splicing" of the others. In light of the concept being examined, this is not a wave, but a catastrophe - "1260."
All three chronological shifts discovered by Fomenko are not astrological, which confirms the conclusion made by A.B. Verevkin about the fact that "astrological" shifts do not have a real prototype. A shift by (330)-360 years reflects a real continuance of "pre-catastrophic Technogenesis"): the years "900" - "1260." A shift by 1,000-(1,050) years is a creation of a "chiliastic" concept, finally adopted in the "15th" century (the "1439 Union"). A shift by 1,750-1,800 years is the total of the chiliastic shift and the fundamental ascending half period of Zhabinskiy's "sine curve" (the "Scaliger-Petavius" scale.)
Arabic numerals and the ability for complex calculations appeared at the turn of the "12th-13th" centuries. (Fibonacci, "1180-1240".) Those very calculations of open-ended time began only after the catastrophe: not earlier than the "14th" century. There could not be any dating "from the Creation," "from the birth of Christ," or "from the hijra" before this. To go beyond the limits of the continuance of a real "pre-catastrophic" stage of the development of our civilization (approximately 360 years) with the comparison of the various undated chronicles without additional contrivances (the "chilia") was simply impossible. And this forced the chroniclers of that time to the acceptance of the chiliastic concept.
Apparently, the "Diocletian Era," fortified by the change of ideology from pagan to monotheistic, became the first attempt for the creation of an open-ended design taking into consideration the added "millennium" (in the traditional history, the Diocletian/Constantine change, the real prototype of this change - is at the turn of the traditional "11-12th" centuries.) And the letter "i," which stands before the subsequent figures with the designation of the year fully could designate from the beginning the abbreviation from "initio" (that is, start), later it is an abbreviation for Jesus, and from the "16th" century - simply "1," that is, the chiliastic "thousand years."

The "third chilia is the era of the Holy Ghost," that is 12 generations from the catastrophe of "1260," terminated exactly at "1440." And the transition of Western Europe to dating from the birth of Christ with the inclusion of a millennium occurred in "1400-1440," in which connection it was caused exclusively for political reasons. This marked a new stage in the creation of a traditional chronology, which received the strongest means of asserting the ideology: its circulation in the form of printed works. The introduction of the Moslem "hijra era" occurred even later, most likely during the time of Suleiman (I, "Kanuni.")
This stage ended approximately in "1520," with the formation of the new western "catholic" empire of Charles V and with the coming to power of Suleiman (I), who united, per se, the whole eastern part of the former empire. After this, an intensive process of the formation of national states and the writing of their own history begins. This also required the creation of an open-ended universal chronological scale, which was put together by the middle of the "17th" century.

Further, the historiography has redacted all sources in accordance with the already established chronological framework. Naturally, at the same time, the historiographers both were besmirching that which did not conform, and they fabricated that which was lacking, and they repeatedly re-wrote anew that which was fabricated by the predecessors. At the same time, real events both of the "pre-catastrophic" and of the "post-catastrophic" stages either were expunged or were dispatched to the distant past. The main thing that the traditional historiography did by the "18th" century in the creation of a universal open-ended chronological scale:
1) it tried to erase the catastrophe of "1260" fully from the memory of mankind, isolating it as the "Great Plague," seeing that epidemics broke out repeatedly;
2) it concealed the lack of any kind of chronological information about our civilization until the traditional "9th" century. At the same time, the Great Flood was ascribed to very remote times and became completely legendary.
The fear of God was placed above the fear of natural phenomena. And the open-ended chronology assured both the legitimization of the powers that be as "anointed by God" and the "historical antiquity" of this very authority.
The very real consequence of the religious events of the Technogenesis epoch can look approximately thus:
1) the "pagan times" the turn of the "9th-10th centuries- the middle of the "12th century. It includes the conventional "pagan period of the Ecumenical Empire" - that is, the assimilation of the Ecumene and the establishment of relations between groups of people, who were assimilated both the same way as the adjacent territories, and the origin of the idea of "God" as the supreme judge - approximately from the middle of the "11th" century;
2)  "monotheism": after the catastrophe of "1260." This is the appearance of the "Mosesites," the "Apostolic Brethren," the "Melchites-true-believers-Orthodox" - that is, of the early Christian sects, the origin of the Moslems is the start of the "14th" century, the Roman Catholic Church is the end of the "14th" century, the struggle for the predominant religion in the Empire is conditionally to "1453," the religious demarcation and split of the Empire and the formation of "nationally religious" states is the end of the "15th" - start of the "17th" century.
At the same time, "Protestantism" is a movement against the appropriation by the clericals of the supreme authority. From this point of view, the seizure by Mehmet (II) of Tsargrad is a victory namely of "Protestantism," the Moslems at that time were an ordinary sect. Religious tolerance in the eastern part of the Empire was maintained fully until the middle of the "18th" century, despite the introduction of Shariat in "1630," but in Siberia and the Far East it is maintained to this time. It is typical that the notion of "Jew" in the New World appeared for the first time only after the purges of the Inquisition with the second wave of emigration at the end of the "16th" - start of the "17th" centuries (inasmuch as "non-Christians" did not have the right to emigrate to America as free people), and, for example, beyond the Volga - only in "1634" with the first settlers from Poland and Lithuania, that is, after the formation of the "Philaret Russian Orthodox Church" in "1627."
The catastrophe of "1260" initiated the rapid scientific and technical progress of our civilization. The maximum to which this catastrophe, having disrupted the continuous chain of civilized events, could extend in general our history is nearly 250 years in addition to the interval of approximately 7,500 years, which was cited in the previous article ("Civilizing Events"). This, by the way, coincides with the glacial data about an even earlier powerful global "acidic" catastrophe nearly 7,800 years ago.
And it is no accident that the civilized development of America, which was separated from contact with the Old World approximately for 200-250 years and "once more was opened up" to Europeans in the "15th-16th" centuries, remained, per se, agrarian. And it is no accident that Western European medieval giants of thought - the fathers of civilization of the type of Albert the Great, Bonaventure, Roger Bacon and Thomas Aquinas appear immediately after the catastrophe in the traditional history. A "New Time" in the history of civilization is coming according to the classical concepts of H. Weiss.
At the same time, a chronology (1) also is starting, according to which up to now mankind has been living.

 

New Tradition  , 2003. Toronto

Reproduced with permission from New Tradition

  THE MEDIEVAL EMPIRE OF THE ISRAELITES
(The project started on May 2003.)
 New Tradition  , 2003. Toronto

By Vladimir Ivanov

The International University. Moscow.

  The Discovery of Dante

Dante is one of the most enigmatic and mystic figures of world history and culture. Despite the fact that in the middle of the 19th century they began to call him the Central Man of the World, as early as the end of the 18th century he remained practically unknown not only to the reader at large, but even to specialists. Voltaire's skeptical exclamation in the "Philosophical Dictionary," that, per se, no one reads Dante, is well known.
At the end of the 18th century, he was considered a little known, medieval Italian poet, the author of a composition under the name of "Satire" (Filip Nereusz Golanski, "On Articulation in Poetry," 1808.)

    The "discovery" of Dante for mankind occurs only at the end of the 18^th century, in the epoch of romanticism.  And the Italian romantic poets Vittorio Alfieri, Vincenzo Monti and, especially, Ugo Foscolo discovered him. In the period of the desperate struggle for Italy's freedom, Dante became a symbol of the independence and dignity of man.