weird craziness I had never heard of

[winterbadger]

The New Chronology is a fringe theory in history, which argues that the conventional chronology is fundamentally flawed, that events attributed to antiquity such as the histories of Rome, Greece and Egypt actually occurred during the Middle Ages, more than a thousand years after the time to which they have conventionally been assigned. The central concepts of the New Chronology are derived from the ideas of Nikolai Morozov, although Jean Hardouin can be viewed as an earlier predecessor. The New Chronology is commonly associated with Anatoly Fomenko, although it is a collaboration between Fomenko and several other mathematicians.

Comments

[peaceful-fox.livejournal.com]

I only glanced over the article, which I plan to read in depth tomorrow. What I am wondering is that if this kind of "history" could be used by people spewing Intelligent Design theories to prop up their belief that the world isn't as old as we think it is?

[winterbadger]

I am sure they love it. They may have some initial heartburn over the fact that the movement seems to have been started by godless communists (or at least socialist Russians...) but I imagine they will get past that and run with it all.

[wcg.livejournal.com]

I've never heard of it either. Once again, I'm reminded of the old saying that conspiracy theories are the sophistication of the ignorant.

[winterbadger]

Indeed (I passed on your observation to The Teacher, who loved it).

When I read about the details of the more outre one, I chuckled. Soooooo Russian! The Mongols? Never existed! They were really just Russians. The Huns, Alans, Sarmatians? All Russians.

Reminds me of debate over the Varangians and the Rus. Russian historians claim that Scandinavians never travelled across Russia and never made up a guard for the emperors of Byzantium---those were all Russians. But the best theory like this is one that one of my Air Force friends told me he had encountered in trips to Russia as a translator--that the people who claim now to be Jews are not Jews at all, but debased and degraded gypsies and low-lives, impostors who have taken on the history and story of the true 12 Tribes of Israel, whose real descendents are... the Russians!

[wcg.livejournal.com]

Next we'll discover that Barack Obama is actually Russian!