ANCIENT ROMAN SALUTE is a myth. Roman Salute: Cinema, History, Ideology by Martin Winkler is debunked.
News Journalism
been published and it has already been debunked. The book is an
incomplete rehash of work published years ago by Dr. Rex Curry (author
of "Pledge of Allegiance Secrets").
http://rexcurry.net/book1a1contents-pledge.html
Also see the video documentary on Youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BssWWZ3XEe4
The author of "Roman Salute" is Martin Winkler of George Mason
University, and his work has been exposed in the past in a
professorial debate challenge (2006) by Dr. Curry.
http://rexcurry.net/pledge-professor-martin-winkler.html
The publisher of Winkler's book is Ohio State University Press
(publication expected in 2009). OSU Press would do better to publish
the work of Dr. Curry.
"Pledge of Allegiance Secrets" by Dr. Curry exposed the the modern
origin of the so-called "Roman salute" from the USA's Pledge of
Allegiance and from the military salute that was used as the first
gesture of two gestures in the pledge. Francis Bellamy (author of the
pledge) was not attempting to do a "Roman salute" nor a "stiff-arm
salute" and he never said such a thing. Bellamy did say that he was
attempting to do a military salute that was then stretched out toward
the flag. In practice, that became the stiff-arm salute because bored
children simply extended Bellamy's initial military salute outward to
point at the flag.
The raised-arm salute was used in America well before the creation of
the National Socialist German Workers Party, and before Mussolini
began his political career as a socialist journalist.
http://rexcurry.net/fascism=socialism.html
That the pledge's author (Francis Bellamy) was raised in Rome N.Y.,
contributed to the use of the term "Roman salute" in the myth. In that
sense, it WAS a "Roman" salute -from Rome, N.Y.- but not an ancient
Roman salute from Italy. see http://rexcurry.net/bookchapter1a1f.html
and http://rexcurry.net/pledgerome.html
One reason that Winkler failed to make the discoveries that were made
long ago by Dr. Curry is because Winkler writes in a manner that is
unscholarly, unprofessional, misleading and propagandistic. Winkler
writes as if he is unaware of the actual full name of the group that
called itself the "National Socialist German Workers Party." Winkler
writes as if he is unaware that the group did not use the hackneyed
shorthand terms that Winkler seems to exclusively substitute for the
actual name of the horrid group. Has Winkler ever written the actual
name of the group about which he writes? http://rexcurry.net/pledgehoratii.html
Winkler's misleading method with hackneyed shorthand terms was evident
years ago in his abstract for the American Philological Association
(APA). That piece also indicated that Winkler was unaware that the
early Pledge of Allegiace used a stiff-arm salute.
http://rexcurry.net/roman-salute-martin-winkler.html
During that time, Dr. Curry's work became known to Winkler and
worldwide showing the origin of the stiff-arm salute from the pledge
in the United States. Dr. Curry pointed out the misleading terms in
Winkler's APA piece and Winkler's apparent ignorance of the Pledge's
early stiff-arm salute, and the fact that the Pledge of Allegiance was
the origin of the mis-named "Roman salute" from the Pledge's initial
military salute. http://rexcurry.net/roman-salute-martin-winkler.html
Dr. Curry's work also appeared in a Petition for Writ of Certirorai to
the United States Supreme Court. http://rexcurry.net/pledgewonschik.pdf
and http://rexcurry.net/pledgewonschik.html
Winkler's method with misleading slang terms continued years later in
"Gladiator: Film and History." That book also had revealing omissions
by Winkler: No mention of his own earlier faulty work regarding the
"Roman Salute."
Winkler's method with misleading shorthand terms continued in a poster
for Winkler's speech that stated "The Roman Salute: Origin and Spread
of a Fascist Symbol." The poster and Winkler's use of the word
"fascist" in the speech perpetuate ignorance (or cover up?) the fact
that the straight-arm salute adopted by the National Socialist German
Workers Party originated from a National Socialist in the USA (Francis
Bellamy) in 1892. Winkler seems ignorant of (or covering up) the fact
that German National Socialists did not interchange "fascist" for the
actual name of their party. Winkler bad writing habit perpetuates
widespread ignorance in that regard. See the poster at
http://rexcurry.net/socialist-salute3.jpg and the more accurate
version at http://rexcurry.net/socialist-salute.jpg
It is embarrassing that the poster for Winkler's speech shows the
painting "Oath of the Horatii." It is a funny error: As proof of an
"ancient Roman salute" the neo-classical painting (from 1784) was, for
a time, cited on Wikipedia, the glorified anonymous bulletin board
where neo-nazis deliberately post propagandistic lies and delete
information about the topics discussed here. There is where that
wackiness began. Believe it or don't, Wikipedia continues to use "Oath
of the Horatii" to imply proof of an "ancient Roman salute" (It
depends upon when Wikipedia is viewed because Wikipedia changes by the
milisecond as people literally do cyber-warfare to maintain lies
there).
After Dr. Curry pointed out the silliness at Wackipedia, someone there
back-pedaled into speculation that the Pledge's early stiff-arm salute
was based on the Horatii painting, not caring that Francis Bellamy
himself explained the origin of his salute and it had nothing to do
with "Oath of the Horatii" by the painter Jacques-Louis David. The
back-pedaling went farther with misinterpretation of adlocutio, not
caring that Bellamy explained the origin of his salute and it had
nothing to do with misinterpretation of adlocutio. Bellamy explained
that his salute started with a military salute that extended out
toward the flag. Francis Bellamy never used the term "ancient Roman
salute" ever for any reason (the concept "ancient Roman salute" did
not exist during Bellamy's time). Indeed, Jacques-Louis David himself
never referred to "Oath of the Horatii" as an "ancient Roman salute"
nor did David use the term "ancient Roman salute" ever for any reason
(the concept "ancient Roman salute" did not exist during David's
time). The "Oath of the Horatii" shows three people reaching for
weapons. http://rexcurry.net/pledgehoratii.html
The term "Roman salute" came after Francis Bellamy from Rome N.Y., and
even later than that after the socialist Mussolini adopted America's
mechanical stiff-arm salute in Rome, Italy. The Oxford English
Dictionary supports Dr. Curry's work. http://rexcurry.net/roman-salute-oxford-english-dictionary.html
Winkler's misleading method continues in his book "Roman Salute:
Cinema, History, Ideology," including Winkler's misleading hackneyed
slang, on display in the Table of Contents. One example is the title
for chapter 3 ("Raised-arm salutes in the United States before
fascism: from the Pledge of allegiance to Ben-Hur on screen") that
seems designed to deceive. Winkler and Wikpedia play word games with
the hackneyed term "fascism" in order to cover-up the National
Socialist German Workers Party and its connection to older American
National Socialism and the pledge from the Bellamys. If the raised arm
salutes in the United States existed before "fascism," as Winkler
claims, then they existed during the enormous growth and popularity of
National Socialism touted by the Bellamys, and they influenced the
dogma, symbols and rituals of the National Socialist German Workers
Party later (Winkler's "fascism"). Winkler wants to pretend that
America's National Socialism was not "fascism" so that Winkler can
evade the connections.
People who refused to perform America's stiff-arm salute and robotic
chanting were persecuted, expelled, and even lynched. The Bellamys
wanted government to take over education under their National
Socialism, and eliminate all of the better alternatives, and when the
government granted their wish the government's schools imposed
segregation by law and taught racism as official policy. See the
photograph of a segregated class forced to perform the mechanical
chanting and America's straight-arm salute at
http://rexcurry.net/pledge-allegiance-pledge-allegiance.jpg
Winkler's table of contents for another chapter builds upon the
widespread ignorance by using the term "Nazi" instead of the actual
name of the German party.
Winkler writes as if he is unaware that Mussolini was a notorious
socialist journalist when he acquired the nick-name "Il Duce" (the
Leader), and that is also the time when Mussolini learned of America's
stiff-arm salute. http://rexcurry.net/mussolini.html and
http://rexcurry.net/bookchapter2a1b.html
The above is also why Winkler failed to make another discovery that
was made years ago by Dr. Curry: the symbol used by the German
national socialists, although an ancient symbol, was altered for use
by socialists as overlapping S-letters for their "socialism" (It was
turned 45 degrees to the horizontal and always oriented in the S-
letter direction). http://rexcurry.net/book1a1contents-swastika.html
Winkler writes as if he is unaware that Francis Bellamy and Edward
Bellamy were cohorts in preaching about "Christian socialism,"
"military socialism," and "national socialism." The Pledge and the
early stiff-arm salute were part of their efforts toward those goals.
The above is also why Winkler failed to make another discovery that
was made years ago by Dr. Curry: Francis Bellamy (who grew up in Rome,
N.Y., authored the "Pledge of Allegiance," and was the origin of the
stiff-arm salute used in the early Pledge) and Edward Bellamy
(Francis' cousin and the author of "Looking Backward") were notorious
national socialsts in America who advocated "military socialism" and
an "industrial army" and they influenced the National Socialist German
Workers Party and its dogma, symbols and rituals. The Bellamys
advocated a government takeover of education, and when the government
granted their wish, government schools imposed segregation by law and
taught racism as official policy. People who refused to perform the
stiff-arm salute and robotic chanting to the nations flag were
persecuted. That happened in the U.S. before it happened in Germany
(and elsewhere) and it even outlasted German National Socialism.
http://rexcurry.net/book1a1contents-pledge.html
The above is also why Winkler failed to make another discovery that
was made years ago by Dr. Curry: the stiff-arm salute developed from
the Pledge because the Bellamy dogma of "military socialism" caused
Francis Bellamy to begin the Pledge with a military salute that was
then extended out toward the flag, as a gesture to the flag. In
practice, annoyed students, forced into robotic ritualism, simply
extended the military salute outward with the palm remaining down.
Thus, the straight-arm salute developed as an extended military salute
from the Pledge of Allegiance. http://rexcurry.net/i-pledge-allegiance-to-the-flag.jpg
See the video on Youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BssWWZ3XEe4
Winkler's book "Roman Salute: Cinema, History, Ideology" overlooks and
misleads regarding the "history and ideology" part in the title.
Winkler missed the one actual analogy between "ancient Rome" and the
origin of the stiff-arm salute in the Pedge of Allegiance:
authoritarianism (then and now), militarism, oppressive taxation and
the decline of a once-great society.
Winkler overlooked the "big picture" that Dr. Curry uncovered years
ago: How the pledge, the salute and the socialist dogma behind it
caused the current massive spending and debt in America, domestic
military socialism, nazi-style numbering of babies with lifetime
tracking (the "social security" ponzi scam) and the police state in
the United States that continues to grow today, along with government
schools that have mechanical chanting every day for twelve years of
each child's life (only the misnamed "Roman salute" has changed).
Winkler overlooked another big picture that Dr. Curry uncovered years
ago: How the pledge, the salute and the socialist dogma behind it
influenced totalitarianism worldwide, including the National Socialist
German Workers Party and its dogma, symbols and rituals.
http://rexcurry.net/roman-salute-metropolitan-museum-of-art.html
See more at Flickr http://www.flickr.com/photos/7894913@N08/
and Picasa http://picasaweb.google.com/rexcurrydotnet
*********************
The raised-arm salute was the most popular symbol of the National
Socialist German Workers Party and related political ideologies in the
twentieth century.
The salute is said to have derived from an ancient Roman custom, but
Dr. Curry showed that it is a myth. Although modern historians and
others employ it as a matter of course, the term “Roman salute” is a
misnomer. http://rexcurry.net/pledge-allegiance-pledge-allegiance.jpg
The myth grew from the pledge and the resulting popular culture of the
late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries that was misunderstood
to deal with ancient Rome: historical plays and films. Three decades
of the Pledge of Allegiance (from 1892) was chiefly responsible for
the wide familiarity of Europeans and Americans with forms of the
raised-arm salute and made it readily available for political
purposes. From America's pledge, the gesture entered the visual
culture of stage and screen from after 1892 to the 1920s and beyond.
The continuing growth of socialism (and of the Pledge) makes an
examination of all its facets desirable, especially when the true
origins of a symbol as potent as the salute and the history of its
dissemination are barely known to classicists and historians of
ancient Rome on the one hand, and to scholars of modern European
history, on the other. Thus Dr. Curry's work appeals to classicists
and historians, including film historians, and will be of interest to
readers beyond the academy.
The military salute to the chest (as well as the stiff-arm gesture)
that is used in Mexico originated in the United States and is more
consistent with Bellamy's original Pledge of Allegiance than is the
current hand-over-the-heart in the United States.
http://rexcurry.net/pledge-of-allegiance-images.html#THE_TRUE_SALUTE
and see http://rexcurry.net/bellamy-edward-emiliano-zapata-mexico-socialism.html
Mexico adopted socialist flag salutes that originated in the United
States (from 1892). The National Socialist German Workers Party
(Nazis) also adopted the U.S. flag gesture after it had been used in
the USA for decades. http://rexcurry.net/bellamy-edward-emiliano-zapata-mexico-socialism.html
**********************
In the past, RexCurry.net challenged Professor Martin Winkler of
George Mason University to debate the origin of the "Roman Salute"
myth, and the spread of the socialist gesture / symbol.
http://rexcurry.net/pledge-professor-martin-winkler.html
Winkler lost by default, having never accepted the debate challenge,
and having never disputed Dr. Curry's work. http://rexcurry.net/roman-salute-martin-winkler.html
As the nation's leading authority on the pledge of allegiance and on
the "Roman Salute," Dr. Rex Curry made the historic discovery that the
salute of the National Socialist German Workers' Party (Nazis)
originated from the military salute in the USA, and from the original
flag pledge (as written by a socialist), and not from ancient Rome.
http://rexcurry.net/pledgesalute.html
The debate was prompted by many factors, including a poster for
Professor Winkler's speech that stated "The Roman Salute: Origin and
Spread of a Fascist Symbol." The poster and the speech's use of the
word "fascist" perpetuate ignorance of the fact that the straight-arm
salute was popularized by a socialist in the USA, Francis Bellamy. See
http://rexcurry.net/socialist-salute3.jpg and the more accurate
version at http://rexcurry.net/socialist-salute.jpg
The poster announces a speech that might also have perpetuated
widespread ignorance of the fact that the word "Nazi" means "National
Socialist German Workers' Party."
The debate was also prompted by Professor Winkler's book "Gladiator"
which also perpetuates similar ignorance and myths. Winkler's book
index lists only the hackneyed terms "Nazi, Nazism....see also
Fascism" again perpetuating ignorance about the socialist origins of
the salute, and about the National Socialist German Workers' Party.
The book appears to never use the actual name of the horrid party but
seems to deliberately repeat the hackneyed shorthand.
The book's tired stereotypes perpetuate the myth that the National
Socialist German Workers' Party slaughtered the most people. Here is
one sample quote "The Fascist and Nazi movements exploited this fear
of the uncontrolled masses to impose their own leaders." The book does
not explain the relationship of the National Socialist German Workers
Party to other socialist movements. The book never indicts the other
socialist movements and their leaders in the socialist inquisitions of
the Wholecaust (of which the Holocaust was a part): ~60 million killed
by the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics; ~50 million by the
Peoples' Republic of China; and ~20 million by the National Socialist
German Workers' Party.
Another glaring puzzle in "Gladiator" is that Winkler never mentions
his own "Roman Salute" work. That might be because, before the book
was published, RexCurry.net had already begun commenting on Professor
Winkler's failure to address the straight-arm salute's origin from a
socialist in the USA who wrote the pledge of allegiance to the flag.
Those facts don't fit in with the book's hackneyed perpetuation of
ignorance about the National Socialist German Workers' Party.
In Professor Winklers' early work on the "Roman" salute myth, the
professor traced the myth to early fictional representations in
movies, but Winkler appeared to be unaware that the original pledge of
allegiance predated all of the movies and used a straight-armed salute
(from 1892).
LloydB
News Journalism wrote:
[snipped and summarized:]
"I have no idea what archaeology is"
Tom McDonald
Yup.
Every once in a while, this Rex Curry person (and/or his
acolyte(s)) feels the need to demand attention for his pet
theories. This is from the OP:
"In the past, RexCurry.net challenged Professor Martin Winkler of
George Mason University to debate the origin of the "Roman
Salute" myth, and the spread of the socialist gesture / symbol.
[link snipped]
"Winkler lost by default, having never accepted the debate
challenge, and having never disputed Dr. Curry's work."
This, of course, translates to, "Curry posted a challenge on a
web site Winkler never saw; and as Winkler never took us up on
the offer to debate, so we are claiming victory and doing a
Snoopy dance of domination."
Sort of like when the Spanish conquistadors, ambushing an Indian
village, had a priest whisper a demand that the Indians convert
to Christianity--from hundreds of yards away, probably in
Spanish, and from cover. According to the Pope, if the Indians
agreed to convert, they were to be spared and treated as equals.
When the Indians, having no idea of any of this, didn't
spontaneously convert, the Spanish attacked and wiped them out.
And took the corn. (Corn! We've been waiting for this for
hundreds of years! Now we can make tortillas!)
--
Tom "Go Pack" McDonald
News Journalism
discussed"
Yup. Every once in a while, this Tom McDonald
<tmcdonald2...@charter.net>
person (and/or his acolyte(s)(LloydB)) feels the need to demand
attention for his ignorance.
This, of course, translates to, "Tom McDonald posted his usual evasion
not realizing that it only highlights Tom's ignorance, jealousy and
envy in conceding that the original post is correct."
Tom McDonald
> LloydB wrote: [snipped and summarized:] "I have no idea what is being
> discussed"
> Yup. Every once in a while, this Tom McDonald
> <tmcdonald2...@charter.net>
> person (and/or his acolyte(s)(LloydB)) feels the need to demand
> attention for his ignorance.
>
> This, of course, translates to, "Tom McDonald posted his usual evasion
> not realizing that it only highlights Tom's ignorance, jealousy and
> envy in conceding that the original post is correct."
Rex and/or his acolytes pokes his/her/their/its nose out of
h/h/t/i burrow every now and then; say the same thing; and
re-poke h/h/t/i nose to claim victory over anyone who replies to
hhti.
It is nice to be remembered.
<snip>