Category Archives: Travel

From Coca Cola Communism to Anarchy

2025 Cruise up the Danube River, Croatia, Extremism, History, Modern History, Pluralism

 

A Proud Croatian in Vukovar

At the end of World War II, communism was ushered in to Yugoslavia by the Russians. This was no favor.  Josip Broz Tito, commonly called Tito led the country as a communist prime minister from 1944 to 1963, and as president from1953 until his death in 1980. Of all the countries under the Soviet umbrella his regime was by far the least intrusive and most gentle. Some called his type of communism Coca Cola Communism.

 

To the amazement of many, Tito boldly declared Yugoslavia independent from the Soviet Union.  The people of Yugoslavia loved it. People around the world loved it, Celebrities from around the world, like Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton came to visit him. Russia was not so keen, but to the surprise of many, it tolerated Tito.

Yugoslavia under the communist regime had been a federal regime, like Canada. It was designed to allow different groups from different regions to live together in relative harmony.  While he was alive it worked quite well. After Tito died things fell apart and as the poet W.B. Yeats said, “Things fall apart, the centre cannot hold.” That is exactly what happened.

After the fall of the Berlin wall in 1989 and the collapse of the Soviet Empire the leaders of Slovenia, Croatia, (under its first President Franjo Tudjman) and Macedonia were persuaded that they should annul their federal ties and instead each declared independence after a referendum that clearly indicated the people favored separation. The same thing of course, could happen in Canada or the United States, and in fact, there have been some recent rumblings of discontent with the federal system in both countries.  That is why for Canada and the US Yugoslavia is so important.  We should learn from it, but so far there are few signs that we will do that, or even try to do that.

Croatia declared its independence from Yugoslavia on June 25, 1991. The Croatian Parliament officially announced the separation, following a referendum held in May 1991 where over 90% of voters favored independence. That should have been simple right? Wrong! It was actually very complicated by the awkward fact that Croatia had large ethnic minorities of Serbians who feared that they would be forever after dominated by the Croats. And the neighboring Serbian state who was dominating Yugoslavia after Tito died, saw themselves as the saviors of their fellow Serbs in Croatia.

 

The Serbs did not take kindly to this rejection of the state they dominated, citing traditional ties and the need to protect Serb minorities in these states. As a result, not just war, but wars, broke out.

 

One might have thought that in modern times with the advent of civilization, things would be more civilized and less bloody.  If one thought that one would be wrong.

 

Tito was a powerful and charismatic leader who amazingly managed to weld together the various ethnic groups of the country that otherwise found it all too easy to attack each other. However, as soon as he died in 1980, the ties that bound these ethnic groups began to fray. As Adam Michnik once said, “the worst thing about Communism is what comes after.”  There is at least a sad grain of truth in this remark.

 

With the collapse of the communist state of Yugoslavia, a number of states that had been held together by the iron fist and charisma of its long standing-leader, Tito, broke off like pieces of glass from a broken window.  With that breakdown the rule of law, such as it was under Tito, evaporated.  Anarchy soon prevailed. When states collapse, they rarely do that in an orderly fashion.

 

This is even more remarkable because Yugoslavia was generally considered the most liberal of all of the Communist regimes. Why did it collapse into such bloody anarchy while Czechoslovakia did not in 1989?

 

No treaty, no law governed what would happen when Yugoslavia broke apart.  It was thus even more fractious than the splintering of Mennonite churches, if that is possible. The basic problem was that the Imperial power, Soviet Russia disappeared, leaving a terrible vacuum behind.

As usually happens, the void was filled by the worst.

A Silly thing in the Balkans

2025 Cruise up the Danube River, Croatia, Hate

 

 

In the late 19th century, Otto von Bismarck, the great German statesman and first Chancellor of Germany predicted “If there is ever another war in Europe, it will come out of some damned silly thing in the Balkans.” And that is exactly what happened in 1914. And it was silly. But deadly serious.

 

All hell broke loose in Europe in 1914 when the Archduke Ferdinand of Austria was assassinated in Sarajevo, Yugoslavia.  For some unfathomable reason this precipitated an incredible melee that goes by the name of World War I or, even less aptly, The Great War. This initiated the Austro-Hungarian empire of the Habsburgs to dissolve, as for some mad and entirely irrational reasons, most of the countries of Europe and even Canada and the United States were drawn into this absurd conflict between disintegrating European empires. If any war showed how thin the veneer of European civilization was, this was it. One of the enduring legacies of Europe, like it or not, is frequent absurd wars.

 

 

World War I never really ended until the state of Yugoslavia, such as it was, got drawn into another European conflict, World War II in 1939. At first the country supported the Nazis, but later it was invaded by them.  Once again Hitler was not afraid to turn on his former allies, sort of like the current leader of the United States, who does so but of course, less violently.   The resistance to the Nazis was led by a communist, Marshall Tito who later became world famous when he became the leader of the Communist Party and the country.  During this time as well, there were bloody conflicts between various factions in the country, breeding hatreds which have not completely dimmed nor have they been forgotten to this day.

 

Hatred has a long life in the Balkans. Empathy, sadly, seems to have a much shorter shelf life.

Ilok Castle, Croatia

2025 Cruise up the Danube River, castle, Croatia

 

After sampling the wines, we returned to the boat. Although I did not have enough time to see the village, I did manage to sneak outside for a very brief view of Ilok Castle, or as some called it, the Odescalchi Castle. It is an impressive on a hill in the middle of town  built on the foundations of the castle of King Nikola Iločki from the 15th century . I managed to take a few photos of it.

 

The castle was built in the 15th century by Nicholas of Ilok a Croatian viceroy and king of Bosnia. We did not visit Bosnia-Herzegovina this year, which I did see the last time we were in the Balkans. It is another of those states that was created when Yugoslavia disintegrated and needless to say, a lots of serious warfare happened there. Many lives were lost in those battles.

The Ottoman Turks conquered Ilok in the 16th century but the Austrian Hungarians recaptured it in the Battle of Vienna in 1683. As a result, the grateful Emperor Leopold I granted the castle to Livio Odescalchi, the nephew of Pope Innocent XI who was also a member of the powerful Odescalchi family. That family reconstructed the castle in the Baroque style in the 18th century. The Yugoslavian government (communist at the time) nationalized the castle in 1945. Apparently, the wine cellars are among the most famous in Croatia, and we never got to sample any of the wine from there. Sometimes, life sucks.

ILOK, CROATIA: Paradise for Wine-lovers

2025 Cruise up the Danube River, Croatia

 

Church of St. John of Capistrano

Today we visited our 4th country as we cruised and explored. Christiane and I had visited other parts of Croatia the last time we visited the Balkans and I have always thought it is the most beautiful country in Europe. Not just the Balkans, but the most beautiful country in all of Europe. Today we saw only a small part of the country, but it was a part we had not seen before so that was good.

Our guide today was the perky and enthusiastic Marda and it was a joy to spend the day with her. We started in the village of Ilok, which is a tiny village whose history goes back to the 3rd century when it was under Roman domination.

 

This was a wall still standing in the town, built by the Romans in the 3rd century.

 

The  village had many small and ancient buildings that I would have loved to explore and  photograph. Sadly, that was not to be. I was only able to take a few photos from the shore where our boat was tied up. The problem with tours is that I can’t go where I want to go. I have a leader and have to follow the leader or risk getting lost or abandoned. Usually, I am quite content with the places selected by the tour host. Today was not one of those days.  I tried to hide my disappointment and take it like a man.

 

That does not mean what we saw was uninteresting. It was interesting, but I would have liked to explore this tiny village. With hindsight, I could have done that and rejoined the group when they got back. My hindsight is always perfect. Unlike my foresight.

 

Our coach driver first took us to a drive-through of interesting little farmhouse where a lot of weddings were held. It was high on a hill top and people loved the view from there. The weddings were marathon affairs.   They lasted all day and all night. Usually, they start at about 9 in the morning and ended the next morning. Many people are usually invited. As a rule they have, about 400-750 people in attendance.

 

At our first stop, we got out of the coach and visited the lovely Church of St. John of Capistrano.  St. John of Capistrano, for whom the church was named, was a 15th-century Franciscan friar, lawyer, and preacher, known as the “Soldier Saint” for his vital role in leading an army to relieve the Siege of Belgrade by the Turks. Like so many others in the Balkans, he and the people of the area took great pride in their roles in the defense of Christian Europe. Serbians and Croatian often are proud of their history as defenders of European civilization and the true Christian church against the hordes from the Turkish empire. Notice though that he was a lawyer and preacher. How is that possible? It seems like an unholy combination.

John of Capistrano was born in 1386 during what has been called “a turbulent time in history.”  Really, one must look hard to find times in European history that were not turbulent. But they might have a legitimate claim to the word. First, one-third of the people and nearly 40 percent of the clergy had been wiped out by the bubonic plague. There was also a Schism in the Catholic Church as 3 different men claimed to be the Pope at one time!  England and France were at war, but times were actually rare when they were not at war. Added to that, the city states of Italy were constantly warring against each other. I guess “turbulent” is a fair description of the times.

 

John was a very talented man who really had earned the title of Renaissance man. He became governor of Perugia at the age of 26. At the battle with the people of  Malatesta he decided to change his life so at the age of 30 he entered the Franciscan order as a novitiate. He was ordained as a priest 4 years later. His preaching was so popular that it attracted large throngs of people even though most people were apathetic about religion. He and his 12 fellow Franciscan brethren were received by the countries of central Europe as ‘angels of God’. Together, they were instrumental in reviving what looked like a dying faith.

 

Perhaps his greatest achievement occurred after the Turks captured Constantinople in 1453. He was commissioned to rescue the city of Belgrade and actually Europe from the devastation of takeover by an alien religion. Why would they commission a lawyer who was also a priest? But he was a good choice for he successively led an army of mainly Hungarians and won a victory against overwhelming odds leading to the siege of Belgrade being lifted. Sadly, he caught an infection (the plague) in the fighting and died on October 23 1456 in the town of what is now called Ilok where we were. Naturally, his grave became a site of pilgrimage and it is credited with nearly 500 miracles in the first 70 years.

The church as built in the 14th century and has survived numerous wars including the most recent war for the Independence of Croatia about 30 years ago. This was one of the rare churches in the area that survived that stupid conflagration. Over the centuries the Christians destroyed the mosques and the Turks destroyed the churches.  We could call it “mutually assured destruction.” Or perhaps, madly assured destruction would be more apt.

We were able to walk through the wine cellars built in the 15th and 18th centuries, withs massive wine barrels of fine wines. During the most recent war, in the 1990s, time between Serbs and Croats, when the Serbian Army was approaching one diligent man, quickly built a wall to hide the collection of vintage wines, from the marauders. He even went to the trouble of covering the wall with dirt and mould to make it look old. It was sufficient to fool the Serbians who missed out on a real treat.

This part of Croatia is famous for its wines and even though we stopped for a wine testing at 10:30 in the morning, we were prepared to make the big sacrifice and enjoy a glass or two of wine.

 

The area here is a well-known and respected wine growing region. We were fortunate enough to go to a local establishment for a wine tasting of several local wines. The wines here are so famous that Queen Elizabeth of England came here as a young woman shortly before she got married and loved the wine so much that she bought 11,000 bottles of wine for her wedding. Locals claim that after that she always kept some bottles for herself in her various castles. I can attest to the fact that the wines are good, even though we were not given the best of the wines as she was. After all, peasants should know their place. And we did.

Sacred Happy Hour

2025 Cruise up the Danube River

 

 

A friend of mine got me this T-shirt which reads, “I drink and I know things.”

I can’t figure out why he got that for me. Was he mocking me?

When the people got back on our boat each day from their excursions—like every day—it was time for happy hour.  On a river cruise filled with tourists’ happy hour is a sacred trust.  Nothing is allowed to get between the tourists and their happy hour. Sometimes the cruise director had to make heroic efforts to twist things around so that no matter what, happy hour was preserved. And thank goodness he did.

Christiane who had to miss some of the excursions because of her limited mobility, was a regular attender. The bartender knew her well. She did not have to order her Jameson and Ginger. It was delivered after she arrived. For her, Happy Hour was more sacred than most.

Bad Oma! Bad Opa.

Eastern Europe needs more lawyers

2024 Trip to Southwest USA, Law

 

 

When I walked down this hill, an old man, about my age in others words slipped and fell while walking down this hill, but was not seriously hurt. It was a close call however and he was fortunate. Others in our group were not so fortunate.

 

Another day, another one of our people on the trip fell and got seriously hurt. Serbia, like most of the Balkan states was liberated after the fall of the Russian empire in 1989, but all of these states emerged as third world countries with weak economies.

 

Under communism of course, nothing was cheaper than human life. And now, in my opinion, tourists feel the effects of that dismissal. People here unlike in the west don’t notice dangers at their touristic sites. Such dangers are not important. There is little accommodation of people, like Christiane, who have mobility issues. They must fend for themselves. That may work with young and fit people. With older people who often have poor balance it does not work so well.  For example, people going up staircases at a fortress popular with tourists  had insufficient hand railings and steps were often uneven.  I know in one case I took one look up and stayed at the bottom. Call me chicken; or call me prudent.

 

In the US in the 1920s people began to appreciate the importance of some health and safety standards. One of the first places was food preparation. People demanded safe food and regulatory institutions were required to ensure the food was safe. For example, people were disgusted to learn how cavalier food production businesses were about mice in their food and understandably they revolted.

 

Places to which the public were invited had to be safe. Lawyers helped in this process. The classic case in fact was one from England where person got sick from a snail in her ginger beer. The case was Donoghue v Stevenson and it laid the foundation for the modern law of negligence and established the principles of the duty of care. People had a duty to be careful if it was reasonably foreseeable that their negligent actions might harm other.

 

In that case Mrs. Donoghue went to a cafe in Scotland with a friend, who ordered her a bottle of ginger beer. Inside the bottle was the decomposed remains of a snail, which u8nfortunately could not be seen until most of it was drunk. By then she suffered shock and severe gastroenteritis and sued the manufacturer, Mr Stevenson. She said a manufacturer of goods owed a duty to her as a consumer to take care that they contained no noxious elements. She alleged that he had neglected that duty, and was therefore liable for any damage. She had no contract with the manufacturer and in the law up to that time prevented her from suing without a contract.  The English court agreed with her and created a new ground of liability—the tort of negligence. A tort is a civil wrong. Not a criminal wrong.

 

After that successful law suit the law in the English speaking world was changed for ever. I know some people will be revolted at the thought that lawyers might do some good, but it’s true. Through the weapon of litigation, they forced businesses in that country, and in others like Canada, to produce safe food, entertainment, housing, cars, and everything that they produced. We are all better for that.

 

Activist like Ralph Nader also forced American businesses to stop ignoring safety. And road safety increased immeasurably. Governments jumped on the band wagon and produced regulations that industries were not keen on but were forced to accept. This was before the age of neo-liberalism that started in about 1980 and was juiced up under Donald Trump.  Donald Trump never met a regulation he was not prepared to strip.

 

Eastern Europe has not gone through this revolution. It is still in the era of neo-liberalism where all government regulation is considered and unbearable shackle no matter how many benefits they deliver.

 

By now, in the west most people agree that governments are expected to impose reasonable standards of safety on businesses, even when the businesses howl in opposition. That is not the yet case in eastern Europe. In the west, usually, if a business or its practices lead to harm to others, they will be held responsible, unless their practices were reasonable and the harm was not reasonably foreseeable. Added to that, if the business practices are such that they cause harm to others which is reasonably foreseeable, they will be held responsible for that damage. The test is what would the reasonable person do in the circumstances of the business person. Would the reasonable business person avoid the risk or take it? If the reasonable person in the same situation would not take the risk, and harm occurs, the business person will he held responsible. Such standards have been imposed by courts (lawyers in other words) through the law of torts (civil wrongs). They are not usually imposed by criminal laws, but civil laws. The business owners get sued for the harms caused by their negligence or that of their employees. They must compensate the victims for their losses incurred or harms suffered from their actions. No one (except ideologues) think businesses should be able to do whatever they want.

 

In eastern Europe the restrictions on businesses are still pretty loose. Therefore, people get hurt unnecessarily. And that is what we saw on this trip. Over and over again.

Christiane was lucky that our cruise director was diligent in warning her about unsafe conditions for someone with her mobility challenges. Others were not so lucky. Or perhaps they ignored the warnings.

Out of 147 passengers on our ship, at least 6 of us got seriously hurt in about 12 days.  That is too many, in my opinion.

Eastern Europe needs more lawyers!

The oldest City in Europe: Lepenski Vir, Serbia

2025 Cruise up the Danube River, Ancient Humans, art, History, religion

 

We had one more stop on this very interesting excursion in Serbia.  That was Lepenski Vir Serbia.

 

We visited one of the most important archaeological sites in Serbia and Europe called Lepenski Vir. It is the oldest planned settlement in Europe, located on the banks of the Danube in the Iron Gate gorge which we passed on our way there. This was the first site that was permanently inhabited in Europe.

 

The word “vir” means “whirlpool.” That refers to a nearby whirlpool so big that it could drag a big boat into it. This of course was very important for the people of the time who got most of their food fishing.

 

 

The Mesolithic Period, or Middle Stone Age, is an archaeological term describing specific cultures that fall between the Paleolithic and the Neolithic Periods. While the start and end dates of the Mesolithic Period are not the same in each region, it is generally accepted that it is dated approximately from 10,000 BCE to 8,000 BCE. [12,000 to 10,000 years ago]. That is pretty darn old.

 

The earlier Paleolithic was an age when humans obtained food only by hunting and gathering, but toward the Mesolithic period, they developed agriculture which contributed to the rise of permanent settlements like this one. This happened in different places around the world at about the same time. The later Neolithic period is distinguished by the domestication of plants and animals. Agriculture was becoming to the norm. Humans started to domestic dogs in the Mesolithic period.  During the Mesolithic period, humans developed cave paintings, engravings, and ceramics to reflect their daily lives. Some Mesolithic people still continued with intensive hunting, but others practiced the initial stages of domestication.

Some Mesolithic settlements were villages of huts, others walled cities. This site contained a sprinkling of huts.

Dragoslav Srejović was the first archaeologist to explore the site. The researchers noticed that the site was an example of an outstanding level of preservation and quality of artifacts.  Because the settlement here was permanent and planned architect Hristivoje Pavlović called it “the first city in Europe.”

 

When Srejović and his team started digging they had no idea how deep they should dig.  Each step down represented 1,000 years of human history. The deeper they dug the more they found. The stone figurines were clearly of human origin and clearly indicated human culture, but at first they had no idea how old. The Lepenski Vir site consists of one large settlement with about ten satellite villages.

 

Cultures are also distinguished by the tools used by the people. Tools used in the Mesolithic period were usually composite devices that they made with small chipped tools.

The very important site of Lepenski Vir was unearthed in the 1960s. This site is usually considered the most important Mesolithic site in south-east Europe.

 

 

There were clear signs of culture discovered at Lepenski Vir. Numerous piscine (fish) sculptures with human-like faces with eyes that looked like fish eyes.  Perhaps they were associating themselves with their gods.  As Northrop Frye, the brilliant Canadian literary critic pointed out, the main purpose of art and religion is to give the world a human shape.

 

Numerous fish sculptures have been found in the area, which is understandable since fish were clearly their main source of food. Even the sculptures they created showed creature with fish like eyes. Some have speculated that these may have been considered as gods. Was the first religion created here?  Perhaps they worshipped something like Mother Earth like the indigenous peoples of North America. Is this some confirmation for my theory that all religions are really the same religion in different forms?

 

What we saw here was the remains of the huts. This period saw the development of unique trapezoidal buildings and monumental sandstone sculptures. You can see the shapes in the photographs. These included huts for human families. These are now all housed inside a structure with massive window to make it feel like nature.

 

One of the interesting features of the structures was their trapezoidal shape that mimicked the rock face across the bay pictured here. Clearly the mirroring shape is not accidental but rather, giving the world a human shape.

It was also noted that the huts (homes) were all facing the river and a large rock outcropping across the water on the other side? The huts trapezoidal shape mimics the shape of the rock face on the other side of an inlet.  Perhaps the people also considered the river a life force. Or even that massive rock an example of the life force? And don’t say rocks are dead. To indigenous people around the world, rocks are considered alive.

 

It was suspected in 1966 and confirmed in 1967 that this was a site of exceptional value. It had unique architectural remains and stone sculptures that were particularly important. The researchers concluded during this time that this was an eponymous site a previously unknown Mesolithic people in the region of the Iron Gates Gorge.  The original assumption had been that this was a Neolithic settlement. At first they had discovered pottery that indicated a Neolithic settlement, but later came to realize that lower down there were the remains of a much older settlement that had been concealed by the materials above it.

 

There is another interesting aspect to this site. The site is a kind of natural arboretum that contains a number of woody species that amount to what has been called an outdoor school for learning about trees. The presence of species from the genus Pines (Pinus), Fir (Abies), Juniper (Juniperus), and Borage (Tsuga)  was also discovered here. As a result, based on what they called the first degree of protection under the Law of Nature protection, it is one of the most it is considered one of the most important nature reserves in Serbia.

 

Lepenski Vir is the only site in Europe where the study of the history of nature and human society are closely connected. It is considered an area of exceptional ecological value.

 

 

Burial methods are also interesting. They started burying bodies in the fetal position, as if returning to the womb of the mother. This would have a very interesting religious connotation.   Important people were buried underneath the homes.

 

There is also evidence that the people who lived here were healthier than other Europeans. They had healthy teeth and dined on meat and fish. Of all the skeletons only 2 teeth were missing. Dentists would not have got rich there. 300 skeletons were found here and more than half, 180, had no evidence of violent deaths. The average life span in Europe at the time was 35 years and here some were found estimated to have died at age 50 or even, in one case, 80 years old. There was no evidence of violent deaths either. Maybe they were a lot smarter than us. It seems they lived in peace for a couple of thousand years.  What could be more impressive than that?

 

The people were also very tall. Elsewhere in Europe at the time the average height was 1.49 metres and here 1.64 metres. Sedentary life must have been good! 4,500 years ago people migrated away from this area. The reason is not clear yet.

 

One tricky thing the archaeologists had to deal with was the fact that a hydro-electric damn was being established on the Danube River, which of course meant that the river would become a reservoir for the project and the water level would rise significantly, thus drowning the found site. As a result, it was necessary to move all everything from the original site to a new one higher up. And by the time they got to this point there was little time. They had to hurry, even though archaeologists, like lawyers, hate to rush. The new site was 29.5 metres higher than the original site. The relocation was completed in 1971. The final conservation work was completed in 2011.

This is the remains of fireplace inside the hut.

During the excavations 121 grave sites were found, which had to be respected and examined for scientific information.

 

There are also signs of human occupation dating back to the Copper Age, the Bronze Age, and the Iron Age as well as Roman and Medieval periods. Some of those trapezoidal structures date back 8,000 years which some have said is one of the most interesting periods of human history. It was a time of substantial economic, cultural, sociological, and spiritual changes caused by contact with different populations. It is also the time during which humans changed from hunter-gatherers to stock-breeding and agricultural communities in Europe. In this Danube Gorges area, the transformations are characterized by some of the most original known cultural expressions ever accomplished in human history. And most of those were discovered right here in Lepenski Vir.

 

The more I thought about what we had all learned today the more in awe I was.  That modern humans had figured all this out  based on skimpy remains is truly astounding. As a species we have created a lot of harm, but we sure have learned a lot too.

Golubac Fortress, Serbia

2025 Cruise up the Danube River, civilization, Fortress, History, Serbia

 

After lunch on the boat, we travelled by bus to the Golubac Fortress, which was built on the south (Serbian) side of the Danube River. The fortress was built during the 14th century by the Medieval State of Serbia at the time when firearms advanced significantly and fortresses had to be changed. Like so much in the Balkans it had a tumultuous history.

 

Before it was built it was the site of a Roman settlement which was frequently fought over in the Middle Ages. In particular, the Ottoman Empire of the Turks frequently fought for control of the area with the Kingdom of Hungary. What were they fighting over?  The right to levy taxes on the Danube River traffic. It was passed between Turks, Bulgarians, Hungarians, Serbs, and Austrians until 1867 when it was turned over to the Serbs. Now, of course, it is the site of popular tourist attractions such as the fortress, but during its long history it successfully repelled 120 attacks.  That number tells a big story. European civilization was so often a place of wars. Wars over politics or religion or both. I remember years ago, when we visited New Zealand and one of the fellow guests at the place we stayed opined how lucky the locals were to have Europeans to bring civilization to the natives. Is that really civilization?

The name of the fortress and the modern town in its vicinity can be translated as the “Pigeon city” or the “Dove city” (golub, “pigeon”).  Some claim the name refers to the towers of the fortress that aim for the skies, like pigeons. Others say it was named after a beautiful girl Golubana who was fought over by a local Turkish pasha and a young Serbian man.

 

Fire arms were used from the first half of the 14th century but they had only a modest killing power so were used mainly to frighten the inexperienced. They were used to make a lot of noise in the hopes of eliciting panic and confusion in the ranks of the enemies. Of course, improvements made them more effective as well. Technological advances are always critical to military success in battle.

 

A big change came with advances to cannons in the 15th century. The architecture of fortresses had to change to make the walls more secure and add hole to use cannons against aggressors. Cannon towers were built as could be seen at the fortress here. Numerous cannonballs were found in the fortress. Fragments of barrels of cannons were also discovered.

Changes in firepower meant changes to the castle defences were required.

The western side of the castle was the most exposed to attack so a moat was built around the castle. But it never contained alligators. In the 15th century it had to be strengthened to be able to repeal modern, at the time, cannonballs. The towers were all walled for that purpose. Of course, they also had to make cannon holes in the walls so that cannonballs could be fired from inside the fortress upon the hapless invaders.

 

The position of the fortress made it very difficult to attack and allowed food to be brought in from the Danube River. It could really only be attacked from the west side and the river both of which exposed the attackers to weapons from inside the castle like bows and arrows, crossbows, catapults, or cannonballs.

 

Heavily armoured horsemen were the most powerful military force in the Middle Ages. A variety of other weapons were used to attack horsemen including maces, battle axes, swords hammers, clubs, battle scythes, and hooks. Because they were so heavy and bulky the mace could only be used by very powerful warriors. Lances and long spears were used for close combat. The infantry and cavalry used lances and long spears when attacking the horsemen. After breaking through the enemy’s line, the strategy was to toss the lances and spears and fight with swords.

The sword was the leading Medieval cold weapon and they kept getting “better” and more effective.  Better at killing in other words. Sort of like Modern nuclear weapons are even better than ancient cannonballs. In the late Middle Ages, the long and heavy swords were the weapon of choice and the swords could be double edged with extended handles that allowed them to be used with both hands to maximize the damage.  Maximizing the damage was always the goal. Armour was also important and kept having to be constantly improved to keep up with improvements to the swords. The Middle Ages had arms races just like modern armies.

That’s what civilization is all about.