Alan Pennie @telston.bsky.social · 2hCuriously, penal imprisonment was originally invented for clergy, because The Church really didn't like killing or mutilating them, even if it wasn't too bothered about the laity. 030
Alan Pennie @telston.bsky.social · 2hDr Crusher sighs: Is there any way to persuade Starfleet to install non - exploding consoles? 010
Alan Pennie @telston.bsky.social · 2hI believe it was generally taught by The Church of England that miracles had ceased after the end of The Apostolic Age. Which probably influenced the secular courts. 020
Alan Pennie @telston.bsky.social · 2hIt would be hard to see on what grounds to reject, assuming the witnesses were of good character. 130
Alan Pennie @telston.bsky.social · 2hYou'd think if the higher clergy were enlightened they wouldn't let their priests languish in ignorance. 330
Alan Pennie @telston.bsky.social · 2hThe term *deluge* is very evocative, though according to Wikipedia it's a late 19th century coinage. 010
Alan Pennie @telston.bsky.social · 3hOne wonders what had happened to The Polish Renaissance. Maybe it didn't survive The Swedes very intact. 240
Alan Pennie @telston.bsky.social · 3hIsn't it ironic, don'tcha think? (A bit like Narnians summoning demons they don't believe in in TLB.) 010
Alan Pennie @telston.bsky.social · 3hThe characters are remarkably susceptible to dreams and visions. Of course that's a somewhat nebulous way of connecting the mundane and the mystical. 020
Alan Pennie @telston.bsky.social · 3hYeah. I think they took the Augustinian view that this was all very bad, but an unavoidable consequence of The Fall. 130
Alan Pennie @telston.bsky.social · 3hRemarkable to see the lay authorities being merciful. Very Rzeczpospolita. 1100
Alan Pennie @telston.bsky.social · 3hYep. I think it's mainly a slogan mouthed, ignorantly or cynically, by some lords there. 010
Alan Pennie @telston.bsky.social · 3hA good question. (I don't think they were ever particularly in favour of it but they didn't object strongly either.) 130
Alan Pennie @telston.bsky.social · 3hI think we can assume that Dany will destroy it, most likely by inadvertently setting off caches of wildfire. 100
Alan Pennie @telston.bsky.social · 3hArya's role in this is more indirect in the books. She, probably, resurrects the vengeful revenant Stoneheart. (Apart from that The Freys are likely to slaughter each other in a vicious civil war.) 110
Alan Pennie @telston.bsky.social · 4hWhen Asha takes control The Iron Born will have to give up their delusions. 000
Alan Pennie @telston.bsky.social · 4hI expect The Dothraki secretly practice hoe husbandry. They don't like to talk about it because it's unmanly. 120
Alan Pennie @telston.bsky.social · 4hI quite liked Mieville's idea of setting his fantasy in a kind of alt belle epoque. 030
Alan Pennie @telston.bsky.social · 4hI suspect GRRM just wasn't very interested in them. They certainly don't seem very plausible compared to The Fremen, for instance. 220
Alan Pennie @telston.bsky.social · 4hIt's kind of in the centre. Indian trade was famously important to The Roman Empire. 000
Alan Pennie @telston.bsky.social · 4hI suppose it's trivially true that all fiction is really set in the time it's written, no matter what period it's ostensibly set. 050
Alan Pennie @telston.bsky.social · 4hYep. The show has showed us something of what *will actually happen*. Now fans have to make sense of it. 020
Alan Pennie @telston.bsky.social · 4hYep. The Brits exercised a kind of minimal supervision, presumably to prevent piracy. 020
Alan Pennie @telston.bsky.social · 4hThe India Office in London had very little to do since India ran itself, as Keynes discovered when he worked for it. Of course this left him plenty of time to write, so it was probably a good thing. 010
Alan Pennie @telston.bsky.social · 4hI do think GRRM is partially to blame, for basically ending his series in medias res. As a result everyone's reconstruction of the whole is somewhat conjectural. (Of course it's also liberating for fans, who can all write their own endings.) 130
Alan Pennie @telston.bsky.social · 4hSummoned up by the gods of vengeance (or by Arya, if she isn't already covered by the foregoing). 160
Alan Pennie @telston.bsky.social · 4hThey definitely had their flaws, as I suppose everyone would agree now. 110
Alan Pennie @telston.bsky.social · 4hI'm sure the knights were perfectly decent people normally. Becket seems to have had a talent for driving other people into a murderous rage. 010
Alan Pennie @telston.bsky.social · 4hThey seem to have been treated remarkably leniently. The assassins of Leo The Armenian (another remarkably sacrilegious murder) were eventually put to death, though only after several years. 000
Alan Pennie @telston.bsky.social · 4hI'm not sure this will happen at all in the book series, in the unlikely event that we get any more books. 100
Alan Pennie @telston.bsky.social · 4hAn image for John The Revelator. The End Times are beginning. 000
Alan Pennie @telston.bsky.social · 4hAs far as I'm aware nobody *ritually murdered* the knights who sacrilegiously killed Becket by the altar of Canterbury Cathedral. 200
Alan Pennie @telston.bsky.social · 4hOf course the series will never get finished, so we can't be absolutely certain, but I think it's pretty apparent that The Freys' breach of guest right has called a curse down on them. 020
Alan Pennie @telston.bsky.social · 5hThe Freys all get killed even in the show, so I don't agree about that. 210
Alan Pennie @telston.bsky.social · 5hYes. I can see that the show (particularly the rushed later seasons) might give that impression. 130
