This is just the latest case: Two villages in the province of Malaga will remove from their coat of arms the chain that Boabdil wears around his neck, which shows he was subjugated, not captive, by the Catholic Kings after taking over the last remnant of al-Andalus: the Kingdom of Granada. The villages are Canillas de Aceituno (2,336 inhabitants) and Sedella (688 inhabitants).
The mayor of Canillas de Aceituno, Jose Manuel Aranda (PSOE), says that he has taken this decision because the chain “represents an element of confrontation that now belongs to the past”. He adds in a pompous and confusing sentence: “We have decided to remove a symbol with connotations of racism and slavery that deepens the struggle for dominion among races, senseless in a new, free generation”.
The decision was formalized last Friday in an extraordinary plenary meeting. The proposal originated with the party ruling the city council (PSOE) and was supported by the Andalusian Party; the Popular Party voted against it.
“We do not understand how they can vote against and be in favour of continuing to use for Canillas de Aceituno symbols that are the hallmark of inequalities and that can raise xenophobic sentiments”, commented the alderman.
That is the shield before and after: Boabdil has been promoted from subject to king by removing the chain. I think this is opening Pandora’s Box.
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It is not the first case. In 2006, the regional parliament of Aragon started the process to remove the “Moors’ heads” from its coat of arms. The heads represent the conquest of Huesca in 1096. This was the first relatively big village that the King of Aragon was able to seize, in spite of being well protected by its remarkable walls. It allowed the Kings of Aragon to leave the Pyrenees and to expand their dominions to the south; a prelude to the annexation, shortly thereafter, of the fertile lands of the Ebro Valley and its rich cities.For the time being the Moors’ heads are still in the coat of arms, separated by St. George’s Cross.
Moors’ heads are a rather common heraldic feature. Or at least they have been common up until, now. For instance, Pope Benedict XVI has also one of those Moors’ heads in his coat of arms. In this case it is not a defeated Moor, but a pre-Islamic Moor. An opportune reminder that Moors were Christians before being invaded by the Mohammedan Arabs.
13 comments:
Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it.
And those who erase their past have a problematic connection with their future.
Those who cannot let the past speak for itself will have their own history expurgated and story castrated.
Orwell mocked this kind of palimsest folly in a book.
(I guess it has been erased.)
Oh the wonderful things still yet to be destroyed by such reasoning!
Keep it a secret dear Armance, but being so imbued with Zapaterian zeal, tonight I might just go out and destroy Trajans storied column which recounts the battles, troop departures / arrivals, fortification works, emperor's speeches to the soldiers, conquests and subjugations in the two campaigns against Dacia - roughly your modern-day Romania. Imagine! There are even friezes showing the evil Trajan witnessing the execution of the "Barbarians"! I get goosebumps of shame and horror!
Please, in light of Italy's modern-day troubles with immigrants hailing from your neck of the woods, allow me to express my deepest and sincerest regrets for the violence perpetrated by mein volk to dein volk, with the promise to sin no more. Never again will our cruel and blood-thirsty Roman legions attack your fair lands. Nor shall we allow this war-mongering, non-inclusive piece of stone which celebrates the horrors of those awful years to cause further suffering, by adding insult to injury to your Danubian brethren.
Once that is destroyed, I'm off to knock down the arch of Titus which celebrated the Roman conquest of ancient Palestine! Sorry Jews!
And then moving right along, I will firebomb the Mausoleum of Augustus at the Campus Martius which celebrated Rome's victory at the Battle of Actium... Sorry dear Greeks!
All this divisiveness! This lack of sensitivity must end!
There's a lot of work ahead of us!
Oh and what's this about a problematic connection to the future? Are you kidding, we are marching blissfully to the dawn of a great new civilization. There's gonna be a lot of hugging and kissing!
I think this one is worth mentioning again:
Swedish Army castrates heraldic lion
Armance wrote:
"And those who erase their past have a problematic connection with their future."
Yes indeed. But what about those erasing vital body parts? Probably a problematic connection to the very idea of their own physical existence.
This is ridiculous. The Spaniards have lost their mind.
Yeah. G. Orwell: Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past.
I am still wondering what is exactly in the mind of the people like that Spanish mayor. What does he expect to achieve removing the chain from Boabdil's neck? Is he a stupid, misguided idealist fool or simply self-loathing and evil?
Speaking of the Orwellian mind: Condoleezza Rice about the independence of Kosovo (striking similarity with the mindset of the Spanish mayor):
"The U.S. secretary of state then went on to send a message to the Serbs to "accept that Kosovo is no longer theirs, and that the Balkans needs to leave behind centuries of laments and sentimentality".
"We believe that the Kosovo decision will really, finally, help the Balkans leave its horrible history behind," Rice said.
"After all, we are talking about something from 1389! It's time to move on," she said, in reference to the year crucial in Serbia's history, when its medieval empire started succumbing to the Ottoman Turk invasion with the Battle of Kosovo, to be renewed as a state only in the 19th century."
So, the magic words are "to leave behind centuries of sentimentality". Boabdil? After all, we are talking about the XVth century! It's time to move on.
Dear Conservative Swede,
Along with offending the ladies, both the original ungelded and un-eunuched lion and the new more inclusive one remain an offense to the animal kingdom and a slight to the suffering people of Africa who have been dispossessed of their noblest animal without due recompense. A moose holding a balloon might be better or perhaps a hermaphrodite snail.
I am disgusted by it!
It is so offensive... it is roling over centuries of suffering, heros died, in that particular region of Spain it was eight hundred years of opression (And the Christians neve ceased to be the majority!)!
I am speachless. No I'm not! I can't stand speachless! Having suffered the same moorish invasion it is like a kick "in the bawls" for me as well.
And that community, who was proud of having the last moorish King in Iberia chained. It was an act of saying: Look, after 800 hundred years and several generations of opression, torture, murder and rape we got you beaten and you were expelled motherf*cker!
And now?
Now they have the muslim master as the icon of their land! Outragous! It's like putting the face of Hitler in an ally burrier site, where brave men died foughtung him.
But I'd like to see that in my country. Here, people (and I thought, in Spain as well) are proud of having the last coat of arms in Western European flags!
Yes, our flags are not blue-blacr-rouge or nothing of the sort; Those flags have symbols! Symbols of hundreds of years of suffering and battling for the Nation!
And my flag is full of islamophobic symbols, and I am proud of that!
Here, the special forces (army, police, whatever) have the decapitated head of a muslim as a symbol!
Here, Algarve, known for its beaches, has in its Historical symbol the head of the moorish and the Christian King, not as a symbol of multiculturalism, but as a symbol of land, conquered to the moors.
But go click on the flag link. Look at it, cause I'll explain to you its Anti Muslim symbols:
1st, you can see that three fifths of the flag are red. This is in memory of those who perish for the Nation (fighting the f*cking muslims to create the Nation!!! Go Serbia...)
2nd, you can see the shield like thing in the middle. It was the shield used by us during the Cruzades against the muslims!
In it, you can see five blue things in a white back. Those things are "chagas". Chagas were the injuries of Christ in the cross. It got in the flag, when our first King (before being a King), D. Afonso Henriques, went down, down South to fight the muslims in the heart of the muslim land. In the way, he saw Jesus Christ and then he defeated the five most important western muslim kings. Each "chaga" represents adead muslim king.
You can also see seven castles. They were the seven moorish castles of the seven moorish Kings of the Algarve (Al-Gharb, The West in Arabic) when they were defeated by our Christian troops.
Amén to those symbols, I want to see who is the Multiculturalist who wants to destroy my flag. Really, I want to meet him.
Also, you can see this, it's funny:
Our National Heraldic is full of symbols against the muslims:
Dragons, big crosses over small crescents, castles, eagles (or other big birds), lyons or even women.
All symbols of conquest over Islam.
We have also manu nobel famalies who ostentate their symbols with decapitated blacks and Arabs, meaning victory over islam and making muslims slaves (blacks). A especial case is the Mesquita family (Mosque) that made very well killing muslim clerigs during the Reconquista. In their coat of arms there is four moorish decapitated heads. Sweet.
Wow afonso. I wish I were portuguese when I read about non-apologetic emblems like that. You're right though, I suppose it's just a matter of time before the Portuguese flag must go, just like the former south african flag it will soon just be a 'symbol of oppression' in majority-muslim portugal.
What will it take to regain our self-confidence, valor, and non-apologetic sense of 'us' and 'them' flags and coats of arms like these used to represent?
'Turks Head' used to be a common name for English pubs - no more.
Diamed asks what it will take for 'us' to regain our self confidence. Have we really lost it or is it that those who allegedly speak for us are speaking for someone else?
I've linked back to you here: http://consul-at-arms.blogspot.com/2008/05/re-spain-heraldic-multiculti.html
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