13.I

Acknowledgements and Research References:

Chianina & Tasting History

The Myth/Story of talking cows and them actually influencing Roman Republic politics was just too good to give up, originally it was gonna be a random world building blurb in the story but a wise friend found out I was going to do that and demanded that I write an actual talking cow.

And that is why we have Bethica and despite the fact she and her marital troubles took up an astounding amount of words I thought I could use for other things in the story I’m so glad I wrote her.

Lateralization of behavior in dairy cows in response to conspecifics and novel persons.

Well Isn't that a mouthful but I am nothing if not thorough. This ended up being such a fun tidbit about cow behavior that I just felt like it teemed with potential for cultural mannerisms in a variant of the animals fully capable of human speech.

Select pleas of the crown

So when I needed to come up with what kind of crime were people going to court for in medieval times I spent quite a while trying to dig up legible sources and this was some of the best I could find. Fascinating stuff honestly.

On Moral Duties

Hey did you know that Cicero’s name is actually a nickname he chose/was chosen for him? And that it essentially means ‘little pea’? This work is probably familiar to the antiquity philosophy geeks in the audience. But for the rest I recommend reading this work. It can be enlightening.

Word of warning though: having dug further into the politics of his era I’ve come to the conclusion that Cicero was kinda an awful person to many, also a politician in Rome, but I repeat myself.

The rest of this website is wonderful by the way, full of juicy historical documents in accessible translations.

A Writer's Perspective

So it turns out a lot of other writers have tried to tread the path I have gone down and made their own notes and observations.

Taking these in with my earlier sources really helped save me from a few linguistic mishaps.

For example, did you know that the word indenture used to be specifically about a kind of legal contract usually made for soldiers/mercenaries joining the army?

I didn't before I found it in this series which drew my attention to it and after some further digging to verify in other sources that one of the likely etymological roots for indenture is because you would write a contract twice (or sometimes thrice) on the same piece of parchment, and then very jaggedly cut them apart forming a toothy but unique matching set of ‘teeth’ hence dental, hence indenture.

Much more stuff also was useful from this site.

Mental Health Matters

Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

It’s a good idea when you want to reach for trauma, mental illness and other such instruments and systems for the purposes of your story that you know what you are talking about. That you bring humanity to the situation when you do. Or that when you choose to diverge from this you are doing it with your eyes open on what you are saying.

Ottoman Empire

Really I feel like the cat is out of the bag on how this is a somewhat alternative history kind of fantasy story. Although I’m not doing something so crude as adhering slavishly to historical events. I will have you know I have very carefully and intentionally selected personages from many centuries apart from one another and some kneading of other events and influences were called for by this.

To be fair this is heartily in the tradition of fiction written back in the day as well, The story of king arthur is a very prominent example of such.

Still I try to make sure this jigsaw of inspirations meshes together sensibly in a shared context and a coherent if new fantasy history.

I recommend treating any references you notice as more of a use of archetypes and historical inspirations than guarantees for events or personality.

The Medieval Shepherd

This is a really fantastic book and I’m so glad I was able to find a relatively affordable translation like it. I recommend reading it, especially for the portions that I ultimately could not find a place for in this story. I found the early ‘credentials’ the ‘author’ gave for his source (an old shepherd) fascinating as it effectively was the life story of a fairly common man and his trials.

Something we get a vanishingly small amount of details on in historical documents.

Matthias, Holy Roman Emperor

I admit that the Matthias in this story has very little to do with the actual man, except for his political place in history. Although kudos for those that noticed the reference and properly identified what dynasty his is a stand in for.

How do your Eastern Dragons Move?

I will freely admit for those my descriptions have yet failed to enlighten that Jewel uses all three of these as the situation/mood demands.

Regelinda

I never got a place to really put this lady in the story, But her life was kinda fantastic, So you get to hear about her here too.

Marco Polo, His Travels & Adventures

This is honestly a huge slog to get through and incredibly dull. I honestly think I failed to deliver the same tone that this book provided despite my desire to match it. However I think if I’d cleaved that closely to the material here the story would have suffered for it.

Modern Knight

This guy has a lot of fascinating explorations he has done on various things from a bit of a more down to earth perspective. Definitely recommend when paired with other sources for a bit of a sense of nuanced flavor for scenes in a period piece.

Crecganford

Fascinating deep dives into folkloric roots and some of the theories of their origins. Honestly just pick one of the videos if you want to sit down and listen to a folklore lecture. Lots of ideas taken up from here but not all. A bit dry for some but if you really love my interludes this should be a treat.

Fall of Civilizations

This is a wonderful series, but each of them are quite long, I admit that I mostly use them to fall asleep too but the approach and the depth of different cultural perspectives that each episode digs into is wonderful. Also there is a book if you prefer to read, but the voice acting (first in as close to the original language as possible and then dubbed over in translation) and music/audio ambience is a huge bonus for this series I think.