The Pleading of Women

When I read the Abduction then Intervention of the Sabine Women, summarized as follows...

After Rome achieved a population of "adequate numbers," such that "it was a match for any of the neighbouring nations in war," and after organizing the commoners and the 100 senators, Romulus ran into another problem when it was found that, in spite of the population spike, there weren't enough women for the city to sustain herself.

The record says that it was on the advice of the Fathers that Romulus sent out invitations to the neighboring cities to intermarry with the men of Rome. I associate family history with a certain education and family solidarity, and find it interesting to wonder about the family connections the Fathers had left in order to join Rome, as part of a group which Livy describes as "[fleeing] from the neighbouring states, without distinction whether freemen or slaves, crowds of all sorts, desirous of change." But all neighboring cities declined with a certain enthusiam, they did not trust the growing power of Rome (as power and ambition were common causes for war), populated with their former fugitives.

So, Romulus sent out new invitations to the neighboring cities, this time for them to come to Rome to participate in a grand festival to Neptune which Rome would be sponsoring. Families attended from all the neighboring cities  -- Cænina, Crustuminum, Antemæ, and especially Latium (the city of the Sabines, and historically the most powerful city in the region). During the celebration, on Romulus's signal, the men of Rome kidnapped for their wives ((and for the Fathers' wives) the daughters of the visiting families, then drove the families out. This is the instance famously referred to as the Abduction of the Sabine Women (since the Sabines were the most represented in the incident).

Romulus declared that the pride of the families of the neighboring cities had prompted this action, but declared that all of the marriages would be proper and lawful ones beyond that, and that as the families grew, the injuries would heal. The husbands were generally able to comfort their kidnapped wives with pronouncements of love for their motivation.

Nevertheless the parents were pissed (not surprising). The most pissed were those from Cænina, the next most pissed from Crustuminum and Antemæ, and then also those from Latium. All wanted revenge, but not all were equally quick to go to war with Rome. They all initially went to the king of Latium, Titus Tatius, to lobby him to lead an army of the four wronged cities against Rome; but neither Tatius nor his people (the Sabines) were thus eager to go to war. So a series of smaller wars were launched in succession by the smaller neighboring cities, with Rome victorious and the neighboring city conquered in each case.

First Cænina attacked in small parties, was pushed back, and their city conquered. Antemæ then attempted an attack on Rome during Rome's counter-campaign against Cænina, but was cut off by a Roman legion, then easily pushed back, an their city conquered. Crustuminum surrendered with battle, "as their spirits were sunk by the defeat of their neighbours." With each victory, Rome annexed their lands, and many people from those cities moved to Rome. 

Others joined Titus Tatius, who by this time was ready to fight, and the Sabine army combined with the remnants of the other fallen cities met the Roman army outside of Rome herself. In the middle of battle, the abducted wives intervened, pleading with their husbands (the Romans) on the one side and their fathers (the Sabines, et al.) on the other to stop fighting and unite now that they were all family by marriage. The fighting did stop, and the two kings worked out a treaty where Latium and Rome would combine under Roman sovereignty, with Romulus and Titus Tatius becoming co-monarchs, "[holding] the regal power not only in common, but in concord also." and the Roman population doubling as a result. 

Romulus organized the people (I presume everyone including the original Romans, the Sabines, Cæninenses, Crustumini, and Antemnates) into 30 curiæ, a division whose definition and social significance are unclear to me at this time. In honor of the Sabine women, credited with facilitating the end of the war and thereby the combining of the people, each curiæ was named after one of the kidnapped women. Livy points out that there were undoubtedly more than 30 women kidnapped, and it is unclear how which names were decided. I point out also that a list of the names, either those of the kidnapped women or those of the curiæ which bear their names (or variations on their names), is not provided.


...It made me think of a story from the Book of Mormon, where the wicked and exiled priests of King Noah kidnap the Lamanite daughters. There are multiple instances of the pleading of women in this episode of Book-of-Mormon history. It is summarized as follows... (in The Pleading of Women, Pt.2)

QUOTES: The Girl With Seven Names, Hyeon-seo Lee, 2015, Part 1, Ch.3

Audiobook via the Hoopla app.

NOTE: The following quotes are transcriptions by the author of this blog from the above noted audiobook. Any mistakes [especially in the spellings of Korean names] in transcription are due to the blogger's error.

"At the beginning of 1984 the three of us arrived in Anju [on the West Coast]. I was four years old. My mother's heart sank when she saw the place. The region's main industry is coal mining, and the Chongchon River, which runs through the city's center to the LOC, was black with silk and coal slag. We were informed that it smelled badly in the summer, and was prone to flooding the city in the rainy season. As with other cities in North Korea, much of Anju was rebuilt after the Korean War. All share a similarly drab colorless look. Concrete blocks of flats line the main roads and center. There were a few Soviet-style state buildings, and a public park with the obligatory bronze statue of Kim Il-Sung. Squat tiled-roof houses made up the rest of the city. Hyesan [where they moved from], it has to be said, was not much different, but the mountain backdrop and our colorful family life there made it a magical place to us.
My mother made severe regrets about leaving Hyesan, knowing she would not be able to visit her family easily or often. But at the same time she knew we were leading a privileged life. Most North Korean families never got to go anywhere. They stayed in the same place all their lives, and needed a travel permit even to leave their local county. My father's job gave him access to goods most other people didn't have. We ate meat or fish with most meals. I did not know then that many North Koreans ate fish or meat so seldom that they could often remember the dates on which they did so, usually the birthdays of the Leaders when extra rations are distributed."
Hyeon-seo Lee, The Girl With Seven Names, Part 1, Ch.3, 2015

"The day we moved in, [the pangjang (?){the head of the neighborhood People's Union}] presented us with the two portraits for our home. These were identical to the portraits in our house in Hyesan, and we'd hung them the wall before we'd even eaten our first meal there. Our entire family life, eating, socializing, and sleeping, took place beneath the portraits. I was growing up under their gaze. Looking after them was the first rule of every family. In fact, they represented a second family, wiser and more benign even than our own parents. They depicted our Great Leader Kim Il-Sung, who founded our country, and his Beloved Son Kim Jung-Il, the Dear Leader who would one day succeed him. Their distant air-brushed faces took pride of place in our home, and in all homes. They hung like icons in every building I ever entered.
  From an early age, I helped my mother clean them. We used a special cloth provided by the government, which could not be used to clean anything else. Even as a toddler, I knew that the portraits were not like other household items. Once, when I pointed a finger at them, my mother scolded me loudly, "Never do that." Pointing, I learned, was extremely rude. If we needed to gesture towards them, we did so with the palm of the hand facing upward, with respect. [...] They had to be the highest objects in the room, and perfectly aligned. No other pictures or clutter were permitted on the same wall. Public building and the homes of high-ranking codgers(?) of the Party were obliged to display a third portrait, of Kim Jong-Suk, a hero of the anti-Japanese resistance who died young. She was the first wife of Kim Il-Sung and the sainted mother of Kim Jung-Il. I thought she was very beautiful. This Holy Trinity we called the three Generals of Mount Paektu
  About once a month, officials with white gloves wntered every house in the block to inspect at the portraits. If they reported a household failing to clean them -- we once saw them shining a flashlight at an angle to see if there was a single mode of dust on the glass -- the family would be punished. Every time we took them down for cleaning, we handled them with extreme caution, as if they were priceless treasures from Coyer(?) tombs or pieces of enriched uranium. Damage to them due to humidity, which could make spots of mold appear on the paper in the summer, was acceptable. Damage from any other cause could get a home-owner into serious trouble. [...]
  This intrusion of the State into our home did not seem oppressive or unnatural to me. It was unthinkable that anyone would complain about the portraits. On the biggest dates in the calendar, the birthdays of Kim Il-Sung and Kim Jung-Il, the three of us would line up in front of them and make a solemn bow. That small family ceremony was the only time politics entered our house. When my father came home from work, and the table was laid with rice, soup, kimchi pickles (which we ate with every meal), my mother waited for me to say "Thank you, Respected Father Leader Kim Il-Sung for our food," before we picked up our chopsticks.
Hyeon-seo Lee, The Girl With Seven Names, Part 1, Ch.3, 2015

"Each year stories of portrait-saving heroics would be featured in the media. My parents would hear a rayjay(?) report commending a grandfather who waded through treacherous flood water holding the portraits above his head. He had saved them, but sacrificed his own life in the attempt. Or see a photograph in the Rodong Sinmun, the "National Daily" [newspaper], of a couple sitting precariously on the tiled roof of their hut after a catastrophic mudslide, clutching the sacred portraits. The newspaper exhorted all citizens to emulate the examples of these real-life heroes."
Hyeon-seo Lee, The Girl With Seven Names, Part 1, Ch.3, 2015

"Serious topics were never discussed. I learned to avoid them in the way children acquire a sense for the dangers of the road. This was for my own protection. But we no different from other families in that respect. Since there was no aspect of life, public or private, that fell outside the authority of the Party, almost every topic of conversation was potentially political, and potentially dangerous. My parents would not risk an incautious remark that might be repeated innocently by me, or misunderstood.
  Growing up, I sensed this danger. I knew it was out there. But at the same time it was normal, like air pollution or the potential for fire to burn. I didn't worry about it, and neither did Minow(?) when he came along. We seldom even mentioned the Leaders whose eyes shown upon us from the wall. Saying Kim Il-Sung's name, for example, and forgetting to afix one of his titles -- "Great Leader," "Respected Father Leader," "Comrade," "President," or "Marshall" -- could result in serious punishments if anyone reported the offense."
Hyeon-seo Lee, The Girl With Seven Names, Part 1, Ch.3, 2015

"I played and quarreled with other children, just like children anywhere else in the world. My parents did the worrying for me. My mother in particular seemed to have a talent for warding off trouble. Part of this came from the self-confidence of being a woman of high songbon. But she also possessed a natural tact in dealing with people, which would save us from disaster several times. She was good at managing the panjang(?), and would go out of her way to befriend her at the weekly block meetings, and give her small gifts. Most of the panjang(?) women we knew were tough, reasonable types my mother could relate to. But she was always careful about what was on view in our house, so as not to draw the State's attention or cause envy. If my mother couldn't solve a problem with reason and good will, she'd try to solve it with money.
  The week after we arrived in Anju, she was stopped in a city-center street by five volunteers wearing red arm-bands. These vigilantes would prowl the city looking for violators of North Korea's myriad social laws -- anyone in jeans, men whose hair was a touch too long, women wearing a necklace or foreign perfume, all of which were un-socialist and symbolic of moral degeneracy and capitalist decadence. The volunteers could be aggressive and arrogant in their zeal. Their nastiest trick was to catch people during the morning rush hour who had left home forgetting to wear their pin of the Great Leader's face, a small round badge worn by all adult North Koreans over their hearts. Those caught could find themselves with a delicate problem: No one could they had simply forgotten the Great Leader.
  My mother's crime that morning was that he happened to be wearing trousers in public, not a skirt. This was prohibited since the Leadership had decreed that trousers were unbecoming of the Korean women. The volunteers surrounded her and demanded to know why she was wearing them. To avoid a scene, she paid the fine., then slipped them a bribe so that the offense would not be entered into her ID passbook. My mother bribed people confidently. There was nothing unusual in this, as long as you weren't caught. In North Korea, bribery is often the only way of making anything happen, or of circumventing a harsh law, or a piece of non-sense ideology."
Hyeon-seo Lee, The Girl With Seven Names, Part 1, Ch.3, 2015

"Military life, I found, was not so different from civilian life. [...] My father joked that the whole country was a military base."
Hyeon-seo Lee, The Girl With Seven Names, Part 1, Ch.3, 2015

"Like my father, my mother avoided being sociable. She knew how to keep her distance from people. This reserve served her well in a country where the more people you knew, the more likely you were to be criticized or denounced. If I brought a friend home to the house, she would be hospitable rather than welcoming. But this was not really the person she was.
  One of the tragedies in North Korea is that everyone wears a mask, which they let slip at their peril. The mask my mother presented to people outside the family was of a hardened, no-nonsense woman of high songbon. In truth, it hid a sense of fun and a deep compassion for others. She would risk everything for those she loved. [...]"
Hyeon-seo Lee, The Girl With Seven Names, Part 1, Ch.3, 2015

"My closest friend at this time was my tiny pet dog. It was one of the cute little breeds that people in other countries put frocks on. I wouldn't have been allowed to do that, because putting clothes on dogs was a well-known example of capitalist degeneracy. "The Yankee jackals care more about dogs than people," this is what my teachers in my kindergarten class told me. "They even dress them up in clothes. That's because they are like dogs themselves.""
Hyeon-seo Lee, The Girl With Seven Names, Part 1, Ch.3, 2015

"I was six when I entered kindergarten in Anju, and although I was far too young to notice it, this marked a subtle change in my relationship with my parents. In a sense, I no longer belonged to them. I belonged to the State."
Hyeon-seo Lee, The Girl With Seven Names, Part 1, Ch.3, 2015

QUOTES: The Girl With Seven Names, Hyeon-seo Lee, 2015, Part 1, Ch.2

Audiobook via the Hoopla app.

NOTE: The following quotes are transcriptions by the author of this blog from the above noted audiobook. Any mistakes [especially in the spellings of Korean names] in transcription are due to the blogger's error.

"For the first four years of my life, I grew up among a large extended family of uncles and aunts in Ryanggang province. Despite the nomadic life that was to come after my parents married, moving with my father's career to various cities and military bases around the country, these early years formed the deep emotional attachment to Hyesan that has remained with me all my life."

Hyeon-seo Lee, The Girl With Seven Names, Part 1, Ch.2, 2015

"Ryanggang province is the highest part of Korea. The mountains in summer are spectacular. Winters are snowy and extremely cold. During the Colonial Period (1910-1945), the Japanese brought the railroads and the lumber mills. On some days, the air everywhere smelled of fresh-cut pine. 

  The province is home both the sacred Revolutionary site surrounding Mount Paektu, North Korea's highest peak, and, conversely, to the hard-scrabbled penal region of Paegam county, where families that had run foul of the Regime are sent into eternal exile."

Hyeon-seo Lee, The Girl With Seven Names, Part 1, Ch.2, 2015

"When I was growing up, Hyesan was an exciting place to be. [...] The city's appeal lay in its proximity to the narrow Yalu River, Korea's ancient border with China. In a closed country like North Korea, Hyesan seemed like a city at the edge of the world. To the citizens who lived there it was a portal through which all manner of marvelous foreign-made goods, legal, illegal, and highly illegal, entered the country. This made it a thriving hub of trade and smuggling, which brought many benefits and advantages to the locals, not least of which were opportunities to form lucrative partnerships with Chinese merchants on the other side of the river and make hard currency.
  At times, it could seem like a semi-lawless place where the government's iron rule was not so strong. This was because almost everyone, from the municipal party chief to the lowliest border guard, wanted a share of the riches. Occasionally, however, there were crack-downs ordered by Pyongyang [the Capitol], and they could be brutal. People from Hyesan were therefore more business-minded and better off than people elsewhere in North Korea. The grown-ups would tell me that we were fortunate to live there. It was the best place in the whole country after Pyongyang, they said."
Hyeon-seo Lee, The Girl With Seven Names, Part 1, Ch.2, 2015

"She [the author's Aunt Pretty] was tough too, and once underwent an appendectomy by candlelight when the hospital had neither power nor enough anesthetic.
'I could hear them cutting me,' she said.
I was horrified. 'Didn't it hurt?'
'Well yes, but what can you do?'"
Hyeon-seo Lee, The Girl With Seven Names, Part 1, Ch.2, 2015

"My mother was a born entrepreneur. This aspect of her was unusual in a woman of high songbon. Many such women in the 1980s and early 1990s would have regarded making money from trade as immoral and beneath their dignity. But my mother was from Hyesan, and had a nose for a deal. Over the years ahead she would run many small profitable ventures that would keep the family through the worse imaginable times. Trade and market were still dirty words when I was growing up. But within a few years attitudes would change radically when it became a matter of survival."
Hyeon-seo Lee, The Girl With Seven Names, Part 1, Ch.2, 2015

QUOTES: The Girl With Seven Names, Hyeon-seo Lee, 2015, Part 1, Ch.1

Audiobook via the Hoopla app.

NOTE: The following quotes are transcriptions by the author of this blog from the above noted audiobook. Any mistakes [especially in the spellings of Korean names] in transcription are due to the blogger's error.

"One morning is the late summer of 1977, a young woman [the author's mother] said goodbye to her sisters on the platform of Hyesan station and boarded the train for Pyongyang [the capital of North Korea]. She had received official permission to visit her brother there. She was so excited she slept little the night before. The capital of the Revolution was for her mind a mythical and futuristic place. A trip there was a rare treat."

Hyeon-seo Lee, The Girl With Seven Names, Part 1, Ch.1, 2015

"[...]My father made a trip to Hyesan to ask my mother to marry him. She accepted with tears. her happiness was complete. And to cap it all, both his family and hers had good songbun, which made their position in society secure.

  Songbun is a caste system that operates in North Korea. A family is classified as Loyal, Wavering, or Hostile, depending on what the father's family was doing at the time just before, during, and after the founding of the State in 1948. If your grandfather was descended from workers and peasants, and had fought the right side of the Korean War, your family would be classified as Loyal. If however your ancestors included landlords or officials who worked for the Japanese during the Colonial Occupation, or anyone who had fled to South Korea during the Korean War, your family would be characterized as Hostile. Within the three broad categories, there are 51 gradations of status, ranging from the ruling Kim family at the top, to political prisoners with no hope of release at the bottom. The irony was that the new Communist State had created a social hierarchy more elaborate and stratified than anything seen at the time of the feudal emperors.

  People in the Hostile class, which made up about 40% of the population, learned not to dream. They got assigned to farms and mines and manual labor. People in the Wavering class might minor officials, teachers, or hold military ranks removed of the centers of power. Only the Loyal class got to live in Pyongyang, had the opportunity to join the Worker's Party, and had freedom to choose a career. No one was ever told their precise ranking in the songbun system, and yet I think most people knew by intuition, in the same way that in a flock of 51 sheep, every individual will know which sheep ranks above it and below it in the pecking order. 

  The insidious beauty of it was that it was very easy to sink, but almost impossible to rise, in this system, even through marriage, except by some special indulgence of the Leader himself. The Elite, about 10 or 15 percent of the population, had to be careful never to make mistakes."

Hyeon-seo Lee, The Girl With Seven Names, Part 1, Ch.1, 2015

"It was a traditional wedding. She [author's mother] wore an elaborately embroidered red silk chima jeogori, the national Korean dress, a long skirt wrapped high on the body, and a short jacket over it. Her groom wore a formal Western-style suit. Afterwards, wedding photographs were taken, as was customary, at the feet of the great bronze statute of Kim Il-Sung on Mansu Hill. This was to demonstrate that, however much a couple may love each other, their loving for the Fatherly Leader was greater. No one smiled."
Hyeon-seo Lee, The Girl With Seven Names, Part 1, Ch.1, 2015

Paternity of Romulus

I placed the quotes below in order as they appear in their books. Each quote has two translations. It was the reading of the third quote, that the People or Commoners (as opposed to the senators or Fathers and the military) felt a "dread as it were of orphanage," like they were "bereft of a father," at the disappearance of Romulus, that I remembered having read the first quote, when Romulus acted to fill the city he had built with people. Apparently (if I am reading this correctly), it was a common strategy at the time to achieve the initial population of a new city by "[sharking] up a lot of homeless and destitute people" from neighboring cities via a two-prong strategy: 1) to preach a doctrine of people being "born of earth," and 2) open the city "as a sanctuary," "as an asylum for fugitives."

(NOTE: The two translations I've found for the word describing Rome's upper class and "senators" and "Fathers." Senators in this case ought be confused with be members of an actual Senate, because the famed Roman Senate did not yet exist at this time. Therefore, to prevent confusion, I will use the translated "Fathers" to label the Roman upper class for this part of the story.
  In my opinion, the two translations for the lower class, "People" and "commoners," do not lend themselves so much to confusion as "senators" and "Fathers." So, merely for consistency, I will refer use the label "Commoners" to describe the lower class.)

Although possibly apocryphal rather than historial, I had not appreciated the seriousness with which the Commoners took that doctrine of "'born of earth' to be [the founder's] progeny" until I read the third quote. I have been thinking often about the notion of a paternal (or more broadly 'parental') government.  

But then I thought about the second quote, how Livy points out that it was the Commoners that loved Romulus more than the Fathers. (The love of the soldiery did not strike me at this time.) That distinction caught my attention, because the Commoners and the Fathers both emerged from that same initial throng of "homeless and destitute people" mentioned in the first quote. And how did that distinction emerge? Romulus picked 100 people from among that newly populated Rome to be these Fathers. How did Romulus decide who to pick? The translation differs on the one criteria which Livy mentions: In one translation, he sought for those who "were in a position [whatever that means] to be made 'Fathers', as they were called, or Heads of Clans."  In the other translation (which I find the more interesting), he sought for those who "could name their fathers." And why did Romulus decide on 100? Livy offers two theories: 1) Romulus thought that 100 senators to be sufficient to "[direct] that strength" which Rome had gained after being sufficiently peopled -- How he came to the conclusion, Livy does not specify. Or, 2) (which I also find the more interesting) Romulus could not find more than only 100 men who could name their fathers.

After the explanation of their origin in the social structure of Rome, Livy provides no further description of the Fathers (or the Commoners, for that matter) until the disappearance of Romulus the King, when it is explained that Romulus was loved more by the Commoners than by the Fathers, that is, by the group whose originals could not name their fathers than by the group whose originals could name their fathers.

This is particularly interesting to me for two reasons:

1) Romulus's reign was over 40 years, which is a long time. And...

2) during that time, Rome had incorporated several cities in the region (some by conquest, some by their surrender, one by treaty), subsequently integrated multiple peoples into the Roman city, and, as a result, made several adjustments to the social structure of Rome; but none apparently to the institution that was the Fathers.

Let me explain: After Romulus's initial immigration policy (described above), he realized that while he had the numbers to solidify Rome's power in the region, there were not enough women to ensure her perpetuity. Invitations were sent to the surrounding cities -- Cænina, Crustuminum, Antemæ, Latium -- to intermarry with Rome. They were refused. So Romulus organized a grand festival to Neptune and invited the same neighboring cities to attend, which they did. At Romulus' signal, the Roman men kidnapped the daughters of the visiting families and married them (an event nicknamed The Abduction of the Sabine Women). This started a series of small wars for Rome with those neighboring cities, all of which Rome won, and resulted in the conquering of Cænina, Crustuminum, and Antemæ. (More detail provided in my post "The Pleading of Women").
  The final war was with Latium, a much more powerful city than the rest, under the command of Titus Tatius, king of the Sabines, the most respected (perhap most powerful?) king in the area at that time. During the battle, the kidnapped and now married Sabine daughters intervened in the battle (an event nicknamed the Intervention of the Sabine Women), pleading with their husbands on the one side and their fathers on the other to stop fighting, and unite now that they were all family by marriage. The two kings worked out a treaty where Latium and Rome would combine under Roman sovereignty, with Romulus and Titus Tatius became co-monarchs, "[holding] the regal power not only in common, but in concord also." Many more moved to Rome. 

Here the text is a little unclear regarding the subsequent social adjustments following the Rome-Latium union. I will do my best to understand.

The Roman population is written to have doubled with the union of Rome and Latium. Romulus organized the people (I presume everyone including the original Romans, the Sabines, Cæninenses, Crustumini, and Antemnates) into 30 curiæ, a division whose definition and social significance are unclear to me at this time. All I can say for the moment is this: The word "citizenship" does not expressly appear in Livy's record of Romulus, but Romulus organized the Commoners and the Fathers after the initial immigration, and I presume that his organizing of the people at this time further supports the idea of his granting citizenship to these people. 

All this I describe as evidence that, even though 30 curiae were added to the city's social structure, I do not read of any adjustments made to the institution of the Fathers through all this, at least none noted by the historian. 

This is interesting to me because when we talk about the response of the Commoners and that of the Fathers to the disappearance of Romulus, we seem to be talking about those original Fathers (maybe in combination with their sons, the Patricians), members of that original first wave of new Romans who could name their fathers, back from Romulus's original proclamation, before the Abduction.

Without a doubt, the Fathers were a type of elite among the those first Roman people, at least in the opinion of Romulus. And it is interesting to me that Romulus would see a knowledge of one's fathers, albeit as rudimentary as that mentioned in the text as simply knowing their names (and maybe where they were born?), was the exclusive criteria that what comes down to us from Livy.

It is also interesting to be me that the group whose originals could not name their fathers was the group that had grown to love Romulus the king such that their grieving at his passing was with a "dread as it were of orphanage," like they were "bereft of a father," a seeming fulfillment of Romulus's original promise that his new subjects would be like his 'progeny,' the 'born of earth.' In contrast, the group whose originals could name their fathers did not form such an attachment to Romulus the king.

QUOTES:
1)

"Meanwhile the city increased by their taking in various lots of ground for buildings, whilst they built rather with a view to future numbers, than for the population which they then had. Then, lest the size of the city might be of no avail, in order to augment the population, according to the ancient policy of the founders of cities, who, after drawing together to them an obscure and mean multitude, used to feign that their offspring sprung out of the earth, he opened as a sanctuary, a place which is now enclosed as you go down "to the two groves." Hither fled from the neighbouring states, without distinction whether freemen or slaves, crowds of all sorts, desirous of change: and this was the first accession of strength to their rising greatness. When he was now not dissatisfied with his strength, he next sets about forming some means of directing that strength. He creates one hundred senators, either because that number was sufficient, or because there were only one hundred who could name their fathers. They certainly were called Fathers, through respect, and their descendants, Patricians.
And now the Roman state was become so powerful, that it was a match for any of the neighbouring nations in war, but, from the paucity of women, its greatness could only last for one age of man; for they had no hope of issue at home, nor had they any intermarriages with their neighbours."

History of Rome, Titus Livius (Livy), Translated by D. Spillan, A.M.A.D., Book 1, Section 8-9 (italics added)

OR

"Meanwhile, Rome was growing. More and more ground was coming within the circuit of its walls. Indeed, the rapid expansion of the enclosed area was out of proportion to the actual population, and evidently indicated an eye to the future. In antiquity the founder of a new settlement, in order to increase its population, would as a matter of course shark up a lot of homeless and destitute folk and pretend that they were 'born of earth' to be his progeny; Romulus now followed a similar course: to help fill his big new town, he threw open, in the ground -- now enclosed -- between the two copses as you go up the Capitoline hill, a place of asylum for fugitives. Hither fled for refuge all the rag-tag-and-bobtail from the neighboring peoples: some free, some slaves, and all of them wanting nothing but a fresh start. That mob was the first real addition to the City's strength, the first step to her future greatness.

Having now adequate numbers, Romulus proceeded to temper strength with policy and turned his attention to social organization. He created a hundred senators -- fixing that number either because it was enough for his purpose, or because there were no more than a hundred who were in a position to be made 'Fathers', as they were called, or Heads of Clans. The title of 'fathers' (patres) undoubtedly was derived from their rank, and their descendants were called 'patricians.'

Rome was now strong enough to challenge any of her neighbours; but, great though she was, her greatness seemed likely to last only for a single generation. There were not enough women, and that, added to the fact that there was no intermarriage with neighboring communities, ruled out any hope of maintaining the level of population."

History of Rome, Titus Livius (Livy), Translated by D. Spillan, A.M.A.D., Book 1, Section 8-9 (italics added)

2) "[...] These are the principal transactions which occurred during the reign of Romulus, in peace and war, none of which seem inconsistent with the belief of his divine original, or of the deification attributed to him after death, neither his spirit in recovering his grandfather's kingdom, nor his project of building a city, nor that of strengthening it by the arts of war and peace. For by the strength attained from that outset under him, it became so powerful, that for forty years after it enjoyed a profound peace. He was, however, dearer to the people than to the fathers; but above all others he was most beloved by the soldiers. [...]"
History of Rome, Titus Livius (Livy), Translated by D. Spillan, A.M.A.D., Book 1, Section 15 (italics added)
OR
"Such is the story of Rome's military and political achievements during the reign of Romulus. All of them chime well with the belief in his divine birth and the divinity ascribed to him after his death. One need but recall the vigour he displayed recovering his ancestral throne; his wisdom in founding Rome and bringing her to strength by the arts of both war and peace. It was him and no one that she owed the power which enabled her to enjoy untroubled tranquility for the next forty years.
Great though Romulus was, he was better loved by the commons than by the senate, and best of all by the army. [...]"
History of Rome, Titus Livius (Livy), Translated by Aubrey de Selincourt, Book 1, Section 15 (italics added)

3)

"Such, then, were the deeds of Romulus, and they will never grow old. One day while we was reviewing his troops on the Camps Martius near the marsh of Capra, a storm burst, wth violent thunder. A cloud enveloped him, so thick that it hid him from the eyes of everyone present; and from that moment he was never seen again upon the earth.
The troops, who had been alarmed by the sudden storm, soon recovered when it passed over and the sun came out again. Then they saw that the throne was empty, and, ready though they were to believe the senators, who had been standing at the king's side and now declared that he had been carried up on high by a whirlwind, they nonetheless felt like children bereft of a father and for a long time stood in sorrowful silence. Then a few voices began to proclaim Romulus's divinity; the cry was taken up, and at last every man present hailed him as a god and son of a god, and prayed to him to be for ever gracious and to protect his children. [...] At all events the story got about [, ...] given further credit by the timely action of a certain Julius Proculus, a man, we are told, honoured for his wise counsel on weighty matters. The loss of he king had left the people in an uneasy mood and suspicious of the senators, and Proculus, aware of the prevalent temper, conceived the shrewd idea of addressing the Assembly. 'Romulus,' he declared, 'the father of our City, descended from Heaven at dawn this morning and appeared to me. In awe and reverence I stood before him, praying for permission to look upon his face without sin. "Go," he said, "and tell the Romans that by heaven's will my Rome shall be capital of the world. Let them learn to be soldiers. Let them know, and teach their children, that no power on earth can stand against Roman arms." Having spoken these words, he was taken up into the sky.'
Proculus's story had a most remarkable effect; the army and commons, cruelly distressed at the loss of their king, were much comforted once they were assured of his immortality."
History of Rome, Titus Livius (Livy), Translated by Aubrey de Selincourt, Book 1, Section 16 (italics added)
OR

"After performing these immortal achievements, while he was holding an assembly of the people for reviewing his army, in the plain near the lake of Capra, on a sudden a storm having arisen, with great thunder and lightning, enveloped the king in so dense a mist, that it took all sight of him from the assembly. Nor was Romulus after this
 seen on earth. The consternation being at length over, and fine clear weather succeeding so turbulent a day, when the Roman youth saw the royal seat empty, though they readily believed the fathers who had stood nearest him, that he was carried aloft by the storm, yet, struck with the dread as it were of orphanage, they preserved a sorrowful silence for a considerable time. Then, a commencement having been made by a few, the whole multitude salute Romulus a god, son of a god, the king and parent of the Roman city; they implore his favour with prayers, that he would be pleased always propitiously to preserve his own offspring. [...] By the contrivance also of one individual, additional credit is said to have been gained to the matter. For Proculus Julius, whilst the state was still troubled with regret for the king, and felt incensed against the senators, a person of weight, as we are told, in any matter however important, comes forward to the assembly, "Romans," he says, "Romulus, the father of this city, suddenly descending from heaven, appeared to me this day at day-break. While I stood covered with awe, and filled with a religious dread, beseeching him to allow me to see him face to face, he said, Go tell the Romans, that the gods so will, that my Rome should become the capitol of the world. Therefore let them cultivate the art of war, and let them know and hand down to posterity, that no human power shall be able to withstand the Roman arms. Having said this, he ascended up to heaven." It is surprising what credit was given to the man on his making this announcement, and how much the regret of the common people and army, for the loss of Romulus, was assuaged upon the assurance of his immortality."
History of Rome, Titus Livius (Livy), Translated by D. Spillan, A.M.A.D., Book 1, Section 16 (italics added)

QUOTES: The Girl With Seven Names, Hyeon-seo Lee, 2015, Prologue

Audiobook via the Hoopla app.

NOTE: The following quotes are transcriptions by the author of this blog from the above noted audiobook. Any mistakes [especially in the spellings of Korean names] in transcription are due to the blogger's error.

"The next thing I knew my father came rushing into the room yelling, "Wake up!" He yanked us up by our arms and herded us, pushed us out of the room. My mother was behind him shrieking.
It was evening and almost dark. The sky was clear. Minow [younger brother] was dazed from sleep. Outside on the street, we turned and saw oily black smoke pouring from our kitchen window, and dark flames licking the outside wall.
  To my astonishment, my father was running back into the house. A strange roar, a wind rushing inward swept passed us. We heard a whoompf. The tiles on one side of the roof collapsed and a fireball like a bright orange chrysanthemum rose into the sky, illuminating the street. One side of the house was ablaze. Thick, tar-black smoke was belching from the other windows.
  Where was my father?
  Our neighbors were suddenly all around us. Someone was throwing a bucket of water, as if that would quench this blaze. We heard the groan and splinter of wood and the rest of the roof went up in flames.
  I wasn't crying, I wasn't even breathing. My father wasn't coming out of the house.
  It must only have been seconds but it seemed like minutes. He emerged running towards us, coughing his lungs up. He was blackened by smoke, his face glistening. Under each arm, he was holding two flat, rectangular objects. He wasn't thinking of our possessions or our savings.
  He'd rescued the portraits [of the Supreme Leader and his wife]."
Hyeon-seo Lee, The Girl With Seven Names, Prologue, 2015

"My father put the portraits down with great care, then hugged the three of us -- a public display of affection that was rare between my parents.
  Huddled together, watching together the remains of our house collapse in a rippling glow, the neighbors may have felt sorry for us. My father looked a sight: his face was filthy, and his new civilian suit ruined. And my mother, who was house-proud and always made an effort to dress nicely, was seeing her best bowls and clothes go up in smoke.
  Yet what struck me most was neither of my parents seemed that upset. Our home was just a low, two-room house with State-issued furniture, common in North Korea. It's hard to imagine now how anyone would have missed it. But my parents' reaction made a strong impression on me. They four of us were together and safe. That was all that mattered to them.
  This is when I understood that we can do without almost anything, our home, even our country, but we will never do without other people, and we will never do without family."
Hyeon-seo Lee, The Girl With Seven Names, Prologue, 2015

"The whole street had seen my father saved the portraits, an act of heroism that would earn a citizen an official commendation."
Hyeon-seo Lee, The Girl With Seven Names, Prologue, 2015

QUOTES: Mass Effect, 2007

"Aegohr, Mannovar, and Jaeto. They were the initial settlements on our first three colony worlds. They are at the heart of Salarian territory to this day. These names will remind my men what they are fighting for. They must have a personal stake in the fight if we are to have any chance of success."
Captain Kirrahe, Salarian Captain, before decoy assault on heavily guarded facility on planet Virmire, Mass Effect, 2007

"There's some kind of energy field emanating from the ship [Sovereign]. It changes thought patterns. Over time -- days, maybe a week -- it weakens your will. You become easier to manipulate and control. But it's a degenerative condition. There's a balance between control and usefulness. The less freedom a subject maintains, the less capable it becomes."
Rana Thanoptis, Ansari neurospecialist, commenting on Sovereign's mind control (referred to in the game as "Indoctrination"), Mass Effect, 2007

"The more control Sovereign exerts, the less capable the subject becomes."
Seran Anterius, Taurian intergalactic rogue agent, Mass Effect, 2007

"[The] transformation from ally to servant can be subtle."
Seran Anterius, Taurian intergalactic rogue agent, Mass Effect, 2007

QUOTES: The Girl With Seven Names: A North Korean Defector's Story, Hyeon-seo Lee, 2015, Introduction

Audiobook via the Hoopla app.

NOTE: The following quotes are transcriptions by the author of this blog from the above noted audiobook. Any mistakes in transcription are due to the blogger's error.

"The audience is silent. I begin to speak. I hear my voice trembling. I'm telling them about a girl who grew up believing her nation to be the greatest on earth, and who witnessed her first public execution at the age of seven. I'm telling them about the night she fled across the frozen river, and how she realized, too late, that she could never go home to her family. I describe the consequences of that night and the terrible events that followed years later. [...]
Among those of us who were born in North Korea, and who have escaped it, the story I am telling is not an uncommon one, but I can feel the impact it is having on the people in the audience at this conference. They are shocked. They are probably asking themselves why a country such as mine still exists in the world.
Perhaps it would be even harder for them to understand that I still love my country and miss it very much. I miss its snowy mountains in winter. The smell of kerosene and burning coal. I miss my childhood there, the safety of my father's embrace, and sleeping on the heated floor.
I should be comfortable with my new life, but I'm still the girl from Hyesan who longs to eat noodles with her family at their favorite restaurant. I miss my bicycle and the view across the river into China.
Leaving North Korea is not like leaving any other country. It is more like leaving another universe. I will never truly be free if it's gravity, no matter how far I journey.
Even for those who have suffered unimaginably there, and who have escaped hell, life in the free world can be so challenging that many struggle to come to terms with it and find happiness. A small number of them even give up and go back to live in that dark place, as I was tempted to do many times.
My reality however is that I cannot go back. I may dream about freedom in North Korea, but nearly 70 years after its creation, it remains as closed and as cruel as ever. By the time it might ever be safe for me to return, I will probably be a stranger in my own land."
Hyeon-seo Lee, The Girl With Seven Names: A North Korean Defector's Story, 2015, Introduction

"I have come to accept that, as a North Korean defector, I am an outsider in the world, an exile. Try as I may to fit into South Korean society, I do not feel that I will ever fully be accepted as a South Korean. More important, I don't think I myself will fully accept this as my identity. I went there too late, age 28. The simple solution for my problem of identity is to say I am 'Korean.' But there is no such nation, the single Korea does not exist.
I would like to shed my North Korean identity, erase the mark it has made on me, but I can't. I'm not sure why this is so, but I suspect it is because I had a happy childhood. As children we have a need, as our awareness of the larger world develops, to feel part of something bigger than family, to belong to a nation. The next step is to identify with humanity as a global citizen.
But in me this development got stuck. I grew up knowing almost nothing of the outside world, except as it was perceived through the lens of the regime. And when I left, I discovered only gradually that my country is a byword everywhere for 'evil.'
But I did not know this years ago when my identity was forming. I thought life in North Korea was normal. Its customs and rulers became strange only with time and distance. Thus I must say that North Korea is my country. I love it. But I want it to become good. My country in my family, and the many good people I knew there. So how could I not be a patriot?"
Hyeon-seo Lee, The Girl With Seven Names: A North Korean Defector's Story, 2015, Introduction

QUOTES: Coolidge, Amity Shlaes, 2014, Ch.1

(Quotes transcribed by author of this blog, who takes full responsibility for any mistakes in the transcription, taken from audiobook of above title, checked out via Hoopla app)

"The smallest unit of government [in Plymouth, VT, at that time] was the school district, and much of what went on in Plymouth focused on that. The room-and-board for teachers were subject to bid, and the family with the lowest bid got the contract. The amount, Coolidge later remembered, tended to hang around $1.25 for two weeks in winter and $0.50 for the same period in summer. It was during his childhood that Plymouth first gave women the chance to vote on school issues. 

As the boy [Calvin] soon learned, the political life of Plymouth ran on its own annual cycle. Town officers were chosen at a March meeting, where the town also set the tax rates. There was also bonded debt to manage due to road construction and costs incurred during the Civil War and by the freshet of 1869, one of the many floods that plagued Vermont. Come September there was another meeting, a freeman's meeting, where the town elected its delegates to the State government as well as to Congress and presidential electors. 

At an annual district meeting at the school house, villagers chose the school officers, such as Calvin's father [John], and set the rate of the school tax. Everything happened on a small scale of pennies and dollars -- collection of a snow tax, for care of an indigent. But the town felt itself the basis of all that was above it, the county authorities and the State authorities in Montpelier.

The records John Coolidge kept showed the painstaking effort of town leaders to budget and manage a small amount of cash. The town paid Coolidge's father $11.50 for superintending the schools, $1.00 to someone else unnamed in a town report for a day's labor, $0.50 to someone else for half-day of work on a road in winter, $104 to a woman Mary A.Sawyer for keeping a sick man C.J. for one year. That year, the town also paid $1.00 for a pair of shoes for a child. In all Plymouth's expenses in that year were $3182. 

One year the other men of the town wanted to raise a large amount of money with a new tax. John Coolidge abstained from voting, saying that he did not wish to place so large a burden on those who were less able, and so was leaving them to make their own decision, Coolidge later remembered.

At the store, too, the boy could see the clockwork that was commerce. His father spent $40 rent for the store, and turned over $10,000 a year in goods. That left room for fat profits, but John and Victoria would not charge high prices on their neighbors. That might turn away business. It was better to operate on narrow margins, and hope to sustain volume and trust. John paid his blacksmith $1.00 a day to run the blacksmith shop. In the store he had to set prices and decide whether to haggle. In the end, he took only $100 or so a month profit out of the store business. That was enough to pay for a maid-servant around the house and some other expenses, but not enough to live richly. Many people who came to the store borrowed small sums to buy items on credit. Remarkably few did not pay the money back."

Amity Shlaes, Coolidge (biography), Ch.1, 2014

"The school itself [Black River Academy, Ludlow, VT] was its own illumination, and there were others like it all over New England. The school, Black River Academy, Baptist in background, enjoyed great independence. Its Head could shape its curriculum and had time to get to know the children. Secondary school was not compulsory. Parents contracted with schools and paid them. Schools did not always have dormitories. Coolidge would board with friends or acquaintances, then attend the school. After a few terms, he might return home to Plymouth, as his father and grandmother had, to farm or run the store. At first, it seemed that he wanted to."
Amity Shlaes, Coolidge (biography), Ch.1, 2014

"I am in first rate health and having a good time, but I wish I was at home, for if I was there, I could have a better time. But having a good time is not everything to think about in this world."
Calvin Coolidge, writing to his grandmother in 1887 (original citation not found by blogger), quoted by Amity Shlaes, Coolidge (biography), Ch.1, 2014

"For graduation in May 1890, Calvin wrote and memorized a speech about the power of oratory. He noted that it was Cicero's voice, the force of Cicero's oratory, that had helped drown out dictators, and made even Caesar tremble. His speech was also about the advances of Great Britain had enjoyed after free traders had won their case there. What mighty changes have been wrought in England's political  system within the last fifty years by the indomitable energy of such orators as Vincent, [Richard] Cobdon, [John] Bright, and scores of others who traversed the kingdom advocating the repeal of the Corn Laws and other measures which were once deemed utopian and hopeless.
There was an inconsistency between his praise for the free-trade Britons and the pro-tariff rule in his region. It was actually an inconsistency typical of New England, which like to see old England's markets open even when some of its own were closed.
The Vermont Tribune lavished praise on him. 'Calvin Coolidge gave a historical resume of the influence of oratory in the formation of public opinion and in the great movement of history.'"
Amity Shlaes, Coolidge (biography), Ch.1, 2014