{"id":50437,"date":"2016-05-28T02:05:58","date_gmt":"2016-05-28T02:05:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/zenpundit.com\/?p=50437"},"modified":"2016-05-28T02:05:58","modified_gmt":"2016-05-28T02:05:58","slug":"the-cat-and-the-database","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/?p=50437","title":{"rendered":"The Cat and the Database"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>[ By <strong>Charles Cameron<\/strong> &#8212; of knotted cords, corporal punishment and external memory ]<br \/>\n.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/zenpundit.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/Tablet-DQ-600-quipu-cat-onine-tails-75-1.png\" alt=\"Tablet DQ 600 quipu cat-o&#039;nine-tails 75\" width=\"450\" height=\"653\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-50439\" srcset=\"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/Tablet-DQ-600-quipu-cat-onine-tails-75-1.png 450w, https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/Tablet-DQ-600-quipu-cat-onine-tails-75-1-207x300.png 207w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 450px) 100vw, 450px\" \/><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>**<\/p>\n<p>I have long toyed with the idea of the <strong>Quipu <\/strong>as a variant <strong>HipBone game-board<\/strong>, as exemplified here:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/zenpundit.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/QuipuBoard.png\" alt=\"QuipuBoard\" width=\"296\" height=\"298\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-50442\" srcset=\"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/QuipuBoard.png 296w, https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/QuipuBoard-150x150.png 150w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 296px) 100vw, 296px\" \/><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>I hadn&#8217;t until now considered the <strong>cat-o&#8217;-nine-tails<\/strong> in the same light.<\/p>\n<p>**<\/p>\n<p>This particular ramble began when I saw this tweet:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-lang=\"en\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Students get 99 lashes for attending mixed party BY <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/CJMortimer\">@CJMortimer<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/UsbB1k8Hgn\">https:\/\/t.co\/UsbB1k8Hgn<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/IRAN?src=hash\">#IRAN<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/NO2ROUHANI?src=hash\">#NO2ROUHANI<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Iran Arab Spring (@IranArabSpring) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/IranArabSpring\/status\/736319086553096192\">May 27, 2016<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>**<\/p>\n<p>Reading that tweet set me wondering, not for the first time, what punishments were like in the <strong>Royal Navy<\/strong>, say 150 or 200 years ago \u2014 not so very many generations in the grand torrent of time.<\/p>\n<p>I hail from a Royal Naval family, and hadn&#8217;t until today realized quite how recently fierce corporal punishment had been a part of RN training. This image shows the punishment known as <strong>Twelve Cuts<\/strong> administered on <strong>HMS Ganges<\/strong>, as recalled from his own early years by the singer <strong>Jimmy Lee<\/strong> of the <strong>Edge of Chaos Orchestra<\/strong>:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/zenpundit.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/Ciorporal-Punishment-Jimmy-Lee-HMS-Ganges-1.png\" alt=\"Corporal Punishment Jimmy Lee HMS Ganges\" width=\"468\" height=\"440\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-50452\" srcset=\"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/Ciorporal-Punishment-Jimmy-Lee-HMS-Ganges-1.png 468w, https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/Ciorporal-Punishment-Jimmy-Lee-HMS-Ganges-1-300x282.png 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 468px) 100vw, 468px\" \/><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>A few pertinent details:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Before receiving his punishment, the young man would be given a medical inspection (\u201cthe boy\u2019s buttocks are examined and his general physical condition observed\u201d \u2014 Admiralty, 1950). He was then marched to the ship\u2019s tailor to be fitted into a pair of extra-thin tropical-weight white cotton duck trousers, with \u2014 at least on HMS Ganges \u2014 no underwear allowed. (The Admiralty wrote in 1950 that the latter provision \u201callows the strokes of the cane to be as painful as need be\u201d. They seem not to have been following their own rules, because the King\u2019s Regulations in 1943 had amended the wording to \u201cCaning on the breech, duck trousers with pants being worn\u201d, but perhaps this was intended to apply only to seagoing ships and not the training ships.)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Perhaps some idea of the fruits of such training can be found in this impressive video of Ganges<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>:<iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"420\" height=\"315\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/htmC__eg8hc\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>**<\/p>\n<p>That image of the &#8220;cuts&#8221; brings back sore memories.. though my own treatment was far more lenient.<\/p>\n<p>In my own youth, I was caned as early as age 6 and as late as age 17, the latter beating administered with sincere expressions of regret by my housemaster, the great archaeologist of the Assassins&#8217; castles, <a href=\"https:\/\/ismailimail.wordpress.com\/2009\/06\/27\/in-memory-of-peter-willey-authority-on-medieval-ismaili-castles\/\">Maj. <strong>Peter Willey<\/strong><\/a>. I&#8217;d admitted to doing the (London) <strong>Times crossword puzzle<\/strong> in the time allotted for my maths homework, and school regulations left him with no option &#8212; I had no option, either. <\/p>\n<p>Six with a bamboo cane was the worst I suffered, so I can barely imagine what twelve cuts, let alone a hundred lashes with a cat-o&#8217;-nine-tails, would be like.<\/p>\n<p><em><strong>Discipline, lad: chin up.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<p>**<\/p>\n<p><strong>Image sources:<\/strong><\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<li><strong>Wikimedia<\/strong>, <a href=\"https:\/\/commons.wikimedia.org\/wiki\/File:Cat-o%27-nine-tails_(PSF).jpg\">Cat-o&#8217;-nine-tails<\/a>\n<li><strong>Wikimedia<\/strong>, <a href=\"https:\/\/commons.wikimedia.org\/wiki\/File:Quipu.png\">Quipu<\/a><\/li>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>I&#8217;m no historian, so cannot vouch for the quality of these materials &#8212; but my <strong>readings today<\/strong> included:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<li><strong>Roger Davies<\/strong>, <a href=\"http:\/\/intelmsl.com\/insights\/stringing-together-a-database\/\">Stringing together a database<\/a>\n<li><strong>C. Farrell<\/strong>, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.corpun.com\/counukn.htm\">Corporal punishment in the Royal Navy<\/a>\n<li><strong>Edge of Chaos Orchestra<\/strong>, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.edgeofchaosorchestra.co.uk\/jim.html\">Jimmy Lee bio<\/a>\n<li><strong>Jimmy Lee \u2013 The Runaway<\/strong>, <a href=\"http:\/\/therunaway.co.uk\/naval-punishment\/\">Naval Punishment<\/a>\n<li><strong>EyeWitness to History<\/strong>, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.eyewitnesstohistory.com\/flogging.htm\">A Flogging at Sea, 1839<\/a><\/li>\n<p><\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>[ By Charles Cameron &#8212; of knotted cords, corporal punishment and external memory ] . ** I have long toyed with the idea of the Quipu as a variant HipBone game-board, as exemplified here: I hadn&#8217;t until now considered the cat-o&#8217;-nine-tails in the same light. ** This particular ramble began when I saw this tweet: [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[53,526,1358,627,93,480,374,1052,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-50437","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-britain","category-charles-cameron","category-discipline","category-doublequotes","category-iran","category-music","category-navy","category-punishment","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50437","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=50437"}],"version-history":[{"count":21,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50437\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":50463,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50437\/revisions\/50463"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=50437"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=50437"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=50437"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}