Yuratuhl wrote:
Nah, I just find the concept of nobility fascinating. Not in the "we should reinstitute it" sense, but because I studied quite a bit of medieval European history and the way titles change hands is interesting from a power perspective.
Nobles by and large were pretentious thugs from what I gather.
My impression is that the system created extremes at both ends - nobles were mostly rot, just like the sheltered noveau riche today, but the nobles of nobles like Newton were truly remarkable people like nothing we can know today.
I think it's also interesting how the same system that bitterly impoverished so many also created French cuisine and music and so much of what we today consider high culture...including things by and for poor peasants, like country homes and French soup.
I definitely agree with you 100% that the instructional value of the system and what can be reimplemented, if not the entire system, is terribly overlooked.
I remember that German dude I worked for warbling in his accent, "Where did all the nobles go after the war, Ethan? Maybe they're hiding in Switzerland, waiting to come back!" Kind of ironic on many levels. He definitely saw the picture from all sides.
I once asked him why he thought so low of the Russian nobility ("they just went to rot") and why the German nobility didn't turn out so badly. His response: "What I think doesn't matter," then curtly walked off.