The Real Gadianton Robbers?

[_Yoda]

BCSpace,

This kind of extreme rhetoric isn't useful in our public discourse and seems somehow even less relevant to a thread about Italian roots of the Gadianton robbers.

Don

Thanks, Don. That was basically my point as well.

[_harmony]

Good start -- now blend in ancient pirates operating out of the old port of Gades (Cadiz) and you have
Gadianton robbers transposed from sea to land.

And how was a farm boy in landlocked New York state supposed to find out about Gades/Cadiz?

Not that I don't like the idea, because it obvious that at least some of the cities and such were simply remakes of surrounding towns, but still... Italy's a long ways from NY state.

[_Uncle Dale]

...
Italy's a long ways from NY state.
...

Italy is where Helorum was.

Spain is where Gades (and Gadiantian pirates) was.

And Corinth is where a narrow neck of land separated a sea east from the sea west
in classical geography.

I suspect that a good classical period map of the Mediterranean, published c. 1810
might be worth our studying closely. Perhaps the sort of thing that the Library at
Dartmouth College would have kept on file.

When was it that Hyrum Smith attended school on the Dartmouth campus?
Or Ethan Smith?
Or Solomon Spalding?

By the way, googling "Gadianton" doesn't quite work -- the old-time spelling for
the pirates operating out of Gades varied a bit, but never quite matched the Book of Mormon
spelling. "Helorum" is a better letter-for-letter match with the Book of Mormon name.

UD

[_Inconceivable]

Very interesting, Karl.

Thanks for the tidbit.

[_Daniel Peterson]

Secret oath-bound combinations recur throughout history (e.g., the Catilinian conspiracy in ancient Rome and the Isma‘ili Shi‘ite Assassins of ‘Alamut).

Guerrillas hiding out in mountains are recurring features in history, too, from Castro's and Che Guevara's forces in Bolivia and the Sierra Maestra Mountains of Cuba and Vo Nguyen Giap's forces in North Vietnam and Mao Tse Tung's Red Army in China back through the Maccabean revolt in intertestamental Palestine.

There's a lot more that needs to be written on the Gadiantons. Here are two offerings:

"The Gadianton Robbers as Guerrilla Warriors"

http://mi.BYU.edu/publications/books/?b ... chapid=728

"Notes on 'Gadianton Masonry.'"

http://mi.BYU.edu/publications/books/?b ... chapid=729

[_Nightlion]

Secret oath-bound combinations recur throughout history (e.g., the Catilinian conspiracy in ancient Rome and the Isma‘ili Shi‘ite Assassins of ‘Alamut).

Guerrillas hiding out in mountains are recurring features in history, too, from Castro's and Che Guevara's forces in Bolivia and the Sierra Maestra Mountains of Cuba and Vo Nguyen Giap's forces in North Vietnam and Mao Tse Tung's Red Army in China back through the Maccabean revolt in intertestamental Palestine.

There's a lot more that needs to be written on the Gadiantons. Here are two offerings:

"The Gadianton Robbers as Guerrilla Warriors"

http://mi.BYU.edu/publications/books/?b ... chapid=728

"Notes on 'Gadianton Masonry.'"

http://mi.BYU.edu/publications/books/?b ... chapid=729

Finally! Something I will use: intertestamental. Great! Thanks.

[_Sethbag]

I think the Italian thing is interesting, but unlikely as a source for the Gadianton robbers.

I like what Fawn Brodie wrote instead, about the anti-Masonic hysteria that pervaded the area Joseph lived in at the time the Book of Mormon came out. For sheer likelihood, local anti-masonry beats out Italian hill bandits, IMHO.

[_karl61]

Secret oath-bound combinations recur throughout history (e.g., the Catilinian conspiracy in ancient Rome and the Isma‘ili Shi‘ite Assassins of ‘Alamut).

Guerrillas hiding out in mountains are recurring features in history, too, from Castro's and Che Guevara's forces in Bolivia and the Sierra Maestra Mountains of Cuba and Vo Nguyen Giap's forces in North Vietnam and Mao Tse Tung's Red Army in China back through the Maccabean revolt in intertestamental Palestine.

There's a lot more that needs to be written on the Gadiantons. Here are two offerings:

"The Gadianton Robbers as Guerrilla Warriors"

http://mi.BYU.edu/publications/books/?b ... chapid=728

"Notes on 'Gadianton Masonry.'"

http://mi.BYU.edu/publications/books/?b ... chapid=729

that's true - I just read about the Shia assassins going after the Sunni leader
Saladin . He had to deal with Crusaders and the assassins who live in the hills.

[_Doctor CamNC4Me]

Secret oath-bound combinations recur throughout history (e.g., the Catilinian conspiracy in ancient Rome and the Isma‘ili Shi‘ite Assassins of ‘Alamut).

Guerrillas hiding out in mountains are recurring features in history, too, from Castro's and Che Guevara's forces in Bolivia and the Sierra Maestra Mountains of Cuba and Vo Nguyen Giap's forces in North Vietnam and Mao Tse Tung's Red Army in China back through the Maccabean revolt in intertestamental Palestine.

There's a lot more that needs to be written on the Gadiantons. Here are two offerings:

"The Gadianton Robbers as Guerrilla Warriors"

http://mi.BYU.edu/publications/books/?b ... chapid=728

"Notes on 'Gadianton Masonry.'"

http://mi.BYU.edu/publications/books/?b ... chapid=729

That’s an interesting observation. I wonder if those who perpetrated the Mountain Meadow Massacre could also have been likened to the Gadianton Robbers?

The attack was, of course, conducted in the mountains. The tactical advantage of operating a siege within a mountainous region seems obvious, and has, indeed, been repeated throughout the centuries.

The attack was conducted by a “secret oath-bound combination” of Mormons and the Paiute tribe.

After the siege, children were taken and distributed to Mormon families, bodies were looted for valuables, livestock was claimed, and many of the Fancher party’s possessions was auctioned off from a Mormon tithing office.

In keeping with the tradition of the Gadianton Robbers, there was a cover up of the nefarious deed not only by the criminals, but also included the Mormon prophet Brigham Young. Unfortunate event this one was…

[_DonBradley]

Clever tie in to the MMM, Doctor Cam.

Prof. Peterson, as I recall you compare the Gadiantons to various guerilla groups including the Iscarii (if I have that name right), the Palestinian bandits of the First Century--this was excellent!

Don