With the creation of the latest pure papillilaminum I had to think about the words “Fort Sherman”quite a bit.

I doubt you know this but I am a huge history fan, and in juxtaposition to my peaceful demeanor and opposition to colonialism and the harm caused, I am a great student of military history. I prefer to learn about violent encounters from the past as opposed to watching it on television; same part of the brain gets stimulated I’m sure. Siege warfare was something that worked in conjunction with human ingenuity to bring us magnificent fortified structures over time. The actual fort in Panama from which this clone’s (the specific individual plant from the species used to make the seedlings mentioned at the start of this piece) name originated is nothing to talk about other than it was used in a James Bond movie: Quantum of Solace (just learned this from wikipedia).

Now to an interesting “fort”.

The fort: Oppidum. Okay, think Lord of The Ring type hill forts with human “enhancements”. These hill forts were used by Gallic (Celts huh.. def not Gaels-thats Scotland .. idk look this was France/ Western Europe) warriors with names like Vercingetorix. Some famous oppida were: Alesia, Gregoria, and one that has the most Tolkien-esque name of all (and a real life location hasn’t really been settled on so it is kind of mystical) and it is.. cue Gandalf with pipe- Noviodunum. These forts would often have steep cliffs on one or more sides, perhaps other geographical features (that could have been what got them selected in the first place) like a river curving around a side, a sharp drop off on one side, deep forests full of warriors, then slap some Iron Age metal work battlements, gates, etc, maybe some cut timber things to beef up security here, stone work walls there, and a few hobbits sneaking in and out of the garden.. and you got the idea. Now Frodo and friends aka the most fierce warriors of the time were all unfortunately squashed by the great historical force of Julius Caesar. The Roman logistical brilliance combined with Caesar’s decisiveness and willingness to break all rules and adapt (go get Germans to help) meant, in spite of what must have been gorgeous peace time structures, these Oppidum were either forced to be burned and demolished by the Gallic Chiefs themselves in a “scorched earth” policy when Caesar was baring down; or, became sites of brutal genocide by the invading conquers. Caesar wiped out everyone and openly wrote about it (in the third person a lot of the time), he also could supposedly dictate several letters at once in multiple languages while drawing up war plans and holding a conversation with you at the same time and saved Rome from what could have been rule by some asshat like Pompey or Crassus, which would have been worse either way trust me, and he had a flare for wearing his clothes real baggy and customized (died purple I think I remember hearing Dan Carlin say once) which pissed everyone off for some reason. Over time we have all in the west adopted the idea that the spread of Hellenism was a net positive: the aqueducts, drama, philosophy, democratic frameworks, olympics, toga parties.. you get the point.. but dammit I bet these hill forts were beautiful on a cool spring morning.

*only by studying the past can we evolve and avoid making the same mistakes.