I couldn’t decide who my history crush is so I made a little collage. These people aren’t my history crushes because I’m secretly in love with them or because I support their world view. No, they’re just people who I’m interested in and I’m mature enough to be critical of their biographies. Stalin, a dictator who supported the murderer of 20 Million people from his own country, was a BAMF when he was young, but that doesn’t mean that I support the Stalinism. I like the design of the Wehrmacht uniform, but I’m totally aware about the war crimes the German soldiers committed while WWII (same goes for the SS). The person on the picture is Stauffenberg. At least he tried to kill Hitler, one year till the ‘party’ was finally over. I think Richelieu is a really interesting personality, although I think that the Siege of La Rochelle was a crime against humanity. Friedrich II. (HRR) is one of my favorite personalities in history. He was educated, intelligent and very calculating. On the one side he was tolerant and had no problems with ‘talking’ with the Arabs, but on the other side he was a huge supporter of the early inquisition. And Napoleon… well, we all know how he tried to bring the ideals of the French Revolution to Europe. Thousands of soldiers and civilians had to pay with their lives. Friedrich Schiller. Okay, he doesn’t kill somebody and never committed a real crime; he was an author to whom I have a little hate-love relationship. And Rousseau was a BAMF, an intelligent BAMF! And who’s left… ah yes, dear Emperor Caligula. Current historians revise his biography and try to separate between facts and myths/negative propaganda. We will see the results, but at the moment most people might know Caligula as one of the cruelest Emperors of Rome and yet he’s just fascinating.
TL;DR. Most of my ‘history crushes’ are people who were reckless, cruel and committed some awful crimes against humanity, but they also created whole empires and made indeed history. History is war and death, and everybody who can’t deal with that shouldn’t study it. And if people think that Goebbels or even Hitler are their ‘history crushes’, than it shall be. But I can’t understand why so many people make such a fuss about a Nazi crush, but don’t care so much when Stalin, Mao (who killed more people than Hitler) or any other crazy dictator is posted. And if a person is really in love with Goebbels, that person has another problem than haters on Tumblr. Fascination doesn’t necessarily equal admiration. And to have a history crush doesn’t mean that you support their world view. Try to see the difference.
Most of my favourites are already here, but going through MANY pages of this blog I’ve never found him, Antoine Lavoisier (1743 - 1794). It’s one of the best of the tights-white wigs-guys from around the time of French Revolution. A brilliant chemist and biologist, quite a religious chap with some social-political zeal pushing him to become a tax collector, which was one of the main reasons why he was tried and executed during the regime of Terror.
His portrait that I am particularly fond of was painted by Jacques-Louis David and includes his quite brilliant and quite hot wife Marie-Anne Pierrette Paulze. Two in one then, enjoy!
François-Marie Arouet de Voltaire
François René de Chateaubriand (1768-1848)
French writer, politician, diplomat and historian.
Known as the “Father of Romanticism” of French literature, his most famous work was Génie du christianisme (Genius of Christianity). He defended the Catholic faith, which was attacked during the French Revolution.
And did I mention that he has a steak named after him?
John Quincy Adams was a wonderful asset to the country as Secretary of State but unfortunately had a rather miserable presidency. Well traveled, and an important diplomat from the age of 14 (when he visited Queen Catherine the Great’s court at St. Petersburg as a secretary and French-translator to Francis Dana) his precocity and intelligence would make any girl’s knees wobble. While not particularly attractive in his old age, this picture of his son should do to estimate what he looked like young. (Not bad, really.) He’s definitely my History crush!
Juliette Gordon Low (1860-1927) was the first leader and founder of Girl Scouts. Juliette was also a very talented artist, and created many paintings and sculptures throughout her life. She founded the Girl Scouts of the USA in 1912.
“On returning to America in 1912, Juliette placed her historic telephone call to her cousin, Nina Anderson Pape: ‘Come right over! I’ve got something for the girls of Savannah, and all of America, and all the world, and we’re going to start it tonight!’” - Wikipedia
This is Andrew Lang, born 1844, died 1912, who was a poet, novelist, literary critic, and collector of folk and fairy tales. I don’t know that much about him because whenever I look him up I always get distracted by how ridiculously attractive he was. Hands down way more attractive than anyone alive today.
From my scant knowledge, I can say that he put together the “Blue Fairy Book” and the rest (with different colors in their titles, like red, pink, or green). He also helped to start the field of parapsychology. Incidentally, he may have approved of this tumblr, had he seen it, as one of his books was titled “Letters to Dead Authors” and a later one was titled “New and Old Letters to Dead Authors.” Clearly, he was pretty into people who had already died.
George Richmond (28 March 1809 – 19 March 1896), English painter
Joachim-Napoléon Murat (born Joachim Murat; 25 March 1767 – 13 October 1815), Marshal of France and Grand Admiral or Admiral of France, 1st Prince Murat, was Grand Duke of Berg from 1806 to 1808 and then King of Naples from 1808 to 1815. He received his titles in part by being the brother-in-law of Napoleon Bonaparte, through marriage to Napoleon’s youngest sister, Caroline Bonaparte. He was noted as a daring and charismatic cavalry officer as well as a flamboyant dresser and was known as “the Dandy King”.
