Everything Everywhere Daily: History, Science, Geography & More - Damnatio Memoriae: Erasing People from History

Episode Date: August 13, 2020

The ancient Romans had a practice called Damnatio Memoriae, which was to banish someone’s memory from public life. It was also sometimes known as oblivion. It called for the complete deletion of the person’s name or image from all statues, inscriptions, coins, and texts. While the practice neither began nor ended with the Romans, they are ones who gave it the name we used today. Learn more about the history of expunging people from history on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The ancient Romans had a practice called Dematio Memori, which was to banish someone's memory from public life. It was also sometimes known as oblivion. It called for the complete deletion of the person's name or image from all statues, inscriptions, coins, and text. While the practice neither began nor ended with the Romans, they are the ones who gave it the name we use today. Learn more about the history of expunging people from history on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily. What if your perceptions about the past were wrong? ThruLine is a podcast that takes you back in time to uncover the parts of the story

that may have gone unnoticed. It effectively turned day into night. And how it shaped the world now. Time travel with us every week on the ThruLine podcast from NPR. This episode of Everything Everywhere Daily is brought to you by G Adventures. G Adventures is the world's premier small group tour operator, offering tours in over 100 countries and on all seven continents. In addition, Gadventures has been a leader in the area of responsible tourism helping to establish social enterprises around the world. When you travel

with G, you not only get to explore the world, you also get to help the people in the communities you visit. And I speak from firsthand experience. I've personally visited over 40 countries on all seven continents with G Adventures. and I can attest to their high standards and the quality of their tours. To learn more about G-Adventures and to find a tour that's right for you, click on the link in the show notes. The Romans gave us the term Domenatio Memore, but the practice dates back well before Rome.

Admittedly, it's difficult to determine a history for someone removing someone from history, because if they were successful, we'd have no idea that it never happened. However, there are several examples we know of from history, because their attempts that erasure left marks. The earliest known example was the Egyptian Pharaoh Hesepsut, who was born in 1478 BC. One of the very few female rulers of ancient Egypt, Heshebsot was a prolific builder, and her tomb out of Luxor is one of the best Egyptian tombs ever discovered. After her death in the reign of Thutmos the Third, whom she jointly ruled with,

an attempt was made to remove any mention of her. At the Deer Al-Bahari Temple, all of her statues were torn down. At the Temple of Karnak, there was an attempt to wall up her obelisks. carvings of her image were chiseled out along its outline. Egyptologists aren't sure why there was an attempt to expunge her from memory. It could have been her stepson, Thutmos III, who wanted to relegate her back to her status as regent, or it might have been his son, Aminhotep II, who resented her for having to wait so long to rule. It wasn't soon after in Egypt when the next major D'Amatio Memori event occurred,

but this time there's a much clear reason as to why it happened. The Pharaoh Aknotin attempted to completely change. change the Egyptian religious system and replace it with a monotheistic system worshipping a deity called the Otten. After his death, the Pharaoh Hormehb attempted to destroy any mention of his reign and all mentions of Acknotin or the cult of the Aten. He was pretty successful, too. It wasn't until the 19th century that anyone knew about Acknautin being a pharaoh. He was admitted from the Abdios Kings List, which was created only 100 years after his death, which listed the 76 previous kings of Egypt. In both these Egyptian cases, they weren't totally successful. There were mentions of the

rulers and statues which were not destroyed, and there was enough for archaeologists to piece together information about their history. The most famous case in ancient history might be that of Hero Stratus in ancient Greece. Hero Stratus burned down one of the seven ancient wonders of the world, the Temple of Artemis at Ephesus. When he was caught, the authorities asked him why he did it, and he said he wanted to immortalize his name. He is believed to have been of low social status, and thought that destroying something great would ensure his name would live forever. Not only was he condemned to death, but they further condemned him to a legacy of oblivion. Any mention of his name in the future would be punished by death to serve as a warning to anyone

who might attempt to do something like this again. The fact that I'm mentioning the name, Hero Stratus, over 2,000 years later, in a podcast, gives an indication of just how successful this was. In fact, the word Herostratic comes from him and means fame at any cause. The Romans not only gave us the name Dematio Memori, but also put its use into high gear. It's difficult to tell if Dematio Memori was used on people of a lower social status, because there probably wasn't much created with their name to begin with, so removing it didn't take much effort. For Roman emperors, however, we have plenty of evidence.

The first case during the imperial era was that of Sejanus, who was the right-hand man to the emperor Tiberius. Sejianus was found to be scheming to take power for himself, and was responsible for the death of Tiberius' son, Drusus. When the plot was discovered, Sejanus was executed, and his body tossed down the Gimonian stairs where it was torn to shreds by the mob. His name was then removed from all coins and monuments, and his entire family was killed, just to ensure that his lineage wouldn't continue. Most of the other instances of Demnatio Memori that we know of happened to the most despised Roman emperors after their deaths. The first emperor we know for certain who was

given this sentence was Nero. In fact, three of the four emperors who ruled in the year 69, which was known as the year of the four emperors, later had their names and images removed from the public. Demaccio Memori became one of the two default conditions for past Roman emperors. Almost every Roman emperor was either deified as a god or condemned to Demaccio Memore. In fact, over a 400-year period, there were only five emperors who were neither deified nor had their memory damned. Demachio Memori more often than not backfired. The most noteworthy example from Rome was the case of the Emperor Gata. Gata ruled as Emperor jointly with his brother Caracalla after the death of their father, the Emperor Septimius Severus. Caracalla killed Gata in his mother's arms, no less,

and ordered any mention of him to be removed throughout the empire. The problem was, many of the public mentions of his father also mentioned his sons. When Geda's name was removed, it left a very obvious chiseled blank space. The arch of Septimius Severus is in the forum in Rome today, and you can still see the scars where Geta's name was removed, which of course just reminds everyone of Geta. It was the ancient version of the Barberstrizan effect. Demaccio Memori is still practiced today, although not to the extent it was in the past. For example, you will not find any mentions on any official monuments in the United States to the hero of the Battle of Saratoga from the Revolutionary War.

In the chapel at the West Point Military Academy, there are plaques for all the Revolutionary War generals, except one that doesn't have a name. Who is the person that's missing? A guy by the name of Benedict Arnold. In the 20th century, Stalin was famous for removing people from photos who fell out a favor. The most famous example was that of Nikolai Yeskov,

who was the head of the NKVD. He was responsible for heading up many of Stalin's purges until he himself was eventually purged. There were some photos which had multiple people removed over time until the only photo which survived was one by Stalin by himself. This use of doctoring photography in editing the past was one of the plot points to Georgia Orwell's 1984, where there was an entire department dedicated to a dystopian future Dimaccio Memore. More recently, several former Soviet republics have removed all public mentions of the Soviet Union. Ukraine has had a systematic policy of decommunization. all but two of the 5,500 statues of Lennon in the country have been taken down.

The last remaining two are in the Chernobyl exclusion zone. Of course, I couldn't do this episode without mentioning the current efforts to take down statues of Confederate generals and renaming U.S. military bases named after Confederate officers. If there is anything which history has shown us is that it is almost impossible to remove someone from the collective memory. Not only is it hard to eradicate every single instance of someone, but often the last of mention is in itself mentionable. Executive producer of Everything Everywhere Daily is James Mackle. Today's review comes from the professional hobo, Nora Dunn, who left a review on the Canadian Apple podcast site.

She notes, I'm getting smarter 10 minutes at a time. I love the bite-sized stories and bits of info I never knew I wanted to know. Gary's voice and inflection is a pleasure to listen to, and the subtle humor keeps it fun. I listen every day. Thank you, Nora. And thank all of you who support the show. Please leave your review over on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcast. And remember to go support the show over at patreon.com.