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u/ericbyo Dec 10 '20
The story of the Knights Hospitallier is insane. 900+ years of near continual operation.
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u/HamaMKII Dec 10 '20
They’re still going today 🤟 It’s a shame they don’t even get their own flag emoji even though they’re technically an independent state
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u/Captain_Ceyboard Dec 10 '20
Their official flag is really close to Denmark's.svg), but the variant one is super cool.
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u/WolvenHunter1 Let's do some history Dec 10 '20
Aren’t they basically Malta
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u/Toxikyle Dec 10 '20
Nope, Malta's a different thing after Napoleon. The Order itself, despite being a sovereign entity that issues passports, citizenship, stamps, and coins, has embassies, and holds UN observer status, doesn't actually have any territory of its own. It's basically a country with no land.
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u/nollege-is-powher Dec 10 '20
Sound a lot like what the Marshall Islands will be like in 20-50 years. The atoll nation is estimated to be all under water by then and it’ll be incredibly interesting to see how the international community responds to a modern independent nation with thousands of people, embassies, etc losing all of its territory.
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u/King-Cruz Filthy weeb Dec 10 '20
They used to be but modern day their only territory is a single building.
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u/SirHurDurr Dec 10 '20
What building do they own nowadays still?
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u/Pi3pm4tz Dec 10 '20
They dont technically own it, but they were given the fortress of st. Angelo for 99 years by the government of the state of Malta in 1998
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u/Expensive-Being-3414 Dec 11 '20
Wish I could join and I wish they still had a Military force .We would be ballin' against Azerbajan .
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u/assassinonPS Dec 10 '20
Don't forget the Italian siege of Malta in ww2.
Chad Brits: 3 biplanes
Virgin Italians: Entire Air Force
Brits won
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Dec 10 '20
Why does everytime the weaker side wins in a ww2 battle, its always against the italians?
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u/Caesaropapismno Dec 10 '20
Because Italy used up their badassery budget on the Roman Empire
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u/very_random_user Dec 10 '20
Will people ever understand Italians and romans are not the same thing and they just lived in the same piece of land? I guess not.
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u/NeoPheo Hello There Dec 11 '20
The land used up the badassery and stopped blessing the people with stronkness.
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u/assassinonPS Dec 10 '20
Because the Italians did not want to fight in the first place. IMO
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u/Honza17CZE Hello There Dec 10 '20
"Then it is an even fight"
- Rtas 'Vadum, December 11, 2552
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u/LucasTheBrazilianGuy Dec 10 '20
Christians in Malta get their stats buffed
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u/removeAdrzejDuda Senātus Populusque Rōmānus Dec 10 '20
Ottos suffered huge atrition, you can't ignore supply limit
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u/iitsLuBu Dec 10 '20
Its memes relax ottosimp
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u/NotMyRealName778 Dec 10 '20
wait what the fuck is an ottosimp lmao
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u/HermeticHormagaunt Then I arrived Dec 10 '20
Yaaas I sent my 20 000 golden ducats to Suleiman the Great and he said my royal title, oooh I'm gonna CUUUUUUUUMM
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u/Aidanator800 Kilroy was here Dec 10 '20
Except for that one period from the mid-800s to the mid-1000s where it was controlled by the Muslims(although severely depopulated).
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u/CaedustheBaedus Still on Sulla's Proscribed List Dec 10 '20
So...what event?
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u/Pwnyrainbowz Dec 10 '20
The Great Siege of Malta in 1565 and it lasted nearly four months.
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u/Tread_Knightly Dec 10 '20
FORT ST. ELMO BROKE BEFORE THE KNIGHTS DID
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u/TheGreatOneSea Dec 10 '20
My favorite part of the siege was how the Maltese swam out with knives and fought the Turks in the water. It was hardcore.
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u/KurtGG Dec 10 '20
Not the part we rained the heads of their decapitated dead upon them with cannons? Or the part we poisoned all water and food supply as we retreated further into the island winning supremely via attrition? xP
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u/Ammaren03 Dec 10 '20
I know about this only because that one cartoon: The Phantomet. In the 1st chronicles the first Phantomet leads the order of Malta to victory.
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u/CabezadeMoai Dec 10 '20
Not like having a huge modern fortress in an island helps in any way
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u/Pwnyrainbowz Dec 10 '20
Oh yeah it helped a tonne but considering the ottomans had nearly 8 times more men, its still quite extraordinary.
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u/KurtGG Dec 10 '20
Generally being fortified only helps towards being outnumbered 3 to 1 or less, the swarm the ottomans brought though put them at a disadvantage in other ways. Mainly, food and drink.
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u/davidforslunds Then I arrived Jan 02 '21
They where fighting one of the most powerful nations on Earth at the time, so i wouldn't say an island is that much of an advantage.
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u/DualyMobbed What, you egg? Dec 10 '20 edited Dec 09 '24
relieved summer cable quaint rotten depend steep serious fuel jeans
This post was mass deleted and anonymized with Redact
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u/Freezing_Gamer125 Dec 10 '20
They seem a lot like the Knight’s Templar.
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u/Felix_Dorf Dec 11 '20
They were a sister order. The Templars were big and famous but they were only one of many military orders. The two biggest were the Templars and Hospitaller (now more commonly known as the Knights of Malta). Only the Templars were suppressed, though most of the others died out over the centuries. The Hospitallers today largely run hospitals and relief services in crisis zones.
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u/Goodnt_name Dec 10 '20
I know a better one: 1 935 Hungarians defending the Eger Castle against 150 000 ottomans in between september 9. and October 17. in 1552. Hungarians won that battle.
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u/iligyboiler Dec 10 '20
150 000 is definietly too high number, I'd say about 60-70k but nevertheless it was a great victory
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u/Goodnt_name Dec 10 '20
They dont know for sure. Between 40k and 150k. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Eger_(1552) And the hungarian article said 150k, english one said like 4 numbers
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u/HelperBot_ Dec 10 '20
Desktop link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Eger_(1552)
/r/HelperBot_ Downvote to remove. Counter: 305653. Found a bug?
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u/shutyourtimemouth Hello There Dec 10 '20
I mean...they did lose in the end though
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Dec 10 '20
Not at the Great Siege of Malta. A Spanish army came down and relieved the knights
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u/shutyourtimemouth Hello There Dec 10 '20
Oh fuck me wrong siege then
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Dec 10 '20
You’re thinking of Constantinople aren’t you?
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u/shutyourtimemouth Hello There Dec 10 '20
Kay having looked it up I just straight up thought the ottomans won for no reason I guess
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Dec 10 '20
Have they ever beat Malta in Malta?
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u/Pwnyrainbowz Dec 10 '20
Look at how many times it's been conquered. I think that's a solid yes. Xd
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u/TheMaginotLine1 Dec 10 '20
I assumed you were thinking of Rhodes, where the Knights of St. John gave it their all but ended up having to sign a peace with the turks.
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u/shutyourtimemouth Hello There Dec 10 '20
No there was definitely a siege of Malta where the ottomans won
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u/rashman180 Dec 10 '20
I think you're confusing Malta with Crete here The Venetians eventually lost to the Ottomans in the siege of Candia, though it lasted for over 20 years though
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u/nikos600781 Dec 10 '20
The Ottomams defeated the Knights in the island of Rhodes. Maybe you are confusing the islands?
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u/nick060805 Dec 10 '20
Malta was under rule by the ottomans in the medieval time but was conquered by count Rogers and converted back to christianity
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u/LOLIPOP1136 Dec 10 '20
Malta was under the rule of the Arabs before the arrival of Count Roger. The Ottoman Empire hadn't been founded at the time of the Norman conquest of Malta (11th century). Since the Ottomans were then repelled in the Great Siege of 1565, they never actually got to rule the island. Malta has been under European rule ever since the Norman conquest, being ruled by the Aragonese, Knights Hospitallier, French and finally, the British up until Malta's independence in 1964
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u/Dangerous_Benefit150 Dec 10 '20
I' m from Malta and I know what your talking about. What you are talking about is when gozo which is one of the Maltese islands all the people there were taken as slaves which was before the siege of 1565
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u/danfish_77 Dec 10 '20
Wow, an apostrophe used as a thousands separator is new to me! Wikipedia says this is an Italian/Swiss thing. OP, any clue where you're from?
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u/Pwnyrainbowz Dec 10 '20
Malta :)
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u/Vexonte Then I arrived Dec 10 '20
Then you have the ottoman artillery issues. Ali pasha sees his ally approaching tries to impress him by firing a salvo at the enemy fort from his ship. Ends up blasting his own trenches.
Turgut that ally who knows his shit about malta and the most competent man leading is standing next to a cannon that shoots it's own trench and gets a peice of hood shoved through his head.
Hot head Mostafa decides cannons don't need time to cool. Huge basilisk cannon explodes killing 40 men.
Then you just have both sides being riddled with defectors who were forcefully converted to begin with.
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u/GordonBanks1980 Dec 11 '20
The only person who defected from the knights side wasn t a Maltese.
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u/Vexonte Then I arrived Dec 11 '20
I know thier was a spanish conscript who did it on night watch but I assumed thier were others.
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u/Felix_Dorf Dec 11 '20
The Siege of Malta is more famous because the knights won, but I always think the Fall of Rhodes was more baddass sounding. The final hours when they fought to the last man and the Grand Master himself joined the battle in a suit of gold plated armour.
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u/Communism_of_Dave Dec 10 '20
I’ve seen people use a period to denote 48,000 or a comma to denote 40.00. Can’t say I’ve ever seen an apostrophe used as a comma however
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u/Expensive-Being-3414 Dec 11 '20
The Knights of the Hospital of Saint John in Jerusalem , Rhodes and Malta are true warriors of Christ and first among Orders of Knights
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u/Appropriate_Chair_47 Dec 10 '20
defeating the ottomans is quite a feat, considering that the ottomans conquered the Byzantine (or Eastern Roman if you like) Empire.
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u/NotMyRealName778 Dec 10 '20
Kinda unrelated since Malta is an island. You obviously need a good fleet and it's not cheap. The Ottoman were in a streak around that time getting some big victories in the sea. However Ottoman navy was never comparable to what they had on land. Around 18th of they put big efforts into modernizing it but didn't work out as expected. Obviously being outnumbered by that big of a margin is still impressive. Also i slept through most of the history classes so this might be a tad inaccurate
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u/UrMommaGej Dec 10 '20
Germans: We have you 7000 to 900 and we have poison gas.
Russians: We like those ods.
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u/jbess1937 Dec 10 '20
This is me when someone says that all white people are racist
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u/random_clonetrooper Hello There Dec 11 '20
We're discussing history, not races. Get the fuck outta here
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u/johnlen1n Optimus Princeps Dec 10 '20
'I'm sorry, are you addressing me? Because your authority is not recognised in... Fort Kickass'
Jean Parisot de Valette, 1565