With luck, this should convince any remaining skeptics that this is on topic. This was the original historical comparison that gave me the idea for this thread.
Avatar and the Hundred Years War:
Several months ago, a thread was created for the purpose of debating as to whether Avatar could have been based off a real war. personally, I highly doubt it, but if it was, the best candidate would be the Hundred Years War, fought between England and France from 1337 to 1453 (116 years total). Below is a basic outlline of the history. There are some things in there that should be quite familiar to people who have seen Avatar.
There were 4 main participants in the war: England (the agressor), France (the largest country defending itself), Burgundy (much smaller than France, it was initially allied to the french, but later switched sides), and the small, but important area of Flanders, which was taken over by the english in the very early stages of the war.
The war began in 1337, when England invaded France. England was enjoying a time of relative prosperity, and since the King of England was related to the royal family of the less prosperous France, he felt that he was entitled to the french lands. A small english army landed in south-western france and occupied it. The french immediatly sent in an army to crush it that was five times as big as the english one, and were shocked when it was soundly defeated at the battle of Cr??cy. It was at this point that the Pope, who as head of the church was supposed to deal with that sort of thing interfered, and told the english that they were to withdraw at once. The Pope was used to people doing as he told them, and was shocked when the english king replied that he had no intention of leaving france, and that the Pope should mind his own business. France was on its own.
Over the next 100 years, the english fought a long series of battles against the french. At every single battle the french outnumbered the english, and yet the english won virtually all of the battles through a combination of tactical planning and vastly superior war technology. Despite their victories on the battlefield though, the english had a lot more trouble capturing the heavily fortified french cities. After several failed sieges the english came up with a new tactic, and instead of attacking the cities attacked the small farming villages that supplied those cities. Villages and farms were burned, forests were cut down and/or burned, and the country in general was messed up badly. It took a while, but after a while the tactic worked, and the cities began to surrender. Only Paris, the capital of France and the largest and best defended city resisted all attempts at capture by the english. Eventually however, it fell when the Burgundians, long considered to be France's strongest ally, betrayed the french and opened the gates of Paris to an english army.
With their capital city taken and most of the country occupied by the english, the surviving french forces realised their only option now was to try and take the fight to the english. An army was assembled and prepared to invade england. The plan was to attack the english capital city of London, and attempt to capture the King of England and force him to withdraw from France. Unfortunatly, english spies were able to find out about the plan, and when the french army crossed over into england, a massive english army was waiting for them.
The few pieces of France (mostly in the south and west of the country) soon united under a new king. The only problem was that the new king was completely mad. When an english army appeared to finish off the french, the crazy king ignored his nobles, who insisted they were willing to fight to the death, and surrendered to the english, a surrender that was largely ignored by most of his subjects. Nevertheless, the french looked done for.
At this point however, about 100 years after the war had begun, somthing happened that turned things around for the french. Two french knights, returning from the new border with the english, came across a girl named Joan of Arc. 17 - 18 years old, she claimed that God had spoken to her and told her to take command of the french army and defeat the english. One of the knights liked Joan, and believed that there was somthing special about her, but the other knight was suspicious, and believed that she might be in the employ of the English, or worse, she was a witch. Eventually however, the second knight was convinced, and they took her to see the crown prince of France (who by all accounts was somthing of an emo after a lifetime of being mistreated, ignored, and generally passed over by his insane father). Most of the french nobles were suspicious of Joan, and said that if she had really been sent by God, she would have been sent 100 years before to stop the war from ever happening. The emo-prince however, decided he liked her, and gave her command of his army. Suprisingly, the 17 year old peasant girl turned out to be a brilliant general, and started her career by decisively defeating a large english army that had been sent to capture Orleans, the greatest remaining french city. Joan spent the next three years winning battle after battle against the english. Her two chief lieutenants were Gilles de Rais, a ridiculously moral man whom Joan was suspected of falling in love with, and La Hire, a short, angry man who people always underestimated in battle because of a deformed foot.
With the sudden reversal in French fortunes, the emo prince was able to summon up enogh courage to get himself crowned King. Things seemed to be going very well, but Joan's luck ran out when she attempted to attack Paris and win back the capital city from the english. The french lost the battle, and Joan was soon captured by the english, and burned at the stake. If the english thought that they could now win the war though, they were wrong. The New french king gathered an army in Joan's memory, and used it to drive the remaining english forces out of France, ending the Hundred Years war after 116 years.
England had been bankrupted by the now lost war, and civil war soon errupted, leaving the french free to rebuild.
It's not exact, but parts of Avatar's storyline are definitely reminescent of the Hundred Years War. The ending might be different, but the begining and middle were quite frankly scarily similar at times.
Cookies and internetz for the people who can pick out the most similarites.
Edited on 08/03/2008 7:05am
Edited 4 total times.
