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Violent knights feared posttraumatic stress

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Sir Edward:
Violent knights feared posttraumatic stress
http://sciencenordic.com/violent-knights-feared-posttraumatic-stress

Sir William:
Soldiers have dealt with this going back to antiquity...at least the ones who lived long enough to regret their actions.  State-sanctioned death still has to be performed by someone and one could argue that just because you were told to do so doesn't mean you should have.  We have all sorts of ways to compartmentalize and marginalize these actions making these veterans able to assimilate back into civilian life...but it isn't going to work on everyone.  And religion doesn't provide the sense of solitude and closeness to the Maker like it once did...technology and cynicism have come forward to be the new religion...God help us.

Ian:

--- Quote ---“De Charny describes stress factors that we also see related in modern military psychology, including reports from Vietnam War veterans,” he says. “His picture of knights shows they are very remote from the violent psychopaths that we picture them as.”
--- End quote ---

I was unaware that modern people viewed knights as violent psychopaths.  I don't think the PTSD thing is really a revelation, as I agree with Sir William that this phenomenon stretches back to the dawn of warfare itself.  Sadly, what I think this article really brings to light is that it appears many people believe PTSD is a relatively modern problem, when in fact all fighting men have had to deal with it in some shape or form throughout history.

I didn't see it listed explicitly in the article, but in case anyone is interested, the De Charny book is A Knight's Own Book of Chivalry and is available on Amazon and the like.  I own a copy but admittedly have not read it yet.

Sir Edward:
Yeah, there's this assumption that just because a condition wasn't officially recognized as a specific named malady in recent years, that it didn't exist prior to that. Psychology wasn't a real profession until modern times. That doesn't mean there was no mental illness in prior centuries.



--- Quote from: Ian on 2011-12-09, 19:01:53 ---I didn't see it listed explicitly in the article, but in case anyone is interested, the De Charny book is A Knight's Own Book of Chivalry and is available on Amazon and the like.  I own a copy but admittedly have not read it yet.

--- End quote ---

It's worth reading. It's a bit dry, and feels repetitive. Charney will never say something concisely when a more verbose way of putting it exists. :) But it's an interesting insight into priorities and values of the time.

SirNathanQ:
Whiel it is very insightful and brings up very worthy points, I feel that it is skwewed somewhat due to the modern aversion to violence. It is also only in modern times whee we start viewing war and battle as inherent evils. While I would suppose that knights did in fact feel PTSD in some cases (taking a sword to someone's brainpan is wont to leave an effect) I feel that the almost total immersion in a society that valued such things might have helped.
Also, I feel that the men of old were much more aware of thier own mortality than most folks are today. Such things would have made the impact less. It was a violent time. They were immersed in it, and that's honestly all they would have known.

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