Class

Class (pronounced klas or klahs)

(1) A number of persons or things regarded as forming a group by reason of common attributes, characteristics, qualities, or traits; kind; sort.

(2) A collection or division of people or things sharing a common characteristic, attribute, quality, or property

(3) A group of persons sharing a similar social position and certain economic, political, and cultural characteristics

(4) In educational use: (1) The period during which a group of students meets for instruction, (2) A group of students meeting regularly to study a subject under the guidance of a teacher or (3) the physical classroom.

(5) Collectively (as “class of YYYY”), all students in the institution who graduated that year, the concept extended also to politicians in an assembly all elected at the same election.

(6) A social stratum sharing basic economic, political, or cultural characteristics, and having the same social position; caste.

(7) In sociology, political science & economics, the system of dividing society on that basis; (ruling class, upper class, middle class, working class etc); of late extended to include concepts such as “political class”, “entrepreneurial class”, “creative class” etc; in Marxist theory, a group of persons sharing the same relationship to the means of production & distribution.

(8) Social rank, especially high rank.

(9) Elegance, grace, or dignity, as in dress and behavior.

(10) The members of a given group in society, regarded as a single entity.

(11) Any division of persons or things according to rank or grade.

(12) Excellence; possessing exceptional merit; in informal use, the best or among the best of its kind (sometimes as “touch of class”).

(13) In Hinduism, any of the four social divisions, the Brahman, Kshatriya, Vaisya, and Shudra, of Hindu society; varna.

(14) Any of several grades of accommodation available on ships, airplanes, trains and such.

(15) In biology, the usual major subdivision of a phylum or division in the classification of organisms, usually consisting of several orders.

(16) In British and Commonwealth universities, the groups into which candidates for honors degrees are divided according to merit on the basis of final examinations or other method of assessment (first class, second class, third class and sometimes graduated (class 2A, 2B etc).

(17) In Ecclesiastical use (early Methodism, as classis), one of several small companies, each composed of about twelve members under a leader, into which each society or congregation was divided.

(18) In statistics, a grouping of data values in an interval, often used for computation of a frequency distribution.

(19) In mathematics (set theory), a collection of sets definable by a shared property, especially one which is not itself a set (in which case the class is called proper).  To please the nerds, every set is a class, but classes are not generally sets.  A class that is not a set is called a proper class.

(20) In computer programming (object-oriented), a set of objects having the same behavior (but typically differing in state), or a template defining such a set in terms of its common properties, functions etc.

(21) To place or arrange in a class; classify; to take or have a place in a particular class.

(22) As “class up” to improve the quality, tone, or status of; add elegance, dignity, style etc.

1590–1600: From the earlier Middle English classis (plural classes), from the fourteenth century French classis, from the Latin classis (a class or division of the people, assembly of people, the whole body of citizens called to arms, the army, the fleet, later a class or division in general, the singular form a back formation from the plural), from the primitive Indo-European kele- (to call, shout).  Classis displaced the Old English ġecynd.  The original use in the late sixteenth century was of a “group of students” (ie number of pupils in a school or college of the same grade) and that in North America became the standard form, enduring to this day.  The Latin classis was most used in military matters (of the army and the sea-fleet) and applied particularly to “a class, a division; army, fleet”, especially “any one of the six orders into which Servius Tullius (sixth king of Rome, reigning 578-535 BC) divided the Roman people for purposes of taxation” (traditionally, originally “the people of Rome under arms” (a sense in use in English by at least the 1650s), and akin to calare (to call (to arms)), thus the link with the primitive Indo-European kele- (to call, shout)).  Class is the standard abbreviation of classification and sometimes is used also for “classical” and “classified”.  The word is for many purposes used as a modifier and there are more than a hundred including asset class, business class, closed class, economy class, first class, leisure class, middle class, night class, professional class, school class, social class, working class. class action, type class, cruiser class, cattle class, class A, classable, class-based, class-conscious, classicide, classism, classist, class warrior, creative class, criminal class, high-class, low class, pseudoclass, ruling class, working-class, class enemy, class struggle and class reunion.

The 19BB (“Barrier Boat”, though sailor's slang is “Boomin’ Beaver”) is a specialized class of miniature tugboat used to deploy and maintain port security booms surrounding Navy ships and installations in port.  The smallest vessels on the USN's (US Navy) active list, the story Donald Trump (b 1946; POTUS 2017-2021 and since 2025) wanted to rename the BBs “Biden Class” (after Joe Biden (b 1942; VPOTUS 2009-2017 & POTUS 2021-2025)) apparently apocryphal.

Borrowing from the concept of classifications in educational & military use, the adoption in science for taxonomy (group of related plants or animals) dates from 1753 and has since been much expanded.  Dictionaries, perhaps surprisingly cite the 1870s as the origin of class being used with the meaning “high quality”, despite the sense of “a division of society according to status” (upper, lower, etc.) being in use since the early 1700s and the idea in societies of a “class-consciousness” will be ancient although it was only in 1903 the term entered English, from the German compound noun Klassenbewusst.  Special adaptations include the nouns classeme (in semiotics a generic or contextual seme, denoting a group of objects) & classitis (in web design, a critique of authoring stylesheets with redundant and semantically unhelpful classes).  Classy endures as an adjective (meaning “elegant; stylish) but the noun classy (also as clashee & clashy) is long obsolete.  Under the Raj, a classy (from khalasi) was an Indian worker at a port or dockyard, traditionally employed in pulling vessels out of the water for maintenance and repair and returning them to the water upon completion; the anglicized forms came ultimately from the Hindi ख़लासी (xalāsī), from the Classical Persian خلاصی (xalāsī).  Class is a noun, verb & adjective, classism & classer are nouns, classist & classful are nouns & adjectives, classable, classy, classless & classlike are adjectives, declass is an adjective, classed is a verb, classing is a noun & verb, classwide is an adjective & adverb and classward is an adverb; the noun plural is classes

Classy look: Lindsay Lohan rendered in the style of nineteenth century Impressionism by Gemini.ai.  The digital version was based on a photograph of her in a Jil Sander (b 1943) gown while attending the Disney Legends Awards ceremony, Anaheim, California, August, 2024.  On the day, although the environment was not optimized for photography, the light and even the breeze cooperated, the gown’s fabric swishing in a way the Impressionists would have painted, even had the air been still.

In the context of a group of people sharing the same social, economic, or occupational status, the term “class” implies usually a social and economic hierarchy in which those of higher class standing have greater status, privilege, prestige, and authority. Western societies traditionally have been divided into three classes: the upper (or leisure), middle (bourgeoisie) & lower (working) class (for Marxists, the significant classes were the bourgeoisie and proletariat although neo-Marxists have for decades adjusted the theory to accommodate changes).  Most associated with the writings of English-born US sociologist Michael Mann (b 1942), classicide (the construct being class + (hom)icide) describes the deliberate and systematic destruction, in whole or in part, of a social class through persecution and violence.  In that it may be compared to genocide (envisaged originally as the mass killing of defined ethnic or religious groups).  Between the two there can be overlap (such as in the Cambodian genocide by the Khmer Rouge regime in Democratic Kampuchea) but the emphasise in classicide is on the premeditated mass killing of a group based on their (perceived) social status; in that its similar to politicide (in which the targets are defined by their political activity) but in that case, the critical factor was what people do rather than what they are.  Very much at the heart of the French Revolution (1989), classicide was a feature of the “terrible twentieth century” and events able to be classified as such occurred in the Soviet Union under comrade Stalin (1878-1953; Soviet leader 1924-1953), during the Cultural Revolution (1966-1976) in the PRC (People's Republic of China) under comrade Chairman Mao Zedong (1893–1976; chairman of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) & paramount leader of the PRC 1949-1976) and in Kampuchea under Pol Pot (Saloth Sâr; 1925–1998; dictator the communist (Maoist) state of Democratic Kampuchea (Cambodia) 1975-1979).  The related “social cleansing” (the removal of certain classes from certain places but (in theory) not involving mass killing) has the same relationship to classicide as ethnic cleansing has to genocide.

USS Defiant, the lead ship in the proposed Trump Class of guided missile cruisers to enter service in the 1930s.

The design has little in common with the historic battleships of the twentieth century but it's believed President Trump is drawn to the word "battleship" because they were the "biggest warships" he calls the Trump Class "battleships".  The future of surface fleets and their configurations is currently the subject of much discussion on the basis the likelihood of threats from massed swarms of autonomous or controlled UAVs (unmanned aerial vehicles (drones)) may render them too vulnerable to risk.  

With machines, “class” came to be used of a “type” or “run” of units of similar (though not necessarily identical) units.  The practice pre-dated mass-production of consumer goods (on the model Henry Ford’s Ford (1863-1947) Model T (1908-1927) made famous) and most influential was the UK’s Royal Navy that in the 1870s & 1880s standardized the use of “class” for designs of capital ships, the convention being the name adopted was the first laid down (and usually, though not always, launched).  By the time of the coming of the upsurge in warship construction that marked the naval “arms race” of the early twentieth century, naval architects in many nations had adopted the scheme of designation.  The “class” referred not to a ship’s “type” but the set of design parameters (dimensions, weight, firepower, propulsion etc) distinguishing the ships from others.  With the smaller warships (destroyers, light cruisers etc), there might be a dozen or more of the class while the big ships (battleships, battlecruisers etc) typically were built in batches of no more than four and the occasional class did consist of a single vessel.  Because it was an “arms race”, ships could be approaching obsolescence not long after being launched and succeeding classes incorporated new innovations and, in the case of the battleships: more of everything, the most famous example being the Royal Navy’s Dreadnought, the first “all big-gun” battleship that rendered obsolete every battleship then afloat (including all others in the British fleets).

HMS Temeraire at anchor, 1909.  She was one of three Bellerophon-class Dreadnought battleships built between 1906-1909, all of which survived World War I (1914-1918) and were scrapped in 1921-1922.

Before navies crystallised the system of “class” warships had tended to be described by “rate” or “type” (first-rate ship of the line, frigate, corvette, etc) but individual names were invoked, phrases such as “ships of the Iron Duke type” or “the Majestic battleships” being common in oral use and routine in Admiralty documents.  So the concept of “classes” had crept in before the system was formalized and, in the late 1800s, it was three factors that encouraged the shift: (1) Industrialised naval construction (steam power, iron and steel hulls and increasingly capable machine tools made designs expensive meaning a run of standardized units was a way to amortize the investment), (2) Serial production (with an arms race in progress, navies were ordering more warships and, as Henry Ford soon would demonstrate, batches of machines with identical (or near-identical) specifications could be produced faster and more cheaply than bespoke creations and (3) Navies were becoming more bureaucratic (as the fleets expanded, so did the establishment & dockyard facilities and, with ships becoming more complex and maintenance intensive, Admiralties needed precise accounting, training, logistics, and doctrinal categorisation.  “Class” already had a long history in engineering (especially in railway workshops) and taxonomy so was the natural administrative solution and at the time, Britain was the world’s leading naval power so, as went the Royal Navy, others followed.

Classes on four wheels

BMW promotional shot of 1964 BMW 1800 Neue Klasse.

The monument in the background is the Siegestor (Victory Gate), located on the on the boundary between the districts of Maxvorstadt & Schwabing in Munich, Bavaria Germany.  Completed in 1852, it was commissioned by Ludwig I (1786–1868; King of Bavaria 1825-1848) to honor the Bavarian army but after suffering severe damage in World War II (1939-1945), it only narrowly avoided demolition.  BMW stands for Bayerische Motoren Werke (Bavarian Motor Works) and the company has been based in Barvaria since formation in 1910.

As body types and other forms of differentiation proliferated in the twentieth century, cars were often sorted into “classes”, variously by manufacturers, dealers, registration authorities or reviewers.  The categories used from time to time numbered in the dozens but literal use of the word “class” has been rare in formal nomenclature although terms like “the 1.5 litre class” or “the family car class” were and remain common.  BMW’s Neue Klasse (1962-1970) became well-known outside Germany as the company’s first “mainstream” product on four wheels BMW and although always appearing in English as “New Class”, the literal translation of Neuse Klasse is “new cash register”; given the significance of the range in restoring the company to profitability (in 1960 it was a loss-making concern on the verge of being sold to avoid a declaration of bankruptcy) and ensuring its survival, the true meaning wholly is appropriate.  BMW’s Neue Klasse’s range was neither innovative or especially distinctive but was well-executed and the specification was perfect for the a point in the Wirtschaftswunder (the post-war “economic miracle” experienced by the FRG (Bundesrepublik Deutschland (Federal Republic of Germany; the old West Germany, 1949-1990))) at which a critical mass of the middle class had become sufficiently prosperous to trade in their Volkswagen Beetle for something “a class above”, just as a decade earlier they’d shifted from a motorcycle to one of the “microcars” built by BMW and others that had in the 1950s “put Germany back on wheels”.

BMW 1800 TI/SA, 1965 24 Hour Race, Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps, Francorchamps, Stavelot, Wallonia, Belgium.

The Neue Klasse tag was never used by BMW; the cars always given a designation based on engine displacement (1500; 1600; 1800; 2000) and the range was important also as the ancestor of the 3 Series, since 1975 the model that internationally has been the backbone of the company’s sales.  The model was noted too for it being the first time a “Hofmeister Kink” appeared on a BMW; although the motif had been seen for more than a decade in both Europe and the US, it became such a brand signature it came to be named after Wilhelm Hofmeister (1912–1978), BMW’s design chief 1955-1970.  Although in the 1960s the company never Neue Klasse part of its corporate language, so enduring did it become that in the 2020s it’s its latest generation of EVs (electric vehicle) is now officially the BMW Neue Klasse.  With Chinese manufacturing of EVs seemingly a juggernaut and thus facing troubles potentially as serious those the original Neue Klasse surmounted, the Bavarians hope history repeats itself.

Mercedes-Benz W116, the first S-Class: 1976 450 SEL 6.9.

Unlike BMW, Mercedes Benz did with the release of the W116 (1972-1980) sedans formalize use, the S Class (Sonderklasse, sometimes abbreviated as S-Klasse and translated as “Special Class”) the first instance of what would later became a convention (S Class, E Class, C Class etc).  The new name also encouraged retrospective use, the earlier “big” sedans (W111/112 (1959-1968) & W108/109 (1965-1972)) also sometimes referred to thus although this was never adopted by the factory.  A landmark achievement in its time, the original S-Class was the first recognizably "modern" Mercedes-Benz sedan and its design elements would be carried forward for two decades.

Mercedes-Benz advertising.  Although never explicitly labelling previous models as "S-Class", the factory does like to to hint and frankly, by 2026, the past was looking better than the future.

Despite that, Mercedes-Benz has in S-Class advertising (the model now in its seventh generation, the W223 introduced in 2020) often shown an array of previous generations of its “big” sedans including models like the W111/112 & W108/109 which, in period, never carried the designation and even the 600 (W100, 1963-1981), a model in the Grosser rather than S-Class lineage.  Although as early as 1968, a distinct range of smaller sedans had augmented the W108/109, (the range expanded further in 1983 by an even more compact model), the now familiar nomenclature (C Class, E Class, S Class) wasn’t standardized until 1993 when the alphanumeric names were inverted (500E becoming E500 etc), a change necessitated by the proliferation of models rendering the old system (dating from the 1920s) so prone to ambiguity it has become unmanageable.

Newspapers, advertisers and readers

Before the internet did what it did, for centuries it was print publications (newspapers, magazines and other periodicals) that were the prime vector for the distribution of news, information and entertainment; film, radio and television all had their effects (television notably contributing to the extinction of most afternoon newspapers) but generally, much of the established print media and what was then the “new media” managed a form of peaceful co-existence that was sometimes synergistic, newspaper proprietors and editors quickly expanding their coverage of what appeared on television because that was what their readers wanted, some buying the copies for no other reason.  In those jurisdictions that allowed the same corporation to publish newspapers and operate television stations in the same market, the techniques of cross-promotion became highly refined.

Unlike many mass-produced products, selling more newspapers did not necessarily increase profits; it was a matter of what class of readers were attracted.

Newspapers and magazines were historically unusual because the cover (or even subscription) price charged often would not be enough to pay for the paper alone, let alone the overall cost of production & distribution.  What covered the costs and provided centuries of sometimes vast profits was advertising revenue and although readers tended to think of themselves as buying “a product”, in reality they were the product being delivered to advertisers, exactly the same strategy that works so well for Facebook, TikTok etc.  However, an additional layer of complexity for the print media was that unlike a manufacturer of widgets, increasing sales did not always translate to greater profits.  It’s true the accountants at the widget factory also had to calculate if the extent of additional demand made worthwhile an investment in increased production (ie a night shift, an additional production line or factory etc) but one simplicity was that every dollar paid by a widget buyer (rich or poor) translated on the balance sheet in the same way.  What made print titles unusual was not all buyers were created equal and while the dollars paid by poor people for their newspapers were banked in the same way and had the same nominal value, they weren’t of necessity “worth having” because selling newspapers to the poor (ie of a lower socio-economic class) could be counter-productive for the business model (ie the more you sold to them, the greater the loss).

In the West, mainstream newspapers by the mid twentieth century had become polarized, the “popular” (ie tabloid) titles at one end and the “quality” press (ie broadsheet) at the other.  Because commercial success depended on being able to deliver to advertisers the “right” readers, an industry of market research emerged to perfect the analysis of working out which titles delivered the “right audience at the lowest cost”.  This research was both quantitative & qualitative because it mattered much to advertising agencies whether a title’s buyer lived in the south east, owned two cars, played golf on Saturdays and took an annual overseas holiday or lived in the north, took the bus to a football match on Saturdays and never left the country.  In many ways, they were separate populations and while both demographics might be attractive to those wishing to advertise products, in many cases they’d be different products and in some, exclusive to each.  By combining this data with advertising rates, agencies were able to work out for their clients which media (print, radio, television etc) could deliver the desired market segment at the cheapest rates.  In the case of national newspapers, the segmentation that mattered most was social class and what evolved in the UK was a metric to handle these calculations.  Developed by the industry collective, JICNARS (Joint Industry Committee for National Readership Surveys, a body owned jointly by publishers, advertisers & agencies), because the occupation of a household’s main breadwinner (chief earner) largely determined the spending pattern of that household, social class was determined primarily the their jobs and for this purpose there were six classes:

Class A: The upper middle class (by the mid 1970s in the UK around 20% of all households) with the chief earner (head of the household) typically a successful businessman, professional (lawyer, doctor, chartered accountant etc) or senior civil servant, living in a large detached house or high-priced apartment.  At the time, that class included headmasters of large public (ie private) schools, executives near board level in large companies, leading figures in local government, newspaper editors, senior journalists, professors and Church of England bishops.  As that list indicates, by the 2020s, the composition of Class A shifted a bet.  For the JICNARS’s purposes, the “upper class” (the so-called “1%”) were included in Class A.

Class B: The middle class, then some 10% of households.  These were often people holding “senior” positions who were financially stable and living lives of “quiet respectability” and although with neither the incomes or accumulated wealth (or, not infrequently, debt) of the Class A members, the significance was that in manners and cultural matters, their tastes and habits often overlapped, meaning their attention was sought by the same advertisers.  The Class B membership included vicars, headmasters of smaller schools, senior executive officers in the civil service, university lecturers, matrons of smaller hospitals, pharmacists, directors of smaller companies and qualified librarians in charge of smaller libraries.

Class C1: Just over 15% of households, the C1 families were the lower middle class, trades-people (employed or self-employed) and non-manual workers, “white-collar” workers such as articled clerks, owners of small businesses, clerks, typists, telephonists, curates and nurses.  A recent trend has been a marginalisation of the white collar component of the C1s by a number of factors, most obviously technology although this is spreading upwards to B and even A more than downwards.  Of the trades, despite recent rises in their economic value to advertisers, they’re considered culturally static so while their purchasing power has increased, they don’t identify with AB tastes.

Class C2: Intriguingly, many of those in Class C2 (about a quarter of households) enjoyed higher incomes than many in the C1 cohort and this was because, as the skilled working class, their economic value was higher because they contributed directly (and measurably) to productivity in a way an accountant’s clerk did not.  The C2 membership included foremen, fitters, knitters, plumbers, shop assistants with supervisory responsibilities, pastry-cooks and prison officers.

Class D: Although it probably wasn’t true statistically, for the purposes of the JICNARS, those is Class D were considered all manual workers, semi-skilled or unskilled; that didn’t mean the latter had no skills, it meant to an economist those skills could be quickly learned and required no formal education or structured training.  Some 20% of households were in Class D and typical employment profiles would include labourers, fishermen, bus conductors, traffic wardens and window cleaners.

Class E: Some 10% of households, the Es operated at the “lowest level of subsistence” and survived through precarious, low-paid employment, petty crime and transfer payments; they would now be classed as “welfare-dependent”.  Although the membership was diverse, the JICNARS for illustrative purposes listed migrants, those with substance abuse issues, families of old age pensioners, widows and those dependent on social security.

Predictably, the 30%-odd of the population in Class A & Class B tended to buy the “quality” papers, titles like the Financial Times, The Times, The Daily Telegraph and The Guardian collectively drawing almost half their readership from the ABs, this declining to around 40% for the Sunday editions.  What this affluent readership did was attract high-priced advertising, enabling the titles to remain profitable despite a low cover price and circulations that were tiny compared with the mass-market tabloids.  Of note too is that it was these publications (along with The Economist (a newspaper that looks like a glossy magazine) that were most read by decision makers in government and industry.  So, it was the quality newspapers that tended to provide informed discussion on public issues, political affairs, business and the arts; although the record of their influence on public policy was patchy, what they tended to do was “set the agenda”, another attraction for advertisers.

What made the pre-internet newspaper business unusual was that there was sometimes a conscious attempt to reduce sales, a discussion usually not heard in boardrooms or among members of management committees.  In 1968, The Times had embarked on a major promotional drive and, using conventional techniques, sales indeed did spike and that was most pleasing until the research revealed some 60% of its readers were now in the undesirable C1, C2, D & E classes, something the advertising agencies to quick to notice.  Accordingly, the paper’s editorial direction shifted back, ensuring as many as possible of the intruders were shed and the bias towards the AB was restored.  Profitability was thus also improved because with each copy of The Times sold at a nominal loss (based on the cost of production & distribution), selling more made sense only if the rising readership attracted more high-value advertising.  With the less desired classes forming a majority of the leadership, not only were the traditional advertisers less attracted, those seeking to reach the C1, C2 and D classes (few except tobacco companies and their ilk chased the E class) were not willing to pay the high-rates charged by the Times.  The Times did not repeat the mistake and that different news appeared in different papers to attract different audiences was hardly surprising for as Evelyn Waugh (1903-1966) put it in Scoop (1938): “They all have different policies, so of course they have to give different news.”

Nye Bevan and his wife Jennie Lee (1904–1988), London, 1934.

Waugh’s point of course can be considered as a matter of both cause and effect because whatever might happen on a publications profit & loss statement, there are also political consequences.  Until scared off, more than one government in the post-war years proposed increasing public expenditure in a way that would increase the burden only on taxpayers earning 2-3 times the national average and, without exception, these have been criticized by the “quality” press, usually on the basis not of such a fiscal package being “unfair” but that it would “alienate the political centre”.  As the JICNARS understood, in electoral terms, this was highly improbable because only about 10-12% of the population would lose out in such a redistribution but that sliver of the electorate was in the AB Class at the centre of the quality press’s readership and this dictated the response.  In his book In Place of Fear (1952), the Welsh Labour Party politician Aneurin "Nye" Bevan (1897–1960) pondered: “How can wealth persuade poverty to use its political freedom to keep wealth in power? Here lies the whole art of Conservative politics in the twentieth century.”  As political parties came to understand, it was possible to convince the poor to vote against their own economic interests if the “culture wars” dangled before their eyes could be made to seem enough of a threat, thus the weaponization in the US of guns, God, pickup trucks, trans rights, abortion, gay marriage and much else.

Kindleberger

Kindleberger (pronounced khin-dil-berg-ah)

A family name of Germanic origin.

As “Kindleberger Moment” & “Kindleberger Trap”, two related terms describing different aspects from an underlying problem in international political economy and named after economist Professor Charles P. Kindleberger (1910-2003) whose writings inspired their coining.  Professor Kindleberger’s middle name was “Poor” and while that may seem more appropriate for a monk than an economist, it didn’t appear to hamper his career.

The surname Kindleberger is of German origin, functioning as a habitational or topographic name, the construct being Kind(l)- + -berg + -er.  Kind (kid, child, young person) was from the Middle High German kint, from the Old High German kind, from the Proto-West Germanic kind, from Proto-Germanic kindą & kinþą, from the primitive Indo-European ǵenh- (to give birth); there were many local dialect variations.  Berg (mountain, hill) was from the Middle High German bërc, from the Old High German bërg, from the Proto-West Germanic berg, ultimately from the Proto-Germanic bergaz; it may be compared with the Dutch berg, the German Low German Barg, Berg & Biärg, the West Frisian berch, the English berry & barrow, the Danish bjerg and the Swedish berg.  The –er suffix (in this context) was appended to indicate inhabitant or person from a specific locality.  The “-berg” element thus in general was used in the names of those living near a specific hill or a place named with those combined linguistic roots and Kindleberger would likely have began with someone who was the (probably male) offspring of someone named “Berg”, “Berger” or such.  As a compound surname, it may in some instances have referred not to individuals living near mountainous regions but those (likely female) who were known for their roles as caretakers of children; the etymological structure can indicate a connection between familial roles and the natural landscape.  The name dates from at least the Late Medieval period (when surnames became hereditary) and records of use exist in several German-speaking regions, clusters found concentrated in areas like the Rheinland-Pfalz (Rhineland-Palatinate) region that, while not characterized by alpine peaks, does have a topography noted for rolling hills, low mountain ranges, and deeply carved river valleys.  As internal migration increased (notably within the Holy Roman Empire), like many European surnames, variations like Kindleberger and Kindelberger spread and this occurred internationally during the nineteenth & twentieth centuries; outside of Europe, the Kindleberger name is most likely to be found in the states of the north-eastern US (the largest concentrations historically in West Virginia, Ohio & Pennsylvania).  Kindleberger is a proper noun; the noun plural is Kindlebergers.

A red meteor observed by US-born astronomer Stephen James O'Meara (b 1956) in the skies above Maun, Botswana.

Asteroid 42354 Kindleberger was named after the professor.  Originally listed by the International Dark Sky Discovery Center in Fountain Hills, Arizona on 12 February, 2002 (and provisionally allocated ID 2002 CK43), it was discovered by Charles Juels (1944–2009) and Paulo Holvorcem (b 1967), both amateur astronomers.  Paulo Holvorcem (b 1967) is a mathematician based in Brasília (one of a handful of “created” capital cities), Brazil while Charles Juels (1944–2009) was a US psychiatrist practicing in Phoenix, Arizona; after retirement, he became one of the planet’s most prolific discoverers of asteroids, minor planets and such.  The naming conventions administered by the IAU (International Astronomical Union) permit those who discover minor planets to submit potential names, once the orbit officially is confirmed.  Professor Kindleberger was honoured in recognition both of his academic contributions to the discipline of economics and the role his books (especially Manias, Panics, and Crashes: A History of Financial Crises (1978) played in explaining such phenomena to a non-specialist audience.  The choice (within certain limitations) is in the hands of the discoverer(s) and other economists have had asteroids named after them.  Red-tailed asteroids are rare but do exist, 3200 Phaethon's (provisionally 1983 TB) vivid tail made of sodium vaporized from the rock by the heat of the Sun, inducing  fluoresce an orange glow.  Definitely the next red-tailed asteroid should be named after Lindsay Lohan.

The World in Depression, 1929-1939 (1973) by Charles P. Kindleberger.

A “Kindleberger Moment” is a critical point in global history when the world’s dominant power (of late typically a hegemon) ceases providing economic leadership and no other country is able or willing to assume the role.  MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) Professor of Economics Charles P. Kindleberger illustrated the concept during his study of the Great Depression of the 1930s, arguing the global economy “crashed” (ie suffered a significant decline in economic activity, employment, trade etc) because (1) the economy of the previously dominant power (the UK) had been too weakened by the First World War (1914-1918) to be able to provide the necessary leadership and corrective mechanisms and (2) the rising power (the US) was both also greatly affected by the downturn and anyway uninterested in becoming entangled in international affairs.  A Kindleberger moment can be considered a “global power vacuum”, the previous leader withdrawing from maintaining and contributing to global rules, trade agreements, and international organizations with no successor available.  At such moments, competing rising new powers tend to focus only on their own interests instead of supporting global stability, meaning the international system faces heightened risks of financial collapse, trade wars, political instability and related chaos (mass irregular migration, border conflicts etc).  Of late, there has been renewed interest in the Kindleberger moment as doubts have been raised about the ability of the US to continue in the rule it has fulfilled since 1945 at a time when the PRC (People’s Republic of China, 1949-) is becoming increasing powerful and assertive but has neither the capacity nor (apparently) the inclination to be the world’s “indispensable nation” (ie “global policeman and banker”).

Professor Kindleberger in his office at MIT, Cambridge, Massachusetts.

As an economist discussing the smooth operation of the international economy, Kindleberger didn’t attach to the concept of “hegemon” the negative connotations vested famously by the Italian Marxist theorist Antonio Gramsci (1891-1937) who had used to idea in a predictably Marxist way (of a “ruling class & ruling culture” able within a society to exert control and maintain power for its own economic benefit).  For Kindleberger, a hegemonic power was a highly desirable element in an inter-connected world economy that in the absence of such an authority would inevitably descent into conflicts that likely would spread.  A Kindleberger moment occurs when there’s hegemonic absence (or even significant deficit) in which the international system lacks a power willing and able to supply essential stabilising functions including:

(1) Maintaining an international trading system in which markets were free, open and transparent.

(2) Providing a system in which international capital flows were regulated to the extent of ensuring stability.

(3) Maintaining a stable monetary system by providing a stable, convertible reserve currency, able to be used by trading nations.

(4) Acting as a lender of last resort.

(5) Coordinating international responses to economic and other crises.

The related “Kindleberger Trap” (a term dating only from 2017) describes the structural dilemma that can arise from the world entering a “Kindleberger Moment”.  Were there always a nice symmetry in that as one power withdrew from the role, another took over on a “business as usual” basis, it would be a smoothly run world but in international relations things tend to be more messy and depending on the dynamics, things can take decades or even centuries to be resolved (for better or worse).  As a rising power acquires sufficient economic, military and geopolitical weight, it might be expected to contribute to maintaining the international order (from which, by definition, it has gained that strength) at a time when the established hegemon simultaneously is reducing its capacity or willingness to carry the burden but history suggests conflict is more likely than cooperation.  The twist in the “Kindleberger Moment” theory is that in a situation where the existing hegemon is in decline but the rising power is unwilling or unable to assume the role, a “trap” begins to open.  That trap is created by the rising power “probing” often regional weaknesses in the hegemon’s strategic architecture and the response to that often is localized tactical violence (often called “containment”), something that can exacerbate the decline of the authority of the established power while doing little to curb (and likely even encourage) the assertiveness of the rival.  Once the hegemon is so engaged, the trap has closed and the point is the “trap” is likely a process rather than a singer decisive event.  Deliberately the phrase echoed the better-known “Thucydides Trap” (the name from the Ancient Greek general & historian Thucydides (circa 460-circa 400 BC)). Describing the idea that when a rising power threatens to supplant the established one, the result is often war (pre-emptive or preventive depending on the spin chosen), either through a fear of being attacked or in an attempt to “contain the upstart”.  So, conceptually, a Kindleberger moment is the situation; the Kindleberger Trap is the recurring structural predicament that can lead to it.

Manias, Panics, and Crashes: A History of Financial Crises (1978) by Charles P. Kindleberger, fifty years on, still the standard work and now in its eighth edition (2023) and, there being no indication there'll not be more manias, panics, and crashes, a ninth edition can be expected, updated to document the latest crises.

The consensus among specialists seems to be the world is not at this point in a Kindleberger Moment because structurally the PRC is not yet able to assume the global role the US has evolved to fulfil since 1945.  These was nothing unique about the shift in 1945, just as the US replaced the UK, the UK had replaced the Netherlands, the Netherlands had replaced Spain and Spain had replaced various Italian city-states.  What however now makes the situation potentially unstable is that the PRC does not accept the existing US-led order, but is not only unable to replicate the global role but uninterested in doing so.  The PRC’s preferred model is “spheres of influence” on a grand scale administered on a “Westphalian basis” (ie non-interference in each other’s spheres).  In that, Beijing’s vision differs from spheres of influence approach during the Cold War in that the earlier model was one of conflict disguised as peaceful co-existence; the PRC’s regarding their mode; as beneficial for all.  Unlike those running the early Soviet Union (1922-1991), the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) has no interest in exporting its system of governance to other states; the lessons have been well-learned from the US attempting to “impose democracy” in places where historically it has never taken root.  The modern CCP does not wish to attempt to transform other places to clones of the PRC; what is wants is for them become good, reliable suppliers and consumers and whether they are run as democracies, theocracies or dictatorships is an “internal affair”.  What matters is peace, good order and a common system of “non-interference”.  The CCP’s collective view is not unknown in the annals of the US State Department, the diplomat and historian George Kennan (1904-2005) in one of his long (and mostly ignored) reports from Moscow in 1945 noting the US should “…remain true to its ideals but should not try to foist them on peoples with entirely different national traditions.”

Leviathan (1651) by Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679).  The etching used for the frontipiece of the original edition was by the French printmaker Abraham Bosse (circa 1604–1676) “with input from the author”.

The One comparison that can be made is between the notion a world hegemon is necessary for a generally stable world economy and the idea the very clever and deliciously wicked English philosopher Thomas Hobbes explored in Leviathan (1651): A strong sovereign (to whom individuals must cede certain “natural rights”) is essential for a peaceful, stable society.  Although striking, there are limitations to the extent the hegemon in Professor Kindleberger's model can be thought an international analogue of the grim vision in Leviathan; it is not a direct application of Hobbesian political theory.  Hobbes argued the fundamental problem in the “state of nature” (ie in which the earliest “societies” came to be formed) was the lack of a sufficiently powerful common authority to prevent individuals from pursuing their interests against one another.  In that model, because each person (at least theoretically) possesses roughly equal capacity to threaten others, rational individuals have an incentive to seek security by establishing a sovereign and one not there merely to coordinate but also with coercive power.  What the existence of a powerful sovereign offered was that in exchange for restrictions on individual freedom (at the most basic, not killing one’s opponents), collective security would be guaranteed.  Because all in the society would be subject to the same authority (and thus the same loss of certain freedoms) the arrangement would come to be accepted, if for no other reason than the alternative(s) being worse: “nasty, solitary, brutish and short” Hobbes’ memorable phrase.

Kindleberger's argument was developed in his book The World in Depression, 1929–1939 (1973) and concerned something analogous to what Hobbes described but at the international economic level.  His thesis was that (1) with an economy damaged by involvement in World War I and the consequent “difficulties” of the following decade, the UK was no longer able to provided the international economic leadership it had delivered before the war while (2) the US was unable or unwilling to assume the role.  With no stabilising hegemon, nations resorted to acting in short-term self interest, leading to reductions in trade, wealth and employment; Professor Kindleberger's key insight was that whatever their granular nature, in international economics these things must be thought public goods but, of course, individual countries each had incentives to have others bear the cost of maintaining them, thus the famous “Kindleberger Problem”: Who pays for the system?  That the UK was not prepared to go deeper into debt and the US preferred to focus on its own problems he held to be the major factors that made what might have been a sharp but relatively short recession into the Great Depression of the 1930s.  It was the leadership vacuum that created the conditions leading to the collapse of the international economic order.

The limitation in pursuing the analogy is of course that neither the UK in the nineteenth century nor the US since 1945 were the sovereign of the international system in the Hobbesian sense; Hobbes’ sovereign had juridical and coercive supremacy over subjects while the international hegemon does not because, although in the modern age state sovereignty is no longer the fabulous beast it was once claimed to be, individual nations remain still independent with some (though much varied) capacity to resist a hegemon.  In other words, Kindleberger's hegemon can help to provide order through preponderance in economic, political and political capabilities whereas the Hobbesian sovereign, within their territory, enjoyed absolute authority.  So the problems can be seen as similar but the solutions differ, Hobbes describing a rigid hierarchy and Kindleberger a leadership that administers anarchy by making it “managed chaos”.

US National Debt: US$40 trillion by August 2026.

All the history and economic theory is of course of interest but of immediate concern is (1) whether a Kindleberger moment is to hand (protagonist and antagonist being the US and PRC) and (2) whether the consequences of soch a moment will be economic disruption (of unknown extent or duration) or armed conflict (of unknown extent or duration).  The world is in a most unusual situation in that although the US continues of operate as hegemon, debatably it shouldn’t be able to because of its US$40 trillion debt (about 123% of GDP (gross domestic product)) and other problems.  While it’s true US debt was nudging 120% immediately after World War II (1939-1945), the US position at that time (vis-à-vis the rest of the planet) was unique and the debt trend was downwards whereas now it’s upwards.  There are those who argue things have changed and the US$40 trillion number is no longer an expression of “debt” in the conventional sense of the word but merely a way of describing the “new” mechanism of managing the US money supply.  The notion the US Treasury could at any time mint a single US$40 trillion coin, add it to the balance sheet and declare a net-debt free status has been offered as one example of why “deficits don’t matter” and while not all accept that, just about the whole world is now dependent on the US sustaining the existing system with this ever-growing debt so, in the absence of another country (or “demi-country” such as the EU (European Union (1993)), the multi-national aggregation which evolved from the EEC (European Economic Community), the Zollverein formed in 1957)) able and willing to fulfil the role of hegemon, the world economy and the US remain engaged in what some fear is a kind of economic danse macabre and there seems no way to use the numbers to predict if it's a debt level of US$50, 75, or 100 trillion that risks triggering a crisis.

Presidents Xi (left) and Trump (right).  With sufficient (1) goodwill or (2) amorality, the art of the deal can be done.  With enough of the latter, the former may one day emerge.

Of course the ultimate wild card (others might prefer “joker”) is that Donald Trump (b 1946; POTUS 2017-2021 and since 2025) is in the White House and while his idiosyncratic methods of governance intrigue political junkies, so marvellously unpredictable are his actions that it’s hard to map onto the dynamics a well understood concept like the Kindleberger Moment.  At heart a CEO (chief executive officer) rather than a democrat operating within constitutional norms, it’s suspected that left to his own devices, Mr Trump would sit down at the map table with comrade Xi Jinping (b 1953; General Secretary of the CCP and paramount leader of the PRC (People's Republic of China) since 2012) and divide up their respective spheres of influence.  Like Mr Trump who wants as little as possible to do with the internal affairs of America’s suppliers and customers (ie other countries), Mr Xi has no wish to waste effort or resources on “pointless squabbles” and not since a couple of horse-traders like Winston Churchill (1875-1965; UK prime-minister 1940-1945 & 1951-1955) & comrade Stalin (1878-1953; Soviet leader 1924-1953), needing nothing more, than pencil, paper and limitless cynicism divided up the Balkans into bite-sized spheres have two great powers been headed by a pair as suited to “doing the art of the deal”.  Of course, for those in places like the “renegade province of Taiwan”, there would be a cost but as at was demonstrated at the Yalta Conference (February 1945), somebody “always has to pay the price” and that may be a better trap to spring than risking the jaws of a Kindleberger Trap.

Calumny

Calumny (pronounced kal-uhm-nee)

(1) A false statement, maliciously made, designed to injure the reputation of someone or something; a malicious utterance of false charges or misrepresentation; slander; defamation.

(2) The act of uttering calumnies; defamatory words.

(3) Such a false charge or misrepresentation.

(4) As “oath of calumny”, in historic Scots law, a method for the prevention of calumnious and unnecessary suits, by which both parties at the beginning of a cause swear, either personally or through counsel, that the facts set forth by them are true.

1400–1450: From the late Middle English calumnīe (false accusation, slander; objection raised in bad faith), from the fifteenth century Old French calomnie (slander (that in modern French endures as calomnie), from the Latin calumnia (trickery, subterfuge, misrepresentation, malicious charge), the construct being calumn- (thought originally a participle of calvī (to deceive; to trick) + -ia +-y).  The source of the Latin is murky but there are etymologists who maintain the primitive Indo-European cognates include the Ancient Greek kēlein (to bewitch, cast a spell) the Gothic holon (to slander), the Old Norse hol (praise, flattery), the Old English hol (slander) & holian (to betray) and the Old High German huolen (to deceive).  It’s suspected the whole group is from the same root as call.  The English word is a doublet of challenge.  Calumny is a noun & verb, calumniousness, calumniator & calumniation are nouns, calumniate, calumniated & calumniating are verbs, calumniatory & calumnious are adjectives and calumniously is an adverb; the noun plural is calumnies.

The Latin -ia and the Ancient Greek -ία (-ía) & -εια (-eia) were used to form abstract nouns of feminine gender (countries, diseases, species etc and, occasionally, collections of stuff).  The –y suffix was from the Middle English –y & -i, from the Old English -iġ (-y, -ic), from the Proto-Germanic -īgaz (-y, -ic), from the primitive Indo-European -kos, -ikos, & -iḱos (-y, -ic).  It was cognate with the Scots -ie (-y), the West Frisian -ich (-y), the Dutch -ig (-y), the Low German -ig (-y), the German -ig (-y), the Swedish -ig (-y), the Latin -icus (-y, -ic), the Sanskrit -इक (-ika) and the Ancient Greek -ικός (-ikós); a doublet of -ic.  The –y suffix was added to (1) nouns and adjectives to form adjectives meaning “having the quality of” and (2) verbs to form adjectives meaning "inclined to".  Words such as derogation, vilification, disapprobation obloquy, traducement etc can in meaning tend towards calumny don’t of necessity carry the “legal baggage” associated with fraudulent misrepresentation, defamation and such.  The modern slang “diss” (from Jamaican English or AAVE (African American Vernacular English and probably a short form of “disrespect” rather than “disparage”) can describe statements sounding calumnious typically they’re a traducement rather than something defamatory.  The adjective calumnious (slanderous, using calumny) emerged in the late fifteenth century and was the equivalent of the Latin calumniosus.  The verb calumniate (knowingly utter false charges) was from Latin calumniatus, past participle of calumniari (falsely to accuse) in use since the 1550s.  The noun calumniation (act of calumniating) was first documented in the 1540s and was the noun of action from calumniate.  The rarely-used noun calumniator (one who falsely and knowingly accuses another of anything disgraceful or maliciously propagates false reports) was in use by the 1560s, from Latin calumniator, an agent noun from calumniari.

Calumny is of course a feature of political exchanges but lest anyone suspects the twenty-first century represents a low point in public politeness, press reports of eighteenth & nineteenth century election campaigns are available and after reviewing these, readers can decide on which side of the Atlantic discourse was most calumnious.  The word calumny is now not commonly applied to political insults (thought often well-deserved) but is a part of the legal jargon in jurisdictions in the common law tradition.  In law, the use of “calumny” rests on the notions of “false, fraudulent & malicious” and is heard most often in matters of probate (the process of verifying the legality of a will).  In the administration of probate “fraudulent calumny” describes the act of a beneficiary making false representations to the person making their will (the testator or testatrix) about another person, the outcome of which is: (1) the beneficiary making the false representations inherits to a greater extent or (2) the person the subject of those representations inherits less.  While these outcomes may be similar to instances in which “undue influence” has been exercised upon a testator or testatrix, what makes fraudulent calumny different is that some sort of falsehood must be involved.  In matters of undue influence, the motives of the influencer may not be pure or honorable but the method of persuasion is more subtle and need not involve untruths, something that makes proving undue influence notoriously challenging because the testator or testatrix has made and executed the will of their own volition.  The text-books sometimes use the legal slang of the “drip, drip, drip of a slow poison” to distinguish undue influence from the sudden, lethal dose of fraudulent calumny.

Lindsay Lohan and her lawyer in court, Los Angeles, December 2011.

Borrowing from criminal law, the familiar maxim mens rea (from the Latin mēns + reus (literally “guilty mind” and the basis of the precept in English common law: Actus non facit reum nisi mens rea sit (the act does not make a person guilty unless the mind is also guilty), what a liability for fraudulent calumny hinges on is not that a representation was false but that it was by the calumniator known to be false or they were so reckless as to not to verity the authenticity of what they said.  Probate can however be a tangled web and in the case law there have been instances where conduct clearly was calumnious yet fraudulent calumny was not found because it was proved the disinheritance of the subject of the untrue representations (for wholly unrelated reasons) anyway have happened in accordance with the wishes of the testator or testatrix.  So there can be “other contextual reasons” leading to a will being changed and courts can find their existence wholly excludes the possibility of fraudulent calumny or reduce the strength of the “fraudulent calumny argument”, the latter vaguely along the lines of the “contributory negligence” concept in tort law.  As a category of claim to challenge the validity of a will, fraudulent calumny is in most jurisdictions rare for the practical reason it is so seldom successful; that’s not to say the act is necessarily uncommon, just that it’s hard to prove.  In some cases this can be because there’s a complete lack of evidence.  A malicious falsehood might well be told to someone making out their will that has the direct and immediate effect of them disinheriting the slandered party and making the person telling the untruth the sole beneficiary but, if only two people were ever part of a conversation behind closed doors and one is dead, there likely will be no evidence the untruth was ever uttered and while there may be other grounds upon which the will might be challenged, it usually would not be possible to find fraudulent calumny.

Nor is mere “untruth” or “recklessness” enough to sustain a finding of fraudulent calumny.  Were someone to have made any number of false representations to a testator or testatrix, even if it was found their will was in some way disadvantageous to the slandered party, if there’s compelling evidence the representations had no effect of the decisions of the testator or testatrix, there can be no finding of fraudulent calumny because there exists no casual connection between one act and another.  So it’s limited and intent alone does not create grounds.  Even if it can be proven the falsehoods were intended to cause a will to be changed that “guilty mind” become irrelevant if those statements can be shown to have had no effect.  In that it differs from the application of criminal law where, if one attempts to murder someone but is so inept the target (1) suffers no harm, (2) was unaware an attempt on their life had been made, (3) and in some way benefited from the attempt and (4) the perpetrator suffered some injury in making the attempt, the offence of attempted murder has still been committed and the incompetent assassin may be subject to prosecution.  So, on the path to the fraudulent calumny finishing line there are many hurdles and what a claimant must demonstrate is:

(1) One or more false representations were made.

(2) The representation(s) were made to the testator or testatrix.

(3) The representation(s) went to character or conduct of an existing or potential beneficiary of the will.

(4) The representation(s) were made for the purpose of inducing the testator or testatrix to alter their testamentary dispositions either (4.1) to leave more to the person making the false representation(s) or (4.2) exclude or leave less to the subject of the false representation(s).

(5) The false representation(s) must have been made in the knowledge they were untrue or with recklessness as to their truth

(6) On the balance of probabilities (ie, the common law test in civil matters), it was the false representation(s) that induced the induced the testator or testatrix to change their will.

That means it hangs on intent, event, cause and effect, thus the frequency with which lawyers use the phrase “notoriously difficult to prove” when the possibility of fraudulent calumny comes up in conversation; one can prove intent and event and even that the desired effect happened but if the cause was found to be unrelated, there can, as a matter of law, be no fraudulent calumny.  Despite the obstacles, the concept is simple: “The alleged “poisoner” is receiving a greater share of the estate than the claimant believes is (1) fair and (2) in accordance with the deceased’s true wishes and his has been achieved by the poisoner “poisoning” the mind of the testator or testatrix with untruths.”  Although “challenging”, on the basis of the evidence presented, courts can find fraudulent calumny established (although in some cases the judgment has made it difficult to work out “undue influence ended” and “fraudulent calumny began”.  Typically, except for theorists,  that matters little because the outcome is the critical point.  In Edwards v Edwards [2007] EWHC 1119 (Ch), a woman of 86 died some three months after cutting from her will one son & grandson, leaving the remaining son the estate’s sole beneficiary.  The evidence suggested the testatrix had at the time she executed her final will enjoyed full “testamentary capacity” (ie the “being of sound mind” thing) and both understood and approved the document’s contents; the burden to produce “compelling evidence” of undue influence or of fraudulent calumny thus fell upon the claimant seeking to have the new will set-aside in favour of the original executed a decade earlier.

Damn! A Book of Calumny (1918) by Henry Louis “H.L.” Mencken (1880–1956).  Although it was not his fault, Mencken lived too long and even by the 1930s was thought (though not by other curmudgeons) “dated”.  The Mencken of 1918 was however the author at his best, Damn! A Book of Calumny a collection of short, cynical, punchy pieces representative of a certain strain of US thought in the era.

After reviewing the evidence, the judge found the new will had been induced by undue influence and set it aside, restoring the original.  In the summary, the judge listed the principles: (1) There is no presumption of undue influence for testamentary dispositions; the burden lies on the challenger; (2) the facts must be inconsistent with any hypothesis other than undue influence; (3) undue influence may arise through coercion (pressure overbearing the testator’s volition without convincing judgment) or fraud.  He added that “fraudulent calumny” exists where a person “poisons the testator’s mind” against a “natural beneficiary” by dishonest aspersions known to be false or made recklessly as to their truth.  In other words, “fraudulent calumny” may be thought a type of (or element in”) undue influence meaning the latter can be found to exist in the absence of the former but the former is a “flavour of the latter”.  In Edwards v Edwards, the just found both were operative.  Because fraudulent calumny cases are rare, the modern reiteration of principles was helpful.  The judge emphasized that while the relevant standard of proof is the civil balance of probabilities, the evidence must be compelling and the facts inconsistent with any innocent hypothesis.  Although understood as an old legal orthodoxy, the judgment in Edwards v Edwards confirmed fraudulent calumny is a “stand-alone” basis on which a will may be set aside, quite distinct from coercion.

Even in Kremlin the word proved useful.  On 5 March, 1940, comrade Stalin (1878-1953; Soviet leader 1924-1953) had signed an “open-ended death warrant” authorizing Lavrentiy Beria (1899–1953; head of the Soviet secret police 1938-1946) to “apply the supreme penalty, shooting” to Polish POWs (prisoners of war) who refused to accept Soviet authority; consequently almost 22,000 were executed with their the bodies buried in a mass grave in the forest of Katyn.  The corpses were unearthed by the German army in 1943 and Dr Joseph Goebbels (1897-1945; Nazi Minister of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda 1933-1945), instantly alive to the possibility of driving a wedge between the Soviets and its western Allies, arranged a forensic examination through the office of the neutral Swiss Red Cross, their unambiguous findings quickly published by the Germans.  In London, the Polish government-in-exile had long suspected the Soviets were responsible for the missing troops but found their repeated attempts to pursue the matter stonewalled and their protests suppressed.

As a cynical opportunist, comrade Stalin had few peers and not only did he deny his government’s involvement in the mass murder, he accused the “London Poles” (an annoyance to him because he was backing an alternative, “puppet communist government” under his control) of siding with the Nazis, the headline “HITLER’S POLISH COLLABORATORS!” appearing in Pravda on 19 April, 1943; within a week, Moscow had broken off diplomatic relations with the London Poles for failing “to offer a rebuff to the vile Fascist calumny.”  The British and Americans were well-aware of the truth but relations with the Kremlin were in 1943 “tense” because the so-called “second front” (the invasion of Europe from the west) had again been postponed so, not wishing further to antagonize comrade Stalin, on both sides of the Atlantic, blind eye were turned to the telescopes and diplomats inclined to “make a fuss” side-lined or posted somewhere remote.  Not until after the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991 did the new government of Russia admit the truth about the Katyn massacre.

The Calumny of Apelles

Apelles of Kos was one of the most renowned painters in Ancient Greece during the fourth century BC.  The work (remembered as the Calumny of Apelles) that was reputedly his greatest masterpiece was lost but a vivid description by the Syrian-born Greek writer Lucian of Samosata (circa 125–circa 187) survived and a number of artists subsequently have interpreted the text and rendered versions in their own style.  Quite how reliable was Lucian’s ekphrasis (from the Ancient Greek ἔκφρασις (ékphrasis) (literally “I describe” and in modern use understood to mean “a detailed description”) can’t be known but that he was what would now be called a “social commentator” noted for his satires rather than an art critic has made some scholars of Antiquity caution the “description” might contain the odd embellishment or “slant”.  Despite that, it’s the only extant critique of the painting so that’s what artists have had to work with.  Appelles painted his Calumny as a “revenge work” after a rival wrongfully accused him of committing an act of treason against the Egyptian king.

La Calumnia de Apeles, (Calumny of Apelles, circa 1503), engraving in black on ivory laid paper by Girolamo Mocetto (circa 1470-circa 1534) after Andrea Mantegna (1431-1506).

Mocetto based his engraving of a drawing by Mantegna and versions by other artists also exist.  The theme of calumny (false accusation) obviously is a thread running through many societies (certainly in Italy during the dying days of the late Middle Ages) so the attraction to artists is not surprising.  Ever since one stone-age man (or woman) copied another’s cave-painting and claimed the work as original, artists have been accusing each-other of this and that, some claims calumniatory, some more measured.  For historians of art, the print is interesting because it’s a “work in progress”, the shading not yet added to the basilica’s dome.  Mocetto remained true to Lucian’s words but relocated the allegory’s scene to Venice’s Campo Santi Giovanni e Paolo, Andrea del Verrocchio’s (circa 1435–1488) equestrian monument to Bartolomeo Colleoni (1400–1475) standing in the background.  Attended by Ignorance and Suspicion, Midas with his donkey’s ears extends his hand to Calumny while she stands at some distance.  Calumny is the most beautiful woman of her age but is riddled with malignant passions, her fury and wrath symbolized by the blazing torch she holds in one hand, the other dragging by the hair the blameless young man she has slandered; he reaches his hand to the heavens, calling on the gods to bear witness to his innocence.  Calumny is attended to by Envy, pale and wasted away by lingering illness, while following her are Fraud & Conspiracy.  Dressed in tattered black is the mournful Repentance, tears in her eyes as in shame she glances at Truth slowly approaching.

La Calumnia de Apeles (Calumny of Apelles, circa 1497), tempera on panel by Alessandro di Mariano di Vanni Filipepi (Sandro Botticelli) (circa 1445-1510).

Botticelli’s Calumny is the most famous of the genre and also was true to the spirit of Lucian’s ekphrasis, the figures personifications of vice & virtue, or the powerful & powerless (the king and victim).  From left to right, they represent (1) Truth, nude and pointing upwards to Heaven, (2) Repentance, in black (3) Perfidy (Conspiracy), in red and yellow, over the innocent half-naked (4) victim on the floor being pulled forward by the hair by (5) Calumny (Slander), in white and blue and holding a flaming torch, (6) Fraud (behind), tending to Calumny's hair, (7) Rancour (Envy), a bearded and hooded man in black, holding his hand towards (8) the king's eyes to obscure his view.  On the throne, the king has the donkey's ears of King Midas, while (9) Ignorance on his right and (10) Suspicion to his left grasp the ears as they whisper into them.  The king extends his hand towards Calumny, but his gaze is averted.  Historians say it’s at least possible Botticelli had in mind some unfortunate slandered chap (perhaps himself) but some years after he finished the work, the Florentine authorities received an anonymous letter, accusing the artist of “keeping a boy” and practicing homosexuality.  There’s no record of any prosecution being initiated and the consensus is the accusation was likely motivated by envy, vengeance or other of the vices Apelles of Kos depicted, all those years ago.  So it was a calumnious letter but not necessarily an untruth, Botticelli’s proclivities a matter of historic record.  The pattern remains current; when politicians sometimes complain a prosecution of them is “politically motivated”, that may well be true but doesn’t mean they’re not as guilty as sin of that with which they’ve been charged.