Veto

Veto (pronounced vee-toh)

(1) In constitutional law, the power or right vested in one branch of a government to cancel or postpone the decisions, enactments etc of another branch, especially the right of a president, governor, or other chief executive to reject bills passed by a legislature.

(2) The exercise of this right.

(3) In the UN Security Council, a non-concurring vote by which one of the five permanent members (China, France, Russia, UK & US) can overrule the actions or decisions of the meeting on most substantive matters.  By practice and convention, in the context of geopolitics, this is "the veto power".

(4) Emphatically to prohibit something.

1620–1630: From the Latin vetō (I forbid), the first person singular present indicative of vetāre (forbid, prohibit, oppose, hinder (perfect active vetuī, supine vetitum)) from the earlier votō & votāre, from the Proto-Italic wetā(je)-, from the primitive Indo-European weth- (to say).  In ancient Rome, the vetō was the technical term for a protest interposed by a tribune of the people against any measure of the Senate or of the magistrates.  As a verb, use dates from 1706.  Veto is a noun, verb and adjective, vetoless is a (non-standard) adjective and vetoer is a noun; the noun plural is vetoes.  In the language of the diplomatic toolbox the related forms pre-veto, re-veto, un-veto & non-veto, used with and without the hyphen.

The best known power of veto is that exercised by the five permanent members (P5) of the United Nations Security Council (UNSC).  The UNSC is an organ of the UN which uniquely possesses the authority to issue resolutions binding upon member states and its powers include creating peacekeeping missions, imposing international sanctions and authorizing military action.  The UNSC has a standing membership of fifteen, five of which (China, France, Russia, the UK and the USA) hold permanent seats, the remaining ten elected by the UNGA (UN General Assembly) on a regional basis for two year terms.  P5 representatives can veto any substantive resolution including the admission of new UN member states or nominations for UN Secretary-General (the UN’s CEO).  The term “united nations” was used as early as 1943, essentially as a synonym for the anti-Axis allies and was later adopted as the name for the international organization which replaced the League of Nations (LoN, 1920-1946) which had in the 1930s proved ineffectual in its attempts to maintain peace.  When the UN was created, its structural arrangements were designed to try to avoid the problems which beset the LoN which, under its covenant, could reach decisions only by unanimous vote and this rule applied both to the League's council (which the specific responsibility of maintaining peace) and the all-member assembly.  In effect, each member state of the League had the power of the veto, and, except for procedural matters and a few specified topics, a single "nay" killed any resolution.  Learning from this mistake, the founders of the UN decided all its organs and subsidiary bodies should make decisions by some type of majority vote (although when dealing with particularly contentious matters things have sometimes awaited a resolution until a consensus emerges).

The creators of the UN Charter always conceived the three victorious “great powers” of World War II (1939-1945), the UK, US & USSR, because of their roles in the establishment of the UN, would continue to play important roles in the maintenance of international peace and security and thus would have permanent seats on the UNSC with the power to veto resolutions.  To this arrangement was added (4) France (at the insistence of Winston Churchill (1875-1965; UK prime minister 1940-1945 & 1951-1955) who wished to re-build the power of France as a counterweight to Germany and (5) China, included because Franklin Roosevelt (1882-1940 US president 1933-1945) was perceptive in predicting the country’s importance in the years to come.  This veto is however a power only in the negative.  Not one of the permanent members nor even all five voting in (an admittedly improbable) block can impose their will in the absence of an overall majority vote of the Security Council.  Nor is an affirmative vote from one or all of the permanent five necessary: If a permanent member does not agree with a resolution but does not wish to cast a veto, it may choose to abstain, thus allowing the resolution to be adopted if it obtains the required majority among the fifteen.

Lindsay Lohan meeting Recep Tayyip Erdoğan (b 1954; prime-minister or president of the Republic of Türkiye since 2003), Ankara, January 2017.

As part of her efforts during 2017 drawing attention to the plight of Syrian refugees, Lindsay Lohan was received by the president of Türkiye.  As well as issuing a statement on the troubles of refugees and IDPs (internally displaced persons) in the region, Ms Lohan also commented on another matter raised by Mr Erdogan: the need to reform the structure of the UNSC which still exists in substantially the form created in 1945, despite the world’s economic and geopolitical realities having since much changed with only the compositional alteration being the PRC (People's Republic of China) in 1971 taking the place of the renegade province of Taiwan, pursuant to UNGA Resolution 2758, which recognized the PRC as “the only legitimate representative of China to the United Nations” and expelled “the representatives” of Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek (1887-1975; leader of the Republic of China (mainland) 1928-1949 & the renegade province of Taiwan.  In an Instagram post, Ms Lohan used the phrase “the world is bigger than five.  Five big nations made promises but they did not keep them.”  Despite her efforts, reform of the UNSC has advanced little because although consensus might be reached on extending permanent membership to certain nations, it remains doubtful all of the P5 (the permanent five members) would achieve consensus for this including the veto.  That would have the effect of replacing the present two-tier structure with three layers and it seems also unlikely a state like India would accept the “second class status” inherent in a permanent seat with no veto.

The Vatican, the CCP and the bishops, real & fake

A well-known and economically significant niche in modern Chinese manufacturing is fakes.  Most obvious are fake Rolexes, fake Range Rovers et al but Peking for decades produced fake bishops.  After the Holy See and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) sundered diplomatic relations in 1951, papal appointments to Chinese bishoprics were not recognized by Peking which appointed their own.  In retaliation, popes refused to acknowledge the fakes who in turn ignored him, the amusing clerical stand-off lasting until January 2018 when negotiations appeared to produce a face-saving (sort-of) concordat.  As a prelude, Rome retired or re-deployed a number of their bishops in order to make way for new (once-fake) bishops, nominated by the CCP and, in a telling gesture, Pope Francis (b 1936; pope 2013-2025) re-admitted to "full ecclesial communion" seven living Chinese bishops who were ordained before the deal without Vatican approval, and had thus incurred a latae sententiae (literally "of a judgment having been brought") penalty.  Long a feature of the Catholic Church's canon law, a latae sententiae works as an administrative act, the liability for which is imposed ipsō factō (literally "by the same fact" and in law understood as "something inherently consequent upon the act").  What that means is the penalty is applied at the moment the unlawful act is done; no judicial or administrative actions needs be taken for this to happen.  Thus, at the point of non-Vatican approved ordination, all fake bishops were excommunicated.

On 22 September 2018, a provisional agreement was signed.  It (1) cleared the Chinese decks of any bishops (fake or real) not acceptable to either side, (2) granted the CCP the right to nominate bishops (the list created with the help of a CCP-run group called the Chinese Catholic Patriotic Association (CCPA) and (3) granted the pope a right of veto.  Although not mentioned by either side, the most important understanding between the parties seemed to be the hints the CCP sent through diplomatic channels that the pope would find their lists of nominees “helpful”.  If so, such a document deserved to be thought "a secret protocol" to the "Holy See-CCP Pact but however the sausages were made, it was a diplomatic triumph for Beijing.  Although Rome at the time noted it was a “provisional agreement”, many observed that unless things proved most unsatisfactory, it was doubtful Rome would be anxious again to draw attention to the matter because, whatever the political or theological implications, to acquiesce to the pope as cipher would diminish the church’s mystique.

Things may be worse even than the cynics had predicted.  In late 2020 the two-year deal handling the appointment of Chinese bishops was extended after an exchange of notes verbales (in diplomatic language, something more formal than an aide-mémoire and less formal than a note, drafted in the third person and never signed), both sides apparently wishing to continue the pact, albeit still (technically) on a temporary basis.  The uneasy entente seems however not to have lasted, Beijing in 2021, through bureaucratic process, acting as if it had never existed by issuing Order No. 15 (new administrative rules for religious affairs) which included an article on establishing a process for the selection of Catholic bishops in China after 1 May 2021.  The new edict makes no mention of any papal role in the process and certainly not a right to approve or veto episcopal appointments in China, the very thing which was celebrated in Rome as the substantive concession gained from the CCP.

Still, Beijing’s new rules have the benefit of clarity and while it's doubtful Francis held many illusions about the nature of CCP rule, he certainly had certainty for the remainder of his pontificate.  Order No. 15 requires clergy of the Chinese Patriotic Catholic Church (CPCC) to “adhere to the principle of independent and self-administered religion in China” and actively support “the leadership of the Chinese Communist Party” and “the socialist system,” as well as to “practice the core values of socialism.”  They must also promote “social harmony” which is usually interpreted as conformity of thought with those of the CCP (although in recent years that has come increasingly to be identified with the thoughts of comrade Xi Jinping (b 1953; paramount leader of China since 2012) which, historically, is an interesting comparison with the times of comrade Chairman Mao Zedong (1893–1976; chairman of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) 1949-1976).  Essentially, the CPCC is an arm of the CCP regime (something like "the PLA (People's Liberation Army" at prayer") and formalizing this is the requirement for bishops and priests to be licensed for ministry, much the same process as being allowed to practice as a driving instructor or electrician.

All this is presumably was a disappointment to the pope though it’s unlikely to have surprised to his critics, some of whom, when the agreement was announced in 2018 and upon renewal in 2020, predicted it would be honored by Beijing only while it proved useful for them to weaken the “underground” church and allow the CCP to assert institutional control over the CPCC.  At the time of the renewal, the Vatican issued a statement saying the agreement was “essential to guarantee the ordinary life of the Church in China.”  The CCP doubtlessly agreed with that which is why they have broken the agreement, and, if asked, presumably they would point out that, legally, it really didn’t exist, the text never having been published and only ever discussed by diplomats.  Although there are (by the Vatican's estimates) only some five million Chinese Catholics among a population of some 1.4 billion, that's still five-million potential malcontents and as the "Godless atheists" of the CCP know from their history books, that's enough to cause problems and if problems can be solved in the "preferred" CCP manner, they must be "managed".

Beware of imitations.  British Range Rover Evoque (left) and Chinese Landwind X7 (right).

Although not matching the original in specification or capabilities, the Landwind X7 sold in China for around a third what was charged for an Evoque and while it took a trained eye to tell the difference between the two, Chinese capitalism rose to the occasion and, within weeks, kits were on the market containing the badges and moldings needed to make the replication closer to exact.  Remarkably, eventually, Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) won a landmark legal case (in a Chinese court!), the judges holding the “…Evoque has five unique features that were copied directly” and that the X7’s similarity “…has led to widespread consumer confusion.”  In a decision which was the first by a Chinese court ruling favor of a foreign automaker in such a case, it was ordered Landwind immediately cease sales of the vehicle and pay compensation to JLR.  It was a bit hypocritical for the British to complain because for years shamelessly the British industry "borrowed" styling from Detroit and in the early, cash-strapped, post-war years, the Standard Motor Company (later Standard-Triumph) sent their chief stylist to sit with his sketch-pad outside the US embassy in London to "harvest" ideas from the new American cars being driven by diplomats and other staff.  That's why Standard's Phase I Vanguard (the so-called "humpback", 1947-1953) so resembles a 1946 Plymouth, somewhat unhappily shrunk in every dimension except height.  One can debate the ethics of what Landwind did but as an act of visual cloning, they did it well and as Chinese historians gleefully will attest, when it comes to cynicism and hypocrisy, the British have centuries of practice.    

Beware of imitations.  Joseph Guo Jincai (b 1968, left) was in 2010 ordained Bishop of Chengde (Hebei) today without the approval of the pope.  He is a member of the China Committee on Religion and Peace and was appointed a deputy to the thirteenth National People's Congress.  Because of the circumstances of his ordination as a bishop, he was excommunicated latae sententiae but later had the consolation of being elected vice-president of Chinese Patriotic Catholic Association.  In September 2018, Francis lifted the excommunication of Joseph Guo Jincai and other six bishops previously appointed by the Chinese government without pontifical mandate.  What Francis did was something like the "re-personing" granted in post-Soviet Russia to those "un-personed" under communist rule.

Politically, one has to admire the CCP’s tactics.  Beijing pursued the 2018 deal only to exterminate the underground Catholic Church which, although for decades doughty in their resistance to persecution by the CCP (including pogroms during the Cultural Revolution (1966-1976)), were compelled to transfer their allegiance to the CPCC once it received the pope’s imprimatur.  After the agreement, Chinese authorities rounded up underground Catholic clergy, warning that they would defy the pope if they continued baptizing, ordaining new clergy and praying in unregistered churches; most of those persuaded became part of the CPCC and those unconvinced resigned their ministries and returned to private life.  According to insiders, a rump underground movement still exists but it seems the CCP now regard the remnant as a terrorist organization (a la the subversive Falun Gong) and are pursuing them accordingly.

The central committee of the CCP's politburo contains operators highly skilled in the art of political opportunism and in 2025 they demonstrated their prowess during the brief interregnum between the death of PFrancis and the election of Leo XIV (b 1955; pope since 2025) when unilaterally they “elected” two bishops, one of them to a diocese already led by a Vatican-appointed bishop.  The clever maneuver took advantage of the fact that during this sede vacante (the vacancy of an episcopal see), the Holy See had been unable to ratify episcopal nominations.  The CCP clearly regards its elections as a fait accompli and one technically within the terms of the 2018 provisional agreement (most recently renewed in October 2024), adopting the pragmatic position of “what’s done is done and can’t be undone”.  The Vatican lawyers might demur and even though the terms of the agreement have never been published, the convention had evolved that Beijing would present to the Vatican a single candidate chosen by assemblies of the clergy affiliated by the CCPA; this nominee the pope could the appoint or not.  In 2025, the argument is that no veto was exercised which, during a sede vacante, was of course impossible but it’s no secret that in recent years Beijing has on a number of occasions violated the agreement.  The CCP are of the “how many divisions has he got” school established by comrade Stalin (1878-1953; Soviet leader 1924-1953), practiced with the “take whatever you can grab” ethos of capitalism which modern China has embraced with muscular efficiency.

The files were among the many piled in Leo’s in-tray and keenly Vaticanologists awaited his response and the new pope didn’t long delay, in June 2025 appointing Bishop Joseph Lin Yuntuan (b 1952) as an assistant in Fuzhou, the capital of the south-eastern Fujian province.  Unlike bishoprics elsewhere, analysts made no mention of whether the appointee belong to the “liberal” or “conservative” factions but focused instead on both sides exhibiting a clear desire to “continue on the path of reconciliation”.  In a statement, the Holy See Press Office stressed “final decision-making power” remained with the pope while for Beijing the attraction was the (substantial) resolution of the decades-long split between the underground church loyal to Rome and the state-supervised CCPA although there are doubtless still renegades being pursued.  Lin had in 2017 been ordained a bishop in the underground church and had the CCP wished to maintain an antagonism it could of course declined to countenance the appointment of a character with such a dubious past but the installation’s rubber-stamping in both states seems a clear indication both wish to maintain the still uneasy accord.  During the ceremony, Bishop Lin swore to abide by Chinese laws and safeguard social harmony.

Gargoyle & Grotesque

Gargoyle (pronounced gahr-goil)

(1) A grotesquely carved figure of a human or animal crafted as an ornament or projection, especially in Gothic and neo-Gothic architecture.

(2) In architecture, a spout, terminating in a grotesque representation of a human, animal or supernatural figure with open mouth, projecting from the gutter of a building for throwing rain water clear of a building.

(3) Archaic slang for person with a grotesque appearance, especially if small and shrivelled.

(4) Fictional monsters; pop-culture creations inspired by the decorative and/or functional projections in Gothic and neo-Gothic architecture.

1250–1300: From the Middle English gargoile & gargurl (grotesque carved waterspout) from the Old French gargouille & gargoule (throat) and it’s from here modern English gets gargle.  Even in the Gothic period, not all gargoyles were conduits for draining rainwater; many were purely decorative and were therefore grotesques.

Grotesque (pronounced groh-tesk)

(1) In architecture, a thing odd, unnatural or fantastic in the shaping and combination of forms, as in the sixteenth-century decorative style (in any material) combining incongruous human, animal or supernatural figures with scrolls, foliage etc.

(2) Distorted, deformed, weird, antic, wild.

(3) In the classification of art, of or characteristic of the grotesque.

(4) In typography, the family of 19th-century sans serif display types

1555:1565: From the Middle French grotesque from the Italian grottesco (of a cave), derived from grotta from the Vulgar Latin grupta.  Ultimate root is the Classical Latin crypta from which English picked up crypt.  Grotta entered French from the Italian pittura (grottesca) (cave-painting) and it was via French English picked up grotto.  Connection with the decorative forms attached to gothic architecture is the fantastical nature of some cave-paintings.  Spreading from Italian to the other European languages, the term was long used interchangeably with arabesque and moresque for decorative patterns using curving foliage elements.

The Gargoyle and Water Management

Gargoyle: Bern Minster, Switzerland.

Often used interchangeably, the technical difference between gargoyles and grotesques is that gargoyles contain a water sprout, carved usually through the mouth, whereas grotesques do not.  A gargoyle thus has a function in engineering whereas a grotesque’s purpose is essentially decorative although it is nominally functional in that they were believed to provide protection from evil, harmful, or unwanted spirits.  The application of more modern techniques of rainwater management has had the effect of turning many gargoyles into grotesques although architectural historians maintain the original designations.  As long ago as the sixteenth century, drainpipes were installed in the Notre Dame cathedral in Paris so the gargoyles became merely ornamental, although, they did of course continue to ward off evil.

Gargoyle: Cologne Cathedral, Germany.

The number of gargoyles attached to a building and their size and shape was a product of climate and fluid dynamics.  Architects used multiple gargoyles to divide the flow of rainwater off the roof to minimize the potential damage of a rainstorm and that number was influenced by the rainfall prevalent in the area where the structure sat.  The architect needed to consider not the annual rainfall but the heaviest prolonged rain-events expected; they thus had to cater for peak demand and the gargoyles needed to be sufficient in total capacity to evacuate the volume of water expected during the heaviest falls.  To achieve this, a trough was cut in the back of the gargoyle, rainwater typically exiting through the open mouth.  Gargoyles usually assumed their elongated fantastical animal forms because the length of the gargoyle determines how far water was thrown from the wall, the shape thus determined by fluid dynamics.  Prior to the extensive use of pipes reaching to the ground, the gargoyles were sometimes augmented by other techniques; when Gothic flying buttresses were used, aqueducts were sometimes cut into the buttress to divert water over the aisle walls.  Typically cut from stone, Non-ferrous metals and alloys such as aluminium, copper, brass and bronze have been used.

Grotesque: Saint Mary’s Cathedral, Edinburgh.  Technically, this is a pair of chimeras (a subset of the grotesque).

The term originates from the French gargouille (throat; gullet) from the Latin gurgulio, gula & gargula (gullet; throat) and similar words derived from the root gar (to swallow) which represented the gurgling sound of water (such as the Spanish garganta (throat) & g‡rgola (gargoyle)).  It was connected also to the French verb gargariser (to gargle).  Most helpful are the languages where the translation is architecturally precise.  The Italian word for gargoyle is doccione o gronda sporgente (protruding gutter), the German is Wasserspeier (water spewer) and the Dutch is waterspuwer (water spitter or (even better) water vomiter).  A building with gargoyles is said to be "gargoyled" but, during the Middle Ages, babewyn was slang used to describe gargoyles and grotesques, a word derived from the Italian babuino (baboon), an indication of what the things resembled, especially when viewed from a distance.  The size and shape of a gargoyle was thus dictated by function but the detail was left to the imagination of the designer.  Those creating grotesques had few limitations.  Because of the need to scare off and protect from evil or harmful spirits, the carvings often had the quality of chimeras, creatures a mix of different types of animal body parts creating a new animal, some notable chimeras being griffins, centaurs, harpies, and mermaids, these eerie figures serving as a warning to those folk who might underestimate the devil.

Grotesque: National Cathedral, Washington DC.  Although there's an open mouth, this plays no part in water management and is purely decorative.

In water management, the gargoyle has a long history.  In the architecture of Ancient Egypt, there was little variation, the spouts typically in the form of a lion's head carved into the marble or terracotta cymatium of the cornice.  The Temple of Zeus had originally 102 of these but, being rendered from marble, they were heavy and many have broken off or been stolen and only 39 remain.  Nor have they always been chimeric, some instead depicting monks, or combinations of real animals and people, many of which were humorous but as urbanisation increased, building codes were imposed which rendered the gargoyles, expect for their spiritual purpose, obsolete.  Typical was London’s 1724 Building Act which mandated the use of downpipes compulsory on all new constructions.

Gargoyle: Marble Church, Bodelwyddan, Clwyd, Wales.  Note the protruding spout: because the water flow will over time erode the passage, many gargoyles have internal piping (some now even plastic) which is replaceable.  The function means this Welsh figure is defined as a gargoyle although its hybrid nature is clearly that of a chimera.  

Within the Church however, the spiritual function wasn’t without controversy.  Gargoyles were thought to keep evil outside a church but existed also to convey messages to a people who usually were illiterate, scaring them into attending church, a reminder that the end of days was near.  However, there were some medieval clergy who viewed gargoyles as a form of idolatry and Burgundian abbot, Saint Bernard of Clairvaux (1090–1153), was famous for his frequent denunciations, his objections theological, aesthetic and fiscal:

"What are these fantastic monsters doing in the cloisters before the eyes of the brothers as they read?  What is the meaning of these unclean monkeys, these strange savage lions, and monsters?  To what purpose are here placed these creatures, half beast, half man, or these spotted tigers?  I see several bodies with one head and several heads with one body.  Here is a quadruped with a serpent's head, there a fish with a quadruped's head, then again an animal half horse, half goat.  Surely if we do not blush for such absurdities, we should at least regret what we have spent on them."

Grotesque: Crooked Hillary Clinton (digitally altered image).

Even after drainpipes took over responsibilities for drainage, the tradition was maintained by the grotesque, sometimes emulating the earlier elongated lines, sometimes more upright.  Grotesques were popular as decoration on nineteenth and early twentieth century skyscrapers and cathedrals in cities such as New York Minneapolis, and Chicago, the stainless steel gargoyles on New York’s Chrysler Building especially celebrated by students of the art.  The twentieth century collegiate form of the Gothic Revival produced many modern gargoyles, notably at Princeton University, Washington University in Saint Louis, Duke University, and the University of Chicago.  One extensive collection of modern gargoyles is on the National Cathedral in Washington DC.  Beginning in 1908 the cathedral was first encrusted with limestone demons but, over the years, many have been added including Star Wars character Darth Vader, a crooked politician, robots and other modern takes on the ancient tradition.  In England, Saint Albans Cathedral has a grotesque of former Archbishop of Canterbury Dr Robert Runcie and one of an astronaut adorns the Cathedral of Salamanca in Spain.

Grotesques modernes, left to right: Star Wars' Darth Vader (from the Star Wars film franchies), National Cathedral, Washington DC; Astronaut or cosmonaut, Cathedral of Salamanca, Spain; Lindsay Lohan, Notre Dame Cathedral of Reims, Marne France (digitally altered image); Dr Robert Runcie (Baron Runcie, 1921–2000; Archbishop of Canterbury 1980-1991) (centre), St Albans Cathedral, England.

Grotesques and chimeras

A chimera of Cathédrale Notre-Dame de Paris, contemplating the city, photographed by Noemiseh91.

So, in architecture, gargoyles are a specialized class of grotesques that include the functional feature of a waterspout and even if a building is renovated with a modern water management system added which means a gargoyle’s spout now longer is connected to the flow, it does not become reclassified as a grotesque; it remains a gargoyle, albeit a “dry” one.  While the difference between a gargoyle and grotesque is a matter of whether the design incorporates the handling of fluid, the distinction between a chimera and a grotesque is at the margins fluid in the metaphorical sense, both being ornamental sculptures most associated with Gothic architecture but critics have created criteria, however loose the parameters may seem.  Classically, a chimera was a fantastical, mythical creature, often a hybrid of multiple animals or a mix of human and animal features and for the architectural feature to be classified thus, it has to conform to this model.  In that chimeras differ from any grotesque which is a representation, however bizarre, of a creature from a single species.  What that means is that while all chimeras are grotesques, not all grotesques are chimeras.

Horodecki House (House with Chimaeras), Ukraine, Kyiv.

One of the most celebrated buildings said (erroneously) to be adorned with chimeras is Horodecki House in the Ukrainian capital Kyiv, a structure better known on Instagram as “House with Chimaeras” which received much attention when Volodymyr Zelensky (b 1978, president of Ukraine since 2019) in February 2022 stood in front of it to deliver his “Our weapon is truth” address following the Russian “special military operation” (invasion of Ukraine).  Classified as being in the Art Nouveau style, the building was designed by Polish architect Władysław Horodecki (1863–1930) and despite all the intricate detailing and other complexities, it was completed in little more than two years, opened in 1903.  One thing which made the speed of construction possible was the core technique of using concrete piles as the underpinning, something necessitated by the land being steeply sloped, resulting in an asymmetric building with six floors on Ivan Franko Square while three face Bankova Street.  Another novelty was the use of cement as the finishing material, something at the time not unknown but still rare.  Despite the popular moniker “House with Chimaeras”, the many sculptures which lend Horodecki House its distinctiveness are technically grotesques because all, bipeds & quadrupeds, are representations of real animals, not figures from mythology or fantastical hybrids and it’s believed it picked up the romantic nickname because it imparts such a wonderful air of gloominess and recalls the Gothic style.  The grotesques, rendered in cement, were the work of the Italian sculptor Emilio Sala (1864-1920) who spent most of his working life in St Petersburg (Leningrad) and Kyiv (Kiev).

Interior detailing, Horodecki House Ukraine, Kyiv.

The motif was the theme also for the interior detailing with stuccos, high reliefs and sculptures decorating the ceilings, walls and stairs and of particular interest is that while what’s depicted on the exterior uses only living creatures as a model, inside, everything is dead and often dismembered; Horodetskyi was an avid hunter.  Despite the pervasive feeling of gloom as one approaches the thing, it’s different inside because (the many carcases notwithstanding) the rooms are bright and airy with the floral ornaments typical of early Modernism although it’s of regret all the original furniture and many of the frescos fell victim during World War II (1939-1945) to marauding Red Army soldiers and other looters.  Although in recent years substantially restored, no attempt was made to re-create the frescos, the space now taken by paintings.

Woman with Catfish, Horodecki House Ukraine, Kyiv, photographed by Константинъ. 

Although there are two creatures in this sculpture, it's still a grotesque because they're separate beings; had the depiction been part fish and part human, it would have been as chimaera.  Although large, certain catfish reach 3 metres in length so the sculptor was rendering still still in the realist tradition.

Following restoration, in 2004 the building was designated a museum but since 2005 it has enjoyed official status as the “Small Residence of the President of Ukraine”, curious term meaning it’s used for meetings with foreign dignitaries and in that there are many advantages, the location meaning it’s easy for security forces to secure the site while the larger rooms are spacious and make a most attractive backdrop for photo opportunities.  Daily Art Magazine has a feature with a fine collection of images.

Faction

Faction (pronounced fak-shun)

(1) A group or clique forming a minority within a larger body, especially a dissentious group within a political party, government or organization.  The terms “splinter group”, “breakaway”, “reform group”, “ginger group” et al are sometimes used as factional descriptors depending on the circumstances but the more familiar (and sometimes formally institutionalized) are forms like “right”, “left”, “wet”, “dry” “moderate”, “conservative” et al.

(2) Internal organizational strife and intrigue; discord or dissension (applied mostly to political parties but used also to describe the internal workings of many institutions).

(3) As a portmanteau word, the construct being fact + (fict)on), in literature, film etc, a form of writing which blends fact and fiction (though distinct from the literary form “magic realism); in journalism, elements of faction are seen in variations of the technique sometimes called “new” or “gonzo” journalism.  In reportage, it should not be confused with “making stuff up” and it’s distinct from the “alternative facts” model associated with some staff employed in the Trump White House.

1500-1510: From the fourteenth century Middle French faction, from the Latin factionem (nominative factiō) (a group of people acting together, a political grouping (literally “a making or doing”)), a noun of process from the perfect passive participle factus, from faciō (do, make), from facere (to make, to do), from the primitive Indo-European root dhe- (to set; put; to place or adjust).  The adjective factious (given to faction, turbulently partisan, dissentious) dates from the 1530s and was from either the French factieux or the Latin factiosus (partisan, seditious, inclined to form parties) again from factionem; the related forms were the noun factiousness and the adverb factiously.  In ancient Rome, the factions were the four teams which contested the chariot racing events in the circus, the members distinguished by the colors used for their clothing and to adorn their horses and equipment.  Because politics and the sport soon intertwined the meaning of faction shifted to include “an oligarchy, usurping faction, party seeking by irregular means to bring about a change in government”.  Even after the fall of Rome, the traditional Roman factions remained prominent in the Byzantine Empire and chariot racing went into decline only after the factions fought during the Nika riots in 532 which saw some thirty-thousand dead and half of Constantinople razed.  Faction, factioneer, factionist & factionalism are nouns, factionalize is a verb, factional & factionless are adjectives, factionally is an adverb, factionary is a noun & adjective, factionate is a verb & adjective; the noun plural is factions.

The use of the word to describe the literary device which blends facts with fiction faction is said to date from the late 1960s although some sources suggest it had earlier been used in discussions held in conferences and meetings but the most usual descriptor of such works was the earlier “non-fiction novel” which by the mid century (especially in the US) had become a popular (and in literary circles a fashionable) form although, as such, it was not originally directly related to post-modernism.  Critics trace the origins of the form to the years immediately after World War I (1914-1918) and distinguish the works produced then from earlier texts where there was some use of dubious material presented as “fact” in that in the twentieth century the author’s made their intent deliberate.

William Shakespeare (1564–1616) was well acquainted with the earthly lusts and frailties of men and in Coriolanus (1605-1608) act 5, scene 2, at the Volscian camp when Menenius is halted by sentries who refuse to allow him to see their generals he knew what to say though it did him little good.

First sentry: Faith, sir, if you had told as many lies in his behalf as you have uttered words in your own, you should not pass here; no, though it were as virtuous to lie as to live chastely. Therefore, go back.

Menenius: Prithee, fellow, remember my name is Menenius, always factionary on the party of your general.

Second sentry: Howsoever you have been his liar, as you say you have, I am one that, telling true under him, must say, you cannot pass.  Therefore, go back.

Menenius: Hath he dined, canst thou tell? for I would not speak with him till after dinner.

The Baader-Meinhof faction

Founded in 1970, the Rote Armee Fraktion (Red Army Faction (RAF)) was a left-wing, armed militant revolutionary group based in the Federal Republic of Germany (The FRG or West Germany (1949-1990)) which, for almost thirty years, undertook assassinations, kidnappings, robberies and bombings and although actually less active than some other terrorist cells, the RAF was better known and most influential in the early-mid 1970s.  The RAF was dissolved in 1998 although, in the nature of such things, some members continued to use their skills in criminal ventures including drug-trafficing as a form of revenue generation.  The RAF always used the word Fraktion, translated into English as faction.  The linguistic implications never pleased RAF members who thought themselves the embedded, military wing of the wider communist workers' movement, not a faction or splinter-group.  In this context the German doesn’t lend well to translation but closest single-word reflecting the RAF’s view is probably “section” or “squad”.  German journalist Stefan Aust (b 1946) also avoided the word, choosing Der Baader Meinhof Komplex (the  Baader-Meinhof Complex) as the title of his 2008 book because it better described how the organization operated.

Andreas Baader & Ulrike Meinhof

In the era they were active, a common descriptor in the English-speaking word was the Baader-Meinhof Group or Gang, named after two of its members Andreas Baader (1943–1977) and Ulrike Meinhof (1934-1976) and the media’s choice of “gang” or “group” may have reflected the desire of governments for the RAF to be depicted more as violent criminals and less as revolutionaries.  The popular press however certainly preferred Baader-Meinhof to RAF because of the drama of the story, Meinhof having been part of the gang which freed Baader from prison.  Both later killed themselves and, although they were never the star-cross'd lovers some journalists liked to suggest, it added to the romance and the Baader-Meinhof name survived their deaths and although the media, politicians and security agencies adopted the eponymous title, it was never used by the RAF.  In the tradition of Marxist collectives, the members regarded the RAF as a co-founded group of many members and not one either defined by or identified with two figureheads, apart from which, the dominant female of the group was actually Gudrun Ensslin (1940-1977).

Andreas Baader and Gudrun Ensslin in court, "Department store trial" (Galeria Kaufhof GmbH), Frankfurt am Main, FRG, 14 October 1968.

The early years of Gudrun Ensslin would have given little hint of how her life would unfold but at 16 comrade Stalin (1878-1953; Soviet leader 1924-1953) entered the Tiflis Theological Seminary to train as a Russian Orthodox priest at the Tiflis Theological Seminary so things can change.  In her youth, Fräulein Ensslin had been a scout leader and assisted her parish priest in work such as organizing Bible studies; her school reports all record her as a diligent, well-behaved student but according to her father (who, as a priest may have some bias), all that changed when “she became erotized” and discovered the charms of dating boys.  By 1967 she was engaged and had given birth to a son when she met Andreas Baader who had arrived in Berlin four years earlier to evade the attention of the Munich police force which had shadowed his dissolute life of petty crime, youth detention centres and prison.  He'd also gone "underground" to escape conscription and rapidly he and Ensslin became lovers; she abandoned her child and with some other discontented souls, the pair decided to escalate their fight against the system, their early attempts to undermine bourgeois capitalism involving fire-bombing the Galeria Kaufhof department stores they considered citadels of "consumerist materialism".  Later they would expand their activities to include kidnappings, bank robberies, bombings & murder and it was in 1968 the German journalist, Ulrike Meinhof, “joined the fight”, writing in the Konkret (published by her husband Klaus Rainer Röhl (1928–2021)):  “Protest is when I say it does not suit me.  Resistance is, when I make sure that what does not suit me, no longer happens.”  The German konkret can be translated as “concrete”, “specific” or “tangible”, depending on the context.  In the sense of Herr Röhl’s (who styled himself “K2R”) magazine, “Konkret” carried the connotation of “real” or “practical”, a nod to Marxist revolutionary principles which tended to discount abstract theoreticians or those who dreamed of utopias; the focus was on what should be done and what could be achieved.  Herr Röhl certainly had a practical understanding of German accounting law because Konkret provided him with a Porsche 911 as a company car.  Because the KPD (German Communist Party) was banned in the FRG (Federal Republic of Germany, the old West Germany, 1949-1990), Herr Röhl's membership was clandestine, as were the payments Konkret received from the GDR (German Democratic Republic, the old East Germany, 1949-1990) and Moscow although funds also came from the FRG.  It must have amused him that Moscow was, in effect, paying for his Porsche, villa and pleasant lifestyle while simultaneously Bonn was contributing to what might be its own overthrow.

Police inspecting the stolen Porsche 911S Targa, Frankfurt, June 1972.

Although a left wing revolutionary, Andreas Bernd Baader liked fast cars owned usually the class enemy and that he never held a drivers licence didn’t deter him from stealing or driving these status symbols of the system he planned to destroy.  His favorite cars by the early 1970s were the Porsche 911 and the BMW E9 coupé and one note in the police reports on him notes that he liked to have a tennis racquet on the passenger seat, the thinking apparently that it was such a middle-class symbol that just the sight of it would make him less suspicious to police.  At the time the Baader-Meinhof gang were active, his automotive taste clearly had been imposed on his fellow revolutionaries because “BMW” came to be understood as “Baader-Meinhof-Wagen” (ie Baader-Meinhof car), the vehicle of choice for the senior gang members whereas newcomers were permitted to drive nothing more elevated than an Audi 100.  Baader-Meinhof had its own class structure and the proletariat was relegated to FWD (front wheel drive), surely as demeaning a humiliation as any inflicted by the plutocracy.

The stolen Iso Rivolta IR300, Frankfurt, June 1972.

For someone trying to avoid the attention of the authorities, Porsches and the big BMW coupés may seem a curious choice given one could more inconspicuously move about in a beige VW Beetle but Baader also affected his style in other ways, his fondness for velvet trousers and designer sunglasses (a thing, even then) mentioned in police reports.  Nor was his taste restricted to German machinery because he also stole an Italian Iso Rivolta IR 300, another inadvisable choice for someone with habits which would have been better pursued with a low profile because of the 800-odd made between 1962-1970, only a reputed 50 were in the FRG when one fell into his (legal but unlawful) possession in 1972.  Apparently he was about to inspect the Rivolta (which he’d yet to drive since the theft) when he was arrested, emerging from the purple (aubergine in the Porsche color chart) Porsche 911S Targa which had been painted its original yellow when he’d stolen it some months earlier.  He and two fellow terrorists had made themselves quite an obvious target, sitting in the aubergine 911, parked facing the wrong way in a middle-class neighbourhood where nobody ever parks in an unapproved manner.  Pleased with the opportunity presented, a police marksman ensconced in a building across the street shot Baader in the thigh and the trio were arrested. Stashed in the Porsche and the garage in which sat the Iso were self-made hand grenades, a bomb in the form of a welded cash box, ammunition, detonators and cables.

Ulrike Meinhof (left) and the cover art for Marianne Faithfull’s album Broken English (1979, right).

Ulrike Meinhof came to public attention for her part in the operation which freed Baader from custody and the escape vehicle used was a silver-grey Alfa Romeo Giulia Sprint GT, a model in which he’d never expressed any interest but which he presumably came to hold in high regard.  Subsequently, for years, Meinhof, the Baader-Ensslin couple and the rest of the RAF left a bloody trail of attacks and bank robberies in their wake and, as a footnote, most of their prominent victims drove Mercedes-Benz, a coincidence of economic circumstances and market preferences.  The title track of Marianne Faithfull’s (1946-2025) album Broken English (1979) was inspired by the life and death of Ulrike Meinhof.

Broken English by Marianne Faithfull, Dave Genn, Matthew Good, Joe Mavety, Barry Reynolds, Terence Stannard & Stephen York.

Could have come through

Anytime

Cold lonely

Puritan

What are you

Fighting for?

It's not my

Security

 

It's just an old war

Not even a cold war

Don't say it in Russian

Don't say it in German

Say it in broken English

Say it in broken English

 

Lose your father

Your husband

Your mother

Your children

What are you

Dying for?

It's not my

Reality

 

It's just an old war

Not even a cold war

Don't say it in Russian

Don't say it in German

Say it in broken English

Say it in broken English

 

What are you fighting for?

What are you fighting for?

What are you fighting for?

What are you fighting for?

What are you fighting for?

What are you fighting for?

Factionalism

Factionalism is probably inherent to the nature of organizations and it really needs only for a structure to have two members for a faction to form.  Factions can be based on ideology, geography, theology, personalities (and factions have been formed purely as vehicles of hatred for another) or just about basis and the names they adopt can be designed to denigrate (redneck faction), operate euphemistically (centre-left (just right wingers who didn’t want to admit it)) or indicate a place on the spectrum (left vs right, liberal vs conservative et al).  They can also be modified by those wishing to demonize (lunar-right, hard-right, religious right etc).  The labelling can also be linguistically productive  In the UK during the 1980s, “the wets” was an epithet applied within the Conservative Party to those who opposed the government’s hard line policies, on the model of the slang “a bit wet” to describe those though effete or lacking resolve.  The wets responded by labelling their detractors “the dries” to which they responded with “warm and dry”, words with positive associations in a cold and damp country.  The names constantly evolve because fissiparousness is in the nature of organizations.

Of human nature

Cady's Map by Janis Ian.

The human race does seem inherently fissiparousness and wherever cultures have formed, history suggests divisions will form and folk will tend to coalesce (or be allocated or otherwise forced) into factions.  Usually, this is attributed to some defined or discernible difference (ethnicity, skin color, language, tribal affiliation, religion et al) but even among homogeneous groups, it's rare to identify one without sub-groups.  It does seem human nature and has long since become institutionalized and labelling theory practitioners can probably now build minor academic careers just by tracking the segregation as it evolves (boomers, gen-X, millennials etc).  The faction names of the cliques at North Shore High School (Mean Girls, Paramount Pictures 2004)) were Actual Human Beings, Anti-Plastics, The Art Freaks, Asexual Band Geeks, Asian Nerds, Burnouts, Cheerleaders, Cool Asians, Desperate Wannabes, Freshmen, Girls Who Eat Their Feelings, J.V. Cheerleaders, J.V. Jocks, Junior Plastics, Preps, ROTC Guys, Sexually Active Band Geeks, The Plastics, Unfriendly Black Hotties, Unnamed Girls Who Don't Eat Anything, and Varsity Jocks.  Given the way sensitivities have evolved, it’s predictable some of those names wouldn’t today be used; the factions' membership rosters would be much the same but some terms are now proscribed in this context, the threshold test for racism now its mere mention, racialism banished to places like epidemiological research papers tracking the distribution of morbidity. 

The factions of the Anglican Church

Fissiparousness is much associated with the modern Church of England, factions of which some time ago mostly abandoned any interest in God or the message of Christ for the more important matters of championing or decrying gay clergy, getting women into or keeping them out of the priesthood, and talking to or ignoring Rome.  Among those resistant to anything beyond the medieval, there's even an institutional forum, the Global Anglican Future Conference (GAFCON) which holds meetings at which there is much intrigue and plotting; it's sort of an anti-Lambeth Conference though the cucumber sandwiches are said to be much the same.  Under the stresses inherent in the late twentieth-century, fissiparousness saw the Anglicans coalesce into three factions, the low & lazy, the broad & hazy and the high & crazy.

Overlaps in the Anglican Church factions

The Low & Lazy

Like the high churchers, the low lot still believe in God but, their time not absorbed plotting and scheming or running campaigns to stamp out gay clergy and opposing the ordination of women, they actually have time to pray, which they do, often.  The evangelical types come from among the low and don’t approve of fancy rituals, Romish ways or anything smelling of popery.  Instead, they like services where there’s clapping, dancing and what sounds like country & western music with sermons telling them it’s Godly to buy things like big TVs and surf-skis.

The Broad & Hazy

The broad church is more a club than a church, something like the Tory Party at prayer.  The parishioners will choose the church they (occasionally) attend on the same basis as their golf club, driving miles if need be to find a congregation acceptably free of racial and cultural DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion).  They’re interested not at all in theology or anything too abstract so sermons need to be brief and sufficiently vague to please the bourgeoisie.  The broad church stands for most things in general and nothing in particular; finding most disputes in Anglicanism baffling, they just can't see what all the fuss is about.

The High & Crazy

The high church has clergy who love dressing up like the Spice Girls, burning incense and chanting the medieval liturgy in Latin.  They disapprove of about everything that’s happened since the 1662 edition of the Book of Common Prayer and believe there’d be less sin were there still burnings at the stake.  Most high church clergy wish Pius IX (1792–1878; pope 1846-1878) still sat on the throne of Saint Peter and some act as though he does.