The Battle of Poitiers was fought on 19 September 1356 between a French
army commanded by King John II and an Anglo-Gascon force under Edward,
the Black Prince, during the Hundred Years' War. The Anglo-Gascons had
set out on a major campaign while John gathered a large and unusually
mobile army and pursued. The 6,000 Anglo-Gascons stood on the defensive
and were attacked by 14,000 to 16,000 Frenchmen. An initial assault was
driven back after hard fighting. A second under John's son and heir was
also repulsed. Many Frenchmen then left the field. Those remaining
gathered around the King and launched another attack, while signalling
that no prisoners were to be taken. The French got the better of this
fight until a small Anglo-Gascon force appeared behind them. The French
panicked and their force collapsed; John and his youngest son were taken
prisoner. Negotiations to end the war and ransom John resulted in the
1360 Treaty of Brétigny, which temporarily ended the war with an
English victory.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Poitiers>
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Today's selected anniversaries:
1846:
Near La Salette-Fallavaux in southeastern France, shepherd
children Mélanie Calvat and Maximin Giraud reported a Marian
apparition, now known as Our Lady of La Salette (statue pictured).
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Our_Lady_of_La_Salette>
1940:
World War II: Polish resistance leader Witold Pilecki allowed
himself to be captured by German forces and sent to Auschwitz to gather
intelligence.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Witold_Pilecki>
1970:
The first Glastonbury Festival, the largest greenfield festival
in the world, was held at Michael Eavis's farm in Glastonbury, England.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glastonbury_Festival>
1995:
Industrial Society and Its Future, the manifesto of American
domestic terrorist Ted Kaczynski, was published in The Washington Post
almost three months after it was submitted.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Kaczynski>
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Wiktionary's word of the day:
scuttlebutt:
1. (countable, nautical) Originally (now chiefly historical), a cask
with a hole cut into its top, used to provide drinking water on board a
ship; now (by extension, informal), a drinking fountain on a modern
ship.
2. (uncountable, originally US, nautical slang) Gossip, idle chatter;
also, rumour.
3. (transitive, rare) To spread (information) by way of gossip or
rumour.
4. (intransitive) To chat idly or gossip; also, to spread rumours.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/scuttlebutt>
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Wikiquote quote of the day:
The man who tells the tale if he has a tale worth telling will
know exactly what he is about and this business of the artist as a sort
of starry-eyed inspired creature, dancing along, with his feet two or
three feet above the surface of the earth, not really knowing what sort
of prints he's leaving behind him, is nothing like the truth.
--William Golding
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/William_Golding>