Quotes About Siege

who set on fire all the siege equipment and destroyed it.

Dune was a world of paradox now—a world under siege, yet the center of power. To come under siege, he decided, was the inevitable fate of power.

Perhaps no defensive structure summarized the truth of siege warfare in the ancient and medieval world as clearly as the walls of Constantinople. The city lived under siege for almost all its life; its defenses reflected the deepest character and history of the place, its mixture of confidence and fatalism, divine inspiration and practical skill, longevity and conservatism.

For Albuquerque, everything was at stake. All the principal figures of the Indian administration were besieged in the Mandovi in the rain, with the shots of the enemy crashing in; the men and their captains cursed him for the lack of food, for his obstinacy, his obsessiveness, his vanity. All he had was his belief in a certain strategic vision, encouraging words, and the severities of discipline. It was perhaps his supreme moment of crisis.

In early April, while the big guns were busy pounding the land walls, Mehmet began to deploy the fleet, his other new weapon, for the first time.

So rapid was the Ottoman assimilation of cannon technology that by the 1440s they had evidently acquired the unique ability, widely commented on by eyewitnesses, to cast medium-size barrels on the battlefield in makeshift foundries. Murat transported gunmetal to the Hexamilion and cast many of his long guns on the spot. This allowed extraordinary flexibility during siege warfare:

They had no particular reason to evolve because siege warfare itself remained static. The basic techniques and equipment – blockade, mining, and escalade, the use of battering rams, catapults, towers, tunnels, and ladders – these were largely unchanging for longer than anyone could recall. The advantage always lay with the defender; in the case of Constantinople its coastal position increased that weighting.

Under orders from Kitchener himself, an attempt was to be made to bribe the Turkish commander of the Kut siege into letting Townshend's army go in return for one million English pounds' worth of gold. If Lawrence resented being the bearer of this shameful instruction, almost without precedent in British military history, he never let on. Then again, he'd very recently been given two reminders of the puffery and hypocrisy of military culture.

I can see that. She is lovely, very different from you. Oh, my clumsy tongue. Vollys's bells clanged. You are lovely too, but in a quieter way. In temperament I see that you are different as well. She could lead a charge, but you could last a siege. This is fascinating, little Adelina. The more I look at her, the more clearly I see you. You may be a worthier opponent than even my Willard was.

Many people in Europe and the U.S. dispute the thesis that we are living through a clash of civilisations between Islam and the west. But a radical minority of Muslims firmly believes that Islam is under siege, and is committed to winning the holy war it has declared against the West.

Happiness is something you lay siege to, it is a battle like a game of go. I will take hold of all the pain and snuff it out.

Out on the street I start to run; I need to breathe in this life, the trees, the warmth of my town. I will be able to control my own fate and I will know how to be happy. Happiness is something you lay siege to, it is a battle . . .

During a wise man's whole life, his destiny holds his philosophy in a state of siege.

Will: I'm looking for fighting men. I plan to sack a castle, and I hear you people are rather good at that.

At dawn on May 25, 1453, the bells of Constantinople's churches rang out an urgent appeal.

Y en el asedio de La Mámora del año 1628, cuando los moros intentaron tomarnos aquella plaza, quienes cavaban las trincheras y dirigían las obras de asedio eran gastadores ingleses. Que a los hijos de puta, como es sabido, Dios los cría y ellos se juntan

Any one who pretended to a knowledge of what occurred at the siege of Badajos was especially an object of silent pity to Mr. Poulter; he wished that prating person had been run down, and had the breath trampled out of him at the first go-off, as he himself had,–he might talk about the siege of Badajos then!

In what was called the second siege of Leningrad, thousands died, but Putin and his partners in crime got rich. Then Putin killed even more Russians when he had the FSB explode bombs in apartment buildings in Moscow in 1999 to give himself the pretext to seize dictatorial powers.

In the government's eyes, the Branch Davidians were a threat.

The fact is that as soon as they reach Baghdad gates, we will besiege them and slaughter them. Until now they have refused to do battle with us. They are just going places. One can describe them as a boa: when it feels threatened, it runs to somewhere else.

The real danger to the world's resistance movements is the attempt to distort reality and to place the blame on the resistance groups' actions without allowing them to portray their perspective, thus ignoring the reality of the occupation and the siege, like the situation in occupied Palestine.

To neglect at any time preparation for death is to sleep on our post at a siege; to omit it in old age is to sleep at an attack.

Even when conservatives have all the marbles, they still act as if they're under siege. Now that they are under siege, it is no time for them to act as if they're losing their marbles.

Operation Typhoon.