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Modern imperialism differs in one respect fundamentally from ancient, it is not so honest; such an innocent term as “punitive expedition” may cover a multitude of sins, from flat-nosed bullets to men blown in shreds from cannon, from the horrors of the Belgian rubber country to the horrors inflicted on Belgian peasants. Imperialism and imperialists are always terribly alike.

— Albert T. Olmstead History of Assyria (1923)

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More quotes by Albert T. Olmstead

One need not belong to the much-abused school of fife-and-drum historians to realise that a narrative in which the wars did not play a large part would not be true to the character of the people themselves.

History of Assyria (1923)

As the student of ancient history has come to realise that there is no such thing as “classical” culture or history, that the Romans were worlds distant from the Greeks, so he must carefully differentiate between Assyrians and Babylonians in his record.

History of Assyria (1923)

Arabia moulded the character of the Semite; it was the Fertile Crescent which made him civilised and gave him a part in world history. Indeed, the whole story of the Mediterranean area is that of a struggle between the nomads, whether from the Arabian desert or the northern grasslands, and the earlier settled population.

History of Assyria (1923)

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Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Albert T. Olmstead (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.