Lepanto: The Most Important Battle No One Knows

#1

Lepanto: The Most Important Battle No One Knows - The Stream

Lepanto: The Most Important Battle No One Knows

900×506 83.3 KB
Wikimedia Commons/Public Domain

“Allegory of the Battle of Lepanto” by Paolo Veronese.

By TIMOTHY FURNISH Published on October 7, 2021

Timothy Furnish

When you think of turning points in history, what comes to mind? Revolutions? Natural disasters? Plagues? Assassinations? Military conflicts, however, have probably been the most influential type of event, even if liberal academia has decided it “ain’t gonna study war no more.” But despite the lack of emphasis on warfare by educators, some important battles are known to the public. At least ones in American history. Bunker Hill. Gettysburg. Pearl Harbor. Not a lot of ones from earlier centuries strike a chord, alas. The Milvian Bridge. Tours. The Horns of Hattin.

I’d be willing to bet practically no one today knows what happened on October 7, 1571.

#2

Traditionalist Roman Catholics, Melkite Catholics, and Maronite Catholics are very aware of Lepanto as it gets tied to the devotion called the Most Holy Rosary of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Also, fans of GK Chesterton will know well his great poem ‘Lepanto’ from which the following is an excerpt:

" The North is full of tangled things and texts and aching eyes
And dead is all the innocence of anger and surprise,
And Christian killeth Christian in a narrow dusty room,
And Christian dreadeth Christ that hath a newer face of doom,
And Christian hateth Mary that God kissed in Galilee,
But Don John of Austria is riding to the sea.
Don John calling through the blast and the eclipse
Crying with the trumpet, with the trumpet of his lips,
Trumpet that sayeth ha!
Domino gloria!
Don John of Austria
Is shouting to the ships."