Legge di Taso sugli onori ai caduti in guerra e alle loro famiglie

The stele, to be displayed in the civic prytaneion, preserves a public decree concerning honours for the war dead, norms and limitations to their public mourning, as well as provisions for the fallen’s fathers and sons. The decree, dated to mid-4th century B.C. on a paleographical basis, has been recently connected with the war the Thasians fought against the Thracians to protect their colony Datos/Krenides between 360 and 356 B.C. The first section (ll. 4-14) concerns public honours for the war dead, while the second section (ll. 14-49) deals with public provisions for the war dead’s fathers and sons. Concerning both the special treatment of the war dead and the welfare in favour of the war orphans, a useful comparison can be drawn from the analogue Athenian practice in Classical times.

The heroes’ children: Rescuing the Great War’s orphans

World War I and its aftermath produced a particularly vulnerable group of child victims: war orphans. This group included children whose fathers had fallen in battle, who had disappeared, or who had not (yet) returned home. Most of Europe’s war and postwar societies witnessed the massive presence of these child victims, and responded in various ways to rescue them and secure their future survival. This article offers an exploration of the ways in which the Hungarian part of the Austro-Hungarian monarchy, and then later the post-imperial Hungarian state, became invested in providing care and relief to Hungarian war orphans. In contrast to other groups of child victims, whose parents were blamed for neglecting their parental duties, war orphans as the offspring of ‘war heroes’ profited from the public appreciation of their fathers’ sacrifice for the war effort and the Hungarian nation. The public discourse in the contemporary Hungarian media offers a glimpse into the emergence of a new public visibility of these child victims and of a new recognition of the societal obligation to care for them. Exploring World War I and its aftermath as a telling example of political transformation in the 20th century, the article showcases how war orphans were taken to personify essential notions of war- and postwar destruction, while also capturing visions of postwar recovery. It furthermore examines how welfare discourses and relief practices for Hungary’s war orphans were embedded in contemporary gender norms, notions of proper Christian morality and ethnic nationalism. On this basis, the article assesses the ways in which the case of Hungary’s war orphans not only mirrors the professionalization but also the fundamental transformation of child welfare in the aftermath of World War I.

Introduction

World War I has been studied extensively by historians of France and for good reason. Waging the first industrial war required mobilizing all of France’s resources, whether military, political, economic, cultural, or imperial. Politicians from the left and the right joined forces to govern the country, priests and seminarians were drafted into the army, factories were retooled to produce armaments and other war material, and women and children were enlisted to do their part. So too were colonial subjects. More than 500,000 men from France’s empire fought in Europe for the French Army, while another 200,000 colonial subjects labored in France’s wartime workplaces. The human losses were staggering and the political, economic, and cultural reverberations long-lasting, both in the metropole and in the colonies. More than 1.3 million French soldiers and an estimated 71,000 colonial soldiers lost their lives, leaving behind approximately 1.1 million war orphans and 600,000 war widows.

Novi izzivi in nove naloge za Cerkev ob koncu prve svetovne vojne na socialnem področju

Category: 1.01 Original scientific paper Language: Original in Slovene (Abstract in Slovene and English, Summary in English) Key words: Diocese of Ljubljana, Diocese of Maribor, charity work, military graves, war orphans, widows, Slovenia Abstract: The events during the war and the time after it brought several consequences for the population of the Slovenian lands. These were noticeable in all areas of personal and community life, and were particularly challenging for church communities, which prepared a series of initiatives to alleviate social distress and to regulate the issues raised by the war. Attention was drawn to various groups of the population: war orphans, widows, disabled soldiers, refugees from the Gorica (Gorizia) region, and the missing. Additional care had to be given to the military graves and the military sections of the cemeteries. The various forms of charitable action needed to be coordinated. The alliance Karitativna zveza became an umbrella organization for said charity work. There were various rallies, the preparation of programs and the raising of funds for the charity work. When the Spanish disease broke out at the end of the war, it was in the ecclesiastical context to find original explanations of this ordeal. The paper also outlines initiatives taken by individual bishops to regulate the situation. They placed greater emphasis on the religious dimension of the event. At the same time, they warned people against taking advantage of affected friends and relatives, and against a disorderly life.