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most famous battle in history

L

luvwomenfeet

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a lot of people say that the most famous military battle in world history is the battle of waterloo. Agree or disagree?
 
IMHO, the Battle of Waterloo is likely the most famous in the UK, but here in the US, it might be the Battle of Gettysburg.
Other nations undoubtedly have their own choices.
 
milagros317 said:
IMHO, the Battle of Waterloo is likely the most famous in the UK, but here in the US, it might be the Battle of Gettysburg.
Other nations undoubtedly have their own choices.
Click to expand...

Exactly. Ask the average Russian and he or she might say the Siege of Leningrad.
 
Globally, I'd guess the Battles of Zhuolu or Kunyang are known by more people than any others. In European history, the Seige of Troy, the Battle of Thermopylae, and the D-Day invasion of Normandy are candidates. In the English-speaking western world, add the Battle of Hastings to the list. Stalingrad, Agincourt, Waterloo, and Pearl Harbor are also contenders.
 
FeatherFiend! said:
the most famous military battle in world history is the battle of waterloo
Click to expand...

It would be difficult to even attempt to prove such a claim objectively, of course, but if it's any kind of gauge, the toponym in that battle's name is one of the very few that have become common nouns with distinct meanings, in the case of Waterloo/waterloo, that of "[a] situation, event, etc., which proves the (final) undoing of a person or thing; a decisive defeat or failure, a catastrophe," credit and praise be for that definition to the vaunted Oxford English Dictionary. And in more than one language, Italian being another that I know has this use of this word but I wouldn't doubt it's found in other European tongues. A further yardstick of the reach of the term and thus indirectly the battle event is its appearance in popular culture, as in--no, not ABBA's breakthrough monster hit as you surely expected to me to advance at this point, but rather this plaintive ballad (by a still-living artist named after the more famous Confederate general), your toe-tapping earworm of the day:

​

The only other actual battle place-name I can think of whose influence lives on in a detached linguistic existence is Stalingrad, which has come to acquire a similar meaning as that of W/waterloo but with the added connotation 'in miserably inhospitable and deprived winter conditions'. (There's also Armageddon, to be sure not--yet--the name of a true-life historic conflict, but a word that has certainly become a something of a synonym for apocalypse.)
 
All good points regarding how one's nationality influences his or her view as to what was "the most famous battle in history."

That said....here's a vote for the Carthaginians utter thrashing of the Romans at Cannae during the 2nd Punic War. For centuries, at least in western civilizations, an unmitigated military victory was called "achieving a Cannae"! Kind of like NedStacey2's point about how "met their Waterloo" became a buzz phrase for utter defeat.
 
loves2TK said:
here's a vote for the Carthaginians utter thrashing of the Romans at Cannae during the 2nd Punic War. For centuries, at least in western civilizations, an unmitigated military victory was called "achieving a Cannae"!
Click to expand...

Thanks for mentioning that; I do recall a reference to that phrase being commonly used in the past. A testament to the pervasive awareness of classical history and mythology that prevailed even here in the U.S., replaced now by TV and other pop-culture allusions (like K/kryptonite from the Superman universe, with a related meaning of 'insurmountable obstacle', which appears to be gaining in currency).
 
I'm reminded of a scene from Karate Kid Part II:

Daniel: What is that, a pillbox?

Mr. Miyagi: Probably left over from World War ll.

Daniel (looking around Okinawa): It must have been terrible here. Up to twelve thousand Americans killed.

Mr. Miyagi: Yeah. And more than 150,000 Okinawans and Japanese too.

Mr. Miyagi:...why we all so stupid?
 
I'll have to double check with my girlfriend, but I think it is the battle of the sexes. ;) The Greeks defeating the Persians at Marathon kept the newfangled idea of democracy going. I agree that the nationality of the poster is key and remember that the victors usually get to write "THE" version of events, however slanted.
 
GEORGIATKLER said:
I'll have to double check with my girlfriend, but I think it is the battle of the sexes.
Click to expand...

LOL, that isn't even a battle. Women win hands down. They either win or we men die cold and alone without a waifu to snuggle. ;) :D
 
I think it really depends on your perception, and maybe, your nationality.

I'm American, and a history major.

My thoughts , are that the most famous battles in history, may be a "tie" so to speak, between the Battle of Yorktown that caused the British to surrender, and ended the American Revolution, and the Battle of Antietim, in the American Civil War.

Again, I think such is a matter of opinion, and perception.
 
Man, this is kinda like going back in time and wondering "what if" ya knows?

What if the United States of America didn't go to war against Nazi Germany and the Empire of Japan in World War II?

What if the Confederacy was able to crush the Union army and therefore win the American Civil War?

What if the Korean War or the Vietnam War or both of them never happened?

It only goes to show how dangerous tampering with history is if such a thing as time travel was ever invented.
 
Well, not so much a single battle, but maybe our dropping the A-bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.... We done did it first, and tho others have developed the beasts, no one else has used them yet. Let us hope that it stays that way.
 
Yeah and you gotta wonder, what if World War II had been prevented? Say the Nazi movement never gained traction and Japan chose a different path?

As for the hope that ICBM's are never used, I dread the day that they ever are as using them pretty much the end of all organic life on Earth (except for deep sea ocean life) for the next hundred or so million years.
 
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