The Random Traveller

Dividing the World

Today, when we think something is nonsense, we call it "bull". When the pope issues a formal written declaration, it is known as a "papal bull".

A very famous papal bull called the Inter Caetera was issued in May 1493 by Pope Alexander VI. This translates as Among Others, as if the document was dealing with minor administrative amendments. In reality, it was a document of world domination and division. The Bull divided the whole world between the kingdoms of Spain and Portugal. An imaginary line was drawn through the Atlantic. All lands to the west of the line were to go to Spain, and all lands to the east, to Portugal. This you will note, would have made all of Desh Portuguese territory, and given their fanatical tendencies, there is no doubt they would have followed a policy of persecution and inquisition until we were all Roman Catholics and had names like Anthony Gonsalves. Which, mind you, is a very fine name indeed, but Anthony-Anthony-Anthony doesn't have quite the same ring to it.

If I may note as an aside, the Jews have in the past been accused of an agenda of world domination, of authoring documents with sinister (and cool!) names like "Protocols of the Elders of Zion". But the Pope's version of this is basically called Among Other Things? A, they need better and more creative titles, and B, if world conquest falls among other things, what were the other more important things on the Agenda?

Today the shape of the world is different. Amrika rules the world, and the Pope rules all of Vatican City. And where once Spain and Portugal divided the world between themselves, today I like, for categorisation purposes only, to divide the cities of Europe I visit between the different communities of Desh. Gujaratis and Tamils figure no doubt, and Kashmiris too, but the Spain and Portugal of my count are the Punjabis and Bengalis, who dominate the diasporic population. So far, between the two of them, allocation goes like this:

Bengalis get: London, Rome
Punjabis get: Paris, Barcelona, Amsterdam
Unconquered for now: Dublin, Prague, Edinburgh, Berlin

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I have recently received a document written in six languages: English of course, and five languages of Desh: Bengali, Gujarati, Hindi, Punjabi and Urdu. A communication from the Government of India perhaps? No sir. It's a booklet on local elections from the city council of Nottingham.