Date: Wed, 27 Mar 2002 11:14:20 -0800
From: Michael Andre-Driussi 
Subject: RE: (urth) Seventeen

I believe that 17 was an unlucky number to the Romans, and they got it from
the Etruscans. (Robert Graves, I, CLAUDIUS, probably.)

The Group of 17 (Ascian leadership in TBOTNS) is said by Wolfe to be based
on the typical number of members in a Soviet politburo, iirc.

The "Seventeen Stones" called out at the Sanguinary Fields (TBOTNS) is very
likely a coded allusion to the Group of 17.

At the more personal level, Gene Wolfe was in the first batallion of the
17th Infantry in Korea (LETTERS HOME, as I understand it).

=mantis=



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