11. The Undignified Fate of Waterloo’s Fallen
These days, we are used to the notion of honoring and lauding those killed in war. That can be readily seen in the solemnity surrounding the various memorials of the Unknown Soldier around the world, or in the reverence and care attendant upon the upkeep of war cemeteries. Doing anything that disrespects the revered fallen is a taboo and something that is simply not done.
However, it was not always like that. Take the Battle of Waterloo, 1815, which ended decades of the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars, and established the broad outlines of European geopolitics for nearly a century. Weird as it might sound to modern ears, the bodies of the fallen of that battle, as seen below, ended up getting sold as fertilizer.
