OFFICE OF THE RECORDS — PATTERN FILE

PATTERN 32-43

ACTIVE
Duration
Breakthrough

DURATION resolving to BREAKTHROUGH. Filed under: locked contention, mutual exhaustion, the third who arrives.

Evidence plate for pattern 32-43 — The Clam and the Snipe
EVIDENCE — PLATE A · THE CLAM AND THE SNIPE

INDEX ENTRY — ON FILE BEFORE EVERY INCIDENT BELOW

爭雞失羊,亡其金囊,利不得長,陳蔡之患。

Fighting over the chicken they lost the sheep, and the purse with it; profit held by contention does not last — the peril between Chen and Cai.

published fragment: Jiaoshi Yilin, c. 40 BC — the entry predates all surviving copies

LOGGED OCCURRENCES

  1. 489 BCthe straits between Chen and Cai

    the straits between Chen and Cai — the master starved while states contended around him. Filed under the pattern's earlier run.

  2. EARLY 3RD C. BCThe Clam and the Snipe

    Estuary, dawn. Snipe's beak clamped in clam's shell; each waiting on the other's death, quoting weather at each other. Filed as ENTRY 005/64.

  3. 1914THE CONTENTION THAT LOCKED A CONTINENT

    Austria-Hungary delivered an ultimatum to Serbia. Russia mobilized for Serbia. Germany mobilized for Austria-Hungary. France mobilized for Russia. The empires locked through the Danube valley, each refusing to release the other. The third who arrived in 1917 was the United States.

  4. 1945THE SURRENDER THAT ENDED BOTH CONTENTIONS

    Japan surrendered on the deck of USS Missouri in Tokyo Bay. Germany had surrendered three months earlier in a railway carriage at Reims. The empire that had watched both wars from across the Atlantic stepped forward to receive the second surrender.

Cited by card ENTRY 005/64 · The Clam and the Snipe — The Records, Deck 1.

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