Lindalino is a

fictional city This is a list of fictional settlements, including fictional towns, villages, and cities, organized by each city's medium. This list should include only well-referenced, notable examples of fictional towns, cities, settlements and villages that a ...

from the 1726 satirical novel ''

Gulliver's Travels ''Gulliver's Travels'', originally titled ''Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World. In Four Parts. By Lemuel Gulliver, First a Surgeon, and then a Captain of Several Ships'', is a 1726 prose satire by the Anglo-Irish writer and clerg ...

'' by

Jonathan Swift Jonathan Swift (30 November 1667 – 19 October 1745) was an Anglo-Irish writer, essayist, satirist, and Anglican cleric. In 1713, he became the Dean (Christianity), dean of St Patrick's Cathedral, Dublin, and was given the sobriquet "Dean Swi ...

. Lindalino successfully revolted against the flying island of Laputa. The name Lindalino is a play on words of

Dublin Dublin is the capital and largest city of Republic of Ireland, Ireland. Situated on Dublin Bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the Provinces of Ireland, province of Leinster, and is bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, pa ...

. Laputa had several methods of enforcing obedience from its subject towns. The island could be made to hover over a city indefinitely, depriving them of sunlight and rain. In more extreme situations, this would be combined with dropping large rocks on the inhabitants. Finally, the Laputans had the ability to lower their island directly onto a town, utterly destroying it. This was exceedingly rare, due to the risk it would pose to the integrity of Laputa itself. As a result of oppressions and tribute demanded from them by Laputa, the Lindalinians rebelled against their governor and constructed tall towers at each of the four corners of the city. On top of these, they placed powerful

lodestone Lodestones are naturally magnetization, magnetized pieces of the mineral magnetite. They are naturally occurring magnets, which can attract iron. The property of magnetism was first discovered in Ancient history, antiquity through lodeston ...

s, or magnets. The result of this was that when Laputa approached them, it was pulled toward these towers more swiftly than the king had expected. As a test, the Laputans then dropped several pieces of adamant, the substance from which their island was constructed. These were violently drawn to the towers. Realizing the situation, the king of Laputa had no choice but to give in to Lindalino's conditions. If he had not, the island would have been fixed in place and overthrown. The story of Lindalino is an allegory for Great Britain's impositions on Ireland. Swift had earlier written a series of pamphlets, known as ''

Drapier's Letters ''Drapier's Letters'' is the collective name for a series of seven pamphlets written between 1724 and 1725 by the Dean of St Patrick's Cathedral in Dublin, Jonathan Swift, to arouse public opinion in Ireland against the imposition of a priv ...

'', to rouse public opinion on the matter. Lindalino represents

, and the impositions of Laputa represent the British imposition of William Wood's currency. Early publications of ''Gulliver's Travels'', including those by

Benjamin Motte Benjamin Motte (; November 1693 – 12 March 1738J. J. Caudle ''Dictionary of National Biography'') was a London publisher and son of Benjamin Motte, Sr. Motte published many works and is well known for his publishing of Jonathan Swift's ''Gulli ...

and George Faulkner, did not include the passage relating to Lindalino, for fear of political reprisal. It was not until 1899 that the passage was finally included in a new edition of the Collected Works. Modern editions derive from the Faulkner edition with the inclusion of this 1899 addendum.

References

External links

''Gulliver's Travels'', by Jonathan Swift
at

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