Which nation invented the concentration camp ?

sadly I think it was the British in the second Boer War :
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concentration_camps

quote:

Originally posted by dance girl:
sadly I think it was the British in the second Boer War :
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concentration_camps

Curiously not, though we certainly used such places then, as the link states.We did not have the concept first.

There is a clue in the heading to this post (even to the place ). We anglicised the original word when we called them 'concentration' camps. From which language, and in this context, did we borrow it ?

The term was first used to describe prison camps used by the Spanish military during the Cuban insurrection (1868–78).

quote:

Originally posted by mozart56:
The term was first used to describe prison camps used by the Spanish military during the Cuban insurrection (1868–78).

Right. The Spanish forces hit upon the idea of 'concentrating' civilans in one place to make them easier to control. The British adopted and translated reconcentration, the Spanish term for this practice. The Spaniards were still doing this in 1895, right up to their withdrawal in 1898 (What's the Spanish for 'go long, go short, go home'?). So the British had a very recent example of what to try when the Second Boer War broke out in 1899.