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What's the reason for the Roman manpower shortage in late antiquity, particularly around the time just after Adrianople? I mean, how could they afford to lose 50-60 thousand guys a few centuries back fighting Hannibal and not break a sweat, and then have to turn to barbarian mercenaries in the 4th century after losing half that number?
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Jun 1, 2014 04:47
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Sulla posted:What's the reason for the Roman manpower shortage in late antiquity, particularly around the time just after Adrianople? I mean, how could they afford to lose 50-60 thousand guys a few centuries back fighting Hannibal and not break a sweat, and then have to turn to barbarian mercenaries in the 4th century after losing half that number? There were a variety of reasons, but one of the big ones was that there was a series of plagues that hit the empire around that time. The legions were particularly hard hit.
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Jun 1, 2014 04:51
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How big of a role did Caracalla's extending citizenship to everyone affect things? Obviously the impact wouldn't have been felt immediately but down the line does it deserve a large amount/small amount of blame or is any blame at all exaggerated? Actually speaking of Caracalla, there's your crazy emperors, your useless/lovely emperors and Commodus but in terms of just being giant hate-filled pricks is there a bigger one than him? Everything about him just reads like a person somehow made entirely of rage, hate and spite.
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Jun 1, 2014 08:17
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Suben posted:Actually speaking of Caracalla, there's your crazy emperors, your useless/lovely emperors and Commodus but in terms of just being giant hate-filled pricks is there a bigger one than him? Everything about him just reads like a person somehow made entirely of rage, hate and spite. Considering his zealous focus on the Great Persecution, I think Galerius gives Caracalla a run for his money?
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Jun 1, 2014 11:04
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Paxicon posted:Considering his zealous focus on the Great Persecution, I think Galerius gives Caracalla a run for his money? Didn't Galerius later give up in the realisation that it wasn't working and officially end the persecution? Some of those later Christian emperors were pretty harsh in their persecution of pagans (and heretics), like Theodosius.
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Jun 1, 2014 12:52
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Suben posted:How big of a role did Caracalla's extending citizenship to everyone affect things? Obviously the impact wouldn't have been felt immediately but down the line does it deserve a large amount/small amount of blame or is any blame at all exaggerated? It probably wasn't a good idea in the end. People were just talking about military manpower issues. Plagues were part of it, but also giving everyone citizenship eliminated one of the main incentives that got people into the military, the granting of citizenship upon discharge. It became harder to supply the auxiliaries after that, and is part of why the auxiliaries became dominated by German mercenary types that ran off to join up with generals and invade the empire. I believe it was also economically damaging, citizens paid less taxes and got more services than non-citizens. If I'm remembering right.
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Jun 1, 2014 15:55
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Grand Fromage posted:It probably wasn't a good idea in the end. People were just talking about military manpower issues. Plagues were part of it, but also giving everyone citizenship eliminated one of the main incentives that got people into the military, the granting of citizenship upon discharge. It became harder to supply the auxiliaries after that, and is part of why the auxiliaries became dominated by German mercenary types that ran off to join up with generals and invade the empire. I believe it was also economically damaging, citizens paid less taxes and got more services than non-citizens. If I'm remembering right. I am pretty sure that is incorrect on the taxes part, as I think around that point citizenship was more of a burden than anything.
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Jun 1, 2014 15:58
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CharlestheHammer posted:I am pretty sure that is incorrect on the taxes part, as I think around that point citizenship was more of a burden than anything. Could be, it's a bit after the period I studied in detail. I know there were some major differences between citizens and non citizens, economically, and I don't think making everyone a citizen was beneficial. E: I think you're right, I feel like I remember part of the reason he did it was to get more tax revenue.
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Jun 1, 2014 16:04
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Did climate change have anything to do with it? I do recall there being some changes, at least to northern africa, over the centuries that kinda put a damper to farming and whatever it did to the rest of the world to send lots of angry dudes into Europe, but that wasn't exactly a newish occurance either, right?
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Jun 1, 2014 21:41
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Sleep of Bronze posted:2nd singular aorist active imperative, yeah. διδῷς for subjunctive, διδοίης for optative. Optative's better for wishing instead of commanding. homullus posted:It's the aorist imperative of δίδωμι, which does have a sense of "grant us this one time" I guess, as opposed to "start giving it, we'll tell you when to stop." Thanks guys. Wow, I didn't realize there were additional degrees between command and begging. Out of curiosity how does one as a student of dead languages develop a feel for the tenses that have no precise equivalent in our modern languages? Do you resort to a mental rephrasing ("We wish your will be done, we hope for our daily bread"?) I mean I guess if you plow through hymns after prayers for a few semesters and then come across ironic use of optative in some other context you feel some glee.. Also the Illiad: used by both Romans and Greeks in a way that isn't unlike our use of the bible, but at a cursory glance Homer's work has about the moral depth of an Army recruitment poster. A closer inspection and it's pretty confusing. Take Achilles: he's not really Heroic Archetype Ia is he? Half god, nearly invincible, has two destinies to chose between and then sits in his tent sulking. When he eventually emerges it is in a blind rage that is neither noble or heroic, and then he dies. How the gently caress am I supposed to model myself on that? Don't get me wrong, I love the Illiad because it portrays the protagonists as well as the antagonists in a such a human way, warts and all, but there isn't a single character in it I can really identify myself with, except perhaps Nestor when I hit my nineties.
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Jun 1, 2014 22:58
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Achilles is indeed a problematic character. There was some good discussion about him way way back starting on page 110.
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Jun 1, 2014 23:08
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Mr Havafap posted:Thanks guys. Wow, I didn't realize there were additional degrees between command and begging. The Greek aorist tense is one-time/snapshot action; in English we describe it as having aspect more than tense. English has some odd tenses as well -- the present perfect in English ("I have finished the report" vs "I have been here for three years") has kind of a "recent status" feel to it that you probably understand well intuitively, even though the action is sometimes finished, sometimes not. You get used to it in Greek, and you often do resort to periphrasis and additional verbiage when you're trying to convey to somebody else (especially a teacher) that you did, in fact, notice what tense it was or whatever. I don't think it's helpful to compare Homer to the Bible in use, though you could make a case for a similar importance; people don't sit around getting drunk and listening to Biblical verses, and the characters in Homer are not role models in our sense. Already in Homer's Iliad you have the conflict between the straight-talking man and the slick man of many words, the conflict between the worker and his less-qualified supervisor/superior, the conflict between honor/ideology and expedient reality/corruption, the conflict of war and peace. With Achilles, I find it most interesting to think about his purpose: if your whole purpose in life is fighting for honor (as demonstrated by prizes) and the jerk king over you can just take those away from you at will, undoing what you've done in an instant, what are you supposed to do? Why bother? There's nothing else that he's good at when his whole world outlook collapses, though, so he does nothing. There is no point, until Patroclus' death sets in motion the events that will lead to his own death. Even the Odyssey is not unambiguous praise of Odysseus. He's an arrogant, slick operator who indirectly causes Ajax's death (outside of the poem), gets a lot of his own men killed with his arrogance (specifically, mouthing off to Polyphemus), and quite possibly lies about most of his journey when talking to the Phaeacians. Greek tragedy later goes on to explore "man of words" vs. "man of principle", and neither side is the clear "role model." Ancient Greece clearly struggled with the contrast, and we still struggle with it today (cf. Orson Scott Card's "Smartland vs. Heartland").
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Jun 1, 2014 23:45
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I think there are cases for comparisons between Homer and the Bible, even if they're not exactly straightforward. Along with Hesiod, Homer's the first source everyone in the ancient world goes to when they want a description of the gods. Homer and Hesiod have ascribed to the gods all that is shameful and wrong in man, etc. As a religious source, it takes on a status that is at least close to, though not on the level of, the Bible in Christianity. You're not exactly meant to model yourself on many of the characters of the Bible either. Glorious David was still an adulterer; even Moses' faith once failed; Simon Peter the denier and so forth. It's the fact that there's a singular model for you that really sets it apart, I suppose. God, the incontrovertible standard, for you and for all the other imperfect humans of the story. By him and by his actions you're given a quick guide to whether something's right or wrong, almost always. To borrow Schiller's term, Homer's authorial voice is incomparably more naive (that is, not passing judgement) when moral decisions have to be made, and even the more implicit force of the narrative gives few easy answers. That's quite deliberate, I think, driving home what Homer wants you to think about as you listen, the real difficulty to be overcome in the story. It's a very interesting contrast to look at: there's a terribly complex set of questions relating to honour, glory and duty that the mortal characters of the Iliad have to wrestle with and answer throughout the story, and clues that any given take is more/less correct are typically sparse. But when it comes to an ethical decision having been made, the resolved hero almost always has the power to act on it in some way, for better or worse. Achilles can count on the gods' support to punish Agamemnon, or his own prowess to take revenge for Patroclus. Meanwhile, characters of the Bible have a much clearer moral direction. Follow God's commands, and if you're unsure, go pray and he'll probably answer. But despite that, the Bible isn't full of everyone doing God's will all the time - quite the opposite. The human actors of the Bible are so often weak: weak in faith, weak in conviction, weak in courage, and this is where their problems come from. The Iliad's characters have to decide on a standard worthy of them; The Bible's characters have a standard, but one which they are very inconsistently worthy of. Or something like that. I'm not sure that's a coherent post as a whole, or even in many of its parts. But I said some things I meant to say, so it'll do.
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Jun 2, 2014 03:00
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Octy posted:Didn't Galerius later give up in the realisation that it wasn't working and officially end the persecution? Some of those later Christian emperors were pretty harsh in their persecution of pagans (and heretics), like Theodosius. Both are fair points, but he didn't end the persecution until his literal deathbed. Before then he happily continued the persecutions with no moral qualms whatsoever, despite its apparent futility and counter-productiveness. It should also be noted that he didn't legalize Christianity, the end of the persecution is just admitting he was defeated.
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Jun 2, 2014 05:24
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Paxicon posted:Both are fair points, but he didn't end the persecution until his literal deathbed. Before then he happily continued the persecutions with no moral qualms whatsoever, despite its apparent futility and counter-productiveness. It should also be noted that he didn't legalize Christianity, the end of the persecution is just admitting he was defeated. And, as I've heard it anyway, a bit of 'covering all bases' by decreeing that the Christians all had to pray for his recovery.
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Jun 2, 2014 05:26
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Paxicon posted:Both are fair points, but he didn't end the persecution until his literal deathbed. Before then he happily continued the persecutions with no moral qualms whatsoever, despite its apparent futility and counter-productiveness. It should also be noted that he didn't legalize Christianity, the end of the persecution is just admitting he was defeated. But he did issue an edict of toleration, didn't he?
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Jun 2, 2014 05:37
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Homullus, Sleep of Bronze thank you both for your input, the comparing and contrasting of Homer and the Bible is very interesting, much appreciated. I should clarify the main reason I brought up the Bible is the comparison I feel can be made between the ubiquity of said works in their respective times, particularly in the nineteenth century Europe when the Bible would literally be the only book owned by a lot of people, and thus the only reference (and reinforced by a weekly sermon). And if my understanding is correct Homer enjoyed a similar familiarity with much of the populations of Italy and Greece? My wondering on the use of Homer in antiquity is more on the practical side, say you found your eight year old pelting the neighbor's dog for no good reason would you give him a good shake and say "You're no Hector, attacking a poor dog like that!", or if the kid was too clever by half would he be (ironically) likened to Odysseus? If your cart broke an axle you could count on someone quoting the Bible, not very helpful or even appropriate, but at least it lent some gravitas to the situation. Would Homer be used in a similar way? On the other end of the spectrum would an orator quote Homer in times of great crisis? Regarding Odysseus I like to think that he spent the ten years following the Trojan war as a beach bum on the Barbary coast smoking hash, fed up with war and not particularly interested in going home to deal with poo poo like responsibilities, bothering beach goers with insights on how the sea may look the same but it never is man, it never is. You wouldn't happen to have a drachma to spare? No? Just asking. When he eventually returns to Ithaca he's not disguised, he actually is a beggar.. And oh, how was Odysseus regarded by the Romans and their famous dislike of duplicity?
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Jun 2, 2014 23:30
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Fork of Unknown Origins posted:And, as I've heard it anyway, a bit of 'covering all bases' by decreeing that the Christians all had to pray for his recovery. Wikipedia has the text of the edict to end the persecution which is a pretty fun read. It makes the persecutions seem almost like a failed government program, and doesn't seem very apologetic at all. quote:Among all the other arrangements that we are always making for the benefit and utility of the state, we have heretofore wished to repair all things in accordance with the laws and public discipline of the Romans, and to ensure that even the Christians, who abandoned the practice of their ancestors, should return to good sense. Indeed, for some reason or other, such self-indulgence assailed and idiocy possessed those Christians, that they did not follow the practices of the ancients, which their own ancestors had, perhaps, instituted, but according to their own will and as it pleased them, they made laws for themselves that they observed, and gathered various peoples in diverse areas. Then when our order was issued stating that they should return themselves to the practices of the ancients, many were subjected to peril, and many were even killed. Many more persevered in their way of life, and we saw that they neither offered proper worship and cult to the gods, or to the god of the Christians. Considering the observation of our own mild clemency and eternal custom, by which we are accustomed to grant clemency to all people, we have decided to extend our most speedy indulgence to these people as well, so that Christians may once more establish their own meeting places, so long as they do not act in a disorderly way. We are about to send another letter to our officials detailing the conditions they ought to observe. Consequently, in accord with our indulgence, they ought to pray to their god for our health and the safety of the state, so that the state may be kept safe on all sides, and they may be able to live safely and securely in their own homes. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diocletian_Persecution#The_Peace_of_Galerius_and_the_Edict_of_Milan.2C_311.E2.80.93313
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Jun 2, 2014 23:44
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joxxuh posted:Wikipedia has the text of the edict to end the persecution which is a pretty fun read. It makes the persecutions seem almost like a failed government program, and doesn't seem very apologetic at all. This is what makes the later Roman Empire so great. You have the Great Persecution in the early years. The first Christian emperor and the legalisation of Christianity. Every subsequent emperor (barring the Apostate and perhaps a few usurpers) is Christian. There follows a long and not always systematic campaign against the heresies and paganism. You get some fantastic orators and philosophers like Symmachus and Libanius. In 390 the emperor is excommunicated and publicly repents at the feet of the bishop. 394 the so-called last battle between pagans and Christians (although it was much more complicated than that). Oh, my favourite quote from Symmachus. In relation to the issue of the restoration of the Altar of Victory, which had been removed from the Senate by, I think, Gratian or Valentinian II: quote:We gaze up at the same stars; the sky covers us all; the same universe encompasses us. Does it matter what practical system we adopt in our search for the Truth? The heart of so great a mystery cannot be reached by following one road only.
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Jun 3, 2014 00:19
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It Came From Paradox Forums:quote:[Theodoric] was appointed Consul, Magister Militium and Patrician by Emperor Zeno. He grew up in Constantinople and had a Roman education. He brefly was the regent of the Visigoths, he conquered the region around Massalia, stopped the Vandals from raiding Italy and he dealt with the Eastern Emperor as an equal. Plus, he was very well liked by the Romans in Italy. So even if he was the dejure king of the Ostrogoths, he was a defacto [Western Roman] Emperor and actually considered so by his subjects and many in the East Now I know a bit about Late Antiquity and this strikes me as a load of horseshit, but did any contemporary writers actually say anything remotely close to "yeah, Theodoric's basically a Roman emperor"? I don't know who, if anyone, this guy is referring to when he mentions "his subjects and many in the East" who considered Theodoric an emperor.
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Jun 3, 2014 16:32
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It's not complete horseshit. He grew up in Constantinople as a hostage and was educated as a Roman. Theodoric did pay homage to the empire and was appointed a viceroy by the east. He was appointed consul and magister militum. He was a good ruler and the German kings of Italy did at least in theory place themselves under the Roman emperor as vassals. I don't know that anybody considered him Roman, but he was technically ruling Italy as an appointed subject of the Roman emperor. The fact that Justinian rolled in and conquered Italy from the Germans would seem to suggest they didn't really consider them to be legitimate. Nobody ever called them emperors in any official capacity. The emperor was in Constantinople. The German kings went through the motions because they didn't want Roman legions coming over to stab them.
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Jun 3, 2014 16:38
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Grand Fromage posted:It's not complete horseshit. He grew up in Constantinople as a hostage and was educated as a Roman. Theodoric did pay homage to the empire and was appointed a viceroy by the east. He was appointed consul and magister militum. He was a good ruler and the German kings of Italy did at least in theory place themselves under the Roman emperor as vassals. I don't know that anybody considered him Roman, but he was technically ruling Italy as an appointed subject of the Roman emperor. Yeah when the Germans pretended to be a part of the empire, it was always in a subservient role. Not as equals. usually they were seen as a caretaker, which is not an equal.
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Jun 3, 2014 19:17
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CharlestheHammer posted:Yeah when the Germans pretended to be a part of the empire, it was always in a subservient role. Not as equals. usually they were seen as a caretaker, which is not an equal. Theodoric was a loyal vassal, the guys who succeeded him were not. Hence Justinian's invasion.
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Jun 3, 2014 19:52
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The same fellow talked a bit more a pointed to this wall of unsourced text. Choice bits:quote:Although it may be too late to institute this, I just completed a series of studies into Ostrogothic Italy that very effectively and conclusively demonstrated that during his reign Theodoric the Great presented himself as and was accepted as a Roman 'princeps' model of emperor by all of his Romano-Italian subjects, the Gallo-Romans and Romano-Illyrians he brought back into the Western Empire with seperate conquests, AND the Eastern Imperial court, which addressed him as such in official correspondance (prior to the ascension of Justinian)and referred to his empire as an equal partner in the Roman Imperial world - one of two 'republics' in a world surrounded by barbarian-ruled Kingdoms. quote:there was a very real chance for a while - when Eutharic the Hispano-Roman 'Visigoth' was chosen by Theodoric to succeed him as Western Emperor and had his succession recognized by the Eastern Emperor, Justin, who even adopted the young man as his son-at-arms - that Theodoric's reinvigorated Western Roman Empire (which is what it was referred to in its day by both inhabitants, officials, friends, allies, rivals, and enemies) was going to hold on to not just Italy, Provence, Illyria, the Cisalpine provinces, the Western Roman provinces up to the Danube, and Sicily but also Hispania. I just really want to figure out what the devil the root of this "Theodoric was a Western Roman Emperor" thing comes from, because I haven't heard it before the above-linked thread.
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Jun 3, 2014 20:15
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The Western Empire was never really a separate state, it was just another part of the Empire, ruled by Emperors who had various, usually subordinate, relationships with the court at Constantinople. In 476, when Odoacer deposed Romulus Augustulus, I'm pretty sure he sent all the regalia of the Emperors in the West to Constantinople. Of course there was Julius Nepos but he was really really the last one. The most recent incarnation of the Western Empire, which had only lasted for 81 years -- 85 if you count JN -- was over. Rome was reunited. This was the narrative Theodoric knew and at least partially believed in. He invaded and took Italy for the Emperor! Also that idea is double silly because Theodoric was an Arian and an Arian trying to be an Emperor would have been a very bad idea all around. If he really had imperial pretensions, he would have brought back the old-fashioned tradition of the German magister militum and his puppet.
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Jun 3, 2014 21:03
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Ofaloaf posted:I just really want to figure out what the devil the root of this "Theodoric was a Western Roman Emperor" thing comes from, because I haven't heard it before the above-linked thread. Taking a bunch of real things and fetishizing the terminology because of Rome love, I'd guess. Theodoric was a very Romanized German, king of Italy, a good ruler, and a loyal vassal of the empire. Emperor? Not so much. I would not be surprised if common people called him emperor, because common people A) were dumb/uneducated B) didn't give a poo poo. I am reasonably sure nobody was calling him emperor in any official capacity because that'd be usurping and Constantinople would've thrown a poo poo fit.
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Jun 4, 2014 02:35
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Mr Havafap posted:Don't get me wrong, I love the Illiad because it portrays the protagonists as well as the antagonists in a such a human way, warts and all, but there isn't a single character in it I can really identify myself with, except perhaps Nestor when I hit my nineties. Diomedes was the best and its a shame a lot of his epics have been lost  Mr Havafap posted:And oh, how was Odysseus regarded by the Romans and their famous dislike of duplicity? achillesforever6 fucked around with this message at 03:22 on Jun 4, 2014 |
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Jun 4, 2014 03:05
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achillesforever6 posted:That and he used a bow which come on, fight a man face to face like a real man. Read the Iliad, Romans.  He's Ὀδυσεὺς δουρὶ κλυτός. Famous for his spear. Stop trying to make him Ὀδυσεὺς τόξῳ κλυτός. You do not know better than Homer, you terrible little proles. (He's also τλήμονα θυμὸν ἔχων and θυμὸς ἀγήνωρ. So shut up, Romans).
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Jun 4, 2014 05:06
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Ofaloaf posted:The same fellow talked a bit more a pointed to this wall of unsourced text. Choice bits: I found this PhD thesis that argued for it and it has been turned into a book by the Cambridge University Press this year, so I presume it's at least academically respectable enough, even if it is very revisionist. The main gist of it seems to be that the Italians wanted an empire and Theodoric's kingdom looked enough like an empire that both sides maintained the fiction that the empire was restored (though for the author he seems to believe that the empire really was restored and that Justinian was just another evil easterner usurping the position when he reconquered it). The main issue is of course that he relied on Enodius and Cassiodorus, who had an interest in playing up the idea that Theodoric was like an emperor, and I don't think it is convincing how he argued that rhetoric of empire actually meant anything in reality. Shame this position is pushed so hard in the Paradox thread... Durokar fucked around with this message at 11:08 on Jun 4, 2014 |
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Jun 4, 2014 08:39
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Durokar posted:I found this PhD thesis thesis that argued for it and it has been turned into a book by the Cambridge University Press this year, so I presume it's at least academically respectable enough, even if it is very revisionist. The main gist of it seems to be that the Italians wanted an empire and Theodoric's kingdom looked enough like an empire that both sides maintained the fiction that the empire was restored (though for the author he seems to believe that the empire really was restored and that Justinian was just another evil easterner usurping the position when he reconquered it). The main issue is of course that he relied on Enodius and Cassiodorus, who had an interest in playing up the idea that Theodoric was like an emperor, and I don't think it is convincing how he argued that rhetoric of empire actually meant anything in reality. Shame this position is pushed so hard in the Paradox thread... Huh, well the Doctoral Committee has Raymond Van Dam on it and he's written a lot of good stuff. It's always worth reading stuff that challenges everyone's conception of stuff like this in history, too, even if it isn't necessarily correct. Octy fucked around with this message at 10:52 on Jun 4, 2014 |
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Jun 4, 2014 10:47
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Mr Havafap posted:My wondering on the use of Homer in antiquity is more on the practical side, say you found your eight year old pelting the neighbor's dog for no good reason would you give him a good shake and say "You're no Hector, attacking a poor dog like that!", or if the kid was too clever by half would he be (ironically) likened to Odysseus? Anybody might quote Homer at any time, though of course our evidence for daily life is exceedingly rare, and the richer you were, the more often you'd be able to sit around getting drunk and listening to Homer. The prime basis for comparing Homer to the Bible is their ubiquity. "Everyone" knew snippets of Homer (as with the Bible). There were trained professional (competitive!) Homer-reciters, the rhapsodes. Homer was entertainment in a way the Bible wasn't. That all of our earliest Greek alphabetic inscriptions are whole or partial dactylic hexameters (the meter of epic poetry) rather than accounts of bushels of grain or "Callipyges owes me a new amphora" is one of the main bases for the theory that the alphabet was specifically adapted to write down Homer (another is that whoever did it added letters for vowels, which Phoenician didn't have; you need need vowels for Greek poetry, but not for accounting). You can draw an analogy between the Greek alphabet/Homer and movable type/Gutenberg's Bible, but making books more cheaply is at least an order of magnitude smaller than having something written down at all. I can't think of an example Homer being used in a "scolding" or even particularly moralizing way; Homer and Hesiod's very "human" gods end up being the basis for criticism of religion later, even in the ancient world. On the other hand, Lucretius wrote his educational anti-religion text De Rerum Natura in dactylic hexameter as the spoonful of sugar to help the medicine go down, which highlights still further the enormity of poetry in general, and dactylic hexameter specifically, in the largely illiterate ancient world. There's nothing like it today.
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Jun 4, 2014 14:55
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homullus posted:Anybody might quote Homer at any time, though of course our evidence for daily life is exceedingly rare, and the richer you were, the more often you'd be able to sit around getting drunk and listening to Homer. The prime basis for comparing Homer to the Bible is their ubiquity. "Everyone" knew snippets of Homer (as with the Bible). There were trained professional (competitive!) Homer-reciters, the rhapsodes. Homer was entertainment in a way the Bible wasn't. That all of our earliest Greek alphabetic inscriptions are whole or partial dactylic hexameters (the meter of epic poetry) rather than accounts of bushels of grain or "Callipyges owes me a new amphora" is one of the main bases for the theory that the alphabet was specifically adapted to write down Homer (another is that whoever did it added letters for vowels, which Phoenician didn't have; you need need vowels for Greek poetry, but not for accounting). You can draw an analogy between the Greek alphabet/Homer and movable type/Gutenberg's Bible, but making books more cheaply is at least an order of magnitude smaller than having something written down at all. Actually, much of the Bible was entertainment in its original form. That part of the comparison was valid. The stories of the patriarchs, particularly, on up through the judges served as entertainment via epic song for hundreds of years. The Exodus, particularly, was the national epic that bound the disparate tribes together, as each group had their own version that stressed their own role in the story. Some of the stories were compiled and written down as early as David, ca. 975 BCE, while many of the others weren't committed to parchment until the Babylonian captivity, ca. 550 BCE. So the Biblical stories served much the same purpose to the Hebrews as Homer did for the Greeks in that time period.
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Jun 4, 2014 15:10
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Deteriorata posted:Actually, much of the Bible was entertainment in its original form. That part of the comparison was valid. The stories of the patriarchs, particularly, on up through the judges served as entertainment via epic song for hundreds of years. The Exodus, particularly, was the national epic that bound the disparate tribes together, as each group had their own version that stressed their own role in the story. Technically, some of them were written on tablets as early as ~2000 BC, given that they're rehashes of old Sumerian works.
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Jun 4, 2014 16:21
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Deteriorata posted:Actually, much of the Bible was entertainment in its original form. That part of the comparison was valid. The stories of the patriarchs, particularly, on up through the judges served as entertainment via epic song for hundreds of years. The Exodus, particularly, was the national epic that bound the disparate tribes together, as each group had their own version that stressed their own role in the story. Mr Havafap was asking specifically about the Bible, though, and referred to 19th century Europe, so I was speaking of (and thought Mr Havafap meant) the uses of the Christian Bible rather than original usage of the contents of the Hebrew Bible. I agree with everything you just said.
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Jun 4, 2014 16:24
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Durokar posted:I found this PhD thesis that argued for it and it has been turned into a book by the Cambridge University Press this year, so I presume it's at least academically respectable enough, even if it is very revisionist. The main gist of it seems to be that the Italians wanted an empire and Theodoric's kingdom looked enough like an empire that both sides maintained the fiction that the empire was restored (though for the author he seems to believe that the empire really was restored and that Justinian was just another evil easterner usurping the position when he reconquered it). The main issue is of course that he relied on Enodius and Cassiodorus, who had an interest in playing up the idea that Theodoric was like an emperor, and I don't think it is convincing how he argued that rhetoric of empire actually meant anything in reality. Shame this position is pushed so hard in the Paradox thread... Take dissertations with a grain of salt. There are a whole host of sins that will get brushed over in the name of getting a person out the door and into the wider world. Doctoral defenses in history can frequently be more or less six-way conversations about the weaknesses of the dissertation and how this can be addressed before publication. The real test is to see how well it is received by reviewers after publication, who those reviewers are, and what kind of reception it gets by the rest of the historical community in general.
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Jun 4, 2014 19:57
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Cyrano4747 posted:Take dissertations with a grain of salt. There are a whole host of sins that will get brushed over in the name of getting a person out the door and into the wider world. Doctoral defenses in history can frequently be more or less six-way conversations about the weaknesses of the dissertation and how this can be addressed before publication. The real test is to see how well it is received by reviewers after publication, who those reviewers are, and what kind of reception it gets by the rest of the historical community in general. Oh I know, but I couldn't find a review of his book on jstor yet (it came out in February), His article on "Theodoric's Invincible Mustache" was a pretty good read though and it was in the Journal of Late Antiquity, so although I personally think he is wrong, his ideas are worth thinking about at least.
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Jun 4, 2014 22:49
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Did ancient civilizations of Mediterranean basin had something akin to modern western concept of karma? Something like "You reap what you sow" but maybe with some higher power driving the events?
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Jun 11, 2014 17:11
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alex314 posted:Did ancient civilizations of Mediterranean basin had something akin to modern western concept of karma? Something like "You reap what you sow" but maybe with some higher power driving the events? There's a fair amount of just deserts going around in Greek mythology, but it's sort of weird because the gods are controlling events coming and going, so you get cases like Oedipus who is punished for a variety of transgressions (patricide and motherfucking) that were made an unavoidable part of his destiny. There wasn't like a universal code of conduct that one was meant to follow but doing something that offended the gods or a god in particular was a pretty common way to bring bad luck to yourself. Odysseus blinding Poseidon's son, Theseus jilting a favorite of Dionysus, Arachne for, uh, being better than Athena at something.
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Jun 11, 2014 17:33
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Yeah Greek mythology is full of people getting what's coming to them. It's not karma in the actual Buddhist sense, but pretty much the same thing in general use of the term. Despite Buddhism making it to the classical world (and the classical world making it to Buddhism, in the case of Greco-Indian culture) I don't think its philosophy ever made any impact. Best as we can tell, nobody in the west gave a poo poo about it.
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Jun 11, 2014 17:59
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alex314 posted:Did ancient civilizations of Mediterranean basin had something akin to modern western concept of karma? Something like "You reap what you sow" but maybe with some higher power driving the events? Not really, at least not "reaping what you sow." Hubris was certainly an invitation to be struck down, but there is no positive flip side -- being "good" (their definitions not really being like ours) does nothing other than not painting a target on your back. Even mystery religions that promised a better afterlife (compared to being an empty shade in eternal twilight or whatever) hinged on seeing something revealed and then not talking about it, rather than ongoing "goodness."
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Jun 11, 2014 18:13
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