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PittTheElder posted:Lol god drat. Is the majority of the blade black just to be tacticool? How are you supposed to know that something's tactical if it's not black?
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Jun 1, 2020 03:50
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PittTheElder posted:Lol god drat. Is the majority of the blade black just to be tacticool? I think it takes more work and makes it more dangerous to make the blade go all the way to the middle.
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Jun 1, 2020 04:05
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I will try to minimize these History of Rome relisten based questions. Maybe a weekly digest. But I have another! To what extent did people living in the Empire actually think the Emperors were gods (either while they were alive or after they died)? Did it vary by social class? I would guess the senators deifying people had kind of a cynical view of the whole thing. Or maybe was it more similar to how Catholics see saints today?
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Jun 1, 2020 04:11
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This egyptologist posted a thread on how to tear down a monument: https://twitter.com/indyfromspace/status/1267271817439346689
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Jun 1, 2020 04:29
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Badger of Basra posted:To what extent did people living in the Empire actually think the Emperors were gods (either while they were alive or after they died)? Did it vary by social class? I would guess the senators deifying people had kind of a cynical view of the whole thing. Or maybe was it more similar to how Catholics see saints today? The question presumes a consistent theology, which Roman religion didn't have. So there is no satisfying, consistent answer to give. The imperial cult worshiped the genius of the emperor, not the man. Genii were the spirits that existed in the world, connected to places, objects, concepts, and people. The idea of someone like Augustus having a genius was not new, everybody did. But the imperial genius became an object of worship in the state religion, and had to be propitiated with sacrifice. Did this mean they thought emperors became literal gods upon death? Kinda? Not really? The idea of what a god was in Roman religion was flexible. We know there was at least some cynicism about it, Vespasian's reported final words ("I think I'm becoming a god") are a good example. You also have to distinguish different groups. Egyptians probably did think of the emperors as something divine, that had a long precedent in their society. Ethnic Romans would have seen it through the framework of a genius. There would've been other local variations as well. The state didn't care as long as you performed the required sacrifices.
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Jun 1, 2020 04:39
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Imperial Genius sounds like a pretty cool job title.
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Jun 1, 2020 04:46
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It was certainly possible for Romans to be skeptical of the divinity of dead emperors. The best example is Seneca’s piece on the afterlife of Claudius, the central theme of which is that Claudius was too lovely to become a god. But we should note that in the same piece Seneca makes Apollo simper about how cool Nero is and how he wishes the Fates would never let him die. That is to say, when Romans were skeptical that people were gods they were being skeptical of particular people being gods. It was a political act for the senate to deify a dead emperor: what you privately thought was not the point, the point was that the public authorities were going to conduct rituals to continue to affirm the late head of government, and private citizens could choose to spend time and money in support of that policy. But the concept of people being gods was not at all radical or unique to the emperors. Every family worth a drat would have venerated their generalized divine ancestors at the appropriate festival (Parentalia in February).
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Jun 1, 2020 04:57
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Edgar Allen Ho posted:The mediterranean (and for that matter the other sphere of the egyptian world in the south) is such a melting pot and basically always had been that even today I think that a huge bit of what ethnicity or race someone counts as comes from factors other than skin tone. Like most people would say an italian is white and an egyptian isn't, but if you took a random sampling of people, put them in the same clothes, gave them the same clean haircuts, and refused to say their names, would anyone actually be able to pick out which is which with accuracy? I imagine the egyptians are going to trend darker but culture is a huge bit of it, especially when it comes to "whiteness." While you could have a pretty hard time telling Sicilians from Greeks from Turks From Iranians, Egyptians just look like Egyptians, and I assume they always have. The Ancient Egyptian identity wasn't based on around looks, it was based around religion, and before "Egypt" was a thing many different people lived around or near the Nile while using it as a premier transportation corridor.
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Jun 1, 2020 05:29
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Fascists have been fantasizing about using cars to run over protestors for a while. Sounds like the conumdrum of cavalry charges into infantry. Alas pikes aren't very portable. Is there any good way disabling cars that attempt to drive into crowds, or immobilizing them when they are stopped? Is throwing something into the spokes in a car's wheel able to slow it down?
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Jun 1, 2020 06:27
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Phobophilia posted:Fascists have been fantasizing about using cars to run over protestors for a while. Sounds like the conumdrum of cavalry charges into infantry. Alas pikes aren't very portable. Is there any good way disabling cars that attempt to drive into crowds, or immobilizing them when they are stopped? Is throwing something into the spokes in a car's wheel able to slow it down? Slash the tires.
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Jun 1, 2020 06:55
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Phobophilia posted:Fascists have been fantasizing about using cars to run over protestors for a while. Sounds like the conumdrum of cavalry charges into infantry. Alas pikes aren't very portable. Is there any good way disabling cars that attempt to drive into crowds, or immobilizing them when they are stopped? Is throwing something into the spokes in a car's wheel able to slow it down?
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Jun 1, 2020 06:55
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Phobophilia posted:Fascists have been fantasizing about using cars to run over protestors for a while. Sounds like the conumdrum of cavalry charges into infantry. Alas pikes aren't very portable. Is there any good way disabling cars that attempt to drive into crowds, or immobilizing them when they are stopped? Is throwing something into the spokes in a car's wheel able to slow it down? Usually not through the spokes since the wheels are on an axle and there's not a fork to catch on and most of the space behind the spokes is taken up by the brake assembly, and honestly anything short of steel would just get snapped if it was to be put far enough through the spokes, but fit around the brake, to be jammed against the car body. You can spike the tires and honestly it probably would scare the little shits out of it even though it's not gonna stop the car. Safest option is to just find them outside their car.
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Jun 1, 2020 07:31
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So I’m going through the CHP series on the Warlord Period and I’m really really liking it, but goddamn if it doesn’t sound like I’m listening to a Drive-Time Radio DJ. I legit expect to start hearing him talk about how the Marquette is backed up all the way to, I dunno, North Avenue? Or whatever, I think LA people use numbers for highways, so probably that I guess?
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Jun 1, 2020 07:34
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Phobophilia posted:Fascists have been fantasizing about using cars to run over protestors for a while. Sounds like the conumdrum of cavalry charges into infantry. Alas pikes aren't very portable. Is there any good way disabling cars that attempt to drive into crowds, or immobilizing them when they are stopped? Is throwing something into the spokes in a car's wheel able to slow it down? Have you ever heard of the concept of mugger money? It's when you bring a certain amount of money with you that you keep loose on your person seperate from the rest of your valuables. That way, if you get robbed, you can just give up your mugger money and keep your hard to replace wallet type stuff. Or even just throw the money down and run away, hoping that the person robbing you gets too distracted by the money to chase after. Mongol warriors used this same tactic. 21st century protestors should use the same system and bring along some "protest money" to guard against cops and other nutjobs driving cars at them. This money of course would be in the currency of Yap Island.
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Jun 1, 2020 07:53
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Phobophilia posted:Fascists have been fantasizing about using cars to run over protestors for a while. Sounds like the conumdrum of cavalry charges into infantry. Alas pikes aren't very portable. Is there any good way disabling cars that attempt to drive into crowds, or immobilizing them when they are stopped? Is throwing something into the spokes in a car's wheel able to slow it down? What about Czech Hedgehogs? You could use lighter steel than the I-beams used to stop tanks, and the parts can be carried flat and assembled on-location.
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Jun 1, 2020 08:04
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Phobophilia posted:Fascists have been fantasizing about using cars to run over protestors for a while. Sounds like the conumdrum of cavalry charges into infantry. Alas pikes aren't very portable. Is there any good way disabling cars that attempt to drive into crowds, or immobilizing them when they are stopped? Is throwing something into the spokes in a car's wheel able to slow it down? Couldn't you just throw bricks at the windows so they will break and the driver can't see anything anymore? If the driver sticks his head out to see where he is going, just throw bricks at his head, that should stop the car. My first thought was just to shoot the driver, but that may be a bit too harsh. Until he already killed some protestors, I guess then you can just pull out all the guns and punt holes through his body, that should fall under self-defense, probably.
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Jun 1, 2020 12:05
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Though these are important questions I am unsure if we should be putting them in the ancient history thread or that we should be planning exact methods of violent action even in a hypothetical sense, on these forums, given past history.
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Jun 1, 2020 12:42
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Yeah, to be honest, I'm a bit confused as to why Phobophilia even started this derail. Did they accidentally post to the wrong thread?
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Jun 1, 2020 12:48
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Maybe he was reading about the riots in the early days of the Roman Republic searching for inspiration 
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Jun 1, 2020 13:25
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This is a pikethread I expect better from you
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Jun 1, 2020 13:52
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2011 Hyundai Alantra vs PIKES lets go
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Jun 1, 2020 13:57
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Phobophilia posted:This is a pikethread I expect better from you I'm more interested in the time where a bronze axe was an advanced science fiction weapon Did you know the first Egyptian king Narmer executed prisoners with a stone mace? A 16th century pike would have looked to him like an alien ray gun to us
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Jun 1, 2020 14:01
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What would actually happen if someone floored like, a Ford Fiesta into braced phalangites?
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Jun 1, 2020 15:15
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Edgar Allen Ho posted:What would actually happen if someone floored like, a Ford Fiesta into braced phalangites? well a Ford Fiesta weighs about ~2600 pounds so let's say 2800 with a person/some cargo. That's easily 1000lbs heavier than armored cavalry assuming a 1400lb horse. Considering the defense against cavalry became putting pointy bits ahead at a distance from your infantry, chances are it was understood that charging cavalry could just smash through a line of infantry otherwise they wouldn't have developed a defense that prevented it. Seeing as though a car doesn't really have the same access to vulnerable internal bits that a horse does (i.e. you can shove a sword through the radiator but that's just gonna spray hot coolant everywhere while the car continues for some time before overheating, and you're unlikely to get the angle to get a sword or spear into the engine belts which would probably stop the engine a little faster but not as fast as a spear through a horse's heart) the car would probably make a rather significant breach and continue through with potentially fatal damage but not before rendering dozens of your soldiers completely incapable of continuing in battle. The shock effect may well cause a rout right away and the "hot fluids spraying from the engine" effect would certainly help that along. Also phalanges would likely not have seen a car before so all of the above assumes they hold their line long enough for the massive machine to smash into them. E: got a Google survey asking why I was searching for a Ford Fiesta and whether it helped me make a decision in purchasing. Hope it gets seen by someone who is completely baffled by the entry "I was searching for ford fiesta curb weight for a comparison to armored cavalry" FAUXTON fucked around with this message at 15:41 on Jun 1, 2020 |
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Jun 1, 2020 15:37
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Phobophilia posted:Fascists have been fantasizing about using cars to run over protestors for a while. Sounds like the conumdrum of cavalry charges into infantry. Alas pikes aren't very portable. Is there any good way disabling cars that attempt to drive into crowds, or immobilizing them when they are stopped? Is throwing something into the spokes in a car's wheel able to slow it down? This is extremely not the thread for this.
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Jun 1, 2020 15:53
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FAUXTON posted:Considering the defense against cavalry became putting pointy bits ahead at a distance from your infantry, chances are it was understood that charging cavalry could just smash through a line of infantry otherwise they wouldn't have developed a defense that prevented it. Not quite true. Horses aren't very smart, but generally they're smart enough to not run into a wall, or what they perceive as a wall (perception is important). If you have a tightly ordered line of people, especially with shields, it's going to be extremely difficult to get a horse to just slam into the line. That's not to say it never happened, because nobody can accuse horses of being predictable, but usually they would balk and slow down, or veer off rather than just hit the line. Where cavalry charges can wreak the most damage is against people who aren't in close order.
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Jun 1, 2020 16:45
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Grand Fromage posted:The question presumes a consistent theology, which Roman religion didn't have. So there is no satisfying, consistent answer to give. although obviously this will be completely inconsistent with Roman beliefs, I don't think an analogy to modern Japanese traditional religion is off base. The way Roman pagans thought of religion was very different from modern theology. I think this video helps illustrate at least one alternative of how religion can be conceptualized: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=htxVoNBd5do
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Jun 1, 2020 18:09
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Shinto is a good modern analogy to Roman animism, I've used it myself. The broad strokes have a lot of similarities. It's a much better comparison than modern Abrahamic religion at any rate.
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Jun 1, 2020 18:12
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Is there a good (so not CSPAM) China thread? I'm trying to figure out why he think sparrows bad? Point 1: birbs good, Point 2: they eat buggos?
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Jun 1, 2020 18:22
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GBS is the only one that isn't full of tankies. As for that question, Mao thought sparrows ate grain so he wanted them all dead. Mao was not always the brightest bulb, and are you going to be the one to tell Mao that he's wrong? It's the problem with all authoritarian systems. If you tell the boss he's wrong, at the least you're risking your advancement if not your life. So things get covered up, information doesn't go up the chain, and disasters result. Good thing we don't have any recent examples of that or anything.
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Jun 1, 2020 18:33
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It is my understanding that they thought the sparrows or swallows or whatever they were were eating all the grain that had been sown in the fields. This belief was incorrect.
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Jun 1, 2020 18:34
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Schadenboner posted:Is there a good (so not CSPAM) China thread? I'm trying to figure out why he think sparrows bad? Point 1: birbs good, Point 2: they eat buggos? You could have asked this question in any china thread and gotten the same answer, but instead you asked about asking it in the ancient history thread?
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Jun 1, 2020 18:39
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I mean, that's just 3rd grade science (or the thousands of years of lived experience of any loving rural-dweller) though? It's so dumb it makes Lysenkoites look, like, not so dumb?
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Jun 1, 2020 18:39
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Question for historians: A friend of mine has spent a couple years in a North African country doing independent research as part of his doctorate studies. The government aproached him and asked for permission to publish a small part of his work, for tourism guides, websites, small magazines and such, nothing too serious. The thing is that when they did the translation certain parts were changed without his knowledge to give the text a nationalistic slant and he just found out and he's pissed. Probably gonna let it slide, but what can be done in this kind of situations?
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Jun 1, 2020 18:40
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Slim Jim Pickens posted:You could have asked this question in any china thread and gotten the same answer, but instead you asked about asking it in the ancient history thread? I tried yelling "Where's a good China thread?" out the window but the rear end in a top hat outside my house just kept scraeming "LOG OFF"? 
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Jun 1, 2020 18:41
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Mad Hamish posted:It is my understanding that they thought the sparrows or swallows or whatever they were were eating all the grain that had been sown in the fields. Sparrows do eat grain, but they also play a greater role in the environment and Mao was not an ecologist. The failures of the GLF were not caused by killing sparrows though, it was the general ill-founded program of diverting agricultural sector to "industrial" sector and then the government being unable to address the failure of the scheme.
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Jun 1, 2020 19:03
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I'd say that he watched Mary Poppins "Feed The Birds" song and went all  but the timeline is off by about 10 years for that to be the case.
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Jun 1, 2020 19:23
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Badger of Basra posted:I will try to minimize these History of Rome relisten based questions. Maybe a weekly digest. But I have another! Is Donald Trump a god? I mean, he commands armies million strong, he can release forces that can destroy entire cities or even whole planet to ash and his words and actions are keenly followed and obeyed. If some italian farmer heard that there's this guy, the emperor, who has legions worth of soldiers and can produce weird beasts such as elephants to his own amusement, does it even matter if he is a man or not? He is clearly something so powerful and his might is so much bigger than you that he could as well be a god.
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Jun 1, 2020 19:56
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Tell me how the Romans would have analyzed this if it happened to a Consul:
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Jun 1, 2020 20:37
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Edgar Allen Ho posted:Is the idea of people using fancy letter folding (and seals obvs) to try and demonstrate that the letter was reaching the recipient unread a real thing or just a movie invention? This is supposedly a reconstruction of an actual historic letter that still exists. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=16GAIaYN_Gk
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Jun 1, 2020 20:38
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