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Kylaer posted:The lead mines absolutely were, from what I've read, but I'm not sure if the same is true for, say, iron, or tin, or copper. I'm sure it was awful work but I'm not sure it's universally true that mining was a death sentence. The Digests make it seem like a sentence to the mines was the next worst thing to death, basically. They don’t make any distinctions between the types of mine, although they do say that being sent to chalk pits or sulfur pits counts even though they aren’t technically mines. It’s one of the punishments from which decurions and their families are exempt, together with being hanged, or burned alive. Some of the crimes that got you sent there include corrupting virgins, providing abortions, reading living people’s sealed wills, or passing out your legal client’s papers—but only if you’re lower rank. Fancy people get packed off to an island to rot instead. If you survived ten years in the mines and could not do any more labor “through illness or the infirmities of age”, the governor had discretion to release you. There’s also a bit of napkin math in 19.8.7 about what punishments should be given to criminals who escape from hard labor, a corollary of which seems to be that a sentence of more than ten years in the mines should just be considered the same as life. skasion fucked around with this message at 17:15 on Nov 14, 2022 |
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Nov 14, 2022 17:11
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skasion posted:The Digests make it seem like a sentence to the mines was the next worst thing to death, basically. They don’t make any distinctions between the types of mine, although they do say that being sent to chalk pits or sulfur pits counts even though they aren’t technically mines. It’s one of the punishments from which decurions and their families are exempt, together with being hanged, or burned alive. Some of the crimes that got you sent there include corrupting virgins, providing abortions, But leaving children out to exposure is fine… oh that’s right it’s most likely about a man’s right to his healthy male heir.
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Nov 14, 2022 17:32
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Kylaer posted:The lead mines absolutely were, from what I've read, but I'm not sure if the same is true for, say, iron, or tin, or copper. I'm sure it was awful work but I'm not sure it's universally true that mining was a death sentence. Depends a lot on what you're mining and the society in question. Salt mines AFAIK are the most lethal - you develop renal failure VERY quickly from working in a very dehydrating environment. Old school gold mines are also famously lethal. Iron mines AFAIK varies by what the traditions going on are - iron's VERY common and can be mined fairly close to the surface, so medieval iron mines tended to just be places where farmers worked in off-seasons, while Chinese iron mines, being penal colonies owned by the state, tended to be a lot more deadly.
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Nov 14, 2022 17:38
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Tulip posted:Depends a lot on what you're mining and the society in question. Salt mines AFAIK are the most lethal - you develop renal failure VERY quickly from working in a very dehydrating environment. Old school gold mines are also famously lethal. Iron mines AFAIK varies by what the traditions going on are - iron's VERY common and can be mined fairly close to the surface, so medieval iron mines tended to just be places where farmers worked in off-seasons, while Chinese iron mines, being penal colonies owned by the state, tended to be a lot more deadly. The Romans had mercury mines. Those most have been the most deadliest mines ever by comparison. And the Romans knew -apparently they used them as penal colonies.
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Nov 14, 2022 17:55
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There are Greek accounts telling of how the asbestos miners usually died young of lung disease.
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Nov 14, 2022 18:04
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The Roman methods of silver and gold mining used copious amounts of mercury so yeah. Don't get sent there. They were also well aware of lead poisoning so I'm guessing everyone sent to lead mines was considered disposable.
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Nov 14, 2022 18:04
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IIRC pliny the elder also said that cinnabar extraction caused choking.
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Nov 14, 2022 18:06
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KYOON GRIFFEY JR posted:I do not think that is true in all historic situations when it comes to drawing lots. For instance, I don't think that Athenians believed that sortition would bias towards the best and most qualified candidates in a democracy, and that was not the goal. Rather, all candidates in the pool were considered equal and therefore sortition is a fair way of determining who holds office. Also very certainly in the Icelandic sagas, nobody is saying the process of trial by combat is fair or just or providential. The depiction is generally that the system isn't fair at all but what are you gonna do. I mean if people are gonna fight about things they're gonna fight about it, might as well set up some ground rules so that it doesn't turn into a mess of feuds. The later trial by ordeal stuff that does have religious connotations but trial by combat is *old*. It's more about ending disputes with finality than it is about achieving a fair resolution.
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Nov 14, 2022 18:27
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Crab Dad posted:But leaving children out to exposure is fine… oh that’s right it’s most likely about a man’s right to his healthy male heir. Entirely. There is no concern, pretended or otherwise, for the rights of the fetus—in 25.4, Ulpian says in so many words that an unborn child is a part of the woman, “or of her entrails”, and not a child legally speaking. However, the context in which this comes up is a story in which someone claimed his ex-wife was pregnant when she denied it, the conclusion of which is that three midwives should be appointed by the state to determine whether she’s pregnant or not, and thus whether a custodian should be appointed for any child, since the woman would have no right to take charge of its affairs and any inheritance herself. If however the husband dies while a state of uncertainty exists about pregnancy, then you’re in for some real surveillance! quote:(10) With reference to the examination of a pregnant woman, and the precautions to be taken at the time of delivery, the Praetor says: "If a woman, after the death of her husband, declares that she is pregnant, she must take care to notify the parties interested or their agent, twice within the month subsequent to his death, so that they may send persons to examine her, if they wish to do so. Free women to the number of five shall be sent, and all of them shall make the examination at one time, but none, while they are making the examination, shall touch the belly of the woman without her consent. The woman shall be delivered in the house of a respectable matron, whom I will appoint. Thirty days before she expects to be confined, she shall notify the parties interested or their agents to send persons to be present at her delivery, if they should desire to do so. There shall only be one entrance to the room where the woman is to be delivered and if there are more, they shall be closed by means of boards. Before the door of this room, three freemen and three freewomen, together with two companions, shall keep watch. Every time that the said woman enters this room, or any other, or goes to the bath, the custodians can previously make an examination of it, if they wish to do so, and also search any parties who may enter therein. The custodians who are placed in front of the room may search all persons who enter it or the house, if they so desire. When the woman begins to bring forth her child, she must notify all the parties interested, or their agents, in order that they may send persons to be present at her delivery. Freewomen to the number of five shall be sent, so that in addition to two midwives there shall not be present in the said room more than ten freewomen, nor more than six female slaves. All those who are to be present in the room shall be searched, for fear one of them may be pregnant. There shall not be less than three lights in said room, for the reason that darkness is better adapted for the substitution of a child. When the child is born, it shall be shown to the parties interested, or to their agents, if they desire to inspect it. It shall be brought up by whomever its father shall designate. If the father gives no directions in this respect, or the person by whom he desires it to be brought up will not take charge of it, this shall be done by someone appointed by me, after proper cause is shown. The person by whom the child is to be reared shall produce it, after it has reached the age of three months, twice every month until it is six months old; and then once a month, and from the time it is six months old until it has attained the age of a year, it shall be produced every other month; and after it is a year old, until it can speak, he shall exhibit it once every six months, wherever he wishes to do so. If the parties interested are not permitted to examine the woman, and to watch her, or to be present at her delivery, and anything is done to prevent what is set forth above, I will not grant permission for the possession of the child after I have taken cognizance of the case, nor will I do so where the child is not allowed to be examined, as is hereinbefore provided. Where it seems to me that a good reason exists, I will not grant those actions which I promise to those to whom the possession of property has been given in accordance with my Edict." Got that? This is followed up by a couple of sections on what happens to women who abuse the property rights of their children or defraud their husband’s heirs by pretending pregnancy, and then a mostly unrelated section about concubinage which includes the cheerful provision that if you’re a freedwoman concubine and your patron goes insane, it is “more equitable” that you remain his concubine.
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Nov 14, 2022 18:51
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with the caveat that "roman law" covers a very long time period and my recollection here is specifically about the earlier period, my understanding is that infanticide was not no-caveats legal. The pater familias had to gather all his neighbors and they had to agree that it was okay to kill the baby the passing of this law is firmly in the mists of history so we don't explicitly know the motivation, but to me that feels like the kind of law you pass when you agree that in theory that infanticide should sometimes happen (perhaps for obvious birth defects?), but find it distateful and don't want it to be broadly applied
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Nov 14, 2022 19:04
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Tulip posted:Depends a lot on what you're mining and the society in question. Salt mines AFAIK are the most lethal - you develop renal failure VERY quickly from working in a very dehydrating environment. Old school gold mines are also famously lethal. Iron mines AFAIK varies by what the traditions going on are - iron's VERY common and can be mined fairly close to the surface, so medieval iron mines tended to just be places where farmers worked in off-seasons, while Chinese iron mines, being penal colonies owned by the state, tended to be a lot more deadly. Libluini posted:The Romans had mercury mines. Those most have been the most deadliest mines ever by comparison. And the Romans knew -apparently they used them as penal colonies. Azza Bamboo posted:IIRC pliny the elder also said that cinnabar extraction caused choking. Yeah the cinnabar mines (mercury ore aka vermillion) were only slightly less lethal than crucifixion. Gotta have that pigment tho.
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Nov 14, 2022 23:26
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Fond memories of that one Dwarf Fortress story about selling tons of cinnabar cups to the elves
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Nov 15, 2022 05:08
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cowboy
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FreudianSlippers posted:I've been reading about 17th century witch trials in Iceland and the way they worked was that the accused had a certain length of time to find 12 people who could swear an oath that he* wasn't a sorcerer before the trial. Why did Iceland decide magic was a thing for men? I might be misremembering my Norse mythology, but wasn't Odin learning magic considered a bit sus because it was supposed to be a feminine thing?
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Nov 15, 2022 14:31
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Elissimpark posted:Why did Iceland decide magic was a thing for men? I might be misremembering my Norse mythology, but wasn't Odin learning magic considered a bit sus because it was supposed to be a feminine thing? The male practice of magic in Viking-age Scandinavian culture was considered argr (“unmanly/indecent/hosed up”, often implying effeminacy or being a bottom). but that there was, essentially, a word that links the ideas of “sorcerer” and “gaylord”, implies that enough men were out there doing magic to be denigrated for it. But that’s before Christianization and centuries and centuries before the witch trials of the early modern period so I doubt there’s a direct connection.
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Nov 15, 2022 14:51
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In some countries the stereotype of the malevolent magic-worker was that of a man instead of a woman. Same thing in Russia, actually.
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Nov 15, 2022 16:02
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skasion posted:Entirely. There is no concern, pretended or otherwise, for the rights of the fetus—in 25.4, Ulpian says in so many words that an unborn child is a part of the woman, “or of her entrails”, and not a child legally speaking. However, the context in which this comes up is a story in which someone claimed his ex-wife was pregnant when she denied it, the conclusion of which is that three midwives should be appointed by the state to determine whether she’s pregnant or not, and thus whether a custodian should be appointed for any child, since the woman would have no right to take charge of its affairs and any inheritance herself. That's insane, what happens to those that don't can't fulfil the requirements like: quote:There shall only be one entrance to the room where the woman is to be delivered and if there are more, they shall be closed by means of boards. Before the door of this room, three freemen and three freewomen, together with two companions, shall keep watch. That seem like something that only really wealthy people could afford.
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Nov 17, 2022 06:56
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Mad Hamish posted:In some countries the stereotype of the malevolent magic-worker was that of a man instead of a woman. Same thing in Russia, actually. I believe the same was true in Western Europe prior to the 1500s or so Most female witches who were tried tended to be wealthy with no or disputed inheritance, funny that
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Nov 17, 2022 11:10
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I am moderately certain that the concept of the European witch hysteria being used as a tool to eliminate powerful women was disproved a while ago but I don't have any good sources on that to hand. Certainly people have rejected the assumptions of Barstow's Witchcraze by now but I think the most recent books on the subject I have in the house right now are from the late 90s / early aughts.
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Nov 17, 2022 15:28
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downout posted:That's insane, what happens to those that don't can't fulfil the requirements like: If you’re taking a legal action about inheritance, against the widow of a family member, to the urban praetor, you probably are pretty wealthy. If you’re poor and have no meaningful property for anyone to sue you about, then who cares?
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Nov 17, 2022 15:49
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skasion posted:If you’re taking a legal action about inheritance, against the widow of a family member, to the urban praetor, you probably are pretty wealthy. If you’re poor and have no meaningful property for anyone to sue you about, then who cares? Seems like the baby-switching process works better at the beginning of the pregnancy rather than the end; e.g. Caesarion really being Pullo's kid.
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Nov 17, 2022 16:06
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Mad Hamish posted:I am moderately certain that the concept of the European witch hysteria being used as a tool to eliminate powerful women was disproved a while ago but I don't have any good sources on that to hand. Certainly people have rejected the assumptions of Barstow's Witchcraze by now but I think the most recent books on the subject I have in the house right now are from the late 90s / early aughts. I think it was a element of the Salem trials in America, and since those dominate cultural perception of witch trials due to American cultural influence it gets treated as a norm instead of literially being a tiny rural community on the very edge of the Christian world at the peak of idelogical insanity.
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Nov 17, 2022 16:13
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sullat posted:Seems like the baby-switching process works better at the beginning of the pregnancy rather than the end; e.g. Caesarion really being Pullo's kid. Pullout game ironically wasnt one of Pullo's strengths.
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Nov 17, 2022 16:15
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Nothingtoseehere posted:I think it was a element of the Salem trials in America, and since those dominate cultural perception of witch trials due to American cultural influence it gets treated as a norm instead of literially being a tiny rural community on the very edge of the Christian world at the peak of idelogical insanity. Several years ago while at a pagan festival I attended a really neat lecture on Salem and I'll have to dig out my notes from it. I am not as well-versed in Salem as I am in Europe, but it certainly does feel like people focus on it a lot. I am always delighted to correct the major misconceptions about that nightmare because they are everywhere! People get surprised when you tell them that the town called Salem isn't that Salem, and they think people were burned at the stake for the crime of being witches, when they were actually executed because they wouldn't confess to being witches (being weirdo Puritan types, lying would have imperiled their mortal souls, you know) and they were hanged. Except for Giles Corey, of course :metal:.
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Nov 17, 2022 18:17
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Mad Hamish posted:People get surprised when you tell them that the town called Salem isn't that Salem I mean. It kind of is. Like yeah Salem Village/modern Danvers isn’t the same as Salem proper. But not every accusation was about Salem Village, they were all over Essex County. all the actual trials took place in Salem proper not the village, and the hangings too.
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Nov 17, 2022 18:51
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This is a broad question, but I'm curious about Roman slaves' opportunities to earn their own money, and the laws and social norms governing their possession of it. Could e.g. a public slave who swept the streets earn his freedom through odd jobs like running errands or peddling cheap goods?
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Nov 17, 2022 19:27
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Does anyone have any interesting stuff on what the scholar officials actually did? Like I'm not sure I'm clear on what duties they actually managed to preform since my latest reading on Chinese imperial government is that it was a big mess.
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Nov 17, 2022 19:55
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Elissimpark posted:Why did Iceland decide magic was a thing for men? I might be misremembering my Norse mythology, but wasn't Odin learning magic considered a bit sus because it was supposed to be a feminine thing? The traditional wizard is all about taking the world and bending it to his will, essentially making the laws of nature his bitch. Summoning what is essentially minor gods and forcing them to do his bidding. On the other hand the traditional folkloric witch is a willless servant of Satan. All her powers are extensions of the powers of the devil and not her own. Essentially the wizard is a top that fucks Satan and the witch a bottom that gets hosed by Satan (or usually eats his rear end). FreudianSlippers fucked around with this message at 23:32 on Nov 17, 2022 |
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Nov 17, 2022 23:29
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Lawman 0 posted:Does anyone have any interesting stuff on what the scholar officials actually did? Idk about the imperial versions but if the pre imperial shi are any guide, their work chiefly consisted of giving bad advice, getting fired and exiled, and then shopping their sulky poetry around China in hopes of catching a new
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Nov 17, 2022 23:29
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Lawman 0 posted:Does anyone have any interesting stuff on what the scholar officials actually did? https://www.amazon.co.uk/Daily-China-Mongol-Invasion-1250-1276/dp/0804707200 That's not exclusively about scholar officials (and frankly I think the parts about restaurants are the most interesting) but there's some fascinating insights into the behaviors of scholar officials in the capital https://www.amazon.co.uk/Reform-Sun...ks%2C151&sr=1-1 That one's pretty dated (and its using Wade-Giles RIP) but AFAIK there hasn't been a major overturn of the basics that are described. Also its just a fascinating read. The basic gist of their duties was that they would be appointed to a variety of executive positions across the empire (as well as a bunch in the capital itself). And...basically they covered nearly every government function you can imagine. An example that might kind of clarify - it's the Tang dynasty and you've been appointed to a low-level position in a rural area. This area has a bandit problem. You're now responsible for that. So you have a budget and some power and you use that to recruit an ad-hoc small army to go and smash the bandits, killing, imprisoning, enslaving, or pardoning them. Note that the scholar-official is not seen as a specialized military leader, his job is not to know how military issues work exactly its to correctly identify, recruit, and support the leader of the attack. The same kind of logic applies to irrigation, or famine relief, or raising taxes, or building roads, or even printing money (at several points, mints were regional rather than central). The details of this are going to vary considerably with time and place, and that's a lot of why I like Liu's work because it zeros in on almost certainly the most important single event in changing how scholar-officials did their jobs and gives you a before & after portrait of those duties.
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Nov 18, 2022 00:14
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Thank you tulip!
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Nov 18, 2022 04:03
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Lawman 0 posted:Thank you tulip! A point that might clarify things is that, in theory, the scholar-officials were the singular mechanism for implementing the Emperor's vision across the empire/world. Obviously this was not true: the scholar-officials famously spent a lot of time complaining about the eunuch corps, and there was an aristocracy, and an often semi-independent military, and the Empire was an empire which means that a lot of older political orgs just survived as components such as tribes. By-and-large the scholar-officials were the means by which the emperor communicated with at least the non-eunuch elements of this - for example a lot of how a scholar official got things done was to go to a town and develop relations with the local big men and exercise power through the already existing informal power networks, rather than against those networks. But of course from the emperor's perspective, the scholar-officials were frequently moralizing busy-bodies who would gossip and refuse orders and "creatively" interpret his orders in accordance with Confucian principles. Or put more directly, they were loyal to their principles, while the eunuchs or governor-generals or secret police would be loyal exclusively to the emperor. So many emperors would move power from the scholar-officials to their own people. According to the scholar-officials this was basically always a mistake, but they're not exactly political neutral on that question. There are some high-profile fuckups, most obviously An Lushan, but the impulse of an emperor to try and sidestep a group of rigid whiny nerds is pretty understandable (it worked out pretty well for Wu Zetian if you ask me).
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Nov 18, 2022 08:28
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As a rigid whiny nerd, I must dissent
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Nov 18, 2022 08:38
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My favourite rigid whiny nerd sidestep is that King Sejong personally invented the Korean alphabet so that anyone could learn to read, not just the scholars.
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Nov 18, 2022 09:19
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These worthless nerds are nothing but trouble honestly. Objectively, it's best to trust a competent military man.
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Nov 18, 2022 09:22
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Gaius Marius posted:These worthless nerds are nothing but trouble honestly. Objectively, it's best to trust a competent military man.  Edit: FreudianSlippers posted:The traditional wizard is all about taking the world and bending it to his will, essentially making the laws of nature his bitch. Summoning what is essentially minor gods and forcing them to do his bidding. Is there a source for this? Is this in Iceland or elsewhere? The perceptions of magic users and the specificity is fascinating. piL fucked around with this message at 09:38 on Nov 18, 2022 |
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Nov 18, 2022 09:35
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Gaius Marius posted:These worthless nerds are nothing but trouble honestly. Objectively, it's best to trust a competent military man. 
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Nov 18, 2022 11:06
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piL posted:Is there a source for this? Is this in Iceland or elsewhere? The perceptions of magic users and the specificity is fascinating. I think Freudianslippers is going by a pop culture conception of witches and wizards, one that is pretty misogynistic in my opinion. I’m pretty sure there is no such thing as a ‘traditional wizard’, let alone a tradition of topping the universe by summoning godlike creatures. About the wizard part at least, I’d love to be proven wrong.
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Nov 18, 2022 17:07
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China's various incarnations are def the most whiny nerd based of any major historical empires. Korea's higher on the nerd quotient but never qualified for empire status.
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Nov 18, 2022 17:30
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Anthropologically speaking the witch is someone who works magic in a fashion that isn't socially-sanctioned, and often uses their magical powers for malevolent means. The stereotype here is of black and midnight hags making bargains with the Devil and fulfilling his instructions to wither your livestock, sour your sheep's milk, and make your shirts itchy. This is a bit different from 'wizardry' which, if we were to draw any kind of real-life comparison, would be someone would be someone working ceremonial magic in a grimoire or Solomonic tradition, which is where you see things like elaborate magic circles, paying attention to astrological timing, and compelling demons or other spirits to do their bidding instead of bargaining with them - in this sort of setting the operator calls up a demon and binds it to his will with the threat of punishment if it does not comply. Contrast this with the image from the Witches' Sabbath where the Devil is master over the witches, making them carry out his evil work and beating them if they disobey or do not meet sales targets. The Solomonic magician imposes his will on a spirit either by his own authority or by essentially threatening to call that spirit's manager. A lot of the equipment, magic circle design, and especially mode of dress as outlined in the Key of Solomon is basically the operator dressing up as the Creator of the Universe and Karening out at whatever entity s/he is calling up. This kind of thing mostly stems from the Greek magical papyri. Stephen Skinner wrote a fantastic book on the subject, Techniques of Solomonic Magic, which explores the connections and alterations of this material as it moved around Europe. FreudeianSlippers says "Summoning what is essentially minor gods and forcing them to do his bidding." What he is presumably referring to here is the notion that several of the spirits catalogued in Ars Goetia were once pre-Abrahamic gods who were demonized by subsequent religions. This argument is usually predicated on the presence of Astarot (Ashtoreth / Asherah) and Flaures (claimed to be a corruption of Horus) in that spirit catalogue.
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Nov 18, 2022 17:35
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It is necessary to be careful with terms like "wizard" as well. Etymologically in English it simply refers to a "wise man" and is pretty much equivalent to the term "sage" until at least the 16th century if I recall properly. That means that talking about "wizard magic" as a category before the 16th century is probably misleading because it is back-projecting a later concept on to an earlier time.
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Nov 18, 2022 18:03
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