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Epicurius posted:How'd Nerva get.included as a good emperor anyway? dude did a lot to sort out rome's economy and class structure in the two years he was emperor, and he was an emperor proclaimed by the senate rather than the army, which was appealing to ancient historians so they talked him up a lot considering his short tenure
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Dec 18, 2017 17:38
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Jazerus posted:dude did a lot to sort out rome's economy and class structure in the two years he was emperor, and he was an emperor proclaimed by the senate rather than the army, which was appealing to ancient historians so they talked him up a lot considering his short tenure He only needed to “sort out” the economy because he had hosed it up by paying everyone loads of money to like him while simultaneously slashing revenue by giving back all the property Domitian had seized. Amgard posted:Imperial Rome isn't my jam, but my understanding is that Nerva makes first of five because he started the practice of choosing and adopting his successor to be Augustus rather than rely on genetic dice. Thus by enabling four good emperors, he gets to be "good" too. Nerva didn’t choose an adoptive successor because he wanted to out of the goodness of his heart. He had no children, was too aged to produce a natural heir, and most importantly was under serious pressure of a coup from the Praetorian Guard. In general he did not have the respect of the people or the army and needed to get that respect, and that’s why he effectively ceded control of the state to Trajan. This was probably a better move for everyone than just having Trajan or someone else usurp that power by force, but I don’t think it’s too comparable with the succession of the other Good Emperors, at least two of whom adopted heirs mostly because they preferred to have sex with young men.
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Dec 18, 2017 17:48
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The more I look at it, the more the whole "good/bad" emperor distinction comes down to how much the Senate liked them. Nerva is a good emperor and Commodius is a bad one, even though they both spent lavishly to get popular support until they bankrupted Rome, and they both ruled by whim and favorites. But because the Senate liked Nerva, while Commodius made an enemy of the Senate, Nerva is good, and Commodius is bad.
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Dec 18, 2017 17:58
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Epicurius posted:The more I look at it, the more the whole "good/bad" emperor distinction comes down to how much the Senate liked them. Nerva is a good emperor and Commodius is a bad one, even though they both spent lavishly to get popular support until they bankrupted Rome, and they both ruled by whim and favorites. But because the Senate liked Nerva, while Commodius made an enemy of the Senate, Nerva is good, and Commodius is bad. Nerva didn't murder giraffes. Point for Nerva.
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Dec 18, 2017 17:59
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Amgard posted:Nerva didn't murder giraffes. Point for Nerva. The giraffes know what they did.
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Dec 18, 2017 18:09
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skasion posted:He only needed to “sort out” the economy because he had hosed it up by paying everyone loads of money to like him while simultaneously slashing revenue by giving back all the property Domitian had seized. no, he hosed up the treasury with the donatives, tax breaks, and subsidies (some of which were the usual bribes; others seem to be genuine policy changes). that's not the same thing as the economy; the empire almost certainly benefited from the imperial treasury being emptied. and then to make up for it he slashed the calendar for imperially-funded games and races, which had grown a bit out of control, and reduced the amount of lavish government iconography with the side benefit of getting rid of all of domitian's gaudy statues and such the aristocratic bias and lack of economic understanding in ancient histories means that a "bad policy" in their judgment cannot be trusted to be actually bad if the policy is redistributional, unless obvious bad conseqences result.
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Dec 18, 2017 18:15
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Aren't there a few emperors ancient authors liked who seem to benefit from short tenures? Titus as well as Nerva come to mind. Hard to piss people off if you never outlive your honeymoon phase. Also, is there somewhere I can read about how roman naming conventions evolved? I know next to nothing beyond the basics, but in the classical republic it seems praenomen nomen cognomen is ubiquitous and basically everyone's praenomen is one of a few select ones: Gaius, Lucius, Marcus, etc. Then by the late empire names, at least of aristocrats, get a lot longer and there seem to be far more names in use. I guess some of this just comes from names of non-latin origins getting accepted as borders expand. Edgar Allen Ho fucked around with this message at 20:11 on Dec 18, 2017 |
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Dec 18, 2017 20:07
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Epicurius posted:How'd Nerva get.included as a good emperor anyway? Because not including him would undermine the argument.
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Dec 18, 2017 21:02
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skasion posted:Salvaged the relationship with the senate from the status quo under Domitian (“I am your god, obey or I will loving kill you”) very possibly by being involved in his murder, paid basically everyone a bunch of money to win public support, appointed Trajan rather than let the empire collapse into civil war. He seems to have been generally pretty well liked among the Roman elite (anyone who had lasted since Nero’s time must have been very diplomatically minded) but I agree he doesn’t quite fit with the other four. Domitian would have been a great Emperor if he was born like... 200 years later.
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Dec 19, 2017 13:05
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Edgar Allen Ho posted:Also, is there somewhere I can read about how roman naming conventions evolved? I know next to nothing beyond the basics, but in the classical republic it seems praenomen nomen cognomen is ubiquitous and basically everyone's praenomen is one of a few select ones: Gaius, Lucius, Marcus, etc. Then by the late empire names, at least of aristocrats, get a lot longer and there seem to be far more names in use. I guess some of this just comes from names of non-latin origins getting accepted as borders expand. The wikipedia article on Roman names is pretty comprehensive and good, as are the sub-articles I saw. As for why there are more names in Late Antiquity I think you're correct that it's all the fuckin' foreigners, not just Latins anymore.
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Dec 19, 2017 13:27
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As a point on pre-Islamic Arabia, the Saudis don’t really allow any major work done in the country and actively destroy existing sites. A lot of pre-Islamic history may be lost.
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Dec 20, 2017 02:25
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sbaldrick posted:As a point on pre-Islamic Arabia, the Saudis don’t really allow any major work done in the country and actively destroy existing sites. A lot of pre-Islamic history may be lost.
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Dec 20, 2017 19:22
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HEY GUNS posted:Islamic history as well--haven't they destroyed the house where Muhammed was born? Iirc they've also bulldozed the graves of some of his relatives.
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Dec 20, 2017 21:58
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As far as I know Muhammad's house is still there, but most of his companions' houses are gone. They've been debating destroying his home, too, however.
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Dec 23, 2017 22:42
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my point is that unless you belong to the specific kind of islam they do, these dudes are motherfuckers and probably blasphemous
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Dec 23, 2017 22:43
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iconoclasm is one hell of a drug
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Dec 23, 2017 22:54
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HEY GUNS posted:my point is that unless you belong to the specific kind of islam they do, these dudes are motherfuckers and probably blasphemous Like totally.  It's staggering how much of historical Mecca was bulldozed to dump in those gaudy hotels and stuff.
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Dec 23, 2017 23:14
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fishmech posted:It's staggering how much of historical Mecca was bulldozed to dump in those gaudy hotels and stuff. Lot of money in tourism, especially when you control a city that it's a religious duty to go visit.
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Dec 24, 2017 01:58
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fishmech posted:Like totally. It’s funny to listen to my Muslim friends complain about how Disney-fied Mecca has become over the last decade or so. e: I am also quite sympathetic to their being annoyed, to be clear
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Dec 24, 2017 02:59
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fishmech posted:Like totally. My favorite fact about this picture: See the big clocks on top of that tower? See the small towers at the corners between them? These are as big as the tower housing Big Ben in London.
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Dec 24, 2017 14:44
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So I'm reading a translation of Hans Delbruck's History of Medieval War. I'm doing my best to remember that this is an important but dated work and on that note I wanted to share a small excerpt from early in the book that I love and have re-read several times. Hans Delbruck posted:
Is this still considered accurate among modern scholars? I know there's a large push back against the older view of the Dark Ages, but I think Delbruck might be past that era in some ways (he argues against the notion of hordes of peasant armies). I really need to know if this is credible because it's already stuck in my head and I just know I'm going to mention it conversation at some point. He also has a good bit of "look at how this people lost the purity of their primeval warriorhood when they became farmers and stopped standing around in the woods naked, screaming" which is just  , although I'm actually a little hesitant to dismiss the idea that a wandering clan/tribe/people might have a higher percentage of warriors than one that has settled down into agriculture, but the Fall of Rome podcast made it clear that even when these wandering "Barbarians" were strong enough to "invade" Rome (which would be near the height of the Connan-ness acording to Delbruck) they still had sophisticated settlements and societies outside of Roman territory.
Jack B Nimble fucked around with this message at 16:18 on Dec 24, 2017 |
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Dec 24, 2017 16:16
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Reading Mike Duncan's The Storm Before The Storm finally, it's written in a super lay-friendly way but some quirk of the printer turned the letters "hn" into Û.
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Dec 24, 2017 16:36
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Cnidario posted:It’s funny to listen to my Muslim friends complain about how Disney-fied Mecca has become over the last decade or so.
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Dec 24, 2017 16:42
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HEY GUNS posted:the saudis are tremendous fuckers and i am glad they don't control any of my religion's holy sites. What does a pike factory look like anyway
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Dec 24, 2017 16:45
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FAUXTON posted:Reading Mike Duncan's The Storm Before The Storm finally, it's written in a super lay-friendly way but some quirk of the printer turned the letters "hn" into Û. Yeah, I saw that and wondered if one day I'd end up enjoying owning a first run with such a noticeable flaw.
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Dec 24, 2017 16:51
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She has to control the 5 patriarchs before she can mend the schism and turn Catholicism into an Orthodox heresy.
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Dec 24, 2017 16:58
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FAUXTON posted:What does a pike factory look like anyway Pretty similar to the elaborate hat factory, but longer.
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Dec 24, 2017 18:23
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sullat posted:She has to control the 5 patriarchs before she can mend the schism and turn Catholicism into an Orthodox heresy. hot take, it's ALREADY an orthodox heresy
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Dec 24, 2017 18:30
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FAUXTON posted:What does a pike factory look like anyway 
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Dec 24, 2017 18:33
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But even the pike factory is hedging its bets by investing in Pulver, the technology of the future.
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Dec 24, 2017 18:37
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Cyrano4747 posted:But even the pike factory is hedging its bets by investing in Pulver, the technology of the future. There ain't gonna be a future if they don't get it away from that fire
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Dec 24, 2017 18:50
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The pike is not god, but of the same substance of god. It's not that complicated, I don't see why everyone gets up in arms about it....
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Dec 24, 2017 19:00
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I think you need to distinguish the essence of the pike from the energies of the pike.
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Dec 24, 2017 19:20
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Eela6 posted:The pike is not god, but of the same substance of god. It's not that complicated, I don't see why everyone gets up in arms about it.... The pike is both of divine and earthly nature, united without separation or alteration to its constituent parts. All other thinking is heresy 
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Dec 24, 2017 19:22
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I like Halberds.
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Dec 24, 2017 19:28
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Mantis42 posted:I like Halberds.
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Dec 24, 2017 19:32
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Jack B Nimble posted:Is this still considered accurate among modern scholars? I know there's a large push back against the older view of the Dark Ages, but I think Delbruck might be past that era in some ways (he argues against the notion of hordes of peasant armies). I really need to know if this is credible because it's already stuck in my head and I just know I'm going to mention it conversation at some point. I can't answer this specific instance, but administration was really hard in the premodern world and getting accurate counts of anything would have been a monumental task, even if your underlings weren't intentionally lying to you for their advantage. That's why the Domesday Book is such a famous thing, there aren't a lot of similar examples between the Roman census and modern states. Looks like England specifically had no proper census between 1086 and 1876, so yeah. I dunno but it doesn't strike me as unbelievable that they'd have no idea what was going on. Jack B Nimble posted:Yeah, I saw that and wondered if one day I'd end up enjoying owning a first run with such a noticeable flaw. What pisses me off is when the ebook version of something has all the pictures missing with "buy the physical book" captions. gently caress you guys.
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Dec 25, 2017 04:32
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a lot of repression and violence over the years can be chalked up to administrators with bullshit numbers setting things like tax quotas far too high for the territory in question, leading collectors to believe the peasants are just a shifty and untrustworthy lot who are constantly holding back what they ought to be able to produce on paper this is setting aside the cases where administrators deliberately taxed with no regard to the welfare of the lower classes
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Dec 25, 2017 04:51
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The Great Leap Forward is a nicely documented example of it. Of course there's plenty of food, we've managed to make our one acre field 100 times more productive through the pure love of Mao!
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Dec 25, 2017 04:59
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Jack B Nimble posted:He also has a good bit of "look at how this people lost the purity of their primeval warriorhood when they became farmers and stopped standing around in the woods naked, screaming" which is just Wasn't that also part of Ibn Khaldun's theory of history back in the 1300s? It's a very old idea. Barbaric warrior race comes form afar, conquers, and then after they settle in they get all soft and weak until the next wave of conquest. Only he was probably more focused on steppe nomads rather than Germans. Above all else, I can certainly imagine the qualities that make people effective conquerors becoming less desirable as they become administrators and start having a vested interest in the peaceful upkeep of civilization.
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Dec 25, 2017 16:14
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