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Nenonen posted:But whyyyyyyy? Romans were no more dickish then any other people of the era. Less then most, really. Hell, Roman society was pretty inclusive to comparison to any other society of their times. Plus who's to say that you couldn't reform them in other ways as well?
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Jul 12, 2012 12:44
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Romans were absolute dicks. Like, barring Spartans, the most savage anti-intellectual fascists that have walked on earth. Why would anyone want to see them murder and enslave even more peoples than they historically did?
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canuckanese posted:I thought about one like this too. It reminds me of an old Twilight Zone episode where this guy knows everything there is to know about the Napoleonic Wars, how they fought, order of battle, tactics, how to use weapons, etc. Magically he's transported back into the 1800s and he gets to live his dream of being in a Napoleonic army and...he gets shot in the first battle and has to have his leg amputated. For some reason that episode stuck with me and now when I imagine being sent back in time and joining an army I think "well poo poo I'd probably end up getting killed before I became anybody significant" That would be the main problem, sure. Or dying of some age-old disease which doesn't exist today and there isn't a vaccination to it.
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Jul 12, 2012 14:01
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This is a really silly question but...what happened to all the Romans in conquered Byzantine lands? Moved away? Killed? Converted to Islam and were eventually absorbed into other cultures?
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Jul 15, 2012 19:07
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archduke.iago posted:Are any emperors remembered for being sneaky assholes? Constantius II comes to mind, but are there any more obvious ones? Augustus, obviously. Brilliant as gently caress but the man was a snake.
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Aug 19, 2012 12:37
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Agesilaus posted:Don't get too far ahead of yourself, though. Humanity is still yet to recover in may ways; we have regressed politically, philosophically, culturally, and socially from Classical Greece. No, no we really haven't.
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Aug 19, 2012 20:28
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Amused to Death posted:Well, at least the rich back then had some kind of societal pressure to actually do a few things for people in general, fund the maintenance of some aqueducts, sponsor a day of games They still do that and contribute a fraction of their income in exchange to much better outcomes to themselves, just like they did in classical times.
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Aug 19, 2012 22:14
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Agesilaus posted:Sure, we have regressed in many ways politically, culturally, and socially. I have stared at the living eye of idiocy and survived. Thank you for that experience.
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Aug 21, 2012 20:41
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euphronius posted:I think you guys and ladies are underestimating the degree to which Romans were (what we today call) racist. I can recall many instances where generals or other Romans and non Romans were blocked from higher political office because they weren't Latin or whatever. These racist attitudes were probably concentrated in the old Senate, which was cleansed after Caesar, but the attitudes lived on. Rome lasted from 753 BC to 1453. There used to be a time that if you weren't born in the city of Rome or weren't descended from someone who wasn't, you were nothing but filth. And there used to be a time when every free man in Roman Empire was granted citizenship. Sometimes Rome was pretty loving racist, sometimes it was surprisingly advanced for the time it existed in.
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Aug 27, 2012 20:32
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Dr Scoofles posted:I've also been reading a selection of letters by Cicero and it's extremely funny how they are chock full of back handed compliments and demands for more praise. I remember Robert Harris presenting the guy as a cheeky chappie but really he sounds more like a total big head to me. He was. Literally and figuratively.
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Sep 5, 2012 10:32
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Moist von Lipwig posted:I thought it was more that Urine had a lot of Industrial uses and he tried to institute a tax on the sale of it to Tanners and Launderers? Vespasian was great. "Oh! I think I'm becoming a god!"
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Sep 14, 2012 11:27
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Yeah, there were like zillion Antiochs. Also zillion Alexandrias. Both were founded by Macedonians!
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Sep 18, 2012 18:49
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SavageGentleman posted:I remember that the Tokugawa shogunate established a very complex system to deal with its (potentially rebellious) vasalls: Among other measures that only worked with feudal lords (Sankin-kōtai, force them to routineley move their residence between their demesne and the capital, keep 'em poor with the cost of two palaces and huge processions) the Shogunate also forced the lords to keep their families in the capital (under surveillance of the government) when they were at their home provinces - effectively taking them hostage to keep the lords from rebelling. Nope. Not only you have all those Emperors and generals who became emperors who didn't give a flying gently caress about their family or actively hated them - you also got generals who didn't have any or rose from such obscurity that nobody knows where their family even is. Rome was not Japan. It was not a feudal system - and even if it was, it is a lot easier to keep tabs on your nobles in Japan then an Empire spanning nearly twenty times it's size.
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Sep 18, 2012 23:18
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Grand Fromage posted:The fundamental change was where he recruited. Since there were no landholding men available, Marius turned to the vast new population of urban poor. Just to specify if this isn't clear to everyone who doesn't know how bigoted Romans were at this period, these were still citizens, he didn't just grab any poor guy off the streets and toss him a sword and shield. This still caused a huge uproar in the Senate even when there was a war going on that needed to be won and they didn't have any loving soldiers to fight it. Marius didn't pull the reforms off easily. Most of the senators were like at double Mitt Romney level at this point when you are talking about their disdain for the poors.
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Sep 21, 2012 12:16
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WoodrowSkillson posted:Was being a condescending prick part of your education, or were you just gifted that way. Well, most Classicists I've met don't fantasize about owning slaves so... 
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Sep 22, 2012 07:27
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Christoff posted:I swore I remember reading that at it's height Egypt was lush and green.  It never stopped being that. The useless desert was still useless desert 2000 years ago, but the Nile stands eternal.
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Sep 22, 2012 20:19
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Christoff posted:Can you guys sum up the Greek/Roman relationship? It confuses me a bit. I just assumed they were always rivals. Then different language and alphabet. Why didn't they just make them speak Latin? I assume the wealthy folks of Rome spoke Greek.I know Rome kind of came about after they had their glory days. And that they stole a ton of, well, everything from them. Towards the end the Greeks were Rome. Byzantium and all that. 
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Sep 23, 2012 23:01
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Grand Fromage posted:Every history has some ulterior motive. Suetonius grew up during the Vespasian/Titus reign and had a lot of poo poo for Nero, so that influenced things. Hadrian fired him for loving his wife but that was right at the end of his life, about the same time he published the Twelve Caesars so I don't think it had much of an influence. Hell, I think the fact that Hadrian didn't execute him on the spot would have had positive influence. Even if he hated his wife (and vice versa).
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Sep 26, 2012 05:50
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Grand Fromage posted:Well, it helped that Hadrian and his wife hated each other. Come on now, I think hate is a bit str... quote:Sabina was said to have remarked that she had taken steps to see she never had children by Hadrian because they would "harm the human race". Nevermind! Jazerus posted:Romans did the same thing; while he was governor of Spain, Caesar, in particular, famously lamented his relative lack of accomplishment compared to Alexander at roughly the same age. People really underestimate Philip's role in Alexander's rise. Alexander was basically given an army, finances to support it and a stable kingdom (as well as subdued Greek states) to leave behind combined with a near perfectly planned invasion route. All that was needed was an skilled tactician. And Alexander, of course, was possibly the greatest tactician in existence, which didn't hurt. Anyway, I consider Augustus' achievements to equal Alexander's, of course not in the military sense but in the sense that they were both at the top of the world at a very young age. And Octavian had nothing but his brains, name and Agrippa behind him when he started. DarkCrawler fucked around with this message at 21:44 on Sep 26, 2012 |
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Sep 26, 2012 21:23
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Grand Fromage posted:Like 30? loving everywhere. The only still inhabited ones I know of offhand are Alexandria in Egypt obviously, and Kandahar in Afghanistan. I think there are a couple others but I don't remember what their names turned into. Ghazni, Afghanistan Merv, Turkmenistan Iskandariya, Iraq Butte, Montana One of those cities may have not in fact been founded by Alexander the Great, I don't remember which one though. WoodrowSkillson posted:I was just listening to the History of Rome today at work, and it got to the part where Octavian has Alexanders body brought out to him. Augustus is probably one of the only people in history who could reflect on ALexander's life, and feel he stacked up there with him. "About this time [30 BC] Octavian had the sarcophagus and body of Alexander the Great brought forth from its inner sanctum, and, after gazing on it, showed his respect by placing upon it a golden crown and strewing it with flowers; and being then asked whether he wished to see the tomb of the Ptolemies as well, he replied, 'My wish was to see a king, not corpses.'" Badass. DarkCrawler fucked around with this message at 12:45 on Sep 27, 2012 |
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Sep 27, 2012 12:43
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So did Western European nations recognize Eastern Roman Empire as a direct continuation of Rome? Did they still look admiringly at Roman achievements and success and want to emulate them? Or did the whole mess of migrations really just confuse the poo poo out of everyone and people didn't start going all "Yay Rome!" until the Renaissance hit? I just find it funny to think that people were all "Man, Rome was awesome, huh? I wish more countries were like Rome." and Constantinople is going all "HEY WE ARE STILL HERE!"
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Sep 27, 2012 22:46
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Mach5 posted:Thank you nonetheless! I figured there was no agreed-upon date and the two sides just kind of drifted apart: like on the West you had Catholicism ascendant but dealing with plagues and whatnot, while in the East you had the Greek Orthodox guys and that pesky Genghis Khan fellow to deal with. I'll hazard a guess that the Mongols kind of inadvertently helped the Eastern Empire remain cohesive a bit longer due to their crazy-rear end tactics, and how it made sense to remain united against those devilish hordes. Hmm? Mongols came at late 1200's at which point Byzantines did not have any territory near them to conquer and were subjected to the latin partition as well. Their enemies were always the Persians and Arabs, Genghis never factored in.
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Sep 28, 2012 19:34
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Moist von Lipwig posted:Suetonius was basically the People Magazine of Rome, wasn't he? Somewhere between that and the Daily Mail.
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Sep 30, 2012 14:21
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Hedera Helix posted:How did their chain across the Golden Horn work, exactly? What kind of mechanism was in place for raising it or lowering it, and how effective was it in keeping enemy ships from landing? Effective until the end. Mehmet II had to construct a massive road of greased logs across overland to roll his ships to the Golden Horn to circumvent it. Constantinople really was probably the hardest city to siege and conquer in all of history.
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Oct 1, 2012 11:20
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Not that history channel doesn't suck, but Caligula was a pretty bad emperor, right? I mean, Tiberius left Rome with a huge surplus and he pissed it all away. Julio-Claudians have a bad rap though, two good and one phenomenal out of five isn't half bad! Better then most dynasties.
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Oct 8, 2012 16:26
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Tewdrig posted:I assume you are including Tiberius as a good emperor? I thought he was generally seen as bad, though not as bad as Caligula and Nero. Sejanus was awful, and Tiberius left Rome to relax at his villa and ignore governing the empire. He left a huge amount of money behind, strengthened the administration, and consolidated the territories. The Empire learned to govern itself pretty well and was generally strengthened. And he killed Sejanus. He was a moody rear end in a top hat who didn't want to be the Emperor in the first place, a possible sexual deviant and a dick to his family in particular, but he was a pretty good Emperor in my books. And a kickass general.
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Oct 8, 2012 17:59
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achillesforever6 posted:Didn't even Caligula start off "good" but then turned completely batshit insane after a couple of years into his rule? Good in the sense that he wasn't a complete goon when dealing with people, unlike Tiberius. Also, he had a very popular dad, so people were expecting him to be another Germanicus. And he pulled off some crazy parties and everyone was invited. But he was never a good administrator. And he was always a spoiled brat - that's what you get when you have the Roman Legions adopt you as their official mascot at age five or so and obey your commands and cheer for you. quote:To what extent besides he won their love and devotion by being reared in fellowship with them is especially evident from the fact that when they threatened mutiny after the death of Augustus and were ready for any act of madness, the mere sight of Gaius unquestionably calmed them. For they did not become quiet until they saw that he was being spirited away because of the danger from their outbreak and taken for protection to the nearest town. Then at last they became contrite, and laying hold of the carriage and stopping it, begged to be spared the disgrace which was being put upon them. After that, how can you not grow up to think that you are the awesomest person who ever lived?
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Oct 9, 2012 12:41
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Kopijeger posted:Perhaps, but "Constantinopolis" is an obviously Greek name as well, and one that it would make more sense to use in the context you describe. "Constantinopolis" is Latin. And Constantine was Roman. Kōnstantinoupolis/Konstantinoúpoli is Greek, but it's just a Greek transliteration of the Latin name. The ironic thing is that "Byzantium" comes originally from Thracian or Illyrian. DarkCrawler fucked around with this message at 21:25 on Oct 10, 2012 |
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Oct 10, 2012 21:22
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Were there lot of different roman breads and other baking stuff? I'd imagine eating would get pretty boring if they didn't vary it up, and with free grain (in the city of Rome, at the least) they would have had an incentive to switch stuff around?
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Oct 14, 2012 11:00
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Grand Prize Winner posted:Modern greek is fuckin' delicious, so how much did it have to do with Eastern Roman cooking? Modern Greek is pretty much modern Turkish.  And modern Turkish is a mix of so many things from Ottoman Empire that it's nuts to even think about it.Which brings me to the cuisine or Roman Empire - look at all the areas it incorporated, the rich people must have eaten like Gods with all the mixes and matches it brought in. I heard that rich Romans used to puke between every course just so they could stuff themselves some more, is this true?
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Oct 15, 2012 14:22
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But my orgies!
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Oct 15, 2012 14:32
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euphronius posted:Behold! the decadent vomitorium in all its hedonistic and prurient glory!  NSWF much?!
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Oct 15, 2012 16:05
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They really do look more impressive without colors, at least in my opinion. Left: World spanning empire, those who came before us, sophistication thousands of years past, civilization Right: Some tacky porcelain statue my grandma bought at a yard sale
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Oct 16, 2012 16:37
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euphronius posted:I think you are bringing your own 2012 assumptions and ideas into the "Left" observation. Is that what someone in 25 CE think? No, that's what I think. I'm sure people in 25 CE thought that colors were the poo poo, but all that marble is just so much more...dignified.
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Oct 16, 2012 16:47
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Carthage.  Man, I wonder what the world would be like today if they had won. We'd speak some wierd-rear end languages, that's for sure.
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Oct 17, 2012 15:38
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JaggyJagJag posted:If I had a time machine, I'd go be Hannibal's prophet just to see what a world like this would look like. I imagine the American continent would have been discovered at least 500 years earlier. Them Carthaginians sure liked to sail.
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Oct 21, 2012 12:51
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Prons posted:Are there any surviving records of any Roman horror stories/urban legends? Was there a roman big foot? Well, I'm pretty sure more then one Roman mother told their kids to eat their beets and go sleep early or Hannibal would come and go all Cannae on them, does that count?
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Oct 21, 2012 21:18
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman%96Persian_Wars Jeez, I never realized exactly how much Persians/Parthians/Sassanids and Romans fought against eachother. 719 freaking years. Makes some other historical rivalries look like nothing. And in the end it hosed over them both.
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Oct 24, 2012 11:55
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bobthedinosaur posted:Did Romans wear togas? All the time! In fact if you were a magistrate in Republican Rome you weren't supposed to wear anything else. Only citizens could wear it though, foreigners weren't allowed to. The toga is like the most Roman article of clothing ever.
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Oct 25, 2012 08:37
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The Late Republican period is probably unrivaled in history in the amazing people it contained and who lived in the same time and knew each other closely or featured prominently otherwise. And with almost all these people wanting power or some other ultimate desire it's no wonder that it all ended so spectacularly as it did. You got all these amazing personalities and geniuses (whether in politics, oratory, intrigue or military) that if they had been all by themselves in any other period of history with the same relative skillset, each of them could have risen to crazy heights. And they are still world famous despite having to compete with each other. Marius Sulla Pompey Julius Caesar Sertorius Crassus Cassius Brutus Marc Antony Cleopatra Cato Cicero Sextus Pompey Augustus Livia Agrippa Spartacus Catiline Clodius Am I missing anyone? DarkCrawler fucked around with this message at 11:16 on Oct 25, 2012 |
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Oct 25, 2012 11:12
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euphronius posted:Sulla didn't fail. Yeah, he's like the one of the few persons in Roman history who achieved everything he exactly wanted. "Yup, it's all good. Restored the republic. Time to retire and spend my days loving hot dudes." *And he lived happily ever after*
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Oct 26, 2012 12:48
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