Ursus

Wow. A lot of Pennsylvanians here. I'm from the other end of the state.

Infanticide was pretty common. For the elites, a disabled child would not be able to carry on the family name and family fortune. For the peasants, a disabled child would not be able to pull its own weight, something critical to consider in a time when starvation was common. As far as those who were disabled as a result of military service, you'll have to ask the military buffs. I believe though they may have been discharged and given some sort of pension, but I'm not entirely sure. I do know that Roman pagans had terribly different views on suicide than the Christian West does. If someone became a burden to their family - for instance, by reaching a certain infirmity in age - suicide was considered an honorable thing. Perhaps even a necessary thing if someone was becoming an embarrassment to the family honor and fortunes.

This is not my area of expertise, but it seems to me most of the emperors that the Praetorians killed were the ones begging for assassination. At least in the beginning. I find the Praetorians fascinating from the standpoint that as an institution it allowed non-Roman Italians to hold considerable influence over the imperial court. There seem to have been a lot of Etruscans in their ranks, for instance. Is there a good biography of Sejanus out there?

Nope. Saturnalia runs from Dec 17th - Dec 23rd. Dec 25th is the feast of Sol Invictus, the more public version of Mithras. The private Mithraic cults also had their feast this day. And January 6th was the feast of Aion, the Greco-Egyptian god of Time (sometimes identified with Mithras). This used to be the old date of the birth of Christ before it was moved to Dec 25th. In some Christians circles I hear January 6th is still considered sacred.

Lost Warrior, does your have family have a PO box?

I used to have a cool marble background I viked from a Roman Pagan site. But I got tired of that. Now I have a seductive pic of an attractive female celebrity. Heh. BTW, Sextus, that pic is hilarious in a bizarre sort of way.

What I referring to was the book give-a-way to equestrians which the Patricians had been discussing for a while. Consider it a Saturnalia present from the very generous Triumvirs.

I know what you mean. Not many people from work I want to hang around. One or two cute girls, maybe...

Feel free to shut down any thread that outlives its usefullness, even if it is on-topic.

Thank you both for the intelligent responses. This is much better than the last time I asked this question, which garnered such responses as "a Roman is someone who lives in Rome." It was insightful comments like that that make this site what it is... But seriously, this is the start of a great discussion. On Stoicism: Certainly there are elements of the Roman character which made their educated predisposed to Stoicism. The emphasis on emotionless duty to the state, their relative willingness to include others in their empire, their belief in a divine universe. My, problem, though, is that the Roman mentality was simply too simple and straightforward to accept more of the complex abstractions inherent in Greek Philosophy. Perhaps it's a semantic quibble, but Greek Philosophy comes bound with a set of complex assumptions that the Roman mentality in general did not seem to concern itself with. That's why I can't apply "Stoicism" as a whole to describe the Roman soul. As Cato mentioned above in his quote, there are certain contradictions. The Romans could be rowdy and passionate when it suited them. The Stoics also seemed to be indifferent to the glories of the world. The traditional Roman mentality was certainly anything but indifferent to the glories of the world and one

Io Saturnalia! Hail the Equestrian order!

Vegetarian Roman dish? Beans sprinkled with olive oil. Keep hanging around and some Saturnalia goodness just might go your way.

There are plenty of native born Americans who can barely read or write English. I blame a poor educational system, among other things. Especially in the more urban areas, which are the people with whom I largely have to deal in my line of work.

I think this thread has served its purpose. Hail, Germanicus, fellow praetor. Those wanting to climb the hierarchy can look to his example.

CENTURION: What's this, then? 'Romanes Eunt Domus'? 'People called Romanes they go the house'? BRIAN: It-- it says, 'Romans, go home'. CENTURION: No, it doesn't. What's Latin for 'Roman'? Come on! BRIAN: Aah! CENTURION: Come on! BRIAN: 'R-- Romanus'? CENTURION: Goes like...? BRIAN: 'Annus'? CENTURION: Vocative plural of 'annus' is...? BRIAN: Eh. 'Anni'? CENTURION: 'Romani'. 'Eunt'? What is 'eunt'? BRIAN: 'Go'. Let-- CENTURION: Conjugate the verb 'to go'. BRIAN: Uh. 'Ire'. Uh, 'eo'. 'Is'. 'It'. 'Imus'. 'Itis'. 'Eunt'. CENTURION: So 'eunt' is...? BRIAN: Ah, huh, third person plural, uh, present indicative. Uh, 'they go'. CENTURION: But 'Romans, go home' is an order, so you must use the...? BRIAN: The... imperative! CENTURION: Which is...? BRIAN: Umm! Oh. Oh. Um, 'i'. 'I'! CENTURION: How many Romans? BRIAN: Ah! 'I'-- Plural. Plural. 'Ite'. 'Ite'. CENTURION: 'Ite'. BRIAN: Ah. Eh. CENTURION: 'Domus'? BRIAN: Eh. CENTURION: Nominative? BRIAN: Oh. CENTURION: 'Go home'? This is motion towards. Isn't it, boy? BRIAN: Ah. Ah, dative, sir! Ahh! No, not dative! Not the dative, sir! No! Ah! Oh, the... accusative! Accusative! Ah! 'Domum', sir! 'Ad domum'! Ah! Oooh! Ah! CENTURION: Except that 'domus' takes the...? BRIAN: The locative, sir! CENTURION: Which is...?! BRIAN: 'Domum'. CENTURION: 'Domum'. BRIAN: Aaah! Ah. CENTURION: 'Um'. Understand? BRIAN: Yes, sir. CENTURION: Now, write it out a hundred times. BRIAN: Yes, sir. Thank you, sir. Hail Caesar, sir. CENTURION: Hail Caesar. If it's not done by sunrise, I'll cut your balls off. BRIAN: Oh, thank you, sir. Thank you, sir. Hail Caesar and everything, sir! Oh. Mmm! **** REG: They've bled us white, the b******s. They've taken everything we had, and not just from us, from our fathers, and from our fathers' fathers. LORETTA: And from our fathers' fathers' fathers. REG: Yeah. LORETTA: And from our fathers' fathers' fathers' fathers. REG: Yeah. All right, Stan. Don't labour the point. And what have they ever given us in return?! XERXES: The aqueduct? REG: What? XERXES: The aqueduct. REG: Oh. Yeah, yeah. They did give us that. Uh, that's true. Yeah. COMMANDO #3: And the sanitation. LORETTA: Oh, yeah, the sanitation, Reg. Remember what the city used to be like? REG: Yeah. All right. I'll grant you the aqueduct and the sanitation are two things that the Romans have done. MATTHIAS: And the roads. REG: Well, yeah. Obviously the roads. I mean, the roads go without saying, don't they? But apart from the sanitation, the aqueduct, and the roads-- COMMANDO: Irrigation. XERXES: Medicine. COMMANDOS: Huh? Heh? Huh... COMMANDO #2: Education. COMMANDOS: Ohh... REG: Yeah, yeah. All right. Fair enough. COMMANDO #1: And the wine. COMMANDOS: Oh, yes. Yeah... FRANCIS: Yeah. Yeah, that's something we'd really miss, Reg, if the Romans left. Huh. COMMANDO: Public baths. LORETTA: And it's safe to walk in the streets at night now, Reg. FRANCIS: Yeah, they certainly know how to keep order. Let's face it. They're the only ones who could in a place like this. COMMANDOS: Hehh, heh. Heh heh heh heh heh heh heh. REG: All right, but apart from the sanitation, the medicine, education, wine, public order, irrigation, roads, a fresh water system, and public health, what have the Romans ever done for us? XERXES: Brought peace. REG: Oh. Peace? Shut up! ...

Heh. I feel it. I spend half my day answering customer e-mails. Illiterate doesn't begin to describe it.

Most of the arguments on this forum seem to have two questions at their heart. 1) How do we define "Roman" in a political, geographical and cultural sense? Do we use internal standards of those who applied the labels to themselves (e.g, German federates, Byzantines, or even provincials living way out back in the boonies), or is there some external and objective criteria which may exclude even those parties who petitioned the label? 2) That Roman society endured various transitions is not disputed. What is disputed are the merits of the transitions, especially as they relate to the first question regarding identity. Is the Principate a degeneration of the Republic? is the Dominate a degeneration of the Principate? What exactly are the standards that qualify something as good and worthy, the deviation of which qualifies something as bad and fallen? How does one differentiate a mere transition from a degeneration? Exactly how do these transitions effect the relativity of identity as proposed by question #1? What makes a Roman a Roman? What makes a "good" Roman and what makes a "bad" Roman? What differentiates a Roman from a pretender? The last time I asked this question the thread turned out to be an abortion. I'm hoping with all the new fresh, creative minds we can have a second go at it.

The death penalty hasn't meant much since crucifixion went out of style. In the old days they used to nail you to a big piece of wood, where you would spend several hours in agony in full public view. A greater tool of psychological terror I can't think of. These days they simply stick a needle into your veins and you die a painless death out of public view. Big deal. Who is scared of that? I asked the same thing be done to my dog when it passed its prime, and considered it the merciful thing to do. As a tool of terror, castration seems so much more effective. There isn't a man out there who isn't scared of losing his manhood (aside from a few wanna-be transsexuals, I suppose). I advocate castration for any violent crime with sexual overtones. For other serious crimes the chaingang method mentioned by Favonius works for me. As far as Islamic terrorists, I believe they should be subjected to the same laws they would inflict upon us, such as chopping off their hands. It's poetic. Plus, it would deny them martyrdom and a heaven full of virgins.

I suppose this help explains why gladiators were so popular with bored, upper class Roman women.

Indeed, and that's exactly what I'm hoping for ... Christian polemics against Mithraism. One little comment along the lines that Mithras has replicated the Book of Isaiah has led to much speculation. A few more comments along those lines will help fill in the gaps.

It's difficult for me to compose a top ten list, but in general the Roman Empire was essentially a Mediterranean construction. Those provinces outside the Mediterranean may have contributed token economic elements or had some military significance, but they were still secondary.

I would dearly love to see anything new concerning the Mithraic cult.

there are actually several on there I may purchase and review. Thank you, Viggen.

Educated Greek slaves are worth more than illiterate freemen in my book. :-)

Ave, Mr. Dalby. While this is not my area of expertise, I also believe this is the case. Professor Eugene Weber made a convincing case for it in his "Western Tradition" lecture. It seems Romans have always been their own worst enemies. Christians too, for that matter.