Ursus

If Rome had somehow survived, the government might have evolved like the British government, with the Emperor becoming more and more a figurehead under the Senate and Constitutional and traditional boundaries. And when the Industrial revolution hit, the plebians and their assemblies would become all the more powerful, like a House of Commons. I'm not sure if the Roman empire could have ever survived, but it would be interesting if we had something like the crisis of the third century and the empire disintegrated into smaller though still sizeable chunks. How about a Gallic empire including present day Britain and France under one regime? That would have made European history quite different.

A Roman did invent something resembling a steam engine in the reign of Tiberius, and it was completely functional. The problem was that Roman soiciety was complacent and unimaginative and didn't realize the potential for it. I believe it was used to open the doors of some great temple and spook people into believeing the gods themselves had opened the door. Obviously this doesn't have much practical economic or military value, and was soon forgotten.

Yeah. It was actually composed by an anonymous medieval Christian monk.

I'm sure it will come out on DVD eventually. That's when I plan to buy it. I had HBO once and it was overrated.

I admit I've come to a barrier in my own self studies. The amazing array of verb endings are just starting to flow together in my mind and I can't keep them straight. Classical Latin, being an artificial language used by the elite, probably should remain in the history books anyway. However having studied a bit of Latin I now have an enormous respect for the extent to which the vulgar form influenced our own so-called Germanic language of English.

The attitude that Roman conservatives displayed toward Christianity is little different than their attitude to a wide variety of counter-culture cults they attempted to restrict. It was not terribly difficult for the Roman establishment to view something as shameful or disgraceful. Hellenic culture, when it first penetrated heavily into Rome, was considered such. I also never assumed you yourself were Christian. I think the whole argument rests on flimsy assumptions and logical fallacies. If you feel differently I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree. I think there are a lot of reasons Christianity trumped paganism, but not the one presented here. *shrugs*

I'm afraid I really and truly have to disagree. There were a variety of cults throughout the Roman empire that shared certain characteristics with Christianity. Among some of those characteristics were dying and rising gods. Osiris was chopped into pieces by his brother Set and scattered across Egypt. Dionysus was ripped to shreds as an infant and the pieces eaten for lunch. A lot of gods have suffered quite terribly to conquer death. The popularity of these cults probably helped pave the way for Christianity in the first place. There is a certain logical fallacy in saying that your religion is REAL because the deities and mythologies behind it are REAL. Any religion can make that claim. The vast majority of religions do make that claim. I'm not about to argue whether or not Christianity is real, but I think it's rather ridiculous to "prove" it's real based on its success in the former Roman Empire. Is Islam REAL because it's the fastest growing religion on earth?

I still don't see the relevance, though, of "pure blooded" Romans in the hypothetical refounding of the empire. Maybe you could find one, but why bother? Who cares. To paraphrase what Shelly said of the Greeks, we're all Romans.

I think the old Star Trek series had an episode that explored the question. Rome never fell. It conquered the world bringing relative peace and civilization, sparing the world two world wars. Slavery became institutionalized, and gladiatorial games were broadcast on TV. Heh.

Quibble. It wasn't the largest empire on earth. I believe the Mongols had the largest land based empire, while the British had the largest marine based empire.

Locke, Roman citizenship has little to do with blood. The provincial elites were granted Roman citizenship, as did anyone who put their time in with the legions. And then at some point, I think 225 (maybe Primuspilus can confirm that date) all free born males within the empire were granted citizenship. Yeah, there are many reasons we can't have a reborn Roman empire, but I don't think whether or not someone is genetically descended from Romans really matters all that much. Few civilizations were so apt to grant citizenship to outsiders as Rome. We Westerners all carry their legacy.

Early Romans considered the Tiber river sacred. The bridges that crossed the river were also sacred. A religious official charged with upkeep of a sacred bridge was called a Pontifex, or bridge builder. Gradually the Pontiffs formed a college and became the governing body of a more evolving Roman State religion. Their head was the Pontifex Maximus, chief priest. Later the Christians bishops of Rome would assume the title.

Bibat ille, bibat illa, bibat servus et ancilla, bibat hera, bibat herus: ad bibendum nemo serus.

The educated citizens were educated in the Greek tradition and did tend to go for Greek Philosophy. Many versions of Hellenistic philosophy subscribed to a single and ultimate source of divinity, a disdain for wordly glory, a system of austere ethics, and in some cases a belief in asceticism and mysticism designed to liberate the soul. You can see the Greek Philosophical spin on paganism is pretty close to the worldview of Christianity, and some would say there is a direct link between the two. The most popular Hellenistic philosophy in upper class Rome was Stoicism. Ever try reading Cicero or Marcus Aurelius? Their writing reminds me of church sermons. I would say Hellenistic philosophy laid the groundwork for much of Christianity. The State (public) aspect of Roman religion was dry, mechanical, legalistic. It was performed by a bevy of State officials on behalf of the State and directed toward the State's gods. There was little in the way of morality and emotionalism. The only thing that mattered was that the gods received the correct sacrifices on the correct dates. The only participation of the public in these rites would be sharing in some of the free meat from the sacrifice (which no doubt is the only reason some of the poor folk attended - free food!). Yes, public religion in Rome was more about "patriotism" than spirituality as we understand it. And as time went on, these state cults which were never especially emotional to the people to begin with lost some of their prestige and fell to foreign gods offering more to the individual. I do reiterate though that's only one level of Roman religion. The private religion conducted by Romans in their homes, social clubs and trade guilds on behalf of ancestors and certain choice gods never fell out of favor until the Christian government proscribed the death penalty for it.

Yes, its true the old gods of Rome lost some prestige and following as time went on and the empire became more troubled. But the triumph of Christianity wasn't written in stone. A lot of other "foreign" religions were also popular at the time. And Romans, being Roman, often belonged to several of them at once. Also, even after Rome turned to Christianity, most people still performed ancestor rites. That's one aspect of paganism that never lost the people's imagination. Only the death threat from the Christian government finally put a stop to ancestor worship. Robert Turcan and John Scheid have written about the subject from the perspective of Roman paganism. You might want to check out their books. I'm sure there are also hundreds of book on the subject from a Christian perspective.

Probably. Especially when the Pope still carries the old pagan title of Pontifex Maximus.

I'd love to help but post-Constantine Rome is not my specialty. It falls a little outside my own academic interests. I did take a college course on early and eastern Christianity but it's been years. A book with significant info on the Roman economy is: The Roman Empire: Economy, Society and Culture by Garnsey and Saller. You may find some good economic info there. The website Beliefnet hosts a wide variety of Christian communities. Registration is free and I'm sure someone there might be able to help you.

The poll is about what I expected. If we combine the political and historical with the military (since there is no clear cut division between politicians and generals), then we have the overwhelming majority. Which is fine. But I do find it a bit sad that the softer aspects of Roman culture - arts, literature, architecture, religion, law, government, daily life, - get lost in the clash of legions and politicos. If it hadn't been for Rome's achievements in these areas, I would consider it just another empire lost to the ashes of history.

I don't mean to offend either pagans or Christians, but I'm not sure if Julian's Neoplatonic version of paganism is essentially different from Christianity. Nietzsche once called Christianity "Platonism for the people" by which he meant that some watered-down presumptions of neoplatonism found their way into Christianity. While Nietzsche is hardly an objective critic, I think one has to conclude that early Christianity developed in and was inlfuenced by the mysticism and the philosophy of later Greco-Roman thought. I guess the principle difference is that Neoplatonism may be somewhat more tolerant of differing religions than the early church. Don't get me wrong. Neoplatonism is obviously a historic and valid body of thought within classical paganism. But it wasn't the traditional religion of the common people, and I personally don't see Julian as the hero of traditional paganism. The division between Neoplatonism and early Christianity is not in my opinion an inseparable one.

I am thrilled to have an actual archaeologist aboard. Especially one stationed in the quintessential Roman province of Britannia. :-) Look forward to more posts.

I think the question to ask is how many people actually follow the religion they pay lip service to, especially if it is one of those religions that enforces a strict moral code on its adherents. The Dalai Lama once said in all his travels, maybe one out of six people he met actually lived their professed religion on a daily basis. The rest of them might have identified with a religion because they were raised in it, and they might even go to a house of worship once in a while to perform some rituals and ceremonies, but they really don't truly live it on a daily basis. That accords with my own observations. People claim to be Christian, Jewish or what have you, but usually their faith is evident only on the occasions when they attend some important religious ceremony. The rest of the time they are functionally secularists. This seems all the more true as we climb the socio-economic ladder, with increasing levels of education and wealth. The tendency then is to treat a "religious" community more like a network of potential business partners and clients than a community of believers. Uh, what was my point? Oh yeah. Most of the truly religious people I know these days tend to be fanatics and fundamentalists, which may be coloring perceptions of religion. Most of the rest of the people who call themselves religious are just going through the motions and paying lip service. I don't see them as being especially religious except on the few occasions when it suits their purposes.

I can't say as this isn't my area of expertise. Although it doesn't seem to me the Punic or Hellenistic armies Rome fought were weak and unintellectual. Even the Celts in Gaul in Britain could learn quickly and gave Caesar a few tactical scares. But I would suggest the Roman army's finest contributions didn't come from the sword and shield. The legions laid the engineering infrastructure for the empire through massive construction projects. They also laid a civil infrastructure for the empire by giving provincials a stake at Roman citizenship.

I'd like to point out many of the "standard" tales of King Arthur are not historically accurate either. The Medieval bards gave Arthur and his knights a medieval code of chivalry that didn't exist back in the dark ages. I think it's also debatable just how fully Christian, in the Roman Catholic sense of the word, Dark Age British would have been. I haven't seen the movie yet, but if it does help take Arthur out of that Middle Age Christian Chivalry worldview he probably didn't have, I think we're on the right track, no matter the other historical flaws of said movie. As far as the Saxon invasions, they did eventually take over much of the island, of course. But archaeological evidence suggests they were temporarily halted by something around 500, which is when Arthur was said to have fought his "final" victory over them. Who knows what really happened. But I don't think it's entirely impossible that some surviving remnant of the Romano-Celt aristocracy won a temporary victory over Saxons in the Dark Ages.

Yes, the Low Countries were invaded by the Germans in the Second World War. Belgium and Luxemborg were invaded by Germany as a way of bypassing the French Maginot line. The Netherlands were invaded to establish a German supply line on the way to attack Norway. It was their proximity to larger, richer and more strategic nations that made the low countries valuable. ;-)

In addition to what primuspilus articulated, I can just add a few things. By the time Christianity was on the rise, the "native" gods of Rome had already lost prestige at a public level. The intellectual classes adopted Greek philosophy, much of which taught strict ethics, a disdain for worldly glory, and a single ultimate source of divinity. Much of the lower classes were initiating themselves into foreign cults who had colorful and emotional rites, and whose gods promised either a better afterlife or a spiritual enlightenment. It was in this environment in which Christianity slowly spread. On an intellectual level Christianity incoporates something of the Greco-Roman philosophies of Stoicism and Platonism. On a more mundane level it shares some things in common with the various mystery cults so popular in the Roman Empire. I don't think Christianity defeated the other religions and philosophies so much as it absorbed them and reworked them into a new universal premise. The point though is that the straightforward religions we normally associate with Roman paganism had lost some of their luster into the imperial era even before Constantine and Theodosius. As times became more troubled and more chaotic and more exotic, people increasingly turned away from traditional modes of belief into alternative systems that offered different solutions and flavors. I think you can see the same thing happening today in the modern West. Mainstream Christianity seems to be declining. More "charaismatic" versions of Christianity are rising in their place. Also, more people are converting to Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, etc. Then there is the whole New Age and so-called "Pagan" phenomenon. And then there are people like myself and Zeke the Celt who are taking a second look at the religious systems of the Ancients. All of it comes from the fact that as times change (often for the worse) an increasing section of the population is dissatisfied with default religions and values. The same thing happened to the Romans, and Christianity slid very successfully into the chasm.