Kosmo

A 2 episode BBC inquiery about gipsy witches, in english. The post by Ursus about polytheism made me post this. A profitable mix of christianity and pagan practices. One character that apears briefly in the second part, Ralu Filip, the head of the TV regulatory institution, died this summer. Maybe the curses... The site belongs to Rodica Gheorghe the main witch in the documantary and it has a forum and blogs. She has PR people and other helpers. Her latin motto "nihil sine deo" (nothing without God) is the motto of the Romanian royal house ( the Hohenzollern Sigmaringen dinasty) and was the motto of the kingdom of Romania. http://www.vrajitoarea-rodica.ro/

Most of possesions in Asia, from Bythnia to Judeea, came as anexations of client states. If we take as an example the conquest of Greece the pattern becames obvious. First romans "free" Greece thru war from macedonian rule. The new status it's difficult to keep and to provide the needed security for roman interests. Divided Macedonia still rebels, several greek cities use their freedom against romans tempting strong foes to challange the status quo. The result was roman direct rule in Greece and Macedonia. Was this a desired policy when Rome made her first intervention? I don't think so. Direct rule in Greece was a result of the inability of maintaing a peaceful status quo. The same it's true about Anatolia. Roman defeated the seleucids and brought the western part of their empire under the control of several client states like Pergamum and Rhodos with the intention of keeping out both seleucids and macedonians. Even after the anexation of Pergamum and the long wars against Pontus some clientelar states were kept in the area. Where roman rule was not challenged clientelar states had a long life. Numidians are a perfect example being under roman protection between 206-25 BC.

Excelent overview Ursus This is, to a large extent, what christianity believed as well.

I've read an exclent article, that I can not quote now, that there was no transaharian route.

Not all roman conquests were made by the power of the gladius. The roman republic expanded often peacefully. The clearest example it's the inheritance given to Rome of the kingdom of Pergamum that became Roman Asia, a large and rich province. Cyrene was given by it's ruler to Rome.Cyprus was annexed by a single envoy of Cato. etc Other examples are city-states that were allied of Rome, but were never formally anexed: Massalia, Rhodos, Callatis etc. Others kept a theoretical independence: Athens, Sparta etc Rome acquired client kingdoms and after a while this were annexed by decree and not by warfare. I see roman expansion as a mighty force that brakes in pieces his large foes, gets a form of mild and beneficial protectorate over the pieces and then gently swallows them sometimes leaving in place legal fictions as alliances and independence. This proces was not a shock but a gently evolution that sometimes lasted for many years, too long for individuals to feel the change. Of course, the roman military power left few choices beetween cheering submission as friend or brutal destruction, but I don't know many cases in world history of this kind of expansion. Despite brutality mongols were resisted everywhere. I think it has more to do with the positive aspects of roman rule including a large degree of local autonomy.

I like very much greek history. To name some things I would always like to read about: Arhaic Greece with the birth of polis and colonization, history of colonies and their relations with neighbours including "civilisation" of large parts of Europe while absorbing and spreading teachings from Middle East, Rhodos, the hellenistic kingdoms especially that of Lysimach and the seleucids, integration of the polis in the roman world, greek adventures in Central Asia, India and the Red Sea region, the kingdom of Bosphorus. Greek history it's much more complicated then roman history. Rome was one political unit with a very stable order. The greek world was always one of division, of change and of constant fighting inside and outside of each polis/kingdom/league. It's confusing and by repetition becames boring. To follow closely in a narative the political history of the Greek world would be a nightmare. Roman history it's a perfect story and it's often told as a story.

Worse still: a greek god had several ephitetes having to do with different attributes or stories often in contradiction with each other. And of course there are large variations of cults and of stories in different places and different ages. For example in the city of Athens Athena Hippeia was the inventor of chariot and being connected in this way with horses she was the daughter of ... Poseidon that is usually her rival in mytical competitions held to choose the favorite deity of the city. Of course, she had another temple as Athena Parthenon. She it's famous for her connection with owls that are on the athenian coins, but, if I'm not mistaken she had also a cult in Brauron, near Athens, where she was a bear female and was worshipped by little girls. To see only the way in which the athenians worshipped her during the Classical Age it's complicated enough.

I found the topic very interesting. Despite the image of carthaginians as a trading nation, I think that the prosperity of Carthage was based on the agricultural production of the hinterland. The supply system of Rome needed African products but some say that romans did not payed for them but took the goods as tribute in kind. This type of system would have quickly decreased production but we see great investments were made. That means money were given to the food producers by Annona. The great food production of N Tunisia needed a market as much as Rome needed supplies. I see the decay of vandal power as a result of the destruction they brought on their own market - Rome. With no outside market the production had to be reduced to subsistence level and the trade and the cities were dead. The prosperity of N Africa depended on that of Rome/Italy and that was not looking good anyway.

More complains " La dolce vita revisited: Rome's new emperor Walter Veltroni, the Mayor of Rome, is Italy's Mr Nice, happy to welcome Hollywood stars and organise festivals. But the prospective prime minister's mastery of spin has failed to plaster over the cracks of urban degradation. Italy's new emperor is being fitted with a fine new suit of clothes. For the past five years, Walter Veltroni has been a dynamic, hyperactive mayor of Rome. Yesterday he prepared himself for a leap to the highest level in Italian politics, offering himself as leader of the new Democratic Party which is predicted to become the biggest power in the land. If everything goes according to plan, he could become Italy's next prime minister. Yet it takes a willing suspension of disbelief; a happy surrender to the flood of hype, to see Veltroni's years in charge of Rome as a success..." http://news.independent.co.uk/europe/article2717285.ece

And four lead to a headache. This days my favorite thrist quencher it's limonade... Of course, with some vodka or rum inside Beer it's great and I like it blonde, strong and cold. It must have at least 5% alcohool.

Doc, I think Sonic was ironic in the first quote you use. I wonder if all animal butchering in Rome and Greek agricultural society had a ritual and a simbolic meaning, not only the one we will consider an animal sacrifice. We see the slaughtering as an economic activity but for traditional societies it might have had a religious one as well. This will not be surprising as all human activities were required some religious ritual. For sure cereal crops harvest was accompanied by rites and offerings in all agricultural societies.

The excelent point made by Pantaghatus brought another thing in my attention. That is the religious value of animal killing. In romanian traditional society the killing of pigs for Christmas was done on Ignat (22 december) and acompanied by diverse customs, rather prechristian, with obvious mystical connotations. Likewise about lamb killing before Easter. I have no ideea if romans and greeks had similar habits but this could be the origins of animal sacrifice. First they give a religious meaning to the killing then religious meaning takes precedence but practical considerations are still important. If instead of saying "I'm going to butcher the ox with the usual celebrations" I say "I'm going to offer an ox to Zeus and we are going to eat it" the only thing I do it's to place the accent on a different aspect of an activity that combines both religious and practical elements.

"ROME: There is a struggle under way, in plain view, for the soul of Rome's historic center: In one corner sit the forces of restraint, etiquette and cultural preservation; in the other sit those with the unswerving desire for yet another round of drinks. A leisurely midnight stroll on almost any summer night through Campo dei Fiori, Piazza Navona or the medieval neighborhood of Trastevere puts the issue in clear relief. It is "ladies night" at Sloppy Sam's, a popular pub on Campo dei Fiori just in front of the statue of the philosopher Giordano Bruno. Bruno was condemned to death in 1600 by the Roman Catholic Church for heresy. Shirtless male bartenders this night are serving up round after round of half-priced shots. Around the corner, a stone's throw from where Julius Caesar met his treacherous end, the Zeta Lounge is offering two hours of "open bar" - all you can drink for one low price..." http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/06/25/news/journal.php

Try using a smaller font! I like big stories that let me live them for a longer time but 400 pages it's long enough... I'm sure you can cut out the nurse

I never heard anyone seriously claim that the curent heat wave has something to do with global warming. The CO2 models predict a gradual increase in temperatures not a sudden change of the climate from temperate continental to mediterranean. IPCC makes an estimate of 2-6 C in a century.

For sure it's hot! The temperatures in the last 8 months were unusually high. Draught ruined this year crops in many parts of Romania especially the East. If it keeps this way it's very likely that we will have water restrictions at least for irrigation.

CO2 it's a valued commodity and good profits can be make out of it. "Carbon trading: Where greed is green LONDON: Seeking to match a desire to make money with his environmental instincts, Louis Redshaw, a former electricity trader, met with five top investment banks to propose trading carbon dioxide. Only one, Barclays Capital, was interested in his proposition. Three years later, the situation has turned around entirely, and carbon experts like Redshaw, 34, are among the rising stars in the City of London financial district. Managing emissions is one of the fastest-growing segments in financial services, and companies are scrambling for talent. Their goal: a slice of a market now worth about $30 billion, but which could grow to $1 trillion within a decade..." http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/06/20/business/money.php Imagine that cutting emission by half by 2050 as G8 proposed will be realized despite the increased need for CO2 emission brought by development. From now until then a growing part of out taxes, but also of the price of products we use will go in this direction. Today already a part of the price of each european industrial product we buy goes to CO2 costs (penalties, credits, trading etc) Transport will be added soon and then, maybe, cows, humans etc Indeed the climate skeptiks are wrong. This CO2 scare it's very good, at least for some. 1 trillion (1 000 000 000 000) dollars in ten years from today's meger 30 billion! Not a bad business for something based on faulty science and massive propaganda!

An old, but still popular theory has the etruscans caming from West Anatolian kingdom of Lydia. There are many arguments but I believe that is possible that an elite coming from the east dominated local Villanovan tribes. In north Italy some tribes spoke a celtic language. Ligurians were also present. Ilirians on the East coast, greeks in the South played a role as well.

Another related piece: "Archaeologists explore lost kingdom on the Nile On the periphery of history in antiquity, there was a land known as Kush. Overshadowed by Egypt, to the north, it was a place of uncharted breadth and depth far up the Nile, a mystery verging on myth. One thing the Egyptians did know and recorded: Kush had gold. Scholars have come to learn that there was more to the culture of Kush than was previously suspected. From deciphered Egyptian documents and modern archaeological research, it is now known that for five centuries in the second millennium B.C., the kingdom of Kush flourished with the political and military prowess to maintain some control over a wide territory in Africa"... http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/06/19/news/nile.php

Tolga, maybe my firend was mistaken. I can't really say anything about the subject of how laz are viewed in Turkey. Many countries have jokes or preconceived opinions about people from regional groups like the jokes about scots. "Greek culture and Turkish culture are very similar to each other. Traditions, clothes, dances, dishes." I fully agree, but we can't deny that they have different identity. The fact they are quite similar points to two directions. 1. Some populations of Anatolia were greeks or hellenized and they transmited this greek traditions to modern turks. 2. Turks, as overlords of Greece, transmited some of their customs to greeks. This happened in many areas not only in Greece. Words, stories, music, costumes were spread thruout the Balkans (some of them might have older, byzantine origins). Ciorba, sarma, Nastratin Hogea etc are things that prove that Balkans and Anatolia had (for a very long time) a common civilisation despite different languages. The problem is (and I see no answer) on how it's defined an ethnic group. If only language it's the used criteria (like nationalist do) then greek expanded from the coastal regions to the interior of Anatolia and after this was gradually replaced by turkish. If we would use genetics we will find that some of the genes are there since a long time ago while others are from all corners of Eurasia.

Sure, the fall of the empire to a Great Power would have seriously upset european balance. Much of the european policy revolved around The Eastern Question. And this question was "how to keep Russia from conquering the Ottoman Empire?" The solution that the europeans favoured was a gradual disolution that promoted small, weak states. In the period between 1850 and 1914 most nations used imported weapons. This was a period of rapid change of military equipment and doctrine. Turkey did well in adapting new weapons, even better then most european nations. This excelent article shows the flexible, efficient use of modern weapons against conservative russian doctrine in 1877 war. http://www.militaryrifles.com/Turkey/Plevn...levnaDelay.html My opinion is that the ottoman army was constantly outmanouvered by the armies of the european Great Powers so from the begining of the XIX they based their defence on fortifications in an period when everybody else were abandoning them. Napoleon smashed all ottoman armies except that fortified in Accra. The sultan then started to build stong fortifications on the Danube and behind it. This were the defence of the ottomans during the three wars with Russia (1808, 1828, 1877) In the balkan wars they also mostly defended fortifications (Adrianopole, Janina) This means that ottomans had a lot of experience and skill in defending strong positions and when the weaponry changed and the movement war became difficult because of breech-loading repeating rifles and machine guns they had a doctrine advantage while the westerners failed to understand the change and kept charging at fortifications until the end of WW1. So, the effective defence of Gallipoli was possible because the ottoman army was in her element in trench warfare.

Some time ago I posted a question about roman garrisons that were placed in the greek cities of South Italy. The presence of this garrisons sparked the war with Tarentum and Pyrhus. I've found no answer yet but I'm convinced that Rome had already permanent forces. If this were profesional soldiers or a form of rotating conscripts I can't tell as I found no primary or secundary source.

You're not wrong. The ottoman empire became very descentralised in the 1700's and it was very hard for the sultan to force local goverments that exercised a lot of power to reform. This is especially true for the african provinces were by 1800 the sultan had little or no authority. In early XIX C they made many reforms and were succesfull in curbing the power of local lords and strenghening the army. But this reform did not return Egypt, Algeria and Tunis to real ottoman authority. The economic problems were very bad. The ottomans had no money to raise and equip troops or to build the infrastructure to quickly move the army. For example in the First Balcanic War they faced a loose coalition of balcanic states, former ottoman subjects. Despite the much larger population of the empire the ottoman soldiers were seriously outnumbered. Even worse, they had no railways to bring the units from Syria and the sea was dominated by the greek navy. In 1878 Bulgaria and Eastern Rumelia became autonomous. In 1885 they unite. In 1908 Bulgaria becames independent. In 1913 Bulgaria plays a great role in defeating the ottomans taking Edirne and reaching the outskirts of the capital. This rapid development it's in striking contrast to the lethargy of the ottomans. Of course, Bulgaria was far from the level of developed economies, but in 40 years the former otttoman province could threaten her much larger former master. In 1914, when WW1 broke, the ottoman army of 400.000 men was considered insufficient to defend the capital against the bulgarian army in case of war so they gave up some parts of Adrianopole. This examples point to the greatest ottoman problem: they were totally unable to develop their territory or to have a decent economy. In 1878 the ottomans gave Cyprus to Britain. One of the reasons was ottoman inability to pay the debts to Britain. In 1880's the sultan had to give direct control of the buget to european creditors as the empire was banckrupt.

A short article from IHT. "The story of Romulus and Remus is almost as old as Rome. The orphan twins were suckled by a she-wolf in a cave on the banks of the Tiber, and Romulus grew up to found Rome in 753 B.C. Historians have long since dismissed the story as a charming legend. The 19th-century historian Theodor Mommsen said: "The founding of the city in the strict sense, such as the legend assumes, is of course to be reckoned out of the question: Rome was not built in a day." Yet the legend is as imperishable as Mommsen's skeptical verdict, and it has been invigorated by recent archaeological finds." http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/06/13/arts/snlegend.php

A turkish friend of mine from Istanbul told me he is of laz origins and told me that they are generaly viewed by many turks as slow minded. The laz population lives around Trabzon (the eastern part of the turkish Black Sea border) and in neighbouring Georgia. Their direct ancestors lived in the roman province and the kingdom of Lazica where they were influenced by greeks and romans. After conversion to islam in ottoman times they were partially assimilated in the turk speaking population. This is a fine example of how ethnicity survived, but was shaped by political change. The laz elite, maybe, started to became hellenized since Alexander and until after ottoman conquest retained a greek character. The ottoman supremacy made them convert to islam and this also inflenced their language. The turkish nationalism of the last century probably added to their assimilation. As a side note the existance of laz population both in Trabzon area and in Georgia it's a possible explanation for the creation of the Trabzon Empire by the Commnens with the help of the georgian queen Tamara. PS. I met sometime ago a beautiful turkish girl from Alanya (and her husband ) and she told me that some ancestor of her was sudanese. My 8 grand-grandparents were from 5 nations. The 4 with the same ethincity were from different regions. While I have mixed bloodlines I have just one ethnicity and I'm not very fond of it.