Kosmo

There are 2 categories of answers 1. "The worm was in the fruit" - the instability of the imperial succesion, overextansion of the empire etc 2. "something happened" - powerfull migrators, economic/demographic decline, christianty etc One problem with the first category of arguments it's that the empire stayed largely the same 400 years and that's a lot of time. The other problem it's the Empire continued in the East (mainly) for another 1000 years. Between the first and the last emperor there are 1500 years. Even admiting for a "byzantine" entity this cannot be dated as a very different thing before the VIII C. If the institutions of the empire were bad how did the exposed East survived and even expanded? The argument that Heather uses, the empire fell because it was not able to defeat his opponents, I see as the strongest one. If the roman empire could have decisevly defeated goths, huns, vandals etc the V C crisis would have ended quicker then that of the III C because in the V C was much less infighting then in the III C. Goths and vandals were later defeated by the roman army and this confirms the answer. The west fell because of military defeats. It was unable to defend his lands and unable to reconquer what it lost. Of course, this was coupled with internal conflicts that flourished in bad times.

Caldrail, how did you made the test?

Yes, the Cold War was cooool!! Actually, it was freezing. Oh! the days of my youth when the capitalist imperialism was deonounced by the brave proletarians who were fighting for peace. The communist did a terible job of building a classless society but were great at promoting income inequity in capitalism.

Would be interesting to know what they say with those letters.

Who was stronger? Rome or Parthia? 1. Parthia because the victory of Carrhae. 2. Rome because they repeatedly sacked major parthian cities. 3. Neither, as war did not changed much the border between beligerants. For a real event several answers can be given and all can backed with serious academic arguments. But the problem it's even more difficult. Did the romans ever attempted to conquer Parthia? Or Parthians Rome? What were the plans of Crassus or Trajan? Was Trajan defeated by parthians or by the jewish rebellion? Did they saw this as a major goal? Did they invest maximum ammount of roman resources? etc etc ad nauseum. War, as any human activity, does not exist in vacuum. It's connected with goals, means, resources, reasons, leadership, internal and external relations, logistics etc. When you say that people used academic sources to debate an imaginary comparison you make me laugh. What kind of sources can be relevant for this topic? A comparison like this could be fun and I had fun with the comparison between legions and knights, but for this you need to take it easy and abandon both the irelevant sources and the "my guys are uber" positions.

Do we know what it's going on and what to do? As Silentium points with global dimming the problem it's more complicated and taking measures before knowing for sure will just make things worse. The greatest amount of human produced Co2 it's made by burning of forests in tropical countries not by the industrial or car emissions, but the blame it's still placed on the old culprits. You know who! Those people that opressed women, made the africans slaves, spreaded their colonial imperialism all over, wiped out populations, exploited Mother Earth and the Third World, destroyed cultures etc. After so many misdeeds they must be used to take the blame, feel ashamed, apologise and pay the price. This models are fantastic estimates rather then scientific works. Some say that global worming will increase temperatures in Europe. Others say that it will shift away the Gulf Stream and this will lead to a drop of temperatures and rains. Maybe it will be better to spend the money on real research rather on useless preventions and scary campaigns. If we know how and when things will change things can be done. After all, parts of Holland are under the sea level since several centuries. That land was recovered from under the sea with medieval technology. For sure we can do better now if we put our mind and resources to it.

The greatest legion was Gemina because it was double sized (actually just made from two legions that had not full size)

Climate it's changing now as it always does. It's not staying the same for prolonged periods. Without measuring instruments a life time it's not enough to spot the difference especially as one adjusts with this changes. Now with precise measurements scaremongers can bring the news to an uninformed public. Maybe the industrial CO2 story it's to calm poeple down. They can promise that they would do things that are seriously above human capabilities. "this is what is wrong and this is how we fix it" Saying what you Caldrail say will be hopeless and this it's bad for politicians. Polar bears, Venice and Bangladesh are maybe doomed and there is no political correct way to say that our complex thermodinamic machine it's changing phase. In television reports, magazine articles and chain mails they say that the ice cap it's melting but they don't mention when it started shrinking. Cavewomen? I like more the Mad Max style!

http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/05/17/opi...edslaughter.php and http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/05/17/opinion/edsimes.php Dimitri K. Simes, the founding president of The Nixon Center and Anne-Marie Slaughter the dean of the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs at Princeton University debate the future US foreign policy. I think that wilsonian idealism should be abandoned after the bloody failures of a century of ideologycal supremacy in which competed in errors with marxism idealism and a return to the old imperatives of "real politik" and the brilliant balance game of imperial Britain.

After a warm winter with no ice and many days over 15 C, now it is a very hot spring, actually summer like. Since the begining of may the temperature at noon was usually beetwen 25-32 C. That is amazing for our climate. This years looks like a record for high temperature and draught.

Very nice connection between an arheological find a myth. What puzzles me the most it's the use of antiquity goods "Heirloom pieces from the East amongst the burial goods (12th Century BC Cypriot Bronze & ~20th Century BC Old Babylonian Gorget)" A babylonian artifact 1000 years old at the moment of last use!!

Ramses, the ottomans were sunny while the Safavids were shia. They hated each other like the protestant with the catholics in the same time. Safavids were brought to power in Iran by shia brotherhoods fleeing from Anatolia because of ottoman repressions. They created a militant shia state that forcefully converted iranian and arabian sunny to shiism in their empire while the ottomans considered shia unbelievers and as such they could be taken and kept as slaves. They were no muslim brothers. The conflict today in Irak can be traced to the events linked to ottoman expansion in the area.

I got shaved with a flame in Turkey. Actually, the barber shaved me with a blade, and used a burning cotton pad wet with alcohool on a metal wire to burn the hair on the cheeks. It is not painfull at all. I did not feel a thing, but the smell of bruned hair.

"Experts say they were considering restoring the ancient Roman sewers to help drain away that rainwater." That would be nice! Of course the sewers are monuments themselves.

SPARTA, Greece: There's a shortage of swords in Sparta. Greek merchants from Athens to Thermopylae are also concerned about a scarcity of spears as they prepare for summer visitors obsessed with the hit film "300," the gory story of the 480 B.C. clash between King Leonidas of Sparta and his archenemy, King Xerxes of Persia. http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/05/15/europe/letter.php

Textiles made from wool, hemp and flax were common in Europe since ancient times. Cotton it's said to be cultived in India before Alexander's campaign and also there are some claims that it was cultivated in Egypt. Despite this I know nothing about cotton cultivation spread or about cotton cloth trade during roman era. Cotton was a major trade item even before the Industrial Revolution and his absence as a trade item in Antiquity it's strange. Silk, raw or cloth, was traded heavily on the road to China even after India, the Roman Empire and Persia started their own production despite enormous costs of the dangerous overland route. Not even wool and woolen trade that was so lively in Europe during the Midlle Ages does not seem to have the degree of intensity and specialization during roman rule.

For sure the ottomans were a threat to Europe, but Europe was the most serious threat to ottomans compared with their different asiatic oponents (Ak Koiunlu, mameluk Egypt, Sasanid Persia).

It seems that romans used various means to get rid of facial hair. Shaving, waxing, plucking and cuting with razors. It was dangerous and painfull. They used also several means to stop bleeding. Sometimes several methods for shaving and stoping bleeding were used something that amused the public. Hadrian was deified for good reason for bringing the end of this torturous custom.

Thank you Polecat for the links. Damn, I was in Golden Sand a month after they struck real gold there

Romans were pretty hard on those who opposed them, but generally they had a good relation with the conquered. Especially at the moment you mention they were not so violent. Despite Hannibal long presence in Italy most subjects sided with Rome rather then rebel against her. Imagine this: You are a happy cisalpine gaul who in his one lifetime You are born into a cosy rurally bound gaul family Your village chief likes war and loot so you often fight other gauls Because if you don't you will be seriously mistreated as a coward He and other leaders decide to raid the romans You go to war and you are lucky to survive the defeat Romans come and take away the land of the chief After loot and murder things settle and it's peace Your life does begin to settle as you try to rebuild a life You marry a widow and things are going fine Trade is good on the new roads since raiding has stopped The roman cities provide usefull things Hannibal defeats the romans The tribe leaders rebel and you must go to war for Hannibal But you know that if he wins he will be your new master And he does not look nice. Gauls were one of the people that became romanized the fastest and more thoroughlly then others. Under roman rule they really floursihed.

Tyr, the ancient phoenician city, was also an important city of the East. The only other city of the empire besides Rome where people were living in high apartment buildings (insulae). Palmyra, at the outside border of the empire, it's a great example of how greco-roman urbanism and arhitecture radiated in the neighboring areas. In the northern and western european parts of the empire cities were established or greatly enlarged by romans and were badly hit by the III C crisis and the collapse of roman power on which they depended on. Lugdunum (Lyon) was probably the greatest european city outside Italy and greek areas. Other urbanized areas in Europe during roman rule were areas were cities had a longer tradition. East and southern Spain, south Gaul, Tracia, Dalmatia.

Rome did not stop because it wished to stop, but because it was unable to expand further because of dangerous foes and poor, difficult areas were large military expenditure could not be covered by profits. The cultural gap was also a problem. Civilized people were easier to integrate then unorganised, unruly tribes. The failure to have eny lasting effect on basques it's telling. They never adopted roman language, habits, social structure or christianity despite prolonged contact.

Because they were a power in Europe. Actually, the ottomans were more succesfull in Africa and Asia while the European parts were always under threat fron strong opponents and hostile subjects.

There is no source for parthians charging romans at Carrhae. They peppered romans with arrows and attacked isolated bodies and stranglers. When Crassus was killed the romans were still in large massed groups. The parthian cavalry broke when roman infantry was charging only to fire backwards or to wheel around their flanks.

An obvious example of cavalry reluctance at meeting infantry head on it's Pharsalus where Pompey's cavalry smashed Caesar's cavalry and light infantry but fled without enganging the prepared legionaries. The move was designed to flank Caesar and the cavalry to attack the wing from behind. When they realized that they have to attack head on an infantry line guarding the flank they fled.