Kosmo

I fully agree that this is something that needed to be done, but I liked that thread before that person who did not know history and had a political/religious agenda hijecked it for propaganda. The discussion was ruined by him and now the thread is locked Largelly it has run his course, but it's not a good precedent. When the troll came I tried to mantain the original purpose of the thread, but got overrun by a flood of offtopic and non-sense stuff and gave up. Maybe, in the future when another one comes, you should clean the off topic stuff from a legitimate thread (like you usually do), but keep it open. Otherwise, you let them win. I had a feeling that he wanted desperately to hijack the thread because his agenda did not liked a discussion about christian/muslim cohabitation. He had nothing to say about the topic, but he wanted to stop us and he did

Who were the romans and who were the christians? When Constantinopole rise as a capital ? and what is Byzantine Turkey? Do you think Abraham and Moses are historical figures?

A very complex story evolved around this bracelets. 15 of them were found by treasure hunters in Sarmizegetusa Regia area. Former PM Adrian Nastase and influential politician Ioan Talpes were accused of buying some of them. 5 of them were recovered (with lots of money) by the culture ministry from outside Romania after ilegal exports and are now in display at the National History Museum. Before that only silver bracelets were found and very few dacian gold jewelry. This is surprising because of the large gold exploatations of dacians. To make things even stranger an young coin collector, known to illegal diggers, claimes that this bracelets are fake. A jeweler friend of his (now deceased) made them from gold coins of Koson and Lisimah type that they had in huge quantities. Selling the coins would have brought down the market so they forged bracelets from real coins. He said that they studied the silver bracelet from the National History Museum and made gold copies of it. Anyway, this are photos of the bracelets in a Culture Ministry request for buying: http://www.cultura.ro/News.aspx?ID=846 (in romanian) this is the proud announcement of the National Museum (english) http://www.mnir.ro/ro/evenimente/2007/ianu.../bracelets.html and the newspaper interview with the coin collector that claims that the bracelets are forged (romanian ) http://www.adevarulonline.ro/articole/brat...enul-meu/301748

Romans kept some bridgeheads on the left bank of Danube when they abandoned the province. They also had some bridgeheads on Danbue east of the province. This bridgeheads were later expanded in a large area that was paralel with the southern course of Danube. This was defended by a earth ditch/wall very long that goes from West (in Carphatians) to East reaching again Danube as the river heads north. This roman defence system had areas that formerly belonged to the province of Dacia (a small part of the province, only the South of Oltenia) and areas outside it (east of Olt/Alutus river) The whole area was taken over by huns. Aurelian's Dacia that was south of Danube in today Serbia shared the faith of the whole Illiricum being devastated by goths (and setlled) huns etc. It became part of Justiniana Prima diocesis and was lost to slavic invasions at an unknown date, probably during Heraclius wars with the persians (630's), toghether with most Balkanic areas.

No, nor did I say so. It seems to me you did.

I missed this thread so I'm goning to wish to all three of you Happy Birthday!

So, you think that the impact of christianity on the Roman Empire it's less interesting then that on Islam! It still has no connection with the thread and it was an interesting thread. If you want to debate other things do it in other threads. This is about muslims in the roman/byzantine empire and I like it that way. An interesting byzantine-muslim realation was that between the Empire of Trapezunt and neighboring turks and mongols. This included political relations, alliances, protection, marriages, but also extensive trade. They also held parts of Crimeea being in contact with the Golden Horde. "A genuinely friendly alliance with the Muslim potentates seems to have existed between the Comneni and Timur (Tamerlane) who overran Persia and Anatolia at the turn of the 15th century, and the dynasty of the White Sheep who ruled Tabriz and Erzurum later that century. The Great feudal families of the Empire often preferred a Turkish alliance to one with the Italians, and occasionally even to one with their own Greek rulers. In 1311 Alexis II embarked on a joint naval expedition with the Bey of Sinop against Genoese colonies. In 1358 a leader of the

To call this atrocities it's misleading. The law of war aloud for the slaughtering of the inhabitants of a city taken in an assault. This law/custom was very old and wide spread. Atenians, carthagenians, macedonians, romans, arabs, mongols etc used it. The last use I know of was at Drogheda in Ireland by the Lord Protector. The reason for this custom was to prevent prolonged sieges and the high losses of the attacker by giving the defenders more reasons to surrender. Many important cities were destroyed this way: Thebes, Carthage, Corint, Milan, Kiev, Constantinople etc. Sad, but true. We should try not to impose our present moral judgement on things that were guverned by other moral laws. Many of the inhabitants of Jerusalim were ortodox christians that controlled the Holy places of Christianity. Some claim that they were the target of the massacre because the crusaders wanted to take over this important worship places. All the churches were taken over by the catholics afterwords. Yes, we are way off topic.

Who controlls the past rules the future. Is not this the message of Big Brother and the Ministry of Truth? It s hard to draw lines between pseudo-history (like the Atlantis story), purposly distorted history ( all the "isms") and historian error.

I think it's much more then that. The kushan kings called themselves "philellenes" not for some traders, but in the continuation of a political custom of the greek kings of Bactria. I think hellenism survived in the East much longer then usually told by books in both Parthia and the Kushan empire.

Should not the "commandments" include your moral standard? How can you have "particular to a specific case" morals and your own moral standard? "Moral standard" means a general norm that is apllied to specific cases. So, "particular to a specific case" morals don't exist. Hehe sorry if I'm nagging you but I'm reading Dune (actually the sequel Chepterhouse) so I'm under spice influence.

Ghazi? Wiki said the term was used later and I know it as generaly refering to turkish religious warriors. Chinese influence in Central Asia was lost because of the Anshan Rebellion and general weakening of Tang. Maybe without it there would have been more battles with the arabs. Anyway, that area was outside chinese influence core. I must admit that I don't know much about arab armies of the period.

I've been looking for the source, but I can't find it. It is somewhere here http://libro.uca.edu/title.htm Sorry! "Moreover, there was little sense of racial antipathy; the majority of the first wave of invaders were not even Arabs, but Berbers who differed little in appearance from the Hispanic people. Some of these Berbers were themselves not yet fully assimilated into Islam. (For that matter, the Berbers of northwest Africa were not effectively converted until after the adoption of the local Kharijite doctrines in the eighth century.) " http://libro.uca.edu/payne1/spainport1.htm Not exactly what I was looking for but close.

My own nr. 1 will be "know you know nothing" The rest of them I like. Despite not stating clear moral standrads you live room for them in most commandements. This means you believe that moral it's not general but particular to a specific case? What is the purpose of "commandments" if you use another set of moral values outside them? It leaves a lot of space for going around them (you can define "just cause" as you like) and this is maybe the reason why GO said your a good lawyer.

Interchange indeed, but not equal. Selgiuk and ottomans were heavily influenced under a lot of aspects by byzantines. For example the timar system of landed soldiers was very similar with byzantine recruiting system of thema. Byzantine art was the base for muslim arhitecture from the arab begginings when they helped in the building of a mosque in Damasc to ottomans mosques copied after Hagia Sophia and from that to Taj Mahal. Miniature art of Byzantium was also very influential on muslim painting. The romans were less influenced by muslims..Thruout Islam christians lived for a long time (some still do) and for a long period being more numerous and civilised while the gradually shrinking roman empire never had many muslims. Maybe even more interesting it's the fact that the "arab" army that conquered Spain from the Visighots was largely made from christian, latin speaking berbers. The Iron Curtain was a XX C invention. PS A nice novel about muslim painting at the height of ottoman power it's "My Name is Red" by 2006 Nobel Prize winner Orhan Pamuk http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/My_Name_is_Red He speaks about byzantine and chinese influences on persian miniature that was the best in Islam.

In the period of arab expansion the two did not like each other, but there were no muslims in the empire. Sometimes, arbas and romans got along and there was cultural exchange. Perhaps the iconclast movement it's made under the muslim influence. During the byzantine counter attack some areas in Syria and the islands were retaken, but this areas had also large christian population. Similar events occured after the Commnens retook parts of Anatolia. I know of high byzantine officials of selgiuk origins, but not about their religion. A mosque was build in Byzantium, but I don't know the date. Muslim selgiuk turks were colonised in Dobrogea ( today Constanta area - SE Romania) in an autonomus community that still survives. Many selgiuk and ottoman pretenders and exiles lived in the City. This is the reason for the 1453 events. I believe that muslims were not persecuted in the empire and that they always were a small minority. Armenian church survived unmolested in the empire until the end. Bulgarian patriarchy was recognized, despite serious differences and political conflicts, and her stile was spread by byzantines in Russia and other areas. Even catars (bogumili) survived for long despite alliances and conflicts with the power (like the relation with Alexios Commnen) So, not so much fanaticism and persecution. Pecenegs and cumans were not muslims. Some of chazars and the Volga Bulgarians were muslims, but these were far to the East and North. Only after the Golden Horde han Berke converted to islam the stepe people became muslims.

What a story!!! Too bad that US economy it's so thin that they need to outsource even torture. In Wild Moldavia they are well trained in this torture of bad language. They make everybody suffer with it speaking romanian with a russian accent and russian with a romanian one.

Thank you! This is quite a lot of soldiers and I doubt that the province produced enough to cover for so many soldiers and other occupation expanses. I believe that Gaul could be much easier defended on her coastline that on Hadrian's wall. A force deployed on the coasts when the threat arouses would reinforce and be reinforced by the garrisons on the Rhine. The reason for conquest was political and the reason to keep it occupied it's political.

Clasical pagan rites were mostly public rites. The religion was not personal, focused on salvation, but centered on public interest. How can you revive that? I would like to see the worship of my favorite deity "Disciplina Augusta". This kind of recreations would be even less acurate then the way budhism it's done in the West by non-asiatic gurus. Being inacurate they have no right at claiming the heritage of the ancients so they should not be aloud to perform in historical monuments. And I believe that churches have the obligation to be political incorect, so they have the right to fight them. That the state should be tolerant this is another problem, no one should be stopped from believing in whatever (and really no one can be forced). I remember that when I was a teen and a little bit more religious I was in an orthodox monastry and the service was about one martyr girl named Marina. She was from the city of Iconium (today Konya in Turkey). The service and the looks of the orthodox churches are very similar with those of late Middle Ages and many aspects are much older. That is old enough and accurate enough for me. By returning to paganism greeks dont do much for their heritage. Christianity is to a large degree a greek invention as I believe that the original jewish sect would be shocked about what came of their ideea.

The change from calling themselves romans to greeks it's a complex one. In the ottoman empire they ruled the orthodox christian millet (nation/religion) as romans. Still, in early XIX C some intelectuals with strong connections with the West started to focus more on hellenic heritage. When the 1821 revolution started it was planned by Eteria as a "roman" revolution that would recreate the "byzantine" empire. The northern arm of the revolution that developed with russian support in Moldova (the autonoumos part then, that now it's in Romania) and spreaded to Valahia failed, as it faced some conflict with romanians while russian gave them no direct support. Serbians and Muntenegro that had a degree of autonomy also showed no interest in the plan. Nationalist identity was already more important then panorthodoxy and byzantine nostalgic dreams. The only place were the revolution went well (and this was a big surprise for the planners) was in Peloponnes, but to resist there they needed support from the West. The West was very philhellenic, full of admiration of Ancient Athens and Sparta and all things from classical Greece and despised the byzantines seen as infaighting muderous eunuchs and fanatical orthodox. This had lots to do with political movements in the West (republican and anticlerical), but also with education etc. In order to get the support needed exiled intelectuals made a lot of greek propaganda with accent on hellenism with no mention on roman heritage. The claim of Greek independence for a small area was seen with sympathy in the West while the rebuilding of the Byzantine empire in the Balkans was a very serious political challange because everybody had plans on this area. So, several reasons made the use of greeknes more important then of romanity and this was an important political move that followed the general rise of nationalism in that period.

I had the impression that Severus at first praised Pertinax and behaved like his avenger. Then after the long years of civil war when he got absolute power he started to praise Commodus and had his killer thrown to the lions. It is not that he praised Commodus, but before that he praised Pertinax and this really strange. I think that his "Pertinax" phase was when he needed to fight his strong opponents and needed the simpathy of the Senate ( Pertinax was a men of the Senate in the old Antonine way) and "Commodus" when he got absolute power and needed to smash and humble the Senate like Commodus did. He was also duble faced when dealing with Niger and Albinus.

How large was the roman garrison in Britain? Of course, it varried but are there some estimations for different moments?

We don't know much about how it was this library, what was for and what was inside, but some things are clear. During the late period of Ptolemies it was less important. During Roman times it also lost prestige and probably dwindelled toghether with the Museion. Certainly after III Century AD it was hit as all roman world. For sure this library was expansive to guard, repair buildings and books, pay for staff, reasearch and copy of fragile papiry. After the great crisis and the rise of christianty it's obvious that was less interest in culture and old monuments than in defences of the empire. Many books were not intersting for the people of the V century but interested those who made the library. We call it antiquity as a whole, but between Alexander and Omar it was almost a 1.000 years. Many things could and did happen to some books in this huge span of time.

Yes, descendents of Frankincensestain lived many generations in the area under slightly mofied names. A family was named Frankenstain and others Inceststain. From the second family are Vlad Draculea (The Impaler) and Radu the Beautiful (The Impaled)

I feel that is some propaganda here. They do not mention what Petrov did there. It was an early warning center but it was one of many that doublechecked each other. He definetly did not have authority and codes to launch an attack. The russian federation point of view it's well put. Anyway this quote is absolutely precious: "In testing the microphone for his weekly radio address