Furius Venator

Pre Camillus when the Romans fought as a phalanx they were armed with the hasta or spear. No javelins. Post Camillus things changed. The light infantry (velites) carried a light javelin, velitarus, but not the hastati. In any event you seem to be confusing two time periods. Once again, which ancient author are you getting your ideas from? I missed this before, sorry: You really believe that? Nothing to do with their method of fighting? Just your belief that they carried more weapons. By your definition then the Greek hoplite is a light infantryman...

Caesar was of course not dictator at the time he raised the Gallic legions. He had proconsular authority.

I reluctantly conclude then that you have no ancient source and that your claims are mere conjecture. Where does an ancient writer speak of the Hastati carrying both spear and javelins? Or is that mere conjecture on your part also?

No moral judgement. By 'dim view' I mean merely that I will suspect short-termism as motive unless evidence suggests otherwise and that self interest (which of course may masquerade as high principle) will, in general, be the primary factor in men's motives.

Oh, I don't single Antony out, I take a pretty dim view of most 'great men'. I actually think he probably did the best he could given that he was somewhat constrained by circumstances and Octavian's ambition and ability must have been a real surprise. By the time he'd identified the threat, it was to late... It's been interesting, thanks, though as I said, I think you're on stronger ground with your other points.

Agreed, and fits with my post above. As were many Romans. But to suggest that Antony 'went native' is to go beyond a mere fondness for things Greek. Problem or not, yes Caesar had intended to take on Parthia. And Antony could make political capital from that. Still fits with my post above. Indeed, indeed. Equally he may have believed himself the reincarnation of Camillus but as we have no evidence for either they remain speculation. Given the spectacular rise of Octavian, I think that it was a major misjudgement, but yes, not stupid. His stupidity lay elsewhere. Antony already had evidence that young Caesar was a shrewd political operator. Yes. And that as I said, was sensible. If he was thinking only of the east. But he wasn't. He was concerned with Rome too. And the examples of Pompey anf the Liberators were before him. They suited Egypt. And to a lesser extent the east as a whole. But what evidence would a rational roman have that it could be transported to Rome? Please don't patronise me. But yes, he may have cultivated an Alexander image, much like Pompey had. I agree entirely. So his godhood was for the east and the practical man for the west. But of course Octavian could paint him as an oriental despot and it worked. Well he might have done. But we'll never no that. Old Julius didn't do so well on the image front did he? Again, I agree. But that was the whole flaw in Antony's strategy, by chasing money and glory in the east he forfeited the real centre of power. Rome.

There was nothing wrong with Antony's eastern policy as it pertained to the east. But it left him wide open to Octavian's propoganda in Rome. Hence a mistake. My impression of argument up to now has always been that questions are answered not by the poser but by his adversaries... What is simpler (Occum's razor and all that) than this: Antony knows his days are numbered unless he can gain prestige enough to challenge Caesar's heir, and funds and army also. Prestige will only come through beating the Parthians (as no other foes are readily available). Money is readily available in the east. His army will be hardened by the Parthian campaign and paid through the riches of the east. Hence he must go east. The path to prestige in the east is through portrayal as a hellenistic monarch. To meet his short term needs (prestige, money etc) he adopts a policy of apparent hellenisation. Sadly for him this is portrayed in the worst possible light in Rome. Now there is no need in any of the above to assume that he wished to become king/god of Rome. So why introduce something unecessary to the argument?

Antony clearly was not incompetent. He probably made the best of a bad job but Octavian ran rings round him politically. IF Caligula was an Antonine in policy then is it not significant that he maintained the capitol at Rome? And Nero. But really, the Ahenobarbi weren't Antonians, they were a prestigous family in their own right with a tradition of inimictas against the Julii. What more natural than for them to side with Antonius against Octavian? Or that Octavian should 'heal the breach' by incorporating them into his family. Why not simply assume a plot. Why should the Antonians have some kind of long term policy that other families patently did not. Why should any policy survive more than a generation. After all, Augustus' policy was not that of Caesar. Neither was Tiberus' precisely that of Augustus. Each generation modified its 'policy' to reflect political reality. You state that Antonius wanted to rule as deity and monarch. Why on earth would he be so deluded as to assume that the Romans would stand for that? As far as securing Egypt and the east goes, such a policy was wise but it allowed him to be portrayed as a monster in Rome. He'd surely have been bleeding under Pompey's statue within weeks...

The concensus seems to be that Sallust tinkered with Cato's speech more than he did Caesar's. He omits Cato's flattering commendations of Cicero for instance. Hutchinson's The Conspiracy of Catiline is good on this sort of thing (though it's about forty years old so hardly constitutes the cutting edge of modern views on the conspiracy itself).

Actually, I was wondering... could I have a button that would allow me to ignore the 'ignore button'?

All I really meant was: give me something more substantial to 'attack'. I was probably a little over the top in my response but I sensed that you were trying to 'goad' me into a fuller reply (nice tactics...) so I replied in kind... I do think 'Antony as farsighted statesman' is by far your weakest argument though. I admire contentiousness butthere's contentious and just plain implausible...

Cato's not saying that all rich people are atheists. He's not even saying that most rich people are atheists. He's just saying that if you pick a random rich person there's a higher likelihood of him being atheist than were he poor. I suspect though that, as he says, education is the true factor, it's just that wealth and education correlate too.

It would appear so. It is perhaps significant that the triarii were abolished by Marius. Clearly he felt pilum and gladius to be superior to spear.

The answer is of course, as you realise, that the senate was no longer the 'real authority'. As to the second part, all the centurions and probably many of the standard bearers and optios would be veterans. It is also possible that other experienced men might join too. Thus there would be a strong cadre of experience for the legion to draw on. Also Caesar generally kept the 'recruit' legions in reserve where possible until they had gained experience on campaign.

I must say that I'm somewhat sceptical about this feature. I have a particular bete noir but I couldn't bear it were I to let his more outrageous posts go unchallenged should I ease my blood pressure levels by ignoring him. But if people find it useful then it can do no harm.

I confess that I always assumed that they did. Or at very least had the option, given that they were almost certainly the 'remnants' of the Roman 'hoplite phalanx'. But there's a big difference between pike armed phalangite and spear armed hoplite, with the longer weapon having the advantage.

Standard hoplite length (c 8') I think. Certainly only one-handed weapons.

Where is your evidence for Antony's desire to rule from the East? Surely it comes from the same sort of hostile sources that you discount regarding the Julio-Claudians... Frankly a vague comparison to Constantine hardly constitutes a well constructed argument. You appear to seriously suggest that Antony's political insight was hundreds of years ahead of his time? Good grief why? He made a huge miscalculation when he 'went east' with two recent examples of the folly of that policy before him. Perhaps he was infatuated with Cleopatra, perhaps he simply saw no other way of countering Octavian's growing dominance in Italy. Either way it was disastrous. It is conventional for those wishing to overturn accepted thought to state their arguments clearly. You have failed to do so, merely stating Where is your evidence?

I agree that much of the bad reputation of the Julio-Claudians is merely standard Roman political invective and that Tacitus and Suetonius likely had incentive to play up their less attractive traits. I don't agree that Antony was particularly far sighted, I think he went where the money was (the east), falling into exactly the same trap as Pompey and 'the Liberators' had done before him. Augusyus' settlement was rather good, especially when you consider that such anti-Caesareans as the Ahenobarbi 'came onside'. Consul before 20 would have been rather more than Marius, Sulla or Caesar. More than even Pompey (who I would say Augustus aped as much as he did Caesar).

That pretty much is how Alexander's phalangites worked, they could operate both as phalanx or as more open order infantry sans pike. They could clearly 'lock shields' and did so against waggon-rolling opponents. Their basic unit may have been 512 strong as opposed to 480 for the cohort (not a massive difference). In battle of course they stuck to the pike, but that was part of the whole Macedonian tactical system. How on earth would one manage both scutum and pike sarissa? The whole point of the Macedonian shield was that it did not need to be held in the left hand.

Please cite any ancient source that backs your claims. I think you'll find that most folk agree that the hastati and principes used 'javelins' (if we should call them that for clarity) whilst the triarii used thrusting spears, and that all the ancient evidence backs this. There is one instance (Scipio if I recall correctly) of the hastati being armed with the triarii's spears for one battle. This was clearly unusual enough to be worth specific comment.

I think the main beefs with Sallust are his rather pedantic obsession with 'good' use of language. Hence he is not above changing the words that people said for better ones (though he keeps the meaning the same). There is also a suggestion that he supresses certain speeches to amke his work more dramatic. Obviously, he's rather pro-Caesar and anti-Cicero/Cato too. The above is slightly off the top of my head. I'll be able to give some specific references tomorrow.

It's difficult to know with Vegetius whether he's being purely theoretical (wouldn't it be great if they could all ride horses amd swim?) or reflects practise in either his own time or previously. Clearly the legionaries could ride (Caesar mounted some of the Tenth), but I can't recall an instance of 'mass swimming' (though Appian relates a legionary swimming/foundering through the rising tide after single handedly rescuing Caesar and his retinue from Britons).

Opinion actually seems very divided as to this. No proof either way. (I had a bit of a web search and there seems to be support for both Columbian and pre-Columbian theories).

$40 000 would be a fairly decent (not spectacular but better than most) wage in the UK. Could one really not live off it in a US city? I always understood the cost of living to be far lower than in the UK (and though I've not been to the States, that is certainly true of Canada).