Caesar CXXXVII

The "battle of Gaius street" where Marcus beat Spurius , Appius , Manius , Servius , Sextus , Quintus , Numa and Vullero in 35 BCE after He (Marcus) insulted Numa's sister . It was 1:8 !!! Cannae , some 90,000 v. some 35,000 - Genuine numbers , not exaggeration

So , caldrail and PP , Severus wanted to use Commodus' popularity (with in the army or the masses) ? It is a very logical argument , I accepet it . Yet , we are talking about 197 , that is 5 years after Commodus assasination (people's memory you know) and why in the Senate ? He could praise Commodus in the arena , why in the very very Anti-Commodian Senate ? He could say "I am a new Marcus Aurelius" or something like that . Is there another example for an Emperor praising a "bad" Emperor by all standards ? The episode is Fascinating .

I am sometimes quite oblivious to such subtleties, but my guess is that you're right and it was simply a matter of the date and general timing. There didn't seem to be any references to the Jewish holiday in the show anyway. Thanks , I must say , it is odd...

I did not see the episode , it will take many weeks to come to my corner... Why it is called Passover ? (Caesar was murdered on 15th of Mars , the funeral must have been conducted 2 to 10 days later ? Passover is usually at the end of Mars or the beginning of April , That is the connection ?) Me pedant...

I think it's a crying shame that we do not have a historian of Josephus's calibre to record the second and final Judean revolt, the one led by Bar Kokhba. Agreed ! From hindsight it seems to have been far more bloody and destructive than the previous result of the '60s CE. Not so sure , we have the Jewish Talmud where the revolt of 66 to 70 is described as "המרד הגדול" that is "The great revolt" and the revolt of 132 to 135 as "מרד בר כוכבא" that is just "the bar Cochba revolt" .

So , Let say that the destroyers of classical civilization = 100 %. "Caesar and the Christians who together more than anyone" = more than 50% a least ! Let say some 75% If so , the Christians = 37.5% and Caesar = 37.5% Now , in order to know what those 37.5% means , MPC must give us an estimation about "the collapse of classical civilization" , How much was destroyed ? when ? for how long ? Did the Chinese were a "classical civilization" and if they did , how Caesar and the christians "made way for their collapse" . And on You know , science... Notions...estimations...numbers...accusations...We must know ! Now I suppose you did not call Caesar and the christians bastards Literally (didn't you?) but as a word of disgrace , but why if they "didn't even know what they were doing" ? Do you call a baby who rip (sp) a book , a bastard ?

Apparently the unnamed, uncredited author of this story would have us believe that Pompey's change of fortune was caused by the god of the Jews. The theory is patent nonsense. The only thing worthwhile to learn from this nonsense is the fallacy of post hoc reasoning, which is the bread-and-butter of the superstitious. By the same line of thinking, we should believe that since the sun rises after the rooster crows, the sun rises because the rooster crows. O.K. you are polemicist...Hourayyyyyyyyyyyyyyy!!!! Let me get it - The rooster crows before the sun rises or the moon rises before the rooster becomes a wolf ? or maybe you don't know that the sun does not "rises" but it is the earth that is spinning and the sun is fixed ? As I said before - Good for you .

Otherwise I tend to agree that Pompey's career included a rather fortuitous sequence of events. However, I also believe that one makes his own luck through proactive advancement of one's own agenda. He benefited from such circumstances, but he had to be in a position to do so in the first place. Agreed . Yet , Perpenna killed a Sertorius that was not going to be defeated even if Pompey was still fighting against him today.......A lucky guy Pompey...It is all because he had an onion in his shoes and a star of David in his bottom

Thanks for your responses It is difficult to estimate how much Commodus was loved by the masses , we don't have their point of view...but let us assume that he was loved by them , so since when an Emperor (an African soldier) listen to the Roman mob ? And what about him taking the name Pertinax , who , let say , was in the conspiracy to kill Commodus ? He could not represent himself as a Pertinax and as a Commodus at the same time , could he ? If I am not wrong , Nero was very much loved by the masses...why Galba (or Otho or Vitellius or Vespasianus) , who was in the same (more or less) position as Severus did not defied him and praised him ? It is still a problem for me Maybe , as one said (Amit , 2003) he tried to justify his intended persecutions (Teror) against the Senate by claiming that they conspired to kill a lawful Emperor ?

When you say, "With its expansion", when do you mean? Rome was expanding for hundreds of years, yet the number of slaves did not rise proportionately if only because the high mortality rate of slaves would make it impossible. Did Rome of 340 BCE had exactly the same propotion of slaves as in the 1st century BC ? "Between 200 and 91 the Roman territory stayed unchanged , which implies that population density increased by more than 50%. This increase refers only to free citizens, but the population of slaves has grown even faster" (Crawford 1993:46) . "By the late Republic the numbers of assidui shrunk at an alarming degree, whereas the numbers of proletarii and slaves had experienced a massive growth." "...To work the land they used the ever increasing numbers of slaves captured in Rome

95 % of the article is about Pompey's luck , wisdom , reputation and so on , and you are reffering to the last 5% ? The point is very simple - He (who wrote the article) is showing that Pompey was not so great , it is written in every line . Now about the last 5% - The writer is trying to be cynical , that's all . I hope I cleared it .

Yes, the accuracy was a bit lacking As usual , it is a show...but "Octavian" in the funeral ?!?! He was at...well you all know where BTW - If you can bring a source (ancient) that used the name "Octavian" or "Octavianus" ?

In 197 Severus came to Rome after his victories over his opponents and gave a speech in the very shoked Senate . He praised Marius and Sulla for their revengefulness/vindictiveness and scorned Pompey and Caeser for their clementia . The important thing , he praised Commodus and had him Deified !!!!!!!!!!! the Senators were in a state of trauma...... Now , why did he do it ? What were his motives ? How could an intelligent person like Severus praise a Monster , a mad man , a killer ?

Nevertheless, I agree that Pompey was no Alexander, whatever his flatterers (like Caesar at one point) would have had us believe. And Sulla who crowned him "Imperator" when he was a private man and a "Magnus" when he smashed "Marian" "generals" ?

50 Meters ? 58.7 !!!

Are you seriously asking me this question ?

Well ?

I alwayes believed in the notion that Pompey steal "his victories" from others , Wisdom or luck ? A very good (lllooonnnggg) survey - Pompey was born in 106 B.C. and the first forty two years of his life were characterized by uniform good fortune. Oh, I dare say he stubbed his toe now and then and got attacks of indigestion at inconvenient times and lost money on the gladiatorial contests but in the major aspects of life, he remained always on the winning side. Pompey was born at a time when Rome was torn by civil war and social turmoil. The Italian allies, who were not Roman citizens, rose in rebellion against a Roman aristocracy who wouldn't extend the franchise. The lower classes, who were feeling the pinch of a tightening economy, now that Rome had completed the looting of most of the Mediterranean area, were struggling against the senators, who had kept most of the loot. When Pompey was in his teens, his father was trying to walk the tightrope. The elder Pompey had been a general who had served as consul in 89 B.C., and had defeated the Italian non citizens and celebrated a triumph. But he was not an aristocrat by birth and he tried to make a deal with the radicals. This might have gotten him in real trouble, for he had worked himself into a spot where neither side trusted him, but in 87 B.C. he died in the course of an epidemic that swept his army. That left young Pompey as a fatherless nineteen year old who had inherited enemies on both sides of the civil war. He had to choose and he had to choose carefully. The radicals were in control of Rome, but off in Asia Minor fighting a war against Rome's enemies, was the reactionary general Lucius Cornelius Sulla. Pompey, uncertain as to which side would win, lay low and out of sight. When he heard that Sulla was returning, victorious, from Asia Minor, he made his decision. He chose Sulla as probable victor. At once, he scrabbled together an army from among those soldiers who had fought for his father, loudly proclaimed himself on Sulla's side, and took the field against the radicals. There was his first stroke of fortune. He had backed the right man. Sulla arrived in Italy in 83 B.C. and began winning at once. By 82 B.C. he had wiped out the last opposition in Italy and at once made himself dictator. For three years he was absolute ruler of Rome. He reorganized the government and placed the senatorial aristocrats firmly in control. Pompey benefited, for Sulla was properly grateful to him Sulla sent Pompey to Sicily, then to Africa, to wipe out the disorganized forces that still clung to the radical side there, and this was done without trouble. The victories were cheap and Pompey's troops were so pleased that they acclaimed Pompey as "the Great," so that he became Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus the only Roman to bear this utterly un Roman cognomen. Later accounts say that he received this name because of a striking physical resemblance between himself and Alexander the Great, but such a resemblance could have existed only in Pompey's own imagination. Sulla ordered Pompey to disband his army after his African victories but Pompey refused to do so, preferring to stay surrounded by his loyal men. Ordinarily, one did not lightly cross Sulfa, who had no compunctions whatever about ordering a few dozen executions before breakfast. Pompey, however, proceeded to marry Sulla's daughter. Apparently, this won Sulla over to the point of not only accepting the title of "the Great" for the young man, but also to the point of allowing him to celebrate a triumph in 79 B.C. even though he was below the minimum age at which triumphs were permitted. Almost immediately thereafter, Sulla resigned the dictatorship, feeling his work was done, but Pompey's career never as much as stumbled. He now had a considerable reputation (based on his easy victories). What's more, he was greedy for further easy victories. For instance, after Sulla's death, a Roman general, Marcus Aemilius Lepidus, turned against Sulla's policies. The reactionary Senate at once sent an army against him. The senatorial army was led by Quintus Catulus, with Pompey as second in command. Until then, Pompey had supported Lepidus, but again he guessed the winning side in time. Catulus easily defeated Lepidus, and Pompey managed to get most of the credit.There was trouble in Spain at this time, for it was the last stronghold of radicalism. In Spain, a radical general, Quintus Sertorius, maintained himself. Under him, Spain was virtually independent of Rome and was blessed with an enlightened government, for Sertorius was an efficient and liberal administrator. He treated the native Spaniards well, set up a Senate into which they were admitted, and established schools where their young men were trained in Roman style. Naturally, the Spaniards, who for some centuries had had a reputation as fierce and resolute warriors, fought heart and soul on the side of Sertorius. When Sulla sent Roman armies into Spain, they were defeated. So, in 77 B.C. Pompey, all in a glow over Catulus' easy victory over Lepidus, offered to go to Spain to take care of Sertorius. The Senate was willing and off to Spain marched Pompey and his army. On his way through Gaul, he found the dispirited remnants of Lepidus' old army. Lepidus himself was dead by now but what was left of his men were under Marcus Brutus (whose son would, one day, be a famous assassin). There was no trouble in handling the broken army and Pompey offered Brutus his life if he would surrender. Brutus surrendered and Pompey promptly had him executed. One more easy victory, topped by treachery, and Pompey's reputation increased. On to Spain went Pompey. In Spain, a sturdy old Roman general, Metellus Pius, was unsuccessfully trying to cope with Sertorius. Vaingloriously, Pompey advanced on his own to take over the job and Sertorius, who was the first good general Pompey had yet encountered, promptly gave the young man a first class drubbing. Pompey's reputation might have withered then and there, but just in time, Metellus approached with reinforcements and Sertorius had to withdraw. At once, Pompey called it a victory, and, of course, got the credit for it. His luck held. For five years, Pompey remained in Spain, trying to handle Sertorius, and for five years he failed. And then he had a stroke of luck, the luck that never failed Pompey, for Sertorius was assassinated. With Sertorius gone, the resistance movement in Spain collapsed. Pompey could at once win another of his easy victories and could then return to Rome in 71 B.C., claiming to have cleaned up the Spanish mess. But couldn't Rome have seen it took him five years? No, Rome couldn't, for all the time Pompey had been in Spain, Italy itself had been going through a terrible time and there had been no chance of keeping an eye on Spain. A band of gladiators, under Spartacus, had revolted. Many dispossessed flocked to Spartacus' side and for two years, Spartacus (a skillful fighter) destroyed every Roman army sent out against him and struck terror into the heart of every aristocrat. At the height of his power he had 90,000 men under his command and controlled almost all of southern Italy. In 72 B.C., Spartacus fought his way northward to the Alps, intending to leave Italy and gain permanent freedom in the barbarian regions to the north. His men, however, misled by their initial victories, preferred to remain in Italy in reach of more loot. Spartacus turned south again. The senators now placed an army under Marcus Licinius Crassus, Rome's richest and most crooked businessman. In two battles, Crassus managed to defeat the gladiatorial army and in the second one, Spartacus was killed. Then, just as Crassus had finished the hard work, Pompey returned with his Spanish army and hastily swept up the demoralized remnants. He immediately represented himself, successfully, as the man who had cleaned up the gladiatorial mess after having taken care of Spain. The result was that Pompey was allowed to celebrate a triumph, but poor Crassus wasn't. The Senate, though, was growing nervous. They were not sure they trusted Pompey. He had won too many victories and was becoming entirely too popular. Nor did they like Crassus (no one did). For all his wealth, Crassus was not a member of the aristocratic families and he grew angry at being snubbed by the socially superior Senate. Crassus began to court favor with the people with well placed philanthropies. He also began to court Pompey. Pompey always responded to courting and, besides, had an unfailing nose for the winning side. He and Crassus ran for the consulate in 70 B.C. (two consuls were elected each year), and they won. Once consul, Crassus began to undo Sulla's reforms of a decade earlier in order to weaken the hold of the senatorial aristocracy on the government. Pompey, who had been heart and soul with Sulla when that had been the politic thing to do, turned about and went along with Crassus, though not always happily. But Rome was still in trouble. The West had been entirely pacified, but there was mischief at sea. Roman conquests had broken down the older stable governments in the East without having, as yet, established anything quite as stable in their place. The result was that piracy was rife throughout the eastern Mediterranean. It was a rare ship that could get through safely and, in particular, the grain supply to Rome itself had become so precarious that the price of food skyrocketed. Roman attempts to clear out the pirates failed, partly because the generals sent to do the job were never given enough power. In 67 B.C. Pompey maneuvered to have himself appointed to the task but under favorable conditions. The Senate, in a panic over the food supply, leaped at the bait. Pompey was given dictatorial powers over the entire Mediterranean coast to a distance of fifty miles inland for three years and was told to use that time and the entire Roman fleet to destroy the pirates. So great was Roman confidence in Pompey that food prices fell as soon as news of his appointment was made public. Pompey was lucky enough to have what no previous Roman had adequate forces and adequate power. Nevertheless one must admit that he did well. In three months, not three years, he scoured the Mediterranean clear of piracy. If he had been popular before, he was Rome's hero now. The only place where Rome still faced trouble was in eastern Asia Minor, where the kingdom of Pontus had been fighting Rome with varying success for over twenty years. It had been against Pontus that Sulla had won victories in the East, yet Pontus kept fighting on. Now a Roman general, Lucius Licinius Lucullus, had almost finished the job, but he was a hard driving martinet, hated by his soldiers. When Lucullus' army began to mutiny in 66 B.C., just when one more drive would finish Pontus, he was recalled and good old Pompey was sent eastward to replace him. Pompey's reputation preceded him; Locullus' men cheered him madly and for him did what they wouldn't do for Lucullus. They marched against Pontus and beat it. Pompey supplied the one last push and, as always, demanded and accepted credit for the whole thing. All of Asia Minor was now either Roman outright or was under the control of Roman puppet governments. Pompey therefore decided to clean up the East altogether. He marched southward and around Antioch found the last remnant of the Seleucid Empire, established after the death of Alexander the Great two and a half centuries before. It was now ruled by a nonentity called Antiochus XIII. Pompey deposed him, and annexed the empire to Rome as the province of Syria. Still further south was the kingdom of Judea. It had been independent for less than a century, under the rule of a line of kings of the Maccabean family. Two of the Maccabeans were now fighting over the throne and one appealed to Pompey. Pompey at once marched into Judea and laid siege to Jerusalem. Ordinarily, Jerusalem was a hard nut to crack, for it was built on a rocky prominence with a reliable water supply; it had good walls; and it was usually defended with fanatic vigor. Pompey, however, noticed that every seven days things were quiet. Someone explained to him that on the Sabbath, the Jews wouldn't fight unless attacked and even then fought without real conviction. It must have taken quite a while to convince Pompey of such a ridiculous thing but, once convinced, be used a few Sabbaths to bring up his siege machinery without interference, and finally attacked on another Sabbath. No problem. Pompey ended the Maccabean kingdom and annexed Judea to Rome while allowing the Jews to keep their religious freedom, their Temple, their high priests, and their peculiar, but useful, Sabbath. Pompey was forty two years old at this time, and success had smiled at him without interruption. I now skip a single small event in Pompey's life and represent it by a line of asterisks: one apparently unimportant circumstance. Pompey returned to Italy in 61 B.C. absolutely on top of the world, boasting (with considerable exaggeration) that what he had found as the eastern border of the realm be had left at its center. He received the most magnificent triumph Rome had ever seen up to that time. The Senate was in terror lest Pompey make himself a dictator and turn to the radicals. This Pompey did not do. Once, twenty years before, when he had an army, he kept that army even at the risk of Sulla's displeasure. Now, something impelled him to give up his army, disband it, and assume a role as a private citizen. Perhaps he was convinced that he had reached a point where the sheer magic of his name would allow him to dominate the republic. At last, though, his nose for the right action failed him. And once having failed him, it failed him forever after. To begin with, Pompey asked the Senate to approve everything he had done in the East, his victories, his treaties, his depositions of kings, his establishment of provinces. He also asked the Senate to distribute land to his soldiers, for he himself had promised them land. He was sure that he had but to ask and he would be given. Not at all. Pompey was now a man without an army and the Senate insisted on considering each individual act separately and nit pickingly. As for land grants, that was rejected. What's more, Pompey found that he had no one on his side within the government. All his vast popularity suddenly seemed to count for nothing as all parties turned against him for no discernible reason. What's more, Pompey could do nothing about it. Something had happened, and he was no longer the clever, golden boy Pompey he had been before 64 B.C. Now he was uncertain, vacillating, and weak. Even Crassus was no longer his friend. Crassus had found someone else: a handsome, charming individual with a silver tongue and a genius for intrigue a man named Julius Caesar. Caesar was a playboy aristocrat but Crassus paid off the young man's enormous debts and Caesar served him well in return. While Pompey was struggling with the Senate, Caesar was off in Spain, winning some small victories against rebellious tribes and gathering enough ill gotten wealth (as Roman generals usually did) to pay off Crassus and make himself independent. When, he returned to Italy and found Pompey furious with the Senate, he arranged a kind of treaty of alliance between himself, Crassus, and Pompey the "First Triumvirate." But it was Caesar and not Pompey who profited from this. It was Caesar who used the alliance to get himself elected consul in 59 B.C. Once consul, Caesar controlled the Senate with almost contemptuous ease, driving the other consul, a reactionary, into house arrest. One thing Caesar did was to force the aristocrats of the Senate to grant all of Pompey's demands. Pompey got the ratification of all of his acts and he got the land for his soldiers and yet he did not profit from this. Indeed, he suffered humiliation, for it was quite clear that he was standing, hat in hand, while Caesar graciously bestowed largesse on him. Yet Pompey could do nothing, for he had married Julia, Caesar's daughter. She was beautiful and winning and Pompey was crazy about her. While he had her, he could do nothing to cross Caesar. Caesar was running everything now. In 58 B.C. he sug

It's hard to imagine that anything terribly abnormal occurred in the centuriate without it being referenced later either as a precedent or as a cause for strife by later writers. I agree with you on that . "But one would give a lot to know more about M. Claudius Marcellus , from whose remarkable third Consulship in 152 so much was expected but , in the way of success , so little came..." Roms Kriege in Spanien, 154-133 v. Chr., Review author: J. P. V. D. Balsdon The Classical Review 1963 1. If Balsdon would give a lot , I woild give 10$ , and you PP ? 2. Balsdon notion confirms your suggestion that Marcellus was elected for his most strange thitd Consulship , to end the crisis in Hispania . 3. The enigma remains , as Balsdon said , an idea for a book - "Some enigmas in ancient Rome history"

When Consuls entered office : From 509 BCE (V.S.) to 493 BCE (V.S.) on the Ides of September From 493 BCE (V.S.) to 479 BCE (V.S.) on the Kalends of September From 479 BCE (V.S.) to 451 BCE (V.S.) on the Kalends of Sextilis ("June") From 451 BCE (V.S.) to 449 BCE (V.S.) on the Ides of May From 449 BCE (V.S.) to 443 BCE (V.S.) or 400 BCE (V.S.) on the Ides of December From 400 BCE (V.S.) to probably till 397 BCE (V.S.) on the Kalends of October From 397 BCE (V.S.) to 329 BCE (V.S.) or perhaps 327 BCE (V.S.) on the Kalends of Quintilis ("July") From 327 BCE (V.S.) to 223 BCE unknown From 223 BCE to 153 BCE on the Ides of March From 153 BCE till the end , on the Kalends of January So , the answer is no

It is a subject in a big controversy - Most books and articles are in non-English European languages , here are some in English A.Alfoldi, Early Rom and the Latins (Ann Arbor 1965) R.A.Bauman, The Abdication of Collatinus, Acta Classica 9 (1966) 129-141 L.Bonfante Warren, Roman triumphs and Etruscan kings: the changing face of the triupmh, JRS 70 (1980) 49-66 T.J.Cornell, The Beginning of Rome. Italy and Rome from the Bronze Age to the Punic Wars (c.1000-264 B.C.). L.-N.Y., 1995 T.N.Gantz, The Tarquin Dynasty, Historia 24 (1975) 539-554 E.Gjerstad, Discussions Conarning Early Rome, Historia 16 (1967) 257-278 R. R. Holloway, The Archaeology of Early Rome and Latium, Londres-New York 1994 R.M.Ogilvie, Early Rome and the Etruscans, Hassocks 1976 There is more , try C.H.A Vol 7/2 1989

In the five hundred and ninety-eighth year after the founding of the city, the consuls began to enter upon their office on 1 January. The cause of this change in the date of the elections was a rebellion in Hispania. So strange , don't you think ? When I combine this change in 153 , the election of Marcellus in that same year (for 152) against the Lex Vilia and the situation in Hispania my little brain starts to produce (sp?) such speculations that even my 2.9 years old kidd begin to look at me in a very strange look that my wife had for some years... Such an enigma , How the Senate agree to let Marcellus a third Consulship ? Maybe the cenuriata forced the Senate ? What Marcellus did for the people ? Endless questions...even the great Ronald Syme asked (in an article) these questions in 1953 when T.R.S. Broughton published his "Magistrates..." and ended with nothing ! Maybe we should leave history for a more absolute science like cartoons ?

The Fasti Consulares starts at 509 BCE , Varonian system . We have a full list of Ordinari Consuls up until the last one in 541 CE when the Consulate came to its end . We do not have a full list of Sufecti Consuls (mainly for the imperial period) but about 40% of it . The list is accepted as genuine without any doubt from 300 BCE Varonian system to 541 CE . The list from 509 to 300 is very problematic and controversial but is accepted by all as 90% genuine . We have the 5 "years of anarchy" (376 to 371) , the "Dictator years" (333...301) , we have "Plebeian" names in 509 to 450 , we have years with 2 or even 3 different pairs , we have the problem with the "Praetor Maximus" and so on .

The best example I can think of is the B.S. where the Senate gave Scipio command of Sicilia knowing that he intended to invade Africa from there, but did not give him the right to levy troops. I don't know how they expected him to properly execute the war without men, and luckily for the republic he was able to find volunteers and the Cannae legions, without which all he would have had was Massinissa's Numidians (keep in mind that at this point Massinissa had no kingdom). It's that type of crap that caused the frustration of so many of Rome's greatest men, who were trying to help but were stifled by the "old men". Maybe they thought Scipio will use the "force" ?