Primus Pilus

I liked the older ones better actually... not sure why we changed it. I know why and I bet you can guess LOL

An interesting thought regarding corruption. While the Flavians, and 'the 5 good emperors' put in many measures to combat corruption, it certainly still existed. Corruption became a problem when the state lacked the resources to support it. I know that may sound strange, but 'corruption' whether political, economic or social was a part of Rome from its very foundation, the key was managing it properly and offsetting it with enormous economic growth. While there are many considerations for the crisis of the 3rd century, consider the border pressure and lack of conquest as a major factor contributing to economic problems. Corruption became unmanageable because the economy couldn't cope. Just a semi-whimsical observation than a serious treaty, but something I'm going to look into more as an afterthought.

I liked the older ones better actually... not sure why we changed it.

She married Lucius Marcius Philippus in 59 BC and remained so until her death, (a fact conveniently left out of the HBO show). He was a man of consular rank and deep rooted senatorial tradition but was very much a Caesarian supporter. Atia died in late summer of the year following Caesar's death, 43 BC (Octavian was just about 20), and unfortunately not much else is known. We do know that both she and Philippus initially opposed Octavian 'collecting his inheritance' at Caesar's death, but this did not cause a rift. Philippus was later rewarded for his loyalty to Octavian and seems to have truly been a surrogate father. (Octavian's own father died when he was young... 4 if I remember correctly) There really are very few mentions of Atia in the historical record... there are brief passages in Suetonius, Nicolaus of Damascus and Dio Cassius, but none go into any great detail.

Welcome to the forum Dream... just to let you know... we've pretty much had our fill of the Alexander vs. Caesar thing around here. Such conversations have their purpose and can be entertaining, but eventually they end up in an eternal circular pattern that can't find a conclusion.

I certainly don't mean to be insensitive... just that many of these warnings turn out to be hoaxes. I'm not sure why people do it, but they do. You can find lots of them @ Snopes.com

I would establish a self sustaining town environment much like M. Night Shamawhat'shisname's 'The Village' and establish a pure feudalistic monarchy, complete with castle, alligator filled moat and all the trimmings. Next I would explain very carefully to my wife that the survival of the kingdom was absolutely dependent upon the emigration of many beautiful young Swedish women.... And thus ended the rather tumultuous reign of King 'Swedish Loins' Christopher. Hopefully my sons can find something to do with all these blond girls....

Well alrighty then... Skarr we'll send this one your way. I've PM'd you.

As I'm not really taking part in this debate allow me just to interject my own clarification... This question might suggest that modern society is worse because of an 'enlightened' attitude but it leaves out other various factors. It also assumes that 20th century society was inherently peaceful. Certainly there are elements of peaceful people, but there is and always will be those with an opposite attitude. I think numbers of dead don't quite illustrate the entire story. What may be more telling are those numbers as a percentage of total world population. Its much harder to compare numbers to die 2,000 years ago when the world population was only a fraction of today's. In 1 AD, the world's population was perhaps as much as 150 million people vs. 5 billion in the mid to late 20th century. Using the numbers provided by Augur above... .75 million people killed as an average per century prior to AD 1500 translates to about .5% of the world total in 1 AD (these numbers are flawed because the world population is so low in the early part of this formula that is skews the average throughout). Again using the numbers of 180 million (I'm not verifying the accuracy here) the 20th century translates to roughly 4% of the total. While certainly larger we must take into account the ability for man to kill on a massive scale in modern warfare vs. that ability 2,000 years ago and the problem we could have with the 'average' population. Again, this is not my debate, I'm just throwing out these numbers as a percentage for comparison purposes, but I bet with some minor fluctuations we'd find a pretty consistent average percentage of total population being killed throughout history.

Indeed we can certainly see that the Imperial legions of Trajan and Marcus Aurelius fared quite well against various Germanics. Plague and war weariness left the job somewhat unfinished, but after Aurelius the Danube was relatively calm for almost 2 centuries.

Forbidden by whom? Rome might forbid all it wants, but it would only apply if the state who was 'forbidden' feared Roman punitive action. Would a client state government not try a citizen without approval from Rome? Probably not, but I can't see Parthia being overly concerned with a merchant who broke the law unless they used his life as a negotiating tool in some form of diplomatic gesture.

Forgive the rather useless reply I make here... but this post is crying out for an obligatory 'touche'. It's pretty difficult to argue with that logic.

I believe that Gibbon is an imperative read, but will join in the others who say it must be tempered with some sense of, how to say this, nostalgic idealism. While Gibbbon's work is wonderful in its own right, there are others who are far more concise and scholarly. Still its a wonderful introduction to the later empire.

I had the exact same impression with the scene. At first I was thinking... 'Pollo has shown that this sort of thing wouldn't bother him in the slightest, why would it bother him now.' It was good to see that it truly was a lack of knowledge and not a form of scruples as you suggest. He does seem to be developing a fondness for Vorenus for reasons that I'm not entirely sure, but torture as a means to an end certainly doesn't strike me as something to give him pause. As for Vorenus, my impression is that he has no problem killing as a soldier for the greater glory of Rome, but private assassination for the gain of an individual seems to be against his nature. I wouldn't worry too much about this being a bastardized Christianization of ancient Rome... murdering someone was still against the law long before Christ and Vorenus is simply a rather lawful man. (or so it seems as evidenced by his reluctance to serve Caesar due to his own view of current events'). At any rate I think they are doing a wonderful job with the recreation of religious symbolism. I'd be interested in the comments of some of you who are more attuned to such things than I am.

Agreed, its why I only say that I am getting nervous and not overly bent out of shape about anything yet.. There haven't been any blatant obsurdities yet, and I'm holding out hope that there won't be any. The series is too good so far to allow a major breach of protocal methinks.

While Octavian may have been bi-sexual (though the the recorded history is quite opposite) his relationship with Cleopatra surely wouldn't be evidence of it. She was his political enemy and symbolic of the evils besetting Rome. The strange oriental monarch who had taken Antony under her spell and even claimed to have the child god of Caesar would have no chance to 'charm' Octavian. Without her, he would not have been able to legalize his war. He needed her in chains to walk in his triumph or dead. Had he given in to her in any capacity, then his war against her and Antony would've seemed a fraud, imo. Octavian may have been indulging himself with men as well as women, but Cleopatra's case is so unique that I don't think its a fair evaluation of his general preference. I am getting a little more nervous with each passing episode. While subtle, the plot advances more and more rather odd notions. (in episode 5 Octavian accompanies the legionary Pollo on a mission to find out if the centurion Vorenus' wife is faithful). I am still disappointed in Caesar's rather apparant lack of a direction or motivation, but that has been present from the beginning and is building up my rather slight frustation. Yes, I am very much still enjoying the show, I am just expressing concern and hope it doesn't stray too far from a 'historic' chain of events.

Allow me to try to think 'out of the box' here... Famous late Republicans like the Gracchii, Caesar, Octavian, Cato, Cicero etc. were great politicians in their own right, but they operated constantly in a state of strife and dissent. Despite some great achievements I'm looking for someone who rallied all of Rome in unity. We all know the greatness of some of these men so I'm trying to find a 'diamond in the rough' so to speak. A man who stands out is Cincinnatus who rose to the challenge of defeating a menacing Aequi army in the 5th century BC, assuming the title of dictator in the process. Immediately upon resolving the issue he gave up the dictatorship (in just 16 days) and promptly returned to his farm. Now you might say... if he was such a great politician would not he have remained in a prominent position within the Senate? Perhaps, but consider that when another crisis came many years later (a grain issue) it was the greatly respected 80 year old Cincinnatus who was called upon again to assume the dictatorship and resolve the issue. Another interesting and sort of quietly important figure is Nerva. Not only was he a well respected senator from the waning days of the Julio-Claudians, through the turmoil of the civil war following Nero's death, and into the reign of the Flavians, but he may have been the only man who could've save the empire from civil war after Domitians death. Perhaps he was involved in Domitian's assassination, perhaps not, but its interesting to consider that following his death there was hardly a hint of impending civil war. How could it happen that in the political vaccuum following a reviled emperor's death that not a single general declared for himself? It was because of the brilliant appointment of Nerva to the purple. Not only was he highly respected among his peers, but his age (66 years) upon his ascension and the fact that he had no children gave hope to these same generals that Nerva's reign might be short and they would still have a chance if they bided their time. Nerva was smart enough to understand the inherent danger and quickly nominated the powerful Trajan as his heir to prevent any further danger. Perhaps this example shows the shrewdness of the Senate as a whole and Nerva was just in the right place at the right time, but I personally feel that he was in fact a brilliant behind the scenes manipulator who made the easy transition from Domitian to 'the 5 good emperors' happen.

Personally, I feel Hadrian's brilliance is that he understood the Augustan principals of defining and maintaining tenable borders. An army can still conduct punitive operations regardless of whether or not its actually occupies enemy territory. The ever expanding borders proved to be wildly problematic.

Thanks Dan. I'll see what I can find. Seems we might have a simple interpretation issue on our hands.

It simply means coins or money. It is not a specific denomination. 15197[/snapback] In the instances I have seen it used, it seems to be describing a specifically copper coin. 15226[/snapback] Interesting... any chance you might remember where you've seen it? I'd like to see the references for myself... I've personally never heard this.

At the bottom of the forum (when you are in a main category such as Ethics and Morals, but not within an actual topic) you can edit which topics you can see. I think the default is topics within the last 30 days and you can change this from that to several intervals or to 'show all'. You aren't the first to get hit by this so I'm going to try to change the default setting. EDIT: I found the setting and changed all forum to 'show all topics' as default. You can change this by adjusting each category as I described above. Well, I hope its clear anyway

It simply means coins or money. It is not a specific denomination.

For twelve years, Czech archaeologists have been helping their Bulgarian colleagues in the excavations of an Ancient Greek market town in central Bulgaria. The twelve years of work has yielded valuable results, including a hoard of coins, and discovered a surprising connection between the ancient town and the Czech Lands... Full article @ Radio Praha

Ravenna site yields first-ever image of imperial officer - The first-ever image of a soldier in the Ancient Roman navy has surfaced at a major imperial naval base at Ravenna . The armour-clad, weapon-bearing soldier was carved on a funeral stone, or stele, in a waterlogged necropolis at Classe (ancient Classis), the now silted-up Ravenna port area where Rome's Adriatic fleet was stationed.. Full article @ Italymag

A relief image carved approximately 2,050 years ago on an ancient Egyptian stone slab shows Cleopatra dressed as a man, according to a recent analysis of the artifact. The object is only one of three known to exist that represent Cleopatra as a male. The other two artifacts also are stelae that date to around the same time, 51 B.C., at the beginning of Cleopatra's reign... Full article at Discovery News