Ingsoc

The Roman themselves always try to made it look like their were defending themselves or their allies, however they could be several explanations to Roman Imperialism, none of them are without problems. Economic Imperialism: the problem with that explanation is that we don't have any evidence indicate that the Roman extort privileges from provincials and client kingdoms to Roman citizens. Defensive Imperialism: the problem with this explanation is that after the 2nd Punic war their wasn't a real power which could challenge Rome. Expansion Imperialism: Again the problem with this explanation is that the senate usually prefer not to make new provinces (see fir example the case of Macedonia) and the great number of provinces were created in the late republic as result of the initiative of generals (Pompeius and Caesar) and not the senate.

Some of his ancestors had Phoenician names, so this may give a clue on their origin. On the other hand the Historia Augusta say that his family were Roman Equestrians before citizenship was widespread in the provinces, and he did come from Leptis Magna which was organize as a Roman city, so this probably indicate that some of his ancestors were Italians.

Yes, America is the new Roman Empire. Now kneel before Caesar!

There is also this inscription which the common assumption is that the speaker in it is Tiberius. However we must remember that this an apologetic texts which intent to justify the elimination of Sejanus, and what better way to do this by saying he want to eliminate the family of the beloved Germanicus? Cassius Dio, which is the most detailed source, never mention an accusation of rebellion made toward Sejanus: "In the meantime the letter was read. It was a long one, and contained no wholesale denunciation of Sejanus, but first some other matter, then a slight censure of his conduct, then something else, and after that some further objection to him; and at the close it said that two senators who were among his intimate associates must be punished and that he himself must be kept under guard." (58.10)

The Talmud preserve a piece of Roman pun joke: "A certain master came into the house of learning, and said that the man of the nose was being looked for R. Gamaliel understood that he was meant thereby, and hid himself." (Babylonian Talmud, Ta'anit 29) Now the Roman refer to Gamliel as the "man of the nose" because at the time he was the head of the Jews in the Land of Israel and as such hold the title of Nasi (a term that translated to Greek by the church fathers as Ethnarcos - a leader of ethnic group) which in Latin is the genativus of the word Nasus (Nose) and hence the Romans jokely named the Jewish leader the "man of the nose".

1. I suppose that if Caligula would have lived another 43 years he would elect either his son or grandson to be his heir and if he wouldn't have any probably would be another male of his close family. 2. They would continue to have a successfully senatorial career but wouldn't achieve supreme power. 3. I wouldn't say that their would be any radical changes. 4. ???

I found this reference from the 4th century to the fact that Julius Caesar had offered Brutus to serve as his questor at Gaul in 53 BC. "82.1 Marcus Brutus, auunculi Catonis imitator, Athenis philosophiam, Rhodi eloquentiam didicit. 2 Cytheridem mimam cum Antonio et Gallo amauit. 3 Quaestor in Galliam proficisci noluit, quod is bonis omnibus displicebat. 4 Cum Appio socero in Cilicia fuit, et cum ille repetundarum accusaretur, ipse ne uerbo quidem infamatus est. 5 Ciuili bello a Catone ex Cilicia retractus Pompeium secutus est, quo uicto ueniam a Caesare accepit et proconsul Galliam rexit; tamen cum aliis coniuratis in curia Caesarem occidit. 6 Et ob inuidiam ueteranorum in Macedoniam missus, ab Augusto in campis Philippiis uictus Stratoni ceruicem praebuit." (Aurelius Victor,De viris illustribus urbis Romae) Now to me it's seem strange since by this date Brutus was identified with the Optimates and I found no mention of this in another source.

More jokes from Philogelos: http://www.stoa.org/diotima/anthology/quinn_jokes.shtml

Here it is:

I think that the stop of the expansion wars was in great deal due to the change of the political system. In the republic a successful war was the surest way to achieve political power and office and to accumulate wealth. this all change under the imperial system, the princeps was the only source of political power and he was the one which appointed magistrates, furthermore any war was conducted under his auspecies regardless of who was actually the commander in the field.

I think it's very much an issue since the Roman themselves didn't make any distinction, however if you talking about blood you forgetting that Augustus was the great nephew of Caesar, so he had in him Caesarian blood.

I'm not aware that the Romans made a legal distinction between natural born and adopted children, Augustus and Tiberius were as much a legitimate Julii as Julius Caesar. the last male member was Gaius (Caligula) and the last male descendant of Augustus was Nero (however he was not of the Julii but of the Claudii). The last female Julii was Agrippina Minor and the last descendant of Augustus was Junia Calvina who died in 79 (Suetonius, Vespasian, 23.4)

According to Adrian Goldsworthy (The Complete Roman Army, pp. 133) while it's possible that the legionaries carried two pila on a campaign to the battle itself they carry only one pilum.

The whole motion was illegal, the people assemblies had no power to remove a magistrate that they elected. I think that Octavius understand that any veto would disregard by the assembly. Plutarchus hint this in the speech of Gracchus: "A tribune, he said, was sacred and inviolable, because he was consecrated to the people and was a champion of the people. "If, then," said Tiberius, "he should change about, wrong the people, maim its power, and rob it of the privilege of voting, he has by his own acts deprived himself of his honourable office by not fulfilling the conditions on which he received it; 3 for otherwise there would be no interference with a tribune even though he should try to demolish the Capitol or set fire to the naval arsenal. If a tribune does these things, he is a bad tribune; but if he annuls the power of the people, he is no tribune at all." (Life of Tiberius Gracchus, 15.2) As you could see by Gracchus view Octavius has lost the tribunical authority and protection by vetoing his agrarian law.

Not really, the Academy sets regulations that are enforced by countless institutions starting with mass media that is highly influential, schools, bureaucracy etc I don't see how an language academy could enforce her decisions on the mass media (at least in free societies). In Israel we also have an academy ("Academy of the Hebrew Language") and it's more complex than the way that you describe, some time it's translation of foreign words are accepted by the mass public, sometime their not and the foreign words are the one which are in wide use and sometime the mass media translate a word in a diffrent way than the academy and eventually the academy "accept" it as a valid word.

That's pretty ridicules, by dumbing down the language (which probably show what those council men people thinks of their voters intelligence) you preventing people from a chance to enrich their vocabulary which only hurt they later in life if they ever want to read an academic article or good fine literature. As a native speaker of Hebrew, a language that has no roots in Latin, I mostly didn't know what those Latin words meant but it's was pretty easy to check them in the English dictionary.

A great Journal about Papyrology and Epigraphy, has all the issues from the years 1988-2000 avaliable for free download. http://www.uni-koeln.de/phil-fak/ifa/zpe/d...oads/index.html

Happy Birthday! have a great day!

Another interesting phenomenon in the late empire is hybrid names, for example the name of Constantine I nephew was Hannibalianus which is a Semit-Punician theophoric name (Hannibal) merged with the Latin suffix "ianus". I suppose it's another evidence to the growing influence of the eastern provinces culture in the late empire.

Broughton also agreed that Cato Minor father died before 91 BC. The only Cato mention in 89 BC is Lucius Porcius Cato who was a Consul and died during a failed attack against the Marsi.

Do you have a citation for that? If so, I'll change it. Meyer Reinhold, Marcus Agrippa A Biography, The W. F. Humphrey Press: Geneva, New York 1933, pp. 131-132

Macrinus wasn't a Gladiator, he was only the inspiration to the movie character.

He could be on an approved vacation from the army. But really it's just a movie (and a crappy one in my opinion) it's pointless to try to make sense of it's historically.

http://www.cajus-caesar.de/ I wonder what kind of people vote for someone named Cajus Julius Caesar