ASCLEPIADES

Salve, GPM Yes I do think Caesar did everything he claimed he did, OK, maybe he exaggerated with his numbers but you can't deny his achievements... Whatever anyone's opinions of Gaius Julius Caesar wether good or bad, you can not possibly argue against his achievements and with his Generalship. He exaggerated indeed. Maybe. Gaul was largely pacific previous to Caesar. Yes, to cross the same river the Germans had previously pacifically crossed without any bridge; again, the Germans were at peace with Rome when they were attacked by Caesar. In fact, MP Cato and other senators proposed to hand CJ Caesar to the Germans after that. No question he resoundingly defeated Pompeius & Co. fair and square. Even so, the "avenging" of Pompeius' death was one of the most execreable propagandistic acts ever, even by Roman standards. ... etc etc etc

Here comes the assesment of Mestrius Plutarchus (a devoted Caesarophile, BTW) on Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus, previous to his war against Caesar: "It was in the justest manner that Pompey came to fame and power, setting out on his career independently, and rendering many great services to Sulla when Sulla was freeing Italy from her tyrants... Pompey not only continued to hold Sulla in honour while he lived, but also after his death gave his body funeral obsequies in despite of Lepidus, and bestowed upon his son Faustus his own daughter in marriage ... And yet Sulla got no less from Pompey than he gave him... Pompey's transgressions of right and justice in his political life were due to his family connections, for he joined in most of the wrongdoings of Caesar and Scipio because they were his relations by marriage... of their campaigns and achievements in war, the trophies of Pompey were so many, the forces led by him so vast, and the pitched battles in which he was victorious so innumerable... Pompey gave cities to such of the pirates as changed their mode of life, and when it was in his power to lead Tigranes the king of Armenia in his triumphal procession, made him an ally instead, saying that he thought more of future time than of a single day".

Salve, N DCXLVII AUC / 107 BC sounds great to me; your more pertinent primary sources should be Appianus of Alexandria (Bellum Civili I), Mestrius Plutarchus ( Marius & Sulla), Caius Sallustius Crispus (De Bello Iugurthino) and Marcus Tullius Cicero (lot of letters), to begin with. You will find here at UNRV multiple references on secondary and tertiary sources. Good luck and make us know about your progress.

Salve, K

Basically, playing Plutarch requires at least five steps (the last one may be optional): A - Idealizing a carefully selected remote past. B - Developing good doses of national narcissism. C - Straining even the most tenuous similarity that you may be able to find between A & B. D.- Utterly ignoring the overwhelming differences between A & B. E.- Determining how some known-in-advance predictions were clearly

Salve, Amici SOME NICE IMAGES ON ECNOMUS SOME NICE SLIDES ON ILIPA

Yes it's true to an extent figures could be unreliable. But did Caesar fight his battles alone? No he didn't. He was not the ONLY person writing back to Rome, there were many individuals writing back to Rome. If his figures were wildly exaggerated then his exaggerations would not have stood up to much scrutiny, right? Did Quintus NEVER write to Marcus? Wouldn't Cicero (with his notoriously loud mouth), being a political opposite of Caesar make these supposed lies known? I'm using Cicero as an example but anyone could have made exaggerations public, from the tribune down to the legionary, to the camp follower, etc...You can't keep 70,000 mouths shut. And the notion of a pro Caesarian whitewashing of history just does not fly IMO. Well, I would really love to read some of those 70,000 accounts. Cicero's works were clearly purged from almost any anti-Augustus evidence, no doubt by previous re-edition by MT Tiro and the Cicero family. Actually, I'm not aware of any non-caesarean accounts on the Gallic war, in fact not even from the Caesarean Civil War of DCCIII-DCCVII AUC / 49-45 BC. Just isolated indirect references is all we have from prominent anti-Caesar writers like MP Cato Minor; a remarkable coincidence, indeed. Pro-Caesar accounts are basically epic-like propaganda that depicted him as legendary hero; if we rely literally on their figures, we must conclude CJ Caesar was kind of stupid as a military organizer, as he would have stubbornly faced far stronger enemies once and again when he simply didn't need to. Even at Munda (XVI Ante Kalendas Aprilis, DCCVII AUC / March 17, 45 BC), after CJ Caesar has been the undisputable ruler over more than 90% of the Roman world and its resources for some time, the Commentarius De Bello Hispaniensi pretend us to be naive enough to believe Caesar attacked with almost half of his enemies' strength (cp. XXX), with the usual and so unsurprising outcome of getting just a fraction (1:30) of the other side casualties (cp. XXXI). PLEEEAAASEEE!!!

Gratiam habeo for the advice, A III.

Salve, Amici I believe the ancient Romans generally used interpuncts to separate the words, although perhaps these interpuncts weren't always apparent? -- Nephele It's all depend on the quality of the inscriber, for example it's likely that a milestone in some minor province would be of a much lesser quality then an imperial inscription in Rome. Actually, interpuncts are uncommon in surviving Roman inscriptions, even from Rome itself. It seems they derived from the Alexandrian distinctiones system from Aristophanes of Byzantium and Aristarchus of Samothracia (II century BC). They were apparently discarded due to the influence of the contemporary Greek writing (scriptio continua). The spaces for interword separation weren't used until the Middle Ages.

Salve, A III We're dealing again with the persistent confusion of the use of the word "Empire" for two quite different applications: - Geopolitically (American Heritage Dictionary), "a political unit having an extensive territory or comprising a number of territories or nations and ruled by a single supreme authority"; such definition would encompass both the Roman Republic (509-31 BC) and the contemporary United States; ie, they both rule over other countries. - The domain ruled by an emperor (or empress), ie. a monarch with a particular title; this is what we commonly mean by "the Roman Empire" (31 BC - 1453 AD). The latter fulfilled of course the geopolitical definition quoted above, but that's not always the case;ie, as for Japan after 1945. In spite of the recurrent allusion to the so-called "dynasties" of American presidents (a metaphorical term at best), I can see no sign that the US may be evolving into a monarchy; au contraire, they are quite more representative now than in 1776.

Salve, M No confusion: the official name of the country is "United States of America" since 1777 (no other independent country in the Western Hemisphere until 1804) and it's today the only official name of any nation with the word "America" included, while the words "United States" are included in the official name of Mexico (and formerly of four other countries too during the XX century). "American" is the official demonym for this country.

Salve, NN

Salve, LSG Actually two questions. Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus deeds speak eloquently for themselves; half or more of the eastearn Mediterranean, the richest and more populous Roman provinces, were either conquered or left as client states by him. Besides, defeating Mithridates and Tigranes was no easy task. IMHO, on the Civil War campaigns of DCCV-DCCVI AUC (49-48 BC) CJ Caesar had the best army; Pompeius' numerical superiority was presumably not so great as the pro-Caesar sources tried to make us think. Regarding figures and maths, classical historians were frequently biased and unreliable; but CJ Caesar own claims were sometimes frankly delirious (ie, the Helvetii campaign). Anyhow, checking on his curriculum I have no problem in accepting him as the best general of his highly contested era. The Roman Civil War showed us that, brilliant as he was, Titus Labienus was nevertheless neither indispensable for Caesar's victory nor sufficient to compensate the balance on Pompeius' side.

Gratiam habeo for such nice video series, Arctos. No commentary until I finish all of them (phewww...)

Briefly : "What we do about history matters. The often repeated saying that those who forget the lessons of history are doomed to repeat them has a lot of truth in it. But what are 'the lessons of history'? The very attempt at definition furnishes ground for new conflicts. History is not a recipe book; past events are never replicated in the present in quite the same way. Historical events are infinitely variable and their interpretations are a constantly shifting process. There are no certainties to be found in the past... "We can learn from history how past generations thought and acted, how they responded to the demands of their time and how they solved their problems. We can learn by analogy, not by example, for our circumstances will always be different than theirs were. The main thing history can teach us is that human actions have consequences and that certain choices, once made, cannot be undone. They foreclose the possibility of making other choices and thus they determine future events". Gerda Lerner (1920- ) And even more briefly... "Patriotism ruins history" Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832)

BTW, I'm sure you know quite well this palindrome from Marcus Fabius Quintilianus, but anyway: "Roma tibi subito motibus ibit amor" Which, as you know, means something like: "From Rome the passionate love will soon come to you".

"All science is either physics or stamp collecting". Ernest Rutherford (1871 - 1937) A pearl from the first chapter (The Spectre of Empire, page 6): "Much of the early history of Rome concerned the progressive subjugation of the Italian peninsula in a more or less continuous sequence of wars. Anyone familiar with Livy's History of Rome will appreciate the remorseless nature of this process as year after year army levies were raised and sent off to fight, despite the expense and inconvenience that this imposed on a basically agrarian society. Compared to other ancient Italian peoples the Roman state was exceptionally aggressive and warlike. The unification of Italy, the Mediterranean and a large part of the Temperate Europe under Roman rule was a lengthy process and achieved at huge human cost. For instance, more than 300 triumphs are recorded from the sequence of wars between 509 and 19 BC and a "triumph" was only awarded for a victory in a battle that ended a declared war and killed at least 5,000 of the enemy. The total casualties must have far exceeded the minimum of 1,500,000 implicit in the figure. The human impact went much deeper than that, due to the practice of enslaving certain categories of prisoners taken in war. For example, in the five-year period of the Third Samnite War (297-293 BC), figures from Livy indicate that over 66,000 captives were enslaved from a variety of defeated enemies". What can we say? Mr. Mattingly really masters the physics side of History.

BTW, I'm sure you know quite well this palindrome from Marcus Fabius Quintilianus, but anyway: "Roma tibi subito motibus ibit amor"

Salve, WW I am sorry, but these tactics and logistics of which you speak were made notable by the individual, and were much less the result of an overriding cultural mechanism. Whilst many expects dispute almost every other element of Roman society, there is no denying that Rome - most notably Republican Rome - was a highly militarised society. Every position held by Roman aristocrats was, in some way or another, influenced by war; but even this only influenced Rome's perception of war, and not her ability to wage it. As in any society, the society of ancient Rome contained individuals of differing abilities, and thus many generals reacted differently in similar situations. Compare, for example, Marius's campaigns again the Cimbri with his defeated predecessors. It not surprising, then, that we refer to Fabian tactic in war, and not the Roman art of delaying the enemy. Now who is sorry it's me, as I'm not exactly sure where do we disagree.

Salve, Amici. As the soldiers, conquerors, politicians and despots have been myriad all along the known History, I would point to the thousands of mostly unknown Greek-born Roman slaves (and eventually freedmen), from Marcus Tullius Tiro to Epictetus, who were the main way for the Roman based worldwide Hellenisation, a unique Universal phenomenon that is arguably the main contribution from Ancient Rome.

On a more positive side, here comes a Question & Answers section by Dr. David Morgan: "Why do you think the paranoia about the LHC is so prevalent online? [i think] it's becuase people mistrust anything they don't understand, and the conspiracy mindset is rampant in this country. People distrust science so much that they believe scientists would take a 1 in 100 chance of turning the Earth into a black hole just to test theories; that scientists aren't humans and don't care about the potential for a disaster to occur. So what are the actual chances of a major catastrophe resulting from the LHC? I think if you pull out ALL the stops, you get like - 1 in a trillion, but that's really pushing it. I think a more reasonable estimate was soemthing like 1 in 10^20. Will the LHC actually create any black holes? It will create black holes. It's not a given, but fairly probable. But what people don't understand about black holes is that they are not magical sucking machines; they are mass compressed into a small space. These would be black holes with the mass of a proton. See, the black hole scenario is the one that works people up, but it's the strange matter conversion and the vacuum bubble scenario that are far more interesting and horrible. Can't these black holes then grow and suck in all of Europe though? It can't "suck in" any more than any ordinary proton sucks in mass. It's just that, once you get too close to [a black hole] you are stuck. And by close, we're talking 10^-15 meters or something, about a millionth of a nanonmeter. And then what? You'd have a tiny little black hole walking around with you picking up paperclips? No. Can you pick up a paper clip with the gravitational attraction of your hand? A single proton-sized black hole wouldn't be able to do anything, and all our theories say that a proton-sized black hole will evaporate. READ MORE.

Salve, I et gratiam habeo for sharing once again this kind of amazing material with us. This image from wikimedia commons came from the Hungarian version and it's a pic from the original carved in the walls of the Temple of Mandulis (adjacent to the Temple of Per Ptah, from the earlier New Kingdom period and dedicated to Ramesses II the Great) in the recently conquered Nubia (Ethiopia), built circa 30 BC in Bab al-Kalabsha, an area now under the waters of Lake Nasser (some 30 Km south from the Aswan High Dam), so the whole complex was relocated in 1970. Mandulis was the Greek name for Merul, a Lower Nubian sky and solar deity, eventually identyfied with Horus. Here comes the Res Gestae Divi Augusti, cp. XXVI, sec. CIX-CX: Meo iuss

And now, a not-so-funny aspect of the ongoing paranoia on the Large Hadron Collider: "Indian girl commits suicide over 'Big Bang' fear . Reuters, Wed., Sept. 10, 2008 BHOPAL, India - A teenage girl in central India killed herself on Wednesday after being traumatized by media reports that a "Big Bang" experiment in Europe could bring about the end of the world, her father said. The 16-year old girl from the state of Madhya Pradesh drank pesticide and was rushed to the hospital but later died, police said. Her father, identified on local television as Biharilal, said that his daughter, Chayya, killed herself after watching doomsday predictions made on Indian news programs". READ MORE

Salve, LSG Roman victories should be attributted far more to their logistics and overall tactics than to any specific commander's abilities.