sylla

Far as I

But that doesn't set a very good precendent, we might as well ask half the countries of the world to hand over their cultural treasures as they obviously can't (or won't) take care of them like we would. It would be very embarrassing, too, given how much of a luxury problem cultural heritage is. And what if they do? If the Egyptian government decides it's a good idea to dismantle the pyramids what are we going to do about it? They may 'belong to all mankind', but all mankind doesn't own them. And in the West we're not exactly innocent when it comes to purposely destroying ancient treasures. Even today, the way we're treating places like Babylon doesn't inspire confidence. As for the Elgin marbles, there doesn't seem to be a happy solution. Perhaps some sort of joint ownership and regular loans would be a sensible approach, especially considering how grand travelling exhibitions seem to have been doing wonders for museums. On the other hand, what could happen when they first touch Greek soil might be all too predictable. Couldn't agree any more with such an eloquent statement.

Interesting. Does that mean the artists were no longer capable of mastering Greek and just copying shapes? Seems a bit odd for this period. I would rather think the Greek language and alphabet were being progressively displaced and even forgotten with the advance of time after the Seleucid defeat; Aramaic seems to have been the new regional lingua franca.

It is? I thought it was pretty much a given. There doesn't seem to have been any other important event on Dec 25 other than the commemoration of the grand temple to Aurelian's last patron god. Remember that the 24th was the last day of The Saturnalia - the 25th would thus become important date. I would be instead interested in why Sol Invictus was celebrated on the 25th (the winter solstice should be the 21st or 22nd of December). December 25th was set as the date of the winter solstice by the Julian calendar (46 BC); by the XVI century, the actual date of the astronomic solstice was December 12th. The Gregorian calendar in 1582 was referred for its correction to the Council of Nicea (325); therefore, the ten day error accumulated from the IV to the XVI centuries AD was indeed corrected, but not so the three day error from the I century BC to the IV century AD. There is actually no evidence that December 25th played any role at all in Aurelian

The main problem of that assesment is that it takes for granted the absolute reliability of the utterly lavish apologetics written for Africanus Major; we must always (and especially in cases liike this one) favor factual accounts over mere figures and value judgments. The narrative of the Spanish campaigns is particularly problematic.; e.g. if Africanus' army was really never defeated, why did it require five full years for clearing the Peninsula? Even worse; how was Hasdrubal Barca able to get to Italy with such an immense army? (reportedly more than half a hundred thousand men). We can't just left aside such strong and obvious objections. On the other hand, if we are to take literally Polybius and Livy's accounts, winning the Spanish campaigns wouldn't actually seem so impressive (a paradoxical effect of overpraising); after all, all along the twelve years of Punic War II at Spain, the Carthaginians were purpotedly able to win only two times (strictly speaking, two phases of a single battle in 211 BC), and even then, the outcome was entirely attributed to the Celtiberian desertion; absolutely all other battles would then reportedly have been Roman victories. In any case, the notable performance of many Iberian groups against the Romans both during and after Punic War II, either alone or under Punic command, strongly suggests that those warriors were not so "sub-optimal" after all. Besides, please remember that the twin Roman defeats mentioned above for 211 BC were explained because of the Iberian desertion. We can objectively consider Africanus Major as the best Roman commander of Punic War II with reasonable certainty, simply because he utterly defeated Hannibal, who had not only defeated in open field virtually any other Roman commander for years, but had also continued doing so up to his last moment in Italy, even with fewer men than in Africa. Additionally, Zama was the culmination of years of brilliant African campaigns, definitively crushed the worst Roman enemy for centuries and opened the Mediterranean world to Roman conquest; its relevance can hardly be exaggerated.

Here is an old article (1950) on the chemical composition of Parthian coins; its main conclusions seem to be: - Parthian coins seem to had mostly not debased across their long history, a finding which would suggest economic stability. - The only detected exception from the previous trend was the ruler now known as Orodes II (then numbered as Orodes I), i.e. the one ruling when Carrhae happened; his coins were seemingly debased more than once. I haven't been able so far to find more recent reports on this issue.

I must agree with Jason here; this story seems to have been manipulated for obvious religious and propagandistic reasons. Aside from that, even a two-century span seems like a reasonable approximation for "the times of Jesus", and any archaeological find of this kind should have a significant potential for the study of the period (not necessarily religious oriented).

Far as we know, the introduction of coins in the West (the story for China is entirely independent) was mostly a Hellenic contribution. Reportedly, the first coins were introduced by the semi-Hellenized kingdom of Lydia; Achaemenid Persia would have introduced them directly from this conquered state. In any case, Persian Parthian coinage clearly came more from the closer Seleucid than from the remote Achaemenid currency; please note that they used the current Hellenic monetary units (e.g. drachma). For any ancient culture, numismatics have always been a precious source of information; this is especially valid for the Arsacid kingdom, as we virtually lack any native textual source.

EDIT: Let me try a different approach: - Logistics (i.e. "The time-related positioning of resources"): To what extent did it depend from the commander? In any case, I don't think any major logistic failure was reported from the armies under either Africanus Major or Caesar. - Training: The Romans were defeated (which is not the same as untrained) only twice (211 BC) all along 12 years of Punic War II in Spain; and even then, reportedly entirely because of the Celtiberian treachery. The tale of the Cannae survivors in Zama couldn't have been anything but propaganda, simply because Zama was fought 14 years after Cannae. To what extent did training depend on the commander? Aside from moral support (admittedly often critical) the direct personal influence of any general couldn't have been exerted beyond a fistful of men. IMHO, both activities were for the Romans (actually for most armies) the net product of the collective centuries-long effort of a whole nation, hardly just the personal contribution from a couple of enlightened commanders. - Picking of high officers: were this commanders really able to pick their legates? (With the possible exception of the Caesar's Civil War). In any case, we know almost nothing about Africanus' legates, aside from Laelius, Silanus and his brother Lucius. We are far better informed on the regular success of Caesar's legates in Gaul, even by themselves (Labienus, Crassus Jr, Quintus Cicero, Aurunculeius Cotta, Galba, Decimus Brutus and so on). Caesar's legates were defeated mostly when fighting against his Roman peers, especially against Caesar himself (e.g. Labienus); Africanus' soldiers only fought against purportedly qualitatively inferior alien troops. And of course, the ultimate criterion of comparison here is always the same; victory. We simply can't compare anachronic victories. We just can't know if the Barbarians were harder to defeat at the III or at the I century BC.

The purpose is a nice debate by mixing the contributions of all of us; that naturally includes both of your options. By now, I guess it is clear to everyone why I don't think that is determinable at all. If you think otherwise, I would really love to know why (and your choice between those commanders, of course). I'm sure you have something to say on that issue that I'm not aware of; such stuff would be undoubtedly useful for me and other UNRV members.

If by "nature of Christ" and "elements of Arianism" you mean non-Trinitarian ideas, many denominations share them nowadays; however, they all have immense differences between them regarding virtually any other aspect of the nature of Christ (and of their other beliefs and practices too, BTW), presumably as different as they are relative to the hundreds of Trinitarian denominations. Religious narratives often tend to compress most of their respective non-believers in common categories; just calling "Arian" all non-Trinitarian Christian denominations is patently abusive and a gross oversimplification. The Arians were not even the first non-Trinitarians; e.g. the Adoptionists were active at least since the II century. There's no evidence that any of the modern non-Trinitarian denominations came even indirectly from their ancient equivalents; they should probably be better understood as an example of convergent theological evolution, hardly surprising given that all of them basically share the same sacred texts. For example, Unitarianism is a derivation of the XVI century Protestant Reformation and the Jehovah's Witnesses from the American Third Great Awakening (XIX century).

Happy Birthday, CM .

Not to mention some fundamental aspects of logic.

As for most early Christian heresies, virtually all we know about this so-called donatists came from their detractors. If their reasons and arguments seem mundane and fancy, it may well have been because of the understandable bias against them from our sources; we simply can't know for sure. In any case, we can reasonably doubt that a religious movement that seemingly survived for centuries might really have had fundaments so mundane and fancy. ("Seemingly", because with the available sources we can't be entirely sure that all the groups labeled as donatists effectively shared the same doctrines). Their detractors described the donatists basically as radicals that didn't fully accept the compromise with the formerly persecuting Roman authorities; at least some of the Christian martyrs (particularly Africans) came from this sect, which had therefore been persecuted both by Diocletian and by their fellow Christians. A remarkable trait of this sect was its evident local (African) nature, in all likelihood not entirely attributable to purely religious reasons. It's interesting to note that official torture (or at least the menace of it) was used against this sect as early as 314 AD.

Usus autem sum, ne in aliquo fallam carissimam mihi familiaritatem tuam, praecipue libris ex bibliotheca Ulpia, aetate mea thermis Diocletianis, et item ex domo Tiberiana, usus etiam [ex] regestis scribarum porticus porphyreticae, actis etiam senatus ac populi. 2 et quoniam me ad colligenda talis viri gesta ephemeris Turduli Gallicani plurimum invit, viri honestissimi ac sincerissimi, beneficium amici senis tacere non debui. 3 Cn. Pompeium, tribus fulgentem triumphis belli piratici, belli Sertoriani, belli Mithridatici multarumque rerum gestarum maiestate sublimem, quis tandem nosset, nisi eum Marcus Tullius et Titus Livius in litteras rettulissent? 4 Publ<i>um Scipionem Afric<an>um, immo Scipiones omnes, seu Lucios seu Nasicas, nonne tenebrae possiderent ac tegerent, nisi commendatores eorum historici nobiles atque ignobiles extitissent? 5 longum est omnia persequi, quae ad exemplum huiusce modi etiam nobis tacentibus usurpanda sunt. 6 illud tantum contestatum volo me et rem scripsisse, quam, si quis voluerit, honestius eloquio celsiore demonstret, et mihi quidem id animi fuit, 6 <ut> non Sallustios, Livios, Tacito<s>, Trogos atque omnes disertissimos imitarer viros in vita principum et temporibus disserendis, sed Marium Maximum, Suetonium Tranquillum, Fabium Marcellinum, Gargilium Martialem, Iulium Capitolinum, Aelium Lampridium ceterosque, qui haec et talia non tam diserte quam vere memoriae tradiderunt. 8 sum enim unus ex curiosis, quod infi[ni]t<i>as ire non possum, ince<n>dentibus vobis, qui, cum multa sciatis, scire multo plura cupitis. 9 et ne diutius ea, quae ad meum consilium pertinent, loquar, magnum et praeclarum principem et qualem historia nostra non novit, arripiam.

Usus autem sum, ne in aliquo fallam carissimam mihi familiaritatem tuam, praecipue libris ex bibliotheca Ulpia, aetate mea thermis Diocletianis, et item ex domo Tiberiana, usus etiam [ex] regestis scribarum porticus porphyreticae, actis etiam senatus ac populi. 2 et quoniam me ad colligenda talis viri gesta ephemeris Turduli Gallicani plurimum invit, viri honestissimi ac sincerissimi, beneficium amici senis tacere non debui. 3 Cn. Pompeium, tribus fulgentem triumphis belli piratici, belli Sertoriani, belli Mithridatici multarumque rerum gestarum maiestate sublimem, quis tandem nosset, nisi eum Marcus Tullius et Titus Livius in litteras rettulissent? 4 Publ<i>um Scipionem Afric<an>um, immo Scipiones omnes, seu Lucios seu Nasicas, nonne tenebrae possiderent ac tegerent, nisi commendatores eorum historici nobiles atque ignobiles extitissent? 5 longum est omnia persequi, quae ad exemplum huiusce modi etiam nobis tacentibus usurpanda sunt. 6 illud tantum contestatum volo me et rem scripsisse, quam, si quis voluerit, honestius eloquio celsiore demonstret, et mihi quidem id animi fuit, 6 <ut> non Sallustios, Livios, Tacito<s>, Trogos atque omnes disertissimos imitarer viros in vita principum et temporibus disserendis, sed Marium Maximum, Suetonium Tranquillum, Fabium Marcellinum, Gargilium Martialem, Iulium Capitolinum, Aelium Lampridium ceterosque, qui haec et talia non tam diserte quam vere memoriae tradiderunt. 8 sum enim unus ex curiosis, quod infi[ni]t<i>as ire non possum, ince<n>dentibus vobis, qui, cum multa sciatis, scire multo plura cupitis. 9 et ne diutius ea, quae ad meum consilium pertinent, loquar, magnum et praeclarum principem et qualem historia nostra non novit, arripiam.

Methinks the evolution and outcome of the Gothic War of 376-382 will not be fully understood if the whole picture continues being ignored, more specifically the contemporary Hun factor, almost unmentioned all along this thread. Fritigern and his victorious troops were actually not conqueror wannabes; they were paradoxically just refugees from the Hunnic conquest of their land; i.e. the victors over the Roman emperor and army had been previously utterly defeated at and displaced from their own homeland; in fact, almost half the Goths (lately called the Ostrogoths) became Hunnic subjects; and all that happened just two years before Adrianople. Therefore, the real menace for everyone at 378 AD were not the Goths, the Alans or the Romans, but the Huns. If Theodosius had simply tried to erase the offending Goths from the face of the Earth (a rather dangerous and necessarily costly task), the Empire would have simply been left entirely vulnerable to the formidable nomad warriors. In hindsight, Theodosius

The Roman Republic seemed to have much more success against the highly organized combined arms forces of many of the eastern kingdoms, even those that had large numbers of cavalry. Against barbarians (gauls, cimbri, teutons) the outcome seemed less predictable. Not every Roman general was able to beat them in the manner of Marius or Caesar. Usus autem sum, ne in aliquo fallam carissimam mihi familiaritatem tuam, praecipue libris ex bibliotheca Ulpia, aetate mea thermis Diocletianis, et item ex domo Tiberiana, usus etiam [ex] regestis scribarum porticus porphyreticae, actis etiam senatus ac populi. 2 et quoniam me ad colligenda talis viri gesta ephemeris Turduli Gallicani plurimum invit, viri honestissimi ac sincerissimi, beneficium amici senis tacere non debui. 3 Cn. Pompeium, tribus fulgentem triumphis belli piratici, belli Sertoriani, belli Mithridatici multarumque rerum gestarum maiestate sublimem, quis tandem nosset, nisi eum Marcus Tullius et Titus Livius in litteras rettulissent? 4 Publ<i>um Scipionem Afric<an>um, immo Scipiones omnes, seu Lucios seu Nasicas, nonne tenebrae possiderent ac tegerent, nisi commendatores eorum historici nobiles atque ignobiles extitissent? 5 longum est omnia persequi, quae ad exemplum huiusce modi etiam nobis tacentibus usurpanda sunt. 6 illud tantum contestatum volo me et rem scripsisse, quam, si quis voluerit, honestius eloquio celsiore demonstret, et mihi quidem id animi fuit, 6 <ut> non Sallustios, Livios, Tacito<s>, Trogos atque omnes disertissimos imitarer viros in vita principum et temporibus disserendis, sed Marium Maximum, Suetonium Tranquillum, Fabium Marcellinum, Gargilium Martialem, Iulium Capitolinum, Aelium Lampridium ceterosque, qui haec et talia non tam diserte quam vere memoriae tradiderunt. 8 sum enim unus ex curiosis, quod infi[ni]t<i>as ire non possum, ince<n>dentibus vobis, qui, cum multa sciatis, scire multo plura cupitis. 9 et ne diutius ea, quae ad meum consilium pertinent, loquar, magnum et praeclarum principem et qualem historia nostra non novit, arripiam.

(Sorry for not waiting - limited time!!) I have always found it interesting that when historians talk about the controversy present in the early Christian Church, there is sometimes the proviso that, when seen from these modern 'irreligious' times, the debates about seemingly trivial matters can seem very odd to our modern eyes. And yet, when anyone asks questions about them and sensible people begin answering, I feel that many of the same controversies (for example, reliance on Pagan traditions for the date of Christmas, worship of the Sabbath on Sunday rather than Saturday, the 'Trinity' being 'Polytheistic', etc.) rear their heads and we can get a glimpse into the mindset of the past. When coupled with their strong Christian beliefs, we can also see why the arguments became violent: after all, the souls of 'millions' of people were at stake. Au contraire, sorry for that; please accept my apologies. I would think modern times (irrespectively on how they may be defined) are extremely diverse; far from 'irreligious', some outstanding professions of faith (Christian and otherwise) can be easily attested on a daily basis, both in and out of the Web. And we totally agree; for the extreme religious believers, heresy is literally an issue of Public Health, as all souls at any place or time might be at stake. For their own eyes, Medieval Inquisition was something like the modern CDC.

Barca is right; virtually almost just by posting in a theological forum, we are already expressing an opinion. For the sake of impartiality, when posting on fora like this one, I honestly think we should always try to behave like perfect agnostics (i.e. someone that couldn't care less if any deity exists at all). Any analysis on Christianity at Classical times is extremely difficult and complex, mainly because virtually all our sources are rather biased; Christian sources (and Jewish, and even Neoplatonic too), like any religious narrative, naturally tended to judge the world through their own doctrine; on the other other hand, non-religious sources tended to almost entirely ignore Christians and other religious movements; in fact, Christians and Jews were almost systematically studied together (a hardly surprising fact, as Christianity was originally a Jewish sect). Presumably mainly for its original sectarian condition, Christianity was quite sensible on doctrine issues from the very beginning; fierce internal conflicts were reportedly present even from the generation contemporary to Jesus. As in any other religious group, Christian heresy has been defined in hindsight, as the winner parties have literally write their History. (Galileo is a good example; since John Paul II, his ideas are officially no longer "heretic"). The word came from the Greek hairesis "a taking or choosing," from haireisthai "take, seize," from hairein "to choose." In its original non-religious philosophical context, it just means an alternative opinion. It's clear that no later than the early II century, the sectarian position of the early Judeo-Christians was utterly reversed; i.e., they were from now on considered by the other Christians as heretics, variously named as "Judaizers", "Ebionites" and so on. In the latter eyes, the former had "chosen" Moses' Law against Jesus' Law. By the II & III centuries AD, the Christians had a well developed theology; Christology (the study of the nature of Jesus Christ) became a hot topic.From the many opinions, Arius and his disciples were particularly notorious. As for most heretics, his doctrine is known only from his fierce detractors and can't be fully restored. From what we know, even for Christian theological standards, the details were rather complex and extremely tortuous, and they may seem almost absurdly trivial for third parties. For example, one of the main points was a two-letter difference on the reading of a single Greek (Koin

For once, we are now in more than 90% agreement : Yes. Please remember the Romans conquered virtually all their known world; at least up to the V century, they never found an enemy that with enough time and resources they weren't able to defeat; if they didn't conquer Persia (or Caledonia or Germania or Sarmatia or Ethiopia), that was entirely explained for purely logistic limitations; the Empire was simply too big to grow any more. Therefore, in the long run the Romans literally got the full monty: how much better would they have fared with even more and better trained cavalry? Besides, more often than not, the Romans did have an excellent cavalry at their disposition, either national or auxiliary; for example, the Armenians often performed outstandingly well against the Parthians, which was hardly surprising as both nations used essentially the same weapons and tactics. Some minor points: - All armies perform better against enemies that fought in any predictable manner; that is a tautology (i.e. a statement that is necessarily true). - For any conqueror (even for nomads like the Mongols) wilderness has always been difficult to adequately maintain peacefully, as it has always been harder to keep control over dispersed non-urban populations than over cities; ergo, another tautology. - All armies engage in control population; no one can fight against unpopulated territories . - Can you explain a bit more the concept of "area denial"?

Short answer; only sporadically.