sylla

The article on Roman slaves (servus) of the William Smith's Dictionary of Greek and Roman antiquities may be useful for your purpose, particularly the last pages.

Mmmm....what??? (Did you say Chaos?) I see.Thanks, but I think I will better wait NN to reply himself.

Had Maxentius defeated Constantine, he might have still been defeated by Licinius, who eventually signed too the Edict of Milan. Christianity doesn't seem to have been a major contributor to the fall of the Western Empire; after all, the Christian East survived another 1000 years. The culture of the classical world was undoubtedly in big problems, with or without Christianity; otherwise, its utter disappearance after the Germanic conquest couldn't be satisfactorily explained; just compare it with the evolution of the Chinese civilization after the Mongol conquest. As History is no subject of experimentation, any inference on causality is highly speculative. We must balance determinism (inevitable facts) with chaos theory (aleatory facts); available evidence consistently shows the more complex a system is, the more likely Chaos theory fully applies. Almost all historic systems (political, social, economic, etc) are extremely complex, analogous to the parable of the flap of the butterfly that changes the world climate forever. I would think only some mostly pure biologic phenomena are truly deterministic (ie, demographic growth). I must agree that the personalities' contributions to most historical events have been regularly and grossly overestimated, especially when we use to check out classical historians; after so many centuries of accumulated knowledge (particularly in sociology) we should know better. Columbus was a notorious exception, because nothing about the Castilian kingdom suggested they were looking to the other side of the Ocean; the expected step after the end of the Reconquista was the invasion of North Africa, almost entirely prevented by their ultramarine adventures. On the other hand, the Reform of the XVI century heappened for the complex coincidence of many extraordinary facts regarding Luther, the Catholic Church, Charles V, the German nobles, the peasants, the european markets and even the French dynasty. European history has been predominantly war, so the peculiarity of the early XX century was not so much the Great War as the close to half-century of almost complete peace before it. Arguably, most of the emperors from Aurelian onwards had analogous religious ideas to some degree; in fact, that may have contributed to the greatest Christian persecutions. It's a fascinating thesis, but I don't think any of this was inevitable; after all, Christianity continued being a small minority (not especially active) in the neighboring Persian Empire up to the rise of the Islam, and polytheism is still rampant in eastern and southern Asia, a huge portion of modern Humanity. BTW, if required, polytheism can be as fanatical as any monotheism.

Or in his other books, even those attributed today to Hirtius or Oppius; the legions were here always identified by number, even the Tenth. And in addition to the already mentioned legions VII and XI, that seems to have been also the case for the legions I (future Germanica) and VIIII (future Hispana); apparently both were named by Tiberius. That doesn't mean that these seven legions were unnamed under Augustus, just that their names were not systematically used and/or recorded. At least at earlier times, toponymical names were usually related to relevant military deeds, analogous to the honorific agnomina of the nobiles (Africanus, Asiaticus, Achaicus). That explains for example why the legion VIIII was Hispana after only a few years in Spain and another legion X was Fetensis after even less years guarding the Straits of Messina. In the late Empire these names were simply related to the place of formation of the unit or even to their purported original predominant nationality; that was also the case for most auxiliary units. Naturally, the naming of a Roman legion could have had many other mechanisms; ie: - Classica when recruited from a naval force; - Gemina when it was the product of the fusion of residual units; - Adiutrix when it was intended to help already existing units; - Victrix as a good omen, and so on (Needless to say, its genre was always feminine). BTW, the Pia Fidelis agnomen was awarded no less than 26 times to eight legions (up to seven times in two cases).

Agreed; the same well communicated veteran units from the Italian war plus plenty of not so well communicated mercenaries and fresh recruits in his own country against less Roman legionaries than those he was previously facing in the hostile Italy under the same commander three years before. If I didn't miss anything else, Massinissa and his Numidians seem to have been the main (if not the only) significant adverse new factor for the military equation at Zama.

Actually, Caesar never used any names for his legions in his writings; as usual along all the Republican period, their identification was exclusively numerical (even when they were re-enlisted). With the multiplicity of legion numbers after the Civil Wars and the coming of the military-based principate, most legions eventually accumulated honorific titles from satisfied emperors across many years, even centuries. Additionally, subsequent new legions were named after their recruiting emperors. For example, the Legion XI (and the VII too) were awarded with the title of Pia Fidelis (

That, and the nature of Hannibal's army in Africa vs. Italy (ie heavy reliance on fresh recruits/mercenaries in Africa and the lack of time for coordination vs. veteran "professionals" in Italy) No, because the veteran "professionals" from the war in Italy were evacuated to Africa; hence, Hannibal had at his disposition in Africa (202 BC ) both such veterans and the fresh recruits/mercenaries, a far bigger army than in Italy (205 BC). Besides, not all African Carthaginian troops were necessarily rookies; surely some of them (for example, many of Syphax

Northern Neil may have this covered with his book reference but one aspect of the 'veracity' of biblical stories, which I have increasingly become aware of, is the fact that even if we ignore centuries of possible adaption to fit biblical stories to local contexts we are looking at centuries of transcription, translation and consequent errors/ best fits being made. We do not have the 'original' text in most instances, only at best the earliest known written versions. You just have to look at the debate about the 'eye of the needle' reference on sites liek Wikipedia to see how a simple text can be intepreted in a number of different ways - e.g. did the Greek text really mean cable or was it a coded reference to a small gate which camels couldn't get past without being unloaded and going on their knees (now deemed much less likely as probably a medieval gate rather than truly ancient ) in the walls of Jerusalem. I understand that every now and again attempts have been made to go back to the earliest written sources (Aramaic, Greek, Latin or even Hebrew) and not the versions which have gone through at least three or four intervening translations. Howevert these attempts often founder when compared by religious and other scholars to what is seen as the 'authorised'/ 'authentic' versions of texts especially, when 'possibly' misguided contemporary attempts are made to write the new versions in 'modern' English. Overall there may be 'veracity' to be found in biblical stories but they need a lot of specialist knowledge to draw out and even then these are probably always going to be subject to academic debate about the correct starting point for the translation. It is an area where I feel that religious and academic studies probably will never happily co-exist so debate will continue. The real problem is that while going through umpteen iterations of translation the historic points often get overlooked in favour of the sacred - but equally the strength of the interpretation often swings on what language you are reading the text in. Melvadius If by "biblical" we are still talking just about the NT, there is almost universal consensus that the original language for most if not all books was Koine Greek. Naturally we don't have the "original" texts (irrespectively of how we may define them); the copying process unavoidably affects the text to some degree; translation is never 100% exact. Only a true religious believer could think otherwise. However, virtually all our ancient Greek and Latin sources are in the same case, and mostly for the same reasons. That doesn't preclude their use for historical research; in fact, History has always had to deal with the analysis and interpretation of narrative sources. Even Livy and Cassius Dio

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.

Athens?

Delos.

Kos.

Zama was hardly Hannibal Barca's "last battle"; he fought against Rome and/or Roman allies for no less than two decades more, under either Antiochus III or Prusias I of Bithynia; his last recorded victory (by Nepos and Frontinus) was against the fleet of Eumenes II of Pergamon, reportedly by throwing pots full of poisonous snakes onto his ships. Regarding Zama, the most notoriously ignored issue must be that most historians utterly ignore or diminish the outstanding contribution not only of Massinissa, but of the Numidian cavalry, army and resources as a whole; from where I am, that was the main (virtually the only) additional factor that might have explained why Scipio attacked Hannibal in 202 BC in Africa and not in 205 BC in Italy as a consul.

Utica.

I hope you had a nice day, amicus.

Do you consider the Amphitheatres of Britannia were exclusively or predominantly built for the the Army's leisure? Weren't they intended for the local population too? (At least for a pro-Roman elite).

Or maybe Italica.

Once the feline emergency has been solved (I hope), the obligatory classical trivia; According to RC Bansal and M Goyan, the students of Hippocrates (and even the Egyptians from the Middle Empire) used charcoal dust to remove unpleasant smells, specifically for wounds (sadly, that would hardly deter the expected gas gangrene).

It was once a bishops seat. Antioch.

I have never heard such concept in a Roman context; you may be erring on the Empire. It is a well known Romantic orientalist concept of the English literature based on the famous description by Sir George Stauton of the first British embassy to a Chinese Emperor (Quianlong) by the Earl of Macartney in September 14, 1793. It was a political metaphor specifically inspired by the gardens of the Tartar Zhe-hol Summer Palace (built by Kublai Khan and which also contributed to the Xanadu myth) when the Middle Empire was still considered as an administrative model by Europe. An extract from Stauton's Authentic Account (Ch. II): "mountains and valleis, lakes and rivers, rude precipices and gentler slopes, have been created where nature did not intend them... this world, in miniature, has been created at the command, and for the pleasure of one man, but by the hard labour of thousands'". As this metaphor doesn't sound particularly exotic, it seems perfectly possible to me that it may be found within other cultural contexts.

Wow, your feline expertise is really high level... you might have 1% odds of spotting that tiger, after all.

Your quotation comes from the current article on Decimus Brutus from en.wikipedia; as far as I can tell, the passage is exact, including the reference on the order of the strokes on Caesar, from the fragment FGrHF 130 of Nicoalus' Life of Augustus, sec. 24: "First Servilius Casca stabbed him on the left shoulder a little above the collar bone, at which he had aimed but missed through nervousness(1). Caesar sprang up to defend himself against him, and Casca called to his brother, speaking in Greek in his excitement. The latter obeyed him and drove his sword into Caesar's side. A moment before Cassius had struck him obliquely across the face(2). Decimus Brutus struck him through the thigh (3)."

That might be a good example: Wellesley didn't expel the French alone, not even just with his army; in fact, most of the 300,000 or so French casualties in Spain were not killed by the British. The French expulsion from the Iberian Peninsula required an immense effort from both the popular guerrilla and the regular armies of both Portugal and Spain in concert with the British expeditionary force

Is this Asia Minor? (as a clue)