Virgil61

It's these leadership abilities combined with a sense of confidence (his and his soldier's), a choice to make sacrifices for speed and his willingness to take the risks that makes him a great commander. Those strengths are often his greatest weaknesses; call it a trade-off in the matrix of military operations. Whatever his drawbacks the bottom line is that his opponents made more mistakes than JC did.

Thanks, I know about the memory leak problem. I've read on Mozilla forums that some users have had similar problems to mine but no solution's been offered.

I'm using XP. FF works the majority of the time, but after prolonged usage it begins to 'hang' and I've noticed that my computer runs slower.

Yes, twice. It could just be in conflict with something on my computer, unfortunately I have no idea what.

Anyone using firefox find the 2.0 version buggy? For some reason it gums up my computer at times and tends to 'hang' or freeze as well. I've been a long time user but finsd that IE7 is much more stable.

Tournament's over for me.

I honestly believe that it could be the simple contrast of a competitive Republic versus a Principate in which advancement was only gained by the goodwill of the Princeps. As distasteful as that may seem to us now, we have to remember that the wars of Marius/Sulla and Octavian/Antony had been seen as factional rivalries, and once there was one man in control, promising an end to all the strife, the exhausted populace fell for it. (What is really interesting is why?) Whatever Republican facade Augustus may have hid behind, he was very firmly in control of the state. It is what I have always believed, Cato - but I would certainly welcome other views and arguments. It was anathema to Cicero to conceive of one supreme ruler - it went against everything he believed in. Augustus had been brought up with Julius as a 'role model', so the idea was not so alien to him. But you are right - a discussion on how the populace saw the merits of peace and a halt to imperial expansion would be fascinating. You may be on to something. It just may be that the answer to MPC's question is that it is a measure of Augustus' control that he was able to 'manage' such expectations. Governors like Cornelius Gallus who got carried away with self-promotion in Egypt or generals such as Crassus' grandson who expected a triumph and a spolia opima (those who got 'to big for their britches' as they say) seem to have simply disappeared from public life. Whatever else he was, he was an extremely competent politician. Karl Rove might even learn a trick or two from our Octavian.

Tar Heels lost a ten point lead to Georgetown and choked in overtime. Maybe next year.

Congrats to Augusta and to all who took the time to enter!

Normally, job security precludes me from answering that question (especially when my alma mater Michigan plays my employer and arch-rival OSU)... [/url]. Ouch, that is a touchy situation, Big Ten fans are rabid. One of my best friends got her PhD at UNC; a school her grandfather, father and mother all went to. One of the buildings is named after an ancestor as as is one of the streets on campus. 'Tar Heel born' as they say. She got two offers, one at Catholic and one nearby. She took the one nearby and now works at...Duke ('it' and UNC are only 9 miles apart). She struggles. I'll check out those brackets.

Carolina beats USC. Looked like the Trojans were gonna blow us out but the Heels outpaced them. Ohio State v Tar Heels tomorrow. MPC not an OSU fan I take it?

Frankly they all had some culpability in the Republic's demise but weren't the underlying cause. Somewhere during the growth of the Republic its institutions began to fail in dealing with the internal political dynamics and stresses. If the Gracchi, Marius, Sulla, etc., even JC, were never born others would have taken their places in the list.

Yeah they did, but the Heels pulled it out at the end. Heels just had a deeper bench rotating their guys as much as they did it wore MSU out. That Neitzel is a heck of a player. Looks like it's USC-Carolina next week. NCAA March Madness

I enjoyed that game myself! E. Kentucky scared me for a minute when they came back from 20 points and got within 4 of the Heels. They're in Winston-Salem for Michigan St., almost like a home game. EDIT: In case anyone is interested you can watch the games online at the CBS sports page. Go halfway down the page to NCAA March Madness on Demand.

This might add to the debate, or not. I'd posted this a few months back: Myths of British Ancestry Excerpt: Everything you know about British and Irish ancestry is wrong. Our ancestors were Basques, not Celts. The Celts were not wiped out by the Anglo-Saxons, in fact neither had much impact on the genetic stock of these islands

The question could easily be turned on its head and stated as such: Since the Romans were generally more 'democratic' in their individual political make-up why did they submit themselves to discipline more so than a person under the authoritarian rule of an Eastern King? I think using the client relationship is reading far too much into it. Sometimes the answer is far simpler; Early Romans fought a lot and learned the lessons of discipline; pickets who fell asleep led to surprise attacks, formations who stuck it out had a far higher rate of survival or even success, formations who fled led to incredible losses and so on. Sometimes we want to make nice theories about issues that are fairly straightforward. I'm far more inclined to say that the Romans, through hard fought experience, hit on the formula for success. I'm not saying that there may be no input from the client/patron system, but I'd argue it isn't terribly relevant. The Romans found an common-sense organizational training approach that worked (they were like that). To illustrate the point in its extreme, it's a bit like asking how the client/patron system influenced the Roman approach to engineering arches.

I think it might be important to note that some rudimentary elements of democracy endured for generations under the Principate, at least at the local level in the West--Italy, Spain, Greece, perhaps Gaul--outside of Rome. I suspect it wasn't always pretty nor a purely democratic--local politics, factionalism, even feuds and all--but the indications are that it was fairly resilient as a form of urban governance. That it took economic upheaval in the 4th century under the Dominate to bring it to an end might be instructive (or not), but it's certainly interesting. I'd like to have found some literature focusing on the topic, even a dissertation, but no luck so far. I think there were some economic reasons (inflation) for the difficulty in tax collection in the 4th century if I recall Heather (I'll have to dig him up) that led to fewer people wanting the position. I remember he also made a salient point that once appointed rather than elected fewer and fewer civic projects occurred in urban areas since there was really no point in the new officials currying favor with the locals.

Happy 34th MPC! GJC also sends his regards.

I'd seriously challenge the idea that the client/patron relationship had anything but a tangential influence on discipline. The client/patron relationship seems to be a factor in many societies, not all of which produced disciplined armies. The world has never lived in fear of a Latin American army to use a more contemporary example. And, as MPC stated, the Spartans with a vastly different society produced disciplined armies. The idea that you imbue soldiers with a determination to hold their formation or strictly follow orders seems more the outcome of the hard won experience of constant warfare, something the early Romans had a substantial history of. The same goes for training, something discipline is useless without, and that the clientelae institution doesn't explain. What it would explain it is a Roman Army structure where clients led their own groups into battle, something more akin to say what the Gallic and German clans and tribes may have done. Polybius gives a fine example of an army organization during a large call up of citizens who gather at a certain hour on the parade ground (though by this time it may have been centuries in the making). The several tribunes each pick four men at a time, much like we would a softball team, until they are all assigned. Not something that lends to a clientelae relationship in the smaller group sense at least.

No one's mentioned the Brazen Bull. Hollow, bull-shaped and made out of bronze or iron. Put victim inside, light fire underneath and watch as they slowly roast to death. For added warped factor make the bulls nose a horn configuration which amplifies the victim's screams to mimic that of a real bull. Supposedly favored by the Greeks and, like many things, adopted by our Romans.

Graffiti at both Pompeii and Herculaneum show that, at least at the urban level, elections were still ongoing well into the Principate in Italy. Additionally I remember reading about excavations in Spain that revealed a constitutional template of sorts for local governance and elections, dated I think to the 1st or 2d centuries AD. I recall Peter Heather indicating that under Diocletian local officials became to the central Imperial government. The result of this being less involvement to curry favor by the more influential locals; could this be an indication that perhaps this need to curry local favor may mean civic elections had continued into the early 4th century? My best guess is these civic elections during the Principate were mostly confined to Western Europe in cities more heavily populated by Roman settlers, at least at first, and perhaps Greece. Any commentary, or better yet, studies that address the issue of democracy in cities during the empire?

Belated Birthday young man!

BURN!!! BURN you little rampscallion!!!!! Sucks that Carolina lost to GT last night. The GT crowd was chanting "overrated" and rushed the court afterwards--they acted like they'd won the national title. That happens almost any time Carolina has a road loss. Duke on Sunday, last game of the season!

As any Tar Heel worth his or her salt will tell anyone that'll listen, there are only two teams to follow; Carolina (sorry Gamecock's there's only one school everyone knows when they hear that word) and Duke. The first to root for, the second to root against and despise (see my sig).

Nice review PP, very well-written.