Onasander

Ummm.... No style of fighting is ever beneath a infantry soldier. Just some are unreasonable in context. Like techniques that seriously hurt others in a unit, or injure a soon to be made slave.... you want the highest returns for such people. But never is there a fighting art too low. And further, it's not an anachronism to consider the Romans had a concept of fighting styles, they, after all, gave us that concept via the various forms of gladitorial fighting styles. A Roman military colony had arenas, and arenas had gladiators. A soldier fighting in a particular style in his off time, doesn't lower himself in status when done with fellow soldiers. Even a commander such rank as Julius Caesar could get down and dirty on show occasions if he cared to WITHIN his own legions in good sport. The highest rank of the republic, after all was a military dictatorship. The capacity to hold your own is a prerequisite. Making sure your men could fight wasn't a slaves job, it was very legitimately the highest commanders duty, and failure his fault. In order to do this, you gotta get dirty on occasion. Your lower ranks are indeed lower ranks, but you draw your subject matter experts in terms of technique, training, and simple brutality from them. How prevalent was it? By the time of say, Onasander.... I suspect it damn near WASN'T universal, but still practiced..... until the end of the empire. But whenever you see evidence of a competent, highly trained roman unit.... you can rest assured the ranks got rough with one another in mixed training and trusted one another, because they knew from top to bottom what everyone was capable of. In mordern armies, officers or NCOs don't fight with the lower enlisted in off schedule training, but it still happens still even then, and though cautious of becoming too familiar in terms of the seperation of rank, isn't bad... often seen as a good thing. But in offical training, everyone gets thrown in, rank be damn. Few times you can get away with pinning down and tormenting the bastard too. Good way to root out who are your field leaders, and who should be more involved in paper work and planning.

Umm.... no. It's ridiculously.... you don't op for less shielding and nimblesness against a calvary archer force, or shock attack forces. That... is stupid. They were not out there dodging arrows. Roman Army got lazy. Outside of the ore needed, and the soldiers pay, everything needed, including black smithing skills and training for horse and infantry, could of been simply "made" locally by a far sighted commander or governor. It's basically what they did during the middle ages under feudalism. Just suggests Rome was over centralized, the Roman army became lax in terms of foreign deployments and standardization, and the emperors just didn't care about quality over quantity anymore. A severe contraction of a economy in ancient times means less logistics by sea, but not in attracting hungry recruits willing for less pay but more food and job security. They can maintain their own herds, cut their own lumber, train their own men, etc. Just that gold and silver is useful for mercenary troops, attracting and retaining better commanders, hiring highly qualified architects for forttesses, paying local governors, etc.

Cavemen?

I discussed this with a friend. At first I was thinking at very first glance as Byzantine or Persian, but upon further analysis nothing added up. That helmet isn't a combat helmet, 100% certain of this. It's worthless on a horse, see the KKK Calvary charge scene from Django for the reason why.... this guy would of been lost in battle swatting at his own men, or fighting against the branches of a tree most heroically. It's a centurian helmet. Horse is porly armored, as is he. His sword is outdated, so is late republic, early empire.... for close quarter combat. His shield isn't very well thought out either. His lance (?) is all around questionable. This guy wasn't shock calvary, but depended greatly on maneuver and cross parrying. There is a guy in Brasil who teaches old portugese calvary techniques that requires aggressive horse to rider techniques, alot of fancy hoofwork..... expected to hold his own against a crowd of pissed off opponents rather than charge right through them. If this guy was expected to hold off in battle, he would of needed that capacity.... taking his lance/staff and wacking everyone like jackie chan. His lack of armor, infantry shield and sword suggests however he didn't expect much mounted combat, and if it came, it was dismounted. I seriously hope his batman was carring his armor for him. I would be of mixed feelings trying to ambush this guy. Unlike a highly skilled medieval knight who I wouldn't hesitate to trip his horse up with a rope and stab him ruthlessly in the eye slit, this guy was clearly of the economic class to know what he was doing and could pull off that fancy footwork and badh me and my compatriots upside the head in any attempt. However, the fool likely couldn't see it coming and is so poorly armored, that he might just be a high ranking idiot who doesn't know where he is, much less see you coming. He might be Rambo, might be Dumbo.... hard to tell. Lack of meaningful horse armor, no evidence of cross bows, etc rules outa serious calvary unit from byzantine era. No christian insignia. I'm not even positive that's a lance or staff.

I'm still rooting for the Republic of Ireland to try and settle old scores against Scotland prior to any attempt for the Scots to rejoun NATO. Norway or Denmark can snag some islands back.

That is found occasionally here in the upper ohio valley, but I mostly just use anything other than sandstone (you have to grind sandstone, good for say nets anchors, but bad for most other operations, as it's largely just.... sand.) There is a site one hundred miles southwest of here, that has green jade, similar properties to obsedian cutting wise. A trade item apparently in old times. This is a old steel mill town. If you read the children's book "No Star Nights" it gives you a understanding of the degree of industrialization here, and the enviromental toll un terms of slag waste deposits. You have a lot of impurities left over from steel, in a molten state, and have to dump it somewhere... so they dug a hugh ditch a few stories deep parallel to some tracks, and simply poured it off the side, standing in silver suits and face hoods. I would hide out as a kid on the opposite side at night, and watch the lava pour. After a while, they would leave and I would run down ti the lavaflats, and look for the think dryed out crusty grey portions.... and throw newspaper on it. If the newspaper didn't light up in flames, I would run across, high stepping it, never more than one foot on the ground, to get to the wall where the lava first hits.... at about eye level is where little black,blue and white obsedian like rock would form.... not in lumps, but in little cylinder like coils. I used to collect that stuff, alot to brittle to be of use, but some quite solid..... looks awesome as a spear tip, just severly doubt it's functionality. If you have a old steel mill nearby, you have obsedian like rock under the slag deposits. Just know slag is inherently unstable, and you gotta dpread your weight.... and can easily end up losing ground quicker than you climb, plus inviting a mini acalance.

Not saying he did this purposely. De Ja Vue and authors unconsciously plagiarizing..... Jung noting Nietzsche did it, Charles Dickens questioning if he somehow did it, is common. I suppose historians are especially prone to this. I'll have to think about the cognitive parallels and neurological origins of this,and it's implications for the science aspects of history. Religious Apologetics, especially Catholic-Orthodox and Hindu Theologians are prone to it, removing whole theories out of context at times, applying them as new.... out of context. Syncretism fits well for them, but I don't think historians are favorable towards applying a concept of "Historical Syncretism" to ourselves. Just sounds..... bad.

I literally just found this, looks eerily similar, which uncomfortably suggests this theory migrated from the 19th century Germany to explain the origins of Dorian Greece, to the 21st Century to explain Late Roman and Medieval identities. If that's the case, then we have a disturbing conundrum on our hands..... a fully formed historical hypothesis that manages to replicate itself over time, by forcing the facts to fit it's already formed outlook, like a virus. Here is the section I found on Wikipedia: In 1824 Karl Otfried Müller's Die Dorier was published in German and was translated into English by Tufnel and Lewis for publication in 1830. They use such terms as "the Doric invasion"[8] and "the invasian of the Dorians"[9] to translate Müller's "Die Einwanderung von den Doriern" (literally: "the migration of the Dorians"),[10] which was quite a different concept. On one level the Einwanderung meant no more than the Heraklidenzug, the return of the Heracleidae. However, Müller was also applying the sense of Völkerwanderung to it, which was being used of the Germanic migrations. Müller's approach was philological. In trying to explain the distribution of tribes and dialects he hypothesized that the aboriginal or Pelasgian population was Hellenic. His first paragraph of the Introduction asserts:[11] "The Dorians derived their origin [der Ursprung des dorischen Stammes] from those districts in which the Grecian nation bordered toward the north upon numerous and dissimilar races of barbarians. As to the tribes which dwelt beyond these borders we are indeed wholly destitute of information; nor is there the slightest trace of any memorial or tradition that the Greeks originally came from those quarters." Müller goes on to propose that the original Pelasgian language was the common ancestor of Greek and Latin,[12] that it evolved into Proto-Greek and was corrupted in Macedon and Thessaly by invasions of Illyrians. This same pressure of Illyrians drove forth Greeks speaking Achaean (includes Aeolian), Ionian and finally Dorian in three diachronic waves, explaining the dialect distribution of Greek in classical times.[13] http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dorian_invasion I don't know what to call this phenomena. I was just googling Minoan philosophy, saw "Return of the Heracleidae" and followed it. Obvious parallelism, but I don't knowwhat to call this phenomena in the discipline of history. Hypothesis Creep has a good ring to it, but want to denote it comes from a older unrelated theory. Crypto-Archaic Hypothesis Creep. Took a long time on thesaurus.com to figure out how to coin it. My definition: The Axiomatic Structure underlining a theory that has managed overtime, to detach itself from the older theory and migrate to a newer, at face value unrelated theory, appearing original, thought provoking and cutting edge, despite it's much earlier, sometimes but not always, discredited origins.

was there a correlation between names and spacing ratios? If we were to make a map of these areas, I'm guessing alot of South to North Divisions.... If this is the case, was there ratios for tribal identity to given space WITH additional regard to population, and were the Roman Legions with and Without the federated tribes balanced on this north south axis centrally in each case, for easy defense of the Roman side and penetration into the barbarian side? It's the difference between a scalar and static field. If the Romans though static in terms of geographical deposition of their opposition, and ordered their legions accordingly, a domino effect could mess everything up when groups moved laterally instead of north to south piecemeal. I would be forced to conclude it was a mistake on the imperial palace level then if this is what happened.

I honestly doubt the US will be around in 5000 years, outside of a geographical context, like Egypt or Thrace. If it is around, it likely would of mutated by then into something unrecognizable. I think the founding fathers would largely recognize us today, but the technological boom of the 19th century to Today suggests in 5000 years, things will be very, very different. People may hover in silence on a invisible internet, never seem to eat, poop or reproduce and teleport everywhere..... or kill themselves if they get hangnail because their brains are backed up and clones very readibly available. Such a society may identify with us, but I don't think Benjamin Franklin walking around such a space city would identify with them.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/the-fall-of-rome-italys-fears-that-corporatesponsored-restoration-projects-will-lead-to-the-disneyfication-of-its-cultural-heritage-9717010.html Apparently, our troops during WW2 forgot, while clearing the streets and buildings of Europe of Fascists, to continue the push into the universities and arrest those art professors. The Fascists live on, and are at war against pragmatism, private donations, and civic pride for businesses to fund badly needed restoration projects. I suspect these protesters only eat organic microbacterial diets, and inform poor people the are opressed because they can't eat exclusively bacteria too. I have no patience for these people, and think UNESCO should have a special swat team that uses tranquilizer darts, to move in on these Fascists, captr them, and force them into a dark room playing videos on economics and budget debates, before dumping them back on the street again days later after midnight in some alley behind a poorly restored monument. They make me very angry. It's not like these companies are carving their name into these monuments.

Northern Panhandle of West Virginia. We had a hugh steel mill that opened up 1908, alot of Greeks came, especially after the genocide in.Smyrna..... If you go to Chicago or Toronto, they have the largest hellenic population outside of Greece. The Greeks always are very, very nostalgic. Here in west virginia, they love Marseilles because Chios founded it, and many from Chios moved here.... therefore in their wacky mind, they are related. Same for Christopher Colombus, who is as greek Chios as it gets to them. And everyone is cousins to greek shipping captains. One fought world war 2 as a merchant marine, and was prisoner or war in Libya. Another was a soldier of the US Army during the soviet insurgency into greece, he broke the law back then before official american involvement in teaching them how to dismantle floating mines in the harbors. Another here is a cousin to US Major General Pagonis who was second in command during desert storm.... he lives across the border in Pennsylvania and apparently breeds fancy horses. The Patriach of the Greek Orthodox Church was formerly a deacon of the retired Metro here when he was younger.... I can go on and on and on.... that is what Greeks do. They haven't changed much.... greek sailors have a home in every harbor, via the extended family. And this Parthenon here... small. They would cook lamb in it. Greeks always build a Parthenon on the highest point of ground in a city. Why? I dunno. Just know that is the case... perhaps left pver from the classical or hellenistic era, or a modern romance. As a philosopher... I'm a natural byproduct of Alexander the Great's attempt to hellenize the world. I'm reading Theophrastus' surviving works. I couldn't do that had I not had the build from other hellinic authors for years prior. I am the end product Alexander wanted. Xountless others in history did the same. It will continue. It's easy to overlook and forget this.... this is exactly how the greeks colonized and spread.

Could just be a old bucket, from prior to the ban.... or a special export for barbarians. Ummmm.... knowing several byxantine greeks here, I can say they are very nostalgic. They built a mini repluca of the hagai sophia as their church here, and a very small Parthenon on the highest hilltop, and haven't exactly suffered having access to the greek classics. Just suggests that they already began their cultural freeze already.

I had Apraxia, and my spelling never quite has come out correctly myself. It would be silly of me to judge negatively. I haven't gotten that far into it, rarely read fiction these days, and yours is the first historic fiction I've read since Ivanhoe.... I have a fear of the underlining ontology of fiction writers writing on strategy or warfare is going to mess with my understanding unconsciously.... I'm getting rather good at predicting the course and methods used in wars.... I explain what will happen on philosophy sites at the very start, and with minor differences at best, it happens that way. Been covering the current Iraq ISIS campaign.... pissed alot of people off. I only trusted your work given your background. Like I said, I don't like fantasy to get mixed up. One thing I noted was in your book the initial battle was "taken" from a manuscript parchment discovered on a dig, taken from the perspective of the losing (Roman) side. It would be interesting, if you do it in this book or the next, find some fragments for a appendix of a greek historian who was captured by a barbarian tribe, who knew of the Roman reputation, and yet somehow came to the conclusion it was a swell idea to invade Italy anyway..... and what they made sense of regarding roman tactics and strategy up to the battle, why they stuck through it while losing, and how they felt psychologically afterwards making sense of it. Right now, ISIS in Iraq has lost it's momentum, is losing along three fronts, systemmatic attacks on any gatherings or convoy movements.... yet they still go on the offensive, despite losing a tenth of their total claimed forces the last few days. They are routing everywhere, but many are still like "No, this is a swell Idea, lets jump into a death trap and die like martyrs..... yippee". And they do just that. It makes sense to me what the Iraqi gov is doing, I can explain the underlining neurology that makes ISIS what it is, and in one sense can predict them..... but there is this severe sense of disbelief in knowing even in the best of times, this was the inevitable direction they were heading, just how on earth could their lead commanders not know it too? Why go forward with a losing strategy.... Its a factor of mystification on my part. Everything in the west is aimed at studying the mistakes of the past, and how to overcone friction with very low lost of manpower.... I imagine one in a while colonels and generals talking in conference must one in a while just pause.... get existentialist, blink a few times and begin to have serious questioning doubts as to the enemies grasp of awareness and underlining insanity of their actions. It hurts my faith in humanity sometimes. Human beings shouldn't be that stupid, no matter what side they are on. I wonder if Roman commanders thought the same waiting for bandit hordes to come strolling out of the Alps for the umpteenth time..... concepts like discipline, honor, heroics fade away..... and your just looking at these gleeful fools numbly, walking into anbush. Afterwards, just staring at their warchief, your counterpart in their force wincing in a cage..... trying to find that which is you in them..... do they comprehend? Have they figured it out? Or is it just a hamster on a wheel running around in their head, completely oblivious to the underlining nature of events that lead to his loss and capture.

Yeah, I first started reading it last night, found four mistakes, like Goggle Maps.... but whatever, it is what it is. What happened to Carthage for book two?

There are more texts than this..... especially later in the Roman empire, alot of colonel and above oriented works out there actually. Since your going for a US Army S-3 approach, and got to a Lt. Colonel rank, whereas I was a low ranking spaz, I'm going to recommend to you Virgil 61. There was some bruised egos a while back, and half while this site was down went one way under him, other half stayed put. We differ in focus in military history, and is my equal (though differing in emphasis of military history study)..... but I think for your precise needs, he is the best choice I know for you to go and knock up for information, as he can much better anticipate your needs for a potential reading list and much better criticize and review your ideas.... he was at least a 1sg, was Airborne Infantry (like me) then a leg, and I think he mentioned being a CSM..... so you two should get react to one another instinctively in terms of him catching you up to speed. Better than some Specialist like me on a forum. However, if you still get stuck with a question, ask me and I can help. This is his forum: http://classicalhistory.invisionzone.com/ He is the administrator, and don't tell him I sent you.

I wouldn't quite blame the roman citizenry on that one, doubt just how to torture him came down to a public forum discussion and vote..... think that was more the inventiveness of a single man..... not to say such a man wouldnt be moved by including constructive imput by others.

Its our native tongue, and we are the largest speakers of it, in terms of population of native speakers in a single country. You should also stop disrespecting the Queen and use her system of measurements, instead of that frog Napoleon. My state has THE OLDEST dialect of continuously spoken English. Yours has, people who speak some kind of neo-gibberish.... that is increasingly not English.

Basically, Kevlar. You can buy it by the roll.

No.... scipio fought second punic was 218-202. He wrote about the destruction of the city in 146. 50 years plus, but gives you a intellectual sense of the city, and hannibals background. He was quite civilized, as was his people.

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herillus http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clitomachus_(philosopher) Clitomachus continued to reside at Athens till the end of his life; but he continued to cherish a strong affection for his native country, and when Carthage was taken in 146 BC, he wrote a work to console his unfortunate countrymen. This work, which Cicero says he had read, was taken from a discourse of Carneades, and was intended to exhibit the consolation which philosophy supplies even under the greatest calamities.[5] His work was highly regarded by Cicero,[6] who based parts of his De Natura, De Divinatione and De Fato on a work of Clitomachus he names as On the Withholding of Assent (Latin: De Sustinendis Offensionibus).[7] Clitomachus probably treated the history of philosophy in his work on the philosophical sects: On the Schools of Thought (Greek: περί αἱρέσεων).[8] Two of Clitomachus' works are known to have been dedicated to prominent Romans, the poet Gaius Lucilius and the one-time consul Lucius Marcius Censorinus,[9] suggesting that his work was known and appreciated in Rome.

Hmmm.... okay. You do know my name is a Roman military theorist, right? http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0674991729?pc_redir=1404841565&robot_redir=1 When I was in the army, the first captain of the unit I was in messed up his inventories by several hundred thousand dollars, not counting the humvees he was missing..... he didn't pay attention to what he was and wasnt signing for, and got screwed bad for it. They moved him to Battalion, then somehow got rid of him by sending him to west point. I gave him my copy of this edition to read and bring with him. Dont take Asclepciodotus too seriously, he was a Stoic screwing around on a topic he didnt know, but Aeneas Tacticus would of been important. Onasander was very general.... never made claim to originality. He is a principate writer, but the War Scroll of the dead sea Scroll is mostly just extracts similar to Onasander..... so the text got around as traditions prior to Onasander slapping the final concept together. You also have Frontinius to look over. Look to to Cicero's Republic, it deals alot with Scipio Africanus. I know more, just cant think of it. Oh.... Arrian, he was a Stoic Historian, wrote mostly on Epictetus, but also produced a very fine work on Alexander the great. If I recall correctly, a Cartheginian was incharge of either Plato or Aristotles school in Athens at the time. Oh, and check this site' archeology section, they just uncovered the first example of a Cartheginian helmet off sicily, and found the Roman ships were smaller and more powerful. Belisarius in Libya and Carthage much later on gives you a appreciation of how the armies would of moved, as well as The Jugunthine War, which takes place after your era, but still useful. http://mathematica.ludibunda.ch/areas.html Of course, works on statecraft existed, from the peripatetic and stoic traditions. Philosophers dont exist in a void, if one cane to dominate Athens from carthage, it suggests a library or something resembling a school from Carthage working in connection to the senatorial class. Then again, perhaps not.

Are you talking about those hugh Motte and Bailey mounds? Im talking ditches.

http://www.unrv.com/forum/topic/17686-rome-seeks-%C2%A325-million-to-save-emperor-neros-lavish-palace/ The ghost of Nero is reaching out from beyond the dead to drop one last, extravagant spending spree on the people.

Wait..... yeah, Ive seen like two episodes of top gear.... the one in Vietnam where he is chugging up a hillside in a bike painted as a american flag, blarring 'born in the usa'. Its a good show. I wouldnt buy it, but it be in my top choices if I was in the hospital flipping tv channels to watch. Depends on what kind of surgery the TLC channel was showing.