DecimusCaesar

I read in Michael Wood's book 'In Search of the Trojan war' that a tablet had been found in the Hittite capital , it was a letter sent to the Hittite King. Some Scholars were suggesting that the letter might have been written by the historical Paris son of Priam. Seeing as the book was made in the 80s has anyone heard if this idea has been disproved or not?

Great Pictures Pertinax

Another reason for the Persian loss is that many of their troops were inexperienced and had been ordered from their homes to fight in a distant land against an enemy they never heard of. The Greeks often had superior training and were often better armed than the auxillaries used by the Persian King. This does not mean that the Persians had an inferior army, but at Marathon the Greeks attacked the weak inexperienced flank of the Persian army, causing it too collapse. This panicked the Veterans of the Persian army who were just as well armed and trained as the Greek Hoplites. It is certainly true that the Persians on their one territory had a much more diverse army. They could field armies with chariots, archers, cavalry and even war elephants. The Greeks at the time depended on their heavily armed and armoured infantry. We can only guess at what might have happened if the Persians would have been able to unleash their entire forces on Greece.

True, guns were never really useful against the natives. Neither were Crossbows. Like Julius Ratus said the swords and armour of the Conquistadors were of high quality steel and very little could penetrate them. The Conquistadors who fought against the Incas depended on a lightning quick attack to capture Atahulpa. The horses had an important part in this and in subsequent fights against the natives. The natives had no weapon to counter a good cavalry charge (except the Aztecs within the last few days of the Siege of Tenochtitlan - who created long pike-like spears)as a result the cavalry found it easy to crush the natives. You often read of the Conquistadors charging (on foot and on horseback) into massive crowds of indian warriors, being highly outnumbered and still emerging victorius due to their strong armour, superior swords (many natives only had clubs with obsidian blades in them) and the fact that they were veterans of wars in Europe. The only thing that the Conquistadors really feared were the native slings (and some arrows) that would sometimes find a place between their armour.

Hilarious stuff, especially the emperors who set fire to themselves. Oddly enough I think the article is spoofing the 'research' of a Russian scientist who cliams that there was no Roman Empire and it was just the product of the minds of the Rennaisance. Then again that might well have been a joke. It sounded like one at least.

I was surprised to see that monster too. I Knew that Ephialtes was meant to be a monster in the film, but there seems to be quite a few of them according to the trailer, including one man who has a face similar to an animal. You can be pretty sure that this one won't be in the least bit historical in terms of storyline, characters, costumes or anything else. I even think they will add a rock soundtrack to the movie. I agree. When I first saw pictures and footage of this film I knew they were never going to attempt to do a faithful recreation of the Battle of Thermopylae. This is going to be a action/adventure blockbuster made to look like the comic book it's based on, and not on Greek history.

Yes, this is true Alexander of Epirus (the Molossian) did launch an invasion of Italy. He had married Alexander's sister Cleopatra and was killed in a skirmish against either the Samnites or Campanians.

Maybe a little of this intrest in Rome and history in general exists strongly now because we are living in the first decade of the new millennium. In the run up to the Millennium a series of historical documentaries and books were released because people were feeling increasingly nostalgic and wanted to know how far we had come since the beginning of the last millennium (and even before that). Gladiator might have been released during the first year of the new millennium to reflect that, which has led to a resurgence of intrest in history, including that of Ancient Rome. It has of course been fuelled by the release of more and more books, TV shows, documentaries and Films.

Aye! Anyone seen the documentary on the DVD? I was surprised that she had such a thick Irish accent in real life. I saw hints of it in the film 'Unleashed' ...I think the film is called 'Danny the Dog' in the US.

I have searched through my books and I cannot find the source of this claim. The only mentions made of Dracula is his impaling of the Turkish Emissaries. Perhaps I read it on a website or heard it on a Television program I do not know. Perhaps I have imagined it or mistaken him for another person. I apologise if I have caused confusion. Has anyone else come across a similar source?

I have checked and the sword used is a Gladius hispanienses. The sword handle of the Triarius is very celtic looking, although the scabbard looks like those carried by Iberians. A Celt-Iberian weapon perhaps? Seeing as the state manufactured the weapons in the Fabricae during the later period, I would think that perhaps earlier on (especially before the establishment of the Imperial Legion (1st Century BC-AD) the men were allowed to keep the weapons.

NOTE: The original thread heading has a mistake, It is Dr. Simon James not Professor as I previously stated. I have been reading more of Dr. Simon James's work and he does make some very good points about Ancient Britain not being Celtic. The problems with his ideas still remains though. He says that the term 'Celtic' is too vague and generic and that there is no evidence of anyone in Britain calling themslves Celts and as a result the term 'Iron Age Tribes' is more appropriate. Yet this term is vague, generic, and doesn't tell you anything about the people who occupied the land. The people of that time certainly would not have referred to themselves as 'Iron Age Tribes'. We can never be sure what they called themselves because they haven't left any real descriptions of themselves only as what the Romans referred to them (Britanii, or the names of the individual tribes). So what is the differance therefore of calling them 'Celts' or 'Iron Age Tribes' ? At least 'Celts' sounds better. There are numerous names that historians have coined for peoples who share similar language and culture: The Aztecs never called themselves by that name, they referred to themselves as 'Mexica' and their language as 'Nahuatl'. The same could be said for the Byzantines who called themselves 'Romaioi' yet the name 'Byzantine' was created by a French historian in the 19th century. Seeing as the peoples of Iron Age Britain (especially Southern England) shared a common language, art, religion, mythology and culture with those on mainland Europe and that these tribes were similar, wouldn't it make sense to call them 'Celts' unless historians find a better or more appropriate term than 'Celts' or 'Iron Age Peoples/Tribes'? I am not saying that these peoples were part of a unified political group (they obviously weren't - they were warring tribes) but neither were the Mayans, yet historians still talk of a Mayan people who shared similar traits with each other, even though they were disunited and scattered over a large area. I think that Dr. Simon James said a few years ago that he wanted to stir debate in the subject and that is why he brought the idea up - and like I have said there are many valid points in his theories. Yet, unfortunately his ideas have become popular in the rest of Europe too and now French historians like Christian Goudineau have gone one step further and claiming that the Celts did not exist at all. Period. When Caesar wrote the line - He must have been slightly mad as he was fighting against a group of people who didn't exist. It's one thing to say that there were no Celts in Britain (which has some truth in it as Dr. Simon James has pointed out) it's another to deny their exsistance entirely when we have written evidence of the Greeks and Romans calling these people 'Celts'. He denies there were a racial group of Celts (which didn't exist in all of Britain) and a linguistic and cultural group of Celts, so the the Helvetii, Aedui and all the other Gallic tribes had no similarities. They had nothing in common. It is true that many ancient geographers lumped the barbarian tribes of western Europe into one group which they called Celtic (this includes the tribes of Germania and numerous other entities) and that this was obviously an error on their part, yet to deny that there were similarities between the Tribes of Gaul seems odd. They were distinct from those in Germania who were part of the Jartoff culture (The Celts of Gaul were part of the La Tene culture) so it makes sense therefore to say that the Aeduii, Helvetii etc were 'Celts', or at least part of the same La Tene culture. Perhaps this argument is really just about the human need to put groups of similar things into boxes so that they can become easily identifiable. Perhaps there were no Celts. Perhaps there were. What we do know is that across Western Europe groups of people shared the same language, culture, mythology, religion, art etc and that these groups might have or might not referred to themselves as Celts. We also know that many things about them, especially language and to a lesser extent culture, have survived (in an evolved form) to the modern day. Will people start referring to the 'Celtic' style art as 'Iron Age' art? Will 'Celtic' Music be called 'Iron Age' music...more importantly will the languages of the Celts be called 'Iron Age languages' ? (It's a joke among some 'Celtic' scholars today to refer to anyone who speaks 'Breton, Cornish, Welsh or Gaelic' as 'Iron Age speakers'). Dr.Simon James's attempt to curb Celtic ultra-nationalism is noble. All too often history is distorted to fit into an agenda for political reasons. We have seen ourselves that Ancient Rome became a beacon for Fascists in the 20th Century, yet to claim that there were no Romans seems an odd way to stop nationalism...put simply the nationalists will find another symbol if they are denied one. The nationalists would still be around even if there was 100% proof that there were no Celts, because they(the nationalists) exist due to modern grievances not because of ancient ones. It would therefore seem that instead of damaging the credibility of a tiny group of nationalists, this theory has muddled and confused our image of an ancient people. Without the label of 'Celts' and lacking a new identity, it's becoming increasingly hard to grasp the idea of who these 'Iron Age Tribes' were.

I'm sorry I should have elaborated more. I didn't mean to say that the lives of the plebs were boring, it was that if you take away conflict in a tv drama like Rome, many people would see it boring. If Vorenus would not argue with his wife, almost come to blows with Pullo and get into scraps with Erastes Fulman then a lot of people would not have been interested. As terrible as it sounds, it seems that conflict gets people's attentions and keeps them interested.

One of my friends used to be terrified of horses before, but then again he didn't like any sort of farmyard animal. The Spanish horses, if they were like the horses used by Norman Knights were specially trained to rear up and attack people in battle by biting and kicking them. The Incans and other Native peoples who had never seen horses before, thought that the Conquistadores on horseback were half man half animal.

You can put it on your list Pertinax, I am thinking of writing a review for Peter Brown's book, The World of Late Antiquity. Not sure If I am going to do it though.

It's interesting to see that they wore arms and armour, although those statues obviously represent the Nobles and not the average infantryman who would not have been able to afford the armour and helmets of the picture shown by Longbow. It's true that they look Roman. Around this time the hellenistic armies of the middle east began supplying their soldiers with chainmail. This was probably the influence of the Galatians who had brought them to the region.

Thanks WW! Very Much appreciated!!

I agree with Phil. It is often been said that audiences don't want to see 'Ancient Romans' in films and TV shows but that they want to see 21st century men and women in costumes. If the characters were more reserved and avoided conflict, then it would not be considered a good drama. Most people would have just seen the domestic scenes in 'Rome' as a dull history documentary about a retired soldier who has become a shop clerk and his wife who tends the home. If the characters did not show their emotions then the film makers might have to do like David Lynch did with 'Dune' - Have the characters thoughts read out, which would be a very bad idea. Personally I have always thought that the Romans were more open with their feelings than us (The poor at least...I couldn't imagine the rich being the same way) so I personally believed that a lot of them might have been similar to Vorenus or Pullo. They did hint at the 'Pater' being the ruler of the household in the series - Vorenus argues with Crito about his impregnating his daughter "She is my Property!" he shouts, something that many modern audiences might have found distasteful or strange. There is also a hint that Vorenus has the right to kill Niobe if he found out she had an affair, again it shows the power of the father over the household.

The River is called the Rubicon.

I saw a trailer to this film recently....looked interesting and it has managed to keep pretty well to it's comic book roots (although not in the least bit to it's historical ones). Unfortunately the triler has been removed as it was not meant to be shown...It had leaked onto the internet and many scenes weren't finished (in terms of perfecting the CGI graphics).

I agree, that is one of the reasons I like 'Rome' as it was a nice change from the usual Theatrical, melodramatic versions we usually get. Just compare the series with Uli Edel's 2002 mini-series 'Julius Caesar'. That had plenty of melodrama, including a scene at the end where Caesar's wife Calpurnia rushes through the streets of Rome to tearfully hold Caesar as he dies on the senate floor.

It seems to me that you aren't a big fan of the movie. You are right, I have mixed up my Arrian with Oliver Stone's film, sorry. Arrian mentions many times that Alexander pushed towards the outer ocean and that he had intended to sail from there back to Europe, although this might not actually mean that he had his eyes on reaching the outer ocean when he started his wars of conquest. I am sure on the other hand that he wanted to expand and rule all the borders of the outer ocean, for instance Alexandria the furthest was built where it was because Alexander belived that a few miles beyond it lay the ocean (the steppes is what actually layed there). He also believed the Caspian Sea to be a part of the outer ocean. I am not a big fan of his film either. My last avatar made fun of it before I changed it to a coin of Diocletian. (I had a picture of Anthony Hopkins' Ptolemy 'Blah Blah Blahing' around). If they are going to make an attempt on Alexander again in the future it ought to be a big budget series or a series of films. It is impossible to do a 2-3 hour movie about Alexander that would do him justice as so much happened in his life. Even so, the last big budget movie about Alexander before Oliver Stone's film was made in th 1950's...there's a gap of about 50 years there, let's hope we won't have to wait that long for another movie. The 1950's film was a flop as well, but no version is probably as bad as the 1960's TV series starring 'Captain Kirk' as Alexander. I had the displeasure of seeing one short scene from that series where Alexander was ambushed by about 12 Persian archers.