pompeius magnus

I am another, born in georgia, now in iowa. I believe Moonlapse is also an american and zeke too.

A couple of things here. First, there was no peasantry in the city of rome, there were the headcount who were the landless people of Rome. They were not allowed into the army because they could not afford to buy their own equipment relying on the patrician and plebians to make up the majority of the army. After several wars back to back the patrician and plebians were in short supply for the army, so Marius took matters into his own hand and thus his reforms happened. And with these headcount now having something to do it got them out of the city and after a certain number of years they got their own land to life on.

"After reading that I am reminded of a very fundamental problem with Roman society which is not in the poll and which makes the poll invalid." Perhaps reading the topic heading would help you understand a reason for it not being included in my list of problems. Going further slavery and serfdom were not what you are thinking of them as. When the republic was created following the expulsion of the last King Rome was a small city, so it could rely on its ability to use just the nobility as the backbone of its army. As Rome expanded and conquered more lands, they just didn't have enough men from the nobility to form a strong army, mostly because of the recklesseness with lives by some generals. The reforms of Marius were a necessary component but ultimatly led to a changing in loyalty of the troops. Most of the slaves, or a better term would be servants, that worked in the Roman realm were prisioners of war from beaten armies, or conquered provinces. Race wasn't a huge discrimination in Rome as blacks could have a prominant part in the government. For example Lucius Dominitius Ahenobarbus was black and also a counsel as well as Quintus Caecilius Metellus Pius Scipio Nasica.

Actually the majority of Senators dispised Sulla and shortly after his departure from dictator to drunken fool to corpse his political reforms were undone. If he had overthrown the republic it would have been most likely restored as their were no popular generals or political leaders to take his place. Pompey and Caesars rise would be decades away.

I myself also believe that the republics downfall was inevitable, however it is very controversial to say that an event was inevitable. So I did the next best thing, select the individual who led to the generals gaining power over the republic.

I always like this topic for its variety of opinions. I vote for the Gaius Marius and his reforms of the military. Even though it was a necessary reform, it left the soldiers loyal to the generals instead of the mighty republic which would lead to its vast civil wars in its closing years.

I just finished reading the Beginnings of Rome by TJ Cornell. It is more of an archaelogical book, but does give great insights into the beginning of rome from Romulus to the Roman conquest of Italy. Would you like me to do a review on it.

Go to a museum and they could give an accurate date of the mask.

If its northern France, then its almost guaranteed a celtic mask, or a gaulic mask depending on its age.

I have one person who suggested it might be Celtic, but if we can know a more precise location the identification will be much faster and more accurate.

Where was it dug up.

Where was it when you took the pictures. do you know any background on the mask, that would help in the identification of it.

Nevermind I figured the problem out. Give it a day or so to formulate responces and I will post a link to the forum page here.

Im trying to get them on another roman site that has a lot of experts on rome. I am having trouble getting the link to upload. Do you have a direct link you could post here to those pictures, or send me at kslice2k2@aol.com

I am not a conservative chrisitian and feel ashamed at times at the way chrisitans treated Pagans, a view I take is that my monothesitic god is the same as your many just compacted into one being. Anyway my favorite part of Roman society is the architecture and forum life. With the likes of Cicero the Gracchi brothers, and others it would be the place to be in ancient rome.

Viggen can you send me the image then I can put it on another site i belong to that has a lot of experts on masks. My email is kslice2k2@aol.com. Thanks.

I think it probably is a theatre mask. At first glance I thought etruscan, but the material doesn't match the material that ancient etruscan maskes used.

ok just curious because I know that I have never run into a pagan, or a polytheistic follower to throw away the christian descrimitative word that seems to be associated with polytheisists, there are not any that I have come into contact with in the various states i have lived in including georgia, california, illinois, and the state i reside in during school iowa.

Zeke a quick question. No offense intedended but I was curious how you became a pagan. were you born one or did you just decide later on that it was the best religion for you.

Im back to shed some light on the reasons why caesar was better than hannibal. first of all, yes hannibal was outnumbered but nothing to what caesar faced. Even though the roman army hannibal faced was more organized the gauls had enourmous numbers and Vercingertorix was a very a able commander and against the typical throw away lives roman general, with exceptions to Marius, Sulla, Pompeius, Lucullus, and the new age generals to say, vercingetorix would have won a resounding victory over the roman armies. And mind you that during the time of Hannibal it was only a hundred years or so after the roman conquest of Italy and the Saminite wars, which Carahae, spelling, was very close to, so there was a possiblity of dissention in the ranks. Also it was before the Marius reforms and only the patriicans, and those who could afford to buy military equipment, were in the army as well as members of the Italian League who commonly sent armies to assist rome. In conclusion, a poet, whose name slips my mind as so many things do, made a great remark about Hannibal " Hannibal knew how to get a victory, but not how to use it." Caesar knew how to beat you and how to treat you afterwards, clemency during Italian Civil War with pompeius and how to handle the beaten Gauls. hannibal had rome defenseless, but didn't attack, then a patrician stepped up, you might of heard of him Scipio Africanus and he shadowed hannibal and eventually defeated him at the battle of Zama. In the end Hannibal commited suicide to avoid humilation and acceptance of defeat instead of becoming a prisioner, whereas Caesar was assisinated on that fine March day in the year 44 BC because his glory overshadowed everyone else in roman history, oh and the whole taking over the republic thing had something to do with it. Also Caesar made people commit sucide due to defeat, Cato and example, whereas Hannibal was the one commiting suicide. Point Made.

I know I've been here a while but I never did this and am trying to post-pone diving into Latin Homework. Well here it goes My real name is Ken and I am from Chicago but go to school at the university of Iowa majoring of course in ancient history. I am almost 22, Oct. 21 is the great one, part of my user name is magnus, birthday. I study Roman history intensly, in the middle of TJ Cornells great book on the beginnings of Rome, however I jump around between Rome, Greece, Byzantine, Middle Ages, and World War One, the real great war. Thats about it.

I have often thought about this question. And the answer is not a chance. With the threat of Nuclear missiles if you invade another country they can launch a nuclear strike the invaders land without even setting foot into that country. Also there are more protections against invasions and that is UN and NATO, even though they get their critisisms they still do their job. So that is a brief explanation on why an empire can not be established.

That in itself is not a possible form of government as it breaks the prinicple of the free market system-integrated with the command economic system if you are referrign to the combination of a democratic nation such as the USA and a communist one such as the Communisty Soviets of the past. The two are completly different forms of goverment and I can see no concievable way of them working together, although I am open to ideas on how they might work. So please enlighten me if anyone has a way to combine these two forms of government. In my mind you would have better luck combining the absolute monarch of King Louis XIV and the democracy of Athens.

Sorry I should have been more specific, I was referring to the republican government. The imperial government was one of the most efficient gov't we have ever seen. And the republic bugs have to do with voting procedures, bribary problems, and just all the corruption that led to its fall.

The answer is so easy: a constitutional democracy of course. Actually I prefer the Roman way of doing things before Augustus was made emperor, however it would have to be modified to take out several bugs that were in the system.