HISTORY SILLY THOUGHTS

[exe ex machina]

The Colosseum is still pretty impressive even though it's decayed a bit.

On the tour we went on they took us down to the chambers below the stadium where they would keep the lions, tigers. leopards etc and crank them up on lifts to the stadium during gladitorial fights so the gladiators would suddenly have to deal with a wild maneating beast trying to kill them as well as their opponent.

Would've been a hell of a show but not much fun for the gladiators.

Meanwhile, 2013....we have sports leagues complaining about concussions, punching, hands in the back, shirt-fronts, shoulder-charging, etc

 

[Dan Moody]

The word Shylock is not used often enough these days.
Bravo OP for reintroducing it back into the language.

 

[LANGFORDandSON]

aqueducts and plumbing and heating and running water and fancy clothes

But apart from that, what have the Romans done for us.

Nothing.

 

[Sydney Bloods]

But apart from that, what have the Romans done for us.

Nothing.

An accurate calendar, roads/trade routes, the general idea for our legal system.

 

[little graham]

[

But apart from that, what have the Romans done for us.

Nothing.

plenty.

They sent all there shit soldiers to England (all armies sent its waste to the far flung corners of the empire),who bred with the local girls, who went on infest britian with criminals, who eventually (after many generations) got so out of control, they shipped them out here.

 

[LANGFORDandSON]

An accurate calendar, roads/trade routes, the general idea for our legal system.

OK, OK, apart from aqueducts, plumbing, heating, running water, fancy clothes, an accurate calendar, roads/trade routes and the general idea for our legal system, what have they ever done for us, nothing.

 

[Sydney Bloods]

OK, OK, apart from aqueducts, plumbing, heating, running water, fancy clothes, an accurate calendar, roads/trade routes and the general idea for our legal system, what have they ever done for us, nothing.

Provided the root language for all Germanic and French based languages (probably Spanish as well) bricks and mortor.

Divisions of labor, (limited) liberation of women.

Comedy as an art form (unlike those emo Greeks) this of course lead to that great collaboration known as Monty python of which your currently plagiarising.

 

[Father Jack]

The Romans also invented the Scottish-English border.

 

[exe ex machina]

OK, OK, apart from aqueducts, plumbing, heating, running water, fancy clothes, an accurate calendar, roads/trade routes and the general idea for our legal system, what have they ever done for us, nothing.

Pizza?

 

[Catfish Alley]

Pizza?

Greek. Nobody really knows though. Basically whoever first learned to cook flatbread and put something on top.

 

[exe ex machina]

Ok where would the NFL be without roman numerals.

 

[Catfish Alley]

 

[benji2]

Think this video sums it up better than I could type it:

 

[little graham]

The Romans also invented the Scottish-English border.

My family are from here (around hadrians wall)The women on my mum side, who can be traced back to Skye, remained pagan but chose to attend christian churches so they wouldn't be suspicious and alert the authorities to what they called witchcraft. This wall showed how piss weak the Romans actually were. Didn't really stop anything.About as productive as the Mexican border with the USA or the dog fence in Australia.


No one builds walls quite like communists.They know how to keep the trash out.

 

[MaddAdam]

The Romans also invented the Scottish-English border.

Where? At the Antonine Wall? Or Hadrian's Wall? (Well south of the current border) The Scottish-English border has been moving for centuries, last in 1999.

 

[MaddAdam]

Returning to the tactics and effectiveness of the Roman soldier, I once saw great documentary detailing a series of incidents where a citizen farmer rose to become one of the most important officers in the entire army - "Commander of the Armies of the North, General of the Felix Legions" - and whole bested initially in a typically incestuos palace coup, fought his way back to prominence through the honest toil of the colosseum before having his vengeance, in this life or the next, on those who had wronged him. Seems a fairly meritocratic system to me, and perhaps one we could still learn from today.

 

[Father Jack]

My family are from here (around hadrians wall)The women on my mum side, who can be traced back to Skye, remained pagan but chose to attend christian churches so they wouldn't be suspicious and alert the authorities to what they called witchcraft. This wall showed how piss weak the Romans actually were. Didn't really stop anything.About as productive as the Mexican border with the USA or the dog fence in Australia.


No one builds walls quite like communists.They know how to keep the trash out.

Well, it certainly made it more difficult for the northerners to raid the Romans, and it was handy for collecting tolls or tariffs on trade, as the crossings were controlled.

Where? At the Antonine Wall? Or Hadrian's Wall? (Well south of the current border) The Scottish-English border has been moving for centuries, last in 1999.

I didn't say the Romans invented the current border, just the fact that there is one.

 

[Sydney Bloods]

My family are from here (around hadrians wall)The women on my mum side, who can be traced back to Skye, remained pagan but chose to attend christian churches so they wouldn't be suspicious and alert the authorities to what they called witchcraft. This wall showed how piss weak the Romans actually were. Didn't really stop anything.About as productive as the Mexican border with the USA or the dog fence in Australia.


No one builds walls quite like communists.They know how to keep the trash out.

Actually the wall was alot larger back in the day and worked exceptional well, the wall was never built to keep people out (in fact that would be against Roman policy which was all about spreading the influence of rome) the wall was designed to stop pictish cattle raiding parties south of the wall (which it did exceedingly well) it is also suggested that it was built to better collect taxes and stop illegal trade.

Finally the walls construction served as a labor camp after suppressing a rebellion by a multinational group of traitors. (most likely slaves or ex soldiers that had been pressed into service)

Additionally the wall was started in 122AD and completed in 128AD infact Rome would not convert to Christianity until around 380AD

(in fact before 313AD you could not be a Christian and a Roman citizens unless you were wealthy, because Roman citizens were required by law to make sacrifices to keep the gods on their side the only way around This was to pay a fine)

the Romans held hadrians wall until 401AD before they pulled out 9 years before the declaration of Christianity being the religion of Roman Britain.

This is important because Romans loved their rules and forced conversions and punishing pagans for being pagan was illegal unless an area was Christian. (pagans in non Christian areas of the empire were even allowed to still have temples and holy places)

Most important the conversion to Christianity actually stopped witch hunts, because early on Christian Rome's official position was that magic and witchcraft did not exist. (although a few churches and priests still persecuted witches based on ancient pagan beliefs of curses and what not this was frowned upon by the church) 383AD outlawed witch hunts by holy order, because witches were considered a myth.

The Christian Rome's position on witches would not change until the 6 century when witch hunts returned in earnest.

Long after the empire had collapsed.

 

[JoondalupJ]

But apart from that, what have the Romans done for us.

Nothing.

EVERYTHING!

 

[JoondalupJ]

Actually the wall was alot larger back in the day and worked exceptional well, the wall was never built to keep people out (in fact that would be against Roman policy which was all about spreading the influence of rome) the wall was designed to stop pictish cattle raiding parties south of the wall (which it did exceedingly well) it is also suggested that it was built to better collect taxes and stop illegal trade.

Finally the walls construction served as a labor camp after suppressing a rebellion by a multinational group of traitors. (most likely slaves or ex soldiers that had been pressed into service)

Additionally the wall was started in 122AD and completed in 128AD infact Rome would not convert to Christianity until around 380AD

(in fact before 313AD you could not be a Christian and a Roman citizens unless you were wealthy, because Roman citizens were required by law to make sacrifices to keep the gods on their side the only way around This was to pay a fine)

the Romans held hadrians wall until 401AD before they pulled out 9 years before the declaration of Christianity being the religion of Roman Britain.

This is important because Romans loved their rules and forced conversions and punishing pagans for being pagan was illegal unless an area was Christian. (pagans in non Christian areas of the empire were even allowed to still have temples and holy places)

Most important the conversion to Christianity actually stopped witch hunts, because early on Christian Rome's official position was that magic and witchcraft did not exist. (although a few churches and priests still persecuted witches based on ancient pagan beliefs of curses and what not this was frowned upon by the church) 383AD outlawed witch hunts by holy order, because witches were considered a myth.

The Christian Rome's position on witches would not change until the 6 century when witch hunts returned in earnest.

Long after the empire had collapsed.

That is a great post. Thanks. Absolutely right about Hadrians wall. We all tend to think that the Romans were terrified of Picts and Scotts , but other reasons like tax collecting illegal trading theiving and using the building of the wall as a punishment as well as getting something useful built is pure Roman logic.
6 years to build , well that's amazing too.

As for the witch hunts , the Romans had a bit of common sense their it seems. No wonder we owe them for discipline and modern law . Still amazes me in such hard times how they survived . I think maybe me, dead very quickly.

 

[JoondalupJ]

Can't remember where or when I read it, but I'd always had the impression that standard fighting tactics of those eras was to have the more experienced guys further back. You "earnt" your spot further and further back by surviving battle after battle. As the first-timers all shat themselves at the front, the experienced guys all pushed together from the back, ensuring that the inexperienced guys did the hard yards and the wiser older blokes got to mop up at the end when everyone was exhausted. The Romans were a bit more organised but also used these tactics in front on battles.

So the key was to survive the first one or two battles you were in, then stay on the winning side for the next 20-25 years.

Sounds illogical. If your best troops are at the rear , and your new recruits were shitting themselves at the front and probably being slaughtered , how on earth do you get to be a veteran.
No I 'd say Roman training and discipline had something more to do than just surviving the front so you could move to the back.

 

[MaddAdam]

I didn't say the Romans invented the current border, just the fact that there is one.

There was no Scotland then to have a border with.

 

[MaddAdam]

The idea owing the Romans for modern law is a bit overblown. In continental Europe yes but Australian law owes far more to the English common law. As for the law that really counts, as in the primacy of parliament and the people over the sovereign king, the old butcher Oliver Cronwell and then the Glorious Revolution of 1688 take the biscuits there. We owe as much to Hammurabi as Rome.

We tend to focus on the Western Empire and often the Republican or immediate post Republican era but this was actually just a small period of true Roman history. While the Western empire had effectively ceased to exist by 500AM (subsumed under waves of alternating refugees/assailants from the east and north) the eastern empire prospered and existed up until 1483AD.

The richest and most valuable Roman provinces were in North Africa (the breadbasket of Rome) and the Near East. Most of what we'd consider modern day Europe was a wild and thickly forested place inhabited by tribes largely hostile to Roman forces. The Romans never attempted to conquer germany, by and large letting the Alps act as a natural Hadrian's Wall.

 

[Father Jack]

There was no Scotland then to have a border with.

No, and that's the bloody point I'm making, once the Wall went up there was a division created that was maintained for several hundred years by the Romans, and once they left there remained a divide that subsequently went on to manifest itself as England and Scotland.

 

[MaddAdam]

No, and that's the bloody point I'm making, once the Wall went up there was a division created that was maintained for several hundred years by the Romans, and once they left there remained a divide that subsequently went on to manifest itself as England and Scotland.

Nah, that's bullshit. What about the Kingdom of Strathclyde?