Post: #1

I remember reading about fall of Rome.

Contrary to a popular opinion Romans were not annihilated by Barbarians.
It just that Romans stopped reproducing while their subordinates didn't. Barbarians became Roman citizen and in a slow gradual process Romans ceased to exist.

That story seems oddly familiar to what is going on in modern day Western World.

So who is the Rome today and who are the Barbarians?

Can this be stopped?

Post: #2

This isn't going to end well...

Post: #3

The same stuff happened before the fall of the Ancient Babylon (Iraq) Empire, and for hundreds of years after that, religious fundamentalism took over and women were stoned to death on the public square for anything which is considered an infraction.

To answer your question, Rome = West and the Barbarians are the ones who are reproducing the most.

A Westernized Anglo female teacher who rode the carousel in her 20s, who later starts shoving dildos up her ass in her 30s during class hours, while trying to find some 14-year-old male student to get pregnant with isn't gonna sustain civilization as compared to a stable family with at least four or five offspring.

How to stop the SJW degeneracy?

The only way is to create more sovereign states in the West, where sovereign states and cities which are Conservative will be forced to separate from their countries because of the SJW degeneracy of their federal country.

It was told that in Canada, the province of Alberta wanted to separate from Canada because the oil money was extorted to pay for Toronto politicians and other provinces. The leader of that separatist movement, Douglas Christie, he died a few years back, and since then Alberta has gotten taken over by SJW filth politicians who hate oil and innovation...

Post: #4

The difference between Rome and today is that what's happening now is being engineered by elites.

Rome fell like all the empires in annals of history.

Today's West is being deliberately run into the ground by its own elites; out of order comes chaos.

The elites will destroy the West to create their new world order.

Post: #5

There was one dude barbarian who was trained and fed by romans. Who betrayed them. He became a military of some sort. And turned tables against Rome. Can't recall his name.

Post: #6

(10-15-2016 12:10 PM)bodacious Wrote:  There was one dude barbarian who was trained and fed by romans. Who betrayed them. He became a military of some sort. And turned tables against Rome. Can't recall his name.

Alaric was a barbarian who was given command in the Roman army, later turned on Rome.

Post: #7

(10-15-2016 12:10 PM)bodacious Wrote:  There was one dude barbarian who was trained and fed by romans. Who betrayed them. He became a military of some sort. And turned tables against Rome. Can't recall his name.

You probably talk about arminius. A battle in Teutoburg forest.

Post: #8

Rome, during the expansion period (late Republic to early Empire) had a policy to 'Romanize' the non-Roman people. Eventually, the non Romans would adopt Latin (Greek in the later Roman Empire), Roman law, Roman culture, etc.

During this period, Rome overall ruled with a light touch (there are notable exceptions). Pre-Christian Rome you were allowed to keep your religion (as long as your religion did not urged armed resistance against Rome) and taxes were generally lower than under the previous ruling king or chief-tan (more on that later).

The big issue IMHO was the institution of slavery, which put in motion the eventual end of the Western portion of the Empire. Each new conquered territory brought in new slave labor. Why hire a Roman citizen when you could get a Greek, or Gaul, of Visigoth to work without wages?

The elites of Rome, with a steady supply of cheap labor, took over more and more farmland (Rome was primarily an agrarian economy). Small free farmers (freed men and citizens) were forced out of existence, with the Latifundium taking their place. The Latifundium were super farms manned entirely by slaves.

The feed and citizens crowded the cities, largely unemployable due to slavery. Large masses of able bodied men with no purpose is a recipe for chaos. So the state instituted the dole (ancient welfare) and free entertainment to keep the masses at bay.

This of course cost money. Lots of money. Roman law stated that if you served in the military, you were exempt from taxation. The upper classes would serve as officers, exempting the latifundia from taxation. Taxes were increased to confiscatory levels on the knight and freedman classes. When taxes could not keep up, the state inflated the currency (Emperor Marcus Aurelius replaced gold with copper in the coinage), creating hyper inflation within the empire.

The source of taxation (closest thing to a middle class in antiquity) got more and more squeezed. Many of these families, under duress, stopped having children. The population of the empire began to fall. Emperors like Vespasian tried to offer cash incentives for the better Roman classes to have more children, but it wasn't enough.

If you want to relate the above to our modern day situation:
1. Cheap labor driving out citizens from entry level and low skill jobs.
2. H1B visa driving out citizens from white collar jobs.
3. 47%+ of the population on some form of the dole.
4. The state has a policy to inflate the dollar (2% per year target), which frankly, is theft by other means for anyone who saves for the future.

Modern corporate farms, the tech industry, and what remains of the labor intensive industrial base (i.e. meat packing) are the modern version of the Latifundium. The few at the top benefit immensely. You can see it by where the economic growth has been. The top earners and the biggest corporations is where the 'growth' has been. When you look at wage and employment growth for the rest of us, the numbers are pretty sad.

There are a lot of other reason that the empire was under stress. Example: Changes in climate put a number events in motion that brought disease and barbarian invasions into the empire.

Post: #9

(10-15-2016 01:16 PM)Dantes Wrote:  

(10-15-2016 12:10 PM)bodacious Wrote:  There was one dude barbarian who was trained and fed by romans. Who betrayed them. He became a military of some sort. And turned tables against Rome. Can't recall his name.

Alaric was a barbarian who was given command in the Roman army, later turned on Rome.

It was Alaric. He was trained in a Roman military academy. However, he saw himself as a Visigoth and not as a Roman. He later lead an army, conquering most of Greece. A Roman (actually German) general named Stilicho defeated (but did not destroy) Alaric when he invaded Italy.

A lot happened between Stilicho, the Roman emperor, and Alaric during that period. In the end Stilicho was executed, the Germanic soldiers in the Roman army defected to Alaric, and Alaric laid siege to Rome in 408AD. The city fell in 410.

Post: #10

(10-15-2016 01:17 PM)Vinny Wrote:  

(10-15-2016 12:10 PM)bodacious Wrote:  There was one dude barbarian who was trained and fed by romans. Who betrayed them. He became a military of some sort. And turned tables against Rome. Can't recall his name.

You probably talk about arminius. A battle in Teutoburg forest.

Both Arminius and Alarik were trained by Romans, and fought for them. Armimius was a member of the Auxiliaries, while Alarik was a leader of Gothic foederati (barbarian groups which were hired to fight other barbarian groups).

Post: #11

If someone here plays Total War series of games, there is battle of Teutoburg in the Rome 1 and Rome 2. A must play games both of them, actually TT series teaches history maybe even better then books in some ways.

Post: #12

Waiting for the Barbarians by C.P. Cavafy

What are we waiting for, assembled in the forum?

The barbarians are due here today.

Why isn’t anything happening in the senate?
Why do the senators sit there without legislating?

Because the barbarians are coming today.
What laws can the senators make now?
Once the barbarians are here, they’ll do the
legislating.

Why did our emperor get up so early,
and why is he sitting at the city’s main gate
on his throne, in state, wearing the crown?

Because the barbarians are coming today
and the emperor is waiting to receive their
leader.
He has even prepared a scroll to give him,
replete with titles, with imposing names.

Why have our two consuls and praetors come out today
wearing their embroidered, their scarlet togas?
Why have they put on bracelets with so many amethysts,
and rings sparkling with magnificent emeralds?
Why are they carrying elegant canes
beautifully worked in silver and gold?

Because the barbarians are coming today
and things like that dazzle the barbarians.

Why don’t our distinguished orators come forward as usualto make their speeches, say what they have to say?

Because the barbarians are coming today
and they’re bored by rhetoric and public
speaking.

Why this sudden restlessness, this confusion?
(How serious people’s faces have become.)
Why are the streets and squares emptying so rapidly,
everyone going home so lost in thought?

Because night has fallen and the barbarians have
not come.
And some who have just returned from the
border say there are no barbarians any longer.

And now, what’s going to happen to us without barbarians?
They were, those people, a kind of solution.

Post: #13

what are your favourite history books or series describing roman history?

Post: #14

In summary, nations rise and fall and there are many similarities if not the same prescription for each empire ...

The fact that technology and travel has made connections which were not possible in the old world with trade agreements, etc. isn't what makes this situation slightly different? That is, I believe the globalists know that collapse is coming but they have a method to try to hold it together, that is, everyone believing in a one world currency that they'll try to fiat and put faith and credit in? That's the only way fundamentals can be staved off or ignored for even longer ... but even then most will know it's a house of cards, so contingencies will be around in what are considered traditional stores of value (gold, silver, other assets valuable in and of themselves).

Post: #15

(10-15-2016 11:53 AM)Bobb Johnson Wrote:  The difference between Rome and today is that what's happening now is being engineered by elites.

Rome fell like all the empires in annals of history.

Today's West is being deliberately run into the ground by its own elites; out of order comes chaos.

The elites will destroy the West to create their new world order.

Wrong.
The elites interests and therefore, their political interests, provided the substantial drive for the long-played fall of the Roman empire. Just read something about latifundia, industrial agriculture of the day, powered by almost free (slave) machinery.

"I, Kaligula, did know what I was doing when confronting senators and equites with the random strokes of my sword."

What else were Rome brutal wars of conquest in the East (and they brought to life the Roman province of Syria out of ashes of hellenistic regimes) if not the powering of slave machinery with the new material, too...?! Looking from the economic point of view, today there is machinery of magic free debt money, in the Roman times there was machinery of magic free (slave) energy.

Post: #16

(10-17-2016 08:18 AM)Sp5 Wrote:  Waiting for the Barbarians by C.P. Cavafy

What are we waiting for, assembled in the forum?

The barbarians are due here today.

Why isn’t anything happening in the senate?
Why do the senators sit there without legislating?

Because the barbarians are coming today.
What laws can the senators make now?
Once the barbarians are here, they’ll do the
legislating.

Why did our emperor get up so early,
and why is he sitting at the city’s main gate
on his throne, in state, wearing the crown?

Because the barbarians are coming today
and the emperor is waiting to receive their
leader.
He has even prepared a scroll to give him,
replete with titles, with imposing names.

Why have our two consuls and praetors come out today
wearing their embroidered, their scarlet togas?
Why have they put on bracelets with so many amethysts,
and rings sparkling with magnificent emeralds?
Why are they carrying elegant canes
beautifully worked in silver and gold?

Because the barbarians are coming today
and things like that dazzle the barbarians.

Why don’t our distinguished orators come forward as usualto make their speeches, say what they have to say?

Because the barbarians are coming today
and they’re bored by rhetoric and public
speaking.

Why this sudden restlessness, this confusion?
(How serious people’s faces have become.)
Why are the streets and squares emptying so rapidly,
everyone going home so lost in thought?

Because night has fallen and the barbarians have
not come.
And some who have just returned from the
border say there are no barbarians any longer.

And now, what’s going to happen to us without barbarians?
They were, those people, a kind of solution.

Kavafis picture is a romantic decadency, Coetzee "Waiting for the barbarians" is closer to the border reality as it could have been.

Post: #17

(10-18-2016 11:28 AM)Kaligula Wrote:  

(10-15-2016 11:53 AM)Bobb Johnson Wrote:  The difference between Rome and today is that what's happening now is being engineered by elites.

Rome fell like all the empires in annals of history.

Today's West is being deliberately run into the ground by its own elites; out of order comes chaos.

The elites will destroy the West to create their new world order.

Wrong.
The elites interests and therefore, their political interests, provided the substantial drive for the long-played fall of the Roman empire. Just read something about latifundia, industrial agriculture of the day, powered by almost free (slave) machinery.

"I, Kaligula, did know what I was doing when confronting senators and equites with the random strokes of my sword."

What else were Rome brutal wars of conquest in the East (and they brought to life the Roman province of Syria out of ashes of hellenistic regimes) if not the powering of slave machinery with the new material, too...?! Looking from the economic point of view, today there is machinery of magic free debt money, in the Roman times there was machinery of magic free (slave) energy.

For anyone intrested, I just would like to add that there is a very good book dealing with intersections of ancient mentality and ancient economy/society - 'The End of the Past' by Italian historian Aldo Schiavone.
http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?i...0674009837

Post: #18

(10-16-2016 10:05 AM)Hell_Is_Like_Newark Wrote:  Rome, during the expansion period (late Republic to early Empire) had a policy to 'Romanize' the non-Roman people. Eventually, the non Romans would adopt Latin (Greek in the later Roman Empire), Roman law, Roman culture, etc.

During this period, Rome overall ruled with a light touch (there are notable exceptions). Pre-Christian Rome you were allowed to keep your religion (as long as your religion did not urged armed resistance against Rome) and taxes were generally lower than under the previous ruling king or chief-tan (more on that later).

The big issue IMHO was the institution of slavery, which put in motion the eventual end of the Western portion of the Empire. Each new conquered territory brought in new slave labor. Why hire a Roman citizen when you could get a Greek, or Gaul, of Visigoth to work without wages?

The elites of Rome, with a steady supply of cheap labor, took over more and more farmland (Rome was primarily an agrarian economy). Small free farmers (freed men and citizens) were forced out of existence, with the Latifundium taking their place. The Latifundium were super farms manned entirely by slaves.

The feed and citizens crowded the cities, largely unemployable due to slavery. Large masses of able bodied men with no purpose is a recipe for chaos. So the state instituted the dole (ancient welfare) and free entertainment to keep the masses at bay.

This of course cost money. Lots of money. Roman law stated that if you served in the military, you were exempt from taxation. The upper classes would serve as officers, exempting the latifundia from taxation. Taxes were increased to confiscatory levels on the knight and freedman classes. When taxes could not keep up, the state inflated the currency (Emperor Marcus Aurelius replaced gold with copper in the coinage), creating hyper inflation within the empire.

The source of taxation (closest thing to a middle class in antiquity) got more and more squeezed. Many of these families, under duress, stopped having children. The population of the empire began to fall. Emperors like Vespasian tried to offer cash incentives for the better Roman classes to have more children, but it wasn't enough.

If you want to relate the above to our modern day situation:
1. Cheap labor driving out citizens from entry level and low skill jobs.
2. H1B visa driving out citizens from white collar jobs.
3. 47%+ of the population on some form of the dole.
4. The state has a policy to inflate the dollar (2% per year target), which frankly, is theft by other means for anyone who saves for the future.

Modern corporate farms, the tech industry, and what remains of the labor intensive industrial base (i.e. meat packing) are the modern version of the Latifundium. The few at the top benefit immensely. You can see it by where the economic growth has been. The top earners and the biggest corporations is where the 'growth' has been. When you look at wage and employment growth for the rest of us, the numbers are pretty sad.

There are a lot of other reason that the empire was under stress. Example: Changes in climate put a number events in motion that brought disease and barbarian invasions into the empire.

Nice post.

I would also add on, that the slave economy itself turned into the destruction of Rome's economy. As you stated, by the time of the Pax Romana Rome's economy depends entirely on slavery. With relative peace and an end to foreign expansion, there were no longer slaves to be brought in. And its not like the elites suddently started paying unemployed males citizens to do manual labor. The ensuing disruption in the economy leads to huge civic unrest and contributed somehow to the fall of the Empire.

Post: #19

Did Ancient Japan and China have more stable economies compared to Rome? Apart from wars with Europe did East Asian kingdoms ever fall?

Post: #20

(10-26-2016 10:37 AM)Meat Head Wrote:  Did Ancient Japan and China have more stable economies compared to Rome? Apart from wars with Europe did East Asian kingdoms ever fall?

China had invasions (Mongols) and regime collapses. I am ignorant when it comes to Japanese history.

One item that made Rome prosperous was open trade (before the Empire went into steep decline). An example: The best pottery came from what is today England. High quality English dishware has been discovered all the way to North Africa and Syria. Roof tiles made from the same protected homes from the elements.

When Rome collapsed, the pottery market dried up (no more currency, no safe way to transport goods, roads fell apart) the advanced pottery skills were lost. Nobility during this time ate and drank using dishware that a Roman peasant would have rejected as 'junk'. Thatched roofs replaced durable (and fire resistant) tile roofs.

For an economic and 'comfort' perspective, check out this book

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/019280...UTF8&psc=1

The author does a thorough job of describing the economic collapse and the loss of material comforts as the Western Empire descended into anarchy.

Post: #21

I remember reading in the 1949 edition of the "Outline of History" by HG Wells on account of the Roman Empire's twilight. It points out how the taxative abuse by the elite class to maintain their decadent lifestyle bled the citizens throughout the empire to an extreme of cynicism that many were glad to open the gates to the barbarians and direct them to the rich and powerful , or take up arms against the latter blaming and/or joining eventually the barbarians.

Does ring a bit of truth and familiarity as well...

Post: #22

(10-26-2016 10:37 AM)Meat Head Wrote:  Did Ancient Japan and China have more stable economies compared to Rome? Apart from wars with Europe did East Asian kingdoms ever fall?

Depends what you mean by ancient Japan. In the medieval period, it had not one, but two instances of sheer unadulterated luck that kept them from being overrun by the Mongols. In essence, the Mongols attempted to invade it twice: 1274 and 1281. On the first invasion, they were resisted by the samurai clans and forced to retreat to their ships. As they did so, a typhoon destroyed the fleet -- most of the invading army drowned.

The Mongols returned 7 years later, but in the intervening period the samurai had built fortifications on pretty well every conceivable place a navy could beach and land troops. The Mongols sailed around for a few months or so, looking for a beachhead, but another typhoon hit and destroyed their fleet again. (This had been one of the biggest naval invasions in history; 140,000 men in the Mongol horde, only surpassed in size by the D-Day landings 700 years later).

These typhoons were given the name kamikaze -- divine wind. The Mongols never came back.

Japan was in essence a closed system, isolated on its home islands; it didn't have a massive population problem throughout much of its history, and wasn't that advanced compared to Imperial China. It was an essentially Paleolithic culture as late as 200 BC, when Rome was heading into the apex of its power. It only took on a permanent capital around 710 AD. The 'golden age' for Japan seems to have been roughly the early European medieval period, 784 - 1183, the Heian Period.

The Mongols were held back during the following period, the Kamakura ... though the cost of resisting those invasions basically bled the country dry and opened it to internal, civil strife for roughly the next 300 years, ending only with the accession to shogun of the legendary Tokugawa Ieyasu, in 1600. He then closed Japan's borders, set rigid social classes in place, and arguably set the country into decline until the time of the Meiji Restoration in 1868 when the borders began to open (this last time period is best "represented" in the Tom Cruise film The Last Samurai, insofar as Hollywood represents historical periods. Most TV and film portrays Japan as it was under the Tokugawas, called the Edo period.)

God save us from people who mean well. -storm

Post: #23

(10-14-2016 08:27 PM)Gmac Wrote:  This isn't going to end well...

I can understand the pessimism but there turned out to be very insightful lessons in history I had no idea about.

Didn't know Rome really ran on slaves.

Post: #24

The Romans had great admiration for the Germanic tribes. Mainly for their fighting and war ability (never conquered) and second for their low levels of degeneracy. This is similar to how the Greeks viewed the Celts, as honorable and worthy opponents. The term barbarian doesn't mean uncivilized or anything like that.

In addition, Germanic tribes always fully assimilated. Arabs on the other hand burned every book they could find and never assimilated.

The two are not comparable.

There were jews in Rome at that time, they brought christianity, a blood cult at the time popular with fellons, peasents and women.

Post: #25

Greeks came up with the word "barbarian" to mean non-Greek speakers. It came from Greeks imitating a language they didn't understand ( sounded like " bar bar bar" to them). The word then evolved into meaning outsiders, especially uncivilized ones.