Kosmo

Many happy returns and sunny days Bryaxis.

A corn dog is a dog with just one horn, like a canine unicorn. GoC, I don't know why but I don't feel sorry for you about your May job assignment. Have fun in NY and keep on the tourist lane

Huns were very effective in siege warfare, for example their campaigns in the Balkans conquered almost all fortifications, around 100 fortified cities and forts in one summer campaign. It is very likely that they learned that from romans.

The roman and the western civilization don't have a simple relationship with catholicism being the first and most influential roman heritage for the medieval West. In this bigger picture the figure of the first roman emperor is not very important.

What a fortunate day! Have fun MPC.

You mean like in the present?

Both the number of rebels and the roman initial losses are unrealistically high by at least an order of magnitude. I very much doubt that the rebels, without much military training or experience, could have outmaneuvered a campaigning roman army that was aware of them. Given the topography of the area guerrilla was not much of an option and it would have meant to allow romans to bring reinforcements.

European elites were always cosmopolitan with the exception of the disastrous last century and the spread of nationalism, the worst political idea ever. Before WW I almost all European royal dynasties formed a big, deeply intertwined family. That cosmopolitanism existed in many aspects of European societies: craftsman, scholars, soldiers, clergy, businessman, sailors etc.

Happy Birthday PP!

Welcome Corax. Hadrian is my favorite emperor since I had read Hadrian's Memoirs by Yourcenar.

I think the tough part is finding street names.

You can see your posts by accessing "My Profile" feature on the second row in the right upper corner. Once you are on your profile page click the "Posts" button to see your posts in reverse chronological order or the "Topics" button to see threads you started. Don't worry proposals and questions are always welcomed here.

Happy Birthday!

This is fun! Macedonians were the first to show what happens when you break a rigid phalanx line and then launch a fast attack through the gap when at Chaeronea Philip withdrawn a wing and pushed forward the other, fragmenting the Greek line. Of course, the Macedonian line was gone too, but it did not matter because they outmaneuvered the Greeks and pressed on an attack that annihilated them. If I would be a later period Macedonian king facing the legions of the Middle Republic I would not insist on cavalry units. They are expensive, take a lot of time to train and are of limited use in the narrow valleys of Greece where the campaign will be fought. I would have no reason to fear roman cavalry because they would not bring lots in oversees campaign and their Greek allies don't have much. At the same time I know that Hannibal gave some painful lessons to the romans about cavalry so they would be hard to surprise and would know how to defend themselves. Several cavalry units for foraging, scouting, flank protection and pursuit would be enough. The Macedonian army consisted mainly of the sarissa-armed phalanx supported by the excellent light infantry provided by the mountain tribes and Greek mercenaries/allies equipped with spears and narrow Celtic shields (an evolution of Iphicrates-style units). This is not inferior to the armament of the legions that were still of the veliti/hastati/triari type with spears, shields and javelins. Both sides were mainly levy, mercenaries and allies so there was not much standardization of weapons, every soldier brought what he had at home. The main areas of improvement would be the recruiting and training of soldiers and officers, organizational reform of units and sub-units and of corresponding ranks, creating legion-like large, permanent units with several types of soldiers so they are capable of independent action and carrying less important campaigns to give combat experience to the army and a proving ground to the officers. I would try to fight the battle in a easy defensible position, with the flanks covered like in a valley. I would deploy the army in depth with light infantry in front as skirmishers, or covering the flanks, with a main line of sarissa phalanx and a second line/reserve of more mobile units including cavalry to plug the hole in the phalanx if the romans break it or to pursuit them if they flee. The fact that often Greek and Hellenistic formations lacked reserves is rather an error of leadership then an inherent fault of the phalanx. But the most important things I would do would be to establish friendly relations with Rome because in the case of a war I'm definitely in trouble, they are relentless and, just in case, to create a strong fortification in a city as far as possible of Rome, but with a good port, in a strategic location that is easy defensible something like ... I don't know... Byzantium?

Happy Birthday!

Oh, does Provence have an accent? That's news! Only in proven?al !

Better then the King's Speech!

I have 2 main objections to all political systems. First when a political movement gets power over state institutions it brings it's own people in the bureaucracy and they are often incompetent, corrupt or biased but they are untouchable because they have political support. Second, most political organizations have an ideology, a set of simplistic tenets that can not deal with the amazing diversity of reality, but regardless of how useless all ideologies are for dealing with real problems the action of the bureaucracy have to reflect the official political dogma. When modern European political systems appeared the appointment of politicians to directly control the bureaucracy was not in the plan. The administrative apparatus was to be appointed by the king and placed under the supervision of the Parliament. The birth of political parties and the eventual victory of elected politicians over royalty meant that a party could control both the bureaucracy and the institutions meant to check it and keep it efficient. In rare occasions a meritocratic system was allowed to work without much political interference, like the Civil Service of the British Raj, with excellent results. Now, for the first time, we have these European institutions that the national political movements can not take over and that have clear, public, competitive and merit based employment and promotions. Why this is a blow to politicians is clear, they can't use this bureaucracy to reward themselves and their friends and they can't turn it into an ideological tool. For these reasons they are always critical and hostile to European institutions. The main accuse they make is a nebulous deficit of democracy but if by democracy they mean a politicized bureaucracy I trade democracy for efficiency any day.

Spain

France?

Just six episodes in this series but it was a very good one. The ending was a bit surprising.

Happy birthday!

Winters are usually cold here (and the summers are hot) but this one seems more snowy then usual and because the bad weather starts in november and lasts until march it gets tiresome at some point so if you see the sun tell him to come here too.

Maghreb?

Outside is snowing like it did all week and I have to dig, again, the car out. Hopefully the battery did not died, again, from the cold, if it did I'm not touching the car until the snow melts and it may be a while.