Kosmo

Hannibal will be an expert in martial arts and will kill loads of romans with bear hands shouting "you keep what you kill!". Who knows punic? How will they reinvent a language that it's hardly known?

I want to apolgize for not apologiesing earlier, but only if the english speakers apologize for the turment I suffer writting difficult words like apologize. Then I aplogize for massacrating the said words and for my descendent who will prune the hairy martians with his cyborg gatling-egg-thrower.

Some old populations survived in the balkans. Latin populations known as vlachs/aromanians are still preserved in an area from Istria in Croatia to Epir and Bulgaria. They are mentioned repeteadly in byzantine sources and are related with the romanians. Some latin population was placed along the Adriatic coast where they took refuge in the thema of Dalmatia where most became assimilated with the venatians. Their language died in the XX century. Other vlachs from the Balkan mountains rebeled against the Anghelos dinasty and created the second Bulgarian empire and eventually got assimilated with slavic bulgarians. Strong vlach communities existed in ottoman Macedonia and Epir, but later ethnic conflicts led to assimilation or emigration. Some emigrated in Romania and settled in the sea area, Dobrogea. Gheorghe Hagi, former captain of the football national team of Romania is aromanian. His name cames froma aghios=holy in greek and was a name given to people that visited the Holy Land by christians and turks alike. The albanians are illiric with thracian influences. This is all about language because genetics in this contact area might give us a serious surprise.

China failed to improve and payed the price. Japan in a worse situation made it much better. India was a mess troubled by the fall of moghuls when the brits came and create it. Afghans, maratha and other "rich" civilisations were fighting for control razzing towns. Africa was a source for slaves for muslims before the portuguese. And those ones started by selling slaves to the muslims before moving across the ocean. The colonisation is long gone. Africa it's a mess because africans do it like this. Evan Iman agrees. Inca were politically destroyed because it was a loose tribal confederation of bronze age and the inhabitants were killed by diseases spread by europeans in "The Columbus exchenge"

Laid waste? The world evolved thanks to this european expansion. They brought laws, institutions, infrastructure, tehnology and culture not only pillage and murder. This is the defetism that PP mentioned. Feeling guilty for what should be a pride.

Roman law stated "auxilia seguitur principale" secondary object it's attached to the main object like the trees to land or like the belt to the watch and this was interpreted as that what was written in a book it's secondary to the papyrus on witch is wrriten. So, no copyrights for roman writers. About slavery and development: I think that it's more complex than to say "free the slaves and growth will come". For example Jamaica (and other colonies from the Caraibean) experienced a quick economic colapse after the end of slavery while other sugar producing areas like Cuba and Brazil kept slavery for another 50 years with great profits. Jamaica unlike Haiti kept it's profitable colonial status and was not destroyed by war, but what was a very important economic area was reduced to stagnation by the liberation of slaves. Maybe if all slaves in Rome became free an economic collapse will follow because there was no labour market.

For sure it was some amber trade between Eastern Baltica and Rome, but there is nothing about it. It's hard to speak about Lithuania before Mindaungas. Some say venetii were slavic.

You have good arguments, but the greeks before Epaminondas never made any battlefield manouvers. Just deploy one army in front of the other then charge. This is how famous battles, like Marathon and Plateea were fought. The romans before Scipio were in the same situation as it's proven by their battles against more agile adversaries like Pyrrus and Hanibal. With no battlefield manouvers this deep formations have little use. So, the only argument for deep formations is morale and is hard to say anything about it pro or contra because it's hard to compute it. The columns were not used often in Napoleon era, but the main reason for their use was to reduce the frontal exposure to enemy fire and to allow more soldiers to make fast bayonet attacks on a small portion of the enemy thin fire line. Because it was exposed to enfilade fire it was rarely used and never popular as being the head of the column was very dangerous. A classic example of it's use it's the assault on the bridge in Arcole where the flanks of the column were covered by a high road and the swamps.

I'll bet you a botlle of Falern and an amphora of garum that in 5 lifetimes humans will contact inteligent life!

In regard of the question of formation depth: if we might think that roman used deep formations for easy manouvering the greek phalanx never manouvered because was a continuous line and they had even deeper lines. So, I don't think that is the reason. And ther is no info about changing position from back to forward in a greek or macedonian phalanx. Summary: Why were so deep the formations -the back acting as a reserve changing the contact line -to have a large mass for pushing -to keep the contact line from withdrawing -to manouver sideways easy. My opinion it's for options 2 and 3. And I don't understand how they had deep and wide gaps in the line if they don't take a square (or ovo) formation because the flanks of the manipuli will be opened to attack. Maybe the gaps were small so only few enemies will dare to enter between the formations.

Moreea was ruled by latins and was one of the last aquisitions made by the byzantines. Geographic location made it more safe from ottoman raids so it was a refuge for people (greeks and albanians) coming from the mainland Greece. Mistra, the capital of Moreea, was an important cultural center in the last decades of the empire, but I have no ideea about the economic development in the area. I think it was mostly a agricultural society as most sea ports were in venetian hands. An interesting note it's the fact that a italian historian was looking for the ruins of nearby Sparta in the last days of the Roman empire.

Greek leagues were not all ruled by a hegemon. Achean and etolian leagues showed impresive internal unity and military power when confronted with the macedonian kings, but after Persia was defeated most members of the Delian League saw no point in keeping that alliance that was becaming more and more demanding. Athens imposed everywere her democracy and this gave birth to internal conflicts in all other cities. Persian rule was not opresive and many greeks liked it. I think that the greeks were the most important oponents of Alexander in his conquest of Persia and most cities in Ionia resisted against "liberation" Despite the errors of Athens in the first Delian League most of her allies were willing to take another chance with it and, by their own will, joined the second naval league. This means that atenian hegemony was not so bad.

Persia it's my choice, because they attacked the richest areas and were able to make diplomatic connections.

Good point. Muslims shuould present apologies for the conquest of christian lands from Jordan to Southern France and Budapest!

How were the romans deployed to throw all 10.000 the plia at the same time? Those in the back of first line will have serious problems to see the enemy from behind 8-9 soldiers, not to mention that it was impossible to throw for those in the units behind the first line.

Arab invasion was in the seventh century and they destroyed the library of Alexandria and the orders of caliph Omar.

I remember the times when I was a young ignorant and worshiped Daniken. Now I'm a responsible adult with a passion for Tolkien. I believe more in the power of Sauron then in the visit of aliens that build huge mounds of rocks and they fail several times before they get it right. I just visited one of this marvels of space age tehnology and I can assure you that those pyramids have a terrible smell inside. They travel to space, but never hear of "Glade" ? For the Horde!

The fact that he proved that what were considered miths could have a core of truth it's a huge leap forward for culture and history. This opened the use of other texts, like the Bible, previously desmised as miths, as literary sources. He found the first major european civilisation, a big thing as the history of the micenian civilisation it's still debated. His flamboyant stile drew a large crowd to arheology with lasting effects. After him Germany became the country with the biggest interest in arheology.

Pilum was not the first or the last throwing spear used. One used with devastating effect was the "djerid" (sp?) of the turkish horseman. They even invented games to perfect in the use of this weapon. A champion of this sport, at the ottoman court, was Skanderbeg, the famous albanian rebel. It was used by being thrown from the gallop of the horse at the target, withdraw and charge again. This was made in wave after wave of attackers until the defance was shattered. 10.000 pilae thrown at the same time had a devastating effect, but we know that armies that used mass missile fire could not defeat heavy infantry despite sending waves of missiles. The phalanx defeated the persians and the legion the parths and the sarmatians. I think that the foremost use of the pila was to desorganize the enemy front line seconds before the hand-to-hand combat. When most enemies were mounted the romans needed a weapon with a greater range.

I don't see any link between roman and "modern" armies. Some similarities exist because they face similar chalanges, but the same can be said about any ancient army. The biggest innovation was the small complete army called legion. This did not survive and was reinvented much later during napoleonic wars as today division. My view of military history is that sometime in the III AD a horse "revolution" happened and for 1000 years the horseman ruled unoposed the battlefields.

Dacian king Burebista it's said to have destroyed the vinyards. Maybe that got him killed. Anyway, you can try some fine romanian wine. My favorite it's Pinot Noir of Murfatlar made not far from Tomis/Constanta. This why they made a very sweet mix of wines called Ovid Tears. Cotnari it's also a great vinyard famous since Stephan the Great, ruler of Moldova.

Slavery was always bringing good profits. In one book the authors say abouts slavery in US that it what half the price to use a slave compared to hire a free man. Some jobs no free person will ever take, so they needed to force people in this jobs. And there was no real labour market in traditional societies, so no alternative to slavery.

How about other provinces? Did the romans changed the laws or customs of land property in other areas?

The Cantacuzino family, and Paleologu to a lesser extent, played an important tole in romanian history. The Cantacuzino were greeks that came in Valahia around 1600 and became wealthy boiars (noble land owners). Later members got to the throne for short periods and became rulers "mare voievod si domn-great voyevoda and lord" They were also a family that promoted culture. After 1715 they lost their claims to power to other fanariots (greeks from Isatnbul, but kept huge fortunes and political ambitions. One of them was the richest romanian and merried his daughter with the composer George Enescu. Some historians say that their claim of imperial descendence is false and for sure is unproven. There are still some 50 Cantacuzino all over the world. One later Cantacuzino was

Historians speak about most land property, during the hellenistic era, being public and only the right to collect taxes from local communities belonging to private individuals, cities, kings or temples. This kind of free populations that had to give a part of their products was known under many names, but mostly as "pariakoi" This is not about the private property that someone held, but, about the rights that some had to collect tribute from peaseants that had a status between free men and slaves. Some historians evan call them "serfs". My question is, when and how this type of property was converted to the full land ownership that we see during the Roman Empire?. In fact, the situation was similar in Europe where the tribal aristocracy was not based on large proprieties worked with slaves or hired labour, but on rights to collect taxes from peasants.