Primus Pilus

It's quite possible that Agricola did in fact invade Ireland (c. 81 AD), even if only for a short exploratory expedition. There is some contention about the translation of Tacitus' quote found in Agricola 24 as follows: excerpted from Ancient History Sourcebook Some interpret this to mean that Agricola did in fact engage in enough exploration to understand that Hibernia would be easily subdued, while others suggest that Agricola (via Tacitus) was implying a bit of optimistic bravado. Whatever the case may be, there was still work to be done in northern Britannia and Caledonia and Agricola; and whatever the reality or his ultimate intention, he never had a real opportunity to attempt a full scale Hibernian conquest. His recall in 85 AD by Domitian ended any known records of an invasion. There were others who continued the advance into Caledonia of course: most notably in the reigns of Antoninus Pius (the command of Urbicus), Severus and Caracalla, but success was fleeting at best. The inability to completely secure a northern frontier border probably played a major role in leaving Hibernia its independence. In addition, weighing the the financial and manpower cost against the lack of major sources of known mineral commodities, the Romans in Britain likely found it more profitable to maintain tenuous trading relationships. Playing the native tribes against one another politically, at which the Romans were proven experts, also probably helped secure western Britain from significant raiding on Roman interests without the cost of garrisons.

I'm seeing it with Firefox 3.6.9

Neither do I. Could it be because we do have Adobe Flash 11? I got it as well...

I think, after reading the above article I mentioned, that this statement is too strong, as well: " and it obviously had a major presence in manor facets of Roman life." Regardless of whatever you decide about that, I caught some spelling errors/typos in the same paragraph, bolded: That's strange... I don't think it was in there before... alas. The spelling error that is. As for the fact that lead was a major facet in the lives of Romans... I stand by that regardless of the health effect it may or may not have had.

Indeed, the use of the term "no doubt" is clearly too strong. I've modified it. Thanks. Chris

Checking for quote/profile name scroll.... And again

Checking for quote/profile name scroll....

The date issue still exists on internal/sub fora

Reply quotes should also be the correct color sequence to match the rest of the forum.

The fixing of the dates is actually a great relief.

Well this doesn't sound encouraging.

Has anyone watched it on Starz! or Encore? It premiered last week and I DVR'd it but haven't had the time to sit down for the 2 hours and watch it. The book is right at the top of my list of historical fictions and I'm hoping the show stays true (as much as possible of course) to Follet's original text. In any case, between HBO's Rome, The Tudors, Spartacus and this recent production, there's no shortage of historical related television in the last few years.

A friend of mine took this photo recently around the Coliseum. While I lack any sense of creativity whatsoever, I thought maybe some of you could come up with an entertaining caption...

I just finished A Kingdom Strange: The Brief and Tragic History of the Lost Colony of Roanoke by James Horn. An interesting read, though a bit light. It focuses considerable attention on the "politics" equation (ie the Elizabethan court, England vs. Spain) as opposed to the goings on in and around the Roanoke colony, but it makes for an excellent introductory piece into the early North American colonization efforts of England. 420 or so years later, based on the information available from the later expeditions of John Smith and the Jamestown colony as well as information available from local native populations, the author makes an educated hypothesis regarding what actually happened to Roanoke. Essentially, and as many others have surmised over the years, the author agrees that they were absorbed into several nearby tribes. The personal stories are by far the most compelling to me. While people have some general awareness to the story of John White, the colony's first governor, I'll give it a short recap here... Shortly after establishing the colony in 1587 he was compelled by the other colonists, against his great reluctance, to return to England in order to secure re-supply, additional colonists, etc. He left behind his daughter and son-in-law and new granddaughter (the first English citizen born in North America). While he felt he was abandoning his position and the colonists (as well as his benefactor Sir Walter Raleigh and the Queen), they convinced him that he was the only colonist well connected enough to have a chance for success. In fact, the other colonists wrote a rather exhaustive letter explaining these details. After returning to England, White had virtually no success in establishing a re-supply mission. Due to the impending invasion of the Spanish Armada in the English Channel and the reluctance of most captains to curtail profitable privateering expeditions in Spanish America in order to go out of their way north from the West Indies to the Virginia colony, White was unable to procure a return passage until 1590. Upon approaching the colony, they of course found it abandoned (with the relatively famous "CROATOAN" carved on a tree... as was pre-arranged if the colonists found it necessary to leave) but were unable to investigate due to terrible weather and low supply. White was forced to return to England and was never able to gain return passage. That long journey home must have absolutely grueling.

For the record, several of the primary founders who owned slaves, Jefferson in particular, seemed to be tormented by the institution of slavery. Granted, he/they didn't make great personal effort to end the practice, but note that they did understand the hypocrisy. Jefferson's earliest draft of the Declaration blasted the slave trade and King George's role in it, but it would never have been ratified by the representatives of all 13 colonies so it was struck. He was supportive of a Virginia law to end slave importation and attempted to introduce general emancipation and deportation.. an attempt that failed. Additionally, founders from northern states did not own slaves. There is much more than meets the eye in regards to the time and the politics and the horrible institution of slavery.

By the by, I failed to address this in my first post, but I personally agree with your assessment. It would seem most plausible that Augustus died of natural causes and that the poisoning theory was only to add to the general disparagement of Livia and Tiberius. Of course, there is no way for any of us to prove this on either side of the equation, but I find it misleading documentation by the history channel to not address the dramatized nature of the historical reporting of imperial deaths. Death by assassination simply makes for better television, I guess.

It's actually from ancient sources... though Dio Cassius was hardly a contemporary. Dio is convinced of it, while Tacitus only offers that Livia was suspected of the deed. Of course, suspicion of poisoning or foul play came to be rather customary when considering the deaths of imperial family members. Dio 56.30.1-2. Tacitus Ann. 1.5. I believe it was Anthony Everitt in his Augustus, the Life of Rome

Welcome to the forum... here's a good list to get you started. http://www.unrv.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=8719 Livy is definitely the most comprehensive, but others provide more insight into different periods. If you want to do a chronological review though, then Livy, Dio Cassius and/or Dionysus of Halicarnassus are your best options.

Agree with previous posts... not only was he basically the best remaining choice at the time of succession, but he actually was quite accomplished politically and militarily while proving to be capable when applying himself as the princeps. If not for his noted and oft-repeated desire to distance himself from direct governing (ie the self imposed exile to Rhodes, or retirement to Capri), the Roman world would not have been subjected to Sejanus. That is the true failing of Tiberius, not most of the other venom one gets from Suetonius, et al.

Only Caesar had really printed his own likeness on a coin. Sulla's image was represented in quadriga (riding a chariot and in celebration of his triumph over Mithridates) but there is no facial likeness). However, as Caesar had been presenting his own image for about 3 years (starting around 47 BC) it was no longer out of the norm.

There have been stretches of very limited but healthy on topic discussions and also periods of very high activity with more of a random "off-topic" direction of the content. I suppose the term is subject to one's own interpretation, but since we've been around for roughly 7 years and have made some relatively small contribution to the awareness of ancient history, I feel confident that the forum isn't a failure.

Since we have two simultaneous things taking place... datacenter transfer of the site by our host and the forum upgrade... I'm guessing it was a temporary glitch. Hope so anyway.

Is it just me or does anyone else notice a significant performance improvement since our host moved us to a new data center?

How about a couple of Caesar's laws... proposed and passed after the consolidation of his own power though, of course. The Lex Iulia de Provinciis of 46 that limited propraetorial and proconsular commands to 1 and 2 years respectively. Of course, once the Republic was ultimately destroyed, this law was rather meaningless. Good in theory though, especially had it applied to Caesar directly about a decade or so earlier. And how about that Lex Iulia de Calendari of the same year that fixed the calendar. Completely authoritarian tyranny, sure, but at least everyone knew when to plant those crops on time.

About 5 or 6 months ago, we also did a major purge of inactive accounts (those that had registered but had never posted) in order to help combat some of the spambots. That's another reason the membership numbers don't quite equate.