Sometimes creating a permanent empire is just a side effect. “At first, a provincia was a temporary assignment, which came into existence when assigned and ceased to exist when completed. As the Romans decide to permanently garrison their overseas possessions,… Read More »Collections: How to Roman Republic 101, Addenda: The Provinces
Having allies is easier than having subjects. “By contrast, the socii recruit themselves, equip themselves and organize themselves. And they fight hard, because they’re fighting for their home communities, to show their bravery to their own neighbors and family (who… Read More »Collections: How to Roman Republic 101, Addenda: The Socii
Laws mean nothing if people do not take them seriously. “The lion’s share of Sulla’s reforms consisted, after all, in writing into law limits that had once been customary and codifying expectations which before had been unspoken and it did… Read More »Collections: How to Roman Republic 101, Part IIIc: Ten Tribunes, Two Censors and Twenty-Six Guys
Dictatorship was a different thing in old and new Rome. “This point is often missed in teaching Roman history because Roman history is very long and so gets very compressed in a classroom environment. Even in a college course focused… Read More »Collections: The Roman Dictatorship: How Did It Work? Did It Work?
I was tought history of communists so plebeian were always depicted as oppressed. Well. “So, repeat after me: the patrician/plebeian distinction is not particularly meaningful in the Middle Republic. There are rich plebeian families in the Middle Republic who are… Read More »Collections: How to Roman Republic 101, Part I: SPQR
Sometimes charging less means you make more. “There’s probably some rich guy out there who would be willing to pay $10,000 to see a Xavier basketball game, especially if Jay Wright came out of retirement for the Muskies to play… Read More »College Sports is Now Just a Monopoly with First-Degree Price Discrimination and a Labor Market with Lopsided Bargaining Power
2 and 3 work great if you are wrong. “there are three ways to approach a problem: Move the world towards the desired state Change your perception of the current state Change your desired state” https://andreasfragner.com/writing/three-ways-to-solve-problems
In 21st century we are back to roman camps. “I don’t know that US Army planners aimed to reconstruct a modernized version of the Roman playing-card fort, but the concerns of force protection for an army on the move (and… Read More »Collections: Fortification, Part V: The Age of Industrial Firepower
Gunpowder helped state formation in Europe. “The impacts of the sudden apparent obsolescence of European castles were considerable. The period from 1450 to 1550 sees a remarkable degree of state-consolidation in Europe (broadly construed) castles, and the power they gave… Read More »Collections: Fortification, Part IV: French Guns and Italian Lines
Castles are just fortified houses. “In short, home defenses respond to local conditions aiming not for absolute security, but for a balance of security and cost: in safe places, home owners ‘consume’ that security by investing less heavily in it,… Read More »Collections: Fortification, Part III: Castling