Most Roman Civ?

[FireBlaze]

It'd sound like the Romans to let cultural practices that benefited them to flourish, and then suppressed others that didn't.

 

[Dean_the_Young]

The city retains culture of the first owner (in most cases, the founder), not counting barbarians (only other case ).

You know what would be great? Capturing the first barbarian city to spawn and building Acheron.

 

[Lone Wolf]

Acheron is a barb hero, the Elohim can't build national heros with their trait. I think that they shouldn't be able to build palaces of conquered civs too.

 

[Onionsoilder]

Acheron is a barb hero, the Elohim can't build national heros with their trait. I think that they shouldn't be able to build palaces of conquered civs too.

wait what? They can build other palaces?

Do they lose theirs then? Or can they have a 19 different palaces?

 

[Nor'easter]

wait what? They can build other palaces?

Do they lose theirs then? Or can they have a 19 different palaces?

I thought this had been fixed, but maybe not. It's been a while since I played the Elohim.

The way I recall it working was that the Elohim could build the palace of another civ in a captured city. After completing that other civ's palace, they would lose their own palace, but could rebuild the Elohim Palace. Once they'd rebuilt the Elohim Palace they would have two palaces. Maximum was two.

As I said, I thought Kael fixed this, but maybe not.

 

[Lone Wolf]

wait what? They can build other palaces?

Do they lose theirs then?

Yes.

As I said, I thought Kael fixed this, but maybe not.

This is fixed.

 

[MagisterCultuum]

It used to be that they could build another civ's palace to replace their own, and then when they tried to move their capital again they could get another palace without loosing the other civ's palace UB. Now they cannot build other civs' palaces.

 

[Breunor]

In an interesting book I read (not finished yet) Barbarians (BBC books) it argues that the Romans did not allow other cultures to flourish and be accepted but rather that they suppressed other cultures and forced their own Roman culture on the natives.

This is largely correct in effect but it is WAY too simplistic and seems to imply intent. We have to remember that Roman history spans centuries and that Roman culture and its attitudes are different through time, and indeed just like today in most countries differ between people and groups within the Republic or empire. Entire books can be written on this topic.



Indeed, the converse may have been truer - that the Romans were accepted by people wishing to adopt Roman ways.

Clearly, the most tolerant conquerors in the ancient world were the Persians, and the Romans are probably a distant second. Before the second century AD and to some degree after it, the Romans admired Greek culture and often viewed it as a 'superior' culture; throughout Roman history Greek remained the dominant language in the East, for instance. In that respect, the Roman view of the Greeks has some similarities to the American view of British culture.

Outside of the Greek world, Latin did dominate as a language. And wherever the Romans conquered, people flourished if they became romanized. What were the benefits of being in the Roman sphere? Generally, stability and trade. Problems were the loss of political sovereignty and often rapacious governors.

And Roman civilization, literally, was about city building (a literal translation of civilization). Roman rule flourished where cities were established. So, as an example, we see in modern day Britain that generally speaking, once Roman rule was established (way after the Iceni revolt) that Roman rule was successful in the flat lands of the south, where cities were established and Roman culture dominated. Roman rule was never liked or as successful in the highlands or in the sparser areas like what we now call Wales.

And so where less dominant cultures existed, the Romans came, Roman ways were adopted, and Roman culture often forced out the native one; in Gaul we see senators two generations from people defeated by Caesar; we see Spanish emperors in the second century AD - but once again, Roman rule never worked well in the less developed areas of Spain and Spain had many very difficult revolts for the Romans to face. Cities were built with a forum, etc.

So, I don't view that the Romans 'wiped out' native cultures, at least as an instrument of policy. Generally, the Romans conquered, and the people either adapted to Roman ways or assimilated, or they didn't and often had substantial dissention. But the statement made by the poster is factually correct, Roman culture did usually dominate over longer periods of time.

Greek cities, however, often retained a Greek flavor. Roman society adopted substantial Greek culture, where the more dominant and developed culture will often gain substantial influence. I'm sure we all remember from Shakespeare’s play Julius Caesar, where Cicero gives his speech in Greek (to show off), with the comment 'but those that understood him smiled at one another and shook their heads; but, for mine own part, it was Greek to me.'

Oddly, the Romans have a bad rap about religious tolerance, but they were actually very religiously tolerant. However, the two religions that they couldn't get along with were the Jews and the Christians. Despite the press, the Romans didn't give a hoot about these religious, but viewed that the religions were causing political instability. If you look at centuries of Roman rule, you have unbelievably few religious revolts, but unfortunately the Jews were devastated after the three tough revolts (the Great revolt, 66- 73, the Kitos revolt, 115-117, and Bar -Kochba's revolt, 132- 135.) Christians were suppressed, again, not because of religion per se, but because of politics. The Christians were often especially despised because they were an 'internal' threat, and spread seditious ideas (like refusing military service).

There were good Romans, bad Romans, practical Romans, greedy Romans, religious Romans, atheists, etc. But probably the oddest part of Roman conquest was that to some degree large parts of it weren't done as a general policy of Roman expansion. Indeed, much of the East was conquered almost by accident; other areas, like Caesar' conquest or Claudius' conquest of Britain, were done largely to enhance the reputation and wealth of the conqueror and not because of a Roman desire for conquest. Indeed, many of Trajan's conquests were repudiated by his successor Hadrian.

But one aspect that made roman (and Persian) conquest different from most conquests was that they weren't motivated by expansion; even during their glory period Rome face largely a declining population. Settling of colonies for soldiers was dominant issue for the late Republic, but generally speaking, Roman conquests weren't about geographical expansion for the population. We see the Lex Julia, making penalties for families with no children and benefits for those with more. (Unfortunately, since the man we now call Augustus used to call himself by his uncle's name, we don't know if these were proposed by Caesar or by Augustus.)

Rome thrived by inclusion. The Social wars were not about the Roman allies trying to leave the Roman sphere; they were about the Italians being given the rights of the Romans. And where cities sprung up, life was usually better with the Romans than without them.

Of course, let's remember, in real history this statement won't always be true. There were always bad emperors, bad governors, etc,) and the Romans could be cruel.

In conclusion, generally, the Romans were inclusive, and needed to be. They didn’t have a policy to conquer the world and spread Roman culture. However, the Romans did conquer much of the world, and their culture often followed – and where people didn’t play ball, especially if they revolted or didn’t pay taxes, they were often treated harshly. Very harshly, and often the discordant native culture was suppressed.

As far as the military, well, here things were different. Roman success was largely a function of their efficient military, and this wasn’t going to change. Of course, things did change in the 4th century as cavalry started to become emphasized, but the Roman army was going to stay a heavy infantry army.

But their military in many ways like the Tolerant trade in FfH. Conquered areas provided auxilia (slingers from the Balearics, light troops from many areas, etc, cavalry) but the Roman backbone was the legion from the Samnite Wars to the late 4th century. The main issue with Roman military ‘tolerance’ was trust. After the Teutoberg Forest disaster and the ‘treachery’ of Arminius, including foreign troops into the ‘main’ army was done carefully.

Best wishes,

Breunor

 

[Tielby]

OK Bruenor, I can now say definitively that you know more about Roman history than anyone I know.

 

[Dean_the_Young]

Kind of argued against his own point when he compared Roman views on Greek culture to American views of British culture, though.

 

[MagisterCultuum]

Its probably more like how the British viewed French culture centuries ago.

 

[Tasunke]

so why was bannor/elohim most closely roman while following the ROK religion?