Classical History
Posts in The Copybook tagged ‘Classical History’
Rome’s greedy tax policy in Britain and Gaul left farmers with little to show for their labours but the stripes on their backs.
Admission to the Roman Empire brought an unfamiliar prosperity and ease to the former kingdoms of Britain, but American historian David Montgomery emphasised that much of it was a sham. Behind the facade lay a culture of corruption and exploitation fed by government greed, which was not limited to the miserable slaves labouring in mines or brickworks.
A woman convicted of a crime she did not commit took her case to a higher power.
Like his famous son Alexander the Great, Philip II, King of Macedon (r. 359-336 BC) was a Philhellene who aspired to the manners and language of the cultivated Greeks; but there remained a barbarian side to Philip which showed in his seven wives and his bouts of drinking.
Gaius Caesar is disappointed with the quality of the entertainment on offer in Rome’s Circus Maximus.
The well-known story of Androcles and the lion goes back to an eyewitness account written down by Apion (?30 BC - AD ?48), a learned Egyptian whose works are, sadly, entirely lost. Fortunately, passages survive in the work of Aulus Gellius (AD ?125–?180+), and what follows here is based on his ‘Attic Nights’.
A Roman general asks his officers to decide where their priorities lie.
Constantius I Chlorus was supreme commander of the Roman Army in Britain and Gaul, and a co-ruler of the Roman Empire from 293 to 306. His son Constantine the Great became the first Roman Emperor to allow Christians to worship freely, and although Constantius was not a Christian himself, it is clear where his son acquired his respect for religious liberty.
The surprisingly sensitive Roman commander was hoping to impress a girl with his angling skills.
After Julius Caesar was murdered in 44 BC, his nephew Octavian joined forces with Marcus Aemilius Lepidus and Marcus Antonius (Mark Antony) to avenge him at the Battle of Philippi. Rome’s possessions were divided among the three victors, and Mark Antony was granted Egypt, at that time ruled by Cleopatra VII Philopator.
John Stuart Mill reminds us that governments and the courts must never be allowed to criminalise matters of belief or opinion.
We often see those in power trying to use the courts to silence views they find objectionable, rather than tolerate them or engage with them. But Victorian philosopher John Stuart Mill recalled that many centuries ago, such supposedly high-minded legislation resulted in one of history’s worst miscarriages of justice – the execution of Socrates.