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10-29-2003, 02:09 PM

www.vinland.org/scamp/grove/kreich/index.html 
 
Interesting...

TITVS SABATINVS AQVILIVS · 10-29-2003, 04:10 PM

Only interesting? Unfortunately only fews know... 
 
from the article: 
 
"After a decade of violence and destruction there was a brief respite starting in 360 when the visionary (!) and pagan Julian, sometimes known as the Transgressor or to Christians as the Apostate came to the throne. Julian saw the destruction of Mediterranean civilization in the nihilistic forces of Christianity and valiantly attempted to reverse the Church's take-over. He had temples that had been forcibly abandoned repaired and returned to their communities, and the revenues that had been seized returned. Julian wanted no martyrs and didn't persecute the Christians but followed a policy of strengthening the badly assaulted pagan traditions. Unfortunately his life was short and he died in 363 to the rejoicing of the bishops." 
 
Just a word about Iulian: hero... 
 
Valete, 
Titus Sabatinus Aquilius

aitor iriarte · 10-29-2003, 06:57 PM

But not to the taste of the hordes of more or less fanatic Galileans that swell and multiply among us! 
 
DOMINO NOSTRO IVLIANO AVGUSTO FIDEM 
 
Aitor

Goffredo · 10-30-2003, 07:39 AM

Incredible that I will sound like I am defending christianity but I find it has lately become a little trendy to speak bad about christianity. On the one hand it is healthy to refute myths but fashions always annoy me. 
The trouble is that there is too much sway, too far one way and then sway too far the other. That christians did bad things is true but that they were worst is too far. 
Is a corollary being suggested that some other religion or secular ideaology is better? What is the agenda of the article? Is it some neutral analysis or is the author driving at something? 
 
p.s. Roman paganism was dead and although Julian was in more ways than one intelligent he could also be described as a fool. His military record shows this ambivalence too.

JRSCline · 10-30-2003, 09:33 AM

I made a decision last month regarding the inappropriateness of political or religious debates on RAT. They are divisive by always threatening to turn rancorous, and serve no greater good for our community. Threads on these subjects are not welcome here; there are many other venues for discussion of religion and politics and modern controversies. 
 
I will not close this thread now, because it looks like it could still recover and turn back to discussion of ancient Roman religious and the pagan revivalists. However, if I see it devolving into a debate about the general merits of Christianity or any other religion, it's closing time. 
 
Cheers, 
Jenny

TITVS SABATINVS AQVILIVS · 10-30-2003, 11:59 AM

Hope it will not hurt anybody if I go ahead so: 
 
Goffredo, if the fools are like Iulianus, up with the fools! 
 
The existence of such kind of men is, in my opinion, one of the reasons that allow us to tolerate the hardness of our life. And yes, maybe he was a fool, but he was a safe fool... 
 
In so few years he did so many things (and in 356 AD, when he was Caesar, he was about 25 years old): 
 
-Decempagi (Dreuze) and Brotomagus (Brumath) victories over the superior barbarian armies 
 
-Colonia re-conquered 
 
-Treviri fortified 
 
-Alamanni's siege at Sens, Iulianus resists and wins 
 
-The great Argentoratus (Argentoratum) victory vs. 40.000 Alamanni: while he had only 13.000 attacks the enemy and after an all day long battle, wins. 
 
-He pursues the Alamanni beyond the Rhine forcing them to a truce. 
 
-He besieges two Franks fortresses, till the Franks surrender 
 
-One year after attacks the Franks and defeats them 
 
-He attacks the Chamavi and defeats them 
 
-He attacks again the Alamanni and defeats them (kings Suomarius and Ortarius) 
 
-Now the Galliae are pacified and roman again 
 
-20.000 roman citizens prisoneers are given back 
 
-All the destroyed roman fortresses on the Rhine are re-built forcing the barbarian prisoneers to work on them and forcing the barbarian kings to supply materials 
 
-400 new ships are built for the Rhine patrolling 
 
-The devasted territories are repopulated 
 
-He ordered a taxes lowering in Gallia and to avoid any taxes agents abuses (abuses were normal) checked personally the taxes collection 
 
-Iulianus was created emperor by his army in Paris 
 
-Triumph in Constantinopolis 
 
-Immediately begins the monstruos work of restoring to health 
the Empire (East and West) economy and beurocracy. 
 
-Restoration of Paganism (again State religion), no persecutions of Christians 
 
-In a manner typical of his own religiously tolerant outlook, he even proposed to rebuild the Jewish temple in Jerusalem! 
 
-Writing of many philosophic texts about the neo-platonism: "Hymn to King Helios," "Hymn to the Mother of the Gods," "Letter to a Priest," and "Misopogon, "Against the Galileans" 
 
-363 AD: starts a big campaign against Shapur II parthian army from north and west with two roman armies to be rejoined beyond the Tigris river to Ctesiphons 
 
-After a hard campaign, where the other roman army never attended, during the last battle of Ctesiphons, while, as always, he was directly fighting in the melee among his soldiers, he was hit by a javelin that perforated the warrior/philosopher Emperor's cuirass... 
 
-The battle and the parthian war were won, but Iulianus' romantic dream of restoring the Empire to the past greatness was over... 
 
He made his attempt among a lot of christian religious struggles of power (Rimini and Seleucia Isaurica councils), loads of internal enemies, Costantius emperor and others mortal envies and jealousies, betraying generals, menaced frontiers. 
 
Now, if this is not a great roman... who is so? 
 
Valete. 
Titus Sabatinus Aquilius

Goffredo · 10-30-2003, 01:17 PM

I find the final entries of your impressive list not evaluated properly. He did not win the persian war! 
Had he won then after his death the emperor substitute Jovian would not have offered very bad peace terms to Shapor!!! Come now. Do you really think a true roman dominance, resulting from a true victory, would have been so easily given up? I think Julian was foolish to want to try in persia or at least was foolish to insist, once things started going wrong to the point of burning the transport ships. Had he pulled it off successfuly history would have judged him a great gereral. But he did not succeed and you cann't hide this major blemish behind smoke screens. 
 
I think Julian's victory was very VERY nominal (on paper) and not at all concrete. He might have won a major battle infront of Ctestiphon but he did not win the war. I like Julian. I think Julian was an impressive figure but more tragic than truely great. His outdated religious policy and persian policy were ultimately failures. His great victory against the alemanni was crucial for the suvival of the roman empire but I am not the only person to think that his failure in persia almost cancelled the beneficial effect as the army was materially and morally weakened.

TITVS SABATINVS AQVILIVS · 10-30-2003, 02:39 PM

Not easy, I agree, but possible and forced choice. The Persian front was always highly unstable, and Julian realized that he would have only to fight there and not to pay Parthians someway or simply leave them Empire territories to be quiet. So he had to proceed at all costs. 
 
Maybe the Parthian war was not officially won after the victory of Ctesiphons, but about 50 parthian generals and noblesmen plus a great part of the parthian soldiers killed tell us about a almost total defeat of the parthian army, maybe disbanded. Shapur II was alive yet, but what about Iulianus was alive too? And what if (I know, I know, no "if" in History) the other half of the roman army leaded by Procopius, as planned before by Iulianus, was rejoined to the Iulianus' half? But Procopius betrayed... 
 
Yes he did not succeed, but is it a real fault, if it's determined by a betraying? Was it right leave the eastern part of the Empire free to the Parthians, without an attempt to stop them forever? After Iulianus the flood submerged the Empire. 
 
I think that Iulianus with the "whole army" could have a chance: he was not so tragic in my opinion, but the Empire situation was so. 
 
Then, as you tell, his successor Jovian (a Christian general of the Iulianus' army) was badly defeated and made an ignominious peace, by which the districts on the Tigris and Nisibis were ceded to the Persians, and the Romans promised to interfere no more in Armenia, relinquished the five provinces conquered by Diocletian. This "peace" had the results we know: one hundred years of humiliant agony. 
 
Irony: Procopius met the Iovian retreating army at Nisibis and accompanied Julian's body to Tarsus where it was buried. Procopius had an inscription carved on the marble facing of Julian's tomb: 
 
Here lies Julian after the strong-flowing Tigris, both a good king and a brave soldier. 
 
Even, if Christian propagandists set to work at once to blacken Julian 's name, here and there, in rural towns and ancient cities, can still be found inscriptions that express a different view. The emperor who would not use violence against his opponents, who understood the Empire and loved its common people, had won a place in the human heart that rewritten history could not totally eradicate. The deep feeling he called forth from many at all levels of society is perhaps best captured in the simple inscription that survives at Pergamum: 
 
Lord of the world, Teacher of philosophy, reverend ruler, pious emperor, ever-victorious Augustus, spreader of Republican liberty. 
 
Vale, 
Titus Sabatinus Aquilius

10-30-2003, 03:19 PM

Actually I was not really interested in what the author of this pamphlet --for it is a pamphlet-- wrote about Julian. 
On that issue I agree with Goffredo and with the vast majority of historians. In the words of one of them, Julian was a man "mistaken about his times" (L'homme qui s'ÃƒÂ©tait trompÃƒÂ© d'ÃƒÂ©poque). Incidentally the author of this accurate description of Julian is very sympathetic to the man. 
Poets tend to be nice people and Julian was one. In that he was quite un-roman, actually. Generally speaking good roman emperors were pragmatic, cynical and ruthless. Julian was neither. 
I was more interested in the description of the Serapeum of Alexandria and the religious practices of the era, for instance, as well as the nice exercise in rethorics of this paper. 
But when you leave aside the anti-christian, or anti-monotheist rethorics, you're left with a rather accurate description of those troubled times that I rarely saw in books about this period, except a few very specialized ones. 
I am thinking about the emphasis on the violent reactions of local populations to the spread of state sponsored christianity, a fact that is more often than not overlooked in the "official" history. It also includes a candid description of pagan religious practices that would be unacceptable in our day an age, whether you're a christian or not. This is also often overlooked. 
I dont believe The Man was resurrected three days after he died, but I don't believe I can figure out what'll happen tomorrow by looking at the entrails of a bull either.. 
And to go along with Jenny: I had my doubts about putting that link here but I think it is really an interesting paper. 
So, I hope we won't behave like those fanatical men in black so accurately described..

aitor iriarte · 10-30-2003, 05:48 PM

Don't worry, Jenny, discussions on politics and religion are rather boring, in my opinion! 
I agree with Goffredo and Antoninus, that webpage is clearly biased from which we could term 'the reasonable middle' and to speak about 'good' or 'bad' deeds is just over-simplistic. 
Maybe it is too easy to judge from the distance, but I also agree in deeming Julian's Persian expedition as a very risky enterprise that ended in nearly total disaster. Surely Julian would have done better trying to reform the Empire to improve its health before going against the Sassanids. The clash was ineludible since Constantine so wantonly started hostilities, but it could have surely been posponed for a while. 
It is much what Julian could have made for Rome (in spite of his impetuous and a little naif character) if he would have had time for it. Maybe he could have been a second Diocletian or maybe not, who knows... 
Finally, despite my personal opinion on the sect, I think that it is also over-simplistic to try to blame Christianity for the destruction of the Occidental Empire (The Oriental part remained and was Christian for 1,000 years more! ). A series of factors intervened as the Barbarian pressure, the over-taxation to maintain an extremely swelled corps of functionaries (Christian bishops and their councils included), endless civil wars, the dwindling of the army in favour of hired federate German bands... 
 
No, things ain't ever so simple 
 
Aitor

aitor iriarte · 10-30-2003, 05:52 PM

Oh, by the way, Goffredo, are you going to stay around Venice this week-end? My wife and I are going to fly there tomorrow. If rain and tides allow I intend to take some more mesurements of the Tetrarchs! 
 
Aitor

TITVS SABATINVS AQVILIVS · 10-31-2003, 09:15 AM

Anyway considering the things told above just like "trends" is reductive and semplicistic as well. I believe that anyone has to do an attempt to know the truth (it's a moral duty) even if well hidden, also through the hypothesis exercise, also through the doubts generated by a simple pamphlet. It could be a beginnning for the newcomers: how many serious reenactors began with a totally wrong equipment? 
 
The doubts are safe: truth does not have to fear. Then, but just after the knowledge process about both the sides of the coin, anyone does his own choices. 
This is an attempt to see some facts with other points of view. In a free way. Wrong? Right? Our sons will know that better then us (I think any present effort is for them), but any present political correctness will not help them. 
 
About the risk: how many "totally sure" campaigns the Romans (and others) did? Would have you bet one Euro on the Caesar's enterprise to the Gallia? If Iulius Caesar would have been mortally wounded during one of the loads of difficult moments of the gallic expedition, don't you think that his legions could risk to be annihilated as well as the Iulianus' legions? Fortuna is often the only difference and as Aitor says, Iulianus could have been a new Diocletianus, (his qualities are given for sure by almost all), or simply disappear and cancelled in a benedectin monastery, the "damnatio memoriae" after his death was total. A great man can be called fool, naif, weak, when the winners write the History..., but this is an old story. 
 
Valete, 
Titus Sabatinus Aquilius

Goffredo · 10-31-2003, 03:48 PM

Darn 
I hope we meet soon. Unfortunately I am not home this period (away for work). Venice is only 40 minutes by train from my home. Hope you come to Northern Italy again soon so we can organize a get together (Acquilea, Concordia, Grado, Longobard Cividale, then Verona, Brescia,...). 
 
By the way in Milan (were Luca is) there is a nice exhibit on Agostine and Ambrose, hence late empire. Also in Parma there is an exhibit on medieval world. 
 
 
Ciao and enjoy Venice and the tretrarchs

aitor iriarte · 11-04-2003, 05:20 PM

It was only a short trip (three days) ans I'm now at home again. I'm afraid that it will be some years before I can repeat the feat, even if I'm dying for visiting Aquileia since some years ago! 
In spite of acqua alta and the pouring rain of the Saturday, the weather was splendid on Sunday and I could take most of the measurements I needed from the Tetrarchs. 
I hope that we'll be able to meet in a future... 
 
Aitor

**Robert Vermaat** · 11-07-2003, 01:08 PM

Pictures, please!

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