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**Robert Vermaat** · 03-16-2004, 08:55 AM

Hi Togaman, 
 
Why did the first century have only 99 years? I think this is a very common misconception: the first century started in year 1 (today we would say january 1st, 1 AD) and ended at the end of the last day of year 100 AD. 
 
It's like counting to 10, you don't start at 0, and you don't stop at 9 either. the first century ran from 1 to 100, the seconf from 101 to 200, etc. 
 
However, the year 0 is as much a misconception as thinking Medieval man and Church thought the world was flat. Urban mythology, as it were, and very difficult to root out. Therefore, all the Millennium celebrations on december 31st 1999 were a year early, and us concentious/nitpicking historians duly celebrated the start of the third millennium of the Christian Era on december 31st, 2000 AD. 
 
Valete, 
Valerius/Robert

03-17-2004, 01:28 AM

Yes. I quite like 'Christian Era', and hope one day to be able to use the phrase, if I ever hear someone say 'C.E' aloud in cold blood. 
 
"I don't use 'Christian Era'" I shall say, "I'm not enough of a believer, I'm afraid. Good old Anno Domini is my thing." That'll fox 'em. I shall wander away while they're trying to explain. 
 
To be honest, I could live with the change, if they took 2000 as year one. Good luck to them, say I, just as I do with people who learn Esperanto and tell me we'll all speak it one day. It's the revisionist nonsense of referring to Roman dates in that way, or saying Queen Victoria died in 1901 CE. That's when I start to see red. 
 
Cheers all and thank you, Robert. 
 
Conn

rekirts · 03-17-2004, 03:45 AM

If we are to talk of being hypocritical, that is how I feel when I use the terms B.C. and A.D. I feel that in using those terms, I appear to profess a belief to which I do not subscribe. I have no problem with Christian Era, because whether I believe in it or not, it is the era of the rise and spread of Christianity. Also I find Common Era a meaningless term. 
 
I do in fact resent the idea that people would like to force me into using terms that contravene my beliefs or lack of beliefs. I would be perfectly happy to start counting from the founding of Rome. Alternatively, we could put an 'a' in front of B.C. and A.D. to stand for allegedly. 
 
As Jenny said, we all know what the terms mean. I have no problem with people using B.C. and A.D. if they are comfortable with them. Please respect the fact that I am not! 
 
Wendy 
 
"I am an admirer of the ancients,but not like some people so as to despise the talent of our own times." Pliny the YoungerEdited by: <A HREF=http://pub45.ezboard.com/bromanarmytalk.showUserPublicProfile?gid=rekirts>rekirts</A> <IMG HEIGHT=10 WIDTH=10 SRC="http://www.cased.ca/images/Eliz.jpg" BORDER=0> at: 3/17/04 4:47 am

03-17-2004, 04:02 AM

I've actually started to keep track of time from the day I was born. To heck with all these other systems. I don't even recognize anything that happened before I was born. Rome? What's that? Magnus/Matt 
Legio XXX "Ulpia Victrix" 
Niagara Falls, Canada

03-17-2004, 07:33 AM

Hi to all, 
 
First let me state I'm a roman military fan, what I have learnt comes from school (Not much) and books. I have been for more than a decade. 
 
Second, I know the considerations that film makers have to face, cost, mass appeal, easy recognition etc. when it comes to historical costume. 
 
The film itself is well made and I give credit to all the actors speaking in Aramaic and Latin, certainly to learn another language and the act like its native to you is a challenge, and they pulled it off. 
 
Only after reading what has been posted here and some other online reseach did I get a good understanding of the unit types that would have been involved in the events of the film. 
 
The portrayal of those roman soldiers was pure farce. Even if they are Samatian Auxilia, they act with such over the top sadisim, and with most blatant display of disrespect for a senior officer I've seen on film for any era. 
 
SPOILER WARNING 
 
 
 
 
 
 
When one of these 6 foot anglo bald thugs decides to use a new type of flail device for the torture of Jesu's back, he first brings down it onto the desk of an officer whose hands are narrowly missed, he gets an untranslated rebuke of no consequence, and the rest of these "Roman Soldiers" stand around and laugh! 
 
These actors were cast purely for their resemblance to a stereotyped "British Soccer Hooligan" and thats how they act, even when what I presume is a Centurion rides in on horseback, their disrespect is still evident. 
 
Their escort duty of Christ with the cross, highlights the absurd "WE are bad guys" stereotyping complete with openly drinking, maintaining no formation, further reluctance to follow the Centurions repeated miserable attempts to restore discipline, highlighting the two sympathetic "Roman Soldiers" who stand out painfully. 
 
We even see Pontius Pilate watching them! The whole part of the film depicting the Roman rank and file undid the previous scenes of the film.I was taken from any involvement in the story. I heard an interesting comment from a fellow cinema goer: 
 
Why is it the Jewish Soldiers are (In the film) afraid of the Roman soldiers when throughout the film they are more disciplined? How is it that Rome has control in the first place? 
 
This "Historically accurate" film and that is my contention here, NOT a religious one, is inaccurate. 
 
I will gladly submit to any evidence that would convince me that even the most harshly stereotyped Auxilia would function this way. Let alone any military unit as part of an occupation force. 
 
AS to the costumes, the leather Braccae (sp?) are they not for winter conditions? THe Shields I saw bore a large resemblance to those horrible "Sword and Sandal" cheapies made bulk in 60's Italian cinema. The brown leather armour looked very cheap and "The Armourer" was Italian, I would assume he would at least have made some effort-but it does not look like it. 
 
Now I restate it is the historical accuracy I have issue with here, not religious.

**Robert Vermaat** · 03-17-2004, 08:32 AM

Hi Wendy, 
 
Thanks for that. I can fully understand why someone who is not of the Christian belief would refrain from using BC or AD, after all I don't use the Jewish or Muslim calendar either, even tough it is interesting enough to keep track of their time schedule . 
 
I'm glad you don't agree with such term sas Common Era. My main beef is with those who 'hijacked' the Christian calendar and pretend it is theirs! 
Why don't these non-believers invent their own starting point? Start with Napoleon (inventor of the Nation State), start with any Humanist, why don't they? Yes, the BC/AD system is accepted and used worldwide, I realise changing it for another would be hard. 
 
But, the current system is based on that old religion called Christianity, and it was invented during the Middle Ages by some monk who did not even get year 1 right! I'd say the non-Christians would do well to get a better one, it should be easy! 
 
Valete, 
Valerius/Robert

Jeroen Pelgrom · 03-17-2004, 08:55 AM

Absolutely right Matt! 
 
i prefer the BJ/AJ system! (Before Jeroen and After Jeroen). ThatÃƒâ€šÃ‚Â´s what important!! Professionals built the Titanic, amateurs built the ark

rekirts · 03-17-2004, 03:25 PM

Easy???? Ack! Can you imagine the 'Conference to Establish the Year One?' Every non-Christian religious group would want to start the calendar on the birthday of their founding prophet or divinity. Then you'd have the completely non-religious types who would have their own particular favourite starting point in history, none of which would agree. My personal preference would be the beginning of time. I don't even know what the date is on the Matt or Jeroen calendars, and if I started my own according to my birth date, I would probably have started lying about the date about 10 years ago so no one would know how old I am! 
 
In the future, all historians would be identifiable by their baldness from tearing out their hair trying to figure out when stuff happened. "I am an admirer of the ancients,but not like some people so as to despise the talent of our own times." Pliny the YoungerEdited by: <A HREF=http://pub45.ezboard.com/bromanarmytalk.showUserPublicProfile?gid=rekirts>rekirts</A> <IMG HEIGHT=10 WIDTH=10 SRC="http://www.cased.ca/images/Eliz.jpg" BORDER=0> at: 3/17/04 4:26 pm

**Robert Vermaat** · 03-17-2004, 03:40 PM

Quote:<hr>if I started my own according to my birth date, I would probably have started lying about the date about 10 years ago so no one would know how old I am! <hr> 
 
We'd be living in the same year for over a decade now! 
 
Valete, 
Valerius/Robert

rekirts · 03-17-2004, 03:47 PM

Hi Jim, 
 
I haven't seen the movie (it takes awhile for movies to get here), and I found your review interesting. When they (Hollywood types) start over-villainizing the villains so that they are merely evil brutes, they go from drama to melodrama. It's an attempt at emotional highjacking which unfortunately works on many people. Sometimes I go to movies perfectly willing to have my emotions manipulated. But when something purports to be historically accurate, I wish the makers would ditch the stereotypes. 
 
Wendy "I am an admirer of the ancients,but not like some people so as to despise the talent of our own times." Pliny the Younger

03-18-2004, 01:36 AM

Considering the punishment for falling asleep on watch in the Roman army was to be beaten to death by your tent-mates, I'd say disrespectful attitudes like the one you described Jim, would be rare and painfully short. The discipline was far more important than the individual, as I hope the above example demonstrates. 
 
There was an interesting programme on British TV recently where two groups were trained with incentives or punishment. It was called "Carrot and Stick" or something similar. 
 
By the end, I was left with the very strong impression that if I wanted a team to run a leisure centre, I would use the Carrot boys, but the Stick group were the ones to go to war with, no doubt about it. We do tend to forget that lack of respect for authority is a post World war one phenomenon, culturally cemented by 'fragging' and so on, in Vietnam. I do not believe for a single moment, that Roman soldiers would have been openly disrespectful, or not more than once. 
 
I'm really going to have to see this film. 
 
Conn

03-18-2004, 11:37 PM

Having spent a large part of my life moving from one military command to another, I think it bears pointing out that discipline varies widely from one unit to the next. 
 
I don't mean to imply that I thought the disrespect shown to a superior in the flogging scene was exactly believable, but to take a cookie cutter approach to every command out there is a mistake as well. Military commanders are people too, and as such have all the associated strengths, weaknesses and tolerances. 
 
Since many historical documents refer to the fact that a posting in Judea was not exactly choice duty, it stands to reason that many of the people who wound up there were malcontents to begin with, or got that way soon after arrival. 
 
For all we know, the roman depicted as being in charge that day was promptly removed from command and disciplined the following day. 
 
*edited for clarity* Edited by: <A HREF=http://pub45.ezboard.com/bromanarmytalk.showUserPublicProfile?gid=sontor>Sontor</A> <IMG HEIGHT=10 WIDTH=10 SRC="http://www.ezboard.com/ezgfx/gicons/white_bluespot.gif" BORDER=0> at: 3/19/04 2:14 am

Quintius Clavus · 03-19-2004, 01:54 AM

I did find points in the film where the Roman troops seemed out of control, and the officers seemed weak in their handling/discipling of the troops. Jerusalem, in particular, would not have been a "popular or welcome" duty post. I suspect the troops had very few outlets for "R&R" while posted there, and may have felt a bit "caged" in their barracks as a result. It would have been even harder for Roman soldiers than it is for Americans today in Saudi Arabia-where religious law of the host country severely restricts interaction between troops and civilians. On the Jewish side, the resentment caused by the presence of "unclean heathen occupiers" would have made even the Jerusalem prostitutes unwilling to provide their services to the Roman troops. 
One only has to go to Josephus to find examples of Roman brutality and lack of discipline. There was a soldier who turned his back, bent over and made either an obscene gesture or noise (farting?) at the crowd in the temple while Cumanus was procurator (after the brief interlude of Herod Agrippa as King). He repesents one of the more egregious examples. 
The soldier's behavior caused riots, and in putting down the riots, which spread into the countryside, other soldiers deliberately insulted and/or destroyed copies of the Torah they found. 
It took a Jewish appeal to higher authority, either the Proconsul of Syria, or the Emperor Claudius, before order was restored. Unfortunately, I am using memory alone to describe what happened next (My copies of Josephus' books are in a storage unit at present). Orders were issued from the "higher authority", carried by a new procurator, I think. The soldier who started the whole mess by his obscene gesture, whatever it was, was punished by being dragged through the streets of Jerusalem and then publicly executed. I honestly do not remember whether any officers also suffered punishment for failing to discipline the soldier immediately after the incident. 
It took that Jewish appeal to higher-ups outside Judea to get any redress. No one at the local level cared about punishing the original culprit or any of the soldiers who added more insult and injury while "putting down" the riots. 
So,... in that sense, the brutal, undisciplined troops in the "Passion" have "descendents" in the historical record. 
 
M. Quintius Clavus/Quinton

03-21-2004, 06:07 PM

Oh please, you're giving the rowdiness of some troops as evidence that the film is historically inaccurate? I don't think we have to go far to find examples of troops acting disrespectful to their commanding officers, heh, as Quintius Clavus so helpfully pointed out. And the guy who hit his commander's table with the scourge was obviously joking around and, though pissed off, the commander certainly didn't look threatened or anything. You think he's going to have a friend executed for joking around? Please. 
 
The Romans were not portrayed in a stereotypical light. Far from it. *Some* of the Romans were portrayed as being villains, sure, but the characters of Pontius Pilate, Abenader, and Longinus balanced them quite perfectly. The desire was to show that there are always good and bad people amongst every group, whether they be Jews, Romans, or even Christ's following (i.e. Judas). I guess it's unfortunate that you didn't notice the intended contrast between the characterization of these "evil" soldiers and Pilate, Abenader and Longinus.

rekirts · 03-25-2004, 02:35 PM

Have you seen that The Life of Brian is being rereleased in theatres in North America in April? 
 
I'm not sure how long this link will last, but here it is: 
www.cbc.ca/stories/2004/0...rian040324 "I am an admirer of the ancients,but not like some people so as to despise the talent of our own times." Pliny the Younger

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