# The Roman Empire ## Metadata - Author: [[Christopher Kelly]] - Full Title: The Roman Empire - Category: #source/books ## Highlights - Chapter 1 Conquest Expansion and survival ([Location 276](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B000SEW24U&location=276)) - Note: Primarily covers the merciless expansion of the early empire. A prmary theme is the differential narratives amongst leadership, writers, and those annexed/conquered. - The Third Punic War (149–146 BC) ended with the complete destruction of the city. Its buildings were systematically levelled and most of its 50,000 surviving inhabitants enslaved. ([Location 306](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B000SEW24U&location=306)) - The Roman Republic was an unabashed plutocracy; the citizen-body was carefully graded according to stringent property qualifications. In turn, this classification regulated voting rights: all adult male citizens were enfranchised, but a system of electoral colleges guaranteed that the rich, if united, would always be able to out-vote the poor. ([Location 317](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B000SEW24U&location=317)) - The republican constitution also imposed a deliberate restraint on any ambitious individual. Above all, it prevented the long-term concentration of political or military authority in the hands of victorious generals. The true test of a great man – at least for Roman moralists – was not his ability to achieve high office, but his open-handed willingness to relinquish it. ([Location 328](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B000SEW24U&location=328)) - Note: I vaguely remember what is likey a inspired quote or idea. True leadership is about giving away power, not amassing it. - one of its most important battles was won under the leadership of Quinctius Cincinnatus. Cincinnatus (so the story goes) had been loath to leave his fields and interrupt his ploughing in order to raise an army. Even more celebrated than his lack of enthusiasm for high office, was Cincinnatus’ refusal to extend his command. Turning his back on the possibility of continued power, he returned to his smallholding and to his plough. ([Location 331](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B000SEW24U&location=331)) - This huge military establishment created its own dynamic. In its rigorous discipline, in the superior quality of its weapons, and in the campaign experience of its troops, the Roman army exploited the advantages of scale and repeated success. Victory yielded huge quantities of booty. In turn, the riches plundered from defeated enemies, supplemented with revenue from provincial taxation, funded the heavy cost of continued conquest. ([Location 374](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B000SEW24U&location=374)) - Note: It just vcame this positive feedback loop. Likely enabled by and by benefiting the aristocracy. - It is easy to be carried away by such rousing glorifications of conquest. ([Location 418](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B000SEW24U&location=418)) - Note: Context: the brutal conqest and the identity formation that became Roman imperialism. - the siege of Masada was another demonstration of the might of an empire which could concentrate extraordinary resources against even a thousand dissidents who dared oppose it. Like the Arch of Titus in far-away Rome, the great ramp, which still stands firm against Masada’s western escarpment, was a permanent reminder of the impossibility of rebellion. ([Location 460](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B000SEW24U&location=460)) - Note: Context: a auxilary roman military was dispatched to clean up 9,000 jews who'd escaped Jerusalem and found safety in a fotress. Day by day, these Jews watched the the military built bridges to mobilize battering rams a more - no one was too small to conquer. - the Romans seldom recognized that they had been the aggressors. Rather, wars had been fought to pacify enemies who were judged to pose a threat to the integrity of Roman territory. ([Location 472](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B000SEW24U&location=472)) - Note: Such a classic narrative spin. An obvious theme in these conquests is a historic manifest destiny, but publicized as threat prevention - two distinct narratives. - Against the pious justifications proposed by the Aeneid should be placed Calgacus’ stark condemnation of Roman imperialism. Pillagers of the world, now they have exhausted the land by their indiscriminate devastation, they probe the sea. If their enemy is wealthy, they are greedy; if poor, they are overweening; neither East nor West has sated them … To plunder, slaughter, and rapine they falsely give the name ‘empire’. They make a desolation and they call it ‘peace’. ([Location 511](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B000SEW24U&location=511)) - Note: Context: an alternative/critical perpsective on Roman imperialism. This was rare, especially for Roman writers. This highly juxtaposes the Aneid imperialism propoganda… porn. - By thinking of emperors as godlike, unconstrained by the limitations of time or distance, those in the provinces could attempt to make sense of their own subjugation. Their own non-Roman past could be linked, in a seemingly unbroken progression, with a very Roman present. ([Location 567](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B000SEW24U&location=567)) - Note: That's extremely interesting. It gave them a way to connect their past a beliefs with Roman culture and oppression. - this explicit joining of ancestral gods and Roman emperors again demonstrated the dynamic capacity of traditional systems of belief to respond creatively in finding new ways to understand the nature of conquest. A form of ‘religious bilingualism’ helped fuse imperial and local concerns. ([Location 584](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B000SEW24U&location=584)) - One of the most memorable scenes in the Annals opens with the imperial household dining together in a seemingly convincing picture of familial conviviality. Amongst the company was Agrippina, Nero’s mother, as well as the young Octavia and her brother Britannicus, who as the last surviving son of the emperor Claudius represented the most serious dynastic threat to Nero’s imperial position. During the dinner, Britannicus collapsed. Speechless, he fell to the floor desperately gasping for breath. This (at least in Tacitus’ account) is a murder scene. A hot drink, already tasted by Britannicus’ attendant, had been cooled by water containing a fatal poison. As the young prince expired, Nero observed that nothing unusual was happening. The boy was epileptic and would soon recover. As it became clear that Britannicus was not acting up – but was actually dead – those less practised in the artifices of court etiquette hurriedly left the room. The more adept stayed in their places. Britannicus’ loving sister Octavia did not flinch (to quote Tacitus): ‘despite her youthful inexperience, she had learned to conceal her grief, her affection, her every feeling’. All kept their gaze fixed on Nero and followed his lead. ‘And so after this brief silence, the festive pleasures of the meal were resumed.’ ([Location 702](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B000SEW24U&location=702)) - Note: Absolutely crazy scene and imagery