1/4 Terry Jones' Barbarians part 2; The Savage Goths

[GoldenAxeVox666]

Bloody pompus, pretentious, ostentatious Romans, they destroyed their eco-system and had to go elsewhere to find land to farm and mine as they had exhausted their resources within a few centuries of the formation of Rome.

[MsLenepigen]

"The Romans hadn't just been defeated - they'd been defiled."

*Giant Schadenfreude smile*... Bitches got owned!

[serialkiller1990]

And after those supposedly civilized people destroyed the Western Roman empire they destroyed many of the cities and structures built by romans, and they could not figure out for hundreds of years how to imitate what Romans created. Europe had fallen into the dark ages.

[serialkiller1990]

I think this documentary is exaggerating. The Celts and Germans were not as savage as they were portrayed, but Roman civilization was far more advanced.

The "civilizing the barbarian" was not a manifest of their altruistic motives of Romans. Their motives were selfish, and it was simply a rational, but let us not forget what word did they live in. And the conquered tribes did assimilate and embrace Roman culture. Bottom line it was better then te alternative.

[cleanhomer]

@serialkiller1990 Still, it's not as bad as Gladiator, where they had the Germanic tribesmen chanting & thumping Zulu-style.

[andrievici]

@serialkiller1990 If the Roman empire was a better alternative, it would not have been necessary to force "barbarians" into slavery to accept this better life.

[4ThomasAllan]

@andrievici Actually that assumes a fair bit about inculcation politics. Slavery in the Roman empire was not the Same as Slavery in Mississippi. Among other things, slavery served the process of acculturating foreigners and creating a parole-officer/patron bond between them and their new and temporary masters. People talk about slavery anachronistically. Also, It's not as if the entire population of Gaul was enslaved and if anything, Gallic princes increased their power over their subjects with-

[4ThomasAllan]

@andrievici Actually that assumes a fair bit about inculcation politics. Slavery in the Roman empire was not the Same as Slavery in Mississippi. Among other things, slavery served the process of acculturating foreigners and creating a parole-officer/patron bond between them and their new and temporary masters. People talk about slavery anachronistically. Also, It's not as if the entire population of Gaul was enslaved and if anything, Gallic princes increased their power over their subjects-

[4ThomasAllan]

-with Roman hegemony despite having become answerable to the emperor and most of what we would term burghers, got a hell of a lot wealthier. Even during the imperial period, a Roman citizen could become a slave and a Romanized Gallic prince like Vindex for instance, could have bought him/her.

[andrievici]

@4ThomasAllan do you fathom how wars happened and how enslavement too place? "inculcation politics", "acculturating foreigners" are such highly skilled words for a very ruthless event. Of course, the times were ruthless back then, but Romans perfected the system :) If you would live a single day in those times of war you would choke with horror. Just try to imagine first how is to have your property stolen and burned, mother raped, father enslaved, and then talk about "acculturation"

[4ThomasAllan]

@andrievici You're not talking about slavery there, you're talking about an immediate aftermath of war. I like to be careful about how I word things and to some it may seem like vacuous verbosity but I think that only reflects a superficial interpretation on their part. It's anachronistic and culture-centric for us to make comparisons with our society and that of the Romans. Enslavement took place in various ways in those times among various peoples. Slaves could be acquired in war but they-

[4ThomasAllan]

-could also be acquired during peace from among a foreign slavers or domestically from those who sold others or even themselves into slavery. Why would anybody sell themselves into slavery? because slaves were fed and housed where as freemen were both more financially and socially independent although typically still somewhat dependent on a wealthy patron. If you were enslaved you could save up your pocket money and buy your freedom(Roman slaves got pocket money if they were good), and if when-

[4ThomasAllan]

-you procreated, you were a freeman, your child would be a citizen automatically. As a slave you could bring your master to court if he mistreated you beyond what was reasonable. Slaves were fed and sheltered, legally counted as part of the family although so did animate property(even our ideas about what a family is are different). Slaves could hold more authority than freedmen and citizens. If a slave was killed by his master he would have to pay heavy fines not unlike the system of wergeld-

[4ThomasAllan]

-of the German tribes(albeit less as slaves weren't as valuable as freedmen who in turn, weren't as valuable as citizens who were valued less than aristocratic people). The only slaves killed were those in religious rites such as when temples were being killed or in gladiatorial games(entertainment with religious undertones). Masters were legally responsible for their slaves and when they were freed or bought their freedom they could count on those masters to be their patrons and support them-

[4ThomasAllan]

-financially or socially on endeavours such as setting up a shop or helping them find a house or wife. Masters would pay for the funerals of slaves and wrote inscriptions on their graves, often freedmen too, wrote inscriptions on the graves of their masters. Of course there was a difference in the lifestyles of domestic slaves and the field and mine labourers but the latter too were often warriors and criminals and inmate labour hasn't exactly disappeared either despite becoming somewhat-

[4ThomasAllan]

-safer. THIS IS NOT THE SAME SLAVERY OF THE EARLY MODERN PERIOD BY A LONG SHOT. Nobody likes slavery but the stigma it has today was born largely during the early modern period, not the medieval or classical, in fact the serfdom of Poland and Russia around the 16th century was probably worse than the slavery of the Roman empire. No, I wouldn't like to live back then but that should be an understandable opinion from somebody used to living in an industrialized world with internet access and-

[4ThomasAllan]

-medicine, of course I would hate it back then but that is based purely on anachronistic sentiments, I'd probably hate it just as much living in 18th century Vienna if I had to compare it with the modern world. Lastly, I think you're overestimating how systematic the Romans were and underestimating how ruthless the others of the time could be. The armies used by Agricola in the conquest of Britain were made up almost entirely of southern Brits, Gauls and Batavians, the Armies used by Caesar in-

[4ThomasAllan]

-his conquest of Gaul were recruited largely from Cisalpine Gaul and were of Celtic ancestry, bore Celtic names(as evidenced by inscriptions on graves), probably even spoke one of the dialects of Celtic as their native tongue and used Latin just as a lingua franca. Even the Armies on the Rhine were just Celts recruited in Spain, that their weapons changed is no more to the point on this issue than whether or not a combatant in a modern war is killed by a sniper or assault rifle. Don't think-

[4ThomasAllan]

-that the La Tene Celts or even earlier people were particularly less vicious with victims, that's naivete bordering on condescension.

[LordAzanko]

terry jones is always so delightful :) thank you for posting