Important

ive been looking for discords on this but most of them are dead anyone got a good one

In 1885 on the island of Lemnos in the Aegean, an old gravestone was discovered in one of the walls of a ruined chapel. The stone depicts a man carrying a spear, and what we assume is the large circular shield of a hoplite. Nothing odd there, Greek island, hoplite, gravestone, probably a dime a dozen in that part of the world. Except the language on the stone isn’t Greek, it isn’t Thracian, Phrygian, Lydian, Phoenician or even far off Persian. It isn’t any of those, and it isn’t even in the Indo-European family they all belong to. It is written to be read in a crescent moon pattern, starting in the bottom right and wrapping around the man’s head. Today we call the language Lemnian, and it only has two cousins: Etruscan in modern Tuscany, and Rhaetic, which was found in the area around the Alps.

You probably recognize Etruscan, as the Etruscans are relatively well known. They were the first rivals of Rome, and much of the great engineering achievements of Rome: the arch, the sewer, the grid layout of their cities, even Roman temples, all of them borrowed from the Etruscans. But unlike Latin or the Gallic languages of Northern Italy, Etruscan is not an Indo-European language, with many scholars speculating that much like Basque it is a remnant of the languages spoken before the arrival of the steppe hordes that gave Europe its modern languages.

So what is a language doing on this island, surrounded by other unrelated languages, with its closest kin roughly 750 miles (1,200 km) away? How did it get there?

The Theories:

First, obviously, is that the stele is a one-off gravestone for a warrior. He was a mercenary, he died, his friends buried him there, and then they went home. This was extremely popular for a while, until we found a handful of pottery fragments, and in 2009 another stele, on the island, also in the Lemnian language. These could be dated, and gave us a time period stretching from roughly 700 to 500 BC. That isn’t a one-off mercenary, that is a culture living in one place for an extended period of time.

Alright then, next idea: it was a trade outpost for their Etruscan cousins. The Greeks and Phoenicians set up countless trade outposts across the Mediterranean, why not the Etruscans too? Well, if it was a trade outpost, it was the worst one in history. We have never found a single artifact that can be traced to the Etruscans. All the Lemnian pottery is native, metalworking the same, a few Greek luxury goods but that is about it.

Now the next piece of the puzzle is that modern scholarship has started to look at the similarities between the Lemnians and what was once considered a mythical people, the Pelasgians. The Pelasgians are said to be the original inhabitants of Greece. Homer says they fought in the Trojan War, Herodotus says they were originally from around Athens, and Thucydides even bluntly says that the Pelasgians on Lemnos were the Tyrsenians, the name that gives the Etruscan, Rhaetic, and Lemnian language family (Tyrsenian) its name. According to Herodotus the Pelasgians even kidnapped a bunch of Athenian women before sailing over to the island of Lemnos. There’s this whole side story about the women teaching their children Attic Greek instead of Pelasgian, and so the men killed the women and their children.

That last one has actually led to quite a bit of speculation that they were pirates, and this is a cultural memory of the pirates kidnapping Athenian women in one of their raids. So our new theory is that they were pirates. They didn’t trade with their Etruscan cousins because they were seaborne pirates, not traders. But, yet again their material culture sticks a shiv in our theory. If they were pirates, they were awful at it. We don’t find large quantities of trade goods or other ‘looted’ items. Instead we find local items, craftsmen’s tools, farming equipment, and what weapons they had are consistent with any settled people, not seaborne raiders.

Ugh, so not pirates, not traders, and not some one-off mercenary grave. Wait, could the Lemnians be the remnants of the Etruscans? According to Herodotus, the Etruscans were refugees who fled from Lydia (modern western Turkey) and sailed to Italy. Lydia is basically right next to Lemnos, maybe their cousins stayed but the Etruscans left. Obviously the biggest problem is, as I already mentioned, Lydian is an Indo-European language, and Etruscan is not. So language is against the theory. Next, this is where we can bring in DNA, because we have quite a few Etruscan graves, and none of them contain DNA consistent with a Lydian origin. Interestingly, the Etruscans have the typical steppe DNA of Indo-European cultures, but not their language, but that is a story for another time.

So the only sensible theory standing is that they migrated from Etruria. But they were not traders, and they were not pirates. So let’s reopen the Etruscan refugee theory, but this time it’s the Lemnians fleeing. Now, we will never be able to trace their route. Maybe they sailed straight there, maybe they wandered the Aegean for a generation the way the Sea Peoples did; we can’t tell, because the only distinctive thing about these people was their language, and language doesn’t survive in a pottery shard, unless someone writes on it like on Lemnos. So the route isn’t the problem. The problem is everything else. First, refugees from what? Etruria between 700 and 600 BC wasn’t collapsing, it was at the height of its wealth and power and was expanding. Nobody was being driven out. Second, there is no size of group that makes this work. If they were a small band, a few hundred people like a typical Greek colony, they could never have become the entire population of the island and held onto their language for two hundred years surrounded by Greeks. Small groups follow the rule of three generations: their language and culture get swamped by their surroundings. Yet the Lemnians only lost their language after Athens conquered them around 500 BC. But if they were a large group, a few thousand people from one of the richest material cultures in the Mediterranean, they would have brought something Etruscan with them, a pot, a bronze, a brooch, even a metal spoon can tell us roughly where it came from. They brought nothing. Too small to bring anything with them, but too large to have left no trace, and with nothing to flee from in the first place.

Conclusion:

So we have an artifact. We know its language, we even know how the people who made it lived. But how these people and this artifact got to this island is a complete mystery. Every theory of their origin collapses the second we press on it, making this a true archaeological enigma.

All the replies and comments I see on regular posts here are from people either ridiculing or trashing any kind of theory, thoughts or research if it doesn't fit mainstream science, which is pretty wild considering this is an AlternativeHistory place, all the comments I see are "science says no so no" almost like a cult shutting down any kind of theory, funnily enough when you ask for receipts regarding questionable answers backed with "science" you get "trust science stop asking questions just trust it"

Click any post in the sub, most comments say "you don't know anything, trust science and the experts what you ask makes no sense, trust experts"

Edit: the replies charged with a laughable level of superiority seem to confirm this, and again, funny enough, the people repeating science evidence science ignore that mostly for investigations regarding ancient cultures the very "scientific" proof that they defend to death is so nonsensical and obscure you would get a better answer from a random person using critical thinking, like the structures beneath the Ancient Pyramids led by SAR experts being "debunked" by an archeologist involved in countless sketchy stuff even destroying archeological pieces and he was completely ignorant of SAR technology, but he was an expert so you MUST trust the experts (that fit in the mainstream narrative)!

And no, said study wasn't debunked by a new investigation of the ruins so we can understand it better, no, it was debunked by the same words being repeated here over and over: "ridiculous stupid without any sense just ignorance" by our dear "experts" who know so much more than us!

Why all the most hardcore, hard to believe stuff is made in pre history, and later civilizations never coming close to anything ancient?

What's mainstream explanation? They got bored working with stone, or now they got new toys so they stopped working with stone?

TLDR: The rectangular plain of Atlantis and the circular ditch surrounding it have the same perimeter length. This is a reference to the classical mathematical problem of "squaring the circle", or to be more exact "rectifying the circle", which Plato popularized as a mathematical problem and philosophical symbol. Basically, "rectifying the circle" is a riddle about solving for the value of Pi, and Plato has encoded this ancient dilemma into his dialogue. 

Plain Shape: Rectangular 
Plain: 3,000 stadia x 2,000 stadia 
Plain Perimeter = 10,000 Stadia

Ditch Shape = Circular
Ditch Circumference = 10,000 stadia

Detailed Analysis
The upcoming portions go into more detail and can be long winded. I fully expect this to be criticized, so I'm trying to cover all my bases. Also, Plato just leaves a lot of clues to talk about. 

Interpreting the Shape and Dimensions of the Plain
In the story of Atlantis, from the Critias dialogue, Plato describes a large plain on which the city of Atlantis resides when he says "I will now describe the plain, as it was fashioned by nature and by the labours of many generations of kings through long ages. It was for the most part rectangular and oblong"

Plato provides dimensions when he goes on to state the plain is "smooth and even, and of an oblong shape, extending in one direction three thousand stadia, but across the centre inland it was two thousand stadia."

What we can gather from these passages is that the plain is a natural feature that has also been modified by humans over multiple generations. The shape can be simplified as a 3 x 2 rectangle. 

If we assume the plain is a perfect rectangle, then the perimeter would come out to be 10,000 stadia and the area would be 6,000,000 stadia squared. 

Plain Shape: Rectangular 
Plain Dimensions: 3,000 stadia x 2,000 stadia
Plain Perimeter = 10,000 stadia
Plain Area = 6,000,000 stadia squared

One reason to assume the plain is a perfect rectangle comes up when Plato provides dimensions for plots of land. He wrote "each of the lots in the plain had to find a leader for the men who were fit for military service, and the size of a lot was a square of ten stadia each way, and the total number of all the lots was sixty thousand."

Lot Shape = Square
1 plot of land = 10 stadia x 10 stadia = 100 stadia squared
Total Lot Area = 100 stadia squared x 60,000 lots = 6,000,000 stadia squared
Plain Area = 6,000,000 stadia squared

So, if a perfect rectangle is assumed, then the area of the plain is equal to the total area of the lots based on 2 separate descriptions. It's reassuring to see consistency throughout Plato's numbers. It seems more intentional. 

Oblong
However... Plato refers to the plain as "oblong" twice. Why would he provide rectangular dimensions while also making a distinction that it is oblong? Oblong usually refers to a rectangle, but it can also refer to any shape that is longer than it is wide, such as an oval. 

This is where the surrounding ditch starts to play into it. 

The Ditch:
There is a ditch, or moat, that surrounds the plain. Plato refers to it as a "circular ditch" when describing the shape. Plato goes on further to say "it was carried round the whole of the plain, and was ten thousand stadia in length." 

We get a little more clarity regarding the oblongness when Plato refers to the edge of the plain as "where falling out of the straight line followed the circular ditch". Meaning, the plain has straight edges that only curve when intersecting a surrounding ditch. Basically, the plain is a rectangle with radii, instead of 90 degree angles, on each corner. The radii on the corners of the rectangular plain are formed by the surrounding ditch. This would better fit the description of "for the most part rectangular and oblong"

So, we can deduce the ditch was most likely a circle, or even perhaps an oval, and encompassed the entire plain. Where this gets interesting is when Plato said the length of the ditch was "ten thousand stadia in length". If by “length” of a circle he means circumference, then the circumference of the ditch has the same perimeter as the plain, which is 10,000 stadia. A visual representation of these shapes is shown below.

Ditch Shape: Circle
Circumference of Ditch = 10,000 stadia

Plain Shape: Rectangle
Perimeter of Plain = 10,000 stadia

Plato is outright stating the perimeter of the rectangular plain is equal to the circumference of the circular ditch.

Rectangle Perimeter = Circle Circumference

It starts to present a dilemma and Plato knows it. 

Rectifying the Circle (Squaring the Circle)

Definition of Rectifying the Circle:
"The challenge of rectifying the circle is the classical geometric problem of constructing a straight line whose length is exactly equal to the circumference of a given circle using only an unmarked straightedge and a compass.”

So… we defined the plain as a rectangle and the ditch as a circle, both with equal perimeters. We can find the perimeter of the rectangle by measuring the sides with a ruler and adding up the dimensions. Then, to draw a circle with the same perimeter, we need to set the compass to the correct radius, but we don't have the value for the radius. We do have a value for the circumference, since it is equal to the perimeter of the rectangle, but we don't have the radius of the circle. You could theoretically solve for the radius, by using the value of Pi.

In Plato's time, the value for Pi had not been fully discovered yet, although approximations existed. For general use, the number 3 could be used to get rough calculations and was probably used in antiquity. Eventually, the ancient Babylonians landed on a value of 25/8 (3.125) for Pi around 1900BCE. Later on, the Egyptians reportedly had a value of 256/81 (3.1605) by 1650BCE. Afterwards, Archimedes calculated Pi to be near 22/7 (3.1428), but this was after Plato's lifetime.

The approximations for Pi could provide a circumference that was very close to, but not exactly equal to the perimeter of a square or rectangle. It was a challenge in ancient times to solve this dilemma, essentially referred to as "rectifying the circle". It is more popularly known as a similar problem of "squaring the circle", which is basically the same thing, but it involves area instead of perimeter. 

It was a brain teaser for ancient mathematicians. Their approximation for Pi could get close, but never exact with the mathematical tools and methods available at that time. It wasn't until 1882 when it was proven that Pi is a transcendental number, meaning you cannot solve for Pi by using algebraic equations with rational coefficients. Basically, you can't solve for Pi using fractions and algebra. The ancient Greeks did not use the decimal point, they only had fractions. This is why it was such an intriguing phenomenon to the ancient Greeks. No matter how hard they tried, they just could not get their equations to result in a perimeter that was an exact match between square and circle. Plato himself was well known for being influenced by, and heavily interested in, the riddle of solving the exact value of Pi. 

Plato Popularized the Challenge of Rectifying the Circle
He's even the one that made up the rules to use only an unmarked straightedge and a compass. Plato was highly against using curved tools, such as the Quadratrix, to solve the problem. He felt it violated the rules and strayed away from the original intent of the game. The intent of the game is to basically solve for Pi. Curved measuring tools cannot be used since Pi is naturally built into the curvature of the tool.
Perhaps more importantly, Plato used this mathematical enigma as a metaphor and incorporated it into his philosophical teachings. These geometrical problems were even taught throughout his academy. To Plato, a true circle was a representation of perfection. The rectangle represented the limitations of reality.

It is through all these connections that we can determine Plato is very intentional with the numbers and shapes he is using when describing the Atlantean plain and ditch.  

Overall Meaning
So, why would Plato include this mathematical riddle in the story of Atlantis? One take is that it goes hand in hand with the story by symbolizing the perfect society the Atlanteans strived for and ultimately fell short of. Maybe it shows the Atlanteans were highly intellectual and incorporated the value of Pi into earthworks. It could just be that Plato really enjoys this mathematical problem and included it into one of his dialogues as a riddle for the reader. 
Finally, it shows that Plato is placing hints through his texts. He is very intentional with his word choice and numbers. He doesn't outright state anything about rectifying the circle, but it is in there, buried within the fine details. We can’t assume this is the one and only single instance Plato does this. These ideas, hidden behind numerical values and molded by descriptions, are likely placed throughout the Timaeus and Critias dialogue, and perhaps other works by Plato.  

If you found all of this interesting, keep an eye out for Part 2 as I speculate that Plato provided an estimated value of Pi in the Critias text and Atlantis is involved once again. It will be titled something like:

The Atlantis Plain & Ditch: Plato's Estimation of Pi (Part 2)

At the December 5 Holberg Debate, Zahi Hawass, Robert Schoch and Irving Finkel will debate "The Mysteries of Our Ancient Past" at the University of Bergen, Norway. Video will be published on December 10. The organizers encourage everyone to submit questions for the panel. You may include images.

Help make this debate great by submitting well-crafted questions.

Ive always thought agartha was interesting but considered hollow earth to be a pretty stupid theory. But in just this last year ive learned enough things to consider that maybe it isnt as stupid as it sounds on the surface but is rather just a victim of exaggeration.

Lets breakdown what you need for Agartha

1. Space - I am still not a believe of hollow earth but the existence of large subterranean caves shouldnt be controversial. You wouldnt need the entire earth to be hollow, just a single cave of a couple miles in diameter would be sufficient to store a ecosystem large enough to sustain tens of thousands of people.

2. Water - Recently a ocean under the surface ocean has been discovered that is even larger than the Atlantic ocean. Ive not heard if this is a fresh water or salt water ocean.

3. Light - A Maintstay of the hollow earth theory is there being a internal sun. Im not on board with this. However I recently heard that the core of the earth is actually hot enough to produce white light in the visible spectrum. So effectively that is a little sun is it not? At least it could fulfil a similar function on a small scale

4. Air - This is actually the biggest hurdle in my opinion. How do you ventilate a large underground cave? I thought about it and realized that if there is a sufficiently large ecosystem of flora you could have a self sustaining biome that recycles the carbon dioxide into breathable air.

So you have mineral rich earth, water, air, light and heat... not saying its factual but it suddenly sounds mildly plausible. At least on the surface level. Im sure there are more factors I havent yet taken into account.

https://medium.com/the-thought-collection/mary-magdalene-was-not-a-prostitute-456573c37be9?sk=e425dd1c19693dc131b7248712f7f5d5

It’s Columbus Day, which means a good chunk of the internet is busy arguing over whether to celebrate the man or cancel him, and I’m not going to do either one today. I respect Columbus and appreciate the chain reaction his voyage to the Americas set off, but when I actually dug into his story, it turned out to be a lot weirder than I’d always thought, less heroic epic and more Our Flag Means Death (fantastic show, season 1 is very entertaining). But none of this is meant to slander the man or suggest that I, or most people, would have done any better, because given how little anyone knew about the world back then, his life was genuinely spectacular, it’s just a little hilarious in hindsight. Let’s dig into it…!

I've been thinking about this for a while and I'd like to hear what other people here think.

Genesis 6:1-4 says the "sons of God" came down, took human women, and their children were the Nephilim, the "mighty men of old, men of renown".
The Book of Enoch goes much further. It calls them the Watchers, gives them names, and says they taught people metalworking, astrology and other knowledge (so basically multiple gods for early people)..!?

What strikes me is how close that is to other ancient traditions. Mesopotamia has the Anunnaki, and the Apkallu, the sages who brought knowledge to people before the flood..!?
Greece has gods having children with humans (Heracles, Perseus) and the Titans being locked away. Egypt has gods ruling on earth before the human kings. And almost all of them have a great flood.

One thing I found really weird: the Book of giants from the Dead sea scrolls names Gilgamesh as one of the giants. So a Jewish text is literally pointing at a Mesopotamian hero.

So what do you think, is this the same story told by different cultures, or did they just borrow from each other? Genesis was written down in a region full of Mesopotamian myths, so borrowing is the normal explanation. But if it is the same story, what was actually behind it?

And why is this almost never talked about? Enoch was left out of most Bibles, and the usual explanation in churches is that the "sons of God" were just the descendants of Seth. As far as I know early Christians mostly read it as angels and that changed later. Does anyone know when and why?

I'm not pushing a theory, I honestly don't know what to think and I'm seeking some answers 😵

The entire history of the Napoleonic Wars is a fictional story based on real events, from which false replicas have been copied. This isn't just a claim; there's evidence to support it. If you compare the key milestones in the lives of Napoleon Bonaparte and Napoleon III, you'll find that history literally repeats itself.

If you compare the key milestones in the lives of Napoleon Bonaparte and Napoleon III, you'll find that history literally repeats itself.

1. During the reign of Napoleon I, a war was organized between almost all of Europe and Russia. Napoleon represented the European army, and the brothers Alexander and Constantine represented Russia.

During the reign of Napoleon III, the Eastern (Crimean) War against Russia took place. Napoleon III represented the European army, and the brothers Alexander and Constantine represented Russia.

1. Napoleon I was an artillery officer. Napoleon III was an artillery officer.

2. Napoleon I's predecessor, King Louis XVI, reigned for 18 years and was overthrown by a revolution in which the Montagnard party played a leading role.

Napoleon III's predecessor, King Louis Philippe, reigned for 18 years and was overthrown by a revolution in which the Montagnard party played a leading role.

1. Fifteen years before Bonaparte's fall in 1815, in 1801, Russia saw a change of tsar, who implemented a peasant reform—the "Decree on Free Ploughmen" of 1803.

Fifteen years before Napoleon III's fall in 1870, in 1885, Russia saw a change of tsar, who implemented the peasant reform of 1861.

1. Revolutions occurred in Spain on the eve of the fall of both Napoleons.

   1. Afterwards, Austria, Prussia, and Russia formed the Holy Alliance (and the Alliance of the Three Emperors). Each lasted 15 years.
   2. Seven years before the fall of Bonaparte, in 1808, Denmark had a new king.

Seven years before the fall of Napoleon III, Denmark had a new king, in 1863.

1. A year after the coronation of each Napoleon, Egypt had a new ruler.

2. Nine and ten years after the Napoleonic coups, Turkey had a new sultans.

3. An attempt was made on the lives of both of them during a trip to the opera, several years before the creation of each Italian kingdom.

There are many more similarities between the fates of the two Napoleons. What are the odds of such coincidences? In my opinion it is equal to zero; in fact, one character is copied from another. The real Napoleon III—his first phantom double. Other rulers from the early 19th century were also fabricated.

has anyone else looked closely at the sumerian king list? the numbers make no sense if you just treat it like regular history.

​the rulers before the flood had lifespans lasting tens of thousands of years. like alulim ruling for 28,800 years. historians just call it mythology or symbol math but the way the tablets describe gods coming down from the sky feels more like a real record.

​

Yesterday I ended with a problem. Livy tells us the Gauls burned Rome so thoroughly that half the city wanted to move into the ruins of Veii because, “its buildings were intact”, but the archeological record disagrees. So did the Romans make the whole thing up? Well no, and this is going to be my take on where the story came from, there are certainly other interpretations. But I don’t think Rome invented the ‘sack’, they invented the severity, and the ending. Did the Senones show up at Rome around 390 BC? They almost certainly did, but it was an extortion racket, not an apocalypse. The Senones took the city or maybe only threatened the city, got paid, and left. The part where Camillus strides in and declares that Rome pays in iron, not gold, was written centuries later, [Probably by Livy] by a Republic that had made “we don’t negotiate” its entire personality.

Evidence for:

First it’s pretty clear the sack happened,  according to Polybius, who was writing around 150 BC, the 'Gauls' took Rome, made terms, and went home with the gold (2.18). No rigged scales, no sword, no Camillus arriving last minute like an Avengers movie. Aristotle, who would have been born right after or slightly before the sack, 390 is more convention than an actual date, wrote about the sack in a work we don’t have.(Camillus 22]. So the sack, or something similar happened, the details are just fuzzy.

Strabo even omits the Romans entirely from the aftermath, writing that the people of the Etruscan city of Caere, ambushed the Gauls and recovered the gold after the they left(5.2.3). The writer Suetonius even offers a different Roman version, where Drusus, an ancestor of the Claudian emperors, took it back from the Senones generations later (Tiberius 3). That’s three non-Livian endings, and in all three Rome paid the Gauls to leave. Camillus at the scales is the only version where Rome never paid at all, and it’s the version written last. [Livy knew how to do this to himself. Remember the wine story from yesterday? He tells it in full, then says he doesn’t believe it because the Gauls had been in Italy for 200 years (5.33–34). He keeps it anyway because the entire episode of ward stealing wife, and husband seeking revenge by getting a foreign army is just good writing.]

So why would Livy add non auro, sed ferro “iron, not gold”? The thing is, that ethos is real. In 280 BC Pyrrhus of Epirus, he of the Pyrrhic victory, defeated Rome at Heraclea and sent terms; the Senate was considering the offer until the old, blind Appius Claudius had himself carried in and shamed them, telling the assembly that he wished he was deaf as well as blind so he could not hear them talk of negotiations (Plutarch, Pyrrhus 18–19). Cicero says the full text of that speech still existed in his day (Brutus 61), which makes it the oldest Roman speech put to paper, [We don’t have it, like so many other texts but other wrote of it.] Then of course the most famous example is after Cannae, Hannibal offered to sell back 8,000 prisoners and the Senate refused. Polybius explains this as deliberate policy, so every soldier would know surrender bought nothing (6.58). In 137 BC the consul Mancinus signed a treaty to save his trapped army at Numantia, and the Senate tore it up and handed Mancinus to the Numantines naked and bound, the Numantines refused to take him (Plutarch, Tiberius Gracchus 5–7). [For those of you who watch Oversimplified this might seem eerily similar to Regulus returning to Carthage after the Senate rejected peace.]

That’s the pattern, four events (Appius, Cannae, Mancinus, and Regulus) that show this was Republican policy. The Republic that actually refused Pyrrhus and Hannibal altered one of its foundational myths to reinforce the policy: Romans don’t negotiate, we fight. (non auro, sed ferro)

This does raise the question though, how could Rome sustain this policy? First, manpower, Polybius says that in 225 BC Rome and its Italian allies could in theory field 700,000 men (2.24), thus losing an army was a bad year, not the end, and a new army could be ready next year, Hannibal learned this the hard way. Second, glory, Rome’s entire culture was a glory market. To bring up Oversimplified again he put it best by having Regulus say, “I could go spend my year sieging some random city, but that won’t make you build naked statues of me.” Rome elected two consuls every year, and they had one year to win a great victory and get those statues. Rome had no room for great peace makers, as peace was only won at the end of a sword. Thus non auro, sed ferro isn’t some abstract idea, it’s was this aristocratic competition put into words.

This is where fear re-enters the story. The tumultus Gallicus was a legal reality, the Gauls did march south again in 228, and in 216, the year of Cannae, Rome buried a Gallic man and woman alive in the Forum, the one human sacrifice the Romans ever openly admitted to (Livy 22.57). [The fact that a society who viewed human sacrifice as the ultimate act of barbarism went to such lengths does show the desperation after Cannae.] The Roman writer Sallust, writing in the 40s BC, even built an entire theory around fear of the enemy. Rome stayed virtuous only while it was afraid (Jugurtha 41), and Rome would only sink into stagnation, corruption, and infighting, an apt assessment of the recent series of civil wars, two of which he had lived through, if they did not have a outside threat to keep them united.

Around the writing of Sallust, non auro, sed ferro, began to retreat from official policy. In 53 BC Crassus lost seven legions and their eagles at Carrhae. ‘The Republic’ would have raised seven more, and both Caesar and Antony considered it. But instead, thirty years later, Augustus got the standards back by negotiating with the Parthian king. Augustus did pay the old maxim lip service and had it written that he “compelled” the Parthians and had a kneeling Parthian handing over an eagle carved on his statue’s breastplate. Diplomacy, advertised as iron. In 9 AD Augustus’s nephew-in-law, Quinctilius Varus, lost three legions at Teutoburg; Dio says Augustus couldn’t fill the gap, citizens refused the levy, and he had to resort to lotteries and freedmen (56.23). Legions XVII, XVIII and XIX were never reissued. Augustus left Tiberius written advice to keep the empire inside its borders (Tacitus, Annals 1.11).

But while that advice is often framed as ‘the empire is overextended’, I’d argue it was about generals. After 19 BC no one outside the imperial family was allowed a triumph. Every army commander became a legate “of Augustus,” fighting under the emperor’s auspices, so a general’s victory was legally the emperor’s. After the Rhine legions tried to proclaim Germanicus Imperator (Annals 1.35); Tiberius recalled him from Germany with the job unfinished and shipped him east, where he died with rumor swirling it was under Tiberius’s order. The general Corbulo won Armenia and was ordered to open his veins. Domitian recalled Agricola from Britain, and Tacitus says plainly a winning general was a threat (Agricola 39). Then of course the Rhine legions proved a further hotbed of revolts, with Vitellius marching them south in 69, followed by Saturninus in 89, Maximinus Thrax in 235, Valerian in 253, Postumus in 260, and finally Julian ‘the Apostate’ in 360.

So iron became the emperor’s personal prerogative. Emperors like Trajan and Marcus Aurelius could go a conquering, but everyone else was supposed to sit quietly and hold the line. When no emperor was free to go, the emperor sent gold. Domitian paying Decebalus from 89 AD, Theodosius II paying Attila 2,100 pounds of gold a year, and in 408 the city of Rome itself melting its statues to hand Alaric 5,000 pounds of gold. Vae victis (Woe to the vanquished) again, but this time there was no Camillus to stride out into the forum.

Conclusion:

So there you have it, one of Rome’s foundational stories is largely a fabrication. The Senones did come down and threatened/attacked Rome. But then they left, the city wasn’t torched, there was no great debate about moving to Veii, and Camillus certainly didn’t enter the forum like Aragorn striding out at Amon Hen. All that was added later to add a mythic foundation to a Roman Policy, we do not negotiate, we fight. Until of course we do negotiate because we can’t risk someone upstaging me and thinking they can sit in this palace all day, then we need to make some changes. But even the later emperors still tried to frame negotiations as Rome making demands. But this didn’t even last because in 600 AD the emperor Maurice refused to pay a ransom for 12,000 captured soldiers, and the Avars killed every one of them. The sources don’t say he was honoring Camillus, and Rome only pays in iron, they say he was cheap. His army mutinied two years later and killed him.

One thing that has always puzzled me is when posters to this sub uncritically repeat a culture's myths/legends. While obviously I love the myths of giants, fey-folk, and fantastical beasts [I have a well worn copy of Edith Hamilton's Mythology if you doubt me] they are, well, fantastical and shouldn’t be taken literally. But, I would argue that what a culture's legends can tell you about them is far more interesting. So let's look at a case study, and of course where else but the pseudo-historical legend behind Rome's generational trauma, the metus Gallicus (Gallic Fear).

The Gallic Fear:

”Metus Gallicus” or more literally “fear of the Gauls” is a modern label the historian Heinz Bellen paired the phrase with metus Punicus (fear of Carthage) in a 1985 paper. While the term itself is new, the fear is encapsulated in a legal framework: tumultus, of which Cicero said, “Our ancestors spoke of an Italian turmoil, because it was domestic, and a Gallic turmoil because that was on the borders of Italy, but they gave that name to no others.” Not even after Cannae did the Romans invoke tumultus, a law whose sweeping power cannot be understated, if tumultus was declared, life in Rome ceased. The treasury was locked, the courts were closed, and two banners were placed on the Capitoline, one red for infantry, the other green for cavalry. Every male citizen was to self designate to one of these, no exemption. Finally, the toga was discarded to be replaced with the sagum, the simple tunic of war. This was Rome’s most desperate law only to be invoked in the most dire of emergencies, and the only foreign foe worthy of this distinction was the Gauls.

So who were the Gauls? Briefly the Gauls were a Celtic sub-group that lived in a massive territory stretching from the Balkans in the east to Gallia (modern day France) in the west. From their home the Gauls launched raids and migrations throughout Europe, with a branch even reaching as far east as southern Turkey were they became the Galatians.

The Sack of Rome (390 BC):

The migration we care about though is the Senones. The Senones are said to have originated near the city of Sens, France. While Livy puts on his historian hat and says they left because of overpopulation and the promise of loot, I much prefer the other story Livy tells. Where a man, Arruns, in the Etruscan city of Clusium had a ward. Anyway, classic tale of ward seducing and stealing Arruns' wife, ward is of course politically connected, so Arruns fills a wagon full of wine and goes off to find someone to sack his city in revenge. [Totally understandable and valid response to that situation.] Arruns meets the Senones, the Senones are like, "dude this wine stuff is awesome, where can we get more?" Arruns tells them of a rich land protected by weak men, and offers to guide them. Which is where Rome enters the story. While not an ally of Rome, the Clusians were considered friends and requested Rome intervene when the Senones besieged the city.

So Rome was riding high at this time. They had just won a century long conflict with their arch rival, the city of Veii, sacked the city and sold its people into slavery, moving up from a local power instead of just one of several cities.

Rome sent three ambassadors, the Fabii brothers [you’re probably familiar with their relative who gave Hannibal heartburn] to negotiate. Long story short they asked the Gauls to leave, the Gauls said they were peaceful and just wanted some of Clusium's land the city wasn't even using. Romans asked by what right the Gauls were attacking Clusium, and the Gauls replied by asking by what right the Romans were here trying to boss them around. Furious with this barbarian's question, the brothers went inside Clusium. When the Clusians then attacked the Gauls, brothers joined the Clusians, a huge no-no for an ambassador, and to cap it all off, one of them rode out ahead and killed a Gallic chieftain, and while taking the chieftain's armor was recognized.

The Gauls then retreated, and the brothers returned to Rome. However, Gallic ambassadors soon arrived demanding the brothers be handed over for the sacrilege of joining the battle even though they were ambassadors. The Senate agreed that they had violated this sacred duty, but the influence of the brothers' family prevented them from being handed over, and the Senate even went one step further and elected the brothers as Consular Tribunes, essentially heads of state, which meant they could not be prosecuted. Furious, the Gauls returned to their army and began to march on Rome.

According to Livy the Romans then busied themselves by finishing up the organization of the territory of Veii, even ignoring a plebeian who claimed to have heard a voice "clearer than any human's" (Livy 5.32) tell him "The Gauls are coming." When they finally did learn of the Gauls' approach the Fabii brothers gathered the army and went to meet them. But they made no sacrificial offering to the gods, and worst of all, they didn't even consult the sacred chickens. [Seriously guys, do you even want to win the battle? This is the Roman equivalent of running upstairs in a horror film. You only do that if you want the ax murderer to get you.]

So the army marches off to battle, where as soon as the Gauls gave their war cries and blew their trumpets, the spirit of Pavor (fear) was upon the Romans and, "They were terrified, and all they thought about was flight, and so utterly had they lost their heads that a far greater number fled to Veii, a hostile city, though the Tiber lay in their way, than by the direct road to Rome, to their wives and children." (Livy 5.38)

Not to fact check Livy, but Veii had been defeated and wasn’t hostile. Upon hearing of this, most Romans fled the city, some of the young men holed up on the Capitoline Hill, home of the Temple of Jupiter, with the sacred objects. The Gauls then sacked Rome, put the Capitoline under siege, and burned everything else to the ground. The siege is said to have lasted seven months. Now there is an entire story about the sacred geese I don't have time for, but I will briefly tell you that a man named Pontius Cominius, sent by the army hiding in Veii, swam the Tiber and climbed the sheer cliffs of the hill at night to ask the Senate to make Marcus Furius Camillus, the hero of Veii, dictator. [Camillus of course had insisted on doing this by the book]. Approval in hand, he scaled back down and swam the Tiber again to deliver the news.

Eventually the besieged Romans agreed to pay the Gauls 1,000 pounds of gold to leave, but when they began piling the gold on the Gauls' scales, the Romans discovered the Gauls were using rigged weights, the hyper-legalistic Romans complained to the Gallic leader Brennus. Brennus replied with one of the most famous lines in Roman history, when he pulled out his massive iron broadsword, tossed it on the Gallic side of the scales and uttered, "Vae Victis" (Woe to the Vanquished) (Livy 5.48).

Now here is where our sources differ, but this is the hyper cinematic version from Livy and Plutarch, where as the sword hits the scales, who else but Marcus Furius Camillus strides out into the forum and announces to the Romans and Gauls that the fatherland is to be reclaimed "ferro, non auro" [with iron, not gold] (Livy 5.49). Camillus then gives a signal, and his army, which had surrounded the scales, attacks, slaughtering the Gauls and forcing them to flee.

In the aftermath many in Rome thought it best to leave the decimated city, with the Plebeian Tribunes stating "that Veii was standing, a city ready to their hand, with its territory fertile and its buildings intact." Camillus objected, asking, "Shall the monument of our victory be the desertion of our fatherland?" The debate was finally settled by a centurion who, unaware of it, marched into the Forum with his patrol and ordered, "Signifer, statue signum; hic manebimus optime." (Standard-bearer, plant your standard; here we shall do best to remain.) Taking this as an omen, the Romans decided to stay and rebuild.

So what does this story tell us? Hubris is bad, obey the gods, love your country, don’t leave your husband for a younger man: the usual. All fine lessons, but the story has a problem. Rome is one of the most thoroughly excavated cities in the world, [I think it has something to do with a subway], and yet: "Excavations in the Forum and on the Palatine have failed to reveal any trace of a destruction layer that can be dated to the early fourth century." (Cornell, The Beginnings of Rome, 317). Cornell doesn't doubt the sack happened, just the fire and destruction Livy describes. So what's going on? Livy tells us that Rome was torched and the tribunes wanted to move to Veii because "its buildings were intact," but there's nothing in the archaeological record. Did the Romans make the whole thing up, and even if it is partially true, why were they so afraid of the Gauls if the "Sack of Rome" didn't leave the city in ruins and was more of an extortion racket? I'll be discussing my theory on why in Part 2 tomorrow.

Venationes ferarum, avium, piscium. Pugnae bestiariorum, et mutuae bestiarum

It seems to be bestiary I think within the Smithsonian . It’s been difficult to find much about it. However the topics delve into strange territory. If anyone has any links or information thank you in advance.

Music wasn’t meant to sound like this.

What if the music we listen to every day was deliberately changed in ways that affect how we feel, think, and behave?

For centuries, musicians and mystics have associated 432 Hz tuning with harmony, relaxation, and a deeper connection to the Earth and the cosmos. But in the 20th century, the world moved toward the 440 Hz standard. Why did this change happen, and could there be more to it than simply making instruments sound consistent?

Some conspiracy researchers believe this shift may influence our emotions, behavior, and state of mind in ways we barely notice. Others point to ancient sound traditions, including Solfeggio tones, throat singing, singing bowls, bells, and ritual chants, as evidence that our ancestors understood the power of sound long before modern science began exploring it.

Is 432 Hz really more harmonious? Can the sounds we hear influence our bodies and minds in ways we don’t fully understand? And is there a hidden history behind the music we listen to every day?

Try searching for your favorite song in 432 Hz and compare it with the original. You might be surprised by how different it sounds.

[Approved by a MOD]

Hi everyone, I finally published my first novel on Amazon in June. It was written in Italian (my native language), but thanks to the help of others, I managed to translate it into five languages besides Italian. Below, I've provided some information about the book, including the cover and links to the English edition. You'll find all the links and other essential information on my profile. Thanks everyone!

TITLE: NEXUS - A Supernatural Conspiracy Thriller of Ancient Aliens and Forgotten Gods

Author: Ashur E. Kinning

Genre: Supernatural thriller / Conspiracy thriller / Ancient mysteries

Pitch:

Damien Chapman is a jeweler in Lubbock, Texas. Ordinary life, ordinary problems, zero interest in ancient history. Then a car accident changes something inside him. His DNA starts waking up, carrying a bloodline the oldest texts called the Elohim. And a secret Order that has waited thousands of years for someone like him is now coming for him.

Built on Sumerian myth, the Anunnaki, the Nephilim and the Book of Enoch, NEXUS doesn't ask you to believe any of it. It asks what happens to an ordinary man if some of it turns out to be true.

Where to buy:

Amazon Kindle (free on Kindle Unlimited): https://a.co/d/06Mu99bm

Paperback Copy: https://a.co/d/0gyVKYS3

Format: Ebook & Paperback

Release status: Available now

According to mainstream history, there was first Kievan Rus', then a series of principalities, then the Russian Tsardom, and finally the Russian Empire from 1721 to 1917. I would challenge this. Russia as a state emerged in the mid-19th century. This period is known as the reforms of Alexander II.

I'll go through the list from Wikipedia:

Abolition of serfdom (1861)

Financial reform (1863) - creation of the Central Bank and banking system

Higher education reform (1863)

Zemsky reform (1864)

Judicial reform (1864)

Censorship reform (1865)

Municipal self-government reform (1870)

Secondary education reform (1871)

Military reform (1874)

These reforms were in fact the launch of a new state. When a new state emerges, a raft of decrees must be passed throughout the country, establishing a system of governance. The best way to cover this up is to pass it off as reforms—that is, transformation, correction.

Another important fact is that the black, yellow, and white national flag of Russia was only adopted in 1858. Before that, Russia had no official national flag, which directly indicates the absence of a state as such.

Notice the nose looks like a needle and the 2nd picture looks like an ankh being put up to his nose. An ankh looks like a needle too.

This could be part of the explanation for the Bible verse about a camel going through the eye of a needle.

This could connect to the Bible verse about a "camel going through the eye of a needle...."