I'm not sure if it was brought up in that other thread, but it also seems like a lot of these people who are fascinated with colonization and subjugating foreigners have ever been to America in the first place. North of Mexico (and Mexico is pretty damn hot and humid, so you may include that too), the weather is pretty extreme. At least for people who were raised in Italy and think the coldest place on earth is England, it's pretty extreme. In New England the first several groups of colonists (from England no less) had a major problem trying to not freeze to death. There's no reason to assume a random, lost Roman convoy (who've suffered an Atlantic voyage in galleys) are going to be prepared for an East Coast winter. Even the summers can get to be a bit much. Lots more poisonous animals as well. Landing anywhere north of Mexico will just result in Romans suffering hell, the only party those guys will have would be a Donner Party. And anywhere in Mesoamerica they get swarmed by an army of thousands and die quickly.
). Compared to the Gauls, the Mayans had the decisive advantage that they were considerably more urbanized (in some ways, I would say, the Mayan Classical period can compare with the rivaling city states of classical Greece) where the Gauls were generally tribal in organization, and the had the advantage of being longer and as I would argue also more thoroughly literate (apart from the southern Gauls near Massilia who had adopted the Greek alphabet, and those in Cisalpine Gaul, who had adopted the Etruscan alphabet, the Gauls were largely illiterate). On the flip side, the Gauls were decisively more advanced when it came to weapons (in particular skilled with iron-working, and the usage of chariots even though they were technically outdated by the time the Romans and Gauls fought), whereas the Mayans basically had no idea about metallurgy yet. However, on the flip side their obsidian-based weapons were rather dangerous as well. So... I would say it's really tough to estimate there. Steel weapons and armor didn't actually help the Spanish all that much. The first real battle between Spanish and Maya soldiers resulted in a resounding Maya victory, with the Spanish retreating to their boats. Apparently slings and especially atlatls can be very vicious no matter what you're wearing. That, and I'm sure the Maya would've had the advantage of numbers, at their height they had about 10,000,000 people living on a smallish peninsula.This is a fair point (though I suspect, some other board members would know sufficiently about them to tell more
). They were apparently very skilled slingers, and employed by the Carthaginians as mercenaries during the Second Punic War, where they proved to be surprisingly effective. In so far, I can relate to how this must have been a bad, bad surprise for the Spaniards. Yeah, they said that if a sling hit a man wearing a steel helmet in the head he'd be stunned or knocked out. And the Romans did not have nearly as high-quality armor. The atlatls might be a bigger scare, those could also puncture their armor easily enough and they can be damn accurate, and have a much longer range than Roman pila. Hell, besides the material used to make the weapons it can be argued that the natives have a military advantage over the Romans.All very good points there. It's especially interesting that you bring up slings, because I am verymuch reminded there of the natives of the Balearic Isles, the so-called 'Gymnetes' ('Naked Ones', as the Greeks called them... I suppose this hasn't really changed in 2200 years
They build their little Roman fort as nice as they can, and as winter comes the lot of them freeze to death, the survivors end up starving. Locals start telling stories of a village of strange-looking beings who were probably spirit children in the bodies of men because no smart people would die that easily.
For starters the trip to North America will probably be deadly. I don't think a storm would take them to America all that quickly, nor do I think Roman vessels were heavily laden with supplies. Starvation and dehydration will be major problems. And fatigue as well. They will be lucky to reach the shore without losing too many people, let alone having a lot of supplies. And assuming they miraculously build their fort and not completely die off in winter, and meet the natives meet them on friendly terms, if disease spreads the natives will quickly blame the Romans. And then the Romans are all dead. Painfully. And stories might be passed down of the evil magicians who caused many to die before they were killed or captured, and of how the survivors screamed like cowards when they were burned. By the 16th Century the population would definitely have recovered.
Britain and Germany aren't America, and there the Romans were not far from their empire and had a steady supply line. And still they failed. Here you are talking about a couple of boats of lost men with no supplies in a totally alien land they know nothing about. Again, the history of colonization isn't Europeans arriving in America and immediately creating towns and cities, it's one of privation, hardship, suffering, and mass death. The first European settlement in America was Vinland. Look how long that lasted before the hardy Norsemen were chased away. Then there's La Navidad, established by Columbus. Only lasted a year or less before they antagonized the locals and were all killed. Roanoke lasted a year. Others lasted even shorter. And these last few were from the time when colonies weren't as isolated from their empires as a boatload of Romans in New York.
