The Roman Conquest of the British Isles

Um, Islam was actually progressive for it's time when it comes to feminism. Heck, the Koran says women are entitled to own property and inherit from their spouse and father.

Edit: Also, the Dark Ages did not cause a technological collapse. I shall gather evidence for this.
 

Eurofed

Banned
Um, Islam was actually progressive for it's time when it comes to feminism. Heck, the Koran says women are entitled to own property and inherit from their spouse and father.

Progressive in comparison to Arabia and Persia in its age. NOT in comparison to late Imperial Rome. For one thing, drop the polygamy and the veil, which Rome would find abhorrent.
 
Okay, I'll admit that I am unfamiliar with the cultural politics of the Late Roman era. So I'll grant you that.

I know it isn't much to start with, but here is an article that helps refute the idea that the Dark Ages were technologically stagnant or backwards, as opposed to simply a period where there was a paucity of written record.
 

Eurofed

Banned
I know it isn't much to start with, but here is an article that helps refute the idea that the Dark Ages were technologically stagnant or backwards, as opposed to simply a period where there was a paucity of written record.

I never said that. But it is a proven fact that Europe experienced a massive socio-economic collapse between the 3rd century crisis and the 11th century rebirth. Whatever technological advancement happened in that period occurred despite that, not because of that, and it is only reasonable to expect that without the collapse, technology would have progressed to a much better path. The trade network collapsing and barbarians burning down cities are not exactly the best way to boost the spread of the three-field system, much less new advances in medicine.
 
I'm not saying there wasn't a societal collapse, but there wasn't a societal collapse in China either, and they fell into a high level equilibrium trap.
 

Eurofed

Banned
Probably, still, while Grampians are no Hindu Kush, we are talking about a mountainous, cold, remote country, which would probably mutiny a few times if it could.

In other words, not really different from Britannia itself, or Northern Gallia, or western Iberia, or Dacia, which all were logistically-poor, underdeveloped lands peripheral to the Mediterranean core of the Empire, with restive native population which rebelled a few times before Romanization set in.

I agree, if they really wanted to, they probaly would be able to pacify it, and in the end, some roman historian woud say "well, it's good Claudius/someone else took that worthless land after all, those Picts would be a thorn in our side and we would have to keep much more than one legion in Britannia". But, as you said, it would be after a few generations.

Indeed, and judging from the pattern of assimilation of other successful similar conquests, if Romans can entrench for 1-2 generations, they have won the land for good.

Unless Rome is way more stable, it's not that easy to exclude a situation where the highlanders mutiny and the emperor is busy somewhere else.

From conquest of Britannia to the third century crisis, Rome was way sufficiently stable to engage the conquest and assimilation of Caledonia, if the strategic decision is made. Submitting the highlanders is not going to be more taxing than conquering Dacia, probably less so.

Those 2 legions in the western part of the isle, they don't look like they guard it from the north. And it's many years after the conquest of Britannia. It could be the Irish Boat People that were needed to be fended off, but from what i recall, some parts of that island were just restless, event that many years after it's conquest.

Given that Britannia was an island, leaving some kind of garrison in it would be strategic good sense. In my knowledge, with the partial exception of Jews, there were no nationalist-separatist "native" rebellions in Roman provinces since 1-2 generations after conquest. Wales was no exception, even if indeed Romanization was rather less efficient there than in Roman England. However, revolts that occurred after that initial period were military coups, dynastic wars, not separatist ones.

And the pictish highlanders would be even worse. I'm not saying they couldn't conquer it, but even for some time after they did it would require investments, and determination they would lack. Maybe they really were right staying behind that wall?

Let's take the example of Wales: first Roman inroad in 48 CE, last native resistance in 78 CE. Are you seriously saying that early Rome can't spare 20-30 years of effort at pacifying Caledonia, and three centuries of expenses at manning and maintaining the wall were better ???

As for Germannia, after Teutoburg Romans are not going to conquer the place unless some man from the future comes and tells them they will really, really, REALLY regret it in 300 years. It had no cities, low population, was unsuitable for their agriculture, cold, full of angry Germanics. But they could get it at their first attempt and never go back.

In other words, it was not radically different from large swaths of pre-Roman Iberia or Gallia, and wholly similar to pre-Roman Britannia. Yet they conquered, kept, and developed to good use all of them. As you say, Teutoburg critically broke the ongoing momentum at conquest of Germania. If we change that event into a victory or butterfly it away, and make the conquest of Germania a relatively uniform string of victories like Gallia or Britannia, the momentum is unbroken, Germania is gained and in a few decades pacified. Afterwards, it shall not staty the way it was before the legions came in. It had valuable resources (iron, amber), and Roman conquest all but ensures the timely discovery of those technologies (heavy plough, horse collar) that allow to make them almost as productive for Roman agriculture as the Mediterranean lands (they were discoveried soon after the Carolingian conquest, in conditions much less optimal to progress). The pacified native population and Roman colonists (typically discharged veterans) would be settled in and would substantially grow, cities would be founded, roads built and canals dug. By the time the Huns would show up, Romanized Germania would not be really different from High Middle Ages Germany, and would be a substantial asset to the Empire, demographically and economically, not just for the better borders and turning hostile barbarians into loyal subjects (which would already be an asset of immense value).
 

Eurofed

Banned
I'm not saying there wasn't a societal collapse, but there wasn't a societal collapse in China either, and they fell into a high level equilibrium trap.

Notice when the trap sprung, in late Ming and early Manchu period, almost on the verge of China making the transition to the Industrial Revolution. For the rest of its earlier history, China remained amongst the most dynamic cultures in the world, on the cultural and technological vanguard in almost all the fields. This is a mighty argument that such a kind of Imperial cultures are not bound by their nature to eventual stagnation. However, crappy butterflies can always strike, and in all evidence OTL China got one.
 

Eurofed

Banned
I would say that modern Afghanistan is a particularly apt comparison. The problem is not so much in turning the Picts, Caledonians, &c. into loyal Roman citizens once the country has been stabilized. The problem is stabilizing the country. There is substantial evidence that the Romans managed to occupy the entirety of modern Scotland during the campaigns of Septimius Severus in 208-211 AD, but the problem was not defeating the Caledonians in battle and occupying their country, but stabilizing it. As Cassius Dio wrote: “ Severus invaded Caledonia. But as he advanced through the country he experienced countless hardships in cutting down the forests, levelling the heights, filling up the swamps, and bridging the rivers; but he fought no battle and beheld no enemy in battle array. The enemy purposely put sheep and cattle in front of the soldiers for them to seize, in order that they might be lured on still further until they were worn out; for in fact the water caused great suffering to the Romans, and when they became scattered, they would be attacked. Then, unable to walk, they would be slain by their own men, in order to avoid capture, so that a full fifty thousand died. But Severus did not desist until he approached the extremity of the island. Here he observed most accurately the variation of the sun's motion and the length of the days and the nights in summer and winter respectively. Having thus been conveyed through practically the whole of the hostile country (for he actually was conveyed in a covered litter most of the way, on account of his infirmity), he returned to the friendly portion, after he had forced the Britons to come to terms, on the condition that they should abandon a large part of their territory....” In short, the problem is quite similar to modern Afghanistan, in that the occupation forces and the government can only maintain authority within the capital and the provincial centers, and areas with a heavy military presence. There is substantial evidence that since Severus could not bring the Caledonians to battle he enacted a policy of scorched earth and virtual genocide in order to maintain the Roman occupations. So yes, the situation in Britain was quite difficult.

I see nothing in that description that does not match the difficulties that Romans encountered in many other places during their early conquest, from Iberia to Gallia, Dacia, and Britannia itself, where they endured, and in few decades, triumphed. I only read between the lines the poor health of a general that made him seek the short-term easy way out. Romans were very good at enacting scorched earth to quell stubborn resistance, and they were generally very successful at it (ask the Jew Zealots), even if it was but the groundwork to the real cause of their imperial success, their excellence at assimilation.
 
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Notice when the trap sprung, in late Ming and early Manchu period, almost on the verge of China making the transition to the Industrial Revolution. For the rest of its earlier history, China remained amongst the most dynamic cultures in the world, on the cultural and technological vanguard in almost all the fields. This is a mighty argument that such a kind of Imperial cultures are not bound by their nature to eventual stagnation. However, crappy butterflies can always strike, and in all evidence OTL China got one.


I've been doing some reading on the trap. It came about because of efficacy of the existing techniques, availability of very cheap labor such that capital investment was unprofitable, and various other factors. And here's the thing, the American South also fell into the Trap. The Union Army had to pull it out.

If the South Carolina can fall into the Trap even with Massachusetts telling it not to, so can Rome.
 

Nikephoros

Banned
I see nothing in that description that does not match the difficulties that Roamans encountered in many others places during their early conquest, from Iberia to Gallia, Dacia, and Britannia itself, where they endured, and in few decades, triumphed. I only read between the lines the poor health of a general that made him seek the short-term easy way out. Romans were very good at enacting scorched earth to quell stubborn resistance, and they were generally very successful at it (ask the Jew Zealots), even if it was but the groundwork to the real cause of their imperial success, their excellence at assimilation.

I'm gonna assume you are a firm believer in Great Man theory.
 

Eurofed

Banned
I've been doing some reading on the trap. It came about because of efficacy of the existing techniques, availability of very cheap labor such that capital investment was unprofitable, and various other factors. And here's the thing, the American South also fell into the Trap. The Union Army had to pull it out.

If the South Carolina can fall into the Trap even with Massachusetts telling it not to, so can Rome.

I'm not saying that it cannot happen to Rome, I only flaty reject the Eurocentric idea that centralized imperial cultures are doomed, or even especially prone, to stagnation. Btw, you are right about the American South, but as you notice the American North dragged them kicking and screaming out of it. The South had favorable socioeconomic conditions for the trap, but not the North. The same could easily happen to different sections of a successful Roman Empire, whose economic sphere is not geared to see a socio-economic pattern as relatively uniform as China. Eg it is most likely that chattel slavery would gradually get marginalized in Europe and the Middle East as the pools of cheap slave labor dry out (it was already happening IOTL), even if very likely would see a major resurgence in America when Rome colonizes it.
 
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Possible yes, but I don't think it would be easy to have Rome avoid the Trap the same way Dixie did. For one, Rome was a lot more homogeneous than America pre-ACW. Also, Sub-Sahara Africa could easily reinvigorate the Slave Trade in Rome.


It is possible for Rome to avoid the Trap as you describe though. I just don't think it's likely. We shall have to agree to disagree.
 

Eurofed

Banned
Possible yes, but I don't think it would be easy to have Rome avoid the Trap the same way Dixie did. For one, Rome was a lot more homogeneous than America pre-ACW. Also, Sub-Sahara Africa could easily reinvigorate the Slave Trade in Rome.


It is possible for Rome to avoid the Trap as you describe though. I just don't think it's likely. We shall have to agree to disagree.

Agreed. But as a last bit I would like to point out about Sub-Saharian Africa that it wholly failed to revive Slave Trade in late Rome, when chattel slavery was noticeably declining even before the decline, in High-Late Middle Age Europe, or the Muslim world. It only got a new life for part of the Americas, but it wholly failed to be reintroduced in Early Modern Europe. And all of them had ample trade access to Sub-Saharian Africa. As such, I do think that the most likely expectation is that in the late Empire, slavery would be gradually be marginalized, Rome would progress to a mix of command and proto-capitalist economy, continuing the OTL trend, and hence its reintroduction might be possible to colonize America, but not in the Euro-Mediterranean core of the Roman Empire (Here's an idea for you: a Roman transcontinental version of the ARW/ACW, with antislavery Old World Rome squared against a slaveholder Roman Americas, with possibly an intervention of China and/or India to support the rebels).
 
Well, yeah, but remember that China relied primarily on Free Labor. Even if Rome escapes the slavery version of the Trap, they might still go the way of China.


But Rome is a much younger state than China, so it could go either way.
 

Eurofed

Banned
Well, yeah, but remember that China relied primarily on Free Labor. Even if Rome escapes the slavery version of the Trap, they might still go the way of China.


But Rome is a much younger state than China, so it could go either way.

Of course, of course. But given that the early Roman Empire was showing all signs of moving towards a free labor protocapitalist mixed economy, if we butterfly away the 3rd-5th century crises with extra conquests and political stability PoDs, and we let those trends project onward, the most likely outcome seems a repetition of OTL European evolution, followed by an OTL China free labor late Trap. The slavery version really seems very unlikely in the Euro-Mediterranean core, even if it may be totally in the cards for secessionist American colonies.
 
In other words, not really different from Britannia itself, or Northern Gallia, or western Iberia, or Dacia

Oh there were differences, Dacia for example was full of gold. If you include Rhine to Gallia, the whole place is a good and useful conquest because of defenadable border on the Rhine, north-western Iberia could compare though, mountainous, bad climate etc. and not really useful (there was some gold in there too, and iron of course). Romans also were humiliated by the cantabrians - they lost a standard to them.

Are you seriously saying that early Rome can't spare 20-30 years of effort at pacifying Caledonia, and three centuries of expenses at manning and maintaining the wall were better

I think it would be more than 30 years, Wales had a garrison even in 3rd century. I'm not arguing that it's impossible for them to conquer and assimilate it, only that it would be harder than some tend to think, and comparing the amount of resources spent on protecting the border and the wall, to what you'd need to conquer those people and keep them calm, this really is not a no-brainer. By the way, there was a legion in north-western Hispania too, so it wasn't really pacified either.

As for Germania, I agree with you. Maybe even they could conquer it with Teutoburg happening, but the longer they wait, the more numerous and united, and moer advanced the Germanics are, so Teutoburg is obviously the best candidate. But it's not a thread about Germania...

Actually, i think, Caledonia, and Britannia as a whole, are so insignificant in the Empire, we should rather focus on what effects would it have on the post-roman society.
 

jose1357

Donor
If they could capture Masada, then if they put their minds to it and were willing to fight a 10-20 year insurrection like they did in half their conquests then they will get them. That being said, I can't see any real economic incentives for capturing them at this time...they don't really need oil, steel, coal or extra timber and fish stocks
 
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