My liberal arts education weirdly compels me to pick up and read any so-called "Great Book" I happen to find in a local little free library. I recently found an abridged version of Edward Gibbons' "Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire", and friends, I have thoughts. 🧵
I haven't given much thought to the Roman Empire since taking the required (and unfortunately named) "Western Heritage" course my freshman year of college and one viewing of Gladiator. I'm a history buff and I absorbed a lot, so I recall significant dates and events which have come in handy for certain pub trivia rounds, but other than that, there's been no need for me to think about it.
Let me summarize for you the typical cycle of a Roman emperor. You can add, subtract, or rearrange the middle parts: ascension, non-specific palace intrigue, repel barbarians, put down internal revolts, war of conquest, civil war, and CHOOSE ONE: assassinated by army for being too virtuous/assassinated by army for being too depraved/died 50 days after ascension because he was old.
That's what this book has been so far, and given its "Great Book" status, I assume that its the basis for much of what we think about the Empire in popular culture.
To the apparently significant number of men who think about the (presumably Western) Roman Empire several times a day, you're kinda sick in the head and also absolutely boring.
Don't get me wrong - "Decline and Fall" is an impressive work of 18th Century history, but historiography has come a LONG WAY since this was written and is richer and more interesting than the (absolutely repetitive and boring) chronicles of the rich and powerful of which this volume is probably the exemplary case.
But thanks to reactionary state legislators and corporatist college administrators gutting the humanities, get used to more history like this written by dudes of privilege.
And the writing... the narrator clearly enjoyed reading his own prose and probably sensibly chuckled at all his witticisms. It's a slog for a modern reader.
So there you have it. I'm enough of a nerd and masochist that I'm going to finish it, but please, pick up almost any history written in the last two decades on any other topic if and when you have the chance.
@aburtch@wobs modern histories are superior on every topic, and in terms of cultural histories modern intersectional scholarship is a must. Most history books written before about 1970 at latest are of value only in a historiographic sense ("this is what people used to think") - even with the exceptions (e.g. Richard Hofstadter) you can still clearly see the omissions and glaring holes left in the logic by the lack of intersectional thought. Roman history without class struggle is a joke.
@wobs or many modern histories of this topic. Roman history, especially the transition from republic to empire, has a lot to say about modern western society and class struggle. Partly because our oligarchs often idolize the Roman upper classes and especially their willingness to exercise violence to maintain control, but in general, intersectional histories of Greece and Rome illustrate the roots of how we live today. In a very real sense the Roman mindset is exactly what we're fighting against
@wobs practically every modern volume I've read on the ancient and classical Mediterranean societies has had something interesting to say about class struggle, which was the dominant internal dynamic in both Greek and Roman societies. In Roman history the links between oligarchy, class struggle, militarism, patriarchy and imperialism are all laid bare. Gibbon sucks but the topic is among the most relevant.
Plus modern histories touch on the debauchery. Julius Caesar was a bi superfreak btw
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