Enemies of the Roman Order

"This is written by Ramsey MacMullen, an American scholar and one of my heroes. What’s really cool about this is that it’s so different from most modern books on ancient history . Most start with the basic premise that I’m going to study x period of ancient history, y geographic area, z war. This one starts with an idea. He wonders what, if the Romans had had something similar to the House Un-American Activities Committee, would that committee have investigated and persecuted. It’s a brilliant idea and it’s superbly written. It sheds light on how Rome was governed by looking at the flip side, at the people who undermined the empire, the rebels. He uncovered a strange pattern which was the rebels, just like the people who held power, progressively moved down the social scale, so in the early first century AD the men holding the real power and the revolutionaries tend to come from the very élite noble families, but by the fourth century, they don’t. They tend to come from obscure provincial backgrounds, strange geographic places, the Danube, the Balkans, the Near East. Why is something he never actually answers but it’s a fascinating insight. Either they want to restore the Republic or they want to overthrow Rome and re-establish their own ethnic independence, and others are Christians wanting to overthrow paganism. I know of her! I did read one of her books. Its basic drift was an attempt to prove that the ancient world had chemical and biological weapons. No. But it had things that could almost be called that. Like putting snakes in a jar and throwing it at your enemies."