You are right, it does come down to the assumed mechanism. But I believe you are wrong about the lack of objective tests in human systems like history. Let me give you an example. A direct consequence of my model for the early saeculum is that famines should be either more frequent or more severe during social moment turnings than during non-social moments. One way to test this would be to assess the frequence of famines by looking at the complete history of famines in various places over time and see if a saecular pattern emerges. No such records are known to me.

Another way to do the same thing is to look at the record of agricultural prices over time. During a famine prices spike upwards. A period of greater than normal frequency of famine should show a greater than normal volatility in agricultural prices. So we take a series of British agricultural prices and calculate a running standard deviation divided by the running average. This is a plot of running relative standard deviation which is a measure of trends in price volatility over time. Here is such a plot using a ten-year moving period.



Each peak indicates the end of a period of high price volatility, presumably a social moment. According to the model turnings are supposed to be 27 years long so let us draw a series of 27-year social moment turnings that end in the dates given in the chart and compare them social moment turnings given by McGuinness and S&H:

Proposed . McGuiness . . S&H
1176-1203 1174-1204
1222-1249 1230-1254
1293-1320 1305-1328
1352-1379 1348-1378
1418-1445 1415-1445 xxix-1435
1456-1483 xxxx-xxxx 1459-1487
1525-1552 xxxx-xxxx 1517-1542
1572-1599 xxxx-xxxx 1569-1594
1623-1650 xxxx-xxxx 1621-1649

It doesn't work too badly. As I mentioned before, unrest events line up with the turnings (and also with the cycle defined by the figure). It is not unreasonable that popular unrest would be greater during famine-filled (hard) times. It doesn't prove my mechanism, it could be a weather cycle that produces the apparent cycle in volatility, and the unrest, and the saeculum for that matter. Or something else. But it doesn't disprove the mechanism and so strengthens it.

The strength of this comparison relies on the assumption that S&H (and McGuinness) did not use price information to determine their dates. Neither mentions price behavior as a factor they considered and so I consider that the price volatily-based cycle I just constructed is independent of both S&H and McGuiness's saecula.

If you compare the centers of each turning with the centers of my proposed turnings you see they vary from 0 to 8 years apart. Now if there were no relation between the turnings I developed based on the chart and the other ones, then one would expect them to vary from 0 to 1 turning apart. (They can't be more than 1 turning away, because then they would be closer to the one on the other side.) If there were no relation, the spacing between the volatility turnings and the others would be closer than 1/2 of a turning (~13 years) half of the time and farther than 1/2 of a turning the other half of the time. We find that all nine spacings are less than 1/2 of a turning apart. This is like flipping nine coins and having all nine come up heads. The probability is 512 to 1 against that this relation between price volatility and turnings is co-incidence.

To get this excellent significance I have to use both S&H and McGuiness turnings in order to have lots of comparisons. If I just use S&H, I have only four comparisons--making it 4 heads with four coins, or a 1 in 16 probability of arising by chance. Even so, this is nearly significant.

Unfortunately this sort of analysis cannot be done for the Roman saeculum as there is no price series. However, if my proposed mechanism is valid, there is no reason to assume that it wouldn't be operational for Rome since it was an agricultural society. The key timing element would be age of generation turnover (at what age does the average woman produce a daughter who will live to reproduce). With 50% child mortality, and assuming some infertility and premature death of the mother, this would roughly be the age when the 5-6th child is born. Figure age of first child at 15-17 and ~2 year spacing, this gives 23-27 for the female. If I assume a couple of years older for the male, this gives about 26 years for generation turnover. During periods of population decline one might assume a higher mortality rate, which would give longer generations. During times of burgeoning population generations would be shorter.

Recall that this model does not apply to modern times so the shorter generations of today reflect something else.

Originally Posted by Kurt Horner

This all sounds good on the face of it, but see below. However, you have done what I did the first time I tried to to look for a saecular pattern in Roman history -- mistook Sir Edward Gibbon's personal assessment of the "Five Good Emperors" as the identification of a Crisis-through- Awakening set of rulers. However, that assessment is not the Roman view -- it is Gibbon's.

No, I did not let Gibbon define the saeculum for me. I used the consensus of historians that the greatest weakness in the Roman imperial system was succession. Crises in my view are secular periods in which institutional problems are addressed. Since the succession problem was a recurring institutional problem, I simply repeat this as a theme.

Seems like a big change, but as you point out, while Roman government was hardly extant post-Attila, the culture was still there. This is the fade out of the Classical saeculum soon to be replaced by the Frankish saeculum which is, of course, the Western saeculum.

Yes, is is a big instutional change (just like the shift from republic to empire) and a prime candidate for a crisis IMO. Why should there be a difference between Classical and Western saecula? Do these terms even have meaning in the fifth century?

Why is the Senate the important determinant of secular action? I see the effective action of the military with Claudius and it's ineffectiveness in early unravelling with Domitian's death. Which is more important? Almost certainly the military -- since it was the populist force in Roman politics that increasingly dominated through Roman history.

The Senate is not important, the method of succession is. What the military did with Claudius is consistent with the precedent set by Tiberius and Caligula. In each case, a Claudian became emperor. Since no Claudian had been explicitly designated by Caligula as his successor, the soliders picked the senior Claudian. In other words the system of succession established by Livia and Augustus functioned.

Domitian had not named a successor nor had a rule for succession been established. So when Domitian died, an ad hoc new emperor was improvised (and accepted by the military), but more importantly a new rule was introduced. A precedent of selecting a competent man as one's successor was established, which worked for 84 years.

Here is a plot of the frequency of internal unrest events and barbarian incursions into the empire. Together they and the frequency pattern for religious/spiritual events can help define a saecular pattern as is summarized in this table:

http://csf.colorado.edu/authors/Alex...om-seculum.htm

Ken's saeculum fits the event pattern very well up to AD 200. There is a little discrepancy in the third century and then social moment turnings line up again, although I denote his Crises as Awakenings and vice versa. The approximate saeculum I constructed here using the events and Ken's dates does match the events at 97% significance.

Originally Posted by Mike Alexander '59

Ken's [sic?] saeculum fits the event pattern very well up to AD 200. There is a little discrepancy in the third century and then social moment turnings line up again, although I denote his Crises as Awakenings and vice versa. The approximate saeculum I constructed here using the events and Ken's [sic?] dates does match the events at 97% significance.

What I find most interesting is where my saeculum and yours diverge -- at the third century. Prior to Severus, barbarian conflicts were primarily Roman forces impinging on barbarian territory. After Severus, barbarian conflicts were increasingly a case of barbarians impinging on Roman territory.

Notice that earlier in this thread we both saw the Aurelian to Diocletian period as one having a Crisis character. Yet the statistics (when containing barbarian invasions) yield and Unraveling. Then in the 4th century my turnings again agree but only in terms of the location of social moments (the Crises and Awakenings are flip-flopped).

Now my Western saeculum (not yet posted) has the Black Death cutting short a High and an Etruscan length saeculum before then. By my theory that mass politics decrease turning length we would expect turning length in the West to go to Etruscan length in the 6th century and remain there until the Black Death. I tried to project the Classical saeculum forward at Etruscan length and the Western saeculum backward at Etruscan length to see how they agreed.

Projecting back I got a 766-793 Crisis (Rise of Charlemagne) but projecting forward I get an Awakening in the late 8th century -- there's those flip-flopped social moments again. So here's my theory (which might be testable):

As long as the Empire was the agressor, barbarian conflicts followed the Classical saeculum. Then, starting in the third century, barbarian cultures with different cycles arrive and begin intermingling with each other and the Roman Empire. By the 4th century the barbarian cultures have aligned with the Roman saeculum but only by social moment. I.e. the barbarians are half a cycle out-of-phase. This seems reasonable as it would be very unlikely for harmonization of two saeculum to cross over one social moment on the way to the other type, rather, the path-of-least-resistance is to align to the nearest social moment. In fact, half a cycle out-of-phase seems more likely to develop as it would cause the advances of barbarians to correspond with Imperial division (and vice-versa).

Interestingly, this also resolves our dispute as to whether Odoacer's conquest of Rome is a Crisis or an Awakening event -- it's both. For Odoacer it's a Crisis, for Romulus Augustus it's an Awakening. The barbarian cycle pattern then blots out the Classical pattern and eventually becomes the Western saeculum when the Franks emerge.

Originally Posted by Kurt Horner

What I find most interesting is where my saeculum and yours diverge -- at the third century. Prior to Severus, barbarian conflicts were primarily Roman forces impinging on barbarian territory. After Severus, barbarian conflicts were increasingly a case of barbarians impinging on Roman territory.

It is interesting. It's not my saeculum though. Recall I maintained that there was a crisis duirng Domitian's reign, while you saw an Awakening. I still see a Crisis then, but the spiritual data indicate an Awakening so that was that. Notice how with my approach I can change my view abruptly. Using the event data, turnings are discovered, not reasoned out. You cannot change your assessment of where the turnings lie because you can only see what you see. When somebody else "sees" something different there is an impasse. In some ways its simply a matter of taste. But when we look at frequencies of certain kinds of events locating eventful versus non-event period become more objective. Note the excellent correspondece between yur social moments and the empirical ones I come up with. 14 of 16 align. This is like flipping 16 coins and having 14 of them coming all heads or all tails. The probabilty is 0.05%, so it is hardly coincidence.

Notice that earlier in this thread we both saw the Aurelian to Diocletian period as one having a Crisis character. Yet the statistics (when containing barbarian invasions) yield and Unraveling. Then in the 4th century my turnings again agree but only in terms of the location of social moments (the Crises and Awakenings are flip-flopped).

Yes, I believed the Aurelian period to be a crisis just like I did the Domitian period. But when I looked at the event data carefully I had to abandon my initial view.

Now my Western saeculum (not yet posted) has the Black Death cutting short a High and an Etruscan length saeculum before then. By my theory that mass politics decrease turning length we would expect turning length in the West to go to Etruscan length in the 6th century and remain there until the Black Death. I tried to project the Classical saeculum forward at Etruscan length and the Western saeculum backward at Etruscan length to see how they agreed.

The Western saeclum after the 12th century has sufficient events to construct a fairly precise saeculum. Since this method reproduces the S&H saeculum I believe it is fairly well established. The Black Death (1348-1378) is a normal crisis turning occuring roughly a century before the first S&H crisis (1459-87) and sandwiched between the Avignon (1307-28) and Hussite Awakening (1406-35).

Projecting back I got a 766-793 Crisis (Rise of Charlemagne) but projecting forward I get an Awakening in the late 8th century -- there's those flip-flopped social moments again. So here's my theory (which might be testable):

A word of caution. Projecting saecula forward is problematic when history doesn't co-operate. The neat spacing of the Graachi, Sulla and Caesar make it fairly easy to spot saecula. Then the single saeculum between Septimus and Diocletion is fairly easy to spot. Given these three 80-year spacings and the ~240 years between Caesar and Septimus and you can get a fairly good saeculum scheme. But things get messy after Septimus. The whole period of the Barrack emperors is a mess and things don't really get rosy when Diocletian comes to power. There still are many uprisings during his reign and serious problems that aren't solved. Constantine plays a clean up role after Diocletian, just as Diocletian did after the Barrack emperors. For example, Constantine solves the inflation problem that eluded Diocletian.

Constantine can be a High figure as much as Diocletian. After Constantine things are messy for centuries and a variety of turning schemes can be constructed.

As long as the Empire was the agressor, barbarian conflicts followed the Classical saeculum. Then, starting in the third century, barbarian cultures with different cycles arrive and begin intermingling with each other and the Roman Empire. By the 4th century the barbarian cultures have aligned with the Roman saeculum but only by social moment. I.e. the barbarians are half a cycle out-of-phase.

This seems reasonable as it would be very unlikely for harmonization of two saeculum to cross over one social moment on the way to the other type, rather, the path-of-least-resistance is to align to the nearest social moment.

Why? The saeculum cannot offer "resistance" nor does it "mix" with other saecula. Read S&H's description of their model for the saeculum in Appendix A of Generations. They discuss a sudden shock to a population that creates a temporary saeculum. Because people in different phases of life have different roles the shock has a different effect on their peer personalities. The example they use is a war, in which the response is "arming to meet the crisis". With this example the first turning would be a Crisis. It forges Prophets, Nomads, Heroes and Adpatives all at once based on their role in the Crisis as defined by their position in the life cycle location: elder, mid-life, rising adult, childhood.

Suppose the shock were drought rather than war. In this case there is no way to "arm" to meet the crisis. There is little to do except pray for rain. The response to this sort of crisis would be inner-directed--an Awakening.
The point I am getting at is the saeculum can be "restarted" at any time by an exongenous shock of sufficient magnitude.

The German saeculum does not become "intermixed" with the Roman saeculum. The Germans invade the Romans and thus they impose a shock on the Romans. If it is great enough, it will "reset" the Roman saeculum.

Now the "shock" model only produces a one-time saeculum which then fades away. To make the saeculum into a repeating cycle, Strauss and Howe proposed additonal behavioral patterns they claim are due to "modernity". They also introduce a persistance of a pattern into the next life phase, that is, hysteresis. It is this hysteresis that can produce cycles.

The population model I favor naturally delivers a shock every other generation. It shocks the population into an awakening or crisis, producing the four generation types. Then, before the generations have completely died out another shock is adminstered. The next shock does not occur in a pre-saecular society like the first one, but rather it contains older generations of a type forged in the last shock. It is these older generations that determine the nature of the response to the shock, that is whether it will be outer-directed (Crisis) or inner-directed (Awakening).

Specifically, if a generation who grew up during an Awakening is in charge of the society the response to the shock is likely to be grim and pragmatic as they will have bad memories of their childhood. This will make the turning a Crisis. OTOH, a generation born during a Crisis will have fond memories of the crisis (as many people today look back fondly on WW II as a time when everybody "pulled together"). Their response will not be grim and pragmatic. This will make the turning an Awakening.

I wished to respond to this earlier but have been quite busy . . .

Originally Posted by Mike Alexander '59

The Western saeclum after the 12th century has sufficient events to construct a fairly precise saeculum. Since this method reproduces the S&H saeculum I believe it is fairly well established. The Black Death (1348-1378) is a normal crisis turning occuring roughly a century before the first S&H crisis (1459-87) and sandwiched between the Avignon (1307-28) and Hussite Awakening (1406-35).

Hmm, apparently the flip-flop continues. I've got the Avignon Papacy as starting in a Crisis (along with the Hundred Years War). Also, I see the Black Death as contributing to a view of the Church as a damaged institution. Criticism of the Church was not newly brought in by the Death -- rather the Avignon Papacy had already demonstrated to many that worldly matters had hijacked the faith.

Also, I'd like to point out the extremely convenient temporal location of the Black Death "Crisis." The plague supposedly kicks off the turmoil of this Crisis period -- and this makes sense in your "shock" model where bad events create the saeculum. One must ask though: why would the Death be so perfectly timed as to arrive so as not to elevate an already progressing social moment or perhaps to cut short an Unraveling? How did the pathogen happen to arrive precisely in synch with a pre-existing pattern. Seems rather unlikely, don't you think?

You seem to view the saeculum as being driven by a starter event that causes the engine of history to turn over. But we can see from our own time that saecular patterns cause similar events to be viewed differently depending upon what turning they occur in. Human beings are quite prone to viewing events through a "lens" provided by their prior experiences. Most "shock" events would have minimal impact on the saeculum.

Originally Posted by Mike Alexander '59

Why? The saeculum cannot offer "resistance" nor does it "mix" with other saecula. Read S&H's description of their model for the saeculum in Appendix A of Generations. They discuss a sudden shock to a population that creates a temporary saeculum. Because people in different phases of life have different roles the shock has a different effect on their peer personalities. The example they use is a war, in which the response is "arming to meet the crisis". With this example the first turning would be a Crisis. It forges Prophets, Nomads, Heroes and Adpatives all at once based on their role in the Crisis as defined by their position in the life cycle location: elder, mid-life, rising adult, childhood.

However, once such a pattern is in place, it is reinforced by the perceptions and actions of the people within that pattern. This will definitely offer resistance -- optimism will tend to downplay problems, pessimism will induce panic.

Originally Posted by Mike Alexander '59

Suppose the shock were drought rather than war. In this case there is no way to "arm" to meet the crisis. There is little to do except pray for rain. The response to this sort of crisis would be inner-directed--an Awakening.

If this is so, wouldn't the Black Death mark an Awakening? it's hard to "arm" against an invisible enemy that kills so quickly and arrives without warning. A drought sounds inviting by comparison.

Originally Posted by Mike Alexander '59

Specifically, if a generation who grew up during an Awakening is in charge of the society the response to the shock is likely to be grim and pragmatic as they will have bad memories of their childhood. This will make the turning a Crisis. OTOH, a generation born during a Crisis will have fond memories of the crisis (as many people today look back fondly on WW II as a time when everybody "pulled together"). Their response will not be grim and pragmatic. This will make the turning an Awakening.

Perception matters, even in your view. What's important is not by what happened (a revolt here, a saint born there, etc.) but how people responded to events. An exogenous shock would have to be tremendous to impact these perceptions and move turning changes by more than a year or two. The Black Death, IMO, was enough of a shock, but it didn't "restart" the cycle -- it just pushed it forward to the next turning earlier than would otherwise have occurred.

Originally Posted by Kurt Horner

Hmm, apparently the flip-flop continues. I've got the Avignon Papacy as starting in a Crisis (along with the Hundred Years War). Also, I see the Black Death as contributing to a view of the Church as a damaged institution. Criticism of the Church was not newly brought in by the Death -- rather the Avignon Papacy had already demonstrated to many that worldly matters had hijacked the faith.

As you said this view started during the Avignon Awakening. What more than that to undermine the authority of the Church?

Also, I'd like to point out the extremely convenient temporal location of the Black Death "Crisis." The plague supposedly kicks off the turmoil of this Crisis period -- and this makes sense in your "shock" model where bad events create the saeculum. One must ask though: why would the Death be so perfectly timed as to arrive so as not to elevate an already progressing social moment or perhaps to cut short an Unraveling? How did the pathogen happen to arrive precisely in synch with a pre-existing pattern. Seems rather unlikely, don't you think?

Who says it was perfectly timed? Actually the data suggests that the crisis began shortly after the Plague making the Plague itself an unraveling event. McGuinness dates his 1348-78 Crisis early IMO, and does "cut short the unraveling". The data supports 1358-82. Had it come 10 or 30 years later it would have been just one more "unrest event". Had it come 15 or 20 years earlier it would likely have been been an unrest event in the Avignon awakening.

You seem to view the saeculum as being driven by a starter event that causes the engine of history to turn over. But we can see from our own time that saecular patterns cause similar events to be viewed differently depending upon what turning they occur in. Human beings are quite prone to viewing events through a "lens" provided by their prior experiences. Most "shock" events would have minimal impact on the saeculum.

My model refers explicitly to the old saeculum, not the post-1820 one which has a different mechanism. Also it isn't necessarily a single "event" that causes the shock but rather an environment of many shocks that does so. This environment creates/reinforces different moods in the differing generations depending on phase of life.

However, once such a pattern is in place, it is reinforced by the perceptions and actions of the people within that pattern. This will definitely offer resistance -- optimism will tend to downplay problems, pessimism will induce panic.

This is true of the modern saeculum and one of the reasons my model doesn't apply anymore. Today most of our problems are virtual and so can be "spun" depending on public mood. You are making the argument that "moods" have always mattered in the same way they do today. I disagree. In the past problems were real and "in your face". There is no way to "optimistically downplay" the Viking raiding party burning your village and slaughtering your family. Pessimistic panic is entirely appropriate.

If this is so, wouldn't the Black Death mark an Awakening? it's hard to "arm" against an invisible enemy that kills so quickly and arrives without warning. A drought sounds inviting by comparison.

Exactly. A serious of environment disasters like the plague would likely produce an Awakening if brought to a pre-saecular population or one that had not experienced an awakening recently. Indeed this very thing happened with the Great Famine in 1314-1316 in which a tenth of the population perished and which began a long-term population decline that was greatly accelerated by the Plague in 1347-9.

In 1348, Europe had recently had an Awakening, and according to the model, was primed to respond to the next disaster in a outer-directed fashion. Not only that, but the very nature of the crisis lent itself to an outer-directed response as I describe below.

Perception matters, even in your view. What's important is not by what happened (a revolt here, a saint born there, etc.) but how people responded to events. An exogenous shock would have to be tremendous to impact these perceptions and move turning changes by more than a year or two. The Black Death, IMO, was enough of a shock, but it didn't "restart" the cycle -- it just pushed it forward to the next turning earlier than would otherwise have occurred.

Both of us agree that roughly the 1st and 3rd quarters of the 14th century contain social moments. You assign the first as a Crisis while I see it as an Awakening. I see little secular, outer-directed response during the first period. Those critical of the Church (e.g. William of Ockham) responded in an spiritual, inner-directed fashion by becoming Spiritual Franciscans, while during the next social moment critics like Wyclif attacked the Church politically by questioning its finances (treasury of merit) and the authority of the Church over secular rulers. Wyclif was protected by English secular authorities, which is why he didn't get burned at the stake like Jan Hus did. This protection is also political (secular), not spiritual in nature.

Unlike the 1305-28 social moment, I see much more secular, outer-directed response to challenges posed by the Plague. The "shock" administered by the Plague wasn't the disease itself. That was over in three years. It was the aftermath. Wages rose dramatically with no increase in worker productivity. This is a direct transfer of wealth from rich to poor. The upper classes tried to fight back with wage-control laws like the Statute of Laborers in 1351, but to no avail. Monarchs attempted to tap into the rising wealth of the lower classes with new taxes and met with fierce resistance, from the Jacquerie in 1358 (a major revolt of French peasants (derisively called "Jacques" by their betters) to the Maillotin in 1382, a revolt of Parisians, given its name by the mallets they wielded. There were similar uprising elsewhere, the Ciompi in Italy, the Harelle in Rouen, a revolt in Flanders (I can't recall the name), Wat Tyler's revolt in England, etc.

The flavor of this time smacks of old-fashioned "class warfare" and seems to be very secular to me. It supports the story told by the spiritual event density, which identifies the previous social moment as the more "spirit-rich".

To all:

I recently had occasion to analyze the Rome seculae from 218 to 35
BC. I did the analysis, but came out with different dates than you
guys.

This came about because someone challenged my book, and showed me the
following page from a book, Michael Crawford, The Roman Republic, 2nd
Edition, Harvard University Press, 1993, p. 162:



This table shows how many Roman coin hoards were found with coins in
various four year periods. During times of war, people tend to bury
their gold coins for safety, and come back for them later. Thus, the
number of gold coin hoards tells us when the wars were.

The person challenging my book pointed out that the three periods
with highest activity were 218-201, 91-64, and 55-35. He said that
these periods did not run in 80 year cycles, proving that my book
must be wrong.

I did an analysis, and found that the first two are crisis periods,
but the third is an awakening period. This does not disagree with my
book.

Here are the activities associated with the three periods:

(1) 218-201 BC - Second Punic War

(2) 91-64 BC - Social War, Civil War, Mithridatic Wars

(3) 55-35 BC - Rioting in Rome, Civil War, Caesar assassinated

The following is the analysis that I sent back to him:

I did a brief analysis using Stearns' Encyclopedia of World History.
To do a thorough analysis would require checking several sources to
get a much more detailed picture, so the following should be
considered a "work in progress."

Doing generational analysis in ancient times presents special
problems. Generational periods are highly regional, and in ancient
periods the regions were fairly small, with lots of interactions that
distort the generational timelines.

****************************************
**
** Time span from (1) to (2)
**
****************************************

The time span between (1) and (2) is long - about 127 years -- which
is long, but not entirely unreasonably long. Furthermore, it's
possible that with further research, it will turn out that the Third
Punic War (149-146) provides an explanation.

In the many dozens of historical periods that I've examined, this is
only the third one where a cycle length has exceeded 100 years, and
in each case there was war activity in the middle which might explain
the long period, even though I don't yet have a theoretical
explanation.

The other two examples of cycle lengths exceeded 100 years are as
follows:

(*) In Russia: Peasant Rebellions and Church Schism, 1649-70, to War
with Ottomans and Pugachev's Rebellion, 1762-83. However, the Great
Northern War (1700-1720) was a particular harsh mid-cycle war that
occurred in the middle.

(*) In England: French Revolution and Napoleonic Wars, 1789-1815, to
World War II, 1937-45. In this case, England was at war constantly
during the 1800s, and I believe (but cannot prove) that the
Franco-Prussian War and French Commune, 1860s-71, had a crisis war
effect on England.

As I said, I do not yet have a theoretical explanation for these
lengthy cycles, but they're extremely rare.

****************************************
**
** Time span from (2) to (3)
**
****************************************

This, however, is a much more serious problem. These events are
30-40 years apart, and I don't see how there can be any theoretical
explanation of such a short cycle.

I've studied these periods, and I've come to the conclusion that
period (3) is NOT a crisis war period, but an "awakening" period. If
correct, this resolves the problem that you raised.

In order to show you how I arrived at this reasoning, I'm going to
display Stearns' text for each of the 3 periods, and then comment on
how I analyze it. This will give you a concrete illustration of the
kind of analysis that I do to distinguish crisis wars from mid-cycle
wars.

Keep in mind that this is really a preliminary analysis. A full
analysis would require much more time and additional sources.

**** Period (1) 218-201 BC - Second Punic War

Here is Stearns' text, with my comments interspersed:

> 218-201 The SECOND PUNIC WAR arose from Rome's jealousy of
> Carthaginian expansion in Spain. Some time either before or after
> the Ebro Treaty (226), Rome had made an alliance with Saguntum,
> one hundred miles south of the Ebro. Hannibal, the
> twenty-five-year-old son of Hamilcar who assumed command in 221,
> refused to be bullied by Roman threats and sacked Saguntum in 219.
> Rome declared war the next year.

(Comment) So we know that a war began, but we don't yet know whether
it's a crisis war or a mid-cycle war.

> 218 Hannibal marched his army through southern France, across the
> Alps, and into the Po Valley. The consul P. Cornelius Scipio was
> defeated by Hannibal at the Ticinus, a branch of the Po River.
> Hannibal then defeated the other consul at the Battle of the
> Trebia. The Gauls of the Po Valley rallied to Hannibal.

> 217 Hannibal crossed the Apennines and ambushed and annihilated
> the army of the consul C. Flaminius at Lake Trasimene.

By this time, the citizens of Rome would be in a total state of
panic, much like Americans panicked after the 9/11 attacks.

> 216 The consuls L. Aemilius Paullus and C. Terentius Varro lost
> an army of 86,000 to Hannibal at Cannae, in Apulia. Capua deserted
> to Hannibal, along with the Samnites, Lucanians, and other peoples
> of southern Italy. The Romans refused Hannibal's terms and sent
> out an army under M. Claudius Marcellus. Carthage made alliances
> with Philip V of Macedon and Hieronymus, grandson of Hiero of
> Syracuse, who had died in 217. Hannibal wintered at Capua.

It's clear that Hannibal is fighting a crisis war with great energy.
It's not clear from this description that the Romans are fighting with
the same energy, but it seems likely that they are. This is where
some additional sources would be helpful.

> 215 Marcellus defeated Hannibal at Nola and forced him into
> Apulia.

> 218-211 Publius Scipio had rejoined his brother Gnaeus in Spain.
> They kept Hasdrubal (Hannibal's brother) busy and stirred up
> Syphax, king of western Numidia, against Carthage.

> 215-205 By using a few troops for the First Macedonian War, the
> Romans prevented Philip from helping Hannibal. In 211 they
> organized a Greek alliance, under the lead of the Aetolians
> (Treaty of Naupactus). In 206, Rome was forced to make the Peace
> of Phoenice.

> 214-210 Marcellus saved Sicily and the war by capturing Syracuse
> in 211, despite the ingenious defensive machinery devised by
> Archimedes. Hieronymus [>] having been killed, his kingdom was
> incorporated into the Roman province, giving Rome control of all
> Sicily.

> 212 Hannibal seized Tarentum. Both Scipios were slain in Spain.

> 211 Capua surrendered to Rome and was deprived of all
> self-government.

> 210 P. Cornelius Scipio, son of the late general, was sent to
> Spain with proconsular powers, though only 25 years old.

> 209 Scipio captured New Carthage in Spain. Marcellus checked
> Hannibal and Fabius captured Tarentum. In the following year,
> Hasdrubal evaded Scipio and reached the Po Valley.

> 208 Marcellus was killed in an ambush.

> 207 In the Battle of the Metaurus River M. Livius Salinator
> defeated and slew Hasdrubal. Hannibal withdrew to Bruttium.

> 206 Scipio drove the Carthaginians out of Spain and made a secret
> treaty with their ally Massinissa of Numidia. He returned to Italy
> and was elected consul for 205.

> 204 Scipio invaded Africa and defeated the Carthaginians (203).
> Carthage was forced to recall Hannibal, who attempted in vain to
> negotiate.

> 202 In the Battle of Zama, Scipio annihilated the Carthaginian
> army, though Hannibal escaped.

> 201 Carthage accepted Rome's terms: surrender of Spain and all
> other Mediterranean islands, transfer of Numidia to Massinissa,
> payment of 200 talents a year for 50 years, destruction of all
> except 10 warships, and promise not to make war without Rome's
> permission. Scipio, now entitled Africanus, celebrated a splendid
> triumph. The unfaithful Italian allies were forced to cede land
> and were deprived of some autonomy.

(Comment) One of the major signs of a crisis war is that, win or
lose, the nation is dramatically changed -- in character, in national
boundaries, and so forth. This is clearly a crisis war.


**** Period (2) 91-64 BC - Social War, Civil War, Mithridatic Wars

Once again, here's Stearns' text, with my comments interspersed:

> 91-87 THE SOCIAL WAR (War of the Allies). Italian allied states
> formed their own republic, Italia, and declared war on Rome.
> Latin communities, together with Etruscans and Umbrians, remained
> loyal.

(Comment) Once again, we see a great deal of energy here. The Allied
states go to a great deal of preparation in order to declare war on
Rome.

> 90 The lex Iulia extended Roman citizenship to all Italians, thus
> undermining Italian solidarity. The new citizens, however, were
> enrolled in only eight tribes, severely limiting their voting
> power.

> 89-88 Roman victories effectively ended the war, though it
> dragged into 87. Before it was over, 50,000 had died on each side
> and Italy was devastated.

When I read through a historical account of a war, a phrase like
"Italy was devastated" is a signal that the war was genocidal,
indicating a crisis war.

> 88-84 First Mithridatic War. Taking advantage of the Social War
> and Greek hatred of Rome, Mithridates VI Eupator of Pontus
> invaded Bithynia and the province of Asia. L. Cornelius Sulla, a
> successful optimate general in the Social War and consul in 88,
> received the command against Mithridates.

> 88-82 CIVIL WAR broke out in Rome when a popularis tribune, P.
> Sulpicius Rufus, passed laws distributing new Italian citizens
> through the 35 tribes and transferring the Mithridatic command to
> Marius. Sulla marched his army on Rome, killed his opponents
> (Sulpicius among themMarius escaped), passed conservative laws,
> and then left to fight in the east as proconsul of 87.

> 87-84 The popularis consul of 87, L. Cornelius Cinna, went to war
> with his optimate colleague and captured Rome with the support of
> Marius, who then began slaughtering his optimate enemies. Cinna
> and Marius became consuls for 86, but Marius soon died. Cinna's
> attempts to negotiate with Sulla were fruitless, and he died in a
> mutiny in 84. Meanwhile, Sulla had defeated Mithridates' generals
> in Greece (86-85) and driven Mithridates from Asia; then, eager to
> return to Italy, he made peace (85). Sulla demanded the enormous
> sum of 20,000 talents from the cities of Asia.

Once again, I see words like "slaughtering his ... enemies," which is
a signal of a genocidal crisis war.

> 83-81 The Second Mithridatic War resulted from a Roman invasion
> of Cappadocia. Peace was made on the terms of 84.

(Comment) This would be the end of the crisis period.

**** (3) 55-35 BC - Rioting in Rome, Civil War, Caesar assassinated

Once again, here's Stearns' text, with my comments interspersed, but
this time we'll see that it's NOT a crisis war, but a mid-cycle war.

> 55 Pursuant to the arrangement, Pompey and Crassus were consuls
> and carried the following measures by force. Caesar's command was
> extended for another five years, and Crassus and Pompey were
> given matching five-year proconsular commandsCrassus in Syria,
> Pompey in the two Spanish provinces. Crassus departed for his
> province, while Pompey, contrary to custom, remained near Rome and
> governed Spain through legati.

> 54-53 In Rome, optimates opposed the agents of the triumvirate.
> Violence ensued and Rome moved toward anarchy. Crassus's invasion
> of Parthia ended in disaster when he and his army were wiped out
> at Carrhae (53).

(Comment) At first I thought the phrase "moved toward anarchy"
indicated a possible crisis situation. But there was no serious
violence in Rome, and of course Parthia was far away.

This kind of thing is typical of an "awakening" period, midway
between two crisis wars. During awakening periods, there are riots
and demonstrations and low-level violence but no serious war.

Here are three recent examples of awakening periods:

- America, 1960s and 70s. There were massive riots and
demonstrations, caused by a "generation gap," and there was an
appearance of anarchy, but there was no civil war.

- China, 1989, Tiananmen Square. This is most dramatic "awakening"
event ever televised. Over a million Chinese colleges students from
all over the country crowded into Tiananmen Square in Beijing for a
peaceful demonstration. Government troops entered Tiananmen Square
at night and fired at the sleeping students. In the end, several
thousand were killed.

- Iran since 1999. There have been massive pro-American
demonstrations by students. (Notice that it's always students, and
there's always a "generation gap.") But there's only low-level
violence.

One more thing: The buried coin hoards would not be able to
distinguish between crisis wars and mid-cycle wars, because the
rioting and demonstrations make people fear that another war is about
to break out, even though it can't. (This is the case in Iran and
Iraq today, where numerous analysts talk about civil war, but there's
never more than low-level violence, riots and demonstrations.)

> 52 Milo's gang murdered Clodius and rioting broke out in Rome.
> Elections could not be held, and the senate appointed Pompey sole
> consul for 52. Pompey began to move away from Caesar by marrying
> the daughter of the optimate, Metellus Scipio, whom he had elected
> as his consular colleague.

Apparently the birth date of Titus Annius Milo is not known, but he
appears to be a typical "radical" leader during an awakening period.
I would guess that he's in his 20s.

> 51-50 Caesar, as long as he held office, was immune to optimate
> attempts to prosecute him for illegal acts as consul in 59.
> Caesar's attempts to extend his command and canvass in absence as
> proconsul in 49 (so he could proceed directly to the consulship in
> 48 ) were thwarted by the optimates, who were encouraged by
> Pompey's growing support.

> 49 Negotiations with Caesar broke down, and the senate passed the
> SCU, declaring Caesar a public enemy unless he disbanded his
> army. Caesar initiated CIVIL WAR by leading his army over the
> Rubicon River, the boundary between Cisalpine Gaul and Italy.
> Caesar's swift march forced Pompey and the optimates to abandon
> Italy for Greece, leaving Caesar between Pompeian forces in the
> east and in Spain. Caesar averted the danger with a lightning-fast
> campaign in Spain, defeating Pompey's commanders and securing the
> two provinces.

(Comment) "Caesar initiated a civil war." This wording is a very
clear indication of a mid-cycle war. There is little or no energy
among the people for a civil war, but you gotta do what Caesar says to
do. Obviously, the civil war didn't last long anyway.

> 48 Caesar landed in Greece and defeated Pompey at Pharsalus in
> Thessaly. Pompey fled to Egypt where he was murdered. Caesar
> arrived in Alexandria where, after defeating a native army
> (48-47), he made Cleopatra ruler of Egypt.

> 47 In Asia Minor, Caesar defeated Pharnaces, a son of Mithridates,
> at Zela (veni, vidi, vici).

> 46 After returning to Rome, Caesar crossed to Africa and defeated
> the Pompeians, led by Pompey's son Sextus, at Thapsus. M. Cato
> committed suicide at Utica (hence he was called Uticensis). After
> four simultaneous triumphs in Rome, Caesar went to Spain where
> Sextus Pompey had joined his brother Gnaeus.

Caesar is far away. Obviously there's not much going on in Rome,
even though the Romans are burying coin hoards.

> 45 Caesar defeated the Pompeians at Munda, ending armed
> opposition. Caesar's Reforms. Caesar restored the rights of those
> proscribed by Sulla; reformed the calendar according to the nearly
> correct basis of 35614 days per year; provided moderate debt
> relief; reduced the numbers of those receiving free grain; raised
> the pay of the army; transferred the collection of Asian taxes
> from publicani to state officials; raised the numbers of praetors
> to 16, aediles to 6, and quaestors to 40; increased the size of
> the senate to 900 (?) by enrolling Italians as well as Roman
> citizens from Spain and Narbonensis; granted Roman citizenship to
> all Cisalpine Gaul; and founded some 20 extra-Italian colonies for
> veterans and the poor. Caesar's constitutional position was
> eventually that of a monarch. He held the consulship in 48, 46, 45
> (alone), and 44. He was dictator in 48 and 47 and in 46 was
> madepraefectus morum and dictator for ten years; in 44, dictator
> for life.

> 44 The Assassination of Caesar. Once in power, Caesar faced a
> dilemma. The Roman aristocratic tradition of competition,
> patronage, and exclusivity had led to two generations of violence
> and war and had to be curbed. But to govern, Caesar also needed
> the administrative experience of the senatorial class. He knew his
> autocratic behavior offended, so he attempted to win over
> senatorial sentiment with his friendship, money, and clemencyto no
> avail. A broadly based senatorial conspiracy, which included some
> of Caesar's old comrades and friends and was led by C. Cassius
> Longinus and M. Junius Brutus, murdered the dictator at a meeting
> of the senate on the Ides (15) of March. The conspirators had no
> plan, and the situation soon passed to men who controlled troopsM.
> Ameilius Lepidus, Caesar's magister equitum, and M. Antonius
> (Antony), Caesar's co-consul. But Antony's attempt to gain power
> without bloodshed, by compromising with the conspirators, was
> foiled by the appearance of Caesar's eighteen-year-old great
> nephew, heir, and adopted son, Gaius Julius Caesar Octavianus.
> Octavian publicly attacked Antony for treating with Caesar's
> killers and privately negotiated with optimate senators.
> Supported by Cicero and others, who hoped to use him against
> Antony, Octavian illegally raised an army among Caesar's veterans
> in Campania. Meanwhile, Brutus and Cassius had left Italy to raise
> an army in the east. When Antony marched north to claim his
> province of Cisalpine Gaul, Cicero attacked him in a series of
> speeches (the Philippics).

From a theoretical point of view, a society is healthier if the kids
"win" something during the awakening period riots, since that
provides a means of healing the anger from the "generation gap."
Nixon's resignation in 1974 is a good example, because it completely
disarmed the radical demonstrators and rioters, who suddenly got
everything they had demanded. On the other hand, the harsh
repudiation by Chinese officials of the Tiananmen Square students has
served to increase the generational tension augurs an especially
violent rebellion during China's next crisis period in the next 10
years or so.

In the case of Rome's awakening period, the assassination of Caesar
must have done a great deal to abate the generational tension at the
time, which may explain why there was a lengthy period of peace in
Rome.

> 43 The consuls Hirtius and Pansa proceeded against Antony, and
> the senate gave Octavian a special propraetorian command. Antony
> was bested at Mutina and forced to retire north, but the consuls
> were killed, leaving Octavian in command. The nineteen-year-old
> Octavian then demanded the vacant consulship. When refused, he
> marched his army on Rome, where he forced a special election. As
> consul, Octavian abandoned his optimate friends, passed laws
> calling for the arrest of Caesar's assassins, and began to
> negotiate with Antony, who had joined Lepidus in northern Italy.

> 43, Nov The Second Triumvirate. A lex Titia made Antony, Lepidus,
> and Octavian a commission of three to reform the state for five
> years. In essence, they were three dictators who would control
> elections, legislation, and armies. The triumvirs instituted
> widespread proscriptions inspired by political enmity and the need
> for money. Three hundred senators, including Cicero, and 2,000
> equestrians were executed.

> 42 Lepidus remained in the west, while Antony and Octavian crossed
> to Thrace and defeated the armies of Cassius and Brutus at
> Philippi. Antony was the hero of a battle in which some 40,000
> Romans died. The victors divided the Empire, giving Africa to
> Lepidus; Gaul, the east, and the prospect of a glorious Parthian
> war to Antony; Spain, Sicily, and the problem of settling 50,000
> veterans in Italy to Octavian.

> 41-40 Octavian's policy of confiscation led to a war against
> Antony's wife, Fulvia, and brother, Lucius Antonius, which
> Octavian won by reducing them at Perugia in 40.

> 40 War was averted by the Pact of Brundisium, where the recently
> widowed Antony agreed to marry Octavian's sister, Octavia.

(Comment) It seems that gender issues always come to the fore during
awakening periods. Here the women get involved, and deals are made
with people's wives.

> 39 Sextus Pompey, who since Munda had waged a naval war against
> the Caesarians, gained control of Sicily, Sardinia, and the
> Peloponnese; by cutting off Rome's grain supply, he forced the
> triumvirs to recognize his power by the Treaty of Misenum.
> Octavian divorced his second wife, Scribonia, and married Livia,
> previously the wife of Tiberius Claudius Nero.

> 37 Growing tensions between Octavian and Antony were resolved by
> the Treaty of Tarentum. The triumvirate was renewed for another
> five years.

> 36 At Naulochus in Sicily, Octavian's fleet under his general M.
> Vipsanius Agrippa defeated Sextus Pompey, who fled to Greece,
> where he was executed. Lepidus, now odd man out, attempted to take
> Sicily but was deserted by his army. Octavian deprived him of his
> triumviral powers but spared his life. Octavian campaigned in
> Illyricum (35-34).

> 36 Antony suffered a major defeat in his invasion of Parthia,
> losing 22,000 men in his retreat through Armenia. On his return,
> he rejected the aid of Octavia in favor of that of Cleopatra, with
> whom he openly consorted.

(Comment) Too bad about Parthia, but in awakening periods it's always
better to pay attention to women. Let's see, who do I want more -
Octavia or Cleopatra? That must have been quite a decision!

> 34 Antony conducted a victorious campaign in Armenia and by the
> donations of Alexandria distributed various eastern Roman
> territories to his children by Cleopatra.

(Comment) Well, sounds like he did pretty well with Cleopatra after
dumping Octavia!

Originally Posted by Mr. Edward Gibbon in [i

The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire[/i]]If a man were called to fix the period in the history of the world, during which the condition of the human race was most happy and prosperous, he would, without hesitation, name that which elapsed from the death of Domitian to the accession of Commodus.

Originally Posted by Mr. Friedrich von Blowhard

Have you ever wondered why the Romans have gotten such good press over the last 15 centuries? I mean, Edward Gibbon’s opinion above might be a tad extreme, but it has been echoed by countless other writers over the centuries. The more I’ve read about Rome and thought about it, however, the more peculiar this positive glow cast over either Republican or Imperial Rome appears. Rather than one of the high points of civilization, Rome increasingly strikes me as an essentially perverse episode in human history.

"So when I come across the very numerous examples of writers, politicians and intellectuals who, over the centuries, have shown signs of nostalgia for Rome (and particularly the Roman Empire), I’ve begun to wonder whether they were just ignorant of the true nature of the Roman state or perhaps (unconsciously?) eager to emulate the ruthless and exploitative aspects of the Roman political class." from the Roman Way, Part I

Originally Posted by Mr. Edward Gibbon in [i

The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire[/i]]If a man were called to fix the period in the history of the world, during which the condition of the human race was most happy and prosperous, he would, without hesitation, name that which elapsed from the death of Domitian to the accession of Commodus.

Originally Posted by Mr. Friedrich von Blowhard

Have you ever wondered why the Romans have gotten such good press over the last 15 centuries? I mean, Edward Gibbon’s opinion above might be a tad extreme, but it has been echoed by countless other writers over the centuries. The more I’ve read about Rome and thought about it, however, the more peculiar this positive glow cast over either Republican or Imperial Rome appears. Rather than one of the high points of civilization, Rome increasingly strikes me as an essentially perverse episode in human history.

"So when I come across the very numerous examples of writers, politicians and intellectuals who, over the centuries, have shown signs of nostalgia for Rome (and particularly the Roman Empire), I’ve begun to wonder whether they were just ignorant of the true nature of the Roman state or perhaps (unconsciously?) eager to emulate the ruthless and exploitative aspects of the Roman political class." from the Roman Way, Part I

I noticed that the First Punic War had some very, very familiar earmarks.

It started over a squabble between two small towns.

The Senate was hopelessly deadlocked on whether or not to go to war, so they threw the matter into the hands of the Popular Assembly.

The popular assembly was also deadlocked until a hawkish consul promised them an easy victory and lots and lots of loot.

A generation later they got Hannibal.

The parallels with World War One - or for that matter, any 3T war - are so loud and clear I could almost hear -- what's Latin for "Nintendo War"? :lol:

Originally Posted by Idiot Girl

I noticed that the First Punic War had some very, very familiar earmarks.

It started over a squabble between two small towns.

The Senate was hopelessly deadlocked on whether or not to go to war, so they threw the matter into the hands of the Popular Assembly.

The popular assembly was also deadlocked until a hawkish consul promised them an easy victory and lots and lots of loot.

A generation later they got Hannibal.

The parallels with World War One - or for that matter, any 3T war - are so loud and clear I could almost hear -- what's Latin for "Nintendo War"? :lol:

Great analogy! After your 3T connection, I see ties to the Seven Years War (the French & Indian War, out here) and even WWI.

John Xenakis said "Furthermore, it's
possible that with further research, it will turn out that the Third
Punic War (149-146) provides an explanation."

Let's look at it from the Carthaginian side. Second Punic War - decidedly a crisis for Carthage, as well as for Rome. Third Punic War - a mopping up for Rome and total devastation for Carthage, and right on schedule for a Crisis War.

Was it a Crisis War for Rome? I'm going to call up another Roman conundrum posed by Colinvaux (FATE OF NATIONS) in which he remarked that there were eruptions of nomads from the steppes in either Europe or Asia or both about every 500 years - EXCEPT in the 1st Century AD. He did not go on to explain that in that period there was a huge strange attractor lying across the path of any tent-dwelling barbarians - big enough to lick them with one legion, big enough to absorb the energies of their restless youth, and rich enough to afford them employment. Rome, of course.

So - the Third Punic War was an aborted Crisis for Rome because Rome was simply far more powerful than Carthage at that time, It was, instead, a mopping up, "let's finish the job." But if you want genocidal fury, I'm sure Cato the Elder can supply you with some at that time! (And wasn't he an aged Fanatic then?)

@

Please correct me if I got this wrong....

1st Punic War was an Unraveling War. Has been compared to WWI.

2nd Punic War was a Crisis War.

3rd Punic War...was this an Unraveling War? If so, it would be somewhat comparable to the Iraq War (which could be called a mopping up after the Gulf War).

BTW, where does Rome's seizure of Corsica (238 B.C.) fit in? It seems to have gotten Carthage to start preparing for a Crisis war, whereas the 1st Punic War seems more like the French and Indian War.

Of course, the comparisons are not exact.

Anything that happened around the time of the Second Punic War was part of the Crisis.

The 3rd Punic War was an aborted-crisis, not a 3T war. As I mentioned with the steppe nomads "megacrisis", a 4T can sometimes be very softened if the conditions are just right, as they were in mid-Victorian Western Europe and America. Just so the 3rd Punic War was a 4T in the same way the Franco-Prussian war or the Crimeas War were. Or else (S&H are of two minds on this) there was a very long (double?) saeculum without a 4T

So, do you think there is any chance of one this time around?

No.

I don't either. I have tried to imagine moderating influences, but nothing seems plausible.

Originally Posted by Idiot Girl

Anything that happened around the time of the Second Punic War was part of the Crisis.

The 3rd Punic War was an aborted-crisis, not a 3T war. As I mentioned with the steppe nomads "megacrisis", a 4T can sometimes be very softened if the conditions are just right, as they were in mid-Victorian Western Europe and America. Just so the 3rd Punic War was a 4T in the same way the Franco-Prussian war or the Crimeas War were. Or else (S&H are of two minds on this) there was a very long (double?) saeculum without a 4T

One of these days I have to read a book on Ancient Rome, Carthage, Hannibal and the Punic Wars. There isn't much room for Western Civilization when you're an Engineering major!

Originally Posted by Tim Walker

Please correct me if I got this wrong....

1st Punic War was an Unraveling War. Has been compared to WWI.

2nd Punic War was a Crisis War.

3rd Punic War...was this an Unraveling War? If so, it would be somewhat comparable to the Iraq War (which could be called a mopping up after the Gulf War).

Seems right to me. (There's an earlier post of mine in this thread with turning dates for the period just after this.)

Originally Posted by Tim Walker

BTW, where does Rome's seizure of Corsica (238 B.C.) fit in? It seems to have gotten Carthage to start preparing for a Crisis war, whereas the 1st Punic War seems more like the French and Indian War.

Early unraveling I would guess.

Originally Posted by Idiot Girl

The 3rd Punic War was an aborted-crisis, not a 3T war. As I mentioned with the steppe nomads "megacrisis", a 4T can sometimes be very softened if the conditions are just right, as they were in mid-Victorian Western Europe and America. Just so the 3rd Punic War was a 4T in the same way the Franco-Prussian war or the Crimeas War were. Or else (S&H are of two minds on this) there was a very long (double?) saeculum without a 4T.

There is plenty of Crisis immediately after the Third Punic War. That , after all, is the time of the Gracchus brothers -- the first (abortive) triumphs of populism in Roman history. From the Gracchi on, it's just one long slide towards Empire. Essentially, the Third Punic War had left Rome the undisputed master of the Mediterranean and this led to serious internal conflict about how Rome should be governed. For the entire ensuing saeculum, Rome attempted to be an Empire with republican institutions. The following Crisis (the Civil War) ended the Republic.

"For the entire ensuing saeculum, Rome attempted to be an Empire with republican institutions. The following Crisis (the Civil War) ended the Republic."

Yes. Boy, does THAT sound familiar!

I think the turning point there was when Gaius Marius professionalized the army. Of course, he apparently had precious little choice; the citizen-soldier class had been just about wiped out by prolonged service, too many casualties, debt, small farms being bought out by agribusiness... I mean, the latifundia....

An Unraveling Fall of Carthage followed by a Land Reform and Constitutional Crisis.

Carthage = USSR?

USA = Rome?

I think this is the part of Roman history most similar to current events, though I expect our 4T to be more complicated.

If the mopping up was a softened/abortive? 4T then it is easy to classify it as 3T. As I recall there was some debate as to whether Britian had a mid-19th century Crisis or not; the consensus was that there was an unusually mild Reform Crisis.

Alternatively, would it make sense to conflate the 3rd Punic War with a Land Reform and Constitutional Crisis?

Originally Posted by Idiot Girl

"For the entire ensuing saeculum, Rome attempted to be an Empire with republican institutions. The following Crisis (the Civil War) ended the Republic."

Yes. Boy, does THAT sound familiar!

I think the turning point there was when Gaius Marius professionalized the army. Of course, he apparently had precious little choice; the citizen-soldier class had been just about wiped out by prolonged service, too many casualties, debt, small farms being bought out by agribusiness... I mean, the latifundia....

Things may have died down a little earlier than that. Perhaps his reforms were early High? Regardless, if you do parallel Roman history to Western history (in this period) you could get the following parallels:
WWI = First Punic War
WWII = Second Punic War
End of Cold War = Third Punic War
Bush II = Tiberius Gracchus?

Amusing parallels, but I think it's difficult to draw any real parallels between our society and Rome's. Our society is much less violent and our economic power base is centered on banking rather than slavery. If you want a more instructive analogy to classical civilization, I'm more inclined to compare us to the Empire in its later years.

The reason I would draw a parallel to late Rome is by comparing the course of our two civilizations. For Rome, their slave power went up dramatically following the Second Punic War and the inherent conflict was between military and aristocratic interests, eventually culminating in total militarism (around 200 AD) and then decline thereafter. For the West, fractional reserve banking really got going in the 15th century and there was conflict between Protestant and Catholic countries eventually resulting in Protestant victory. As a result I find the following parallel even more amusing:

(late 3rd to mid 4th century)
Aurelian & Diocletian = FDR & Truman
Diocletian's Tetrarchy = Bretton Woods
Constantine = Nixon
Council of Nicaea = Earth Day
Death of Constantine = End of Cold War
Barbarians = The Islamic World
Persia = China?
Constantius = Bush I?
Magnentius = Clinton?
Julian the Apostate = Bush II?

Now here's a parallel; A fraying Empire marked by currency debasement, economic turmoil, cultural confusion, enough new religions to start a Faith of the Month Club, hapless attempts by the powerful to establish a moral consensus by decree, immigration further undermining a once unified culture, frequent barbarian attacks handled with mixed success and political elites who were far more concerned about who gets to sit in the big chair than sound policy.

Eventually, this situation led to division of the Empire and ultimately, the disastrous barbarian victory at Adrianople. So to make a long post short, I think America is less of a new Rome, and more of a new Byzantium.

Sallust, The Catilinarian Conspiracy (selections)



But the love of irregular gratification, open debauchery, and all kinds of luxury, had spread abroad with no less force. Men forgot their sex; women threw off all the restraints of modesty. To gratify appetite, they sought for every kind of production by land and by sea; they slept before there vas any inclination for sleep; they no longer waited to feel hunger, thirst, cold, or fatigue, but anticipated them all by luxurious indulgence. Such propensities drove the youth, when their patrimonies were exhausted, to criminal practices; for their minds, impregnated with evil habits, could not easily abstain from gratifying their passions, and were thus the more inordinately devoted in every way to rapacity and extravagance.


14 In so populous and so corrupt a city, Catiline, as it was very easy to do, kept about him, like a body-guard, crowds of the unprincipled and desperate. For all those shameless, libertine, and profligate characters, who had dissipated their patrimonies by gaming, luxury, and sensuality; all who had contracted heavy debts, to purchase immunity for their crimes or offences; all assassins or sacrilegious persons from every quarter, convicted or dreading conviction for their evil deeds; all, besides, whom their tongue or their hand maintained by perjury or civil bloodshed; all, in fine, whom wickedness, poverty, or a guilty conscience disquieted, were the associates and intimate friends of Catiline. And if any one, as yet of unblemished character, fell into his society, he was presently rendered, by daily intercourse and temptation, similar and equal to the rest. But it was the young whose acquaintance he chiefly courted; as their minds, ductile and unsettled from their age, were easily ensnared by his stratagems. For as the passions of each, according to his years, appeared excited, he furnished mistresses to some, bought horses and dogs for others, and spared, in a word, neither his purse nor his character, if he could but make them his devoted and trustworthy supporters. There were some, I know, who thought that the youth, who frequented the house of Catiline, were guilty of crimes against nature; but this report arose rather from other causes than from any evidence of the fact.


*****



26 Catiline, having made these arrangements, still canvassed for the consulship for the following year; hoping that, if he should be elected, he would easily manage Antonius according to his pleasure. Nor did he, in the mean time, remain inactive, but devised schemes, in every possible way, against Cicero, who, however, did not want skill or policy to guard against them. For, at the very beginning of his consulship, he had, by making many promises through Fulvia, prevailed on Quintus Curius, whom I have already mentioned, to give him secret information of Catiline’s proceedings. He had also persuaded his colleague, Antonius, by an arrangement respecting their provinces, to entertain no sentiments of disaffection towards the state; and he kept around him, though without ostentation, a guard of his friends and dependents.



When the day of the comitia came, and neither Catiline’s efforts for the consulship, nor the plots which he had laid for the consuls in the Campus Martius, were attended with success, he determined to proceed to war, and to resort to the utmost extremities, since what he had attempted secretly had ended in confusion and disgrace.



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36 At this period the empire of Rome appears to me to have been in an extremely deplorable condition; for though every nation, from the rising to the setting of the sun, lay in subjection to her arms, and though peace and prosperity, which mankind think the greatest blessings, were hers in abundance, there yet were found, among her citizens, men who were bent, with obstinate determination, to plunge themselves and their country into ruin; for, notwithstanding the two decrees of the senate, not one individual, out of so vast a number, was induced by the offer of reward to give information of the conspiracy; nor was there a single deserter from the camp of Catiline. So strong a spirit of disaffection had, like a pestilence, pervaded the minds of most of the citizens.


37 Nor was this disaffected spirit confined to those who were actually concerned in the conspiracy; for the whole of the common people, from a desire of change, favored the projects of Catiline. This they seemed to do in accordance with their general character; for, in every state, they that are poor envy those of a better class, and endeavor to exalt the factious; they dislike the established condition of things, and long for something new; they are discontented with their own circumstances, and desire a general alteration; they can support themselves amidst revolt and sedition, without anxiety, since poverty does not easily suffer loss.



As for the populace of the city, they had become disaffected from various causes. In the first place, such as everywhere took the lead in crime and profligacy, with others who had squandered their fortunes in dissipation, and, in a word, all whom vice and villainy had driven from their homes, had flocked to Rome as a general receptacle of impurity. In the next place, many, who thought of the success of Sylla, when they had seen some raised from common soldiers into senators, and others so enriched as to live in regal luxury and pomp, hoped, each for himself, similar results from victory, if they should once take up arms. In addition to this, the youth, who, in the country, had earned a scanty livelihood by manual labor, tempted by public and private largesses, had preferred idleness in the city to unwelcome toil in the field. To these and all others of similar character, public disorders would furnish subsistence. It is not at all surprising, therefore, that men in distress, of dissolute principles and extravagant expectations, should have consulted the interest of the state no further than as it was subservient to their own. Besides, those whose parents, by the victory of Sylla, had been proscribed, whose property had been confiscated, and whose civil rights had been curtailed, looked forward to the event of a war with precisely the same feelings.



All those, too, who were of any party opposed to that of the senate, were desirous rather that the state should be embroiled, than that they themselves should be out of power. This was an evil, which, after many years, had returned upon the community to the extent to which it now prevailed.