Originally Posted by Tim Walker

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?

I personally suspect that some here would prefer to see the US as Carthage, and China as Rome, in an all too realistic replay of the 3rd Punic War. However, as you have probably figured out, I would more compare the US to Rome, and the old Soviet Union to the Parthian Empire, while China comes in as Sassanid Persia.

Originally Posted by Prisoner 81591518

Originally Posted by Tim Walker

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?

I personally suspect that some here would prefer to see the US as Carthage, and China as Rome, in an all too realistic replay of the 3rd Punic War. However, as you have probably figured out, I would more compare the US to Rome, and the old Soviet Union to the Parthian Empire, while China comes in as Sassanid Persia.

You really need to put up or shut up. Please tell us who you are talking about and what they have said on this board or elsewhere to make you suspect what you wrote above.

I noticed that Tiberius Gracchus introduced some very modest reforms - in the name of what was best for Rome - 13 years after the end of the Third Punic War/conquest of Greece. Reading what he wanted, he comes across as such a typical postwar reformer (and I'm a War Baby Silent) --

Gaius, 10 years later, is far more radical. And Gaius is tried and convicted, whereas Tiberius was merely executed. There is discussion as to how far Cornelia was involved. Awakening, most decidely, complete with women playing a more prominent role than in the past (or at least the indomitable Cornelia.)

31 years later we have the Social Wars, which devastated Italy and were followed by the Wars of Marius & Sulla, which overturned all precedent and resulted in a bloodbath.

Question: was Sulla's dictatorship part of that 4T? Or was is the 4T-1T cusp? The fact that he retired and got away with it argues for the former.

Catullus started writing in the party-hearty anything-goes atmosphere of 20 years later - sounds like an Awakening to me, and Catullus was born either during the Wars or during the Dictatorship depending on what dates you accept. So-- cusp?

Caesar's civil wars started out as Third Turning, but you can't mistake the fact that Octavian reset Rome's clock once and for all when he began his reign, and it started with a most unmistakeable High. (As I said - an old Silent knows a High when she sees one!) So - a foreshortened Dying Republic Saeculum? The Awakening and Unraveling merged into one?

I still, really think if we're doing Roman parallels, this is where we're at. With the Missionary Generation as the Gracchi. smart enough to forestall any possible Social Wars? Not that one can compare an Agricultural Age society with an Industrial Age one, but still --- and Rome was plenty urbanized, Minerva knows.

Well, a merger of Awakening and Unraveling certainly doesn't apply to the Millenial Saeculum.

I didn't postulate a point-for-point mapping. Just that the Millenial Saeculum shows signs of being America's Dying Republic Saeculum.

You'll note the the First and Second Punic Wars weren't really followed by a Cold War in which the enemy collapsed, either.

Originally Posted by Idiot Girl

I noticed that Tiberius Gracchus introduced some very modest reforms . . .

Or perhaps . . .

I noticed that George W. Bush introduced some very modest reforms - in the name of what was best for America - 13 or so years after the end of the Cold War.

(?), 10 years later, is far more radical. And (?) is assassinated/impeached, whereas Bush merely saw a slow decline in his popularity.

30 or so years later we have the Second American Civil War, which devastated America, overturned all precedent and resulted in a bloodbath.

The later civil wars started out as Third Turning, but you can't mistake the fact that (America's first President for Life) reset the nation's clock once and for all when he began his reign, and it started with a most unmistakeable High.

Parallel speculations aside, have you considered that Ocatvian didn't reset the Roman saeculum? That he was, rather, right on time. The whole post-Carthage period from the Gracchi to Octavian is one of constant turmoil (at least half a dozen distinct civil wars!). The Dying Republic Saeculum (good name, btw) seems borne of the breakdown of the consensus created by Rome's total dominance in the Mediterranean following the defeat of Cathage and conquest of Greece. Rome was unequivocally an Empire, but how would it be governed? Octavian represents the decisive end to that debate, a debate which began with the Gracchi some 80 years before.

Originally Posted by Kurt Horner

Originally Posted by Idiot Girl

I noticed that Tiberius Gracchus introduced some very modest reforms . . .

(snip).[/i]

Parallel speculations aside, have you considered that Ocatvian didn't reset the Roman saeculum? That he was, rather, right on time. The whole post-Carthage period from the Gracchi to Octavian is one of constant turmoil (at least half a dozen distinct civil wars!). The Dying Republic Saeculum (good name, btw) seems borne of the breakdown of the consensus created by Rome's total dominance in the Mediterranean following the defeat of Cathage and conquest of Greece. Rome was unequivocally an Empire, but how would it be governed? Octavian represents the decisive end to that debate, a debate which began with the Gracchi some 80 years before.

Let me sit down and run the numbers on that. Because the German Invasions/Social Wars were a most decidedly scary time for Rome.

P.S. I DO hope you're not comparing The W to Li'l Augie, are you? What an insult to Octavian's ghost! (And he certainly isn't up to Big Julie's level. I'm still waiting for him to get up to the Formal Operations Thinking level.)

Originally Posted by Idiot Girl

Let me sit down and run the numbers on that. Because the German Invasions/Social Wars were a most decidedly scary time for Rome.

Awakenings can be full of turmoil too.

Originally Posted by Idiot Girl

P.S. I DO hope you're not comparing The W to Li'l Augie, are you? What an insult to Octavian's ghost! (And he certainly isn't up to Big Julie's level. I'm still waiting for him to get up to the Formal Operations Thinking level.)

Nope, still comparing Bush II to Tiberius Gracchus -- in that the darkest fears of the Gracchi's opponents were realized one Crisis later in the form of Octavian. While it is feared by many on the left that Bush II desires to end the Republic, it is more likely that an actual end to American democracy would take another full saeculum.

Doesn't work very well when comparing histories of different civilizations.

The main themes may be similar when comparing two different eras, but the particular details may play out more like that of a third era.

The Dying Republic theme resonates with MilSaec USA. However, different authors have compared our times-re: globalization and international affairs-to the years leading up to World War I. The environmental problems caused by the works of man (and cutthroat businessmen) can be compared to those of Babylon after the death of Hammarabi.

FWIW, here's my attempt to parallel our history with that of Imperial Rome.

Originally Posted by Prisoner 81591518

Here's a relatively optimistic scenario (for me, at least) which I have posited on another thread for the course and outcome of this 4T, where America is concerned:

Suppose history does repeat itself to some degree, in that the next 4T bears at least some resemblance to the 3rd Century Crisis in the Roman Empire? How might that go?

Well, first we would have to go with the scenario that many Bush-haters here are predicting for the next four years - that Bush plunges us into another depression, even worse than that of the 1930s. At the same time, our enemies grow bolder with their attacks on us while our few remaining friends begin to desert us. This leads to the massive Democrat sweeps in 2006 and 2008 which so many here so fervently hope for.

Unfortunately, the new President proves to be no more capable of dealing with the economic mess, which continues to worsen. What he or she does do is to bring all US forces home, and propose their (at least partial) demobilization. This, however, does not regain any favor for us overseas. Rather, it simply turns the universal hatred of America into contempt, while the attacks against our homeland become even bolder and more damaging than ever before. Those few countries who had stuck by us during Bush's second term now turn against us, as war spreads across the Eastern Hemisphere like a plague, with nukes employed in many cases. Meanwhile, a Republican minority in both houses of Congress continuously employs the same obstructionist tactics that many expected from the Congressional Democrats for the remainder of Bush's term, and upheaval spreads across the land. The country is now staring it's seemingly inevitable destruction in the face.

At this point, as far as a critical number of Americans are concerned, both parties have been equally discredited, and many believe that the same sad fate has befallen democracy itself. Thus, when a military coup occurs sometime between 2010 and 2012, while the act is entirely illegal, even treasonous, the resistance to it proves to be far less than would have been anticipated only a few months before it actually happens. This leads to a swift series of revolving door 'Generalissimos'. The (last-wave Boomer) Generalissimo who finally takes charge of the country a couple of years later proves to be the GC so long hoped for, and the Regeneracy finally begins. As he or she takes hold of things, the downward spiral finally slows, and then begins to reverse itself. The American economy staggers back onto it's feet, as the country turns inward, to heal it's wounds of the previous decade. The social cost, in terms of personal freedom, proves to be quite high, but after years of ever-increasing suffering, the American people find themselves surprisingly willing to pay it. Even as the country becomes increasingly authoritarian, the military is also reformed, top to bottom, for homeland and hemispheric defense. (There is no longer any interest in events beyond the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, except insofar as they endanger the Western Hemisphere.) As this is done, the attacks on American soil become fewer, less bold, and less damaging, until they become a rare occurrence. The contempt is turning once more into fear, though the hatred remains.

The Climax occurs in the late teens and early 20s, as a regenerated but now authoritarian America reasserts it's hegemony over the Western Hemisphere in a series of wars. As China begins to see that we have no further interest in stopping them from dominating East Asia and the Western Pacific in the same way, they turn their full attention to that task, leaving us to turn our full attention to our self-imposed task. As Russia by this time has become a Chinese client state, Japan, India and the Middle East a nuclear wasteland, and Europe is far gone in decline, China has no other credible opponent to deal with. The attitude in both governments is something like "One day there will have to be a final reckoning between us, but why rush it?"

Sometime around 2025, the task is completed, by both China and America. (In that order of strength, the two superpowers.) The 'GC' Generalissimo dies now, of old age and exhaustion, having chosen his or her (GenX) successor. The motto of the 1T that now begins is 'America Restored', as said successor moves to calm the stormy waters. His or her counterpart in China is doing the same thing, as both leaders realize that their countries, and indeed the world, are weary of war and tumult, and heartily wish for something better. Besides, both countries, and both leaders, realize how close run a thing it has been. Domestically, the iron hand begins to relax it's grip, sensing that the need for a tight grip is no longer what it had been. Still, everyone from the Generalissimo on down is all too well aware that things will never truly be the same again.

BTW, for those who fear (or would welcome) a fundamentalist theocracy in America, I suspect that such a military GC would apply a more even-handed policy towards the religions of the country than that.

When another poster suggested that the following 2T might see the rebirth of democracy, I suggested that instead, said 2T would see the final triumph of a new religion or ideology, which would further undermine what's left of our society's legitimacy, thus preparing the way for our final collapse at the end of the century.

Was there a hero generation associated with the third Punic War?

Originally Posted by Tim Walker

Was there a hero generation associated with the third Punic War?

If there was , they were probably getting older by then, as said war could be described in terms comparable to Korea or the War of 1812. (An echo of the recently ended [Second Punic war] 4T.)

I thoiught this was an interesting thread and decided to bump it since I've been reading a new book on the Ancient Mediterranean called The Classical World: An Epic History from Homer to Hadrian.


IMO it's painfully obvious that the best classical analogy to the current situation Western Civilization is the late Hellenistic Period, just before the Gracchian Crisis. Both the coming 4T and the Gracchian 4T are "Moral" Crises ( http://www.fourthturning.com/forum/s...7&postcount=37 ) and Both periods are in the latter half of the "Time of troubles" of thier respective civilizations. Both the modern US and late 2nd century Rome had become the dominant power of thier respective civilizations in the precceding 4T.

"...trend during the last days of the Republic was the social mood. The society was exhausted and ready to welcome a regime that restored internal peace and order...When Octavian Augustus emerged as the winner of the civil war, he found it relatively easy to impose a new political regime of the Principate. The rule of Augustus rested on a broad popular consensus...."

I think the USA has reached a Point of Departure. We might end up following a course similar to the dying Roman Republic. Or, concievably, follow the course of the Assyrians, who embraced militarism, leading to the hollowing out and eventual ruin of their society.

Alternatively, we might see a future similar to that of Britian in the second half of the twentieth century. This seems promising, as the USA has not (so far) had a civil war during the MilSaec.

"He had never sought the approval of officialdom. In this sense he was the odd man out in the golden quartet of Augustan writers. Livy's History, in 142 books, had Rome's greatness as its unswerving theme. Virgil's Aeneid, a patriotic epic, climaxed in the birth of Rome and its rebirth under Augustus. Even the hedonistic and satirical Horace reflected, in his Odes, the great pageant of the Roman story. These were, in the highest sense, the Augustan apologists. Rome's mission had been their inspiration and they lifted Latin to parity with Greek as the supreme languages of civilized mankind. All three were, however, older than Ovid. Theirs was the civil war generation, which had longed for peace and prized the blessings it brought. Ovid's was the post-war generation, which took peace for granted and had heard enough of valiant deeds. Understandably, he turned toward less patriotic themes, unrelated to public events. His commitment was total but it was to poetry itself, not to a regime, however glorious. It is of course clear to us that, far from being contrary to the glory of the Augustan Age, Ovid's achievement was a proud part of it; and that his deviations from orthodoxy were refreshing as well as harmless."

"...geography...of the former Soviet Union whose zones of natural vegetation run crosswise in broad and even bands: tundra, pine, deciduous woodland, woodland mixed with grass, and finally grassland. The last, too dry for tree growth, was known as the grassy steppe: a strip barely 150 miles deep and running the entire length of the Black Sea's northern shore.

"Steppe is Russian for prairie or pampas. This grassy or Pontic steppe is so flat that the Greeks called part of it the Racecourse of Achilles...."

"...Although narrow in a north-south sense, from west to east it is one of the longerst features on earth, extending some 5,000 miles from eastern Europe to Manchuria, where the grassy strip widens to 600 miles...Though its central portion is interrupted by mountains, these are crossable. As this grassy path marches eastwards it becomes higher, drier and more thinly peopled. However, the normal direction of march is westwards; for with each day's journey the winter grows minutely milder, the climate infinitesimally moister and the pasture fractionally richer. If sheep led shepherd...greener grass would draw them gently toward Europe.

"It is easy to see how these accidents of climate and geography made the steppe a feature of long-term danger for the West. Not only did it offer the Asian herd folk a corridor toward the Balkans, it brought that most irksome enemy, the mounted nomad; for such vast distances, and the tangle of summer herbage, decreed that horsemen dominate the steppe, as cowboys would one day rule the American prairie and gauchos the Argentinian pampa. This is why steppe migration awaited the taming of the horse and did not begin until about 2000 B.C. At least a further twelve centuries then elapsed before a distinctive, mounted warrior emerged, using armour and weapons largely copied from Iran."

"Whether squabbling over grazing and watering rights or harrying the farmers along its edges, aggression was a fact of steppe life. Though nomad populations were thinly spread, raiding parties could be mustered quickly. Doubless they would as quickly dissolve, for lacking logistical capacity, there was little likelihood of prolonged campaigns. However, limitation was compensated by performance. these were the world's best horsemen. All adults were warriors. The steppe drew little distinction between military and civilian, man and woman. Accordingly the Pontic region supplied the ancient world with two of its abiding images: the amazon, a woman who could outfight a man; and the centaur, in which rider and horse merge into a powerful killing machine.

"...the Pontic steppe was part of an invasion path of long standing. This is not to say that mounted hordes were continually pouring out of Mongolia, intent on the West's destruction. Their view was local and their progress slow. Nor did they necessarily stay the course. Sometimes their wanderings ceased for centuries. Some tribes left the path midway, while others entered it. In particular the wide gaps between the Caspian and Aral, Aral and Lake Balkhash, invited the northward movement of refugees from the droughts of norther Iran and Afghanistan, who joined the steppe in its central or Kirghiz portion. This is the probable origin of the Scythian and Sarmation peoples....

"...Nor did this pastoral corridor end at the Black Sea. Its natural termini were more ominous still; the Wallachian Plain, that part of the lower Danube where Bucharest now stands; or, branching north round the Carpathians, the Hungarian Plain and the middle Danube."

"...Late summer and autumn...the bronze and silver steppe a sea in which the walker wades, waist-high, through tinkling grass and crackling weed, legs pricked by stalks, socks stiff with burrs, and bootfuls of sharp seeds. Here unmounted man makes little headway. Winter is more savage still. Big blizzards scours the plain, reminding us that, though we may be at the latitude of northern Italy, this, after all, is close to Russia.

"...the absence of huts and presence of wagons. The latter were the standard dwelling of the Sarmatian tribes and an essential part of nomad equipment. Where might timber for these carts be found? Though the steppe was generally treeless, its river bottoms were often wooded. The so-called Iron Age was a period of major advance in wood working, not least in the construction of vehicles with strong, spoked wheels. Clay models, probably toys, from Scythian tombs show these as covered wagons, with skins stretched over (or bark nailed onto) hooped frames. Sometimes the rearward half was enclosed, leaving an open-fronted driving compartment. Occasionally the covering was pyramidical, a sort of wigwam erected on the wagon's stern. The classic shape, however, resembled the American or Afrikaner covered wagon and was possibly a distant ancestor of the gypsy caravan.

"When they halted, the wagons would be formed into a laager or defensive ring. Though able-bodied lived in the saddle, vehicles were essential for child-rearing and winter shelter...."

"Rome's calvary, her weakest arm, could neither catch nor match these horsemen on their native prairie and did not try....

"...once out on the open steppe there was little likelihood of catching them. 'Pursuing or pursued, they gallop great distances on fast horses, leading one or even two more so that by alternating mounts they can maintain speed.

"Herodotus touched upon a universal military problem when he wrote: 'They who are without permanent towns or fortifications and live not by agriculture but by stock-raising, carrying dwellings in wagons: surely such people will be uncatchable and therefore unconquerable....'"

"The Turks call it Kara Deniz (Black Sea) in contrast to the Mediterranean, Ak Deniz (Blue Sea), and for good reason. Emerging from a Bosphorus bright with lawns and palaces, the very act of entering seems to induce a mood change, appropriate to the sea's name in all languages except Greek and Latin. The Greeks called it Pontos Euxinos, the Hospitable Sea and the Romans followed their lead. But this was a publicity stunt, rather as Eric the Red was to change Whiteshirt Land to Greenland, 'so that people will go there'....

"Despite the steppe's apartness and the essential separateness of its way of life, this strange and frightening world was surprisingly penetrable. It was a short sail from the Aegean to the Black Sea. Greek commercial outposts had been established round the entire coast at approximately 100 mile intervals, tolerated by the barbarians as their principle source of outside products.

"...the Greeks were without particular advantage and faced impossible odds, surviving because the local peoples wanted them to.

"In the absence of later arrivals (Turks, Slavs and Bulgars), the Greek lands were adjacent to the Black Sea's western end and Greek ships could penetrate its eastern...the Black Sea brought Greece to Inner Asia's doorstep. Not surprisingly, the twin seas, Black and Aegean, though wedded by water, were culturally divorced. The Greek view of this alien world is evoked by the Golden Fleece legend, in which fear and fascination mingle. Here was a sombre sea surrounded by savages...yet tempting boldness with rich reward...Doubtless the origins of the Fleece legend may be sought in Caucasian gold, swept down in the freezing torrents, to be panned by prospectors and filtered through wool.. Where Jason led businessmen followed, pursuing, if not gold, then a golden rule: that whenever unlike peoples meet, money is to be made. Such convergences are eternal settings for commerce, since each side has something the other lacks.

"At least five centuries before Rome's arrival, two dozen trading stations had been established. Some were at the mouths of the rivers which drain down from the immensity of what we now call Russia: the Dniestr, Bug, Deniepr and Don. Others were on the Crimean peninsula and the Sea of Asov.

"There is ample evidence of the store set by barbarian societies upon trade and the goods it brought. Strabo speaks of 'the Caucasian people, taking produce to market by sliding down the snowy slopes on sledges made of animal skins'...Strabo on Tanais, at the Don mouth: 'It was a market for both Asiatic and European nomads...who bring slaves, hides and such things as they produce; the Greeks giving in exchange clothing, wine and other commodities associated with civilized life'. Nevertheless, though normally tenable, and though there were also Greek colonies in unfriendly parts of the Mediterranean, the Pontic were the most precarious.

"Cities like Tomis, on the Black Sea's northern shore, faced a particular problem in that the world on whose edge they were precariously poised was itself precarious; for they were liable, after a long investment in bribes and trust building, to be confronted by new and even fiercer arrivals."

"The Greeks were amazed and amused by the nomad diet, calling the steppe peoples hippemolgi (horse milkers) and galactophagi (milk eaters). 'They live on meat, including horse meat; and mare's milk, the latter (prepared in a certain way) being especially enjoyed....

Other food products were nevertheless available, both from the north and the Crimea. The latter, in climate a mini-Mediterranean, had been famous for its grain from the late Bronze Age. There is also evidence for millet cultivation in valleys on the steppe itself; and the Pontic cities had surrounded themselves with fields....

"Even so there were shortages. The trading colonies did not consider it their role to feed the Sarmatians but rather, with their help, to acquire grain for shipment to Greece in return for luxury goods. This could be a recipe for trouble. In winter the pasture disappeared under snow and the undernourished herds produced little milk. The Pontic colonies then faced starving tribes to their front and frozen seas to their back...."

Originally Posted by TimWalker

"Rome's calvary, her weakest arm, could neither catch nor match these horsemen on their native prairie and did not try....

"...once out on the open steppe there was little likelihood of catching them. 'Pursuing or pursued, they gallop great distances on fast horses, leading one or even two more so that by alternating mounts they can maintain speed.

"Herodotus touched upon a universal military problem when he wrote: 'They who are without permanent towns or fortifications and live not by agriculture but by stock-raising, carrying dwellings in wagons: surely such people will be uncatchable and therefore unconquerable....'"

Hey-yah-hey Lakota!

"Barbarian portraits are common on Roman soldiers' tombstones; especially of cavalry troopers, who are shown overleaping sprawling enemies. Prisoners are featured on triumphal arches: usually tousled and muscular, dressed (when not naked) in shaggy skins and often trousers. Were they always of strapping build, or was this so that Roman courage would seem greater? To the Mediterranean nations, trousers were as much a symbol of savagery as today's cliches of war-paint or bones through noses. In fact they were simply the invention of horseriding peoples and a practical part of their lives."