this post was submitted on 15 May 2025
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1081
Probably not tbf (lemmy.world)
submitted 2 days ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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[–] [email protected] 173 points 2 days ago (2 children)

It absolutely was. Just greedy oligarchs squabbling over power and stealing as much as they could. No parallels to current events, of course.

[–] [email protected] 85 points 2 days ago (2 children)

"On hearing the news that Rome had "perished", Honorius was initially shocked, thinking the news was in reference to a favourite chicken he had named "Roma".

It was absolutely every bit as stupid as today. People really haven't changed much in 2000 years.

[–] [email protected] 52 points 2 days ago (1 children)

In his History of the Wars, Procopius mentions a likely apocryphal story:

At that time they say that the Emperor Honorius in Ravenna received the message from one of the eunuchs, evidently a keeper of the poultry, that Rome had perished. And he cried out and said, 'And yet it has just eaten from my hands!' For he had a very large cock, Rome by name; and the eunuch comprehending his words said that it was the city of Rome which had perished at the hands of Alaric, and the emperor with a sigh of relief answered quickly: 'But I thought that my fowl Rome had perished.' So great, they say, was the folly with which this emperor was possessed.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

When was that translated? Having a very large cock has meant something else for a very long time. Not as long as the story is old, mind, but I do wonder if the translator had a little fun with it.

[–] [email protected] 21 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

As ironic and perhaps metaphorical as that sounds, it's not considered to be historically accurate. In the vein of the onion.

However, many of Donald's antics could easily be misconstrued as sarcasm. It needs to be very carefully described historiography so that it is unambiguously clear that ~~Nero~~ Donnie did indeed play the ~~fiddle~~ golf whilst ~~Rome,~~ the USA burned.

Otherwise historians might take it to be slander from political opponents.