Three Roman Army Camps Dated almost 2000 Years Have Been Discovered in the Arabian Desert

[Fizzzzle]

'Spectacular' Roman military camps almost 2,000 years old discovered

NEWS.SKY.COM

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The camps were first sighted on Google Earth and are surprisingly well-preserved. Spotted in the Arabian Desert, they provide an insight into Roman campaigns in the peninsula during the second century.

 

 

@Commissar SFLUFAN this might be your jam.

 

It's actually a pretty cool, and I normally find Roman history really boring. We knew the Romans tried at various points to establish control over the Red Sea Coast. The Persians did the same. It wasn't until the Arabs themselves launched campaigns of conquest that there was any kind of continuous land empire that connected the bab al-mandab strait to the Mediterranean. The discovery of these forts goes to show that it was not for lack of trying.

 

One could say that the Romans kind of fucked around and found out. This was basically at the height of the empire, too. The Arabian Desert was an impassible obstacle. Not just for them, but for the Persians, too.

 

Also it's super cool how this was discovered with Google Earth. Satellites are dope.

 

[Fizzzzle]

This actually challenges the reason WHY I find Roman history so boring. To me, it's like there's nothing new to discover. We have all the accounts. We know all the biases and account for them. Spoiler alert: Caligula probably wasn't as bad as you think he was. It turns out every Roman emperor who took power with questionable legitimacy had a vested interest in making their predecessor out to be Satan incarnate, on top of that histories had to be approved by the current emperor... Essentially, if there's an account of a deposed emperor that said he fucked horses and paraded the horse around as his lover, just dial it back 50%. He probably just had a child sex slave with a big dick and didn't like people to know he loved to get fucked in the ass.

 

Remember: the past was the worst

 

BUT, it's fun to think about the Romans making waves in Arabia. 

 

The Romans would have been very familiar with the Red Sea trade through people like the Axumites. I find it fascinating that there's a situation in which the Arabian Peninsula was basically the Romans' Vietnam.

[Commissar SFLUFAN]

On 4/29/2023 at 12:21 AM, Fizzzzle said:

 I find it fascinating that there's a situation in which the Arabian Peninsula was basically the Romans' Vietnam.

 

The Roman debacles in Germania and Persia would like to have a word about that

[Spork3245]

4 minutes ago, Commissar SFLUFAN said:

 

The Roman debacles in Germania and Persia would like to have a word about that

And let us not forget that they built a literal wall rather than deal with Scotland 

[Commissar SFLUFAN]

8 minutes ago, Spork3245 said:

And let us not forget that they built a literal wall rather than deal with Scotland 

 

I don't blame them in the least.

[Spork3245]

Just now, Commissar SFLUFAN said:

 

I don't blame them in the least.

After tasting British food I guess they assumed the rest of the island wasn’t worth taking 

[Mercury33]

2 hours ago, Spork3245 said:

And let us not forget that they built a literal wall rather than deal with Scotland 

Had no choice since Uhtred wasn’t around to broker a peace and rule the borderlands for them. 

[Fizzzzle]

5 hours ago, Commissar SFLUFAN said:

 

The Roman debacles in Germania and Persia would like to have a word about that

I mean, they still ruled Dacia for like 150 years. It wasn't nothing, even if they did abandon it. And Persia was pretty much on even footing with them militarily for the most part. The Persians even captured and executed Valerian in 260. 

[BloodyHell]

The Desert is an incredible place. It’s striking in that all the times I’ve been in deserts of Africa and the Middle East, there’s a strong sense of lost history. Every day history is covered and uncovered, over and over again. Nobody knows how many lost antiquities have eroded in its sandy winds, how many bodies and scattered bones lay under the sands, secret burial chambers, lost treasures?

It changes so fast. It’s a beautiful but awful place to make a life, that’s for sure. 
Also, camels, like zebras, show how messed up evolution is.

[Commissar SFLUFAN]

On 4/30/2023 at 2:01 PM, Fizzzzle said:

I mean, they still ruled Dacia for like 150 years. It wasn't nothing, even if they did abandon it. And Persia was pretty much on even footing with them militarily for the most part. The Persians even captured and executed Valerian in 260. 

 

Dacia wasn't nearly the hostile, impenetrable territory that was Germania!

 

I'd give the Romans this: when they got their ass kicked in a battle, they knew how to get their ass kicked!  We're not talking the loss of just a few thousand legionnaires - oh no, we're talking the annihilation of several legions (tens of thousands able-bodied fighting men) with their commander having his skull turned into a drinking goblet and his testicles used for dice.

[Fizzzzle]

32 minutes ago, Commissar SFLUFAN said:

 

Dacia wasn't nearly the hostile, impenetrable territory that was Germania!

 

I'd give the Romans this: when they got their ass kicked in a battle, they knew how to get their ass kicked!  We're not talking the loss of just a few thousand legionnaires - oh no, we're talking the annihilation of several legions (tens of thousands able-bodied fighting men) with their commander having his skull turned into a drinking goblet and his testicles used for dice.

The sheer numbers of men that the Romans lost in the Second Punic war was absolutely jaw-dropping. Tens of thousands of men just went *poof* (and by *poof* I mean they were all brutally stabbed to death or drowned) and the Roman Republic at the time was like "... yeah, that's fine, let's go again." I belive the Romans lost two entire fleets with tens of thousands of men each to storms and just rebuilt their fleets afterward.

 

Almost FIFTY THOUSAND MEN were killed in the Battle of Cannae alone. That was in a single day. And our source for that is Livy, a Roman historian. I'm almost certain Livy pumped up those numbers to garner patrotic ferver, but it's still a staggering amount of people.

[Commissar SFLUFAN]

13 minutes ago, Fizzzzle said:

The sheer numbers of men that the Romans lost in the Second Punic war was absolutely jaw-dropping. Tens of thousands of men just went *poof* (and by *poof* I mean they were all brutally stabbed to death or drowned) and the Roman Republic at the time was like "... yeah, that's fine, let's go again." I belive the Romans lost two entire fleets with tens of thousands of men each to storms and just rebuilt their fleets afterward.

 

Almost FIFTY THOUSAND MEN were killed in the Battle of Cannae alone. That was in a single day. And our source for that is Livy, a Roman historian. I'm almost certain Livy pumped up those numbers to garner patrotic ferver, but it's still a staggering amount of people.

 

The Second Romano-Punic War was exactly what I had in mind when I made that post!

[Reputator]

In recent months I discovered and subsequently binged Time Team, which spends many of their episodes delving into the Roman occupation of Britain. It was a great 90s/early 00s show, and a bunch of it is on YouTube.

[Commissar SFLUFAN]

1 minute ago, Reputator said:

In recent months I discovered and subsequently binged Time Team, which spends many of their episodes delving into the Roman occupation of Britain. It was a great 90s/early 00s show, and a bunch of it is on YouTube.

 

The Roman invasion/occupation of Britain was truly a ridiculous blunder derived solely from Roman imperial "arrogance" - a waste of both time and resources for little (if any) tangible gain.

[Reputator]

Just now, Commissar SFLUFAN said:

 

The Roman invasion/occupation of Britain was truly a ridiculous blunder derived solely from Roman imperial "arrogance" - a waste of both time and resources for little (if any) tangible gain.

 

Wow clearly you haven't seen the magnificent hilltop views those Roman folks with their giant villas got to enjoy.

[Fizzzzle]

1 hour ago, Commissar SFLUFAN said:

 

The Roman invasion/occupation of Britain was truly a ridiculous blunder derived solely from Roman imperial "arrogance" - a waste of both time and resources for little (if any) tangible gain.

Britain was a valuable source of tin. If it wasn't for that, they probably would have left the island well enough alone after Caesar's vanity project.

 

Still, I've always found it interesting how Roman culture never really took root in Britain. Romance languages never developed. If anything, post-Roman Britain was far more closely related to pagan Germany and/or Vikings than it was to anything Roman, which is weird considering the Romans ruled England for like 400 years. Once the Romans left, it was like they were never there.

[Spork3245]

5 hours ago, Commissar SFLUFAN said:

 

The Second Romano-Punic War was exactly what I had in mind when I made that post!

Their losses in the first punic war weren’t much better. Just kept sailing into storms for awhile. 50k citizens, 350k allies. 

[Spork3245]

Speaking of Punic Wars, @Commissar SFLUFAN, have you ever seen Oversimplified on YouTube?

 

 

[gamer.tv]

On 4/30/2023 at 1:56 PM, Spork3245 said:

And let us not forget that they built a literal wall rather than deal with Scotland 

I’m teaching this particular aspect of Roman history to my class in about two weeks 

[Spork3245]

57 minutes ago, gamer.tv said:

I’m teaching this particular aspect of Roman history to my class in about two weeks 

You need to focus on how it was the British food that discouraged them so much. Had they continued north they would’ve been rewarded with glorious dinner pies, scones, and scotch eggs.

[Spork3245]

 @Commissar SFLUFAN

https://orbis.stanford.edu

Someone at Stanford made an interactive google-esq map of the Roman Empire