A Much Larger Rome that Survives until the Present Day Version 2.0
- Thread starter ericams2786
- Start date
Thanks Eurofed! I wasn't sure if I would be very good at writing little short stories.
Eurofed
Banned
The first part of the short story gave me a distinct Cuthbert Binns vibe, but then again I was lucky enough to never experience such a terminally boring high school or college teacher in RL.
Hey I did like 3 updates in a row and I had just two comments from Eurofed (which I greatly appreciate of course).
I like it, and am always following new posts.
The story was entertaining and interesting. I find how it always rains in your stories to be an interesting aspect of the universe, and makes me wonder about weather patterns. lol Beyond that, its pretty cool.
I really liked the recent attempt by the senate faction to try and restrict the Emperor, which epically failed, so that was cool.
The development of a navy, and all the events going around that is made of win as naval elements are cool.
All in all, nice chain of events, great histories and cool developments.
The story was entertaining and interesting. I find how it always rains in your stories to be an interesting aspect of the universe, and makes me wonder about weather patterns. lol Beyond that, its pretty cool.
I really liked the recent attempt by the senate faction to try and restrict the Emperor, which epically failed, so that was cool.
The development of a navy, and all the events going around that is made of win as naval elements are cool.
All in all, nice chain of events, great histories and cool developments.
Rex Romanum
Banned
...and 1 comment from me to...
IMHO eric, lack of comments doesn't mean lack of people who like your TL.
I remember even in poll thread people preferring voting to giving comments...
I like it, and am always following new posts.
The story was entertaining and interesting. I find how it always rains in your stories to be an interesting aspect of the universe, and makes me wonder about weather patterns. lol Beyond that, its pretty cool.
I really liked the recent attempt by the senate faction to try and restrict the Emperor, which epically failed, so that was cool.
The development of a navy, and all the events going around that is made of win as naval elements are cool.
All in all, nice chain of events, great histories and cool developments.
The story I posted the other day is actually the beginning part of the story I posted a couple of months ago on here. The storm in the first story is the one that hits and in this story it is just beginning to pick up speed. I promise it's just a storm; nothing hinting at weather patterns. Basically it's just a really bad storm. Thanks for the comment as usual. Glad you like the part about the navy. I was kind of thinking about doing a story from the POV of a pirate.
748 AUC (5 BCE):
Domestic: Ptolemy leaves Rome to command a large army of thirty offensive legions in the widening Bello Songno in early April after hearing of Pollio’s massive defeat and death at the Battle of Nisa. After Ptolemy’s departure from Rome, Paullus pushes the lex Paullia through the Senate, a law which rescinds Octavius’ earlier bill, the lex Factionis, officially making the formation of factions within the Senate legal again. Paullus quietly begins to build a faction of anti-Ptolemy senators aimed at decreasing the emperor’s power. Paullus also begins actively advocating for an amendment to the Lex Magnus that would severely decrease the power of the emperorship, while simultaneously increasing the power of the Imperial Senate, and especially that of the powerful patrician order (which over the past fifteen years since Caesar’s death have regained much of the power they had lost previously to the equestrian order and the first order of commoners within the Senate). Paullus also commissions the construction of the first Senatorial fleet, the Classis Senatus on the River Tiberis and begins strengthening the Senatorial Guard. The increasingly dangerous rhetoric and suspicious actions cause a major rift between the Senate and Livius, Ptolemy’s Imperator Interrex. Tobias of Halicarnassus, the famous historian of Marcus Antonius’ conquests in Germania, dies at the age of 83. The Egyptian poet, Ptah dies and his son, Atohentum, continues his trade and his life work, the Isiseid, a monumental epic poem about the mythology surrounding the Egyptian goddess Isis, posthumously. The Isiseid will be incredibly influential later in the continued growth of the Cult of Isis, a powerful religious movement (first began by Ptolemy Soter) that would eventually dominate Aegyptus, Mesopotamia, and Persia. The Cult of Isis would eventually morph into Isiacism, a religion advocating piety to the “Goddess of Earth and Motherhood” in return for eternal salvation and life in the Overworld [sky]. Strabo begins travelling with Mus after Pollio’s death and continues to map the geography of Parthia and Persia.
Military: Using their massive advantage in mobility, the Xiongnu guli, Hzuizi and Jouzhou lure Pollio and Mus into a pincer movement after fooling them into believing that the main body of their cavalry forces had been routed from the field during the intense opening of the Battle of Nisa. Mus manages to escape the battle field with three intact legions and force-march his decimated army back to Dara to recuperate, but Pollio dies during the battle, which also sees the utter destruction of twelve Roman legions. According to Livius, upon hearing of the horrendous defeat of the Roman army at Nisa, Ptolemy fell to his knees and shouted, “Asinius Pollio, legions redde!” [“Asinius Pollio, give me back my legions!”]. Mus, shaken by the defeat, is defeated three separate times in minor engagements while retreating back to Dara. Hzuizi and Jouzhou (arguably the best Xiongnu generals of the war) besiege Dara several weeks after their huge victory at Nisa. Dara holds until August, when Mus, taking a big risk in attempting to break out of the city, attacks the Xiongnu army during the night, focusing on depleting the Xiongnu light cavalry and capturing as many Xiongnu war horses as possible. The Siege of Dara is won by Mus after this daring and unorthodox move and he forces Hzuizi and Jouzhou to retreat from Dara. The battle cements Mus as one of the most capable of the Roman generals during the reign of Ptolemy and makes him a famous and popular figure throughout the empire up to the present time. Mus does not advance toward the retreating Xiongnu, but decides to move his army southwest toward Hecatompylos, leaving a small force to defend Dara to lure the Xingnu into besieging the city once more. He sends a messenger to offer a phony temporary truce with Hzuizi and Jouzhou, who reject his supposed offer of peace. The two guli however, do believe that he is still entrenched at Dara and besiege the city once again in late September. Mus maneuvers his army (largely by refitting most of his veteran legions as cavalry units using captured Xiongnu horses) around the entrenched Xiongnu army and utterly crushes them at the Second Siege of Dara, killing Jouzhou in the process. Hzuizi retreats northeast to Merv for the remainder of the year. Saloninus continues to engage Gaognu in inconclusive battles north of Gedrosia, finally defeating Gaognu with the help of the Gedrosian army at the Battle of the River Candriacis under King Sextus II Aetellus (his advanced cavalry forces making the difference during the battle). Saloninus spends the rest of the year in Gedrosia, making his cavalry forces lighter and more mobile and recruiting highly skilled Gedrosian cavalry. Diogi conquers Gandhara and moves south into India Occidia.
Literature, Art, and Science: The Roman scientist Sertor Granius Ligustinus is born at Memphis in Aegyptus. Laelius perfects a working version of the heavy plow that can be carried by oxen and disseminates several working prototypes of his invention to local farmers outside of Mogontiacum. The new plow helps to significantly increase crop yields in the colony and over the course of the next decade, the population of the Roman colony nearly doubles from the increased food production and becomes a major hub of Roman culture in Germania. Ovidius completes the II Verborum Latium, the second edition of his comprehensive text on Latin and Roman literary history. This edition is the first to include several Greek and Egyptian words that have been Latinized over the past several decades.
Foreign: The Mathuran Empire invades across the Indus and captures Patala, beginning the Bello Mathura in August. The Mathurans spend most of the rest of the year establishing control of the Roman side of the Indus. Stolo travels on another Chinese trading junk to Kumari, a major port of the Pandya Kingdom in southern India. Stolo spends the year traveling north through the Indian subcontinent, but is arrested upon arriving in Mathura (not realizing that Mathura and Rome are at war). In China, Consort Fu demands the title of Grand Empress Dowager and Emperor Ai of Han accepts, increasing her power and influence on the young emperor and his court. Consort Fu pushes Emperor Ai to increase taxes so as to build another grand temple in Chang’an for his court and she begins pushing him to persecute members of the Wang clan so as to decrease their power in the government. Consort Fu also convinces Ai that he could be seen as a great conqueror if he actively began to push west to cement control of the Tarim Basin for good and the eastern-most lands of Rome. She played on his fears (and that of many other people within the imperial court) that this powerful Daqin in the west might try to invade China and that a pre-emptive measure to secure the border areas would be the best way to defend against possible Roman aggression.
Domestic: Ptolemy leaves Rome to command a large army of thirty offensive legions in the widening Bello Songno in early April after hearing of Pollio’s massive defeat and death at the Battle of Nisa. After Ptolemy’s departure from Rome, Paullus pushes the lex Paullia through the Senate, a law which rescinds Octavius’ earlier bill, the lex Factionis, officially making the formation of factions within the Senate legal again. Paullus quietly begins to build a faction of anti-Ptolemy senators aimed at decreasing the emperor’s power. Paullus also begins actively advocating for an amendment to the Lex Magnus that would severely decrease the power of the emperorship, while simultaneously increasing the power of the Imperial Senate, and especially that of the powerful patrician order (which over the past fifteen years since Caesar’s death have regained much of the power they had lost previously to the equestrian order and the first order of commoners within the Senate). Paullus also commissions the construction of the first Senatorial fleet, the Classis Senatus on the River Tiberis and begins strengthening the Senatorial Guard. The increasingly dangerous rhetoric and suspicious actions cause a major rift between the Senate and Livius, Ptolemy’s Imperator Interrex. Tobias of Halicarnassus, the famous historian of Marcus Antonius’ conquests in Germania, dies at the age of 83. The Egyptian poet, Ptah dies and his son, Atohentum, continues his trade and his life work, the Isiseid, a monumental epic poem about the mythology surrounding the Egyptian goddess Isis, posthumously. The Isiseid will be incredibly influential later in the continued growth of the Cult of Isis, a powerful religious movement (first began by Ptolemy Soter) that would eventually dominate Aegyptus, Mesopotamia, and Persia. The Cult of Isis would eventually morph into Isiacism, a religion advocating piety to the “Goddess of Earth and Motherhood” in return for eternal salvation and life in the Overworld [sky]. Strabo begins travelling with Mus after Pollio’s death and continues to map the geography of Parthia and Persia.
Military: Using their massive advantage in mobility, the Xiongnu guli, Hzuizi and Jouzhou lure Pollio and Mus into a pincer movement after fooling them into believing that the main body of their cavalry forces had been routed from the field during the intense opening of the Battle of Nisa. Mus manages to escape the battle field with three intact legions and force-march his decimated army back to Dara to recuperate, but Pollio dies during the battle, which also sees the utter destruction of twelve Roman legions. According to Livius, upon hearing of the horrendous defeat of the Roman army at Nisa, Ptolemy fell to his knees and shouted, “Asinius Pollio, legions redde!” [“Asinius Pollio, give me back my legions!”]. Mus, shaken by the defeat, is defeated three separate times in minor engagements while retreating back to Dara. Hzuizi and Jouzhou (arguably the best Xiongnu generals of the war) besiege Dara several weeks after their huge victory at Nisa. Dara holds until August, when Mus, taking a big risk in attempting to break out of the city, attacks the Xiongnu army during the night, focusing on depleting the Xiongnu light cavalry and capturing as many Xiongnu war horses as possible. The Siege of Dara is won by Mus after this daring and unorthodox move and he forces Hzuizi and Jouzhou to retreat from Dara. The battle cements Mus as one of the most capable of the Roman generals during the reign of Ptolemy and makes him a famous and popular figure throughout the empire up to the present time. Mus does not advance toward the retreating Xiongnu, but decides to move his army southwest toward Hecatompylos, leaving a small force to defend Dara to lure the Xingnu into besieging the city once more. He sends a messenger to offer a phony temporary truce with Hzuizi and Jouzhou, who reject his supposed offer of peace. The two guli however, do believe that he is still entrenched at Dara and besiege the city once again in late September. Mus maneuvers his army (largely by refitting most of his veteran legions as cavalry units using captured Xiongnu horses) around the entrenched Xiongnu army and utterly crushes them at the Second Siege of Dara, killing Jouzhou in the process. Hzuizi retreats northeast to Merv for the remainder of the year. Saloninus continues to engage Gaognu in inconclusive battles north of Gedrosia, finally defeating Gaognu with the help of the Gedrosian army at the Battle of the River Candriacis under King Sextus II Aetellus (his advanced cavalry forces making the difference during the battle). Saloninus spends the rest of the year in Gedrosia, making his cavalry forces lighter and more mobile and recruiting highly skilled Gedrosian cavalry. Diogi conquers Gandhara and moves south into India Occidia.
Literature, Art, and Science: The Roman scientist Sertor Granius Ligustinus is born at Memphis in Aegyptus. Laelius perfects a working version of the heavy plow that can be carried by oxen and disseminates several working prototypes of his invention to local farmers outside of Mogontiacum. The new plow helps to significantly increase crop yields in the colony and over the course of the next decade, the population of the Roman colony nearly doubles from the increased food production and becomes a major hub of Roman culture in Germania. Ovidius completes the II Verborum Latium, the second edition of his comprehensive text on Latin and Roman literary history. This edition is the first to include several Greek and Egyptian words that have been Latinized over the past several decades.
Foreign: The Mathuran Empire invades across the Indus and captures Patala, beginning the Bello Mathura in August. The Mathurans spend most of the rest of the year establishing control of the Roman side of the Indus. Stolo travels on another Chinese trading junk to Kumari, a major port of the Pandya Kingdom in southern India. Stolo spends the year traveling north through the Indian subcontinent, but is arrested upon arriving in Mathura (not realizing that Mathura and Rome are at war). In China, Consort Fu demands the title of Grand Empress Dowager and Emperor Ai of Han accepts, increasing her power and influence on the young emperor and his court. Consort Fu pushes Emperor Ai to increase taxes so as to build another grand temple in Chang’an for his court and she begins pushing him to persecute members of the Wang clan so as to decrease their power in the government. Consort Fu also convinces Ai that he could be seen as a great conqueror if he actively began to push west to cement control of the Tarim Basin for good and the eastern-most lands of Rome. She played on his fears (and that of many other people within the imperial court) that this powerful Daqin in the west might try to invade China and that a pre-emptive measure to secure the border areas would be the best way to defend against possible Roman aggression.
Well things are going down, as rifts form between senate and emperor. Eventually matters will move to the point where the Emperor will be forced to act or he will loose credibility and authority, and maybe his right to Imperium. So, because of this, he will be forced to strike down this political rebellion.
I cannot wait to see it.
Very interesting and very entertaining, I am quite enjoying it.
Oh, and about the storm, okay, cool, I am glad its just a storm and not something greater. hehe
I cannot wait to see it.
Very interesting and very entertaining, I am quite enjoying it.
Oh, and about the storm, okay, cool, I am glad its just a storm and not something greater. hehe
Yep things are going to get kind of ugly in the next few years, but Ptolemy will prevail and things will be much calmer after the political issues and war are over. Thank you as always for your support and comments.
I followed the previous TL with much enthusiasm and this one has proven so far to be even better than the last one!
I hope Stolo finds some way out of his arrest so he can complete his epic journey! It also sounds like Ptolemy has his work cut out for him...
Great work on the present day pieces aswell.
Keep up the awesome job!
Rechyt
**EDIT**
considered me subscribed to this!
I hope Stolo finds some way out of his arrest so he can complete his epic journey! It also sounds like Ptolemy has his work cut out for him...
Great work on the present day pieces aswell.
Keep up the awesome job!
Rechyt
**EDIT**
considered me subscribed to this!
Last edited:
Eurofed
Banned
I'm most curious to see how the political issue is settled. On one hand, the neo-Optimate faction in the Senate is a bunch of short-sighted pricks that is sabotaging the security and welfare of the Empire for political expediency. OTOH, they need to be put down for good in a way that does not wreck Rome's evolution into a genuine constitutional monarchy. It seems that the neo-Optimates need to overstep themselves and violate the Great Law in some way (good ole failed coup ??).
Thanks! Glad you are enjoying the TL. I wanted to massively improve on the original TL because it was just to amateurish. Anyway, thanks for the comment and the subscription!
Eurofed
Banned
I just got this weird inner picture of roman legions marching to the tune of "The Imperial March"
Why not ? I always thought that "The Imperial March" was too cool to waste it for an empire that, well, failed, unlike this Rome.
I've got to say I found the huge conquests of Ceasar within a short amount of time slightly implausible but to be quite honest I don't give a damn! This timeline is sooo enthralling, it's written brilliantly and in such a way it is really spellbinding. The little details you give through your updates really help make it more believable and enjoyable to read. I'm really glad I discovered this and I eagerly look forward to the next update!
P.S Someone should really make a map for this, all the territorial changes that have come about recently need to be shown on an updated map.
P.S Someone should really make a map for this, all the territorial changes that have come about recently need to be shown on an updated map.
Thank you very much! I unfortunately don't really have the time to do a map, but if I find some time, I'll try to do one. More updates are on the way, just more slowly, should have one today or tomorrow.