Poll: Which Ancient Civilisation would yo liked to have lived in?

[DirtyJunkieScum]

I don't think she was attaching herself to being an Angle/Gaul, more of detaching herself from being called a Vandal.

Your taking this too literally, she doesn't walk around telling everyone that she is an Angle/Gaul, she only replied in that instance that she wasn't a Vandal and is in fact half English (Angle) and half French (from the Gaul regions).

There are other factors too, but you gotta admit put yourself in my shoes, how funny is it that my Mother punched a guy because he called her a Vandal. Its one of those "we'll laugh about it in the future" type scenarios.

You used Angle/Gaul to describe her, that's what I was addressing and has been my general point all along. Being English/French isn't the same as Angle/Gaul, Angle=/=English. Gaul=/=French. They are both tribes that at one time inhabited areas that now make up these modern day countries. If you are white English you might well have DNA markers predominantly associated with Britons, Romans, Angles, Saxons, Jutes, Danes, Normans, Dutch or various others, you probably have a good smattering of African or Asian as well. Most likely a mix of them all but you might well have virtually zero Angle in you. Same with French, could be part Gaulish, Roman, Frank, Visigoth, Burgundian, Vandal (there, I said it!), Norman (they get around don't they? ;p) etc. Might not be remotely Gaulish.
I do understand what you are trying to say, I'm just pointing out that saying Angles were the English isn't right.

Yes that is quite amusing.

I'm not too sure what your getting at here

I wrote that before I realised the full implications of missing "also" from the meaning of vandal. Re reading it I realise that you thought I was saying that "vandal" wasn't an old Germanic tribe and when you said you had seen someone punch someone in a pub in England for calling them a vandal, that was just you adding evidence that it was an old German tribe and whoever was involved was irrelevant. I hadn't realised that I didn't explained what I meant very well so I thought the anecdote was to imply that vandal was likely to be taken as some sort of ethnic insult in England and result in a good punching. Then when you admitted it was your mum etc, it looked like you were using an anecdote that did not support it which when the full details were known. However I now realise that your point was actually something different so it doesn't really apply.

Yeah I know its inaccurate, but I was just pointing out earlier on that the English are Angles hence us French call the country "Angleterre", I was aware of the Saxons and also that the Vikings totally rocked the British isles too but it would have been extraneous of me to have a disclaimer stating as such because saying that the tribe of the Angles becoming Angleterre is accurate, me saying the English are Saxons and thats why the French called England "Saxonterre" would be an outright fabrication.

I wasn't disagreeing with you saying that the French word for England (and by extension the English word for England) comes from "Land of the Angles", it was the start of the sentence saying the English are Angles. We are pretty much going back to my first point here.
It would have been better to say "The Angles once lived in parts of the Isle of Great Britain, hence us French call the country Angleterre". Saying the English are Angles is wrong, we aren't.

 

[DigitalSushi]

I wrote that before I realised the full implications of missing "also" from the meaning of vandal. Re reading it I realise that you thought I was saying that "vandal" wasn't an old Germanic tribe and when you said you had seen someone punch someone in a pub in England for calling them a vandal, that was just you adding evidence that it was an old German tribe and whoever was involved was irrelevant. I hadn't realised that I didn't explained what I meant very well so I thought the anecdote was to imply that vandal was likely to be taken as some sort of ethnic insult in England and result in a good punching. Then when you admitted it was your mum etc, it looked like you were using an anecdote that did not support it which when the full details were known. However I now realise that your point was actually something different so it doesn't really apply.

Yeah its my fault since I wasn't clear and in fact didn't tell the whole truth, sorry about that, I was just making an amusing anecdotal comment, I'm not an internet warrior (I'm a Gaul, hehe ).

And this is highly amusing

that vandal was likely to be taken as some sort of ethnic insult in England and result in a good punching

LOL, being called a Vandal results in a good punching!

Love it.

 

[Eldrig]

Definately late Roman Republic era. And no, my man-crush on Julius Caesar has ABSOLUTELY nothing to do with it.
REALLY.

 

[Samus Aran but a man]

Well since I'm gay, might as well go with Ancient Greece.

jks feudal-era Japan for me

 

[acturisme]

I'd have liked to have lived in ancient Egypt. Those people knew how to build big things.

 

[IGGEL]

I'd go with the Indus River Valley Civilization or Achaemenid Persia. Persia had tolerance and little slavery (also I'm a really big fan of Persia). The IRV had good sewers and had little to no warfare (although that's what was thought of the Mayans as well before we deciphered their writing system)

 

[t3h br0th3r]

I want to visit the Mali Empire during its height, see if the women really did weave gold into their hair on formal occasions.

 

[DirtyJunkieScum]

Yeah its my fault since I wasn't clear and in fact didn't tell the whole truth, sorry about that, I was just making an amusing anecdotal comment, I'm not an internet warrior (I'm a Gaul, hehe ).

WHAT?! NO! It was MY fault, I missed out the "also" in my definition of the word vandal.

I also demand verification of your status as a Gaul in the form of a DNA test. I think "celtic" DNA can be distinguished from later Germanic immigration and previous inhabitants, but it all gets rather complex, I don't know much at all about the specifics.

And this is highly amusing

that vandal was likely to be taken as some sort of ethnic insult in England and result in a good punching

LOL, being called a Vandal results in a good punching!

Love it.

There is no punching like a good punching, bad punching is to be avoided though.

 

[AWAR]

Ancient Greece, I want to see how their customs and daily life correlate to modern Greece. Also to prove that the Erasmian system is wrong

 

[liquidsolid]

I voted Greek Hellenistic because I LOVE the culture and the climate. However, I think you should have put up Ancient China to balance off the mostly western core civilizations. Props for Mayans though, I'd pick that because I am of Mayan decent but I just couldn't pass up the opportunity to live in Hellenistic Greece.

 

[DanielBrown]

Greece certinly would be awesome if you were part of the nobles.
Aah, all the led poisoning a man could wish for.

And sex.

 

[Viirin]

Norse.
I've always been in love with their culture and food, and especially their religion and ideas on the afterlife. Why wouldn't I choose them?

 

[Olas]

I was REAL close to saying Greece, then I remembered Rome had gladiators and similar entertainment. As barbaric as it may have been it sure beats baseball.

I personally think it's a little inconsiderate that only western civilizations are being included as options. China had a pretty impressive empire throughout ancient times, easily worth a polling option.

 

[Thaluikhain]

Even with diseases taken out of the equation, most ancient civilisations were pretty shitty places to live, both figuratively and literally. Might be fun to visit, the way third world countries get tourism, but not to stay.

Though, most people don't even mention the diseases when they come up with these things, so points for that.

You might actually be surprised how nice conditions could be in ancient times. Everyone has this idea that things were horrible, because they didn't have indoor plumbing or gas stoves or something, but the reason third world countries are crap in today's world is because they were exploited and abused by the first world countries, and then left that way.

Ancient life wasn't nearly so hard as a lot of people think, not until medieval/feudalism/renaissance times did it actually start getting really crappy. There just wasn't enough population to truly make things horrible for the lower class, and even being a slave in some ancient civilizations was better than being a serf in medieval times. I don't want to just say things were good, but they were better than you might think.

Yeah, not buying that. Not being as bad as a medieval serf is very faint praise.

If you are a slave, you have no rights. If you are low class, you have very few rights. Disease regularly swept through crowded cities with no sanitation, high infant mortality rate, loads of women dying in childbirth etc.

Perhaps popular culture might exagerate a few things, but by our standards it was an extremely shitty way to live.

Spartan's training was awful and intense, and the reason they were able to sustain their culture and society was because they had enslaved an entire race of people, and made them do all the work. If you wanted truly honorable combat/army whatever, you would want to stick with Athens. Who, contrary to popular belief, were very war like. They required that all citizens serve a stint in the military and everything.

Honourable? They might have treated their slaves better than helots, but they still kept slaves, and made war upon their neighbours for no good reason.

The Spartans, by contrast, tended to stay at home and mostly mind their own business, the Athenians kept declaring war on them.

 

[sexbutler]

Honestly, all they were missing were pants.

Dude, have you ever worn a toga? SOOO much better than pants!

But that is off topic. I'd pick Minoan Crete. They were the most advanced society in the mediterranean (perhaps the world) in the bronze age. They sat right in the cultural stream between Egypt, Anatolia and Greece. They had RUNNING WATER (not sure about their bathing habits though...). It would be the most interesting place to be in 1600BC.

 

[sexbutler]

I'd probably have to go for Iron age though, bronze age just feels a bit too ancient...although I could bring all my 21st century knowledge and be venerated as wisest in all the land! Just wait till the Romans land and get repelled by a volley of rifle fire! Mwuhahaha!

Absolutely! Just think what you could do to history even with just todays high school education! You'd become a god-king in your own right! Or be burned as a witch or something...

 

[Yoshisummons]

None because they all are batshit crazy! Then there is the lack of medicine and paranoia(which some could argue still exists in large amounts).

Roman medicine was actually pretty good (by ancient world standards), they boiled their surgery tools in water before every surgery, and doctors actually had different levels of qualification. They also had hospitals were doctors could observe you. (The fact of running water/bath houses in Rome also helped ward off disease that allowed them to have such a booming city live)

Although, the gov't didn't allow human dissection, so some surgeons decided to practice on pigs.

You win some, you lose some.

Yes they were quite good, but would you say it's better than our ability now? I'd say no.

 

[BOOM headshot65]

We have been looking at how myths and legends could tell us how an older society lived, and when we looked at the Romans, I said "Huh, I must have been a Roman in a past life, because they sounds alot like me." So, Rome.

 

[J3bba]

Greeks for me, at the forefront of maths and science

 

[ThatLankyBastard]

Ancient Japan sounds nice...

...sword fights to the left of me, ninja's to the right!

And here I am, stuck in the ancient-Japanese time period...

...seems pretty legit!