Did Rome attempt to justify its conquests?
Upvote:16
Yes, they did. They argued that their conquests bring benefits of peace, civilization and prosperity to the conquered lands. This point of view was expressed not only by native Roman writers (like Cicero) but also by some writers from the conquered nations (Polybius, for example).
In the case of Greece, they certainly did not bring civilization to Greece, just the opposite happened. But they brought peace. The whole history of ancient Greece is the history of continuous cruel warfare between the city-states. And all attempts to stop it and unite the Greek states before the Roman conquest failed. Writers of that time perfectly understood that "Greek freedom is essentially the freedom to make war on each other", I don't remember which (Greek) writer said that.
The same argument was used by some British empire builders (The "burden of white man" as Kipling called it). Some modern scientists agree with this argument, for example:
Ian Morris, War! What is it good for?: Conflict and the Progress of Civilization from Primates to Robots, 2014.
EDIT. I do not say anything about the plausibility of this argument, but this was not asked. In some cases indeed it looks like Roman conquest brought peace (Greece). In other cases it led to complete destruction of the conquered society (Carthage).
More post
- 📝 What are the flags in this Yellow Peril Cartoon from Italy?
- 📝 What religion did Mustafa Kemal Atatürk self-identify as following?
- 📝 What caused Yugoslavia to switch sides early in World War II?
- 📝 Did the Soviet Union investigate greenhouses in the early 1920's?
- 📝 How did the Poland-Lithuanian Commonwealth become official?
- 📝 What was the role of Theon at the Library of Alexandria?
- 📝 What was the status of Arab Christians during the crusades?
- 📝 When did the allies find out about the killing of Jews during WW2
- 📝 What is the source of "the three most useless things in the world are the Great Wall, Pyramids, and the Yamato"?
- 📝 What was the difference between the Sykes Picot and League of Nations Mandate?
- 📝 How deadly was the Wild West?
- 📝 Governors' veto power
- 📝 How do we know that Louvre version of Mona Lisa painting is the original one painted by Leonardo Da Vinci?
- 📝 Was there ever a democracy where the three branches went to war?
- 📝 What was the English Civil War called during the Protectorate?
- 📝 How many British prisoners of war were taken by the Wehrmacht and how many died?
- 📝 Did the Roman government attempt to hide the collapse of the empire?
- 📝 Please help identify aircarft
- 📝 Can you identify the plane in the picture?
- 📝 Why the Rzhev battle is not as famous as Stalingrad?
- 📝 Why were Axis bombings deadlier than Allied ones?
- 📝 How significant was poetry as mnemonic device in technical / philosophical / scientific texts in classical Rome and Greece?
- 📝 Impact of the Berlin Wall to GDR
- 📝 Were there any other systems which resemble the complex election procedure for the doge of Venice
- 📝 In the late 18th century, would any of the southwestern area of Germany used Franks instead of their own currency?
- 📝 What authority did the Catholic Church have over European monarchs from 900–1450?
- 📝 How did ancient mystery religions impact Christianity?
- 📝 Why did Stephen II of Blois (father of King Stephen of England) abandon the First Crusade in 1098 knowing how much he would lose by doing so?
- 📝 When did Herod the Great die?
- 📝 How was the Lanfang Republic set up if emigration from China was illegal?
Source: stackoverflow.com
Search Posts
Related post
- 📝 Did Rome attempt to justify its conquests?
- 📝 Did Rome conquer the Parthian Empire during the conquests of Trajan?
- 📝 Why did Poland keep Warsaw as its capital instead of returning it to Krakow in the 20th century?
- 📝 What pretext did Hitler use to justify Operation Barbarossa?
- 📝 Why did the Republic of China retract its simplified Chinese characters?
- 📝 Why did Italy abandon its alliance with Germany in WW1 and join the Allied side?
- 📝 Did Germany's role in WW2 affect the historical perception of its role in WW1?
- 📝 Why did the Soviet Union close its borders and restrict travel abroad?
- 📝 Did the Soviet Union or its satellite states have any broadcast propaganda media for an international audience?
- 📝 Why did Great Britain switch its alliance to France?
- 📝 What did Germany do after World War II to recover so successfully that it became more prosperous than its WW2 victors?
- 📝 How did the British Navy pass orders to its fleet before radio?
- 📝 What did Tacitus write about Nero and the Great Fire of Rome 64AD?
- 📝 Were there any conquests that Ancient Rome undertook explicitly to gain control of a natural resource?
- 📝 Did Northern troops attempt to re-enslave African Americans in Southern plantations during the Civil War?
- 📝 Did the Byzantines ever attempt to move their capital to Rome?
- 📝 When and how did the West lose its dependency on the USSR for Titanium?
- 📝 Did ancient Rome have slave hunters?
- 📝 Why did this anti-communist pamphlet, from the USA in the 1950s, include UNESCO among its targets?
- 📝 How did France worsen its relationship with Turkey?
- 📝 Why did France put so many resources into fighting Algeria in comparison to its other former colonial holdings?
- 📝 Why did Japan not withdraw from China as its pacific front was crumbling and the threat of US invasion imminent?
- 📝 Did Japan make a contribution to World War II way out of proportion to its nominal relative GDP?
- 📝 How much tax revenue did the British Empire receive from its colonies in a given year?
- 📝 What relief efforts did the Japanese attempt after the atomic bombings?
- 📝 When did the White House get its current address, 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue?
- 📝 Why did Russia give up its claims to the Oregon Country?
- 📝 How did the US "Greek" fraternity system at universities arise and what is its relationship with ancient Greece?
- 📝 Why did Britain object to the Ottomans bringing its ships-of-the-line against Russia in the beginning of the Crimean War?
- 📝 Was Rome exporting its trash to Egypt as an early example of recycling?