Immortals and Archaic Rome

matthew.malthouse · 18 Jun 2003, 07:29 · from urth-v0306.mbox · original

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From: matthew.malthouse at guardian.co.uk
Subject: Re: (urth) Immortals and Archaic Rome
Date: Wed, 18 Jun 2003 08:29:13 +0100
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On 17/06/2003 21:24:23 James Jordan wrote:

>>
>>Crush recants:
>>Hmmm. Herodotus 7:83 says that the Immortals were "all Persians". So=20
either
>>Latro was not an Immortal, or Wolfe is engaging in literary license in
>>presuming that Latro somehow gained a special honor. There *were* 10,000=20
of
>>them so I guess it is not inconceivable that a Latin slipped in.
>
>         Or maybe that "Persian" does not refer to race per se, but to
>those considered part of Persia, which was pretty multifarious racially.
>Latro could have been an adopted "Persian," since adoption of various=20
kinds
>was quite common in the ancient world.

The ancient historians had a pretty clear idea of what were Persians and=20
what were other nations conquered by the Persian Empire.  Just as they=20
made the distinction between Romans by origin, Roman citizens and subjects=20
of Roman Empire.  I don't know but I suspect that Medes, Parthians,=20
Assyrians etc in the Immortal Guard would have been worth of comment.

Of course I'm assuming that Herodotus didn't just make it up.  ;-)

Matthew

--=20

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