To expand on this: The actor portraying him, Russell Crowe, said he wanted to use a Spanish accent for the character, but they ultimately settled on "generic modern English", as these movies are wont to do.

Since Spanish evolved from Latin centuries later, and the populations of Europe were still heavily in flux in that era, wouldn't Maximus most likely have been Celtic or something closer to that? What would he have sounded like (best estimation) and what would his ethnicity have been?

EDIT: specifically, he states he lives in the "hills above Trujillo".

When the fall of the Roman empire came it seems its language died off with it. As i understand Italy soon after the fall became divided up into city states with their own customs and languages, and the Italian language we know today is a language that was forced upon the rest of Italy. My question is why did Latin cease to be a universal language in Italy? It seems like a common tongue would've help the land reunite much faster.

One of my friend supports the idea that in ancient times he would side with barbarians no matter what because, whatever they did, they didn't massacre, pillage and exterminate whole populations like Romans did. His theory is that in order to do so (at least in a large scale) you need to function under a civilization (I guess to coordinate, large scale orchestrate such things etc.).

I am kind of a Roman buff, so I guess I am biased. Still, I readily acknowledge that under our modern standards most of the things Romans did are immoral or just plainly wrong (although I think that it is falling a bit into "presentism" and judging people from other eras under our current moral compass, but ok).

What strikes me as weird is considering that barbarians hold a higher moral ground to the Roman Empire. Besides battles were they killed enemy soldiers, aren't there well documented events where barbarians murdered and pillaged innocent people exactly like the Romans would have (maybe with a bit less of rational efficiency, if anything, but not that different)? Especially considering that I understand anyone NOT Roman was thought to be a "barbarian"?

Thanks a lot!

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Hi all,

Can you help me with what the typical profile of an emigration ship heading to North America from Britain in the early part of the 17th century. This is quite a wide ranging question but I would be very grateful for any information you can provide me. Indeed I would be grateful to be pointed to sources covering emigrant ships to the new world.

What would the occupants of the ship be made up of? Would there be women, children, whole families? Multiple generations? Older folk? How many people would likely be on one emigrant ship? Would the captain/crew be merchant sailors intent on returning home or would they intend also to remain in the new world? Could the crew have made this trip a dozen times or is that unlikely?

What would they take with them to make a success of the new world? Would they take livestock and crops with them to survive? If so how many of what exactly? Horses perhaps? Cattle? Sheep? Would they take tools and tradesmen to help build new homes/buildings/defences on arrival?

Also, how long would this journey take. What is the likely attrition rate during the journey, would lots of people die? Just a handful? None? (assuming a fairly uneventful crossing). What are the stopping points (if any) en route.

What is the typical reason in this period for people to be emigrating - the possibility of making a better life? Escape from religious persecution? Could it be a mixture of all these things?

And finally, roughly where is my destination in the first couple of decades of the 17th century. Are we talking Virginia? New England?

Many thanks.

EDIT: One more related question. Is there typically a time of year they would leave Britain / aim to arrive. Would they try to avoid travelling/arriving in Winter or were people arriving year round.

The internet likes to paint him as some sort of hack, and is full of articles like "top 10 things Edison didn't actually invent." So what are some things that, beyond the shadow of a doubt, came from the mind of Thomas Edison alone?

A priest from the Holy Roman Empire, found himself summoned to a gathering of Church and secular politicians to answer for his apparent religious crimes. He was famous, perhaps infamous, as the head of a religious movement that, in the eyes of the Church, offered a profound challenge to its authority. Under the promise of safe conduct from the German nobility, he headed off to the convocation.

To this point, of course, I've been describing two people. In 1415, Jan Hus was arrested at the Council of Constance and burned at the stake. In 1521, Martin Luther left the Diet of Worms and went on to guide his reform movement into a reformation of European religion, politics, and society.

In today's Tuesday Trivia, tell me about those fortunate and unfortunate hipsters of history: the people--not time travelers, not aliens, but historical people acting in their own historical contexts--who "did it before it was cool."

I'm reading some Tolstoy short stories set in the Caucasus (I believe 1850s), and he references the Asiatic rifles and cannons that the enemy use.

From what I know, these Caucasians are non-state actors, fighting Imperial Russian soldiers at the nadir of Ottoman and Persian influence in the region. Are they making their own rifles, cannons, and gunpowder? Do they rely mainly on importing guns from abroad? Where?

Every time I come across a reference to Victor Davis Hanson's work, it seems to me (as a lefty, European non-historian) so ridiculously ideological, archaic and frankly racist that I can't believe that he's actually a bona fide classical historian. What's the deal? Is his work on classical and military history considered mainstream in those fields? Was it when it was published? Do contemporary historians really think there's any merit to his idea that the West dominates the world stage because of "superior values"?

I've been looking into it, but I find quite a lot of it is politically charged. Can someone explain what happened in the conflict, and potentially link me to some good documentaries or articles?

One question that I've mainly been trying to find an answer to is - why were the Parachute Regiment and Royal Marine Commandos sent to fight first? Were they deliberately sent to soften up resistence due to their special forces status?

Wikipedia article states that of 100k french soldiers in Britain at the time of de Gauls exile, only 7000 stayed and the rest returned to France an were summarily imprisoned. This makes no sense for them. What is going on here?

With not everyone able to afford a horse, were there land transportation services in medieval Europe with armed guards escorting the convoy?

All societies have inequalities, winners and losers. What was the face of extreme poverty in the Soviet Union? Who were the poorest of the poor, and what was their story?

/u/tim_mcdaniel had the idea for the wordplay.

But actually? Were any u-bots still active during Germany's unconditionnal surrender? How and when did they learn about the end of the war and come back to shore?

Hi, Mecca is located on the golden ratio latitude of the earth. That means that the ratio of the distance from the south pole to mecca to the distance between north pole to mecca equals to the ratio between the distance between poles to the distance between south pole to mecca, which equals 1.618.

Assuming there was no place called Mecca before the 7th century, Is it possible for the scientists of the 7th or 8th century to make calculations watching the stars to be able to find something unique about the location of Mecca and therefore have built a place of worship there ?

What kind of calculations would they have made so that the place they chose to build the kaaba at, is today found to be at the golden ratio latitude of the earth ?

Thank You.

I don't get it.

I'm curious how becoming a saint worked in the past and also now.

Is there a submission and campaigning process like for example actors with awards? Or would it be people nominating someone they thought performed a wondrous act and it would count against the person if they nominated themselves?

Also are there any stats on how many people claim or were claimed to have performed wondrous acts, but then were turned down versus those that actually were sainted?

With European classical singing I mean this school with lots of Italian terminology (soprano, rubato, vibrato, falsetto, timbre, tessitura) that you'll hear in every opera house throughout the world.

I'm asking for reasons:

• In folk traditions weird and loud singing ("yodling") is mostly found in mountainous areas (the Alps, the Caucasus, Guinea Range) or in the church. Did this Italian school also arrive from the alps?

• As Tolstoy repeatedly noted, the appreciation for this kind of music has got to be trained or feigned. Now, ballet has spread because it was popular with Catherine de Medici and Louis XIV. Is there a similar figure for Italian high style song?

I've seen this trope in quite a few pieces of medieval themed media, most recently medieval 2, where some knights would be wearing what essentially amounts to a chainmail dress. Is this sort of ankle low mail armor historical or a purely fictional creation?