HBO Rome

[Mulceber]

Actually there is LS. In the 2nd season, some legionaires of Augustus' are wearing some kind of bronze(?) LS.

True, although for the most part, the Legionaires in that series tended to wear Lorica Hamata and generally pretty accurate garb. -M

[jirisys]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RLzf...eature=related

A more, historical version of Caesar's campaing i just found on youtube

~Jirisys (not enough brainpower to put anything witty but sadly, unfunny in this space)

[Macilrille]

Ugh.

Not this again, look Rome was a piece of dross historically. They got some things right, but most of it was wrong. All the armor etc. was taken off Trajan's column and is therefore both anachronistic and inacurately stylised. The best bits were the little details, like when Pullo's slave-girl touches his (anachronistic) Gladius' blade and he takes it away from her before wiping it down with an oiled cloth. He does that because the acid in your skin etches steel.

Cicero's death was also good, as was the generally lower regard for human life.

Beyond that though... everyone was having too much sex, a subject the writers and producers completely failed to comprehend in a Roman context, and to which they aired every ancient scurrilous rumour about the historical persons.

American? I find that most people complaining about the amount of sex in Rome are Americans while most Europeans just shrug and takes it as a matter of fact, reflecting reality. I have to repeat that Rome has no more sex than my life the last 15 years; sex is a fact of life, it is wonderful and it takes up a lot of our thoughts, and we have it whenever we can. We look at women, we think of it, we fantasize about it. To deny that is to deny nature (procreation you know, it is pretty important, is why we are so obsessed about it). If a series is to reflect life, sex should take up a lot of space- much more than it did in Rome. And if Rome had passed on all rumours it would be a pretty perverse porn flick, not what HBO aired.

I also have to disagree about Cicero's death; he was given away by his brother's slave while trying to escape to Macedonia, then leaned out of his litter; bowing his head andbaring his neck in a traditional gladiatorial sign of acceptance of death. Herennius then killed him. That is not really the way things are depicted in Rome. On the other hand, AFAIK, the arms and armour seems correct. Why is the Gladius Hispanensis anachronistic in 43 BC? What armour other than Lorica Hamata did the legions wear at Caesar's time? It may be that I am unenlightened, but AFAIK, that is exactly what they wore and used. In fact even the round-edged Scutum seems correctly depicted instead of the later types which seems to have been a mix of these and square-edged ones. Further, you claim most of Rome was wrong. "Most" means that at least 51 % of all content is not corresponding to the ancient sources, written, archeological and depictions, and our understanding of them.
I would very much like to see this documented if you please so I can achieve enlightenment (edited to add) for it was my understanding that Rome is closer to 85% correct than 51% + wrong.


Edted a second time to add that looking for something else (BG II SOA but a link provided in this forum), I came across this site. It is really good and enlightened in all its humour and irony, pinning mass-media/mass-entertainment culture pretty well. If whoever posted the original link to it pipes up, I owe him a balloon.

[TancredTheNorman]

That is true, although I liked the accurate depiction of Cicero's close friendship to his slave, who lived on after the chaos in order to write about his master, although that isn't how Cicero died.

I also have grown to really love HBO following learning about Spartacus Blood and Sand.

[Macilrille]

More than that I saw on TVTropes that HBO has signed on for producing one of my favorite fantasy book series- unfortunately I forgot which ;-)

[Kival]

More than that I saw on TVTropes that HBO has signed on for producing one of my favorite fantasy book series- unfortunately I forgot which ;-)

A Game of Thrones, the first part of the song of ice and fire series from George R. R. Martin. ;-)

[Macilrille]

Never actually read A song of Ice and Fire, so there must be some other one. I think it may actually be Wheel of Time, which I liked immensely for the first few years (until book 6, it is quite unfortunate, but I suspect the only thing that could have completed that series instead of it just droning on forever was Jordan's death- tragick as it otherwise is), and have faithfully sort of followed since (I still have not purchased or read Book 12).