Historic image from July 1980: A look from West Berlin over the Berlin wall to Brandenburg Gate and East Berlin. Sign with “Caution: You are leaving West Berlin” in the foreground. Scanned Slide.

A Brief History Of The Iron Curtain

Berlin

Communism

History

Karl Marx

NATO

Readers Pass

Russia

World

World War II

Julius Caesar statue in Rome

A Brief History Of The Roman Empire, Part 6: Julius Caesar And The March To The Ides

Italy

Ancient statue of Julius Caesar in Italy isolated against blue Sky

A Brief History Of The Roman Empire, Part 5: The Die Is Cast

If you know anything about Ancient Rome, you probably know that Julius Caesar used his army to overthrow the government and established himself as dictator for life before being assassinated in a vain attempt to restore the Republic. But before we can talk about Caesar, we have to talk about Gaius Marius. Because while the Gracchi had been put to rest, the pool of eligible soldiers was still shrinking at an alarming rate.
<h2>The Marian Reforms</h2>
Marius was a gifted commander from comparatively humble beginnings who married into a prominent patrician family known as the Julii. Marius distinguished himself in various campaigns in North Africa alongside a gifted young lieutenant of his named Cornelius Sulla. His lasting impact on the Roman military, however, would be established in 104 BC after Germanic tribes, the Cimbri and Teutones, routed several Roman legions and menaced Italy itself.
Marius was tasked with rebuilding the defeated legions from scratch, and to do so he completely scrapped property requirements for enlistment. Rome had begun to recruit from the landless poor in dire emergencies, but Marius made it standard policy — military service would no longer be a civic sacrifice but a career. Professional soldiers would serve for decades and be paid by the state and settled on conquered lands at the end of their service.
<div id="attachment_514307" style="width: 394px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-514307" loading="lazy" class="wp-image-514307 size-large" src="https://www.dailywire.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/Bust_of_Marius_GL_319_-_Glyptothek_-_Munich_-_Germany_2017-384x576.jpg" alt="" width="384" height="576" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/Bust_of_Marius_GL_319_-_Glyptothek_-_Munich_-_Germany_2017-384x576.jpg 384w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/Bust_of_Marius_GL_319_-_Glyptothek_-_Munich_-_Germany_2017-200x300.jpg 200w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/Bust_of_Marius_GL_319_-_Glyptothek_-_Munich_-_Germany_2017-768x1152.jpg 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/Bust_of_Marius_GL_319_-_Glyptothek_-_Munich_-_Germany_2017-1024x1536.jpg 1024w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/Bust_of_Marius_GL_319_-_Glyptothek_-_Munich_-_Germany_2017-1365x2048.jpg 1365w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/Bust_of_Marius_GL_319_-_Glyptothek_-_Munich_-_Germany_2017-1360x2040.jpg 1360w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/Bust_of_Marius_GL_319_-_Glyptothek_-_Munich_-_Germany_2017-scaled.jpg 1706w" sizes="(max-width: 384px) 100vw, 384px" />Bust of Marius. By © José Luiz Bernardes Ribeiro, CC BY-SA 4.0</div>
By all accounts, Marius’s armies were better trained, better disciplined and better organized than any of their predecessors — but they created a fundamentally different political dynamic. Previously, soldiers had been stakeholders in the Republic who served part time to defend their own homes and interests. Now, soldiers were fighting for their commanders — because it was their commanders who made sure that they were paid, their commanders that led them to victory and booty, their commanders that made sure they were settled on good farmland when their decades in the legions were up.
The new Roman legions created economic opportunities for Rome’s underclass, but their men were loyal to the people who paid them — which, in effect, was not the Roman state.
It was for good reason that, centuries later, Emperor Septimius Severus would advise his sons to “enrich the soldiers and scorn all other men.”
Marius himself would be elected consul an unprecedented five times in a row between 104-100 BC (the same year his darling nephew was born) and would hold Rome’s highest office seven times before dying during his final term. He would also antagonize his former lieutenant, Sulla, repeatedly. 
<h2>Marius and Sulla</h2>
In 88 BC, Roman territory in modern-day Turkey was invaded by King Mithridates VI of Pontus, and an army was raised to retaliate. Sulla, who was a sitting consul at the time, was given command of that army and sent off to defend Roman territory and retaliate against the invaders. 
<div id="attachment_514429" style="width: 730px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-514429" loading="lazy" class="size-large wp-image-514429" src="https://www.dailywire.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/GettyImages-546795522-720x576.jpg" alt="" width="720" height="576" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/GettyImages-546795522-720x576.jpg 720w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/GettyImages-546795522-300x240.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/GettyImages-546795522-768x614.jpg 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/GettyImages-546795522-1536x1229.jpg 1536w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/GettyImages-546795522-2048x1638.jpg 2048w" sizes="(max-width: 720px) 100vw, 720px" />Getty Images.</div>
But commanding such an operation came with significant prestige and the possibility of great riches, so Marius and his allies in the Senate worked to strip Sulla of his command and give it to Marius while Sulla and the army were marching out. Marius succeeded and his men intercepted Sulla’s force and informed him that Marius was in command now and he needed to step down.
Sulla promptly killed Marius’s messengers, turned his army around, put the defense of Anatolia on hold, and turned his full attention on driving Marius and his allies out of Rome. It was the first time a Roman army would march on their own capital — although it would not be the last.
<div id="attachment_514354" style="width: 928px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-514354" loading="lazy" class="size-large wp-image-514354" src="https://www.dailywire.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/GettyImages-697274088-918x576.jpg" alt="" width="918" height="576" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/GettyImages-697274088-918x576.jpg 918w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/GettyImages-697274088-300x188.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/GettyImages-697274088-768x482.jpg 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/GettyImages-697274088-1536x964.jpg 1536w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/GettyImages-697274088-2048x1285.jpg 2048w" sizes="(max-width: 918px) 100vw, 918px" />The Entrance of Cornelius Sulla into Rome. Getty Images.</div>
While this was happening, Mithridates was busy <a href="https://www.historytoday.com/archive/mithradates-scourge-rome" target="_blank" rel="noopener">massacring tens of thousands of Roman civilians</a> and advancing into territory Sulla’s army was ostensibly raised to defend, but political squabbles came first.
Marius was forced to flee for his life while over a dozen of his closest supporters were put to death. Once Sulla was satisfied that Marius had been put out to pasture and his own supporters were firmly in place, he left the city to go deal with the foreign invasion that had started this debacle.
<div id="attachment_514317" style="width: 655px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-514317" loading="lazy" class="wp-image-514317 size-large" src="https://www.dailywire.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/Bellum_mithridaticum_85aC-645x576.png" alt="Greece_large_topographic_basemap.svg" width="645" height="576" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/Bellum_mithridaticum_85aC-645x576.png 645w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/Bellum_mithridaticum_85aC-300x268.png 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/Bellum_mithridaticum_85aC-768x686.png 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/Bellum_mithridaticum_85aC-1536x1371.png 1536w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/Bellum_mithridaticum_85aC.png 1901w" sizes="(max-width: 645px) 100vw, 645px" />Roman republic during the first Mithridatic War 85 B.C.</div>
But while Sulla was busy prosecuting the First Mithridatic War, Marius was back in North Africa, licking his wounds and consolidating support. While Sulla was away Marius would play, and in 87 BC Marius marched an army of his own into Rome, purged roughly 100 of Sulla’s political allies and seized control of the government. Marius would be elected to the consulship for a record-breaking 7th time before dying two weeks after taking office, leaving his various allies holding the bag.
The Mithridatic invasion had pushed all the way into Greece at this point, and Sulla’s forces were thoroughly engaged so he couldn’t up and leave, but once the invading army had been dealt with and peace terms had been agreed to in 85 BC, the Civil War was back on.
Two big personalities made a name for themselves during this period, Marcus Licinius Crassus and Gnaeus Pompeius, who would later be known to history as &#8220;Pompey the Great&#8221; but at this point was known simply as &#8220;the adolescent butcher&#8221; — Pompey began serving under Sulla at the tender age of 19 and his ruthlessness during the war was infamous.
By 82 BC, Sulla had re-established control of the city and declared himself dictator for life — he also ordered hundreds of prominent Romans put to death and put many more on a &#8220;proscription list.&#8221;
<div id="attachment_514325" style="width: 742px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-514325" loading="lazy" class="wp-image-514325 size-large" src="https://www.dailywire.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/Augustyn_mirys-sulla_proscription-732x576.jpg" alt="" width="732" height="576" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/Augustyn_mirys-sulla_proscription-732x576.jpg 732w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/Augustyn_mirys-sulla_proscription-300x236.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/Augustyn_mirys-sulla_proscription-768x604.jpg 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/Augustyn_mirys-sulla_proscription-1536x1209.jpg 1536w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/Augustyn_mirys-sulla_proscription.jpg 1836w" sizes="(max-width: 732px) 100vw, 732px" />By Silvestre David Mirys, Public Domain. Wiki Commons. </div>
The proscription was a Sullan innovation where a citizen was declared an enemy of the state and marked for death — the catch was that the property of the proscripted was nationalized and anyone who killed them was entitled to a share of it as a bounty. This refilled the public coffers, which had been thoroughly exhausted over the course of the Civil War. They also caused a reign of mass terror as hundreds of prominent Romans were brutally murdered in the streets, their heirs left disinherited and destitute, and their murders made off with small fortunes.
Crassus, whose family’s wealth had been seized by the Marians early in the war, made a massive fortune off the proscription, <a href="http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/Plutarch/Lives/Crassus*.html">buying up stolen property</a> for a fraction of its value and growing that investment over through similarly dubious firesales until he was by far the wealthiest man in Rome.
Nobody liked Crassus.
Hundreds of Romans perished during the proscriptions, some for the simple crime of being related to the wrong people, but one especially notable person would escape by the skin of his teeth. Marius’s young nephew, Julius Caesar.
<h2>Gaius Julius Caesar</h2>
Caesar was only a teenager when Sulla had his name added to the list of the damned — but he had already been married off to Cornelia, the daughter of Cinna, one of Marius’s top lieutenants. Sulla ordered the boy to divorce her — marriages often signified political alliances and this particular union was unacceptable. 
Caesar <a href="https://www.history.com/topics/ancient-rome/julius-caesar">refused</a>. That got him on the list.
The Julii were one of Rome’s noblest patrician families, dating back to the founding of the city and supposedly the direct descendants of the goddess Venus herself. The Caesares branch of the family may have backed the wrong horse in the civil war, but while it was a death penalty offense to aid or comfort the proscribed, Caesar’s friends in the countryside gave him shelter while his family’s powerful friends in Sulla’s court pleaded for the boy’s life.
Eventually, and very reluctantly, Sulla relented. Sulla would not live to see this boy grow, but even then he had some inkling of what he would become. In his memoirs, Sulla would go so far as to specifically cite his decision to spare the young man as one of his lasting regrets, because Sulla saw “many a Marius” in Caesar.
Caesar, wisely recognizing that Sulla had second thoughts about sparing his life, quickly exited stage left for a military career in the provinces before Rome’s first dictator-for-life changed his mind. Sulla meanwhile, ruled for three years, from 82 BC — 79 BC, before stepping down as dictator-for-life, one year prematurely. 
<div id="attachment_514409" style="width: 388px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-514409" loading="lazy" class="wp-image-514409 size-large" src="https://www.dailywire.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/Sulla_Glyptothek_Munich_309-1-378x576.jpg" alt="" width="378" height="576" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/Sulla_Glyptothek_Munich_309-1-378x576.jpg 378w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/Sulla_Glyptothek_Munich_309-1-197x300.jpg 197w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/Sulla_Glyptothek_Munich_309-1-768x1171.jpg 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/Sulla_Glyptothek_Munich_309-1-1007x1536.jpg 1007w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/Sulla_Glyptothek_Munich_309-1-1343x2048.jpg 1343w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/Sulla_Glyptothek_Munich_309-1.jpg 1645w" sizes="(max-width: 378px) 100vw, 378px" />Bust of Sulla. Public Domain. Wiki Commons.</div>
Sulla used his absolute power to <a href="https://www.worldhistory.org/article/1481/sullas-reforms-as-dictator/">reform</a> the state — introducing new requirements and restrictions for holding office and passing various constitutional reforms that in his view eliminated roots of corruption — including the diminishment of the office of Tribune of the Plebs, that constant source of rabble-rousers. Sulla at least cast himself as a restorer of the Senate and republican virtue, in contrast to the depraved Marians, and spent his year of retirement hoping that his achievements would protect future generations of Romans from … men exactly like him.
Nevertheless, Sulla’s ‘do as I say, not as I do’ style of statesmanship proved unpersuasive.
RELATED: <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/a-brief-history-of-the-roman-empire-part-1-the-founding-of-rome">A Brief History Of The Roman Empire, Part 1: The Founding Of Rome</a>
RELATED: <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/a-brief-history-of-the-roman-empire-part-2-the-public-thing">A Brief History Of The Roman Empire, Part 2: The Public Thing</a>
RELATED: <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/a-brief-history-of-the-roman-empire-part-3-land-reform-and-the-era-of-gracchi">A Brief History Of The Roman Empire, Part 3: Land Reform And The Era Of Gracchi</a>
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Ancient Roman bas-relief showing flag, spears, and armor

A Brief History Of The Roman Empire, Part 4: Marius And Sulla

Roman And Dacian War Fight Scene

A Brief History Of The Roman Empire, Part 3: Land Reform And The Era Of Gracchi

Military

“How many times does someone have to lie to you before you call them a liar?” podcaster and independent journalist <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/topic/tim-pool">Tim Pool</a> asks in a recent PragerU video.
Pool goes through several prominent cases of mainstream media outlets misrepresenting major national news stories, and suggests that said organizations do not deserve the blanket trust that some Americans still give them.
He specifically cites the Michael Brown shooting in 2014, where media portrayed Brown as a ‘gentle giant’ who was shot by a racist police after pleading for his life with the famous — and fictitious — line “hands up, don’t shoot!”.
In reality, Brown had just robbed a convenience store and had violently assaulted officer Darren Wilson, punching him and reaching for his gun. A local grand jury and a federal probe by the Justice Department under the Obama administration found that Wilson had justifiably used lethal force in self defense.
“The whole story was manufactured by the media.” Pool observed. “It wasn’t the first time. It wouldn’t be the last.” 

Pool outlined other major scandals, such as the big tech suppression of Hunter Biden’s &#8220;laptop from hell&#8221; during the 2020 election, and the mainstream media’s insistence that it was &#8220;Russian disinformation.&#8221; In a similar vein, Pool zeroes in on the &#8220;Russia Hoax&#8221; that dominated the aftermath of the 2016 election.
“The biggest whopper of them all was the Russia Hoax, the entirely made up story that Donald Trump the candidate, then Donald Trump the President of the United States, was a Russian Agent. This dark fantasy preoccupied the legacy media for 3 years.”
Pool notes that most of the reporting on this issue was sourced from opposition research funded by the Clinton campaign that was totally baseless — the New York Times and the Washington Post would both win Pulitzer Prizes for that baseless reporting.
Pool advised listeners to seek out information from across the political spectrum, and to critically evaluate the motives and credibility of their sources.
“If someone or some news source lies over and over again, you may not want to trust them.”
WATCH:
<iframe loading="lazy" title="Lying Liars" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/e2HvetIkdLk?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" allowfullscreen></iframe>
&nbsp;

E36B4835-38DB-4F25-A0DA-6F44F5E248C9

WATCH: Tim Pool Calls Out ‘Lying Liars’ In Legacy Media

Legacy Media

Mainstream Media

Media Bias

Prager University

Tim Pool

U.S.

SPQR is an initialism of the ancient Latin phrase meaning: “The Senate and People of Rome”.

A Brief History Of The Roman Empire, Part 2: The Public Thing

Republic

Perhaps more than any other culture, Rome was the seminal civilization of the West. Over the centuries, a tiny town on the banks of the Tiber would be transformed into the beating heart of the greatest empire of antiquity — a shining city of marble that housed over a million souls with architectural marvels that could not be equalled for over a millennia.
For context, the population of London, the capital of the British Empire, the greatest imperial power of all time, did not reach one million until the early 19th century, decades before they mastered indoor plumbing.
The Romans had both in the 1st century.
<div id="attachment_511418" style="width: 880px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-511418" loading="lazy" class="size-large wp-image-511418" src="https://www.dailywire.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/GettyImages-660179953-870x576.jpg" alt="" width="870" height="576" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/GettyImages-660179953-870x576.jpg 870w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/GettyImages-660179953-300x199.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/GettyImages-660179953-768x509.jpg 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/GettyImages-660179953-1536x1017.jpg 1536w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/GettyImages-660179953-2048x1357.jpg 2048w" sizes="(max-width: 870px) 100vw, 870px" />Getty Images</div>
Our political, legal, religious and linguistic traditions all have their roots in Rome: Republics and dictators, civil and common law, the Roman Catholic Church and its Protestant offshoots, and the Romance languages (French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Romanian … even English, that bastard mutt of a tongue, did not emerge unscathed.) Latin was the West’s liturgical language until the 16th century and the language of science for centuries after that. It’s only within the last century or so that Latin has declined as the international language of educated people.
People have often wondered how such a mighty empire fell, but in many ways the more interesting question is — why did it rise in the first place, and why didn’t it fall far sooner? Why didn’t it collapse in the face of centuries of crises that would have brought most self respecting civilizations to their knees? 
All empires crumble, yet from their legendary founding the Romans lasted for over a millennia (two if we count the Byzantines), and their legacy is still going strong. It is the exceptional, above all, that requires an explanation.
<h2>Ignoble Origins</h2>
The Romans were a martial, legalistic people who forged an empire through conquest. Their distant ancestor, Aeneas, was a refugee from the Trojan War, and the founder and the first of their mythical kings, Romulus, was supposedly the son of Mars, god of war, who slew his twin brother for daring to challenge his city’s borders. 
<div id="attachment_511447" style="width: 778px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-511447" loading="lazy" class="wp-image-511447 size-large" src="https://www.dailywire.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/GettyImages-465042394-768x576.jpg" alt="" width="768" height="576" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/GettyImages-465042394-768x576.jpg 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/GettyImages-465042394-300x225.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/GettyImages-465042394-1536x1152.jpg 1536w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/GettyImages-465042394-2048x1536.jpg 2048w" sizes="(max-width: 768px) 100vw, 768px" />Roman marble relief AD140-150 showing the Trojan Aeneas and his son Ascanius landing on the shores of Italy. The sow is telling him to found the city of Rome. Getty Images.</div>
Archeological evidence shows the site that would become Rome was intermittently inhabited as far back as 12,000 BC, although none of these settlements were cities. By the early first millennia BC small villages of Latin speakers across the many hills of Rome had begun to coalesce into a larger urban settlement sometime around the city’s mythical founding in 753 BC.
According to Rome’s own telling, its first inhabitants were brigands, runaways, and the castoffs that no respectable people would deal with — Romulus could supposedly find only 100 out of the entire lot pious enough to perform religious duties without angering the gods — the first patriarchs of what would become the patricians, and the first members of the city’s senate. The sex ratio of the new city was rather lopsided, and no father would ever marry his daughter to a Roman, so Romulus staved off a demographic crisis by luring the nearby tribes to the town for a festival, ambushing the lot of them and kidnapping as many of their daughters as they could.
Not the most flattering of origin stories.
Their neighbors, of course, took exception to this, the Sabines especially, and peace was only achieved when the captured Sabine brides begged their husbands, brothers, and fathers not to slaughter one another, and the Sabine tribes were integrated into the state and senate, doubling its number. The early Senate was responsible for choosing and advising the Kings, and after Romulus’s death — and a year of deadlock — the Sabines were granted a concession: a Sabine would be king, but the Roman senators got to pick. 

They chose Numa Pomilius, an ascetic who did not want the job, who proceeded to found most of Rome’s important religious institutions and elevate the city to semi-respectable status among its neighbors.
In the heart of their city stood one of his most famous creations, the temple of Janus, god of beginnings, endings, doors and change, namesake of the month of January. In the heart of that temple there were the Gates of Janus. When Rome was at peace, the gates were closed, but when the city was at war they were flung open. Supposedly, for the entire reign of Numa, those gates were proudly sealed shut, but in the years to come they would be open ever after.
<div id="attachment_511433" style="width: 1034px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-511433" loading="lazy" class="size-large wp-image-511433" src="https://www.dailywire.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/GettyImages-1219623750-1024x515.jpg" alt="" width="1024" height="515" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/GettyImages-1219623750-1024x515.jpg 1024w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/GettyImages-1219623750-300x151.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/GettyImages-1219623750-768x386.jpg 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/GettyImages-1219623750-1536x773.jpg 1536w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/GettyImages-1219623750-2048x1030.jpg 2048w" sizes="(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" />Heritage Art/Heritage Images via Getty Images</div>
Most early Roman records are at least semi-mythical and probably wrong — no comparable kingdom ever had a stretch of seven kings reign for an average of 35 years, but there are helpful clues within the myths. Rome lies smack dab in the middle of the Italian peninsula, and was an important trading post between the Greek colonies in the south (Magna Graecia) and the powerful Etruscan city-states to the north.
<div class="image"><img loading="lazy" class="size-large wp-image-511437" src="https://www.dailywire.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/GettyImages-87709438-726x576.jpg" alt="" width="726" height="576" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/GettyImages-87709438-726x576.jpg 726w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/GettyImages-87709438-300x238.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/GettyImages-87709438-768x609.jpg 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/GettyImages-87709438-1536x1219.jpg 1536w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/03/GettyImages-87709438-2048x1625.jpg 2048w" sizes="(max-width: 726px) 100vw, 726px" /></div>
Getty Images
The bloodline of Aeneas connected the Latins to the greatest work of Greek mythology, as Rome would borrow much of its religion from the Greeks. We can’t say much about the Etruscans — we can’t even read all of their language, but the last three kings of Rome came from an Etruscan family so it’s safe to say that the city fell under their dominion at some point. Whether or not its final king, Tarquinius Superbus (Tarquin the Proud) actually murdered his brother, executed political opponents, and drained the treasury dry is up for dispute, but whatever Rome’s experience with monarchy actually was by the end of the ordeal they were good and through with it.
Thus, in 509 BC (one year before Athenian Democracy was born in 508, conveniently) the world’s first Republic was created — “res publica,” the public thing.
RELATED: <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/a-brief-history-of-the-roman-empire-part-2-the-public-thing">A Brief History Of The Roman Empire, Part 2: The Public Thing</a>

Coliseum, Rome, Italy

A Brief History Of The Roman Empire, Part 1: The Founding Of Rome

Daily Wire Host Michael Knowles faced down protestors at University of Buffalo after lambasting gender ideology at CPAC last weekend.
Knowles’ lecture, ‘How Feminism Destroys Women (And Everything Else),’ was interrupted from the beginning by a group of activists who shouted down Knowles with cries of “Trans Lives Matter” for several minutes before they were escorted out of the room by security.
“I especially want to thank those people in the audience.” Knowles responded. “Because even though they’re trying to interrupt the talk they are showing a lot of bravery for even coming into this auditorium with such an allegedly genocidal maniac.”
Knowles was making light of <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/left-falsely-frames-michael-knowles-call-for-end-to-transgenderism-as-genocide">several headlines</a> put out by left-wing media outlets after his speech at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference, where he called for a ‘complete eradication of transgenderism from public life.’
“I didn’t know that I was a genocidal maniac before this week,” Knowles continued. “But I read about it in Rolling Stone and The Daily Beast and The Huffington Post … I’m just not really a ‘genocide’ kind of guy.”
In his speech last weekend, Knowles argued that gender ideology was built on false premises about the human condition and that it could not be imposed or indulged in any context without granting those premises, which undermined the foundations of society itself.
“For the good of society and especially for the good of the poor people who have fallen prey to this confusion, transgenderism must be eradicated from public life entirely, the whole preposterous ideology — at every level.” Knowles <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/he-is-of-course-completely-right-knowles-call-to-end-transgenderism-backed-by-conservatives" target="_blank" rel="noopener">said</a>.
Despite expressing concern for the well-being of trans-identifying individuals and specifying that he was speaking of an ideology rather than a group of people, several outlets and even a sitting member of Congress claimed that Knowles was calling for the mass killing of trans people. Those claims crossed the extremely high threshold for libel of a public figure under US law, and most of the outlets retracted and revised those statements, likely, as Knowles notes,  after counsel told them “Change the headlines before you get sued into oblivion.”
“I am not quite sure how someone could hear those words and conclude that I was calling to murder all the transvestites,” Knowles said. “When one calls to eradicate poverty, one is not calling to murder the poor. When one calls to eradicate cancer one is not suggesting that we ought to murder cancer patients.”
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Despite these revisions, many people continue to characterize Knowles’ comments as that of a genocidal tirade, including New York Congressman Jamaal Bowman(D) who <a href="https://twitter.com/JamaalBowmanNY/status/1633107848644141057" target="_blank" rel="noopener">wrote</a>:
<blockquote>“Michael Knowles is a Nazi hellbent on keeping only white men alive and in power. We cannot allow him and others to push their evil agenda and we must stand up for the transgender rights.”</blockquote>
“I think I struck a nerve.” Knowles mused.
<h2>WATCH:</h2>
<iframe loading="lazy" title="How Feminism Destroys Women (And Everything Else) | Michael Knowles LIVE at University at Buffalo" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/DpMuCarxYc4?start=868&#038;feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" allowfullscreen></iframe>
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Mike Huckabee And Sarah Huckabee Sanders Visits “The Story With Martha MacCallum”

‘I’m Just Not Really A ‘Genocide’ Kind of Guy’: Michael Knowles Addresses Libel At Buffalo

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An embattled northern <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/topic/virginia" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Virginia</a> school district has aggravated both parents and teachers with a new policy that would see boys and girls in grades 4-8 taught sex education together, apparently in order to avoid alienating their trans-identifying classmates.
Currently, instruction at those grade levels in Fairfax County Public Schools is separated by sex, but LGBTQ activists have argued that this harms trans-identifying students by potentially forcing them to out themselves or to pick a gender they don’t identify with. Opponents of the proposal have argued that combining the classes by sex would create awkwardness and tension, decrease student participation in class and lead to a greater number of students opting out of the program entirely.
“Notwithstanding the public expressing its clear opposition to this &amp; explaining how combined classes will be less effective, the Family Life Committee plans to push forward with the plan for political reasons,” The Fairfax County Parents Association said via Twitter.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
🚨Breaking: Activists Buried FCPS Survey Showing Overwhelming Opposition to Combined Sex-Ed Classes🚨
Activists on FCPS&#39;s Family Life Committee plan to recommend &amp; push for a vote proposing combined gender sex-ed classes despite survey showing ~85% opposition to plan. <a href="https://t.co/XPjOYxL6nO">pic.twitter.com/XPjOYxL6nO</a>
&mdash; Fairfax County Parents Association (@FFXParentsAssoc) <a href="https://twitter.com/FFXParentsAssoc/status/1632037908466081793?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 4, 2023</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
Fairfax County Public schools have drawn fire for <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/media/virginia-mom-equity-warriors-sons-merit-award-secret-2-years" target="_blank" rel="noopener">withholding academic awards </a>from minority students in the name of &#8220;equity&#8221; and for its <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/michael-delaney-isnt-the-first-judicial-nominee-to-traumatize-child-sexual-abuse-survivors">handling of sexual abuse allegations</a>. The county, one of the wealthiest in the nation, is just outside of Washington D.C. It is also Virginia’s most populous county and its school district is the 10th largest in the country.
The parents association on Saturday released data from an internal survey conducted by the school district which had until that point been hidden from the public, which found overwhelming opposition to the proposal — almost 85% of survey respondents opposed combined instruction. Every subcategory that was surveyed opposed the changes by a large majority: among parents 183 were in favor compared to 1392 who were opposed, among teachers 14 were in favor and 100 were opposed, and among students 20 were in favor and 60 were opposed.
The group alleges that the survey data has been deliberately suppressed in order to keep the issue out of the public eye so that supporters on the school board and attendant committees can push the changes through in an upcoming vote on March 30 with minimal opposition.
The Daily Wire reached out to several members of the Fairfax County School Board about the proposed changes to the curriculum. At the time of writing, they had not responded.
Several concerned residents of Fairfax County expressed concern about the proposed changes to The Daily Wire and the transparency of the process.
Family Life Education (FLE) and issues surrounding sex and gender identity have been highly contentious within the district for much of the last decade. The controversy within the community began as far back as 2015, when gender identity was first added as a protected class under the district’s non-discrimination policy, with later overhauls to the curriculum striking terms such as “biological sex” in favor of “sex assigned at birth”.
The Fairfax County school board has <a href="https://www.ffxnow.com/2022/10/10/fairfax-county-school-board-commits-to-supporting-transgender-students-as-community-speaks-out/">allied itself with LGBTQ activists</a> and against critics such as Virginia Republican Governor Glenn Youngkin, who <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/curl-heres-what-really-drove-the-vote-in-virginia" target="_blank" rel="noopener">centered his campaign</a> on this issue of parents’ rights in their children’s education.
“The Fairfax County School Board understands that our LGBTQIA+ students, staff, and families are worried about the impact of Governor Youngkin’s proposed model policies for transgender and gender-expansive students.” The school board <a href="https://www.ffxnow.com/2022/10/10/fairfax-county-school-board-commits-to-supporting-transgender-students-as-community-speaks-out/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">said</a> in a public statement last year. “Nearly one in five transgender and non-binary youth attempted suicide in the last year. LGBTQIA+ youth who found their school to be affirming reported lower rates of attempting suicide. It is necessary to ensure our school community is a place where all students can live without fear of prejudice, discrimination, harassment, or violence.”
“Fairfax County has prided itself for a long time on being a progressive wedge and setting the tone.” Laura Bryant Hanford, a former member of the county’s FLE Curriculum Advisory Committee told the Daily Wire.
Still, Fairfax is not a monolith, and many parents, instructors, and residents have reservations about gender ideology and its influence on FLE.
“We’re oversexualizing kids,” one community member, who asked to remain anonymous for fear of personal and professional reprisal, told The Daily Wire. “We’re asking the kids their sexual preferences … their gender … why are we even talking sexual preference in middle or elementary school? &#8230; This is an age when they’re confused.”
Still, the issue has become contentious enough that many residents believe they can only speak out at great personal cost.“People have jobs,” Andrea Bayer, a former school board candidate, told The Daily Wire. “They’re contractors and government employees, and anything they say will be used against them.”
“Fairfax County doesn’t play around,&#8221; one resident told The Daily Wire. “If, somehow, they got wind that I talked to you, they’re coming for me now.”

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Fairfax County Schools Accused Of Suppressing Sex-Ed Data

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<a href="https://get.dailywire.com/subscribe/plus-jordan-peterson?utm_campaign=peterson&amp;utm_medium=paid&amp;utm_source=bing&amp;utm_content=na_subscriptions&amp;cid=peterson&amp;mid=b&amp;xid=0&amp;msclkid=2f3e9dfb6fda124d9c53fe03817c1b88" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Dr Jordan B Peterson</a>’s second episode of “<a href="https://get.dailywire.com/jordan-b-peterson/vision-destiny?_gl=1*1p5vsln*_ga*MTk1ODkzMzYxNi4xNjc3MjU4NDE3*_ga_CZKR9ZYKJP*MTY3NzI1ODQxNi4xLjEuMTY3NzI1ODQ1My4yMy4wLjA." target="_blank" rel="noopener">Vision &amp; Destiny</a>” on DailyWire+ features the best-selling author and clinical psychologist exploring the ongoing identity crisis in the West and how radical gender ideology is adding fuel to the fire.
Peterson first came to international attention in September of 2016 when he posted a series of videos criticizing Bill C-16, a proposed piece of Canadian legislation that would add &#8220;gender expression&#8221; and &#8220;gender identity&#8221; to the list of protected classes under the Canadian Human Rights Act. Peterson argued that the law represented an unprecedented infringement on free speech as it would compel people to use a person’s desired pronouns whether or not the speaker thought they were legitimate.
While the initial controversy was primarily about free speech, Peterson has continued to maintain that the category of &#8220;gender identity&#8221; is ill-formed, psychometrically invalid, and is rooted in and promulgated by a corrupt ideology of Marxist origins.
“It’s not real,” Peterson said. “They have no idea in their idiot decisions how to measure the phenomena that they claim exist.”
“Obviously there are functional differences between men and women,” Peterson continued. “The most important of which, you might say, is the fact that if you take a typical man and a typical woman and they engage in sexual activity, there is some reasonable probability that a child will emerge … that’s a fundamental reality and it takes that binary process.”
Peterson argues that this differential approach to reproductive process drives the other biological and psychological differences between men and women — men tend to be larger, stronger, more robust, and more willing to engage in physical confrontation, whereas female bodies are optimized toward the bearing and rearing of infants.
<iframe loading="lazy" title="The Official Vision &amp; Destiny Trailer" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/sRB8OG5lvqc?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" allowfullscreen></iframe>
Within the Big 5 model of personality traits, the major sex differences are that women tend to be more agreeable and more sensitive to negative emotion than men, making them more threat sensitive and more likely to sacrifice their own interests for vulnerable members of their ingroup.
Peterson notes that while there are differences in the temperament between the average male and average female, there is also overlap, the same way there is a smaller overlap in the distribution of strength and height, so that within the set of all men and all women there will be some &#8220;masculine&#8221; women and some &#8220;feminine&#8221; men.
Peterson also argues that while human beings develop in a social context, and identities and expectations are inevitably shaped by and negotiated within a culturally loaded framework, any cultural edifice is built atop the basic biological structure.
Peterson also objects to the imposition of one’s subjective feelings in the name of respecting a person’s “true self.”
“As a trained physician, I think I’m going to do a lot more damage to you in the medium-to-long run by going along with your claim that you can just be anything you want,” he remarked.
“It’s an absolute and utter unethical abdication of every element of professional responsibility,” Peterson said. “There’s no excuse for it.”

Jordan Peterson

Dr Jordan Peterson Takes On Gender Madness In New Episode Of ‘Vision & Destiny’

Dr Jordan Peterson Takes On Gender Madness In New Episode Of 'Vision & Destiny'

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Gender Identity

Over the last few months, roughly two dozen whale corpses have washed up on the Atlantic Coast of the United States. The unexplained increase in fatalities is happening as the state of <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/topic/new-jersey" target="_blank" rel="noopener">New Jersey</a> is constructing a massive offshore wind farm, which some conservationists claim is affecting whale navigation.
Federal scientists insist that no evidence has directly linked the construction to the spike in beached whales, but some local lawmakers, environmentalist groups, and conservative commentators have insisted the wind turbines are the obvious culprit and are demanding action.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has tracked 184 “<a href="https://www.fisheries.noaa.gov/national/marine-life-distress/2016-2023-humpback-whale-unusual-mortality-event-along-atlantic-coast" target="_blank" rel="noopener">unusual mortality events</a>” for Humpback whales in the area since 2016 — roughly 25 per year, but over the past few months, there have been <a href="https://www.newscientist.com/article/2360641-why-are-so-many-whales-getting-stranded-on-us-beaches/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">at least 22 large whales</a> stranded in the region, including 15 humpbacks, rivaling last year’s annual total.
“It’s an alarming surge,” said Sheila Dean, director of the Marine Mammal Stranding Center in New Jersey.
Roughly a third of the corpses have washed up on the shores of New York and New Jersey — that’s significant because a massive wind farm is being constructed off New Jersey’s coast. The state has committed $10 billion to the project, which they hope will generate 11 Gigawatts of power by 2040. But now, there’s a growing effort to stop the project.
Thousands of protesters gathered on Sunday — “international whale day” — at Pleasant Point Beach in New Jersey to lobby for a moratorium on offshore wind developments. The group spearheading the effort, Clean Ocean Action, was initially supportive of smaller wind projects, but has expressed concerns over the impact larger developments could have.
<div id="attachment_505219" style="width: 310px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-505219" loading="lazy" class="wp-image-505219 size-medium" src="https://www.dailywire.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/Wind-Kills-Whales-300x200.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="200" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/02/Wind-Kills-Whales-300x200.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/02/Wind-Kills-Whales-864x576.jpg 864w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/02/Wind-Kills-Whales-768x512.jpg 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/02/Wind-Kills-Whales-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/02/Wind-Kills-Whales-2048x1366.jpg 2048w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/02/Wind-Kills-Whales-1800x1200.jpg 1800w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2023/02/Wind-Kills-Whales-1200x800.jpg 1200w" sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />Photo by Kena Betancur/VIEWpress</div>
“At this point, there is no evidence to support speculation that noise resulting from wind development-related site characterization surveys could potentially cause mortality of whales,” according to the <a href="https://www.fisheries.noaa.gov/new-england-mid-atlantic/marine-life-distress/frequent-questions-offshore-wind-and-whales">official website of the NOAA</a>, “and no specific links between recent large whale mortalities and currently ongoing surveys. We will continue to gather data to help us determine the cause of death for these mortality events.”
While investigations have not connected the construction of the wind farm to the excess fatalities, some employees of the NOAA had raised concerns about the risks it may pose before the surge began.
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Sean Hayes, chief of the protected species branch at NOAA’s Northeast Fisheries Science Center, <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-02-18/why-are-whales-dying-in-new-jersey-some-blame-wind-farms" target="_blank" rel="noopener">warned</a> regulators last year that “additional noise, vessel traffic and habitat modifications due to offshore wind development will likely cause added stress [to whales and] result in additional population consequences.”
Whales and other cetaceans often rely on echolocation, a sort of natural sonar, to sense their surroundings, and excess noise could distort their perceptions and lead them into dangerous waters.
Advocates of the turbines have argued that the ships involved only account for 2% of the total traffic in the area — the port of New York and New Jersey is the <a href="https://container-news.com/top-10-the-busiest-container-ports-in-the-united-states/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">third busiest</a> in the United States — and whatever minor marine disruptions that are created would be offset by a decline in greenhouse emissions.
<a href="https://www.foxnews.com/politics/dozens-nj-mayors-call-immediate-offshore-wind-moratorium-latest-whale-deaths" target="_blank" rel="noopener">30 mayors of coastal communities</a> in the area, and several sitting members of Congress, including Chris Smith (R-NJ), Jeff Van Drew (R-NJ), and <a href="https://www.newsweek.com/marjorie-taylor-greene-wind-farms-killing-whales-environmentalism-sean-hannity-1781312" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Marjorie Taylor Greene</a> (R-GA) have called for a moratorium on the project. Tucker Carlson of Fox News also <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=foVo6GP8Vmw" target="_blank" rel="noopener">highlighted</a> the issue to a national audience.
The office of Governor Phil Murphy put out a statement in response to the public outcry, expressing sympathy for concerned environmentalists while insinuating that some critics were not concerned with whales at all and were merely capitalizing on the situation to shut down a project they had already opposed.
“We know that many residents, both in our shore communities and across the state, share our genuine concern for marine life and its survival,” the statement said. “But we also know that there are those out there who are motivated not by a concern for our environment but by their own political ideologies and opposition to the very efforts that will preserve and protect our environment for generations to come.”
Other observers were even less charitable.
“It’s just a cynical disinformation campaign,” Greenpeace oceans director John Hocevar told <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2023/02/11/whale-deaths-and-windmills/11178432002/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">USA Today</a>.
Still, while the cause of the surge in stranded whales has not been firmly established, the phenomenon is indisputable.
“I’ve gotten lots of information from different sources,” said Kim Wetzel, 57, an Ocean City resident who attended Sunday’s rally, “and you can’t argue with the fact that 10 whales have washed up.”

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