Thread 514731027

ITT: It is 376 AD in the Roman Empire

Barbarian immigration is fundamentally important to Rome without it the economy will be destroyed and we won't have enough manpower for the legions. The barbarians are also willing to do the jobs the lazy Romans don't want to do.

Did you read Decline and Fall? Ultimately the real problem is they had terrible corruption which led to this situation. Noblesse Oblige had declined, which led to the rich getting richer because they had no sense of feeling for or obligation to their subjects. Praetorian Guard participated in several coups and eventually just transparently killed Emperors and installed whoever paid the most. But it was because cheap foreign labor had been allowed into the market outside their provinces of origin, it had long been the practice to colonize a place but not allow provincials or colonials to travel freely without authorization.

>>514731027 (OP)
fixd

>>514731649
>rampant corruption
>buying out leadership
>cheap foreign labor everywhere

hmm sounds a little familiar

I dunno Marcus, remember when we imported Greek and asiatic people (and slaves)?
It was a great boon to our economy and culture.
I say people are just fear mongering about these barbarians from Germania (although huns do sound scary, a little bit).
That said what could possibly go wrong, it's not like they could destroy or sack the eternal city.... Right?
I hope for our emperor they don't do that, even if we treat them antagonistically.

>>514732287
It's a good book. People frequently say it says this or that, there's a lil Penguin abridged version and that's the one most people read. It gives you all the wrong conclusions because the editor skipped 90% of the book.

>>514732364
Those barbarians are a little violent and may have sacked a couple of towns but their food is amazing and I would say a couple of raids here and there are well worth it for something other than our boring Roman food.

>>514731649

> cheap foreign labor

in a slave empire? What are you talking about. The part about upper class ethics is important though. That needs to be brought up more regularly

>>514733310
>a slave empire?
The practice of moving slaves all about came much later. Anyway slaves were more akin to salaried workers, there were legal means by which they could buy their freedom, there were minimum standards for treatment, etc. And slavery was almost always a punishment, people were made slaves after a military victory but not just because. There were legal remedies for reducing somebody to slavery.

This is all adequately covered but people don't know about it at all. Read Varro's guide to farming, he talks about how this all worked at his time in a QRD fashion.

>>514733310
They stopped conquering shit like 400 years ago slavery was on life support by that point.

>>514732867
Yeah exactly, what's the problem with them going on a couple of drunken riots?
This empire survived worse.
Besides it's great that they fill the ranks of our military, so we don't have to do it!
Now we can relax, as long as they don't touch the eternal city we are safe.

>>514733739
They kept their slaves mainly in the provinces. They'd move 'em from one place to another but not to Rome proper or Roman settlements. They went to country estates to work.

There weren't slaves in the Agricola until pretty late in the game. All that land was worked by Roman provincials, land-bound peasants essentially in serfdom but with Citizenship, pay, rights, etc. Romans didn't want a bunch of smelly foreigners mucking up their own country. Rome itself was an international city but the countryside was essentially off limits to foreigners for a very long time.

>>514731027 (OP)
I still use their baths that were cut into the coastline.