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In contradistinction to a Julian, an Alexander Severus, a Marcus Aurelius and even a Hadrian, who felt themselves more Greek than Latin, Justinian wished to be a Latin Roman Emperor. He was confirmed in these feelings by his horror of Hellen ism. A Roman Emperor, Justinian was also a Christian Emperor. He considered himself the pillar of the Christian orthodox faith. The Hellenic spirit is profoundly pagan and Justinian abominated it. For him, as for his contem poraries and successors, Hellene was synonymous with pagan and to call anyone by this term was to insult him. The Greek peoples themselves assumed the name Pauaio (Romans). Even to-day Romios is still used by the common people. Hellene is an artificial term revived in the nineteenth century. The capital of the Empire is called Roum by the Arab and Turkish peoples of Asia. Lot, F., 2013. End of the Ancient World. Routledge.
3:40 What??? Before they assimilated the Hellenistic influences, Romans had assimilated Etruscan influences into their native religions which included a fully formed pantheon of gods with humanistic forms, personalities, and representations. And while the earliest Roman 'tribal' religions are still being explored, we believe they had a more nature based ideology with ancestor worship elements.
5:19 *Fun fact:* Speaking of Castor and Pollux, many citizens of Rome considered blasphemous and intolerable that Emperor Caligula, who had proclaimed himself a God, desecrated the pavilion of the two gods by creating a tunnel to the Palace between the two statues of the siblings, which made Castor and Pollux look like mere ornaments rather than holy figures to be worshipped. This controversy motivated the Praetorians to kill Caligula and his family.
@@firstnamelastname4249 But what they did to his family was completely immoral. In fact, Caligula's daughter had her head smashed against a wall. If you ask me, the rightest Emperor killed by the Praetorians was Elagabalus
The Romans already essentially had the “Greek” gods. Or, more accurately, the same Indo-European gods the Greeks worshipped. Since all Indi-European peoples share a common origin in the original Indo-European tribes around the Black and Caspian seas (4500-3500BC) most of their core pantheon remained common to all of them. As they migrated out of the core homeland over time and eventually became Celts, Tocharians, Germanics, Balts, Slavs etc. they did pick up various new gods from the non-Indo-European peoples they encountered along the way. But the core Indi-European gods remained the same. It’s only differences in dialect as the various Indo-European languages evolved separately over time that cause the names of those gods to sound different. For instance, the original chief Indo-European god was “Deus Pitar” (sky father). The Greek tribes simply referred to him as “Zeus”, dropping the following “father” part. The Romans included the “father” part and referred to him as Jiu-Pitar. Jupiter.
@@gordonbryce there is the theory that Italic Languages and Celtic languages split from what was called proto Italo Celtic, which itself split from proto indo european
I love historical parallels and ironies. Like the fact the city of Rome was started by a Romulus and ended with a Romulus. In this case, Greek slaves gave the Romans their pantheon. And then gave them Christianity the same way.
@@chronikhiles yeah and if he ever did exist, he didn't found rome and existed during the proto indo european times. He is the first man who sacrificed his giant twin brother to deus pater.
"This god has civilized, by the agency of the Greek colonies, the greatest part of the habitable globe; he has prepared it the more readily to submit to the Romans----a race possessing not merely a Grecian origin, but also Greek, and who have established and maintained a creed as regards the gods that is thoroughly Greek from, beginning to end; and who, besides all this, have founded a form of government in no way inferior to that of the best regulated states----even if of all the governments that have ever been tried, it be not the very best; from all which circumstances, I think I have myself recognized the Roman state as being Greek both in its origin and in its government. Emperor Julian.
In India, we still have temples dedicated to Brihaspati (Jupiter). Every 12 years, In India we also celebrate Jupiters rotation around the Sun, thru the Maha Kumbh Mela.
Brihaspati was first mentioned in the Rigveda (Book 4, hymn 50, it is way older than Jupiter of the Romans and predates it by several centuries (even before Alexander's invasion). It is not uncommon for Civilizations to develop their own pantheons and knowledge systems independently, so one can easily say that Brihaspati and Jupiter have no connection though they represent the same celestial entity.
@@Deepak_Dhakad Given it’s not one ethic country but a giant region of different cultures and religions it makes sense, Greece was more centralized than India. That doesn’t make the “Indians” any better.
@@Deepak_Dhakad Tiny yet somehow more influential and know than the so called “India” and you aren’t the same people by far actually, that would be like Scandinavia, Britain and Germany uniting to be some kind of Germanic republic, they aren’t the same people either.
@@ChronosHellas Lol, all of Europe are pretty much different shades of the same stock genetically, much less diverse than India is. Scandinavia, Britain and Germany together would be like one of the Northern states, Uttar Pradesh perhaps. Yet India manages to integrate its diverse culture or cultures into one nation without killing each other as often as Europeans do.
Fustel de Coulanges (Ancient City) Concerning the origin of the divinities: "Still the elements which could be deified were not very numerous. The sun which gives fecundity, the earth which nourishes, the clouds, by turns beneficent and destructive - such were the different powers of which they could make gods. But from each one of these elements thousands of gods were created; because the same physical agent, viewed under different aspects, received from men different names. The sun, for example, was called in one place Hercules (the glorious); in another, Phoebus (the shining); and still again Apollo (he who drives away night or evil); one called him Hyperion (the elevated Being); another, Alexicacos (the beneficent); and in the course of time groups of men, who had given these various names to the brilliant luminary, no longer saw that they had the same god. Indeed, each man adored but a very small number of divinities; but the gods of one were not those of another. The names, it is true, might resemble each other; many men might separately have given their god the name of Apollo, or of Hercules; these words belonged to the common language, and were merely adjectives, and designated the divine Being by one or another of his most prominent attributes” The repetition of names to different divinities: “The same name often conceals very different divinities. Poseidon Hippius, Poseidon Phytalmius, the Erechthean Poseidon, the Ægean Poseidon, the Heliconian Poseidon, were different gods, who had neither the same attributes nor the same worshippers.” The lack of universality of protecting divinities: "We may recall the saying of a certain Greek, whose city adored the hero Alabandos; he was speaking to an inhabitant of another city, that worshipped Hercules. 'Alabandos,' said he, 'is a god, and Hercules is not one.' With such ideas it was important, in a treaty of peace, that each city called its own gods to bear witness to its oaths. 'We made a treaty, and poured out the libations,' said the Plataeans to the Spartans; 'we called to witness, you the gods of your fathers, we the gods who occupy our country.' Both parties tried, indeed, if it was possible, to invoke divinities that were common to both cities. They swore by those gods that were visible everywhere - the sun, which shines upon all, and the nourishing earth. But the gods of each city, and its protecting heroes, touched men much more, and it was necessary to call them to witness, if men wished to have oaths really confirmed by religion." "In the legend of the Trojan war we see a Pallas who fights for the Greeks, and there is among the Trojans another Pallas, who receives their worship and protects her worshippers. Would any one say that it was the same divinity who figured in both armies? Certainly not; for the ancients did not attribute the gift of ubiquity to their gods. The cities of Argos and Samos had each a Here Polias, but it was not the same goddess, for she was represented in the two cities with very different attributes. There was at Rome a Juno; at a distance of five leagues, the city of Veii had another. So little were they the same divinity that we see the dictator Camillus, while besieging Veii, address himself to the Juno of the enemy, to induce her to abandon the Etruscan city and pass into his camp. When he is master of the city, he takes the statue, well persuaded that he gains possession of the goddess at the same time, and devoutly transports it to Rome. From that time Rome had two protecting Junos. There is a similar history, a few years later, of a Jupiter that another dictator took from Praeneste, though at that time Rome already had three or four of them at home." The exclusivity of divinities: "The city which possessed a divinity of its own did not wish strangers to be protected by it, or to adore it. More commonly a temple was accessible only to citizens. The Argives alone had the right to enter the temple of Hera at Argos. To enter that of Athene at Athens, one had to be an Athenian. The Romans who adored two Junos at home could not enter the temple of a third Juno, who was in the little city of Lanuvium." That universal and external cults were secondary to personal religion: "A man had no chance to choose his belief. He must believe and submit to the religion of the city. He could hate and despise the gods of the neighboring city. As to the divinities of a general and universal character, like Jupiter, or Cybele, or Juno, he was free to believe or not to believe in them, but it would not do to entertain doubts about Athene Polias, or Erechtheus, or Cecrops. That would have been grave impiety, which would have endangered religion and the state at the same time, and which the state would have severely punished. Socrates was put to death for this crime."
This is good but somehow misses that some of these conflated gods were literally the same god to begin with. Both Greece and Rome inherited much of their mythology from older Indo-European myths, as did many of the PIE daughter cultures, and Rome was heavily influenced by Greece not just later in history but from its absolute very beginnings, with Alba Longa almost definitely drawing settlers from Greece or Grecian colonies and later providing much of the original Roman colonial stock in turn. Zeus and Jupiter didn't get conflated, they were just different names for the same guy (Zeus-Pater[father]->Jupiter) with enough generations of separate mythological evolution to differentiate the two states' popular image thereof. That's why they could be mashed back together with great ease.
No, they were not the same guy, it would be saying like italian and french are the same language because they both came from latin ^^' There's parallels between the two, but after centuries of evolution, they had differences. In fact, even after the syncretism, the gods had differences XD
Muad'Dib Very well said. The title of this video is misleading. The Romans adopted some bits of Greek mythology, not Greek gods. The Romans had their own gods. They only adopted a few, like Apollo. This is not unusual in and of itself; ancient peoples, even the Greeks, borrowed foreign gods and added them to their own pantheons.
Christian Orthodox people belonged to the millet-i Rum, and progressively, Greek became the dominant means of communication amongst the members of the millet, who were called by others and were calling themselves. Romioi. Interestingly, the term 'Hellene' still signified for most people the pagan classical tradition, and it was a term that especially the clergy was keen to eliminate. Certain evocations of the term 'Hellene' by Byzantine scholars (e.g. in the twelfth century) contained some elements of contemporary ethnic identification, but it never acquired widespread currency, it never really "caught" on' (Beaton 2007: 93). Boys-Stones, G., Graziosi, B. and Vasunia, P., n.d. The Oxford handbook of Hellenic studies. p.21 A second way that Robert establishes the moral superiority of the French over and against the Greeks is by framing the French, rather than the Byzantines, as the true Romans. On this score, it is important to note that the very naming of the Byzantines as "Greek" was an explicit rejection of the Byzantine claim that they were "Roman"-as noted in the introduc tion, the people we call Byzantines never employed the term Byzantine (it is a modern categorization), never used the Latin Graecus, and only began to employ the Greek word "Hellene" around the time of the Fourth Cru sade. Rather, they almost always self-identified as Romans." Robert not only rejects their Roman identity by referring to them as Graeci, he re peatedly asserts that it is the French, not the Byzantines, who adhere to the "law of Rome." Demacopoulos., 2019. Colonizing Christianity: Greek and Latin Religious Identity in the Era of the Fourth Crusade (Orthodox Christianity and Contemporary Thought) 1st Edition.. New York, N.Y.: Fordham University Press, p.18.
Many times in the video, they refer to the "expected benefits" from a sacrifice. A common misconception of polytheistic faiths is that if you give a sacrifice, the Gods would be forced to give you whatever you want. The Romans and Greeks thought it would be an act of great hubris to demand a reward. Instead, look at it like a gifting cycle of reciprocity. Practitioners would give offerings out of love, like a tithe, and should not expect anything in return (to demand something in return would be impure). The Gods help with rain, harvest, the State, personal matters because they believed the Gods loved them too. Thus, you have gifts and blessings back and forth, establishing "Kharis". Source: The Republic by Plato, The Iliad & the Odyssey by Homer, the Homeric Hymns, and Orphic Theogony
"Jupiter", like "Zeus", is derived from the Proto-Indo-European "Dyeus Phter", literally, "Sky Father". So Jupiter didn't become a sky god due to syncretism with Zeus; rather, both were, at their origin, sky gods.
@@moutsatsosa It's "Buenos Días" And Día precisely refers to day, specifically daylight. The sky, the day, and the ruler God are the three main fatures of Dyeus Phter, which is why IE sky Gods tend to be Gods of the day, and ruler Gods
It's fascinating with Greeks living in the Italian peninsula & Sicily not only influenced the Romans. But trained Romans, hence there were Roman Hoplites in the Roman Kingdom until the use of the Triarii and legion.
It's an interesting subject, temples to Egyptian Gods were not unknown in the empire especially Seraphis (a dual god). There are (somewhat scary) classical statues of Anubis as a dogheaded man.
@Bransford There were IIRC several actually, some more syncretic with Greek Gods than others. In Gaul and Britannia Celtic-Roman melts were important to.
@@forthrightgambitia1032 Because both Anubis and Hermes represent the same role of psychopomp, therefore is normal for the romans under Interpretatio to say "Anubis is just Mercury/Hermes so it's valid to worship Anubis"
@@americaeaustraliaepius4338 Some Romans may have seen him that way, but others who belong to the Isis mystery cult would have seen him as an important distinct figure, a blood relation to Isis herself. His image was extremely common in archaelogical finds from the Roman era, and the satirist Lucian even penned some lines mocking his popularity, so there must have been some reason this god became so ubiquitous throughout the Roman empire whilst other similar gods that were held as different forms of Roman Gods from other parts of the empire were localised or forgotten. At least part of it was that Egypt was (even before the Roman empire - see Plato's Theaetetus) regarded as a site of mysticis and ancient wisdom and the religious imagery from Egypt as having some kind of symbolic "spiritualism" that became popular as belief in the traditional Roman gods - who themselves had been heavily altered by Etruscan and Greek religious cults only a few centuries before - waned. This can be seen for example in the sojourns of the Emperor Hadrian there. Another key element against this association would be the fact that the well established tradition of Hermes Trismegistus - that formed a node of mythological mystery literature that was considered a core text in both medieval alcemy and Renaissance neo-Platonic myticism - as a Egyptian sage specifically tied the Greek god Hermes with the Egyptian god Thoth, not Anubis. This association long being established before in antiquity.
@@forthrightgambitia1032 Yeah, but the Isis cult was also accepted by the romans, there even was a temple of Isis in Rome itself. All the stuff around Hermes Trismegistus is medieval esoterism mainly, not from an ancient tradition.
3:40 What??? Before they assimilated the Hellenistic influences, Romans had assimilated Etruscan influences into their native religions which included a fully formed pantheon of gods with humanistic forms, personalities, and representations. And while the earliest Roman 'tribal' religions are still being explored, we believe they had a more nature based ideology with ancestor worship elements.
In fact, in a way the video actually contradicts itself immediately by showing how they equated Roman gods to Greek gods.....how did they get these gods to equate in the first place? Where did they come from? Is this video suggesting that the Romans just took these gods from the Greeks and gave them Roman names? Why would they do this? I mean, why would they bother to change their names to Roman equivalents if they were so impressed that they bothered to embrace these Greeks gods in first place? They brought up Apollo, and the video actually points out that they didn't change Apollo's name. And this is a biggie. Why? Why didn't they change Apollo's name? The video suggested the theory that the Romans didn't change Apollo's name because they were familiar with him. However, that theory might be incorrect and in reality...the exact opposite for why they didn't change the name. What if the reason they didn't change his name was because they didn't have an Apollo in their religion already to equate to? What if they literally did just take him and add him to their religious line up of gods cause they liked him? And because they took him from a foreign source, they kept his name as is. And if they did that for Apollo, and some other notable gods, why not for all of them? Now in fairness to the video, I know they wanted to concentrate on the Greek influences on Roman religions. And that's fine, I will even agree with the majority of their video. But the statement they made here is a disservice to history as they kind of misrepresented early Roman regions and religious practices. This part of the video to a person who didn't know any better, might lead them to believe that before the adopting of some Greek influences, that the Romans didn't already have strong and developed religions with humanistic gods. The Romans did already have humanistic statues, dolls, and other imagery of their gods just like the Greeks. The Romans did have developed stories and myths about their gods just like the Greeks. And Rome did have both religious and cultural traditions developed around their religious beliefs and ideologies....just like Greeks.
@@nonbreapelido3549 Etruscan writing, Phoenicians mixed with a bit of Greek... Like... Latin. A local dialect within a linguistic set which has been able to evolve and become standardized.
Αnd actually from the Greeks they took christianity too, after some centuries, the holy mass was taking place in Romo in greek until the middle of the third century.
North Africa, and part of the near East, were Christian first. Like Carthage, Egypt, and Tyre. A number of ppl spread the word of the Cross. Not just Hellenes.
@@90skidcultist Christianity was spreading among the Greeks from the very first time of the apostolic years, all those areas that you mentioned were influenced and colonized heavenly, at least in urban areas, by Greeks and every cultural element in christianity after the final schism with the Jews was Greek. Greece herself and Minor Asia or Cyprus were among the first areas that were christianized even by apostles like Paul, Barnabas, Andrew, John the Beloved, Titus etc, saying that christianity in Rome initially was a greek matter it's not a hype, same for Gaul.
Thank you for another very interesting episode! I enjoyed the references to Troy in this one. I'm looking forward to the next entry on the topic. Stay well out there everybody, and God bless you, friends. ✝️ :)
The Greek god Ares was not much liked by the Greeks, because he represented the pure horror and destruction it brought. But Mars was a God of war that Roman soldiers would turn to for success in battle, and was also considered a protector of agricultural land.
back in the day od the tv shows hercules/xena ... there was a episode wherecthe gods where their opositive versions .. a mirror universe . so ares became the god of romance .. it was funny since him wear a pink outfit whilr being al buffed up like the rock in toothfairy when he wore the fairy tights
More precisely, Ares was despised by Athenians, probably because they had their own goddess of war. But other cities like Sparta had much more respect for Ares ^^
I think that most of the Greeks (well, the Athenians at least) did not like Ares because his personality and actions represented the brutal, horrific and uncontrollable nature of war. On the other hand, they like Athena because she represented the intelligent, strategic and honoring nature of it (for many Greek city states cultures it was wildly respected when someone fought for his people and even died doing so. Sparta actually kept telling the 300 story for centuries and used it as a brand for the morale of her army..). Of course, all of this is just a theory. A fascinating one though..
"... its striking resemblance to the 'Theogony' of the Greek poet Hesiod. There the Earth (Gaia) gives birth to Heaven (Uranos); then Uranos and Gaia together become the parents of Kronos and the Titans. Uranos hates his children and seeks to prevent their birth, but Kronos, incited by Gaia, emasculates his father with a sickle, and out of the blood which flows comes forth the Erinyes (Furies), the Giants, and the Melian nymphs, while Aphrodite is born from the foam what's arises when the severed member falls into the sea. Kronos and his wife Rhea then beget the Olympian gods, foremost among whom is Zeus. Kronos swallows all his children except Zeus, who is saved by the substitution of a stone which Kronos swallows instead of him. Zeus, on growing to manhood, forces Kronos to spit out the gods whom he has swallowed, and the stone, which comes out first, is set up as a cult-object at Pytho (Delphi). The poem ends with the Battle of the Gods and Titans and the final victory of the Olympians. Hesiod's sequence Uranus-Kronos-Zeus is matched in the hittite version by the sequence: Anu (Sumerian 'an'= heaven)- Kumarbi, father of the gods,- Weather-god, though Alalu in the Hittite version represent a still older generation unknown to Hesiod. The emasculation of the Sky-god occurs in both myths, though the motif of the swallowing and spitting out seems to have become attached to a different incident. In the broken part of the tablet there is some reference to Kumarbi eating and to a stone which may possibly correspond to the Pythian 'omphalos' of Hesiod's version; & it is probable that the Hittite myth ends with the victory of the Weather-god. These points of resemblance are enough to establish a strong probability that both versions derive ultimately from the same Hurrian myth. The 'Song of Ullikummi'..." [The Hittites, O. R. Gurney, 1966, Ch. VIII. LITERATURE; §. Myths, Legends, & Romance, p. 190-191]
7:20: The Greek Gods also took on war aspects in like practically every part of the Roman pantheon. For example Venus becomes not just the Goddess of love, but also the Goddess of victory.
This is a bit of an offshoot but in mythology, there was a bargain between Zeus, Hera and Aeneas. If I recall correctly, Hera was angry that Aeneas was spared so she kept diverting Aeneas course and constantly endangering his crew. So much so that Aeneas pleaded to the gods and in turn Zeus and Hera agreed under the condition that he would change the names of the gods.
@@moutsatsosa It's not "ash", it's like "us". The name Aeneas has been directly adopted from Latin, and it is pronounced in English the same way it is pronounced in Ecclesiastical Latin. In Classical Latin, the "Ae" in "Aeneas" was pronounced as "Ai", instead of "Eh".
"It was the twenty-fourth evening of December, the eve of the winter solstice--the eve of the birth of Mithras; and quite soon now, in camps and forts wherever the Eagles flew, men would be gathering to his worship. In the outposts and the little frontier forts the gatherings would be mere handfuls, but in the great Legionary Stations there would be full caves of a hundred men. Last year, at Isca, he had been one of them, newly initiated at the bull-slaying, the brand of the Raven Degree still raw between his brows." [The Eagle of the Ninth, Rosemary Sutcliff, 1954]
The Romans apart from the Iliad and Aeneas, they associated at their mythological origins of Rome, Evander of Pallantium. In Roman mythology, Evander (from Greek Εὔανδρος Euandros, "good man" or "strong man": an etymology used by poets to emphasize the hero's virtue)[1] was a culture hero from Arcadia, Greece, who was said to have brought the Greek pantheon, laws, and alphabet to Italy, where he founded the city of Pallantium on the future site of Palatine Hill, Rome, sixty years before the Trojan War. He instituted the festival of the Lupercalia. Evander was deified after his death and an altar was constructed to him on the Aventine Hill. Later Roman Emperors excepted from taxis the birth city of Evander in Arcadia, as tribute of honour to him.
This was not a very common origin theory in ancient Rome. Most ancient Romans believed that they came from Romulus and Remus. There was also the Trojan theory favored by some of the Roman elite, like Constantine I "the Great". Hardly any Romans believed that they were Greeks.
@Βασιλεία τῶν Ῥωμαῖων I' m not saying that the Romans considered themselves Greeks. I' m just saying that they tried to associate themselves to the Greek world. Evander is a good example of this attempt, who also plays a major role in Virgil's Aeneid Books VIII-XII. Previous to the Trojan War, Evander gathered a group of native Latins to a city he founded in Italy near the Tiber river, which he named Pallantium.[6] Virgil states that he named the city in honour of his Arcadian ancestor, Pallas, although Pausanias, Livy[7] and Dionysius of Halicarnassus[8] say that originally Evander's birth city was Pallantium in Arcadia, after which he named the new city. The reasons for Evander's fleeing his homeland are unclear; Ovid states that Evander had angered the Gods and had been sent into exile by way of a trial; Dionysius describes a civil unrest in Arcadia which led to Evander and his people being forced to leave; the commentator Servius, however, recounts that Evander's mother persuaded him to murder his father, Hermes, leading to the pair being banished from Arcadia, although other commentators have it that Evander killed his mother. Evander settled in Pallantium where it is said he killed the three-souled Erulus, the king of Italy, three times in one day, prior to becoming the most powerful King of Italy. The oldest tradition of its founding ascribes to Evander the erection of the Great Altar of Hercules in the Forum Boarium. In Aeneid, VIII, where Aeneas and his crew first come upon Evander and his people, they were venerating Hercules for dispatching the giant Cacus. Virgil's listeners would have related this scene to the same Great Altar of Hercules in the Forum Boarium of their own day, one detail among many in the Aeneid that Virgil used to link the heroic past of myth with the Age of Augustus. Also according to Virgil, Hercules was returning from Gades with Geryon's cattle when Evander entertained him. Evander then became the first to raise an altar to Hercules' heroism. This archaic altar was destroyed in the Great Fire of Rome, AD 64.
@@pseudomonas03 I misunderstood what you meant. There were attempts to tie together the Greeks and Latins. 1) The myth of Evander. In Latin mythology, Latinus was the brother of Graecus and also Pandora. 2) The theory that Latin was a dialect of Greek by Dionysius of Helicarnassus. This theory is incorrect and was not widely acknowledged by ancient circles, but is now seen as an attempt to syncretize Greco-Latin factions of antiquity. 3) Roman propaganda claiming that Alexander was a Roman emperor. Anatolians started believing that Alexander was a Roman as early as 1st century AD. 4) Incorporation of Greco-Roman religious continuity, transferring over even after the switch to Christianity 5) Romans learning Greek, borrowing Greek customs. Greeks borrowed some elements of Latin culture, this ancient cross-culturization can still be noted in Greece and Italy today. 6) Transferring Roman infrastructure to Hellenized Anatolia by Diocletian. This was essentially the beginning of "Eastern Rome". 7) Foundation of Nova Roma by Constantine the Great on Greek-speaking lands. Constantine's goal was more thoroughly to romanize the Greek-speaking parts of the Roman Empire. Granting of Roman citizenship to everyone helped, Roman institutions in the East instilled Roman identity into peoples who were not originally Romans. 8) Latin colonies built in key parts of Greece and western Asia Minor As Georgius Acropolites of Constantinople states in his memoirs, "the Italians and the Greeks were different nations in the past. Now they are both Roman because they have adopted a common culture, common ideals and common religion."
Because Romulus and Remus were the decedents of Aeneas, a Trojan adventurer (see Virgil) and that is the direct Greek God connection. Short, sweet and simple.
Given that both Romulus, Remus and Aeneas are fictionnal characters, I'm not sure it's a real explanation ^^' No, latins are not descendants from Hittites chased from Minor Asia by the Greeks XD
It’s probably not something kings and generals would do but I think it would be cool to see you guys do a video on the Jewish history and beliefs and the traditions they had.
Finally!!! 👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻 well done! Rome was mainly a military state. Philosophy, literature, religion, architecture, theatre, arts… etc were adopted by Hellas🇬🇷 Then, based on our myths they created their own and claimed mythological origin for themselves (the example of Aeneas of Troy to be the founder of Rome).
I think the way Romans dealt with Gods really worked; absorb the conquered pantheon into your own, keep religion free but still have tribute. I think that's why there wasn't much religious strife in the empire, we might do to have the same way of thinking in 2022.
Freer than lots of societies today. And for Christians no, but what about all the dozens of other faiths that still could believe in their gods? Britons and Germans and Greeks and Africans? They were still able to have their gods
@@jonbaxter2254 Because their GodS can still be seen as the same as there GodS. If I'm not wrong the Romans tried this to the Christians too but the people got angry and they thought that they chose the wrong God from their pantheon to represent the Christian God. Monotheistic is just different and times were changing too.
Very reasonable ! We know that the Romans made the most of spreading Christianity but on the purpose of unification of masses ! For better good , abandoning decadency of Pagan World ! The other subject is that Pagan world was long time in oblivion even if we say Helenism was advanced culture ! If we see how people were not latinised by force , even Slav inhabitant were approved with Cirilic letterwriting and spreading to Central and Eastern Europe calling it Moravian mission ! For Roman Empire we cannot say that it was colonising power , for a better future of Rom itself ! I wish if they had stud untill today ! But Otoman Empire was unconvinian if they know how Cristianity was optained and Renaisanse of European cuture was achieved . Look how they took advantage of Roman Empire ramparting ! Still today it cannot be recovered because of a great influence and ongoing attacs from South !
To be fair the roman calendar was functional. The only problem was that it required someone to add new days to keep in sync with the sun. That role was given to the Pontifex Maximus, who decided to go in campaign for several years, hence the big unsync with the solar year XD Basically, Caesar caused the problem, then came with a solution :p
But his solution was better than the original one. It no longer required some dude to correct the calendar. It had a fixed system in place that perscribed when to add corrections. Although they got the 365.25 part a bit wrong and that's why you have to skip 3 leap years every 400 years. And that's where pope Pope Gregory XIII came in. So I guess Caesar only fixed the problem for about 1500 years. Then another Pontifex Maximus had to step in and correct his system a bit.
My favorite is greco-buddhism which is arguably a bigger cultural impact. Shame about the statues in afghanistan that got blown up but there are a lot of really cool stuff the greeks influenced and they brought back from india a ton of stuff too. Herakles as Buddha's bodyguard Vajra is a cool bit of syncretism.
Romans did not adopt greek Gods. Their gods and worship were similar to the greek Gods and their worship. Hence it was easier for both peoples to get along.
11:54_No 'separation of 'Church and State'..much like Judaism of antiquity..Religion, politics and commerce were like a trinity..😂..Even Roman camps/fortresses had a strongroom in the HQ building (principia)..it was like a shrine where they kept the armies funds and their legionary standards including; Aquila, Vexillum, Signum and Imago (which was a sacred image of the emperor).
I would have loved it if you mentioned that the name Jupiter derives directly from Zeus. Father Zeus/"Zeus pater" (translating to somethig like "heavenly father")* simply became Jupiter. Zeus also was pronounced in Greek somewhat like [Dzeus] and Jupiter [Djupiter] by the Romans. *Zeus as well as the Latin "deus" derive from the old Indoeuropean word "deiwos", meaning somithing like heaven or (bright) sky
They were Latins. From Lazio. Before the empire the romans viewed the greeks as an enemy civilization in Italy and the greeks called the romans "barbarians". the historical reality. The greek colonies was only in the in some city of south of Italy with other local italian civilization. Flavius Claudius Iulianus was educated in the province of Macedonia and he was a great admirer of the hellenistc culture. The emperor Iulians he was a fanatic enough to restore pagan religions against Christianity. A civilization with another language that become great, more sophisticated, ruler of the world, incorporated the Hellenic culture giving itself a religion of heterogeneous origin and a mythology similar to those of the greek mythology. As like the globalization today.
It is good to dream, but when a dream becomes a crazy fantasy, Aoki Aoki, it is best not to dream at all. The original Romans, the ones in Latium were not of Greek stock. They were Latins. I wonder what you have to say to the fact that the "Byzantines" or eastern Romans were calling themselves Ausones, which basically means Italian.
@@legioromanaxvii7644 Eastern Romans had anti Latin and italic ideals, they literally took out all the Italians traders in Constantinople, to eastern Rome Latins were barbars through and through, they didn’t call themselves Italians because they had nothing to do with the same people who lost to them during WW2.
"The tradition that Romulus & Remus were suckled by a wolf in a dark recess on the side of the Aventine Hill which was swallowed by an overhanging grove, rendered this spot scared in the eyes of the Romans. Here was formerly celebrated the festival of the Lupercalia in honour of the god Pan, & riotous & lavacious scenes were annually witnessed there. After Rome became Christian this festival was celebrated even until the end of the Fifth century. In the course of the centuries, that sylvan spot became covered with the stately buildings of the Forum, the seat of justice of Imperial Rome. Tacitus mentions the Lucus Asyli, or the grove of the Asylum, because Romulus, wishing to gather foreigners into his new State, made a sanctuary there. It was situated between the two rocks of the Capitoline Hill, & now the Piazza del Campidoglio occupies its site. On one of the rocks the temple of Jupiter Capitoline was built, & on the other that of Feretrian Jove*." [The Forest: In Folklore & Mythology, Alexander Porteous, 1928/2002, p. 67-68](*John Dryden)
In contradistinction to a Julian, an Alexander Severus, a Marcus Aurelius and even a Hadrian, who felt themselves more Greek than Latin, Justinian wished to be a Latin Roman Emperor. He was confirmed in these feelings by his horror of Hellen ism. A Roman Emperor, Justinian was also a Christian Emperor. He considered himself the pillar of the Christian orthodox faith. The Hellenic spirit is profoundly pagan and Justinian abominated it. For him, as for his contem poraries and successors, Hellene was synonymous with pagan and to call anyone by this term was to insult him. The Greek peoples themselves assumed the name Pauaio (Romans). Even to-day Romios is still used by the common people. Hellene is an artificial term revived in the nineteenth century. The capital of the Empire is called Roum by the Arab and Turkish peoples of Asia. Lot, F., 2013. End of the Ancient World. Routledge.
Hello Khights and generals could you make a video on Mohammed the Arab prophet, or a video of the Roman general Lucio Marcio Settimo who fought against Hannibal during the second Punic war in North of Spain please?? Bye and have a good day Khinghts and generals.
No, Πλούτων (in Greek _Ploútōn,_ lit. “Wealthy One”) was one of the chief epithets of Hades, PLVTO was simply the Latinized form; Dīs Pater was the Latin deity equivalent to him. The same is true of Dionysos, BACCHVS was merely the Latinization of his chief epithet Bakkhos, *Liber* (else called Liber Pater) was the Latin god with whom he was syncretized.
I would say that the video might be misleading: they didn't "adopted" the greek gods, they "adapted" them, since the ancient religions usually considered other people's gods as different versions of their own.
![Felix "Unfair" | [Stray Kids : SKZ-PLAYER]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/Oswujxm2Ag0/mqdefault.jpg)
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In contradistinction to a Julian, an Alexander Severus, a Marcus Aurelius and even a Hadrian, who felt themselves more Greek than Latin, Justinian wished to be a Latin Roman Emperor. He was confirmed in these feelings by his horror of Hellen ism. A Roman Emperor, Justinian was also a Christian Emperor. He considered himself the pillar of the Christian orthodox faith. The Hellenic spirit is profoundly pagan and Justinian abominated it. For him, as for his contem poraries and successors, Hellene was synonymous with pagan and to call anyone by this term was to insult him. The Greek peoples themselves assumed the name Pauaio (Romans). Even to-day Romios is still used by the common people. Hellene is an artificial term revived in the nineteenth century. The capital of the Empire is called Roum by the Arab and Turkish peoples of Asia.
Lot, F., 2013. End of the Ancient World. Routledge.
Is the Ukraine vedio available
3:40 What??? Before they assimilated the Hellenistic influences, Romans had assimilated Etruscan influences into their native religions which included a fully formed pantheon of gods with humanistic forms, personalities, and representations. And while the earliest Roman 'tribal' religions are still being explored, we believe they had a more nature based ideology with ancestor worship elements.
What sources do you use for Roman myth and religion?
Isn't Pluto the roman version of Hades?
5:19 *Fun fact:* Speaking of Castor and Pollux, many citizens of Rome considered blasphemous and intolerable that Emperor Caligula, who had proclaimed himself a God, desecrated the pavilion of the two gods by creating a tunnel to the Palace between the two statues of the siblings, which made Castor and Pollux look like mere ornaments rather than holy figures to be worshipped. This controversy motivated the Praetorians to kill Caligula and his family.
@@caesar2514 Nope, it’s the right video.
That one time when the Praetorians killed the right Emperor.
@@firstnamelastname4249 But what they did to his family was completely immoral. In fact, Caligula's daughter had her head smashed against a wall. If you ask me, the rightest Emperor killed by the Praetorians was Elagabalus
@@TetsuShima
Yeah, murder of children is always an evil act, I agree
Can we have a video of how the Romans look at Alexander and the impact of Alexander to roman culture
And yes I'm referring to Alexander the great
Yes, please!
The idea of citizenship was firstly applied by Alexander
Yes please 🙏
And a Maori one
If I am not wrong Caesar revered him.
Reminds me of the saying, "Romans arms conquered Greece but Greek culture conquered Rome."
Throw in Carthage and lets make us-a triangulation
Greeks copied Egypt
@@EIiKatz I Know right? Some may even call it "poetic justice."
The Romans already essentially had the “Greek” gods. Or, more accurately, the same Indo-European gods the Greeks worshipped. Since all Indi-European peoples share a common origin in the original Indo-European tribes around the Black and Caspian seas (4500-3500BC) most of their core pantheon remained common to all of them. As they migrated out of the core homeland over time and eventually became Celts, Tocharians, Germanics, Balts, Slavs etc. they did pick up various new gods from the non-Indo-European peoples they encountered along the way. But the core Indi-European gods remained the same. It’s only differences in dialect as the various Indo-European languages evolved separately over time that cause the names of those gods to sound different. For instance, the original chief Indo-European god was “Deus Pitar” (sky father). The Greek tribes simply referred to him as “Zeus”, dropping the following “father” part. The Romans included the “father” part and referred to him as Jiu-Pitar. Jupiter.
Best comment.
@@gordonbryce there is the theory that Italic Languages and Celtic languages split from what was called proto Italo Celtic, which itself split from proto indo european
I love historical parallels and ironies. Like the fact the city of Rome was started by a Romulus and ended with a Romulus. In this case, Greek slaves gave the Romans their pantheon. And then gave them Christianity the same way.
Rome love parallels like that, as the last roman emperor of Constantinople was Constantin too ^^
Parallels or intersections? In the meta-cartesian sense lmao
It's not actually a historical parallel when you consider the fact that Romulus is considered to be mythological.
@@chronikhiles yeah and if he ever did exist, he didn't found rome and existed during the proto indo european times. He is the first man who sacrificed his giant twin brother to deus pater.
@@chronikhiles so was jesus, so it still kinda works lol
"This god has civilized, by the agency of the Greek colonies, the greatest part of the habitable globe; he has prepared it the more readily to submit to the Romans----a race possessing not merely a Grecian origin, but also Greek, and who have established and maintained a creed as regards the gods that is thoroughly Greek from, beginning to end; and who, besides all this, have founded a form of government in no way inferior to that of the best regulated states----even if of all the governments that have ever been tried, it be not the very best; from all which circumstances, I think I have myself recognized the Roman state as being Greek both in its origin and in its government.
Emperor Julian.
?
genuinely love your work. easily one of the best channels on youtube
In India, we still have temples dedicated to Brihaspati (Jupiter).
Every 12 years, In India we also celebrate Jupiters rotation around the Sun, thru the Maha Kumbh Mela.
Brihaspati was first mentioned in the Rigveda (Book 4, hymn 50, it is way older than Jupiter of the Romans and predates it by several centuries (even before Alexander's invasion). It is not uncommon for Civilizations to develop their own pantheons and knowledge systems independently, so one can easily say that Brihaspati and Jupiter have no connection though they represent the same celestial entity.
@@libshastra Except both pantheons have the same protoindoeuropean origin.
@@americaeaustraliaepius4338north india is a piece of greco-roman mediterranean civilization in south asia then.
@@jasonmuniz-contreras6630 Yes
You are one of the best RUclipsr and I'm French and they are plenty of excellent French podcasters about history; well done you are the best actually
Great topic, I can't believe how consistently you guys deliver
I absolutely love this channel, some quality work right here.
I am waiting for the episode about the cult of Isis and Serapis in Rome! Apparently, the Roman Serapeum was an impressive building!💜
Yes ISIS was the most Famous one. loved
Curtis Ryan Woodside documentary about her
Same, and indeed it was!.
The Greeks are indeed the most iconic culture on earth. Love your videos about Greece, keep it up !
@@Deepak_Dhakad india is also very diverse and interesting. Greeks and Indians share very common culture and language.
@@Deepak_Dhakad Given it’s not one ethic country but a giant region of different cultures and religions it makes sense, Greece was more centralized than India. That doesn’t make the “Indians” any better.
@@Deepak_Dhakad Tiny yet somehow more influential and know than the so called “India” and you aren’t the same people by far actually, that would be like Scandinavia, Britain and Germany uniting to be some kind of Germanic republic, they aren’t the same people either.
@@ChronosHellas Lol, all of Europe are pretty much different shades of the same stock genetically, much less diverse than India is. Scandinavia, Britain and Germany together would be like one of the Northern states, Uttar Pradesh perhaps. Yet India manages to integrate its diverse culture or cultures into one nation without killing each other as often as Europeans do.
Fustel de Coulanges (Ancient City)
Concerning the origin of the divinities:
"Still the elements which could be deified were not very numerous. The sun which gives fecundity, the earth which nourishes, the clouds, by turns beneficent and destructive - such were the different powers of which they could make gods. But from each one of these elements thousands of gods were created; because the same physical agent, viewed under different aspects, received from men different names. The sun, for example, was called in one place Hercules (the glorious); in another, Phoebus (the shining); and still again Apollo (he who drives away night or evil); one called him Hyperion (the elevated Being); another, Alexicacos (the beneficent); and in the course of time groups of men, who had given these various names to the brilliant luminary, no longer saw that they had the same god.
Indeed, each man adored but a very small number of divinities; but the gods of one were not those of another. The names, it is true, might resemble each other; many men might separately have given their god the name of Apollo, or of Hercules; these words belonged to the common language, and were merely adjectives, and designated the divine Being by one or another of his most prominent attributes”
The repetition of names to different divinities:
“The same name often conceals very different divinities. Poseidon Hippius, Poseidon Phytalmius, the Erechthean Poseidon, the Ægean Poseidon, the Heliconian Poseidon, were different gods, who had neither the same attributes nor the same worshippers.”
The lack of universality of protecting divinities:
"We may recall the saying of a certain Greek, whose city adored the hero Alabandos; he was speaking to an inhabitant of another city, that worshipped Hercules. 'Alabandos,' said he, 'is a god, and Hercules is not one.' With such ideas it was important, in a treaty of peace, that each city called its own gods to bear witness to its oaths. 'We made a treaty, and poured out the libations,' said the Plataeans to the Spartans; 'we called to witness, you the gods of your fathers, we the gods who occupy our country.' Both parties tried, indeed, if it was possible, to invoke divinities that were common to both cities. They swore by those gods that were visible everywhere - the sun, which shines upon all, and the nourishing earth. But the gods of each city, and its protecting heroes, touched men much more, and it was necessary to call them to witness, if men wished to have oaths really confirmed by religion."
"In the legend of the Trojan war we see a Pallas who fights for the Greeks, and there is among the Trojans another Pallas, who receives their worship and protects her worshippers. Would any one say that it was the same divinity who figured in both armies? Certainly not; for the ancients did not attribute the gift of ubiquity to their gods. The cities of Argos and Samos had each a Here Polias, but it was not the same goddess, for she was represented in the two cities with very different attributes. There was at Rome a Juno; at a distance of five leagues, the city of Veii had another. So little were they the same divinity that we see the dictator Camillus, while besieging Veii, address himself to the Juno of the enemy, to induce her to abandon the Etruscan city and pass into his camp. When he is master of the city, he takes the statue, well persuaded that he gains possession of the goddess at the same time, and devoutly transports it to Rome. From that time Rome had two protecting Junos. There is a similar history, a few years later, of a Jupiter that another dictator took from Praeneste, though at that time Rome already had three or four of them at home."
The exclusivity of divinities:
"The city which possessed a divinity of its own did not wish strangers to be protected by it, or to adore it. More commonly a temple was accessible only to citizens. The Argives alone had the right to enter the temple of Hera at Argos. To enter that of Athene at Athens, one had to be an Athenian. The Romans who adored two Junos at home could not enter the temple of a third Juno, who was in the little city of Lanuvium."
That universal and external cults were secondary to personal religion:
"A man had no chance to choose his belief. He must believe and submit to the
religion of the city. He could hate and despise the gods of the neighboring city. As to the divinities of a general and universal character, like Jupiter, or Cybele, or Juno, he was free to believe or not to believe in them, but it would not do to entertain doubts about Athene Polias, or Erechtheus, or Cecrops. That would have been grave impiety, which would have endangered religion and the state at the same time, and which the state would have severely punished. Socrates was put to death for this crime."
This is good but somehow misses that some of these conflated gods were literally the same god to begin with. Both Greece and Rome inherited much of their mythology from older Indo-European myths, as did many of the PIE daughter cultures, and Rome was heavily influenced by Greece not just later in history but from its absolute very beginnings, with Alba Longa almost definitely drawing settlers from Greece or Grecian colonies and later providing much of the original Roman colonial stock in turn. Zeus and Jupiter didn't get conflated, they were just different names for the same guy (Zeus-Pater[father]->Jupiter) with enough generations of separate mythological evolution to differentiate the two states' popular image thereof. That's why they could be mashed back together with great ease.
Yes, Celtic and Germanic pantheons were similar to Roman and Greek pantheons for the reasons you outlined, but with greater divergence.
No, they were not the same guy, it would be saying like italian and french are the same language because they both came from latin ^^'
There's parallels between the two, but after centuries of evolution, they had differences. In fact, even after the syncretism, the gods had differences XD
Muad'Dib
Very well said. The title of this video is misleading. The Romans adopted some bits of Greek mythology, not Greek gods. The Romans had their own gods. They only adopted a few, like Apollo. This is not unusual in and of itself; ancient peoples, even the Greeks, borrowed foreign gods and added them to their own pantheons.
What romans adopted and adapted was not the Gods but the mythology.
No, Jupiter was different from Zeus. I can't believe Philhellenes are still around.
Christian Orthodox people belonged to the millet-i Rum, and progressively, Greek became the dominant means of communication amongst the members of the millet, who were called by others and were calling themselves. Romioi. Interestingly, the term 'Hellene' still signified for most people the pagan classical tradition, and it was a term that especially the clergy was keen to eliminate. Certain evocations of the term 'Hellene' by Byzantine scholars (e.g. in the twelfth century) contained some elements of contemporary ethnic identification, but it never acquired widespread currency, it never really "caught" on' (Beaton 2007: 93).
Boys-Stones, G., Graziosi, B. and Vasunia, P., n.d. The Oxford handbook of Hellenic studies. p.21
A second way that Robert establishes the moral superiority of the French over and against the Greeks is by framing the French, rather than the Byzantines, as the true Romans. On this score, it is important to note that the very naming of the Byzantines as "Greek" was an explicit rejection of the Byzantine claim that they were "Roman"-as noted in the introduc tion, the people we call Byzantines never employed the term Byzantine (it is a modern categorization), never used the Latin Graecus, and only began to employ the Greek word "Hellene" around the time of the Fourth Cru sade. Rather, they almost always self-identified as Romans." Robert not only rejects their Roman identity by referring to them as Graeci, he re peatedly asserts that it is the French, not the Byzantines, who adhere to the "law of Rome."
Demacopoulos., 2019. Colonizing Christianity: Greek and Latin Religious Identity in the Era of the Fourth Crusade (Orthodox Christianity and Contemporary Thought) 1st Edition.. New York, N.Y.: Fordham University Press, p.18.
Barbarian
As always thanks for the video
Another amazingly interesting video.. Kings and Generals,you're rocking it!
Many times in the video, they refer to the "expected benefits" from a sacrifice. A common misconception of polytheistic faiths is that if you give a sacrifice, the Gods would be forced to give you whatever you want. The Romans and Greeks thought it would be an act of great hubris to demand a reward.
Instead, look at it like a gifting cycle of reciprocity. Practitioners would give offerings out of love, like a tithe, and should not expect anything in return (to demand something in return would be impure). The Gods help with rain, harvest, the State, personal matters because they believed the Gods loved them too. Thus, you have gifts and blessings back and forth, establishing "Kharis".
Source: The Republic by Plato, The Iliad & the Odyssey by Homer, the Homeric Hymns, and Orphic Theogony
@@moutsatsosa Well said brother
"Jupiter", like "Zeus", is derived from the Proto-Indo-European "Dyeus Phter", literally, "Sky Father". So Jupiter didn't become a sky god due to syncretism with Zeus; rather, both were, at their origin, sky gods.
Word
Also called Dyuspitar (if I remember correctly), amongst other names, in sanskrit
@@moutsatsosa Sounds more like pseudoscience and pathetic modern nationalism... still, Zeus unifier is certainly one of His epithets, so...
@Historia It doesn't, it's just modern nationalism...
@@moutsatsosa It's "Buenos Días" And Día precisely refers to day, specifically daylight. The sky, the day, and the ruler God are the three main fatures of Dyeus Phter, which is why IE sky Gods tend to be Gods of the day, and ruler Gods
It's fascinating with Greeks living in the Italian peninsula & Sicily not only influenced the Romans. But trained Romans, hence there were Roman Hoplites in the Roman Kingdom until the use of the Triarii and legion.
So what's next? The views of the Romans toward the Ancient Egyptian Gods? I would love to see. Really, I mean it.
It's an interesting subject, temples to Egyptian Gods were not unknown in the empire especially Seraphis (a dual god). There are (somewhat scary) classical statues of Anubis as a dogheaded man.
@Bransford There were IIRC several actually, some more syncretic with Greek Gods than others.
In Gaul and Britannia Celtic-Roman melts were important to.
@@forthrightgambitia1032 Because both Anubis and Hermes represent the same role of psychopomp, therefore is normal for the romans under Interpretatio to say "Anubis is just Mercury/Hermes so it's valid to worship Anubis"
@@americaeaustraliaepius4338 Some Romans may have seen him that way, but others who belong to the Isis mystery cult would have seen him as an important distinct figure, a blood relation to Isis herself. His image was extremely common in archaelogical finds from the Roman era, and the satirist Lucian even penned some lines mocking his popularity, so there must have been some reason this god became so ubiquitous throughout the Roman empire whilst other similar gods that were held as different forms of Roman Gods from other parts of the empire were localised or forgotten. At least part of it was that Egypt was (even before the Roman empire - see Plato's Theaetetus) regarded as a site of mysticis and ancient wisdom and the religious imagery from Egypt as having some kind of symbolic "spiritualism" that became popular as belief in the traditional Roman gods - who themselves had been heavily altered by Etruscan and Greek religious cults only a few centuries before - waned. This can be seen for example in the sojourns of the Emperor Hadrian there.
Another key element against this association would be the fact that the well established tradition of Hermes Trismegistus - that formed a node of mythological mystery literature that was considered a core text in both medieval alcemy and Renaissance neo-Platonic myticism - as a Egyptian sage specifically tied the Greek god Hermes with the Egyptian god Thoth, not Anubis. This association long being established before in antiquity.
@@forthrightgambitia1032 Yeah, but the Isis cult was also accepted by the romans, there even was a temple of Isis in Rome itself.
All the stuff around Hermes Trismegistus is medieval esoterism mainly, not from an ancient tradition.
3:40 What??? Before they assimilated the Hellenistic influences, Romans had assimilated Etruscan influences into their native religions which included a fully formed pantheon of gods with humanistic forms, personalities, and representations. And while the earliest Roman 'tribal' religions are still being explored, we believe they had a more nature based ideology with ancestor worship elements.
We must also remember that Rome was a minor Etruscan city before the republic...
In fact, in a way the video actually contradicts itself immediately by showing how they equated Roman gods to Greek gods.....how did they get these gods to equate in the first place? Where did they come from? Is this video suggesting that the Romans just took these gods from the Greeks and gave them Roman names? Why would they do this? I mean, why would they bother to change their names to Roman equivalents if they were so impressed that they bothered to embrace these Greeks gods in first place? They brought up Apollo, and the video actually points out that they didn't change Apollo's name. And this is a biggie.
Why? Why didn't they change Apollo's name?
The video suggested the theory that the Romans didn't change Apollo's name because they were familiar with him. However, that theory might be incorrect and in reality...the exact opposite for why they didn't change the name. What if the reason they didn't change his name was because they didn't have an Apollo in their religion already to equate to? What if they literally did just take him and add him to their religious line up of gods cause they liked him? And because they took him from a foreign source, they kept his name as is. And if they did that for Apollo, and some other notable gods, why not for all of them?
Now in fairness to the video, I know they wanted to concentrate on the Greek influences on Roman religions. And that's fine, I will even agree with the majority of their video. But the statement they made here is a disservice to history as they kind of misrepresented early Roman regions and religious practices. This part of the video to a person who didn't know any better, might lead them to believe that before the adopting of some Greek influences, that the Romans didn't already have strong and developed religions with humanistic gods. The Romans did already have humanistic statues, dolls, and other imagery of their gods just like the Greeks. The Romans did have developed stories and myths about their gods just like the Greeks. And Rome did have both religious and cultural traditions developed around their religious beliefs and ideologies....just like Greeks.
@@nonbreapelido3549 Etruscan writing, Phoenicians mixed with a bit of Greek... Like... Latin.
A local dialect within a linguistic set which has been able to evolve and become standardized.
The last king of Etruscans was a Greek
@@michaelguay-lachapelle4546 latin is not greek
Very informative!
Αnd actually from the Greeks they took christianity too, after some centuries, the holy mass was taking place in Romo in greek until the middle of the third century.
North Africa, and part of the near East, were Christian first. Like Carthage, Egypt, and Tyre. A number of ppl spread the word of the Cross. Not just Hellenes.
@@90skidcultist Christianity was spreading among the Greeks from the very first time of the apostolic years, all those areas that you mentioned were influenced and colonized heavenly, at least in urban areas, by Greeks and every cultural element in christianity after the final schism with the Jews was Greek. Greece herself and Minor Asia or Cyprus were among the first areas that were christianized even by apostles like Paul, Barnabas, Andrew, John the Beloved, Titus etc, saying that christianity in Rome initially was a greek matter it's not a hype, same for Gaul.
"every cultural element in christianity after the final schism with the Jews was Greek."
Tell that to the Knanayas.
@@goodday2760 Knanayas...who even are they?
I like how HBO’s Rome also featured some of this, like mentioning Dis, or making a prayer and burying the sacrifice
I love this channel. 💟💟💟
Kings and generals (Hi Devin) you make me feel happy with every video. Thank you.
Fantastic video keep it up your doing amazing job
Thank you for another very interesting episode! I enjoyed the references to Troy in this one. I'm looking forward to the next entry on the topic.
Stay well out there everybody, and God bless you, friends. ✝️ :)
Love your videos so much!!! Thank you for all of this quality content.
Yes. I reached Early enough to have a request. Can you guys talk more of the late Bronze Age collapse?
The Greek god Ares was not much liked by the Greeks, because he represented the pure horror and destruction it brought. But Mars was a God of war that Roman soldiers would turn to for success in battle, and was also considered a protector of agricultural land.
back in the day od the tv shows hercules/xena ... there was a episode wherecthe gods where their opositive versions .. a mirror universe . so ares became the god of romance .. it was funny since him wear a pink outfit whilr being al buffed up like the rock in toothfairy when he wore the fairy tights
Greek soldiers similarly turned to Ares..
More precisely, Ares was despised by Athenians, probably because they had their own goddess of war. But other cities like Sparta had much more respect for Ares ^^
I think that most of the Greeks (well, the Athenians at least) did not like Ares because his personality and actions represented the brutal, horrific and uncontrollable nature of war. On the other hand, they like Athena because she represented the intelligent, strategic and honoring nature of it (for many Greek city states cultures it was wildly respected when someone fought for his people and even died doing so. Sparta actually kept telling the 300 story for centuries and used it as a brand for the morale of her army..). Of course, all of this is just a theory. A fascinating one though..
Smaller local variations were the norm in every corner of Greek polytheism
Beautifully made for such a complex subject!
This is so wonderful. Thank You
"... its striking resemblance to the 'Theogony' of the Greek poet Hesiod. There the Earth (Gaia) gives birth to Heaven (Uranos); then Uranos and Gaia together become the parents of Kronos and the Titans. Uranos hates his children and seeks to prevent their birth, but Kronos, incited by Gaia, emasculates his father with a sickle, and out of the blood which flows comes forth the Erinyes (Furies), the Giants, and the Melian nymphs, while Aphrodite is born from the foam what's arises when the severed member falls into the sea. Kronos and his wife Rhea then beget the Olympian gods, foremost among whom is Zeus. Kronos swallows all his children except Zeus, who is saved by the substitution of a stone which Kronos swallows instead of him. Zeus, on growing to manhood, forces Kronos to spit out the gods whom he has swallowed, and the stone, which comes out first, is set up as a cult-object at Pytho (Delphi). The poem ends with the Battle of the Gods and Titans and the final victory of the Olympians.
Hesiod's sequence Uranus-Kronos-Zeus is matched in the hittite version by the sequence: Anu (Sumerian 'an'= heaven)- Kumarbi, father of the gods,- Weather-god, though Alalu in the Hittite version represent a still older generation unknown to Hesiod. The emasculation of the Sky-god occurs in both myths, though the motif of the swallowing and spitting out seems to have become attached to a different incident. In the broken part of the tablet there is some reference to Kumarbi eating and to a stone which may possibly correspond to the Pythian 'omphalos' of Hesiod's version; & it is probable that the Hittite myth ends with the victory of the Weather-god. These points of resemblance are enough to establish a strong probability that both versions derive ultimately from the same Hurrian myth.
The 'Song of Ullikummi'..."
[The Hittites, O. R. Gurney, 1966, Ch. VIII. LITERATURE; §. Myths, Legends, & Romance, p. 190-191]
Basically Ancient Romans were "bro let me copy your homework I promise I will change it a bit" version of the ancient world.
@@wormchampion9893 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
@@wormchampion9893 not really
What a way to start my Birthday weekend
Your birthday was last weekend.
i love greco-roman history
Wonderful video!
I'd love to hear more about the ancient Roman god Janus, if there's any material out there that is lol
7:20: The Greek Gods also took on war aspects in like practically every part of the Roman pantheon. For example Venus becomes not just the Goddess of love, but also the Goddess of victory.
@@moutsatsosa It's not uncommon for Gods to share the same portfolio, like Ares and Athena being Gods of war.
This is a bit of an offshoot but in mythology, there was a bargain between Zeus, Hera and Aeneas. If I recall correctly, Hera was angry that Aeneas was spared so she kept diverting Aeneas course and constantly endangering his crew. So much so that Aeneas pleaded to the gods and in turn Zeus and Hera agreed under the condition that he would change the names of the gods.
@@moutsatsosa It's not "ash", it's like "us". The name Aeneas has been directly adopted from Latin, and it is pronounced in English the same way it is pronounced in Ecclesiastical Latin. In Classical Latin, the "Ae" in "Aeneas" was pronounced as "Ai", instead of "Eh".
@@moutsatsosa Sow yor seying thet inglish shud bi ritn th wey its pronaunsd?
Zeus and Hera? Don’t you mean Iupiter and Iuno? (Latin had no J)
"It was the twenty-fourth evening of December, the eve of the winter solstice--the eve of the birth of Mithras; and quite soon now, in camps and forts wherever the Eagles flew, men would be gathering to his worship. In the outposts and the little frontier forts the gatherings would be mere handfuls, but in the great Legionary Stations there would be full caves of a hundred men. Last year, at Isca, he had been one of them, newly initiated at the bull-slaying, the brand of the Raven Degree still raw between his brows."
[The Eagle of the Ninth, Rosemary Sutcliff, 1954]
The Romans apart from the Iliad and Aeneas, they associated at their mythological origins of Rome, Evander of Pallantium. In Roman mythology, Evander (from Greek Εὔανδρος Euandros, "good man" or "strong man": an etymology used by poets to emphasize the hero's virtue)[1] was a culture hero from Arcadia, Greece, who was said to have brought the Greek pantheon, laws, and alphabet to Italy, where he founded the city of Pallantium on the future site of Palatine Hill, Rome, sixty years before the Trojan War. He instituted the festival of the Lupercalia. Evander was deified after his death and an altar was constructed to him on the Aventine Hill. Later Roman Emperors excepted from taxis the birth city of Evander in Arcadia, as tribute of honour to him.
This was not a very common origin theory in ancient Rome. Most ancient Romans believed that they came from Romulus and Remus. There was also the Trojan theory favored by some of the Roman elite, like Constantine I "the Great". Hardly any Romans believed that they were Greeks.
@Βασιλεία τῶν Ῥωμαῖων I' m not saying that the Romans considered themselves Greeks. I' m just saying that they tried to associate themselves to the Greek world. Evander is a good example of this attempt, who also plays a major role in Virgil's Aeneid Books VIII-XII. Previous to the Trojan War, Evander gathered a group of native Latins to a city he founded in Italy near the Tiber river, which he named Pallantium.[6] Virgil states that he named the city in honour of his Arcadian ancestor, Pallas, although Pausanias, Livy[7] and Dionysius of Halicarnassus[8] say that originally Evander's birth city was Pallantium in Arcadia, after which he named the new city. The reasons for Evander's fleeing his homeland are unclear; Ovid states that Evander had angered the Gods and had been sent into exile by way of a trial; Dionysius describes a civil unrest in Arcadia which led to Evander and his people being forced to leave; the commentator Servius, however, recounts that Evander's mother persuaded him to murder his father, Hermes, leading to the pair being banished from Arcadia, although other commentators have it that Evander killed his mother. Evander settled in Pallantium where it is said he killed the three-souled Erulus, the king of Italy, three times in one day, prior to becoming the most powerful King of Italy. The oldest tradition of its founding ascribes to Evander the erection of the Great Altar of Hercules in the Forum Boarium. In Aeneid, VIII, where Aeneas and his crew first come upon Evander and his people, they were venerating Hercules for dispatching the giant Cacus. Virgil's listeners would have related this scene to the same Great Altar of Hercules in the Forum Boarium of their own day, one detail among many in the Aeneid that Virgil used to link the heroic past of myth with the Age of Augustus. Also according to Virgil, Hercules was returning from Gades with Geryon's cattle when Evander entertained him. Evander then became the first to raise an altar to Hercules' heroism. This archaic altar was destroyed in the Great Fire of Rome, AD 64.
@@pseudomonas03 I misunderstood what you meant. There were attempts to tie together the Greeks and Latins.
1) The myth of Evander. In Latin mythology, Latinus was the brother of Graecus and also Pandora.
2) The theory that Latin was a dialect of Greek by Dionysius of Helicarnassus. This theory is incorrect and was not widely acknowledged by ancient circles, but is now seen as an attempt to syncretize Greco-Latin factions of antiquity.
3) Roman propaganda claiming that Alexander was a Roman emperor. Anatolians started believing that Alexander was a Roman as early as 1st century AD.
4) Incorporation of Greco-Roman religious continuity, transferring over even after the switch to Christianity
5) Romans learning Greek, borrowing Greek customs. Greeks borrowed some elements of Latin culture, this ancient cross-culturization can still be noted in Greece and Italy today.
6) Transferring Roman infrastructure to Hellenized Anatolia by Diocletian. This was essentially the beginning of "Eastern Rome".
7) Foundation of Nova Roma by Constantine the Great on Greek-speaking lands. Constantine's goal was more thoroughly to romanize the Greek-speaking parts of the Roman Empire. Granting of Roman citizenship to everyone helped, Roman institutions in the East instilled Roman identity into peoples who were not originally Romans.
8) Latin colonies built in key parts of Greece and western Asia Minor
As Georgius Acropolites of Constantinople states in his memoirs, "the Italians and the Greeks were different nations in the past. Now they are both Roman because they have adopted a common culture, common ideals and common religion."
@@ΒασιλείατῶνῬωμαῖων Exactly!
Because Romulus and Remus were the decedents of Aeneas, a Trojan adventurer (see Virgil) and that is the direct Greek God connection. Short, sweet and simple.
Given that both Romulus, Remus and Aeneas are fictionnal characters, I'm not sure it's a real explanation ^^'
No, latins are not descendants from Hittites chased from Minor Asia by the Greeks XD
@@krankarvolund7771 Latins were actually the crosspoint of Europe and Africa, it's a bit more complicated
@@aokiaoki4238 No they're not, they're indo-europeans that founded a civilization in the Latium ^^'
@@krankarvolund7771 Very heavily mixed. Hittites were indoeuropean also.
@@aokiaoki4238 Yeah, and? There's indians with indo-european ancestry, does that mean that Rome descend from Gujaratis? ^^
It’s probably not something kings and generals would do but I think it would be cool to see you guys do a video on the Jewish history and beliefs and the traditions they had.
At some point
Great video. Can you please share some reading material for this topic?
what is the name of the song starting from 2:40?
Finally!!! 👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻 well done!
Rome was mainly a military state. Philosophy, literature, religion, architecture, theatre, arts… etc were adopted by Hellas🇬🇷
Then, based on our myths they created their own and claimed mythological origin for themselves (the example of Aeneas of Troy to be the founder of Rome).
Love The vid
Rome: the 1st Philhellenes.
I think the way Romans dealt with Gods really worked; absorb the conquered pantheon into your own, keep religion free but still have tribute. I think that's why there wasn't much religious strife in the empire, we might do to have the same way of thinking in 2022.
@Thisis Gettinboring But you could still believe in your Gods? You were not forcibly converted were you?
Freer than lots of societies today. And for Christians no, but what about all the dozens of other faiths that still could believe in their gods? Britons and Germans and Greeks and Africans? They were still able to have their gods
@@jonbaxter2254 Because their GodS can still be seen as the same as there GodS. If I'm not wrong the Romans tried this to the Christians too but the people got angry and they thought that they chose the wrong God from their pantheon to represent the Christian God. Monotheistic is just different and times were changing too.
@@canyou7670 Problem is that Christian God is jealous. He get angry even if you deal minutely with other gods.
He has narcissistic & toxic behaviour.
Very reasonable !
We know that the Romans made the most of spreading Christianity but on the purpose of unification of masses !
For better good , abandoning decadency of Pagan World !
The other subject is that Pagan world was long time in oblivion even if we say Helenism was advanced culture !
If we see how people were not latinised by force , even Slav inhabitant were approved with Cirilic letterwriting and spreading to Central and Eastern Europe calling it Moravian mission !
For Roman Empire we cannot say that it was colonising power , for a better future of Rom itself !
I wish if they had stud untill today !
But Otoman Empire was unconvinian if they know how Cristianity was optained and Renaisanse of European cuture was achieved . Look how they took advantage of Roman Empire ramparting !
Still today it cannot be recovered because of a great influence and ongoing attacs from South !
Thank you!
To be fair the roman calendar was functional. The only problem was that it required someone to add new days to keep in sync with the sun. That role was given to the Pontifex Maximus, who decided to go in campaign for several years, hence the big unsync with the solar year XD
Basically, Caesar caused the problem, then came with a solution :p
But his solution was better than the original one. It no longer required some dude to correct the calendar. It had a fixed system in place that perscribed when to add corrections. Although they got the 365.25 part a bit wrong and that's why you have to skip 3 leap years every 400 years. And that's where pope Pope Gregory XIII came in. So I guess Caesar only fixed the problem for about 1500 years. Then another Pontifex Maximus had to step in and correct his system a bit.
@@hebl47 Yeah, I know ^^
Interesting video
Great video keep them coming. Waiting for the next ww2 video of the pacific theater
From Dumézil with love.
I had no idea that "Bacanal" had Roman roots. I always associated that word with carnival/ turnt up Caribbean parties. If you know, you know
Cool vid
My favorite is greco-buddhism which is arguably a bigger cultural impact. Shame about the statues in afghanistan that got blown up but there are a lot of really cool stuff the greeks influenced and they brought back from india a ton of stuff too. Herakles as Buddha's bodyguard Vajra is a cool bit of syncretism.
Kings and Generals when are you going to upload a video on Post-Caesar Civil Wars #5?
Romans: Can I See your God's?
Greeks: okay but don't copy them
They difn't
That was a interesting video, but what was Russia doing during the Roman Enpire?
The Scythians lived there then.
Romans did not adopt greek Gods. Their gods and worship were similar to the greek Gods and their worship. Hence it was easier for both peoples to get along.
They did, though. Of course they were similar, being an Indo-European people. Doesn’t mean they still didn’t double down.🙄
@@90skidcultist !
Would love to know what's written in the Apollo's pergamenes...
11:54_No 'separation of 'Church and State'..much like
Judaism of antiquity..Religion, politics and commerce
were like a trinity..😂..Even Roman camps/fortresses had
a strongroom in the HQ building (principia)..it was like a
shrine where they kept the armies funds and their legionary
standards including; Aquila, Vexillum, Signum and Imago
(which was a sacred image of the emperor).
Not even close. The macabees killed those who refused to convert, the romans never did that, only till they were christianized.
I would have loved it if you mentioned that the name Jupiter derives directly from Zeus. Father Zeus/"Zeus pater" (translating to somethig like "heavenly father")* simply became Jupiter. Zeus also was pronounced in Greek somewhat like [Dzeus] and Jupiter [Djupiter] by the Romans.
*Zeus as well as the Latin "deus" derive from the old Indoeuropean word "deiwos", meaning somithing like heaven or (bright) sky
It's from ido-european not feom greeks, don't say bullshit
No
is it true that Greek adopted Thracian Gods,as Romans ?
I'd love to see one on the adoption of Islam by common Egyptians.
can we get a video about how the history of ancient dating
"I am aware that you Romans are yourselves descended from the Greeks, and that the greater part of Italy was colonised by Greeks"
Emperor Julian
They were Latins. From Lazio. Before the empire the romans viewed the greeks as an enemy civilization in Italy and the greeks called the romans "barbarians". the historical reality. The greek colonies was only in the in some city of south of Italy with other local italian civilization. Flavius Claudius Iulianus was educated in the province of Macedonia and he was a great admirer of the hellenistc culture. The emperor Iulians he was a fanatic enough to restore pagan religions against Christianity. A civilization with another language that become great, more sophisticated, ruler of the world, incorporated the Hellenic culture giving itself a religion of heterogeneous origin and a mythology similar to those of the greek mythology. As like the globalization today.
It is good to dream, but when a dream becomes a crazy fantasy, Aoki Aoki, it is best not to dream at all. The original Romans, the ones in Latium were not of Greek stock. They were Latins. I wonder what you have to say to the fact that the "Byzantines" or eastern Romans were calling themselves Ausones, which basically means Italian.
Julian did nothing wrong and was completely right.
@@legioromanaxvii7644 and Greeks colonised them...
@@legioromanaxvii7644 Eastern Romans had anti Latin and italic ideals, they literally took out all the Italians traders in Constantinople, to eastern Rome Latins were barbars through and through, they didn’t call themselves Italians because they had nothing to do with the same people who lost to them during WW2.
what book is your reference?
Can't blame Aeneas on changing the names of the greek gods. They failed troy during the trojan war.
"The tradition that Romulus & Remus were suckled by a wolf in a dark recess on the side of the Aventine Hill which was swallowed by an overhanging grove, rendered this spot scared in the eyes of the Romans. Here was formerly celebrated the festival of the Lupercalia in honour of the god Pan, & riotous & lavacious scenes were annually witnessed there. After Rome became Christian this festival was celebrated even until the end of the Fifth century. In the course of the centuries, that sylvan spot became covered with the stately buildings of the Forum, the seat of justice of Imperial Rome.
Tacitus mentions the Lucus Asyli, or the grove of the Asylum, because Romulus, wishing to gather foreigners into his new State, made a sanctuary there. It was situated between the two rocks of the Capitoline Hill, & now the Piazza del Campidoglio occupies its site. On one of the rocks the temple of Jupiter Capitoline was built, & on the other that of Feretrian Jove*."
[The Forest: In Folklore & Mythology, Alexander Porteous, 1928/2002, p. 67-68](*John Dryden)
video starts at 2:35
Please can you make the video about Ottoman-Safavid war 1603-1612 (Ahmed 1 vs Abbas 1)
Great video. But you wrote Apollo only with one L. I feel sad now.
Shared common denominators et characteristics? Features?
Roman. I see now that you Greeks are men of culture as well.
Greek: As well?
@@aokiaoki4238 Naturally, it was Rome that was first in believing in the true gods. Anyone who feels differently will be sent to gladiator school.
Can you cover some other, perhaps niche, religions? Eg, I'm trying to understand more about Zoroastrianism but am confused on the starting date.
Cultus Deorum is certainly a niche religion nowdays
You forgot to talk about the Roman god Janus that has no Greek equivalent.
Smaller local gods were the norm in every corner of Greek polytheism
@@aokiaoki4238 Still, Janus is 100% roman, just as Terminus or the Lares and the Penates
@@americaeaustraliaepius4338 Ιανός was also recognised by the Greeks. His mythical origin was from Thessaly
Because the names of the Greek Gods sound really cool!
I’m Greek and I prefer the Latin naming. The names sound more “ominous” and regal.
Greeks : I made this
Romans : hmmmh I made this
Greeks : >:(
ขอบคุณค่ะ
Obligatory comment for the algorithm
The Greek Religion influenced Much Rome Of The Rise of Christianism.
In contradistinction to a Julian, an Alexander Severus, a Marcus Aurelius and even a Hadrian, who felt themselves more Greek than Latin, Justinian wished to be a Latin Roman Emperor. He was confirmed in these feelings by his horror of Hellen ism. A Roman Emperor, Justinian was also a Christian Emperor. He considered himself the pillar of the Christian orthodox faith. The Hellenic spirit is profoundly pagan and Justinian abominated it. For him, as for his contem poraries and successors, Hellene was synonymous with pagan and to call anyone by this term was to insult him. The Greek peoples themselves assumed the name Pauaio (Romans). Even to-day Romios is still used by the common people. Hellene is an artificial term revived in the nineteenth century. The capital of the Empire is called Roum by the Arab and Turkish peoples of Asia.
Lot, F., 2013. End of the Ancient World. Routledge.
Why is the notoriously bald Julius Caesar, depicted with a full head of hair. “Men of Rome, keep close to your wives, here’s a bald adulterer."
Pls do an episode on indo European pantheon
I wish we still worshipped things like nature… the earth. Oh how we went wrong.
Make a video about mythra
Can't imagine why it didn't work....
But the Roman calendar was the most accurate, when stolen from the Egyptians?. Nice
Hello Khights and generals could you make a video on Mohammed the Arab prophet, or a video of the Roman general Lucio Marcio Settimo who fought against Hannibal during the second Punic war in North of Spain please??
Bye and have a good day Khinghts and generals.
Wasn’t Pluto the equivalent of Hades?
No, Πλούτων (in Greek _Ploútōn,_ lit. “Wealthy One”) was one of the chief epithets of Hades, PLVTO was simply the Latinized form; Dīs Pater was the Latin deity equivalent to him.
The same is true of Dionysos, BACCHVS was merely the Latinization of his chief epithet Bakkhos, *Liber* (else called Liber Pater) was the Latin god with whom he was syncretized.
Video Request: Please make a historical series how Latins and Greeks became the Roman nation. This video was a good first step.
"Graecae Urbis Romae "
can you finally stfu ? you didn't have to be jealous of italian history so the only thing you can do is to claim everything italian as greek
in the meet industry the expiration dare i believe its call the julian date ..
With all this marriage of brothers and sisters amongst the gods, one might think they’re from Alabama
I would say that the video might be misleading: they didn't "adopted" the greek gods, they "adapted" them, since the ancient religions usually considered other people's gods as different versions of their own.