
Julius Caesar battlefield unearthed in southern Netherlands - phesse14
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/dec/11/julius-caesar-battlefield-unearthed-southern-netherlands-dutch-archaeologists
======
an_account_name
Picking a round number of 200MM people in the world at the time [1], this is
0.1% of the entire population killed in a single event, which is staggering.

[1] -
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_population_estimates](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_population_estimates)

~~~
meric
All the more staggering because back in those times the majority of the world
population resided in China and India. At around 0 A.D, there were 100M people
in India and 58M people in China[1][2], leaving a few tens of millions in the
rest of the world.

By the way, in the 202BC battle of Gaixia, 250,000 people died in a world of
150M people[3].

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_China](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_China)

[2]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographic_history#India](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographic_history#India)

[3]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Gaixia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Gaixia)

------
brudgers
The Dutch _National Geographic_ article contains more detail and reads
reasonably with computer translation:

[http://www.nationalgeographic.nl/artikel/genocidaire-
slachti...](http://www.nationalgeographic.nl/artikel/genocidaire-slachting-
onder-leiding-van-julius-caesar-bij-kessel)

Regardless, the scale of slaughter is staggering.

------
danielvf
You can read, Caesar's version here:
[https://en.m.wikisource.org/wiki/Commentaries_on_the_Gallic_...](https://en.m.wikisource.org/wiki/Commentaries_on_the_Gallic_War/Book_4#1)

------
erdewit
According to Caesar he made 430000 casualties, while historians now estimate
it were about 160000. Among these were women an children. On the Roman side
there were zero casualties so it was more a genocide than a battle.

~~~
Amezarak
> On the Roman side there were zero casualties so it was more a genocide than
> a battle.

While it's certainly true that it meets the definition of a genocide, it's
rather anachronistic to call it that. Ancient peoples did not possess our
norms and values.

To the Romans, the Germanic and Celtic peoples represented an existential
threat. And they were correct in that analysis. Periodically, for hundreds of
years, German tribes the Romans had never even _heard_ of came down into Italy
in mass migrations looting and killing everyone in their path. The numbers
involved were always absolutely _massive_ , and in many respects the Germans
were superior fighters. On several occasions the Romans survived only by the
skin of their teeth. For various reasons, the cultural and demographics of the
Germanic tribes provided them with a huge birthrate and rapid population
growth, which led to pressure that eventually led to huge armed migrations.
(Of course, war for pleasure and profit were also common, and later often they
fled from even more numerous, warlike tribes, Germanic or otherwise.)

To say, as an aside, that 'among these were women and children' is also a
little disingenuous and anachronistic. Not only were women and children not
regarded as particularly sacrosanct or immune from the horrors of war, the
Germanic and Celtic peoples often included their women in their armies _on
purpose_ to prevent the men from retreating, to assist in whatever ways they
could, and sometimes to fight. Sometimes the women in the rear merely mocked
or pleaded with the men not to retreat. Sometimes they _killed them_.

I confess I am not intimately familiar with these particular tribes and this
particular battle. But from a realpolitik point of view, Caesar was acting
sensibly. Letting these tribes survive would be to the eventual detriment of
Rome. They would eventually invade. No agreement with the Germanic peoples
ever lasted long. Nothing less than genocide ever kept a tribe suppressed for
more than decades or centuries.

In general, ancient peoples had a _very_ different mindset than we do. Most of
them regarded their ethnicity and culture as an absolutely bedrock part of
their identity. For many of them, it was better to die as and for who they
were than to live in submission - even peaceful submission - to a foreign
people. This was true for both the Romans and many of the Germanic tribes. The
Cimbri women, for example, killed their children and themselves rather than
submit to the Romans. Indeed, the particularly strong Roman identity is one of
the reasons for their early successes. The Romans often suffered devastating
losses, both in absolute numbers and relative proportions of the Roman people,
and refused to surrender or stop fighting where many other peoples did. We
could probably, anachronistically, call the Romans and the Germans genocidal
racists. But the only reason the Romans survived to become an empire and
provide future generations with all their advancements and civilizations was
_because_ they were genocidal racists.

Of course, as time went on, and Rome became an empire, 'Roman' became more of
a national identity and less of an ethnic or cultural identity. This was
correlated with what Roman conservatives thought of as mass decadence: for
example, the importation of foreign values, dress, and behaviors. The
conservative outrage against homosexuals and transgendered people almost reads
like something from the modern day. And the truly 'Roman' part of the
population became less of a factor due to lower birth rates (Romans had birth
control and abortion, and probably also due to the increasingly large role of
women in society). Perhaps consequently, Romans began seeing the military as
less of a duty and more of a burden, particularly in conjunction with ever-
ongoing wars, and the Roman military essentially became a mercenary army.

As time went on, German pressure on Roman borders became intolerable. Rome
constantly meddled with the tribes to play them off against each other, but
Germanic peoples remained a perpetual problem for the empire. Since Germans
were incredibly effective fighters - born to military life, and often bigger
and stronger than Romans, particularly as the empire became more 'decadent'
and commercial and academic activity became more common than warfare for the
average citizen, Romans began to incorporate Germans into the military, both
as auxiliaries and as actual members.

Then as Roman internal politics became increasingly complicated due to the
changes in the governance structure, the economy, and interminable civil wars,
the Roman military became less effective and the Romans often turned a mostly
blind (and helpless) eye to Germanic migrations/invasions and sometimes
encouraged them. Then, after several more crises, the Romans allowed a
contingent of Germanic refugees fleeing from the Huns into the empire.
Ultimately these Germans (the Goths) turned against the Romans (perhaps
justifiably) and that was one of the primary proximate causes of the end of
the western Roman empire.

...I suppose I went on a little there, but I like the subject and I recently
finished Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. :)

~~~
mafribe

        Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire.
    

And since when is that a credible work of historical scholarship, rather than
a (not very subtle) apology of British imperialism (England the new Rome)?

~~~
Amezarak
> And since when is that a credible work of historical scholarship, rather
> than a (not very subtle) apology of British imperialism (England the new
> Rome)?

Since always. I'm not sure where you're going with this since it's received
innumerable accolades and been considered an exemplary classic for hundreds of
years. You must be aware that criticism such as you just gave is a minority
view, but you didn't present it as such.

D&F is very well sourced, cited, and footnoted from primary and secondary
Roman sources. There are criticisms to be made of it, and there are a few
things that modern discoveries have shed more light on, but by-and-large
reading Decline and Fall gets you a decent grounding.

I'm afraid I did not read at all an apology of British imperialism; if
anything, a criticism of it, but I wouldn't go so far as to say that either.
Historians still recommend reading Decline and Fall.

------
stygiansonic
Related: For curated list of the 100 largest atrocities, ranked by largest
loss of life, check out Matthew White's _The Great Big Book of Horrible
Things_ [0]

It grew out of his website, _Historical Atlas of the Twentieth Century_ , and
while he is not an historian by profession (I believe he's a librarian), the
book is very well researched (lots of footnotes, citations, etc.) and IMO,
"fun" to read. (Only because of his style of writing, obviously not about the
content)

Each event is a relatively short read, with decent background provided, though
the book is quite long overall.

Spoiler: One of the items on the list is Caesar's Gallic Wars, and there are
many dedicated to various events that transpired the Roman {Republic, Empire}

0\.
[http://www.bookofhorriblethings.com/](http://www.bookofhorriblethings.com/)

1\.
[http://users.erols.com/mwhite28/20centry.htm](http://users.erols.com/mwhite28/20centry.htm)

