Because Wikipedia search histories are fun.
This one starts with me watching Gladiator, a movie which, unlike Braveheart, has perhaps not aged as well as it should have, but which serves to start us off with me looking up Commodus.
Commodus
Augustus
Marcus Licinius Crassus
Battle of Carrhae
Sino-Roman Relations
Daqin
Seres
Roman Trade With India
Buddhism and the Roman World
Thence to Augustus, a few other places, and on to the possibility of Roman soldiers captured in the Parthian wars being sent east and coming into contact with China. Not to mention embassies being sent between Rome and China, a flourishing trade with India, and a discussion of Buddhism in the West, wherein the assertion is made that Buddhists were kicking around in some numbers in pre-Christian Britian. How fascinating is that?
After that, I decided to play some Civ, wherein I discovered that it's possible to treat scenarios like random maps in certain ways (yay!), whereupon I started a new game as Augustus of Rome on a randomized starting location Earth map. Yes, the game put me in China. Yes, that amuses me greatly.
On another note, this is the sort of thing I ponder at 4am when trying to sleep:
- I'm a huge fan of the Romans.
- I'm a huge fan of Gaius Marius, among other Romans.
- My ancestry is essentially pure Germanic, both Swiss and German.
- There's a not-inconsiderable chance that my distant ancestors got their asses beat by Marius.
- Which is kinda strange.
- OTOH, it's hard not to root for Rome over one's barbarian ancestors in these things.
- OTOOH, others of my distant ancestors likely had a hand in beating Rome's ass later in its life.
- Which kind of makes me sad. Also, the Alamanni aren't nearly as awesome as, say, the Ostrogoths.