I’m a woman and I think about ancient Rome every day—but that’s not surprising, since I’m a graduate student in Ancient Greek and Roman Studies. Thinking about ancient Rome is an intrinsic part of what I do. What is rather surprising, though, is the fact that a viral trend has arisen on TikTok for women to ask their male partners and relatives how much they think about the Roman Empire. Invariably, the men respond that they think about it frequently and the women to act shocked to learn this.
Those who have been reading my blog for a while know that I am not on TikTok, so they may be surprised to find me writing about a trend that originated there. The trend, however, has gone so viral that it has spilled over onto Twitter—a platform which I do occasionally check up on, even though it is generally a cesspit and has only grown even more toxic since Elon took over. Additionally, a whole host of media outlets, including The Washington Post, Insider, The Independent, The New York Post, The National Review, and Wired, have all published articles about it.
Since everyone is apparently talking about this trend, in this post, I intend to explore and answer two closely related, but distinct, questions. First, what about the Roman Empire makes it seem (at least on a purely anecdotal basis) to be especially interesting to men? Second, why, in this particular historical moment, is a viral social media trend constructing interest in ancient Rome as specifically a masculine trait?
What about the Roman Empire makes it interesting specifically to men?
At the most basic level, most people are aware that, over the course of centuries, Rome conquered its neighboring civilizations and became an empire, which, at its greatest territorial extent, ruled vast territories extending from the icy reaches of northern England to the sands of southern Egypt, from the western shores of Portugal to the banks of the Euphrates River. Because our society socializes men to view conquest, power, and domination as admirable masculine qualities, the basic fact that Rome became a powerful empire makes it appealing to many men.
On top of this, for most of the time western universities have existed, most of them completely barred women from attending as students, let alone holding faculty positions, and academic publishing houses were rarely willing to publish works of scholarship written by women. As a result of this, for centuries, even though some exceptional women in exceptional circumstances did occasionally manage to break through barriers and attain recognition in the field, the overwhelming majority of scholars who wrote and published about ancient Rome were men.
Partly as a result of this, scholarship on ancient Rome tended to fixate heavily on the aspects of the civilization that western culture constructs as masculine. Literary scholarship mainly focused on canonical works by male authors about male heroes, such as Vergil’s Aeneid. Historical scholarship mainly focused on military and political history, especially Rome’s wars of conquest and powerful male political figures like Julius Caesar, Augustus, and emperors in general. Archaeology tended to focus on impressive, monumental architecture.
This situation gradually began to change over the course of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, but it wasn’t really until the final three decades of the twentieth century that female scholars began to find success as professional classicists and ancient historians in mass numbers.
Thus, it has only been in the past roughly fifty years, as more women and openly queer scholars have entered the field, that scholars have begun to more thoroughly explore previously overlooked aspects of Roman civilization, such as the works of female authors like Sulpicia, female historical figures whom traditional historiography has overlooked or villainized, evidence for the everyday lives of Roman women, conceptions of gender and sexuality, and so forth.
ABOVE: Photo from Wikimedia Commons of the Augustus of Prima Porta, a colossal marble statue of the emperor Augustus dating to the first century CE (left) and photo from Wikimedia Commons of a small bronze statuette of an unknown upper-class Roman girl reading, also dating to the first century CE (left)
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Unfortunately, despite the shift in scholarship over the past half century, even today, most influential representations of ancient Rome in popular culture (such as the 2000 film Gladiator, the HBO/BBC Two television series Rome, the Total War: Rome video games, etc.) still mostly focus on powerful male political figures and other subjects that the public views as masculine, such as wars, political intrigue, and gladiators. These portrayals have helped to reinforce the general public’s association of ancient Rome with ideas of masculinity, power, and violence.
It should therefore come as little surprise that, in the TikTok videos, when the women ask the men which aspects of the Roman Empire they fixate on, many of them give answers that focus on the imperialist and militaristic aspects of ancient Rome.
ABOVE: Photo from Wikimedia Commons of modern men cosplaying—sorry, I mean performing a serious historical reenactment—as Roman soldiers
Why does this trend construct interest in the Roman Empire as masculine?
Now that we’ve examined the question of why so many men seem to be interested in ancient Rome, let’s move on to what I think is the far more interesting question. Men (or, for that matter, people in general) thinking about the Roman Empire on a relatively frequent basis is not at all a new phenomenon. People have been thinking about the Roman Empire for thousands of years. This fact on its own does not explain why, at this particular historical moment, a trend like this has arisen and gained such rapid attention and popularity. What, then, about the current cultural climate has primed people to talk about it now?
I think that, to understand this trend, one needs to pay attention to the wider conversation that people in the western world, especially the United States, are having right now about gender. Gender roles in general are becoming less rigid, possibilities for women are continuing to become more open, trans and nonbinary identities are becoming more socially acceptable, especially among young people, and the traditional notion that gender is predetermined by biological characteristics, binary, and immutable is being seriously called into question.
In reaction to this changing cultural climate, right-wing pundits are devoting enormous amounts of time and energy into viciously attacking trans people and calling for a return to traditional gender roles. Meanwhile, right-wing politicians are pushing legislation to eliminate or severely curtail trans people’s existing rights and protections (a situation that has only grown considerably more dire since I wrote about it back in July 2022).
I think that, partly in response to this complex and changing cultural landscape, a certain subset of young people who more-or-less adhere to traditional gender and sexual norms feel particularly compelled to shore up their own gender identities by emphasizing perceived gender differences. As a result, social media trends, especially in the past year on TikTok, have become especially focused on constructing such differences.
For instance, in around late July and early August, it became a trend on TikTok for women to post videos in which they prepared dinners for themselves that consisted entirely of an assortment of low-effort appetizers and snacks and called it “girl dinner.” The implication of the name was that these are the kind of meals that women eat when they are on their own and they don’t have to cook for their men. (As I mentioned before, I’m not on TikTok. I only know about this trend because my former roommate explained it to me and showed me some of the videos.)
Weeks before the trend about how much men think about the Roman Empire began, the comedian Jaboukie Young-White (who I don’t actually follow, but whose tweet came up in my feed) remarked on Twitter: “the gender binary is to gen z as harry potter houses are to millennials.” Of course, he said this as a joke, but I still think it contains some kernel of truth.
Unfortunately, although I doubt that the people who invented and popularized these trends were consciously thinking about their sociopolitical implications, the not-so-implicit message of the trend—which is that most or all men are constantly thinking about war, conquest, and the glory of empire while women are not—easily plays into a right-wing sociopolitical agenda. It’s no surprise that The National Review (a right-wing publication) has an article that interprets the trend as evidence of the supposed inherent differences between men and women and the supposed innate, masculine drive for domination.
Conclusion
I would like to say that I find the fact that millions of men who are not academics are apparently thinking about something related to my chosen field of study every day reassuring. After all, the tagline of this blog is “Making the Distant Past Relevant to the Present Day” and men thinking about ancient Rome on a regular basis is certainly an indication of its relevance today.
Unfortunately, I find the fact that so many men are fixated specifically on the militaristic and imperialist aspects of ancient Rome, as well as the way that this trend constructs interest in ancient Rome as a masculine trait, more concerning than anything else.
I’m all with ya Spencer. As someone who is truly fascinated by the genuinely fascinating influences of the Roman Empire, it’s change over time, (Classical – Late Antiquity – Eastern Roman/Byzantine) and its place in historiography, I am highly critical of the misty-eyed romanticism surrounding ancient states such as Rome and Sparta. Various elements consist of this culture, the idolization of “great men”, (when when Great Man History TM has not been taken seriously for the last century), the extraordinarily narrow conception, the regurgitation of tired cliches and myths, (Whig history, barbarization of the army, etc) the uncritical acceptance of priori assumptions and frameworks, the copy and paste of anachronistic modern world views, the fundamental misunderstanding of the modern study of history, etc. This assessment is quite harsh, but I think at **some** of these “history bros” are actually obsessed with the aesthetic of the ancient past, specifically, the modern fantasy version that popular culture has constructed, not the reality of the ancient past, so complex, so unknown, and so continuously explored by scholars.
So many of these people say they are interested in history and are history “nerds”, whilst only listing YouTube videos and media such as video games as their sources. (YouTube videos can be extremely helpful and digestible, but there’s unfortunately a lot of nonsense regarding it too) Actual academic books on the subject? Acknowledgement of the lack of sources, the ambiguity of studying such a fundamentally different world? Pfffff. I’m not saying these people should be all reading up on monographs and waging war against the badhistory YouTube infidels but at least be transparent, and acknowledge the limitations of our modern conception of the ancient past.
I feel certain components of this culture collectively ignore the vast amount of ever-changing modern scholarship that presents all sorts of fresh new perspectives on this time period. Thus, the conception of history these sorts of people tend to engage in seem extremely simplistic, and honestly rather shallow. They appreciate History for its beauty, but don’t put in the work to actually understand it on a deeper level, or even acknowledge the complexity of the past.
Not to mention the various ideological and political motivations that can come with this sort of thing. One of the most prevalent, and yet still false, being the Renaissance Myth. (https://www.exurbe.com/black-death-covid-and-why-we-keep-telling-the-myth-of-a-renaissance-golden-age-and-bad-middle-ages)
This shows as well: The obsession with the invincible Sparta is one of the best examples. Dr. Bret C. Devereaux, (as you probably already know) wrote a complete and utter debunking of this Spartan myth, showing that Sparta was at best great at hoplite battles, bad at logistics, slow to innovate, loving of luxury, terrible at diplomacy, and mediocre strategically. (https://acoup.blog/category/collections/this-isnt-sparta/ ) Saying in its retrospective:
“ It has always been striking to me that for everything we are told about Spartan values and society, the actual spartiates would have despised nearly all of their boosters with sole exception of the praise they got from southern enslaver-planter aristocrats in the pre-Civil War United States. If there is one thing I wish I had emphasized more in This. Isn’t. Sparta. it would have been to tell the average ‘Sparta bro’ that the Spartans would have held him in contempt.”
I actually find it much more captivating to see just how fundamentally alien societies such as Ancient Rome are to modern eyes, and see just how different and varied these societies can be while still being very much human. And still being absolutely foundational to everything we have today. Don’t get me wrong, I love how interested people are in the ancient past, and hope that more people of all demographics more interested in history! The problem here fundamentally is within the over-romanticism surrounding the past, most notably the ancient past. I will absolutely Larp as a Roman officer if I want to, and I do think about the Roman Empire a lot, specifically on just how much it changed over the years.
As Tim O’Neill once said: (something along the lines of this) “Did a highly idealised version of the ancient past inspire people to do admirable things? Yes. Should we try to imitate it? No.”
Thanks! That needed to be said and you said it well. There’s much to admire in some of these past societies, and much to learn from, but as is often said, a “little” knowledge can be a dangerous thing. And there is way too much lazy romanticizing these days without careful, sober thought. That is not the way of wisdom, of sophia. Athena would not approve.
Very well said.
(Also, quick correction to the above. It’s supposed to say: the extraordinarily narrow conception of historical understanding (Only the most obvious historical sources are considered in a way that is rather quaintly conservative and constrained in the eyes of modern historians. Reminiscent of the days in which historians detailed events and dates, great men and rulers, wars and treaties, as well as myths and fables. (Most notably in the history of science; in which Tim O’Neill has written that when writers such as Draper and White wrote their versions of the infamous Conflict Thesis, there was virtually no history of science as a field that existed, *and* was not stained by significant ideological/sectarian bias) Numismatics? Archaeology? Queer studies? Economic history? Whats that!?
I truly do love history; especially as you move further back, it allows the exploration of people and societies so familiar at one end but at the exact same time so utterly alien in many regards, that despite everything, laid down the origins, the seeds of modernity today.
I just feel that these Roma bros just take the “authentic” sources and propaganda of these various states at face value with far too much faith, and are simply ignorant of other very much valid perspectives and interpretations of history, all stemming from the enforcement mentioned fundamental lack of understanding of how modern history works.
But then again, so much of the history some of these fellows adhere to are extremely outdated antiquarian work done by old men like Edward Gibbon over a century ago at least. Look, I get that Gibbon was a pioneer in the application of primary sources, but his work is extremely outdated, and relying on it is like relying on a medical textbook from the 19th century.
When will you post Part 8 of your adventure in Greece? Just asking.
I am planning to publish it sometime soon. I really want to finish the adventure in Greece series before the end of this month. Unfortunately, since all the posts I’ve written in the past three months have been about my time in Greece, I wanted to write about some other things for a change of pace.
Fair enough. I am looking forward to finding out about your trip home from Greece.
But another article is fine by me. It is unfortunate that toxic masculinity is still such a big part of our society.
Spencer, I find whatever you write about interesting!
You mentioned what little influence women have had on contemporary knowledge of ancient history. I recently read a comment claiming that until recently, most women recognized for contributions to scientific knowledge only achieved it under the direction of male romantic partners!
In reading about the recent floods in Libya, I came upon an article reporting flood damage to Leptis Magna in 1988. I was previously unaware of Roman ruins in Libya, and Google led me to ancient Greek ruins there at Cyrene. They’re more intact than many locations you toured in Greece. If only the recent flooding helps unify Libya, and opens those ancient cities to more research and preservation.
Thank you so much! I’m glad that you’re enjoying my posts!
I appreciate your comment, especially your remarks about Libya. The recent floods are truly an unfathomable catastrophe for the people of that country and also a warning for the rest of us of how climate change continues to exacerbate natural disasters. Regarding the ancient ruins (which are, of course, less important than people’s lives and livelihoods), Leptis Magna was a very important city during the Roman Period. In fact, it was the birthplace of Septimius Severus, the founder of the Severan Dynasty, whom I have written about several times on this blog.
Sadly, I’ve never been to Libya, but, based on the photos I’ve seen, Leptis Magna and Kyrene are both stunning. The reason why those cities are so well preserved compared to so many sites in Greece is because they were both basically completely abandoned in late antiquity and, as a result, the ruins became buried and no one carted away most of the stones to use for other building projects. Thus, many of the buildings and monuments were left intact. With many of the sites in Greece, by contrast, people continued to live nearby and they took stones from the ancient buildings in order to reuse them to build new buildings.
Thank you for this short article, at once interesting and disturbing. I don’t know if this is a global phenomenon or just something that happens in my country, but it seems that a spectre is haunting among some younger folks — the spectre of far-right totalitarianism. As I was reading your article, I couldn’t help but think about how Mussolini exalted the Roman empire. I’ve been talking with some very smart folks, of my age (31) or under, who told me that they experienced a short sympathy for far-right, even Neo-Nazi views, when they were teenagers, before realizing it was all just a pile of absurdities. I fear that now more and more young people may never come to this realization, as they find new living cultural and political referents.
I don’t want to be a reductionist, but I think the economic context is the biggest catalyst for this new reactionary movement, at least in my country (Argentina). I’ve been reading Capitalism and Socialism on Trial, a 1951 book by Fritz Sternberg, which in its third part deals with the period between the World Wars, and found some alarming resemblance between the economic context of Germany in 1932 and that of my country: they were both in the midst of a huge economic crisis, with the middle classes feeling very angered after suffering the consequences of rampant inflation, and wanting to change radically their political system. They thought that, since the traditional parties had no credibility left, they would do better voting for the guys who had never been in charge before, and that anyway things couldn’t possibly go worse.
I hope that, despite this global trend, your country can escape this dangerous pipeline.
I share the same anxieties as you. I fear that, in the current social, cultural, and economic environment, far-right ideologies do appeal to many young people, especially to young straight cis white men.
Totally agreed about the economic context.
We have seen this plot unfolding time after time. Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany are definitely the most prominent examples but this list is far from exhaustive. In fact this phenomenon has been observed in every single crisis but just to a lesser extent. What you observe currently in Argentina has been observed to some degree throughout the world during the pandemic, throughout Southern Europe (Portugal, Italy, Greece, Spain) and USA after the extended crisis of 2008 and in several other occasions in latin American countries just during the past decade. Economic crises correlate perfectly with bursts of far right sentiments among the people. I think it will be difficult to find a single instance in 21st century world history where an increase in far right sentiments was not preceded by some form of economic crisis, and even harder to find an instance where an economic crisis was not followed by an increase of far right sentiments.
So, it is safe to say that the economic context and in particular a steep decrease of the quality of life of the working and lower middle classes is the catalyst for that phenomenon.
I think that this is a well known fact and its causes have been extensively analyzed. In short, it is not a secret that capitalism works pretty well with totalitarian regimes and it prefers to turn unhappy people against other nations than against the local economical elite.
However, it is worth to note that in such occassions the revolutionary labour movement also tends to grow stronger and it is always open which side is going to prevail.
That’s true. But the same applies to the far left. Your revolutionary movements feed on the same misery, and when they win, it makes no difference.
Well, that was my point! Of course the revolutionary movements feed on the misery. It seems that you assume this to be negative but I don’t get how you got there. What’s wrong about it? If there was no misery there would be no need for a revolution. So what more reasonable than revolutions feeding on misery?
You claim that it makes no difference if the socialist revolutions succeed but I am not quite sure what you have in mind. I mean even if one doesn’t care about the significant decrease in economic inequalities that has been observed in most such cases at least socialist revolutions don’t promote xenophobia or target minorities. I guess that makes no difference for you either. For more non-differences you are encouraged to google my username.
That being said, I am the last person to claim that any regime so far has been perfect. In my opinion most socialist regimes failed in substantially including the people in the governing of the state, contrary to their own proclamations, and they may have been as authoritarian as any other regime. So, I don’t understand why you call them “my” revolutions. I have nothing to do with any of them (no matter what my username may imply) and I don’t defend any of them. But the fact that no regime so far has been perfect doesn’t mean that there is no difference between the regimes. It needs a huge logical jumb to conclude from this fact that there is no difference if Hitler succeds or Sankara succeeds.
Moreover, the shortcomings of the past are not constraints for the future. Nothing restricts a future revolution from doing things differently. Please go ahead and propose your own plan for improvements! But please, try to at least give the same oportunities to everyone! And no, someone being born with no property has not the same oportunities with someone being born a millionaire, even if things can turn around. Starting a basketball game being down 50 points doesn’t mean that you cannot win, but this doesn’t mean that you have equal chances as your opponents either.
I don’t know Sankara. I don’t know if I’m particularly ignorant on the subject or if he’s simply not often cited as a model, but this is the first time I’ve seen someone cite him as an example.
What I wanted to say about revolutions is (apart from the fact that socialist revolutions have ended in dictatorships – which is what I meant by “no difference”) that you can never know what the consequences of such and such a revolutionary movement will be until it’s in power, and that you can’t therefore trust such and such a movement a priori just because it has good intentions.
Oh, it was that Sankara. I had forgotten about him. I thought your username was a reference to Śaṅkara, the Indiаn writer.
Don’t feel bad! I totally assumed that Sankara’s username was a reference to Ādi Śaṅkara, the eighth-century CE Indian Advaita Vedanta philosopher and writer, as well! (I’m familiar with Ādi Śaṅkara mainly because I took a course on Hinduism the second semester of my junior year at IU Bloomington in which we were assigned to read the Vivekacūḍāmaṇi or Crest-Jewel of Discrimination, which is traditionally attributed to him.)
I saw the report on the Washington Post site and have read a lot of the MANY comments on the article, many of which are hilarious, and myself have contributed to the general jokery. Latin puns, references to Life of Brian, Spartacus, references to Hadrian’s Wall, Vestal Virgins, and glarum, you’ll find it all there! For the benefit of Spencer’s readers, here’s a guest link I am allowed, as a WAPO subscriber, no paywall for this:
https://wapo.st/3F1m0ol
Salve!
“garum,” sorry for the typo!
Thanks for sharing this!
Maybe all this is light-hearted, I don’t know. But it feels sad if intellectual interests (however inchoate, in some cases) like ancient history are genuinely being ridiculed on social media. Presumably the thinking is that the ideal young man doesn’t think about such stuff at all.
Ditto if that interest is being associated with some kind of maniacal war-mongering. You seem worried about this but the evidence that this is the motivation seems weak, to be honest.
I don’t think Spencer is saying that if you’re a man interested in the Roman Empire, it’s automatically for negative reasons. Even being interested in Roman military history isn’t automatically bad. Many, if not most, people who love history started out that way.
The problem is the prioritizing of war, conquest and generally male dominated endeavors over everything else. The dudes who think studying history through the lens of minorities, the enslaved and women is “too political.” People who think that because all that they read about when they study ancient history, then that’s all that it was, or at least it being more worthy of study than aspects like gender, sexuality, ethnicity or any social factor that they consider “trivia.”
It’s ironic that this trend/meme came about right as I was in the middle of reading a collected volume on the construction of ethnicity in the Roman Empire and a book on religion in Roman Egypt. So these days specifically, I would have to plead guilty if someone asked me if I think about the Roman Empire every day (though, it seems, not for the same reasons as most of the people who say they frequently think about Rome).
Usually I don’t think about the Roman Empire more than other ancient societies, especially those in the Near East like the Assyrians, Israelites, and Nabataeans, but I still figured that would be more than most people who aren’t specifically interested in ancient Mediterranean history. Apparently I underestimated how rent-free Rome lives in many people’s heads!
That’s amusing!
I think that one thing this meme neglects is that what people think about on a daily basis varies greatly from one time to another. One month, someone may be thinking about ancient Rome all the time because there is something in their life that is reminding them of it, but, another month, they might not think about Rome at all. If you asked me on any random week how often I think about the ancient Mesopotamian demoness Lamashtu, I would probably respond that I don’t think about her very much, but I’ve been thinking about her a lot this week because we’re discussing her in one of the courses I’m taking.
That’s a peculiar thing, I’m – I think – one of those “Rome bros”. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that, nor is it surprising, popular culture sees the Romans as they themselves want us to see them: masculine, conquerors, traditional and victorious and these models of virility are always in demand. Of course, this is to take at face value the Roman propaganda, or should I say the Roman national mythos, to which is added in modern times the idea of a return to the values of the ancients (the mos maiorum – the Romans were already making a great deal of it in their day), but it seems to me that this is how we love history: by believing in its myths. Then you can learn history and kill the myths, but most people don’t learn it – it’s long and hard – so you just love it.
I think that there is something alarming about being a “Rome bro”. I would say that, in general, any belief that doesn’t correspond to reality is potentially dangerous, not just for the others, but for the one who holds it. That’s the reason we do science!
It seems I failed…
🙁
Sorry once again for not keeping up with the blog! I guess now I at least have the excuse that I have been working, and also started on a new university course.
The topic is interesting, as usual! I had seen some references to this before but did not know it was a viral trend, not having Tiktok nor even Twitter myself. Like you and the other commenters here I definitely think about Ancient Rome daily or almost so, and usually not for the same reason as “Rome bros”.
When it comes to this group, I think we should definitely not pander to it but at the same time not ignore it either. After all this will be a pretty large part of those who look up content relating to Antiquity online. I would hope that some right guidance might set them on the path of actual appreciation and understanding of ancient cultures, instead of just idealisation. Maybe Bret Devereaux’s blog (and to some extent yours) can help a little with that
I also would hope that, but what I’ve seen online hasn’t been very encouraging. Bret Devereaux seemed to get a lot of flak for his article from twitter users who were personally insulting (posting pictures of him etc.) without engaging with anything he’d actually said. Speaking more generally, I do find in my that some people when they have been misinformed, and especially when they think that they know something of the subject and have pride in that knowledge, don’t appreciate being corrected and become corrected. I agree that they shouldn’t just be ignored, but it’s difficult to know how scholars can reach these people when they are so adamantly stuck to their fantasy view, especially when it’s motivated by their politics and bolstered by a distrust of academia.
*don’t appreciate being corrected and become defensive
Good point! I did not see that Devereaux suffered contumely from this crowd; though I’m aware that Konijnendijk/Iphikrates got a lot of hate for discussing the fitness of ancient Greek warriors. Then again I’m not on twitter, and with it now being unavailable for non-users I miss most of what happens there (which is often for the better, I’d think)
I agree. I’m not a westerner but Roman Empire is always on my mind as well.
Roman Empire is the embodiment of power and domination and that is what we men want. Power, power and more power.
I don’t think it is true that all men have an innate or instinctive longing for power and domination. Masculinity and power are both social constructs that don’t always look the same across cultures. I think that many societies teach men to want power, the nature of which varies depending on the culture.
You’re right to say that the form of power is historically contingent, but I don’t think the will to power itself is. All beings have it; if you want to look for social constructs it will be – as you said – the manifestation of this power and perhaps the fact that men seek it more than women; as far as I’m concerned there’s more female education in not seeking power than male education in seeking it.
Interesting take… I guess I have to reconsider my gender…
Or, is there some chance that not all men have the same desires as you?? Could it be?
😀
hi Spencer! Good topic although kinda creepy too… for the record, I can add that in the late 1970s early 80s when I was in HS there seemed to be a nostalgia for perceived aspects of the Roman Empire, at least in the nerd culture I knew … it seemed to go along with the war/history-themed board games and such that a lot of the guys played, and maybe even some of the SF show aesthetics of the time? I have a photo somewhere of one of the boys doing that chest-thump “Roman salute” thing as he greets another guy at the door to the computer room after school.
I wonder how much this “fantasy Roman” male mystique has in common with the “American cowboy” rugged individualism fantasy.
I think that the Roman militarist and cowboy masculinist fantasies have a lot in common in terms of their motivations, the kinds of people they appeal to, and even their histories; after all, westerns and sword-and-sandal films were at their greatest popularity at roughly the same time and were often produced by the same companies, sometimes even in the same studios. The main difference is where they draw their inspiration from and which culture they choose to idealize.
Today, there’s another essay on this, from an academic, at CNN: https://www.cnn.com/2023/09/18/opinions/men-and-roman-empire-viral-meme-perry/index.html
The meme just keeps rolling! O tempora, o mores!
Woah. I thought this was just a joke from Tik Tok.
I think you’re right, though. Unfortunately history in general is typically associated with war. In the academic sphere this has long changed, but it still remains to change in pop culture.
I associate the deep fascination with Rome as a symptom of Eurocentrism and in some cases White Nationalism, as some people use the aesthetic and popular imagination of Rome to assert that Europe, as Rome’s “successor”, should remain culturally and racially homogenous. This is often in the face of immigration (they of course forget that Syria and other places that these refugees come from were also integral parts of the Roman Empire). And then of course there’s the whole history of using the Hellenistic empires and Rome as a sort of justification for European colonialism (the idea of “civilizing” other cultures).
But yes, an appeal to gender roles plays an equally important role. Sadly, while history departments are often full of female students, history online remains a sausage fest.
I should add that I’m more likely to think of the Ottomans, the Arab Caliphates or Islam in West Africa before I think of Rome. When I do think of the Romans, it’s usually the “Byzantine” Romans. Anthony Kaldellis has an interesting episode on his podcast where he discusses how the Byzantines are traditionally thought of as more effeminate, which might play a role in why many, especially in the West, still don’t regard them as real Romans.
Well, duh—it’s because we men need something to think about besides sex, cars, sex, sports, and sex! [ducks and runs]
Your information ended up as a question on last weekend’s Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me on NPR.
I’m confused. What do you mean when you say my “information ended up as a question”? Are you saying that someone referenced me on “Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me,” that they referenced this post specifically, or that they merely discussed the same general topic that this post addresses without specifically referencing me or this post?
I was surprised to read the following sentence:
“The fact that so many men maintain a casual interest in the Roman Empire is absolutely no surprise to any woman in classics or ancient history”.
Why the reference to women and not to all scholars no matter the gender? Would this fact be a surprise to men in classics or ancient history? This contradicts my experience. Consequently, this unnecessary distinction of scholars according to their gender makes me worry that Spencer has adopted an antagonistic stance towards men.
Another indication of this is the paragraph “Thus, it has only been in the past roughly fifty years…” Here it is implied that the focus in the field changed only when and because more women and openly queer scholars entered the field. While this sounds plausible I don’t think it is valid. It is based on the assumption that men sholars antagonize women and try to promote the historical and intellectual accomplishments of men while suppressing women. However, this doesn’t seem to be the case (even if at some point and to some degree (I say this because the example of Sappho indicates that it was not totally the case) it was. There are several scholars identifying as men (I happen to know some personally) that currently study very passionately precisely those topics (and specifically Sulpicia) that Spencer implies that were developed only after and because women and queer scholars entered the field, and there are many men scholars who contributed to that shift.
Instead of pointing out the counter-evidence I leave it on Spencer! After all, I am pretty well aware that if someone doesn’t honestly try to disprove their position by themselves, then no evidence is going to be sufficient to change their mind!
Tip: Notice that in order to support the claim that Spencer suggests in that paragraph it is not sufficient to find some examples of women who contributed greatly in this shift in academic focus, but it is necessary to demonstrate that no man contributed substantially before them or contemporaneously.
The question is really, why did Spencer accept this widespread myth, concerning a field Spencer is part of, before trying to refute it? Refuting myths is Spencer’s passion after all! I suspect it’s because it fits nicely in the narrative of the genders antagonizing each other, which Spencer seems to have unconsciously adopted. Hence, Spencer didn’t critically examine the belief that men promote “men’s” history and women promote “women’s” history.
My understanding is that the reason why the academic interest changed focus is the same as the reason why more women entered academia. That is social change. How humans think changed. Both men and women. Men and women came to the realization that there is no evidence supporting the intellectual superiority of men. And both men and women contributed to this realization. After all, women wouldn’t be able to enter the men’s exclusive academia if they were not accepted by men (given how hiring in academia works). At the same time, capitalism saw the benefits of doubling the workforce while reducing the wages to half, which helped in institutionalizing these, otherwise undoubtedly positive, changes.
There is no doubt that there still exist many men antagonizing or discriminating against women. At the same time, there are probably equally many women discriminating against women. (Look at the women supporting Trump). Personally, I have met numerous women thinking that the natural role of women is to be pretty and please the men or that men have natural interest in politics while women in gossip and infinite other unfounded sexist trash.
So, I hope that Spencer realizes that the enemy is not the men but sexism. It is not women or men who need to fight sexism but any reasonable person of any gender. By antagonizing men, you just become part of the problem as you essentially assume that men, just because of their gender, discriminate against women or that they wouldn’t fight sexism. Which is sexist and exacerbates the antagonism.
Personally, I identify as a feminist man and I do my best to fight sexism. Therefore, I hope that Spencer will keep publicizing relentlessly actual instances of women’s (and not only) oppression while staying away from anti-men sexism and being as critical of narratives that serve Spencer’s own beliefs as of those that serve Spencer’s opponents’ beliefs. Because, even if the intentions are the best, if the claim is not true, it will turn against your intentions.
I do not know why on earth you are so worked up about my post. It seems to me like you desperately want to be offended and are therefore trying to construe anything you can possibly find as evidence that I am somehow hostile to men, even though that is not the case at all.
The reason why I say “any woman in classics or ancient history” rather than “any scholar of ancient history” is simply because the social media trend that I discuss in this post is about women being shocked to find out how much the men in their lives think about the Roman Empire. My point in the statement that you have quoted above is that, unlike apparently many women who are not in classics, women who are in classics are not surprised by men thinking about the Roman Empire (although we may be surprised that there is a social media trend about it). The contrast isn’t between women in classics and men in classics, but rather between women who are in classics and women who aren’t in classics.
Regarding your second and much lengthier objection, I absolutely never at any point in my post above claimed or implied in any way that all men in all historical periods have only ever promoted “men’s history” and all women in all historical periods have only promoted “women’s history,” nor did I ever claim or imply that all men are inherently sexist and all women are inherently feminist, nor did I ever claim or imply that men have not made significant contributions to scholarship on topics such as women in antiquity, ancient conceptions of gender and sexuality, etc., nor did I ever claim or imply that women and openly queer scholars entering the field in greater numbers is the sole factor that has contributed to the shift in scholarly interest over the past half century. You are imputing claims to me that I absolutely never made.
All I said or meant to say above is that, until roughly the 1960s and ’70s, although there were, of course, some exceptions, most male academics wrote nothing or very little about topics such as the daily lives of women in antiquity, they tended to downplay the importance of historical women, and there were relatively few women in academia at the time because institutional sexism made it difficult or impossible for women to succeed as professional academics. Since that time, as a result of broader social changes, this situation has changed. The fact that, over the past half century, women and openly queer scholars have come to make up a larger proportion of the field has been a major contributing factor to the shift in scholarly focus over the same period of time. Feminist women scholars produced most of the important early scholarship on topics such as women in antiquity (e.g., Sarah Pomeroy’s Goddesses, Whores, Wives, and Slaves: Women in Antiquity, published in 1975, etc.). Yes, there were some male scholars who contributed to scholarship on those topics and supported the shift, but feminist women scholars were largely the driving force. Meanwhile, many traditionalist-minded male scholars were resistant to feminist scholarship and approaches.
Both my post above and my reply here speak in generalities and do not seek to convey a detailed or nuanced history of the scholarship on ancient Rome, but rather merely an extremely loose, basic outline of its absolute broadest strokes. If people want to learn the more complete history, going into details like the social and cultural background of the shift in scholarship, the careers of specific scholars who have played major roles in it, significant articles and monographs that contributed, the founding of the Women’s Classical Caucus, and so on, this article isn’t the place for that, nor it is intended to be.
I do not at all appreciate this level of misrepresentation and condescension. If you really want to be a feminist man and fight sexism, you should start by not leaving a ten-paragraph-long reply to a post written by woman criticizing her in very condescending terms for not devoting the time in a minimalist bare-bones historical outline of scholarship on the Roman Empire to congratulate men for their achievements for the cause of feminism.
At the same time, capitalism saw the benefits of doubling the workforce while reducing the wages to half, which helped in institutionalizing these, otherwise undoubtedly positive, changes.
‘reducing the wages to half’? Was that statement serious or in jest? It is difficult to tell on the internet?
Anyway, whatever the effects of ‘doubling the workforce’ were they certainly did not include ‘reducing the wages to half’; according to recent research increases in female labor force participation rates are associated with an increases in real wages. Sources: (https://hbr.org/2018/01/when-more-women-join-the-workforce-wages-rise-including-for-men) (https://www.reddit.com/r/badeconomics/comments/8lcexw/jordan_peterson_women_joining_workforce_cuts/)
Not that this is a general law, according to other studies women joining the workforce during WWII depressed wages for both genders. (Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/badeconomics/comments/s7iekd/repost_why_women_joining_the_workforce_doesnt/) Which indicates the effect, like so many things in economics, depends on the circumstances.
What is a “men sholar”?
Seems generous and optimistic of Spencer to provide such a detailed, good faith response to Asbolus’ screed, as it bears more than a little resemblance to the “I have a Black friend and am a nice, non-racist Caucasian person who has never witnessed those racist incidents of which you speak, therefore not only am I not racist but also institutional racism does not exist because I haven’t witnessed it.”
We have seen in science and medicine the glaring flaws and lacks caused by not including diverse bodies in our studies and diverse POVs among our authorities, and it is not new to acknowledge similar weak areas in the humanities generally so it’s not surprising that there should be such in ancient history particularly. There was, we suppose, equally to be anticipated there would be cavilling.
Good morning, Spencer.
“The vast majority of the time, when a man does this, his knowledge of the subject he is pontificating about will be superficial and his attitude toward it will amount to little more than a wide-eyed idolization of imperialism, military might, and powerful men.”
I’ve been following your blog for a while and greatly appreciate your work but these generalisations can be a bit off-putting…
I just removed the entire section of the post where I talked about “Rome bros.” It was at best tangential to my argument and enough people seemed to be getting upset by the level of generalization that section contained that I decided it was distracting from my main points and wasn’t worth keeping.
Fair enough. Keep up the good work 🙏
Thank you!
Very good article, as always.
I do wonder how much this is an American thing. I’m English and decided to ask some of my friends how often they think about it. Most found the question bemusing (and went on to crack jokes about the trend when I explained), but a couple responded along the lines of “now that you ask, I probably do think about it a bit more often than I’d expect, but just because it’s referenced/remains of it are all around” (so not pretending to have any deeper interest). I think in general I’ve only really met one person who might be described as a “rome bro”, but he has never really pontificated to me on the subject. I struggle to think of any others who have shown great interest in my studying Ancient History that weren’t studying history themselves. But that might simply be the kind of circles I’m in, or the fact I’m a man.