The citizens of Capua were consulted

As it is well known, the Athenians invented back in the fifth century BC. the democracy or political system in which the citizens, the people, the “demos”, chose their rulers. This grandiose fact, whose most advanced development only exists in a few present Western countries, does not allow us to ignore the great limitation of that original democracy: only the citizens, a minority among the inhabitants of Athens, had these rights; Nor women, nor slaves, nor foreigners could vote.

Neither should we ignore the ease with which the people were “manipulated”, impressed, to make damaging agreements even against democracy itself, when there emerge the “demagogues” who even impose “tyrants”.

Ovid in the Prado Museum-Madrid (Ovid V)

The most famous Latin poets of the three of the time of Augustus, Virgil, Horace and Ovid, undoubtedly the most influential of them all in Western culture has been Ovid, although not the best valued by literary criticism. The influence of Ovid has been felt since antiquity itself, during the Middle Ages and the Renaissance to the present day in all arts, in literature of course, but also especially in painting and even in music. This is a subject very attended by the scholars and to which perhaps I should on my part dedicate some ample comment at some time. Something of this I have said in some of the articles that I have published in the thread of the celebration of the bimillenary of the poet’s death.

Was the Ovid’s exile real or mere fiction? (Ovid IV)

Was the exile that fueled part of Ovid’s poetry real or was it only a poetic fiction with which the creative poet has deceived us two thousand years?

The question may seem a modern exaggeration, characteristic of scholars who seek notoriety at any price. But it is not so and it is worthwhile to devote some time to this topic that was already raised at the beginning of the 20th century, and to which since then serious reflections and studies have been dedicated.

Some Roman public service contractors were fraudsters

In ancient Rome, and from Republican era, it is leased to private the exploitation of land and resources of the state, which were all conquered by the roman legions, and even strong companies of investors were established for it. This activity generated a space where it was easy to confuse the private with the public and produced some episodes of corruption which to some extent remind current events.

Ovid among the barbarians of the Euxine Pontus. (Ovid III)

In the eighth year of our era, the cheerful and worldly Latin poet Ovid was in Elba island in the company of his friend Maximus whose full name was Marcus Aurelius Cotta Máximus, son of Marcus Valerius Messala Corvinus, the protector of some literates. There Ovid received from the emperor Augustus a letter with the charge of serious crimes and the order to appear quickly in Rome, where he received the immediate condemnation of exile to the frontiers of the Empire.

Bimillenary of Ovid’s death, Autobiography (Ovide II)

The Latin poet Publius Ovidius Naso, desperate and sick, died in exile in 17 AD in Tomis, the present Constanza, in Romania, by the Black Sea, then called Pontus Euxinus, the Euxine Sea (favorable sea). He was born on March 20, 43 BC, the year after the assassination of Julius Caesar, in the city of Sulmona, in the center of Italy, east of Rome and about 130 km from the Urbe, the City, from an old and rich family; He was 60 years old when he died, much less than his father who died at 90 years old.

At the gates of the Roman Empire / At the gates of Europe

The History does not repeat itself but sometimes some events occur at different times and the have some similarity. See article http://www.antiquitatem.com/en/cervantes-world-book-day.

In these present times they appear occasionally comparisons of the fall of the Roman Empire with the present time of tensions between East and West. More specifically similarities are seen between the events of the year 378 which end with the defeat of the Romans at Adrianople, present-day Edirne in Turkey at the current borders of Greece and Bulgaria and the death of Emperor Valens in battle and the wars in Iraq and Syria, which move millions of displaced fugitives from one place to another.

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