Hey you

Athens.

Rome?

Rome

Pffft.

Correct.

One of their most important festivals was dedicated to Apollo's favorite boipussy. They were possibly the biggest fags on the peninsula.

Samos, Mycenae or Corinth for life.

Hahaha just hang out and fight the winner

Messenia

You would all prefer to be in Athens

because if any of you spergs were born in Sparta you'd either be a Helot slave or thrown from the cliff for being imperfect. If you got through that you'd probably die in training and assuming you got through training you'd have to live a boring stoic spartan life.

Athens would offer the closest thing to "modern" pleasures, it's the perfect city for a time traveler to visit because you might actually survive in that society without being a perfect physical specimen

t. pericles

>thrown from the cliff for being imperfect.
That urban myth is extremely exaggerated.

The guys who won the greatest war yet fought. Athenian history is one long litany of them talking shit and getting hit.
Also Syracuse and Archaic Corinth were pretty great.

being part of the perioikoi probably wouldn't be too bad desu. but yeah athens is absolutely far more palatable for a modern human to live in.

You do know that pederasty was literally a huge thing in Sparta right?

Carthage

I DON'T LIKE ELF HATERS

>You do (realize/know) that [some argument], right?
I agree with your post but is anyone fed the fuck up with questions phrased this way? It's like the go to response for high schoolers on facebook.

Let me rephrase your argument: pederasty was all prominent in Sparta, not just Athens.

Anyone who doesn't say Athens is memeing, or confused.

Yeah, we all know it wasn't perfect, but it was still objectively a better place.

Athens :(

Athens:
>build your city walls in the face of opposition from the rest of the hellenes iranian nuke program style
>smash the oligarchy
>secure the existence of the ionian race and a future for ionian children
>might makes right
>dream of ever greater glory and conquer all of the greek city states to form one athenian empire in order to conquer all the mediterranean

Sparta:
>ineffectually try to assert dominance over the hellenes after being shown up by athens in the persian war
>support the oligarchical status quo
>dorian barbaroi working with the persians to contain athens
>fighting for justice against athenian tyranny
>protect the independence of all the miniscule greek city states and stay a big fish in a small pond

The Peloponnesian war is really amazing to read about. It was cool when I thought it was just a standard fight between two powerful Greek states, but when I read further and discovered the ideological civil war between the revolutionary Democrats and the reactionary Oligarchs aspect it really came alive to me.

Syracuse was realy fucking great when Archimedes was around.It was the largest greek city-state, with huge fucking walls and had a genius who made innovative shit daily.Too bad they got arrogant when they were besieged by romans, and decided to attend to a local festival than defend the fucking city.

If Carthage's council wasn't so fucking retarded, they'd allow Hannibal to siege Rome.Rome was scared shitless and lost most of its allies switched, which was only natural after so many crushing defeats.

most of its allies who switched sides*

Macedon

>If Carthage's council wasn't so fucking retarded, they'd allow Hannibal to siege Rome.
I want you to stop and think for a minute as to how long it would take for Hannibal and Cartage's senate to communicate with each other and how that makes tactical advice impractical.
Not to mention that given that Hannibal's army was living off of the land, he couldn't exactly stop and besiege a place like Rome.
>Rome was scared shitless and lost most of its allies switched,
That is objectively wrong. Most of their allies did NOT switch, which was the nail in the coffin for Hannibal's plan. About the only major ally that did was Capua, and that wasn't nearly enough.

Please kill yourself.

>That is objectively wrong. Most of their allies did NOT switch, which was the nail in the coffin for Hannibal's plan. About the only major ally that did was Capua, and that wasn't nearly enough.
By 215 BC, Hannibal's alliance system covered the bulk of southern Italy, save for the Greek cities along the coast (except Croton, which was conquered by his allies), Rhegium, and the Latin colonies of Beneventum, Luceria in Samnium, Venusia in Apulia, Brundisium and Paestum.

>I want you to stop and think for a minute as to how long it would take for Hannibal and Cartage's senate to communicate with each other and how that makes tactical advice impractical.

Rome was saved because Hannibal thought it was hard to siege Rome and instead tried to negotiate.Rome would've been fucked.Carthage could easily supply via syracuse and the southern Italian allies.

By Carthage I mean Hannibal.Sorry,doing a side project atm.

Athens did nothing wrong.

Pelopennesians and ESPECIALLY THE FUCKING CORINTHIANS are a buncha cunts.

Alcibiades is the worst human to have ever lived.

Baktria.

Lesbos

>cucked by sapphos

lol

what?

Childhood is idolizing Athens and Sparta. Adulthood is realizing Thebes and Corinth make more sense.

childhood is idolizing greece

adulthood is realizing that they were a bunch of turncoat bastards and all of them allied with the persians against other greeks at some point or another and that Macedonia only became so powerful because of the imperial influence the persians had on them.

oldmanhood is realizing that "greek nationalism" at this point is a fucking joke, the persians played the greeks like a fiddle against each other for hundreds of years and were the most impressive diplomats of their time, and that during every war involving greeks and persians, the persians always found greeks willing to fight for them against their supposed countrymen. (the center of darius's line at gaugamela was composed of greeks)

Sparta, I am a real alpha male

Can I be a super smart Athenian philosopher with a Veeky Forums tomboy Spartan wife?

Delenda this

That wasn't Carthage's fault, it was Hannibal's. After Cannae he should have immediately went after Rome, but he underestimated the Roman resilience. But who wouldn't, t b h. No Empire in history was like Rome, they would just not surrender no matter how many of them you kill or maim.

>No Empire in history was like Rome, they would just not surrender no matter how many of them you kill or maim.

S P A R T A
P
A
R
T
A

Athens, Syracuse or one of the Ionian city states near or in Anatolia.
Sparta is for edgelords who think life there was like bootcamp, when it was a mix of pogroms, constant threat by everyone, inhumane hardship, mansex maxed to 100, a reputation for being a shitty, slimy, brutish cunt and a dystopian caste system.

>getting literally upset how someone frames their statement
Literal autism.

Who sucked Persian dick more post Greco-Persian War? Spartans or Athenians? I recall something about the Corinthian War and Persian support and naval power being very important for one side.

spartans were literal niggers who produced no worthwhile cultural output and were constantly cucked by their slaves
youd have to be retarded to like them

That was mostly Sparta

Massalia

I'd have her laying down her writ to the praises of Phallos

So Spartans are basically:

>boy-fuckers unironically
>cowards
>braggarts
>the jocks of the Hellenistic world
And basically later on went to beg the Persians for aid when the Athenians were getting the upper hand?

homosexuals being treacherous?

color me surprised

>thrown from the cliff for being imperfect
No children skeletons have been found at the foot of Mt. Taygetus, only adults.

This was all made up by Plutarch.

No it wasn't, at least not in the classic Sparta. This was also probably made up by Plutarch.

Xenophon did experience the agoge himself and explicitly denies this.

Hello Leonidas.

It takes about 3 weeks to communicate with Carthage from pretty much anywhere in Italy....provided you have a port

Friendly reminder that Xenophon of Athens is the only authentic source on the agoge system and he was not born Spartan, although he might have been biased to some extent.

>Athenian history is one long litany of them talking shit and getting hit.
Marathon.

He probably fucked some teenaged Spartan boys then lied about when everyone else talked about how huge faggots the Spartans are.

YOU ARE A FUCKING RETARD.
>Hannibal's alliance system covered the bulk of southern Italy,

Let me rephrase this for you:
>Hannibal's alliance system failed to incorporate the latins, the most vital of all the allies
>Hannibal's alliance system was solely comprised of subjugated people who had no capacity to deal with the roman army
>Hannibal's alliance system was a patchwork of people who either didn't care for each other or fucking hated each other
>Hannibal's alliance system had no method in place to field and army
>Hannibal's alliance system had no means of forcing his allies to provide troops
>Hannibal's alliance system was shit

>Rome was saved because Hannibal thought it was hard to siege Rome and instead tried to negotiate. Rome would've been fucked.
Rome had multiple armies in the field that would have trapped him against the walls and slaughtered him.

They had legiones urbanae in the fucking city. Every. SINGLE. Citizen who hadn't served a full sixteen campaigns was eligible for the draft and as such was a trained combatant, likely already owning a panoply. On top of that, the city was fucking filled with captured arms.

The citizen population alone could have simply marched out and drowned hannibal in blood if it came down to it, and that's BEFORE they form armies of freed slaves with captured arms-something they actually fucking did.

>Carthage could easily supply via syracuse and the southern Italian allies.
Rome had complete and total fucking dominance over the sea. They were mobilizing 220 ships to Carthages 82 at the start of the war, with far more capacity to replace losses. The Carthaginians lost naval supremacy during the first war, you faggot.
>via syracuse
Syracuse was allied to rome for a full two years after cannae.

Literally the entire of Hannibals Italian campaign is him fucking running and trying to not get pinned down unless on a battlefield of his choosing, and you're sitting here saying he'd have been fine if he tried to invest rome AND OSTIA-which you must do, or it will supply rome- despite rome having more soldiers in the city, and a shitload of soldiers in the field who would march home.

Clearly, user, you know better than both Fabian, who literally ran a campaign on the simple premise that Hannibal couldn't stop moving and survive, and Hannibal himself, who LITERALLY FOUGHT HIS WAR ON THE PREMISE THAT HE COULDN'T STOP MOVING.

Clearly, user, you know better than Fabian and Hannibal. And of course, your assessment of the utter failure that was his network of allies is better than that of both Hannibal and the Romans, who both came to regard them as a fucking weak link and hindrance to Hannibal, who couldn't defend them, couldn't get troops from them, and couldn't get them to defend each other.

All hail user, greatest military mind of 216bc.

Kill yourself.

Syracuse

Sparta are the world champions of banter and have a much wiser foreign policy than Athens.

Athens is better in every other way, though.

No one ever says Argos, the most based of the Heraclidae legacy.

Stop, stop He's already dead.

>Implying Spartans weren't gay for each others

I get my history from 300, the post.

Athens. The Athenians were brutal slave-owners, but at least they didn't literally hunt slaves for sport like Spartans did. Sparta was ISIS-tier.

>Demosthenes

I choose Rhodes tyvm. They were both horrible decisions; supporting either of them makes me an enemy of their satellite states, which Sparta and especially, Athens, had.

Athens were murderous bastards, they killed the whole fucking Melos island populations. Interesting that the more democratic an entity is, the shittier they treat others, especially those dependent on them. Rome was a gang of thieves to provinces during republic but when empire built everywhere roads and shit. USA just bombs the shit out of everyone while USSR wasted money building power stations and tenement blocks for niggers.

Athens, I'm not going to be some isolated manchild.

All true, the persians did play the greeks but because they were fucking scared of them and did their best to keep them divided.

Proof is in the pudding. Once Philip/Alexander resurrected the hellenic league, it was ogre for persia in less than 10 years. Persian spasarabas couldnt handle the hoplite banter.

But military prowess aside you are correct when it comes to politics, greeks never could evolve past the polis model. Whenever one city state became hegemonous, all the others would gang up on it ( corinthian wars, theban wars, etc) and you could be sure Persia was financing/supporting whatever league arose to counter the dominant polis of that time.

>>the jocks of the Hellenistic world
More like the pretty boy who is a kicker on the American football team: he talks a big game, wears the varsity letter, and loves picking on all the nerds, but in practical terms he doesn't do all that much in terms of heavy lifting, and he gets his ass handed to him the moment that Thebes (the flaming faggot on the wrestling team) gets him to put up or shut up.

Considering how Athens dominated the Olympic games, they're the ones who make the case for being the jock, just one who also happens to be a cultured rich boy.

>gets utterly btfo by a single roman tax decree in 168BC
lyl

>the eternal Persian strikes again

Athens is the stereotypical "my dad is a lawyer, hence I'll become a career politician starting in school" guy

But the better question is, which Greek-state would be a typical schoolshooter type ?

>But the better question is, which Greek-state would be a typical schoolshooter type ?
Messenia was bullied like fuck so maybe? I don't think there is an actual greek state who matches that stereotype, none that went in a blaze of """glory"""". At least none of the well known ones.

The only I can think of actually would be Macedon, and it was more of a fringe mercenary state than a genuine member of Hellas for greeks. But they were bitches for the majority of their history until Philip/Alexander where they went full REEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE; and then they got immediately majorly cucked by Ptolemy soter and Seleucus nicator.

Antigonids are the most JUST'd kingdom in history.

Thebes. Alexander did humanity a favor by putting those mongrels down for good.

>Syracuse was allied to rome for a full two years after cannae.
Hannibal secured an alliance with Hieronymus of Syracuse, the new king of the city-state

>They had legiones urbanae in the fucking city. Every. SINGLE. Citizen who hadn't served a full sixteen campaigns was eligible for the draft and as such was a trained combatant, likely already owning a panoply. On top of that, the city was fucking filled with captured arms.

The citizen population alone could have simply marched out and drowned hannibal in blood if it came down to it, and that's BEFORE they form armies of freed slaves with captured arms-something they actually fucking did.

In the battle of Cannae, Hannibal still won albeit being outnumbered.Numbers don't always count, especially when it comes to citizens with mediocre training,m in contrast to hannibal's more experienced army.

>who LITERALLY FOUGHT HIS WAR ON THE PREMISE THAT HE COULDN'T STOP MOVING.

This was his only option when he crossed the alps.After the battle of Cannae, he was capable of sieging rome, he just spent too much time pondering about it.

I don't get why you're so mad, is it baby's first time having a discussion?

>Syracuse was allied to rome for a full two years after cannae.
Hannibal secured an alliance with Hieronymus of Syracuse, the new king of the city-state

>They had legiones urbanae in the fucking city. Every. SINGLE. Citizen who hadn't served a full sixteen campaigns was eligible for the draft and as such was a trained combatant, likely already owning a panoply. On top of that, the city was fucking filled with captured arms.

>The citizen population alone could have simply marched out and drowned hannibal in blood if it came down to it, and that's BEFORE they form armies of freed slaves with captured arms-something they actually fucking did.

In the battle of Cannae, Hannibal still won albeit being outnumbered.Numbers don't always count, especially when it comes to citizens with mediocre training, in contrast to hannibal's more experienced army.

>who LITERALLY FOUGHT HIS WAR ON THE PREMISE THAT HE COULDN'T STOP MOVING.

This was his only option when he crossed the alps.After the battle of Cannae, he was capable of sieging rome.He had the allies to resupply him, and a decimated rome;he just spent too much time pondering about it.

I don't get why you're so mad, is it baby's first time having a discussion?

>After the battle of Cannae, he was capable of sieging rome
Agreed with everything you said except that. Hannibal lacked sieging experience and materials. Plus sieging in those times took years, Hannibal couldn't afford remaining static in the latium countryside where roman loyalty was at its strongest. He'd have been vulnerable to fabian strategy the most by doing that.

The majority of his reinforcements got cucked by the romans. Tried to appeal to philip V but the romans blocked that with the illyrian war. He was able to count on capua and syracuse, but syracuse was sieged by 214BC and btfo'd 2 years later. Hannibal tried to stage a coup in sardinia at battle of caralis but that failed too. He was going to receive support in 215BC from iberia but siege of dertosa prevented Hasdrubal from parting with his troops. Hasdrubal eventually fled iberia with insufficient forces to join hannibal in 208BC. Mago was forced to do the same in 206BC after Ilipa.

The fabian strategy worked as intended. Without sufficient reinforcement and trained siegemasters, Hannibal could never take Rome and was forced into stomping across the countryside desesperately trying to break apart the roman confederacy and to bait rome into a response. Eventually it was Hannibal who was baited back to Africa when Scipio was launching a massive invasion force from syracuse to carthage in 204BC.

Sparte. They were both brutal slave states but at least Sparta didn't pretend they were enlightened, just and civilized peoples. They just did what they wanted without any mental gymnastics to convince the selves they were good.

not him, but
>I don't get why you're so mad, is it baby's first time having a discussion?
Romaboos, and I say that as someone who loves studying Roman history. They have a difficult time appreciating just how close Hannibal came to victory in the second Punic War. Of course Rome's victory seems inevitable in hindsight, but it sure didn't seem that way to the average Roman who lived through it.

Imperial Japan vs nationalistic China during World War 2 is a good modern parallel for how having manpower reserves doesn't mean shit if your leadership lacks funding and cohesive strategy. No matter how many poorly trained conscripts the Kuomintang threw at them, they simply melted away when the fighting got hairy against Japan's zealous, professional soldiers.

but what this user said, the problem is that Hannibal simply didn't have the resources to maintain a protracted siege. It's easy for us in the modern era to forget just how difficult it was lay siege to a city in classical times, how many sieges failed simply because the besieging army ran out of food before the defenders did. And you can't directly assault a city like Rome with simple equipment like ladders and battering rams, you needed towers and other giant machines of war which would let you funnel huge numbers of soldiers into the ramparts, which require specialist engineers and the time they would need to construct them by the dozens.

Also like what that user said, Carthage's fatal flaw was its oligarchic leadership whose individual players put their own needs above the good of their country. Romans had been gifted with Quintus Fabius, one of history's greatest geniuses of politics, who could placate the frothing mob of terrified Romans by taking religious tests, who could form a strategy and stick to it even in the face of setbacks, who alone out of all the Romans realized that they didn't need to defeat Hannibal, but simply outlast him.

>Romans had been gifted with Quintus Fabius, one of history's greatest geniuses of politics, who could placate the frothing mob of terrified Romans by taking religious tests, who could form a strategy and stick to it even in the face of setbacks, who alone out of all the Romans realized that they didn't need to defeat Hannibal, but simply outlast him.
To be fair, it did not go exactly THAT smoothly. The romans were originally highly skeptical of Fabius and his attrition strategy and after his dictatorship was over, they reverted back to throwing large armies at Hannibal. It's only after Cannae when Varro & Paullus got BTFO that they retracted on it. Funnily enough when Varro made his way back to Rome bruised and beaten, the senate was essentially forced into "applauding" and commenting at his courage because (a) it was their overall decision and (b) they wanted to make Rome look more alluring than the Carthagenian league (where defeated generals & magistrates would get crucified). Meanwhile at the same time Hannibal would "spare" any non-romans that was captured and let them return home while only enslaving/executing the romans.
It was like a mini-ideological war for either save or break the roman confederacy.

Also Fabius was ferociously opposed to Scipio's plan to invade Carthage as he still feared Hannibal and wanted to wait until attrition did 99% of the job, and wasn't certain whether an attack on Carthage would successfully bait the "council of 104" into calling Hannibal back to defend his city. If Scipio didn't win his consulship in 205BC, it might have been a very different end to the war.

But yeah, in the end the fabian tactic worked wonders. It's just that Fabius himself was hesitant to jumping to the offensive after years of being on the defensive. But two good strategists is always better than one.