[Jason Jewell]

Early medieval Ireland and Iceland are the places most often mentioned in this context because there’s no centralized government. Everything was clan- and tribe-based. These would not have been societies in which individual liberty was necessarily prized, though. David Friedman has written about medieval Iceland: http://www.daviddfriedman.com/Academic/Iceland/Iceland.html

[Jason Jewell]

Ray, I’m working on a blog post on this topic. I’ll post a link to it here when it’s ready. My teaching schedule this month is extremely heavy, but I hope to finish this over the weekend.

[Jason Jewell]

“Was the Roman Empire better or worse than the Roman Republic from a libertarian point of view?”

This is a difficult question to answer, since each period spans 500 years. There were ups and downs in each. Generally speaking, the early republic and early empire are less bad than the later republic and later empire in terms of taxation, wars, etc. On the other hand, common people gradually gained more liberties between the founding of the republic and the early third century B.C. as a result of the Struggle of the Orders. So it’s a mixed bag.

“Does Hoppe’s theory of monarchy and democracy apply to Roman history?”

The difference between the republic and empire is one of aristocracy (Senate) vs. monarchy, so the parallel is not exact. The structures of both republic and empire provided incentives to implement policies sensible over the long run.

“How much aggression did the Roman government commit against ordinary people during the various stages of its history?”

This is a very broad question. Are you trying to compare the Roman government to some other State?

[Jason Jewell]

Bismarck had the support of the traditional landowning class in Prussia (the “Junkers”). He favored the continued dominance of this class, and his implementation of portions of the welfare state were a strategy to co-opt the growing socialist movement. By promising social “insurance” he reduced the risk of social unrest from the working class. So he was neither a socialist nor a classical liberal, although he obviously displayed more traits of the former because of his statism.

It sounds like your teacher gave what was in most respects a correct answer.

[Jason Jewell]

I’ve submitted these to the webmaster for repair/removal. Thanks for alerting me.

[Jason Jewell]

I’m not a specialist in Egyptian history, but the narrative I”m familiar with says that Menes was the king of Upper Egypt and then conquered Lower Egypt. I don’t know what the Wikipedia article could mean specifically by calling Menes the inventor of wealth, since wealth as an economic concept includes pretty much all goods.

Sorry for the slow responses. I’ve been without internet access for almost a week.

[Jason Jewell]

Hi, Kenn. There are other first-century sources that corroborate the life of Jesus, although not in any great detail. The Jewish historian Josephus, who was hostile to Christianity, writes of Jesus’ trial and crucifixion. The Roman historian Tacitus writes of him as well. The so-called “Gnostic” Gospels are second-century compositions. A prominent atheist whose name escapes me at the moment just published a book from a major press that is very hostile to Christianity but that also scolds his fellow atheists for playing the “Jesus didn’t really exist” card because there’s as much historical evidence for his life as for the life of almost anyone who lived in the ancient world.

[Jason Jewell]

Most modern scholars’ dating of the beginning of Egypt has nothing to do with the Hebrew text. They try to date from when they think certain astronomical events occurred that the Egyptians recorded. Everyone agrees that there was a society of some kind in Egypt before 3000 B.C. The question is when does it qualify as a civilization, and that is normally dated from the union of Lower and Upper Egypt by Menes.

[Jason Jewell]

Hi, LSS. By its very nature, a survey course cannot be thorough. Many interesting topics must be omitted or mentioned only briefly. The Parthian Empire existed for a few hundred years and ruled much of the territory formerly controlled by the Persian and Seleucid empires. It was in regular conflict with the Romans.

I’m not familiar with Collins’s book beyond what’s on its Amazon.com page, but it looks like it attempts to prove an ethnic connection between the Parthians and modern Caucasians. That may be of interest to anthropologists, but it does not necessarily mean that Parthia was important in shaping Western civilization. What’s at stake here?

[Jason Jewell]

Since civilization involves cities, and cities can’t really exist without agriculture, you could say that civilization can’t exist without agriculture.

Agriculture may have made war more destructive, but it has certainly brought many benefits as well.

[Jason Jewell]

Chris, the pharaoh, backed by the priests, did have some tricks up his sleeve. Some Egyptian temples had sophisticated ways of measuring the water levels in the Nile and could “predict” the annual floods before anyone else noticed the changes in the levels. Priests typically were the only people who were literate.

Of course, none of this means that the pharaoh and priests did not actually believe what they were doing was real.

Succession within dynasties was through family inheritance (often matrilineal, which is why pharaohs often married their sisters). A transition between dynasties sometimes involved violent conflict where one family overthrew another. This was not the norm; Egypt had stable political succession for the most part.

[Jason Jewell]

Ray, sorry for the slow reply. I have been out of town for a conference and family vacation since last Thursday and won’t be home till next Wednesday. I don’t have my notes with me and am going off the top of my head, but I can see where the statement might seem contradictory because in the modern world control over the common man through taxation is the mark of the State’s power. In the 15th century this was not necessarily how monarchs thought. They wanted to end resistance from the Church and the local nobility to their policies, and one way they achieved this was by promising not to interfere in the nobles’ “micro” policies if the nobility would stop resisting the monarchs’ “macro” policies so much.

I can try to get you more details when I return home next week.

[Jason Jewell]

Siabaa, the individual states are historic political communities that could form the basis for a post-Union order. It’s conceivable that, for example, coastal states that are net payers to the federal government would find autonomy attractive if their security concerns were met. I think you’re right that new republics organized on ethnic lines are very unlikely.

[Jason Jewell]

Some Anabaptist groups held property in common, but for the most part this was not a statist measure. There was no state apparatus to redistribute wealth forcibly. (I am excepting extreme examples like the Anabaptist takeover of Munster in the 1530s.) Think of it as something akin to a monastery, where those who join agree to renounce title to material possessions.

[Jason Jewell]

If this helps to clarify things for Walter: one of the big differences historically between the Eastern and Western churches is how they treat the relationship between the Church and the State. The Eastern church viewed the emperor as being the head of the Church on earth, whereas the Western church assigned this position to the pope. Neither rejected the legitimacy of the State as an institution except in a few cases like the Anabaptists, who were well outside the mainstream.

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