History Memes

Bemusement at the 'barbarian' concept, probably! The Romans believed (somewhat simplistically, but not entirely inaccurately) that skin color was the product of exposure to sun - people from Africa were darker-skinned because they lived in a land where the sun was constant and harsh; while people from Germany were pale because they lived in a land where sunlight was less intense. There was a great emphasis in Roman thought on the idea that environments made people, rather than birth - in part for that reason, Roman cities everywhere from Africa to Britain followed extremely similar construction patterns, under the idea that even in foreign lands that were altogether too hot or too cold, and intermarrying with foreign peoples, people in suitably Roman social environments would grow up to be Romans, or Roman-material.

It's a shame that whenever I see someone with a Graeco-Roman bust as a profile picture, my first assumption is not "Classics fan" but "fascist". We might reclaim some of that imagery someday, but I'll probably be old and gray by the time we succeed - IF we succeed. Bloodsucking fascist fucks.