nora

nora reed

hello i am nora reed

you may know me from all the bots i have made. they live on nora.zone now. i also run an abortion resources page at abortion.cafe and have a jewelry store at nora.jewelry.


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in reply to @numberonebug's post:

no,,, good catch omg

so they had Equites? Which was like, a caste in Rome that originated in the founding of the city where men who could afford a horse + armor were designated equate, and the landed gentry amongst that caste were allowed into the Senate. It quickly stopped being able being able to afford a horse but the title stuck

That's kind of like a knight? Privileged class status confired by service as heavy calvary and acting as a buffer between low class and oligarchical nobles? I could see there being a translation error

that's basically a knight tbh. it's a little weird that modern conceptions of knights are knights-errant, but those are better storytelling devices. and obviously the code of chivalry hadn't been invented yet. but there's a clear throughline anyway.

I think the comparison is muddied by the fact that by the time of the imperium Equites very rarely served in the military, so the title etymologically was from a time where they were akin to knights, but for most of the empires history they were more akin to a leisure class or bourgeoisie.

idk it's a Whole Thing, I have like twenty pages of draft post about class in Rome because it's really wacky

could they have been called to service though? or I suppose more importantly were they ever?

it seems to me like knights were rarely called upon even in medieval times, but they weren't ossified to the point they couldn't be. guess there were enough wars that they never got the chance.

That's where the term originated from, it was designating "this person could supply calvary gear if called upon", but by the time Rome formed it's republic that was no longer what it meant.

By the time the kings were overthrown, so early in their history when they were just one city among many, there wasn't* conscription or "calls to arms" like that though so,,, not really,

* Conscription kind of existed outside the city in that allies (cities on the peninsula) had to provide a set amount of soldiers when called upon, and in the late empire Nobles had to provide a prescribed amount of serfs to act as soldiers when called upon, and in both instances recruitment could be uh heavy handed at times, but military service was by and far voluntary (at first because it was required to serve in elected office, and later because it was the only way out of serfdom)

might need to backslash escape that asterisk lol

I guess in hindsight it's kinda obvious that knights fall apart without kings to ensure their privileges and enforce their duties

the Senate didn't have much interest in keeping them around in that form