Be advised: this thread is not for serious in-depth discussion of weighty topics (we have a link for that), this thread is not for anything Culture War related. This thread is for Fun. You got jokes? Share 'em. You got silly questions? Ask 'em.
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Notes -
Don’t have anything of substance to add, but what a writer Gibbon was, at least half the sentences feel expertly constructed, pored over, slot together like puzzle pieces.
As for the question, I have long taken the view that many famous historical cuckolds were submissive homosexual men who lacked the ability to have (regular or any) relations with their wives and so requested they provide them with children by whatever means necessary.
I do deeply appreciate Gibbon. Usually material this dense is slow going for me, but I slide through Gibbon as easily as a pulpy sci-fi novel. The first volume especially gets into a rhythm where the details are interesting, but not particularly important. Between Commodus and Diocletian an uninterrupted procession of military dictators, virtually held hostage by their own military, who reign for relatively short periods of instability and decline. Some slow the decline, but don't reverse it. Some go full speed ahead. It gets to a point where people are begging not to be proclaimed emperor because the military has murdered so many of them when they aren't bribed enough. I honestly can't tell you, despite having just read it over this last month, most of the particularly good or bad emperors from that period. But I wasn't studying for an exam, and I mostly don't care. It was a pleasure to read all the same, and the arc of history, at least as Gibbon tells it, is made clear.
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