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Old December 22nd, 2019 #1
David Reiner
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Default Did skin color matter to the ancient Greeks and Romans?

I was disturbed to read this article from Ancient Origins recently entitled, "Skin Color Didn’t Matter to the Ancient Greeks and Romans". The premise of the article is that, "But racism specifically against darker-skinned individuals appears to be a relatively new concept." (para. 2). One of the more salient paragraphs reads this way:
Quote:
According to Before Color Prejudice [Snowden, Frank. (1991) Before Color Prejudice: The Ancient View of Blacks . Harvard University Press.], prejudice specific to black culture was not a large piece of the ancient Roman world. Not only was ancient Rome very closely tied to the shores of modern day Africa, discrimination based on skin would have been considered unusual—particularly as the later emperors of the Severan Dynasty were Libyan (i.e., African) themselves. Further, Ovid, writing under the first Emperor, “suggests that a black lover of Aurora was the father of Memnon. Perseus, the son of Zeus by Danae, married the dark-skinned Andromeda, whose father, king of the Ethiopians, was a mulatto, at least in the eyes of a vase painter in the mid-fifth century.” Therefore, one can reasonably presume that skin-color was not a factor of racism, but rather a fact of life. Discrimination was predominately a class or wealth based decision instead. ("Differing Skin Color as a Fact of Life ", https://www.ancient-origins.net/hist...-romans-009358)
The article also features a rather disgusting picture of racing mixing on a classical mosaic. I get the sneaking suspicion that this article is biased and failing to tell the whole story.

I searched the VNN forums and found this reference:

Quote:
Thus so far as legitimate offspring were concerned, in aristocratic Greek society, as in most early historic I.E. societies, the strict endogamy of the conquering classes was evidenced by the admission that 'we choose our wives like we choose our horses: by the lengths of their pedigrees' — and the high respect in which the Greeks held their horses is well known! (R. Peterson, "The Greek Face", para. 4, http://www.geocities.ws/race_articles/greekface.html)
Unfortunately, Peterson's main focus in that article was not endogamy among the aristocracy of ancient Greece or other IE cultures. Does anyone have some additional sources on this subject? What about the subject of how race mixing was viewed in ancient Rome?

This topic is significant to my mind because it strikes at the root of the natural law argument against race mixing. Antimiscegenation laws in America were based on the principle that it is unnatural for whites to mate with blacks, and I've always felt it was disgusting without anyone ever teaching me this. Therefore, a major platform of the campaign to exterminate whites through interbreeding seems to be that it has always been viewed as natural for whites and nonwhites to mix.

This not only encourages race mixing, but it implies that those of us who are disgusted by such a proposition are mentally deranged or even dangerous. For these reasons it seems critical that we firmly establish the fact that race mixing was never endorsed by white societies in the past and that encouraging such behavior is a modern and perverse invention.
 
Old December 23rd, 2019 #2
Hugh Akston
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Even if this was true, what is also true is that niggers (especially) have been perceived as inferior for at least four centuries - and that perceived inferiority is why we forced their lazy nigger asses to pick our cotton.

 
Old December 23rd, 2019 #3
Jim Harting
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The ancient Egyptians were definitely racially conscious, even by today's standards.

Here is a short article by Savitri Devi, which reveals the utter contempt for Blacks which the ancient Egyptians felt - and also their racial shortsightedness.

The Egyptian Conquest of Nubia

“This is the Southern Frontier. . . No Negro is permitted to pass this boundary northwards, either by foot or by boat . . .”

Which awful racist wrote these words? Shocking they sound! The Anti-Defamation League of B’nai B’rith should look into the matter, surely. It is too late, however, for the Jews to punish this author. These words were written—cut into hard stone—over 4,000 years ago.

The ADL, or any equivalent of it, was not yet invented, and any attempt to bring the spirit of such a body into action would have been met with universal contempt on the part of the people and with the severest penalties on the part of the authorities in power.

The quoted words are part of the inscription which can be seen to this day upon the boundary stone set up by the order of Pharaoh Senusret III (the fifth king of the Twelfth Egyptian dynasty) at Semneh, one of the two fortresses he had built upon the hills on each side of the Nile, some 30 miles above the second cataract.

The fortresses were built after his first military expedition into Nubia (the Sudan of today) in the eighth year of his reign. The expeditions of Senusret III followed those of his predecessors. Already under Senusret the First—three generations before—the region of the third cataract was Egyptian and ruled by Hapzefa of Siut, who was buried at Kerma under a mound, with his slaves slain all around him.

The main motive of the Twelfth dynasty pharaohs in conquering Nubia was their desire to control the Nile more effectively and to be able to foresee more accurately the probable height of the yearly inundation on which the prosperity of Egypt depended. The regulation of the great river was looked upon as the highest duty of the Egyptian ruler—which is true even today. In addition to this, there was also the desire to acquire the gold with which the Wadi Alaki and other areas of the Nubian desert valley were full.

The military expeditions into this region brought the ancient Egyptians—a proud Aryan people—into close contact with the primitive Blacks who inhabited the area.

The remainder of Senusret III’s inscription at Semneh is interesting: “No boat of the Negroes is to be allowed to pass northward forever . . .”

And a few years later:
Year 16, third month of Peret, His Majesty fixed the frontier of the South at Heh . . . I advanced up-river beyond my forefathers; I added much thereto. What lay in my heart was brought to pass by my hand.

I am vigorous in seizing, powerful in succeeding, never resting; one in whose heart there is a word which is unknown to the weak; one who arises against mercy; never showing clemency to the enemy who attacks him, but attacking he who attacks him. For to take no notice of a violent attack is to strengthen the heart of the enemy.

Cowardice is vile. He is a coward who is vanquished on his own frontier, since the Negro will fall prostrate at a word: answer him and he retreats! If one is vigorous with him, he turns his back, even when on the way to attack.

Behold! These people [the Negroes] have nothing frightening about them; they are feeble and insignificant; they have buttocks for hearts! I have seen it, even I, the majesty, it is no lie!

I have seized their women; I have carried off their folk; I have marched to their wells; I took their cattle; I destroyed their cornseed, I set fire to it. By my life and my father’s, I speak the truth!

Every son of mine who shall have preserved this frontier which My Majesty has made, is indeed my son and born of My Majesty, verily a son who avenges his father and preserves the boundary of him who begat him. But he who shall have abandoned it, he who shall not have fought for it, behold, he is no son of mine he is none born of me.

Behold! My Majesty has set up an image of My Majesty upon this frontier, which My Majesty has made, not from the desire that ye should worship it, but from the desire that ye should fight for it!
In the days this was hewn out of the granite by the scribes of Senusret III, Egypt was a mighty Aryan nation, a military power to be reckoned with, a centre of learning and culture.

Today, Egypt is no longer a world power, nor is it an Aryan nation. It is impoverished, and populated by mongrels and half-castes. It was vanquished by the very people it had enslaved centuries earlier—a people which is not known for its heroism and warlike spirit: the Jews. How far the civilisation of our ancestors has fallen!

Without realizing it, Senusret III himself tells us how this came to be: “. . . I have seized their women; I have carried off their folk . . .”

And thus the stage was set for race-mixing which inevitably leads to the destruction of the greatness which lies in the purity of Aryan blood.

“Cowardice is vile.” “(The Negro) is . . . insignificant.” “. . . for to take no notice of a violent attack is to strengthen the heart of the enemy.” “My Majesty has made (this boundary), not from the desire that ye should worship it, but from the desire that ye should fight for it!”

This inscription of Senusret III contains much wisdom for 20th century Americans—if they choose to heed it. Nothing, however, is more important than the unintentional lesson he teaches us concerning the pollution of the blood. Another great Aryan leader, who, unlike Senusret III, was conscious of this, has expressed it better than anyone:
“Blood sin and desecration of the race are the original sin in this world and the end of a humanity which surrenders to it.”
Source: WHITE POWER: The Revolutionary Voice of National Socialism, February-March 1979. (WHITE POWER was the mass-distribution tabloid of the National Socialist White People's Party)
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Old December 23rd, 2019 #4
Hugh Akston
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Old December 23rd, 2019 #5
David Reiner
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That is a good reference, Jim. Thank you. I dug around for a little more info on ancient Nubian genetics, and it seems there has been some debate over what ancient Nubians were like physically.

Quote:
If indeed there were adequate models for the presumed Negro race of Africa that existed thousands of years ago, then this approach has validity. However, it can be contended that such models are at present not valid since there is little evidence for reconstructing what the then contemporary African Negroes were like skeletally. One can only extrapolate from modern Negroes who may not at all be like their ancestory since racial groups are not static, but evolve. (Greene et al., 1967, "Dentition of a Mesolithic Population from Wadi Halfa, Sudan" as in https://racialreality.blogspot.com/2...ly-werent.html)
Whatever they were, it seems probable that ancient Nubians from the era of Senusret III had little in common with modern Africans beyond dark skin. It seems clear that Africa was extremely diverse genetically in ancient times, as it is today.

People on the Left like to assume that because intermarriage occurred in ancient times between "Nubians" and other peoples, this justifies white Americans mixing with American blacks, but it's not justified to correlate modern American blacks with Nubian blacks from thousands of years B.C..

This brings me back to my initial concern about whether it was socially acceptable in ancient times for dimorphic racial groups to intermarry freely. The inscription from Senusret III certainly shows that the Egyptians had disdain for the Nubians, but it also shows the ancient Egyptians didn't have much trouble with the idea of intermixing sexually with the Nubians: "I have seized their women;".

It seems obvious from this inscription that the Nubian women were used as slaves rather than married as high-status wives in the Egyptian nobility. I believe I have read elsewhere that the ancient Egyptian pharaohs were highly endogamous to the point of marrying immediate siblings. Unfortunately, I can't put my finger on scholarly sources for this.
 
Old December 24th, 2019 #6
David Reiner
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That is an interesting quotation, Jim. Thanks for posting! This certainly shows that the ancient Egyptians were aware of a racial difference between Nubian and Egyptian populations, but it also shows the Egyptians seemed to have no qualms about capturing Nubian women and, presumably, mating with them.

In its own way, this argues in favor of the Jewish race-mixing propaganda which would have us believe that aversion to race-mixing is socially conditioned rather than natural and innate. The New Order website in your signature states

Quote:
But there is a better way, a way of Life. That way calls for a rebirth of racial idealism and reverence for the eternal laws of Nature. (https://www.theneworder.org/)
Laws against mixing with Negroes are well known in historic America, but if these laws are simply reflecting the eternal laws of Nature, we should find similar laws in ancient Egypt, Rome, China, and every other culture around the world.
 
Old December 24th, 2019 #7
Hugh Akston
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Quote:
Originally Posted by David Reiner View Post
Did skin color matter to the ancient Greeks and Romans?
Only when it came time for this:

 
Old December 28th, 2019 #8
David Reiner
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The Julian Marriage Laws imply that ancient Rome was concerned with the preservation of native Roman stock.

Quote:
In 18 B.C., the Emperor Augustus turned his attention to social problems at Rome. Extravagance and adultery were widespread. Among the upper classes, marriage was increasingly infrequent and, many couples who did marry failed to produce offspring. Augustus, who hoped thereby to elevate both the morals and the numbers of the upper classes in Rome, and to increase the population of native Italians in Italy, enacted laws to encourage marriage and having children (lex Julia de maritandis ordinibus), including provisions establishing adultery as a crime. (https://www.unrv.com/government/julianmarriage.php)
It seems that "class" was the important concept for ancient Roman marriage.

Quote:
Augustus was convinced that Rome's success depended on the self discipline, morality , and dedication that could be found only in the native born, aristocratic Roman: this class had declined considerably in number, and, in his view, scorned marriage and allowed its women far too much freedom. (http://www.womenintheancientworld.co...eformation.htm)
Class distinctions in Rome were based on a combination of wealth and birth.

Quote:
Patricians/ Upper Class: The people who were born in Rome and having Roman Blood and having numerous wealth and property came under the category of Upper Class in the Ancient Roman Hierarchy. (https://www.hierarchystructure.com/a...man-hierarchy/)
Quote:
Only certain families were part of the patrician class and you had to be born a patrician. (https://www.ducksters.com/history/an...patricians.php)
The requirement of birth was initially strict to achieve certain classes, but this became lax as time went on.

Quote:
The class of Rome was very class-conscious and highly hierarchical. In Ancient Roman Class, was determined solely by birth. But later on, there was mobility between different classes as the class was not solely determined by birth. (https://ancient-rome.info/ancient-ro...ass-structure/)
Quote:
Prior to 445 BC, intermarriage (connubium) between patricians and plebeians was forbidden. After that the children of such marriages took the social rank of the father, be it patrician or plebeian, regardless of the mother's status. (https://www.unrv.com/culture/roman-marriage.php)
The date "445 BC" seems debatable since other sources place the acquisition of connubial rights by the plebian class much later.

Quote:
Starting around 494 BC, the plebeians began to fight against the rule of the patricians. This struggle is called the "Conflict of the Orders." Over the course of around 200 years the plebeians gained more rights. They protested by going on strike. They would leave the city for a while, refuse to work, or even refuse to fight in the army. Eventually, the plebeians gained a number of rights including the right to run for office and marry patricians. (https://www.ducksters.com/history/an...patricians.php)
This information is sufficient to show that skin color did matter to the ancient Romans because this was a component of class distinctions. The ancient Roman Patrician class did not have any foreign, nonwhite families, nor did it allow intrusion of nonwhite foreigners into the Patrician class until the latter 5th century.
 
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