the sabines and the roman immigrants

2,450 years ago the human family in the known world was experiencing a golden age. In Athens, the glorious Parthenon was being built on the Acropolis; the reformation of Israel led by the Jewish scribes Nehemiah and Ezra was taking place; the Sabines, like other neighboring indigenous tribes, were being absorbed into the superior immigrant Roman culture; and one of the Sabine families -- the Attus Clausus -- later evolved into one of Rome's elite families, the Roman Gens Claudian.

Rome, of course, was founded by colonists from Greece and the Middle East, and there was little ethnic division between the three centers of learning -- Athens, Rome and Jerusalem. The Italian Peninsula, 2,450 years ago, was the New World for the Greeks and the people of the Middle East, and the successful colonization of Rome was, essentially, a success for Greece in the same way as the successful colonization of America later became a success for England.

In Rome, the territory between the Tiber and Anio was constantly pressured by the indigenous Sabine tribes. Unlike the American Indians, the Sabines were likely to have had fair complexions and hair similar to the ferocious Northern Celtic tribes who had yet to make an impact on history. Naturally, the indigenous tribes of the Italian Peninsula resented their lands being colonized by foreigners and their women being abducted, and fighting broke out.

After a major victory for Rome in 449 BC the Sabines -- like other neighboring Italian tribes -- were absorbed into Roman culture in the same way that all indigenous populations are eventually absorbed (or annihilated) by superior invading colonists, at all times in history.

In fact, one of the Sabine tribes was so zealously allied with Rome that it sought and gained permission to move its entire population onto Roman territory and become Roman in all respects. Among these new Romans was the Attus Clausus family -- later the Roman Gens Claudian family -- which became one of Rome's elite families, producing emperors and statesmen.

Back in those days they didn't have any rules forbidding 'foreigners' becoming emperors and in 445 BC, the Romans even gave plebeians the right to marry patricians. Considering that a king of England, Edward VIII, was forced to abdicate his throne in 1936 over a marriage with a commoner, the Romans were far more enlightened 2,450 years ago.

Also, just like all colonies rebel against their mother countries at all times in history, the Greek colonies were forever fighting for trading rights, if not outright independence, from the home country.

Corinth and one of its colonies, Corfu, got into a dispute in which Athens intervened and soon after, Corinth and Athens argued over control of Potidaea

Athens sieged Potidaea and issued a series of economic decrees known as the Megarian Decrees that placed economic sanctions on the Megarian people. We are still placing economic sanctions on nations we don't get along with, so nothing has changed!

Athens was accused by the Peloponnesian allies (sort of like a Greek United Nations) of violating the Thirty Years Peace and Sparta -- the main rival of Athens -- formally declared war on Athens in 431 BC.

The Peloponnesian War would last 27 years, and it all started over a Corinthian colony that had nothing to do with either Athens or Sparta. So much for allies and treaties -- they get nations into all sorts of trouble. An old treaty with Poland, for instance, forced Great Britain to declare war on Germany in 1939 when Hitler invaded Poland.

In stark contrast to today, Israel was a peaceful nation 2,450 years ago. In 444 BC, the reformation of Israel was led by the Jewish scribes Nehemiah and Ezra and Ezra was particularly instrumental in instituting synagogue and prayer services. He canonized the Torah by reading it publicly to the Great Assembly that he set up in Jerusalem