Peter Jones

A recent analysis has concluded that ‘British public opinion has got so used to things being bad/chaotic it’s hard to imagine anything else.’ But what ‘things’? Perhaps electioneering politics (always chaotic), but more likely the myriad social, legal and medical services the state claims to provide. No such services (let alone ‘rights’) were available in the ancient world. Family

The original Olympic Games established a basic canon of seven games unchanged over some 900 years: foot, horse and chariot races, boxing, wrestling, pankration, and pentathlon. This year’s Olympics feature 42 games, adding for the first time ‘competitive breakdancing, an urban sport that originated in the hip-hop culture of 1970s block parties in the US’.

Frescoes are always the lead story in reports of the latest finds from Pompeii, but they are only a part of a much bigger picture. Before it was destroyed in ad 79 Pompeii had been a flourishing port town (the explosion of Vesuvius altered the whole landscape) with a population of around 11,000, offering trading

The Sentencing Council, consisting of various legal authorities, has told judges and magistrates to consider, when sentencing the young, their ‘difficult and/or deprived backgrounds or personal circumstances’. To what end? To induct the young into proper moral behaviour, Aristotle thought that family discipline should go hand in hand with the community’s laws, customs and education.

What a song and dance about the end of life! Historians assure us that, among human beings, there is a long, well-established tradition of dying and if, after a life well lived, one feels enough is enough, what on earth is the problem? Seneca, the philosopher and adviser to Nero, took a duly stoical approach:

What fun to mock the elite in the Garrick! But there were no Garricks in Rome: clubs were for those lower down the scale. They were called collegia and consisted of citizens, freedmen (ex-slaves) and in some cases slaves. All usually had some religious connection and were properly organised with presidents, treasurers and so on.

socrates: I was talking with some handsome young men in St Andrews University when the vice chancellor appeared, keen to discuss her new student ‘training module’. It would include ticking the statement: ‘Acknowledging your personal guilt is a useful start point in overcoming unconscious bias.’ socrates: I was talking with some handsome young men in

Accounting systems have apparently existed since the Mesopotamian period (c. 5000 bc). But what about ‘budgets’? Early Romans had no such concept because, in the absence of a welfare state, self-reliance was the order of the day. They did however pay an annual tax, fixed by the Senate and collected locally, to refund (for days

Last week Athenian free speech was contrasted with a demand from some dons at Buckingham University to ban a ‘heterodox’ Social Science Centre questioning woke ‘culture’. The Centre should stage an Aristophanic comedy on the subject. In the 5th century bc Athens was a hotbed of controversial ideas being taught, for money, by people called

Hardly a day goes by without another story of academics clamping down on free speech. Dons at Buckingham University are the latest to express outrage at a proposed ‘heterodox’ (i.e. not woke) social science centre. In democratic Athens (5th century bc), free speech in the citizens’ assembly and the courts was called isêgoria, meaning ‘equality

After 14 years in power, the Tory party still does not seem to know how to serve everyone’s interests, even its own. After 14 years out of power, the Labour party’s one consolation is that, for all Angela Rayner’s best efforts, it could hardly do worse. Might a new model for selecting MPs help? After

Golden Globes, Baftas, Emmies – here we go again with the annual rituals of self-worship to which actors are so addicted. The ancient Greeks are to blame: they staged plays in competition, with awards for best plays, producers and actors. Their worldwide luvvies’ Guild, formed in the 3rd century bc, was called ‘Artists of Dionysus’ –

Ian Hislop’s genial radio series on the earliest English jokes got off to an odd start since the joke in question – Pope Gregory’s description of the Angli being more like Angeli – was a Latin one. Romans had much to say about humour, most of it cribbed from ancient Greeks. Cicero saw jokes as

Last week in a piece on populism, Pericles’ and Cleon’s methods of persuading the Athenian assembly to do their bidding were analysed: Pericles calm and persuasive, Cleon taking to court or viciously slandering his elite rivals for power. But Cleon did also have his moment of glory, in circumstances quite extraordinary even by the standards

As elections approach and arguments become more strident, the term ‘populism’ becomes more and more thrown about, as if it is a bad thing, a form of demagoguery. But what populists do is to represent themselves as champions of ‘real’ people whose interests are completely ignored by the elite. What can be wrong with that?

Given the failure of all political parties to deal with the Post Office’s wrongful conviction of so many postmasters, ITV’s re-enaction of the story has been a triumph for democracy (Greek demo-kratia ‘people-power’) in rousing the people to force parliament to act. But will justice be done by the popular demand that parliament overrides past

The Baroness Mone-ing about allegations of fraud and bribery no doubt thinks everyone ‘has it in for me’. They do indeed. So would the ancients: it was standard practice to tar Roman merchants with infamia, a reputation that did them no good at all. The root of the problem for the ancient traders was the

Cicero’s statement salus populi suprema lex esto (‘Let the security of the people be the ultimate law’) has been the motto or guiding principle of any number of institutions and thinkers from the state of Missouri to Hobbes and Locke. Benjamin Netanyahu is well aware of this and knows that, whatever action he takes, his

At this time of year the Romans, too, enjoyed a celebration, called the Saturnalia. It was a time of licence, the one day when slaves were free to eat, drink and be merry, and be served by their owners. One wonders what part such role-reversal played in Vedius Pollio’s villa on the Bay of Naples

Next year there will be an election, and all the talk is of strategies for winning power. But for the elite Romans who thought about politics, the debate was not so much about power as about the ethics of those seeking it: did they possess virtus, i.e. moral excellence? And did they practise it? That