Red Széll

I'm paraphrasing here, but Rome was not a racist place.

Rome looked at Romans and barbarians, yes, but it also looked at, if you were part of the Roman Empire, you could rise up.

It was a meritocracy as well as a power base system.

And if you were rich and well-connected, you and good at your job, you could rise up.

And some of the richest, best connected and most determined people in 180 AD were the North Africans, the Libyans, like Septimius Severus.

In fact, you look at a lot of his contemporaries and certainly the majority of the people who were

in charge when he was an emperor, and they were North Africans.

Huh.

Fascinating.

Man, this book sounds awesome.

What's the name of the author again?

It's called The African Emperor by Simon Elliott, and it was the episode that broadcast in the first week of January.

So it's still there on every podcast provider that you might want to care looking at.

And I think it's absolutely vital, Jacob, that...

What you're reading about is something that you can empathize with.

And what's so important with that is the voice of the author.

You know, we don't want style over substance, but we do want that author to sound like a human being, not a press release.

Or a god-like figure sometimes.

Exactly.

That's it.