And yet it's not rare to find people explaining that the roman empire, the roman armies or the roman cities were "all the same". Yet these persons seem to know that in real life population is not limited to 200 or that there is day-night cycles.

The article talks about it, and makes the point that people who created AOE may have been biased by the same misconception that is also visible more generally. And it is an interesting thing to raise.

edit: in fact, it is illustrated by the ridiculous recent Elon Musk fit about "the odyssey" cast, itself fueled by the misconceptions that "having black guys in a roman army is woke because everyone knows the romans are not black".

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onraglanroad 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Yes but Musk is really astonishingly ignorant. I realise he didn't have a classical education but he's the kind of person who would complain about Othello casting a black man as the main character.

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cauch an hour ago | parent [-]

Sure, but it is just an example, he is not the only one thinking this misconceptions is "historical".

	▲	onraglanroad an hour ago \| parent [-]
		I'm agreeing with you. Rome was the centre of the empire so had every type of person just as London had as the centre of the British empire. And I suppose New York as a major centre of the American empire. Multicultural cities are the rule rather than the exception.

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complianceowll 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Ah, the classic HN commenter who somehow manages to bring their hatred for Elon into anything. Elon Musk rants against Hollywood rechasting characters that were originally white as people of color. Snow White was originally white; they recasted her as Columbian. The Gladiator was white; he was rechast as black. Why? Because Hollywood is obsessed with race.

But nice try though; gotta take things out of context somehow.

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onraglanroad an hour ago | parent | next [-]

Have you ever watched The Gladiator? How many of them were black? They were slaves.

Do you know how many slaves were black in the Roman empire? More than had American accents I assure you.

None of them spoke English either.

	▲	complianceowll 5 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		More times than I can count, bubba. And if you can't differentiate between a producer making a movie in English because its main audience is English speaking and producing a movie that is either: (1) accurate historically; or (2) true to its original story -- than I can't help you, bud.

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cauch an hour ago | parent | prev [-]

What do you mean "out of context". The initial article is literally explaining that there is a misconception around the diversity of culture during the antiquity. This anecdotal event, that I picked because it was recent (sorry to disappoint you, I don't really care for Musk), was just a concrete example that the exact misconception we are talking about is real and still present today. The fact that the culprit is Musk is just "by chance".

(ps: and the fact that you end up with "and in hollywood, they depicted a roman army that was not entirely Rome-inhabitant-looking, so it is the proof that it's "wokeness" seems to also illustrate that indeed you have assimilated the misconception yourself)

	▲	complianceowll a minute ago \| parent [-]
		> I don't really care for Musk I'm laughing so hard right now. You resoundingly do care about Musk; you're obsessed with him. Second, who said anything about me alleging that "they depicted a roman army that was no entirely Rome-inhabitant looking"? Those are your words not mine, and if anyone is looking for the king of strawman arguments, we have a winner with you. Rome was a very ethnically diverse place, including the demographics of its slaves, contrary to America's slaves. The only thing I said was that they recast the Gladiator as black, not being true to the original MOVIE character. If you didn't understand that, the solution is not to put words in people's mouth. The solution is to work on your reading comprehension.