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Bret Devereaux

What Bret Devereaux thinks about government

@bret-devereaux · 25 positions · 0 changes of mind

Ancient and military historian specialising in the economy of the ancient Mediterranean, who writes the long-form blog A Collection of Unmitigated Pedantry on pre-modern economies, logistics and warfare, and on what popular history, film and games get wrong about them.

Bret Devereaux did not write this page.

We collected these quotes from things they published elsewhere, and every quote links to where it was said. They have no account here and have not endorsed this site. Quotes are word for word; the short line under each one is our own restatement, not their wording. Their own site. Is this you? Claim it or ask us to remove it. Or tell us what is wrong here.

5 dated positions, 2020 to 2022, in their own words. Our reading of what Bret Devereaux has said — not written or endorsed by them.

  1. Our readingSparta is a cautionary tale rather than a model: an over-militarised, paranoid state that added only oppression to human experience.

    Their wordsSparta was – if you will permit the comparison – an ancient North Korea. An over-militarized, paranoid state which was able only to protect its own systems of internal brutality and which added only oppression to the sum of the human experience.

    ↗Collections: This. Isn’t. Sparta. Retrospectiveacoup.blog 2nd of 2 in this piece

  2. 7 months earlier

  3. Our readingThe fall of the Western Roman Empire was a real loss of state capacity, not merely a change of management, and the evidence for that loss is ample.

    Their wordsOf course that assumes a loss of state capacity, but as we’re going to see, the evidence for that loss is actually quite ample.

    ↗Collections: Rome: Decline and Fall? Part II: Institutionsacoup.blog 1st of 4 in this piece

  5. Our readingA heavily centralised state is the most fragile kind: when Rome’s centre failed, its successors were left without the resources or administration to do what it had done.

    Their wordsPrecisely because the late Roman system was so top-heavy and centralized, the collapse of central Roman rule mortally wounded it and left the successor states of Rome with much more limited resources and administration to try to achieve their aims.

    ↗Collections: Rome: Decline and Fall? Part II: Institutionsacoup.blog 2nd of 4 in this piece

  6. 18 months earlier

  7. Our readingA pre-modern countryside produces an enormous amount of food and almost no extractable surplus, which is the hard limit on everything the state above it can do.

    Their wordsThere is a ton of food in this countryside (nearly everyone is producing it) but hardly any surplus.

    ↗Collections: Bread, How Did They Make It? Part I: Farmers!acoup.blog 3rd of 4 in this piece

  8. 6 months earlier

  9. Our readingStates were born in the richest and easiest country, not in hard marginal land.

    Their wordsRather than hard, difficult country being the breeding ground for the state, it is in fact the richest, softest areas that were (for those who have been to Mesopotamia and are wondering why it doesn’t seem quite so rich and soft anymore, the word you want to look up is salinization).

    ↗Collections: The Fremen Mirage, Part I: War at the Dawn of Civilizationacoup.blog 1st of 2 in this piece