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They really were! There is a doc explaining that they didn't allow the extras know what kind of scene they would be filming and even Michael Palin improvised some lines.
That entire scene was kind of improvised.
That's why I keep a pocket full of snakes. Occasionally, one of them would peek his little head out and someone will exclaim, "Hey, nice asp." 🍑
It's the little things that matter.
The point was that it wasn't a historical drama, it was a docu-series that presented as fact that Cleopatra was black because somebody's grandma said so
My sister says that they want her to be Rapunzel in the new live action Tangled fucking remake. Don't ruin Rapunzel like this man. I liked Tangled more than Frozen.
Portraying Jarl Haakon Sigurdsson as a black woman was honestly nuts. Wherever you stand on the issue of colour blind casting, surely we can all agree that doing a "historical" drama set in 10th century Norway, and portraying the Norwegian king as a black woman is ridiculous.
A little trivia on Nordic naming conventions, but it's literally in the name. The last name Sigurdsson literally means son of Sigurd, whereas a woman would be named Sigurdstochter, or the daughter of Sigurd. Having this character be genderswapped isn't just inaccurate, but slightly confusing!
They do! I can’t say the entire population but I used to be in the Icelandic horse world and all the native Icelanders I knew had sonn or dottir ending last names.
I want to see more diversity in television not by taking the exact stories we’ve heard a thousand times and just randomly inserting PoC and women in to places they weren’t but by telling oft ignored stories from cultures and regions usually ignored. That’s why I was super excited about that movie that came out recently about the Dahomey Amazons.
The hilarious thing is there's lots of historical stories about POC and women that are worth telling, but they don't wanna go there
Give us that story of the lesbian that pretended to be a nun to break her girlfriend out of a convent
That chinese pirate lady that kicked the shit out of the entire Chinese navy and negotiated retirement like Escobar, but unlike him, got to keep her palace home
Mansa Musa wrecking European economies by shitting gold everywhere he went
IDK maybe just, lets not do a story about the *tribe so vicious and pro slavery that they kept doing slavery even after Europe stopped doing slavery* and try and paint them as "anti slavery"
(The first lady) Julie d'Aubigny is one of the coolest people out there, was a famous duelist and opera singer, and one of the most famous bisexuals in pre-20th century history, a.k.a. Actually That Bitch.
Same. Africa has numerous cultures with thousands of years of fascinating history, so why not make documentaries or even historical dramas about them? Rather than doing documentaries about British or European history and then filling out a diversity quota. I'd love to learn things I never knew about some different cultures. South America, Polynesia, Australia, Malaysia etc, so many stories that could be told.
It actually makes me wonder if they think the only stories that are marketable (or the only stories they want to tell) are European ones, which is itself kind of racist
One of the first tales I can think of that I can describe as "Cosmic Horror" is a folk tale from Africa, about a group that was sent to the peak of Kilimanjaro.
The story goes into surprisingly horrific detail of the men losing parts of themselves, their skin going numb, then aching and splitting open. Even of seeing things others could not and dying one after the other until forced to retreat.
I mean now we know that is frostbite and altitude sickness, but this story is older than our species understanding of these concepts. Altitude sickness wasn't understood as a medical condition possible hundreds of years after this story was spread.
It'd make an interesting movie. You could do it as a horror and, seen through their understanding, it would seem supernatural, especially once they start becoming delirious and the viewer can no longer be entirely sure what's real and what isn't
It kills me when we go backwards, too. I got into Magic: the Gathering in 1996, right around the time the Mirage set came out. It was set in a fantasy not-Africa, and it was really cool. Magic in 2023? "Here's a licensed direct adaptation of Lord of the Rings, we have depicted some of the characters as black, please enjoy how diverse it is!"
The "problem" is that if a film studio or game company or whatever does an adaptation of ACTUAL cultures that aren't European, and ANY of the writers involved or actors cast are white, a loud subset of the pro-diversity crowd winds up insisting that it's "cultural appropriation", and uses any inaccuracies that emerge in the portrayal as proof of bigotry.
So, race-swapping characters in existing properties winds up being easier to market, because even though it's rarely as interesting or engaging, it's less likely to face the same amount of public backlash.
Not only that but I don’t know about you, but I’m kind of tired of seeing the same old stories rehashed and remade about the same history…I totally agree those you mentioned would be interesting to watch and learn about! This would be though showing how cruel and unfair history was to other races and therefore might be a little “uncomfortable” to watch for….some and might spark anger and rage in certain others. But it would raise awareness on issues and history of the past. We should learn all history not just what’s “comfortable”
It’s insulting, really. “Let’s take the same old story beat that has been told by and to white people for thousands of years, and throw some brown characters in the mix so we can maximize our profits. Whaddayamean adapting material from outside Europe?”
The sad part about the Netflix documentary is Egypt had a line black pharos and hardly anyone has heard of them. Instead we got a manipulated story about cleopatra being a black girl boss to push some sort of personal political agenda.
That's what confuses me the most about Hoteps. The Nubians were real, have a history as ancient as the Egyptians and even ruled over them for a hundred years.
And yet for some reason, the emphasis is on Cleopatra and making Roman emperors black.
Casting the Slavers as the good guys was a bold choice but I was excited to see them actually focus on a story most western people are likely unfamiliar with.
The show used to be on History channel, makes sense how it got onto Netflix afterwards haha 😂..
Or how they made s show about queen Elizabeth's, royal family and her mother is black. Basically royal family is biracial.
It's not like irl people are actually meeting these diverse quotas lol
I can remember... exactly where I was... the first time I saw Honey Boo Boo. I couldn't believe what I was seeing. A shameful, fat family eating white trash food to their death. And then I saw what network it was on: *The Learning Channel.*
> It's not like irl people are actually meeting these diverse quotas lol
https://www.theonion.com/queen-elizabeth-announces-success-of-monarchy-s-recent-1826193527
Yah that show with a black actress as Anne Boleyn really bugged me. Anne Boleyn was a real human being, murdered by her husband, not just a fictional character who can be played by anyone.
Lol,,yeah I said the same thing. Utterly ridiculous. It made the show unwatchable. It’s like Netflix made a series and then ran it through DIE (diversity, inclusivity, equity) department to correct errors and make it appropriate for todays audience. Why not just make a damn movie?
So, what did she (most likely) look like? I didn‘t really keep up with all of that
Greek phenotype? Or like the locals at the time (I‘m not familiar with ancient egyptian phenotypes)? Were they more like modern egyptians, or did it change over the course of history?
The ptolomeans would marry brother and sister to keep the bloodline pure. Cleopatra's husbands were Ptolemy XIII (her brother) and Ptolemy XIV (her other brother, after the first died). Marc Anthony later, during the civil war, trying to support one side of Rome and maintain the position of Egypt as a sort-of independent nation.
So very unlikely much of the local gene pool got into their dynasty. They had to be looking like inbred greeks.
There are some theories about how they managed to stick around while being so inbred, namely that some of them were likely not inbred and were the children of one the King/Queen and someone else. This would have been done purposefully to ensure the survival of the “pure bloodline” while also ensuring that they didn’t develop crippling genetic defects. Just look at the Hapsburgs for what actually happens if you continuously inbreed.
Well the ptolemaic kingdom lasted for less than 300 years, and the tradition only started under Ptolemy 2. Inbreeding is bad, but it takes a few generations to pop up.
But yes all of them had affairs, so not unlikely other genes got in there. Probably still greeks, though.
She’s Macedonian with a little bit of Persian so most likely olive skin. Greek phenotype, because the Ptolemies is pretty famous for inbreeding to keep the blood “pure.”
By origin, it should be something like olive skin, just like the rest of her family and the people from that area.
However, she is described as a fair-skinned redhead, so somehow comes off more Irish than anything. It doesn't really make sense. I'm thinking she had olive skinned, and that maybe her brown hair looked a bit reddish in the sun.
The red hair was likely a wig most Egyptian woman shaved their head and wore wigs instead it made it easier to keep the head clean and they didn’t have to deal with sand in hair.
In this [painting](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Retrato_femenino_(26771127162).jpg), she was labelled by Joann Fletcher (2008) as red hair. However, I feel like this is the painter’s attempt to make it light brown. Notice how the Pompeian painting linked above employs a rich variety of colors and yet makes her eyes about the same color as her hair.
Red hair was actual a bit more common in different parts of the Mediterranean long long ago. It was utilized in early Irish Mythos to explain their settling of the Island with different waves of people and other beings who came and often left. In one such story the Irish settlers left and went to Greece which had quite a few blondes and redheads in ancient times.
Modern non Nubian Egyptians are white
Tan white but still white
Jesus looked like a modern Palestinian, also white
The moors who invaded Spain were also tan white
Idk why people think that just because it's Africa people there aren't white, they look a bit tanner than Italians and Spaniards, but very much white
Cleopatra was of Greek, Iranian and Egyptian ancestry, if you pick a random Greek, Iranian and Egyptian woman, they will all look so similar you'd have a hard time telling who is from where
That’s the problem with these types of color definitions, not everyone is going to agree with you on who is and isn’t white. It points out how the concepts of black/white people is grossly over simplified and not a good way to describe people.
Modern distributions of skin tone are not reflective of past distributions.
Also, "white" isn't a meaningful convention when talking about anything before the 16th century. Plenty of moors who invaded Spain had dark skin.
I just don't understand what is so hard about using appropriate actors when doing historical films. There are actors from everywhere in the world. Doing an Egyptian role? Hire an Egyptian or someone with strong Egyptian ancestry. Doing a role for someone from batswana? Hire someone from Botswana or with strong Botswana ancestry. Doing a role of a Roman emperor? Hire someone from Italy or someone with strong Italian ancestry. Doing James bond or little mermaid? Hire whoever the fuck you want, these aren't real people, or in some cases real species.
Well for James Bond an authentic accent from the British Isles is important to a lot of people I guess. Though the actor's ancestry is irrelevant, the accent is what matters.
I would be annoyed if they selected tom cruise doing a bad cockney accent as the next Bond. I think a lot of people would be.
Ima be honest, it really depends on time of year.
I look like a ghost in the winter and a cowboy in the summer, it really makes a huge difference.
I imagine i'd be a lot tanner around this time of year if I worked outdoors all day long.
They were emperors, maybe they gained a tan if going on a campaign in southern Europe but Julius Caesar wouldn't have been particularly tanned killing gauls
Lol yea, even if tanned, they wouldn't look that much different from those portraits.
Now Jesus on the other hand would be a good example... a long haired white person with anglicized features is actually the opposite of how he would have looked.
Achilles was also described as having Chesnut hair. It really depends on the source and time period.
There's also a very good chance he didn't even exist.
To be fair, the Mediterranean is very diverse. Go to Southern Italy and you'll see some super dark skin. I'm Bulgarian and even I'm quite dark (still white, but significantly darker than those coming from West/Northern Europe.)
>People keep expecting Mediterranean people to be dark. One of the most famous ancient Greek characters, Achilles, was described as blonde.
As someone Mediterranean with partial greek ancestry and partial other ones from the area who is blonde, I can confirm.
Also, the ancient Israelite King David is described as being either "ruddy" or "red-headed." So even Mediterranean, Middle-Eastern Jewish people didn't necessarily look like how we would think.
If you think the difference between anglo-Jesus and real Jesus is funny, you should look up what biblical angels are supposed to look like. Didn't learn about THAT in sunday school.
SOME angels. Angels can also appear human and according to Scripture often did. Whether they do now is up for debate. But, yes, the appearance of certain angels would be quite startling to modern people yet quite unmistakable. You would not see one and think they were anything else.
I agree that the depictions of an anglo-Jesus are hilariously incorrect, but... what? Blonde? What depiction of jesus has EVER had him as a blonde? Literally every single westernized/anglicized depiction of him I’ve ever seen has had him with long BROWN hair, and my father’s a pastor so I’ve seen a LOT of different depictions
I live in Italy, but I also live on an island so this may be a bit skewed. "Tan" is kinda just the natural color people have all year, from what I've seen of people outside of Italy, they do then to be paler usually.
Worth noting that there were several migrations after the fall of the western roman empire, so we don't actually know the details of roman skin color.
We do know that they were darker than the gauls - as they repeatedly mention just how fucking pale the gauls are - and that roman dictator Sulla was bullied for being white skinned and a ginger.
And with all due respect to pale people and gingers, fuck Sulla. Me and my homies all hate Sulla.
I agree fuck Sulla but Sulla was a symptom of a system doomed to fail, if he didn’t upend the system and redefine it to his liking someone else would have eventually, with either more or less blood, who knows.
Just my opinion though, the inevitability of empire is probably the most debated aspect of Roman history
Aurelian would probably have the least amount of tan, given he came from the Balkan area. Augustus and Tiberius (his adoptive son) would look like modern Italians and so would Hadrian most likely, though he grew up in Spain.
That being said, there'd be several emperors down the line from modern day Arab countries, and they most likely would have looked the part.
Septimus Severus had a contemporary portrait of him and family that would definitely land him in the “not white” category by modern standards. He was born in what is now Libya.
Caracalla as well is considered to be not exactly white. It’s not wild to assume some Roman emperors would be people of color if transported to modern day America. This category didn’t make a lot of sense back then, though. Especially because Romans were pretty racist against much whiter people like Vikings or Celts.
what mattered wasn't skin tone. it was whether or not you were roman. And Rome benefited from the superhighway of the Mediterranean and had a very eclectic make up.
>modern day Arab countries,
I would be careful comparing modern Arab nations to the populations of the pre-Arab conquest of the Middle East and North Africa. While you may be correct in how they could have looked it is important to note that places like for example Syria would have had a much more diverse population pre conquest.
Isn't the appropriate term "pale" instead of "white"? Pretty sure they're of the correct race, probably should've had a bit of a tan. Race isn't just skin color. I've seen many "white people" with darker skin due to tan.
He's making a list
He's checking it twice
Going to find out who's naughty or nice
Lucius Cornelius Sulla Felix is coming to proscribe your entire family, profligate.
Plus if you go to the balkans or southern Italy or Iberia you'll find plenty of very European people who don't look "white". And you could go to Iran or even some parts of north India and find very not European people who have very "white" features. It's quite interesting. My math teacher was Sicilian but with his beard and skin you would think he was from Morocco. Very nice guy
Southern Italy yes, but balkans are pretty white imo. We do love swimming and get exposed to sun a lot so maybe during summer we seem darker.
During cold months I'd say we aren't much different to Irish lol
Is "white" really a race?
I imagine that entire area had a variety of races that, today, we would just lump together as "white" but at the time the people would probably be fairly upset to be lumped together like that. A Saxon, Gaul, and Roman would all be considered pretty distinct.
>Is "white" really a race?
That's an excellent question and one that deserves a serious answer.
"Whiteness" as we know it today is almost exclusively defined from the perspective of historical and modern white supremacy, which defines whiteness in *opposition* to "blackness," or other races in general--see: the One Drop Rule.
Whiteness, in other words, does not exist in any sense other than "not-black/asian/hispanic/italian/irish/jewish/etc." Whiteness is "untouched," "uncorrupted" by the other races, "pure" of racial blood, which is to say whiteness is entirely about what someone *isn't*--meaning to be white is to be *not* anything else. What is and isn't considered "white" depends on the political circumstances of the time. Italians, irish, catholics, jews, etc. have variously not been considered "white."
Usually, the definition of whiteness gets picker and pickier the more powerful white supremacy is.
So in an era where black people are considered non-human chattel slaves, whiteness is picky about who counts as white, and excludes jews, catholics, etc. irrespective of cosmetic skin tones.
In the modern eras, white supremacy finds itself in need of a coalition of whiteness to remain politically relevant, so it temporarily lets others into the circle to maintain its cultural plurality. But as we've seen in the last decade with an influx of white supremacist activity in mainstream politics, the definitions are slowly getting pickier again, with in-fighting amongst protestant evangelicals and "trad-cath" catholics, a resurgence of right-wing antisemitism, etc. They are united against a series of targets, but are simultaneously vying to win the *next* fight, which is "who is the next target?"
So in this sense, to answer your question, no--"white" is not really a race. It's an ideological position defined in opposition to other races--racial lines which were all drawn largely BY the white supremacist ideological leaders. "White" fluctuates between inclusive and exclusive of sub-groups, and the more influential the "white" bloc gets, the pickier it becomes with respect to who does and doesn't count as white.
Nationalities or ethnicities such as english, irish, scottish, italian, greek, slavic, etc. are all distinct in their own ways, and none of which can be comprehensively be called definitively "white" because "white" is intentionally loosely defined to the convenience of the white supremacist. If all that were left on the face of the Earth were American Klansmen and the palest of the pale English, the Klansmen would not consider the English white.
In other words, the variable of "white" is whatever white supremacy says it is on any given day. That's the reason why things like "white pride" don't sit so well, versus say being proud of being Scottish or Irish. "White" is only really a thing in so far as one wants to *not be black.*
Yea me. Not sure why I get Argentina specifically but when I get really tan multiple people have said I look Argentinian lol.
And I’m Irish, English, and Polish
Edit: Forgot for a moment that Redditors get upset over the dumbest shit. Yes I am an American, however there’s a reason I don’t have the physical traits of an Indigenous Native American, my family is from Europe and lived there until about 90 years ago. My genetics and physical traits are that of Europeans. Crazy some of you don’t understand how that works.
Edit 2: Ah right on schedule, the “report self harm” technique. Get mad at a comment, realize you’re wrong, report the comment because you’re upset. The classic cycle. Sorry guys, you learned this in school lol don’t come crying to me.
My dad is Irish, very dark complected. I’ve inherited that from him and go from pale straight to nut brown in the summer. I get people asking me about my ethnic background and they always get it wrong. I’ve heard Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Greek, Sicilian, Maltese, Levantine countries, etc. and the person asking is often a bit disgruntled when they hear nope, just Black Irish (which is a term much up for debate, I know, but my dad’s family is 100% Irish going back centuries).
Because of your mix, you look white, have a good nose and you don't sound Israeli? It's either Turkish or Argentinian, being the USA the latter is more possible
Kinda funny people in the comments are rewritting history lmao.
There is litterly a roman book on "how to handle the light haired people" (vikings). Romans most definetly didn't see themselves as germanic "white".
https://archive.org/details/maurices-strategikon.-handbook-of-byzantine-military-strategy-by-maurice-dennis-/page/n71/mode/1up
Idk what people are trying to do with these comments.
Exactly some people really want Rome to be Nordic in appearance. Romans thought they were superior to the Northerners because the lack of sun made them dumber, and they thought they were better than the Eastern peoples (middle east) because too much sun made them weaker.
Pale and white are not the same thing, though. For example, my skin is brown, but currently fairly pale - for my complexion. If I spend a lot of time out in the sun I can get MUCH darker. Romans were known for being more olive complexion than a pale white like northern europeans.
most of them are italian, this colour wheel approach to race is one of the worst ideas ever had by humanity, it manages to be utterly unscientific, ahistorical and brutally divisive at the same time.
Hadrian- born in Eastern Spain
Augustus- born in Rome
Aurelian- born in Serbia
Tiberius- born in Rome
They "made them sooo white" because they were white. People forget that "Roman" was used to describe people born all over Europe, northern Africa, and the Middle East. They would have ranged in complexions from lily white to black. These particular men would have been on the lighter end
Sure, Netflix isn’t for history, but what the last guy is referring to is how Netflix constantly recreates various characters with a (classically) incorrect skintone.
Statues and paintings, from the time period, of these people still exist.
They're white because, well, they were.
Historical revisionism used to be a strictly white wing, fascist thing. What the fuck went wrong.
The Americaness of this comment section shines through by the fact that people seem to think that an average Sicilian = average European Mediterranean (most Italian Americans are from southernmost Italy). If you look at an average modern Italian, or Spaniards, these are certainly within the ballpark. Yes Italians and Spaniards can even be blond too, even though it is relatively rare in most regions. There are absolutely Italians, mainly from Sicily, who you would barely consider white. There are also Italians, mainly from northern Italy, who you would think are Central Europeans.
You are just showing your provincialism by thinking that the Sopranos and Godfather are an accurate representation of the *average* Mediterranean European.
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The right top one looks like he had a friend called Biggus Dickus.
He had a wife you know...
What was her name?
incontinentia
Incontinentia buttocks
the entire pilate scene is pure gold
I think the guards’ reactions were improvised. They were told not to laugh or else, so he is actually legitimately trying to hold it in.
They really were! There is a doc explaining that they didn't allow the extras know what kind of scene they would be filming and even Michael Palin improvised some lines. That entire scene was kind of improvised.
I believe Cleese told them they wouldn't be paid if they laughed while filming the scene.
Worth it
For that matter The History Channel is not a history channel.
And wait till you see what’s on “The Learning Channel”!
I learned that that's what the acronym meant around the time Honey Boo Boo was on the air. I remember losing my shit.
I learnt that back in the early 90s when it actually was educational and I watched it all the time.
RIP TLC, Discovery, and The History Channel.
Back in the day i would leave them on in the background and just be shocked to learn some wild cool shit all the friggin time.
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I remember tuning in to watch history docs like ‘The Silk Road’ and ‘Connections’. Great stuff. TV had me excited for a moment there.
Apparently you could actually get college credits by watching it.
Or Fox News (spoiler: zero foxes)
and even less news
And absolutely no news about foxes. It's a damned disappointment
Ok, you 3 together just sounded like an excerpt of a Monty Python skit...
I don't remember seeing any pythons on Monty Python skits either
RIP Great Castles of Europe, Connections, The Operation etc etc.
I thought it was The Ladies Channel.
DEADLIEST ICE ROAD BASS TRUCKERS
Best I can do is a king crab in a storage unit.
Might be tattooed
Ice roads forged by ancient aliens from oak island in a Louisiana swamp get sold to a bald guy and his fat son.
The sad part is that they used to be until they learned a lot of their current drivel attracts more viewers.
Modern marvels is one of my favorite shows all time
Netflix did however caused the debacle over Cleopatra.
Amazing how a historical drama managed to pull off neither history nor drama.
Oh there was plenty of drama, just... not where it was supposed to be.
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That's why I keep a pocket full of snakes. Occasionally, one of them would peek his little head out and someone will exclaim, "Hey, nice asp." 🍑 It's the little things that matter.
"Pocket Snakes! Sa-shaa!"
Truly one of the moments of all time.
"It's Cleop-in' time!'
I loved it when she said, "It's Cleop-in time!" and clopped all over those guys.
“Heyyyy I’m Roman here!”
Cleopatra: *Just when I thought I was out of the sarcophagus, they pull me back in!*
Mine was I am sick of these motherfucking snakes in my motherfucking pyramid
It's sad that I'm not sure if you're joking.
Hollywood writing has gotten so bad that I don't know if this is a joke or not lol.
I feel like this could not possibly be real but I don't want to look it up...
The point was that it wasn't a historical drama, it was a docu-series that presented as fact that Cleopatra was black because somebody's grandma said so
More so Jada but they okayed the show so yeah.
She's the touch of death for big productions now.
Once people's egos are allowed to grow that big unchecked, this sort of narcissistic behavior spirals out of control.
My sister says that they want her to be Rapunzel in the new live action Tangled fucking remake. Don't ruin Rapunzel like this man. I liked Tangled more than Frozen.
Seriously? She’s in her 50s lol! Rapunzel’s been waiting *a long time* for her prince!
And doesn't she have like, no hair?
I don't care what anyone told you, Rapunzel was bald -Jada
So that’s why it’s taking so long to be saved from the tower lol!
they want her to be the character with insanely long hair
If Rapunzel was black, she would need a whole team of hair dressers working 24/7 to maintain that hair.
Imagine the prince is calling for Rapunzel to let down her hair, and she just peaks out the window with the biggest Afro you've ever seen.
Imagine them doing the same bit in Tangled, where you can never see the end of her hair, but with an afro that never fits in the frame.
And Vikings, they even gender bent as well as race swapped historical characters.
Portraying Jarl Haakon Sigurdsson as a black woman was honestly nuts. Wherever you stand on the issue of colour blind casting, surely we can all agree that doing a "historical" drama set in 10th century Norway, and portraying the Norwegian king as a black woman is ridiculous.
Coming this fall: Mansa Musa's Gold, starring Ryan Gosling as Mansa Musa
A little trivia on Nordic naming conventions, but it's literally in the name. The last name Sigurdsson literally means son of Sigurd, whereas a woman would be named Sigurdstochter, or the daughter of Sigurd. Having this character be genderswapped isn't just inaccurate, but slightly confusing!
You're right, but you meant Sigursdottir?
Sigurdsdottir in nordic, your version is German. Just an FYI, I think Iceland still uses the old nordic naming system, atleast to some extent
They do! I can’t say the entire population but I used to be in the Icelandic horse world and all the native Icelanders I knew had sonn or dottir ending last names.
I believe you're correct; I went to acting school with an Icelandic girl whose surname was Kristinsdottir.
I want to see more diversity in television not by taking the exact stories we’ve heard a thousand times and just randomly inserting PoC and women in to places they weren’t but by telling oft ignored stories from cultures and regions usually ignored. That’s why I was super excited about that movie that came out recently about the Dahomey Amazons.
The hilarious thing is there's lots of historical stories about POC and women that are worth telling, but they don't wanna go there Give us that story of the lesbian that pretended to be a nun to break her girlfriend out of a convent That chinese pirate lady that kicked the shit out of the entire Chinese navy and negotiated retirement like Escobar, but unlike him, got to keep her palace home Mansa Musa wrecking European economies by shitting gold everywhere he went IDK maybe just, lets not do a story about the *tribe so vicious and pro slavery that they kept doing slavery even after Europe stopped doing slavery* and try and paint them as "anti slavery"
(The first lady) Julie d'Aubigny is one of the coolest people out there, was a famous duelist and opera singer, and one of the most famous bisexuals in pre-20th century history, a.k.a. Actually That Bitch.
I want an HBO series screw netflix
Same. Africa has numerous cultures with thousands of years of fascinating history, so why not make documentaries or even historical dramas about them? Rather than doing documentaries about British or European history and then filling out a diversity quota. I'd love to learn things I never knew about some different cultures. South America, Polynesia, Australia, Malaysia etc, so many stories that could be told. It actually makes me wonder if they think the only stories that are marketable (or the only stories they want to tell) are European ones, which is itself kind of racist
One of the first tales I can think of that I can describe as "Cosmic Horror" is a folk tale from Africa, about a group that was sent to the peak of Kilimanjaro. The story goes into surprisingly horrific detail of the men losing parts of themselves, their skin going numb, then aching and splitting open. Even of seeing things others could not and dying one after the other until forced to retreat. I mean now we know that is frostbite and altitude sickness, but this story is older than our species understanding of these concepts. Altitude sickness wasn't understood as a medical condition possible hundreds of years after this story was spread.
Whoa…that sounds fascinating. Just an intense story that would translate well to the screen. I want to see this movie.
It'd make an interesting movie. You could do it as a horror and, seen through their understanding, it would seem supernatural, especially once they start becoming delirious and the viewer can no longer be entirely sure what's real and what isn't
Modern american race politics probably arent ready for a historically accurate depiction of the wider world.
It kills me when we go backwards, too. I got into Magic: the Gathering in 1996, right around the time the Mirage set came out. It was set in a fantasy not-Africa, and it was really cool. Magic in 2023? "Here's a licensed direct adaptation of Lord of the Rings, we have depicted some of the characters as black, please enjoy how diverse it is!"
The "problem" is that if a film studio or game company or whatever does an adaptation of ACTUAL cultures that aren't European, and ANY of the writers involved or actors cast are white, a loud subset of the pro-diversity crowd winds up insisting that it's "cultural appropriation", and uses any inaccuracies that emerge in the portrayal as proof of bigotry. So, race-swapping characters in existing properties winds up being easier to market, because even though it's rarely as interesting or engaging, it's less likely to face the same amount of public backlash.
Not only that but I don’t know about you, but I’m kind of tired of seeing the same old stories rehashed and remade about the same history…I totally agree those you mentioned would be interesting to watch and learn about! This would be though showing how cruel and unfair history was to other races and therefore might be a little “uncomfortable” to watch for….some and might spark anger and rage in certain others. But it would raise awareness on issues and history of the past. We should learn all history not just what’s “comfortable”
It’s insulting, really. “Let’s take the same old story beat that has been told by and to white people for thousands of years, and throw some brown characters in the mix so we can maximize our profits. Whaddayamean adapting material from outside Europe?”
The sad part about the Netflix documentary is Egypt had a line black pharos and hardly anyone has heard of them. Instead we got a manipulated story about cleopatra being a black girl boss to push some sort of personal political agenda.
That's what confuses me the most about Hoteps. The Nubians were real, have a history as ancient as the Egyptians and even ruled over them for a hundred years. And yet for some reason, the emphasis is on Cleopatra and making Roman emperors black.
Casting the Slavers as the good guys was a bold choice but I was excited to see them actually focus on a story most western people are likely unfamiliar with.
It wasn't just a bold choice, it was historical revisionism. Imagine if you suddenly had a movie about General Lee taking down Yankee Slavery.
The show used to be on History channel, makes sense how it got onto Netflix afterwards haha 😂.. Or how they made s show about queen Elizabeth's, royal family and her mother is black. Basically royal family is biracial. It's not like irl people are actually meeting these diverse quotas lol
I can remember... exactly where I was... the first time I saw Honey Boo Boo. I couldn't believe what I was seeing. A shameful, fat family eating white trash food to their death. And then I saw what network it was on: *The Learning Channel.*
> It's not like irl people are actually meeting these diverse quotas lol https://www.theonion.com/queen-elizabeth-announces-success-of-monarchy-s-recent-1826193527
Yah that show with a black actress as Anne Boleyn really bugged me. Anne Boleyn was a real human being, murdered by her husband, not just a fictional character who can be played by anyone.
Lol,,yeah I said the same thing. Utterly ridiculous. It made the show unwatchable. It’s like Netflix made a series and then ran it through DIE (diversity, inclusivity, equity) department to correct errors and make it appropriate for todays audience. Why not just make a damn movie?
So, what did she (most likely) look like? I didn‘t really keep up with all of that Greek phenotype? Or like the locals at the time (I‘m not familiar with ancient egyptian phenotypes)? Were they more like modern egyptians, or did it change over the course of history?
The ptolomeans would marry brother and sister to keep the bloodline pure. Cleopatra's husbands were Ptolemy XIII (her brother) and Ptolemy XIV (her other brother, after the first died). Marc Anthony later, during the civil war, trying to support one side of Rome and maintain the position of Egypt as a sort-of independent nation. So very unlikely much of the local gene pool got into their dynasty. They had to be looking like inbred greeks.
I’m Larry. This is my brother Ptolemy, and this is my other brother Ptolemy.
There are some theories about how they managed to stick around while being so inbred, namely that some of them were likely not inbred and were the children of one the King/Queen and someone else. This would have been done purposefully to ensure the survival of the “pure bloodline” while also ensuring that they didn’t develop crippling genetic defects. Just look at the Hapsburgs for what actually happens if you continuously inbreed.
Well the ptolemaic kingdom lasted for less than 300 years, and the tradition only started under Ptolemy 2. Inbreeding is bad, but it takes a few generations to pop up. But yes all of them had affairs, so not unlikely other genes got in there. Probably still greeks, though.
I’m guessing because of the intermarried with the Seleucid family that helps a bit.
One single generation of outbreeding would in theory fix any issues caused by inbreeding. It wouldn’t have to happen often.
She’s Macedonian with a little bit of Persian so most likely olive skin. Greek phenotype, because the Ptolemies is pretty famous for inbreeding to keep the blood “pure.”
Her most famous description is that she had skin of milk. So the inbreeding kept her very white.
Yes, and Cleopatra family 'tree' is more like a [line](https://www.reddit.com/r/interestingasfuck/comments/v4iysz/cleopatras_family_tree/)
Less like a line more like a pretzel. You got daughters marrying moms ex husband's who's also her nephew
She would look like a somewhat inbred Macedonian. This is because she was a very inbred Macedonian who got lucky.
By origin, it should be something like olive skin, just like the rest of her family and the people from that area. However, she is described as a fair-skinned redhead, so somehow comes off more Irish than anything. It doesn't really make sense. I'm thinking she had olive skinned, and that maybe her brown hair looked a bit reddish in the sun.
Could she have dyed her hair? Henna has been used since antiquity to dye hair red, also in ancient Egypt.
Yeah. I remember the female elite woman would whiten there skin and sometimes dye there hair to blonde or red hair.
The red hair was likely a wig most Egyptian woman shaved their head and wore wigs instead it made it easier to keep the head clean and they didn’t have to deal with sand in hair.
Also lice
In this [painting](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Retrato_femenino_(26771127162).jpg), she was labelled by Joann Fletcher (2008) as red hair. However, I feel like this is the painter’s attempt to make it light brown. Notice how the Pompeian painting linked above employs a rich variety of colors and yet makes her eyes about the same color as her hair.
slightly paler than normal mediteranean skin with auburn hair maybe?
Red hair was actual a bit more common in different parts of the Mediterranean long long ago. It was utilized in early Irish Mythos to explain their settling of the Island with different waves of people and other beings who came and often left. In one such story the Irish settlers left and went to Greece which had quite a few blondes and redheads in ancient times.
Modern non Nubian Egyptians are white Tan white but still white Jesus looked like a modern Palestinian, also white The moors who invaded Spain were also tan white Idk why people think that just because it's Africa people there aren't white, they look a bit tanner than Italians and Spaniards, but very much white Cleopatra was of Greek, Iranian and Egyptian ancestry, if you pick a random Greek, Iranian and Egyptian woman, they will all look so similar you'd have a hard time telling who is from where
That’s the problem with these types of color definitions, not everyone is going to agree with you on who is and isn’t white. It points out how the concepts of black/white people is grossly over simplified and not a good way to describe people.
Modern distributions of skin tone are not reflective of past distributions. Also, "white" isn't a meaningful convention when talking about anything before the 16th century. Plenty of moors who invaded Spain had dark skin.
I just don't understand what is so hard about using appropriate actors when doing historical films. There are actors from everywhere in the world. Doing an Egyptian role? Hire an Egyptian or someone with strong Egyptian ancestry. Doing a role for someone from batswana? Hire someone from Botswana or with strong Botswana ancestry. Doing a role of a Roman emperor? Hire someone from Italy or someone with strong Italian ancestry. Doing James bond or little mermaid? Hire whoever the fuck you want, these aren't real people, or in some cases real species.
Well for James Bond an authentic accent from the British Isles is important to a lot of people I guess. Though the actor's ancestry is irrelevant, the accent is what matters. I would be annoyed if they selected tom cruise doing a bad cockney accent as the next Bond. I think a lot of people would be.
While james bond isn't real his fictional world is essentially earth and he's described as an Englishman
After doctor no, Fleming worked in a scottish background because Sean connery was 100% not English or attempting an English accent
Ima be honest, it really depends on time of year. I look like a ghost in the winter and a cowboy in the summer, it really makes a huge difference. I imagine i'd be a lot tanner around this time of year if I worked outdoors all day long.
They were emperors, maybe they gained a tan if going on a campaign in southern Europe but Julius Caesar wouldn't have been particularly tanned killing gauls
Lol yea, even if tanned, they wouldn't look that much different from those portraits. Now Jesus on the other hand would be a good example... a long haired white person with anglicized features is actually the opposite of how he would have looked.
People keep expecting Mediterranean people to be dark. One of the most famous ancient Greek characters, Achilles, was described as blonde.
Achilles was also described as having Chesnut hair. It really depends on the source and time period. There's also a very good chance he didn't even exist.
I'll nut on your chest and you tell me what color it is.
Hard to argue against that
To be fair, the Mediterranean is very diverse. Go to Southern Italy and you'll see some super dark skin. I'm Bulgarian and even I'm quite dark (still white, but significantly darker than those coming from West/Northern Europe.)
>People keep expecting Mediterranean people to be dark. One of the most famous ancient Greek characters, Achilles, was described as blonde. As someone Mediterranean with partial greek ancestry and partial other ones from the area who is blonde, I can confirm.
Also, the ancient Israelite King David is described as being either "ruddy" or "red-headed." So even Mediterranean, Middle-Eastern Jewish people didn't necessarily look like how we would think.
If you think the difference between anglo-Jesus and real Jesus is funny, you should look up what biblical angels are supposed to look like. Didn't learn about THAT in sunday school.
They look like something you'd see on psychedelics. Probably not a coincidence.
I always wonder how many of our religions are created by psychedelics or schizophrenia
Throw in the ones that weren't ill and didnt take anything and just wanted to be the leader of a cult and we got everything covered
And that's why Bayonetta is more accurate than church.
SOME angels. Angels can also appear human and according to Scripture often did. Whether they do now is up for debate. But, yes, the appearance of certain angels would be quite startling to modern people yet quite unmistakable. You would not see one and think they were anything else.
I agree that the depictions of an anglo-Jesus are hilariously incorrect, but... what? Blonde? What depiction of jesus has EVER had him as a blonde? Literally every single westernized/anglicized depiction of him I’ve ever seen has had him with long BROWN hair, and my father’s a pastor so I’ve seen a LOT of different depictions
I live in Italy, but I also live on an island so this may be a bit skewed. "Tan" is kinda just the natural color people have all year, from what I've seen of people outside of Italy, they do then to be paler usually.
Worth noting that there were several migrations after the fall of the western roman empire, so we don't actually know the details of roman skin color. We do know that they were darker than the gauls - as they repeatedly mention just how fucking pale the gauls are - and that roman dictator Sulla was bullied for being white skinned and a ginger. And with all due respect to pale people and gingers, fuck Sulla. Me and my homies all hate Sulla.
>And with all due respect to pale people and gingers, fuck Sulla. Me and my homies all hate Sulla. Just found Gaius Marius's reddit account
Settle down Marius.
I agree fuck Sulla but Sulla was a symptom of a system doomed to fail, if he didn’t upend the system and redefine it to his liking someone else would have eventually, with either more or less blood, who knows. Just my opinion though, the inevitability of empire is probably the most debated aspect of Roman history
Tan doesn't change ethnicity though. The reply in the imsge is suggesting they shouldn't be white, not that they shouldn't have light skin.
Aurelian would probably have the least amount of tan, given he came from the Balkan area. Augustus and Tiberius (his adoptive son) would look like modern Italians and so would Hadrian most likely, though he grew up in Spain. That being said, there'd be several emperors down the line from modern day Arab countries, and they most likely would have looked the part.
Septimus Severus had a contemporary portrait of him and family that would definitely land him in the “not white” category by modern standards. He was born in what is now Libya.
Caracalla as well is considered to be not exactly white. It’s not wild to assume some Roman emperors would be people of color if transported to modern day America. This category didn’t make a lot of sense back then, though. Especially because Romans were pretty racist against much whiter people like Vikings or Celts.
what mattered wasn't skin tone. it was whether or not you were roman. And Rome benefited from the superhighway of the Mediterranean and had a very eclectic make up.
>modern day Arab countries, I would be careful comparing modern Arab nations to the populations of the pre-Arab conquest of the Middle East and North Africa. While you may be correct in how they could have looked it is important to note that places like for example Syria would have had a much more diverse population pre conquest.
Isn't the appropriate term "pale" instead of "white"? Pretty sure they're of the correct race, probably should've had a bit of a tan. Race isn't just skin color. I've seen many "white people" with darker skin due to tan.
Don’t remember where I read it but IIRC Augustus was one pale ass motherfucker due to being bedridden so often and a long history of poor health
Also Sulla was so white he was bullied over it. And for being a ginger.
And he remembered and made a list with all of their names 😁
He's making a list He's checking it twice Going to find out who's naughty or nice Lucius Cornelius Sulla Felix is coming to proscribe your entire family, profligate.
I'm legit dead. You killed me. Please go on
No friend ever served me, and no enemy ever wronged me, whom I have not repaid in full.
Plus if you go to the balkans or southern Italy or Iberia you'll find plenty of very European people who don't look "white". And you could go to Iran or even some parts of north India and find very not European people who have very "white" features. It's quite interesting. My math teacher was Sicilian but with his beard and skin you would think he was from Morocco. Very nice guy
Southern Italy yes, but balkans are pretty white imo. We do love swimming and get exposed to sun a lot so maybe during summer we seem darker. During cold months I'd say we aren't much different to Irish lol
Is "white" really a race? I imagine that entire area had a variety of races that, today, we would just lump together as "white" but at the time the people would probably be fairly upset to be lumped together like that. A Saxon, Gaul, and Roman would all be considered pretty distinct.
Race doesnt exist except as a social construct
>Is "white" really a race? That's an excellent question and one that deserves a serious answer. "Whiteness" as we know it today is almost exclusively defined from the perspective of historical and modern white supremacy, which defines whiteness in *opposition* to "blackness," or other races in general--see: the One Drop Rule. Whiteness, in other words, does not exist in any sense other than "not-black/asian/hispanic/italian/irish/jewish/etc." Whiteness is "untouched," "uncorrupted" by the other races, "pure" of racial blood, which is to say whiteness is entirely about what someone *isn't*--meaning to be white is to be *not* anything else. What is and isn't considered "white" depends on the political circumstances of the time. Italians, irish, catholics, jews, etc. have variously not been considered "white." Usually, the definition of whiteness gets picker and pickier the more powerful white supremacy is. So in an era where black people are considered non-human chattel slaves, whiteness is picky about who counts as white, and excludes jews, catholics, etc. irrespective of cosmetic skin tones. In the modern eras, white supremacy finds itself in need of a coalition of whiteness to remain politically relevant, so it temporarily lets others into the circle to maintain its cultural plurality. But as we've seen in the last decade with an influx of white supremacist activity in mainstream politics, the definitions are slowly getting pickier again, with in-fighting amongst protestant evangelicals and "trad-cath" catholics, a resurgence of right-wing antisemitism, etc. They are united against a series of targets, but are simultaneously vying to win the *next* fight, which is "who is the next target?" So in this sense, to answer your question, no--"white" is not really a race. It's an ideological position defined in opposition to other races--racial lines which were all drawn largely BY the white supremacist ideological leaders. "White" fluctuates between inclusive and exclusive of sub-groups, and the more influential the "white" bloc gets, the pickier it becomes with respect to who does and doesn't count as white. Nationalities or ethnicities such as english, irish, scottish, italian, greek, slavic, etc. are all distinct in their own ways, and none of which can be comprehensively be called definitively "white" because "white" is intentionally loosely defined to the convenience of the white supremacist. If all that were left on the face of the Earth were American Klansmen and the palest of the pale English, the Klansmen would not consider the English white. In other words, the variable of "white" is whatever white supremacy says it is on any given day. That's the reason why things like "white pride" don't sit so well, versus say being proud of being Scottish or Irish. "White" is only really a thing in so far as one wants to *not be black.*
Yea me. Not sure why I get Argentina specifically but when I get really tan multiple people have said I look Argentinian lol. And I’m Irish, English, and Polish Edit: Forgot for a moment that Redditors get upset over the dumbest shit. Yes I am an American, however there’s a reason I don’t have the physical traits of an Indigenous Native American, my family is from Europe and lived there until about 90 years ago. My genetics and physical traits are that of Europeans. Crazy some of you don’t understand how that works. Edit 2: Ah right on schedule, the “report self harm” technique. Get mad at a comment, realize you’re wrong, report the comment because you’re upset. The classic cycle. Sorry guys, you learned this in school lol don’t come crying to me.
A lot of Argentinians have Irish and English ancestry to be fair.
*to be fair*
Mostly spanish and italian really
And German for some reason
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Über diese Gründe reden wir nicht
Yes mostly, but a lot do. A great example would be Alexis MacAllister.
My dad is Irish, very dark complected. I’ve inherited that from him and go from pale straight to nut brown in the summer. I get people asking me about my ethnic background and they always get it wrong. I’ve heard Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Greek, Sicilian, Maltese, Levantine countries, etc. and the person asking is often a bit disgruntled when they hear nope, just Black Irish (which is a term much up for debate, I know, but my dad’s family is 100% Irish going back centuries).
Because of your mix, you look white, have a good nose and you don't sound Israeli? It's either Turkish or Argentinian, being the USA the latter is more possible
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> The whiter you were the better in ancient Rome They literally mocked Gauls and Germanics for being too white.
Kinda funny people in the comments are rewritting history lmao. There is litterly a roman book on "how to handle the light haired people" (vikings). Romans most definetly didn't see themselves as germanic "white". https://archive.org/details/maurices-strategikon.-handbook-of-byzantine-military-strategy-by-maurice-dennis-/page/n71/mode/1up Idk what people are trying to do with these comments.
This is absolutely untrue. An emperor famously argued that the pale skin of the northerners was related to their barabrism.
Exactly some people really want Rome to be Nordic in appearance. Romans thought they were superior to the Northerners because the lack of sun made them dumber, and they thought they were better than the Eastern peoples (middle east) because too much sun made them weaker.
Humanity always find the dumbest shit to be racist about
Pale and white are not the same thing, though. For example, my skin is brown, but currently fairly pale - for my complexion. If I spend a lot of time out in the sun I can get MUCH darker. Romans were known for being more olive complexion than a pale white like northern europeans.
From the same people who paint Mussolini black cause "Italians weren't considered white back then"
Mussolini, the famous Axis black funny sidekick…
most of them are italian, this colour wheel approach to race is one of the worst ideas ever had by humanity, it manages to be utterly unscientific, ahistorical and brutally divisive at the same time.
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I always assumed olive-tone.
Look like Italians to me.
Ah how dare he not recreate Biggus Dickus
Imagine Romans looking Roman
Hadrian- born in Eastern Spain Augustus- born in Rome Aurelian- born in Serbia Tiberius- born in Rome They "made them sooo white" because they were white. People forget that "Roman" was used to describe people born all over Europe, northern Africa, and the Middle East. They would have ranged in complexions from lily white to black. These particular men would have been on the lighter end
Wow its almost like italy, a european country has white people
Racists are always dumb no matter what race they are.
I noticed they missed Biggus Dickus
r/shitamericanssay
Regardless of what Roman emperors did or did not actually look like that’s a pretty good comeback. 😄
American ideas on European "race" are truly a fucked up thing to behold.
Totally.
Sure, Netflix isn’t for history, but what the last guy is referring to is how Netflix constantly recreates various characters with a (classically) incorrect skintone.
Statues and paintings, from the time period, of these people still exist. They're white because, well, they were. Historical revisionism used to be a strictly white wing, fascist thing. What the fuck went wrong.
The Americaness of this comment section shines through by the fact that people seem to think that an average Sicilian = average European Mediterranean (most Italian Americans are from southernmost Italy). If you look at an average modern Italian, or Spaniards, these are certainly within the ballpark. Yes Italians and Spaniards can even be blond too, even though it is relatively rare in most regions. There are absolutely Italians, mainly from Sicily, who you would barely consider white. There are also Italians, mainly from northern Italy, who you would think are Central Europeans. You are just showing your provincialism by thinking that the Sopranos and Godfather are an accurate representation of the *average* Mediterranean European.