More stylistic anomalies for emperor Diocletian

“Diocletian’s enigmatic “renaissance of Hellenistic forms” … of the late 1st c. BC – instead of developing appropriate weapons to match the most advanced enemies of the 3rd/4th c. AD – still causes insurmountable difficulties of interpretation”. Gunnar Heinsohn See also my (Damien Mackey’s) article: Diocletian, rhyming with, or repeating, Augustus? (3) Diocletian, rhyming with, or repeating, Augustus? | Damien Mackey - Academia.edu Professor Gunnar Heinsohn wrote: https://www.scribd.com/document/655098736/Gunnar-060322-Jerusalem-First-Millennium-Ad-Heinsohn-September-2021-1 Modern scholars are amazed, and even rave, that “Diocletian’s bent was markedly conservative." They admire "Diocletian’s appeal to tradition”, his “distinctly old Roman concept” and his “insistent old Roman-ness” (all Williams 1985, 161 f.). They are convinced that Diocletian‘s “judicious blend of conservatism [...] was rooted in “Roman‘ moral values” of the Augustean period (Bowman 2005, 88). And yet, insanity is not excluded because Diocletian and his fellow rulers carried swords that had been out of fashion for more than 300 years. Their “bird head handles [...] appear on monuments of the Hellenistic period, such as the balustrade barriers (after 188 BC) of the Athena Shrine in Pergamon […] After that they are well represented at the beginning of the imperial era" of the late 1st century BC and the early 1st century AD“ (Miks 2007/I, 210). Assumed renaissance, after c. 300 years, of Late Hellenistic swords with bird head handles under DIOCLETIAN’S TETRARCHY in the late 3rd and early 4th c. AD [see already Heinsohn 2019 a]. 1st c. BC Greek/Eastern Roman sword with bird head handle (stele from Chalcedon [Louvre]) from the [Miks 2007/II, Table 291/A]. Eastern Roman swords with bird head handle from the porphyry tetrarch statue late 3rd/early 4th c. AD (originally Byzantium, today Venice) from the . [http://sword-site.com/thread/99/byzantine-swords?page=1] Diocletian even returned to the annual military draft of Roman citizens: “Conscription was again necessary” (Lo Cascio 2005, 173). Octavian’s original number of 25-33 legions (Pollard/Berry 2012, 213) was also reintroduced by the Tetrarchy. Diocletian’s enigmatic “renaissance of Hellenistic forms“ (Miks 2007/I, 211) of the late 1st c. BC – instead of developing appropriate weapons to match the most advanced enemies of the 3rd/4th c. AD – still causes insurmountable difficulties of interpretation. Perhaps, it is proposed, the repeated “promotion of traditional Italian-Greek design details [...] was meant to underline the eternal West-East (Greek-Persian) confrontation“ (Miks 2007/I, 463). Yet, no swords of Roman origin were found anywhere for 4th century common Roman soldiers (Miks 2007/I, 211). Archaeologists cannot tell from the excavated weapons whether they date from the 1st or the 4th c. AD. But if Diocletian, indeed, went into battle with outmoded weapons he must have been out of his mind. However, if he was, as many sources show, a concerned and even outstanding general, the aberrations could rather lie with us than with him. After all, Diocletian had no idea that he began a “Dominate” in the 3rd/4th c. AD after a “Principate’s” start in the 1st c. BC/1st c. AD. The term “Dominate” was created by Theodor Mommsen (1817-1903; Bleicken 1978). But wait, Jerusalem's archaeologists might interject, Diocletian was by no means insane but could perform miracles like no one else. For a large peristyle villa of his time in the City of David not only has the three-century outdated style of Late Hellenism but also stands stratigraphically directly, i.e. without layers for the 300 years in between, on a house of the Hasmonean period (140-37 BC). But why do they not date the villa to the 1st c. AD? Like most scholars, they believe that dating by coins is a scientific method. Moreover, this method of dating is ingeniously simple. All you have to do is open a coin catalog and write the date found there in your excavation report: “The scores of coins found buried under the collapse point to its actual date of destruction, early in the second half of the fourth century CE” (Ben-Ami/Tchekhanovets 2013). How these dates get into the catalogs, they do not have to care. That is the work of specialists who have been doing it for centuries. One can trust them blindly. And every educated person knows Diocletian's obsession with Late Hellenistic and early imperial fashion. With the emperor, his co-rulers and successors, i.e. the entire timespan from the 290s to 360 AD, had to be placed some 300 years earlier. It worked perfectly from the British Isles to Egypt and Israel. There have never been any complaints. All architects and craftsmen must have obeyed to the word. Through never ending miracles across thousands of kilometers they achieved perfect replications down to the chemical composition of paints and glass tesserae. The three-century ‘younger’ objects perfectly match unquestionable items from Late Hellenism. Anyone who does not immediately believe this is leaving the context of accepted science. ….