The interconnectedness of the Semitic and Indo-European worlds in the first millennium BC helps explain why the word ‘Rama’ was universally held in high esteem. ‘Rama’ may have had different connotations in various cultures, but the feelings it stirred were always positive. Especially from the eighth century to sixth century BC, we observe unusually thoughtful interactions between distinct civilizations.
Richard Foltz, a Canadian scholar on Iran, has noted that many Israelites deported by Assyrians after 722 BC moved to Iranian territories. In Iran the Israelites imbibed Zoroastrian ideas and assimilated them into their own religion, which also influenced Christianity and Islam. Foltz writes: “Avestan notions that came to be central to later religions such as Christianity and Islam - including the existence of heaven and hell, angels and demons, the Devil, the Resurrection of the dead and the Last Judgement, and the restoration of the divine kingdom by a Savior figure following an apocalyptic battle between the forces of good and evil - are all absent from the Israelites’ sacrifice-based Yahweh cult prior to their contact with Iranians.” (pg. 13, Iran in World History). Whether we look at Etruscans and Phoenicians, Israelites and Iranians (Persians), Ionian Greeks and Indians, or Athenian Greeks and Egyptians, this so-called Axial Age (circa middle of the 1st millennium BC) was a pivotal period in the historical expansion of trade and social exchange. The encounters between Ionian Greeks and Indians, in particular, during the sixth century BC and beyond, would prove to be one of the most significant in the history of philosophical inquiry (please see The Shape of Ancient Thought by Thomas McEvilley). Simon Price and Peter Thonemann confirm the importance of this ancient era in their book The Birth of Classical Europe (published by Penguin Books, 2011):
“The period from the eighth to the sixth century BC undoubtedly marks a critical stage in the development of Europe… The Greek and Phoenician diaspora in the west tied the whole Mediterranean into a single macro-economic system, with an increasingly homogenous material culture stretching from Tyre to Gadir and from Massilia to Euboea, in which Egyptian faience was as prized at Tarquinii and Perachora as it was at Nineveh and Carthage. By 500 BC, we can for the first time talk about the Mediterranean world as a single cultural unit.” (pg. 100)
Therefore it should be no surprise that the so-called Italian tribal name ‘Ramnes’ also refers to a geographic location, 'Ramah', in the Near Eastern lingua franca Aramaic, in addition to the heroic, Indo-Iranian personal name Rama. Because Aramaic was the common language of the Mediterranean world during the seventh and sixth centuries BC, it was a perfect candidate for providing a name for the new cosmopolitan city in Latium. Ruled by the Etruscan kings, who were inclined towards Orientalization, Rome was founded with the intention of making it a global metropolis with a lasting impact. In order for this to happen, the name had to live up to the Etruscan, as well as Latin, Sabine, Greek, and Phoenician, notions of grandeur. To be recognized by all these cultures and many other civilizations of the world, the new city could not simply be a local, Italian term. ‘Rama’ means ‘pleasing to all’ in Indo-Iranian, and connotes a place of high elevation, mainly used for Near Eastern town names in Syria and Israel. It was a natural word because it encapsulated all the qualities of the central setting in Latium, especially its geographical features. The Roman hills and the Roman imitation of Near Eastern kingship in that time period were thus designated by a common terminology, which was passed on from generation to generation encoded in the form Ramnes or Ramnenses.
It may seem odd to make such an assertion, but there are examples from the present that validate my argument’s cogency. Memphis, Tennessee has nothing in common with Memphis, Egypt, except that both were founded along great rivers, the Mississippi and the Nile, respectively. Because Memphis was remembered as the glorious ancient capital of Egyptian civilization, the American leaders (including Andrew Jackson) wanted to initiate their own glorious chapter in the New World of North America with this Egyptian place name. Similarly, the Roman kings in Latium wanted to capture the magnificence of the Near East, and ‘Rama’, used from one end of the Persian Empire (Levant) to another (Indus Valley), was a good choice.
Martin Bernal astutely observes in his controversial work Black Athena: The Afroasiatic Roots of Classical Civilization (Vol. III): “For a city set on seven hills, the name Roma and the Etruscan clan name Ruma are more plausibly derived from the common Canaanite place-name Ramah ‘citadel, high place’.” (pg. 181). By no means am I necessarily endorsing all or most of Bernal’s theories, but I totally agree with him here about Rome because I independently arrived at the same conclusion. However, even though he was a white historian, Martin Bernal has been shunned by colleagues and the mainstream research community because of his unconventional views. Check out the Bible Atlas map of Ramah to understand its importance in the ancient Judeo-Christian world. Modern Ramallah is the most likely representative of the ancient city of Ramah, according to the Encyclopedia Judaica and the Bible Atlas webpage.
The most likely explanation for ‘Ramnenses’ is the following: Ramn- + -ensis (Latin for ‘of or from a place’), which would literally stand for ‘of Ramna’ or ‘from Ramna’ (perhaps the near eastern places called Ramah), or from the land of Ramna - India and Persia. “The suffix -ēnsis is added to a toponym (usually the name of a town) or to a topographical name, in order to form an adjective” in Latin (Wiktionary). Rama the hero may have been interpreted as a topographical name, or a name derived from the places of high elevation in Aramaic speaking lands (e.g. today we have Rahm Emanuel, current mayor of Chicago in the USA); otherwise, Ramna (Rama) simply referred to the land of the Aryans (Indo-Persia).
When Varro says that ‘Ramnenses’ is Etruscan, he really means the first syllable (‘Ram’) is imported, but the suffix -enses or -nes utilizes Latin or Greek. Ramnes is simply a Greek form of Ramna, as Ariya-Ramna becomes Ariya-Ramnes. Ramna-enses can be broken down in Latin as ‘of or pertaining to the Roman or Raman people’, similar to the modern surname Ramanathan, commonly found in South India. The fact that they do not spell or pronounce the tribe as ‘Romnes’ or ‘Romnenses’ (or even ‘Rumnes’ or ‘Rumnenses’) reveals its genesis from a non-indigenous source. Ramnenses literally should connote the tribe native to a place of high elevation, which is exactly what Rome is and was - a city of seven hills.
To make the point I am making clearer, let me give you a parallel example of an imported regal name, this time from Rome to others: the prevalence of Augustus and Caesar in place names located in regions under the jurisdiction of the Roman Empire. Taking place in ancient Israel and Judea, Herod’s biography is similar to that of the tyrant of Rome, Tarquinius Superbus. Because he was a Roman ally, Herod organized his Jewish kingdom “in such a way as to situate it firmly within the cultural climate of the Graeco-Roman world… A new city, called Caesarea, was founded, and the ancient city of Samaria was rebuilt and renamed Sebaste (Greek equivalent of Latin Augusta, honoring emperor Augustus).” (pg. 14, The Archaeology of Ancient Judea and Palestine, by Ariel Lewin). In addition, Herod rebuilt the Temple of Jerusalem (c. 20 - 12 BC), which was “his most ambitious project”. This brings to mind the Temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus supposedly completed by the last Tarquin (Superbus), after Tarquinius Priscus initiated the construction in the sixth century BC, according to two authors contemporary to Herod, Dionysus of Halicarnassus and Livy. Perhaps they borrowed some elements from Herod’s life story when composing their own narrations of the Tarquin dynasty. Herod’s biography itself could be somewhat connected to mythical tyrants such as the Indian Kamsa, at least when we examine those parts relevant to the tales of the Biblical Christ and Puranic Krishna (see pgs. 70-72, The Bible and Asia by R.S. Sugirtharajah, Harvard University Press).
The forms Caesarea and Sebaste (now modern Sebastia) clearly indicate how the word form Roma (Rama) was invented - after a legendary king who was not physically present. The Etruscan kings were trying to organize the land of southern Etruria and Latium in such a way so that central Italy would be integrated seamlessly into the cultural climate of the Eastern Mediterranean world. Therefore, like minds (Tarquinius Superbus and Herod) from unlike eras lead to similar results, including the naming of towns after foreign leaders they wished to emulate, impress or honor.
We are all Romans, and yet we are all Persians as well. We are all Greeks, but we cannot forget that makes us all Indians as well. The entire human race is one family, and no matter what disputes people have had with each other in history, this fact can never be invalidated. It can be re-validated, however, and that is the ultimate purpose of this article. Without re-validation of our common heritage, we have no chance of achieving world peace in the foreseeable future. Ancient Heraclea Pontica in Asia Minor, modern Romania, ancient Apollonia in Libya, and Hellenistic era ‘Apollonia-Arsuf’ in Judea are all testaments to the transfer of the given names of Graeco-Roman gods and kings from one region to another. True, these receiving provinces were all subjects of a conquering empire, but even Rome was not a Latin-ruled nation until the Republic (509 BC). The Latin people were subjects of the Etruscan and Sabine kings, who were free to name the country using whatever language they deemed appropriate. They were under no obligation to use a Latin word, given the power they wielded.
The clinching proof that Ramnenses is also referencing a personality, not just a place, is the existence of ‘Caesariensis’ in the names of ancient Roman cities and provinces spread across Eurasia. These names include the 3rd century AD provinces in Britain - Flavia Caesariensis (Caesarian province of Flavius in north Britain) and Maxima Caesariensis (Caesarian province of Maximus in south Britain). One of the earliest examples is Mauretania Caesariensis. The North African province of Mauretania was divided by Claudius (c. 1st century AD) into Caesariensis and Tingitana; the first division was “named after its capital, one of many cities simply named Caesarea after the imperial cognomen that had become a title.” (Wikipedia). Here we have yet another Roman city well outside of Italy, named Caesarea. Sound like a familiar trend? Caesarea, like Ramna in Italy, was a foreign term in Britain, Judea, and Africa. On top of that, Caesar himself never founded any city named Caesarea, much like Indo-Aryan Ramna did not found Rome. Successors of Julius Caesar (such as Claudius and Augustus) encouraged the use of Caesar as an honorific, which was not literally meant to be taken as a direct reference to him. Similarly, Romulus is an encoded honorific, an allusion to legendary Eastern kings, especially Cyrus the Great of Persia and Rama of India.
Often names like 'Ramnenses' or 'Ramnes' are ‘puns’ with multiple meanings. The ancient historians are presenting us with puzzles that either they themselves could not solve or, they did not want us to solve. Cornell, for example, is confused by the two names of the Roman people - Romani and Quirites (pg. 75, The Beginnings of Rome). The names of the three tribes - Ramnenses, Titienses, and Lucerenses - are another riddle. These three names may be, among many other things, a subtle allusion to Rama, Sita, and Lakshman depicted in nearby Etruscan Caere. The narrative of female vulnerability, such as The Rape of Sabine women, Rhea Silvia’s seduction, and Lucretia’s violation, has a familiar ring to it - noble, chaste girls, like Sita, snatched away and shifted around to satisfy the patriarchal framework and instigate conflict. Titus Tatius, the Sabine king, may be a Roman pun on Sita or Sita’s father. Luceres, or Lucumo, while certainly an Etruscan word, may have been used by Romans as another indirect hint to our third Ramayanic hero, Lakshmana.
Ovid’s Fasti (3.124-126), translated by Peter Wiseman and his wife, Anne, is yet another source from the Roman Imperial period which mentions Ramnes, in a somewhat peculiar manner:
“Romulus divided the hundred Fathers into circles of ten each, and he instituted the ten hastati… He gave the same number of divisions to the Titienses, to those they call Ramnes, and to the Luceres.” (pg. 43-44). When the English classicist Wiseman translates Ovid’s words into “those they call Ramnes”, is he intimating that this is an alien term? It certainly appears that way, but he provides no explanatory note on the three groups, as if they are commonly understood. He gives us explanatory notes on numerous obscure anecdotes written by Ovid, but Peter Wiseman does not address ‘Ramnes’ here or in his book Remus: A Roman Myth. When British historians are afraid of a certain truth, they seem to pretend it is unimportant or decline to elaborate on the matter. In his book Remus: A Roman Myth, dedicated solely to Rome’s foundation myth and its origins, the British author Wiseman makes no mention of ‘Ramnes’ or ‘Ramnenses’. This is totally hypocritical, because you have to look at all the evidence, not just the evidence that suits your agenda. In her critique of Wiseman’s approach to Romulus and Remus, the classical scholar Mary Beard says that much of Wiseman’s book “is closer to fantasy than history… A whole series of lost Roman plays are concocted out of next to no evidence at all, and then made into major agents in the transmission of the myth.” (pg. 68, Confronting the Classics). So he was not only guilty of omitting factual evidence of great relevance, but he also was guilty of literally manufacturing his own evidence out of thin air!
The following statement regarding the three Roman tribes (including Ramnes), by Robert Palmer in his book The Archaic Community of the Romans, illustrates the willful ignorance of many western scholars: “The names of the tribunes of the three archaic tribes survived into historical times. Romans and Etruscans made of them what they would. The origin of the names cannot be ascertained. They do not belong to any known compound of personal names.” (pg. 8). Apparently Palmer has taken Juliet’s stance, ‘Deny thy father and refuse thy name!’, i.e., deny the very existence of ‘Ramnes’ in any known personal name in ancient historical records. Sure, that will solve the problem! Palmer’s ridiculous and arrogant assertion is very dangerous, and even Tim Cornell, a white British historian, has warned us about Anglo-Saxon attitudes toward early Roman history. He writes in the Preface to his book The Beginnings of Rome: “What is surprising, and needs to be explained, is the fact that early Roman history has been largely ignored by scholars in the English-speaking world. This seems to be a curiously Anglo-Saxon phenomenon.” (pg. xiv).
George Orwell’s Why I Write discusses the historical impulse of a writer, or the "desire to see things as they are, to find out true facts and store them up for the use of posterity.” Orwell adds later in his essay: “When I sit down to write a book, I do not say to myself, 'I am going to produce a work of art'. I write it because there is some lie that I want to expose, some fact to which I want to draw attention, and my initial concern is to get a hearing.” My sentiments are exactly the same as Orwell’s, so there is always a chance of reconciliation between Anglo-American and Indian history writers, despite the unreliability and hypocrisy of both. When commenting on the life of Mahatma Gandhi, Orwell insightfully remarked that Gandhi seemed to be “quite free from that maniacal suspiciousness which, as E. M. Forster rightly says in A Passage to India, is the besetting Indian vice, as hypocrisy is the British vice. Although no doubt he was shrewd enough in detecting dishonesty, he seems wherever possible to have believed that other people were acting in good faith and had a better nature through which they could be approached.”
Gandhi’s approach needs to be adopted by both sides to produce meaningful progress in ancient historical research. Indians are too extreme or ambitious in their inflated expectations that everyone should accept very early dates for the Vedic civilization, while Westerners are overly conservative and hesitant in their estimates of the antiquity of Vedic culture, especially its literature and art. An ethical middle ground, not a compromise, is needed to stem the tide of “Anglo-Saxon” ignorance referred to by Tim Cornell. Looking at the list of contributing writers to the modern work A Companion to Livy, said to be “a collection of essays representing the most up-to-date international scholarship on the life and works of the Roman historian Livy”, one does not recognize a single author of any chapter in the book who comes from outside of Western Europe and North America. None of the authors are of Asian or African descent, at least as far as I can tell. Why are there so many European and White American scholars of ancient Indian history, but very few (if any) Asian scholars of ancient Greek and Roman history? Having a diversity of perspectives can lead to a more wholesome and satisfying comprehension of the ancient world, would you not agree?
Brahmins are blamed for monopolizing the sacred literature and knowledge of ancient India, but the western historians who pin the blame on Brahmanism are themselves guilty of all but monopolizing the study of the classical period. The historical content and discourse is dictated by the tastes and whims of British/European classicists, who often choose to emphasize only esoteric or trivial points of concern from the standpoint of the non-specialist studying ancient history. The public needs to put pressure on them to be more straightforward and less disingenuous. In short, Anglo-American historians have been conservative to a fault. Indian historians can be too liberal and overly optimistic about the antiquity of Vedic Aryan civilization, which plays right into the hands of the opposition which seeks to discredit them as Hindu fundamentalists. What needs to be remembered is that the truth is what matters, not someone’s political agenda. There is no real way of scientifically proving, for instance, at least to a satisfactory degree, that the Mahabharata War took place in roughly 3100 BC. These beliefs are based on faith, and are almost impossible to prove with hard science. Faith is a wonderful emotion, and nobody should discourage a person of faith from maintaining a belief in supernatural miracles. But since the whole world cannot unanimously accept something mainly or only based on faith, we have to restrict ourselves to historical events from the last two to three thousand years first, where everyone can arrive at some reasonable consensus.
At Quora.com Nirmalananda Reddy Kasivi, former Emeritus Professor in Anthropology (Biological) at Sri Venkateswara University (1992-2010), offers us an explanation of the meaning behind Rāma, which mirrors the Iranian scripture Bundahišn (see Part I of this series for the excerpt to compare): “Rama in Sanskrit means a person with purity of mind and embodiment of dharma, who attracts all with his divine appearance and qualities… The utterance or invocation of the word ‘Rama’ is the very cure for the disease of Samsara (family or worldly ties).”
Therefore the Rāma of India, Rāman of Persia, Rāmah of Judea and Ramnes of Italy are essentially one and the same entity.
Richard Foltz, a Canadian scholar on Iran, has noted that many Israelites deported by Assyrians after 722 BC moved to Iranian territories. In Iran the Israelites imbibed Zoroastrian ideas and assimilated them into their own religion, which also influenced Christianity and Islam. Foltz writes: “Avestan notions that came to be central to later religions such as Christianity and Islam - including the existence of heaven and hell, angels and demons, the Devil, the Resurrection of the dead and the Last Judgement, and the restoration of the divine kingdom by a Savior figure following an apocalyptic battle between the forces of good and evil - are all absent from the Israelites’ sacrifice-based Yahweh cult prior to their contact with Iranians.” (pg. 13, Iran in World History). Whether we look at Etruscans and Phoenicians, Israelites and Iranians (Persians), Ionian Greeks and Indians, or Athenian Greeks and Egyptians, this so-called Axial Age (circa middle of the 1st millennium BC) was a pivotal period in the historical expansion of trade and social exchange. The encounters between Ionian Greeks and Indians, in particular, during the sixth century BC and beyond, would prove to be one of the most significant in the history of philosophical inquiry (please see The Shape of Ancient Thought by Thomas McEvilley). Simon Price and Peter Thonemann confirm the importance of this ancient era in their book The Birth of Classical Europe (published by Penguin Books, 2011):
“The period from the eighth to the sixth century BC undoubtedly marks a critical stage in the development of Europe… The Greek and Phoenician diaspora in the west tied the whole Mediterranean into a single macro-economic system, with an increasingly homogenous material culture stretching from Tyre to Gadir and from Massilia to Euboea, in which Egyptian faience was as prized at Tarquinii and Perachora as it was at Nineveh and Carthage. By 500 BC, we can for the first time talk about the Mediterranean world as a single cultural unit.” (pg. 100)
Therefore it should be no surprise that the so-called Italian tribal name ‘Ramnes’ also refers to a geographic location, 'Ramah', in the Near Eastern lingua franca Aramaic, in addition to the heroic, Indo-Iranian personal name Rama. Because Aramaic was the common language of the Mediterranean world during the seventh and sixth centuries BC, it was a perfect candidate for providing a name for the new cosmopolitan city in Latium. Ruled by the Etruscan kings, who were inclined towards Orientalization, Rome was founded with the intention of making it a global metropolis with a lasting impact. In order for this to happen, the name had to live up to the Etruscan, as well as Latin, Sabine, Greek, and Phoenician, notions of grandeur. To be recognized by all these cultures and many other civilizations of the world, the new city could not simply be a local, Italian term. ‘Rama’ means ‘pleasing to all’ in Indo-Iranian, and connotes a place of high elevation, mainly used for Near Eastern town names in Syria and Israel. It was a natural word because it encapsulated all the qualities of the central setting in Latium, especially its geographical features. The Roman hills and the Roman imitation of Near Eastern kingship in that time period were thus designated by a common terminology, which was passed on from generation to generation encoded in the form Ramnes or Ramnenses.
It may seem odd to make such an assertion, but there are examples from the present that validate my argument’s cogency. Memphis, Tennessee has nothing in common with Memphis, Egypt, except that both were founded along great rivers, the Mississippi and the Nile, respectively. Because Memphis was remembered as the glorious ancient capital of Egyptian civilization, the American leaders (including Andrew Jackson) wanted to initiate their own glorious chapter in the New World of North America with this Egyptian place name. Similarly, the Roman kings in Latium wanted to capture the magnificence of the Near East, and ‘Rama’, used from one end of the Persian Empire (Levant) to another (Indus Valley), was a good choice.
Martin Bernal astutely observes in his controversial work Black Athena: The Afroasiatic Roots of Classical Civilization (Vol. III): “For a city set on seven hills, the name Roma and the Etruscan clan name Ruma are more plausibly derived from the common Canaanite place-name Ramah ‘citadel, high place’.” (pg. 181). By no means am I necessarily endorsing all or most of Bernal’s theories, but I totally agree with him here about Rome because I independently arrived at the same conclusion. However, even though he was a white historian, Martin Bernal has been shunned by colleagues and the mainstream research community because of his unconventional views. Check out the Bible Atlas map of Ramah to understand its importance in the ancient Judeo-Christian world. Modern Ramallah is the most likely representative of the ancient city of Ramah, according to the Encyclopedia Judaica and the Bible Atlas webpage.
The most likely explanation for ‘Ramnenses’ is the following: Ramn- + -ensis (Latin for ‘of or from a place’), which would literally stand for ‘of Ramna’ or ‘from Ramna’ (perhaps the near eastern places called Ramah), or from the land of Ramna - India and Persia. “The suffix -ēnsis is added to a toponym (usually the name of a town) or to a topographical name, in order to form an adjective” in Latin (Wiktionary). Rama the hero may have been interpreted as a topographical name, or a name derived from the places of high elevation in Aramaic speaking lands (e.g. today we have Rahm Emanuel, current mayor of Chicago in the USA); otherwise, Ramna (Rama) simply referred to the land of the Aryans (Indo-Persia).
When Varro says that ‘Ramnenses’ is Etruscan, he really means the first syllable (‘Ram’) is imported, but the suffix -enses or -nes utilizes Latin or Greek. Ramnes is simply a Greek form of Ramna, as Ariya-Ramna becomes Ariya-Ramnes. Ramna-enses can be broken down in Latin as ‘of or pertaining to the Roman or Raman people’, similar to the modern surname Ramanathan, commonly found in South India. The fact that they do not spell or pronounce the tribe as ‘Romnes’ or ‘Romnenses’ (or even ‘Rumnes’ or ‘Rumnenses’) reveals its genesis from a non-indigenous source. Ramnenses literally should connote the tribe native to a place of high elevation, which is exactly what Rome is and was - a city of seven hills.
To make the point I am making clearer, let me give you a parallel example of an imported regal name, this time from Rome to others: the prevalence of Augustus and Caesar in place names located in regions under the jurisdiction of the Roman Empire. Taking place in ancient Israel and Judea, Herod’s biography is similar to that of the tyrant of Rome, Tarquinius Superbus. Because he was a Roman ally, Herod organized his Jewish kingdom “in such a way as to situate it firmly within the cultural climate of the Graeco-Roman world… A new city, called Caesarea, was founded, and the ancient city of Samaria was rebuilt and renamed Sebaste (Greek equivalent of Latin Augusta, honoring emperor Augustus).” (pg. 14, The Archaeology of Ancient Judea and Palestine, by Ariel Lewin). In addition, Herod rebuilt the Temple of Jerusalem (c. 20 - 12 BC), which was “his most ambitious project”. This brings to mind the Temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus supposedly completed by the last Tarquin (Superbus), after Tarquinius Priscus initiated the construction in the sixth century BC, according to two authors contemporary to Herod, Dionysus of Halicarnassus and Livy. Perhaps they borrowed some elements from Herod’s life story when composing their own narrations of the Tarquin dynasty. Herod’s biography itself could be somewhat connected to mythical tyrants such as the Indian Kamsa, at least when we examine those parts relevant to the tales of the Biblical Christ and Puranic Krishna (see pgs. 70-72, The Bible and Asia by R.S. Sugirtharajah, Harvard University Press).
The forms Caesarea and Sebaste (now modern Sebastia) clearly indicate how the word form Roma (Rama) was invented - after a legendary king who was not physically present. The Etruscan kings were trying to organize the land of southern Etruria and Latium in such a way so that central Italy would be integrated seamlessly into the cultural climate of the Eastern Mediterranean world. Therefore, like minds (Tarquinius Superbus and Herod) from unlike eras lead to similar results, including the naming of towns after foreign leaders they wished to emulate, impress or honor.
We are all Romans, and yet we are all Persians as well. We are all Greeks, but we cannot forget that makes us all Indians as well. The entire human race is one family, and no matter what disputes people have had with each other in history, this fact can never be invalidated. It can be re-validated, however, and that is the ultimate purpose of this article. Without re-validation of our common heritage, we have no chance of achieving world peace in the foreseeable future. Ancient Heraclea Pontica in Asia Minor, modern Romania, ancient Apollonia in Libya, and Hellenistic era ‘Apollonia-Arsuf’ in Judea are all testaments to the transfer of the given names of Graeco-Roman gods and kings from one region to another. True, these receiving provinces were all subjects of a conquering empire, but even Rome was not a Latin-ruled nation until the Republic (509 BC). The Latin people were subjects of the Etruscan and Sabine kings, who were free to name the country using whatever language they deemed appropriate. They were under no obligation to use a Latin word, given the power they wielded.
The clinching proof that Ramnenses is also referencing a personality, not just a place, is the existence of ‘Caesariensis’ in the names of ancient Roman cities and provinces spread across Eurasia. These names include the 3rd century AD provinces in Britain - Flavia Caesariensis (Caesarian province of Flavius in north Britain) and Maxima Caesariensis (Caesarian province of Maximus in south Britain). One of the earliest examples is Mauretania Caesariensis. The North African province of Mauretania was divided by Claudius (c. 1st century AD) into Caesariensis and Tingitana; the first division was “named after its capital, one of many cities simply named Caesarea after the imperial cognomen that had become a title.” (Wikipedia). Here we have yet another Roman city well outside of Italy, named Caesarea. Sound like a familiar trend? Caesarea, like Ramna in Italy, was a foreign term in Britain, Judea, and Africa. On top of that, Caesar himself never founded any city named Caesarea, much like Indo-Aryan Ramna did not found Rome. Successors of Julius Caesar (such as Claudius and Augustus) encouraged the use of Caesar as an honorific, which was not literally meant to be taken as a direct reference to him. Similarly, Romulus is an encoded honorific, an allusion to legendary Eastern kings, especially Cyrus the Great of Persia and Rama of India.
 | |
| Roman Empire (125 AD): Places Named After Caesar, Augustus, and Romulus |
Often names like 'Ramnenses' or 'Ramnes' are ‘puns’ with multiple meanings. The ancient historians are presenting us with puzzles that either they themselves could not solve or, they did not want us to solve. Cornell, for example, is confused by the two names of the Roman people - Romani and Quirites (pg. 75, The Beginnings of Rome). The names of the three tribes - Ramnenses, Titienses, and Lucerenses - are another riddle. These three names may be, among many other things, a subtle allusion to Rama, Sita, and Lakshman depicted in nearby Etruscan Caere. The narrative of female vulnerability, such as The Rape of Sabine women, Rhea Silvia’s seduction, and Lucretia’s violation, has a familiar ring to it - noble, chaste girls, like Sita, snatched away and shifted around to satisfy the patriarchal framework and instigate conflict. Titus Tatius, the Sabine king, may be a Roman pun on Sita or Sita’s father. Luceres, or Lucumo, while certainly an Etruscan word, may have been used by Romans as another indirect hint to our third Ramayanic hero, Lakshmana.
Ovid’s Fasti (3.124-126), translated by Peter Wiseman and his wife, Anne, is yet another source from the Roman Imperial period which mentions Ramnes, in a somewhat peculiar manner:
“Romulus divided the hundred Fathers into circles of ten each, and he instituted the ten hastati… He gave the same number of divisions to the Titienses, to those they call Ramnes, and to the Luceres.” (pg. 43-44). When the English classicist Wiseman translates Ovid’s words into “those they call Ramnes”, is he intimating that this is an alien term? It certainly appears that way, but he provides no explanatory note on the three groups, as if they are commonly understood. He gives us explanatory notes on numerous obscure anecdotes written by Ovid, but Peter Wiseman does not address ‘Ramnes’ here or in his book Remus: A Roman Myth. When British historians are afraid of a certain truth, they seem to pretend it is unimportant or decline to elaborate on the matter. In his book Remus: A Roman Myth, dedicated solely to Rome’s foundation myth and its origins, the British author Wiseman makes no mention of ‘Ramnes’ or ‘Ramnenses’. This is totally hypocritical, because you have to look at all the evidence, not just the evidence that suits your agenda. In her critique of Wiseman’s approach to Romulus and Remus, the classical scholar Mary Beard says that much of Wiseman’s book “is closer to fantasy than history… A whole series of lost Roman plays are concocted out of next to no evidence at all, and then made into major agents in the transmission of the myth.” (pg. 68, Confronting the Classics). So he was not only guilty of omitting factual evidence of great relevance, but he also was guilty of literally manufacturing his own evidence out of thin air!
The following statement regarding the three Roman tribes (including Ramnes), by Robert Palmer in his book The Archaic Community of the Romans, illustrates the willful ignorance of many western scholars: “The names of the tribunes of the three archaic tribes survived into historical times. Romans and Etruscans made of them what they would. The origin of the names cannot be ascertained. They do not belong to any known compound of personal names.” (pg. 8). Apparently Palmer has taken Juliet’s stance, ‘Deny thy father and refuse thy name!’, i.e., deny the very existence of ‘Ramnes’ in any known personal name in ancient historical records. Sure, that will solve the problem! Palmer’s ridiculous and arrogant assertion is very dangerous, and even Tim Cornell, a white British historian, has warned us about Anglo-Saxon attitudes toward early Roman history. He writes in the Preface to his book The Beginnings of Rome: “What is surprising, and needs to be explained, is the fact that early Roman history has been largely ignored by scholars in the English-speaking world. This seems to be a curiously Anglo-Saxon phenomenon.” (pg. xiv).
George Orwell’s Why I Write discusses the historical impulse of a writer, or the "desire to see things as they are, to find out true facts and store them up for the use of posterity.” Orwell adds later in his essay: “When I sit down to write a book, I do not say to myself, 'I am going to produce a work of art'. I write it because there is some lie that I want to expose, some fact to which I want to draw attention, and my initial concern is to get a hearing.” My sentiments are exactly the same as Orwell’s, so there is always a chance of reconciliation between Anglo-American and Indian history writers, despite the unreliability and hypocrisy of both. When commenting on the life of Mahatma Gandhi, Orwell insightfully remarked that Gandhi seemed to be “quite free from that maniacal suspiciousness which, as E. M. Forster rightly says in A Passage to India, is the besetting Indian vice, as hypocrisy is the British vice. Although no doubt he was shrewd enough in detecting dishonesty, he seems wherever possible to have believed that other people were acting in good faith and had a better nature through which they could be approached.”
Gandhi’s approach needs to be adopted by both sides to produce meaningful progress in ancient historical research. Indians are too extreme or ambitious in their inflated expectations that everyone should accept very early dates for the Vedic civilization, while Westerners are overly conservative and hesitant in their estimates of the antiquity of Vedic culture, especially its literature and art. An ethical middle ground, not a compromise, is needed to stem the tide of “Anglo-Saxon” ignorance referred to by Tim Cornell. Looking at the list of contributing writers to the modern work A Companion to Livy, said to be “a collection of essays representing the most up-to-date international scholarship on the life and works of the Roman historian Livy”, one does not recognize a single author of any chapter in the book who comes from outside of Western Europe and North America. None of the authors are of Asian or African descent, at least as far as I can tell. Why are there so many European and White American scholars of ancient Indian history, but very few (if any) Asian scholars of ancient Greek and Roman history? Having a diversity of perspectives can lead to a more wholesome and satisfying comprehension of the ancient world, would you not agree?
Brahmins are blamed for monopolizing the sacred literature and knowledge of ancient India, but the western historians who pin the blame on Brahmanism are themselves guilty of all but monopolizing the study of the classical period. The historical content and discourse is dictated by the tastes and whims of British/European classicists, who often choose to emphasize only esoteric or trivial points of concern from the standpoint of the non-specialist studying ancient history. The public needs to put pressure on them to be more straightforward and less disingenuous. In short, Anglo-American historians have been conservative to a fault. Indian historians can be too liberal and overly optimistic about the antiquity of Vedic Aryan civilization, which plays right into the hands of the opposition which seeks to discredit them as Hindu fundamentalists. What needs to be remembered is that the truth is what matters, not someone’s political agenda. There is no real way of scientifically proving, for instance, at least to a satisfactory degree, that the Mahabharata War took place in roughly 3100 BC. These beliefs are based on faith, and are almost impossible to prove with hard science. Faith is a wonderful emotion, and nobody should discourage a person of faith from maintaining a belief in supernatural miracles. But since the whole world cannot unanimously accept something mainly or only based on faith, we have to restrict ourselves to historical events from the last two to three thousand years first, where everyone can arrive at some reasonable consensus.
At Quora.com Nirmalananda Reddy Kasivi, former Emeritus Professor in Anthropology (Biological) at Sri Venkateswara University (1992-2010), offers us an explanation of the meaning behind Rāma, which mirrors the Iranian scripture Bundahišn (see Part I of this series for the excerpt to compare): “Rama in Sanskrit means a person with purity of mind and embodiment of dharma, who attracts all with his divine appearance and qualities… The utterance or invocation of the word ‘Rama’ is the very cure for the disease of Samsara (family or worldly ties).”
Therefore the Rāma of India, Rāman of Persia, Rāmah of Judea and Ramnes of Italy are essentially one and the same entity.
