<iframe src="//www.googletagmanager.com/ns.html?id=GTM-K3L4M3" height="0" width="0" style="display:none;visibility:hidden">

Ancient and modern

Livy on immigration policy

10 September 2015

1:00 PM

10 September 2015

1:00 PM

In the migration crisis, the EU is currently acting just like the ancients, as if border controls did not exist, though the mass, peaceful migration we see today was not a tremendously common occurrence then.

The reason is that in the ancient world, every male was a potential warrior. So in conflict they would either fight to defend their land and, if they lost, be killed or sold into slavery, or they would flee, en masse, as Germanic tribes did into the Roman Empire in the 4th century ad, escaping the Hun onslaught.

Already a subscriber? Log in

Black Friday sale

Subscribe today and get 10 weeks of The Spectator Australia for just $1

  • Unlimited access to spectator.com.au and app
  • The weekly edition on the Spectator Australia app
  • Spectator podcasts and newsletters
  • Full access to spectator.co.uk
Or

Unlock this article

REGISTER


Comments

Black Friday sale

Subscribe today and get 10 weeks of The Spectator Australia for just $1

Already a subscriber? Log in

Close