If you haven’t seen it pop up on your For You page, Twitter feed, or group chat yet, just wait—it’s coming. The burning question that’s been making the rounds: How often do you think about the Roman Empire? While the origin of this quirky query is a bit hazy, it likely emerged from a tweet or a TikTok, capturing the internet’s fascination. Suddenly, everyone is curious about the frequency with which men ponder the Roman Empire.
A viral TikTok posted by @paige.elysee set the stage, teasing that you’ll be “shocked with their responses.” However, the answers, as gleaned from my friend group and the WIRED Culture Slack, were more intriguing than shocking. Most responses leaned toward variations of “Is this that Twitter poll? lol” or “I got asked this last night. Truly never.” In essence, the replies weren’t jaw-dropping but rather amusing.
Some colleagues playfully chimed in with responses like “My brain: ‘The Roman Empire is to men what girl dinner is to women'” and “My theory is that it’s because that Daily Stoic podcast is so popular.” WIRED veteran Steven Levy humorously quipped that he contemplates Ancient Rome “Every time I write about Mark Zuckerberg.” In contrast, those outside my circle reported thinking about the Roman Empire “every single day,” once a week, or “a few times a month.”
To dive deeper into this thought-provoking matter, I decided to poll my WIRED colleagues. While I firmly believe that this question should be devoid of gender stereotypes—history buffs come in all identities and backgrounds—it’s a discussion for another day. The preliminary responses from a diverse group of men and women suggest that about a fifth of them “never” think about the Roman Empire. “Never” was on par with “weekly,” followed by “monthly” at approximately 15 percent.
During my extensive morning investigation, several responses hinted at other historical periods like the Cold War, Pompeii, or the Roaring Twenties being more worthy of contemplation. This led me to a theory: It’s not that dudes/people think about the Roman Empire extensively, but rather they ponder media related to the Roman Empire. Video games set in the Colosseum, classic films like Cleopatra, countless History Channel documentaries, and Monty Python’s Life of Brian have etched Roman history into our collective memories.
Consider Jay-Z’s iconic use of Russell Crowe’s “Are you not entertained?” from Gladiator at the beginning of “What More Can I Say.” It worked because Gladiator had left an indelible mark on pop culture.
My personal musings about Ancient Rome often center around the persecution of Christians and the empire’s eventual conversion to Christianity under Constantine. And then, in an amusing twist, Keanu Reeves enters my thoughts. One of my former editors responded to my group text query by recounting how she recently watched HBO’s Rome alongside Amazon Prime Video’s Domina to “contrast the characterizations of Octavian’s wife during the Second Triumvirate.” Naturally, I had to Google this, and down the rabbit hole I went.
Welcome to the world of media consumption in 2023. Hollywood, in its voracious appetite for adaptation, has transformed history into intellectual property. We now watch historical shows and movies while clutching our smartphones and keeping laptops open to verify every on-screen detail. Who among us hasn’t lost track of time while delving into the KGB Wikipedia page after a binge-watch of The Americans? Or rushed to fact-check The Trial of the Chicago 7?
Every streaming service offers hours of content on World War II. I once dedicated almost a month of research to Alan Turing’s “Bombe” code-breaking machine after watching The Imitation Game. Truth be told, Turing is probably my equivalent of the Roman Empire. (Feel free to ask me about the Apple logo in the comments.)
As the saying goes, history is written by the victors. Yet, in modern times, it often gets translated by screenwriters and meticulously “punched-up” by studio notes. People, irrespective of gender, are captivated by the past. The more extended my text and Slack threads became, the more respondents delved into the broader questions of why we even discuss men and the Roman Empire in the first place.
Conversations meandered into inquiries about humanity’s fascination with war, the collective intrigue with powerful men, and various other topics. No one definitively cracked the mystery behind the meme’s virality or whether men genuinely contemplate the Roman Empire more than individuals of other genders. Nevertheless, we were all thoroughly entertained by the discourse.
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