Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC. In our last minutes today, a recent TikTok trend of women asking the men in their lives how often they think about the Roman Empire has gone viral. Have you seen it? In the videos, women sound pretty shocked to discover that some men think about Ancient Rome on a regular basis, ranging from a few times a week to even daily. Here are just a few examples under the #RomanEmpire on TikTok that has garnered millions of views.

Speaker 1: Just how many times in general do you think about the Roman Empire?

Speaker 2: Probably not a lot. Why?

Speaker 1: Not a lot? When was the last time you thought about it?

Speaker 2: Maybe a week or two ago.

Speaker 1: [chuckles]

Speaker 2: The Roman Empire was a very big part in history.

Speaker 3: How often/ever do you think about the Roman Empire?

Speaker 4: Not crazy often. I think more than the average adult [crosstalk]--

Speaker 3: Really?

Speaker 4: Really not often. I would say, I don't know, probably like three, four times a week I think about it.

Speaker 3: You're kidding. [chuckles]

Speaker 5: How often do I think about it?

Speaker 6: Yes.

Speaker 5: I don't know. I guess technically like every day.

Speaker 6: What? [chuckles]

Brian Lehrer: Yes, every day. Listeners, do you ever think about the Roman Empire, and if so, how often? If you're someone who thinks about it a lot, what aspect of Ancient Rome do you think about? The viral trend is aimed at men, but we'll invite listeners of any gender to call in or text us now at 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692. Or maybe you want to nominate another empire that more people should think about. Any Ottoman, Benin, or Inca Empire fans out there, Han dynasty, maybe? Make your case about why more people should think about your favorite empire. 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692.

Joining me now to break down the obsession and explain what Ancient Rome and the United States have in common is Kevin Feeney, a faculty fellow at NYU who teaches Roman history. Dr. Feeney, welcome to WNYC.

Kevin Feeney: Hi, Brian. Thanks so much for having me.

Brian Lehrer: When asked about why they love Ancient Rome so much or think about it so much, a lot of people apparently point to just how much of modern American life was influenced by the Romans, particularly in everyday infrastructure. Like someone wrote on X, "Archaeological techniques, you can't help but marvel." How much did the ancient Romans really invent?

Kevin Feeney: Well, that's an interesting one because the Romans in the ancient world, they weren't necessarily famous for inventing things from scratch or coming up with brand-new things. What the Romans were really great at is they were really great at early adopters of technology, and they were really great problem solvers. It's up to the Greeks to be more theoretical and come up with abstract concepts. The Romans, I think like a lot of Americans, were very practically minded, and they really liked to confront concrete solutions.

Actually, that's a good example. Concrete is something that the Romans are at the forefront of, that they come up with, and they're able to build a lot of really impressive infrastructure and a lot of impressive architecture through their use of advanced building techniques. [crosstalk] They used things like the arches-- [crosstalk] Sorry, go on.

Brian Lehrer: No. I was just going to say, I have to admit that I guess I take concrete for granted, and when I walk on the sidewalk, I don't think about the Roman Empire. Some men on social media, when explaining their obsession, argue that Ancient Rome is intriguing to Americans because some think the US is facing a similar decline today. Here's one video of an older man explaining it to his partner.

Speaker 7: Roman Empire said that everybody was equal, everybody had a chance, but it wasn't. The rich got richer and the poor got poorer, and they worried constantly about people rioting because they knew that the common man, the common people could take over at any time. They would bring them into the coliseums, and they would give them free grain, they would give them bread, they would give them wine, whatever they needed to fill their bellies and block their minds from what they were angry about. That's where we're at right now, and I think about it all the time.

Brian Lehrer: Well, Dr. Feeney, that clip hints at something like, maybe you'd call it status anxiety, or that when people think about the Roman Empire, they think about it in terms of the first two words; decline of. Can you fact-check that clip for historical accuracy for one thing?

Kevin Feeney: Well, sure. It's definitely true that the Romans were a very, very wealthy empire. They provided free grain for inhabitants of the city of Rome, and they put on a lot of public spectacles like gladiatorial games, like chariot races that people really went crazy about. So that part is true. Sure. What I would say [crosstalk]--

Brian Lehrer: Go ahead, finish up. I'm sorry.

Kevin Feeney: What I would say beyond that is, though, this isn't a new concern. The reason we know about this is because there were Romans complaining at the time that all this was happening. The Romans themselves were kind of obsessed with the idea that they were declining and that they were always on the downslope. We can say in retrospect that even when the Romans were at their peak, when they were incredibly wealthy and powerful and they had hundreds of years to go, they were still convinced that they were declining. Worrying about decline in these terms is itself a very Roman thing to do.

Brian Lehrer: Do you know that we have a board full of calls of people ready to tell us [crosstalk]--

Kevin Feeney: [chuckles] Of both genders, I hope.

Brian Lehrer: -when and why? Well, that's a good question. Let's see. Mostly men. I see one woman, two women out of our 10 lines, and one person named Jan. I don't know if that's a man or a woman. Mostly guys. Let's see why John in Cutchogue, on the island, thinks about the Roman Empire. Hi, John. You're on WNYC.

John: Hey, Brian. How are you doing? Yes, driving on the Long Island Expressway. They have since fixed in Suffolk County, but it was horrible. I drive in a pickup truck and you're bouncing all over the place, and I thought, if the Romans had built this, we would never have to fix this every seven years.

Brian Lehrer: John, thank you very much. Were they good, Professor Feeney, at building expressways in Ancient Rome?

Kevin Feeney: They were pretty fantastic at building expressways, it must be said. People say all roads lead to Rome for a reason. The Romans were fantastic when it came to building new roads everywhere they went, and maintaining those roads too was one of the top responsibilities. If you were elected in Rome that was one of your main duties, was making sure the roads stayed in good condition.

Brian Lehrer: I did not even think I was going to get a serious answer to that question. I underestimated you. Alam in Boonton, you're on WNYC. Hello, Alam.

Alam: Hey. Basically, I want to talk about Marcus Aurelius and the philosophies and the beliefs in Ancient Rome back then. That's actually really nice. Some of the beliefs that they used to have back then, not all of them, obviously, helps you structure your daily life and helps you have a nice discipline over yourself. My wife asked me too, and I was like, "Yes, probably daily." She's like, "Why, dude?" I was just like, "Because it's a beautiful thing" [crosstalk]--

Brian Lehrer: You're one of the people who thinks about the Roman Empire daily. That's incredible. Stoicism to you, Roman stoicism to you, I guess today we would call it self-care.

Kevin Feeney: Well, I think that it's definitely true that the Romans do have their own ideas of self-care. I think that if people can find inspiration in the way that philosophy was written about and practiced by the ancients then, that's fantastic. The caller pointed to Marcus Aurelius. We have other stoic writers like Seneca. They were people who were trying to work out how to survive in the world just like we are, and maybe some of their ideas can be of help to us yesterday. I think that's great.

Brian Lehrer: Here's Janet, who, I think, thinks about the Roman Empire for a reason that not many people probably do. Janet, you're on WNYC. Hello.

Janet: Yes, hi. I started thinking about them very recently with all of the talk about men in drag and how awful it is, men in drag, how awful mixing the feminine and the masculine, all confused. It is so arbitrary. What is feminine and masculine attire? It is totally conventional and traditional. For example, the Pope, as far as I know, the Pope wears a dress, a very long dress. He does not wear a three-piece suit, or jeans and a t-shirt. He wears traditional feminine garb.

I started speaking about I, Claudius, that fabulous series. I think it was in the 1970s, starring-- on PBS. If you haven't seen it, everybody, you've got to see it. Derek Jacobi, and Siân Phillips, and John Hurt as Caligula. Fabulous. [unintelligible 00:09:38] expert there. All of these macho emperors who go around invading places and enslaving people, they all wore these little white mini dresses. The way they dressed, if I saw that on the rack in Macy's, I'd say, "Oh, what a cute little summer white mini dress. Maybe I'll buy that."

Brian Lehrer: For a woman. Janet, thank you very much. Okay, did the Romans give us the original Drag Story Hours?

Kevin Feeney: Honestly, I think we can say they absolutely did. Roman public entertainment was often the opposite of that philosophy we talked about a moment ago, was often extremely, extremely crude and full of a lot of dirty jokes and things, and lots of gender-mixing and gender-bending. A point I'd add to what the caller just noted there was that the Romans actually saw wearing trousers as a strange and even sometimes feminine thing. It was something they associated with weird wild Northerners from places like Britain. Whereas of course, they knew that good Roman men wore togas and wore tunics and wore things that were not quite so tight around their legs.

Brian Lehrer: By the way, I was joking about the stoicism Marcus Aurelius being the Roman version of self-care, but I gather the TV host Carson Daly recently posited that this trend is part of a whole male self-improvement culture that can be linked to the popularity of podcast host Joe Rogan and the controversial psychologist Jordan Peterson who are sort of reviving the stoicism philosophy of the ancient Greeks and Romans.

Is this sort of a Right-wing culture war thing?

Kevin Feeney: I think that's a bit of a stretch, to be honest. I think that what people like Peterson and Rogan and others are doing, it doesn't look a lot like stoicism to me, other than that point you mentioned before, that it's different ways of people thinking about how to survive in the world and get on in the world. I think they have very different ideas to the ideas of the Greeks and Romans.

Honestly, I think the trend is a little bit more innocent than that. I'm sure for some people, there's that macho side, but I think for a lot of people, whether they're men or women thinking about the Roman Empire, there is just more of a genuine interest in a culture that does a lot of very impressive things a very, very long time ago.

Brian Lehrer: We are out of time, I'm sorry to say, but I'm just going to throw in as a quick summary of Theresa in Brooklyn's call that we're not going to have time to actually put on the air; that she thought about the Roman Empire not for a long, long time, until 2015 when Trump came down the escalator in that royal way and announced his candidacy for president, and she thought, Roman Empire again. There we leave it.

We thank Kevin Feeney, faculty fellow at NYU who teaches Roman history. Thank you so much.

Kevin Feeney: Thanks so much for having me on, Brian.

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