If you were sent back to the roman era and could only bring a backpack of goods. What would you bring?
An English-Latin phrasebook, a survival manual explaining how to recognize plants, grow food, handle livestock, set traps, and make simple shelter, e-reader loaded with modern books and a usb solar panel, a multitool, sewing kit, a small dagger, cerium/magnesium flint, first-aid kit, antibiotics, water treatment (Sodium Dichloro-S-Triazinetrione), preservative and neutralizer (sodium metabisulfite), salt, potassium chloride, peanut butter.
But I’d probably be quickly ambushed and killed nonetheless, or hauled off to the slave markets.
i’d fill it up with a variety of bulk spices
…that’s an amazing idea.
Let’s go further - seeds for modern crops that grow well in the Mediterranean. We didn’t spend thousands of years selecting them for nothing.
Tomatos potatos and corn
20 identical ereaders packed with every book I can fit, solar panels, and batteries.
And the rest of the volume with gold.
I would do the same, except instead of gold I would pack as much Fentanyl as possible. (Not like the cops will find you after you time hop anyway).
I could then, heavily dilute the Fentanyl and sell it and earn way more gold. You could also poison your enemies with pure Fentanyl and no one would understand what sort of poison it is.
With all that money you could probably buy a small castle, a loyal guard, hire the smartest people around and have them start creating weapons, medicines and mechanization from the 21st century before you even die.
The other reason Fentanyl is superior than gold is that if people see gold they will just steal it. If they see bricks of Fentanyl, they probably won’t steal it. They might try and see what it is… and likely kill themselves in the process… which would likely dissuade any other thieves associated with them.
Not too different from the British strategy in the Opium Wars. They got Hong Kong and lots of tea this way.
That’s incredibly big brain, although highly immoral. But thems are slavers you’re going to swindle so it’s all good I guess.
Automatic crossbows, so Rome can become eternal
Tablets with a shitload of how to build books on it, several small solar chargers and USB cables.
“Your device is not connected to the Internet so we can’t confirm you aren’t stealing something so we will just assume you are. Error code: SUCK DICK”
Gray’s Sports Almanac 1950-2000.
Buy bitcoin in 100AD…
Just wait 1950 years and you’ll be rich
Remember that old reddit post where someone asked “what if a battalion of marines were suddenly zapped back to the roman era with all their gear and stuff, what would happen?” and somebody answered with a full on novel they titled “Rome, Sweet Rome” and some time later some Hollywood dude bought the rights to it?
It was a short story, and the film adaptation has been in development hell for over a decade.
Well that’s disappointing
I remember at the time someone warned the writer that this would be the most likely outcome. Most of the things Hollywood buys the rights to don’t get made into movies.
Oddly enough, the ending of the latest Indiana Jones movie has something along these lines happen, if you can sit through the boring middle part of the movie. Not a great movie, but the ending was bonkers (in a good way). “You forgot about continental drift!” LOL
Antibiotics. All of the antibiotics. Textbooks, dictionary, precious metals, etc.
Guns.
“Y’all don’t need to stab Julius. I got you. And you, too, Brutus.”
Probably mostly medical supplies. I don’t want to die of a stubbed toe.
You and everyone you interact with will probably get very sick. Neither of you will be resistant to each others germs. Maybe you will set off another plague. Probably. I’m not an expert.
Hence the medical supplies. Antibiotics, painkillers, antiseptic, bleach, etc.
Modern cannabis seeds, because if I’m going to be in Ancient Times I still don’t want to smoke schwag.
Not a bad idea, but also, you could definitely still make hash out of schwag.
Bringing the seeds would be easier though.
And since you mentioned seeds, let’s go ahead and also bring seeds of modern potatoes, tomatoes, definitely chilis like proper habaneros. Salads, perhaps. Definitely modern brewing yeasts! Bananas, maybe? Tobacco, definitely.
There’s even yeast strains which produce opiates instead of alcohol (purposefully made with gmo ofc), but I wouldn’t be able to get my hands on those.
Also, medication. Lots of modern medication.
But a backpack full is a lot. So, seeds, electronics (full Wikipedia and other such information), solar charger, tons of meds. A few good blades, a gun, and several reliable methods of making fire. Several good modern bowstrings. Gunpowder, if there’s room. (Making bullets isn’t too hard and modern smokeless powder would be preferable to basic black powder.)
Holy shit man!
— Julius Caesar
A sports almanac would be all I need
I’m all in on Caesar being stabbed today
Death for treason!
Maps. Lots of laminated maps of North Africa and the Middle East. Every time I run low on silver pennies to pay my palm frond air conditioner, I sell one more map.
Sell a hand drawn COPY of the map.
They’re going to be pissed off when they can’t find this Argleton place, though.
Cipromax, isoproyl alcohol, neosporin, and and as many Band-Aids as I could stuff. I’ll make room for an English-latin dictionary.
Maybe one of those “facts about everything” almanacs in the outside pocket, because I’m too stupid to remember my sines and cosines or the difference between sodium carbonate and sodium bicarbonate. I can figure out the rest from there.
