Quote:You can't have a kingdom with just a ruling class, though,
Oh, sure you can. In fact, in antiquity it seems to be the norm. Evidence suggests that the Etruscans were little more than a warrior class who descended on Central Italy an replaced the ruling class with themselves. They left the peasants alone.
For that matter, with its talent for hyperbole the bible claims that the Assyrians deported the 10 tribes but even the Assyrians do not say that. The inscription by Sargon II claims that only 20,000 odd people were deported and replaced by others. That means the bulk of the population, the peasants, stayed right on their land but working for new "management." Again the bible indicates that the Babylonians took all the population of Judah into captivity but no such thing happened. As before, the upper classes were deported while the peasants stayed behind to work their farms for new Babylonian overseers who based themselves at Mizpah as nearby Jerusalem had been burned to the ground.
The peasants performed a useful service. They grew the food. I rather doubt they gave a shit which hand was holding the whip.
