caldrail

Yes, but then Stonehenge was at the time just a ring of smaller stones marking graves, not the famous trilithon arcade we see today. The site had features that attracted neolithic people, such as the 'approach road' and the alignment with the rising sun. Salisbury plain would host a wide ranging ritual landscape that included Stonehenge as a main feature. So many people think it was just the stone rings as we see it today.

Our sample size is limited to very few examples so drawing conclusions might be premature. Why is our auxiliary paying for barley? That's animal food, aside from punishments (which would mean he was paying as well as suffering humiliation for sleeping on duty). Presumably he has access to an animal such as a mule and must pay for the supply to feed it (since many animals were not 'issued' but requisitioned as necessary). One could speculate that the costs were deliberate. Is an officer scamming his men? Or is this a means of stamping out corruption (you cannot bribe if you have no cash). Or is this working on a similar premise to the modern Foreign Legion, where restrictions are applied to prevent breaches of discipline? There's a lot of possibilities but little to go on.

Take no notice of them. Conspiracy theorists love attention and I think you'll find that 'knowing something you don't' is what empowers their self respect. It's also a way of being an 'expert' without learning anything. As for the theory itself, one has to wonder why they think that. Much of modern culture in the west is descended from either Roman or Germanic roots. Is this theory Russian in origin?

I notice that the video describes Germanic culture as somewhat similar to the American plains Indians centuries later, albeit with a grittier edge. The tentative connection with horses, the warrior lifestyle, the meritocracy of their chiefs. Different landscape of course. In Germany they've set aside some land to revert to primeval conditions and it really is what Tacitus and Florus describe.

Relics? Oh dear. I suppose it might just be possible that these bits really are remnants of the individuals claimed, but the reality is the vast majority of revered christian relics are nothing but fakes (and not always human either). Medieval christians were suckers for this kind of thing and grave robbers did good business selling their wares. I heard somewhere there were more pieces of the true cross than the original. Then there was that marvellous story about the crusaders under siege in Antioch in the First Crusade. Things were going badly, water and food petering out, and then some bright spark told his mates that he'd had a vision that the spear that pierced Christ would be found buried in the castle shrine. So they dug and found a spear. Inspired by religious fervour (and delirious with dehydration and starvation) the knights got on horses and charged out to meet the much larger Turkish army, and caused a rout of the Turks. Incredible.

That's a fascinating thing about Rome. They thought the Cloaca Maxima was the height of civilisation, and as Simon Montefiore explained on a recent documentary, symbolic of purifying what was always regarded as a sacred city by the removal of the unwanted waste. The Roman social toilet must have been the place for some bawdy humour and shared gossip, you know, that macho 'locker room' sort of banter.

This is one subject that won't go away. Prevailing opinion seems to favour defeat in Scotland, but even that wouldn't necessarily prevent the IX being revived provided the Eagle had not been lost. That is of course speculation but it does seem odd we don't have anything obvious in the sources to suggest what happened to them.

One point though - masking smells? The Romans don't seem to have had a problem with smell other than they preferred personal cleanliness. It isn't the smell of the city they moan about - it's the noise.

Interesting project. Keep at it.

@Guy, yes, legion medics were pretty much Greeks. But Roman medicine wasn't that scientific on the whole. They were as likely to prescribe prayers rather than strange substances, and some of those weren't too healthy.

The disabled would have been dependent on charity surely? Also, whilst there are many great temples of huge size and impressive colonnaded visual impact, the majority of temples were in fact quite small and easily accessible for those who found difficulty climbing steps. I also note the Romans don't dwell on incapacitation. Their ideas of male virility made disability something unmentionable?

Bear in mind that Irish and Roman churches were not in accord. Once Irish Christianity started popping up in western Europe the Roman church went into complete rivalry and won. People like Pelagius disappeared as well. But regarding Roman culture - that was never foisted on people. There's this common theme that conquered peoples were 'romanised' shortly after. There never was any such assimilation. The Romans offered their culture to those under their sway and rewarded those that adopted it, but if you wanted native clothes and customs that was fine. All they demanded was tribute and loyalty. In fact, the empire was a cosmopolitan spread of diverse cultures and peoples within its territories, quite unlike the single flavour Roman world that's normally described. There's the difference between Empire and Faith. The Roman Empire was a cooperative whole. The Church demanded conformity - though admittedly that was because of Constantine the Great in the first instance who needed something to bind his shattered empire together and chose the various christian sects, who were brought together at the Council of Nicaea in 325 to unite the diverse beliefs that all the sects had promulgated beforehand. Something like fifty gospels were reduced to the four approved gospels we still have today. Hadrian was an exception I suppose. He had this idea about creating a Graeco-Roman bubble of civilisation that excluded the barbarian. His policies were not that successful and sparked a war in Judaea when he reneged on his promise to rebuild Jerusalem and instead ordered a Roman city built on the same spot, to be called Colonia Aelia Capitolina. Too much for the Judaeans to accept.

The Vatican as an independent state has only existed since recognition by Mussolini's fascist government in 1929. Before that it was the capital of the Papal States and then only under the sole control of the Pope from the 8th century. I did chuckle when you mentioned that church leaders claimed the Vatican succeeded where the Roman Empire failed. That's complete nonsense unless you mean persistence. Of course I'm aware of the influence the Pope has, but he does not rule an empire (I'm sure national leaders would have something to say about that if he tried). Further, Roman Catholicism has not prevailed entirely. Protestant and Orthodox churches still exist and are dominant in some countries around the world (including my own, where it is illegal for a Catholic to become monarch). Historically it was influence that the Catholic church sought to expand rather than actual power, and to be honest, they had reached the highest point in the late eleventh century. Pope Urban II was empire building outrageously, excommunicating monarchs when they didn't comply, but blew his project when he responded to a request from Emperor Alexius of the Byzantines for military assistance and ordered the First Crusade. So no, ROman Catholicism has failed to create an empire at all. Rome 1, Catholicism 0.

Tavern life in ancient Rome could well have been a lively experience. Witness the images in Pompeii of situations the landlord does not want happening, rather like 'this is banned' posters. Despite the demand for orderly behaviour, there seems to be a certain sense of humour in portraying things this way. Expedient, obviously, because posters as such are less likely to be read than a scene is viewed, and because paint is more available than paper.

Small point but female gladiators never fought male opponents - that was considered unfair. In fact, female contestants originated as a comedic act, sometimes paired with dwarfs (who were male, I might add). This sort of attraction began around the time of Nero and ended when Septimius Severus banned female warriors in the arena (though as with all things Roman, it's likely that small numbers still performed in wandering troupes out in the provinces for some time).

Yes, Rome was a very family-centric society. Okay, maybe this was more important for families with some money in the belt, but I note from Pompeii and Herculaneum that pets were never far away. That said, I also notice that pets don't generally get mentioned in the sources except for perhaps the odd case of something unusual or something touted as evidence of divine favour. I suppose this is partly down to Rome's attitude toward animals. Love them or whip them, they were animals, unable to decide for themselves and bound to human direction (this was why slaves had the same status). Except for funerary items like this, which give a little insight that status was not entirely a fixed view, rather one that varied according to the emotional needs of the owner. After all, there were plenty of men who freed slaves in order to marry them.

Hang on... Pyroclastic flows are both searing hot and violently turbulent. Odd that there's a lack of evidence for heat in amongst pyroclastic residue.

It does a ring a bell. But I confess, I'm in the same boat as you, creasing my brow in an effort to recall some fleeting memory of a mention in a source normally left in a dusty library or obscure website. Tell you what. You search your research material, I'll search mine. One of us is going to find him. Join in everybody. X marks the spot. Seriously though it does sound familiar. The trouble is so many Romans fell out of favour for transgressions great and small I'm struggling to think who it might be. For a moment I thought of Cicero's son, but no, that didn't fit the bill. I'll keep an eye out for this one.

Almost the end of the year. Most of 2020 has been about Coronavirus and the government locking up the population for fear of catching it. Man With A Skateboard The other day I was on the doorstep waiting for a parcel delivery (having been advised by phone and email he was going to turn up imminently) when this old guy wandered by taking his skateboard for a walk. Not since the 1970's and the kids tv show Magic Roundabout have I seen anything quite so weird. No, really, it was rolling gently down the hill, the man ambling after it and occaisonally nudging it with his foot to keep it travelling down the pavement. Man With Something I want To Buy I'd been out shopping and happened to pass one of my local music stores. I wonder if they've got a gizmo that could help me with my home studio? Hmmm... So I bravely crossed the road - Yeah same to you mate - and found that due to Covid restrictions I can't just walk in, masked or not (Bizarre that shops will only serve masked men these days). I rang the doorbell. Actually it wasn't all that bad, you get let in and ask for what you want. The guy behind the counter listened to my detailed requirements for gizmo heaven and offered me a gizmo. Not a simple gizmo you understand, but a quality gizmo, fully featured, compact, and able to cope with the mind blowing requirements of modern musicians. It's got this, he started, and it's got that, oh, and thingy here is used for... Okay. I said, I'll take it. No, stop selling, you've already sold it. He looked up a bit disorientated from having to stop his sales patter halfway through, but the gizmo did everything I needed, so yes, I'll buy it. We both parted in a good mood, a successful days transacting at the shop. Actually just in time too. By midnight Tier 4 comes into play and the music shop is shut. Man With An Agenda Part of my job is quality control. That means I have to check other people's work in some degree (by order of senior management no less). That makes me as popular as a traffic warden of course. Having spent the last two years having endless confrontations and giving endless lectures about proper procedures one of the key members of the team decided to brush me aside and ignore the standing procedure completely. I got miffed, confronted him about it, he got miffed because he's too important to be confronted, and before you know it, on the last day before our Xmas hols a minor war breaks out. There's a fair few of the team on my naughty list right now. Trouble is, I might be on a managerial naughty list myself. January might be interesting... Man At Last We Have A Proper Brexit Good grief, who would have thought it? Not only have we spent the last year under siege from Covid but we've also been tearing ourselves away from Imperial Europe, and we now have an actual deal with them, signed and done. From tomorrow night the United Kingdom is a seperate nation properly. I feel all British all of a sudden. We even won the custody battle with Scotland too. They can moan and sob all they want but frankly in the long term we've done them a favour. Sooner or later their precious independence was going to vanish in some European re-organisation aimed at dissolving national borders. We've also done preparatory deals with Canada, Japan, South Korea, and somewhere else too. I notice that the EU has now pulled business from London to an internal financial market. Bearing in mind how utterly obsessed they are with external borders, both real and virtual, one can't help comparing the situation with the waning years of the Western Roman Empire when Britain threw out the corrupt Roman administration after they withdrew their legions.. So, the EU is going to be overrun by hordes of barbarians wanting a piece of their action, and we're going to be overrun by hordes of Barbarians wanting a piece of our action. Funnily enough, the increasing numbers of migrants attempting to cross the Channel to get here is a startling parallel. But look on the bright side. In a few hundred years we'll be owning half of France again. Celebration Of The Year Oh come on, stop griping. Goodbye 2020 and hello 2021. Yeah! Rock and roll man!

No real suprise to me. It's been increasingly obvious in recent years that Britain has plenty of Roman military sites around the country. I mean, the town I live in descends from a work camp used during the building of the Roman road from Calleva Atrebatum to Corinium Dobinorum which would have been used by soldiers working as labourers and artisans.

Roman writers love to 'quote' speeches. Of course they do. Rhetoric was a vital part of a schoolboy education since the youngster was being prepared for a life that might well have involved politics. The problem is that they're making it up more often than not. Possibly the quote from Calgacus is accurate but there's no corroboration. It's a sort of socially acceptable derivation to enliven an otherwise dry account of the past. That said, Tacitus was well aware of the shortcomings of the empire's soldiery, barely wasting any explanation for the mutiny in Pannonia of ad14 (and adds a speech from a soldier to describe the complaints of the legionaries that nobody could have recorded). Britannia was a distant province though. A rebellion there during Hadrian's reign barely gets mentioned in the sources. How serious was it? Who rebelled? Who fought the rebels? Who won? One might suspect an easy victory for the Empire if the event is so casually passed over. had the rebellion been a disaster for Rome, or involved some great tragedy or drama involving the rich and famous, then more detail would have no doubt been dug up. It was, perhaps, thought of as a dull subject with nothing to thrill the reader.

What we don't know is the objective of these presumed reprisals. Official retaliation? Local revenge? Suppression? Criminal activity (Roman soldiers sometimes indulged in a spot of banditry though this was more common in the late empire)? I would point out that the quote you gave above is highlighted concerning the actions of the 'barbarians', not the Romans. Or at least that was how I read it. The governor, Paulus Suetonius, is more concerned with preserving the province against the rebellion according to Tacitus.

Shield walls are inherently defensive. The late empire made use of them, but the wider rounded shields of the day made that practicable. Principatal shield were less useful in that regard since they were optimised for personal protection and shaped to allow gaps for men to thrust swords between when in close order melee, and the compromise in spacing made advances just as easy as static defence. Okay, the celebrated testudo was an exception but that was not a hirsute tank. It was a means of advancing with added protection. When you got to the enemy, you had to do something else.

Same thing has happened everywhere in Britain. We used to have an industrial landscape that just doesn't exist any more. Locally, I remember when the canal wharf warehouse was pulled down, or the redevelopment of Little London. That said, in the middle of Old Town, in amongst the tightly packed terraces you can still find country cottages from before the railways came, when Swindon was a small market village on top of the hill.

Ermm.... There is only one Coliseum. The other arenas are simply amphitheatres no matter how grand. The name Coliseum is not Roman by the way. They called it the Flavian Amphitheatre.