caldrail

Oh yes, when this sort of thing happens history gets very real indeed. You can reach out and touch it, admire it, but really you want to walk up to the guy, shake hands, and chat for all you're worth. I last got that feeling in the Auckland Museum, New Zealand, where they have a Mitsubishi Zero and personal effects of the man who flew it. The area where I live was inhabited by romano-brits. They dug sandstone from quarries, farmed, worked iron, and made pottery. A marching fort, vicus, and cemetary are hidden on the edge of town. Some of the finds are in the local museum. There isn't much, but it piques your interest nonetheless. The one thing there that did attract my attention was a saxon sword dug up from Beranburgh Field. The handle was small - too small for an adult. "Here son, now you're 13 years old its time to cast off childhood. Here's your first sword. Tomorrow we go raiding west toward Durocornovium!"

It should be remembered that the roman army was derived from the greek model. The very earliest roman forces were warbands on a basic level. Greek organisation was adopted until the romans decided a more flexible approach was needed during the Punic Wars - a typical case of warfare advancing techinique and technology. But isn't that typical of Rome? Like the modern Japanese, not so good at inventing but they sure know a good idea when they see one.

I vaguely remember some mention of an increase in deformed children that was seen as portent of bad things.

We laugh, but augury was a serious business business for many romans. They were a very superstitious people in most cases (although a few worldly wise grifters would have sneered) and acts of nature always had some divine cause. Claudius was particularly keen on augury if I remember, and Tiberius kept an astrologer, Thrassylus, on his payroll. Caesar ignored an augury at his own cost did he not? Constantine famously rallied his troops by claiming he had seen a vision from god - I think he was telling king sized porkies there myself seeing as he would remain a pagan until his deathbed.

I suspect he didn't find much marble there. A lot of those early monuments were used as building materials for later ones. Am I wrong, or did Rome migrate back toward a brick city in the later half?