Flavia Gemina

That's right. It was the sulphur fumes and ash that killed Pliny, but only because he was asthmatic with a weak chest. We know from Pliny the Younger's letters that most of his companions survived. They were all at Stabia (modern Castellammare di Stabia) about 7 miles away from the volcano, so just on the edge of the pyroclastic flow. Flavia P.S. You can read both Pliny's letters HERE

Little spelling correction: it's FalerNian (with an 'N') from a region just northwest of Naples. Interestingly, it was a white wine, described by one ancient writer as 'amber' in colour. Flavia

Sorry to re-open the discussion on lemons but as they are integral to my third book, set in AD 79, I feel very strongly about them. When I was at the Villa Poppaea in Oplontis a few years ago, the guide told us they found extensive root system of lemon trees. There is the perhaps dubious lemon tree of the Villa Livia, already mentioned. But this one, from Pompeii, is clearly a lemon tree!

Thanks for those kind words. We are hoping to have news of US distribution after a big convention called Mipcom in Cannes next month. I'll keep you posted but we are hopeful for TV airing followed by DVDs! Vale! Flavia

Thank you, Nephele, my faithful promoter! The BBC are about to film The Slave-girl of Jerusalem at Boyana Studios in Bulgaria, and guess what? They are going to cut out the whole Masada back story! But that's because they are doing it as a one hour episode for TV and not a feature film. BTW, two other 'real' characters who appear in Slave-girl are the two Roman soldiers mentioned by Josephus earlier in The Jewish War, one of whom jumps from the burning portico of the Temple into his companion's arms during the sack of Jerusalem. Flavia

Here's a wonderful fresco from Pompeii of Mt Vesuvius before it erupted. Presumably the artist merely looked out his 'window' tp paint it!

Yeah! Go Gladiators! Where would we be without them?

Yes, and that reminds me that the origin of the gladiatorial combat is thought to go back to the sacrifice of a slave at Etruscan funerals. Not everyone agrees with this theory but it does involve shedding of human blood unto death. As for the shedding of human blood as an offering on an altar, I'm now convinced it never happened. Thanks to one and all for your contributions! Flavia

Wish you could join us, Nephele! The Augusta is signing up, too! We'll have a real UNRV group! Flavia

Those images are great, Klingan, and they are definitely what Stamp and/or Heller based their monumental 'wall calendar' on... but I think those ones are quite small. It was Stamp/Heller's own initiative to make a giant wall-sized one. Do correct me if I'm wrong and one exists! Flavia

Hey guys, what I'd like is a quote from a primary source or a fresco or statue or some other hard evidence that they did this in Roman times. Personally, I don't believe they did, but Jonathan Stamp and Bruno Heller usually try to get it right. Is this one of their own fabrications, like dripping breast-milk on a corpse's lips and smoking hemp?

Not quite. Every eighth day was a market day. The Romans called these days nundinae (ninth days) because their system of counting was inclusive,(like the 'three days' Jesus was in the tomb: Friday, Saturday, Sunday) and they counted the eighth day as the ninth, if you follow. On those days farmers came in from out of town to sell their produce. After the time of Augustus, the Romans started adopting the way seven-day week of the east, like the Jewish week. But for quite a while both countings were used. The 'dies nefasti' were the days on which you couldn't do certain types of business, e.g. some even-numbered days and some days on which disasters had occurred. I either heard a podcast or read an article where Jonathan Stamp (historical consultant for HBO) said that although they'd never found such a thing, he thought it would be fun to create a monumental calendar. I've tried to find it and can't. Sorry!

I've already signed up so maybe I'll see some of you there! Flavia

As a self-taught writer who has now published fourteen historical novels set in Rome -- with a TV series based on them -- I suggest you concentrate on plot structure and writing style. Prose is very different from poetry. When you've written something and you feel it's as good as you can make it, don't show it to friends. Send it to something like The Writers Group. You have to pay but they will professionally appraise your work in positive and constructive ways. To find their URL and to see my own tips on How to Get Published, go HERE. It's not easy to get published, but being a writer is the best job in the world. Good luck! Flavia

In the third episode of season one of HBO's Rome, 'An Owl in a Thornbush', Vorenus stops at a shrine to Venus and prays that his wife will love him. He cuts his hand and drips blood onto the altar, telling Venus that he offers his own blood. Did this ever actually happen in Roman times? I thought sacrifices were always birds or animals -- maybe the occasional human -- or honey-cakes or other gifts. I would love to know if any of the primary sources support this dripping of one's own blood on an altar! Gratias ago! Flavia

Many, many thanks for these and for the wonderful photo of you. It will inspire me! Flavia

You're probably right Gaius, they introduced curfew to avoid the cost of extras. All I can say -- as the writer of the book the episode was based on -- is that they drastically changed my plot, and the ending... and practically everything else about it. I never saw the screenplay of that episode and was not consulted historically. It is really infuriating but there's nothing I can do about it. I gather all writers -- except the mega-rich or powerful -- like J.K.Rowling, have this problem. So whatever you decide about curfew, it wasn't in my book! Flavia

Just one more example of 'red' -- rather than 'purple' -- clavi, from the (bearded) Hadrianic period, but nice and clear... Flavia

Wow, Nephele, you're a star! I searched for ages and couldn't find an article like this. Anyway, I'm glad to say it tallies with what I assumed the synthesis would be: colourful long, loose tunic with cape or mantle thing attached. Just wish there was an image. She mentions a relief of P. Vitellius Successus in Daremberg and Saglio's Dictionnaire des antiquitis, IV, 1590, figure 6697. It shows a detail from a tombstone in the Vatican and is reproduced and described in toto in Altmann's Romische Grabaltare (Berlin, r905), figure 154, page 192, section 2~9. It represents a man reclining before a table that is set for a meal... Anybody have access to the Dictionnaire des antiquitis? Or to Altmann's Romische Grabaltare? Flavia

Thanks, Gaius. I know those sources but they don't really give an idea, do they? I even emailed Kathleen Coleman at Harvard -- an expert on Martial and the Flavian period -- and she didn't know! What I would love to see is a fresco or encaustic painting of a synthesis on a male diner from the first or second century AD! Vale. Flavia

One of my favourite sources for the Flavian period (late first century AD) is Martial. He often mentions the 'synthesis', a garment worn by men at relaxed dinner parties and during the Saturnalia. In all my research I have never seen an image from ancient times of one of these. I ended up describing it as a sort of long tunic or caftan, with an attached short cape or cloak of the same colour, hence the name 'synthesis' or 'putting together'. Can anyone out there correct or enlighten me further. Or best of all supply an image? Flavia

Speaking of the 'synthesis', this is another garment I would love to have a clear picture of. But I will add it as a new topic...

Excellent article, Gaius! And it nicely accounts for variations of 'purple' both in images from ancient times and in modern TV and film! Gratias ago! Flavia

OK, I've gone back to the sources. The encaustic paintings of Roman Egypt from the Ancient Faces catalogue. In portraits of equestrian males, the clavi range in colour from pink to red to dark red to scarlet to purple. Some of this might be accounted for by fading but not all. Here's a (not very brilliant) photo I took in the British Museum a few months ago. But still... the clavi look red to me! This makes me think there may have been some flexibility not just in the equestrian tunic, but also the senatorial toga... Flavia

Were the stripes on tunics purple or scarlet, Nephele? I always thought the narrow equestrian and broad patrician stripes were red. Or were scarlet and purple (both expensive) interchangeable? This has always niggled at me... Flavia