GhostOfClayton

Well here we are once again, that annual midwinter dog and pony show they call Christmas. Bloody hell! And that was swearing. I make no apology, and I will swear later as well. It�s already a matter of record that I lament Christmas getting ever-earlier (I blogged about it a few weeks ago . . . where were you?), so that�s the first reason for me to curse. Apart from that, I�m not religious, I probably have anti-capitalist tendencies, and don�t have kids, I rarely drink, I�m still on that perpetual diet I went on earlier this year, and I�m also unfortunate enough to spend most of any given winter quite far up the northern hemisphere. I long for the days when I used to spend the festive period in the Mediterranean sun. Now I spend it with rain, wind, snow, fog, ice, etc. Can you think of any more things people look forward to at Christmas that haven�t been dismissed by my previous statements. What�s that? Peace and good will to all men? I try and do that all year . . . what kind of miserable shit is only ever good to people for a fortnight every year? (I said I would swear again, didn�t I?) Christmas lights? I have to admit that Christmas lights can be breathtakingly beautiful (they can also be breathtakingly tacky, but we won�t go there), but once I started to understand the concept of a carbon footprint, they kind of lost their appeal. And does anyone like shopping in December? Or the ever increasing war of escalation where people buy each other slightly more expensive presents every year. In the words of the great Sheldon Cooper, �You haven�t given me a present, you�ve given me an obligation.� Turkey? Seriously, does anyone ever eat turkey outside of Christmas (and Thanksgiving if you live in the good old U S of A) ? I doubt it. As meats go, it�s pretty ordinary, isn�t it? Spending time with your family? I will spend Christmas Day with one of the the belligerent and numerous OfClayton nice/nephew tribes. They�re nice kids, and fun to be with for about an hour. After that, the fun wears a bit thin, especially when the excitement of Christmas renders them uncontrollable. I dread the day when they become too tall to steer by placing a hand on top of their heads, and turning. Anyway, I�ve got to go. My ex-business partner has put three appointments in my diary for later tonight. Don�t know what that�s all about . . . . So I�ll leave you with details of what�s in my iPhone Christmas playlist: Thea Gilmore � That�ll be Christmas The Darkness � Don�t Let the Bells End Jona Lewie � Stop the Cavalry The Pogues and Kirsty MacColl � Fairy Tale of New York Greg Lake - I believe in Father Christmas The Pretenders - 2000 Miles Hurts - All I want for Christmas is New Year�s Day (Don�t judge me on this one, it was a freebie from Apple) Kylie � Santa Baby (also a freebie) Care to share your Christmas favourites?

Would that be a republic era hairdo?

I will be kind this time.

Of course, you're correct. Over to you, Bryaxis.

. . . and of course, there has to be a minuimum of an additional 4+ years for ET to retaliate in any way.

Don't apologise. Acedemics like yourself have earned the right, through years of study and hard work, to use lingo and jargon. Otherwise, there'd be nothing to mark you as seperate from the likes of me, who has learned everything he knows from Wikipedia. That's how it should be, and long may it continue.

Right - I'm going to take the initiative, but we

Hmm . . An enigma. Looking at the wooded slopes, and the general quality/scope of the remains, my first thought would be Vaison la Romaine, but those roofs are quite steeply pitched . . . I'll say it anyway . . . Vaison la Romaine?

What's 'Ad Cat. I'?

Io Saturnalia to you, Ummidia. Interesting one. The bell tower looks Norman, so UK or France. However, those chimney pots don't look British, so I'm going start the ball rolling with France?

There was also the favourite little theory that any phallus you found around was ejaculating in the direction of a brothel. This theory is obvioulsy b****cks, (in more ways than one). But it seems to be disproved all the more by the lack of any other direction signs.

To simplify the question. . . Did the Roman Tradition of "Cruciform Tropaeums" evolve into the modern Christian tradition of decorating a Christmas Tree? No. The decorating of an evergreen bough is a pagan (we should use the word ploytheist to be politically correct) midwinter tradition that stretches back into antiquity in northern Europe. After all, in the deepest part of winter, when everything is dead, the still-living evergreen had a semi-religious significance, and also a symbol of hope for the return of the warmer weather. A bough would be brought into the home, latterly at the time of the year where the days stopped shortening, but no doubt (human nature being what it is) in many cases much earlier in the cold season, to be replaced periodically when the needles dropped. If you were a polytheist, and you had a religious object in your house, you'd probably decorate it, wouldn't you? Ockham's Razor applies, ergo Cruciform Tropaemus <> Christmas Tree Decoration. QED.

More like that, please! I now know that Demeter is the Greek equivalent of Ceres . . . so we're laughing AND learning here. (Mainly learning, though, if I'm honest!)

The simple answer to your first question is 'Yes'. Yule is originally northern European, and stems from the ancient Germanic habit of referring to halves of the year as 'Before July' and 'After July'. Not sure that the rest follows logically though. It would be pretty obvious thing to bring an evergreen into your home at midwinter and decorate it. Plenty of evergreens kicking about the northern european forests.

It'd be interesting to find a modern parallel to Livia Drusilla. At first I thought about Margaret Thatcher, but to be true to the spirit of the exercise, we would need to be looking for a 'first lady' type person. Though I can't help thinking the iron Lady would be secretly delighted to be likened to the Divine Augusta.

I was listening to a programme on Radio 4 recently. It's called The Infinite Monkey Cage, and takes a light-hearted look at weighty scientific matters. It stars Professor Brian 'all the men want to be him, all the girls want to be with him' Cox, and a very talented comedian called Robin Ince. I can heartily recommend it, though any historical content is purely incidental to the main scientific themes, so my recomendation on this forum may constitute 'off topic'. Too late! It can be listened to as a podcast through iTunes, or via the previous link. The recent episode was on the subject of Codes and Ciphers, and an expert made a passing comment, "The ancient Romans used ciphers." Sounds very interesting. Anyone have any evidence of the use of ciphers used in ancient Rome?

Are you sure? I was mainly looking at the landscape to be honest, and I'd written off Peastum before I even looked at the masonry. But you're quite right. Coastal sandstone and widespread use of Opus Quadratum would be the next thing I looked for.

Surely it's Italy! My first thought was Paestum, but the landscape leading up to the hills is much flatter at Paestum. This is (as my colleague used to say) a curly one!

. . . and another . . . Scandal Takes a Holiday A nice little Falco, this one. Very much like the earlier stuff, and probable very little more needs be said. There's still a trifle too much happy coincidence going on for my tastes, though, and this comes to the fore more so in STAH than previous Falcos. Think of the bits were the crew of the Star Ship Enterprise face almost certain anihilation, only to have someone say, "why don't we reverse the polarity of the tachyon converters using the magnetic resanance imaging scanners. That will allow us to route a controlled neutron flow into that big swirly thing out there and kill it." Now imagine the equivalent in Ancient Rome. I have to say, it's getting a bit annoying now. If Falco just went out and bought a Lottery Ticket, he wouldn't have to get bogged down with all this Private Informer work. He'd just win, and put his feet up. Rant over. This is a very enjoyable read, and don't let anyone (least of all me) tell you otherwise. The book's strength, however, is in the detailed description of Ostia and Portus, the lives lead, the sights, sounds and smells, and so on. The reader really gets to feel they know the place. Anyway who has read this book could, I'm sure, be dropped into ancient Ostia, and instantly feel right at home. Although this wasn't Davis' best Falco so far, I'm still very much enjoying the series and really looking forward to See Delphi and Die.

Yet again, a couple of days overdue, but if you hunt the schedules, you may find it. Rome's Lost Empire Country: UK Channel: BBC 1 (and BBC One HD) Date: Sunday, 9th December - sadly, not repeated anywhere I can find, but it won't be long before it turns up on BBC 4, I'm sure. Episodes: 1 Link: BBC 1 As usual, this one will be on iPlayer, but if you're living outside this green and pleasant land, you may not be able to get it. My review: This was a splendid (and unexpected) piece of telly. It gave a wonderful introduction to the new academic field of Space Archaeology. There were a number of significant discoveries including what I'm sure will turn out to be the lighthouse at Portus, and a canal running from Portus to Rome. These seemed a little staged for the programme, and some of the video screens used to demonstrate were clearly a special effect/mockup to make the whole thing seem more like Minority Report. They can be forgiven for this. The other key strength was the on location stuff. Africa, Arabia, Dacia, Portus, etc. They were all over the empire. Top notch stuff, and an unexpected Christmas treat! More like this please, BBC.

Bashing the Bishop What do you think to the title? Bit rude? Bit adult? Hey, I can do blogs that�re �edgy�. In fact, there are those in the world that will almost certainly find the following down right offensive. There are those who say it�s high time I did a controversial blog. So here goes: It may have passed the rest of the world by, but the Church of England had a vote recently on whether or not they should allow women to be ordained as bishops. In the end, they voted against, some people were delighted, some people were devastated, the world kept turning, and now the big news is tomorrow�s fish �n� chip paper. No one�s that bothered any more, now that a few days have passed. I know what you�re thinking. GhostOfClayton is some kind of Arch-Atheist, and that will have made his blood boil with sheer frustrated anger. Firstly, I don�t see myself as an atheist. Richard Dawkins is an atheist. He has that same degree of fervour and passionate belief that religious people have. He�s religious about atheism. I�m not. Normally religion has no impact whatsoever on my life, and I try not to have an opinion on it. It seems to offer some benefit to religious individuals (though it seems to have been pretty disastrous for mankind), so who am I to poke my nose into their affairs? So why am I blogging about it, if I care so little? Is it because they rejected women as bishops? No. My personal morality, as a good egalitarian, is that we�re all equal, and that we should all have the same opportunities in life regardless of our age, gender, beliefs, sexual orientation, skin colour, etc., etc. However, that�s just my personal morality. My personal morality also tells me that I shouldn�t try and project my personal morality on anyone else. If they want to take an institutionally non-inclusive position, that�s their business, much as it�s their business if they hold somewhat disconcerting views about gay people. However, what the whole lady-bish episode did highlight to me was a significant hole in the inclusivity of our age old British democratic system. Did you know that 26 seats in the House of Lords are reserved exclusively for Church of England bishops? Part of every UK resident�s life, whatever their religious belief, is still controlled by the Church of England. And to add insult to this anachronistic injury, the Church of England has just proved that it isn�t fit to exercise any kind of constitutional power, due to its institutional misogyny. Now�s the time to imagine my blood boiling with sheer frustrated anger. No other body has this automatic right to power (it�s just possible that this statement isn�t true, but if you want to read a blogger that checks their facts, good luck finding one � for the purposes of this blog, it�s an absolute truth). Anyway, we don�t live in a perfect world, and one angry blogger with an optimistic total of three readers (who probably don�t agree with him anyway) isn�t going to change that one iota. My personal morality should possibly keep its gob shut and get on with its own business. It�s nice to have an occasional rant, though. PS If you�re not sure why the title of this blog is rude/adult, Google it. You may want to check over your shoulder to see who�s about before you start typing, though.

Ta muchly.

Looking at that website, it's probably worth pointing out to overseas readers (and many in Great Britain, no doubt) that Cirencester is neither in Devon nor Cornwall. It was in Gloucestershire last time I looked.

I'm sort of assuming 'Latifundia' is plural, and 'Latifundium' is singular. Maybe one of the Latin speakers could put me right?

Well done Ummidia Quadratilla, it is Hotbank Milecastle. Also, you're quite right, Melvadius, I've only got as far as 35 or 36. I had to stop when Spring came along and took me far away from my research materials. I haven't really got back into it since my return. I know this one, so I'll hang back (especially since my last success was a wild, wild guess!)