caesar novus

That seems to be an anachronic statement; arguably, for the people of the time (from any side) that's exactly what it was. Obviously I meant WW1 didn't have such clear ethical polarization as WW2, that could motivate remote global players such as the US to put aside it's mixed allegiances and inhibitions to play war. 1930's Japan invasion of China, and Hitlers invasion of Poland etc was so over-the-top brutal and uncalled for. WW1 had more balanced moves, a little rough on Belgium and the Balkans perhaps, but more often in a tit-for-tat fashion. Meanwhile countries like Italy bargained with each side to see what rewards would come with an alliance (chunk of Austria eventually awarded to Italy). WW1 seems to fiercely have that quality of how a butterfly's random movements has an expanding domino effect on bigger things. I thought this obscure book emphasized that, since it almost put Wilson out of the picture who like FDR campaigned for peace, but did all kinds of sneaky things to get into war. In hindsight, maybe it would have been best if only a very weak US participation was deployed, so that a more balanced Armistice came about. Could have easily happened, apparently.

Of course, but my point wasn't sympathies so much as acting on them... such as from a neutral or pro German US president. WW1 wasn't a battle of good vs evil with natural villains (although I gather it started mainly due to the German negotiator being sloppier and less war-averse than his counterparts in the initial diplomatic crises). However as a stalemate WW1 was a powderkeg of possibilities for a fresh player such as US to make a splash on 20th century history. If it remained neutral, the US probably would have remained weak and uninfluential in the globe because gearling up for WW1 was a big learning process. Not sure about the fate of Europe... weren't many French troops in mutiny just before the Americans came? It's probably unlikely that even a pro German president could have asisted the Axis side, because the British ruled/blocaded the seas. But a neutral or even weak pro Allies policy by a president other than Wilson would seem to exert a lot of leverage to change history, esp if you think of WW2 as cleaning up loose ends of WW1.

I caught bits of a talk that seemed to have weighty claims about the near-alternate-history of US involvement with Germany in the last century: http://www.booktv.org/Program/10805/The+Ha...+Great+War.aspx has the video and future TV schedule. Apparently it is based on a bootleg copy of presidential correspondance whose official copy is withheld and was almost destroyed. I will mention some half remembered themes to encourage some interested person to pursue it. If I have it wrong, remember that at least I have led you to the source. I am not going to pursue this because I don't yet have enough WW1 background info to sort out conflicting claims. -Wilson was only president by a fluke when he declared war on Germany in WW1. He had almost lost to a nobody for his second term, and the popular Harding could have had the presidency then for the asking but for some reason bowed out. -Harding was long term soul-mate to a rabidly pro German mistress (who spent part time in Berlin, tried to blackmail him into not voting for war, and joined a bunch of German mata-hari type spies outside US military camps). There was a lot of pro-German sentiment in the US, although not necessarily in Hardings case. -The spying in US focused on ascertaining when the trainees would be ready to ship over, so that Germany could use all the time it could to build up the greatest possible assault and end the war before US could tip the stalemate the other way. This played out in the massive Leutendorf(sp?) attack which was almost successful if it hadn't exhausted troops from it's very progress, and left Hitler and the German populace unconvinced they had been properly beaten after their show of strength.

We seem in the third phase of anthropological agendas. Somewhere in academia there may be unbiased seekers of truth but especially at the entry level, participants underlying drive seems polluted by fashionable narratives about unfamiliar cultures: 1) Early "patronizing" phase - Cultures studied as curious stepping stones to the western ultimate. 2) Recent "Rousseau" phase - Cultures as romanticized ideals that show the west as wayward (eg Margeret Mead's disputed findings of supposedly uninhibited, pacifist cultures) 3) Current "Jim Jones" phase - Cultures demonized along with the west as examples of being on the road to ruin. Either nature is the ultimate good, and societies are better off dead like the Jim Jones mass suicide, or societies must be policed simply for their own survival by green-gestapo nut cases whose fractured knowledge of physics/chemistry springs more from puffing weed rather than textbooks. I've been more guilty than most of #2 in my life and study. Now I realize all 3 are crap. Don't underestimate bias-by-implication rather than explicit bias. It's like the New York Times; it's not the wording of articles that exhibit bias (often they are written by other outsiders anyway). It's the editorial selection of stories chosen, and what narrative is implied by that pattern. Surely similar for what studies are done or published in anthro/archeology - if no energizer motive like 1, 2, or 3... the rewards for authors time may be pretty austerely intellectual (admirable but rare).

Ours is going to be the first civilization that destroys itself due to environmental hypochondria, after regressing from the heights of scientific agnosticism down to timid new-age nature worship. All kinds of needless costs and restrictions are already kicking in, strictly based on junk science. Environmental stress of the ice age helped turn a bunch of scruffy mango pluckers into mighty toga wearing Roman wheat farmers - embrace the stress! P.S. no need to quote all of a post and cause needless scrolling and eyeball scrambling for your buried reply.

What a delectable movie, although a bit rough around the edges! I propose any true Romanophile use it's "Bring me my Bride" song as a wedding march or even vows: [MILES] Stand aside everyone! I take really large steps.

Its shewtime! HMGM high def channel will be showing "a funny thing" starting 8.5 hours from this posting (at least in my area).

Do you mean decades-old reconstruction maps of ancient Rome like http://catholic-resources.org/AncientRome/Platner.htm ? From fuzzy memory of watching a DVD course in a distracting environment, I gather many such layouts have recently been flipped around on very latest maps. "Experiencing Rome: A Visual Exploration of Antiquity's Greatest Empire" keeps apologizing for showing showing 3D layouts in conflicting ways - some apparently based on that old model in EUR that we always see in TV documentaries, and some corrected diagrams by the course artist. I believe most changes are a reversal of forum orientations, putting the temples and entrances(?) on opposite sides than previously thought. http://www.teach12.com/ttcx/coursedesclong2.aspx?cid=3430

Pantheon is an obligatory 10 min stop any time you are in the tourist center of Rome. It is central, free, and lineless. I find the proportions and interior "upgrades" kind of awkward, but maybe take it too much for granted. Castel didn't leave much of an impression during a quick visit during the "free" week. Diocletians baths look better than I have experienced in http://www.flickr.com/search/show/?q=terme+Diocletian (turn on the "show info" button, and maybe pause the show and click forward at your own speed). It has a jumble of churches and a museum embedded in a confusing maze of pedestrian hostile streets and eternally abandoned construction barricades, so I don't think of it as "an attraction" so much as a variety pack you nibble at occasionally. Major parts seem off limits. It isn't directly across from the Termini; the epic Massimo sculpture museum slightly to the south is closer, although also surrounded by abandoned scaffolding blocking everything but an obscure side entrance. If you cross the sprawl of outdoor bus terminal from the Termini, and somehow survive the endless wide roads where exiting busses try to mow you down... you then have to cross a garbagy sun baked wasteland where out of work immigrants have drunken fights (maybe attracted by the watermelon kiosks where you should rehydrate too). From there, you can plan your assault on the fortress of the baths which gives every indication of not wanting anyone to enter. Just about the closest entrance is obscure, but turns out to be a dazzling church (the one with an endless name) fitted into the baths by Michelangelo in a way that celebrates the original architecture. Now I see from the slideshow there is another nice church in there I missed. There is a museum that bored me at the time, maybe due to jet lag and it's focus on Latin inscriptions. Clearly I haven't done this site justice, but I think it's hard to. The Massimo museum surely challenges it in importance, since like the Naples one it cherry picks items from archeo sites all over Rome and Italy (ground floor a bit eccentric, so elevator yourself to the top, then work downwards).

I think a key factor making Pompeii impressive is not only the horizontal sprawl, but the height. It isn't like most ruins with just some stubby blocks above foundations, but gives you the feeling of the original enclosed space. I think many Roman ruins in Africa and mid east are low (some used mud brick?). That is nice if Sagalassos is rising again. For a person not used to mentally translating low ruins to the original, Pompeii is mind blowing because it gives such 3D presence. The height is sort of a triumph against the ravages of time, and gives a boost to not only Pompeii but the Colosseum and Caracalla's baths (which you can also appreciate even outside the entrance gate). Maybe lack of height it is why Ostia Antica and Herculaneum leave me a bit cold. In the latter case the buildings are as high as Pompeii but you only perceive that by walking in the narrow trench nearby; mostly you view it from above at modern ground level as almost a maze of basements. With all the praise of sites outside Italy, it would still help to rate them relative to well known Italian ones. Exploratory travel can be expensive, wearing, and time consuming. I have little idea how to rate, say, Italica vs various sites in Turkey or Tunisia except for a few nonflattering photos. Need to be guided by prioritizing that stands up under scrutiny rather than just islolated report from an enthusiast. Personally I have already used up my 9 lives in adventure travel, for instance stranded in southern Algeria without money or plane tickets.

Maybe so, but I was of course considering day tripping logistics (with my own biases). Pompeii is the superstar, but a bit wearing to spend every hour of a day there. What aching void most needs to be filled with your remaining shreds of strength? See yet more ramshackle dwellings in Herculaneum, or the gems of artifacts that were cherry picked out of Pompeii into the museum? I would say add Naples museum. Of course if you don't know to request permission for the "sexy" room when you buy your ticket, your percentage of Pompeii related stuff will fall and it can almost seem like a stand alone museum to judge on it's own merits. On the other hand, don't some archeo sites have their own little museum, which muddies the distinctions? Basically the list was inspired by my regret at discovering quite late how important some of the lesser known items were, like Palazzo Massimo. But that point is made, and I guess a reformatted list could benefit from not assuming how you travel and for how long.

Right, that seems to be Seutonious talking about Caligula. I think the prof did throw in a few kudos for Nero, but since there is no exam I never activated my photographic memory.

One should never miss the outside of the Colosseum, but that comes automatically when touring around Palatine. I agree Colosseum INSIDE the entry gate tends toward the unrewarding and unpleasant - I even saw a tourism article advocate just seeing it from the outside as well. Thinking of yanking Colosseum from list and pulling in http://www.flickr.com/search/show/?q=ephesus last (due to logistics to get there). Vatican logistics are truely awful, although there are rumours of times of the week or year that are more bearable. A tourism article recently called on the church to pull this museum out of it's shameful state. But in comfort take look at the Vatican slideshow link I posted (or your own pictures?)... wow, what a Roman treasure trove!.

Like Caligula or Henry VIII, he started out really well. I heard he had some redeeming features even later, but one sticks in my mind from a lecture that said he was the last emperor who proposed a return to partial democracy. It wasn't put into effect, and the professor thought Nero might have been up to no good somehow. Anyway it would have allowed voting only for some something relatively minor, like city councils or the like.

1) Forum + Palatine http://www.flickr.com/search/show/?q=Palatine+forum 2) Pompeii + Naples museum http://www.flickr.com/search/show/?q=pompeii+museo 3) Palazzo Massimo http://www.flickr.com/search/show/?q=Palazzo+Massimo 4) Vatican museum http://www.flickr.com/search/show/?q=vatican+roman 5) Colosseum http://www.flickr.com/search/show/?q=colosseum 6) Capitoline museum http://www.flickr.com/search/show/?q=capitolini 7) Ostia Antica http://www.flickr.com/search/show/?q=ostia+antica 8) Hadrians Villa http://www.flickr.com/search/show/?q=hadrians+villa 9) Terme Caracalla http://www.flickr.com/search/show/?q=bath+caracalla 10) Herculeum http://www.flickr.com/search/show/?q=herculeum Honorable mention: Palazzo Altemps, Hadrians wall, Diocletians palace It has come to my royal attention that there is a lot of loose talk about Rome based on second hand naratives, and not enough attention to experiencing the actual artifacts first hand. Furthermore, wrong priorities are being applied as to which sites to visit first. So I have posted an official priority list for visitation. FAQs: Q: What if I do not agree with the list? A: Pray night and day for the wisdom of a Caesar. If you still cannot contain yourself, you're allowed to suggest one more honorable mention here. Q: What if I prefer to visit in a different order? A: You may be quizzed at the entrance at, say, the Colosseum about your Massimo visit. Any wrong answers, and you may be tossed into the pool of victim reenactors. Q: Why is X in front of Y? A: The order is based on a balance of substance, crowd logistics, and presentation style. So for example Vatican suffers by logistics and Museum of Rome Massimo is elevated by substance. Capitoline has style with less subtance, and so on. Anyway, this is strictly a royal matter that is none of your business - just go follow it!

Whew, I just made it to the ship before they just now closed down its display for a few years. The Telegraph shows an artifact that reminds how transmitted disease wasn't entirely a one way street from explorers to the new world. Syphilis is thought to originate in the new world, and the Mary Rose used this urethra syringe to treat it:

No objection, but it would be nice to eventually see a summary here. I guess I had the order reversed from the usual convention, such as http://www.toptenz.net/top-10-worst-popes-in-history.php which builds up to the #1 worst at the end. Maybe "worst" is a good term to put in front of "Roman atrocities" as well, in case someone wonders if you are for or against.

You seem to say punishment in order to make an example is nothing noteworthy for the time. Maybe a sort of hot-blooded knee-jerk variety was the norm, but I find the Roman style of cold blooded (staged) exemplary punishment beyond the pale. I really like Roman civilization as altruistic for the most part, so this selfish side of making potential innocents suffer sticks out as gangster-think. And it can even be counterproductive; think of how some bombings have rallied the victims or think of how many analysts today are saying the gov'ts exemplary punishment of Lehman (folding) greatly magnified todays financial crises. It's true I was going from summaries inferring the cripples were otherwise innocent and only there for the sick needs of a theatrical narrative. If they might in fact be guilty of something, then fine... I guess there were no jails, so offenders had to be sorted into extremes of very light or very harsh punishment. But it seems a stretch to project guilt, with no evidence. BTW, I'm a bit puzzled why some emperors pandered largely to populism, esp via cruelty. It's one thing where my "genius" emperors balance pandering to the army, elites, AND populace to kind of keep the peace, but wasn't it really mainly the army that you had to buy off in order to survive and thrive? For goodness sake, I was being metaphorical. If you require such tidiness to reach any conclusion, then no conclusion can be reached for Rome with it's incomplete evidence. One thing that is certain is archeological remains, and I think Roman architecture, engineering, and art just shout refinement for the most part. But the scraps of surviving narrative contrast so much from what we associate with refinement, that it's reasonable to assume where there is smoke there may be fire. So it's interesting to look at the contrast, and not get at all relativistically jelly spined about it. Romans are interesting precisely because when imposing TODAYs standards they look so good in many ways... and bad in others (with volumes of admittedly shakier evidence for the latter).

OK, let's try revising this idea for a deep pocket forum demographic. A final headcount please... anyone wishing to join a tour of Roman archeo sites normally closed to the public, send a signed blank check to http://www.romasotterranea.it/guided-tours.html and tell them since it was my idea, to let me tag along for free.

If you get the Smithsonian HiDef TV channel, they often repeat documentaries on Maurizio http://www.smithsonianchannel.com/site/smi...ci_detective.do which is a little less up to date, but full of behind the scenes gossip by him. I was especially hooked by his debunking of the "The Adoration of the Magi painting" because "none of the paint we see on the Adoration today was put there by Leonardo" (his quote from Wikipedia). I always thought that painting was vomitous crap and hated the reverence for it. His claims for it's lineage is funny and further reinforced my impression that the mafia did no serious wrong by blowing up part of the Ufizzi. But the BATTLE OF ANGHIARI documentary was even more wild, with him pointing out that it was considered superior to the Mona Lisa by contemporaries. Maurizio's early sensor machinery pointed to an incorrect location for the BATTLE picture, and he claims it was "guerilla" action unknown to him when unauthorized people started tearing open a wall with a famous mural on it in the search for it there. This event ruined his reputation for when he decided he found the real location of BATTLE, he couldn't get permission to open the wall. If I have this story right, it sounds that now he has permission?

I believe I found most of the Roman plays listed in Wikipedia available in http://www.archive.org/details/texts . Someone might enjoy adapting those plots and characters into more modernized scripts and selling them http://www.scriptfrenzy.org/eng/nowwhat2009

Let's see, quantity or quality of depravity? One account of a royal child's execution sticks in my mind due to the sick way they solved a certain legalistic snag about killing youngsters... I can't even type in the particulars. On the other extreme, the naumachia slaughters sound so wildly over the top. Put aside the technicalities of putting it on water, but to have tens of thousands of POW's hack each other to death for a cold blooded show!? Also I hear there may have had to be several "staff" for every prisoner of war, such as to row or guard; that must have been a scary profession done by Romans, like the poor sods who had to hold prisoners still while wild animals tore into them. It would be nice to come up with tidy top ten lists, but I guess it is too numbing of a sick subject for that...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tVvDTN_gLxk...feature=related seems to capture it. If that doesn't work for you there are many other versions if you search for "engineering an empire" without rome, or with rome at the end. It's kind of disappointing for it's overly melodramatic approach. I was always puzzled why such an expensive palace would be destroyed rather than at least partly reused. But I gather from several sources that it was kind of a pointless non functional show palace. I'm thinking maybe like the more recent palace at Caserta near Naples, kind of a clone of Versailles but seeming monotonous and souless with a too obvious goal of just looking expensive and expansive.

I wonder if anyone would want to meet or at least "group think" plans for an excursion to the Rome area during the week when they open all state museums/archeo sites for free? You can stay cheaply such as at http://www.monasterystays.com/index.php and some can fly for just pennies on http://www.whichbudget.com/en/cheapflights.php?to=ROM . Daytrips from Rome sometimes can be made easier or cheaper with knowhow, such as public buses passing near Hadrian's Villa. Challenges where group-think or meeting in person might help: 1) Finding out the dates of "culture week" ahead of time. Usually notice pops up a couple months ahead of time on gov't web pages (in Italian). In the past it has been in March, April, May, or skipped a year. 2) Making travel / accom arrangements at last minute. 3) working out logistics of local excursions on the cheap (such as getting on/off busses apparently in the middle of nowhere with no language skills).