Northern Neil

It was on round about the late '80's, on Channel 4. It features Jimmy Mulville, Rory McGrath, Philip Pope and Neil Pearson of 'Drop the Dead Donkey' fame. Some of the actors from the Blackadder series got in there too, including Bill Wallis, who played an excellent Emperor Hadrian. I think it only got repeated a couple of times, probably because some of the jokes were a little too historical for the average ITV punter. But I thought it was hilarious - prepare yourself for a treat, GPM!

This is fantastic news, Ghost! I shall be ordering my DVDs without delay! I have seen several reviews which didn't really rate this series, but even if I wasn't interested in Roman history, I would still find it funny. 'You are, with respect, Grasientus, an ugly bastard' Great!

Happy Birthday from accross the pond!

Terrific! many thanks, Bryaxis - and only

I suppose this topic is aimed at members such as Viggen, Medusa and Kosmo. I am looking for books which have site plans, photos and reconstruction drawings of Roman forts and towns in continental provinces. There are many, many works relating to British sites, but in the course of looking for ever more sources for my model making activities it would be nice to have some books with material from the Rhine and Danube provinces, especially with regard to some of the excellent reconstructed forts in Germany. I have a few books of French and Italian sites already. So far I have found Amazon a bit of a let down in this regard. I don't mind if these books are not in English; I can read French, and have limited abilities to read German and Italian. Romanian I havent a clue, but it would be SO nice to have some material relating to Porolissum, for example.

The west at the time acknowledged the name the greeks had for their empire, which was 'Romania' or the Roman Empire, although they called its inhabitants Greeks. Aparently, the extinction of the Western Empire officially re-united the Empire. There has recently been a move away from the term 'Byzantine Empire' in some quarters, and historical atlases have started to call the Empire 'The Eastern Roman Empire' right up to 1453. Which is, as I believe, the way it ought to be. The name 'Eastern Roman Empire' is retained - as Colin McEvedy (Penguin atlas of Mediaeval History) says, to acknowledge '...the many differences between the Classical Empire of Rome and the Roman Empire of Constantinople'.

BBC Radio 4 Extra are currently airing a remake of Seutonius' 12 Caesars. This started on Monday 5th Sept, but Monday and Tuesday's episodes are still available here

When I visited Pompeii, I was appalled by the sight of wall paintings damaged by modern graffiti. I was equally appalled by the fact that these paintings were unprotected by perspex or glass, and that people obviously interested enough to pay to see these monuments caused the damage.

Hi Scott, I shall order your books from Amazon as soon as my next payday arrives!

Its actually relatively simple. The radiator heats up and expands the air inside the engine, which escapes through the narrower rear. The heated element (if one prefers that to radiator) serves the same function as the fuel burner. The radiator/element does not in itself cause thrust, the escaping heated air does. It is really irrelevent what the nature of the heat source is, as long as air is heated and has a means of escape.

It seems to me that radiator thrust is a given - it matters not wether a heat source is burning fuel, or heat from an element - the heated air has to escape somehow, and with an exit smaller than intake, this effect will be enhanced.

Linked to this discussion, although admittedly possibly straying off topic, How do you view the presence of named characters in the sub - Roman period? I refer particularly to figures such as Vitolinus and Cerdic, people who appear to have fought for the Anglo Saxons, but seem to have Roman or British names.

This is indeed correct, if we regard the predominance of la tene objects over Germanic objects as evidence for a lack of germanic people. There is nothing in the archaeological contexts which tells us wether or not these people spoke a germanic language however. Oppenheimer seems to believe that there is plenty of evidence that lowland Britons were Germanic in origin, even though their grave goods are of a type associated with celtic settlements - just as people buried in saxon graves later on have been found by DNA evidence to have been native Britons. An assumption that people wearing torcs and wearing checked trousers must be Celtic is I suppose like an assumption that people driving BMWs are Germans. The Gauls which were having problems with Germans further east were Belgae, or related to Belgae - themselves described as resembling Germans (If being tall and having fair hair is an indicator of German - ness!), and, more tellingly, speaking a language different from that spoken in the west of Gaul and Britain. Could it be that when Caesar referred to Germans he was referring to people living in the geographical area called Germania, as opposed to specifically being ethnic Germans? I admit I find oppenheimer's theory attractive (which is why I mention it ad nauseam on here!) but I do find it more logical and convincing than the rather cut and dried idea of sudden Germanic influx within a couple of centuries. In addition, Oppenheimer refers to linguistic evidence, which states that the degree of separation of German and English is greater than one would expect over a 1600 year period. Dr. H

...Which, by the way, is not to knock wargamers, being one myself - or at least, someone who makes and buys wargaming material. Just as an aside, I often get round the 'uniform size' problem in my display units by mixing 25mm and 28mm figures, and also different makes. This achieves a nice slight variation in size one would expect from a real unit. Given that there may be a slight difference in average height during the early Empire in favour of Gauls and Germans, maybe a pleasing sense of authenticity could be arrived at by using the following ratios: Roman Army - two thirds 25mm, 0ne third 28mm. Gauls / Germans - the reverse. Another factor to be considered is that childhood nutrition can effect height in a general population. Given that Gauls and lowland Britons all but had a civilization of their own, in which some hillforts seemed to have played a role in storing and distributing surplus food centrally, maybe there is something in the assumption we are discussing. At least, prior to the second century. Add to this the poor childhood conditions of many urban Romans, which probably made the legions attractive as for the first time in their lives they had regular meals and healthcare. The sizes Guy gives indicates that central/southern Italians - generally - were and aren't, on average, giants. So, another question to be asked here is at what point were the legions no longer staffed predominantly by Italians? And to what extent did the presence of Northern Italians, with their part - gaulish makeup, mitigate the average height in the opposite direction to their Southern Italian comrades? Sorry, even more questions I'm afraid!

I believe some of this depends on what you regard as Roman. As is often the case, Wargamers tend to make vast generalisations (as well as inventing their own historical terms!), and the 'Roman Period' - even excluding its later Byzantine phase - extended over more than a millenium. The writer of the article refers to the period from Caesar onwards, and not late Empire units, so we can assume he means the Principate up to the reforms of Diocletian. Well trodden territory. In which case, a lot of legionaries, with Roman citizenship and therefore Roman in every way that mattered during this phase of the Roman period, would have come from all parts of the Empire. The absurdly named Gaulish 'Barbarian Legions' referred to in the article would thus be peopled by Citizen Roman provincials. With such a mix of different European and Middle Eastern physical types present in the legions, I find it hard to believe that legionaries were uniformly shorter than their foes from outside the Empire. As paratrooper Lirelou points out, archaeological evidence seems to suggest that Pompeiians were taller than modern Neapolitans. Also, Maximinus Thrax was said to be nearly seven feet tall.

So far, so bad... yes, the omission of a defensive breastwork on the gate tower is a pretty serious one, and I dont like much the sparse, pointy palisade on the ramparts. Bonus points for the half stone, half timber and plaster barrack block (Shame on you, GPM! ) but a minus for placing it directly to the rear of the gate, when one would either see the buildings of the central range, or the gables of the barracks/stores diminishing towards a view of the Principia in the middle distance.

Typical! I'm away for two days and miss all this fascinating debate. I take your point about Hawkers - I'm not actually a massive fan of the Spitfire, preferring the Hurricane for style, manoevrability and ability to take more punishment than the Spitfire. And I must confess, I forgot all about sea furys and Tempests, assuming we were talking best piston engined fighter of WWII - although I concede, the Tempest did see limited action before May '45. Typhoons I believe were a bit lacking in manoevrability compared to the Mk. XIV Spitfire. When I was at Duxford last year, the fighter that impressed me the most was actually the P47. Chunky body, 12ft. prop and massive radial enginne - its just a no nonsense beast that, with its eight .50 Brownings, could knock a steam engine off its tracks.

Hmm... P51d yes, FW 190 maybe, P47 debateable, Vought Corsair debatable. Which other piston engined fighters outperformed the Supermarine Spitfire?

To me, this is an eminently sensible solution to the conundrum. Then as now, people are people and financial pressures greatly influence people's choice of consumer goods. Assuming that the army continued to deduct cost of equipment from the pay of its members, this would explain why legionaries tended to have the more sophisticated equipment. I think that the assumption is that this sate of affairs was enforced, rather than down to choice based on income. I would imagine that some Auxilliary soldiers would have saved up and bought the higher priced items - hence the presence of Lorica Segmentata at places such as Corbridge.

Thanks, chaps. So far so good...

Before I buy this film, please someone tell me what the reconstructed buildings are like. For me, poor attention to this tends to spoil a Roman movie for me. I give some examples: ARTHUR - beautiful reconstructions of Roman Forts and Hadrian's Wall, spoiled at the last minute by some art director stupidly insisting that they should be embellished by fictitious columned gateways. THE LAST LEGION - Hadrian's Wall built out of yellowish polystyrene blocks. CENTURION - The Legionary Fortress at Inchtuthill depicted as being about the same size as a milecastle. On the other hand, I applaud the movie GLADIATOR for its close attention to architectural details, and total acceptance of current theories (at least where buildings are concerned) and thus forgive its errors in other contexts. Will this movie make me happy, or make me foam at the mouth with rage?

Having re-read the old posts on this thread as well as the new ones, I see repeated references to legionaries wearing Lorica Segmentata, and Auxilia wearing chainmail. And of course, 'everybody knows' that this was the case. Apart from Trajans column, is there any hard evidence or original source which supports this assertion? I just think it is rather too neat an hypothesis, and Lorica Segmentata has been known to turn up in non-loegionary contexts, such as auxilliary forts.

I do not believe to the same degree, though. Moral values derided in the UK for decades still seem to be quite prevalent in the US.