Romans May Have Learned From Chinese Great Wall?

[Pertinax]

Pertinax, sometimes your comments about medicine makes my head explode. Fairly complicated, but interestingly enough that I can work it out in my head. I suppose I should better learn more about chemistry and biology.

Well I always wonder about vey small scale, commonplace things that people do (like drink too much coke) which has a huge effect on everyday life -im not saying cabbage saved Rome from infertility but it might have helped.

[Favonius Cornelius]

I don't believe the Romans needed the benefit of Sinic instruction in their engineering arts. If the Romans were taught engineering by anyone, it would have been the Etruscans early in Roman history.

 

 

You know you've hit on an interesting topic of discussion: just where did those Romans get their engineering skills? I was thinking more along the lines of the Greeks.

 

Such tremendous skill (and confidence) would not,you imagine,appear overnight-I think this is actually one of the gretest Roman attributes but of which I have very little knowledge, I was hoping someone would open a debate so I could enjoy a ringside seat.

Favonius-you probably think im obsessed with lead pipes, but, Pantagathus sparked a line of enquiry that made me realise that apart from calcification inside pipes (preventing solution of lead) ,Romans used cabbage as a food and a plentiful medicine. The presence of l'methionine in cabbage (the reason they used it for hangovers without knowing what element worked) would tend to detox a person with lead and cadmium in their bodies.

 

 

Oh wow thanks Pertinax! That information is valuable to me, because every once in a while I come across some pleb who has heard this rediculous theory and I certainly do not mind additional rationale.

[Pertinax]

hmmm

 

remember-cabbage versus impotence!

Edited December 23, 2005 by Pertinax

[phil25]

The Romans were superb engineers and developed a great deal during the empire.

 

Look at the brick vaults that constitute the Basilica of Maxentius/Constantine between the Forum Romanum and the Colosseum; or the under-pinings of the palace of Septimius severus on the Palatine. The use of concrete is also impressive.

 

Incidentally, a classics teacher in the 60s once told me that the secret of Roman concrete remains unknown. he was referring to its amazing longevity in holding buildings together. Does anyone know if that is true?

 

They Roman engineers may have emulated things they saw in Parthia, but I don't think that given the idea, they needed much help from anyone.

 

Phil

[Pertinax]

I saw a practical demonstration using a reverse engineered Roman formula for quick setting underwater concrete -I was seriously impressed, the key ingredient was the vesuvian ash used as ballast by Roman vesels.

 

Rapid set (underwater ) took place in about 20 minutes, obviously curing to a significant proportion of full strength would be a matter of weeks.The cast held a heavy post almost at once.

Edited December 25, 2005 by Pertinax

[Ursus]

From what I can garner from _Oxford Classical Dictionary_, the Greeks and Etruscans exerted a certain technical influence on the Romans in their formative years as they did on most other areas of life. But the Romans took these influences and fashioned them to new heights as they evolved. The Roman penchant for engineering was simply part of their practical mentality as a society.

 

In other words, unless someone can offer damning proof otherwise, the Roman gift for engineering was a largely indigenous phenomenon, though one spurred within the context of a greater Mediterranean society. Multiculturalism aside, we need not attribute every triumph of Westerners as theft from non-Western sources. Unless one wants to count Etruscan as non-Western.

[M. Porcius Cato]

From the chief propaganda organ of the ruling Communist Party.... Perhaps we'll next learn that Falun Gong's meditation practices were behind the Catilinarean conspiracy?

[Skarr]

The Romans were no doubt superb engineers. However, they also freely borrowed / integrated ideas from other sources and adapted things easily into their overall framework. The famous arch, for example, which was the most significant structural design that was incorporated into all their buildings was Etruscan in origin. The widespread use of this in various buildings and monuments by the Romans is testimony to the genius of the Romans in recognizing what really worked. I think they were a highly practical people, from the way their religious practices were conducted to the way their overall society was structured.