Classical Words of the Day
- obambulate (Worthless Word for the Day)
- inanition (Dictionary.com)
- dermatoglyphics (Wordsmith)
rogueclassicism
quidquid bene dictum est ab ullo, meum est
Archive for the month “March, 2009”
Classical Words of the Day
- mathematicaster (Wordsmith)
- acedia (Merriam-Webster … should use it in a report card comment)
- idiotism (Worthless Word for the Day)
Modified Cookie Cutter Houses at Pompeii?
Science Daily picks up this item from NWO which originally hit the interweb back in January:
Metrological analysis of ancient houses reveals the use of standard models that were ingeniously adapted to suit individual situations.
Pre-Roman atrium houses exhibited a striking number of similarities as part of a long Italic building tradition. Dutch researcher Noor van Krimpen analysed the measurements of primary mansions in Pompeii. As buildings were constructed according to a standard model, the adaptations to that model, required by the economical, practical and social demands of any particular project, provide a lot of information about the social significance of the houses of Pompeii’s elite.
Noor van Krimpen has added a new weapon to the archaeologist’s arsenal; the metrological analysis. This was already used to find out more about the design aspects of historical constructions. Van Krimpen, however, has now also used the method to add to our knowledge of the social significance of the houses of Pompeii’s elite. The main advantage of using metrological analysis is that it does not require further excavations and so the remains are kept intact.
The ideal measurementsThe elite in Pompeii had architects to design their houses. Van Krimpen has demonstrated that these architects worked according to geometric figures and proportions, expressed in arithmetic approximations, a well-known tradition of classical mathematics. This resulted in a number of standard sets of ratios that were used by architects in the design of houses.
Despite the fact that the atrium houses in Pompeii show a high degree of homogeneity – all having been splendidly built around a so-called atrium, an inner courtyard with or without a roof – the architect’s skill and clients personal wishes ensured that each house retained an original character.
Dress to impressVan Krimpen used a metrological analysis to establish what the original design must have been before subsequently examining how the houses were adapted to the particular circumstances. The adaptations revealed how a client exerted his influence on a design and how each situation required a unique solution. The primary mansions were mainly intended to receive friends and other notable persons and so had to be designed accordingly.
The Pompeii elite tried to maintain the illusion of a perfect home. The central symmetry was not solely maintained by juggling with the dimensions of the rooms. Van Krimpen even demonstrated how two neighbours had cooperated to outdo a third neighbour, one of the richest men in the city. They let their two houses be built behind a single facade so that their property appeared to be as big as that of their neighbour.
Van Krimpen investigated 18 primary mansions from Pompeii. Her research formed part of the broader project RUSPA (Ricerche Urbanistiche Su Pompei Antica) and was funded by NWO.
… the research was Van Krimpen’s doctoral thesis …
- Mansions In Pompeii: Ideal Measurements Of A Pre-Roman Model (Science Daily)
Windsor ‘Folly’
The incipit of an item from Staines News:
The restoration of an ancient ruin was completed on Thursday when the final decorative stone was put into place.
A 25-tonne crane was needed to lower the final stone on top of the Roman pillars of the ‘thousands of years old’ Leptis Magna ruins in Windsor Great Park, Virginia Water, on March 5.
The moment marked the completion of a restoration project started in November to restore the condition of the ruins, which had weathered severely, since being brought to the UK from Libya in 1818.
The project also involved the re-standing of seven columns that had fallen and a new ground level viewing platform being built.
I guess they’re technically not a ‘folly’, since they are genuine ruins … I never knew these things even existed. I also can’t find the circumstances under which George III brought them to their current location. Will the attention of their restoration lead them to being the next ‘repatriation’ issue?
Ruthless Romans on the DS
The Nintendo fansite, DS-x2 reports that a DS-version game inspired by the Horrible Histories’ installment called The Ruthless Romans is in the works … more details as they come, but this might be something teachers could incorporate into the classroom (the book series is great) …
Acropolis Strike … Again
(Rant)I’m sorry, but Greece will never, ever convince me about returning any marbles of any epithet until they can solve their seemingly constant labour problems. If I go to London, I can be pretty much assured of seeing the marbles. If I go to Athens, it’s a crapshoot whether this, that, or the other group prevents me from seeing things because Greece doesn’t have its labour house in order. (/Rant)
UPDATE (03/15/09): check out the following for the possible resolution to all this:
- Attempt to end Acropolis row
(Kathimerini)
Artemisial Neglect
Hurriyet relates the state of affairs at the Temple of Artemis in Ephesus … erstwhile wonder, of course:
The site of the historic Temple of Artemis at Ephesus, considered one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, looks more like a zoo these days as ducks, geese, chickens and sheep wander around its unfenced grounds.
Visited by approximately 1.5 million people a year, the temple lies within the boundaries of the Selçuk district in Aydın. Built by Croesus, the king of Lydia from around 560 to 550 B.C., it was burned down in 356 B.C. by a man called Herostratus who wanted to immortalize his name. Afterward, the temple was rebuilt on the same scale as the original, but three meters higher.
[...]
Though by its nature an important tourism spot, the Temple of Artemis retains little of its former glory. Only one column is still erect while remnants of others lie on the ground. Representatives of the tourism industry want to see this pitiful state improved. They are asking to have informational signs put up at the site to guide tourists and a mockup of the temple to be built there based on the building’s known architectural structure. They also want to have a fence put around the area to keep animals and cattle from roaming around the ruins.
We’ve mentioned the (possibly tacky) plans to rebuild before …
UPDATE (03/20/09): From Today’s Zaman comes another short item on plans to rebuild/reconstruct the Temple (or at least a model of it):
Gallo-Roman Vineyard from Burgundy
The incipit of an interesting item from CNRS … mirrored in various places:
Gevrey-Chambertin, 12 km from Dijon, is famous throughout the world for its Burgundy wines. It is now possible to conclude that winegrowing in this region goes back to the Gallo-Roman era, as testified by the findings of excavations by the Institut National de Recherches Archéologiques Préventives (INRAP), at the spot known as “Au dessus de Bergis”. Carried out in collaboration with scientists from the ARTeHIS Laboratory (CNRS/Ministère de la Culture et de la Communication/Université de Bourgogne), this dig revealed 316 rectangular pits aligned in 26 rows, interpreted as being the remains of a vineyard from the first century AD.
Commissioned by the French Government (DRAC Bourgogne), excavations covering nearly 12,000 m² were completed during the summer of 2008 before building work started to enlarge a housing estate planned by Gevrey-Chambertin town council. The dig, divided into two sectors, revealed a series of hollow remains (pits, pot-holes and ditches) from different periods. For the Gallo-Roman era, an area of more than 6000 m² was covered by more than 300, regularly spaced and aligned pits, surrounded by a continuous peripheral ditch. These rectangular pits are 90 to 130 cm long by a little less than 60 cm wide, and sections of the soil filling them indicate the void left by the trunk and roots of a small shrub. Many of the pits are split into two compartments by a small ridge of rubble and soil.How can these remains be interpreted? The alignment and rectangular shape of the pits are similar to those found at the sites of other Gallo-Roman vineyards discovered in both southern France, the region around Paris and in the UK. The small dimensions of the pits mean that the hypothesis of an orchard can be excluded. The “ghosts” of small shrubs observed in the filing earth are of the size of a vine stock. The two compartments separated by a ridge correspond to the recommendations of Pliny the Elder and Columella, two 1st century Latin authors, which were to plant two vine stocks in each pit and arrange them “so that the roots of the two layers in the same pit do not twist around each other, which will be easy to do by placing rocks no heavier than five pounts in the bottom of the pits, transversally and across the middle.” These pits are the first example how these viticultural and agronomic precepts were applied in Gaul. Some pits are edged by smaller, more shallow ditches. The secondary ditches probably served for provining, an ancient technique for the vegetative propagation of vines, when the above-ground part of the plant (stem, branches, etc.) was buried so that it developed its own roots before being separated from the parent plant and living as a new, independent individual.
- Gallo-Roman vine in Gevrey-Chambertin (AlphaGalileo)
This Day in Ancient History
ante diem v idus martias
Festival of Mars (day 11)
222 A.D. — murder of the emperor Elagabalus
ca. 263 A.D. — martyrdom of Heraclius
ca. 300 A.D. — martyrdom of Thalus
ca. 300 A.D. — martyrdom of Trophimus
1903 — birth of Ronald Syme (The Roman Revolution, among other seminal works)
Classical Words of the Day
- lepidopterology (Wordsmith)
- ululate (Dictionary.com)
- proliferate (Merriam-Webster … always wondered about that one)
- sicarian (Worthless Word for the Day)
Lampardian Latin?
A column on Frank Lampard in Wales Online includes the following in medias res:
The former Swansea City player is also famously proud of the A* he bagged in his Latin GCSE. There’s nothing on record to suggest what sort of shape his Ancient Greek is in though.
A lot of men are proud of their material worth whether it’s the sort of car they drive, the size of their house or their earning power, but Frank’s obsession with the classics speaks of a more lofty sphere.
After all, as a fabulously well-paid, famous and accomplished footballer he can’t possibly have any other concerns.
Men who harp on about their motor, or their property or their business do it because they are worried. That’s the truth. They’re worried that their car isn’t the fastest, their house isn’t the biggest and their business isn’t the most booming.
Frank knows he’s OK, he doesn’t need to worry about that sort of thing. He just wants to talk about his Latin GCSE.
Or is it simply that he has picked a different outlet for his angst? I mean, how much does he really care about Latin?
We can never know for sure but it’s hard to imagine that Frank has spent a lot of time over the last 15 years or so going head to head with intransitive verbs and the ablative absolute.
After all, there’s not much call for Latin in football. It only tends to confuse matters. There’s nothing wrong with this of course. If football skill was in any way proportional to your command of the language we’d probably be rating A.E. Housman as the King of Football rather than Pele.
Unless of course in reality he spends long lonely nights in his Surrey mansion, head buried between the tear-stained scuffed red cover of his Latin primer as Saskia begs him to venire lecto, we’re not doing Frank a grave disservice to suggest that his footballing skills are probably a more significant facet of his being than his ability to decline relative pronouns.
What I’m trying to suggest here, is that Frank has displaced whatever anxiety he feels about himself into a safe area. He’s got his Latin GCSE, it’s not a threatening area for him. Everybody does it. It’s easier to shift your worries than face up to them.
Rather than worrying about the job you have, you beat yourself up for not being a rock star, or a stained-glass window maker, or even a professional footballer or whatever other unlikely and unachievable goal you once idly set yourself.
This Day in Ancient History
ante diem vi idus martias
- Festival of Mars (day 10) …
- 241 B.C. — Romans are victorious against the Carthaginians in the naval battle of Aegusa, bringing the First Punic War to an end
- 15 A.D. — Tiberius becomes pontifex maximus
- ca. 172 A.D. — martyrdom of Alexander in Phrygia
- ca. 258 A.D. — martyrdom of Codratus of Corinth and companions
Classical Words of the Day
- subintelligitur (Wordsmith … great word)
- pedestrian (Dictionary.com)
- crepuscular (Merriam-Webster)
- cliosophic (Worthless Word for the Day)
Principum Amicitias
Explorator readers are filling my box with a story about a recently rediscovered lifetime portrait of Bill Shakespeare, with the authenticity impinging on the inscription you see at the top, to wit, principum amicitias. Savvy rogueclassicism readers will recognize the line as an excerpt from Horace, Ode 2.1.4, which is addressed to Asinius Pollio. Here’s the incipit of that piece:
MOTVM ex Metello consule ciuicum
bellique causas et uitia et modos
Iudumque Fortunae grauisque
principum amicitias et arma
nondum expiatis uncta cruoribus,
periculosae plenum opus aleae,
tractas et incedis per ignis
suppositos cineri doloso.
bellique causas et uitia et modos
Iudumque Fortunae grauisque
principum amicitias et arma
nondum expiatis uncta cruoribus,
periculosae plenum opus aleae,
tractas et incedis per ignis
suppositos cineri doloso.
(from Bartleby)
Most of the news coverage is translating the two-word phrase as “Beware the friendship of princes”, which is more a translation of the whole passage than those two words. It probably has a positive spin in the painting …
(photo from Time magazine via Wikimedia Commons)
- A true Shakespeare “portrait”? Surely not… (Charlotte Higgins in the Guardian; no mention of Horace)
- William Shakespeare portrait in Irish home painted from life, say experts (also no mention of Horace)
This Day in Ancient History
ante diem vii idus martias
- Festival of Mars (day 9) which included another procession of the Salian priests around the city
- 320 A.D. — martyrdom of Candidus and the other “Forty Armenian Martyrs”
Classical Words of the Day
- infundibuliform (Wordsmith … check out their contest)
- incisive (Dictionary.com)
- remedial (OED)
- organonymy (Worthless Word for the Day)
The Romans and Greek Mathematics
This is kind of different … a press release for a doctoral dissertation! Ecce:
Most people have heard of the great Greeks Euclid and Archimedes. And who is not familiar with Pythagoras” theorem? When Rome usurped political power around the Mediterranean, the Romans came into close contact with Greek culture, its literature and science.
According to some sources, the Roman author Varro is supposed to have written a book on the subject of geometry. This book has not been preserved however. In Erik Bohlin”s view, after critical examination of the collective historic evidence, very little can be established with reasonable probability about its contents. Earlier research has attempted to claim, for example, that Varro”s book was used by later Roman authors as a source of geometric teaching matter. This assertion does not stand up to critical examination, however, and must be seen as a more or less unfounded hypothesis according to Bohlin.
Cicero”s rhetorical and philosophical writings contain many passages that deal with or touch on the subject of geometry. Geometry and geometric knowledge are fundamental in Vitruvius” De architectura (On architecture). There are many passages in which geometry is applied practically or which assume that the reader is familiar with it. The dissertation comments on and interprets a selection of significant passages from both these authors.
For Vitruvius, the practical use of geometry does of course come first: geometric designs are required in architecture, not least, to achieve exact drawings. In general, the scientific view of the Romans was strongly influenced by limiting utilitarianism: only knowledge with immediate practical use was worth cultivating.
According to the author of the dissertation, this picture ought to be nuanced, however, especially with regard to the authors Cicero and Vitruvius who essentially had an open and appreciative attitude to the Greek advances in mathematics and studies of geometry – even if practical use came first. Bohlin finds a clearly expressed ideological dimension to the significance of geometry in both Cicero and Vitruvius. Geometry is regarded as an integrated part of civilisation and refined human culture. As such, an inherent cultural value, which is thereby also universal, is attached to geometry.
For Cicero and, in particular, for Vitruvius, this ideological dimension was not independent of practical use, but both aspects were seen as linked.
“With this perspective, the actual differences between that which is Roman and that which is Greek can be toned down, and in this we find a motivation for Cicero”s and Vitruvius”s more open attitude to geometry and Greek knowledge in general,” says Bohlin.
… the ‘news’ was also picked up by Science Daily.
- What the Romans learnt from Greek mathematics (Press Release)
- What The Romans Learned From Greek Mathematics(Science Daily)
Gladiatorial Hazards
The Belfast Telegraph reports on an incident between those pseudo-Gladiatorial folks who hang out by the Colosseum … inter alia:
One of the “centurions” who haunts the Colosseum suffered head injuries this week in a fight with a colleague outside the arena. A police officer said he found the man sprawled on the ground “with his face covered in blood”.
Officers said the centurions were fighting over tourists’ attention but colleagues disagree. “It’s not true he was beaten. He just fell over and hurt himself,” one of the gladiators said.
In other gladiatorial news, fans of footwear will be happy to know the gladiator sandal continues to have a good, er, run:
When the fashion gods tell you the gladiator sandal is still around, but only hotter and higher, you listen. Even the fashion disciples (Dolce & Gabanna, Versace, etc.) turned up the volume on this ancient Roman footwear this season, and whether you love them or hate them, they are the shoe to wear for spring ’09.
APA Panel: Military History of the Greek, Roman, and Late Roman Worlds
Some (all?) of the papers from this panel have been made available at the APA site:
Man it would be nice if every panel did this sort of thing … or at least had podcasts of the presentations … whatever the case, perhaps this is a hint (finally) that publication on the web is considered ‘legitimate’?
