A brief item from El Khabar, an Algerian daily:

A group of foreign archaeologists have rung the alarm of the destruction of the tomb of Massinissa, the first King of Numidia (c. 240 or 238 BC – c. 148 BC), situated at El Khroub municipality, Constantine eastern province, a reliable source told El Khabar.

According to the same source, a study conducted by the foreign experts, for Ministry of Culture, has revealed that local authorities have changed the archaeological site through the installation of a power distribution network inside the fence surrounding the protected site.
The same study has recommended removing the water tank that had been constructed on an area estimated at 300m of the archaeological site.
However the study has stressed that facilities and reshaping works carried out by the local authorities did not respect international standards into force. To recall, the aforementioned works had been suspended following the controversy erupted between both Ministry of Culture and local authorities in Constantine, in view of protecting the national and international archaeological sites.

Wow … I didn’t even know that Massinissa‘s tomb existed. Not really much on the web about it other than photos; does anyone know if the identification is secure?

• King Massinissa’s tomb in Constantine subject to deformation

Okay … it hasn’t been played yet and probably won’t even be a great game (unless it becomes the Larry Fitzgerald show like it did last week), but we’ve come across some coverage which puts the big game within our purview. First we have the usual spate of Roman Numeral articles … first, from the Bucks County Courier Times is a representative rant against the use of Roman numerals, which ends with this bit of presagia (don’t know if that ‘s a word, but it works for me):

Something tells me, though, that the day the NFL moves away from Roman numerals will be the same day the Eagles win a Super Bowl, which will be sometime in the year NEVER.

• Super Bowl using Roman numerals is just silly

Another sports guy, from KHSL concludes:

Okay, so let’s see if I can get this right. The current year, 2009, would therefore be expressed as MMIX. Try this one: I was born in the year MCMLXIII. Go ahead and take a few minutes to work that one out. Just to be clear though, XXL is not a roman numeral. That’s my shirt size, though I’m working to get back to size XL, which, by the way, does not mean size 40. See? It makes your head spin. I can’t wait for Super Bowl L. My head needs a rest.

• The Super Bowl and Those Blasted Roman Numerals

… both of which suggest to me that sports writers really would look a lot more intelligent as writers if they DID understand Roman numerals; it’s not as if they are inherently difficult and if writing for humour’s sake, well, the joke is mighty old. More interesting was something noted in the Daily Freeman:

If you think this constitutes extravagant behavior, it is because you are a communist or hate Roman numerals. This year is number XLIII, which stands for “I don’t know how to read Roman numerals, for Lenin’s sake!”

But thanks to the intrepid reporters at a newspaper in Tampa Bay, Fla., this numerical mystery has been solved. According to an important investigative piece published in the Tampa Tribune, the reported number of strip clubs in Super Bowl host city Tampa Bay is the same as the number of Super Bowls played.

• Indecipherable number is name of the game

But enough of the Roman numerals stuff which plagues us on an annual basis this time of year. I’m more interested in reading about a computer program called Zeus. Here’s the incipit of a piece in the New York Times:

N.F.L. teams have used advances in technology to improve the condition of their athletes, to scout opponents better and to research prospects better. But when it comes to play-calling, particularly in crucial situations, the N.F.L. might as well bring back George Halas.

That’s because few coaches in the risk-averse N.F.L. have been willing to break with practices that have grown hoary with age — like punting on fourth down almost every time — when research has repeatedly shown that it is better to go for it.

We know this because we created a computer program, Zeus, that assesses play-calling decisions of N.F.L. coaches, using the same modeling techniques that have revolutionized backgammon and chess. It’s no different than I.B.M.’s supercomputer beating a skeptical Garry Kasparov in 1997.

Built through research into game logs, statistics and the behavioral traits of coaches, Zeus accurately replicates a modern N.F.L. game.

• The Computerized Coach

• Worshiping a New God

… but wouldn’t Apollo have been a more appropriate moniker?

From Short News, FWIW:

Staff at Derby’s new Royal Hospital; have been terrified by an apparition of a man appearing in the hallways, they have been so frightened that managers at the NHS hospital have called a local priest for an exorcism.

Senior manager Debbie Butler e-mailed her staff she wrote: “I’m not sure how many of you are aware that some members of staff have reported seeing a ghost. “I’m taking it seriously as the last thing I want is staff feeling uneasy at work.”

Experts said this spirit may be the ghost of a Roman soldier killed on the grounds, Protesters attempted to halt the first hospital being built in 1920, but Developers continued to build on one of Ancient Britain’s main Roman roads.

In the past, we’ve mentioned a possible Roman ghost on a paintball site at Teeside, Boudicca’s ghost running around Lincolnshire and Flintshire, assorted Roman ghosts at York.

• Roman Ghost Haunts Derby’s new Royal Hospital

One of the fun aspects of going to Queen’s (where I did my M.A.) was reading the local paper, which had the great name Whig-Standard (which is almost as good as Times-Picayune) and I note a letter to the editor this past week from R. Drew Griffith, one of my former professors and current head of the department (I believe):

The story “Hate on campus” (Jan. 24) outlines Queen’s University’s uphill battle for inclusiveness, noting that last month the university’s board of trustees failed to endorse a plan to name a building on campus after Robert Sutherland (BA, 1852), the first black graduate of any college in British North America, later a successful lawyer and Queen’s first major benefactor.

When Sutherland’s story is fully celebrated, as it should be, I will note with pride that he majored in classics (my department) and mathematics, and that he graduated with a prize for translation from English into ancient Greek verse, a feat neither my colleagues nor I nowadays would dare to attempt.

Queen’s classics department scored another first, by the way, in 1917, when it and the English department appointed Queen’s first two female professors – not too shabby for a field devoted to the study of dead European males.

There’s actually a visiting professorship at Queen’s named for Sutherland as well, and the accompanying biography in the description thereof only mentions a Classics connection in passing (if that) … perhaps some rectification of this would be a good thing as well. Perhaps we need a Canadian version of Twelve Black Classicists …

• Honour this Queen’s man