Day: February 14, 2010

Classics in Malta

~ David Meadows ~ rogueclassicist ~ 1 Comment

Always nice to see this sort of thing, even if you thought one must have already existed:

A group of graduates and lecturers is planning to set up a Malta Classical Association with the aim of raising the profile of Classics in Malta.

The association will hold public lectures on aspects of the Classical world, offer basic courses in the Greek and Latin languages and hopes to produce plays from the great playwrights as well as recitations from selected poets. In fact, it is planned to launch the association this summer at an event comprising a play and a recital.

Its plans include launching a publication featuring essays and reflections by members of the public on the Classical world and its relevance today, as well as exercises in Latin and Greek prose and poetry. Another journal would be set up to offer academics a medium in which to publish their work.

The group is inviting anyone interested in the Classical world in joining the association to send an e-mail with their details to Joseph Anthony Debono at classicsmaltasoc@gmail.com.

No knowledge of Latin or Greek is necessary for membership.

via Reviving our roots | Times of Malta.

What’s (in) a Roman Urn?

~ David Meadows ~ rogueclassicist ~ Leave a comment

Interesting find/followup:

THE Romans had something to declare at Exeter Airport – 2,000 years after they arrived in Devon.Passing through customs was a very old pot that the visitors had left behind during their stay in the county some time in the mid-70s AD.The black-burnished urn was dug up during an archaeological dig in Cullompton and since then everyone has been wondering what was in it.Rather than put a hand in and root about inside or hold it upside down and scatter the contents on the table, the pot was sent along to the airport which has a big X-ray machine usually devoted to ensuring airline passengers’ security.Staff from Exeter’s Royal Albert Memorial Museum – whose own X-ray gear was a bit small for the job – gathered round to see what would be revealed.And in the end it was a 2,000-year-old dead Roman. Or at least, the remains of a dead Roman, along with some strange curved objects that may or may not be pieces of jewellery or brooches.Jenny Durrant, the museum’s assistant curator of antiquities, said experts would now be sifting through the remains to learn more. “It was very unusual to find an urn like this intact. It could have been a Roman soldier or may be even a well-off local person.”The find is helping rewrite the history of Cullompton. A Roman fort at St Andrews Hill in the Mid-Devon town, which was abandoned around the mid-70s AD, was discovered in 1984.

via Urn X-ray picks up Roman remains | Western Morning News.

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