Origins
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The Standard Freeholder ponders the meaning of pH and Rh … the latter is of interest to us: The technical “Rh factor” refers to a protein characteristic of blood. The blood of about 85 percent of the world’s population is Rh positive while that of the other approximately 15 percent is Rh negative (lacking the…
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In a piece about the sorts of folks who hound celebrities for autographs, Barry Koltnow writes in the Orange County Register, inter alia: After all, autograph-collecting (philography) has been practiced since the ancient Greeks, although I doubt whether any Greek would have asked Paris Hilton for an autograph. Unlike most of our ‘origins’ commentary, this…
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At UEFA.com there’s an interview with Ukrainian football/soccer star Anatoliy Tymoshchuk … towards the end he sez: These days, some consider the role of captain as just a nod to tradition. But remember that Herodotus described a game in ancient Greece, where soldiers played to develop their fighting capacities and used the head of the…
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Every now and then, this story about the purported Roman origins of hopscotch pops up … most recently in the East London Advertiser: The game involving hopping between squares on a chalk grid dates back to Roman times. It was used originally for military training when foot soldiers ran in full armour and field packs…
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Arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrgh. The older I get the less patience I have with this one … every year in the first couple of weeks of February, piles of journalists and/or their editors parade their stunning lack of critical thinking throughout the world (but mostly in the North American press) by claiming some sort of link between Lupercalia…
rogue classicism 