Category: Popculch

Gladiating Returns to Aspendos

~ David Meadows ~ rogueclassicist ~ Leave a comment

From Hurriyet:

Roman era blood sports – or at least a mock dramatization thereof – will return to an ancient arena in the southern province of Antalya tomorrow thanks to an initiative to stage gladiator fights for tourists.

“The performances will start at 9 p.m. on Wednesdays and Saturdays,” Mehmet Bıcıoğlu, a consultant for the Aspendos Gladiator Arena, recently told Anatolia news agency. “Performed by a group of 80 people, the gladiator fights will be accompanied by Gregorian music, and dance performances will also be presented.”

Gladiator fights were typically staged between slaves, or slaves and ferocious animals, as a form of entertainment in the Roman era. The dramatized fights in Aspendos will be presented with hand-made clothes and weapons before audiences of up to 800 people, Bıcıoğlu said, adding that the arena for the battles has been completed.

Bıcıoğlu said his group would be presenting a type of event that has never been seen in modern Turkey. “I think our organization [will] contribute greatly to cultural tourism in Antalya,” he said.

The group is planning to perform until the end of November, Bıcıoğlu said, adding that tickets for the first performance tomorrow will cost 25 Turkish Liras.

The 12 performers who are set to portray gladiators have been engaged in rigorous training ahead of the first performance, while organizers are working to make the hand-made clothes and weapons, as wells as the sword fights and execution scenes, resemble the original spectacle as closely as possible.

The performers who will act in the swordfight scenes are also training hard to ensure they will not harm each other.

“Our practices are going very well; we would like to see many spectators here,” said İbrahim Caner, one of the gladiators.

This one’s a bit confusing; Aspendos does have one of the best preserved theatres in the area but (as the Wikipedia article on Aspendos notes) it hasn’t been used for performances for a while. They did build something called the ‘Aspendos Arena’ nearby … can we assume that’s where the fighting will take place? I’m still trying to wrap my head around gladiators fighting to ‘Gregorian music’, but it probably doesn’t mean what I think it is.

More Ancient Technology

~ David Meadows ~ rogueclassicist ~ Leave a comment

For those of you who collect images of ancient laptops and ipads, here’s a tweet that should be of interest:

Boris Johnson’s Original Oration of Armand D’Angour’s Ode at the Royal Opera House

~ David Meadows ~ rogueclassicist ~ Leave a comment

Armand D’Angour has written to inform us that a somewhat shaky video of Boris Johnson’s original oration of Dr. D’Angour’s ode is available at his site. It’s rather dramatic (and funny) and is rather more formal than the plaque-ceremony repeat which we mentioned last week (Boris Johnson Orates Armand D’Angour’s Olympian Ode!!).  Here’s a direct link to the video (it takes a while to download). Dr. D’Angour’s page on the Ode and the events surrounding it is also definitely worth a visit: Ode for London Olympics 2012

Classical (maybe Imperial Roman) Weather Events?

~ David Meadows ~ rogueclassicist ~ Leave a comment

My spiders bring back the strangest things … first,  this one from AGI:

The sixth African anticyclone is on its way for the mid-August holiday and is due to linger for eight to ten days. Antonio Sano’, director of the http://www.ilmeteo.it weather website, warns that the hottest days will be around Sunday when ‘Caligula’ will push warm air from the Moroccan and Tunisian interior to Italy. However, the intense heat is set to continue the following week until the weekend of 25 August. Temperatures will reach 39 degrees in Bologna, Florence, and Rome, with spikes of 41 in the south, Sicily and Sardinia. . .

… but it gets better … last week, it was Nero:

Nero, the summer’s 5th powerful sub-tropical Saharian anticyclone, has its day of glory in the center & south of Italy. Right now, it is moving from the Algerian hinterland and making its way to Rome, Sardenia, Sicily and the rest of Southern Italy. The data are alarming, affirms Antonio Sano’, the Director of the http://www.ILMeteo.it portal: this afternoon, almost all the cities from the region of Latium southward will record temperatures of over 36-37C, which means a sky-high fever. The thermometer will hit 39 degrees in Sardenia. In Rome and Florence, it will peak at 37 degrees but the situation is more alarming than expected in the regions of Apulia, Basilicata, Calabria and especially Sicily, where spikes of 44C will be recorded in the province of Agrigento. . .

Even better, from back in July:

Anticyclone Virgilio has set in from the Azzorre Islands and is heading Westward from the Atlantic Ocean and Spain. It has definitively swept away Minosse which was however uncomparable to the African anticyclones that have stifled Central and Southern Italy during the last month. Rain and storms are forecast during the weekend in the North, subsequently extending to Central Italy and Sardenia and ultimately to the South. Temperatures are forecast to drop by 10 degrees and will settle 5 degrees below the average at the beginning of next week. . .

I can understand Nero or Vergil as names for such things; couldn’t find any other emperors being named in such capacities (maybe they’ll come), and I can’t quite picture Virgil as a storm … whatever the case, clearly Europe seems to give better names to these things than North American weather services …

Also Seen: Greek Roots

~ David Meadows ~ rogueclassicist ~ Leave a comment

We don’t often see newspaper articles acknowledge the contribution of ancient Greek to the English language — especially in a Canadian newspaper … a taste in medias res of an item in the Globe and Mail:

[…] In the unlikely event that you are asked to strip naked in a gym by a philologist, don’t freak out. The word “gymnastics” descends from its Greek parent gumnazo, which means “train naked” and comes from the word gumnós – “naked.” In ancient Greece, exercises were often performed in the nude, and at one time Olympic track meets were run in the buff because it was believed that the sun was soothing to the nerves of the back. While in practice sessions, the modern gymnast performs calisthenics, vigorous exercises to improve muscle tone and fitness. This term blends the Greek stem kalli, which means “beauty,” with the Greek word for strength, sthenos.

The Greek word for contest is athlon, and this has bequeathed to us four Olympic sports: the decathlon (10 events), the heptathlon (seven events), the pentathlon (five events) and the triathlon (three events). The pentathlon, in which contestants compete in shooting, fencing, swimming, riding and cross-country running, has an interesting history. The choice of these sports was based on the legend of a warrior who, having to convey a message to the rear of the fighting forces, had to battle on horseback with his pistol and sword. However, because his horse was killed in the struggle, he had to swim and run to complete his mission. […]

… we appear to have been given license to tell people to strip naked; use it responsibly! 😉