Andrew Dalby

If anyone wants to know the Greek for a g-string, incidentally, I'll post it here tomorrow. But can anyone tell me the Latin?

Thank you, Pertinax, an excellent reason for picking cowslips. They are becoming rare in British hedgerows I believe. I thought the reason was the spraying or the petrol fumes: maybe they are being over-harvested by hallucinands.

Am I allowed to add a Carthaginian menu to this topic? I'd love to hear what others think about this feast. On the following page Salammbo's Feast I've put the French text and two English translations of the Carthaginian Feast which is the first scene in Flaubert's Salammbo (historical novel published 1862). My questions: Did Flaubert's research pay off? Is this feast realistic? How well have the translators managed? And incidentally, does anyone fancy recreating this scene today? A few initial comments/queries: I don't know anything about the force-fed puppies with pink bristles (and I'm not sure if I want to); does anyone? I suppose that by 'assa foetida' (which is the correct French spelling) Flaubert means the extinct Mediterranean spice, silphium? What on earth is Tamrapanni wood? Andrew

And while we're talking about gold mines, don't forget another natural resource of ancient Liguria -- the culinary/medicinal herb Lovage, whose name was ligusticum in classical Latin, levisticum/libystikon in later Latin and Greek, hence liv

That's a very polite way to address a slave ...

For her name, try Libertas (Latin = Freedom) or Eleutheria (Greek = Freedom). Slaves and non-citizens often had Greek names, even if they weren't Greek in origin, so I would choose the Greek. Not a very beautiful word though. Or you might I suppose say Libera (Latin = free [feminine]), but not Liberta (Latin = freedwoman, former slave). For the line, try Nominemus eam Libertatem/Eleutheriam/Liberam (Let us call her Freedom/Free) or Nominabimus eam L/E/L (We will call her Freedom/Free). Does that help? Can we read the story?

Late in the day, I just want to agree with Germanicus here. Here's a different kind of evidence. Trimalchio, the slave-who-became-rich-Roman character invented in Petronius's Satyricon, is proud of his slave history, has a painting in his house depicting the slave market in which he was sold, etc. But just one thing. When conversation is about his having been his master's cinaedus, i.e. 'boyfriend' and assumed to have been sexually penetrated, Trimalchio says as a kind of excuse 'There's nothing wrong if your master tells you to do it'. It seems to me a realisitc detail. Now he's a rich Roman, he has to explain that part of his history away somehow.

I think, in the long run, 1204 (the Crusader conquest) spelt the end of the Byzantine Empire. They got the Latins out agin in 1261, but the Empire never really recovered.

I agree with Philhellene and others. There's more, too. Probably the majority of surviving literature from the Roman Empire is in Greek. Well-educated Romans were expected to know Greek, and many went to study (at 'university') in Greek-speaking provinces. Although some Romans didn't like to hear Greek in the Senate, it's true in many ways that the Roman Empire was bilingual (or maybe multilingual?)

I vote for Andronikos I (Komnenos), Manuel's wayward cousin. Seized power 1182, killed young Alexios II in 1183 having already killed Alexios's sister Maria, her husband Renier, Alexios's mother Xene, and lots of others; killed many more before he was himself killed, horribly, by the people of Constantinople, in 1185. He only had a short time to rival Nero, but he worked hard at it. Oh, and (aged 65) he married Alexios's fiancee, Agnes/Anna, who was then aged 11. Andrew