Kosmo

Today I made a fresh salad and the plant had many snails and a earthworm on it. This natural product totally ruined my apetite.

In our days it's presumed that the age of fertility it's connected with the abundence of food. The age of first menstruation dropped significantly in the last century in the West while in some poorer areas it can be as high as 18. Unfortunatelly I do not remember the source for this as it was not of prime interest for me. I think the early age for marriage had to more with eliminating the girls opposition rather than to maximise use of her fertility years as some say. This is still the case for gypsies and other groups that don't take the bride's (or groom) opinion in regard. The rich feared the division of fortune if they had many children as romans did not have primogeniture rules that give all inheritance to the first born. So, if a senator had the 2 milion to keep his rank, his 3 children will have less then 1 million each and they will not be senators. A brief comment on this it's in Bennet's "Trajan" as one of the reasons for the gradual disapearance of the roman aristocracy. Also if they tried to keep the number of children low they could end childless. What means TMI?

Wow, nice! History and religion. "Missionary Position: Mother Teresa in Theory and Practice" - this title it's hillarious

Menstruation was less common in those times. A women was married before her fertile age and hade many preganancies during her fertile years. Of course, the rich had a much lower fertility.

"Appian Way, the queen of Roman roads, is under threat In ancient times the Appian Way, which links Rome to the southern city of Brindisi, was known as the regina viarum, the queen of the roads. But these days its crown appears to be tarnished by chronic traffic congestion, vandalism and, some of its guardians grumble, illegal development. "Look at this!" bristled Rita Paris, the Italian state archaeological official responsible for the Appian Way, peering through a weathered bamboo screen lining the road while bumpily maneuvering her car through a patch of uneven ancient stones. "You can bet that it was once a canopy that was walled in and transformed into a home..." http://iht.com/articles/2008/04/06/europe/appian.php

... not necessarely. The city had ample and varied opportunities.

Any ideea how the spoils of victory were divided betwen the soldiers, general and the state?

A man was not supposed to stay at home to much. Just sleep and sometimes eat.

Later, the emperor was the highest patron. Everybody else was in a position of client to someone else. Those who were patrons were clients themselves as the political system became a pyramid. Sydonius Apollinarius in the V C was seing the barbarians that had taken part of his domain as his patrons and paid them the traditional morning visit.

Most coins found in suedish viking sites are arab and much less byzantines. The route to Middle East thru Volga was very used.

How did this theories explain the fact the England had to be converted to christianty in the VII C? Christianty was present since roman rule and survived in the West and spreaded from there to Ireland but the East had to be converted by pope's emissaries. If the locals survived in England one would expect that christianty survived also even in a subordinate position. Belgae were not present in Ireland also?

Ancients had no formal training for the officer corps, they were either handed a rank for political reasons or were gradually promoted. After 1700 officer training became spread across european armies even those that bought their commisions had to go this schools.

The short piece mentions "Infant Mortality rate = 319/1000 Stationary population requires GRR = 2.543 (i.e. about 5 children per mother, live-born)" but I have no ideea how they came to this numbers...

At our civil ceremony we only had 1 friend invited becuse we needed 2 witnesses. The other witness was the photographer. Then we went by ourselfs for the religious ceremony at a small church in the mountains, the priest (a friend) told us that we needed godfathers so he brought us a nice couple from the village. After our wedding trip to Paris and Rome we told everybody about our marriage and saw their jaws dropping

I realy dislike the arguments about a politician being "genuine" or "autenthic", they remind me of the Big Brother show. Does it really matters if the candidate likes the kids he uses in a foto op or not? Of course that they are all fakes and all lie, but this are not even important. I disliked HRC's Bosnian story not because it was a lie but because it showed poor judgement lying about something easy to check.

I'm reading HRC's book "Living History" and there she mentiones that were snipers in the mountains overlooking Tuzla's airstrip, but no ditching of bullets. Her recent statement was a blatant lie, but, hell, she is a politician. The book it's very well written, a masterpiece of puting her in the right light. She is smart, experienced, determined and ruthless so I guess that she will make a good president but if the reciprocal bashing beetwen her and Obama continues in this pace McCain would have an easier job.

I had seen both series recently on DVD. The fact that I watched them without a break between the series, in continuation, made me feel less a diference between the series. My view was that from a good start the series went downhill in a constant manner. It can also be blaimed on getting use with the spectacular sets that felt breathtaking in the beginning. The actors were very good, but as the plot progressed the best were eliminated (Caesar, Cicero, Brutus) while the unconvincing Octavian played a greater role. With less political carachters the plots focused too much on the unhistorical sidelines (Atia - Servilia, the jews, Vorenus and Pullo etc ) while other new important carachters were barely scatched (Agrippa, Maecena, Cassius)

I forgot to tell that the site at Cornesti it's presumed by some to be the capital of Atilla's huns.

Simplified? Sure, but when factoring a reason for fame, a simplification might be all that's necessary. I might only add that Lincoln is not only famous because it is he who issued the proclamation, but also because it was his administration that did ultimately hold the union together in the face of a true crisis. Whether folks view that as good or bad is irrelevant for why he is famous, but the resulting debate based on personal beliefs does add to that level of fame (or infamy as the case may be), and the discussion in this thread shows a keen level of interest in the topic. Notice we don't have such discussions over relatively obscure figures as Chester Arthur or Rutherford B. Hayes. A good summary, but I have to add that someones fame as a firefighter it's not deserved when he was one of those who started the fire in the first place.

I see now, that's how australians got their accent!

That will make pigs of most, if not all, civilisations for most of history. Historically, slavery is not that as common as you think. But, you take my implication correctly--before the Stoics developed the concept of individual rights (and for a very long time after), most civilizations were piggish and had no idea that anything better was possible. By the 1860s, the South had no such excuse. Both South and North were thinking in the same piggish way at the moment 0, that of independance. Gradually the North "waked up" and changed his opinion on slavery while the South did not. In this marriagge the divergence developed gradually as one of the partners, the North, changed and wanted to change the other partener. Seing in the election of Lincoln that it cannot make a household toghether with the North, the South wanted a divorce. But this divorce was a reaction to a different North attitude not because something had changed in the South. Lincoln was a main trompet of the new voice of the North that had uppset the South.

That will make pigs of most, if not all, civilisations for most of history. It will be a diferent thing if the southerners had invented slavery or were the only ones having it. But it was quite the contrary.

The clouds of damn things tried to enter my mouth while I was smoking, pinched me thru the shirt and were crawling on my skin searching for a spot without insect repelant. I was trying to fish while it was dark outside, but the air was full of them. As morning came a loud buzzing group of dragonflies started hunting them and drove the mosquitos in the nearby forest. The place it's like a jungle. I can bet that nobody it's distasteful for Danube Delta desperate mosquitos.

I doubt that bears know what a rifle is. They are protected since many years and the ones that actually see a rifle... Many bears come to mountain cities, resorts and villages to eat. Even Brasov, a 300.000 men city, has some visits as the mountain is very close to the city's medieval center. Bears are the only animals I fear around here. And cows of course... A great place it's the Danube Delta, incredibly full of life, 3 hours drive away. I was there just once, in a weekend at it's limits, and I saw foxes, snakes, loads of birds, fish, frogs and ... mosquitos.

Err... my I ask why the two constitutive parts of the US were so uneven in rights?