caldrail

The gas bill arrived this morning. For the first time since I moved in nearly eight years ago, I've made a loss on that particular service. Worse still, the supply company have automatically doubled my payments. I can't afford to pay that much. My benefits don't cover domestic bills. It seems a bit odd in a way but all I get is Jobseekers Allowance plus Housing Benefit, and I have to pay for everything out of those two sources, which has never left me with a huge profit but now energy prices are being hiked up, I'm losing what little profit I once made. Some people think I live the life of Reilly. I imagine they enjoy a social life. Holidays abroad twice a year. I can't afford those. It's true I own this or that, but then, for the most part those belongings were my property before I became unemployed, and any major purchase since has come out of my savings, so I'm not exactly as well off as people imagine. Today I have to phone the gas company and ask them to terminate the service until further notice. It's a sad reflection of the times but I'll just have to do without hot water for now. On The Bright Side "I'd like to leave a message for Lord Caldrail" Said the recording played out over my mobile phones answering service. You know what? That's the first time in nearly six months that anyone has adressed me in that polite manner.

By coincidence I stumbled across something yesterday. Plutarch tells in his Life of Marius that Roman soldiers loved nothing more than a leader who eats the same food and shares in their labour. It's a very telling statement. Even in Roman times, when society was strictly layered with sometimes harsh punishments for those who transgress the rules of privilege, there is a sense of inequality in the lower classes. You might argue there was bound to be. The lower classes were rubbing shoulders with people considerably wealthier than they were. Despite the overall acceptance of the status quo, some may have looked enviously at the rich and asked themselves why it was they were denied such comforts. In our case study above, Blaesus is mentioned as having household slaves and even gladiators as personal guards. Rufus is described as using a carriage for mobility. So we could in fact add another motive... Envy.

As so often happens, a young asian lad sat at the next library computer began chattering on his mobile phone in a montone barrage of meaningless syllables. He just didn't draw breath. He didn't notice my cold disapproving stare. Coughs did not attract his attention. So eventually a 'Hey!' roused him from his hypnotic mantra. He nodded, and after another minute or so of constant chat, finally hung up the call. At last! He came back five minutes later and started his phone call all over again. Today as I begin to log on to a computer, some bloke behind me loudly proclaims where he is and what he's doing over his phone, almost as if the world needs to know. He was pounced on. The librarian on duty came at him veritably spitting and snarling - "You cannot use mobile phones on this floor!" He said with respectable finality. Obviously taking lessons from Dragon Lady. I shall have to watch my step. About Mobile Phones I never saw this, but the story was told to me some time ago. On a rail journey some businessman was making those annoying calls and getting up everyones noses. Eventually his bladder could take no more, and as he needed to visit the toilet desperately, he rather foolishly asked another passenger to watch his belongings for him. Once out of sight, the passenger grabbed the mans phone left on the seat and threw it out the window. When the businessman came back, he bagan searching for the missing device and asked whether the passenger had seen it... Erm... Nope. A part of me wants to do that in the library. Sorry mate, but no mobile phones allowed.... There you go... It's out there, on the pavement. Might need a repair. But then my own mobile phone never works properly either. Even when calls manage to stay connected, the battery brings an air of excitment as you never know if the wretched thing will give up halfway through your conversation. The salesmen insist a charged battery will last two or three weeks, but two or three days is more accurate, and the device is programmed to lose power in the midst of the most important phone calls. There I was, talking to an employer about getting a job for in excess of

Yesterday afternoon I sat down to watch the news while I got on with other projects. It so happened I chose the moment when the space shuttle Atlantis returned to base for the last time. It was a majestic sight, watching this bulky and heavy 'aircraft' swoop down onto the Florida runway at three hundred miles and hour, a testament to the co-operation between crew and control, never mind the technical gizmos that enable this accuracy. Although the shuttle is going to be hangared and serviced, they don't plan to fly it ever again. With the tragic loss of two of the fleet, the rising cost of maintenance of an aging vessel, and the economic realities of our day, it's just too expensive to operate. I am genuinely saddened by this. I remember those heady days in the sixties when, as a child, we were all told to go into the school hall in front of one of those primitive black and white televisions mounted in a tall mobile cabinet, to watch men land on the moon for the first time. And we don't go there any more either. meanwhile, Back At The College What do I see in todays local newspaper? The government have made no secret of their plans to cut spending in order to tackle the mounting national debt, and that means the redevelopment of the old college site might have to be abandoned after all. It's expected the development agency will lose something like 7% of its budget anyway. That kind of makes me curious. How does this affect the plans to rebuild the canal through Swindon town center? Their money was going to come from the EU (which means us, in a roundabout way) and they once told me it wasn't going to cost the local community anything. I wonder if they'll find the cash? Stars of the Week I am due to become more outsppoken, according the stars in my local paper. The influence of Uranus will not be thwarted (no jokes please). My claims advisor will be so pleased. She loves putting people in their place.

The chances of being freed by the editor of the games were actually not good. Succesful fighters were a source of profit for their owner, and whilst the crowd might cheer the editor for his act of generosity, the owner would have to be paid compensation for his loss. This does not apply to contract fighters. Such men (or women) volunteered to serve as a slave in the arena for a fixed term, usually five to seven years. Since the statistics we have available suggest the average life expectantancy for a gladiator was four years, it was more likely he would meet a sticky end than walk away. In terms of rebellion, it's also unlikely such people would become disobedient. They had after all volunteered for this life, either to earn money to pay off debt, or perhaps they simply wanted stardom - much like modern youths want to be rock stars today.

The shape was in the clouds, presumably a gap through which the sun shone. At any rate, I'm not aware of any astronimical event. It makes little difference because Constantine wasn't exactly being honest. He needed a rallying call, a unifying factor, and used christianity for his own ends. It may well be he was talking out of his subligaria and no such vision was actually revealed, but then, soldiers were notoriously superstitious and easily manipulated.

That's right, and it can't be stressed enough that professional bouts were different from the 'spectacles' staged to wow the audiences, in which we see the larger scale slaughters going on. One on one fights were indeed rigidly controlled and taken very seriously by all concerned. In some cases, gladiators were chained at the ankle to a large stone in the centre of the arena, possibly to another gladiator at the other end, in order to restrict the space they could move around in and add to the drama - one such stone is depicted on a mosiac in Britain and I believe one was actually unearthed not too long ago. I suspect lesser fighters were subject to this sort of match, and it might have been a bit hard to be disobedient while so constrained. Gladiators who spoke the same languages were seperated in the ludum, the training school, to avert any attempt at organising break outs, and even before the escape of Spartacus it's clear that weapons were only made available immediately prior to the event, the gladiators being left with wooden practice weapons for most purposes, yet even with that restriction some researchers have stated they believe up to a third of trainees, whether volunteers or condemned men, were either killed or invalided out before their first bout. Also, a newbie gladiator was often set against an experienced man. This veteran fighter was worth more, a source of profit for his owner, so in a sense the fight might be skewed in his favour both to keep this man alive to earn money, but also to please the crowd with another victory to his credit. I don't know if newbies were aware of this. It certainly didn't stop them volunteering. At the height of gladiatorial combat in the Pax Romana, it's believed perhaps half the men fighting were volunteers, the era of the pampered professional star fighter, a big change since the days of Spartacus when fighters were expendable slaves and little else, not to mentioned treated very brutally. Professional training as an athlete (as opposed to merely a fighter) was something that came more or less with the empire. There are stories of those being sent to fight who simply couldn't face going out on the sand. That shouldn't suprise us. Not everyone is a natural fighter. For these people, who did things like push their heads through the spokes of a moving wagon wheel and so break their necks, or the man who suffocated himself with a toilet sponge, their disobedience was a case of suicide rather than face combat with sharp swords. I don't think there were many cases of this, but I must add that men with spears were on hand to prod reluctant fighters back into the fray. I recall the scene in an african town, where Russel Crowes Maximus loses patience with his lot and demands to know whether the audience were entertained by his slaughter of his hapless foes, then throwing the sword at the editor of the games in disgust. A great fighter or not, any gladiator who behaved in such a fashion was going to find the Romans had plenty of nasty ways to entertain a crowd. That said, we don't read of gladiators behaving like that. Possibly because they didn't live long afterward. They took the business quite seriously, and a professional attitude is something our sources point at. I also note the games at which Caligula complained that the fight had been spectacularly bad and unimpressive. One man snatched a trident and slew his suprised opponents in quick order. He did this to please his emperor, the games editor, and strangely enough Calgula was disgusted at this action. He was after all the man who slew gladiators armed with practice swords at training sessions and danced about in victory.

The stifling warm spell seems to run its course. Last night was a blessed relief from lying there gasping for breath, a definite cooler feel to the air, and this morning was actually quite chilly. At last... A chance to get some real sleep.... But no. For some reason every alarm in the neighbourhood was going off. The abanonded office across the road made its usuall insistent bleeping. Car alarms went off one after the other in the streets behind my home. A burglar alarm sounded into the small hours. What is going on? A mass invasion of teenage thieves? I just want to sleeeeepppp...... A Question of Time Here's something for the scientifically minded to ponder.... Our view of space time is effectively einsteinian. That is, we have three dimensions plus time, which Einstein recognised is linked to our mundane cosmos. Most people wouldn't go any further than that - it isn't a big real world issue. Now, most people would simply regard our three dimensions as all there is and that it's a simple rectilinear description of the volume of space we observe. There are theories that other dimensions exist, seperated from the ones we can perceive, and curled up so small they'd be invisible anyway. But our familiar three dimensions might not be so rectilinear. Einstien himself recognised that space-time is curved. A theory now describes the universe as 'crinkled'. In other words, although we see everything as sort of flat, it isn't, because light and other electromagnetic energies we use to observe the universe around us are simply following the curves, thus we don't see them. Now we consider dark matter. A strange, mysterious substance that cannot be detected yet accounts for a bulk of the theoretical mass of the universes contents. It should be there, but we can't find it. A theory describes dark matter not as some exotic form of 'stuff', but as the gravitic footprint of ordinary matter like stars and planets that to us appear very, very far away, but that because of the folds in space -time are actually quite close. Now consider time. Traditionally this is seen as a dimension of its own, like a river, or in some peoples imaginations, a container for all possibilities. Scientists are now coming around to the idea that time does not exist. There is only Now, this moment, flicking from one quantum state to the next at the rate of ten to the thirty four times a second. This means there is no past and no future, no co-existence of things happening in other time periods. So this means that time travel really is impossible. But wait a minute. We know space-time is curved, We know time runs at different rates according to velocity of the observer and the gravity well of whatever mass is close by. We think electromagnetism follows the curvature of the universe, and that gravity doesn't. What if then, if it were possible to do the same as gravity - to cut across folds in space? Certainly that would make science fiction come true in that you could travel huge distances instantly, but because of the relative variations in time rate, you would also be travelling back and forth in time, because everything is relative to the observer. Think about that the next time you see a blue 1960's police telephone box. Or not. Depending on how much time you have, how busy your social life is, or whether you give a monkeys

For many people, the Roman legions remain the quintessential army. Well organised, disciplined, capable, and utterly remorseless. Whilst the legions did display these qualities from time to time, they were more often less than this popular image. Much can be said about the faults of their military regime. The corruption, brutality, larceny, indolence, and rebelliousness should always be born in mind when considering the performance of these men. To see the Roman legions in the same light as a modern western army is something of a misconception, and we should be wary of judging the Romans by our own standards. In particular it has been suggested that examining the rebelliousness of legions might prove an interesting article. At first glance it seems odd that a legion would rebel. They represented a strong society. As soldiers, they were given a relatively secure if risky career for regular pay, combined with better medical care for the common man than most civilians could expect. They might receive bonuses or gratuities, a plot of land on retirement, and they even contributed to a lump-sum pension scheme. The legion was a fraternity, a brotherhood in which the men would be made to feel part of, and to reinforce the bonds of loyalty soldiers were grouped into conterbernii (close friends), squads of eight men who lived, paraded, marched, camped, and fought together. Nonetheless, whilst all this was true, legions did mutiny. In most cases a rebellion is mentioned in passing by our sources. Time and again the Roman writers gloss over the causes of rebellion as if it were no suprise that these things were going on. Unlike today, where any deficiency in the circumstance and behaviour of an army unit is a front-page scandal, in Roman times it was front page news that the threat of civil disorder had been dealt with. Roman legions were not well behaved to begin with. That was the price the Romans paid for an army toughened and willing to fight on their behalf. There is however one legion mutiny that has been discussed in depth by our Roman sources. We begin our investigation at a summer camp commanded by Junius Blaesus in the province of Pannonia following the news that Augustus had died. So his troops could mourn their beloved emperor, Blaesus ordered that all duties were set aside. This was when insubordination and altercation began. Before long, easy living and idleness were all the troops wanted; The idea of work and discipline became distasteful. Annals (Tacitus) The speed with which discipline broke down is astonishing, but also very revealing of the legionaries character. These were men kept in place by brutality. For all their supposed professionalism, the reality was that it never matched what we expect of our modern soldiers. If the control was relaxed for a moment, the Roman soldiers invariably exploited it to a greater or lesser degree. For the troops in Pannonia had mutinied as soon as they learned of the death of Augustus, and coming together into one camp and strengthening it, they committed many rebellious acts. Among other things they attempted to kill their commander, Junius Blaesus, and arrested and tortured his slaves. Their demands were, in brief, that their term of service should be limited to sixteen years, that they should be paid a denarius per day, and that they should receive their prizes then and there in the camp; and they threatened, in case they did not obtain these demands, to cause the province to revolt and then to march upon Rome. Book 57, History of Rome (Cassius Dio) Dio gives us a typical description of such a rebellion. There's precious little detail or indeed any sympathy for the mutineers, and although we can read and understand what the rebellion is about, we don't know if the grievances were real or opportunistic. We don't know how the soldiers reall felt, what their real motivations were, or waht was actually happening to set them on this course. Tacitus on the other hand has no illusions as to the nature of a mutiny in the ranks. ...mutiny broke out in the regular army in Pannonia. There were no fresh motives for this, except that the change of emperors offered hopes of rioting with impunity and collecting the profits afforded by civil war... Annals - Tacitus As I searched through the Roman sources for mentions of mutinies, what comes across is the element of profit. Soldiers felt aggrieved because they were not receiving enough pay, booty, or reward for their service, which must be said was no small commitment. There is an unwritten agreement amongst soldiers that they're in it for the money. Even in republican times, when the soldiers swore allegiance to the senate and the people of Rome, their personal profit came before any feelings of patriotism. In fact, in a culture that was ruthlessly commercial and where status was based on wealth, our modern concept of patriotism is something of an anachronism. National loyalties exist but remain unimportant. What matters more is personal loyalty - to your friends, your commander, and your general. It should come as no suprise that a successful general in Roman times was one who ensured his troops were well rewarded for their efforts. To underline that, notice what happens in the siege of Jerusalem in AD 72. Once the troops finally break into the city, Titus allows his men to loot and pillage freely. Valuables are stolen by rampaging legionaries, and such was their spending spree afterward that the value of gold in Syria plummets. For all the supposed benefits of legionary life, the soldiers took every opportunity to enjoy themselves away from the camp. We may well assume from this that day to day life was not an overly interesting and rewarding experience. In most cases, the voices of the soldiers are silent in the Roman sources. We read from the perspective of learned men, often those of higher station or of relatively safe position. There is however a fascinating exception provided by Tacitus, who records what was apparently said by men involved in the Pannonian revolt. "Old men, mutilated by wounds, are serving their thirtieth or fortieth year. And even after your official discharge your service is not finished, for you stay on with the colours as a reserve, still under canvas - the same drudgery under another name! And if you manage to survive all these hazards, even then you are dragged off to a remote country and 'settled' in some waterlogged swamp or untilled mountainside. Truly the army is a harsh and unrewarding profession! Body and soul are reckoned at two and a half sesterces a day - and with this you have to find clothes, weapons, tents, and bribes for brutal company commanders if you want to avoid chores. Heaven knows, lashes and wounds are always with us!" From the speech of Percennius Annals (Tacitus) Tacitus describes Percennius as a former cheer-leader in a theatre. To us that may seem no more than a brief outline of a man with some experience of playing to the crowd. But actors were infama in Roman society, infamous, below the horizon socially. In this dry but barbed summary, he is dismissing Percennius as a man of low station and integrity. A worthless troublemaker. In fairness, Tacitus doesn't entirely place the blame with him. There was something more scandalous going on, and he records another speech made by a soldier in Pannonia which is a chilling insight as what was actually happening. But you can't give my brother back to me, or me to him! The army in Germany sent him to talk to you about our common interests, and the general had him murdered last night by the gladiators he keeps armed to butcher us soldiers. Answer, Blaesus - Where have you put his corpse? Even enemies don't refuse a grave. Later, when I have embraced his corpse and mourned my fill, you can tell them to murder me as well. But they musn't grudge us a burial. We are not dying because of any crime. We are dying because we worked for the armies good!" From the speech of Vibulenus Annals (Tacitus) Vibulenus is at first spared the quiet dismissal and seems to be a man with genuine grievance. Later, we read that it turns out the slaves of Junius Blaesus, questioned under torture as required for legal niceties in the Roman world, denied that a man had been murdered. Further, we learn that Vibulenus had no brother. Without independent verification it's impossible to determine whether Vibulenus was a liar or Tacitus was depicting the rebellion as an act of lawlessness alone. Clearly the plight of the average legionary was not an important consideration. In many cases of mutiny the first thing done was to send an officer to mediate and persuade the men to go back to work. Retribution against the troublemakers could wait. It was more important that the threat of civil war was averted. Such a task must have required courage to confront men who had already slain their commanders. "Why have you come, if you are not going to raise salaries, improve terms of service, or help us at all? Anyone, on the other hand, is allowed to murder and flog!" Anonymous dissent Annals (Tacitus) One slain centurion is mentioned by name. Lucilius, whose nickname was 'Give Me Another' after his habit of breaking vine staffs used to chastise his men. There can be no doubt that some soldiers took advantage of the breakdown in discipline to revenge their personal grievances against him. Although the centurionate was a class of career junior officers, responsible more than any other factor for the maintenance of order and standards within the legion, these were hard men, the dominant warriors of a pack, who dealt out swift punishment for infractions. Many were also corrupt, taking bribes from their men to avoid onerous duties. It might be construed that there was little sense of 'fairness' about legionary life. Rather it was simply who could grab whatever perks they could, a state affairs consistent with Roman society and yet curiously in opposition to the 'brotherhood' regime offically sanctioned in the military. The soldiers sense of justice wasn't always lethal. One senior military official, Aufidienus Rufus, was dragged from his carriage and made to walk ahead of a column with baggage piled on his back, repeatedly taunted and mocked about whether he liked the hard labour of a common soldier. On the other hand, mutineers require allies to survive. They had sent messengers to legions in Germany seeking to enlarge the rebellion, broken deserters and condemned murderers out of their cells, and even kept one officer from harm to act as a spokesman for their cause. Further, they require funds and supplies to ensure they remain fed. Local villages had already been looted by soldiers who were effectively out of control. In considering the account made by Tacitus we're left with something of a problem. It was always common practice for Roman writers to relate speeches in this way, and Dio especially is fond of recording such orations, yet it's a bit hard to understand how an address given in distant places, perhaps made before living memory, without offical record, could be accurately described at all. We are then left with a strong possibility that this is done for dramatic purpose. That doesn't mean the sentiments expressed are wrong, merely that the words are not those used by the men involved. The Mutiny In Easy Steps Listed below are the events of this rebellion in as close a chronological order as possible. 1 - News of Augustus's death and the accession of Tiberius reaches the summer camp of the legion of Quintus Junius Blaesus stationed in Pannonia. 2 - Junius Blaesus orders all normal duties suspended to allow his men to mourn or rejoice. 3 - Instances of insolence and insubordination begin 4 - Percennius recruits a cadre of rebels in secret 5 - Decision is made to merge units into one, but jealousy causes acrimony amongst conspirators. 6 - All military standards are placed together on a conspicuous turf mound, a symbol of rebellious unity. 7 - Blaesus discovers what is going on and demands his troops remain loyal to Rome, even if they wish to kill him. His persistence pays off and work on the platform ceases. 8 - Mutineers demand that Blaesus's own son, a senior officer in the legion, goes to Rome as a delegate to place their demands before the Emperor. Bad behaviour eases. 9 - Detachments away from camp for building bridges and roads hear of the mutiny and loot surrounding villages. Officers attempting to restrain them are jeered and beaten. 10 - Aufidienus Rufus, a senior officer who believed in strict old fashioned military values, is made to walk ahead of a column bearing excessive baggage. 11 - Arrival of the detachments back at camp. Bad behaviour resumes. Troops begin wider ranged looting and pillaging. 12 - Blaesus uses loyal soldiers to arrest the worst offenders to be flogged and confined as examples. Mutineers break open the cells and free them. 13 - Mutiny gains momentum. Vibulenus makes his speech. Gladiators and household slaves of Blaesus are taken captive by the mutiny. 14 - Many senior officers flee and their belongings looted. Centurion Lucilius 'Give Me Another' is murdered. 15 - Centurion Julius Clemens is kept from harm provided he speaks for the mutiny. There is some acrimony over this move. 16 - Tiberius hears the news of the mutiny and sends Drusus to deal with the situation as he sees fit. 17 - Drusus arrives at the camp to a turbulent reception and eventually manages to read out a letter from Tiberius, who gives consent for whatever demands are immediately possible. The mutiny is told all others must await the deliberation of the Senate. 18 - Clemens voices the demands. Drusus declares the Emperor and the Senate must have their say. Drusus withdraws with one of the legions officers, Gnaeus Cornelius Lentulus, who is stoned by the angered men until Drusus's main force arrives to prevent further disorder. 19 - The moon is observed to decline in a clear night sky. A bad omen and the mutineers morale suffers. 20 - Julius Clemens is co-opted by Drusus to persuade the mutiny to give up. Standards are returned to their normal place and 'a sense of obedience' returns. 21 The son of Blaesus is again sent to Rome. Drusus calls for an end to the mutiny. 22 - Percennius and Vibulenus are arrested and executed. 23 - Other ringleaders are gathered by former mutineers and turned over to prove their loyalty. 24 - Drusus returns to Rome satisfied the mutiny has ended. How typical was the mutiny in Pannonia? That's difficult to tell. Another rebellion in Germany of a larger scale and threat clearly had the intention of persuading Germanicus to become emperor. But then Germanicus passed on to the mutiny. What on earth had happened, he asked, to their famous traditional military discipline, and where had they driven their tribunes and centurions? Annals (Tacitus As with the other mutiny, the immediate concern of the Empire was to restore order, and certain demands were met straightaway. One aspect of this remains interesting. Officers were asked to present themselves for appraisal and if found 'grasping and brutal' they were summarily dismissed. This was offset by the actions of Caecina, commander of another legion involved in the mutiny sixty miles away, who was told by letter that Germanicus would arrive shortly and was to ensure that action had been taken beforehand. He did so by arranging for a mass slaughter of mutineers by loyal troops. We run into the same problem that the sources rarely give much away. That said, we could summarise the various motives found in Roman mutinies. Liberty There comes a point where individuals cannot tolerate their current situation any more. In normal circumstances this results in desertion from the legion, but not everyone would consider that course as viable. There is, after all, safety in numbers, and instead of deserting alone and vulnerable, why not do so en masse? That of course requires co-operation from other members of the legion, and so this is characterised by a period of persuasion and debate. Roman troops do appear to be easily led, and none too bright. Purpose A primary cause of problems with soldiers is inactivity. The Romans knew this. Men were co-opted onto civil engineering projects for just this reason, to keep them busy and thus out of mischief. Without good order the legions may well disintergrate into armed bands as the more vocal personalities begin to dominate. Should any of these individuals have more ambition, then it's likely they will quickly recruit followers to their cause and thus give them purpose. Loyalty Time and again a legions sided with ambitious generals and threatened Rome. It's sometimes hard to tell whether the general was persuaded by his men to mount a coup or the general took advantage of his mens loyalty to him. There were also occaisions, such as the civil war between Caesar and Antony, where troops changed loyalties from side to the other where they felt they would benefit. Greed By far and away the most common motive for mutiny is the question of personal reward. The majority of soldiers signed up to earn a living, with the possibility of getting windfalls from victories or other means, and bear in mind their daily life is often boring, harsh, and tiring.. Prolongued periods of low pay, or indeed a failure to receive any expected gratuities, will quickly anger Roman troops. It must also be said that promises of gratuities may well persuade a mutiny to begin. Final Question Thus a certain rudeness, derived from the shepherds, their ancestors, which still remained in them, betrayed something of an untamed spirit. Hence it happened that the army, having mutinied in the camp, stoned their general, Posthumius, for withholding the spoil which he had promised them; that under Appius Claudius they refused to conquer the enemy when they had the power; that on occasion of the soldiers, with Volero at their head, declining to serve, the fasces of the consul were broken; and that the people punished their most eminent leaders with exile, when they opposed their will: Epitome of Roman History, Book One (Florus) Were rebellions not so much a matter of circumstance, but of the character of the Roman people, or perhaps even a reflection of human nature generally?

What can I say about last night? Without doubt, it was the worst nights sleep I've had in ages. Usually that would be because the local gorillas are out partying, or some resident of north swindon is trying to use my half-abandoned car to get a cheap ride home, or simply that the urban foxes living in the old college site are yelping their heads off. No, it was off course the stale air. It wasn't warm enough to be sweaty, just unpleasantly heavy. This morning is one of odd days. There's some thick haze and low cloud around, fighting it out with the sunshine for dominance of our weather, and judging from what I see out the library window as I type this, it seems the sun is winning hands down. So I can expect another sultry night. I might have to move my fan into the bedroom. Have I mentioned my trusty electric fan? He's.... No, I refuse to give him a name. Pixie Spotting I passed the Malignant Pixie this morning. She's an odd one. She really is. All mischief and no intelligence whatsoever. Today she passed me with a grin, but didn't answer me when I relunctantly said hello. Fine with me. Her boyfriend, a young lad desperately trying to look cool in shades, remained aloof as if to underline his superior status. Sorry son, I'm a little too old to be fooled by that. Let's face it - if the Malignant Pixie is the best you can do, trying to impress me is a waste of time. Who's On Duty Now that I'm sat using up my allotted time on the library computer, I notice which librarian is on duty at the enquiries desk. It's that old guy, the tall one. He is, for want of a better description, useless. If you ask him anything he merely responds "I don't know." Could you fetch someone who does? "I don't know who would be able to help you" Is his standard reply. Usually I have to throw a minor strop and he rushes off to do what he should have done anyway. At the moment he's helping someone out with a problem on their computer. Poor bloke's more confused than when he asked for assistance.

Here's how it works (and this did happen at least once - a lament inscribed on a tombstone at Pompeii warns others not to spare opponents) Strictly speaking, a gladiator is taking all the risks, and thus honourable behaviour allows him the right to spare his opponent if he chooses. Unfortunately, the gladiator is a slave, and thus the decision is made by his owner (or the games editor) as their right, and any gladiator so presumptuous to act without the consent of his betters is not going to receive mercy. If the gladiator refuses to finish his opponent, then typically he was ordered to fight again with a fresh opponent, and so on, until he learnt a very painful lesson. Disobedience from armed men in the arena was not tolerated. It must be pointed out however that not all bouts ended in death. It was sword fight, and if both parties fought well, they might be granted missio, or a draw in which both fighters walk away. generally speaking the practice bouts of the morning weren't lethal. Other fights were known to have been to the first blood, or similar conditions. Fights to the death (sine missione, where one man must die) were becoming more frequent until Augustus banned them, though I understand they were re-instated at a later date. Gladiators often bonded with each other in the barracks, and despite that, would fight their best friend if need be. It's been said of them that nothing pleased them more than to give pleasure to their owner. They were professional fighters. The risks were accepted. And for the succesful minority, very handsomely rewarded.

Summer is here with a vengeance. Already it feels sweltering hot after dark with all the warm air persisting upstairs. My trusty little fan (no, I'm not going to give him a name) struggles to provide sufficient ventilation. I'm considering buying a movie studio wind machine, but then hauling an ex-WW2 radial aero-engine up my stairs isn't for the faint hearted and something tells me it won't fit. Might be a little noisy too. Oh yeah... Fuel economy... With petrol at an obscene price these days I can't help wondering how much that's going to cost... Funny thing was I was walking home yesterday in the sunshine, sweating profusely, and ahead was a black Trans-Am. We don't get a lot of american cars in Britain, mostly because the manufacturers put the steering wheel on the wrong side, but also because they're usually so much bigger than european cars and we struggle to make way on our narrower roads. It did look like a tidy example. The passenger was getting out to take photo's whilst the driver attempted to park closer to the pavement - wouldn't want to block the road. These muscle cars would be great if the US realised that some nations have bendy roads. It wobbled on its wheels as it stopped in place. I asked the passenger about it. He reckoned the best they could get was fourteen miles to the gallon. Not a cheap car to drive in Blighty then. It seems he and the driver are off to Le Mans for some race meeting or other. Good luck to them and hope they get a second mortgage to pay for it. This does remind me of a Cadillac a friend of mine bought in a moment of automotive madness twenty years ago. Proud of his new giant imported barge, he called his brother and both being mischievous characters decided it would be fun to inaugurate their yankee car ownership by cruising round the block. They ran out of petrol. Actually, talking about american cars, there was a chap just down the road from where I saw this Trans-Am who owned a black Corvette, mid-to-late 70's style, and that too looked very nice. Not as big as I imagined it might be, and certainly less visually dominant than the gleaming red new-model ZR I saw parked outside a sandwich bar last year. I was passing that Stingray model when he'd pushed it out of the garage, a treasured second car for the weekend, and listened as he attempted to get it started. I think he sold it shortly afterward. We brits like american cars. It's just that we don't have affordable petrol and wide, straight roads. Defrosting of the Week The ice box in my fridge had begun to look like a scene from Starwars II: The Empire Strikes Back in 1/300th scale. It was almost impossible to put anything in there and hope to get it out again the following day. perhaps then it might be just as well if I defrost it. Switch the thing off, prop it up on a tray to stop water leaking out, and go about my business while I wait. What I hadn't realised was that my fridge is also the exit for a natural spring. I went back into the kitchen to see how things were proceeding only to discover that the floor of both kitchen and bathroom were host to a large puddle. Oh ye gods this water is going to seep downstairs! Okay... Right.... Bucket, mopping up rags, rubber mat. This may take some time...

Thousands of love lorn people every year are sending heart felt letters to 'Juliet' in Verona, Italy. A part of me sees this as ridiculus, given that Juliet is a fictional shakespearean character dreamt up hundreds of years ago, but on the other hand, an illustration of how popular fantasy and modern privacy have made people feel so lonely.The 'Juliet Secretaries' who are paid to read these letters answer them too. I can imagine them being sympathetic to these messages of despair, but at what point do they become used to it, or even contemptuous? How To Chat Someone Up In Five Minutes Flat Following on from How To Spot Someone Is Interested In You, I discovered this gem on the internet news site. How to chat someone up in five minutes. 1. Picture the scene Before you approach that gorgeous creature or meet your date, run through some chatty scenarios in your head. Think about things you might say and how they might reply. Picture yourself responding with calm wit and fluency. You probably won

Like many others with projects to get on with, I find myself in a struggle. On the one hand, the relative quiet of the early hours is conducive to productivity in the absence of distraction, yet on the other you're tired and want to go to sleep. Eventually I succumbed to the latter, and realising I was asleep at my computer, decided it was right and proper to abandon any more effort and seek the comfort of my bed. Tired.... Eyes closing.... zzzzzzzzzz THUD THUD THUD THUD THUD THUD THUD THUD THUD.... What the...?! Ten o'clock and the neighbours have decided that they want to play music. Okay, I've slept in, and I do snore at night, but I can't get any rest with this noise coming through the walls and floorboards. As it happens I do need to be elsewhere, so I left my hi-fi pumping out a choice selection of death metal tracks. If I'm not allowed to sleep, no-one is. That's the kind of mood I was in this morning as I shuffled into the bathroom and noticed a zombie in the mirror. Oh no... That's me... Eventually my errant neighbour got the hint and quietened down, leaving me free to rush out the house satisifed in having administered to my sense of justice. Except... The front door won't close. Eh? What's going on? I haven't got time for this! No, no good, it won't close. It's saturday so the letting agent have gone to sleep and won't wake up until monday afternoon, so I'll have to sort this out. Back upstairs, dig out some screwdrivers, and back down to the front door in a sort of battle between urgency and tiredness. Adjust this... Adjust that... Nope, still wont close. I all but had the door off it's hinges until I discovered a small insignificant stone had gotten into the doorway and was preventing it from shutting completely. How on earth did that get there? More to the point, how on earth did the door close previously with that stone there? No matter, the world is back on course, and my life returns to mundane tedium. Sigh.... Radio Amnesty In 2015 the ordinary old fashioned radio broadcasts in Britain will be switched off and everyone will need to own a shiney new digital radio to hear their favourite metronome and chuckle at the inept humour of programme presenters. The government are aware that many of us are unhappy and may even be ignorant of that fact and have offered a 'radio amnesty' to persuade us to upgrade. Everyone will buy new radios. Do you hear? Actually I'm not that bothered. I just hope my neighbours are too busy bonking and arguing to realise that the reason their radio isn't working has nothing to do with dead batteries or being thrown against the wall.

Agreed, but bear in mind the Roman mindset - hunger would have to pretty bad - exceptional even - for the writers to mention it for no other reason than these men were legionaries and thus not wimps, and surely no citizen soldier would complain about a little hardship whilst defending Rome? Also, would a consul report his men as suffering at his own incompetence? It's his report that gets read in the senate - not that of the soldiers. We're also used to hearing about mutinies. Now I agree that was mostly the imperial period but I don't believe the majority of those were spurred on by grass roots politics. Soldiers aren't like that. They become survivalists of a sort very quickly because that's the regime they live in. They have much more personal and practical reasons to spur them on.

For the first time this year I've had the fan plugged in. I can't claim this is a momentous event but it does show that despite regular good weather of recent months it hasn't actually been all that warm. Neither is today all that hot, rather an uncomfortable warmth that makes the air feel heavy. My little fan is a reliable machine. I haven't quite sunk the depths of sadness by giving it a name or having one-sided conversations with it, but after twelve years of faultless service, I think it deserves a mention. Well done that fan. Caught With Intent To Eat Curry Last night I popped down the hill for a curry at my favoured takeaway. That's something of an extravagance these days, but since I split it between two meals, I can claim reasonable value for money especially if I choose the cheaper dishes like biryani's, which also happen to a house speciality and taste darn good. Vindaloo hot please. It's a curry - What else would I demand? The street is a busy road junction and whilst I could walk the other way a few yards and use pedestrian crossings, I invariably don't, since with a bit of care and urgency I can nip across between traffic light changes. Last night though a police car cruised by as I waited for an opportunity to cross the road. Even in the dark I could see the driver talking to his companion, gesturing at me in a casual summary of my character, 'form', derogatory stories, or merely criticising my interesting fashion sense. On the other hand, everyone knows unemployed people cannot afford luxuries like hot food.... Now that my electric fan is more famous than I am, I was hoping my anonymity would avoid this sort of attention. Oh well. No doubt my cirumstances will be investigated again shortly. In the meantime, I have a curry to enjoy. The Old Place When I came across the new plan for the redevelopment of the Swindon College site, I was curious to find out more. Not just because I live next door, but also because I happen to know that a Romano-British farmstead once stood at the bottom of the hill. It also happens the bottom of the hill was still a farm before the old market town and the railway village finally closed against each other on the nineteenth century. The sense of continuity is astonishing. At times like this my imagination runs riot, pondering how generations of the same family might have lived on the same plot of land for nearly fifteen centuries. It probably didn't happen that way of course, but then, studies have shown how our ancestory is often linked to the area we live in, even in our modern mobile world. It's funny, but love or loathe Swindon, once you live here a while and get to know its hidden history, you can't help feeling attached to the place. Especially with such a good curry house down the road.

I had a similar experience seven years ago. I think the chef was rather better at cooking fish than I was. These days I don't bother too much with cooked fish and go straight for the sushi when I can afford it. Yum...

Firstly legions did not ordinarily employ wagons for carrying individual rations or gear. It is true that a mule might well be allocated to an eight-man group, or perhaps another if they could find and liberate it from its owner, but those animals were for the most part used to carry large heavyweight items like the leather tents. 'Brothers' did not carry rations as such. Instead, they would be issued a measure of grain with which to make bread, porridge, or perhaps even a crude pasta. Anything else in their diet was supplemented by foraging from the locals as armies always indulge themselves. As to how long a soldier could survive without support is hard to say as much depends on whether he had received his issue or not. Support from his surroundings is probably an essential long term requirement and after a few days I suspect the average legionary would be reaching the point of not caring too much where he got his next meal. As a rule, people in the wilderness can weaken very quickly unless they keep themselves properly fed and watered, especially if undertaking hard exercise. It is true however that armies can persist for suprisingly long times out of sheer bloody minded determination if nothing else. I do note the story of Hannibal crossing the Alps. Reaching the end of their tether, his senior commanders discussed the hunger they were all suffering en route and one told Hannibal that before long they would have to become cannibals and learn to like it, a suggestion the disgusted general immediately dismissed.

Todays entry is going to be a challenge. The reason is fairly obvious in that pretty well nothing happened. Partly my own fault since I've been engrossed in one thing or another, but at least I'm doing stuff instead of simply becoming agoraphobic. My flat is currently demonstrating that the theory of quantum mechanics is correct. I know what belongings I have, just that I cannot predict where they are at any given moment. Somewhere amongst this pile of clothes awaiting a good wash is my socks. I know I have socks. I am spectacularly well blessed with socks, except they seem to have spontaneously moved to secret locations. I have a sock here in good condition. Now my task for the next fifteen minutes is to find a matching sock to go with it. Breakfast? No, I can't face it. The pile of yesterdays washing-up remains un-washed-up and placed in some sort of non-euclidian proof that Isaac Newton got it all completely wrong. It isn't that I've gotten into a rut, more like a deep canyon, and to be honest the hopelessly specific job adverts in this mornings paper are not helping. Still, my horoscope suggests that now is the time to move elsewhere, find fresh fields and new challenges, and looking at moribund Swindon around me, it's hard to disagree, other than the expense and sheer logistical hardships are too much to bear. So... What's in this mornings paper? In The Papers In line with local policy of beautifying Swindon, the authorities have erected a water feature on the site of a former urinal emptying into the canal that once crossed the location. I strongly suspect it will sooner or later revert to its former purpose as Swindon football fans, much the worse for alcohol now they've persuaded pubs to allow them to watch games on big screen televisions once more, find themselves in need of something to empty their bladders onto. One more reason to not bother with the town centre of an evening then. I was however stunned to discover that the Moonies have a site in a village next to Swindon, right next to a park and its ornamental lake. There was once a roman villa there, and the path of a former branch railway winds past the site. These Moonies want to create a cemetary there apparently, which I would approve of if it meant the cult was dying out. Who knows? Maybe in a few hundred years archaeologists will be digging them up for study too. The Flash Returns A certain young man of idle and ignorant disposition is back at the library. Presumably his noisy girlfriend has had enough and thrown him out at last, meaning he now spends all day sat staring into space. Aprt from, that is, that moment when the doors to the library open, and he immediately threads his way to the front of the queue and sprints up the staris, probably the only display of movement he's put on since the last time he persuaded his girl that sex was going to be fun. Young people are naturally gregarious, but this youth doesn't seem to want to speak to anyone other than his favourite security guard, and then only because they speak the same lingo as it were. Well, now he's bounded up the stairs, and will spend the day on the first floor, watching the world go by. He's in a library for crying out loud. Books on every subject known to political correctness and community spirit. But he won't touch them. He justs sits there all day long waiting to find someone of a similar mindset so he can have a conversation with someone he understands. My own ennui doesn't seem half as bad anymore.

"It's been a strange kind of day" Said the librarian as he joked with another customer. He isn't wrong. When I logged on this morning all I got was a blank blue screen and no icons to access programs or my beloved internet. Every so often an electronic whine makes an insistent if intermittent intrusion to my daily round of website forums, emailed job applications, and the sort of browsing you do when you've done everything you needed and you just want to use up your alloted time. I even had a confrontation with Dragon Lady. Having returned armed with important job application documents I discovered it was impossible to book a computer today, because the system was acting funny. Can I book one please? "Do you have your library card" She asked me. No, but I do have the number, so... "Do you have any alternative ID?" Errr.... No.... "I'm sorry, but without your library card I can't log you on. You're supposed to carry your card with you at all times" What is this? Communist Russia? Oh good grief woman, I've been using this library for six years. Even you know who I am. What's scottish for You Silly Woman? She was going to give me a lecture but I said goodbye, rushing downstairs to be assisted by a somewhat more co-operative democratic librarian, who logged me on no problem at all. Okay. Now to relate what happened yesterday... What Happened Yesterday The highlight of my day was a stroll through the local open spaces to enjoy the warm weather. Okay, maybe that's not exactly a supercharged action packed adrenaline pumping way to spend your time, but bear with me, it does get marginally more exciting in the next couple of paragraphs. My first close encounter was with a great dane. Luckily it was more concerned with something else and totally ignored me as it galloped past like a racehorse with fangs. I have to say, it was a very impressive sight. Thank heaven dog food is tastier these days. My second encounter with a dog was the pet of a young man hanging out with his mates by a social club. They were draped across the footpath, naturally enough seeing as they think they own the neighbourhood, and as I approached he even ordered his dog to lie down on the pavement. I did try to step over the dog. I really did. Unfortunately I sort of accidentially kicked the animal up the bum slightly in the process of my somewhat clumsy attempt at penetrating their brooding throng. One youth spat on the pavement. A bemused dog-owner, who clearly couldn't believe I'd risk life and limb in this manner, offered a strangely mocking apology. No, don't answer him, he'll only get up tight over it. And that was my day. I got home, safe and well, and the only bad point was being woken early this morning by some guy yelling curses and threats outside the back of my house. Oh dear... Has my car not got a steering wheel then?

...his self infatuation...

One of the most intriguing human speculations is the sixth sense, the extra sensory perception, the pyshic ability that some would have us believe is a latent talent lurking in the dark recesses of our brain. It's been the fundamental idea behind plenty of fiction, television, and film. Can we really reach out with our minds and become aware of things our mundane senses don't perceive? In europe there's a guy called Bronnikov that tells us we can. He was the subject of an investigation by Derren Brown, a stage hypnotist/magician, who was curious about the claims made by Bronnikov that he can teach people to see without eyes, or even that he can set people on the road to development as a more gifted species. That's a big claim. Time then to put aside the hobbies and sit down to watch the program. This might be interesting. It seems that Bronnikov claims he was aware of his impending birth before it happened. That he was visited in a dream at the age of three by a tibetan monk who taught him these techniques. That he can levitate. He claims that we need to engage our 'uro-genital energy' and our 'psycho-bio-computer' to harness the forces that enable our leap in mental state. He also refused to tell Derren Brown what was inside the sealed cardboard box because such a test was unscientific. You can draw your own conclusions but as the program makers noted, everyone still kept bumping into things no matter how hard they concentrated our how much money they spent on lessons. Just another charlatan selling snake oil and miracle cures. There's nothing new about this sort of activity, and indeed, it might be argued that religions begin from people like this and always have done. My own tip is to buy a white stick or a guide dog. Mind Or Spirit? Dreams can be so seductive. You can buy books on how to interpret them. Despite my misgivings, there are people who genuinely claim to have had strange experiences and I have to say, I'm amongst them. Was it an internal message or something more ethereal? Was it something deliberately contrived for our consideration, or that simply we can recall something of our brain doing its own file maintenance iduring our sleep? I must be honest, there have been times when I've been convinced that a dream is all buit real. As a spiritualist I cannot dismiss the concept entirely, though in fairness I remain sceptical and require some sort of rational basis for believing something that remains hidden to us. Traditionally psychic ability is thought to be a power of the mind. By mental discipline we're supposed to able to access that larger part of our brain that remains dormant, even though there's no reason for believing such talents are part of natures design for the contents of our skulls. Let's face it, most people can't read past the sports pages of a newspaper, never mind reach out with their feelings and take a first step into a new world. My own feeling is that if psychic ability exists, then it's a power of the spirit, not the mind. The mind is locked within us, an amalgam of instinct and deliberation. All those 'Concentrate And Guess The Card' games are essentially pointless as scientific experiments because any subliminal reading is drowned out by the concious mind. On the Richard & Judy afternoon chat show (remember them?) there was once a piece where it was claimed that depriving people of sensory input makes them more aware of things they shouldn't be aware of. Now provided they weren't pulling our legs, that was a fascinating insight into what might be there. Of course I've had experiences that make me believe one thing or another. That's why I became a spiritualist for crying out loud. But for me, belief is what you hold to be true, and religion what you're told to believe. It seems ironic that in order to sell cures for blindness, these merchants rely on our blind faith. To Fly Or Not To Fly It just gets better doesn't it. Volcanic ash from Iceland is making international travel something of a lottery, and now the discontent of British Airways staff is dangerously close to mounting industrial action to make their grievances felt. Should you fly abroad or not right now? You could think about it, weigh up the probabilities of success or failure, and decide what course of action you think is to your advantage. Or perhaps you could see the future, reach out with your feelings and see what lies in store.... Or maybe just book the holiday anyway because you've only only been able to arrange time off work for that week and the everday grind is getting boring.

Half past eight? The interview slot was a bit suspicious but that's the time printed on the notification. As it turned out that's the new opening hours of the Job Centre. A few waifs and strays like me silently congregated in the small plaza outside in varrious states of dishevellment. Personally I just couldn't be bothered to dress tidily at this hour of the day and for my part turned up looking like a vietnam POW. The security guard opened the doors and we all sauntered in. Android Lady at the enquiries desk was the most vocal of all present. She is of course programmed to be polite and her cheery "Good Morning" largely went unanswered. I mean, we're all rejects for crying out loud, any sign of genial happiness and we're under suspicion of illegal earnings. My claims advisor called me over. She said it again. Okay, if she wants to call me 'Mister' then she gets no pleasantries, regardless of any attempt to cajole me into servile behaviour. This time she made no such demand. Everything was conducted in a sort of strained business-like atmosphere. I presented my job search record, signed on the dotted line, and received printouts of various vacancies on offer. Apparently the system doesn't allow the title of 'Lord', as my claims advisor has pointed out previously as one reason for her continued dismissal of my human rights, so each page bore 'Mr' in front of my name. Nope, I'm not having it. Have you got a pen? She looked perplexed at why I needed to use a pen after signing my name, but she passed one to me nonetheless. I then proceeded to scratch out the title on each page and corrected it manually in front of her. "You could do that at home." She suggested, hoping the whole problem would then walk out the door as lowly as possible. No, I'm doing it here. "I see" She replied, constraining her matronly desire to pulverise me for my outrageous defiance of her sensibilities. Okay, job done, and the problem walks out the door head held high. It's those little victories that make dole-claiming bearable. Gone Looking out the window I see a clear blue sky. It's strange how something so very ordinary assumes huge significance when you think about the death of someone. The tragic news of Ronnie James Dio's departure wasn't entirely shocking. I'd already heard he was suffering from cancer. Neither for that matter have I ever met him, never mind knew him personally. He was however one of those artists I enjoyed in the heyday of my musical past, and I'm saddened his work has come to an end. Heaven or Hell? They say the devil has all the best music, but something kind of makes me think he hasn't.

Sunday lunchtime - my last chance to fire off that last extra job application before I get my nose rubbed in it first thing monday morning at the Job Centre. I've already run into file version snags but with my usual ingenuity and cursing I got around that obstacle. Yours faithfully... Press send.... There it goes, never to be seen again. Welcome to my life. As it happens today isn't a spectacularly good day. The sky is a featureless dark grey, the rain intermittent if not quite heavy. There's an odd sort of warmth as well, a combination we don't usually get in England. Getting home dry is now impossible. If the rain doesn't dampen my spirit, the sweat will. I'm sat here in the overly warm library literally dripping. There's an odd atmosphere in here today. Sort of like a spaghetti-western saloon without the piano player. Welcome to the Last Chance Library. "What'll it be, son?" Gimme a book, Librarian.... No, I'll take the whole shelf. To add to my misery, an old bloke in the next cubicle is making silly noises and humming to himself. It's like listening to a geriatric rap record stuck on replay. In fairness the old folk aren't all bad. There's a lady who's just sat down at her PC, and although her IT skills are sharp enough to let her log on on without two hours of impromptu instruction from a librarian, she's only discovered the volume control for the first time. half the library rush to her aid and stop the errant PC from playing loud beeping noises all the time. Who said chivalry was dead? Now the old guy has left and a young asian lad sits down. He's not using his mobile! Poor lad, he must be so bereft of social contact. In fact, I notice little signs have sprouted around the cubicles telling us to be considerate and not use our mobiles. But no matter. He consoles himself with a bag of crisps and noisily chews his way through them, wiping his salty hands on his hair as he finishes.... There goes the chimes of the town hall clock. Time then to wind up my session and set about going home and relax before the gunfight at the O.K. Job Centre tomorrow.

Here's a great article in the news bulletins. Not everyone makes their desire for you obvious, so here's ten things to clue you in.... 1. They don