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Three weeks of winter mayhem they promised us. We do tend to get wintery weather second hand from the States, albeit weakened by its long journey across the Atlantic, and the news reports of deep snowdrifts over there certainly seemed to confirm our impending doom. So what happened? We've barely had a cold day and it's end of December. No white Christmas then. And now the weather warnings are telling us to expect more winter mayhem. In fairness it does seem that some of us are being stopped by snow. Is there any other country in the world so completely unable to cope with a few flakes and icy conditions? License To Kringe Someone at work said you can always tell it's Christmas when a James Bond movie gets aired on television. That might have been the case ten years ago, but high definition digital tv has pretty much destroyed the significance of MI5 and their loveable assassins in our xmas celebrtations. I'm suprised there isn't a James Bond channel by now. Or perhaps there is. I've got so many channels on freeview now that finding something I want to see is turning into anything between a desperate search for the lost entertainment and a nail biting agonising decision over which program is the one to watch. I never knew being a couch potato was so stressfull. Now I come to think about it, Christmas seemed to be a bit muted this year. Even my local supermarket didn't start their annual assault on the nerves with Christmas Hits Of The Last Century until they had two weeks to go. Just enough time to fit them in on a never ending loop interminably then. Not that I'm complaining mind you - one of their shop assistants said hello to me for the first time since I started shopping there twelve years ago. Just another step on my ladder to fame and fortune I guess. I don't know about James Bond movies any more, but certainly at Christmas there's a sudden outbreak of singing and busking. Sure enough this hapened just recently. A smiling rastafarian making the worst racket you've ever heard on some badly tuned tin drums, a small choir in the town centre who hadn't realised that singing in tune sounds better, and a down and out guitar player who repeats the same song over and over just to pass the time of day. It wasn't all bad. There was an amusing puppet mandolin player (the actual player was in an oversized backpack). Funnily enough there were none of these people around when a police car idled by along the pedestrian way. No Deal Of The Week According to the letter from the Department of Work and Pensions, they can't pay me the benefits I claimed from November. Cute. So I exceeded the terms of my Jobseekers Agreement by an order of magnitude, conducted a consistent jobsearch record even when I wasn't being paid for it, and accepted an offer of paid employment way below my level of skill, education, and experience. Worse, I suffered accusations of fraud, defamation of character, and found myself financially coerced into a deal that pretty much amounted to enslavement. Sorryy Eva, but you should have been honest. You reneged on the deal, not me. Lord Rail is back.

The greeks didn't have the same straight/gay debate we do today. For them relationships between men were perfectly normal, and that sort of attitude has been present in other societies such as medieval japan. Sex is not necessarily involved (we do tend to assume that it was these days), and since the strongly masculine Romans took greek mythology and made it their own, perhaps some adjustments to the image presented to the public were indeed made, although in fairness I don't recall seeing anything that suggersted Zeus was gay.

Clearly human beings have a propensity toward sexual behaviours whenever they feel they can get away with it.

But the system was basically the continuation of republican politics and Tiberius opted out because he couldn't stand the pettiness of it. His retirement to Capi was a good sized portion of his reign. To be blunt, he was only too happy to let someone else run Rome - hence his mistake over assuming Sejanus as "the partner of his labours", and the consequent 'police state' Sejanus instituted to bolster his own attempt to reach the top.

Although I've already mentioned I'm currently a dustman inside a warehouse, the company did briefly try me on unliading containers. That's where I got the bruises from, both physical and ego related. It turns out that my age and physical fitness have somewhat reduced my ability to handle boxes in excess of twenty five kilos in weight. There's quite a few of them packed into a typical container. Some are more a hundred kilos. Help. Of course I'm not working alone. I joined a bunch of cheery youths engaged in the task of unloading. One lad vanished deep into a gap between boxes to help push them out. Obviously a former housebreaker, he was quickly nicknamed 'Gerbil'. I on the other hand inevitably got called 'Grandad'. Cheers guys. Another chap happened to be in the wrong plae at the wrong time as a box corner buried itself into his groin. "Mind the penis!" He said, somewhat concerned for the continued safe operation of his anatomy. "Nah, you don't need it." I quipped, clearly stung by references to my advancing age. Later on he noted my wheezing helplessness. "I'm not young any more" was my excuse. With some artistic license he replied that he was twice my age and hence my excuse was invalid. "Twice my age?" I answered, "That's why you don't need your penis". Warehousing is such fun. Houston We Have A Challenge One of my colleagues is a very laid back afro-carribean chap. So laid back that the word horizontal loses all meaning. Imagine my suprise then when he told me he liked a challenge. Pardon me? Face it, you're not NASA material. He insisted he could be. Houston - "Ahh, Apollo Thirteen, we have some strange readings back here. Is everything okay up there?" Astronaut - "Housten, we have no problem at all. Houston - "Right. We're showing oxygen leakages. Please confirm." Astronaut - "Oh yeah. Sorry 'bout dat. Heh heh..." I have to work with this guy. Not that any work gets done. On A Mission One of the team leaders called me over. For a moment I thought I was about to get told off for some obscure misdemeanour, but no, the warehouse needed two boxes from the overflow warehouse across the road. So me and a company veteran popped over to the deserted building to risk life and limb in a vain search for two boxes among thousands stashed in tall rows in utter darkness. He found them because he had a torch. I just bumped into a lot of cardbiard and got lost in the darkness. So once I'd been rescued we girded our loins and heaved the boxes out into the damp dark night. Talk about ridiculous. We would have been fine but with strong blustery winds our simple task turned into a sort of kamikaze mission. Once the wind caught the box staying on the pavement was all but impossible, you either wandered helplessly into the road or fall over a herbaceous border. Fear not. Mission accomplished. Eventually. Criticism Of The Week Thee I was minding my own television when some udiot outside the house shouted "Your blog is rubbish!" What? Again? Oh well. At least he read it.

Gasp! Ghost, what are you saying? A roman male should say "Can I shag it?"

Working for a living is pretty much an unavoidable necessity. Firstly as unemployedI cannot officially refuse an offer of paid employment. Secondly, since the Job Centre have been pulling every trick in the book to avoid or delay paying me, I'm now looking forward to a christmas £1000 worse off than I should have been. Not sure which game is more mug-friendly.

I don't think there's a set format as such. Explain your reasons for theorising, present your evidence, explain your findings, then present your conclusion. Don't forget to list sources and credits. It's the quality of your argument that matters, not the juxtaposition of texxt. As long as it's rational and readable it'll probably be okay.

Last night I wearily wound my way home from work. That's right, I'm working. Or at least I'm trying to. I've discovered that being over fifty years old isn't what I thought it would be. Blisters on my feet, a long bruise on my leg when a sixty eight kilo carton fell on it, stiff legs from constant walking, and worst of all, a well and truly bruised ego. Being a dustman in a warehouse isn't exactly what I 'd planned for. Across the street were two doormen outside a gentlemans club. I've always called them the 'Bruise Briothers', identikit bruisers with overcoats and bald heads, looking like refugees from a Bond movie audition. They don't think much of me. I'm not bothered about that, but making it known at the top of their jocular voices wasn't welcome. So I'm living in dreamworld, eh? Feels more like a nightmare right now. But maybe you're right. Maybe I should stop believing the world is about possibilities, that I should be arrested for conspiring to be success, or that a migistrate should punish me most severely for several counts of gross assistance to others? Perhaps I should take their example, and stand in a doorway all night haranguing passers by? Then it occurs to me. These two idiots have nothing in their lives other than the right to obstruct whoever they don't like from entering a premises. So they feel powerful. Big fish in a very tiny pond. You know what? They're welcome to it. Okay. Back to the dreamworld. Well And Truly Mistered There is also a rumour that I've had my title taken away. Not true. I can squish that rumour with one sentence. What did happen was that instead of an interrogation, my claims advisor then decided to try and become a sort of mother figure. Why is it that middle aged women from northern England have to be so odious? Or is that people in the north push these harridans elsewhere because they can't stand them either? In an impossibly condescending tone, she informed me that my title was 'just a bit of paper' and that it was a serious impediment to getting a job? Pardon me? I've had more interest from employers in the last six months than I did in the last six years. Well. She's devalued all my efforts to find a job, reduced me to plebian status in the eyes of the Job Centre, accused me of acting illegally, virtually blackmailed me by witholding dole payments, and then had the gall to think I would in some way begin to respect her. No wonder I'm feeling a bit woebegone. The irony of this is that barely minutes before I was obliged to change my CV on the internet to a politically correct and colourless mini-me version, my somewhat more colourful CV with title and heradlry finally got me a job. As a dustman in a warehouse. Unfair Life Of The Week It so happens that one of my colleagues at work is a caucasian immgrant from Bradford. He sympathised with my description of my claims advisor - maybe I was right about northern women after all - but what amzes me is how this twenty one year old is getting interesting things to do. Technicaly he's supposed to be doing the same sorts of things as me, but on one day he was asked to go upstairs into the IT department to help out, then the other day, got a message that he would spend the next day in the offices doing photography for their marketing department. Yeah. See you at work mate. At least I've still got the weekend to feel sorry for myself and find the will to do the dishes.

Interesting choice. He wasn.t particularly happy about his role as Caesar and being such a gruff no-nonsense type, soon got tired of the petty squablling of the Senate. I've always seen him as something of a misanthrope with a considerable chip on his shoulder. In any case he preferred to let Sejabus run the Imperial Houselhold and avoid having to deal with the Senate. Which was a problem because SEjanus was plotting to replace him. Once caught, Tiberius left the state in the hands of the Senate and retired to Capri. He was not well liked, and unusually for the celebrity laden Julio-Caludians, was not well liked by the lower classes because he didn't invest in games the same way that Augustus had. Tiberius didn't like such things. Whilst his reign was otherwise stable, it included a period of brutal tyranny by Sejanus, the state was being left to the Senate to run, the Praetorians were amalgamated in one barracks (which Augustus had avoided doing for obvious reasons), and as far as I can see, SPQR simply muddled on without him.

Some caesars defintely were. Caligula for instance is recorded as receiving adoration from a crowd. He hears one shouting "How about a days games, Caesar?", which the indulgent Caligula duly organised for him.

Oh come off it, Ghost, this is lunacy

The role of Caesar is not as clear cut as you might think. Caligula, for all his excesses, was beloved by the common people - so was Nero - but because Caligula treated the Senate with disdain and started assuming powers, his chances of keeping the Senate sweet rapidly diminished. He went through this same process of deterioration, too, in almost all other respects. Thus, he had seemed at first most democratic, to such a degree, in fact, that he would send no letters either to the people or to the senate nor assume any of the imperial titles; yet he became most autocratic, so that he took in one day all the honours which Augustus had with difficulty been induced to accept, and then only as they were voted to him one at a time during the long extent of his reign, some of which indeed Tiberius had refused to accept at all. Indeed, he postponed none of them except the title of Father, and even that he acquired after no long time. Roman History Book 59 (Cassius Dio) What's important to realise is that Caesars who were tyrannical and openly flaunted their power were rapidly unpopular by those in influential positions, many of whom were directly vulnerable to their machinations. Antoninus Pius was so popular as a Caesar because he allowed the Senate to rule. He didn't interfere. The idea of benificient or democratic rule was as important in imperial times as before, only more difficult to assure.

Whilst you're welcome to disagree, there is nothing in the Roman sources that says Augustus was a monarch. Neither does his role in Roman society indicate that he was. His powers were not based on official allocation from the Republic, but the use of personal influence. He was defintiely a control freak - even his wife said that - and he acted in much the same way as a mafia gangster, influencing politics both openly with a beneficient face and enforcing it behind the scenes in a rather more ugly tone. Remember that Augustus refused official honours more often than not and officially handed power back to the Senate. When Augustus proposed that he was princeps, he meant it. He was holding on to status and influence, not power, especially since a man - Juluius Caesar - who had taken every power that Rome had to offer, had been so brutally removed from the office he had been given by consent. And it's worth rememering that early on Augustus more than once left the Senate house with jeers at his back, as senators demanded to know when they'd be allowed to make a decision. The adoption of 'Augustus' was not as clear cut as most people believe. He won a propaganda war in many ways - he would have died as brutally as Julius had he lost. There is no similarity between Augustus and Julius in terms of official power - Julius had the lot and permanently. Augustus preferred to be seen to be honoured in the same way as other politicians might thus his official powers were limited. In any case it doesn't matter. There is nothing in the Roman constitution after the Republic was founded that said they had kings ruling them - that was unacceptable by tradition and sensibility - nor was the position of princeps, or the role of Caesar that followed it, anything more than political opportunism. There is no argument that in theory a Caesar had immense control and influence. Not all of them did. Didius Julianus was disdained for buying the job from the Praetorians who had murdered Pertinax shortly before. Didius had not earned his status, even after serving as consul, by any acceptable means up to and including lethal conspiracy - he had simply promised a large sum of money (and didn't even pay that). Thus when rebel armies marched on Rome, he appealed to the Senate for help, and mindful of potential purges to come, they ignored him. Of course they did. The whole reason that the Caesars had been tolerated was because there were too many swords behind them. The reason they were accepted was because some politicians saw their influence as useful to their own careers, and so licked their backsides for all they were worth. The reason they not dismissed legally was because too many senators believed that with sufficient opportunity, they could achieve the same influence and status, and that by removing Caesars from politics, there was no further chance of dominating Roman politics in the same way - and profit - as before. The Senate did not prevent the warlords of the late Republic from seizing power because they preferred to do business with dominant characters rather than have to fight them. There is a concept prevalent in the study of Roman history that the Republic ended at some point and the Empire began. This simplification is rather naive and doesn't reflect Roman politics accurately at all. It's the result of a historical categorisation that appeals to the general public - it's easy to understand the republic stopping somehow and the Caesars ruling like kings thereafter. Also, rather than than using the word 'birth', we should perhaps speak of emergence, since the features of the Augustan monarchy that were adopted by its successors took shape gradually, bit by bit, within the Republican institutional edifice. For the Principate was not created ex nihilo, but put slowly into position using existing forms, and following no preconceived plan but, rather, added to and modified according to circumstance...[/] A History of Rome (Le Glay, Voisin, & Le Bohec) In his Acts and on his coins he (Augustus) stressed that he was the Liberator who had saved the lives of citizens, that he had held no post 'contrary to ancestral tradition', that he had 'transferred the state from his own control to the free will of the Senate and the Romanie', and to those traditional components of the Roman state, the S.P.Q.R., there are many honorific references on his coins. It may seem suprising that in spite of their vigilant Republicanism many members of the Italian governing class were satisfied by what seems to us a fiction. Yet the Romans, although their intense anxiety to preserve everything good in the past made them instinctively averse to open changes, had a fairly impressive record for modifying their institutions when this was necessary. The World Of Rome (Michael Grant)

"I'm cold" mentioned a young lady to her friends outside the library this morning. She's right. It is. That usually happens around the start of December so quite why she's dressed in the bare minimum of clothing I don't know. Dogs don't have this problem because they come with fur coats attached. I spotted a little keeshond puppy last night and couldn't resist the temptation to approach the owner and find some excuse to pet the little bundle of furry fun. We used to have a keeshond many years ago. Wonderful dogs, full of character, full of spirit, and this little one was no exception. They break your heart but every tear is worth it. Not sure about the half naked girl outside the library though. Who's Kidding Who? Our chancellor, some guy called George Osbourne who seems to have popped out of thin air, has just released his Autumn Statement, the last chance the government have to impress us with their economic policies and results before Cameron starts his campaign to justify another five years of the media catwalk. So has George Osbourne impressed us? I have no idea. I changed channels. I did notice that they claimed unemployment was down. Yes, George, I know. You shameless fakers pushed me off benefits along with everyone else to claim that. With a bit of luck they'll catch a few of you on illegal earnings. Wouldn't be the first time, would it? Dealing With Dole Documents Talking about benefits, my self imposed exile is up and my new claim is under way. The bad news is that I'm back with Eva Braun as my claims advisor. She doesn't like me. Or my jobsearching. Or my evidence. Or my military surplus trousers. She's northern. They don't have fashion in the north of England. In order to claim nil earnings payments from the Council to compensate for my self imposed exile I must complete my submission of documentary evidence before the deadline because I voluntarily exiled myself from benefits and if I don't meet the deadline I get no cash. With me so far? Okay, keep up. I have submitted all the documentary evidence I have so far and now I'm only awaiting the letter that tells me I'm back on benefits at the specified rate. You may now breathe once to maintain conciousness. That would have arrived within the specified deadline except that the Department of Work and Pensions have decided that I must submit my bank statements that I failed to submit to the claims handler who took photocopies of them at the Job Centre. Still here? I'm impressed. So now that I'm unable to submit that final letter confirming my new benefits payments because submitting my bank statements again will delay confirming my new claim, and so in order to inform the Council of my inability to meet their deadline for nil earnings submissions, I had to submit my letter from the Job Centre telling me to submit my bank statements that I already submitted. Not only that, I had to explain all this to a lady from the Council who probably woke up this morning expecting a dull boring afternoon. Just another day on the dole queue - as soon as the letter confirming it arrives. Sorry Apologies to Ghost for trumping his b-fortnightly blog entry yet again. It isn't deliberate - I'm just losing track of which year it is. I noticed this morning a letter from the Job Centre telling me a payment had been made for "going into full time work". What the...? So I made a phone call and the DWP contact centre didn't know what I was talking about. Then I made a visit to the Council to register the evidence when the kind lady behind the desk pointed out the letter was two years old. DOH !!!! Salute of the Week It seems my neighbours are beginning to get the hint about late night noise. Just this week one of them warned me he was having a birthday celebration. That he was expecting guests wouldn't bother me, I was only concerned at what would happen after they came back from the clubs. No problem he assurred me. So I'd like to thank Black Sabbath, Led Zeppelin, the Who, Deep Purple, and any other pioneer of very loud music for providing me with the tools to achieve peace and quiet in the wee small hours.

Evidence suggets the Romans used cannabis for medicinal purposes. I've just read a book deaing with this sort of thing and although recreational drug use is not well supported in Roman sources, it's a fair bet some of them did. How widespread that practice was is open to doubt - there's no sign of a 'drug trade' and the use of such substances may well have been restricted. I've also been made aware that Roman legionaries had noticed the celts using substances to induce beserk rages and began copying them. Again, there's little documentary evidence.

Augustus' nasty side rarely gets focused on - being such a successful politican and getting favourable reviews from the ROmans themselves, he tends to be described as 'great' - but in reality he was very quick to get suspicious about potential threats and none too merciful once he'd made up his mind.

Yes, the Romans ate burgers, Roman style. They had street vendors like we do as well. Personally I quite like globi (bread with poppy seeds and honey - really nice)

Feel free to join in. We love debates on this site

It's an interesting point because strictly speaking fame is a matter of degree, not simply a label you can attach to yourself at some point. If I am actually famous it certainly isn't earning me millions nor do I live in a country mansion with armed security dudes everywhere. Okay, I do occaisionally communicate with arab sheiks and african dynasties, but most people seem to dismiss my musical career rather quickly and as for being Lord, you ought to see the arguments I get into with Swindon Job Centre. But then they're just a bunch of pompous communist desk jockeys and snobs. A few years ago I mentioned on my CV that I was known around the world for various things, Roman history among them, in order to accentuate the positive rather than any attempt to be big-headed. At one particular interview the office manager held up my CV with no shortage of moral outrage and demanded to know why I thought I was famous. I don't recall using that word, I told him, but that didn't prevent him from challenging my CV. In the end I simply shrugged and said "My name's been published in credits - that pretty much cuts it". Well that shut him up. I didn't get the job. Am I famous? I honestly don't know. So far I'm not being invited to all the right parties.

A dynastic title? "Caesar" was nothing of the sort. It ought to havebeen and Augustus had every intention of creating such. There was nothing in Roman law that said a Caesar had to rule the empire. They didn't officially need one. Unfortunately, once the precedent had been set, it was difficult to avoid, because many senators preferred some scapegoat at the top rather than a mass slaughter of politicians when things got sticky, because there were always senators wanting to join factions and support a powerful individual, and because there were always individuals who wanted the job (however bogus it actually was). As I've rep[eated ad nauseum, Commodus was the first Caesar identified as a dynastic inheritor by the Romans. Not even the Julio-Claudians got that credit - because it wasn't the family tie that got them the job - it was senatorial politics. You can stop this sort of nonsense right now. Republic means "For the people", which in the context of the Roman world was something of an excuse if not an outright lie. All tjhe Caesars did was make things more complicated and reduce the public's say in matters. What "republic" means to the modern US or any other similarly democratic state is irrelevant.

No, but it did make to to Dio... He was most enthusiastically aided and abetted in all his undertakings by Lucius Aelius Sejanus, the son of Strabo, and formerly a favourite of Marcus Gabius Apicius — that Apicius who so far surpassed all mankind in prodigality that, when he wished one day to know how much he had already spent and how much he still had left, and learned that ten millions still remained to him, became grief-stricken, feeling that he was destined to die of hunger, and took his own life. Roman History Book 57 (Cassius Dio)

The diner in qiuestion was Apicius, a known gourmet, who collated a cookbook by the name of De Re Coquinaria in the 1st century ad. He was supposed to have spent more than a 100 million sestercii on his palette and when he realised he had only 10 million left, he ended his life. I understand this account comes from Pliny - I can't confirm that yet.

Our military nature is the extension of primeval social instincts. Chimpanzee groups have been observed patrolling territory and resorting to predetermined violence to enforce it.

Via the neo-pagan movement there has been a more sanctified image of celtic tribes than previously considered in Britain, but the opinion is deeply devided between the 'Golden-Agers', the historical researchers, and those who sneer at 'primitive' peoples, usually preferring the Graeco-Roman world in a sort of modern analogue. As for Betthany Hughes I can't say I agree with everything she broadcasts - television has an unfortuante tendency to amplify things a bit but that's not neceesarily her fault - yet on the whole she makes rational and realistic points. As it happens, on this subject I seem to be somewhat in agrrement. My own study of the area I live in rather confirms this colonial image, with iron age tribes co-existing with the Roman military, economy, and government. The idea that the British were mystically converted into pure Romans is bunkum taught in schools by people who just don't know any better - they're simply reaffirming the same rubbish to the next generation. Regional and cultural identity is a very strong factor in human society. It can survive changes and can be demonstrated to be still existant after a millenia or more. It is, after all, these identities that weakened central government in Britain is contending with with calls for devolution and local independence.