Klingan

I have seen those first hand, they have two (I believe it was 2) at the Museo Nationale, and I tell you it's most impressive that they can read anything at all. Secondly from the scrolls that have been read so far it's been filled with bad stoic philosophy. Apparently the owner of the Villa de Papyri had a thing for keeping a Greek stoic in his cellar, writing bad philosophy to fill the library.

I'm not going to argue against the article as I don't know all the facts but I must admit my doubt still. Secondly would I in one way appreciate if the statue was from the 13th century, maybe finally some people would listen to my argument that we take style dating far to seriously.

My spontaneous question is: How do you carbon date a metal object?

I must admit that it's rather difficult to read the full inscription on the sides. My Latin isn't good enough to work without a quite clear text. Would it be possible to get shots of the sides too?

Very well chosen topic A. I have seen so many What did the Romans ever do for us, this is most refreshing. Aqueducts? e.g the remains of the one at Mytilene are thought to be from the Augustan era. But i'm honnestly not sure whether the Greeks had them already. My favorite subject, water technology! Anyway most Greek cities was well supplied with water already before the Romans entered the picture and they proved that they had potential for long distance water transporting through most notably tunnels. They also had aqueducts. There are two main differences between Roman and Greek water technology; - The scale. The Romans made it all far larger, complex and advanced. - A pressure system vs a free fall system. The Romans preferred pipes of lead for the in-pipes to make use of the pressure. The Greeks on the other side used basically pots as pipes, leading the water in a gentle slope downhills. This was never changed and the Greeks never took in the use of lead-pipes. The conclusion must be that the Romans took inspiration from the Greeks and other neighbors (as the Etruscans) developing their system, then they took it a few steps further in scale and sophistication and spread it to most parts of the empire. However Greece itself were never incorporated in the urban system tradition and even as they did get aqueducts on several places, that was hardly anything new in the Greek world.

That's because Swedish is not a Romance language. As Docta explained, "the Romance languages would naturally utilize the phonological changes on the proper Latin names just as they were applied to the rest of the lexicon". The Cornelian cognomen Sulla poses some particular problems, explained by a couple of historical-linguistic oddities. Even if all contemporary Latin authors wrote Sulla , the main primary sources on the famous Happy Dictator, Appianus and Plutarchus, wrote both in Greek. Then, the first Latin vowel "u" was transliterated by the Hellenic upsilon ("Y"). There you get the Sylla used by some late Latin authors, like Orosius and Jordanes. Now, when you re-transliterate "Y" back to Latin, you have two main alternatives; "i" and "u". Spanish and related languages have the additional phonological circumstance that their double consonant "ll" is quite different from the original Latin usage. Actually, original latin "ll" sounds closer to their simple consonant "l". Those are the reasons why, depending on the language, you may find "Sulla", "Sylla", "Silla", "Sula" or even "Sila". Thanks for bringing light to the subject!

Thanks for the post Asclepiades!

It is sometimes difficult to get in to the discussions here I agree, took me a long time. But just give it a try. I won't bite your head of (Some members might but hey they usually let you have it back after a while ) If you have a favorite subject or any question just start a new tread on it and see what springs up.

It would be great if something was really done. I'm far from convinced though.

Well I wouldn't say close, but there's a modern built roman villa in Malibu, California, a copy of the Villa de Papyri close to Herculaneum. It's not as much of an reenactment as a reconstruction thou.

Ultimately yes - I keep needing to alter some of them though as I learn more. For instance, Faustus' original essay on this thread has made me re-think how to build doorways, given that the vestibule to a Domus appears to be open, and the door actually some way inside. I must admit that some houses (Not all) give a certain feeling of that the door should be about one meter in. Take the Cave Canem as an example. What good would it have done behind a closed door? At the same time, I'm not entirely convinced.

NN do you intend to put your models together city style? It would be a great sight!

Sounds like a logical assumption. However I would believe that they spread at least to the most romanized provinces. Say modern Croatia, France and Spain. Possibly some of the very large near-eastern cities too.

My apologies for the size of the pictures. I want them to be available in a decent resolution. (Any one interested in high res versions can pm me.) The approximated size of all the pictures are between 4.5 and 5 Mb.

With no intention of hijacking this great thread, I thought that I might add pictures to show how each part Faustus discussed would have looked. But first: I would not agree. The would have frescoes in bedrooms not mosaics on the walls. Mosaics were reserved for floors and water installations in the roman world. ------------- The compluvium. The atrium and impluvium. Notice the cistern right behind the impluvium. The peristylum. The hortus. The outer closed walls. Notice how remarkably closely looking the facing is on the two walls. This picture was taken in Lund, Sweden only days ago. The entrance, vestibulum and fauces. The cubulum (bedroom). The triclinium. A shop.

I think it does. The French does. Sulla is called something really silly there, Zilla or Zylla -ish. I keep forgetting it. We normally keep the names in Sweden.

I hate it too... I would never neither write nor say Mark Anthony or any other named changed. (Of course as far as possible)

I would say corrupted by power not luxuries.

I have uploaded additional pictures on those pipes. Take a look at those and you'll see what I mean point by point! This is a main line. I now firmly believe that main lines were not, as I used to believe, one heavy pipe, but many smaller. Those may have had a diameter of around 5 cm. Unfortunatly it was impossible to determine exactly as they were unreachable.

Well posted. I will be back with an elaborated answer as soon as possible, as I have some objections.

All the pictures are now commented and properly named.

Easy slavery and peace wasn't coming hand in hand. As the offensive wars pretty much ended so did a very large part of the sources for slaves. Bread and gamed were not connected to the wars but to the happiness of the masses in the large cities. Reading ancient texts it's quite clear that the Romans praised their ancient virtues. However they never connect this in anyway to that the roman state (in any shape) would ever be able to fall. Even during the military emperors of the 3rd century it seems like people thought that things were just going on as they used to. It's a very catchy preface thou, he's probably been thinking about that for a long time.

Remember that sanitation is a very relative word. Compared to what had been before I'm sure the baths were a major change in public sanitation. Also the baths was just one of many things making roman cities cleaner. In my opinion were the overflow water and sewers of a much greater importance.

Very interesting Faustus, I am very much looking forward to the next post. Does your source explain how he gets all those numbers? I would really like to know, it would be invaluable to me!

I will keep on adding and commenting the photos. Since you mentioned the last one, I'll fix it right away If you want more high resolution pictures I could send the one you like to your mail or something. However without a very smart way to sending them I won't be able to send 'em all even as I wish I could.