Bryaxis Hecatee

Nephele, should you find yourself with too much time maybe you could do the same trick for my more hellenised pseudo in order to make me feel more "at home" in this roman world

Here I got no idea... it looks barbarian to me, german or even later and viking, but i really don't know... As for Alba Fucens my class goes there because it is this' years subject in "advanced seminary on ancient roman art and archeology", the archeologists of the class even going to dig there for a full month in august.

Indeed it is, the place i'm going to in two weeks, I could'nt pass the opportunity Up to you Maladict

Well i did indeed give some pretty good intel with this comment, but I still wait for the right answer

Well no one can identify this city from the center of the italian peninsula, both fortress and prison of the republican perdiod ?

Well at Rome most of the fight took place in non-permanent wooden arena as was the case at Cesar's mother's death. Gladiatorial games were indeed at first a kind of games often given in honour to recently deceased peoples.

Thank you, I simply knew about the cartaginian sanctuaries on Ibiza and went from there, especially since I was recently at a seminary in Oxford where the byzantine hold on the islands of the area was re-indicated. Now a picture that will take us back to Italy :

Not speaking of the gauls depicted : outside of the magic potion one may notice the boar ( which does not seems to have been eaten as often as in the comic, if ever, due to religious considerations ), the cities' design ( Lutetia comes to my mind ), and other such elements.

If it's not Ibiza then it must be one of the other balearic island... Majorca or Minorca I presume...

no, it's Ibiza I think, for the byzantine did not get up to Taragona and Cordoba does not attract much peoples

For those who want to learn more about collegia here is some bibliography, not complete but a very good start still since it's the one given to my class by those of my colleagues who had to make a presentation on that particular subject. Note that it is in various languages : English, German, French, Italian : I. Colleges : - Aubert, J.-J. : Workshop managers, in Harris W.V. The inscribed economy : production and distribution in the Roman empire in the light of instrumentum domesticum, 1994 pp. 171-181 - Aubert, J.J., La gestion des collegia : aspects juridiques,

Yes, it is the main avenue of Apamea in Syria, dug by an international team including ULB's Centre de Recherche Arch

It happens that this year Professor Rapsaet of the ULB has decided to study the collegia in his seminary on ancient society and economy. This allow me to give you some more data on the subject. First it must be noted that we have to distinguish between the early to middle republican, late republican, early empire and late empire collegia. While the first ones are those set up by Numa ( Plut. Numa, 17 ) and concerned a rather limited amount of people those of the late republic were another breed who did look a lot like HBO's ones, especially in the period between 75 and Augustus : the actions of Clodius organized the poors in a real army of thugs who extorted the peoples and were used to make pressure on the riches. These abuses led to ceasarean and augustean legislation on colleges which was much more restrictive. The collegia grew in wealth in the first three centuries of the Empire as shown by their Scholae, meeting places, whose archeology is studied by Beate Bollman in her 2001 book on the scholae of Italy ( in german ). But our main source of information is epigraphy. Only looking trough the CIL one finds many data. They show the various kinds of colleges like the territorial ones ( CIL I,2105 mentions a collegium paganorum Aventiniensis , Vorenus' college ). The legal status of the colleges is given by various texts and one may look at Asconius Contra Piso, Dio XXXVIII,13,2 and Cicero's Pro Sestius 34 as well as to CIL, VI,1872 and 4416. The Digeste also gives infomations in 3,4,1-3. On the membership of the colleges and their access to slave the Digeste 47,22,3,2 is of interest as is the Lex Collegium salutare Dianae et Antinoi from Lanuvium ( CIL XIV,2112 ) which also gives us information on membership fees : 100SS and one good amphora of wine at entry and then 5 as a month. CIL VIII,2557 is probably one of the best conserved collegial internal law with a detailed account of how the money of this military college will be spent while CIL VI,266 is exceptional as a verbal account of a dispute between a college of Rome and the fiscus about some taxes. All this give a vivid description of thoses colleges but they are too many inscriptions for me to cite them all, I just want to give an introduction. For the later periods of the Empire membership in the professional collegia becomes mandatory for all workers. We do note a decline in the building activity of scholae and one may wonder if they did not simply become a administrative division of the workers, proof of their perfect assimilation into the society which had created them in a much different context centuries before...

No, but this city is indeed in the Near East

Well a picture now... I think I got something which should have you look for some minutes... And do not believe the folder in which I put the picture, it is not a german place EDIT : does someone know how to reduce the size of the picture please ? EDIT 2 : Thanks to Klingan for the reduced size !

Well posting the Porta Nigra of Colonia Augusta Treverorum ( modern Trier ) 3 days before I go for the second time to that beautifull city is a very nice thing

Unfortunately unplanned events have slowed me and I only have a french version of the paper right now, haven't had the time to translate it so I won't enter the contest....

The change between republican and imperial periods toward the provinces was indeed mighty and proceeded from a general change of attitude. The consequences were many and involved lot's of daily changes for the provincials. First there was the taxes system reform : it allowed for a fairer collection of taxes using more gentle and more controlled methods, lowering the need for provincials to get into debts in order to pay their taxes. Of course it was not perfect but still it was better than the Publicani of the republic. The imperial period also provided security of the roads and thus led to a better and more important trade, increasing the revenues of the inhabitants and thus the taxes' incomes. Infrastructure was also improved with the newly raised money. While in the east a lot did already exist the policy had huge effects in Africa and the west. But from the 3rd century onward the system became too heavy and began to crumble under it's own weight : corruption, always a problem, became a major drain on the economy, and the bureaucracy began to make decisions which would in time lead the the attachment of every roman to a land and put the bases for the medieval serf ( this is a very short version of the story but i currently don't have the time to expand on that ). Thus I'd say that for at least the 1st and 2nd centuries the new system was a big improvement but that later it became the plague common to all bureaucratic empires.

The legionnaires/legionaries question is simply one of language : in French we use the word legionnaire to describe both the modern day unit and the roman soldiers, that's all. But to return on topic we must remember that fallen soldiers were buried by clubs giving them a tomb and giving their name forever. Also we can see the great troubles suffered by Germanicus in order to bury the deads of Varus and give them a proper resting place. So my answer would be no, no dishonor.

Here you ask a large series of questions to which I'll try to give some answers : - City management : one must remember that in ancient times a city was more than an urban area : it was made of a urban center a a large area around. They were directed by a panel of annually elected local magistrates, usually rich enough to claim equestrian status. Sometimes cities might regroup in Civitas, as the Civitas Tungrorum, which seems ( but information is scarce ) to have been mainly religious in purpose. - A Prefect is not at this position, he his in fact usually superior to the governor. - A mine was usually state owned and under control of state officials. In many known case the mine's control was given to the Legions, as is well shown by the Spanish examples, but this is not the only solution used : we see cases of private "corporations" having to operate the mine in exchange for a certain amount paid to the State. Yet mining activity often producing either gold or silver it was a highly controlled area in order to maintain financial stability.

Here the "horns" are done by the child in order not to respect her serment without incuring the god's wrath, the same effect could be done by holding a stone during the oath ( done by some politicians around Marius' time by the way ).

Well we know that in many instances luxury products came from afar : we know of red ware ceramic "sigill

Well I can see two main sources : the first one will be the papirii from Egypt, but they relate to local taxes which may not apply to the whole empire. Other documentation may come from late authors, especially those from the church who writes more often about realia like those.

I currently got a colleague doing his end of studies disertation on the subject, and his studies show that not all beast were killed and that sometimes they were even cured in case of wound because they were costly and precious.

Well originally the foreign peoples, including the Germans, served in auxiliary units while the legion was reserved to the sole citizens. After the 212 Caracalla edict on citizenship this distinction began to disappear inside the Empire with many auxiliary units getting the citizenship, but not peoples from outside of the Empire, thus not the Germans. But at the time they were individual Germans inside larger groups of peoples and thus they had to learn to speak and write Latin. With time German chieftains began to enter service in the Roman army with their retinue, then whole tribes began to enter Roman's service. This meant that while the nobles spoke Latin the rank soldiers could keep speaking Germans, even if they learned some Latin in order to live daily. Until the 5th century the Romans took care to give the Germans Roman commanders because they did not trust the German nobles but then they changed their practice. This in turn led to changes in units training and tactics, and the final evolution we all know. During this process equipment also evolved from purely roman uniform to mixed roman and barbarian and then purely barbarian form, but the barbarian cultures had also begun to adopt roman equipments...