guy

I'm not sure that really is a bust of Probus. Coins are among the best sources of information (including portraits) about the emperors from the poorly documented third century: http://www.dirtyoldcoins.com/roman/id/Coins-of-Roman-Emperor-Probus.htm The bust found in the Wikipedia page possibly resembles the numismatic evidence better, but I can't be sure. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcus_Aurelius_Probus guy also known as gaius

On this site, we have discussed before the coins of Suetonius' twelve caesars. Here's an article by David Vagi from NGC-Ancients with excellent pictures of gold coins (aurei) of the "twelve caesars" and some background information: http://www.ngccoin.com/gallery/twelve-caesars/gallery.aspx Here's a link to the previous post: http://www.unrv.com/forum/topic/10818-suetoniuss-twelve-caesars/ guy also known as gaius Note: I want to thank Mat from cointalk.com for alerting me to this post by David Vagi.

I agree! It was very well written. Not wanting to hijack this thread, I found this quote thought provoking: The quote is why I am among the few who feel that the figure of about 10% of the empire being Christian at the time of Constantine's "conversion" is probably an underestimation. I've written about this point before, but the question remains: "How do we know what the poor, females, and slaves believed since their points of view and beliefs are so poorly documented throughout history?" I think the movie gave some insight behind the potential motivations and beliefs of the poor and dispossessed who embraced the Christian movement. Once again, excellent review: guy also known as gaius

This is a rather silly and sophomoric rendition of history. Pompey's successful campaign against the pirates, which assured both the grain trade to Rome and the unfettered trade throughout the Republic, had far less to do with the collapse of the Roman Republic than the dictatorial actions of his predecessors Marius and Sulla. Continuing with the analogy, however, perhaps the author is suggesting that Bush so weakened this republic's long held institutions and respect for freedom that it allowed a pernicious demagogic upstart successor to further subvert freedoms by waging class warfare and claiming extra-constitutional powers to deal with crises--both real and fabricated. Wow. Even I wouldn't go that far with my rhetoric. guy also known as gaius

As the series "The Borgias" comes to the conclusion of its first season, I have to recommend this series highly (again!). Like the HBO series "Rome," there are many layers of interest in the series: politics, love, war, art, etc. Unlike the "Rome" series, however, the pace so far has been less rushed, allowing for greater character development. Learning about the politics of the Italian Renaissance can be very difficult. The many cities and city states (Milan, Venice, Naples, Florence, Rome, etc.) and personalities (Visconti, Sforzas, Venetian doges, the confusing cavalcade of Roman popes, etc) make grasping Italian Renaissance history and politics difficult for anyone. From this series, many of these Renaissance personalities now come into sharper focus: the ruthless Charles VIII of France, the bizarre King Ferrante of Naples, the scheming Medici and Machiavelli, self-righteous Savonarola, and of course, the ambitious Borgia family (Pope Alexander VI and Cesare, with the tragic Lucrezia). I admit my simple mind sometimes requires a TV series like

Thanks for the link. I love the Netherlands and enjoy the Dutch people. That said, the strong guttural Dutch spoken by a tall and beautiful woman in Amsterdam is very disturbing. I always thought that Dutch should be used in movies as the barbarian Germanic language. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KlhbT2kjCro&feature=related guy also knwon as gaius

For the Ancient Romans, the Germanic tongues (and the relatively large Germans) must have been very intimidating: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dEuyYDtnDyE&feature=related This is a very sweet McDonalds Commercial with the even more gutteral and intimidating Dutch: guy also known as gaius

Here's another Iron Maiden song with a Roman theme, "The Evil Men Do." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Evil_That_Men_Do_(song) guy also known as gaius

Here's a great Iron Maiden song with a Roman theme, Wicker Man : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JeXO7AqKGOQ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wicker_man I'm not a big metal fan, but you have to love this song. http://classics.mit.edu/Caesar/gallic.6.6.html From Julius Caesar's Gallic Wars. guy also known as gaius

Here's a rendition of Metallica's "Nothing Else Matters" played by the descendants of Rome's sworn enemies--the Parthians and Sassanians. I like it. The strange looking instrument is the Persian tar. guy also known as gaius

Nice clip. Have your friend do a youtube clip of us here at UNRV. That might bring a few eyeballs our way. guy also known as gaius

I've watched the first couple episodes. So far, so good. guy also known as gaius

This is a link to the excellent review article by David Vagi from NGC Ancients: http://www.ngccoin.com/news/viewarticle.aspx?NewsletterNewsArticleID=1152 I found the article very helpful. guy also known as gaius

I was going to write a post on the series, too. I enjoy historical series if they have any semblance of reality. This helps me slog through non-fiction books about the period. Correctly or not, it helps me keep the true historical characters of any time period straight in my simple mind. Anyway, the series looks interesting. It might rekindle my interest in renaissance Italy. http://www.sho.com/site/borgias/home.sho (You can watch the first episode through the above link or click below.) http://www.sho.com/site/order/preview.do#/Borgias_s01_e01 guy also known as gaius

Well, at least both Noricum and Pannonia were partially in Austria. I've always been confused by ferrum noricum, however. If I read correctly, the iron in that region naturally contains manganese, which creates an alloy steel that is harder than the usual pure iron. This explains the popularity of the iron from that region. (I think even the Roman physician Galen mentioned a preference for scalpels made from ferrum noricum.) Is my understanding correct? http://www.alpine-space.org/uploads/media/IRONROUTE_Abstract_of_the_research_activities_WP5_PP3.pdf guy also known as gaius

No society exists in a vacuum. Remember, those areas of the Arabic Empire had previously been part of a greater Greco-Roman and Parthian-Sassanian axis of intellectual and cultural achievement. These ancient cultures and their intellectual traditions were subsumed by a conquering military force and its ideology. Did these ancient traditions and driving intellectual forces immediately disappear with the advent of a new ideology? Of course they didn’t.

It is, definitely. You didn't comment on my initial guesses of Carus or Decius (from post #481). guy also known as gaius

I still think it was one of the "third century crisis" emperors. Interestingly, it was only through numismatic evidence that historians were able to determine the images of many otherwise obscure emperors. They were able to match up the images on coins with unidentified busts. guy also known as gaius

Am I in the correct time period? Let me add Gordian I to the list of possibilities. guy also known as gaius

This might help to confirm Pliny's statement: This was written by Pliny the Elder and published between AD 77-79. If this coin traveled to India around that time, it is a nice confirmation of Pliny's statement. guy also known as gaius

Although it is always good to hear the non-Roman perspective, parts of the series are both sheer fantasy and sensationalistic. Jones, for example, insists on telling us that the Sassanians, who supplanted the weakened Parthians as a result of Roman aggression, were less culturally developed and more brutish than their Parthian successor. Oh, how simplisitic...and wrong. Not surprising, however, he fails to make the same criticism about the successors to the Sassanian Empire, the Arabs. Interestingly, it was the bloody and enervating conflicts with the Roman and later Byzantine Empire that weakened the Sassanian Empire and that led to its eventual decline and collapse. But let us not discuss that. It might upset some people's sensibilities. guy also known as gaius

I have missed this thread before, but I was intrigued by the bust. I'm sorry I missed the answer. Looks like one of the third century of crisis emperors. Two sons? Carus or Decius? Both of those emperors (like most the emperor busts of that century) have a scruffy beard and a worried look with the furrowed brow. And no wonder: Life expectancy for most emperors of the third century was very short. Decius: Carus: So who did everyone decide that this bust was? guy also known as gaius

Don't forget to look at the numismatic sources of Augustan art and propaganda: http://www.dirtyoldcoins.com/roman/id/Coins-of-Roman-Emperor-Augustus.htm guy also known as gaius

Well, I saw the movie. Despite the many historical inaccuracies and moments of pure fantasy (and there were many)...I liked the movie. The medical scenes could have been better portrayed, also. That said, I liked the film because it gave more than a Romanocentric view of the interactions between Rome and the indigenous populations. It also went beyond depicting the non-Romanized peoples as merely "noble savages." The movie gives a potential perspective from the invaded indigenous peoples, creating a more balanced picture of the relationship and tensions between Romans and indigenous peoples. (We never got the Germanic tribes' perspective in the movie Gladiator, for example. We just saw the Germanic tribes as giant brutish barbarians, with no attention paid to the Germanic tribes' motivations or grievances.) My inner-Scotsman and Roman enjoyed the movie. Question for the group: How far away are the mountain scenes of Scotland in the movie from Hadrian's Wall? (I assume they were filmed in Scotland, although parts of the movie were filmed in Hungary.) guy also known as gaius

I certainly enjoy a good discussion. First, the "Gracchi" coin refers to the possible moneyer (the person who physically makes the coin), but does not have the image of the any of the Gracchi. Interestingly, the coin description is incorrect: http://www.acsearch.info/record.html?id=416217 The reverse appeared with Rome's first gold coin minted during the darkest hours of the second Punic War: We discussed the significance of this image on a previous post: http://www.unrv.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=11283 The obverse of the coin is an image of Mars, not one of the Gracchi brothers. Second, all the coins minted in Rome with a living human portrait were made after the infamous Julius Caesar coin. Once the taboo against portraits was broken, coins portrayed various images of Romans. (Note the dates of the coin in your post.) The Sulla coin is almost an exception to rule: http://www.acsearch.info/record.html?id=3999 Although the obverse of the coin is an image of a helmeted Roma, on the reverse of the coin Of great significance was that this coin was probably made by a traveling mint outside of Rome. Even Sulla had a limit to his ego. guy also known as gaius