Melvadius

I suspsect we should be looking further east and north again - somewhere along the Danube frontier again perchance?

Ghost - I never knew you were a re-enactment groupie Lanista - ain't 'real' TV something to die for - or at least it feels like you have when you keep being asked to do the same thing again and again - your own personal 'Groundhog Day'.

I appeared (briefly and only below the knee) in some of the march pasts of legionnaries used in "What the Roman's Did for us?" TV series.

Guy, Are you sure that would garner more custom this way? Have you considered what some of us may really look like in the flesh? Mind you I keep getting reminded from my re-enactment days I am a TV star already - even if I wasn't filmed above the knees BTW Lanista nice video.

As a guess I would suspect it is in one of the northern provinces, possibly near the Danube?

OK it may not be specifically Roman related but she was involved in several adventures in Time and Space during her time in Dr Who. So just in case any fans out there haven't heard yet the BBC have announced the sad lose of arguably the best companion the Doctor ever had - Sarah Jane Smith played by Lis Sladen. So good she appeared several times after she left the series in both one-off episodes of Dr Who and several spin-off programmes including her own series. to a great, funny and beautiful actress - she will be sadly missed.

I must admit that confused me too. With a quick search I could only find these particular letter combinations quotoed together on the Web as abbreviations for 'real time web, for the win' which didn't really seem very 'Roman' related to me. . BTW there do seem to be some cited quotations here on the About.com, Ancient Quotations Index A-Z but it does seem fairly patchy as far as the sources listed are concerned.

No there isn't; several people have stated their theories, including some providing very specific reasoning for their position. This discussion has drawn on a range of material ranging from ancient texts to more modern comparisons along with some more speculative comments apparently based on general reading. Unless someone can present new evidence, whether from ancient texts or from comparason studies, to support any of these theories in my view they cannot at present be proved or disproved so all to a lesser or greater degree remain speculative. On that basis I repeat my view that at present enough has probably been said on this particular topic.

Bl*st, I accidently mixed up Vienne with Vienna when I posted Congratulations Noricum - a worthy winner

Looks like it could be the Temple d'Auguste in Vindobona/ Vienna.

Just to pick up one thing from the above We seem to have some agreement although I remain unconvinced that the 'laws' and 'views' alluded to in the discussions above are as definitive 'proof' as some may believe of actual practices within the Roman military. Writing about this topic in particular, citing the Roman view of homosexuality in the period I believe all too often suffers adversely from both implied and explicit homophobia rather than verifiable writen sources. Often, although not exclusively, this can be seen to arise from much later writings and views which have an obvious influence of 'Christian' theological writing. There is an old saying that 'absence of evidence is not evidence of absence' and this is a case in point where we will probably continue to differ - enough said.

Caldrail, The idea that at the practical level; from at least the Republican period Romans saw some sexual practices as 'inferior' while others were 'superior', rather than 'masculine'/ 'femine' per se, has already been answered by postings above including those by Ingsoc adn Byraxis. That leave the question of how homosexuality was reacted to within the military for at least another 500 years of Roman history when we do not have much in the way of written evidence and even less which can be said to enshrine 'military law' as opposed to some academics view on what it shold be. On that basis I would disagree that someone with homosexual, or any other variant sexual inclinations for that matter, would always have been treated as a lesser being and thrown out of the military or necessarily mistreated for being such. It comes down to individual circumstances and military leaders have a long record of deciding that they will keep men (or even in some exceptionally rare circumstances women) whose sexual activities may go against the 'norm' of society or indeed military law throughout recorded history. The way in which they may have been kept is rarely if ever 'formally' recorded but I know that it occured within the British military during periods when homosexual practices were still effectively banned by national laws. I would agree that what you have said may 'fit' the 'letter' of some Roman laws but not all. Even where there may have been laws against; that does not mean they were followed in every circumstance. Decisions about what or what was not acceptable to both men and officers throughout human history depends on multiple factors and frequently change becoming more or less restrictive if you look at them over a sufficiently long period of time - such as 500 years.

Apparently there is also a video by Dr Warrington discussing this discovery 'buried' at the bottom of the BBC news article although I cannot access it at present as it is here on youtube in case anyone misses it. From what I have heard and seen so far this could be one to keep an eye on for future developments. [Edit] - There is a separate BBC video report here

Granted that the comparison with the Royal Navy is not necessarily a precise fit but the main point I was making is that in any group of people who live in constrained circumstances you can get a number who do not fit the sterotypical 'masculine' image. I have come across several individuals who are homosexual but who I would not consider by any means to be effiminate and I don't see why when we get 'modern' individuals of varient sexuality who 'fit' inot most situations as 100% male it should have been any different in the Roman period. During the period of the Principate and as far as most military forces up to at least the 19th cwentury were concerned the main consideration when enrolling men is could they be trained to fight and carry the equipment they needed to be able to wear and/or use on a regular basis. Providing they didn't do anything strange in the street and frighten the horses most people in any authority would take a good fighter over a bad one every time irrespective of their sexuality. The official seperation into who could or could not be enlisted on the basis of their sexuality is a much more recent one than most people probably realise.

The real problem with any speculation about how the legions operated in practice as opposed to modern perceptions of how they 'should have' or 'actually may have' operated is precisely that - specualtion. There is so little written about internal discipline and for this discussion how homosexuality or indeed sexuality in general was perceived then in my view there is no 'correct' answer. If I can take an example from more recent history; the Royal Navy of the 17th and 18th century, due to the time spent at sea, was an almost totally masculine environment the same as the early to mid-Principate legion was by 'law'. Winston Churchill famously took the view however that the very masculine RN was therefore only renowned for 'Rum, Sodomy and the lash'. Why should life in a Roman legion have been markedly different from that when it faced similar pressures and restrictions on permanent relationships? THere would have been issues with discipline a proportion of the men would probably have had more or less equivocal sexual preferences and depending on the cultural imperatives of themen in the unit this may or may not have caused a problem but there is nothing that I am aware of amongst the limited ancient sources which indicates that homosexuality per se was subject to a blanket ban.

Probably something to do with 'cabotage' or at least a couple of foreign drivers trying to get around legal limits on how many deliveries they can make while visiting a foreign country. As to extra holidays if you look carefully you will probably find that we don't actually get another holiday just the current powers that be mucking around with the millenia old tradition of May Day occuring on 1 May

Just to spread the guesses how about a smaller site in Turkey?

Thank you for the complements folks I found it fun and was glad to share As to Ghost's question: Hansard (the official record of parliamentary discussions in the UK) uses the term 'hear, hear' including in this example from 12 June 2006 where it occurs part way down the page beyond '12 Jun 2006 : Column 97'. Checking on Wikipedia it appears that the phrase originally was 'hear him, hear him' in the 17th century but abbreviated to 'hear, hear' by the 18th. In the context of Parliamentary discussions where applause is generally not allowed this does seem highly likely to be the correct derivation.

Past Horizons is carrying an article with a few good photographs about the recent discovery of at least four definite plus two possible Roman period New Forest pottery kilns during excavation work in advance of quarrying:

The Romanian 'Business Review' is carrying the following report about the unusual discovery within a legionary fortress of a temple to the Roman goddess Nemesis in legio Gemina XIII fortress at Alba-Julia

There is actually quite a lot of variation in the shade of blue (or grey) worn by re-enactors since they generally use vegetable based dyes like the original combatants which naturally fade through use. The Confederacy normally wore grey but some units/ individuals also wore what is described as 'butternut' coloured uniforms while the union generally wore shades of blue. However there are also a few unusual/ unlikely colour combinations which were used during the conflict like the 'zouaves' who fought on the Union side wearing red hats and reg baggy trousers/pantaloons while union sharpshooters apparently wore forest green uniforms but some Confederate units also had green uniforms and some units on both side wore what is pususally claimned as the other sides 'coolours'. This site has some interesting information on the third page about the wide variation in uniform colours used in the conflict. But to answer your question I think in this instance these particular re-enactors are representing Union troops - the Ghostbusters, Star Wars and Pirates of the Caribean re-enactors apparently wandered over form a local toy fair which was happening nearby that weekend.

Some interesting links although I am not convinced that Salvian, On the Government of God (1930) Book 7 [Translated by Eva M. Sanford] is the diatribe against homosexuality implied by the original article. I had a read through the first dozen of so sections of it and they seem to be a general cry against general vices (possibly exmplified by the 'arena' although I thought that had stopped by then - possibly he just meant horse racing) and lewdness of masters with their maidservants instead of 'cleaving to their wives' than an identifiable complaint about 'homosexual' practices per se. On this basis although I haven't seen a full translation fo the original Italian articles are we as certain as the Telegraph article indicates that de Mattei was actually complaining about homosexuality? Is it conceivable that he may instead have been trying to join in on the Vatican's recent implied condemnation of the current Italian Prime Minister, Silvio Berlusconi, and the ongoing Bunga Bunga scandal?

You may wish to have a look at a couple of sites where it appears such a list has been at least started if by no means complete: Illustrated Roman Empire Our civilisation

I had numerous children although this was possibly not the main reason that I am counted as having been good in my position.

Antiquarian writers and all too many historians have long 'accepted' the patchy written sources at face value as describing particular 'racial' or 'ethnic' groupings. 'Celt' may have long been a 'convenient' term but what it actually means and how representative it is is coming under increasing scrutiny and consequently does it not necessarly mean the same thing to any of the modern 'experts' on the period. Caldrail has hit the nail on the head with his question. The recurring problem archaelogically is that when sites are excavated there is often a lot of ambiguity in what artefacts may or may not be a marker of cultural, ethnic or simply geographic differences down to the proximity or otherwise of particular manufacturing sites or trade routes. The ways in which individuals chose or used particular artefacts in life and how they deposited them as grave goods show a high degree of variation even within very small geographic areas and their associated cemeteries. This problem is compounded when individual bodies are analysed and similarly ambiguous patterns of use can be identified irrespective of an individuals place of origin or where is being surveyed. The term 'Celt' is in effect a very vague categorisation and actually incorporates numerous groupings who probably did not consider themselves of one 'race' but may in effect have been a much looser and possibly temporary groupings which came under the sway of different warlords/ leaders or village councils. Effectively the various 'tribal' names which have been recorded may only have been the name of their 'current' leader with groupings reforming on each leader's death and new individuals or groups came to prominence.