Melvadius

In my earlier post I suggested a few books as possible good sources and having had a quick look at a couple of them have realised that Andrew Wallace-Hadrill (1994) Houses and society in Pompeii and Herculaneum is probably a better main reference on how villa's may have been used with public and private spaces than Ray Laurence (1994) Roman Pompeii: Space and Society. The Lawrence book seems more concerned with the distribution of certain types of buildings in Pompeii with only a small amount of discussion directly about the sue fo villa's. That said depending on how you structure your essay there may still be useful material to glean from Lawrence's book so I wouldn't discount it as a source.

This Yankee had to look up what "snooker" meant. At first I thought it was some kind of recreational drug. For anyone else confused by the reference - think of a variation of 'pool' but without the numbers on the balls or alternatively 'billiards' but with lots more coloured balls

The simple answer is that it would depend on the individual villa most would presumably have some form of draw-shaft through which a bucket could be lowered into the cistern and water drawn up in much the same way as a well. I suppose a few may have a had a more involved system but basically the point of a cistern is to collect as much water as possible, often in areas subject to prolonged drought or where there is only limited available fresh water. The best form of cistern for use by a single household would be a 'sealed' container sunk into the ground to maximise the water collection although presumably there may also have been some facility to deal with overflows during severe storms. c/f Roger Ling (1997) The Insula of the Menander at Pompeii, Vol 1: the Structures, page 203: In the Insula of the Menander in Pompeii there are three individual villa's; one of these, the Casa Degli Amanti's, only water supply was from cisterns located under the atrium and the peristyle. The water from one of thse cisterns was drawn up through a draw-shaft spanned by a terracota puteal (well-head) about 70cm high with an internal diameter of 54cm. Apparently it was also common to use a well where there was ground water available and very few villa's had direct access to water from aqueducts which mainly supplied the baths and/or public fountains in the streets. It was not just the Roman's that used a system of cisterns and draw-shafts as can be seen from this photograph of a Punic building on Byrsa Hill where the access to the cistern is lying open and the draw shaft can be seen in the further room.

I wondered about Split but I couldn't find any images of Diocletian's Palace that really fit.

There are of course exceptions to every rule

And the map at the end of the article proves once and for all how straight the Romans built their major roads

Something in some ways utterly suprising has been found in a barn on a Cornish Estate a Native American birch canoe which is believed to be one of the oldest if not oldest survivng anywhere in the world apparently a souvenir of the American war of Independence National Maritime Museum Cornwall report here

I would point out that regarding the ArchNews article we have already covered the 'scene setting and the second part basically comes down on the side already discussed although it does provide a few more details which contradict Dubbs.

I see they needed help for the critical part of the build last night - I must admit that the writing had been on the walls for several weeks about what they needed to do. The question I suppose is why the TV producers felt the need to only take modern builders with little or no experience of the basic skills that their Roman equivalents would have been well versed in. Indeed the builders involved in this project have had to learn a lot of basic skills that craftsmen working in restoration are very skilled in while some re-enactors also spend a lot of time researching and practicing them. From their resumes several of the team seem to have had financial problems with their previous businesses and in a couple of cases be long term unemployed - maybe it was because they were 'available' rather than necessarily 'skilled' that the team were taken on. The alternative is view is a possibly more cynical underlying intent on the part of the producers to have the builders make obvious mistakes and possibly some fail at critical tasks rather than an intention to have a smooth (ie uninteresting TV) build.

No it was on Channel 5, these links may give more information : Secrets of the Vanishing Sphinx Apparently this programme is available on AOL video but I cannot open it from here so cannot confirm it's contents

That said I do worry about at elast one of the conclusions in last nights Secret fo the Vanishing Sphinx As with most TV programmes a definite single 'conclusion' was presented based on what was fairly limited or at least only loosely connected 'evidence'. The basic geological 'evidence' seemed fairly convincing as far as weathering and reuse of material is concerned. However several times watching I felt that although their aims may have been admirable their methodology left much to be desired and could possibly be challenged by what was shown on TV. The worst feeling of 'nice theory shame about the evidence' came towards the end of the programme. If the map and projections used were in any way accurate there was a noticable misalignment which, given how accurate the pyramids construction and alignment seem to have been, to me calls into question the 'experts' theory about who was responsible for the sphinx's construction and when it would been carried out. I also worry about his tying the Egyptian 24 hour clock - the earliest of which known apparently date to around 1500BC to something built around 2500BC.

On one site I checked the series is listed as eight parts but in addition apparently this may also be the same series recently shown by National Geographic in the USA as 'When Rome Ruled'.

With that last hint it seems that your lecturer is looking for interpretations of enclosures and vista's within the villa. There is an abstract of a paper presented to the Theoretical Archaeology Group 2010 on Archaeological Ambulations: Integrative Approaches to Movement by John W. Stephenson (Appalachian State University) entitled Processional Spaces and Theatrical Effects in the Late Roman Villa which you may wish to read here. I attended a lecture last year at the Theoretical Roman Archaeological Conference in which one of the speakers suggested that the floor plans of Roman villa's in Pompeii give a confusing impression. Some of the 'openings' to vista's in reality would have contained doors while other may have had curtains or screens blocking them off. The issue is that the evidence for these door closures in many cases have been lost sometimes with restoration of the upper walls of the villa's however in some instances by resurveying the group he was part of found evidence for door pivots or even marks of screens which would originally block off some of the vista's unless the villa owner decided to 'reveal' the view to his guests. Unfortunately I don't think the research has been published as yet, on previous experience the related essay the talk was based on is unlikely to be published until just in time for the next TRACs conference. This will be held in Newcastle during April 2011.

I'm not sure that your first option would work as the internal support could severely restrict the turning of the rudder when the ship was in danger of running ashore. Don't forget that in this period at, least with smaller vessels, you have to be able to unship the rudder at times when working close to a shelving beach especially if you may intended to ground the vessel for loading and unloading. Given that you are dealing with a very large vessel is it not possible that the Roman made use of the rear platform to centrally mount a single rudder sweep fixed by a 'universal joint' made out of over-crossed hawsers/ large ropes? Alternatively doing a general web search I stumbled across this image apparently of a later Byzantine Droman which seems to show a different rudder arrangement. The original source of the image is apparently from The Climax of Rome by Michael Grant The plate is from The Mansell Collection. A possible better source is this site which is the R

If you wish a companion book then try: The Roman army, 31 BC-AD 337: a sourcebook By J. B. Campbell

You are welcome. As to towers - even the ones that we have no 'actual' evidence they ever existed? Seriously you may find Poulter's conclusions about the sequence of construction and intended purpose(s) suprising in a couple of places but bear with him.

Flashing images for a split second, often but now not exclusively linked to advertising, comes under the category of subliminal images.

Salve Gordian, welcome to the forum. The topic of historical comparisons does come up here from time to time notably but not exclusively between Ancient Rome and America: A couple of threads on the American comparisons are: http://www.unrv.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=1104 http://www.unrv.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=9138&st=0&p=90317&hl=america&fromsearch=1entry90317 I suppose my own opinion tends to be along the line that if we do not take note of history we are liable to keep repeating the same mistakes. Knowing how little note politicians tend to take of historical comparisons this possibly leads to the all too obvious conclusion that under their leadership we will continue to make the same mistakes

BTW - If anyone was looking in vain for details of how to get involved in the ongoing excavations at Vindolanda. Be warned however that the annual Friends of Vindolanda newsletter has advised that, as is now usually the case, all available places were sold out within 3 days of the excavation details being announced on the Vindolanda website on 1 November

From a quick search this appears to be springing off of the back of the Earthwatch Institute organised excavations at Arbeia, more details of the archaeological team involved, dates (and prices) can be found at the Earthwatch Institute website here. In fact as can be seen here, Earthwatch seem to run several archaeological packages. I have to say that you may find there are other (and possibly cheaper) ways of getting involved in archaeology although they do seem to cater for a slightly more relaxed way of excavating than some more pressurised sites may be able to provide. Alternatively you may want to look at some of the sites listed by About.com.Archaeology which provides links to dedicated websites providing details of numerous excavations being carried out in 2011.

Looking at what could be Thyme Rosemary bushes in the picture I would have thought somewhere along the Adriatic coast, possibly in Greece more likely. [Edit - sorry I did actually mean to say Rosemary in this post]

The BBC is carrying a video as part of their report on a recent discovery of a Medieval Mural depicting Henry VIII. Apparently the building carries a Grade II listing which although not preserving it in aspic does mean that they need to obtain their local planning officers permission for any work which may affect what makes the particular building of historical interest. The work the couple were doing when they made the discovery was the removal of wooden panels from the wall with a view to painting it. Whatever the previous listing the owners may find their home has now moved up a notch or two in importance as the only other known Medieval mural of Henry VIII was apparently destroyed by fire in the 16th Century.

Give that man a coconut - Dougga/ Thugga it is

Split as requested.