caesar novus

It's been decades since I took classes in dating artifacts, but as I understand it the dendrochronology approaches (new and old) are limited to finding matches between artifacts of known date vs found artifacts. You often may have no continuous map of the seasonal variations to piece together for a given locality. In contrast approaches like radiocarbon dating (new and old) doesn't rely on seasons and continuity, but of course has much less precision.

I'm sure some of the travelers among us are wary of the fact that most of the black sea coast of Georgia was occupied since 2008, but fortunately the site is near Turkish border and not invaded (yet): Another attraction for visitors is perhaps one of the least known charming capitals if I can believe youtube walking tours. Here is an eccentric one, but find your own one to fit your fancy:

Pretty close to a ruined city recently added to my youtube ruins playlist - probably more to be discovered...

Nice; I've brought it up before, but will add more here. I went to a glass lecture by a (technical) rep of that museum, and asked about the myth that glass is slightly fluid over the centuries. It sounds silly and he did deny it, but there is various supposed evidence out there. After the lecture he was nibbling at an appetizer table and I got more explanation on what accounts for that misleading evidence and how it applies to Roman glass. Bottom line is that the topsy-turvy Roman glass at our local museum is that way because they (or their donors) could only afford cheaper objects, not because Roman objects wilted in underground pressure and volcanic heat. Or at least our museum had other priorities than than premium Roman objects and the security they would need. The post above has slightly asymmetrical blue objects but ours just scream asymmetry. BTW, I had no idea that lecture would have a Roman connection but went because it was held in an outrageous "arabian-nights-like" mansion of the once richest women in the world. The estate hadn't finished being converted to a museum, but I got on an email list for stealth events there (no outsiders allowed to drive or walk in that neighborhood). The very rich/artistic audience showed little comprehension of the technicalities of glass, so the speaker seemed to appreciate my odd but at least on-topic line of questioning.

Contrast these 2 videos: atmospheric celebration of (tourist) life in Rome vs death spiral of the country. While playing the 2nd video (1.1M views) display comments which are mostly from Italians in english confirming the economy and population decline passing the point of no return, due to benefits-sucking oldster voting block in charge permanently. Note comments saying only remaining jobs are for cleaning tourist toilets which won't pay rent or support children. My observation is that even the human waves of illegal immigration mainly pass thru Italy towards greener EU pastures.

Here are interesting, more justified reclamation actions. Notice how the museum and the artifacts donor almost had to beat Italy over the head in order to check whether their stuff was stolen. Not the usual narrative of selfish artifact owners and vigilant enforcers: https://tvpworld.com/71975995/italy-repatriates-looted-ancient-artifacts-from-us https://tvpworld.com/73610023/spain-seizes-smuggled-ukrainian-gold-artifacts-worth-eur-60-mln

A Manhattan district attorney has in one year of office forced the return of a thousand antiquities, finally meeting with legal checks and balances from a Cleveland Museum for it's statue of Marcus Aurelius. How can provenance be upended so massively and suddenly unless it's a woke narrative that steamrollers past reasonable deliberation? To humble Cleveland, this is was a huge investment and point of pride and worth arguing that Turkey had no proof that the statue came from there: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-10-19/cleveland-museum-sues-over-seized-20-million-ancient-statue-ny-says-was-stolen It's one thing to have due process with a genuine debate, but the attitude now seems to be guilty unless proven innocent. Museums seem eager to empty their shelves in a hurry to prove their virtue, vs blue collar Ohio city that knows the value of things hard won. I was just reading about how that attitude nourished it's rock musicians (R & R museum there). P.S. you may wonder why the top notch Cleveland sitcom "Drew Cary" show is no longer rerun, and it because they worked in so much local rock which subsequently became such classics that they cannot afford to license replay.

Porta Asinaria on Rome's wall 34m from Romano Impero Really fine Rome's Wall part2 44m from Romano Impero Another excellent Appian Way 108m from Romano Impero BTW, above can be slightly slow paced so can either increase speed or use option-arrow to jump to next chapters. May want to briefly step down resolution to enable quick navigation. Honorable mention to related videos Rome Wall part 1 and Rome Wall part 3. That whole body of Roman video work is worthy of following.

(title sounds backwards)

This one sparks some thoughts, like don't let success bring liver abuse only to die early: Ah well, modern cars are so incredibly ugly (and not in a functional way) that I can't recognize them:

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Here is more from a Romanian cast of the column. I guess the reason I get excited by column videos is that I thought I had seen it all in the cast museum outside of Rome. But for some reason that one is colored (shiny?) grey with weird fluorescent lighting that doesn't show shadow relief. My long savoring of it there doesn't compare to the ivory colored Romanian cast or the actual column distantly captured on zoom lenses, where relief jumps out:

Here is a spectacular dialogue on first Punic War by maritime experts. The quality of discussion, graphics, and content are unsurpassed. Clarifies how Rome always was navy-savvy and did not have to play catchup as in the usual implausible narrative. Cartage was grappling with latest naval technology while Roman allies had exactly the same vessels on call for Rome to borrow. There are quite odd set of incentives for how fleets were financed that I don't entirely get, but also there are many sidelights into Roman culture to appreciate:

Yeah, I think I posted much earlier about not needing land bridges when you have ice bridges along with cultures adapted to life on the water/ice boundary hunting seals with kayaks etc. I heard a lecture on that in early 1990s and had the further thought that the southern Pacific may have had a ice bridge as well. I think there has been evidence of super early northward migration in S. America. I reject the stale narratives like Canada's "first nations" where a homogeneous group migrates during a thaw window and the nasty westerners disrupt paradise. There had to be endless incoming waves and warfare, seen not only in the archeology but the accounts of shipwrecked Álvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca who walked from Florida to southern Mexico among pre-contact constantly warring tribes.

Wow, I thought visiting Venice was a guilty interlude of non-Roman pleasures, but it turns out much decor was physically looted from Constantinople. Looting being a rescue sometimes, since many of the source edifices in Constantinople demolished now (with that city full of it's own loot, er, rescues of foreign stuff).

These all are on quite a hot streak now but I wanted to comment on one from the middle channel (which confusingly has a somewhat different name when the "at" sign is used or not). This tour of ongoing reconstruction amazes me for two reasons. One, the unassuming pile was once a bold, towering construct with spiral staircase and all, which even partial rebuilding will now give an idea of. Two, this may bring NW Rome back to life for ancient enthusiasts. It was kind of sparse with mainly the emperor's prissy maybe hypocritical peace temple nearby. I'm not charmed by near highlights of Spanish steps, Borghese park and museum, and the Via del Corso shopping. They plan to create a piazza down at original mausoleum ground level. This gives intimate views but may be a gamble. People are willing to walk up to a viewpoint then don't mind the easy walk down, like at the Capitoline Hill area. But will they meander down into a limited viewpoint, hang out, then trudge back up even when not entering the structure (with entrance fee)? It's sort of a dead end pedestrian flow that might become a hangout for graffiti writers and vagrants.

That outrageous sounding giveaway may be the very bribe that Cleopatra used in order to have Antony influenced against everyone's better judgement: There may be a parallel to today's world of politics. Some claim that in modern democracies the elite team up with the poor, with tax loopholes for the rich combined with increasing freebies for the poor so that the tax load mainly crushes the election-losing middle class.

I am listening to this "new" Stones track that has more vitality than you would expect from these geezers resembling wispy dandelions gone to seed and ready to blow away. Supposedly from album recently put together but some of the music and video includes a dead member and a long retired member (Wyman now amateur archeologist). Maybe someone can comment on whether depicted cars are contemporary. Surely the video depicts band members looking a score or two years younger playing this song - done by AI or was this song old and unreleased? Song is "Angry" from "Hackney Diamonds" which is slang for the pile of glass shards from vandalized car windows:

I will earn few "likes" for honestly riffing on the subject of Ozzie museum quality, which generally seems a waste of time. Australia excels in outdoor sights, including urban, but seems quite amateurish indoors even compared to similarly low population countries. Even a medium size city like mine focuses limited budget into museums that can do a reasonable job for a specialty. Australia seems to aim high but attain mostly mediocrity. If that sounds mean, it comes from wasting precious museum time giving numerous chances after spending much to get there. I haven't been to the museum of the story, but most of the famous ones in Canberra, Sydney, and I forget about Melbourne. They seem to prefer 500 mundane exhibits instead of 50 quality ones, and visitor counts can be abysmal. A similar Uni classics museum in Sydney had an "interpreter" so bored from no visitors that she desperately detained me with endless small talk. I encountered one spectacular museum which is the War one in the capital. Maybe their lengthy record of givebacks can convince them to rely less on bargain hunting. The country's most famous building, Sydney Opera, is a metaphor for this indoor/outdoor dichotomy. The outside is ultimate world class, but they threw away the architect's blueprints for indoors over a money spat. Instead the inside is like elementary school auditorium caliber. One other area of disappointment I have occasionally encountered are small city museums in England. They can be super amateurish cheerleader type affairs, having for example exhibits of vintage postcards.

Thanks, but as your pictures and the article show it was underground (2ad gymnasium)

istanbulMuseum

https://www.foxbusiness.com/lifestyle/venice-international-travel-hotspot-charge-daily-tourists-fee-next-year

My memory of that area is of shambles just before the Sorrento train dives into tunnels, so looked up status in wiki. I guess they are still digging and even offer free admission to some modest ruins. From satellite view it kind of looks like poorly rebuilt WW2 damage, but wiki sez ancient baths were demolished in 1956 and the ambitious restoral ran out of money. There is a vacant shipping port clinging to sea cliffs; maybe a Eurozone funded boondoggle.