Roman soldier's gift found.

[Gaius Paulinus Maximus]

HE was many miles from home - a Roman soldier posted to Manchester, perhaps feeling cold and lonely, longing for loved ones left behind.

 

He was called Aelius Victor. And now after 2,000 years an altar he built to keep a promise to the goddesses he prayed to has been unearthed in the middle of the city.

 

http://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/new...iers_gift_found

 

This is less than an hours drive from where I live, if I get the time I might pop down and take a look.

Edited April 10, 2008 by Gaius Paulinus Maximus

[DecimusCaesar]

That altar looks rather psychedelic. Aelius Victor must have been wacked out most of the time. Still, does anyone now why it is that colour? I do remember reading that many altars and headstones were painted.

[G-Manicus]

He's got good handwriting.

[Faustus]

That altar looks rather psychedelic. Aelius Victor must have been wacked out most of the time. Still, does anyone now why it is that colour? I do remember reading that many altars and headstones were painted.

It looks a lot like rough faced marble, but it could also be a granitic eratic either of them dropped by a glacier. The Scandinavian Ice Sheet passed just north of London running from about Bristol in the west curving up to about Northampton, and then back down about to just at or north of London. Take a look HERE and note the ice exclusion area across south England. Then take a look here at Indiana and you will see a similar exclusion. We have eratics like the one our altar "object" was possibly fashioned from in lawns as landscape art objects.

 

However England/British Isles is so rich in geological features, that the science of Geology enjoys more names of time periods or ages named from "first" discoveries there than perhaps anywhere else. Both Marble (from limestone) and Granite have undergone immense heat when they were buried far below the surface and that is the cause of the discoloration they both show, and which makes them suitable for architecture and gives them their psychedelic like beauty. Marble is quarried in Ireland.

 

Faustus

Edited April 11, 2008 by Faustus

[Lost_Warrior]

Beautiful!!!

 

Does anyone know what the symbols between the letters in the last line are?

[Melvadius]

Beautiful!!!

 

Does anyone know what the symbols between the letters in the last line are?

 

I suspect that the small circles on the altar are meant to represent dots, although these marks can also be small crosses indicating an abbreviation and are part of a standard tag line used on altars throughout the Roman world.

 

In this case: -

 

votum solvit libens laetus merito - commonly abbreviated as V. S .L. L. M. - "willingly, gladly and deservedly fulfilled a vow".

 

An altenative version that is fairly common if not more so than VSLLM dispenses with laetus and is abbreviated as V.S.L.M (for votum solvit libens merito) - "willingly and deservedly fulfilled a vow".

 

For a large number of common abbreviations in Roman inscriptions c/f http://www.roman-britain.org/latin.htm

 

BTW I would need to see the altar myself to be certain but I suspect that the colours may well be surving traces of the original roman period colouring which could well seem somewhat garish to modern eyes.

Edited April 14, 2008 by Melvadius

[M. Porcius Cato]

The two goddesses mentioned were unfamiliar to me. I still don't have Hananeftis identified, but Ollototis is apparently a Celtic goddess, discussed HERE.

[Gaius Octavius]

It shows that the pagans had the proper way of dealing with the gods: If you do this for me; I'll do this for you. With Christians (and others?), it's the opposite.

[DecimusCaesar]

That altar looks rather psychedelic. Aelius Victor must have been wacked out most of the time. Still, does anyone now why it is that colour? I do remember reading that many altars and headstones were painted.

It looks a lot like rough faced marble, but it could also be a granitic eratic either of them dropped by a glacier. The Scandinavian Ice Sheet passed just north of London running from about Bristol in the west curving up to about Northampton, and then back down about to just at or north of London. Take a look HERE and note the ice exclusion area across south England. Then take a look here at Indiana and you will see a similar exclusion. We have eratics like the one our altar "object" was possibly fashioned from in lawns as landscape art objects.

 

However England/British Isles is so rich in geological features, that the science of Geology enjoys more names of time periods or ages named from "first" discoveries there than perhaps anywhere else. Both Marble (from limestone) and Granite have undergone immense heat when they were buried far below the surface and that is the cause of the discoloration they both show, and which makes them suitable for architecture and gives them their psychedelic like beauty. Marble is quarried in Ireland.

 

Faustus

 

Thank you for the answer Faustus. The natural colours are beautiful.

[Faustus]

That altar looks rather psychedelic. Aelius Victor must have been wacked out most of the time. Still, does anyone now why it is that colour? I do remember reading that many altars and headstones were painted.

It looks a lot like rough faced marble, but it could also be a granitic eratic either of them dropped by a glacier . . . . and note the ice exclusion area across south England . . . . We have eratics like the one our altar "object" was possibly fashioned from in lawns as landscape art objects.

 

However England/British Isles is so rich in geological features, . . . . Marble is quarried in Ireland.

 

Faustus

 

Thank you for the answer Faustus. The natural colours are beautiful.

The purpose of showing the oddities and the direction of flow of the ice sheets is to illustrate the possibility that pieces of stone like the one here did not necessarily need to be imported from the continent, nor even to be quarried locally. With naturally occurring deposits existing and being flaked off