Archaeological Finds On The Roman Frontiers

[SimonBurchell]

Good point.
Thing is, Romans considered human sacrifice barbaric and not the done thing!

Whereas the Romans didn't think twice about raping children before killing them, because killing a virgin would be a sin against the gods.

 

[Stormkhan]

Yep, undeniable.
But that was done only once with the family of Sejanus. That didn't go down too well with the narrow/broad 'purple stripers' even then.

 

[ramonmercado]

The demographics of the shifting Roman Frontiers traced through genome data.

A multidisciplinary study has reconstructed the genomic history of the Balkan Peninsula during the first millennium of the common era, a time and place of profound demographic, cultural and linguistic change.

The team has recovered and analyzed whole genome data from 146 ancient people excavated primarily from Serbia and Croatia—more than a third of which came from the Roman military frontier at the massive archaeological site of Viminacium in Serbia—which they co-analyzed with data from the rest of the Balkans and nearby regions.

The work, published in the journal Cell, highlights the cosmopolitanism of the Roman frontier and the long-term consequences of migrations that accompanied the breakdown of Roman control, including the arrival of people speaking Slavic languages. Archaeological DNA reveals that despite nation-state boundaries that divide them, populations in the Balkans have been shaped by shared demographic processes.

"Archaeogenetics is an indispensable complement to archaeological and historical evidence. A new and much richer picture comes into view when we synthesize written records, archaeological remains like grave goods and human skeletons, and ancient genomes", said co-author Kyle Harper, a historian of the ancient Roman world at the University of Oklahoma.

https://phys.org/news/2023-12-ancient-balkan-genomes-fall-roman.html

 

[ramonmercado]

Julius Caesar's supporters in Spain.

An almond-shaped lead bullet — inscribed with the names of Julius Caesar and an unknown city and likely fired from a slingshot — hints that Indigenous people in Spain supported the cause of the would-be dictator during his ultimately successful civil war more than 2,000 years ago, a new study finds.

As general, Caesar led the Roman army to victory in the Gallic Wars (58 to 50 B.C.). But unwilling to give up his newfound power, he famously crossed the Rubicon River on Jan. 10, 49 B.C., leading his chief political rival, Pompey the Great, to declare Caesar's action tantamount to a state of civil war.

Caesar's civil war (49 to 45 B.C.) spanned Europe, including Italy, Greece, Egypt, Africa, Spain and the Balkan Peninsula. The final engagement, on March 17, 45 B.C., is known as the Battle of Munda, which likely took place in Andalusia, in southern Spain. Tens of thousands of Pompey's troops were killed, and Caesar returned to Rome victorious.

https://www.livescience.com/archaeo...esars-name-on-it-was-likely-used-in-civil-war

 

[Mr. Banooka]

Archaeologists Unearthed a Treasure Trove of Stones at the Site of an Ancient Roman Bathhouse in the UK

Recently, archaeologists in Britain discovered dozens of engraved semiprecious stones from the third century at the site of an ancient bathhouse beneath the Carlisle Cricket Club.

Smaller than a dime, the 36 gems are made of materials like amethyst, carnelian, and jasper. Called “intaglios,” meaning they have images carved into them, the jewels likely fell out of wealthy people’s rings after they entered the baths.

Venus holding a mirror on an amethyst gem

The water may have loosened the adhesives used in the rings—like birch bark resin—and caused the metal settings to expand and contract. So the stones probably just fell off, sinking to the bottom of the baths and ending up in the drains when the pools and saunas were cleaned.

https://news.yahoo.com/archaeologis...zR1LDT4W4JT-tLvOldHkJ1Eg-_3EuNKBZ3_QosENTJWxH

maximus otter

Just been watching about this on Digging for Britain. I commented that they are likely going to have to rehouse the cricket club now.

The kids now want to visit Hadrian's Wall after watching the episode. Glad that they are showing interest in History.

 

[Mythopoeika]

Julius Caesar's supporters in Spain.

An almond-shaped lead bullet — inscribed with the names of Julius Caesar and an unknown city and likely fired from a slingshot — hints that Indigenous people in Spain supported the cause of the would-be dictator during his ultimately successful civil war more than 2,000 years ago, a new study finds.

As general, Caesar led the Roman army to victory in the Gallic Wars (58 to 50 B.C.). But unwilling to give up his newfound power, he famously crossed the Rubicon River on Jan. 10, 49 B.C., leading his chief political rival, Pompey the Great, to declare Caesar's action tantamount to a state of civil war.

Caesar's civil war (49 to 45 B.C.) spanned Europe, including Italy, Greece, Egypt, Africa, Spain and the Balkan Peninsula. The final engagement, on March 17, 45 B.C., is known as the Battle of Munda, which likely took place in Andalusia, in southern Spain. Tens of thousands of Pompey's troops were killed, and Caesar returned to Rome victorious.

https://www.livescience.com/archaeo...esars-name-on-it-was-likely-used-in-civil-war

Inscribing a bullet with a name... isn't that usually done because they wish to kill that person?

 

[ramonmercado]

Inscribing a bullet with a name... isn't that usually done because they wish to kill that person?

All of my bullets are inscribed with the names, Bono, The Edge.

 

[Erinaceus]

Baldrick's cunning plan involved him carving his name into a bullet because he couldn't be shot if he had the bullet with his name on it.

What about a bullet inscribed "to whom it may concern" though?

 

[maximus otter]

Inscribing a bullet with a name... isn't that usually done because they wish to kill that person?

“A thunderbolt, a snake, a scorpion, or others symbols indicating how it might strike without warning were popular. Writing might include the name of the military unit or commander, or was sometimes more imaginative, such as, "Take this," "Ouch," "Catch," or even "For Pompey's backside." ”

https://www.forumancientcoins.com/catalog/roman-and-greek-coins.asp?vpar=3125

maximus otter

 

[Floyd]

It's still done today;

 

[Stormkhan]

While Caesar's name on a sling bullet is evidence, his support in Hispania and Gaul is long known.
Historians think it was the way he invaded then occupied, treating local leaders with respect, helping local development etc. Many of the Gallic leaders became clientes or even 'adopted' into the Julian distant family. And the Gauls valued family ties and obligations.

 

[Steven]

Really interesting article, and not merely about Teutoburg:

‘Their heads were nailed to the trees’: what was life – and death – like for Roman legionnaires?

It was the defeat that traumatised Rome, leaving 15,000 soldiers slaughtered in a German field. As a major show explores this horror and more, our writer finds traces of the fallen by a forest near the Rhine

https://www.theguardian.com/culture...rees-roman-legionnaires-british-museum-legion

 

[SimonBurchell]

View attachment 73408

Really interesting article, and not merely about Teutoburg:

‘Their heads were nailed to the trees’: what was life – and death – like for Roman legionnaires?

It was the defeat that traumatised Rome, leaving 15,000 soldiers slaughtered in a German field. As a major show explores this horror and more, our writer finds traces of the fallen by a forest near the Rhine

https://www.theguardian.com/culture...rees-roman-legionnaires-british-museum-legion

Ancient history, perverted into myth, still vibrates in the present.

An odd turn of phrase, revealing more about the article's writer than the article's subject.

 

[Stormkhan]

When Germanicus went back to Upper Germany, to finally avenge and investigate into the Varus massacre, finding the Roman remains to be treated so far against Roman funerary rites, it acted as a spur for the legions to re-assert the Rhine border and stamp down on any native resistance.

 

[Steven]

It kinda troubled me how generally pleasant Brian Blessed's Augustus was in I, Claudius; hardly the full story of someone who was notorious when young, and who armed himself in diplomacy in later years as one might hide a knife within a cloak...

 

[Stormkhan]

I thought the representation of Tiberius was in complete contrast. He knew exactly how much more suitable Livia was as Emperor and how much he relied on her as a canny partner. While his self-imposed exile on Capri allowed for all kinds of perversions, some contemporary accounts relate that he'd grown to despise the Senate as being weak and malleable. When 'talk' of his perversions in his palace was raised, he's reputed to say "Let them say and think of me what they wish - they are too cowardly to act upon it!"
It must be said that Prince Gaius (Caligula) went to stay on Capri for three reasons: firstly, the attraction to perversity; secondly, he wanted to stay out of Sejanus' way; thirdly, he wanted to stay as influence on Tiberius.

 

[Steven]

To be honest, I find it hard to believe when the likes of Tacitus write of supposed scandals. For instance, pretty much everyone agrees that Tiberius was long a scholarly, sober and self-disciplined person...and yet we're supposed to believe that, in late age, he suddenly developed a rapacious and 'liberal' sexuality?

 

[Stormkhan]

Tacitus was well known to despise the Julian emperors.

 

[Mythopoeika]

Tacitus was well known to despise the Julian emperors.

But he kept quiet about it.

 

[Steven]

Legion: Life in the Roman Army review – ‘More than just a blood and guts orgy of military might’

British Museum, London

From monsters to messiahs, from rebels to republics, from sex workers to chilled-out lovers, this wildly enjoyable exhibition delivers a Rome for everyone

https://www.theguardian.com/culture...e-roman-army-review-british-museum-five-stars

 

[ramonmercado]

Well it was hardly built to keep the legionnaires in.

1,700-year-old Roman fort discovered in Germany was built to keep out barbarians

The wall was built by Romans to protect against Germanic tribal attack.​

The wall was built 1,700 years ago using concrete-like mortar and rock. (Image credit: Donata Kyritz)

Archaeologists have unearthed the ruins of a Roman fortress in Germany that once protected against barbarian intruders.

For more than a century, historians have suspected that a defense structure known as a castrum was lurking beneath a cobblestone street in Aachen, a city in western Germany. However, it wasn't until recent excavations ahead of a construction project that archaeologists finally saw the remains of the 1,700-year-old fortification. They immediately knew it was a Roman construction, according to a translated statement.

"The way the wall was built left no doubt it had to be of Roman origin," Donata Kyritz, an archaeologist and owner of sk ArcheoConsult, the firm that led the excavation, told Live Science in an email. "The concrete-like mortar and the choice of rock was typical for the Roman period. Also, the dimensions and the way the foundation was built differed from the technique used in medieval times." ...

https://www.livescience.com/archaeo...d-in-germany-was-built-to-keep-out-barbarians

 

[Aydee_Aitchdee]

Ancient Roman construction methods revealed in Pompeii building site excavation​

Now, recent excavations at the Archaeological Park of Pompeii have uncovered evidence of a building site which appears to be in perfect condition with work tools, stacked tiles, bricks of tuff (a type of rock made of volcanic ash), and piles of lime. This find gives researchers an idea of the construction techniques that were used in Ancient Rome for buildings that remain standing to this day.
https://www.indy100.com/news/ancient-rome-site-pompeii

 

[hunck]

Statue of Hermes found

Buried in a Roman sewer at the site of the ancient city of Heraclea Sintica in southwestern Bulgaria, which lies close to the Greek border.

Archaeologists leading the work said that after an earthquake devastated the sprawling city in about A.D. 388, the statue had been carefully placed in the sewers and covered with soil, explaining its good condition.

“Its head is preserved. (It’s in a) very good condition. There are a few fractures on the hands,” said Lyudmil Vagalinski, who led the team of archaeologists, adding that the statue was a Roman copy of an ancient Greek original.

Heraclea Sintica was a sprawling city founded by the ancient Macedonian king Philip II of Macedon, between 356 B.C. and 339 B.C. in what is now the Bulgarian region of Pirin Macedonia.

Archaeologists say that the people of the Heraclea Sintica likely attempted to preserve the statue, even after Christianity was adopted as the official religion in the Roman Empire.

“Everything pagan was forbidden, and they have joined the new ideology, but apparently they took care of their old deities,” he said.

After the earthquake, the Heraclea Sintica fell into a rapid decline and was abandoned by around A.D. 500.

 

[ramonmercado]

This could turn out to be a really significant find.

A silver amulet found in a 1,800-year-old grave in Germany speaks to the importance — and the risk — of being Christian in Roman times.

A small piece of silver foil was virtually unrolled using CT scanning to reveal an 18-line Christian inscription in Latin dated to the third century. (Image credit: © Leibniz Institute for Archaeology in Mainz (LEIZA))

A 1,800-year-old silver amulet discovered in a burial in Germany is the oldest evidence of Christianity north of the Alps, according to a new study.

Researchers made the discovery by digitally unrolling a tiny scroll inside the amulet, which revealed an unusual Latin inscription. The finding may upend historians' understanding of how Christianity was practiced in the early Roman Empire.

Measuring just 1.4 inches (3.5 centimeters) long, the amulet contains a wafer-thin sheet of silver foil that's rolled up tightly. Archaeologists discovered it in the grave of a man who died between A.D. 230 and 270 and was buried in a cemetery on the outskirts of Frankfurt. The man likely wore the amulet on a cord around his neck, as it was found just below his chin.

The purpose of these amulets, also known as phylacteries, "was to protect or heal their owners from a range of misfortunes, such as illnesses, bodily aches, infertility, or even demonic forces," Tine Rassalle, an independent biblical archaeologist who was not involved in the study, told Live Science in an email. "In an era without advanced medical knowledge, such items were vital sources of comfort and security for you and your loved ones."

The location of the artifact's discovery is rare, she added.

"These amulets were widely used in Late Antiquity, especially in the eastern Mediterranean world," Rassalle said, but "they are much rarer in the western Roman world. The discovery of this amulet in Germany suggests that Christian ideas had already begun to penetrate areas far from Christianity's early centers of growth."

Although the object was discovered in 2018, experts at the Leibniz Center for Archaeology (LEIZA) in Mainz spent several years conserving, restoring and analyzing it before announcing their findings in a statement Wednesday (Dec. 11).

"The challenge in the analysis was that the silver sheet was rolled, but after around 1800 years, it was of course also creased and pressed," Ivan Calandra, head of the imaging platform at LEIZA, said in the statement. "Using CT, we were able to scan it at a very high resolution and create a 3D model." ...

https://www.livescience.com/archaeo...ory-of-christianity-in-the-early-roman-empire