Salve! Do you have trouble finding your way from Brindisium to Antium or planning a vacation at your villa in the Appenines because no one produces an online map with directions in good Latin these days? Well, be of good cheer, friend,
OmnesViae has what you need.
[more inside]
posted by ricochet biscuit
on Sep 26, 2011 -
23 comments
Evan Osnos joins a tour group from China as they traverse Europe. In the front row of the bus, Li stood facing the group with a microphone in hand, a posture he would retain for most of our waking hours in the days ahead. In the life of a Chinese tourist, guides play an especially prominent role—translator, raconteur, and field marshal—and Li projected a calm, seasoned air. He often referred to himself in the third person—Guide Li—and he prided himself on efficiency. “Everyone, our watches should be synchronized,” he said. “It is now 7:16 P.M.” He implored us to be five minutes early for every departure. “We flew all the way here,” he said. “Let’s make the most of it.” [more inside]
posted by WalterMitty
on Jul 28, 2011 -
71 comments
Over 143 episodes of audio, Mike Duncan has covered the founding of Rome through the Crisis of the Third Century in his
History of Rome podcast [
previously], having now reached the last pagan Emperor,
Julian The Apostate. Enlivened by drawing on comparisons to popular culture, from
The Empire Strikes Back (when Hannibal makes his appearance) to
The Godfather (as a metaphor for Rome's social client system), Mr Duncan's work makes for fun, informative 25-minute sessions with the greatest empire of the ancient western world. If you're interested in more, the podcasts could be handily supplemented with...
[more inside]
posted by Bora Horza Gobuchul
on Jul 10, 2011 -
42 comments
"They are the earliest painted portraits that have survived; they were painted whilst the Gospels of the New Testament were being written. Why then do they strike us today as being so immediate? Why does their individuality feel like our own? Why is their look more contemporary than any look to be found in the rest of the two millennia of traditional European art which followed them? The
Fayum portraits touch us as if they had been painted last month." The Fayum mummy portraits were painted between the first and third centuries AD, in Roman Egypt, and preserved by the dry Egyptian climate.
Wikimedia Commons. According to
Wikipedia, 900 portraits are known to have survived.
John Bavaro has been creating
modern versions using the Brushes app on the iPhone.
Via the Brushes Gallery on Flickr.
posted by russilwvong
on Jul 18, 2010 -
39 comments
Roman ingots to shield particle detector. "Around four tonnes of ancient Roman lead was yesterday transferred from a museum on the Italian island of Sardinia to the country's national particle physics
laboratory at Gran Sasso on the mainland. Once destined to become water pipes, coins or ammunition for Roman soldiers' slingshots, the metal will instead form part of a cutting-edge experiment to nail down the mass of neutrinos."
[Via]
posted by homunculus
on Apr 16, 2010 -
22 comments
Economic crisis, mounting national debt, excessive foreign commitments -- this is no way to run an empire. America needs serious strategic counseling. And fast. It has never been Rome, and to adopt its strategies no -- its ruthless expansion of empire, domination of foreign peoples, and bone-crushing brand of total war -- would only hasten America's decline. Better instead to look to the empire's eastern incarnation: Byzantium, which outlasted its Roman predecessor by eight centuries. It is the lessons of Byzantine grand strategy that America must rediscover today.
posted by jason's_planet
on Jan 25, 2010 -
38 comments
"Soon were the lofty peaks of Corcyra lost to view;
We coasted along Epirus, and coming to the Chaonian
Harbour, we drew near Buthrotum, that hill city."
- The Aenid - Book III, Virgil (trans. Cecil Day Lewis)
Founded by Trojans, populated by Chaonians, a sanctuary dedicated to Asclepius, colonized by the Greeks and Romans, sacked by the Goths, ruled by the Slavs, the Byzantine Empire and the Turks, taken by Manfred of Hohenstaufen, purchased by the Most Serene Republic of Venice, invaded by Ali Pasha and Suleiman the Magnificent, eventually becoming a place of refuge for the likes of Casanova and for hunters and painters, the
ancient city of
Butrint, a
microcosm of Mediterranean history, is a
World Heritage Site within a
National Park which includes a
Wetland of International Importance all of which is being kept alive by a
partnership of local, national and international organizations . Come and
explore Butrint.
[more inside]
posted by shoesfullofdust
on Apr 3, 2009 -
12 comments
Piggybacking the opening of the
Rome Film Fest, a group of self-styled
cultural "terrorists"
struck Rome yesterday,
dyeing the Trevi
fountain red. In an elaborate manifesto, the previously unknown group Azione Futurista is claiming to represent "precarious workers, the unemployed, the elderly, the ill, the student body and workers alike", and have announced that "we are coming with our vermilion to colour the grey of your everyday" - "a blob of colour will bury you all."
[more inside]
posted by progosk
on Oct 20, 2007 -
37 comments
Wiki City Rome - "
anyone with an Internet connection will be able to see a unique map of the Italian capital that shows the movements of crowds, event locations, the whereabouts of well-known Roman personalities, and the real-time position of city buses and trains."
posted by Gyan
on Sep 7, 2007 -
3 comments
The Nolli Plan. In 1748, Giambattista Nolli drew one of the most detailed and accurate maps ever created for the city of Rome. Improving on the
Buffalini Plan of 1551 [
interactive link to zoom], Nolli’s plan was drawn to an incredible precision, going as far as revealing public interior spaces in a stark figure-ground relationship. The
Interactive Nolli Map allows you to overlap transparencies of the modern city to see how little has changed and how precise Nolli’s measurements were.
Piranesi’s maps –
however fanciful- were also inspired by Nolli’s achievements.
posted by yeti
on May 10, 2007 -
8 comments
Did the roof of the Pantheon influence Copernicus? Are the planets of the solar system aligned in accordance with a nearly-forgotten hypothesis known (unfairly) as
Bode's Law? A fascinating wide-ranging discussion on BLDGBLOG with
Walter Murch, the visionary editor and sound designer for such films as
The Conversation, Apocalypse Now, The English Patient, THX1138, and many others. [Murch's film work has previously been discussed
here and
here.]
posted by digaman
on Apr 7, 2007 -
20 comments
The
UBS Bank calculated
how long it takes an average worker around the world to earn enough to buy a Big Mac. Workers in Tokyo were the fastest:
Tokyo 10 minutes,
New York 13 minutes,
London 16 minutes,
Hong Kong 17 minutes,
Paris 21 minutes,
Moscow 25 minutes,
Rome 39 minutes,
Beijing 44 minutes,
Manila 81 minutes,
Jakarta 86 minutes.
Is this a fair comparison? Is it something that will change people's perspective about the rest of the world?
posted by PetBoogaloo
on Nov 17, 2006 -
53 comments
De Architectura, known also as The Ten Books of Architecture, is an exposition on architecture by Marcus Vitruvius Pollio. Originally in Latin, here it is translated into English.
posted by nthdegx
on Nov 9, 2006 -
15 comments
Empire Falls. "They called it 'the American Century,' but the past hundred years actually saw a shift
away from Western dominance. Through the long lens of Edward Gibbon's history,
The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Rome 331 and America and Europe 2006 appear to have more than a few problems in common." By Niall Ferguson, whose views on the American hegemony have been
discussed previously.
posted by homunculus
on Oct 25, 2006 -
46 comments
Real Time Rome, the MIT SENSEable City Lab’s contribution to the 2006 Venice Biennale, aggregated data from cell phones, buses and taxis in Rome to better understand urban dynamics in real time.
via information aesthetics
posted by signal
on Sep 18, 2006 -
4 comments
The Da Vinci Cup Think of it as a gathering of tribes... There's a lot of ritual involved. It's probably the biggest single unifying event that our species can muster. Forget the Olympics. Not even close.
Poor poor China.
Keeping the romans entertained since BC.
posted by Unregistered User
on Jun 25, 2006 -
11 comments
All right, but apart from the
sanitation, the
medicine,
education,
wine,
public order,
irrigation,
roads, a
fresh
water system, and
public
health, what have the Romans ever done for us?
Brought
peace?
Oh. Peace?
Shut up!
posted by gimonca
on Mar 28, 2005 -
15 comments
Roman Emperors , there sure were a
lot of them. This online encyclopedia is the most comprehensive resource on the autocratic rulers of Rome I have come across. It ranges from
Augustus to Constantine Dragases, the last emperor in Constantinople. It doesn't include them all, but has most, including my two favorites,
Basil II, the Bulgarslayer and
Antonius Pius. You can also find the one
least deserving of fame, the one with the
silliest name and, of course, the
completely batshit ones.
Also on the site,
maps,
battles,
coins and everybody's favorite subject,
genealogy.
posted by Kattullus
on Feb 14, 2005 -
21 comments
