Bread and Circuses

Third century altar found in Dalheim

A 1.3m high limestone altar dating to the third century has been found at the Gallo-Roman site of Dalheim, Luxembourg. The Latin inscription, ten lines long, shows that the altar was dedicated to the goddess Fortuna. It also confirms that Dalheim was the town Ricciacum, which gets a name check on the Peutinger Map, and states that the altar relates to the reconstruction of the portico of the baths which had been destroyed "by violent barbarians".

The full press release in French is here:

Une fois de plus, les fouilles actuellement en cours à Dalheim sur le site des thermes du vicus gallo-romain (anc. propriété Simon) ont produit une découverte archéologique exceptionnelle.

Récemment l’équipe de fouille du Musée national d’histoire et d’art (MNHA), dirigée par la jeune archéologue allemande Heike Pösche et supervisée par le conservateur Jean Krier, a mis au jour les fragments d’un grand autel en calcaire (hauteur : 1,30 m) portant sur sa face antérieure une inscription latine du IIIe siècle après J.-C. L’autel est dédié à la déesse Fortuna. Sur 10 lignes, le texte mentionne non seulement les habitants du vicus de Ricciacum, il relate aussi la restitution du portique de l’édifice des bains, détruit "par la violence des barbares", probablement lors d’une incursion de Germains. Comme curateur des travaux entrepris à l’époque figure un militaire de la 8^e légion Augusta stationnée à Strasbourg.

Les différents fragments de l’inscription ont immédiatement été transférés dans les ateliers du MNHA à Bertrange où ils feront l’objet d’une restauration adéquate.

Comme, à la fin du mois d’août, la fouille a déjà produit une sculpture en ronde bosse de Fortune (hauteur : 0,33 m), on peut supposer qu’un petit sanctuaire en l’honneur de cette déesse était aménagé dans l’une des pièces du bâtiment des thermes publics de l’agglomération antique de Dalheim.

L’intérêt particulier de la nouvelle découverte réside dans le fait que cette inscription nous apporte la preuve définitive pour l’identification de l’agglomération romaine de Dalheim avec la station "Ricciaco" indiqué sur la célèbre "Tabula Peutingeriana", copie médiévale d’une carte routière romaine. Jusqu’à présent, uniquement sept petites tessères (jetons) en plomb, trouvées à Dalheim, parlaient en faveur de cette identification.

La secrétaire d’État à la Culture, à l’Enseignement supérieur et à la Recherche, Octavie Modert, se félicite de cette découverte importante dont l’intérêt historique dépasse de loin le seul site de Dalheim. Par ailleurs, les objets trouvés démontrent à ses yeux qu’il reste essentiel de continuer les fouilles à Dalheim.

En effet, étant donné que les fouilles archéologiques sur le site des thermes sont loin d’être terminées, d’autres surprises majeures ne sont pas exclues.

There is an abbreviated English version here, though it does have an image of the inscription.

Archaeology students at Cambridge cheat

Various papers (Telegraph and the Mail) have picked up on the story in Cambridge's Varsity newspaper that half the students have admitted in a recent survey to cheating. While it is not exactly earth-shattering news to discover that putative lawyers like to cut corners, it is less palatable to find out that the second highest school was archaeology and anthropology.

49 per cent of students admitted that they have plagiarised work, although this differed radically between subjects and colleges. Ironically, students of the Law faculty plagiarised the most out of any subject, with 62 per cent of them breaking the university rules. The second highest was the Archaeology and Anthropology department with 59 per cent.

The survey confirms what we knew all along. You can't trust a Tab.

Fourth century hoard in Newport Pagnell

Another coin story today, though the details are irritatingly vague. Also, those of a sensitive archaeological disposition should not read the description of how the coins were taken out of the ground.

As the credit crunch hits pensioners across the country one pair have hit the jackpot by finding buried treasure.

The finders of a hoard of thousands of Roman coins agree with the words inscribed on them; 'happy times are here again'.

The collection of bronze coins, which may be worth hundreds of thousands in sterling, were discovered in a field north of Newport Pagnell and have now been declared as treasure.

It was discovered by a pair of experienced metal detectorists on ploughed farmland on December 1, 2006...

The coins are inscribed with the heads of various Roman emperors and leaders and some with words translated as 'Happy times are here again', which date from around 348AD and was meant to reassure Roman citizenry of their safety against barbarian raids.

It is believed the hoard was deposited on a Roman rubbish pit.

The full story is in the Milton Keynes News.

Paul Barford at Portable Antiquity Collecting and Heritage Issues has more on the find and reckons that it comes from the Cold Brayfield hoard.

Late Roman coin hoard found in Sully, Wales

Several reports of the discovery of 5,913 copper-alloy coins from the early fourth century which were uncovered found in April near Sully, in the Vale of Glamorgan. It is one of the largest hoards found in Wales. The Cardiff coroner declared them treasure trove yesterday and it is hoped that they will eventually be donated to the National Museum Wales.

A deposit of almost 6,000 ancient Roman coins was unearthed in a farmer’s field by a metal detecting enthusiast.

A present-day value is yet to be put on the coins, found buried in two pots and compared by one expert to an early single European currency.

The pots’ combined contents of 5,913 copper-alloy coins from the early fourth century were uncovered over two days in April near Sully, in the Vale of Glamorgan.

Most of the coins were minted in London, Trier and Lyon, but some came from more distant imperial outposts in what is now Croatia and Syria...

The rest of the story from WalesOnline. The story was also picked up by the BBC.

The buried Roman bath house in Exeter

A letter from John Salvatore, historic environment officer for Plymouth City Council, to the Express & Echo, on the first century Roman bath house in Exeter (Isca) that remains hidden.

I worked on the excavation of the building and watched the site back-filled with sand in 1974 when there was then great hope that a better economic climate in the future would see it take its place as a major tourist attraction alongside the cathedral. However, those hopes have been dashed year on year during the subsequent decades...

In 2002, Paul Bidwell, the excavator of the bath-house, described the building as one of the most elaborate of the early Roman empire. In fact, the building was so grand that after the legion left, it was converted to become Exeter's basilica, the equivalent of the modern civic centre, and therefore the true birthplace of the city in around AD 89.

Full letter here. You might not be able to visit the remains in person, but they can be visited virtually here.

A photograph, copyright Exeter City Council. The view is taken from the top of the West Front of the Cathedral in 1972 and shows the excavation of the bath-house in progress. To the extreme right of the view is the solid Roman concrete floor which was inserted when the baths were briefly adapted at the end of the military period c. AD 75. Elsewhere the basement of the caldarium (hot room) is being excavated and the stacks of tiles which would have supported its raised floor are being exposed.

Hadrian's Wall threatened?

Frommers has been getting a lot of publicity for its latest book, 500 Places to See Before They Disappear. No surprise that the BBC has gone great guns on the story (here, here and here). It is hard to think of a more Zeitgeist-y book title. But Hadrian's Wall is apparently also threatened. The book claims:

Over the last two millennia, nature broke down some sections of Hadrian’s Wall and many stones from the Wall were removed and used to build other structures, but much of the Wall is still intact.

Besides nature itself, the biggest threat to Hadrian’s Wall are the tourists who flock to the site each year and walk on the Wall.

Not so, says a slightly piqued Linda Tuttiett, chief executive of Hadrian’s Wall Heritage.

This important World Heritage Site needs careful management, but it is not about to disappear.

A great deal of work is being done by us and our partners to ensure that the Wall can be enjoyed by future generations.

Full story from the Journal Live here.

Frank Walbank RIP

Obituary of the unchallenged expert in Polybius, who passed away on Thursday last week. Today's Independent:

Frank Walbank, Emeritus Rathbone Professor of Ancient History at Liverpool University, was one of the great ancient historians of the 20th century. For around half a century he defined and dominated the field of Hellenistic history. Above all he was the unchallenged expert on the Greek politician and historian Polybius, who composed his history of Rome around the middle of the second century BC. Walbank's magnum opus is the monumental three-volume Historical Commentary on Polybius – a project launched in 1944 and completed in 1979 – which is widely regarded as the finest commentary ever composed on a historical author from antiquity.

Full story here.

Animal Welfare in the Coliseum

The Telegraph has its knickers in a twist for the last couple of days about historical revisionism. The twin stories that Vikings were jolly good chaps and that it was the British who were beastly at Agincourt resulted in an editorial yesterday:

Marauding bands of historical revisionists have recently been raiding some of the most settled territories of our past. First came the French academics, appealing to the referee six centuries after the event and claiming that the sturdy English yeoman had committed a number of fouls, particularly late tackles, on the haughty Gallic cavalier at Agincourt. Now here come the Cambridge dons to claim that the average Viking, far from being a horn-helmeted, axe-wielding berserker, was really quite a cultured chap...

This morning, Jim White rewrites history in the light of modern sensibilities. He considers building regulation violations at the Battle of Jericho, health and safety concerns at the Battle of Hastings and government intervention in the South Sea Bubble:

Issues of Animal Welfare in the Coliseum. It is all very well providing bread and circuses, but insufficient consideration was given to the rights of those involved in the entertainment.

Take the animals. Elephants billeted in inadequate accommodation, tigers ripped from their natural habitat and horses expected to perform in up to three chariot races a day without proper comfort breaks.

As for the poor lions: frankly a diet consisting solely of stringy Christians must have played havoc with their digestive systems.

The full and very funny op ed story here.

Byzantine art to see before you die

Over the weekend, the Guardian published a series of articles called "1,000 artworks to see before you die". Lists like these are always popular and tend to do what newspapers are supposed to do - get people talking and shift copies. Jonathan Jones put together the Byzantine section:

The Roman empire did not fall in the fifth century; in the east it survived until 1453. That was when Byzantium, the new capital of Rome's emperors when Italy and Gaul became impossible to defend, finally fell to its Turkish besiegers. For a millennium after the death of the western empire Byzantium was shielded by its fortifications and secret weapons, including the lethal incendiary weapon "Greek fire". From the Byzantine point of view the city was not a last retreat of empire but an eternal and enduring civilisation — and Christians and Muslims alike accepted its cultural supremacy. Byzantine mosaicists were sought after to decorate the most prestigious palaces, mosques and churches across the mediterranean world.

More here.

The list he comes up with has much to recommend it, primarily because it includes Christ Pantocrator at Daphni, which has long been one of my favourite Byzantine images.

• The Transfiguration, mosaic in the church of the Monastery of St Catherine, Mount Sinai (548-565)
• The Virgin and Child enthroned between St Theodore and St George, icon from Constantinople, in the Monastery of St Catherine (6th or 7th century)
• St Peter, painted icon from Constantinople, in the Monastery of St Catherine (6th or 7th century)
• Mosaics in Hagios Demetrios, Salonika (Thessaloniki), Greece (7th century)
• Mosaics in Haghia Sophia, Istanbul (9th century)
• Christ Pantocrator, mosaic in the dome of the Church of the Dormition, Daphni, near Athens (c1100)

Image from Wikipedia:

Metrosexual Vikings

Vikings have been badly vilified. Not the pillagers of history, instead they used to spend the cold winter Rejkavik evenings discussing nail polish and hemlines when not debating the finer points of scansion ... at least according to the Department of Anglo-Saxon, Norse and Celtic at Cambridge and a story in the Telegraph:

Cambridge University has launched a campaign to recast [Vikings} as "new men" with an interest in grooming, fashion and poetry.

Academics claim that the old stereotype is damaging, and want teenagers to be more appreciative of the Vikings' social and cultural impact on Britain.

They say that the Norse explorers, far from being obsessed with fighting and drinking, were a largely-peaceful race who were even criticised for being too hygienic.

Full story here.

Given the shameless abuse that Iceland has had in the past few weeks, this could be the final straw.