Bread and Circuses

The New Season at Kalefeld

Archaeologists are gearing up for a new season on the Harzhorn, near Kalefeld to excavate the battle that took place around AD235 between the Romans under Maximinus Thrax and the Germans. The big discovery last year was the dolabra with the inscription LEGIIII (previous post here).

There is a note in today's HNA.de about the plans:

Vier Wochen sollen die Ausgrabungen dauern, die sich auf den östlichen Teil des Bergrückens konzentrieren. Das teilte der Landkreis Northeim am Montag mit.

Im östlichen Teil des Harzhorns wurden mittels Metalldetektoren auffallend viele Schuhnägel im Erdreich ausgemacht. Die Grabung soll nun klären, warum die Schuhnägel sich ausgerechnet in jenem Teil so häufen und warum das Schlachtfeld in einigen Bereichen so gut erhalten ist. Die Schuhnägelfunde könnten darauf hinweisen, dass die Römer dort einen von Germanen besetzten Bergkamm stürmten.

Full story here.

Kalkriese - the German Evidence, part II

I had hoped for much more over the weekend on this year's excavations at Kalkriese, the site of the Battle of Teutoburg Forest in AD9. There was a brief note in the German tabloid Bild that work would focus on Germanic settlements near the battlefield - I mentioned it here.

But there has been little. Notes in the Neue Presse and WeltOnline.

More details in the Mindener Tagebatt. What has become clear is that the area around Kalkriese was not especially densely inhabited at the time of Arminius' uprising:

Bei der Auswahl der Grabungsorte habe man sich an älteren Grabungen aus den 90er Jahren orientiert, sagte Archäologin Susanne Wilbers-Rost. Von den aus Holz gebauten germanischen Häusern sind heute nur noch dunkle Verfärbungen in dem sandigen Boden in etwa dreißig Zentimetern Tiefe zu sehen. "Die Holzpfähle waren irgendwann weg, aber dafür rutschte Mutterboden von oben nach."

Die genaue Datierung der Siedlungsstelle soll später anhand von Keramik-Funden erfolgen. Die Arbeit der Archäologen gleiche einem Puzzle, erklärte Wilbers-Rost. Denn es gibt nicht nur menschliche Siedlungsspuren aus jüngerer Zeit, etwa dem Mittelalter. Auch Tiere haben Gänge in der Erde gegraben und damit Spuren hinterlassen.

Full story here.

Recent journalism - July

Recent journalism.

IFR - July 21. Tiers after the hangover on European bank covered bond issuance. Little supply, big demand on the lack of German Pfandbrief issuance. And Small beginnings on Asia ex Australia ex Japan issuance.

Health Investor - July. Australian healthcare market.

Kalkriese - the German Evidence

Hopefully there will be much more on this, but for the moment a brief NIB in Bild.de. The archaeological work at Kalkriese this season - until October - will focus on Germanic settlements near the battlefield, the site of the Battle of Teutoburg Forest in AD9. The outline of a Germanic house that dates roughly to the birth of Christ has been discovered:

Bei den Forschungen zur historischen Varusschlacht nehmen Wissenschaftler derzeit die Germanen in den Blick. Bereits im zweiten Jahr graben Archäologen nach germanischen Siedlungen im Umfeld des Schlachtfeldes, sagte am Mittwoch Prof. Günther Moosbauer von der Universität Osnabrück. «Es geht um Detailfragen, etwa: Wie ist das Schlachtfeld eingebettet in die Siedlungslandschaft?», erläuterte er. Noch bis Oktober wird gegraben. Die Forscher haben bereits den Grundriss eines germanischen Hauses aus der Zeit um Christi Geburt freigelegt. Kalkriese bei Osnabrück war Schauplatz einer Schlacht zwischen Römern und Germanen - wahrscheinlich der legendären Varusschlacht neun nach Christus.

Late Antique Head of Alexander Looted from Italy

Dorothy King at Lootbusters passed over details of a head of Alexander the Great (inv 468) which was stolen from the Museo Ostiense. What makes the head so interesting is that it dates to the fifth century AD. Who would have been commissioning so overtly classical a sculpture at such a late date? More photos here.

 

Histoire Auguste - Tome IV, 3e partie

A review at BMCR of François Paschoud (ed.), Histoire Auguste - Tome IV, 3e partie: Vies des Trente Tyrans et de Claude, a work that has been obsessing and frustrating me in equal quantities:

The Life of Claudius, according to Paschoud's calculations, is the book of the HA that contains the second smallest percentage of factual material (14%), outdone only by the book on the usurpers Firmus, Saturninus, Proculus and Bonosus, which contains not a single true piece of information. The few facts in the Life are diluted by the inclusion of many tedious false letters which are little more than enumerated lists of military supplies or gifts, and similarly tedious false reports of acclamations and oracles associated with the emperor. Still, the discursive introduction and the panegyrical treatment of Claudius as the ancestor of the supposed dedicatee, Constantius Caesar, are of some interest as literature, if not as biography.

Full review here.

RCAHMS "Disappointed" Over Merger With Historic Scotland

I had intended to write more fully about this, but the day is escaping from me. Following on from the announcement by culture secretary Fiona Hyslop on July 4 that the Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland (RCAHMS) was to be swallowed up by Historic Scotland, the commissioners from the RCAHMS have responded:

We are disappointed by the decision. We believe the reconstituted NDPB [non-departmental public body] option established in primary legislation, placing RCAHMS on a similar footing to other National Collections, would have best protected the functions and remit of the Commission, but we accept the Cabinet Secretary's right to decide otherwise.

Their full statement is here.

Emperor Julian and Sappho

A fascinating blog post by Jo Balmer about translating Sappho. If you haven’t read her poetry I would urge you to rush out straight away and buy Poems and Fragments and Chasing Catullus at the earliest opportunity.

She mentions a poem of Sappho – Fragment 48 - quoted by the Emperor Julian. This is how she translates it:

You’ve come and you -
                                                                 oh, I was longing for you -
                       have cooled my heart
                                                                 which was burning with desire

This struck me as slightly odd. Not the wonderful translation, but the reference to Julian. The overly-literary emperor cites much of the classical canon in his writings, but Sappho has never seemed his cup of tea. She is mentioned in only one oration - unsurprisingly in the Panegyric to Eusebia - and in his letters he cites Sappho only once (I don’t see either Ep 60 or Ep 63 as authentic).

Some time in AD361 to Alypius, the Antiochene-born vicarius of Britain, Julian writes (Ep 7):

It happened that when you sent me your map I had just recovered from my illness, but I was none the less glad on that account to receive the chart that you sent. For not only does it contain diagrams better than any hitherto made; but you have embellished it by adding those iambic verses, not such as “Sing the War of Bupalus,” as the poet of Cyrene [Callimachus] expresses it, but such as beautiful Sappho is wont to fashion for her songs.

Sappho Fragment 48 appears in Ep 77, a letter to Iamblichus.

"Thou hast come! well hast thou done!" You have indeed come, even though absent, by means of your letter - "And I was yearning for thee, and thou didst set ablaze my heart, already aflame with longing for thee." Nay, I neither refuse the lovephiltre nor do I ever leave you at all, but with my soul I behold you as though you were present, and am with you when absent, and nothing is enough to quench my insatiate desire.

It is of course apocryphally attributed to Julian. Iamblichus died in AD324 when Julian was just a boy. I have a recollection that the seven letters to Iamblichus might be attributed to Julian's maternal uncle who was the right age. Either way though it is authentic Sappho.

 

Late Antique Crossbow Fibula Looted from Turin

Dorothy King at Lootbusters passed over details of a crossbow fibula which was stolen from the Museo d'Antichita in Turin. It can be dated fairly precisely to AD306-307 thanks to the two inscriptions: CONSTANTINE CAES VIVAS and HERCULI CAES VIVAS.

The most recent analysis of the fibula is by Barbara Leppert-Lippitz in "A Late Antique Crossbow Fibula", Metropolitan Museum Journal 35 (2000), pp39-70, especially pp49-50. She writes:

The inscription, CONSTANTINE CAES VIVAS (May Constantine caesar live)… is an indisputable reference to the emperor who was going to have a greater impact on history than any other of the tetrarchs, the future augustus Constantine the Great. More difficult is the other part of the inscription, HERCULI CAES VINCAS (May Herculius caesar win). When in 305 the first two augusti were followed by Constantinius Chlorus in the west and Galerius in the east, Galerius had secured the appointment of men who were primarily obligated to him as the new caesar. Maxentius and Constantine, the sons respectively of the former augustus, Maximianus Herculius, and his successor, Constantius Chlorus, had been passed over in favor of a certain Flavius Valerius Severus as the western caesar and Maximinus Daza as his eastern counterpart. As a result, this second tetrarchy lasted only one year. In 306, at the death of Constantius Chlorus, the army raised his son Constantine to the purple, and Galerius accepted the fait accompli to avoid civil war. Constantius's legal successor, Severus, was raised to the senior position of augustus and Constantine became the fourth member of the second tetrarchy as caesar in the western part of the empire. The inscription on the fibula is an interesting political statement, attributing to Constantine's position as caesar a legitimacy which dejure it did not have.

Constantine remained the Herculius caesar for a very short period, from July 25, 306, to March 31, 307, before he assumed the title of augustus. If both parts of the inscription refer to Constantine, then the period during which the fibula in Turin was made is limited to less than a year.

See also discussion of the fibula in R. Noll, “Eine goldene ‘Kaiserfibel’ aus Niederemmel vom Jahre 316,” Bonner Jahrbücher 174 (1974), pp 221-43 and M. Mowat, “Notice de quelques bijoux d’or au nom de Constantin,” Memoires de la Societe Nationale des Antiquaires de France 50 (1889), pp 321-28. The Met Museum article is here and details at Lootbusters - with pix - here.

A Mithraeum in Inveresk, Scotland

A Mithraeum has been found at the second century – Antonine – Roman fort of Inveresk in Scotland. All of the details with analysis and pictures are in a fantastically detailed post at Roger Pearce's blog. Definitely worth a read.