Among the various questions I was asked, one stands out because it is a question that I never thought to ask when I was an undergraduate student myself and only recently became aware of.  There are important implications for historical study when the necessary primary sources are not only unavailable but, in all likelihood, no longer exist at all.

This student was looking for a primary source similar in scope and detail to Suetonius’ Twelve Caesars which ends with the death of the third Flavian emperor, Domitian in AD 98.  The most obvious extension of Suetonius’ work is of course the Historia Augusta that chronicles the reign of Hadrian beginning in AD 117 to Carinus in AD 284.  Written during the reigns of Diocletian and Constantine (Diocletian reigned from AD 284 until his abdication in AD 305; Constantine reigned from AD 306-337 and was sole emperor from AD 324 until his death), the authors of this document claim to be picking up precisely where Suetonius left off.  This of course suggests that the reigns of the Five Good Emperors and that of Trajan were once included in this compilation as well and have since disappeared.

More recently, scholars have disputed this claim, stating that there is nothing to suggest that the Historia Augusta ever contained the histories of emperors prior to Hadrian.  So where did we get the information on these emperors?  And what can be said about the information from the Historia Augusta on the emperors from Hadrian to Carinus?

At this stage, I will address the latter question.  The Historia Augusta is not a primary source for the second half of the second century AD.  It was written nearly one hundred years later by an author, or multiple authors (that debate still rages as well), who could not have seen the events they described unless they lived well into their hundreds (as unlikely 2,000 years ago as it is today).  Therefore it is a wonderful primary source for the fourth century AD but must be taken with grains of salt regarding the second.  It is also largely agreed that the information in the opening pages of the HA are much more reasonably objective than the grossly unsubstantiated details in the later chapters, where chronologies and events vary sometimes by decades.

In situations like this – and, in fact, it is good academic practice to take every primary source at less than face value – we can compare and contrast the primary sources that are available to paint a fuller picture of events at a given point in time.  What the HA cannot offer with reasonable accuracy, we can sometimes find in other sources, such as the letters of Simon bar Kochba written during the Second Jewish Rebellion in AD 132-136, the report on aqueducts written by Rome’s Water Commissioner, Sextus Julius Frontinus, in the first century AD, and even other historical treatises that may be Roman but do not represent eye-witness accounts or living testaments to the nature of the world in the second century AD.

One must look at historical evidence with the same discerning eye that a jury considers witness statements during a trial.  Are they trustworthy accounts?  Is there something about one account that makes more or less sense than another?  Are there details that do not quite fit that you feel would benefit from further study to confirm or deny?  Remember, what you might consider an outlandish description may in fact have more grounding in truth that you would expect.

Never assume, always corroborate.  Happy hunting!

The wall once ran right across northern England for 117km and cut off the Caledonian ‘barbarians’ from the romanized civilians to the south.  Hadrian built it as part of his campaign of peace and stabilitythroughout the empire (he also had another border built along the farthest reaches of Roman Africa.   Following the massive expansion efforts under Trajan (including the conquest of Dacia in AD 106 and the campaigns against the Parthians beginning in AD 107), Hadrian was faced with a formidable task when he came to power following Trajan’s death in AD 117:  how to consolidate power and stabilize the Roman empire when it had been overstretched for far too long.  Among his various solutions – some successful, some not – were the construction of the wall in Britain and the huge pallisade across North Africa.

Among the benefits of such an undertaking, the construction of Hadrian’s Wall in Britain kept some potentially rebellious soldiers occupied with other tasks.  The wall took years to build as legionaries dug the foundation from the cold, wet clay-mud of northern England and built the forts and milecastles to maintain security at the Empire’s northern border.

The Wall is a rather surprising thing to see, particularly when you only realise after the fact that you have indeed seen it.  During one train trip to Edinburgh, the train I was on passed by a rural neighbourhood near the east coast and there, nestled in a little valley between the train tracks and a farm house, was a small pile of cut stone.  Nothing so spectacular as some of the taller sections and certainly less impressive than the restored section of the wall, this little bit of Hadrian’s political power was enough to catch in my throat all the history that it stood for, and still does stand for.

Also from The Guardian, here is a cute little video of the lighting of the wall this weekend.  THe music may be a bit schmalzy, but it’s a lovely event none-the-less.

No matter how skillful these translations, Virgil’s Latin suffers far more in translation than does Homeric Greek. It’s worth learning Latin just to read the “Aeneid.”

Clearly there are some people who enjoyed translating the mightily convoluted 4th Eclogue more than my high school latin class who condemned the technicolour sheep for their very presence in our busy lives.

Not to condemn the value of learning Latin, of course.  Yes, to read the Aeneid, you must have some sincere appreciation for the beauty of the language Virgil uses throughout his poetic epic.  But you need that same appreciation to recognize Caesar’s wit and political prowess, to sympathize with Catullus’ sparrow, and to understand what a conceited wretch Cicero really was.  To know the people, you must know the language so that you can know how they thought about the world they lived in.  It’s as simple as that.

Most recently – and, as far as I’m aware, not the first time this has been implemented – a group of archaeologist who discovered a huge sealed urn utilized the X-ray machines at the Exeter Airport to determine what was inside it.  The answer was the remains of a Roman, discovered at the site of a Roman fort at St. Andrews Hill in Cullompton.

From the dates of the fort and of the urn, it appears that this site was abandoned shortly after the Romans established more definite control over the south coast of England.  This would have been years after the Boudiccan Revolt of 60-61 AD/CE and well after the sweeping invasions of Aulus Plautius during the reign of Claudius (41-54 AD/CE).  In AD/CE 43, distinguished senator Aulus Plautius landed at Rutupiae with four legions:  the Second Augusta, the Ninth Hispania, the Fourteenth Gemina and the Twentieth Valeria Victrix.  The Ninth Hispania would later march north in 117 AD/CE to support the defeat of an uprising and were never heard from again (although it is argued that they survived their stint in Britain and were thereafter posted to the East, where they were destroyed during the Bar Kochba Revolt in Judaea) .  The Second Augusta was commanded by the future emperor Vespasian, sweeping through the countryside to Wales, where they established their base of operations at Caerleon in the Usk valley.

My Italian is very mediocre but it seems that, from the quote offered, Mr. Vierin feels that archaeological work allows Italy to continue to develop an understanding of her history and her cultural heritage and that the discovery of this head exemplifies and reinforces that.

If anyone sees when the English reports on this find become available, perhaps a specialist will be able to translate the information more effectively.

*Many thanks to the Rogue Classicist for bringing this to my attention to begin with.

The site is 8 metres under water and boasts a huge set of granite doors, remarkably still sealed.  The Greek archaeological team who has been conducting work off the coast of Alexandria in past years feel that this could be the entrance to the Pharaoh’s tomb and could, due to the intact seal, possibly contain the remains of Cleopatra herself.  Is the mighty Queen of Egypt still lying at rest behind the huge gateway?  Is Antony there with her?  Will we finally see the face of, perhaps, the most famous woman in human history?

Forensic anthropologists have long considered the discovery of Cleopatra’s body to be the highest honour of facial reconstructive specialists.  If her remains can be scanned, a 3-D image of her skull could be digitized and we might finally know whether the greatest seductress of the Ancient World is as beautiful now as she was then.

Archaeology Magazine’s website has an excellent list compiled from the summer 2009 season of underwater sites that made the news when they first appeared but have since fallen out of the public eye, as the intensive archaeological excavations and analyses continue.  In particular, a Phoenician ship discovered off the coast of Cartagena has yielded vital information suggesting that Phoenician traders were interacting with peoples on the Atlantic coast west of the Straits of Gibraltar in the sixth century BCE.  There is also evidence of the diet – primarily nuts – that these ancient sailors could have expected during these long merchant voyages.  A Roman stone carrier was also discovered and, four years on, the site is still thrilling archaeologists.  Nautical archaeologist Deborah Carlson notes that this ship was carrying a marble column that, once assembled, would have been 30 feet high and included a Doric capitol.

There was also a Roman sewn ship discovered in Croatia in May of 2009 at the site of ongoing excavations of the Roman town of Kissa that has sunk into Caska Bay since the Romans inhabited it.  The remains of this ship will enlighten researchers about the process of manufacturing such a light, portable vehicle in this area of the Roman world.

The English Heritage website has also compiled a short list of ongoing projects in the UK that, from the moment of their identification, have had the Roman archaeological world all atwitter.  The most obvious of these are the Chester amphitheatre first discovered in 2004, the Roman villa at Groundwell Ridge, and the Cawthorn Roman camps.

Surprisingly missing from this list is the 2005 discovery of a Roman circus in Colchester, the first of its kind to be found in Britain, thus dispelling all theories about British art depicting the horse races based on stories and travels disseminated to the natives by non-Britons.  This discovery followed quickly on the heels of that of the amphitheatre at the same site in 2004.  The circus has been commemorated with a mosaic created in the Roman tradition by modern artists, and its unveiling was captured in this youtube video.

Also missing from the English Heritage site is the work currently ongoing at the site of the London amphitheatre, discovered in 1988 underneath the late medieval Guildhall of Britain’s capital.  An impressive if surprisingly short tour of the archaeological remains is available, after descending through the Guildhall Art Gallery into the dark underground beneath the Guildhall plaza itself.  Engineers have included a slate ring on the outer floor of this plaza that identifies the limits of the original Roman arena.

The Sagalassos Archaeological Project in recent years has yielded some of the most amazing artifacts ever discovered.  The site, first identified in the nineteenth century by French archaeologists, has since been found to include a large bath complex.  Beginning in July 2007, archaeologists discovered the remains of colossi of Hadrian, the Empress Faustina, and the Emperor Marcus Aurelius.  The colossus of Hadrian made its international debut at the British Museum’s ‘Hadrian:  Empire and Conflict’ exhibition.  The hope is that excavations in coming years will reveal colossal statues for each of the three remaining alcoves in the frigidarium of the baths, perhaps representing the Emperor Antoninus Pius, Hadrian’s wife Sabina, and Marcus Aurelius’ wife Faustina the Younger.  This find potentially represents the first example of imperial statuary limited to a single family, the Antonids, the last three of the traditional Five Good Emperors.

The Pylos Regional Archaeological Project concluded in 2005 after fifteen years of work in Greece at a Bronze Age site dubbed the ‘Palace of Nestor’, after the famously wise king of Homeric epic.  At this point, research and analysis are continuing in the lab and office to compile a publication of this successful dig.

In 2008, news came through the wire from the Egyptian Higher Council of Antiquities that archaeologists had eliminated all but three possible locations of the tomb of the Pharaoh Cleopatra and her doomed lover, the Roman general Marc Antony.  Excavations have, as of October 2009, resumed in Egypt at a site 50 kilometres from Alexandria in the hopes of unearthing the final resting place of this infamous pair.

What is being called the Staffordshire Hoard - a massive find of 1500 gold and silver pieces, larger than the famous Sutton Hoo hoard by a remarkable 6kg – has formally become part of the Department of Prehistory and Europe’s displays at the British Museum.  These pieces, featuring some of the most exquisite goldworking known from the Anglo-Saxon world, was discovered in September 2009 by amateur archaeologist Terry Herbert using a metal detector on a farm in Southern Staffordshire.  Dated to approximately the seventh century, it is the largest gold hoard ever discovered and has been equated with the Lindisfarne Gospels and the Book of Kells for its priceless value to the study of this period of history.

The mighty Perseus Digital Library continues to grow, with further texts by Seneca, Quintillian, Flaccus, Cicero, Aulus Gellius, Ammianus and Petronius.  In addition, they are looking to expand their Greek word database, improve their general searchability, and have recently announced the first release of their Arabic Collection.

And finally, for all those literary projects that I have not yet mentioned, the Athena Review has a substantial and comprehensive list of ongoing work worldwide.

Onward!

NOTE:  The titular quote is from Poem 54, line 63, by Michelangelo Buonarroti as translated by Anthony Mortimer.

15,000 square meters in size, its main hall is complete with a luxurious marble floor quarried in North Africa and includes two other rooms with excellent mosaics.

Vespasian, who came to power with the support of the legions in the East in 69 CE, concluding the bloody upheaval of the Year of the Four Emperors, was known for his stingy financial policies and his minimalist living style.  His financial strategy can be linked to the incredible spending of the Emperor Nero that nearly bankrupted Rome and left the coffers empty.  Vespasian himself cultivated the image of the simple man, being the first Roman emperor who was not from a patrician family, and much preferred his provincial home to his house on the Palatine (that his son, the third Flavian emperor, expanded into a much more ostentatious palatial residence).

Vespasian’s villa at Falacrinae was the family home, the place where he himself was born, and may also be the place where he died in 79 CE uttering the famous line from Suetonius:  “Oh dear, I think I’m becoming a god”, a joke on the Roman Senate’s readiness to deify recently deceased emperors.  Vespasian was indeed deified on his death, having left the Roman Empire stable in its finances and its borders, and generally being recognized as an excellent ruler after decades of sordid, selfish, and unpredictable Julio-Claudians.

The battle on the Plains of Abraham took place on 13th September 1759 and represents the reversal of fortunes for France in its competition with England over control of North America.  The French lost.  Their general, the Marquis de Montcalm, engaged the enemy English from outside the walls of Quebec City and was soundly defeated by forces under the command of General James Wolfe, who himself died at the site.  Although there would be other battles, some won by the French, and others by the English, by 1763, the Seven Years’ War was concluded with the Treaty of Paris, and France relinquished all control over its American colonies.  Canada thus became British North America and, a little more than a decade later, after the American colonies to the south declared their independence and won the Revolutionary War, would remain the last bastion of British imperial interests on this continent.

Now, 18th century history is not my forte, and it never has been.  I simply could never work up the enthusiasm for a period of history so closely resembling my own.  Nearly every 18th century historian would vehemently argue this point, that the century was more than unique and more than distant, that it was something incredibly original and diverse and worth studying in extremes.  That is how I feel about Roman history, and I applaud the enthusiasm of anyone who loves such a thing so much that they want to learn every last spec of detail about it.

The re-enactment of the battle on the Plains of Abraham was to be an excellent way to show the immediacy of Canadian history and the value of knowing about it.  And in a way, it did.  Separatists in Quebec went up in arms over the proposed staging of the ‘conquest’ of French Canada by the English and, in the end, the re-enactment went ahead 250 miles away in New York State.  Globe and Mail feature writer Ian Brown reported on the success and failure of this historical event.

All the participants involved were shocked and appalled when it was decided that the re-enactment could not take place because it would insult French Canadian history.  A celebration of a ‘conquest’ can be nothing but that.  Arguably, when the Eurostar high-speed train service between Paris and London was begun, and it was decided that the trains would leave from a rejuvenated St. Pancras International train station rather than Waterloo, to avoid the awkwardity of French passengers disembarking at a station named after the site of Napoleon’s greatest defeat, the situation is very similar.  But as re-enactors state, this was not an event meant to tarnish the indelible stamp that French culture has added to Canadian history, but rather to bring history closer to a country that may have lost touch or lost interest.

The interest is certainly still there.  In a way, trying to bring back the immediacy of Canadian history has been a success, because the social and political implications and tensions rose up like a geiser when the event was suggested.  Clearly history in Canada is not nearly as far removed from modern society as an ancient historian like myself would believe.  Even though the event had to be moved away from the site of the original battle, and even though this caused hurt and outrage among those wishing to celebrate history as a shared concept as well as those who do not wish to celebrate the changing tide of history, it shows that the events of history still resonate in startling ways more than 200 years later.

If people can get this emotional and this involved in the reproduction of historical events, can we not also claim a proximity to history that is more than immediate, more than latent, but still inextricably bound to our self-definition as Canadians?  Such a wonderful thought appeals on so many levels that I could not help but comment on it here.

Ventotene was famous in antiquity for being the island upon which noble ladies of Roman society were exiled to for committing heinous acts of adultery or treason.  Among the most unfortunate of these ladies was the only child of the emperor Augustus himself.  He exiled his daughter Julia there after discovering an affair that could have severely damaged the image of the imperial family as one embodying the most traditional of Roman virtues.

Archaeologists are hopeful that, among the delicious cargo, the ships may yield imperial correspondence from between the first century BCE and the fourth century CE.