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Roman Resources
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Praefectus Praetorio
R.I.P. Brother of the Quill
Roman clothing came up in another thread. Here is a nice drawing
For those interested in illustrating or describing classic Romans, these are a excellent articles:
For those interested in illustrating or describing classic Romans, these are a excellent articles:
Praefectus Praetorio
R.I.P. Brother of the Quill
For those who longed to make their own homemade version of the ubiquitous Roman condiment, Garum. Without spending two months polluting the neighborhood air.
malins
Stumbling Seeker
Ha I did not actually know that!
Frank Petrexa
Tribune
Volcanoes take the blame for everything--enough already! Tell it to Cleopatra!
www.cnn.com
Scientists identify Alaskan volcano that may have helped the rise of the Roman Empire
What does an Alaskan volcano called Okmuk have to do with the assassination of Julius Caesar in ancient Rome and the rise of the Roman Empire? More than you might think, according to a new study from an international group of scientists and historians.
RacingRodent
Consul
Volcanoes take the blame for everything--enough already! Tell it to Cleopatra!
Scientists identify Alaskan volcano that may have helped the rise of the Roman Empire
What does an Alaskan volcano called Okmuk have to do with the assassination of Julius Caesar in ancient Rome and the rise of the Roman Empire? More than you might think, according to a new study from an international group of scientists and historians.
Fascinating, as much as humans imagine they are separate from nature it is affecting them all the time.
willowfall
Senator
Except that is an incredible stretch by the authors to prove a pet theory. For example the article states that Sicily had been a candidate for the explosion. Sicily had been in the center of Med civilization for centuries by the time Caesar was killed. ANY major explosion in Sicily would have gone into the books but they were looking at it as a candidate?
Mother Nature does have an extremely nasty habit of doing what she wants even if it inconveniences us. But I am a big believer in Occam's Razor (find the simplest explanation and you are probably right).
The Republic had been tottering for quite a while (anybody remember Sulla or the "Social War") when ole Julius made his power grab and the boys who had power objected to losing it. A pretty conventional political story. That environmental\social conditions made it easier for both sides to make their move? No doubt, it always does, nobody throws a successful social revolution in a stable prosperous environment.
But no volcano in Alaska caused the Roman Republic to just tip over.
kisses
willowfall
RacingRodent
Consul
But the 'pet' theory discusses the impact of the eruptions as contributory rather than causal.
Praefectus Praetorio
R.I.P. Brother of the Quill
Especially since volcanos in Alaska are notorious for false eruptions.
Eruption hoax
On April 1, 1974, a local prankster named Oliver "Porky" Bickar ignited 70 old tires[9] in the crater, which he had flown in for an April Fools' Day joke.[10] The dark smoke rising from the crater convinced nearby residents of Sitka, Alaska, that the volcano was erupting. The hoax was soon revealed, as around the rim of the volcano, "April Fool" was spray-painted in 50-foot (15 m) letters. The Guardian reports that Bickar had been planning the prank for four years, and lists it among the ten best Aprils Fools hoaxes of all time.
My daughter lived in Sitka at the time.
That brings back a dear memory, Velut Luna gave me a recipe for Garum when we were working on Amica, she said she'd made it herself, I admit I've not tried it, though I do make some delicious Neapolitan dishes she taught me.
Indeed, although the actual recipe remains a secret, the ingredients have to be listed on the bottle these days, they are: malt vinegar (from barley), spirit vinegar, molasses, sugar, salt, anchovies, tamarind, onions, garlic and spices. The story is that, in Lea and Perrins chemists' shop in Worcester in 1837, a barrel of spice vinegar made to an Indian recipe for a customer but never collected was left for some years in a cellar. It began to ferment (possibly because one of the ingredients was soy sauce). The shopkeeper was minded to throw it away, but tasted a little and decided it was worth bottling and selling as sauce. 'The Original and Genuine' Worcestershire Sauce these days is fermented for 18 months. It doesn't contain soy sauce, but it is very popular in Japan and China because it has the same 'umami' flavour.
Loxuru
Graf von Kreuzigung
The climate cooling during Julius Caesar's lifetime is generally known, and explains movements of tribes living in the Alps, because their territories were threatened by colder weather and hence they risked starvations. These movements into other's terrritory were the pretext for Julius Caesar to invade Gallia, in 58 BC. So, it was already going on for a while, when JC was assassinated in 44 BC. ItGlobal cooling also explains the interest in Egypt, since Egypt produced plenty of grain, while agriculture production in parts of Italy was also under pressure by the colder climate. Rome turned to Egypt for food, like the USA does today with Saudi Arabia for oil.
Praefectus Praetorio
R.I.P. Brother of the Quill
Eulalia! You have exploded one of my dearest beliefs. I have loved L&P on steak since a wee one. I always believed that it was "from the recipe of a nobleman in the county" to be precise, Marcus Sandys, 3rd Baron Sandys who had served in Bengal and tasted a fish sauce there which he asked them to recreate! An accidental putrifaction!!
Owned by the American Company Kraft Heinz
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malins
Stumbling Seeker
I've never tried making anything like that
-- neither garum nor Worcestershire sauce; I did try a a kind of Branston's pickle emulation 
willowfall
Senator
Minor correction here, while the US did import oil from the Middle East (making your comparison valid) it no longer does we protect the oil for the rest of the world.
Heating and cooling periods have historically affected human civilizations. When the Vikings arrived in America they called it Vineland even though they didn't get far enough south to get to what would be considered grape growing country today (but they also called that giant block of ice "Greenland" so maybe they were just the first practicing deception thru marketing).
When drilling for oil in the North Sea they have pulled up remnants of Neolithic settlements that occupied the land bridge between the UK and Europe. At the last glacial maxim (approximately 17,000 years ago) the oceans were about 500 ft lower than they are today. Meaning there was no Persian Gulf, English Channel or Long Island Sound.
There are plenty of records indicating mini-ice ages since the time of Rome.
ALL of North Africa (Egypt being the most prominent) was once the bread basket of the Roman Empire. Today they hardly grow enough to feed themselves.
Resource rich countries have always trade away high-end goods for basic items and agrarian societies have been happy to trade their surplus food for things they can't make themselves.
The reality is the planet has a life cycle of its own, does what it wants (whether that inconveniences us or not) and we adapt or get wiped out. Adaptions include seizing resources, adapting plants from far places to grow in new places or simply getting up and moving to a more hospitable place.
It is only our cultural arrogance which makes some of us think we are above it all, can control it or have the planet stay the way WE'd like it to be.
kisses
willowfall
My corner of Scotland is still bouncing back after the most recent glaciation, about 10,000 years back. The relative sea-level is dropping at about 1mm a year - may not seem much, but when the Romans came the sea-level would have been getting on for 2 metres higher than today, which meant the tide flowed a significant way further up the river estuaries than it does now, and helps explain the locations of Roman camps and crossing-places.
Of course if global warming melts the Greenland ice-sheet, the sea could rise very quickly back to Roman level or even higher.
twonines
LIMERICUS
I believe Eulalia`s version is correct.Eulalia! You have exploded one of my dearest beliefs. I have loved L&P on steak since a wee one. I always believed that it was "from the recipe of a nobleman in the county" to be precise, Marcus Sandys, 3rd Baron Sandys who had served in Bengal and tasted a fish sauce there which he asked them to recreate! An accidental putrifaction!!
View attachment 871112View attachment 871113
Owned by the American Company Kraft Heinz
In Yorkshire we are more likely to use Hendersons Relish which is made in Sheffield and, as far as I know, is still owned by the original company.
The naming of Greenland was a deliberate decision by Erik the Red, who said people would be more likely drawn to settle there if it had an appealing name. This was a man who had sailed west from Iceland due to disputes with neighbours that led to killings and exile.
His son Leif Erikson mounted the expedition that found what they called Vinland, even though it was almost certainly in the northern part of North America. Kathy might know something about the Norse remains that have been found in Newfoundland.
L’Anse aux Meadows National Historic Site
At the tip of the Great Northern Peninsula of the island of Newfoundland, the remains of an 11th-century Viking settlement are evidence of the first European presence in North America. The excavated remains of ...
whc.unesco.org
The two versions are not incompatible, it seems that Baron Sandys may have been the customer who ordered the concoction but either forgot to collect it or didn't like the look/ smell of it and left it with the chemists.Eulalia! You have exploded one of my dearest beliefs. I have loved L&P on steak since a wee one. I always believed that it was "from the recipe of a nobleman in the county" to be precise, Marcus Sandys, 3rd Baron Sandys who had served in Bengal and tasted a fish sauce there which he asked them to recreate! An accidental putrifaction!!
View attachment 871112View attachment 871113
Owned by the American Company Kraft Heinz
Indeed, it has been swallowed up in the ever bigger maw of Kraft Heinz. They tried tinkering with the recipe but, at least in Britain, there was an outcry, sales plummeted, they saw the error of their ways.