Roman Resources

[Eulalia]

l'bogo explains the straps on her feet aren't really sandals, like the ones round her wrists, they're to hold her still while the nails are driven in, and ensure she doesn't pull herself free - a kind of belt and braces job! The leather straps would only be strengthened with a soaking of blood, and could well be re-used.

 

[Frank Petrexa]

Specimeat is in Ibiza in the Baleares, Phoenician Ibissim, Roman Ebusa - I'm the one in the Northern Forest - where it doesn't change much all the year round, the days just get longer or shorter, but it goes on being wet, windy but (at least in the sheltered glens and down near the sea) quite mild.

Yes, sorry, I didn't pay close attention.
All I can think of when I think of the Balearic Islands is jellyfish--I read that the Mediterranean is teeming with them because the water has warmed up, and "las playas en Espan~a" are having problems. I imagine stuff is coming north in the Irish Sea, as well. I know the Great White sharks seem to be hanging out for more months off New England--there was a fatality in Maine this summer from a shark attack. (Sorry, I tend to free associate.)

 

[Frank Petrexa]

Yes, I suppose a large unit, like a whole legion, on the move would have had a pretty massive back-up of transport, and a supply of premium crux-wood with hammers and nails would undoubtedly have been among the top-priority equipment. Probably in convertible kit form - a bridge, a couple of siege-engines, or 100 crosses, depending what's needed.

Josephus does say that during Titus' siege of Jerusalem the Romans ran out of wood for the crosses and nailed people to the walls of the city.

 

[Frank Petrexa]

The timber that the Romans brought during the war campaigns was also used for the construction of the bridges, which were works of high engineering. The Romans built a cantilevered structure, starting from one bank to reach the opposite one without entering the water.

When I read Caesar in Latin class, I remember being amazed at how much work the troops put into building the "oppida", even when they weren't going to be there all that long. Engineering is vital to any army.
(I imagine the Romans had to solve this problem as well.)

 

[specimeat]

Yes, sorry, I didn't pay close attention.
All I can think of when I think of the Balearic Islands is jellyfish--I read that the Mediterranean is teeming with them because the water has warmed up, and "las playas en Espan~a" are having problems. I imagine stuff is coming north in the Irish Sea, as well. I know the Great White sharks seem to be hanging out for more months off New England--there was a fatality in Maine this summer from a shark attack. (Sorry, I tend to free associate.)

They sometines visit, maybe around 5% of the time in summer and less than 1% when not in summer. It depends a lot of the beach, the geography and the currents force them in or out. For instance, they're very unusual in the area where i live, but there've been problems with them in beaches like Es Viver or Atlantis. A warning flag is raised when large amounts of them are detected, though. We have MedusApp too.

 

[Praefectus Praetorio]

Of course it was very practical for the Romans that there were also very large cinnabar deposits in Spain, where they got large quantities of mercury.
(Later, in the age of their own colonial conquests, the Spaniards would actually transport mercury to the Americas in order to use it for gold extraction there)
One important step in purifying the metals was driving out lead impurities at high temperatures - basically boiling it off - which led to a very widespread lead pollution signature from Roman metallurgy, that's also clearly detectable for instance in Greenland ice cores.
(It has been used as a proxy to judge the ups and downs of economic activity in the Roman Empire)

 

[malins]

small scale 'artisanal' gold mining is going on in a lot of poorer places of the world,
and a lot of people depend on it for income...
probably even more so with the combination of economic crisis plus rising gold prices.
A lot of people suffer from mercury poisoning due to this,
and it also affects populations & the environment beyond those directly involved in the gold mining.

Alternative methods like borax are safer ...
and there are a number of initiatives to bring knowledge of safer alternative extraction methods to communities who depend on artisanal gold mining for income,

but as far as we know the Romans, and also the colonial Spaniards had no knowledge yet of this gold extraction technique.
(ancient civilizations did use borax, for instance for glazing or even as a metallurgic flux ... which isn't far from the application here ... but probably the gold extraction method became feasible only after the wide availability of cheap borax from the 19th century onward...)

 

[l'bogo]

The timber that the Romans brought during the war campaigns was also used for the construction of the bridges, which were works of high engineering. The Romans built a cantilevered structure, starting from one bank to reach the opposite one without entering the water.

....an example of how the Romans built cantilevered and self-locking bridges:

this is only a pedestrian bridge with limited span, but the construction principle is the same for much longer and wider bridges.
The poles were tied with ropes to ensure stability to the structure but not strictly essential, a modest seat along the trunk was sufficient to almost make a joint.

 

[Eulalia]

small scale 'artisanal' gold mining is going on in a lot of poorer places of the world,
and a lot of people depend on it for income...
probably even more so with the combination of economic crisis plus rising gold prices.
A lot of people suffer from mercury poisoning due to this,
and it also affects populations & the environment beyond those directly involved in the gold mining.

Alternative methods like borax are safer ...
and there are a number of initiatives to bring knowledge of safer alternative extraction methods to communities who depend on artisanal gold mining for income,

but as far as we know the Romans, and also the colonial Spaniards had no knowledge yet of this gold extraction technique.
(ancient civilizations did use borax, for instance for glazing or even as a metallurgic flux ... which isn't far from the application here ... but probably the gold extraction method became feasible only after the wide availability of cheap borax from the 19th century onward...)

I know folk who go panning for gold in burns in the Galloway hills, and more in parts of the Highlands. And they find small quantities. In fact, there was more gold than silver in Scotland, so when the Romans were wanting to keep the warlords north of the Wall on-side, they found they were more excited by silver than by gold!

 

[Eulalia]

Yes, sorry, I didn't pay close attention.
All I can think of when I think of the Balearic Islands is jellyfish--I read that the Mediterranean is teeming with them because the water has warmed up, and "las playas en Espan~a" are having problems. I imagine stuff is coming north in the Irish Sea, as well. I know the Great White sharks seem to be hanging out for more months off New England--there was a fatality in Maine this summer from a shark attack. (Sorry, I tend to free associate.)

Jelllyfish do turn up in the sea round my way, sometimes in quite large quantities, more so in the Clyde estuary. I think I've heard from those who study such things that some warmer-water species are turning up, as are many other creatures, but it's more a matter of new species than greater quantities.

 

[l'bogo]

....an example of how the Romans built cantilevered and self-locking bridges:

View attachment 901342 this is only a pedestrian bridge with limited span, but the construction principle is the same for much longer and wider bridges.
The poles were tied with ropes to ensure stability to the structure but not strictly essential, a modest seat along the trunk was sufficient to almost make a joint.

Now we can explore the construction phases.

F1. Base construction on the reachable side :
F2. First four cantilever beams:
F3. Adding the first cross beam:
F4. Laying of the service walkways:

... to be continued

 

[l'bogo]

F5. Adding the second cross beam: which must be linked to the four cantilever beams with ropes.

F6. Insertion of the cantilever beams of the central span: to which the end cross beam is added.
F7. Advancement of the cantilever beams: to which the second cross beam is added.

In these phases the cantilever beams are counterbalanced with the use of counterweights and restrained with ropes.

 

[l'bogo]

F8. Full extension of the cantilevered central span: Also In this phase the midspan cantilever beams are counterbalanced with the use of counterweights and restrained with ropes.

 

[l'bogo]

F9. Laying of the service walkways:

F10. Laying of the beams towards the opposite bank:

At this point we proceed with the completion of the structure.

 

[l'bogo]

F11. Base construction on the opposite bank:
F12. Completion of the walkways and beams of the central span:

 

[l'bogo]

F13. The bridge was completed with the laying of the overstructure:

F14. View of the beams that form the supporting structure of the bridge:

 

[l'bogo]

F15. Static testing:

Thus Roman engineering made it possible to reach the borders of the Empire up to Hadrian's Wall!

 

[flesh1]

The Whipping Game

In the etruscan necropolis of Monterozzi, by Tarquinia, on the tyrrhenian coast more or less 100 kms north of Roma, there is an ancient tomb in which there are frescos of erotic subject.
The actors are two men and a woman. In one of these scenes the woman is whipped and spanked while she is giving a blowjob to a guy and is penetrated – it's impossible to determine whether vaginally or anally – by the other, and these are hitting her buttocks with a thin rod – presumably an olive rod that is very flexible – and the hand.
Here is the picture:



The other fresco shows two men and a woman, presumably the same actors of the first scene, while standing penetrate the woman between them from the front and the backside.
This fresco is very ruined and barely distinguishable, but the subject is that.
There is another tomb frescoed with erotic subjects, the Tomb of the Bulls, in which we can see a woman fucked by a man while she is lying on the back of another man.
Here is the picture:



The age of these tombs is about 500 b.C. And the next century Etruria was occupied by the Romans and shortly after melted with their civilization becoming part of the latin culture.

Sex was a very important part in the life of Etruscans, many ancient historians said that these people used to banquet with servant waiting on diners and guests completely naked and very often banquests finished in gang bangs.

Some archaeologists have assumed that their tombs reflected the concepts of life between Etruscans: these tombs consist of underground burial chambers reachable through a sort of descending corridor, the dromos, representing the vagina leading to the uterus of the Earth; while when you are born you get out of the womb through the vagina, when you die you cross backwards the vagina (dromos) reaching the uterus (the burial chamber) and from there to an after life physical dimension.


According to this view, acquire a logical sense the images of frescoed doors on the walls of the chamber as you can see in this picture:



That is supposed to be the door separating the life from the after life , a “utriusque naturae vinculum”, the hinge between two worlds. There are three doors actually in that tomb. There are also tombs in which the frescoed door is half open, so the owner spares the fatighe to open it to go through it to the other dimension.

25 centuries separate us from them and many things have changed, but the humankind is the same, and now we like whipping games during sex as 25 centuries ago.

We say that “tira più un pelo di fregna che 100 bovi di Maremma” - is more powerful a cunt hair than 100 oxen leading a cart.

 

[RacingRodent]

The Whipping Game

In the etruscan necropolis of Monterozzi, by Tarquinia, on the tyrrhenian coast more or less 100 kms north of Roma, there is an ancient tomb in which there are frescos of erotic subject.
The actors are two men and a woman. In one of these scenes the woman is whipped and spanked while she is giving a blowjob to a guy and is penetrated – it's impossible to determine whether vaginally or anally – by the other, and these are hitting her buttocks with a thin rod – presumably an olive rod that is very flexible – and the hand.
Here is the picture:

View attachment 903950

The other fresco shows two men and a woman, presumably the same actors of the first scene, while standing penetrate the woman between them from the front and the backside.
This fresco is very ruined and barely distinguishable, but the subject is that.
There is another tomb frescoed with erotic subjects, the Tomb of the Bulls, in which we can see a woman fucked by a man while she is lying on the back of another man.
Here is the picture:

View attachment 903951

The age of these tombs is about 500 b.C. And the next century Etruria was occupied by the Romans and shortly after melted with their civilization becoming part of the latin culture.

Sex was a very important part in the life of Etruscans, many ancient historians said that these people used to banquet with servant waiting on diners and guests completely naked and very often banquests finished in gang bangs.

Some archaeologists have assumed that their tombs reflected the concepts of life between Etruscans: these tombs consist of underground burial chambers reachable through a sort of descending corridor, the dromos, representing the vagina leading to the uterus of the Earth; while when you are born you get out of the womb through the vagina, when you die you cross backwards the vagina (dromos) reaching the uterus (the burial chamber) and from there to an after life physical dimension.


According to this view, acquire a logical sense the images of frescoed doors on the walls of the chamber as you can see in this picture:

View attachment 903952

That is supposed to be the door separating the life from the after life , a “utriusque naturae vinculum”, the hinge between two worlds. There are three doors actually in that tomb. There are also tombs in which the frescoed door is half open, so the owner spares the fatighe to open it to go through it to the other dimension.

25 centuries separate us from them and many things have changed, but the humankind is the same, and now we like whipping games during sex as 25 centuries ago.

We say that “tira più un pelo di fregna che 100 bovi di Maremma” - is more powerful a cunt hair than 100 oxen leading a cart.

Thanks for this, the necropoli of the Etruscans are fascinating and it is sad we have lost so much understanding of their culture.

 

[specimeat]

25 centuries separate us from them and many things have changed, but the humankind is the same, and now we like whipping games during sex as 25 centuries ago.

One of these days, when i have more time, i'll write something about some Greco-Roman mystery religions and their penchant for, huh, the lustful mortification of the flesh to hardcore levels. So much that even the non-exactly-squeamish Romans eventually banned a couple of them as they became a bit too popular not only among the masses but among patrician matrons and their daughters too, allowing for rumors and scandal.

We say that “tira più un pelo di fregna che 100 bovi di Maremma” - is more powerful a cunt hair than 100 oxen leading a cart.

In Spanish, "tiran más dos tetas que dos carretas" ---two boobs pull more than two carts.
In Catalan, "tira més un pèl de cony / figa que una maroma de barco" ---a pussy hair pulls more than a ship's rope.

We girls have superpowers or something.