Tag: Rome
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Gods, Girls, and Gender: Elagabalus and the Cultural Politics of the Severan Roman Empire
Since it’s Pride Month here the US for our LGBTQ+ community, I thought we’d do a little deep dive into the reign of Rome’s queerest ruler (yes, even more than Hadrian…), the 3rd century emperor Elagabalus (c.204-222 CE), formerly mentioned on this blog as a Vestal Virgin-marrying early adopter of the wheelbarrow/unicycle. Held by many traditional historians […]
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Glimpses of Love: The Two Sulpicias and the Private Lives of Roman Women
“He who shall weigh well her poems will say no maid was so roguish, will say no maid was so modest.” (Martial, Epigrams, 10.35, 11-12) We’ve spent a fair amount of time (some, I’m sure, would argue too much) talking about Roman poets and their work. But at end of the day, the poets, indeed all […]
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Getting Away the Roman Way: Drama, Death, and Debauchery in Baiae
To witness persons wandering drunk along the beach, the riotous revelling of sailing parties, the lakes a-din with choral song, and all the other ways in which luxury, when it is, so to speak, released from the restraints of law not merely sins, but blazons its sins abroad, – why must I witness all this? – […]
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Is This a Blog Post, or is it a Boar Vessel 600-500 BC Etruscan Ceramic?: The Wonderful World of Forged Antiquities
Back in the faraway time of the 2010s, classical Reddit and Twitter were seized by a strange obsession with an Etruscan ceramic piece in the collection of the Cleveland Museum of Art. It is a small vessel about seven inches done in terracotta in the shape of a wild boar. The museum acquired the piece […]
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Beyond the Plagiarism: (Almost) Ten Things Actually Invented by the Romans
“You read what others had done and you took the next step. You didn’t earn the knowledge for yourselves, so you don’t take any responsibility for it. You stood on the shoulders of geniuses to accomplish something as fast as you could, and before you even knew what you had, you patented it, and you […]
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Purple Reign: The Cross-Cultural History of Murex
“The most favourable season for taking these [shellfish] is after the rising of the Dog-Star, or else before spring; for when they have once discharged their waxy secretion, their juices have no consistency: this, however, is a fact unknown in the dyers’ workshops, although it is a point of primary importance.” – Pliny the Elder, Natural […]
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East Meets West: The Unexpectedly Diverse History of the Parthian Empire
Getting back in into harder history, I thought after talking a little bit about the Roman Republic’s greatest enemy, Carthage, last week that this week we’d shift forward and look at the Roman Empire’s most stubborn foe: Parthia. Despite ruling a majority of the Middle East from Turkey to Afghanistan for nearly five hundred years and […]
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Vives Annos: Foreign Influences on the Saturnalia
“Well (since our ancestors would have it so), use the freedom of December [and] speak on.” – Horace to his slave, Davus, on the Saturnalia (Satires, II, 7.4) I’m writing this up on the Sigillaria (December 23rd), the last day of the best known of the Roman festivals, the Saturnalia. The Sigillaria was devoted to […]
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Rome’s Mystery Goddess: Bona Dea and Her Cult
“[C]um fuget a templis oculos Bona Diva virorum, praeterquam siquos illa venire iubet.” (“Bona Dea bars the eyes of men from her temple, except such as she bids come there herself.”) – Ovid, Ars Amatoria This week I thought we’d jump back into some ancient festivals, and coming up next week on December 3rd is the […]
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The Bones Are Their Dollars: Ghosts in the Ancient World
“Hail thou One, who shinest from the moon. Grant that this one may come forth among thy multitudes who are at the portal. Let [me] be with the Light-god. Let the Duat be open to [me].” – The Book of Coming Forth by Day “We’ve been going about this all wrong. This Mr. Stay Puft’s okay! […]
Sarah Holz 