Military History Photo Friday: Roman Crocodile Armor

Yes, it's been almost a month since I posted. Sorry about that! I was on a research trip to Oxford and London, plus I was slammed with a ghostwriting deadline. Hopefully I'm now back on track for more regular blog posts.

I spotted this lovely suit of armor in the British Museum. It's from Manfalout, Egypt, from the 3rd or 4th century AD. This town is in Middle Egypt where there were many sacred grottoes to the crocodile-headed god Sobek, god of the Nile. These grottoes had sacred crocodiles that were often mummified after death. Roman soldiers often took on local religions and the troops in Manfalout were no exception. They would hold religious processions in honor of Sobek while wearing crocodile armor.

Photo copyright Sean McLachlan. Sorry for the reflection in the middle of the shot. I twisted and turned every which way and this was the best I could get. They really needed to invent artifact cases that don't reflect at all!

Military History Photo Friday: Roman Warship Ram

I haven't blogged in a while because I've been up in Oxford for my usual summer research and writing trip. Besides that, I've been hiking and visiting museums. The best exhibition of the summer is certainly the Ashmolean Museum's Storms, War & Shipwrecks Treasures from the Sicilian Seas, which I've written up for Black Gate. This show looks at the amazing finds from more than a dozen shipwrecks around Sicily.

One of the more unusual displays shows three warship rams from the Battle of the Egadi Islands, fought between the Roman and Carthaginian navies in 241 BC. It was the final battle of the First Punic War and an important Roman victory. A fleet of 200 Roman warships ambushed a convoy of 250 heavily laden Carthaginian warships. The Romans sunk 50 ships and captured 70, while losing only 30 of their own. They seized control of Sicily and began to dominate the Mediterranean. Of course it would take two more Punic Wars before the Romans vanquished their rivals once and for all.

The ram shown here once adorned the prow of a Roman warship. You can just see on the top a decoration in the form of a helmet. The spiky bits would have been just below the waterline and apparently they made a direct hit on some poor Carthaginian vessel, because a chunk of wood is still stuck in the bottom groove!

Check out my article for more on this great exhibition. I blog on Black Gate every Wednesday.

Travel Tuesday: Roman Mosaics in Morocco

Venus and Adonis.

Morocco became part of the Roman Empire in 40 AD as the province of Mauretania Tingitana. There are several good archaeological sites in the country, including the famous city of Volubilis and several smaller cities such as Lixus.

In the archaeological museum of Tetouan, there are a number of fine mosaics from Lixus. Originally a Phoenician city founded in the 7th century BC, it prospered under Roman rule. The mosaics you see here were all made in the 2nd and 3rd centuries AD. Life wasn't always peaceful in Roman Mauretania Tingitana, however, as you can see from this picture of a most unfortunate Roman soldier.

For some more shots of this kind of art, check out my post on Roman gladiator mosaics.

Mars and Rhea Silvia.

The three graces.

Military History Photo Friday: Frontier Forts of the Emperor Hadrian

Photo courtesy Jean-Pierre Neri via Wikimedia Commons.

This is an aerial photo of Lambaesis, a Roman fort in what is now Algeria. It was built during the reign of Emperor Hadrian (117–138 AD). This was a permanent camp for the III Augusta legion complete with fortification walls, baths, an amphitheater, and temples.

Meanwhile, at the empire's northern frontier at the edge of Scotland, Hadrian was building the wall that would bear his name. The below photo is an aerial view of Housesteads fort, situated on the wall and the base for the II Augusta legion. While it's smaller than the contemporary fort in Algeria, you can see that its based on a very similar plan. The Romans standardized many of their buildings, only varying them because of special needs or terrain. Thus if a legionnaire decided to switch from the III to the II legion, and moved from the heat of Algeria to the damp of Scotland, he'd be able to make his way around the fort without any problem.

A few years ago I did a series about hiking Hadrian's Wall on the now-defunct travel blog Gadling. The photo galleries are gone but all my text is still up.

The photo of Housesteads is courtesy the Tynedale U3A. Hadrian's Wall Group, which is doing great work educating the public about Hadrian's Wall.

Military History Photo Friday: A Most Unfortunate Roman

If you take a close look at this skull, you'll notice a metal point had punched right through it. This poor fellow currently resides in the archaeological museum in Tetouan, Morocco. Two thousand years ago it was the Roman province of Mauritania, and this man was a soldier protecting the empire against hostile tribes to the south. Sadly he made the ultimate sacrifice for his country.

Travel Tuesday: The Roman Theater in Merida, Spain

Welcome to Travel Tuesday, a new feature here on Midlist Writer. I'm active with the #traveltuesday hashtag on Twitter, so I decided to bring it on over to my blog too. Every week I'll be posting one of my travel photos and talking about it.

This shot shows the Roman theater in Mérida, western Spain. In Roman times it was called Emerita Augusta and was capital of the province of Lusitania. The city was founded in 25 BC. There are several well-preserved Roman buildings that make up a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

The theater was one of the first buildings to be erected in the new city and was finished in 15 BC. It seated 6,000 people and, as you can see, its backdrop is in a remarkable state of preservation. It was improved between 333 and 335 AD, a time after the Roman Empire had converted to Christianity. The Church took a dim view of theater plays so its surprising the builders didn't remove earlier statues of pagan deities such as Serapis and Ceres. It looks like some folks in Emerita Augusta still valued the old ways.

Military History Photo Friday: Roman Gladiator Mosaics

OK, this isn't strictly military history, but these guys had a shorter lifespan than most combat units! Of course they got to be stars before being gutted in front of a cheering crowd, so that's some compensation I guess.

This mosaic shows a secutor fighting a retiarius and was found at a 3rd century AD site in Rome. The secutor is named Astyanax and the word "victor" is written next to him. The retiarius Kalendio has a crossed out O next to his name, which stands for "Obiit" (death).

The next mosaic is also from 3rd century Rome and shows a fight between two murmillones, Symmachus and Maternus. Symmachus killed Maternus, but is dubbed "a fortunate man", perhaps indicating that the bookies were against him!

These images come from the newly reopened Museo Arqueológico Nacional in Madrid. You can see more mosaics in an article I wrote for Black Gate Magazine.

Book Review: Pagan City and Christian Capital

Pagan City and Christian Capital: Rome in the 4th Century by John Curran
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This academic tome is an in-depth look at Rome's architectural and social development in the fourth century AD, a time when paganism was waning and Christianity became the dominant religion.

The first half looks at how the imperial capital, replete with symbols of paganism, slowly transformed into a place of churches and the tombs of martyrs. The second half is social history, looking at the development of the aristocracy of the time and at changing attitudes towards the Roman circus.

There are surprises throughout. While more simplistic books often describe the fourth century as a time of conflict between paganism and Christianity, the reality Curran reveals was much more complex. Christians and pagans lived and worked side by side, and except for some notable examples of persecution, pagans kept most of their religious rights for much of this century.

One of the most interesting chapters was on how Christian aristocrats discouraged individuals of their class from becoming Christian ascetics. (It was all about inheritance and continuing the family line, you see). Another interesting passage studies how the pagan symbols in the Circus Maximus remained in full public view long after most temples were closed, yet gradually lost their pagan meaning to be replaced with a more general one. The statues of Victory, for example, stopped being statues of a goddess and became symbols of the idea of victory.

I found the reading a bit dense at times and the author assumes way too much knowledge. I have a Masters in archaeology (although not Classical archaeology) but didn't know all the terms Curran expected me to. Also, he quotes extensively from French, Latin, and Greek sources without translating them. The French I can do, the Latin kinda sorta, and the Greek, well. . .it's all Greek to me!

I think Curran made a serious mistake here. With a bit of extra work, he could attract a much larger readership of educated laymen rather than a tiny audience of fellow academics. Considering the interesting subject matter and the depth of work that went into this book, that's a pity.

View all my reviews