In the recent Gladiator II film, much has been made about the naval battle in the Colosseum. Did this really happen and what about those sharks? Well let’s look at both elements and ancient Greece as well. Sharks and the Mediterranean. The Mediterranean is home to approximately 73 shark species (according to the Blue Marine […]
Sharks in ancient Rome & Greece Read More »
Phoenician whale finds. The island of San Pantaleo sits a kilometre or so off the western tip of Sicily. Protected by a small chain of islands to the west it rests in a natural lagoon and in antiquity it was home to a Phoenician trading settlement called Motya. For the Phoenicians, a people who excelled
The whale and the ancient Mediterranean. Read More »
Don’t worry, this isn’t about aliens. Well not really, you see I recently came across a fantastic site which allows you to see what types of spaceships (and other vehicles) would look like when overlayed on a map. The site is called www.parkmyspaceship.com so make sure you check it out. Anyway, here’s a few examples
A spaceship and ancient sites. Read More »
Over the past several years I have carved pumpkins using a design from a Greek vase (though there is also a Roman mosaic in there as well). I’m still deciding what design to use but in the meantime here are some previous ones and a bit about them. If you want to have a go
Greek Vase pumpkin 2023. Read More »
I hope you enjoyed the episode on Magna Graecia, as promised here is some more content (including the sources I used/ further reading) and the transcription. In case you are interested here’s the link for the museum at Pithekoussai – it’s got some great information. Perhaps one day I’ll get to visit. There is also
Magna Graecia: Episode notes. Read More »
It can be easy to fall into the trap of thinking pottery from antiquity as distant to ourselves in the modern day. Savage tales of heroism, brash nudity and a plethora of deities deipicted on them only serve to remind how different the ancient Greeks were. But finds can sometimes do the opposite, namely to
Personal pottery from ancient Pithekoussai. Read More »
The eclipse as a dating device. The experience of studying ancient history at any level is to deal with dates as amorphous and ranging. Even where we can assign a year to an event the idea that you can whittle this down to a specific date and, shock horror, an hour makes the hairs on
Eclipses in Antiquity. Read More »
A trip to the British Museum. In May I took the day off and journeyed up to the British Museum. I had planned on doing this anyhow, but the Feminine Power exhibition was on and so I thought I’d check it out. Here are some of the artefacts with notes. For my recent trip to
Feminine Power exhibition (British Museum). Read More »
Types of camel. It was Aristotle, in his work The History of Animals, who noted that there were two types of camels. The Bactrian, who had two humps, and the dromedary who was afforded a single hump[1]. Though he may not have been the first to make this classification (as I will come to) he
The camel in Mesopotamia, Greece and Rome. Read More »
If you’ve listened to the latest Ancient History Hound podcast on ghosts then you’ll have heard me mention that I’d post some bits from the episode which I mentioned. These sources I read and mentioned, maps, links, pictures and podcasts (including the one on ghosts). Maps. I referred to both Mesopotamia and Assur in the
Night of the Livy Dead 3: Ghosts – episode notes. Read More »
