ALL-PRO SEXMAN posted:

Wait, Jesus didn't believe that he himself existed?

Patter Song posted:

Eh, that wouldn't be the worst thing. Lucretius was pretty great, a whole bookshelf of unknown Epicureans would be a fine addition. A couple more of Epicurus' actual works would be fantastic.

Hell, even being able to fill in the various missing sections of works we have would be nice. If you're thinking it's a philisophical bookshelf, how about filling in the many blank spots in Cicero's On The Nature Of the Gods?

ALL-PRO SEXMAN posted:

I'd be happy even if they were things like Caesar's laundry list or "Nero's Great Big List of People Who Smell Worse Than Me".

pugnax posted:

Did you see Ironclad? I thought that was some really well done combat.

ALL-PRO SEXMAN posted:

I'd be happy even if they were things like Caesar's laundry list or "Nero's Great Big List of People Who Smell Worse Than Me".

ColtMcAsskick posted:

I hope you guys like epicurean philosophy because that is all those scrolls will end up being

Zopotantor posted:

Still better than loving Stoicism. Seneca

ALL-PRO SEXMAN posted:

I'd be happy even if they were things like Caesar's laundry list or "Nero's Great Big List of People Who Smell Worse Than Me".

Halloween Jack posted:

If Elagabalus were alive today he'd just be a really annoying kid on tumblr.

Tunicate posted:

I can only imagine Cato's blog.

Disinterested posted:

My university actually started teaching 'The Middle Ages on Film: medieval violence and modern identities' after I left. Lame.

Baconroll posted:

Sad bit of ancient history news - King Tut's burial mask has been dropped and the large ornate beard snapped off...Then has been crudely epoxied back into place and then they managed to smear some epoxy on the face as well.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-30931369

Jazerus posted:

Let's be honest here, Cato would be dalereed.

sbaldrick posted:

My university taught an upper-year class like this. It was basically ripping about movies and what was wrong with them.

We also had a history of wine class that was about getting drunk really.

Baconroll posted:

Sad bit of ancient history news - King Tut's burial mask has been dropped and the large ornate beard snapped off...Then has been crudely epoxied back into place and then they managed to smear some epoxy on the face as well.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-30931369

Tunicate posted:

Looks like they're also pulling texts out of papyrus mummy masks

quote:

We're recovering ancient documents from the first, second and third centuries. Not just Christian documents, not just biblical documents, but classical Greek texts, business papers, various mundane papers, personal letters," Evans told Live Science. The documents include philosophical texts and copies of stories by the Greek poet Homer.

Baconroll posted:

Sad bit of ancient history news - King Tut's burial mask has been dropped and the large ornate beard snapped off...Then has been crudely epoxied back into place and then they managed to smear some epoxy on the face as well.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-30931369

Baconroll posted:

Sad bit of ancient history news - King Tut's burial mask has been dropped and the large ornate beard snapped off...Then has been crudely epoxied back into place and then they managed to smear some epoxy on the face as well.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-30931369

homullus posted:

Baconroll posted:

Sad bit of ancient history news - King Tut's burial mask has been dropped and the large ornate beard snapped off...Then has been crudely epoxied back into place and then they managed to smear some epoxy on the face as well.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-30931369

SlothfulCobra posted:

Sometimes people don't even care about artifacts. The whole reason the Elgin Marbles were taken from Greece was that other statues had already been looted. What do people even do with things that can't be melted down and remolded?

Tunicate posted:

I can only imagine Cato's blog.

Nostalgia4Dicks posted:

Curious about ancient civilizations and fitness and personal appearance. I know the Romans at least were obsessed with appearance. Wigs, plucking hairs, bath houses, etc. I know there was the olympics of course, they were competitive, etc. Aside from that and the Military did people want to be all healthy like? Aside from knowing that if you run a lot you'll be able to run more and faster did they understand all the effects on their health? Are the statues of swole as gently caress dudes exaggerated a lot?

Like did the concept of gyms exist outside of Military and gladiators? Was some upper class woman going to get her daily exercises in to tone her booty? Would you see people out for their daily jog in the morning through the streets of Rome?


Did the Romans revere the Greeks as athletes?

Tunicate posted:

I can only imagine Cato's blog.

Tao Jones posted:

The Greeks were crazy about fitness and exercise. It's where the word gymnasium comes from - there were sort of like mini-temples for athletes. I think pretty much any insane diet & exercise regimen we could come up with today would probably be familiar to some ancient Greek guy. In Athens it was strictly no women allowed, while in Sparta both sexes trained together.

The Romans, on the other hand, certainly thought it was important to be tough. Obsession with fitness and bodybuilding, though, was seen as a vain, decadent thing and I doubt you'd see all that many people exercising just for the sake of exercising. According to Suetonius, the first Greek-style gymnasium in Rome was built by Nero, and even then most Romans were kind of like "meh, whatever" about it.

e: I'd imagine people in general were healthier in ancient times just because life was harder and more physical. If you're some dude who's soldiering and farming for thirty years, or grinding a mill, or hammering iron, or something, like that you're going to be stronger than a modern guy who's a got a job that doesn't demand constant physical exertion.

JaucheCharly posted:

It's funny how people like masons are absurdly strong, but look nothing like it. If you're used to hard physical labor, you're not necessarily ripped like a bodybuilder. You may be a skinny dude that handles 50kg cement bags like it's nothing all day. The looks are diet all the way.

quote:

The old Romans had a custom which survived even into my lifetime. They would add to the opening words of a letter: "If you are well, it is well; I also am well." Persons like ourselves would do well to say. "If you are studying philosophy, it is well." For this is just what "being well" means. Without philosophy the mind is sickly, and the body, too, though it may be very powerful, is strong only as that of a madman or a lunatic is strong. 2. This, then, is the sort of health you should primarily cultivate; the other kind of health comes second, and will involve little effort, if you wish to be well physically. It is indeed foolish, my dear Lucilius, and very unsuitable for a cultivated man, to work hard over developing the muscles and broadening the shoulders and strengthening the lungs. For although your heavy feeding produce good results and your sinews grow solid, you can never be a match, either in strength or in weight, for a first-class bull. Besides, by overloading the body with food you strangle the soul and render it less active. Accordingly, limit the flesh as much as possible, and allow free play to the spirit. 3. Many inconveniences beset those who devote themselves to such pursuits. In the first place, they have their exercises, at which they must work and waste their life-force and render it less fit to bear a strain or the severer studies. Second, their keen edge is dulled by heavy eating. Besides, they must take orders from slaves of the vilest stamp, – men who alternate between the oil-flask[1] and the flagon, whose day passes satisfactorily if they have got up a good perspiration and quaffed, to make good what they have lost in sweat, huge draughts of liquor which will sink deeper because of their fasting. Drinking and sweating, – it's the life of a dyspeptic![2]

4. Now there are short and simple exercises which tire the body rapidly, and so save our time; and time is something of which we ought to keep strict account. These exercises are running, brandishing weights, and jumping, – high-jumping or broad-jumping, or the kind which I may call, "the Priest's dance,"[3] or, in slighting terms, "the clothes-cleaner's jump."[4] Select for practice any one of these, and you will find it plain and easy. 5. But whatever you do, come back soon from body to mind. The mind must be exercised both day and night, for it is nourished by moderate labour. and this form of exercise need not be hampered by cold or hot weather, or even by old age. Cultivate that good which improves with the years. 6. Of course I do not command you to be always bending over your books and your writing materials; the mind must have a change, – but a change of such a kind that it is not unnerved, but merely unbent. Riding in a litter shakes up the body, and does not interfere with study: one may read, dictate, converse, or listen to another; nor does walking prevent any of these things.

7. You need not scorn voice-culture; but I forbid you to practise raising and lowering your voice by scales and specific intonations. What if you should next propose to take lessons in walking! If you consult the sort of person whom starvation has taught new tricks, you will have someone to regulate your steps, watch every mouthful as you eat, and go to such lengths as you yourself, by enduring him and believing in him, have encouraged his effrontery to go. "What, then?" you will ask; "is my voice to begin at the outset with shouting and straining the lungs to the utmost?" No; the natural thing is that it be aroused to such a pitch by easy stages, just as persons who are wrangling begin with ordinary conversational tones and then pass to shouting at the top of their lungs. No speaker cries "Help me, citizens!" at the outset of his speech. 8. Therefore, whenever your spirit's impulse prompts you, raise a hubbub, now in louder now in milder tones, according as your voice, as well as your spirit, shall suggest to you, when you are moved to such a performance. Then let your voice, when you rein it in and call it back to earth, come down gently, not collapse; it should trail off in tones half way between high and low, and should not abruptly drop from its raving in the uncouth manner of countrymen. For our purpose is, not to give the voice exercise, but to make it give us exercise.

9. You see, I have relieved you of no slight bother; and I shall throw in a little complementary present, – it is Greek, too. Here is the proverb; it is an excellent one: "The fool's life is empty of gratitude and full of fears; its course lies wholly toward the future." "Who uttered these words?" you say. The same writer whom I mentioned before.[5] And what sort of life do you think is meant by the fool's life? That of Baba and Isio?[6] No; he means our own, for we are plunged by our blind desires into ventures which will harm us, but certainly will never satisfy us; for if we could be satisfied with anything, we should have been satisfied long ago; nor do we reflect how pleasant it is to demand nothing, how noble it is to be contented and not to be dependent upon Fortune. 10. Therefore continually remind yourself, Lucilius, how many ambitions you have attained. When you see many ahead of you, think how many are behind! If you would thank the gods, and be grateful for your past life, you should contemplate how many men you have outstripped. But what have you to do with the others? You have outstripped yourself.

11. Fix a limit which you will not even desire to pass, should you have the power. At last, then, away with all these treacherous goods! They look better to those who hope for them than to those who have attained them. If there were anything substantial in them, they would sooner or later satisfy you; as it is, they merely rouse the drinkers' thirst. Away with fripperies which only serve for show! As to what the future's uncertain lot has in store, why should I demand of Fortune that she give rather than demand of myself that I should not crave? And why should l crave? Shall I heap up my winnings, and forget that man's lot is unsubstantial? For what end should I toil? Lo, to-day is the last; if not, it is near the last. Farewell.

Charlie Mopps posted:

The Romans liked to use Greek athletes during games, even though they would disapprove a Roman spending as much time exercising as the athletes did. Just like they loved gladiators but if you decided to become one yourself.

What is also often seen in Roman literature is that training the body was a distraction from training the mind. For example, both Cicero and Tacitus talk about this. However, this idea is also seen in Greek literature, and Romans loved copying Greek literature. Its not really clear whether its just a way of showing that you know your Greek poo poo and are thus part of the elite, or that Romans really considered physical training bad for the mind. Considering how training for war was Good and Roman i guess it was only bad if you trained to be a fit handsome dude, and not if you trained to be a fit handsome dude who was good at stabbing people.

Another thing is that the Romans linked physical appearance and posture to character. So on the one hand a fit and muscular body could be seen as someone who had neglected the mind, but also as someone who embodied Good Roman VIrtues like determination and manliness. It can be seen in statues like the ones from Polykleitos which were often copied by the Romans, which embodied the masculine ideal that should be copied, but also a statue like the boxer of Quirinal, which embodied the toll and beatings a boxer takes, which could deform a man. But of course such statues could also be seen as presenting a virtue, because persevering through pain and suffering is also a good thing.

Basically, Roman attitudes towards athletes were contradictory and varied and are another reason why Roman history owns.

Alchenar posted:

I don't think there's a contradiction here. There's a big difference between 'soldier fit' and 'bodybuilder fit' - the Romans expected you to be lean and physically fit, but thought that spending 12 hours a day in the gym and packing bulging muscle all over was excessive and indicative of someone lacking in the brains department.

Not only is there no contradiction there, it's basically identical to modern attitudes towards fitness. Bodybuilders are not stereotypically know for being master chess players.

Charlie Mopps posted:

The Romans liked to use Greek athletes during games, even though they would disapprove a Roman spending as much time exercising as the athletes did. Just like they loved gladiators but if you decided to become one yourself.

What is also often seen in Roman literature is that training the body was a distraction from training the mind. For example, both Cicero and Tacitus talk about this. However, this idea is also seen in Greek literature, and Romans loved copying Greek literature. Its not really clear whether its just a way of showing that you know your Greek poo poo and are thus part of the elite, or that Romans really considered physical training bad for the mind. Considering how training for war was Good and Roman i guess it was only bad if you trained to be a fit handsome dude, and not if you trained to be a fit handsome dude who was good at stabbing people.

Another thing is that the Romans linked physical appearance and posture to character. So on the one hand a fit and muscular body could be seen as someone who had neglected the mind, but also as someone who embodied Good Roman VIrtues like determination and manliness. It can be seen in statues like the ones from Polykleitos which were often copied by the Romans, which embodied the masculine ideal that should be copied, but also a statue like the boxer of Quirinal, which embodied the toll and beatings a boxer takes, which could deform a man. But of course such statues could also be seen as presenting a virtue, because persevering through pain and suffering is also a good thing.

Basically, Roman attitudes towards athletes were contradictory and varied and are another reason why Roman history owns.


Also, two good books about athletics in the Roman world are Newby, Greek Athletics in the Roman World (Oxford 2005) and König, Athletics and Literature in the Roman Empire (Cambridge 2005).

Baconroll posted:

Sad bit of ancient history news - King Tut's burial mask has been dropped and the large ornate beard snapped off...Then has been crudely epoxied back into place and then they managed to smear some epoxy on the face as well.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-30931369

PittTheElder posted:

(save the lack of helmets, done for obvious TV reasons, and it apparently makes GRRM furious)

Oberleutnant posted:

Buncha here but might help as an illustrative example of the attitude of some Romans to exercise:

JaucheCharly posted:

How would a roman upperclass man train the mind? Debate? Trigonometry?