#history

Modern preconceptions of ancient warfare place significant emphasis on the virtues of youth. This is a clear misconception however, experience and teamwork coun…

It is often in unexpected places that we find references to classical antiquity. Today, while catching up on another favourite past time (comics), I stumbled up…

One of my all time favourite comics (and now television show by AMC) is The Walking Dead. The show depicts a post apocalyptic world filled with zombies (dead pe…

The AIRC Unlisted Conference recently featured a video on Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) in Digital Archaeology. This naturally sparked my interest as someone…

While many modern people might consider ourselves figuratively slaves to debt, it was literally the case in early Rome. Citizens unable to pay debts were liable…

There have been many famous secessions in Ancient Rome (the multiple secessions of the plebeians immediately springs to mind). However, until recently reading a…

The career of Lucius Cornelius Sulla remains an enigma on the political landscape of the Roman Republic. An aristocrat that achieved the ultimate power of the d…

For the ancient Romans, there was a clear distinction between practices that could be defined as religious and those that were a superstition. This article will…

As a follow on from our previous post on the Punishments in the Roman Army is an examination of the rewards and commendations on offer. The carrots as opposed t…

In the second century BC, the Roman aristocracy promoted a value system that emphasised the customs, traditions and reverence of ancestors. The military and pol…

Eighteen years after the battle of Actium decisively brought the civil wars to a foregone conclusion, the Roman Senate consecrated an altar in honour of Augusta…

Idioms are a collection of words whom’s meaning is not easily discernible from them individually. Only through usage and context are they given a meaning that i…

A lecturer of Ancient History at Macquarie University once mentioned that the Romans could teach us a thing or two about bureaucracy. I’ve never quite taken the…

In the classical period (800 BC – AD 500), suicide held a different connotation than it does today. It was only at the Council of Arles in AD 452 that it was of…

In the first episode of HBO’s acclaimed series Rome, we were lucky enough to see a form of punishment used within the Roman Army. Lucius Vorenus (Kevin McKidd)…

Epitaphs from Ancient Rome and Greece provide an abundance of primary source material. It was the Roman orator Cicero who claimed the life of the dead is placed…

In our previous post discussing the intentions of the Roman proconsul Titus Quinctius Flamininus when he proclaimed the Freedom of the Greeks at the Isthmian Ga…

At the Isthmian Games in 196 B.C., the Roman proconsul Titus Quinctius Flamininus proclaimed the ‘Freedom of the Greeks’ as the outcome of the second Macedonian…