REPOST : Roman stylus 70AD, in comon vanacular translates into “i went into the city and all i bought you was this lousy pen” , link and full translation in the comments [640 x 320]
Fucking screaming, shitty souvenirs haven’t changed a bit in almost 2000 years
The inscription has been painstakingly examined and translated by classicist and epigrapher Dr Roger Tomlin. It reads:
‘ab urbe v[e]n[i] munus tibi gratum adf(e)ro acul[eat]um ut habe[a]s memor[ia]m nostra(m) rogo si fortuna dar[e]t quo possem largius ut longa via ceu sacculus est (v)acuus’
‘I have come from the City. I bring you a welcome gift with a sharp point that you may remember me. I ask, if fortune allowed, that I might be able (to give) as generously as the way is long (and) as my purse is empty.’ In other words: the stylus is a gift to remind the recipient of its sender; the sender acknowledges that it is a cheap gift and wishes that they could have given more. Its tongue-in-cheek sentiment is reminiscent of the kinds of novelty souvenirs we still give today. It is the Roman equivalent of ‘I went to Rome and all I got you was this pen’, providing a touching personal insight into the humour of someone who lived nearly 2000 years ago.
There are several bowls and trullae / paterae whose decoration include the names of forts on Hadrian’s Wall, and were almost certainly souvenirs for soldiers serving there.
A trulla or patera is a small cooking / serving pan, used by civilians and also part of army mess-kit as carried by legionaries on Trajan’s Column.
They could be quite plain, like the military one, or fancier in various ways including decorative handles. This one is a panthera pantera (cough)…
The shallowness suggests it’s probably civilian, from a kitchen with several different sizes – rather than the one-for-all-functions army issue – or maybe for pouring libations during religious ceremonies, which is another use shown in Roman art.
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Two souvenir types have been discovered, one showing the Wall itself, the other with Celtic patterns. Both have a list of fortress names, and their workmanship and finish indicate they were for wealthy customers, perhaps Section Commanders with authority over the named forts.
This is the “Rudge Cup” decorated with the Wall and its towers, found in England, with curator Dr Frances McIntosh to give scale:
What’s interesting is that a handled patera with almost the same design was found in France, near Amiens (Ambianum, a legionary staging area)…
…so maybe the Rudge Cup was originally meant to be a patera but, since there’s no sign of a break-point, never had a handle fitted. (Insert Latin for “Don’t bother with the handle, I like it as it is.”)
This one, the “Staffordshire Moorlands Pan” did have a handle; the place where it broke off is clearly visible in the right-hand photo.
I haven’t seen anyone with Archaeological Authority say this, so it may be just the way my mind works, but those Celtic patterns suggest nothing so much as the Ancient Roman equivalent of tartan on a shortbread tin (here 1930s and 2020s; some things don’t change) . :->
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The paterae are enamelled bronze or copper alloy, so moderately tough, but what never ceases to amaze me is how something as fragile as pottery and glassware managed to survive the centuries.
How about these pieces of sports memorabilia, gladiator-fan glasses from the 1st Century CE:
…or this “Seaside Attractions” souvenir flask from the 3rd Century CE:
It depicts the port city of Puteoli (there are others for the city of Baiae) and this drawing made from another, similar flask shows the Attractions more clearly.
From left to right:
“See the harbour pillars (PILAE) and seahorse arch; visit the stadium and sun-terrace (STADI.SOLAR); enjoy the seafood (various fish); watch games in the amphitheatre (AMPI.THEAT); worship at the temple (a sun-crowned god); stroll in the upper and lower forum (FORU.POS.FORU); catch a play at the theatre (THEA.TRU); shop in the emporium (INPU) and admire the triton arch at the other side of the harbour.”
Tourism hasn’t changed much in 1800 years. They were us and we are them, and if we don’t record our experiences with a smartphone, we might do it on a tablet.
So did they…
…and maybe even used a souvenir stylus to do it.
:->
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A bit more (including some observations about those styli) here.
I do want to note that the whole “women are allowed to dress masculine and wear trousers” thing needs to be viewed in its historical context:
People fought for generations to be allowed to dress that way. They fought hard to be allowed to wear pants. Blue jeans were a symbol of feminist revolution. Women were barred from workplaces and schools for wearing them.
This is not some a natural fact that women dressing masculine is less shocking and humiliating. That normalization was fought for and hard-won.
And yet so many people erase the struggles of those people who fought to make that happen and pretend that it’s just normal and natural that people don’t see women “dressed like men” as ridiculous.
The Marriage of Figaro has what’s called a “breeches role” which is a woman wearing men’s clothes playing am ale role. This was done partly due to the vocal range requirements, but in many cases it was done comedically. It was risque and sexualized or comic relief that a woman was dressed as a man.
Anti-suffragette posters mock women wearing pants – well they were bloomers and split skirts back then – and mocking more masculine cut styles of clothes. This was meant to portray this as ridiculous.
They mocked the “new woman” in Weimar Germany, lamenting that they were too masculine.
This is a political cartoon from the 1920s depicting a woman in masculine dress deciding which bathroom to use:
Sorry but you’re erasing these struggles and flattening history when you say this shit.
Women were killed and institutionalized in the struggle to make this happen. It really fucking bothers me the way it’s framed as “people just don’t find it as weird when women dress masculine.”
Yes they fucking did. Until women and transmasculine people fought for their right to wear what they want. It’s normalized because people struggled to normalize it.
And it’s not normal everywhere. There are many countries where it’s still illegal for women to wear pants. Sudan, Saudi Arabia.
Even in the US, it’s forbidden and considered ridiculous in groups like the FLDS, the Amish, and the Hutterites.
We are flattening and erasing the struggles of women when we say these things. I know we’re trying to build theory here but you can’t build solid theory on a foundation of lies.
When my mom was in school, in the 1960s, you weren’t allowed to wear pants to school. You had to wear a skirt. Had to. At public schools, mind you, not private ones. Public school. Regular degular school.
And even up into the 1990s, Disney mandated all female workers wear dresses and skirts, with nylons, to work. I know this because I watched my mom change immediately from jumperskirts to pants as soon as she was allowed, which was NOT until well into the 00s. This was company-wide, it affected millions of workers. And while Disney is well-known for its pavingstone of a dress code book, it’s still indicative of what is considered Respectable.
My mom’s entire generation, the Boomers, fought to wear pants, to be allowed short hair, to wear comfortable shoes and honestly women are still fighting to be allowed their natural hair and still fighting to be allowed to NOT wear makeup at work.
People existed before you were born and things were different before you were born. Things have not always been the same as they are for you everywhere for everyone. Think outside your own experience for fuck’s sake.
Top: the three Super Mario cartoon series contain a wide variety of errors and oversights, but a particularly notable one happens in the Super Mario World episode “The Night Before Cave Christmas” in the scene where Mario shows off his Santa costume.
Between Mario saying “So, what do you think?” and Luigi replying “Don’t try wearing it in Brooklyn!”, the episode’s production information card is visible for a single frame. This is the animated equivalent of a clapperboard from the beginning of a scene being visible in the finished cut of a movie.
“How can we distinguish what is biologically determined from what people merely try to justify through biological myths? A good rule of thumb is ‘Biology enables, culture forbids.’ Biology is willing to tolerate a very wide spectrum of possibilities. It’s culture that obliges people to realise some possibilities while forbidding others. Biology enables women to have children – some cultures oblige women to realise this possibility. Biology enables men to enjoy sex with one another – some cultures forbid them to realise this possibility. Culture tends to argue that it forbids only that which is unnatural. But from a biological perspective, nothing is unnatural. Whatever is possible is by definition also natural. A truly unnatural behaviour, one that goes against the laws of nature, simply cannot exist, so it would need no prohibition. No culture has ever bothered to forbid men to photosynthesise, women to run faster than the speed of light, or negatively charged electrons to be attracted to each other. In truth, our concepts ‘natural’ and unnatural’ are taken not from biology, but from Christian theology. The theological meaning of ‘natural’ is ‘in accordance with the intentions of the God who created nature’. Christian theologians argued that God created the human body, intending each limb and organ to serve a particular purpose. If we use our limbs and organs for the purpose envisioned by God, then it is a natural activity. To use them differently than God intends is unnatural. But evolution has no purpose. Organs have not evolved with a purpose, and the way they are used is in constant flux. There is not a single organ in the human body that only does the job its prototype did when it first appeared hundreds of millions of years ago. Organs evolve to perform a particular function, but once they exist, they can be adapted for other usages as well. Mouths, for example, appeared because the earliest multicellular organisms needed a way to take nutrients into their bodies. We still use our mouths for that purpose, but we also use them to kiss, speak and, if we are Rambo, to pull the pins out of hand grenades. Are any of these uses unnatural simply because our worm-like ancestors 600 million years ago didn’t do those things with their mouths?”
— Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind (Harari, Yuval Noah)
one of my favorite books as a kid was this one on speculative
zoology/evolution that I loved so much I borrowed it to the point my
school had to chase me up on returning it several times. it influenced my early creature art and design and pushed me to delve into my own specbio (on dragons. no surprises there). I loved the informatic entries, all their little lore bits and ecological adaptations; the wild color palettes, their weird little shapes. it was called The New Dinosaurs, by Dougal Dixon.
there were two more books in the series that my school didn’t have, which is either a blessing or a curse, because the third book in the set is called Man After Man.
