CHATTER: Tempicide

Killing some time here, I think maybe I'll start reporting on some of the ways people come to rogueclassicism -- like many blog services, Radio Userland provides links to referrers, and most of the ones I get to see are from search engines like Google. The reason I even started thinking about reporting on this is because I noticed over the past couple of weeks that I get a pile of hits via Google from people searching for things having to do with Yale's Skull and Bones thing -- apparently my post from October 24 on same is well trodden in the blog world. That sort of makes sense, but today I notice rogueclassicism is also high on the list for the search term "european pain exam in budapest", which definitely doesn't. Still stranger (or perhaps related?), the 'comet search' (whatever that is) puts rogueclassicism in the top five for a search for "circumcised sports stars". Oh well ... whatever gets folks in the door, I guess.

4:59:43 PM    

CHATTER: Source Criticism and Oliver Stone

Here's an interesting little bit of 'following the sources' ... what Classicists normally do instinctively (or should, nudge, nudge), but what entertainment and gossip columnists apparently do not. The following item by Doug Camilli in the Montreal Gazette just washed up on my shore:

Like many people, I've been wondering how the dread Oliver Stone would find a way to denounce America in the process of making a movie about Alexander the Great. Now, reports Jeannette Walls of MSNBC, a Thai newspaper has explained it: The director told the newspaper Nation that his movie makes it clear that by "Alexander" he means "George," and, of course, it ends badly.

"The connection is the West moving into the East," Stone is quoted as saying. "Alexander did the same journey. He went into Iraq, took Babylon, then went north into Afghanistan."

Okay ... so let's see what Jeanette Walls actually said at MSNBC:

Don’t be surprised if Oliver Stone’s “Alexander the Great” draws parallels between the Macedonian conquer and George W. Bush. “The connection is the West moving into the East,” Stone said, according to the Thai newspaper Nation. “Alexander did the same journey. He went into Iraq, took Babylon, then went north into Afghanistan.”

Okay ... let's go back to the horse's mouth ... that piece in The Nation (which we actually mentioned a week ago in rogueclassicism; I can't seem to get the original to come up):

With his latest film, “Alexander”, Stone conjures up parallels between Alexander the Great of ancient Macedonia and US President George W Bush.

“The connection is the West moving into the East,” Stone said just before arriving in Thailand. “Alexander did the same journey – he went into Iraq, took Babylon, then went north into Afghanistan.”

Here in Bangkok, where Stone received a lifetime achievement award a week ago, he skirted political issues and discussed how satisfied he was with the footage from Lop Buri, 115 kilometres north of Bangkok, where hundreds of Thai Army soldiers are serving as Macedonian warriors alongside 20 armour-clad elephants. Stone’s US$125 million (Bt5 billion) opus, filmed in just 87 days in Morocco, London and Thailand, stars Farrell, Angelina Jolie, Anthony Hopkins and Val Kilmer.

Okay ... let's go back further. Back in October, Stone was interviewed by S.F. Said for the Sydney Morning Herald (or an affiliate, or most likely,  the Telegraph) in regards to the controversy surrounding his documentary about Castro, which was yanked from HBO. Here's the relevant bit:

Instead, Stone's next project delves into history. He is about to start filming the epic story of Alexander the Great. Yet even this has topical resonance. "The connection is the West moving into the East," he said. "Alexander did the same journey - he went into Iraq, took Babylon, then went north into Afghanistan."

It will be fascinating to see what he does with the material. One thing's certain: there will be controversy, and lots of it. Perhaps it's the inevitable result of making popular cinema from big, complex issues at a time when most filmmakers aspire to nothing beyond entertainment. And at such a time - whatever one thinks of his answers - it's good to know that Oliver Stone is still asking questions.

So S.F. Said says "even this has topical relevance" (one can imagine the original question: ' Any connection between Alexander the Great and current events?'). Someone at the Nation massages this to say that Stone "conjures up parallels between Alexander the Great of ancient Macedonia and US President George W. Bush". Jeanette Walls alters the spin slightly to suggest "Don’t be surprised if Oliver Stone’s “Alexander the Great” draws parallels between the Macedonian conquer and George W. Bush." By the time Doug Camilli has touched it, he can assert, "The director told the newspaper Nation that his movie makes it clear that by "Alexander" he means "George," and, of course, it ends badly."

Just as a point of comparison, a good chunk of folks reading this, no doubt, think they know the story of Caligula making his favourite horse Incitatus a consul or senator or something. Our first mention of the story -- from Suetonius Vit. Cal. 55 (ca. 120 A.D.) goes like this:

He used to send his soldiers on the day before the games and order silence in the neighborhood, to prevent the horse Incitatus from being disturbed. Besides a stall of marble, a manger of ivory, purple blankets and a collar of precious stones, he even gave this horse a house, a troop of slaves and furniture, for the more elegant entertainment of the guests invited in his name; and it is also said that he planned to make him consul.

A generation or so later, Cassius Dio (59.14.7) writes:

One of the horses, which he named Incitatus, he used to invite to dinner, where he would offer him golden barley and drink his health in wine from golden goblets; he swore by the animal's life and fortune and even promised to appoint him consul, a promise that he would certainly have carried out if he had lived longer.

And now, of course, it is 'well known' that Caligula actually did make his horse a consul or senator or something -- a fact which is regularly mentioned in the press when someone unqualified gets a prize political appointment. So, in case I've lost you ... Oliver Stone's Alexander the Great is a movie criticizing the U.S. invasion of Iraq. The entertainment columnists have spoken. I'm sure Dio and Suetonius are wryly smiling from on high ...

12:56:41 PM    

REVIEW: Tanagras

Here's another road trip in the making, and this time it doesn't involve beer (well, not much, anyway) ... it appears that the Tanagra exhibition that was at the Louvre has wended its weary way to the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts. Here's the incipit of a review in the Montreal Gazette:

The old section of the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, the Michal and Renata Hornstein Pavilion, has lately been transformed into what might be described as a vast stage set. The walls are made over in pastel tones, and rows of long cloth banners dangle from the ceiling.

These strips of fabric make the height of the ceiling less daunting, but they also echo the play of drapery folds on the small figurines at the centre of an important new show.

Titled Tanagra: A Small World in Clay, after the name of an ancient Greek city where many of the statuettes originated, this unusual exhibition was conceived jointly by Violaine Jeammet, curator of antiquities at the Louvre in Paris, and John Fossey, internationally known curator of archeology at the MMFA; it comes to Montreal after its debut in Paris.  [more]

It's there until May 9 ...

11:51:41 AM    

CHATTER: Feedster

Welcome to all the folks visiting rogueclassicism for the first time via Feedster's feed of the day -- maybe y'all will push us over the 30,000 visitor mark a bit earlier than anticipated... hope you enjoy your stay! [for the uninitiated: Feedster is a "news aggregator" ... useful for keeping on top of your favourite blogs]

11:40:33 AM    

THIS DAY IN ANCIENT HISTORY

ante diem xvi kalendas martias

• Parentalia (day 2) -- the period for appeasing the dead continued.
• 270 A.D. -- traditional date for the beheading of Saint Valentine

7:45:44 AM    

CHATTER: Valentine's Day III

I don't even know where to begin with this one, from the Cameroon Tribune:

Another story traces Saint Valentine's Day to a pagan feast. It holds that Valentine originated from the feast of Luberous, a protector of flock of Romans from wolves. On every February 14th Romans celebrated a feast called Lupercalia to honour Luberous.

I'm sure this Luberous fellow was a rather slippery character ...

7:35:05 AM    

CHATTER: Bathing and Democracy

Seen in passing ... in a touristy piece which mentions some hot springs in Puerto Rico:

It is said the during the height of the Roman Republic the foundations of democracy were not to be found in the halls of the Senate as much as in the city's public baths because they were the only place in the city where the senator and the mason existed outside their social stations.

Not sure who said it, but it's an interesting -- though possibly simplistic -- idea. I wonder if a patron went to the baths accompanied by clientes?

7:28:55 AM    

CHATTER: Valentines Day II

Okay ... this one's come up again and every year the claim bothers me. This version comes from the Keystone, but I'm sure it's repeated in myriad newspapers this weekend:

Also during the Lupercalia, but in honor of the goddess Juno Februata, the names of young women were put into a box from which the youths drew names. The boys and girls so matched were considered “partners” for the coming year, which began in March.

With the advent of Christian influence over the Romans, the hierarchy forced the people to conform to the Christians’ creed. To Christianize the heathen practice of picking lots for sweethearts, all that was needed was to replace the Roman practice of placing girls’ names with the names of saints, and to have the youths emulate the particular virtues of whatever saint they drew. This custom of civilization’s past is still observed in some religious orders today.

This is one of those very difficult things because it involves 'proving a negative'. I have searched a number of times for this 'name out of a box thing' (in some versions, they're partners for the year; in others, it seems to be a rather more carnal version of spin the bottle) and I have yet to find any mention of anything remotely like it in the ancient Roman world. If someone can point me to a source, please do -- it certainly doesn't 'fit' with what we know about Roman marriage practices and the like. I've also been unable to track to any reference to a ritual connected Juno Februata except in the context of some purported link to Valentine's day.

7:22:31 AM    

CHATTER: Happy Valentine's Day I

I suspect as I wade through my mailbox this a.m., which appears to have just received a major dump of email that was delayed somewhere along the line, that I'll find plenty of Valentine's Day-related material. Here's the first one worth mentioning, mentioned in passing in the Scotsman in an article on kissing:

But, regardless of its origin, the erotic nature of the kiss was born. By the time Alexander the Great arrived in India (300BC), Indians had perfected the art of kissing. The custom is reported to have spread throughout Syria, Persia and Assyria before reaching Rome and Greece. The Ancient Romans went so far as to perfume their lips with Oriental spices in preparation for a romantic clinch.

I'm not sure, but this seems to be implying that there was no kissing in the West before Alexander's troops returned. If true, perhaps it answers something I have long wondered about Penelope in the Odyssey ... she never does give Odysseus the big cinematic kiss our postpostmodern predispositions tend to expect. In Book XXIII, she ponders doing something of the sort, but it sounds more like a 'greeting-out-of-control kiss' than something erotic. Then there's that 'Roman Question' of Plutarch about the practice of the ancient Romans to kiss their wives when they returned from a trip -- not because they missed them, but to check whether they had been drinking wine.

7:09:10 AM    

AWOTV: On TV Today

11.00 a.m. |DTC| Mystery of the Minoans
The latest computer modeling techniques combine with fossil records
to reveal the fate of the 17th century Minoan civilization of Crete.
Tidal waves and torrents of burning ash from a massive volcano may
have altered the course of Western history.

3.00 p.m. |DTC| Secrets of the Colosseum
Visit the ruins of this massive triumph of Roman building and
engineering for clues to its ingenious design. Built in a remarkably
short span of 10 years, the structure combined travertine stone,
iron, concrete, brick and lava rocks from nearby Vesuvius.

DTC = Discovery Times Channel (US)

6:33:57 AM