SZA was 'scared and freaked out' at Glastonbury

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Gladiator knife handle found near Hadrian’s Wall

A rare knife handle in the shape of a gladiator found by divers in 1997 has been donated to English Heritage and will go on public display for the first time next year. The copper alloy figure was discovered near Corbridge Roman Town in Northumberland on Hadrian’s Wall and is in pristine condition, preserved in the water of the River Tyne for 2,000 years. Originally the handle for a folding knife, it is only the second Roman gladiator knife handle to be found in England.

The figure depicts a gladiator of the secutor class, a heavily armed fighter who carried a heavy rectangular shield and short sword. He wore a full-coverage helmet with two small openings to see through, a manica (arm guard) on his right arm and an ocrea (greave) on his left leg. The secutor was fielded again the retiarius who fought bareheaded and unshielded with a trident, net and dagger. This particular secutor is left-handed. Left-handedness was considered unlucky, so it is a distinguishing feature for a gladiator and may indicate the figure is depicting a specific fighter.

Another rare depiction of a gladiator on an object of English origin, the Colchester Vase, features a fight between a secutor and retiarius and both of them are named. Colchester, known to the Romans as Camulodunum, was a major city in the southeast and had two theaters where gladiatorial combat may have been staged. Corbridge, on the other hand, was a civilian settlement associated with a fort on the remote northern border of the Roman Empire. It was a bustling town that played a key commercial role as a supply base for the Roman army, one of only two civilian communities of substance on the wall (Carlisle is the other). It had granaries, public buildings, an aqueduct, a temple and housing for officers, but there was no theater or arena.

Dr Frances McIntosh, English Heritage’s Collections Curator for Hadrian’s Wall and the North East, said, ‘It is rare to find a piece of gladiator memorabilia in Britain and to find such a well preserved and interesting piece is particularly remarkable.

‘Despite being enslaved and socially outcast due to their profession, gladiators could become huge celebrities. Gladiators and the ‘spectacles’ were an integral part of Roman cultural life, taking place all across the Roman Empire. The phenomenon inspired the creation of sporting memorabilia, such as decorated ceramics and glass cups, lamps and figurines.

‘Gladiators had sex appeal and there are cases of high-status Roman women falling ‘in love’ with these lowly fighters, despite the vast social difference. This beautifully made knife handle is a testament to how pervasive this celebrity culture was, reaching all the way to Hadrian’s Wall at the very edge of the Roman Empire.”

The Tyne knife handle was finely cast and is a high-quality piece. It not mass-produced. It was likely a commissioned piece, and if it fell into the river by accident, the loss would have been much regretted.

The handle will go on display at Corbridge Roman Town in 2025 accompanied by other artifacts discovered in the River Tyne.

* This article was originally published here

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Roman hobnailed shoe found in playground in Germany

An excavation in a children’s playground adjacent to the Roman military camp at Haltern am See, northern Germany, has uncovered the remains of a hobnailed boot, a glass game piece and evidence of the camp’s wood-earth defensive wall.

Archaeologists with the Westphalia-Lippe Regional Association (LWL) began excavating the site this summer accompanying construction work on the playground. Its proximity to the fortifications of the 1st century Roman camp of Aliso made it likely that archaeological materials were to be found at the location.

Aliso was built during the reign of the emperor Augustus as part of his aim to establish the province of Magna Germania, a much larger territory in northwestern Europe that would stretch from the Rhine in the west to the Vistula in the east and the Danube in the south. Augustus’ ambition was dashed to bloody pieces at the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest in 9 A.D.

Arminius, leader of the Cherusci tribe and former ally of Rome who was responsible for the resounding defeat of three legions and the permanent derailment of all hopes of imperial expansion into Germany, besieged Aliso after his victory over the winter of 9/10 A.D. The garrison put up a great fight, and ultimately managed to escape destruction, but Aliso would be the last of the six military camps built by Augustus during his Germanic campaigns to be held by Rome after Teutoburg. The camp was occupied until 16 A.D.

Archaeological evidence of the siege — lead and stone slingshot balls, arrowheads, mass graves — and remains of the camp’s south, west and east gates have been found in previous excavations. The playground is located on the wood-earth wall, and the excavation found well-preserved post holes from the wall. It also uncovered two bread-baking pit ovens and several waste pits. The boot was found in one of the waste pits.

LWL archaeologist Dr. Bettina Tremmel said: “A legionnaire threw his worn-out caliga into one of these waste pits and disposed of it that way. The shoe leather has now completely decomposed in the sandy soil of Haltern. However, the shoe nails that were under the sole of the shoe remained in place.”

The archaeologists tracked these down with the help of a so-called pinpointer, a compact mini metal detector. “In one place we found shoe nails lying close together and used the pinpointer to continue the search. This hit an area of ​​20 by 20 centimeters,” says Tremmel. The archaeologists then recovered the entire block of earth in order not to change the position of the small metal finds in the ground and to ensure that they could be transported without breakage.

“The shoe must have been relatively small and turned over in the heel area. There is a 90-degree bend there,” says LWL restorer Andreas Weisgerber. “We also looked at whether organic matter might have been preserved on the iron oxides. Unfortunately, this was not the case. Judging by the length of the nail thorn, the sole was about 0.8 centimeters thick.”

“The soles of the Caligae shoes consisted of three layers of leather, which were held together by small, hand-forged nails. The tips of the nails were folded over on the top of the sole,” adds Tremmel. “As the legionaries did not wear socks, walking on the 60 nails hammered into each sole must have been almost like a massage,” she believes.

* This article was originally published here

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Why does Pharrell's biopic sidestep Blurred Lines?

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‘King Arthur’s Hall’ is 4,000 years older than thought

A new investigation of the ancient site known as King Arthur’s Hall on Bodmin Moor in Cornwall has revealed it dates back to the Neolithic Period, 4,000 years older than previously believed. Researchers from the Cornwall Archaeological Unit (CAU) employed Optically Stimulated Luminescence (OSL) dating to discover that the enclosure was dug approximately 5,000 to 5,500 years ago, making it as old as Stonehenge, not medieval.

The site is a rectangular sunken enclosure 155 feet long and 65 feet wide outlined by an earth and stone embankment. The inner bank is lined with 56 orthostats (standing stones) up to six feet high. Most of the visible ones are leaning or lying down, but there may be more under the surface.

It was long thought to be a medieval animal pound, an enclosure for livestock, and was listed by Historic England as dating to around 1000 A.D., but there was speculation that due to the use of orthostats, its north-south orientation and the presence of other standing stone groupings nearby, at least part of the mound was much older. The rectangular enclosure with embankment and interior standing stones is unique, however. There are no known directly comparable Neolithic examples.

CAU was commissioned to excavate a small investigative trench near the entrance area at the south of the rectangle. Soil samples were taken from the main trench through the bank and organic samples from the exposed stone construction of the bank. The Optically Stimulated Luminescence dating, which measures the time soil was last exposed to light, was used on samples from the soil in the bank and soils underneath it. The OSL results indicate the embankment was dug and built up in the later part of the 4th millennium B.C. Geological analysis of the standing stones found they were local, sourced from within 820 feet of the site.

Test pits dug in other parts of the Hall recovered pollen, seeds, insects, parasite eggs samples for radiocarbon dating. The results found that infilling of the enclosure began about 2,000 – 2,500 years ago, and activities in the marshy interior are indeed medieval, dating to 500 – 1000 years ago, so it may have been used a pound after all, and then later as a reservoir used in tin mining.

It was first documented as “King Arthur’s Hall” in 1584, but there is no specific Arthurian legend connection claimed beyond that he visited there. The association with the legendary king may be a more recent cultural expression of a much older understanding of the site as sacred and important.

Pete Herring, president of the Cornwall Archaeological Society, said: ““The romantic sounding 16th century name King Arthur’s Hall tells us that here is a place regarded by the moorland community as something ancient and unfathomable, like other sites attributed to Arthur. Science has responded to that name’s challenge, providing a very early date of origin, and two other dates, later prehistoric and medieval, when there was activity at the enclosure.

“The monument retains its mystery: there are no Neolithic parallels for a stone-lined sunken and embanked rectangular enclosure, possibly watery. We may presume it was a sacred site, a place for gatherings, for rituals or ceremonies, but perhaps Neolithic people made and used it for very different purposes.

“Its later prehistoric and medieval dates for reuse may relate to two of Cornwall’s great sources of wealth, supporting the sustainable summer grazing of extensive commons, and then serving as a reservoir for water used in tin stream working.”

Historic England has listed the site on its Heritage at Risk Register because it is under threat from vegetation and erosion from visitors. The confirmation of its Neolithic origin will help heritage authorities develop a management plan for its long-term conservation, starting with rebuilding a fence surrounding the monument to prevent erosion from human tourists and the cattle that pasture Bodmin Moor.

* This article was originally published here

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