Roman influence in your average day and other assorted curiosities

[Lord Baal]

The why of this:
Given the constant heated debate here lately, it's mandatory to have some more friendly, anecdotal chatting, hence I'm creating this thread to such things, and it will be themed in the influence of Rome over our modern, current lives. I'm not talking about the huge, world changing geopolitical influences, but the small, little details that will make you chuckle once you come across them and remember our beloved game.

I think this is somehow in the same spirit as this excellent thread. After all, even when we don't agree in a lot of things, we are united by the fact we all are strategy players, most of us are attracted to history in some way or another, at different lengths but in the end we are all Total War players, and I don't know for most of you guys, but I get in this forums to learn, share and have a good time with people that have common interests with me. Not to outdick anyone showing my supposedly superior knowledge and history degrees, that given our way of interaction mean squat. For all you know I could be a history teacher in a university, a alien from Mars, a busty blond girl or the heir of New Zanzibar that send those pesky emails asking for 500 bucks.

The idea of this whole thing is to share some anecdote and maybe have a light hearted discussion of some things regarding those, but as soon people start to act as dickheads I will call a moderator and either the offending posts are deleted or the thread gets closed.

The how of this, let me start it for you people:
How are we gonna start? Well I have to tell you (and disappoint you, I'm not a busty blond girl), I work at the IT department of a food factory, and by some freakish unfortunate series of events I got stuck with a project involving the weighing scales for the transports (trucks) that bring in the wheat from the port. Now I wont bore you people with the details of all the work.

I have been pretty cranky the past few days with this, until yesterday when I somehow made a connection. The weighing scales in Spanish are called "Balanzas". However they are commonly known as... Romana (the female of Roman in Spanish), all thanks to the steelyard balance that is called Romana in Spanish, then the name got stuck in any weight measurement device. Even when the Romans where not the first in invent them, I think they are the ones that made them popular among the western hemisphere, and even if not, the term got somehow stickied with them.

So, even when it's not my field of work and the actual mechanism is different, I have a about week working around something commonly nicknamed after Rome.

I know it's kind of silly and not so huge as the urban legend of the track gauge (see here for more info about it), but it made me chuckle a little bit when I figured that out.

EDIT: Oh and things from the Gauls, Parthians, Egyptians, Greeks and other cultures from the time frame could be fun too.

[Marcus Aemilius Lepidus]

Its not specifily Roman but i hope you accept great Lord Baal. I hear about the myth that mayonnaise might be named after Hannibals Brother Mago who stayed in Mallorca for a while. Has anybody heart about this too

[Lord Baal]

Oh I forgot, things do not necessarily have to be something roman per se... it could be from anywhere within the scope of the pc game so it can remain here, but curious things from China or other parts of the world could have a space here.

[PROMETHEUS ts]

All the western culture , attitude to life and even daily schedule derives from the ancient Greek and Roman society , quite different from asian one or middleastern and quite a distinctive mark of the western society .
Too long really to write in a post ...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_culture

[The Juggernaut]

My family is italian, and one day my parents told me that the urinals in Italy are commonly dubbed "Vespasians". They didn't know that there was a Roman emperor named Vespasian, or what connection there was between them, but it turns out that the Emperor Vespasian charged a tax on pisspots that were collected for curing leather.

[Marcus Aemilius Lepidus]

My family is italian, and one day my parents told me that the urinals in Italy are commonly dubbed "Vespasians". They didn't know that there was a Roman emperor named Vespasian, or what connection there was between them, but it turns out that the Emperor Vespasian charged a tax on pisspots that were collected for curing leather.

Not only leather. Also for bleaching. The best way to get the best white. Persil Megaperls of the antiqui

[Count Roger Borsa]

Theres a city where I live in Missouri named Hannibal, probably not refering to Hannibal himself but I thought it was pretty neat!

[RoyalNobody]

Icknield Way is where I occasionally walk my dogs, so I guess I can thank the Romans for that.

[Godless Pickle]

Hermmm......the english language, sandals, rapping a towel around the waist, hot tubs.

[hochmeister devin]

The romans didnt invent english, or add that much to it since todays english is about 45% germanic 45% french and 10% other for where the words are originate.

[Lord Baal]

Excellent anecdotes pals! PROMETHEUS ts, you post although good it's a bit too much encompassing, I was looking for the little things, details more mundane and simple like the other examples. Things from the day to day.

[PROMETHEUS ts]

The romans didnt invent english, or add that much to it since todays english is about 45% germanic 45% french and 10% other for where the words are originate.

Just in the sentence you wrote you used latin words ... a couple ....

to invent : from L. inventus
to Originate: from L. originationem

from

Excellent anecdotes pals! PROMETHEUS ts, you post although good it's a bit too much encompassing, I was looking for the little things, details more mundane and simple like the other examples. Things from the day to day.

well still are too many to list them all , there is a huge load of roman inventions or greek that are still used today , from surgical instruments that varied very little directly from the field experience in the roman army to concrete or the glass windows . but one thing of everyday life ... Do you wash everyday and take a shower?

The Romans not only had showers, but also believed in bathing multiple times a week, if not every day. After the fall of the Roman Empire and the rise of Christianity, practising what is today considered good hygiene became a religious taboo and was abandoned almost completely from the Middle Ages until the Victorian era. for this reason there had been more pestilences in the middle ages than during the Roman empire .

[Lord Baal]

It's more on the road. What thing recently have you discovered or remembered to have heavy roman influence (or some other culture from that epoch)

[Durnaug]

The computer. Invented by the Greeks, destroyed by the Romans (as usual), setting us back 2000 years.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antikythera_mechanism

Oh yeh, and democracy. Invented by the Greeks, stamped out by the Romans etc...

I'm teasing. Just envious of Rome - upstart barbarians

[Marcus Aemilius Lepidus]

But shower and washing is nothing special roman. They had a big bathculture, but all cultures are washing their bodies. The way you wrote it could be missundertood.

My biggest contact in school was the selfloved cicero. Damn i hated that guy

[PROMETHEUS ts]

But shower and washing is nothing special roman. They had a big bathculture, but all cultures are washing their bodies. The way you wrote it could be missundertood.

My biggest contact in school was the selfloved cicero. Damn i hated that guy

PErhaps for you is nothing special to wash but if nowday its part of the modern culture to use a bath is Due to the roman legacy ... after the fall of rome and barbarian invasion this use was lost , you may say yes barbarians washed in the river ... well who wouln't after days you do not wash and find a river?
Romans had baths in cities and some villas even had internal baths and conditioning system as well as heated water and with "showers"...

The computer. Invented by the Greeks, destroyed by the Romans (as usual), setting us back 2000 years.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antikythera_mechanism

Oh yeh, and democracy. Invented by the Greeks, stamped out by the Romans etc...


I'm teasing. Just envious of Rome - upstart barbarians

Let's not start with fake claims . Democracy was invented in Greece and since then its principles are known , Romans didn't use democracy but never concealed .... it .
they had a republic ... as for the antikythera mechanism its of late hellenistic period some supposed from the same southern Italian city of Syracuse and Romans never refused the technology on the countrary they made large use of it and they deeply incorporated the greeek culture so that its now considered usually as grecoroman and there is not a straght distinction between the roman and the greek as the roman one was heavily influenced by the greek one ...
the roman age was full of inventions and inventors , often greek ... if you want to blame someone for bringing backward the ancient europe then you should point your finger on some others ...

[Marcus Aemilius Lepidus]

PErhaps for you is nothing special to wash but if nowday its part of the modern culture to use a bath is Due to the roman legacy ... after the fall of rome and barbarian invasion this use was lost , you may say yes barbarians washed in the river ... well who wouln't after days you do not wash and find a river?
Romans had baths in cities and some villas even had internal baths and conditioning system as well as heated water and with "showers"...

Hmmm strange that the romans just build up on further traditions when they build their baths in the provinces. The best example is Bath in England where the celts were washing long before the romans. In celtic and german traditions cleaning is a sacred tradition and we have enough gods who prove that. Only because the romans build up on further structures with stone it is no prove that diffrent cultures lacked the ability and the wish to wash.

Article on Bath:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/legacies/immig_...rticle_1.shtml

[General Sultan V]

Are you implying that if the celts found it sacred to bathe Challenges Rome's Public & Privately owned and Highly technological Baths? (Technological beyond what you seem to know).

[B. W.]

Hmmm, the month of July has 31 days in it because of Julius Caesar. Come to think of it, the month of August has 31 days in it beause of Octavian. The calendar we have today is pretty much the calander J. Caesar gave us with a little twiking done on it.

Most people are familiar with the law that if a nieghbors tree has limb growing over your property you can cut off the part of the limb that hangs over. This was one of the first laws in the ancient Roman Republic. There are a lot of other legal traditions that were Roman that have been incorporated into the many judicial systems of the western world.

Ancient Rome has long coatails that many folks aren't aware of. If someone were to make a list of things Roman that have been passed down to us, the list would be quite extensive.

[General Sultan V]

including Citizenship Records....