© 2012 Werner Schnell - All rights reserved

Eflatun Pınar.....bears unique testimony to a major cult monument of the Hittite Empire. The Hittites secured the political unity in Anatolia, existed in these lands roughly between 1620 BC and 1200 BC and acquired a very different and significant place in the Anatolian history. The Hittites built their temples nearby sources of water as they thought water was elixir of life. The spring sanctuary of Eflatun Pınar has a great importance within the water cult having a significant role in the Hititte religion. Integration of water in the architectural and religious concept is a unique feature of the site. As the Hittites had a theocratic understanding of religion they often established their cities and erected their temples nearby the sources of water which is elixir of life. These sources of water and rivers were sanctified and good deal of importance that attached to the cult of water by performing a lot of rituals. In lots of places of the Hittite Empire territory, foremost Hattusa, basins, dams, weirs, especially rock monuments were built nearby water were unearthed. For usually Hittite spring sanctuaries had been carved everywhere in Anatolia in the natural rock, but in this case obviously Eflatun Pınar was erected artificially in order to be able to mount the relief. Thousands tons of stones had to be transported from an andesite quarry about five kilometres away from the construction site that is an impressive logistical achievement. No inscriptions were found at the site, but based on its proximity to Yalburt and Köylütolu Monuments this monument may be dated to the 2nd half of 13th century BC. A Hittite cult basin is also preserved in Yalburt, a place that is only 60 kilometres away from Eflatun Pınar. Yet the water structural arrangements of this monument are very simple and cannot be compared to those in Eflatun Pınar. In one point, the two structures are nevertheless similar the basin of Yalburt is erected of large ashlars, that are stacked up in several courses. There is no relief existed on the monument of Yalburt and as a result of its drain spring, it has lost its original function currently.

I guess Flickr puts a limit on how long videos can be. A longer video is on youtube here: www.youtube.com/watch?v=WQ74OXBN3Rw&t=8s

You may recognize this structure from some of my other photos, but I just really love the shape and the way it plays with light. This is the Tacoma Glass Museum whose interesting design serves to house the Glass Blowing Shop and observation area while allowing exhaust and cooling for the giant blast furnaces. fineartamerica.com/profiles/1-jason-jacobs.html

“Beato chi je la fa… la vertenza!”

A Dodge 300 parked in Danville, IN. Nov 2023

Alana, an educator at the zoo, holds a turtle at a fundraising event. Certain zoo residents are identified as "ambassador" animals, who travel to educational functions, parties, and fundraising banquets like the one last night.

Modèle / Model : Ford Galaxy III

Affectation / Assignment : Police Nationale / National Police

Fonction / Function : Véhicule de patrouille Tour de France / Tour de France patrol vehicle

Mise en service / Commissioning : Mars 2018 / March 2018

Équipementier / Maker : Gruau

Catégorie / Category : Officiel / Official

 

Événement / Event : Tour de France 2018, étape 21 / Tour de France 2018, stage 21

Hadrian's Wall (Latin: Vallum Hadriani, also known as the Roman Wall, Picts' Wall, or Vallum Aelium in Latin), is a former defensive fortification of the Roman province of Britannia, begun in AD 122 in the reign of the Emperor Hadrian.[1] Running from Wallsend on the River Tyne in the east to Bowness-on-Solway in the west of what is now northern England, it was a stone wall with large ditches in front of it and behind it that crossed the whole width of the island. Soldiers were garrisoned along the line of the wall in large forts, smaller milecastles, and intervening turrets. In addition to the wall's defensive military role, its gates may have been customs posts.

 

Hadrian's Wall Path generally runs very close to the wall. Almost all of the standing masonry of the wall was removed in early modern times and used for local roads and farmhouses. None of it stands to its original height, but modern work has exposed much of the footings, and some segments display a few courses of modern masonry reconstruction. Many of the excavated forts on or near the wall are open to the public, and various nearby museums present its history. The largest Roman archaeological feature in Britain, it runs a total of 73 miles (117.5 kilometres) in northern England. Regarded as a British cultural icon, Hadrian's Wall is one of Britain's major ancient tourist attractions. It was designated as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1987. The turf-built Antonine Wall in what is now central Scotland, which briefly superseded Hadrian's Wall before being abandoned, was declared a World Heritage Site in 2008.

 

Hadrian's Wall marked the boundary between Roman Britannia and unconquered Caledonia to the north. The wall lies entirely within England and has never formed the Anglo-Scottish border, though it is sometimes loosely or colloquially described as being such.

 

Roman Britain was the territory that became the Roman province of Britannia after the Roman conquest of Britain, consisting of a large part of the island of Great Britain. The occupation lasted from AD 43 to AD 410.

 

Julius Caesar invaded Britain in 55 and 54 BC as part of his Gallic Wars. According to Caesar, the Britons had been overrun or culturally assimilated by the Belgae during the British Iron Age and had been aiding Caesar's enemies. The Belgae were the only Celtic tribe to cross the sea into Britain, for to all other Celtic tribes this land was unknown. He received tribute, installed the friendly king Mandubracius over the Trinovantes, and returned to Gaul. Planned invasions under Augustus were called off in 34, 27, and 25 BC. In 40 AD, Caligula assembled 200,000 men at the Channel on the continent, only to have them gather seashells (musculi) according to Suetonius, perhaps as a symbolic gesture to proclaim Caligula's victory over the sea. Three years later, Claudius directed four legions to invade Britain and restore the exiled king Verica over the Atrebates. The Romans defeated the Catuvellauni, and then organized their conquests as the province of Britain. By 47 AD, the Romans held the lands southeast of the Fosse Way. Control over Wales was delayed by reverses and the effects of Boudica's uprising, but the Romans expanded steadily northward.

 

The conquest of Britain continued under command of Gnaeus Julius Agricola (77–84), who expanded the Roman Empire as far as Caledonia. In mid-84 AD, Agricola faced the armies of the Caledonians, led by Calgacus, at the Battle of Mons Graupius. Battle casualties were estimated by Tacitus to be upwards of 10,000 on the Caledonian side and about 360 on the Roman side. The bloodbath at Mons Graupius concluded the forty-year conquest of Britain, a period that possibly saw between 100,000 and 250,000 Britons killed. In the context of pre-industrial warfare and of a total population of Britain of c. 2 million, these are very high figures.

 

Under the 2nd-century emperors Hadrian and Antoninus Pius, two walls were built to defend the Roman province from the Caledonians, whose realms in the Scottish Highlands were never controlled. Around 197 AD, the Severan Reforms divided Britain into two provinces: Britannia Superior and Britannia Inferior. During the Diocletian Reforms, at the end of the 3rd century, Britannia was divided into four provinces under the direction of a vicarius, who administered the Diocese of the Britains. A fifth province, Valentia, is attested in the later 4th century. For much of the later period of the Roman occupation, Britannia was subject to barbarian invasions and often came under the control of imperial usurpers and imperial pretenders. The final Roman withdrawal from Britain occurred around 410; the native kingdoms are considered to have formed Sub-Roman Britain after that.

 

Following the conquest of the Britons, a distinctive Romano-British culture emerged as the Romans introduced improved agriculture, urban planning, industrial production, and architecture. The Roman goddess Britannia became the female personification of Britain. After the initial invasions, Roman historians generally only mention Britain in passing. Thus, most present knowledge derives from archaeological investigations and occasional epigraphic evidence lauding the Britannic achievements of an emperor. Roman citizens settled in Britain from many parts of the Empire.

 

History

Britain was known to the Classical world. The Greeks, the Phoenicians and the Carthaginians traded for Cornish tin in the 4th century BC. The Greeks referred to the Cassiterides, or "tin islands", and placed them near the west coast of Europe. The Carthaginian sailor Himilco is said to have visited the island in the 6th or 5th century BC and the Greek explorer Pytheas in the 4th. It was regarded as a place of mystery, with some writers refusing to believe it existed.

 

The first direct Roman contact was when Julius Caesar undertook two expeditions in 55 and 54 BC, as part of his conquest of Gaul, believing the Britons were helping the Gallic resistance. The first expedition was more a reconnaissance than a full invasion and gained a foothold on the coast of Kent but was unable to advance further because of storm damage to the ships and a lack of cavalry. Despite the military failure, it was a political success, with the Roman Senate declaring a 20-day public holiday in Rome to honour the unprecedented achievement of obtaining hostages from Britain and defeating Belgic tribes on returning to the continent.

 

The second invasion involved a substantially larger force and Caesar coerced or invited many of the native Celtic tribes to pay tribute and give hostages in return for peace. A friendly local king, Mandubracius, was installed, and his rival, Cassivellaunus, was brought to terms. Hostages were taken, but historians disagree over whether any tribute was paid after Caesar returned to Gaul.

 

Caesar conquered no territory and left no troops behind, but he established clients and brought Britain into Rome's sphere of influence. Augustus planned invasions in 34, 27 and 25 BC, but circumstances were never favourable, and the relationship between Britain and Rome settled into one of diplomacy and trade. Strabo, writing late in Augustus's reign, claimed that taxes on trade brought in more annual revenue than any conquest could. Archaeology shows that there was an increase in imported luxury goods in southeastern Britain. Strabo also mentions British kings who sent embassies to Augustus, and Augustus's own Res Gestae refers to two British kings he received as refugees. When some of Tiberius's ships were carried to Britain in a storm during his campaigns in Germany in 16 AD, they came back with tales of monsters.

 

Rome appears to have encouraged a balance of power in southern Britain, supporting two powerful kingdoms: the Catuvellauni, ruled by the descendants of Tasciovanus, and the Atrebates, ruled by the descendants of Commius. This policy was followed until 39 or 40 AD, when Caligula received an exiled member of the Catuvellaunian dynasty and planned an invasion of Britain that collapsed in farcical circumstances before it left Gaul. When Claudius successfully invaded in 43 AD, it was in aid of another fugitive British ruler, Verica of the Atrebates.

 

Roman invasion

The invasion force in 43 AD was led by Aulus Plautius,[26] but it is unclear how many legions were sent. The Legio II Augusta, commanded by future emperor Vespasian, was the only one directly attested to have taken part. The Legio IX Hispana, the XIV Gemina (later styled Martia Victrix) and the XX (later styled Valeria Victrix) are known to have served during the Boudican Revolt of 60/61, and were probably there since the initial invasion. This is not certain because the Roman army was flexible, with units being moved around whenever necessary. The IX Hispana may have been permanently stationed, with records showing it at Eboracum (York) in 71 and on a building inscription there dated 108, before being destroyed in the east of the Empire, possibly during the Bar Kokhba revolt.

 

The invasion was delayed by a troop mutiny until an imperial freedman persuaded them to overcome their fear of crossing the Ocean and campaigning beyond the limits of the known world. They sailed in three divisions, and probably landed at Richborough in Kent; at least part of the force may have landed near Fishbourne, West Sussex.

 

The Catuvellauni and their allies were defeated in two battles: the first, assuming a Richborough landing, on the river Medway, the second on the river Thames. One of their leaders, Togodumnus, was killed, but his brother Caratacus survived to continue resistance elsewhere. Plautius halted at the Thames and sent for Claudius, who arrived with reinforcements, including artillery and elephants, for the final march to the Catuvellaunian capital, Camulodunum (Colchester). Vespasian subdued the southwest, Cogidubnus was set up as a friendly king of several territories, and treaties were made with tribes outside direct Roman control.

 

Establishment of Roman rule

After capturing the south of the island, the Romans turned their attention to what is now Wales. The Silures, Ordovices and Deceangli remained implacably opposed to the invaders and for the first few decades were the focus of Roman military attention, despite occasional minor revolts among Roman allies like the Brigantes and the Iceni. The Silures were led by Caratacus, and he carried out an effective guerrilla campaign against Governor Publius Ostorius Scapula. Finally, in 51, Ostorius lured Caratacus into a set-piece battle and defeated him. The British leader sought refuge among the Brigantes, but their queen, Cartimandua, proved her loyalty by surrendering him to the Romans. He was brought as a captive to Rome, where a dignified speech he made during Claudius's triumph persuaded the emperor to spare his life. The Silures were still not pacified, and Cartimandua's ex-husband Venutius replaced Caratacus as the most prominent leader of British resistance.

 

On Nero's accession, Roman Britain extended as far north as Lindum. Gaius Suetonius Paulinus, the conqueror of Mauretania (modern day Algeria and Morocco), then became governor of Britain, and in 60 and 61 he moved against Mona (Anglesey) to settle accounts with Druidism once and for all. Paulinus led his army across the Menai Strait and massacred the Druids and burnt their sacred groves.

 

While Paulinus was campaigning in Mona, the southeast of Britain rose in revolt under the leadership of Boudica. She was the widow of the recently deceased king of the Iceni, Prasutagus. The Roman historian Tacitus reports that Prasutagus had left a will leaving half his kingdom to Nero in the hope that the remainder would be left untouched. He was wrong. When his will was enforced, Rome[clarification needed] responded by violently seizing the tribe's lands in full. Boudica protested. In consequence, Rome[clarification needed] punished her and her daughters by flogging and rape. In response, the Iceni, joined by the Trinovantes, destroyed the Roman colony at Camulodunum (Colchester) and routed the part of the IXth Legion that was sent to relieve it. Paulinus rode to London (then called Londinium), the rebels' next target, but concluded it could not be defended. Abandoned, it was destroyed, as was Verulamium (St. Albans). Between seventy and eighty thousand people are said to have been killed in the three cities. But Paulinus regrouped with two of the three legions still available to him, chose a battlefield, and, despite being outnumbered by more than twenty to one, defeated the rebels in the Battle of Watling Street. Boudica died not long afterwards, by self-administered poison or by illness. During this time, the Emperor Nero considered withdrawing Roman forces from Britain altogether.

 

There was further turmoil in 69, the "Year of the Four Emperors". As civil war raged in Rome, weak governors were unable to control the legions in Britain, and Venutius of the Brigantes seized his chance. The Romans had previously defended Cartimandua against him, but this time were unable to do so. Cartimandua was evacuated, and Venutius was left in control of the north of the country. After Vespasian secured the empire, his first two appointments as governor, Quintus Petillius Cerialis and Sextus Julius Frontinus, took on the task of subduing the Brigantes and Silures respectively.[38] Frontinus extended Roman rule to all of South Wales, and initiated exploitation of the mineral resources, such as the gold mines at Dolaucothi.

 

In the following years, the Romans conquered more of the island, increasing the size of Roman Britain. Governor Gnaeus Julius Agricola, father-in-law to the historian Tacitus, conquered the Ordovices in 78. With the XX Valeria Victrix legion, Agricola defeated the Caledonians in 84 at the Battle of Mons Graupius, in north-east Scotland. This was the high-water mark of Roman territory in Britain: shortly after his victory, Agricola was recalled from Britain back to Rome, and the Romans initially retired to a more defensible line along the Forth–Clyde isthmus, freeing soldiers badly needed along other frontiers.

 

For much of the history of Roman Britain, a large number of soldiers were garrisoned on the island. This required that the emperor station a trusted senior man as governor of the province. As a result, many future emperors served as governors or legates in this province, including Vespasian, Pertinax, and Gordian I.

 

Roman military organisation in the north

In 84 AD

In 84 AD

 

In 155 AD

In 155 AD

 

Hadrian's Wall, and Antonine Wall

There is no historical source describing the decades that followed Agricola's recall. Even the name of his replacement is unknown. Archaeology has shown that some Roman forts south of the Forth–Clyde isthmus were rebuilt and enlarged; others appear to have been abandoned. By 87 the frontier had been consolidated on the Stanegate. Roman coins and pottery have been found circulating at native settlement sites in the Scottish Lowlands in the years before 100, indicating growing Romanisation. Some of the most important sources for this era are the writing tablets from the fort at Vindolanda in Northumberland, mostly dating to 90–110. These tablets provide evidence for the operation of a Roman fort at the edge of the Roman Empire, where officers' wives maintained polite society while merchants, hauliers and military personnel kept the fort operational and supplied.

 

Around 105 there appears to have been a serious setback at the hands of the tribes of the Picts: several Roman forts were destroyed by fire, with human remains and damaged armour at Trimontium (at modern Newstead, in SE Scotland) indicating hostilities at least at that site.[citation needed] There is also circumstantial evidence that auxiliary reinforcements were sent from Germany, and an unnamed British war of the period is mentioned on the gravestone of a tribune of Cyrene. Trajan's Dacian Wars may have led to troop reductions in the area or even total withdrawal followed by slighting of the forts by the Picts rather than an unrecorded military defeat. The Romans were also in the habit of destroying their own forts during an orderly withdrawal, in order to deny resources to an enemy. In either case, the frontier probably moved south to the line of the Stanegate at the Solway–Tyne isthmus around this time.

 

A new crisis occurred at the beginning of Hadrian's reign): a rising in the north which was suppressed by Quintus Pompeius Falco. When Hadrian reached Britannia on his famous tour of the Roman provinces around 120, he directed an extensive defensive wall, known to posterity as Hadrian's Wall, to be built close to the line of the Stanegate frontier. Hadrian appointed Aulus Platorius Nepos as governor to undertake this work who brought the Legio VI Victrix legion with him from Germania Inferior. This replaced the famous Legio IX Hispana, whose disappearance has been much discussed. Archaeology indicates considerable political instability in Scotland during the first half of the 2nd century, and the shifting frontier at this time should be seen in this context.

 

In the reign of Antoninus Pius (138–161) the Hadrianic border was briefly extended north to the Forth–Clyde isthmus, where the Antonine Wall was built around 142 following the military reoccupation of the Scottish lowlands by a new governor, Quintus Lollius Urbicus.

 

The first Antonine occupation of Scotland ended as a result of a further crisis in 155–157, when the Brigantes revolted. With limited options to despatch reinforcements, the Romans moved their troops south, and this rising was suppressed by Governor Gnaeus Julius Verus. Within a year the Antonine Wall was recaptured, but by 163 or 164 it was abandoned. The second occupation was probably connected with Antoninus's undertakings to protect the Votadini or his pride in enlarging the empire, since the retreat to the Hadrianic frontier occurred not long after his death when a more objective strategic assessment of the benefits of the Antonine Wall could be made. The Romans did not entirely withdraw from Scotland at this time: the large fort at Newstead was maintained along with seven smaller outposts until at least 180.

 

During the twenty-year period following the reversion of the frontier to Hadrian's Wall in 163/4, Rome was concerned with continental issues, primarily problems in the Danubian provinces. Increasing numbers of hoards of buried coins in Britain at this time indicate that peace was not entirely achieved. Sufficient Roman silver has been found in Scotland to suggest more than ordinary trade, and it is likely that the Romans were reinforcing treaty agreements by paying tribute to their implacable enemies, the Picts.

 

In 175, a large force of Sarmatian cavalry, consisting of 5,500 men, arrived in Britannia, probably to reinforce troops fighting unrecorded uprisings. In 180, Hadrian's Wall was breached by the Picts and the commanding officer or governor was killed there in what Cassius Dio described as the most serious war of the reign of Commodus. Ulpius Marcellus was sent as replacement governor and by 184 he had won a new peace, only to be faced with a mutiny from his own troops. Unhappy with Marcellus's strictness, they tried to elect a legate named Priscus as usurper governor; he refused, but Marcellus was lucky to leave the province alive. The Roman army in Britannia continued its insubordination: they sent a delegation of 1,500 to Rome to demand the execution of Tigidius Perennis, a Praetorian prefect who they felt had earlier wronged them by posting lowly equites to legate ranks in Britannia. Commodus met the party outside Rome and agreed to have Perennis killed, but this only made them feel more secure in their mutiny.

 

The future emperor Pertinax (lived 126–193) was sent to Britannia to quell the mutiny and was initially successful in regaining control, but a riot broke out among the troops. Pertinax was attacked and left for dead, and asked to be recalled to Rome, where he briefly succeeded Commodus as emperor in 192.

 

3rd century

The death of Commodus put into motion a series of events which eventually led to civil war. Following the short reign of Pertinax, several rivals for the emperorship emerged, including Septimius Severus and Clodius Albinus. The latter was the new governor of Britannia, and had seemingly won the natives over after their earlier rebellions; he also controlled three legions, making him a potentially significant claimant. His sometime rival Severus promised him the title of Caesar in return for Albinus's support against Pescennius Niger in the east. Once Niger was neutralised, Severus turned on his ally in Britannia; it is likely that Albinus saw he would be the next target and was already preparing for war.

 

Albinus crossed to Gaul in 195, where the provinces were also sympathetic to him, and set up at Lugdunum. Severus arrived in February 196, and the ensuing battle was decisive. Albinus came close to victory, but Severus's reinforcements won the day, and the British governor committed suicide. Severus soon purged Albinus's sympathisers and perhaps confiscated large tracts of land in Britain as punishment. Albinus had demonstrated the major problem posed by Roman Britain. In order to maintain security, the province required the presence of three legions, but command of these forces provided an ideal power base for ambitious rivals. Deploying those legions elsewhere would strip the island of its garrison, leaving the province defenceless against uprisings by the native Celtic tribes and against invasion by the Picts and Scots.

 

The traditional view is that northern Britain descended into anarchy during Albinus's absence. Cassius Dio records that the new Governor, Virius Lupus, was obliged to buy peace from a fractious northern tribe known as the Maeatae. The succession of militarily distinguished governors who were subsequently appointed suggests that enemies of Rome were posing a difficult challenge, and Lucius Alfenus Senecio's report to Rome in 207 describes barbarians "rebelling, over-running the land, taking loot and creating destruction". In order to rebel, of course, one must be a subject – the Maeatae clearly did not consider themselves such. Senecio requested either reinforcements or an Imperial expedition, and Severus chose the latter, despite being 62 years old. Archaeological evidence shows that Senecio had been rebuilding the defences of Hadrian's Wall and the forts beyond it, and Severus's arrival in Britain prompted the enemy tribes to sue for peace immediately. The emperor had not come all that way to leave without a victory, and it is likely that he wished to provide his teenage sons Caracalla and Geta with first-hand experience of controlling a hostile barbarian land.

 

Northern campaigns, 208–211

An invasion of Caledonia led by Severus and probably numbering around 20,000 troops moved north in 208 or 209, crossing the Wall and passing through eastern Scotland on a route similar to that used by Agricola. Harried by punishing guerrilla raids by the northern tribes and slowed by an unforgiving terrain, Severus was unable to meet the Caledonians on a battlefield. The emperor's forces pushed north as far as the River Tay, but little appears to have been achieved by the invasion, as peace treaties were signed with the Caledonians. By 210 Severus had returned to York, and the frontier had once again become Hadrian's Wall. He assumed the title Britannicus but the title meant little with regard to the unconquered north, which clearly remained outside the authority of the Empire. Almost immediately, another northern tribe, the Maeatae, went to war. Caracalla left with a punitive expedition, but by the following year his ailing father had died and he and his brother left the province to press their claim to the throne.

 

As one of his last acts, Severus tried to solve the problem of powerful and rebellious governors in Britain by dividing the province into Britannia Superior and Britannia Inferior. This kept the potential for rebellion in check for almost a century. Historical sources provide little information on the following decades, a period known as the Long Peace. Even so, the number of buried hoards found from this period rises, suggesting continuing unrest. A string of forts were built along the coast of southern Britain to control piracy; and over the following hundred years they increased in number, becoming the Saxon Shore Forts.

 

During the middle of the 3rd century, the Roman Empire was convulsed by barbarian invasions, rebellions and new imperial pretenders. Britannia apparently avoided these troubles, but increasing inflation had its economic effect. In 259 a so-called Gallic Empire was established when Postumus rebelled against Gallienus. Britannia was part of this until 274 when Aurelian reunited the empire.

 

Around the year 280, a half-British officer named Bonosus was in command of the Roman's Rhenish fleet when the Germans managed to burn it at anchor. To avoid punishment, he proclaimed himself emperor at Colonia Agrippina (Cologne) but was crushed by Marcus Aurelius Probus. Soon afterwards, an unnamed governor of one of the British provinces also attempted an uprising. Probus put it down by sending irregular troops of Vandals and Burgundians across the Channel.

 

The Carausian Revolt led to a short-lived Britannic Empire from 286 to 296. Carausius was a Menapian naval commander of the Britannic fleet; he revolted upon learning of a death sentence ordered by the emperor Maximian on charges of having abetted Frankish and Saxon pirates and having embezzled recovered treasure. He consolidated control over all the provinces of Britain and some of northern Gaul while Maximian dealt with other uprisings. An invasion in 288 failed to unseat him and an uneasy peace ensued, with Carausius issuing coins and inviting official recognition. In 293, the junior emperor Constantius Chlorus launched a second offensive, besieging the rebel port of Gesoriacum (Boulogne-sur-Mer) by land and sea. After it fell, Constantius attacked Carausius's other Gallic holdings and Frankish allies and Carausius was usurped by his treasurer, Allectus. Julius Asclepiodotus landed an invasion fleet near Southampton and defeated Allectus in a land battle.

 

Diocletian's reforms

As part of Diocletian's reforms, the provinces of Roman Britain were organized as a diocese governed by a vicarius under a praetorian prefect who, from 318 to 331, was Junius Bassus who was based at Augusta Treverorum (Trier).

 

The vicarius was based at Londinium as the principal city of the diocese. Londinium and Eboracum continued as provincial capitals and the territory was divided up into smaller provinces for administrative efficiency.

 

Civilian and military authority of a province was no longer exercised by one official and the governor was stripped of military command which was handed over to the Dux Britanniarum by 314. The governor of a province assumed more financial duties (the procurators of the Treasury ministry were slowly phased out in the first three decades of the 4th century). The Dux was commander of the troops of the Northern Region, primarily along Hadrian's Wall and his responsibilities included protection of the frontier. He had significant autonomy due in part to the distance from his superiors.

 

The tasks of the vicarius were to control and coordinate the activities of governors; monitor but not interfere with the daily functioning of the Treasury and Crown Estates, which had their own administrative infrastructure; and act as the regional quartermaster-general of the armed forces. In short, as the sole civilian official with superior authority, he had general oversight of the administration, as well as direct control, while not absolute, over governors who were part of the prefecture; the other two fiscal departments were not.

 

The early-4th-century Verona List, the late-4th-century work of Sextus Rufus, and the early-5th-century List of Offices and work of Polemius Silvius all list four provinces by some variation of the names Britannia I, Britannia II, Maxima Caesariensis, and Flavia Caesariensis; all of these seem to have initially been directed by a governor (praeses) of equestrian rank. The 5th-century sources list a fifth province named Valentia and give its governor and Maxima's a consular rank. Ammianus mentions Valentia as well, describing its creation by Count Theodosius in 369 after the quelling of the Great Conspiracy. Ammianus considered it a re-creation of a formerly lost province, leading some to think there had been an earlier fifth province under another name (may be the enigmatic "Vespasiana"), and leading others to place Valentia beyond Hadrian's Wall, in the territory abandoned south of the Antonine Wall.

 

Reconstructions of the provinces and provincial capitals during this period partially rely on ecclesiastical records. On the assumption that the early bishoprics mimicked the imperial hierarchy, scholars use the list of bishops for the 314 Council of Arles. The list is patently corrupt: the British delegation is given as including a Bishop "Eborius" of Eboracum and two bishops "from Londinium" (one de civitate Londinensi and the other de civitate colonia Londinensium). The error is variously emended: Bishop Ussher proposed Colonia, Selden Col. or Colon. Camalodun., and Spelman Colonia Cameloduni (all various names of Colchester); Gale and Bingham offered colonia Lindi and Henry Colonia Lindum (both Lincoln); and Bishop Stillingfleet and Francis Thackeray read it as a scribal error of Civ. Col. Londin. for an original Civ. Col. Leg. II (Caerleon). On the basis of the Verona List, the priest and deacon who accompanied the bishops in some manuscripts are ascribed to the fourth province.

 

In the 12th century, Gerald of Wales described the supposedly metropolitan sees of the early British church established by the legendary SS Fagan and "Duvian". He placed Britannia Prima in Wales and western England with its capital at "Urbs Legionum" (Caerleon); Britannia Secunda in Kent and southern England with its capital at "Dorobernia" (Canterbury); Flavia in Mercia and central England with its capital at "Lundonia" (London); "Maximia" in northern England with its capital at Eboracum (York); and Valentia in "Albania which is now Scotland" with its capital at St Andrews. Modern scholars generally dispute the last: some place Valentia at or beyond Hadrian's Wall but St Andrews is beyond even the Antonine Wall and Gerald seems to have simply been supporting the antiquity of its church for political reasons.

 

A common modern reconstruction places the consular province of Maxima at Londinium, on the basis of its status as the seat of the diocesan vicarius; places Prima in the west according to Gerald's traditional account but moves its capital to Corinium of the Dobunni (Cirencester) on the basis of an artifact recovered there referring to Lucius Septimius, a provincial rector; places Flavia north of Maxima, with its capital placed at Lindum Colonia (Lincoln) to match one emendation of the bishops list from Arles;[d] and places Secunda in the north with its capital at Eboracum (York). Valentia is placed variously in northern Wales around Deva (Chester); beside Hadrian's Wall around Luguvalium (Carlisle); and between the walls along Dere Street.

 

4th century

Emperor Constantius returned to Britain in 306, despite his poor health, with an army aiming to invade northern Britain, the provincial defences having been rebuilt in the preceding years. Little is known of his campaigns with scant archaeological evidence, but fragmentary historical sources suggest he reached the far north of Britain and won a major battle in early summer before returning south. His son Constantine (later Constantine the Great) spent a year in northern Britain at his father's side, campaigning against the Picts beyond Hadrian's Wall in the summer and autumn. Constantius died in York in July 306 with his son at his side. Constantine then successfully used Britain as the starting point of his march to the imperial throne, unlike the earlier usurper, Albinus.

 

In the middle of the century, the province was loyal for a few years to the usurper Magnentius, who succeeded Constans following the latter's death. After the defeat and death of Magnentius in the Battle of Mons Seleucus in 353, Constantius II dispatched his chief imperial notary Paulus Catena to Britain to hunt down Magnentius's supporters. The investigation deteriorated into a witch-hunt, which forced the vicarius Flavius Martinus to intervene. When Paulus retaliated by accusing Martinus of treason, the vicarius attacked Paulus with a sword, with the aim of assassinating him, but in the end he committed suicide.

 

As the 4th century progressed, there were increasing attacks from the Saxons in the east and the Scoti (Irish) in the west. A series of forts had been built, starting around 280, to defend the coasts, but these preparations were not enough when, in 367, a general assault of Saxons, Picts, Scoti and Attacotti, combined with apparent dissension in the garrison on Hadrian's Wall, left Roman Britain prostrate. The invaders overwhelmed the entire western and northern regions of Britannia and the cities were sacked. This crisis, sometimes called the Barbarian Conspiracy or the Great Conspiracy, was settled by Count Theodosius from 368 with a string of military and civil reforms. Theodosius crossed from Bononia (Boulogne-sur-Mer) and marched on Londinium where he began to deal with the invaders and made his base.[ An amnesty was promised to deserters which enabled Theodosius to regarrison abandoned forts. By the end of the year Hadrian's Wall was retaken and order returned. Considerable reorganization was undertaken in Britain, including the creation of a new province named Valentia, probably to better address the state of the far north. A new Dux Britanniarum was appointed, Dulcitius, with Civilis to head a new civilian administration.

 

Another imperial usurper, Magnus Maximus, raised the standard of revolt at Segontium (Caernarfon) in north Wales in 383, and crossed the English Channel. Maximus held much of the western empire, and fought a successful campaign against the Picts and Scots around 384. His continental exploits required troops from Britain, and it appears that forts at Chester and elsewhere were abandoned in this period, triggering raids and settlement in north Wales by the Irish. His rule was ended in 388, but not all the British troops may have returned: the Empire's military resources were stretched to the limit along the Rhine and Danube. Around 396 there were more barbarian incursions into Britain. Stilicho led a punitive expedition. It seems peace was restored by 399, and it is likely that no further garrisoning was ordered; by 401 more troops were withdrawn, to assist in the war against Alaric I.

 

End of Roman rule

The traditional view of historians, informed by the work of Michael Rostovtzeff, was of a widespread economic decline at the beginning of the 5th century. Consistent archaeological evidence has told another story, and the accepted view is undergoing re-evaluation. Some features are agreed: more opulent but fewer urban houses, an end to new public building and some abandonment of existing ones, with the exception of defensive structures, and the widespread formation of "dark earth" deposits indicating increased horticulture within urban precincts. Turning over the basilica at Silchester to industrial uses in the late 3rd century, doubtless officially condoned, marks an early stage in the de-urbanisation of Roman Britain.

 

The abandonment of some sites is now believed to be later than had been thought. Many buildings changed use but were not destroyed. There was a growing number of barbarian attacks, but these targeted vulnerable rural settlements rather than towns. Some villas such as Chedworth, Great Casterton in Rutland and Hucclecote in Gloucestershire had new mosaic floors laid around this time, suggesting that economic problems may have been limited and patchy. Many suffered some decay before being abandoned in the 5th century; the story of Saint Patrick indicates that villas were still occupied until at least 430. Exceptionally, new buildings were still going up in this period in Verulamium and Cirencester. Some urban centres, for example Canterbury, Cirencester, Wroxeter, Winchester and Gloucester, remained active during the 5th and 6th centuries, surrounded by large farming estates.

 

Urban life had generally grown less intense by the fourth quarter of the 4th century, and coins minted between 378 and 388 are very rare, indicating a likely combination of economic decline, diminishing numbers of troops, problems with the payment of soldiers and officials or with unstable conditions during the usurpation of Magnus Maximus 383–87. Coinage circulation increased during the 390s, but never attained the levels of earlier decades. Copper coins are very rare after 402, though minted silver and gold coins from hoards indicate they were still present in the province even if they were not being spent. By 407 there were very few new Roman coins going into circulation, and by 430 it is likely that coinage as a medium of exchange had been abandoned. Mass-produced wheel thrown pottery ended at approximately the same time; the rich continued to use metal and glass vessels, while the poor made do with humble "grey ware" or resorted to leather or wooden containers.

 

Sub-Roman Britain

Towards the end of the 4th century Roman rule in Britain came under increasing pressure from barbarian attacks. Apparently, there were not enough troops to mount an effective defence. After elevating two disappointing usurpers, the army chose a soldier, Constantine III, to become emperor in 407. He crossed to Gaul but was defeated by Honorius; it is unclear how many troops remained or ever returned, or whether a commander-in-chief in Britain was ever reappointed. A Saxon incursion in 408 was apparently repelled by the Britons, and in 409 Zosimus records that the natives expelled the Roman civilian administration. Zosimus may be referring to the Bacaudic rebellion of the Breton inhabitants of Armorica since he describes how, in the aftermath of the revolt, all of Armorica and the rest of Gaul followed the example of the Brettaniai. A letter from Emperor Honorius in 410 has traditionally been seen as rejecting a British appeal for help, but it may have been addressed to Bruttium or Bologna. With the imperial layers of the military and civil government gone, administration and justice fell to municipal authorities, and local warlords gradually emerged all over Britain, still utilizing Romano-British ideals and conventions. Historian Stuart Laycock has investigated this process and emphasised elements of continuity from the British tribes in the pre-Roman and Roman periods, through to the native post-Roman kingdoms.

 

In British tradition, pagan Saxons were invited by Vortigern to assist in fighting the Picts, Scoti, and Déisi. (Germanic migration into Roman Britannia may have begun much earlier. There is recorded evidence, for example, of Germanic auxiliaries supporting the legions in Britain in the 1st and 2nd centuries.) The new arrivals rebelled, plunging the country into a series of wars that eventually led to the Saxon occupation of Lowland Britain by 600. Around this time, many Britons fled to Brittany (hence its name), Galicia and probably Ireland. A significant date in sub-Roman Britain is the Groans of the Britons, an unanswered appeal to Aetius, leading general of the western Empire, for assistance against Saxon invasion in 446. Another is the Battle of Deorham in 577, after which the significant cities of Bath, Cirencester and Gloucester fell and the Saxons reached the western sea.

 

Historians generally reject the historicity of King Arthur, who is supposed to have resisted the Anglo-Saxon conquest according to later medieval legends.

 

Trade

During the Roman period Britain's continental trade was principally directed across the Southern North Sea and Eastern Channel, focusing on the narrow Strait of Dover, with more limited links via the Atlantic seaways. The most important British ports were London and Richborough, whilst the continental ports most heavily engaged in trade with Britain were Boulogne and the sites of Domburg and Colijnsplaat at the mouth of the river Scheldt. During the Late Roman period it is likely that the shore forts played some role in continental trade alongside their defensive functions.

 

Exports to Britain included: coin; pottery, particularly red-gloss terra sigillata (samian ware) from southern, central and eastern Gaul, as well as various other wares from Gaul and the Rhine provinces; olive oil from southern Spain in amphorae; wine from Gaul in amphorae and barrels; salted fish products from the western Mediterranean and Brittany in barrels and amphorae; preserved olives from southern Spain in amphorae; lava quern-stones from Mayen on the middle Rhine; glass; and some agricultural products. Britain's exports are harder to detect archaeologically, but will have included metals, such as silver and gold and some lead, iron and copper. Other exports probably included agricultural products, oysters and salt, whilst large quantities of coin would have been re-exported back to the continent as well.

 

These products moved as a result of private trade and also through payments and contracts established by the Roman state to support its military forces and officials on the island, as well as through state taxation and extraction of resources. Up until the mid-3rd century, the Roman state's payments appear to have been unbalanced, with far more products sent to Britain, to support its large military force (which had reached c. 53,000 by the mid-2nd century), than were extracted from the island.

 

It has been argued that Roman Britain's continental trade peaked in the late 1st century AD and thereafter declined as a result of an increasing reliance on local products by the population of Britain, caused by economic development on the island and by the Roman state's desire to save money by shifting away from expensive long-distance imports. Evidence has been outlined that suggests that the principal decline in Roman Britain's continental trade may have occurred in the late 2nd century AD, from c. 165 AD onwards. This has been linked to the economic impact of contemporary Empire-wide crises: the Antonine Plague and the Marcomannic Wars.

 

From the mid-3rd century onwards, Britain no longer received such a wide range and extensive quantity of foreign imports as it did during the earlier part of the Roman period; vast quantities of coin from continental mints reached the island, whilst there is historical evidence for the export of large amounts of British grain to the continent during the mid-4th century. During the latter part of the Roman period British agricultural products, paid for by both the Roman state and by private consumers, clearly played an important role in supporting the military garrisons and urban centres of the northwestern continental Empire. This came about as a result of the rapid decline in the size of the British garrison from the mid-3rd century onwards (thus freeing up more goods for export), and because of 'Germanic' incursions across the Rhine, which appear to have reduced rural settlement and agricultural output in northern Gaul.

 

Economy

Mineral extraction sites such as the Dolaucothi gold mine were probably first worked by the Roman army from c. 75, and at some later stage passed to civilian operators. The mine developed as a series of opencast workings, mainly by the use of hydraulic mining methods. They are described by Pliny the Elder in his Natural History in great detail. Essentially, water supplied by aqueducts was used to prospect for ore veins by stripping away soil to reveal the bedrock. If veins were present, they were attacked using fire-setting and the ore removed for comminution. The dust was washed in a small stream of water and the heavy gold dust and gold nuggets collected in riffles. The diagram at right shows how Dolaucothi developed from c. 75 through to the 1st century. When opencast work was no longer feasible, tunnels were driven to follow the veins. The evidence from the site shows advanced technology probably under the control of army engineers.

 

The Wealden ironworking zone, the lead and silver mines of the Mendip Hills and the tin mines of Cornwall seem to have been private enterprises leased from the government for a fee. Mining had long been practised in Britain (see Grimes Graves), but the Romans introduced new technical knowledge and large-scale industrial production to revolutionise the industry. It included hydraulic mining to prospect for ore by removing overburden as well as work alluvial deposits. The water needed for such large-scale operations was supplied by one or more aqueducts, those surviving at Dolaucothi being especially impressive. Many prospecting areas were in dangerous, upland country, and, although mineral exploitation was presumably one of the main reasons for the Roman invasion, it had to wait until these areas were subdued.

 

By the 3rd and 4th centuries, small towns could often be found near villas. In these towns, villa owners and small-scale farmers could obtain specialist tools. Lowland Britain in the 4th century was agriculturally prosperous enough to export grain to the continent. This prosperity lay behind the blossoming of villa building and decoration that occurred between AD 300 and 350.

 

Britain's cities also consumed Roman-style pottery and other goods, and were centres through which goods could be distributed elsewhere. At Wroxeter in Shropshire, stock smashed into a gutter during a 2nd-century fire reveals that Gaulish samian ware was being sold alongside mixing bowls from the Mancetter-Hartshill industry of the West Midlands. Roman designs were most popular, but rural craftsmen still produced items derived from the Iron Age La Tène artistic traditions. Britain was home to much gold, which attracted Roman invaders. By the 3rd century, Britain's economy was diverse and well established, with commerce extending into the non-Romanised north.

 

Government

Further information: Governors of Roman Britain, Roman client kingdoms in Britain, and Roman auxiliaries in Britain

Under the Roman Empire, administration of peaceful provinces was ultimately the remit of the Senate, but those, like Britain, that required permanent garrisons, were placed under the Emperor's control. In practice imperial provinces were run by resident governors who were members of the Senate and had held the consulship. These men were carefully selected, often having strong records of military success and administrative ability. In Britain, a governor's role was primarily military, but numerous other tasks were also his responsibility, such as maintaining diplomatic relations with local client kings, building roads, ensuring the public courier system functioned, supervising the civitates and acting as a judge in important legal cases. When not campaigning, he would travel the province hearing complaints and recruiting new troops.

 

To assist him in legal matters he had an adviser, the legatus juridicus, and those in Britain appear to have been distinguished lawyers perhaps because of the challenge of incorporating tribes into the imperial system and devising a workable method of taxing them. Financial administration was dealt with by a procurator with junior posts for each tax-raising power. Each legion in Britain had a commander who answered to the governor and, in time of war, probably directly ruled troublesome districts. Each of these commands carried a tour of duty of two to three years in different provinces. Below these posts was a network of administrative managers covering intelligence gathering, sending reports to Rome, organising military supplies and dealing with prisoners. A staff of seconded soldiers provided clerical services.

 

Colchester was probably the earliest capital of Roman Britain, but it was soon eclipsed by London with its strong mercantile connections. The different forms of municipal organisation in Britannia were known as civitas (which were subdivided, amongst other forms, into colonies such as York, Colchester, Gloucester and Lincoln and municipalities such as Verulamium), and were each governed by a senate of local landowners, whether Brythonic or Roman, who elected magistrates concerning judicial and civic affairs. The various civitates sent representatives to a yearly provincial council in order to profess loyalty to the Roman state, to send direct petitions to the Emperor in times of extraordinary need, and to worship the imperial cult.

 

Demographics

Roman Britain had an estimated population between 2.8 million and 3 million people at the end of the second century. At the end of the fourth century, it had an estimated population of 3.6 million people, of whom 125,000 consisted of the Roman army and their families and dependents.[80] The urban population of Roman Britain was about 240,000 people at the end of the fourth century. The capital city of Londinium is estimated to have had a population of about 60,000 people. Londinium was an ethnically diverse city with inhabitants from the Roman Empire, including natives of Britannia, continental Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa. There was also cultural diversity in other Roman-British towns, which were sustained by considerable migration, from Britannia and other Roman territories, including continental Europe, Roman Syria, the Eastern Mediterranean and North Africa. In a study conducted in 2012, around 45 percent of sites investigated dating from the Roman period had at least one individual of North African origin.

 

Town and country

During their occupation of Britain the Romans founded a number of important settlements, many of which survive. The towns suffered attrition in the later 4th century, when public building ceased and some were abandoned to private uses. Place names survived the deurbanised Sub-Roman and early Anglo-Saxon periods, and historiography has been at pains to signal the expected survivals, but archaeology shows that a bare handful of Roman towns were continuously occupied. According to S.T. Loseby, the very idea of a town as a centre of power and administration was reintroduced to England by the Roman Christianising mission to Canterbury, and its urban revival was delayed to the 10th century.

 

Roman towns can be broadly grouped in two categories. Civitates, "public towns" were formally laid out on a grid plan, and their role in imperial administration occasioned the construction of public buildings. The much more numerous category of vici, "small towns" grew on informal plans, often round a camp or at a ford or crossroads; some were not small, others were scarcely urban, some not even defended by a wall, the characteristic feature of a place of any importance.

 

Cities and towns which have Roman origins, or were extensively developed by them are listed with their Latin names in brackets; civitates are marked C

 

Alcester (Alauna)

Alchester

Aldborough, North Yorkshire (Isurium Brigantum) C

Bath (Aquae Sulis) C

Brough (Petuaria) C

Buxton (Aquae Arnemetiae)

Caerleon (Isca Augusta) C

Caernarfon (Segontium) C

Caerwent (Venta Silurum) C

Caister-on-Sea C

Canterbury (Durovernum Cantiacorum) C

Carlisle (Luguvalium) C

Carmarthen (Moridunum) C

Chelmsford (Caesaromagus)

Chester (Deva Victrix) C

Chester-le-Street (Concangis)

Chichester (Noviomagus Reginorum) C

Cirencester (Corinium) C

Colchester (Camulodunum) C

Corbridge (Coria) C

Dorchester (Durnovaria) C

Dover (Portus Dubris)

Exeter (Isca Dumnoniorum) C

Gloucester (Glevum) C

Great Chesterford (the name of this vicus is unknown)

Ilchester (Lindinis) C

Leicester (Ratae Corieltauvorum) C

Lincoln (Lindum Colonia) C

London (Londinium) C

Manchester (Mamucium) C

Newcastle upon Tyne (Pons Aelius)

Northwich (Condate)

St Albans (Verulamium) C

Silchester (Calleva Atrebatum) C

Towcester (Lactodurum)

Whitchurch (Mediolanum) C

Winchester (Venta Belgarum) C

Wroxeter (Viroconium Cornoviorum) C

York (Eboracum) C

 

Religion

The druids, the Celtic priestly caste who were believed to originate in Britain, were outlawed by Claudius, and in 61 they vainly defended their sacred groves from destruction by the Romans on the island of Mona (Anglesey). Under Roman rule the Britons continued to worship native Celtic deities, such as Ancasta, but often conflated with their Roman equivalents, like Mars Rigonemetos at Nettleham.

 

The degree to which earlier native beliefs survived is difficult to gauge precisely. Certain European ritual traits such as the significance of the number 3, the importance of the head and of water sources such as springs remain in the archaeological record, but the differences in the votive offerings made at the baths at Bath, Somerset, before and after the Roman conquest suggest that continuity was only partial. Worship of the Roman emperor is widely recorded, especially at military sites. The founding of a Roman temple to Claudius at Camulodunum was one of the impositions that led to the revolt of Boudica. By the 3rd century, Pagans Hill Roman Temple in Somerset was able to exist peaceably and it did so into the 5th century.

 

Pagan religious practices were supported by priests, represented in Britain by votive deposits of priestly regalia such as chain crowns from West Stow and Willingham Fen.

 

Eastern cults such as Mithraism also grew in popularity towards the end of the occupation. The London Mithraeum is one example of the popularity of mystery religions among the soldiery. Temples to Mithras also exist in military contexts at Vindobala on Hadrian's Wall (the Rudchester Mithraeum) and at Segontium in Roman Wales (the Caernarfon Mithraeum).

 

Christianity

It is not clear when or how Christianity came to Britain. A 2nd-century "word square" has been discovered in Mamucium, the Roman settlement of Manchester. It consists of an anagram of PATER NOSTER carved on a piece of amphora. There has been discussion by academics whether the "word square" is a Christian artefact, but if it is, it is one of the earliest examples of early Christianity in Britain. The earliest confirmed written evidence for Christianity in Britain is a statement by Tertullian, c. 200 AD, in which he described "all the limits of the Spains, and the diverse nations of the Gauls, and the haunts of the Britons, inaccessible to the Romans, but subjugated to Christ". Archaeological evidence for Christian communities begins to appear in the 3rd and 4th centuries. Small timber churches are suggested at Lincoln and Silchester and baptismal fonts have been found at Icklingham and the Saxon Shore Fort at Richborough. The Icklingham font is made of lead, and visible in the British Museum. A Roman Christian graveyard exists at the same site in Icklingham. A possible Roman 4th-century church and associated burial ground was also discovered at Butt Road on the south-west outskirts of Colchester during the construction of the new police station there, overlying an earlier pagan cemetery. The Water Newton Treasure is a hoard of Christian silver church plate from the early 4th century and the Roman villas at Lullingstone and Hinton St Mary contained Christian wall paintings and mosaics respectively. A large 4th-century cemetery at Poundbury with its east–west oriented burials and lack of grave goods has been interpreted as an early Christian burial ground, although such burial rites were also becoming increasingly common in pagan contexts during the period.

 

The Church in Britain seems to have developed the customary diocesan system, as evidenced from the records of the Council of Arles in Gaul in 314: represented at the council were bishops from thirty-five sees from Europe and North Africa, including three bishops from Britain, Eborius of York, Restitutus of London, and Adelphius, possibly a bishop of Lincoln. No other early sees are documented, and the material remains of early church structures are far to seek. The existence of a church in the forum courtyard of Lincoln and the martyrium of Saint Alban on the outskirts of Roman Verulamium are exceptional. Alban, the first British Christian martyr and by far the most prominent, is believed to have died in the early 4th century (some date him in the middle 3rd century), followed by Saints Julius and Aaron of Isca Augusta. Christianity was legalised in the Roman Empire by Constantine I in 313. Theodosius I made Christianity the state religion of the empire in 391, and by the 5th century it was well established. One belief labelled a heresy by the church authorities — Pelagianism — was originated by a British monk teaching in Rome: Pelagius lived c. 354 to c. 420/440.

 

A letter found on a lead tablet in Bath, Somerset, datable to c. 363, had been widely publicised as documentary evidence regarding the state of Christianity in Britain during Roman times. According to its first translator, it was written in Wroxeter by a Christian man called Vinisius to a Christian woman called Nigra, and was claimed as the first epigraphic record of Christianity in Britain. This translation of the letter was apparently based on grave paleographical errors, and the text has nothing to do with Christianity, and in fact relates to pagan rituals.

 

Environmental changes

The Romans introduced a number of species to Britain, including possibly the now-rare Roman nettle (Urtica pilulifera), said to have been used by soldiers to warm their arms and legs, and the edible snail Helix pomatia. There is also some evidence they may have introduced rabbits, but of the smaller southern mediterranean type. The European rabbit (Oryctolagus cuniculus) prevalent in modern Britain is assumed to have been introduced from the continent after the Norman invasion of 1066. Box (Buxus sempervirens) is rarely recorded before the Roman period, but becomes a common find in towns and villas

 

Legacy

During their occupation of Britain the Romans built an extensive network of roads which continued to be used in later centuries and many are still followed today. The Romans also built water supply, sanitation and wastewater systems. Many of Britain's major cities, such as London (Londinium), Manchester (Mamucium) and York (Eboracum), were founded by the Romans, but the original Roman settlements were abandoned not long after the Romans left.

 

Unlike many other areas of the Western Roman Empire, the current majority language is not a Romance language, or a language descended from the pre-Roman inhabitants. The British language at the time of the invasion was Common Brittonic, and remained so after the Romans withdrew. It later split into regional languages, notably Cumbric, Cornish, Breton and Welsh. Examination of these languages suggests some 800 Latin words were incorporated into Common Brittonic (see Brittonic languages). The current majority language, English, is based on the languages of the Germanic tribes who migrated to the island from continental Europe

Please comment if you fave, comments and criticism are appreciated!

 

So this is a build I've had for months now and I think it's come time to post it so I can tear it down and begin anew on an all new Batcave! So for this one it's built on a large grey baseplate, with nine main sections:

 

Batcomputer: I really loved the setup of the official set, so I basically moved that to the new cave, added more consoles and posted the bat symbol above.

 

Medical Station: I saw Legoman685 make the X-Ray screen, so all credit should go to him for that beautiful idea. I really loved the chair from Greivous's starfighter set, so i basically just slapped it in there.

 

Elevator: I really liked the play feature of the official set, so I took the same basic idea and I had to stretch it out to be much taller. It looks really ugly and that's the number one thing I want to improve.

 

Trophy Room: Simple design, features Bruce's League of Assassins sword, Two-Face's coin, A vile of VENOM, and a kryptonite gem.

 

BooM Tube: what you see is what you get, helps other heroes and Bat's get around the city, also will lead to the Watchtower.

 

Equipment Rack: features a rotating wall, one side with baterangs, grappling hook, handcuffs, and bow staff. Alternate side features stand for scuba tank, flippers, and two boomerang baterangs.

 

Bottom Floor Left: has a latter to get up to the second story, sliding door that will fit all Batmobiles, and a glass case holding the uniform of Jason Todd.

 

Bottom Floor Right: features the suit display, which works the same way as the equipment rack. The display holds six suits. This will also need to be changed in the new batcave, hopefully fitting 8 suits, maybe even 10.

 

Batmobile Platform: Basically just a large rotating platform that spins and allows the batmobile to drive in and out.

 

And that's about it. What do you guys think? What should I add in my second version?

A gridshell is a structure which derives its strength from its double curvature (in the same way that a fabric structure derives strength from double curvature), but is constructed of a grid or lattice.

 

The grid can be made of any material, but is most often wood (similar to garden trellis) or steel.

 

Gridshells were pioneered in the 1896 by Russian engineer Vladimir Shukhov in constructions of exhibition pavilions of the All-Russia industrial and art exhibition 1896 in Nizhny Novgorod.

 

Large span timber gridshells are commonly constructed by initially laying out the main lath members flat in a regular square or rectangular lattice, and subsequently deforming this into the desired doubly curved form. This can be achieved by pushing the members up from the ground, as in the Mannheim Multihalle. More recent projects such as the Savill Garden gridshell were constructed by laying the laths on top of a sizeable temporary scaffolding structure which is removed in phases to let the laths settle into the desired curvature.

Clerestory windows in the main room at Wingspread, the home built for the Johnson family by Frank Lloyd Wright. Word is they leaked like a sieve for years until the homeowner found a way to fix them.

Still unsure how sturdy this will be in real life. The locomotive is hollow to allow for power functions component wires to bundle up.

Another remake of a classic set - this time, the mother of all CS vehicles: mighty Mega Core Magnetizer. PF system included, as well as almost all play functions of original model. Be sure to check a little movie:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=7pDMPDJSBEA

without coffee

  

Dr. Sharma and shared with Dr. Judith Ho that he believes that one of the biggest problems right across the U.S. in the assessment and treatment of substance abuse disorders is that we are putting people in process groups that cannot process information because we are not measuring cognitive function. Understanding the effects of addiction on cognitive function is a key to changing behavior in those affected. For quite some time doctors and psychologists have had the tools to measure brain function yet they’re not being used in a systematic way. If we collect and measure the data it can be used to analyze, interpret and ultimately inform treatment plans. Dr. Sharma stated that establishing standards of assessment it really quite simple yet it is not happening. The treatment community has been stuck in a mind set with an unwillingness to change. It is time for a paradigm shift and he called upon the substance abuse treatment community to establish measurement based assessment, treatment and follow-up. First it’s important to understand what cognitive function is and how it affects substance use disorders and mental illnesses. Cognitive function are the basic functions that enables us to think. We navigate through everyday life by using functions such as memory, attention, reasoning and problem solving. We use these skills almost unconsciously. New information comes to you, you pay attention to it, you absorb that information and you decide what is important and what to keep. With cognitive disorders there you are not able to keep that information because your brain function has decreased due to illness or other circumstances such as alcohol or drug addiction. In the substance abuse treatment community we should be assessing attention, memory, reasoning and problem solving because cognitive impairment impacts response to treatment including a patient not understanding what is wrong with them. Unfortunately it has been the norm to treat substance abuse with cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) such as process groups. And process groups require somebody to sit down and absorbing information from someone else and make sense of that information and then utilize the information so they can change behavior. make sense of that information, effectively rendering the treatment useless to the patient. The person seeking treatment is left wondering how is it possible to change if I can’t process the information. However it isn’t the patient who needs to change but the providers who need to change their methods of collecting and analyzing the cognitive function of the patient and work to establish measurement based assessment and standards of care.

 

About Dr. Tonmoy Sharma, CEO, Sovereign Health Group. Over a career spanning 30 years Dr. Sharma has served primarily as an acclaimed researcher having led countless international mental health clinical research trials, taught and trained students as a neuro-scientist and served as author or co-author of more than 200 peer-reviewed published articles and five books on schizophrenia and mental illness. His entire career has been dedicated to putting his vast knowledge to further the mental health field with insights into pharmacology and cognitive impairment treatment. Dr Sharma recognizes that the substance abuse treatment community is heading towards an inevitable next step in its evolution to ensure it continues to improve the quality of patients’ treatment. Today Dr. Sharma is committed to tirelessly promote and call for measurement-based care (MBC) in the diagnosis and treatment of addiction and mental health cognitive impairments so that a national standard measurement scale for level of addiction, and normalcy symptoms can be identified to standardize care and standardize treatment. For more on Tonmoy Sharma, CEO of Sovereign Health Group go to LinkedIn www.linkedin.com/in/tonmoysharmaceo

 

About Dr. Ho. A licensed and board certified clinical psychologist, Dr Judy Ho, Ph. D. offers her expertise on a variety of national television shows. Based in Los Angeles, she provides professional services in psychological testing and forensic expert work.

 

🍃A Refuge Production Collaboration🍃

 

Step into a world reclaimed by nature, where music echoes through the ruins.

 

📅 Date: January 25, 2025

⏰ Time: 11 AM–12 AM SLT

📍 Location: Drone Haven Music Festival

 

Dress Code: Apocalyptic | Robotic | Futuristic | Survivalist

 

Performers:

11 AM: Cypress Rosewood (Live)

12 PM: Seventh (Live)

1 PM: DJ Khaos

2 PM: DJ Kris Walpole

3 PM: Creme (Live)

4 PM: DJ Viv

5 PM: Dia G (Live)

6 PM: Poppy Morris (Live)

7 PM: DJ Aisling

8 PM: Christo Winslet (Live)

9 PM: DJ Sabbian

10 PM: DJ Jaz Spiritheart

11 PM: Shiny Starchild

 

Poster By: Christo Winslet

 

🎬 Production Credits 🎬

Sim Build: Myrdin Sommer

Story Creators: Cate Infinity, Myrdin Sommer, Dia G

Robot Creators: Poppy Morris, Myrdin Sommer, Balaclava

Sound Engineers: Christo Winslet, Poppy Morris

Produced By: Cate Infinity of The Refuge Productions

 

Backstory:

Drone Haven, a city long abandoned by humanity, stands as a haunting testament to the fleeting importance of humankind in the grand narrative of nature. Rusted skyscrapers rise from fractured earth, their decayed frames wrapped in vines and moss, bearing witness to nature’s quiet reclamation. Faded posters and graffiti whisper a warning from a forgotten era: “The End is Near!” On the city’s outskirts, a survivalist camp briefly clung to life. Dreamers and pragmatists built it as humanity’s final stand, cultivating gardens and creating shelters in defiance of the inevitable. Yet disease, dwindling resources, and discord proved stronger than their resolve. The camp fell silent, overtaken by creeping greenery, its remnants a poignant symbol of resilience overshadowed by decline. At the city’s heart lies the ruins of a once-famous butcher shop, its walls weathered and its windows shattered. Moss softens its rusted fixtures, and vines snake through every crevice. Outside, the grim message echoes: “The End is Near!” This decaying relic serves as a stark reminder of human hubris and the fragile nature of survival. Amid the ruins, drones roam like spectral caretakers. Left by their creators, these machines continue to perform their programmed duties, planting native flora during their annual Echocycle rituals. They maintain Drone Haven as a paradox—a city simultaneously embodying human ambition and nature’s enduring dominance. Yet even the drones are not eternal. As creations of humankind, they too are bound by the finite nature of energy. Like their creators, they will eventually exhaust their resources and cease to function. This juxtaposition—humanity’s ephemeral existence and its legacy in the mechanical species it forged—underscores the fragility of all things, natural or artificial. Drone Haven whispers a layered tale: a reminder that humanity, for all its self-importance, is but a fleeting presence in the face of nature’s vast, enduring cycles. In its rusted beams and flowering vines, it reflects on collapse, resilience, and the inescapable truth that all energy is finite and ultimately consumed.

 

Join us for an unforgettable celebration of resilience, creativity, and the enduring beauty of sound amidst the ruins.

 

The Refuge Productions Flickr

Drone Haven Discord

 

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Special Edition BBB Stamp at Event! The Bellisserian Bureau of Bureaucracy (BBB) is offering a special limited edition stamp at the event location. Known for promoting exploration and community in Bellisseria and across Second Life, the BBB invites participants to join their passport game. Free passports can be stamped at numerous unique locations on the grid. In addition to the game, the BBB hosts events, tours, manages embassies on seven continents, and publishes a weekly online publication. Visit their headquarters for more information here: BBB HQ. Don’t miss this opportunity to collect your special edition stamp and engage with a vibrant community.

 

“I learned that just beneath the surface there's another world, and still different worlds as you dig deeper. I knew it as a kid, but I couldn't find the proof. It was just a kind of feeling. There is goodness in blue skies and flowers, but another force-a wild pain and decay-also accompanies everything.” - David Lynch (RIP)

This is a shot of the statue of Themis (the goddess of Justice) exhibited at the Museum of the Ancient Agora (within the ‘Stoa of Attalus’) in Athens, Greece. The marble statue's head and extremities (both upper and lower) haven't been preserved as the piece dates back to the 4th century B.C. (350–325 B.C.).

 

The broken (headless, armless and legless) Statue of the goddess of Justice may pictorially represent the concept of ‘Justice itself being decapitated, handicapped, incapacitated or unable to be served’ whenever there are conditions preventing Justice from functioning…

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Brain and brain functions, leftover teacher lesson from a classroom in an abandoned school in Toronto. Shot with the Rolleiflex.

 

Film: Expired Kodak Ektachrome 100

Shutter: about 1 second

Aperture: F/11-ish

Camera: Rolleiflex 2.8D

Featuring JFL Hats, Rainbow's Custom Jewelry, and Digital Eyes for the Jewelry & Accessory Expo this coming Dec. 6-21, 2013

 

Also the new "chesterfield" coat by ::K::

 

Blog: bijinlicious.wordpress.com/2013/12/04/jfl-and-rainbows-cu...

  

"The artist has one function--to affirm and glorify life."

This was a fun one - The idea was to build Narmoto with as many action features as I could reasonably fit on him. I'm particularly happy with the mechanism for retracting the shoulder launcher.

The retracted filigree-like proboscis is so simple and yet so perfect in its' design.

 

a LARGER look

 

hand held and in natural light of live Long-Tailed Skipper Butterfly (Urbanus proteus) from Sept. 2008.

In: KAPPELMAYR, Barbara (Red.) (1995). Geïllustreerd handboek van de kunst. VG Bild-Kunst/De Hoeve, Alphen aan de Rijn. ISBN 90 6113 763 2

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Pp. 874ff in: QUADRALECTIC ARCHITECTURE – A Panoramic Review by Marten Kuilman. Falcon Press (2011). ISBN 978-90-814420-0-8

 

quadralectics.wordpress.com/4-representation/4-2-function...

 

‘Real’ palaces were designed and constructed in Spain at about the same time as Palladio provided the Valmarana family with shelter in Italy. The Royal Palace of the Escorial is located some forty-five kilometers northwest of Madrid (Spain) at the rim of the Guadarrama Mountains. It appears as a great stone platform carved from the mountain and its harmonizing with the landscape makes it a stone scape. It has reminiscence, according to George KUBLER (1982, p. 98), to certain Quattrocento paintings of ideal cities drawn with a single-point perspective in Renaissance Italy. He gives the panel painting ‘A City Square’, attributed to Luciano de Laurana, in the Walters Art Gallery in Baltimore, as an example.

 

The history of the Escorial has four distinct elements, which were planned by King Philip II (1527 – 1598) after he became King of Spain in 1556: 1. The initial purpose as a place to house the tombs of the dynasty, in particular his father Charles V, who was buried in Yuste; 2. The foundation of a monastery (with hospital buildings); 3. A basilica (with a dome); 4. A palace (with a library). These four intentions, which were brought forward more or less simultaneously, have aspects of higher division thinking, but the psychological setting of the King is hard to prove.

 

Spain was in the second half of the sixteenth century on the heights of its political power, covering the larger part of Europe when Philip II was King of Spain and Portugal, King of Naples, Duke of Milan, Ruler of the Spanish Netherlands, and King consort of England (as the husband of Mary I). It was furthermore, a global player in the colonial expansions across the Atlantic.

 

King Philip II began his search for a foundation of a new monastery in 1558 – 1559. He called it San Lorenzo de la Victoria – referring to the victory in the battle of San Quintin (in northern France) on 10 August 1557, on the day of San Lorenzo. The King employed the help of the Jeronymite Order, but their suggestions and plan, where about half the size than the cuadro (block), which was laid out in April 1562 in a location near El Escorial. The plan of the monastery, which was first to be started, had a classical tetradic design.

 

George KUBLER (1982) mentioned three Jeronymite friars, who played a major role in the history of the construction of the Scoria. Juan de San Jeronimo was present from 1562 to 1591 as the chief accountant and most authoritative as a chronicler. Antonio de Villacastin was the Obrero mayor (chief workman) and Jose de Sigüenza wrote a history of the building by recording the progress of design and construction.

 

The official work started in 1563 with the intention of Philip II to bring the body of his father Charles V, the Emperor, who died in 1558, from Yuste to the new location. Philip had an interest in building matters, which only increased after his European tour at his father’s command (1548 – 1551). The King visited England for the marriage to Queen Mary (1516 – 1558, also known as Bloody Mary, because she had three hundred religious dissenters burned at the stake) in July 1554. He was accompanied at that (political-inspired) trip by the architect and engineer Gaspar de Vega, who had to study foreign buildings and constructions, which could be useful in Spain. Vega returned overland and visited places like the Louvre, St.Germain-en-Laye and Fontainebleau.

 

The three main architects of the Escorial were Francisco de Villalpando, Juan Bautista de Toledo, and Juan de Herrera. The first named architect was originally a bronze worker, who translated Serlio. He was titled as a ‘geometer and architect’, which was the first official use of this term by a Spanish royal patron. His qualities as a humanist and theorist gained him (royal) recognition in the liberal art of architecture (KUBLER, 1982).

 

The second, Juan Bautista de Toledo, was appointed as an architect in 1559. He had been Michelangelo’s assistant at St. Peter from 1546 to 1548. His promotion turned into a personal tragedy when his wife and two daughters and all his books and papers were lost when the ship sank, which had to bring them from Naples to Spain. His appointment – after this event and as an outsider – was marred with conflicts and crises, but the King backed him until he died on 21 May 1567.

 

The third, Juan de Herrera, was an assistant of Toledo, appointed by the King in 1563 to check on the unpredictable authority of Toledo. He was appointed in 1576 as a royal architect – after years working in the background, with close ties to the King as Master of the Horse (1569 – 1577) and later (1579) as a court chamberlain.

 

The inactive year of Toledo’s death (1567) was followed two years later by an increase in activities. Flemish slaters expanded their trade after the work on the King's temporary dwelling La Fresneda was finished. The main staircase, which was the showpiece of the monastery, the roofing of the kitchen wing, and the paving made good progress. The cloister was finished in 1579 when the parapets were placed. The basilica started in 1574 and was finished in 1586.

 

The building of the fountain began in 1586, following the symbolism of the Garden of Eden, with four rivers watering Asia, Africa, Europe and America. The design had similarities with the Fons Vitae, also with four basins, at the Manga cloister of Santa Cruz in Coimbra (Portugal), built in 1533 – 1534.

 

The work on the actual royal dwelling (King’s House) in the northeast quadrant had begun in 1570 – 1572. It took nearly fifteen years until the court moved from their provisional quarters to the new accommodation in August 1585, but most of the palace and the college had still to be finished.

 

The library portico, which was part of Toledo’s ‘’universal plan’, only started when the construction of the palace, basilica, and college had ceased and was finished in 1583. The hospital buildings (infirmary) were situated outside the main cuadro (of 1562) at the southwestern corner. Farm buildings, later known as La Compana, were also outside the monastery. The northern service buildings (casas de oficios) were mentioned in 1581. Fig. 727 shows the Escorial in a reconstruction of the situation in 1568.

 

The history of the Escorial came into a new phase after Philip died in September 1598. The complex was complete except for its initial purpose: the underground burial chamber intended for the tombs of the dynasty. The circular plan of Panteón, initiated under Herrera’s direction, had four stairs and a light shaft. However, little work was done until 1617 – 1635 when G.B. Crescenzi altered the plan from circular to octagonal. After he died in 1635 the work was completed in 1654 by Fray Nicolas de Madrid (following Crescenzi’s plan). The crypt was described by Fray Francisco de los Santos as the Panteon. His book included all the rituals of transferring the royal bodies since 1586.

 

Several fires caused damage to the complex in later years. The first one happened in 1577 at the southwest tower. A most destructive fire took place on the 7th of June 1671, in which also the monastery roofs burst into flames. Many manuscripts were destroyed. Some sixty years later, in 1731, the fire started again at a chimney in the college. The Compana was destroyed in 1744, and the last great fires took place in 1763 and 1825.

 

A plague of termites threatened the building in 1953. This event sparked a restoration program instigated by the government. The crossing towers in the monastery and college were rebuilt in 1963. Their spires were re-designed by Bartolomé Zúmbigo in 1673 in a Baroque fashion but changed again to the original layout of Herrera as given in the last quarter of the sixteenth century. The result was an example of the use of two of the major elements of a quadralectic architecture: the octagonal roof fitted onto the square of the tower.

 

Characterization of the Escorial complex by art historians (like Nikolaus Pevsner) pointed to a classification as a ‘mannerist’ building. Mannerism is the term (from maniera) used for imitation and exaggeration of the work of the High Renaissance. Its severity and simplicity were associated in the first half of the twentieth century (mainly by German art historians) with puritanism and asceticism, like the character of Philip II himself. This perception was later challenged and even denied: ‘If psychic states and architectural forms were this closely related in the process of design, then architecture as a whole would long ago have been recognized as a dictionary of psychic attitudes’ (KUBLER, 1982; p. 126).

 

The plan of the Escorial near Madrid follows tetradic lines with a four-division in function (palace, college, monastery, and place of contemplation) organized around a church with a square ground plan.

 

Some observers pointed to Post-Reformation geomancy as initiating the design. Nigel PENNICK (1979) stated that ‘the Escorial at Madrid was built according to a Jesuit interpretation of the Vision of Ezekiel’. Others go further back and tried to find Renaissance ideas of magic underlying the design of the Escorial (TAYLOR, 1967). René Taylor wondered whether the courtier and ‘architect’ Herrera could not be ‘a Magus, a man deeply versed in Hermetism and occult lore, who by virtue of this was attached in a special way to the King?’

 

George Kubler (pp. 128 – 130) denied the view that the King and Herrera had occult views. He could prove that the King did not sympathize with astrology and horoscopes. The court’s association with the mystic Ramon Lull (1232 – 1316) – the ‘Doctor illuminatus’ with his combinatorial method for categorizing all possible knowledge (see p. 780), but also with his intention to convert Muslims to Christianity – was purely academically, according to Kubler. It is regrettable that none of these authors make any reference to a particular type of division thinking, which might elucidate such labels like Mannerism, Puritanism, astrology, magic, etc.

---

Bibliography

 

KUBLER, George (1982). Building the Escorial. Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey. ISBN 0-691-03975-5

 

PENNICK, Nigel (1979). The Ancient Science of Geomancy. Man in harmony with the earth. Thames and Hudson Ltd., London.

 

TAYLOR, René (1967). Architecture and Magic. Considerations on the Idea of the Escorial. Pp. 81 – 109 in: Essays in the History of Archtecture Presented to Rudolf Wittkower. New York.

The remains of Bass Breweries Bass Maltings a Grade II listed complex on Mareham Lane, Sleaford, Lincolnshire.

 

The Maltings were built between 1892 and 1905 for Bass, Ratcliff and Gretton of Burton on Trent and were designed by H.A. Couchman. They are the largest maltings complex in the country outside Burton. It consist of eight red brick pavilions with a massive square tower and slender chimney in the centre. The total frontage is of about 1000 feet.

 

The Bass Maltings complex opened fully in 1905, replacing all the small malthouses in the area. The complex struggled to remain open during the Second World War, but survived and continued operating until 1960.

 

Sir Nikolaus Pevsner considered the huge brewing malthouses to be Lincolnshire's most important industrial architecture, stating in his book Buildings of England; "For sheer impressiveness, little in English architecture can equal the scale of this building. A massive four-storey square tower is in the centre of a line of eight detached pavilions.

 

The Maltings closed in 1960, and the two Robey engines were transferred to museums. In 1976 one of the pavilions caught fire and spread to the tower and a further two pavilions and the site has remained unused ever since.

 

Remains associated with a railway serving the maltings complex were uncovered during trial trenching on land to the west of the main buildings. A concrete culvert was also seen, although its full extent and function remain unknown.

 

In 2011 agreement was reached to convert the Bass Maltings site into shops, offices and more than 220 apartments and houses.

 

@ laohuzui 老虎嘴, yunnan 云南, china 中国

 

view large on black

 

[ XXX --> #437 ]

  

Ferrari FF - Beverly Hills, CA

+++ DISCLAIMER +++

Nothing you see here is real, even though the conversion or the presented background story might be based historical facts. BEWARE!

  

Some background:

The Douglas F3D Skyknight (later designated F-10 Skyknight) was a United States twin-engined, mid-wing jet fighter aircraft manufactured by the Douglas Aircraft Company in El Segundo, California. The F3D was designed as a carrier-based all-weather night fighter and saw service with the United States Navy and United States Marine Corps. The mission of the F3D-2 was to search out and destroy enemy aircraft at night.

 

The F3D was not intended to be a typical sleek and nimble dogfighter, but as a standoff night fighter, packing a powerful radar system and a second crew member. It originated in 1945 with a US Navy requirement for a jet-powered, radar-equipped, carrier-based night fighter. The Douglas team led by Ed Heinemann designed around the bulky air intercept radar systems of the time, with side-by-side seating for the pilot and radar operator. The result was an aircraft with a wide, deep, and roomy fuselage. Instead of ejection seats, an escape tunnel was used.

 

As a night fighter that was not expected to be as fast as smaller daylight fighters, the expectation was to have a stable platform for its radar system and the four 20 mm cannon mounted in the lower fuselage. The F3D was, however, able to outturn a MiG-15 in an inside circle. The fire control system in the F3D-1 was the Westinghouse AN/APQ-35.

The AN/APQ-35 was advanced for the time, a combination of three different radars, each performing separate functions: an AN/APS-21 search radar, an AN/APG-26 tracking radar, both located in the nose, and an AN/APS-28 tail warning radar. The complexity of this vacuum tube-based radar system, which was produced before the advent of semiconductor electronics, required intensive maintenance to keep it operating properly.

 

The F3D Skyknight was never produced in great numbers but it did achieve many firsts in its role as a night fighter over Korea. While it never achieved the fame of the North American F-86 Sabre, it did down several Soviet-built MiG-15s as a night fighter over Korea with only one air-to-air loss of its own against a Chinese MiG-15 on the night of 29 May 1953.

 

In the years after the Korean War, the F3D was gradually replaced by more powerful aircraft with better radar systems. The F3D's career was not over though; its stability and spacious fuselage made it easily adaptable to other roles. The Skyknight played an important role in the development of the radar-guided AIM-7 Sparrow missile in the 1950s which led to further guided air-to-air missile developments.

In 1954, the F3D-2M was the first U.S. Navy jet aircraft to be fitted with an operational air-to-air missile: the Sparrow I,an all weather day/night BVR missile that used beam riding guidance for the aircrew to control the flight of the missile. Only 38 aircraft (12 F3D-1Ms, and 16 F3D-2Ms) were modified to use the missiles, though.

 

One of the F3D's main flaws, which it shared with many early jet aircraft, was its lack of power and performance. Douglas tried to mend this through a radical redesign: The resulting F3D-3 was the designation assigned to a swept-winged version (36° sweep at quarter chord) of the Skyknight. It was originally to be powered by the J46 turbojet, rated at 4.080 lbf for takeoff, which was under development but suffered serious trouble.

 

This led to the cancellation of the J46, and calculated performance of the F3D-3 with the substitute J34 was deemed insufficient. As an alternative the aircraft had to be modified to carry two larger and longer J47-GE-2 engines, which also powered the USN's FJ-2 "Fury" fighter.

This engine's thrust of 6.000 pounds-force (27 kN) at 7,950 rpm appeared sufficient for the heavy, swept-wing aircraft, and in 1954 an order for 287 production F3D-3s was issued, right time to upgrade the new type with the Sparrow I.

 

While the F3D-3's outline resembled that of its straight wing predecessors, a lot of structural changes had to be made to accommodate the shifted main wing spar, and the heavy radar equipment also took its toll: the gross weight climbed by more than 3 tons, and as a result much of the gained performance through the stronger engines and the swept wings was eaten away.

 

Maximum internal fuel load was 1.350 US gallons, plus a further 300 in underwing drop tanks. Overall wing surface remained the same, but the swept wing surfaces reduced the wing span.

In the end, thrust-to-weight ratio was only marginally improved and in fact, the F3D-3 had a lower rate of climb than the F3D-2, its top speed at height was only marginally higher, and stall speed climbed by more than 30 mph, making carrier landings more complicated.

 

It's equipment was also the same - the AN/APQ-35 was still fitted, but mainly because the large radar dish offered the largest detection range of any carrier-borne type of that time, and better radars that could match this performance were still under construction. Anyway, the F3D-3 was able to carry Sparrow I from the start, and this would soon be upgraded to Sparrow III (which became the AIM-7), and it showed much better flight characteristics at medium altitude.

 

Despite the ,many shortcomings the "new" aircraft represented an overall improvement over the F3D-2 and was accepted for service. Production of the F3D-3 started in 1955, but technology advanced quickly and a serious competitor with supersonic capability appeared with the McDonnell F3H Demon and the F4D Skyray - much more potent aircraft that the USN immediately preferred to the slow F3Ds. As a consequence, the production contract was cut down to only 102 aircraft.

 

But it came even worse: production of the swept wing Skyknight already ceased after 18 months and 71 completed airframes. Ironically, the F3D-3's successor, the F3H and its J40 engine, turned out to be more capricious than expected, which delayed the Demon's service introduction and seriously hampered its performance, so that the F3D-3 kept its all weather/night fighter role until 1960, and was eventually taken out of service in 1964 when the first F-4 Phantom II fighters appeared in USN service.

 

In 1962 all F3D versions were re-designated into F-10, the swept wing F3D-3 became the F-10C. The straight wing versions were used as trainers and also served as an electronic warfare platform into the Vietnam War as a precursor to the EA-6A Intruder and EA-6B Prowler, while the swept-wing fighters were completely retired as their performance and mission equipment had been outdated. The last F-10C flew in 1965.

  

General characteristics

Crew: two

Length: 49 ft (14.96 m)

Wingspan: 42 feet 5 inches (12.95 m)

Height: 16 ft 1 in (4.90 m)

Wing area: 400 ft² (37.16 m²)

Empty weight: 19.800 lb (8.989 kg)

Loaded weight: 28,843 lb (13.095 kg)

Max. takeoff weight: 34.000 lb (15.436 kg)

 

Powerplant:

2× General Electric J47-GE-2 turbojets, each rated at 6.000 lbf (26,7 kN) each

 

Performance

Maximum speed: 630 mph (1.014 km/h) at sea level, 515 mph (829 km/h) t (6,095 m)

Cruise speed: 515 mph (829 km/h) at 40,000 feet

Stall speed: 128 mph (206 km/h)

Range: 890 mi (1.433 km) with internal fuel; 1,374 mi, 2,212 km with 2× 300 gal (1.136 l) tanks

Service ceiling: 43.000 ft (13.025 m)

Rate of climb: 2,640 ft/min (13,3 m/s)

Wing loading: 53.4 lb/ft² (383 kg/m²)

Thrust/weight: 0.353

 

Armament

4× 20 mm Hispano-Suiza M2 cannon, 200 rpg, in the lower nose

Four underwing hardpoints inboard of the wing folding points for up to 4.000 lb (1.816 kg)

ordnance, including AIM-7 Sparrow air-to-air missiles, 11.75 in (29.8cm) Tiny Tim rockets, two

150 or 300 US gal drop tanks or bombs of up to 2.000 lb (900 kg) caliber, plus four hardpoints

under each outer wing for a total of eight 5" HVARs or eight pods with six 2 3/4" FFARs each

  

The kit and its assembly:

Another project which had been on the list for some years now but finally entered the hardware stage. The F3D itself is already a more or less forgotten aircraft, and there are only a few kits available - there has been a vacu kit, the Matchbox offering and lately kits in 1:72 and 1:48 by Sword.

 

The swept wing F3D-3 remained on the drawing board, but would have been a very attractive evolution of the tubby Skyknight. In fact, the swept surfaces resemble those of the A3D/B-66 a Iot, and this was the spark that started the attempt to build this aircraft as a model through a kitbash.

 

This model is basically the Matchbox F3D coupled with wings from an Italeri B-66, even though, being much bigger, these had to be modified.

 

The whole new tail is based on B-66 material. The fin's chord was shortened, though, and a new leading edge (with its beautiful curvature) had to be sculpted from 2C putty. The vertical stabilizers also come from the B-66, its span was adjusted to the Skyknight's and a new root intersection was created from styrene and putty, so that a cross-shaped tail could be realized.

The tail radar dish was retained, even though sketches show the F3D-3 without it.

 

The wings were take 1:1 from the B-66 and match well. They just had to be shortened, I set the cut at maybe 5mm outwards of the engine pods' attachment points. They needed some re-engraving for the inner flaps, as these would touch the F3D-3's engines when lowered, but shape, depth and size are very good for the conversion.

 

On the fuselage, the wings' original "attachment bays" had to be filled, and the new wings needed a new position much further forward, directly behind the cockpit, in order to keep the CoG.

 

One big issue would be the main landing gear. On the straight wing aircraft it retracts outwards, and I kept this arrangement. No detail of the exact landing gear well position was available to me, so I used the Matchbox parts as stencils and placed the new wells as much aft as possible, cutting out new openings from the B-66 wings.

The OOB landing gear was retained, but I added some structure to the landing gear wells with plastic blister material - not to be realistic, just for the effect. A lot of lead was added in the kit's nose section, making sure it actually stands on the front wheel.

 

The Matchbox Skyknight basically offers no real problems, even though the air intake design leaves, by tendency some ugly seams and even gaps. I slightly pimped the cockpit with headrests, additional gauges and a gunsight, as well as two (half) pilot figures. I did not plan to present the opened cockpit and the bulbous windows do not allow a clear view onto the inside anyway, so this job was only basically done. In fact, the pilots don't have a lower body at all...

 

Ordnance comprises of four Sparrow III - the Sparrow I with its pointed nose could have been an option, too, but I think at the time of 1960 the early version was already phased out?

   

Painting and markings:

This was supposed to become a typical USN service aircraft of the 60ies, so a grey/white livery was predetermined. I had built an EF-10B many years ago from the Matchbox kit, and the grey/white guise suits the Whale well - and here it would look even better, with the new, elegant wings.

 

For easy painting I used semi matt white from the rattle can on the lower sides (painting the landing gear at the same time!), and then added FS 36440 (Light Gull Grey, Humbrol 129) with a brush to the upper sides. The radar nose became semi matt black (with some weathering), while the RHAWS dish was kept in tan (Humbrol 71).

 

In order to emphasize the landing gear and the respective wells I added a red rim to the covers.

The cockpit interior was painted in dark grey - another factor which made adding too many details there futile, too...

 

The aircraft's individual marking were to be authentic, and not flamboyant. In the mid 50ies the USN machines were not as colorful as in the Vietnam War era, that just started towards the 60ies.

 

The markings I used come primarily from an Emhar F3H Demon, which features no less than four(!) markings, all with different colors. I settled for a machine of VF-61 "Jolly Rogers", which operated from the USS Saratoga primarily in the Mediterranean from 1958 on - and shortly thereafter the unit was disbanded.

 

I took some of the Demon markings and modified them with very similar but somewhat more discrete markings from VMF-323, which flew FJ-4 at the time - both squadrons marked their aircraft with yellow diamonds on black background, and I had some leftover decals from a respective Xtradecal sheet in the stash.

  

IMHO a good result with the B-66 donation parts, even though I am not totally happy with the fin - it could have been more slender at the top, and with a longer, more elegant spine fillet, but for that the B-66 fin was just too thick. Anyway, I am not certain if anyone has ever built this aircraft? I would not call the F3D-3 elegant or beautiful, but the swept wings underline the fuselage's almost perfect teardrop shape, and the thing reminds a lot of the later Grumman A-6 Intruder?

This was a fun one - The idea was to build Narmoto with as many action features as I could reasonably fit on him. I'm particularly happy with the mechanism for retracting the shoulder launcher.

Many LDS temples have distinctive themes and patterns in their design. The Billings Montana temple has lots of straight lines and right angles. Regardless of the design, each temple serves the same sacred function: the creation of eternal families.

 

*** Prints and galleries: danielhopkins.com/p/i-wmLLmST ***

Website | 500px | Flickr | Facebook | Instagram | Google+ | Pinterest | Twitter | Ello

That's how it would work:

the green parts are where the power comes from and one motor is connected to. The dark red wheel can be moved by the 2nd motor and changes the function. The other colours are the "outlets" for the power. yellow and blue for lowering/lifting the crane arm and hook and purple for turning the crane base.

 

This was taken in the afternoon on the day after we had reached our next camp, at the Sabora Tented Camp, adjacent to the Serengeti National Park in Tanzania.

 

It's one of two "vintage" vehicles that were parked right outside the entrance to the main lodge. I don't know if it's still functioning, but apparently it's typical of what the well-to-do European hunters and tourists (mostly German and British) drove around when they came to visit this part of Africa.

 

For more details about the camp, see singita.com/sabora-tented-camp/

 

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As I wrote in the notes for my October 2012 safari in South Africa, I have lived most of my adult life without ever venturing into the African jungle, and without participating in the mysterious activity known as “safari.” Thus, my impressions were based on a variety of movies -- ranging from Meryl Streep’s glorious Out of Africa (filmed nearv the starting point of this current trip, at the base of Mt. Kilimanjaro) to The African Queen to the silliness of childhood Tarzan movies -- as well as photographs and visits to local zoos to see mangy animals who have no more first-hand experience with the continent than I had.

 

Actually, I have made a few visits to Africa over the years — even before that first safari trip a couple years ago. I’m not sure that my two visits to Egypt count in this regard -- but I did travel to South Africa in the early 1990s, to speak at computer conferences in Johannesburg and Cape Town. The last visit was made shortly before the release of Nelson Mandela, when the entire country waited for a fundamental transition, even though no one was sure what kind of future lay ahead of them. Hectic travel schedules, the demands of business, and the desire not to leave my family stranded at home any longer than necessary, eliminated the casual thought of spending a week on safari on those early trips … and so, like several other potential trips (Easter Island, Machu Picchu, Patagonia, Antarctica, a river trip on the Amazon, etc.), it was simply added to my “bucket list.”

 

But in 2012, I had another opportunity to return to South Africa, for an abortive computer conference that took place in Cape Town. After 20 years, our children are grown and gone, and most of the hectic pressures of business have diminished; so my wife and I were able to set aside a week, and we visited two different safari lodges in the Kruger National Park of northern South Africa, just a few miles from the Mozambique border. If you’re interested, you can see the photos in this Flickr album; suffice it to say that it was impressive enough that we decided to come back for another safari, if we ever had the chance.

 

The “chance,” as it turns out, occurred in a quiet two-week period of August 2014; and this second safari involved brief stays in five small camps located in northern Tanzania and southern Kenya. As I noted after our first safari, we could have gone to Botswana or Zaire or Zimbabwe or a dozen other countries; even without South Africa or Tanzania, there were dozens of different parks, game reserves, lodges, and camps that we could have chosen. (A brief bit of history, in case you’re interested: Tanzania used to be Tanganyika, and before that it was German East Africa; in 1964, it combined with the island-state of Zanzibar to become the Republic of Tanzania. You can read more details in this Wikipedia article).

 

As with our previous trip, we saw such an amazing variety of animals that I can scarcely remember them all. People at each new camp that we visited kept asking if we had seen the “big five”: lions, leopards, cheetahs, rhinos, and elephants. To which the answer, after the first one or two camps, was simply yes, yes, yes, yes, and yes. We also saw zebras (millions, or so it seemed), giraffes, ostriches, wildebeest (gazillions of the shaggy beasts), warthogs, crocodiles, hyenas,jackals, babboons, monkeys, and vast herds of antelopes (which included kudu and impalas and topi and Thompson gazelles and dic-dic antelopes, and goodness knows what else). I didn’t even try to keep track of all the birds we saw; vultures, eagles, and hawks were everywhere, but there were many others that I had never seen or heard of before, and which I’ll probably never see again back in the urban jungle of New York City.

 

As we had seen on our earlier 2012 trip, some of these species were quite compatible and nonchalant about being in each others’ presence; but there was no question that predators were everywhere, and that there was a constant struggle between the hunters and the hunted. Indeed, it was somewhat surprising to see how many thousands of antelope and wildebeest and zebras managed to evade the constant danger of lions, leopards, and cheetahs (which turn out to be at the bottom of the “pecking order” of predators); but it gradually became clear that hackneyed phrases like “survival of the fittest” actually do mean something out here. Yes, the older animals, and the weak and lame and very young, are quite vulnerable — and they generally don’t survive very long. But lots more do survive by being constantly alert, constantly sniffing the breeze, and constantly listening for warning sounds from nearby birds, monkeys, and members of their own herd.

 

We saw a few indications of a “kill” that had recently taken place: a pride of lions ripping away at the flesh of a recently-killed wildebeest; a jaguar that had dragged a recently-killed warthog up into a tree for safekeeping, while hyenas and jackals frantically leapt and jumped in a vain attempt to get up the tree themselves — along with the occasional skeletons and bleached-white bones of animals killed a season or two ago.

 

We had several hours each day to observe all of this, and I took roughly three thousand photos by the end of the trip. I’ve uploaded a relatively small number of “keepers" to this Flickr album, which will convey at least a little of what it’s like to actually be in the presence of so many animals. But to truly appreciate it, you’ve got to be there, in person.

 

The only caution I’ll add is that your return trip should avoid Nairobi if at all possible. The chaos and confusion in the Nairobi airport, on the day of our return, is a story unto itself … but I took no photos there, so you’ll just have to use your imagination.v

Steampunk may be defined as “where history and fantasy collide with technology.” More specifically, Steampunk is a subgenre of science fiction that typically features steam-powered machinery rather than advanced technology

Aspects of steampunk design emphasise a balance between form and function

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pixlr/ai-manipulted via gimp

Kinkaku-ji (金閣寺, literally "Temple of the Golden Pavilion"), officially named Rokuon-ji (鹿苑寺, literally "Deer Garden Temple"), is a Zen Buddhist temple in Kyoto, Japan.[2] It is one of the most popular buildings in Japan, attracting many visitors annually.[3] It is designated as a National Special Historic Site, a National Special Landscape and is one of 17 locations making up the Historic Monuments of Ancient Kyoto which are World Heritage Sites.

 

The Golden Pavilion (金閣 Kinkaku) is a three-storey building on the grounds of the Rokuon-ji temple complex.[11] The top two stories of the pavilion are covered with pure gold leaf.[11] The pavilion functions as a shariden (舎利殿), housing relics of the Buddha (Buddha's Ashes). The building was an important model for Ginkaku-ji (Silver Pavilion Temple) and Shōkoku-ji, which are also located in Kyoto.[2] When these buildings were constructed, Ashikaga Yoshimasa employed the styles used at Kinkaku-ji and even borrowed the names of its second and third floors.[2]

 

Architectural design

The pavilion successfully incorporates three distinct styles of architecture, which are shinden, samurai and zen, specifically on each floor.[8] Each floor of the Kinkaku uses a different architectural style.[2]

The first floor, called The Chamber of Dharma Waters (法水院, Hō-sui-in), is rendered in shinden-zukuri style, reminiscent of the residential style of the 11th century Heian imperial aristocracy.[2] It is evocative of the Shinden palace style. It is designed as an open space with adjacent verandas and uses natural, unpainted wood and white plaster.[8] This helps to emphasize the surrounding landscape. The walls and fenestration also affect the views from inside the pavilion. Most of the walls are made of shutters that can vary the amount of light and air into the pavilion[8] and change the view by controlling the shutters' heights. The second floor, called The Tower of Sound Waves (潮音洞, Chō-on-dō ),[2] is built in the style of warrior aristocrats, or buke-zukuri. On this floor, sliding wood doors and latticed windows create a feeling of impermanence. The second floor also contains a Buddha Hall and a shrine dedicated to the goddess of mercy, Kannon.[8] The third floor is built in traditional Chinese chán (Jpn. zen) style, also known as zenshū-butsuden-zukuri. It is called the Cupola of the Ultimate (究竟頂, Kukkyō-chō). The zen typology depicts a more religious ambiance in the pavilion, as was popular during the Muromachi period.[8]

The roof is in a thatched pyramid with shingles.[12] The building is topped with a bronze hōō (phoenix) ornament.[11] From the outside, viewers can see gold plating added to the upper stories of the pavilion. The gold leaf covering the upper stories hints at what is housed inside: the shrines.[9] The outside is a reflection of the inside. The elements of nature, death, religion, are formed together to create this connection between the pavilion and outside intrusions.

 

Garden

The Golden Pavilion is set in a Japanese strolling garden (回遊式庭園 kaiyū-shiki-teien, lit. a landscape garden in the go-round style).[6] The location implements the idea of borrowing of scenery ("shakkei") that integrates the outside and the inside, creating an extension of the views surrounding the pavilion and connecting it with the outside world. The pavilion extends over a pond, called Kyōko-chi (鏡湖池 Mirror Pond), that reflects the building.[5] The pond contains 10 smaller islands.[8] The zen typology is seen through the rock composition; the bridges and plants are arranged in a specific way to represent famous places in Chinese and Japanese literature.[8] Vantage points and focal points were established because of the strategic placement of the pavilion to view the gardens surrounding the pavilion.[10] A small fishing deck (釣殿 tsuri-dono) is attached to the rear of the pavilion building, allowing a small boat to be moored under it.[5] The pavilion grounds were built according to descriptions of the Western Paradise of the Buddha Amida, intending to illustrate a harmony between heaven and earth.[6] The largest islet in the pond represents the Japanese islands.[5] The four stones forming a straight line in the pond near the pavilion are intended to represent sailboats anchored at night, bound for the Isle of Eternal Life in Chinese mythology.[5]

The garden complex is an excellent example of Muromachi period garden design.[11] The Muromachi period is considered to be a classical age of Japanese garden design.[10] The correlation between buildings and its settings were greatly emphasized during this period.[10] It was a way to integrate the structure within the landscape in an artistic way. The garden designs were characterized by a reduction in scale, a more central purpose and a distinct setting.[13] A minimalistic approach was brought to the garden design, by recreating larger landscapes in a smaller scale around a structure.

 

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kinkaku-ji

ROMANIA. Bucharest. 2014.

Grimlock

  

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