Roman rubbish dump reveals secrets of ancient trading networks

Telegraph UK ^ | June 4, 2015 | Nick Squires

[Texan5]

That woman I was talking about got the stuff at the oriental market near the base-it had a label, but I don’t read oriental characters-the fermented soybean curd she would make herself, and was very proud of the fact that she allowed it to ferment for several months...

[Red Badger]

Each amphora was painted or stamped with an inscription detailing which product it contained, how much it weighed, where it was produced, when it was shipped to Rome and how much import duty was paid.

Damn government regulations..........................

[Red Badger]

They had technology we had to rediscover after the Dark Ages. The Romans has sophisticated machinery and engineers........................

[Red Badger]

It’s an acquired taste, but once you have it, YUUUMMMMYYYYY!!!.........................

[pierrem15]

Yup- forgot about that. Only it wasn't enduring in the sense that the secret of producing the volcanic cement produced by the Romans died with the Empire.

I believe that cement not only sets under water but also has a tensile strength more or less equal to our reinforced concrete, without the reinforcement.

I think there's a company in Arizona or New Mexico that is marketing a similar concrete made from American volcanic material.

[SunkenCiv]

;’)

[pierrem15]

In what's today Algeria, archaeologists have found the remains of a high pressure drop horizontal turbine with curved blades. Water from a sluice was redirected to a pipe made of tightly fitted hollowed stone slabs with a drop of about 30 feet.

It's in the Oxford handbook of ancient technology. They're not sure why the Romans needed needed a high-speed turbine.

Must be aliens! /s

[Flag_This]

"The Romans has sophisticated machinery and engineers........................"

They were no slouches, that's for sure. The obelisk that stands in St. Peter's Square is 25 meters tall and weighs something like 320 tons. People are justifiably amazed by what the Egyptians were able to do with huge stones, but no one seems interested in the fact that the Romans moved that huge obelisk first to Alexandria and later shipped it to Rome, where they positioned it in what became known as the Circus of Nero. In the 1500s, the Italians decided to move and the obelisk to St. Peter's, 250 meters away; it took a titanic effort and nearly failed.

[Red Badger]

I believe God has intervened a couple of times in the past to ‘slow down’ the advancement of knowledge just as he did in the Tower of Babel.

The burning of the Library at Alexandria, the repository of the sum total of the world’s knowledge, then after Rome fell, the Dark Ages lasted a thousand years until the Renaissance began and the New World was discovered.................

[Texan5]

I’ll just have to take your word for that, since I have no intention of trying even a drop of the stuff...

[Red Badger]

I’ll eat just about anything that doesn’t eat me first......................

[Texan5]

I’m fond of grilled rattlesnake, barbacoa-the whole cow head, eyes and all-cooked overnight in a covered pit, and just about any cheese, no matter the odor-but even I draw the line at fermented fish offal...

[Red Badger]

I won’t eat RAW oysters. Fried, boiled, baked or steamed, but not raw....................

[Texan5]

I love them raw-better than cooked, actually-and two of my least favorite foods are cooked carrots and cabbage-but I like both raw.