roman
The Battle of Frigidus. September 6, 394.
The Battle of Frigidus, or the Battle of the River Frigid, took place between September 5 and 6, 394, pitting the Roman Emperor Theodosius I´s army against the army of the western usurper, Eugenius. As a result of Eugenius and his Frankish magister militum, Arbogast´s, defeat, the Roman Empire was in the hands of a sole emperor for the last time in its history. As a Christian, Theodosius was enraged by the pagan awakening that was taking place in the West under the reign of Eugenius. Furthermore, the death of Valentinian remained unsolved, and Eugenius had deposed all the civilian offices appointed by Theodosius when he ceded the western part of the empire to Valentinian II, leaving him with no control over the western Roman Empire. When a Western embassy arrived at Constantinople to reque...
The Battle of Cannae. August 2, 216 BC.
The Battle of Cannae, an historic and decisive battle of the Second Punic War, took place on August 2, 216 BC between the Punic army, led by Hannibal Barca, and Roman troops, commanded by consuls Gaius Terentius Varro and Lucius Aemilius Paullus. The battle took place in the city of Cannae in the Apulian region to the southeast of the Italian Peninsula, and ended with the victory of the Carthaginian army, despite being clearly outnumbered by the Romans. After the Roman defeat, several city-states abandoned the Roman Republic side. Although the battle didn´t bring the Carthaginians final victory in the Punic War, it is nevertheless remembered as one of the most incredible battles in military history, and the biggest defeat of Roman history up until that moment, though the future would deliv...
The Stoning of Petronius Maximus. May 31, 455.
His birthdate is unclear, being his origins quite obscure, but it is widely believed that the late Roman Emperor, Petronius Maximus, belonged to the illustrious Anicius family. He developed his senatorial career during the reigns of Honorius and Valentinian III and was praetor in the first stage of his career in 411. Around 415, he served as tribunus et notarius, an entry position to the Imperial bureaucracy, which would take him to the position of comes sacrarum largitionum between 416 and 419, as well as urban prefect between 419 and 433. In 433, he was elected consul, and from 439 to 441 held the praetorian prefecture of Italy. By the time he obtained the title of patrician in 445, he had become the Roman with most honors outside the Imperial circle. According to John of Antioch, Valent...
Empress Irene of Athens. April 19, 797.
On November 1, 768, a young and beautiful girl from Athens arrived to Constantinople, capital of the Eastern Roman Empire, the Byzantine Empire. At the time she was one of the many applicants to marry Leo IV, future emperor. History nevertheless will remember her as one of the most powerful and controversial Byzantine Empresses, not only for her solo rule and her opposition to her son, but also for stopping, at least for some time, iconoclasm. Irene was unlikely to be chosen as Leo´s future wife for two reasons: first, she came from a noble family from Athens, not from Constantinople´s aristocracy. The second reason, even more significant, was that the Emperor Constantine V fiercely defended iconoclasm, while Irene supported, and possibly also professed veneration of icons. This was a pinp...
The Battle of Silva Arsia. March 1, 509 BC.
The Battle of Silva Arsia was a battle that confronted the forces of the Roman Republic and the Etruscans from Tarquinii and Veii, led by the deposed Roman king Tarquinius Superbus. The battle took place in Roman territory, in the Arsian forest. The battle was one of the several attempts of Tarquinius to recover the throne, and may also be analyzed as part of the permanent conflict between the Etruscan cities and a Roman Republic that was growing both in strength and in territorial expansion. The battle is part of the ancient history of Rome, most probably, a legend in great part. In 509 BC, Roman monarchy was overthrown, and the Roman Republic started as the first elections of the first consuls took place. The deposed king, Tarquinius Superbus (Tarquinius “The Proud”), whose family came f...
February 1, 1851. Mary Shelley.
Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin, better known by her husband´s surname, Mary Shelley, was a British writer, mostly remembered for being the author of the Gothic novel Frankenstein or the Modern Prometheus (1818), which is actually considered to be the first modern science-fiction novel, starting the genre. She also published and promoted Percy Bysshe Shelley´s works, romantic poet and philosopher, as well as her husband. Both her father and her mother were reputed philosophers and politicians, her mother being also a famous feminist activist that unfortunately died after giving birth of puerperal fever. She received from her father, William Godwin, an education that urged her to join liberal politics, and gave her to read her mother´s memoirs and books, that incremented Mary´s devotion t...
The Murder of Caligula. January 24, 41 AD.
Formally known as Gaius (Gaius Caesar Augustus Germanicus), but better known as Caligula, the third Roman emperor, from 37 to 41 AD, was born to the Julio-Claudian dynasty. He was son of Germanicus, one of the greatest generals of Roman history and adoptive son of Emperor Tiberius. His mother was Agrippina the Elder, a fiercely independent woman, who was married to Germanicus by order of Tiberius in order to bring him closer to the Julian family. As a child he accompanied his father on campaigns in the north of Germania, where he received the nickname of Caligula meaning “little (soldier’s) boot” in Latin, after the small boots (caligae) he wore… a nickname he grew to hate. Germanicus died in Syria, possibly poisoned by order of Tiberius, who saw him and his descendants a...
Mount Vesuvius on the feast of Vulcan. August 23, 79 AD.
The eruption of Mount Vesuvius in AD 79 destroyed the Roman cities of Pompeii, Herculaneum, Oplontis and Stabiae, as well as several other settlements. The eruption ejected a cloud of stones, ashes and volcanic gases to a height of 33 km (21 mi), erupting molten rock and pulverized pumice and ultimately releasing 100,000 times the thermal energy released by the Hiroshima-Nagasaki bombings. More than 1,000 people died in the eruption, but exact numbers are unknown. The only surviving eyewitness account of the event consists of two letters by Pliny the Younger to the historian Tacitus. On August 23, Mount Vesuvius begins stirring, on the feast day of Vulcan, the Roman god of fire. The Vulcanalia was the annual festival held August 23 in his honor. His Greek counterpart is Hephaestus, the god...
Life on Mars. August 6, 1996.
In August 6, 1996 a team of researchers announced that the meteorite ALH84001, discovered in the Allan Hills of Antarctica, may contain evidence of life on Mars, but further tests were inconclusive. To date, no proof has been found of past or present life on Mars. Cumulative evidence shows that during the ancient Noachian time period, the surface environment of Mars had liquid water and may have been habitable for microorganisms. The existence of habitable conditions does not necessarily indicate the presence of life. Scientific searches for evidence of life began in the 19th century, and continue today via telescopic investigations and deployed probes. While early work focused on phenomenology and bordered on fantasy, the modern scientific inquiry has emphasized the search for water, chem...
The end of Placidia´s Regency. July 2, 437.
Placidia was the daughter of Theodosius I and his second wife, Galla, who was herself daughter of Valentinian I and his second wife, Justina. She was regent to Valentinian III from 423 until his majority in 437, and a major force in Roman politics for most of her life. She was queen consort to Ataulf, king of the Visigoths from 414 until his death in 415, and briefly empress consort to Constantius III in 421. Coins issued in Placidia’s honour in Constantinople after 425 give her name as AELIA PLACIDIA; this may have been intended to integrate Placidia with the eastern dynasty of Theodosius II. There is no evidence that the name Aelia was ever used in the west, or that it formed part of Placidia’s official nomenclature. Placidia was granted her own household by her father in the...
The Ashmolean Museum, the first university museum. May 24, 1683.
Its first building was finished in 1683 to house the cabinet of curiosities that Elias Ashmole gave to the University of Oxford in 1677 and opened its doors on May 24. Ashmole was an antiquary with a strong Baconian leaning towards the study of nature. His library reflected his intellectual outlook, including works on English history, law, numismatics, chorography, alchemy, astrology, astronomy, and botany. Although he was one of the founding Fellows of the Royal Society, a key institution in the development of experimental science, his interests were antiquarian and mystical as well as scientific. He was an early freemason, although the extent of his involvement and commitment is unclear. Throughout his life he was an avid collector of curiosities and other artefacts. Ashmole donated most...
The Second Temple for Venus Erycina. April 23, 181 BC.
The Capitoline Hill was earlier known as Mons Saturnius, dedicated to the god Saturn. The word Capitolium first referred to the temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus later built here, and afterwards it was used for the whole hill (and even other temples of Jupiter on other hills), thus Mons Capitolinus (the adjective noun of Capitolium). In an etiological myth, ancient sources connect the name to caput (“head”, “summit”) and the tale was that, when laying the foundations for the temple, the head of a man was found, some sources even saying it was the head of some Tolus or Olus. The Capitolium was regarded by the Romans as indestructible, and was adopted as a symbol of eternity. At this hill, the Sabines, creeping to the Citadel, were let in by the Roman maiden Tarpeia. ...