Keys (Tasti vecchio)

In media and life, I've seen a coincidental confluence in the past few months of keys, both the physical kind that you might open a lock with and more abstract kinds. My brother misplaced his car keys, I generated an encryption keyset for a business client, then took a quick try at decrypting a note (published by the FBI) that was found in a dead guy's pocket (I was not successful, hah). The acting mayor of Dallas got into trouble for giving Michael Vick the 'key to the city' which I cartoonishly imagine as an enormous gilded key with a big 'D' on the end. But, I've never seen it and really think it's probably just a disappointing piece of paper with 'Key advice' on it. I guess there hasn't been anything in the news about Panama or the canal (also having locks). What kind of locks am I forgetting?

To take us in what I'm sure is a completely unexpected direction... the Romans made physical keys out of bronze and improved the Egyptian designs by replacing wooden components with metals. Of course, I guess if the Romans made keys out of cotton candy, there wouldn't be much evidence of it now... Keys and locks made in the shops back then were pretty much unique works of art as they didn't have ANSI standards back then.

Here is a photo I took in Arles, France a few years back of keys found in that area.















Also, from Aqueilia Italy, a relief sculpture of a Roman locksmith's grave showing him at work.












The ancients also had the abstract notion of logical keys (and encryption). The historian Suetonius wrote of an ancient shift cypher that Julius Caeser used to encrypt messages. The idea was just to replace an alphabetic letter with another letter farther down the alphabetical sequence. Thousands of years ago, it was good enough to guard important state secrets. Now comically, the acronym for the encryption is 'ROT-n', (rotten, as in 'not good' hehe).

Anyway, puns aside, the best encryption schemes I've seen involve combinations of modulus functions (remainders) which accomplishes compression and encryption at the same time, but for prearranged lengths of data in the overall stream to be encrypted.

If I needed to encrypt something, I'd be too paranoid to use RSABase because it's prime number based, and I think NSA has skeleton key for that (decrypts all).
It's probably best to do your own cryptography from scratch and only share it with those you want to receive your message.

For good reading on keys and locks in ancient times, check out romanlocks.com

Books About Ancient Water and Disaster (Libri di Acqua Antichi e Disastri)

I've just finished reading a book called Pompeii by Robert Harris. Not *just* now, it's not like the book is still in my hand as I'm setting it down while typing this.The book was an imaginative story set in ancient Italy in the days immediately before the eruption of Vesuvius. It was extraordinarily well researched, and even though I caught two historical mistakes, the presentation of the story was very novel. Whoa is that why they call those things 'novels'?

It followed an hour by hour timeline interwoven with documented historical events from the era, which as you can imagine for me was a good read.I won't give away plot points, but there is a strong chance in this book that the volcano erupts at the end.

The main character of the story was a maintenance engineer assigned to work on the various aqueducts around the bay of Naples. I know a few things about the aqueducts, having spent some time around Pont du Gard just north of Nimes, France.


Here are some photos I took of the famous above ground part of the aqueduct. Most all of the aqueducts were below ground, except for these grand bridgey parts. The whole area around there is great, you can kayak on the river (great fun, I highly recommend Kayak Vert for both this place and Fontaine de Vaucluse) and the natural marble outcroppings are fantastic to look at.
Notice the huge shadow the 160 foot tall aqueduct casts on the river?












You can see the flow chanel for the water here, look at all the sediment buildup on the floor. I wonder in ancient Romans had 'Evian'(tm) as an alternative?


















As a quick digression about the area around Pont du Gard, did you know that the town of Nimes is the namesake of the mythological 'Nemesis'? A Greek goddess who personified vengeful fate against mortals who were excessively arrogant or tried to achieve too much. Hubris / blind ambition was apparently not appreciated back then, especially by the Roman generals who retired here and patronized the Nemesis temple. Maybe their patronage was motivated by a desire to keep people below them in line?

Foundations of a Good Pavement

I've been interested lately in the ancient ways of laying down a foundation because I'm thinking of doing a large 80m sq outside pavement that will more or less serve as a canvas for some mosaics I have in mind. Maybe make a few bronze legged ancient couches and such for lounging around said pavement.



The books of architecture by Vitruvius in classical antiquity really cast a light on how they built things to last, and why some of the buildings in the Roman forum are still standing, even with several tons of stone supported for thousands of years. I also think those Seven-Eleven convenience stores on the Appian Way will be there forever because of this.

In Book 7 chapter 1, Vitruvius covers the proper way to lay down a pavement or foundation. First, they hammered the soil down to compact it tighter than your glutes after an hour of squats, and then set a layer of logs on the ground on top of that. Next, at least six inches of stone were set down on the logs, followed by 12 inches of the smaller stone cemented together with lime which was compacted by beating it with wood.

But that's not all... Then an upper layer of another 6 inches, this time more rich in lime, was set with stones and leveled off. Finally the slab pieces or mosaic tessarae were mortared on to that. So back in the day, they used 2/3 meter thick foundations. Very impressive, much more thick and longer lasting than the foundations of today.

And now for something completely different, OtherWorldlyOne (warning, a bit salty sometimes) picked me for another one of those questiony things. I like her comments and blog, so who am I to turn that down? Feel free to do this one if you like.

So here are ten things not previously published about me (that I'm aware of).

• On the piano, I can pick out a note I hear in the first try, but it's always exactly 1 and 1/2 steps off. I blame years of playing the trumpet, which is a B flat instrument to the piano's key of C.
  


• The tops of my feet have absolutely no hair.
  


• I've never had a tattoo or piercing of any kind, and never felt the need to get one.
  


• I karaoke sometimes, but unfortunately I sound similar to Billy Joel.
  


• As a kid, I always wanted to play hockey, but there was not much ice in Texas so I couldn't.



• I was blessed with an unnaturally good sense of balance and can still do an unhealthy amount of skateboarding tricks including multiple 360s.
  


• When I make margaritas, they always use small amounts of Cointreau and pineapple juice, and are always on the rocks because frozen is just not the way to go.
  


• I have never been to South America, even though boat chartering is less expensive there. At some point, I want to go hiking to see Machu Picchu.
  


• I used to be able to throw a really wicked baseball breaking pitch, but haven't tried in a while.
  


• When I was 12 years old, I took the SAT (college admissions test) because Duke University wanted me to.

So there you have it!

Have a great weekend all, I'll be working the marble and studying the Italian if you know what I mean...

PS - Like my ironic subject made in Photoshop?

Antiquity Called - They Want Their Clothes Back

As I was glancing (quickly) through some of the fashion and clothing blog posts from Wendy B, Heather Cherry, and others for as long as I could manage without losing my man card, or becoming distracted by squirrels, I was starting to wonder exactly what it was the ancient Romans used to wear.

Sure, I had seen thousands of ancient women and men shown in statue, mosaic, fresco, and relief forms. But the most thought I had given it was, 'yes, they are wearing clothes of some kind.' Or, 'oh wow (oh gross), she (he) is not wearing clothes of any kind.' Well that, and it all seemed to be cotton or wool, since polyester and rayon were out of style a few thousand years ago.

There is more to it all than just togas. Women who wore togas were apparently advertising that they were 'working girls'. So anyone reading this should bear that in mind for the next frat party on the todo list.

The women had a few clothing options. One way to go was with something called a chiton, which is my favorite thing for ancient women to wear. It is a super thin fine fabric sewn above the shoulders and draped low, but usually belted. Here is an example expertly carved onto the Venus-Genetrix.
















As an option with the chiton, the girls might have put a rectangular sheet of wool (called a himation or the heavier diplax) over this for a bit of controllable modesty.

All this extra rectangular sheetage was typically draped forward over the left shoulder, then wrapped behind and around. Evidence shows wearing it on the right side signaled that you listened to lame music. Typically, they would fasten all these wrapped sheets together over a shoulder with a pin (fibulae). Also pulling part of it over the back of your head indicated chastity and/or reverence.

Another option for the girls was to start with a base tunic (long shirt gown thing down to the ankles for women), and add over that a long sleeveless dress called a stola. Then if the weather was a little iffy or if they were worried about looking too brazenly promiscuous, it was topped off with a palla (yet another wrap around rectangular sheet).










Or as a last option, the girls could wear just the regular ankle length tunic if hanging out around home or if it was casual friday at the office.

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The men would wear a toga at least when conducting business or in the forum. Togas themselves are actually elongated octagons and not the rectagular bedsheets that most college kids fold up (more accurately called a himation).



















In a more casual setting, the men could wear a tunic (calf length shirt belted), or a himation (rectangular sheet draped and wrapped, then pinned). Or if you were a general or soldier, a tunic with appropriate armor. Here is a himation example.


So go hit the fabric store, and buy that blue leopard print wool blend, because now you have a few more options for the next costume party you might attend. Or, if you are really fun, wear one of these to a non-costume party.