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A 2k-year-old sun hat worn by a Roman soldier in Egypt

smithsonianmag.com

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Re: A 2k-year-old sun hat worn by a Roman soldier in Egypt

#51

Post by deadbabe »

davnicwil wrote: post #41
steve_adams_86 wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One thing I've learned is that in all of the brief history of humans we're aware of, people a lot smarter than I am existed in fairly large numbers. It puts things into perspective. They would have learned to use hacker news and program computers as easily as I do. We stand on the shoulders of giants. I love the perspective they had on things due to living in such different (yet remarkably similar) conditions.

Definitely true. In modern times we confuse understanding things with just being used to them. I'm typing this on a smartphone. I don't conciously think of it as my "magic pane of glass" like the cliched Roman might but what's actually going on when I tap this screen is as much a mystery to me as it would be to them, at least beyond a few high-level concepts which it also wouldn't take all that much time to explain.…

I think if you transported the average Roman to modern times, after the initial future shock wears off, they would likely just become accustomed to technology much like any other person today who has no clue how most things work. They could learn to drive cars, use smartphones, catch flights, take medicine, etc.

They would probably even spend a lot of time talking about how things were better back in their days, and how pathetic society is now.

Re: A 2k-year-old sun hat worn by a Roman soldier in Egypt

#52

Post by user3939382 »

cardiffspaceman wrote: post #47
user3939382 wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I learned the formal name later in life but for many years pondered this in terms of sports teams. “I’m a Rams fan!” Are you really though?

I have been a Rams fan twice. I saw them defeat the Browns in a preseason game that benefited some charity (Fearsome Foursome era). It took place at the Coliseum. A blocked Browns punt sent the ball into the Browns end zone to settle the game in the final minutes. Then some scallawag moved the team to St Louis, and then better people moved it back to Los Angeles. Aren’t all “teams” “of Theseus”? If the team remains i…

The academic ship is too abstract, I like the sport team concept. Name, ownership, coach, players, like you said stadium. I can't think of any immutable identity one of those teams has.

Re: A 2k-year-old sun hat worn by a Roman soldier in Egypt

#53

Post by metalman »

goscript wrote: post #8
metalman wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

yep, the worlds oldest shirt was found in an ancient rubbish pile in eygypt, nice shirt, but obviosly thrown out from ancient wear and tear.....it NEVER rains in eygypt...or to be exact any area can expect rain once in 400 years or something ludicrous, so ya stuff just sits, and in just the right conditions lasts for millenia, so we have ancient chit chat letters sent back and forth between women that represent the e…

> it NEVER rains in eygypt...or to be exact any area can expect rain once in 400 years or something ludicrous, The northern part of the country receives some rainfall in the winter. heavy winter rains occasionally cause flooding in Cairo, Ptolemaic Egypt was centered around Alexandria, which gets the most rain in the country - about 200 mm (7.87 in) annually. while that's still relatively low, it's not nearly as extr…

it is as extreme as I make it out to be in many places in eygypt, links from your link

city of 400000, where it does not rain

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asyut#Climate

ancient heart of eygypt, modern city of 250000 where the rain is a sort of academic thing that can be proven scientificly, but will never get the ground wet

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luxor#Climate

Re: A 2k-year-old sun hat worn by a Roman soldier in Egypt

#54

Post by ekianjo »

decimalenough wrote: post #31
ekianjo wrote: post #15

> As it turns out, even the Romans understood the power of a good hat. The author thinks Roman had low intellect or something?

No, the Romans just generally did not wear hats, particularly the upper classes. Every Roman statue ever depicts a full head of hair, occasionally with veils, wigs or hairnets, but not hats. Apparently even Caesar's famous laurel wreath was meant primarily as a disguise for baldness. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_hairstyles

Every roman statue depicts politicians and leaders who lived in the city. Peasants, farmers did not get statues.

Re: A 2k-year-old sun hat worn by a Roman soldier in Egypt

#55

Post by ekianjo »

Illniyar wrote: post #38
ekianjo wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Romans could have invented steam engines if they wanted to. You invent such things when you have resolved many other problems first. Like water and sanitation, and geopolitical stability. And no, steam engines took a lot more time anyway because advanced metallurgy was necessary to get there.

If geopolitical stability was a precursor to technology, we would still be living in the stone age :)

There were times where one would be involved in many wars happening at their local level within their lifetime. We have had two big wars in the 20th century but many countries were not directly the theater of war and most frontiers did not change. There is much more stability now, you just get a lot of news that makes you seem that the world is chaos but the reality is the opposite.

Re: A 2k-year-old sun hat worn by a Roman soldier in Egypt

#56

Post by WalterBright »

mk89 wrote: post #49
idkfasayer wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The only reason the Romans could not have invented the steam engine was that the Greeks already did before them: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aeolipile They had a Lathe too.

Incredible. I found this video that shows how the Aelopile works: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/trUtLLu_Ono What an awesome invention!!!

It was a one off that never progressed beyond a toy, then or since.

Re: A 2k-year-old sun hat worn by a Roman soldier in Egypt

#57

Post by WalterBright »

idkfasayer wrote: post #46
WalterBright wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Romans could have invented steam engines if they wanted to. They did not have the precursors to it, such as a lathe. Steam engine technology evolved out of cannon technology, which was developing for centuries before the steam engine. (The lathe also came about from cannon improvements.)

The only reason the Romans could not have invented the steam engine was that the Greeks already did before them: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aeolipile They had a Lathe too.

I didn't know the Romans had the lathe. Thanks for the correction.

But they did not have a metal lathe, which is substantially more sophisticated. Invention of the metal lathe is credited to Henry Maudslay around 1800.

While steam engines with pistons existed before, the poor sealing because of inaccurate bores and pistons, made them not very efficient.

Re: A 2k-year-old sun hat worn by a Roman soldier in Egypt

#58

Post by IAmBroom »

darkwater wrote: post #39

(talking about other hats) > The other two are housed at the Whitworth art gallery in Manchester and a museum in Florence, Italy. This sentence is somewhere in between funny and unprofessional. The other hat in England gets an accurate location and a back link, the one in Italy gets a "in some museum in Florence". At least they put the city's name...

Reminds me of a Mitchell and Webb Look skit, where one of them has been working "for years" to ban tourists from Venice... along with the Italians. Keep Venice British!

Re: A 2k-year-old sun hat worn by a Roman soldier in Egypt

#59

Post by IAmBroom »

decimalenough wrote: post #31
ekianjo wrote: post #15

> As it turns out, even the Romans understood the power of a good hat. The author thinks Roman had low intellect or something?

No, the Romans just generally did not wear hats, particularly the upper classes. Every Roman statue ever depicts a full head of hair, occasionally with veils, wigs or hairnets, but not hats. Apparently even Caesar's famous laurel wreath was meant primarily as a disguise for baldness. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_hairstyles

Suspect. Laurel wreaths would make the world's worst toupee, as they are empty in the center, and provide the most coverage where balding men have the most hair.

Re: A 2k-year-old sun hat worn by a Roman soldier in Egypt

#60

Post by IAmBroom »

kinj28 wrote: post #12

I wonder how authentic the hat must be after restoration? And how exactly restoration is done ? It seems restoration had to be funded so must be some elaborate process.

Presuming they were careful to preserve the area of the hat surface, likely very authentic. If it doesn't have any creases, there's precious little you can do to reshape a given convex piece of felt. More oblate/more circular is really about it.

Now, felt can be reshaped easily with steam-level heat - but that would require a conscious effort.

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