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The last Romans are still around

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Re: The last Romans are still around

#81

Post by tar0m »

scheme271 wrote: post #62
rob74 wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course the manhole covers aren't ancient, but they're a sign that Rome still sees itself in the tradition of the Roman Empire.

Or alterntively, that it's a relatively modern addition to add to it's mystique for tourism purposes. When did SPQR get added to the manhole covers and does anything else in Rome use similar signage?

As a Roman, this is a bit painful to read. I will play fair and assume you are not trying to say that the only thing there is to my city is tourist attractions.

The answer is no (and you can easily look this up). SPQR has been used continually since the Roman Empire, through the Middle Ages, by the Fascists and into the modern era by the current administration. You will find it everywhere, even far removed from tourist areas, and there is absolutely no mystique to it. It just means "this is public property of the city". You will also find it on the city's website and on pretty much all symbols of the city. Some of those manhole covers even predate the era of mass tourism... I had one in my yard on the outskirts of the city when I was a kid.

Re: The last Romans are still around

#83

Post by Zardoz84 »

toyg wrote: post #14
Insanity wrote: post #2

Just wait for Hollywood to create a film about Roman mythology and not cast a single Roman! But less tongue-in-cheek, the other thing is that the legacy of the Romans is pretty much all around us. The Roman Calendar (with July and August both referencing a Roman leader), the Latin alphabet (with the additional letters like 'y' being added later on to support Greek), the roads we can travel, etc.

It's not only July and August; January, May, June, and Mars, are named after Roman gods; February and April after Roman rituals; and September to December after Roman numerals (7 to 10th month, as they were when the calendar first started).

Also the weekdays in many Latin derived languages.

Re: The last Romans are still around

#85

Post by Zardoz84 »

4rtem wrote: post #33

I bought a torrone (Italian nougat dessert) in local Auchan (French supermarket chain) today and while briefly researching the dessert history found out that it was popular in Ancient Rome named as cupedia and in some Southern parts of Italy it still called as cupeta. Just imagine to make recipe so good that it not just transferred across generations through 2000 years, but also evolved to come in supermarket in Russ…

There was a Roman recipe of what we call now burger.

Re: The last Romans are still around

#87

Post by joegibbs »

DuperPower wrote: post #51
rob74 wrote: post #50

I'm a bit surprised that the "people from modern Rome" only got an honorable mention. After all, Rome still sees itself as the successor of the Roman Empire. When first visiting it, I was surprised to see the famous SPQR ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SPQR ) acronym all over the place - on trash cans, manhole covers etc. etc.

when you see something histórical in Europe ask chatgpt if its something actually ancient that lasted until today or It was a xix century tourist marketing stunt made by the burgoisie

The coat of arms of the city has been using SPQR since the medieval period

Re: The last Romans are still around

#88

Post by astrobe_ »

dpe82 wrote: post #37
epolanski wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every modern law system has its roots in Roman one.

> *English Common Law* has entered the chat

Still romanian. "The common law—so named because it was common to all the king's courts across England—originated in the practices of the courts of the English kings in the centuries following the Norman Conquest in 1066" [1]

France (and Normandy) was conquered by Rome before it was granted to Rollo, a Viking. A few generations later, his descendant William the Conqueror claimed the English crown. Just like what happened with Gauls and Romans, the conquered people adopted large parts of the language and customs of the conqueror. That's why the English language is ~25% of Roman origin for it's vocabulary. I suppose it is the same for English common law.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_law#History

Re: The last Romans are still around

#89

Post by flohofwoe »

fhars wrote: post #84

Depending on who's legal fiction you believe, the Roman Empire was only dissolved in 1806 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reichsdeputationshauptschluss

You could just as well say 1922 because the Ottomans also claimed to be the successor to the Roman Empire, or alternatively 1917, because the Russian Empire did too.

The more realistic alternatives are 'around 480', 1204 or 1453 :)

Re: The last Romans are still around

#90

Post by astrobe_ »

dhosek wrote: post #65
gerdesj wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Senatus Populus ... Que Romani! The senate and people of Rome. Italy, per se, is a modern construct but the capital is still Rome and I think it fair to draw associations to the old empire. I love seeing the SPQR logo and I think it is a really useful link to the past.

Fun fact: The -gh endings of many English words share a proto–Indo European root with that enclitic¹ -que in Senatus Populusque Romani. I remember being skeptical of this when I first heard it assuming that the person was arguing for a shared Latin heritage until I dug in and discovered that it actually went back to PIE.² ⸻ 1. For the non-linguists here, an enclitic is a suffix added to a word that either functions a…

It seems this -que was already a relic at that time, or maybe sort of literary, because it coexisted with et (as in etc, et cetera, &c), which still exists e.g. in French. Or maybe one is from antic Latin and the other is from "vulgar"/late Latin ?
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