Roman sailing – boats in the Roman empire
Roman sailing ship with square sails (100s AD, Bardo Museum, Tunisia) Until the First Punic War, in 264 BC, the Romans had not been sailors, and had never had a navy. But [...]
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09, 2017
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09, 2017
Ptolemy – Roman astronomy – history of science
A copy of Ptolemy's map of the world Ptolemy was born in Egypt in about 90 AD, when the Romans were ruling Egypt. He was a Roman citizen. Probably he was the son or grandson of [...]
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09, 2017
Medicine and doctors in the Roman Empire
Roman medicine: Galen used surgical instruments like these What do we mean by Roman medicine? Roman medicine is really West Asian and African medicine. That's because most of the great [...]
4
09, 2017
Roman numerals – Ancient Roman numbers
Claudia Pieris' tombstone (CIL VI.15543) She lived 117-138 AD. Now in Copenhagen, at the Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek. The Romans used several different systems for writing numbers. Sometimes they wrote numbers [...]
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09, 2017
Roman science – What did ancient Romans invent?
Roman mold-blown glass (100s AD) West Asian/African science under Roman rule What we call Roman science is a mixture of two different things. The first is the discoveries and inventions [...]
4
09, 2017
Lucretius and Epicureanism
A medieval manuscript copy of Lucretius' De Rerum Natura (On the Nature of Things) What's Lucretius's backstory? Lucretius was born about 99 BC, in the later Roman Republic. Nobody knows anything about [...]
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08, 2017
How did people eat in ancient Rome?
Spoons made out of bronze and animal bone from ancient Rome Most people in ancient Rome ate most of their food with spoons. A lot of it was soups and [...]
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08, 2017
Roman aqueducts – Pont du Gard, Segovia, and more
Aqueduct in the city of Rome - Roman aqueducts brought clean water to the people of Rome Why did the Romans build aqueducts? As Roman towns got bigger under the Roman [...]
20
08, 2017
Why is the sky blue? Weather science
Blue sky with cirrus clouds This is an easy question to ask but the answer is pretty hard. The light that comes from the Sun to Earth looks white, but really it is made [...]
20
08, 2017
Where do tornadoes come from? – Weather – Earth science
A tornado wrecked a town in northern France When there's wind coming from more than one direction at the same time, sometimes the air begins to spin around in one place. This [...]
