For those of you interested in ancient Roman history, the Arsht Center is hosting the play, Julius Caesar! Here is the description:
A world torn by greed and lust! In Rome, Julius Caesar and Pompey the Great are fighting a civil war, while in Egypt, Ptolemy and his sister Cleopatra fight for the throne. Julius Caesar is an explosive tale of power and passion as this historic couple unites in Handel’s quintessential Baroque tour de force.
To commemorate “Pi Day” here at DCS, we have a lot of events planned. Latin class is no exception! We can pitch in with our knowledge of the ancient world and Pi - after all, it isn’t just a number 3.14159 but also a Greek letter!
Today, we are going to talk about Archimedes and his approximation of Pi. He was one of the greatest mathematicians of all time, and made many discoveries regarding physics and mathematics.
I just wanted to attach these short clips to give more detail about Pi and Archimedes. Enjoy!
Part I
Part II
Part III
Part IV
Part V
Part VI
And something extra…
Maybe we could do this in Latin class? This school is using Roman coins to learn about inscriptions and getting experience reading REAL Latin. Is this something you would like to do?
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- April 2, 2007
HAMPTON - Rachel Fenske squinted at the smudged, dime-sized coin in her fingers. Tarnish the color of old leather blurred the raised letters and figures. Undaunted, the Kecoughtan High School 10th-grader rubbed the coin and again looked closely at it.
“At the bottom, it looks like R, T, S and either an O or a P,” she reported.
“The background shows one wing or two wings on a horse. On the front it has an emperor, but I couldn’t tell you which one. And it’s green. There’s more writing on it, but that’s kind of smashed.”
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Fenske was one of 14 students in Lisa Auanger’s Latin II class deciphering inscriptions on Roman coins.
Each student in class received one of the small bronze coins, which were donated by coin dealers through a nonprofit, nationwide program called Ancient Coins of Education.
The ancient pocket change, which dates from about 300 to 400 A.D, offers students a chance to practice not only language and detective skills, but also to study history, mythology, economics and civics.
They must prepare a Power Point presentation of their findings, adding technology skills to the lesson mix.
About 68 percent of Virginia’s public school districts offer Latin classes to high school students.
All four of Hampton’s high schools have classes in the language, which Auanger said is far from dead.
The class provides a strong foundation for college-level humanities classes, ranging from philosophy to classic literature to law and sciences, she said.
The multifaceted nature of Auanger’s Latin II class is one reason 10th-grader John Blackwood enrolled.
“I don’t think they’re doing stuff with coins in Spanish or French,” Blackwood said. “We do other things. It’s more than just language. That adds to the fun factor.”
“Latin isn’t just Virgil anymore,” Auanger added.
Hampton students have connected with other high school students learning the language through activities organized by area chapters of the Junior Classical League, a nonprofit extracurricular organization dedicated to studying Latin and classical subjects.
They also participated in Hampton Roads Latin Day.
Auanger said students enroll in Latin for a variety of reasons, but improving vocabulary skills is one of the top draws.
That’s the reason 16-year-old Siedah Holmes decided to enroll.
She said she now can figure out English word definitions and origins based on her Latin lessons.
Fenske offered another reason for taking the course: medicine.
“I wanted to know what doctors were putting in medicine bottles,” she explained.
Neither Fenske nor Holmes had expected to use toothbrushes or microscopes in a language class.
Students cleaned the Roman coins with old toothbrushes and used microscopes to study mint marks and other details.
Holmes said students also spent time on the Internet, looking up empires and campaigns.
“We did a lot of research,” she said.
While some of the coin inscriptions were rubbed almost bare, Blackwood said his looked fairly crisp.
“This coin is in better condition than most pennies I see,” he said, holding the bronze coin to the light.
Holmes said being able to read an inscription did not mean deciphering it was easy.
“A lot is in Roman numbers, and they were different back then,” she said, hold
ing her coin against a poster filled with coins. “It’s a challenge.”So was identifying the ruler on her coin. During the centuries in which the coins were minted, the empire was in a state of flux, with a constantly changing cast of rulers and military leaders, each of whom had coins minted in his image.
Auanger said the coin detective work helps sharpen other skills students will need for college and work.
“They have to think about things they don’t know and not jump to conclusions,” she said, watching Holmes try to match her coin to the examples on the poster.
“It’s got to be one of them,” Holmes said.
Well, finally it’s here!
I have been kicking around this idea for the entire year but finally just got the opportunity to piece it together and get it done. We now have an Archaeology Club at Doctors Charter School!
This is an exciting endeavor for me as I spent 4 years excavating in Italy as a graduate student on a dig for Etruscan and Roman artifacts. The site was called Poggio Colle delle Civitelle and is located near the small town of San Venanzo in Umbria, Italy.
In fact, I am currently working on getting together a trip to Italy for members of the DCS Archaeology Club which will shape up to be something of a tour of Etruscan and Roman sites with my mentor who is a prominent archaeologist in Italy.
As for you students, we will be launching the club this week with our first ever meeting! Stay tuned to the announcements.
Here at Doctors Charter School, the 2nd quarter is winding down.
We are having midterm exams this week, and it is a grueling process for our students. They are faced with the challenge of not just one exam, but all 7 exams for all 7 of their courses at one time. This is no small task and will tax the best of students and their efforts.
This is no different for the Latin student at DCS. The exam is cumulative in nature, and requires the Latin student in our program to be able to comprehend two quarters worth of material. We boil it down to a week long review session which, judging by the results so far, has not been enough. But this is understood - at least by instructors. Students need to take it upon themselves to be responsible for their own educations. If there is something they are not understanding, they have to speak up. Teachers are not mind readers and it is a good life lesson to get out of the way now - if you don’t know, don’t be ashamed. Ask a question and challenge someone to show you the way.
It is difficult, under these circumstances, for students to succeed. Expected to recall everything on a whim, there seems like no room for error. Straying upon the edge of a knife, perhaps. But we cannot progress if we don’t know our own limitations. And if we don’t know our own limitations, we will not know how we can take the initiative towards progressing.
So dear students of mine - ask questions.
Well, we got the forum up and running now - see for yourself.
This will be a more general meeting place for students, scholars and enthusiasts of Latin and Roman history and culture. You can ask for help with your Latin grammar or if you come across a tricky passage. You know how those Roman authors are!
Also, you can discuss various aspects of Roman history and culture. Magic? Religion? Science? Whatever itch needs scratching.
ROME, Italy (Reuters) — Archaeologists have discovered a more than 2,000-year-old Etruscan tomb perfectly preserved in the hills of Tuscany with a treasure trove of artifacts inside, including urns that hold the remains of about 30 people.
The tomb, in the Tuscan town of Civitella Paganico, probably dates from between the 1st and 3rd centuries B.C., when Etruscan power was in decline, Andrea Marcocci, who led digging at the site, told Reuters.
“It’s quite rare to find a tomb intact like this,” said Marcocci, who had suspected one might exist in the area after work on a nearby road scattered pieces of artifacts.
“When we found fragments outside, we thought we would find that the tomb had been violated. But the main burial room was completely intact.”
Inside the tomb, a narrow corridor led to a small burial chamber, about 2 meters long and 1.79 meters wide, he said. It housed about 80 objects including vases and mirrors in bronze and ceramic. Urns holding human remains were also found.
“It’s quite exceptional to find so many objects in a tomb so small,” Marcocci said. “Some of the vases (urns) were fairly small, so we think they were probably for children.”
One of Italy’s first and most mysterious civilizations, the Etruscans lived north of Rome in present day regions of Tuscany and Umbria. Their civilization lasted for about 1,000 years, reaching its height roughly from the 7th to the 6th century B.C., before its cities were replaced by Roman settlements.
Much of what is known about the Etruscans derives from other lavish burial sites, decorated with paintings and filled with vases and other objects. LINK
Although this is an old article, there is a small movement that seems to support the use of Latin as the new lingua franca in today’s shrinking world. The reason is it is a universal language that all cultures could easily implement as the knowledge base is in place to teach it and utilize it. Read on!
EU Could Revive Latin as a Working Language
Posted on August 29, 2006By Jonathan Luxmoore: The Vatican’s daily newspaper has called for Latin to be made the official working language of the European Union, after attempts by the new Finnish presidency to promote its use in EU departments.
“While Latin has been given up as a compulsory subject in schools over recent years, interest in the language is growing in Europe and other parts of the world,” the semi-official L’Osservatore Romano said in a commentary.
“In these circumstances, it would constitute a suitable instrument for international communication.”
The paper said a Latin-language news programme, Nuntii Latini, had been broadcast weekly for the past decade by YLE, Finland’s equivalent to the BBC, making the ancient Roman language “potentially contemporary.”
It added that Latin formulations had been found for numerous modern phenomena, such autocinetica (motorway), supervenalicium (supermarket), fullonica electrica (washing machine) and pilae coriaceae lusor (soccer star).
Besides Finland, which has a tradition of classical scholarship, other countries have reported a growing interest in Latin, whose renewed use as a once-universal language has also been encouraged by the Catholic Church.
The Finnish government set up a weekly news summary in Latin when it first assumed the EU’s rotating presidency in 1999, and has repeated the service, alongside English, French and Swedish, since taking over the six-months presidency for its second term on 1 July.
Classics scholars have insisted use of the language would “turn EU jargon into poetry”. As examples, they said the Common Agricultural Policy could be rendered as “Ratio communis agros colendi” (“common scheme for cultivating the fields”), while the EU’s Acquis Communautaire, or body of laws and regulations, could be Latinised as “Corpus legum institutorumque iuris Europaei.”
“Using Latin is a way of paying tribute to European civilisation and it serves to remind people of European society’s roots, stretching back to ancient times,” explained Mia Lahti, editor of the Finnish presidency’s website.
“Latin isn’t dead – it’s still very much in use in different forms across the world today. After all, Italians, French and Spaniards all speak a new form of Latin.”
Several Italian newspapers have backed the L’Osservatore Romano proposal, while noting that Finland itself was never part of the Roman Empire.
Here are a few examples of Latin being used on Youtube:
Don’t worry. If you practice Latin to the point you can speak it, you won’t turn out like these guys. At least, I still hold hope.