Roman Trivia

Trivia time. Roman Trivia. Why Roman Trivia? Well, Alan didn't take 4 years of Latin to talk to the pope. Not that he could. So anyway, since it's too late to change the name of the party (or rather, Alan's too lazy to think of a new one and now he's commited to this fate), let's take a look at some fun Roman stuff.

The Word Trivia New: 03/03/03
The Ides and Roman Calendar New: 03/05/03
Roman Orgies New: 03/10/03
Toga Tying New: 03/12/03
Latin Phrases New: 03/19/03

The Word Trivia

Trivia is one of those words that's great because the story behind it is trivia of the highest order. First, let's look at the dictionary defintion: the plural of trivium.

Geez... that's dumb.

But that's the first one I get from dictionary.com That says something about online reference materials, doesn't it? The definition of trivia should really become obvious from the Latin root words: tri meaning three, and via meaning roads.

Get it? No? Ok. Let me explain. It's the meeting of three roads-- a crossroads. Now, before you start thinking about that Britney Spears movie, trivia is simply the stuff people talk about when they meet at a crossroads. It's small talk. The stuff that you can say while the carriage is in the ditch... Kevin L and I experienced many days of that "raeda in fossa."

So, anyway, that's how trivia works. And plenty more to come.

The Ides and the Roman Calendar

Beware the Ides of March! So, you think that line's just from William Shakespeare's Julius Caesar? Nope. It's much older than that.

In ancient Rome during Caesar's time there were three days per month that had names. All the other days in the month are designated by counting the days between the current day and the next named day.

Huh? Well, let's look at the three days: The Kalends, Nones, and the Ides. The funny thing about those names is they're Greek. Yup. (an aside: the motto of the Olympics-- Citius, Altius, Fortius: Swifter, Higher, Stronger-- is not Greek like the original Olympiad, instead it's Latin. Silly, huh?) The Kalends is always the first of the month. Deductive folks may guess that's what the word "Calendar" comes from. Good job, team.

Now the fun part. The examples. March First is listed: "Kalends March." Easy, right? So, the next named day is the Nones March which is the 7th. So, on the second day of March, it's designated as a count from the next named day. So, march 2 is 5 days from March 7, right? WRONG! Those crazy romans counted dates inclusively, so they count the days between and the days on the ends. So, March 2 is "Six Days Before the Nones of March" or... Ante Diem VI Nonas March. And March 5 is Ante Diem III Nonas March. But...

March 6 (the day before the Nones) is just Pridie Nonas March. "Pridie" is a compound word: "pri" (like pre... before) and "die" (like the Spanish "Dia"... day) Then the Nones is just Nonas March. Then the days count to the Ides. Then after the Ides the counting is towards the next month's Kalends.

The Kalends is always the first of the month, but the Nones and the Ides move. I don't know exactly why, but they do. In March, the Nones are the 7th and the Ides are the 15th. But in April the Nones are the 5th and the Ides are the 13th. March, May, July, and October have the later Nones and Ides while the other months have the early ones.

Nutty Romans.

More fun? Roman years used to only be 10 months long. That's why the last month of the year is December. December is the month where the root is Decem; like decimal-- based on 10. How did it get messed up? Well it's Caesar's fault. Julius Caesar just added a month in during Summer and named it after himself: July. Then another Caesar named another month in Summer after himself. Guess which one... here's a hint, the Emperor was Augustus Caesar.

So, learn a lot? Well, I'm sure it's lots of trivia.

Roman Orgies

Okay, okay, before you get all excited, the idea of the Roman Orgy as a big party of drinking excesses and sexual wildness isn't true... totally. While some orgies were pretty crazy, not all were like in the movie Caligula. In fact, the emperor Caligula probably didn't even have many of those kinds of parties. So, don't believe the hype. Everyone wants to be remembered for throwing good parties, and while the Romans threw some of the biggest, they weren't necessarily all wine, song, and scantily clad women.

The word orgy comes from the same root as the word worship because orgies were held as feasts for celebration of the gods. The licentiousness depended on the gods involved. Now, if that god happened to be Bacchus (the god of wine) well, it might be closer to the wild parties of rumor.

Roman parties have a general form, and that's where we'll start. First off, the party begins with everyone staking out a spot on the chairs and ample furniture, almost always reclining or lying prone or otherwise stretched out. All the food is prepared in bite-size portions so it can be eaten with hands... or rather, just one hand. Eating with two hands was considered barbaric.

During the meal or cena everyone would engage in light conversation, talking of matters of state and important things would usually happen as the dinner wore on, but that's about as serious as it got because after the cena began the commisatio.

The commisatio is the drinking bout-- where everyone's goal is to get everyone else drunk. Drinking games were common, especially those that involved insulting your fellow partyers about not holding their liquor. Now, while everyone's goal was to get drunk, nobody likes it when people get drunk to fast, and running out of alcohol was as much of a party-killer then as now. The person most responsible for controlling this was the arbiter bibendi.

Literally meaning master of drinking, the arbiter bibendi was usually chosen by the host as the person who knew the correct ratios of wine and water to mix so everyone has a good time. This person was party-host, master-of-ceremonies, bouncer, and DJ all in one.

So, how did Roman Orgies get such a saucy reputation? Well, a couple factors: togas are not for the modest. While one can remain decent in one, it's pretty tough when one is lying down. Thus, most paintings and renderings show people in mild stages of undress. Also, there's lots of alcohol involved, and alcohol is almost always associated with untoward behavior. Some Roman emperors were a bit loony. They often thought themselves the incarnation of gods among the people and would take liberties... and daughters. And occasionally sons.

The sum total of all of that, and people not knowing how to read Latin lead to a lot of hearsay about Roman parties. While we want our party to be fun, I don't think we'll be able to live up to the hype. And good thing, too, because otherwise I'll have to either disable the partycam or charge for it!

Toga Tying

The clothing of Ancient Rome was limited to mostly the tunica (duh, tunic) which looks mostly like a long, big shirt that's cinched about the waist. Women would wear tunics, too. Married women, though would wear the stola which is like a big tank top worn over a tunic. The toga was the symbol of a free man. A plain white toga pura was the the symbol of the general citizen.

Colors and stripes made all the difference in making class distinctions. Purple edging on the toga was the symbol of senators. This was called the toga praetexta and it was also worn by young boys before their coming of age ceremony at about 15 when they switched to the white toga pura which is also called the toga virilis which loosely translates to toga of men.

So now how to tie a toga. First, you have to start with the right amount of cloth. Togas are made of about 12 square yards of cloth: 2x6. That's about 6 feet by 18 feet. Yeah, that's a lot. Notice, though, that it's much longer than it is wide. A sheet won't look as good because it's too square. Instead, go to a fabric store. A big thing of cloth is probably going to be cheaper than a sheet, anyway.

Now the instructions. The general idea is to wrap it a couple times around the body and toss over the shoulder. Some variations have the toga start over the shoulder, then go around the waist and back over the same shoulder. The goal is to get a drape that has a lot of folds in it. The folds in the toga are very important-- they can be used to hold money, or maybe knives for stabbing megalomaniac emperors.

(Somewhat Useful) Latin Phrases

Learning Latin in high school for four years will mess one up.

It supposedly made me smarter, but it looks like all I have is broken phrases and some strange understanding of facts so odd they wouldn't make it to the dopey TV trivia shows of yesteryear.

That said, let's look at some of the good and bad Latin phrases to know.

Noli me vocare, ego te vocabo -- Simply, Don't call me, I'll call you. Obviously, this is somewhat silly, but it's good Latin: it shows the general Latin structure of subject-object-verb rather than the English subject-verb-object.
Quidquid Latine dictum sit altum viditure -- Anything said in Latin seems profound. I wholeheartedly believe this. One of my favorite examples of this is the Olympic motto:
Citius, Altius, Fortius -- Swifter, Higher, Stronger. Since the Olympics are Greek in origin, you'd think the motto would be in Greek, but nope. Latin. Which sounds more profound.
Illiud Latine dici non potest -- You can't say that in Latin. Some things, though, can't be said in Latin.
Lege atque lacrima -- Read 'em and weep. Another quick good one.
Si tu aeficas, ei venient -- If you build it, they will come. Okay, this one's just funny, but I like it.

Those are pretty good, but now for some of my favorites.
In extremis -- Easy... In the Extremes. I sometimes say this when something is way... way cool and striking.
Persona non grata -- Not a liked person. This is used when one is ostracized or otherwise uncool or unwelcome.
Ex luna scientia -- From the moon, knowledge. Motto of the Apollo 13 mission to the moon.
Excalibur -- Okay, this is just a word, but check this: Ex is Out of, Cali is heavens, and ibur is ivory or scabbard since they're made of ivory. So, the legendary sword Excalibur means Out of the scabbard of the heavens. Now is that boss or what? In Extremis!

Now one of the super favorites...
In flagrante delicto -- In the burning crime. The Latin equivalent of caught red handed. It is commonly used when catching somebody one knows in bed with someone unexpected. In a bad way.

So that's my favorite Latin phrases. There are others, sure. All the boring legal ones, and the ones used for scholarly journals. Maybe I'll put some up. In the meantime, get ready for the party, and Pax Vobiscum (Peace Be With You).
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