The book Paris, 1200 is pretty good read for anyone interested in 'point in time' history:
> Paris in 1200 was a city in transition. The great cathedral of Notre Dame was halfway through its construction and walls were being built to enclose the new, larger limits of the city. Pope Innocent III ordered all French churches closed to punish King Philip Augustus for his remarriage; the king himself negotiated an unprecedented truce with the English; and the students of Paris threatened a general strike, punctuated with incidents of violence, to protest infringements of their rights. John W. Baldwin brilliantly resurrects this key moment in Parisian history using documents only from 1190 to 1210—a narrow focus made possible by the availability of collections of the Capetian monarchy and the medieval scholastic thinkers. This unique approach results in a vivid snapshot of the city at the turn of the thirteenth century. Paris, 1200 introduces the reader to the city itself and its inhabitants. Three "faces" exemplify these that of the celebrated scholar Pierre the Chanter, of King Philip Augustus, and of the more deeply hidden visages of women. The book examines the city's primary the royal government, the Church, and its celebrated schools that evolved into the university at Paris. Finally, it offers an account of the delights and pleasures, as well as the fears and sorrows, of Parisian life in this period.
Awesome book. Students were already gaming the system as extremists in 1200 Paris.
> (the cleric students were) marked by the tonsure, which granted them two major privileges:
> the privilegium canonis, protected their persons, which were regarded as sacred. Any physical violence against them entailed excommunication, which could only be lifted after severe penance. One did not mistreat a cleric without exposing oneself to serious consequences.
> The second was the privilegium fori, which placed clerics under the sole jurisdiction of ecclesiastical courts... Philip Augustus is said to have observed the boldness of clerics who rushed into the fray brandishing swords, yet wearing neither armour nor helmets. Hardly surprising, when a shaved head offered better protection than a helmet.
There was already a museum of a Roman era settlement out in the plaza. It's somewhat confusingly named the Archeological Crypt, but it's not the crypt of the Notre Dame Cathedral. (The Cathedral doesn't have a crypt; I think the water table is too low to allow there to be significant spaces below the level of the nearby river.)
So I'm unclear on exactly what this dig is. I get the impression that it's around the edge of the plaza. Perhaps it will be incorporated into the The Crypte Archéologique de l'İle de la Cité?
I second that recommendation. It's my favorite part of the Louvre. It's a very castle-looking castle; it feels like it's straight out of a movie.
To my mind, all of the best stuff in the Louvre is in the basement: the Codex Hammurabi, Babylonian artifacts, etc. Yeah, it's all just as stolen as the artifacts in the British Museum that get more attention, but it's more significant than their art collection that are "the greatest" because they said so.
(Not that they aren't also great works. But there are many great works, and the distinction of these has more to do with French nationalism than any serious consideration of artistic merit.)
It's surprising that they're not doing that systematically around the building, but then again I guess that applies to a large part of the city as well.
One always wonders which incredible books we lost, from amazing mysterious old philosophers. The burning of the library of Alexandria is such an incredible sadness
> It's surprising that they're not doing that systematically around the building, but then again I guess that applies to a large part of the city as well.
In some places in Italy, Greece, Malta, probably others I don't know, people always joke that you shouldn't try to ever do any renovations lest you end up finding something and lose your house. Some places you're almost guaranteed to find stuff if you just dig once or twice.
There is a wonderful museum it the Italian city of Lecce that started when someone went to fix some plumbing in their house and ended up finding so much amazing historical stuff that they ended up opening the house as a museum:
I didn't know there was a game. The movie is great, but it focuses on the crime plot and unfortunately leaves most of the historical/philosophical/linguistic meat out, which is not surprising when you compress a 500 page book into a 100 page screenplay. I guess an adventure game would actually be more suitable for incorporating some of the things the film left out.
"Twenty centuries are stacked in 4 meters (13 feet) of earth — or about the height of two-and-a-half Napoleon Bonapartes standing on top of one another."
Way to get history wrong in your story about history.
I actually was about to post this quote for another reason as well. Usually you make these references to “known sizes” so people can relate. But no one has seen Napoleon in the flesh _and_ they underestimate his size. This was a useless comparison.
That said, the dig itself is pretty cool and I’m excited to see what they’ll unearth. I’m pretty interested in Roman history but haven’t gone as deep into the history of the provinces.
Semi-related to that, if someone reading this is in the Toronto area, the bata shoe museum has an exhibit (Vindolanda) about unearthed Roman footwear in England
The book Paris, 1200 is pretty good read for anyone interested in 'point in time' history:
> Paris in 1200 was a city in transition. The great cathedral of Notre Dame was halfway through its construction and walls were being built to enclose the new, larger limits of the city. Pope Innocent III ordered all French churches closed to punish King Philip Augustus for his remarriage; the king himself negotiated an unprecedented truce with the English; and the students of Paris threatened a general strike, punctuated with incidents of violence, to protest infringements of their rights. John W. Baldwin brilliantly resurrects this key moment in Parisian history using documents only from 1190 to 1210—a narrow focus made possible by the availability of collections of the Capetian monarchy and the medieval scholastic thinkers. This unique approach results in a vivid snapshot of the city at the turn of the thirteenth century. Paris, 1200 introduces the reader to the city itself and its inhabitants. Three "faces" exemplify these that of the celebrated scholar Pierre the Chanter, of King Philip Augustus, and of the more deeply hidden visages of women. The book examines the city's primary the royal government, the Church, and its celebrated schools that evolved into the university at Paris. Finally, it offers an account of the delights and pleasures, as well as the fears and sorrows, of Parisian life in this period.
* https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/8937746-paris-1200
* https://www.sup.org/books/history/paris-1200
Two other books in that vein that I really liked:
1. A World Lit Only by Fire — William Manchester
2. One Summer: America, 1927 — Bill Bryson
Awesome book. Students were already gaming the system as extremists in 1200 Paris.
> (the cleric students were) marked by the tonsure, which granted them two major privileges:
> the privilegium canonis, protected their persons, which were regarded as sacred. Any physical violence against them entailed excommunication, which could only be lifted after severe penance. One did not mistreat a cleric without exposing oneself to serious consequences.
> The second was the privilegium fori, which placed clerics under the sole jurisdiction of ecclesiastical courts... Philip Augustus is said to have observed the boldness of clerics who rushed into the fray brandishing swords, yet wearing neither armour nor helmets. Hardly surprising, when a shaved head offered better protection than a helmet.
> the students of Paris threatened a general strike
Paris in 1200 was at least somewhat recognizable.
There was already a museum of a Roman era settlement out in the plaza. It's somewhat confusingly named the Archeological Crypt, but it's not the crypt of the Notre Dame Cathedral. (The Cathedral doesn't have a crypt; I think the water table is too low to allow there to be significant spaces below the level of the nearby river.)
So I'm unclear on exactly what this dig is. I get the impression that it's around the edge of the plaza. Perhaps it will be incorporated into the The Crypte Archéologique de l'İle de la Cité?
Definitely worth visiting if you’re there, along with the remains of the medieval fortress under the Louvre.
I second that recommendation. It's my favorite part of the Louvre. It's a very castle-looking castle; it feels like it's straight out of a movie.
To my mind, all of the best stuff in the Louvre is in the basement: the Codex Hammurabi, Babylonian artifacts, etc. Yeah, it's all just as stolen as the artifacts in the British Museum that get more attention, but it's more significant than their art collection that are "the greatest" because they said so.
(Not that they aren't also great works. But there are many great works, and the distinction of these has more to do with French nationalism than any serious consideration of artistic merit.)
It's surprising that they're not doing that systematically around the building, but then again I guess that applies to a large part of the city as well.
One always wonders which incredible books we lost, from amazing mysterious old philosophers. The burning of the library of Alexandria is such an incredible sadness
> It's surprising that they're not doing that systematically around the building
There's a very good reason for that: archaeological techniques improve all the time. The idea here is to leave something for future archaeologists.
By not excavating the whole city they leave work for future archaeologists. :)
> It's surprising that they're not doing that systematically around the building, but then again I guess that applies to a large part of the city as well.
In some places in Italy, Greece, Malta, probably others I don't know, people always joke that you shouldn't try to ever do any renovations lest you end up finding something and lose your house. Some places you're almost guaranteed to find stuff if you just dig once or twice.
There is a wonderful museum it the Italian city of Lecce that started when someone went to fix some plumbing in their house and ended up finding so much amazing historical stuff that they ended up opening the house as a museum:
https://www.museofaggiano.it/en/home/
And that's just one house in one city in one country!
Edit: I strongly recommend the museum, Lecce and indeed all of Puglia!
Spain, in some cities like Merida, hapens.
> One always wonders which incredible books we lost, from amazing mysterious old philosophers.
You might be interested in The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco, a historical novel about such a lost work.
Also, the movie was good. And the 8-bit era game was very popular.
I didn't know there was a game. The movie is great, but it focuses on the crime plot and unfortunately leaves most of the historical/philosophical/linguistic meat out, which is not surprising when you compress a 500 page book into a 100 page screenplay. I guess an adventure game would actually be more suitable for incorporating some of the things the film left out.
Excavation with our soon-to-be-outdated techniques is needless destruction.
We should only excavate what is about to be destroyed.
( And we shouldn't destroy stuff just to put up yet another shitty modern building. )
> now Paris wants to soften the hot, bare square in front of it with trees and shade.
It's not a building.
It was a general point.
"Twenty centuries are stacked in 4 meters (13 feet) of earth — or about the height of two-and-a-half Napoleon Bonapartes standing on top of one another."
Way to get history wrong in your story about history.
I actually was about to post this quote for another reason as well. Usually you make these references to “known sizes” so people can relate. But no one has seen Napoleon in the flesh _and_ they underestimate his size. This was a useless comparison.
That said, the dig itself is pretty cool and I’m excited to see what they’ll unearth. I’m pretty interested in Roman history but haven’t gone as deep into the history of the provinces.
Semi-related to that, if someone reading this is in the Toronto area, the bata shoe museum has an exhibit (Vindolanda) about unearthed Roman footwear in England
The author should’ve known that we already have an accepted unit for measuring things in terms of a person’s stature:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smoot
Or about 1/27th of a football field for the Americans
The classic American height reference would make it, depending how you're counting, 1/100 of an Empire State Building.
It's about two and a half Ford Tauri stacked on top of each other
>It's about two and a half Ford Tauri stacked on top of each other
Or almost exactly one Companhia worth of Tauri stacked on top of each other.
(there's a programming joke in there btw)
Comparing a height to a distance is pretty silly, for Americans and non-Americans alike. Also it's much closer to 1/23rd than 1/27th.