The SPQR Citizens' Companion

• Barbarians seeking to know more of our ways may consult the Classics FAQ .
  
  
• Those in a hurry (a notorious barbarian vice) may start with a quick guide to the major Roman Virtues.
  
  
• L. Aelius Stilo has assembled an informal encyclopeda of Roman life
  
  
• A French site displays models of ancient Rome . This site is now available in English, and has more material.
  
  
• Our works may be made easier by keeping track of our days with a good calendar .(apparently off-line; try alternate calendar page instead)
  
  
• If all those numbers are too much for you, try the Roman Numeral Converter. (For dates, add 752 -- 753 from the founding of the City, less 1 because there is no year 0.) Or download a Roman Numeral calulator(different page from previous link).
  
  
• If you are having a little trouble with our language, an on-line dictionary may help.
  
  
• For use on the Forum and in Chat Rooms, Trimalchio has complied a list of Useful Phrases.
  
  
• For those who wish more extensive instruction, a twenty lesson course in Latin, with accompanying essays on history and culture, is offered by the London Telegraph.
  
  
• For practice, listen to a newscast in Latin.(updated URL)
  
  
• For fluent speakers, the next step is some formal training in rhetoric.
  
  
• For those interested in the engineering aspects of our advanced civilization, explanations of many areas of Roman Technology are available.
  
  
• Something to talk ABOUT? Here's a Timeline showing our City's history, courtesy of Trimalchio and Apicius.
  
  
• For an idea of the cosmopolitanism of Rome, study this map of the birthplaces of the Emperors. It covers three continents.
  
  
• The family is the basis of Roman society. Here is some information on the forms of Roman names (These discussions slightly slight the ladies -- do these supposed scholars really think we don't have personal names?) There is also a list of our more prominent families. .
  
  

• The center of everyday life is the family home. Those who would like to see the inside of a well-appointed domus may visit Livia Drusa (the tour starts in the garden, featuring extensive plantings, statuary, singing birds and colorful butterflies).
  
  
• What could be a more Roman than a visit to the Baths of Herculaneum ? (M. Didius Festus, prop.).(temporarily closed due to furnace problems)
  
  
• For those giving the dinner parties that play such an important role in our social and political lives, a cookbook is available. (Note from that notable housewife, FeAudrey: these are European recipes, so they use weights of ingredients where an American would use measures of volume. The suggested conversions are somewhat dubious.)
  Another helping? Try this Rhaetian site featuring recipes with the original Latin and modern adaptions or this directory of food references.
  
  
• You are invited? Here is a full account of Romans at table (updated address), at home, away, in literature and during the holidays.
  
  
• Those interested in Imperial trade may be interested in background on that culinary essential, salt.
  
  
• A formal occasion calls for music (at last! Synaulia's own page!) to entertain the guests. There is also an essay for those with the need for a little history of the subject, and some notes for the recording cited above.
  
  
• And one can finish up with a cup of wine at Leela's Taberna .
  
  
• More tabernas! Visit the establishments on the Via Ripa or the Via S. Procolo.
  
  
• And what to wear? Inspect the decriptions and models at the clothing collection. (replaces previous link, which went off the air)
  
  
• What would Rome be without the baths? to say nothing of the other comforts and conveniences of our public and domestic plumbing facilities.
  
  
• And the Circus! If your interest is horses, Horse World has information on racing and transport; if sport, One Man's Meanderings takes you to the races and the games.
  
  
• More animals? Here is a guide to Animals in Roman art.
  
  
• For more classic tastes, there is the Theater .
  
  
• A little time on your hands? Learn the rules of some of our more popular sports (includes the "Roman Ball"). For more sedentary types, there are board games.
  
  
• Anticus Cornelius is collecting some material on Law.
  
  
• Those with even only a little money may be interested in information about the coins in our purses. (new site)
  
  
• Writings and images of the Gods (and Goddesses!) are being assembled by one who has only begun his task.For a more academic background, it's Bullfinch's Mythology.
  
  
• Many legionaries are devotees of the cult of Mithraism .
  
  
• But the Eleusinian Mysteries , brought from Greece, also have a wide following.
  
  
• A scholar has collected some accounts of the lives of women in our times.(updated URL)
  
  
• Livia Drusa also offers materials on women's roles in our society .
  
  

• In the Imperial capital at Split, Diocletian's Palace has been opened to the public.
  
  
• In Newcastle-upon-Tyne, U.K. (hard by Hadrian's Wall), the Museum of Antiquities displays many relics of the Britannia campaign.
  
  
• Up along the Rhine lies the virtual town of Xanten, whose streets can be explored by those with powerful "browsers".
  
  
• A visitor to Pompeii has brought back some notes of that city's grafitti .
  
  
• What if you had been born a Greek instead of a Roman? Test yourself on a virtual Odyssey by playing a game based on that epic.
  
  
• Such an extensive journey is beyond the dreams of most of us, but here is an itinerary for the grandest grand tour of all, the Seven Wonders of the World.
  
  
• A modest local journey that we can all take is a visit to the kennel of Canis Venaticus . He will bark out his entertaining stories and bite the hand that is feeding us SPQR with his fantasia on Chapter Four (and more).
  Chapter VII is in its early stages! When it is complete, Canis will have equaled the feats of the CyberGods in chapter creation.
  
  Alas!Canis and friends are temporarily homeless! The new address will be added as soon as it is available.

• Visit the (VR) Forum of Trajan. Instruction in the history and art of the period is also available.
  
  
• An annotated list of mysteries set in the ancient world may be viewed here, along with news of the genre.
  For devotees of the novels of Lindsey Davis, there are sites both official and unofficial (the work of our own "M Didius").
  
  
• It is said (just ask Gordian) that all roads lead to Rome. Many visitors travel upon them. Some visitors from very far away indeed -- even farther east than the end of the Silk Road -- have taken some interesting views of the City. (Some of you will need a special instrument to view them.)
  
  
• What will become of Rome? Some pictures envisioning Rome in a barely imaginable future may be examined (walk-through of the Forum as it stands today).
  
  
• Two Legions based abroad offer accounts of themselves: Legio IX Hispana and Legio X Gemina (updated address)
  
  

• There must be something to be said for life of indulgence after all, and not just how authentically Roman it is. Our Trimachio has produced that for which we have been hungering since we first came to Rome -- a MAP of our place and time. (L. Aelius Stilo has done a little technical optimizing on it, and uploaded it to a site maintained by Canis Venaticus, so it is a model of cooperation as well as cartography.)
  
  
• The CyberGods have directed Gordian the Engineer to conduct interested citizens on a Guided Tour (broken link -- formerly at AS)of the Forum.
  It begins southeast of the House of the Vestals.
• Citizens more familiar with the City may prefer to go along for only the first few stops of the above tour, and re-join at the end for the other newly-viewable areas (broken link -- formerly at AS). These sights include the area west of the Tabularium, starting on the steps.
  
  
• The CyberGods, heeding our prayers, have provided a second tour(broken link -- formerly at AS). This one leads us along the Tiber and through quiet streets to the Forum.
  
  
• Gordian's maps of the Forum form a three-panel sequence,
  • West(broken link -- formerly at AS),
  • Central(broken link -- formerly at AS), and
  • East(broken link -- formerly at AS).
  
  
  
• Not quite sure where you are? Consult the list of Ancient and Modern Place Name Equivalents, and find your place in the world.
  
  

• General: Consult the many hints under topics offering help. We citizens of Rome have a well-established track record of helpfulness to newcomers. But over the course of the last two and a half years and more, many questions have already been amply discussed.
  
  
• For the on-line chapters, Camilla Lucretius has produced the Spoiler of Spoilers (to be used with caution -- she tells ALL). (Chapter I, so far; there's also preserved content for the four-chapter original, all in one concise page -- courtesy of the Wayback Machine.)
  
  One of the projects of the group "Rostra" has been to recover those posts from the old bulletin board. Thus far, we have
  
  
• Julilla's effort on Chapter II, and
• Venusta's, with Chapter IV.
  
  
• Chapter I ---The original Spoilarius post has been removed from the postings. The topic "Barbarians" still carries posting about the Spoilarius controversy.
  
  Questions about the chapters (the strongbox combination, for example...)? Join the Forum discussions of Chapter I, Chapter II, Chapter III, and Chapter IV.
  
  
• Histnacticus has assembled a formidable collection of Chapter I references (Gordian's Notebook a specialty).
  
  
• Chapter II & Chapter III-- There is an abundance of material in Sulla's War Chest ..

  Here is Sulla's meditation on the City on the occasion of the release of Chapter II:
  My heart yearned to see more of mytrue old friend - the city of Rome! And my ghost still remains confined the same as always - to theForum. Indeed, beautiful and soothing though it is, it is a prison nevertheless. Peering through gatesat the Spring countryside makes me yearn for more, more! And could I not enter the Temples tooffer my prayers and sacrifices? What beauty awaits us within... As it is, I must crawl through thetunnels to scrabble for a few gold coins, at the risk of poisoning my soul. All that is new, I fear, are soulless rooms and dank sewers.
  
  

• CD-ROM Game: Our Venusta has produced a definitive spoiler collection at the SPQR Unofficial Walk-Through (Venusta's original, restored!).
  
  
• Noble citizen Eupolis Aristophanes has taken up the quill and produced what we have been waiting so long for some industrious soul to compose: an Ancient Sites FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) ((preserved content -- courtesy of the Wayback Machine) -- offered here for historic reasons, as the site for which it is a guide, is no more).
  
  

Home Pages of the Citizens of Rome

...and There's More

Welcome Page

IronAge TopPage

Technical Resources

Web Crawl

ABCs

Search Tutorial

Blackjack Strategy

Rationality

Stupid 'net Tricks

This page's URL is:
http://pages.prodigy.net/feaudrey/spqrcmpn.htm

Graphics Sources:

"THe SKuLL" is offering vivid, content-rich lines at the Home of the Horizontal Rule.
Start your search for backgrounds in Your Team 's neighborhood..
The new "Companion " bug was a gift from Bazart, whose site should be visited for his animated cartoon comic set in Roman Britain

My usual round of home, market, Circus, and baths does not give me a wide acquaintanceship withthe greater world. I ask my fellow citizens to send me, FeAudrey, suggestions for additions to this page.

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These pages last updated August 2003
Entire Site Copyright ©1996-2003 Gail Beddow All Rights Reserved

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