There's No Place Like Rome

By: Greg Kandra
Topics: Hot Links

You have to see it to believe it.

A professor at the University of Virginia (Katie's alma mater, btw) has created something truly unique: a computer simululation of Rome, circa 320 A.D.

According to Reuters:

Tourists puzzled by the jumble of buildings in classical and modern Rome can now find their bearings by visiting a virtual model of the imperial capital in what is being billed as the world's biggest computer simulation of an ancient city.

"Rome Reborn" was unveiled on Monday in a first release showing the city at its peak in 320 AD, under the Emperor Constantine when it had grown to a million inhabitants.

Brainchild of the University of Virginia's Bernard Frischer, Rome Reborn will eventually show its evolution from Bronze Age hut settlements to the Sack of Rome in the 5th century AD and the devastating Gothic Wars.

Reproduced for tourists on satellite-guided handsets and 3-D orientation movies in a theatre to be opened near the Colosseum, Frischer says his model "will prepare them for their visit to the Colosseum, the Forum, the imperial palaces on the Palatine, so that they can understand the ruins a lot better."

"We can take people under the Colosseum and show them how the elevators worked to bring the animals up from underground chambers for the animal hunts they held," he said, referring to the great Roman amphitheatre inaugurated by Titus in 80 AD.

There truly is no place like Rome. Especially as it was 1700 years ago.

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by thy1138 June 13, 2007 1:19 AM EDT: I think it should help discover some of the questions. Fustel de Coulanges researched the "Ancient City" (1864) I've read in social anthropology. "in which he showed forcibly the part played by religion in the political and social evolution of Greece and Rome. Although his making religion the sole factor of this evolution was a perversion of the historical facts, the book was so consistent throughout, so full of ingenious ideas, and written in so striking a style, that it ranks as one of the masterpieces of the French language in the 19th century." Perhaps it is a warning, after which Rome fell...not to but perhaps why.; Reply to this comment


by ericmichael1 June 12, 2007 8:23 PM EDT: There are many similarities between the United States and the Roman Empire. In fact, the Anglo-American dual world power could be said to be the Roman Empire's offspring.

With the demise in the U.S. of the family, morality and ethics, we can expect a gradual downfall with occasional rises, as the Roman Empire also saw.

If the planet is not destroyed by nuclear bombs or pollution before that happens, anyway.

But maybe the future survivors will be able to Google a 3D version of the U.S. with a before and after version as a history lesson.

Or perhaps we can learn from history's great mistakes...

Eric; Reply to this comment