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Curiosities of ancient Rome (Unknown facts)

The world of ancient Romans abounded in a number of amazing curiosities and information. The source of knowledge about the life of the Romans are mainly works left to us by ancient writers or discoveries. The Romans left behind a lot of strange information and facts that are sometimes hard to believe.

Few words about Forma Urbis

There is no doubt that Rome is a big city. It was already big in antiquity and just like today’s cities are divided into districts, so Rome was divided into the so-called. regions. During the times of Octavian Augustus, the Eternal City had 14 of them. Each of them had a separate administration to facilitate the management of the entire city. This was not easy, because under Emperor Constantine I the Great, Rome had 322 important intersections and 423 streets.

Reconstruction of a fragment of the Forma Urbis with the Pompey Theater audience

Lugii – ancestors of Poles?

Lugii/Longiones were a people of not entirely clear origin, just before BCE and in the first centuries CE they inhabited the upper basin of the Oder and Vistula rivers, i.e. the area of ​​today’s southern and central Poland.

Lugii

Epic work of Nero

According to historian Cassius Dio, Nero decided to write a huge, epic work about Roman history. Only one question occupied his mind – how long should this work be?

Nero

Herd of elephants surrounded by people

Pliny the Elder mentions in his encyclopedic work Natural History that a herd of elephants surrounded by hunters position themselves in such a way that the individuals with the smallest fangs were at the front. In this way, they supposedly want to convince people that it is not worth trying ivory.

Herd of elephants

Lions and boars on battlefield?

Lucretius – Roman poet and philosopher from the 1st century BCE – in his work De rerum natura (“On the Nature of Things”) made various philosophical and scientific considerations. He believed that early humanity used all sorts of wild animals on the battlefields, including lions and wild boars.

Mosaic showing a lion

Consuls and their funny nicknames

Marcus Aemilius Lepidus, a consul for 137 BCE, was so obese that any movement and effort over time became a great problem for him. Due to his physical condition and clumsiness on the battlefield, he was given the nickname Porcina (“Pig”).

Pig in Roman uniform

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