The Tabula Peutingeriana is believed to be the only surviving copy of a roadmap of the Roman Empire. Even the copy is 800 years old and quite delicate; all 22 feet of it made a rare, one day public appearance from the vaults of the Manuscripts, Autographs and Closed Collections of the Austrian National Library.
The department's director compares it to a map of the London Underground.
Tasty. On display for a UN "celebration", I would have had to hold my breath and attend regardless. Flea-readers who missed the day may peruse the whole of the Tabula Peutingeriana thanks to the miracle that is the "internet".
Now is the time at the Flea when we dance.
Related: A Prophet 5 demonstration.
James Purefoy, aka Mark Antony from the late lamented Rome, is to play Robert E. Howard's most ass-kickingest of anti-heroes: Solomon Kane. The film is currently in pre-production (via Weird Tales).
Add a well thumbed copy of the Geneva Bible and we are cooking with gas.
Update: We very nearly had Ray Stevenson as a detective in “apocalyptic zombie drama”, Babylon Fields. The did not make the cut and, what with the writers' strike - I expect we have missed the zombie boat.
Now is the time at the Flea when we dance.
The best Top Gear race yet: Bicycle vs Bus vs Underground vs Boat to the London City Airport. Hard to call. The last time I went there I arrived by black cab (Part I, Part II, Part III).
I now have a new goal in life: To radio for permission to pass through the Thames Barrier at speed.
Microbiologist Siro Trevisanato believes Hittites used "cursed" rams infected with tularemia as an early biological WMD.
The Phoenicians of Simyra took a hit and were subsequently vulnerable to Hittite raiding. Fifteen years later when mysterious rams began appearing on roads in Arzawa the locals must have thought it was good fortune until the plague struck, again to Hittite advantage. Once could be an accident. Twice looks like you meant it.
This Alien V Predator: Requiem widget may not be visible to Flea-readers on slower connections or lacking shockwave flash; my apologies. I was lying awake thinking about using this critter as a segue into discussing the fragility of social arrangements which can seem eternal and the various collapsed civilizations whose example should have taught us better. Suffice to say: I worry (via Reverse Vampyr.
Now is the time at the Flea when we dance.
And here is Battle of the Mounds. This just never gets old. If I was to, say, interview an American presidential candidate I would ask him/her to watch this and correctly identify its relevance to United States foreign policy.
Thanks to an intervention in yesterday's Battlestar Galactica post, I noticed Starbuck's awesome interlocking rings tattoo. One half appears on her arm while its mate appears on the arm of her character's husband, whiny Pyramid jock guy.
It turns out Katee Sackhoff has some tattoos as well.
I am going to assume most UK Flea-readers have not seen the Battlestar Galactica Season 3.5 episode Razor (which falls at around Season 2.5 and earlier in the continuity). I will not say anything spoilerish but every link here does; here is a trailer for anyone wanting just a taste... Flea-readers unafraid of spoilers can have a look at this Ace of Spades HQ comment thread or Ron Moore's responses to fannish questions.
I am still technically boycotting the show though I appear to be actually watching it.
Now is the time at the Flea when we dance.
Sweeney Todd: The Movie. This via Goth Magazine, adding:
All this and Helena Bonham Carter... delish.
Now is the time at the Flea when we dance (via La Petite Claudine).
SoftFocus interviews Henry Rollins for VBS.tv. While Rollins has a mild case of BDS - if it was any other man I would say it is feigned - he has done multiple engagements for the USO. He not only has the right as an American to disagree, he has earned it through his actions.
Datamancer's latest creation: The Steampunk Laptop. It takes a clock-winding key to start... (via Brass Goggles).
Flea-readers desperate for a Datamancer original might consider this Steampunk Keyboard; a snip at $1000! Not by Datamancer but steampunk and inexplicably enticing is this necklace, these earrings and especially this necklace.
Now is the time at the Flea when we dance.
I could use some help settling something. Creole Scream: One olive or two?
Updated: Dorkafork provides the definitive answer:
Philosophically, I'd say that more than one olive makes it a salad.
Is there anything positive in life Skinny Puppy feels disposed to write about? Warning: Features terrifying '80s Much Music vjs. Also, City Limits in 1985. The second interview gave me Zinc - a once upon a time goth club in Hull, Québec whose name I have been trying to remember for weeks now - and Foufounes Électrique, a club in Montréal I have not been to in years.
Ultraquiet No More links a BBC piece sure to inspire confidence in the Royal Navy.
This via The Belmont Club where Wretchard adds the following.
Or, as one comment points out, a Bic pen. Which does rather put the kibosh on any number of Bond film finales...
Now is the time at the Flea when we dance.
Bill Wyman discusses the art of selling out in an article to the Washington Post.
Which is all very interesting, of course, but I am looking for more of a how to.
It appears the birthplace of Rome's founders, Romulus and Remus, has been unearthed. Discovered during excavations of Augustus' palace on the Palatine, the Lupercal has now been penetrated with a probe - archaeologists are concerned for its structural integrity - which provided images of the Wolf Cave.
No word re goings on in the cave once they were done with the purification ritual. Yahoo! News has a slideshow while the BBC (from whence the quote) offers a cross-section diagram of the Palatine featuring the cave.
Now is the time at the Flea when we dance.
Ace supports Rudy Giuliani in light of Giuliani's support for a virtual fence along the Mexican border.
Formerly, the Sun was the largest object in the Solar System. Now, comet 17P/Holmes has pride of place. Its remarkable outburst changing the shape of Perseus.
Which is all very interesting. But what does it mean? The problem with astrology these days is that - as with so much else - the discipline has been PC-fied into whining kintergarden pablum for the edification of the slow. I can just imagine one ersatz astronomer of my acquaintance "In council" with "Elders" determining this new star* in Perseus signifies the necessity for new growth and change but holds within its message a warning against rampant, unprovoked warmongering and the threat of global warmenism due to humanity's hubris and an addiction to sweet crude oil (mmm... so sweet).
This being complete toss, obviously. Far more likely is a sign from Perseus that Alyson Hannigan is seconds away from my door. I will hear her knocking and, opening, find her there with a bottle of Maker's Mark in her hand and the words "Face it, Tiger... you just hit the jackpot!" on her lips. Even now, I hear footfalls on the stairs. I rise and make for the door... Ia! Ia! Nyarlathotop ngai! Ia! Ia! The stars are aligned!
* Thinking like the ancients for a moment.
Now is the time at the Flea when we dance.
Prime Minister Ayaan Hirsi Ali: Now there is an excellent idea. Perhaps she still will be. This generation is still seeking its Churchill*; wouldn't that be something.
'They are mighty Arthur's warriors!'
Said the grey-man; 'Till the day
When the bell shall ring to wake them,
They must sleep. Then wake for aye!
* Thanks to one of several Red Ensign bloggers last week for the expression. Auchentoshan concentrates the mind.
Now is the time at the Flea when we dance.
A Royal Navy officer reportedly averted a friendly fire incident involving a Predator or Reaper UAV.
One comment suggests use of gait recognition software to help avert future incidents and anthropologists to teach our forces "local gaiting" to prevent hostile forces from recognizing them the same way this Royal Navy officer did. If only they had someone on hand who, for example, had taught nonverbal communication for a few years... Walk without rhythm and you won't attract the worm.
Speculation that Lily Allen was to become the new... face of Agent Provocateur may have proved to be unfounded. That is not to say they were unjustified. She is looking fine.
There aren't any Flea-readers who have missed the Kylie Agent Provocateur ad by any chance?
Now is the time at the Flea when we dance. This via Mr. Atrocities: "Die, Lily Allen!"
Rantburg regular, Anonymoose offers a useful introduction to some of the formal nomenclature surrounding Avian flu in the first comment to a post on an outbreak in the UK. Also: Fun facts. For instance, I had no idea fish could be carriers of the virus. And this tidbit struck me as interesting.
Reassuring if you happen to be a lucky plague victim descendant.
Blackballed by Airbus for his unflattering remarks about their new product, Patrick Smith makes an intriguing claim which leads me to ask: The Boeing 727, goth or not goth?*
A fair point.
* Now to be serious: Gothic or not gothic? While the allusion is fascinating I cannot see anything gothic in the 727. It is beautiful, yes, but without ornament and conveys no sense of awe or the numinous. Nor, I think, is it meant to. I suppose the silhouette might work as negative space for a vault if the vehicle was sat on its tail...
David Wong's Grandpa always said, there were no naked human pyramids in Starcraft. A reminder in case there is anyone who thinks defeating the enemy in detail means having better stats.
The Daily Mail proves it is good for something with a photo-pictorial piece documenting, amongst other things, Kylie Minogue's recovery from breast cancer and her course of treatment. She is looking fit. Ahem (hat tip to Agent Bedhead).
Fun fact: Kylie also makes music!
On a completely unrelated note is Sarah Michelle Gellar topless in Maxim. I cannot think of anything I plan to write about over the next few days where this link will fit. But I somehow feel obligated to let Flea-readers know. So there you go.
Now is the time at the Flea when we dance.*
* This indirectly via a link at Ace of Spades HQ: A nsfw job interview.
An awesome aspect of the internet and, by extension, our new way of life is how one day I can be missing London as I do a Google Earth flyby and abstractly wonder what was going on in Trafalgar Square and a couple days later I can visit Londonist where somebody else had been wondering the same thing.
Michael Ledeen thinks through the Kremlin's deception of Persia, concluding with a satisfying - if perhaps apocryphal - homily. Pity the Third Section, whatever it is calling itself these days.
Crazy like a fox.
With the 2014 commissioning of the HMS Queen Elizabeth and the Prince of Wales in 2016, the Royal Navy is relearning big deck carrier operations.
The Flea is a big fan of carriers - the bigger, the better - but an even bigger fan of submarines. HMCS Cornerbrook, for example. That is HMS Illustrious* in her cross-hairs above. A Defense Review article arguing the vulnerability of supercarriers and, by extension, of the might of the United States Navy is worth revisiting. The comments section to this Rantburg aircraft carrier post are also worth a look; from whence the source of my tag-line and for an excellent question: "Does somebody have the link to the invulnerable weapons systems list?"
* NATO’s High Readiness Maritime Strike Carrier, now operating with a United States Marine Corps Harrier wing. The Royal Navy and the Royal Air Force cannot scrape together enough aircraft between them to do the job. Have we learned nothing from Battlestar Galactica?
Update: Damn the BBC.
The BBC: Your license fee supporting twenty-first century pirates. Real pirates not Johnny Depp pirates.
Now is the time at the Flea when we dance.
Peggy Noonan argues Hillary Clinton is no Margaret Thatcher. Thatcher, she argues, never stood as a woman but was a woman at the head of a movement.
Defense Tech reprinted an article from the Wiltshire Gazette and Herald.* At issue: The helmet in development for the F-35. No word whether it will also reveal details of a lady's undergarments.
* A note defense industry publication, I am certain.
Now is the time at the Flea when we dance.
There was a time when RE/Search #12: Modern Primitives was the dernier cri in counter-culture self-expression. Now there is Philips Design Probe, Electronics Tattoo.
An odd refractory effect of postmodern authenticity - for I think this is not the contradiction in terms many critics would suggest - is to the effect that a multinational corporation can appropriate a counter-culture practice but, thanks to Neuromancer and Blade Runner, such corporate appropriation of said practices only serves to reinforce the aesthetic it would commodify. The advertising does not subvert or attenuate the scene, only serve as a backdrop or wallpaper for it.
All I can say is I am glad I read Pattern Recognition before reading this William Gibson interview for Rolling Stone. Full on BDS and global warmenism suggests the man is a bit of a dim bulb. Disappointing when a white goods manufacturer is doing a better job living in the future than the father of cyberpunk.
Even in defeat, perhaps especially in defeat, it was beyond Napoleon's capacity to ascribe any motives but his own to his greatest adversary.* Free peoples have shown time and again they can defeat the Enemy. Time and again we have demonstrated we want nothing more than to return to our families and the warmth of the home fires. Napoleon's ilk are missing something; some part of their humanity which would allow them to understand how great a sacrifice it is to be away from home. In the end, the men we face are little men; from the Dark Lord down to his Death Eater apologists amongst us.** Something else to remember.
* Thanks to C.S. Lewis' A Preface to Paradise Lost for the observation.
** And their "pacifist" fellow travelers.
Worth reading: A conversation in Bagram, Afghanistan; End of the War Hero; How the War was Won (Part one).
An aside for someone in particular: Looking for my music? Check out my MySpace...
I did mention Abney Park* played the Opera House last week? Images from the event are starting to appear on Flickr; here** and here, for example. Also featured was some local steamfashion (hat tip to Ragged Robin). I will not comment too closely on the above image. While I have been assured I am currently in violation of no temporal restraining orders it is best not to push one's luck in these matters lest a vortex open and the nice gentlemen arrive with the Odic generators and the butterfly nets and the taking away for assisting with inquiries. There are only so many times a soul can escape Bedlam without making a nuisance of oneself.
* I do not believe I have ever mentioned Abney Park Cemetery at the Flea. It is about two minutes further along the Number 73 bus route from my Islington home; close and consequently was a frequent dog walking destination. There are some Quaker connections besides. The last I saw the place it was in some disrepair... the first time I saw the place I managed to put a foot wrong and straight into some poor soul's not quite final resting place. Not an experience to be repeated. But I digress.
** Joe Szilvagyi is clearly a genius. These images are stunning.
Now is the time at the Flea when we dance.
The Experiences of a Very Unimportant Officer, The Great War diary of Captain Alexander Stewart of 3rd Scottish Rifles, was written in 1917 shortly after an injury and returning home. Only three copies existed until his grandson Jaime Stewart came across them and decided they deserved a wider public. I will never be one tenth as Flea-ish as Captain Stewart was on the front line.
Telegraph readers share their parents and grandparents stories of the War in comments to a related article.
BldgBlog finds a parallel between the Antares neutrino telescope and the writings of H.P. Lovecraft, viz:
Ia! Ia! Cthulhu ftagn!!
To think Elena Gibson was disqualified for stripping. Perish the thought. Now is the time at the Flea when we dance. A little risquée for work unless you are employed in a pole-dancing related industry.
A search for memorable hacks of MIT's Great Dome lead to the following supplement to my vocabulary: smoots.
Oliver Reed Smoot, Jr., it transpires, was in the fullness of time to become Chairman of the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) from 2001 to 2002 and President of the International Organization for Standardization ( ISO) from 2003 to 2004. The wheels of karma grind slowly but they grind exceedingly fine.
The University of Delaware doubles down on its Maoist indoctrination program. Student RAs have been forbidden to speak to the media about the curriculum of their program but have been mandated to speak against the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) (via Instapundit).
I have no idea what this last fellow's personal views might be; it is entirely possible I would disagree with him on every point. But his decision to stand up for himself is a decision to be free. It is a decision which in today's academy imposes a stiff price. The University of Delaware almost certainly has no idea its actions are tyrannical and their methods totalitarian; the program appears to be in violation of the 1871 Civil Rights Act - the Ku Klux Klan Act - forbidding a state from denying civil rights to its citizens. I hope the University's officials are held personally liable for this little bubble of evil. Let their lives be an object lesson for the rest of their kind. Unfortunately, it is difficult to see what legal recourse Canadian undergraduate students would have if faced with the same brainwashing program. They would have to face down the entire Canadian establishment were they to complain.
BBC3's Discovering Music considers The Tallis Fantasia. Stunning. Vaughan Williams' Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis was first performed at the Three Choirs Festival in Gloucester Cathedral on September 6, 1910.*
It must have been both Potterish and extraordinary; the acoustics of Gloucester Cathedral are just otherworldly...
This is a sound file split into six parts and uploaded to YouTube. There is no video component so possibly listenable even to dial-up using Flea-readers. Alternately, the whole piece may be downloaded as a RealMedia file from the Discovering Music archive.
* The photo pictures a carving in Gloucester Cathedral made around 1280. The photo itself was borrowed from The English Square Fydell page, one of a number of wonderful, unprofitable instruments... "Some all-but-forgotten bowed instruments from centuries ago produce sounds so ghastly and aggressive that it's easy to understand why they may not generate much revenue for their makers."
Panorama presents that rarest beast to be found on British public television: A sympathetic portrayal of the British mission in Afghanistan, the British Army and - most important - of British soldiers. "Taking on the Taleban -The Soldiers' Story" will be available as streaming media for the next few days (via the Drink Soaked Trots).
For so it is written: Watch the whole thing. If you cannot spare the time, watch a few minutes from about 36 to 41 minutes in. The people want the Afghan and the British armies to stay. Remember this the next time some self-styled progressive wants to hand everything back to Dark Ages lunatics. I will try to remember it the next time some intemperate thought crosses my mind.
Related: An invisible tank the British Army may never get to use and the Taranis unmanned fighter-bomber; an innovation we may live to regret (with video!).
Theodore Dalrymple considers a rash of neo-atheist publications. Much to consider as ever. I am particularly taken with his critique of a bone-brained skepticism.
Though their purpose is a good deal more sinister than mere philosophical fol-de-rol, there could be no more succinct condemnation of those who claim to be "just asking questions".
Here is what I would like to see: Another of Christopher Hitchens' challenge debates with this time with Dalrymple, a non-believer himself. That would be a proper argument.* The above image is Quince, Cabbage, Melon and Cucumber (1602) by Juan Sánchez Cotán. Dalrymple puts it in context, as he does some fine thoughts of Joseph Hall, late lord bishop of Exeter and of Norwich.
* As opposed to the usual death-match with half-wits. For example, Dinesh D’Souza & Christopher Hitchens debated “Is Christianity the Problem?” Hitchens has a high opinion of him, one I do not believe is merited given the secondary school debating club rhetoric D'Souza brings to the fight. I will put up with a law of physics being confused with a moral law when I am watching Event Horizon, not in matters of public policy.
Now is the time at the Flea when we dance.
Flea-readers who have not read Stephen King's classic novella The Mist or heard its astonishing ZBS Foundation radio adaption - in kunstkopf binaural sound! - and have any plans whatsoever to do so are best advised not to watch this trailer for the forthcoming film. I understand the artards need to be reassured they will enjoy a movie before they shell out to see it but why must the rest of us be made to suffer for it? These are the same cretins who read the last page of a romance novel; they need to know everything turns out for the best for for committing to the story.
Shoot them. Shoot the people who enable them.
With my apologies to anyone with work to get done:
... Bigfoot
... Ghosts
... The Elephant Man
... Marilyn Monroe
... UFOs
These people are completely missing the point. The point is about girl power and how you should be proud of yourself no matter what you look like. Take Victoria Beckham, for example. You can assume a positive attitude about your appearance despite having had a somewhat pneumatic breast enhancement. Not everyone's cup of tea, admittedly, nor indeed everyone's champagne glass or - as circumstances have it - whisky quaich. But each to his own. Each to his own. For does not the Good Book counsel us that what is one man's bread is another man's poison? Exactly.
Laura Pyper is looking well fit. Now is the time at the Flea when we dance.
The Age claims the big trend in footwear this season is fetishism.
There is an article attached as well. It is probably very interesting.
Unrelated good news: Joss Whedon is reported to have a new television series on the way. Better yet, it is set to star Eliza Dushku (hat tip to the Sister of the Flea). Here is a Fox blurb; an interview follows.
Now is the time at the Flea when we dance.
A bit overwhelmed by Abney Park 's appearance at last night's A Clockwork Fantasy. Suffice to say, watching a lovely ex dance on stage with Magdalene Veen is a moment to treasure.
Flea-readers not in attendance can get a little steampunk fix with StormWinds, a fanciful time waster for the Friday cubicle bound (via Brass Goggles).
Now is the time at the Flea when we dance.