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Britannia: More Vindolanda tablets?
#1
I was browsing the contents of the new Britannia journal from the Roman Society and found this enticing abstract:

Quote:A.K. Bowman, J.D. Thomas and R.S.O. Tomlin: The Vindolanda Writing-Tablets (Tabulae Vindolandenses IV, Part 1)

This article contains full editions with commentaries of the first instalment of the approximately 37 ink writing-tablets from Vindolanda discovered in the excavation seasons of 2001, 2002 and 2003. The editions are numbered continuously from 854, following the sequence in A.K. Bowman and J.D. Thomas, The Vindolanda Writing-tablets (Tabulae Vindolandenses III) (2003), and are grouped in the following categories: Literary Texts, Military Documents, Accounts, Letters. The second instalment, to be published in 2011, will contain the remaining Letters and Descripta.

As far as I can figure out these "new" tablets aren't in the online database.
David J. Cord
www.davidcord.com
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#2
Quote:As far as I can figure out these "new" tablets aren't in the online database.
Correct. The web site only has tablets from Volumes I and II. There is a Volume III (which I have not seen). The Britannia article is apparently Part 1 of Volume IV.
posted by Duncan B Campbell
https://ninth-legion.blogspot.com/
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#3
....and from the website- have a look at the AGM ......

http://www.romansociety.org/events/lond ... s-agm.html

London meetings & AGMLondon Meetings 2010-2011All London lectures and the AGM will be held in the Institute of Classical Studies, Room G22/26, South Block, Senate House, Malet Street, London WC1E 7HU.



Tuesday 18th January, 2011 at 5.30pm
Professor Michael Crawford: Language, Geography and the Roman conquest of Italy

Tuesday 15th March, 2011 at 5.30pm
Dr Susan Walker: Rome in Oxford: new galleries at the Ashmolean Museum

Annual General Meeting 2011
Saturday 4th June, 2011Any resolution for the AGM must be notified in writing to the Secretary at least four weeks before 4th June 2011

2.00 AGM

Frontier News: old friends and new discoveries from Vindolanda
The programme for the AGM celebrates the achievements of Alan Bowman (so far!) on the occasion of his retirement from the Camden Professorship of Ancient History.

2.30 Dr Ralph Jackson: Actuality and aspiration: curating the Vindolanda Tablets

3.00 Dr Andrew Birley: The landscape and archaeology of the Vindolanda writing tablets

3.30 Tea
4.15 Professor Alan Bowman: The Vindolanda Tablets and the Military Community

4.45 Dr David Thomas: Some observations on the palaeography of the Vindolanda Wiritng-Tablets

5.15 Dr Roger Tomlin: Not to mention the Tablets: Vindolanda's other inscriptions

6.00 Reception
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aka Paul B, moderator
http://www.romanarmy.net/auxilia.htm
Moderation in all things
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#4
At the recent What's New in Roman Scotland conference, Bowman talked about the vol. IV texts. The only one that caught my attention was a record of the vexillarius of the Tungrians buying lanceae.

R!
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#5
Quote:At the recent What's New in Roman Scotland conference ...
Scotland? Vindolanda? The Border Reivers strike again?!
Quote:... Bowman talked about the vol. IV texts. The only one that caught my attention was a record of the vexillarius of the Tungrians buying lanceae.
That one appears in the Britannia article. Tablet 861, an account headed 7 (centuria) Ianuari ("century of Ianuarius"). Leaf II, lines 25-26 read: d(ebet) Tagomas vexellarius | lanceas d(enarium) i ("Tagomas the flag-bearer owes: spears, 1 denarius"). Tagomas is already known from Tablet 181, where he was thought to belong to the equites Vardulli. (I do not see why that necessarily follows.) The editors of 861 agonise over Tagomas' inclusion in a list of infantrymen from Ianuarius' century, without reaching much of a solution.
posted by Duncan B Campbell
https://ninth-legion.blogspot.com/
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#6
Thanks. So the online database of Volumes I and II goes up to tablet 573. Volume III must have some 280 tablets if IV starts at 854. There seems to be a larger number of these than I had realised.

It's also interesting how long it takes for them to be published. Some of those just coming out now were originally excavated nine years ago. Good archeology is like good whisky, I suppose: it takes time to ferment.
David J. Cord
www.davidcord.com
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#7
Quote: Good archeology is like good whisky, I suppose: it takes time to ferment.

...but takes almost no time to drink :wink: !
Virilis / Jyrki Halme
PHILODOX
Moderator
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#8
"That one appears in the Britannia article. Tablet 861, an account headed 7 (centuria) Ianuari ("century of Ianuarius"). Leaf II, lines 25-26 read: d(ebet) Tagomas vexellarius | lanceas d(enarium) i ("Tagomas the flag-bearer owes: spears, 1 denarius"). Tagomas is already known from Tablet 181, where he was thought to belong to the equites Vardulli. (I do not see why that necessarily follows.) The editors of 861 agonise over Tagomas' inclusion in a list of infantrymen from Ianuarius' century, without reaching much of a solution."

So what does that make lanceas cost in comparison with other goods?
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aka Paul B, moderator
http://www.romanarmy.net/auxilia.htm
Moderation in all things
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#9
I was thinking about that also. For example, from Tablet 181 we have:
Quote:... for timbers purchased, denarii 7 (?)

a tunic, denarii 3 (?)

...

from Alio the veterinary doctor, denarii 10(plus)

...

So a tunic cost three times a lance? A vet charged ten times what a lance was worth?

But there are many prices listed in various tablets. It would probably take a very determined effort to sift through them and come up with some sort of coherent list of prices. And there seems to be some difficulties reading the prices in 181.
David J. Cord
www.davidcord.com
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#10
Seems very cheap- especially as it seems to say lanceas in the plural!!
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aka Paul B, moderator
http://www.romanarmy.net/auxilia.htm
Moderation in all things
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#11
Maybe he was paying on the installment plan, and had only 1 D left to pay? That sort of payout was not unheard of.
M. Demetrius Abicio
(David Wills)

Saepe veritas est dura.
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#12
Quote:Good archeology is like good whisky, I suppose: it takes time to ferment.
Please allow a Scotsman to correct your terminology: good whisky takes time to mature (the aging process, when it lies in wooden casks). The original grain mash is, indeed, fermented, but the liquor is then distilled (ideally, three times), before being aged (e.g. "20 year old") in casks. We take our whisky seriously around here. :wink:
posted by Duncan B Campbell
https://ninth-legion.blogspot.com/
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#13
Quote:Maybe he was paying on the installment plan, and had only 1 D left to pay? That sort of payout was not unheard of.
I think you're quite right, David. The abbreviation d (thought to represent debet, "he owes") suggests that it was a long-term payment plan.
posted by Duncan B Campbell
https://ninth-legion.blogspot.com/
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