Idea Factory

[Aldus Marius]

Salvete, Romani...

Sometimes I'm having so much fun in the various Collegia that I neglect to put in an occasional appearance before the Societas as a whole. My Roman Humor thread's in the Collegium Artium for this reason, when it would probably have fit better in the General classification. Bene, this time I'm gonna get it right.

This thread is for people to share ideas for Roman projects. A project can be anything from re-creating a type of jewelry to coding a computer program that will automatically generate Roman names. Brainstorming for logos, inventions, even plans for a Roman-history park can be presented here.

But this is not just for sharing the original ideas. The feedback those ideas generate is probably the most important part. If Lucius is working on a Fill-in-the-Blank, and Quintus has prior experience or knowledge about Fill-in-the-Blanks, he can help Lucius with his project by giving tips and pointers or background info. We can ask questions here and hope some Expert Knowledge raises its head. This should lead to more fulfilling off-line time as our brainkids become reality.

So go ahead and submit an idea or two. What's in your head trying to get out? What cool Roman thingie are you convinced the world shouldn't have to do without? I'll have a few up here in the next several days, but don't let that stop you...it's only to show the variety of notions Mother Roma can inspire on a good day.

Looking forward to budding acts of genius...

[Gnaeus Dionysius Draco]

Salve mi Mari,

A great idea to "braintstorm" a little!

Well, here's a couple of suggestions:

GENERAL IDEAS

* a Roman (and perhaps Greek) quote database for collegium philosophicum? easy to create, easy to find... but it does require some cooperation!!
* an overview of the inner workings of the Roman military... we still don't have this basic information!
* more about Greek language... where are our hellenists?
* cont'd Latin lessons
* essays that can show even the most obtuse illiteratus the importance of Roman civilisation for the Western world, and why it is still relevant today
* how about some more biographies of celebrities from Antiquity?

PERSONAL PROJECTS

* I hope to work on an essay exploring the similiraties and dissimilarities between the USA and Rome/Greece
* My verb conjugation table for ColLat.. it's actually finished but I have difficulties uploading it
* I plan to rewrite my "Roman" sf story I wrote two years back, but this is going to take time, time which I won't have for the coming months... so this is gonna be a looooong term project

----

Vale bene!
Draco

[Quintus Aurelius Orcus]

Salve Mari
It is a great idea of yours to put together our ideas: i will add some of mine now and maybe in the coming days i will add some more.
Anyway:

- to create a database for Roman and Hellenic battles and conquests until the Imperial period (both on land as naval battles) Seperated ofcourse with a summary and possible indepth essay on each of them. (possible a long term project)

- Naval and land battles/ conquests during the Imperial period.

- Hoping to start the Collegium Graecum project: daily life of a Greek.

personal projects i have planned on doing

- planning to create a painting showing us a city sight of any Roman or Hellenic city

- planned to draw and paint some mythological figure like Gods, heroes, etc...

- planning to write a indepth essay on the Battle of Thermopylae since i was always fascinated about this and that there will be a movie coming out based on the book Gates of Fire by Steven Pressfield (highly recomended btw)

- planning on rewriting my Spartan essay using the book "The Spartans, legend and reality" by Carl W. Weber

- And hopefully if i ever get this far: rewriting my essay on Carthage.

I hope to complete most of them before september the 1st because after that, i will have little time to do any projects with the exception of artprojects since i'm planning on making a painting showing a Roman or Hellenic temple with a city on the background.
Well some will be long term projects, others not.
bye
Vale

[Q. C. Locatus Barbatus]

Salvete!

My dream is to put together a thread in the Col VQ about 'the daily life of Marcus, a Roman'; but I haven't started it yet because: a) it requires a lot of work; and b)I don't have to knowledge to put it together.

With this project I would like to describe a day or week about an 'ordinary' Roman, how he's going to work, which work, when he's going shopping, what he buys etc.

Valete,


Loc

[Tiberius Dionysius Draco]

Avete Romani,

I have had this idea a few weeks ago and I've already completed it. It's the official SVR letterhead! If you want to know how it looks like, you'll need Outlook Express. Just pm me if you would like to receive it.

Valete bene,

Tiberius Dionysius Draco

[Aldus Marius]

From Thomas W. Africa's The Immense Majesty: A History of Rome and the Roman Empire (one of my favorite general histories):

"Across the centuries some Romans still cry to be remembered:

"'Young man, though you are in a hurry, this little stone asks you to look at it, and then to read the message with which it is inscribed. Here lie the bones of Lucius Maecius Philotemus the hardwareman. I wanted you to know this. Farewell.'

"More poignant was the epitaph raised by the father of a dead child:

"'Here an unhappy parent has laid to rest his one and only daughter, Nymphe, whom he cherished in the joy of sweet love while the shortened hours of the Fates allowed it...'

"The role of Philotemus was a humble one, and Nymphe died before her life had really begun, but once they lived, the hardwareman who was proud of his honest profession and the girl who was the darling of her father--they, too, were Romans."

The last sentence could well be the bywords of the Collegium Vitae Quotidianae. They are also the inspiration for one of my first ideas for a Roman project: What if each of us wore, engraved in a copper or bronze bracelet around our wrists, the name of a particular Roman--perhaps famous, more likely not; perhaps known to us only through a single inscription lucky enough to have survived the centuries? (I dibs Philotemus.)

Similar bracelets have been made to honor the memories of American POWs, victims of Sept. 11, and those who died in the Oklahoma City bombing. They tend to be of aluminum or other inexpensive metal, sometimes colored. I've never owned such a bracelet, but I don't suppose they have much more than the deceased's name and the date on the front side. Underneath, or perhaps included on a separate tag with a 'deluxe' kit, might be an explanation of who this person was (child-care technician, grounds maintenance worker), the company s/he worked for, what floor s/he was on or, in the case of a Roman one, an actual copy or translation of the inscription mentioning the person if it isn't too long.

This idea has been rattling around in my skull for over a decade. What has kept it there is my utter lack of metalworking skill or facilities. Is this idea worth pursuing? If so, have we anyone who could help me make these into concrete objects?

In fide,

[Q. C. Locatus Barbatus]

Salve Mari,

Someone who could be pretty good at this stuff is Allegra. She already has made some jewelry. But we haven't heard from her for a long time.

Allegra? Ubi es?

Vale,

Loc

[Quintus Aurelius Orcus]

Salvete

On this forum we have 85 members and only a handful are talking. Isn't it time for the anciens to step back and let the newest recruits talk?
Only a few have introduced themselves and personally i would like to see more of this being done. We need something to inspire some activity among the not so active members. I'm not asking here to participate in everything we do, just that let us know that they are out there. The question is: how do we let them know that we want to hear from them?
Or how do you let them talk?
Valete optime

[Gnaeus Dionysius Draco]

Salve Sokare,

Actually this is more a topic for the Comitia since it deals with the organisation itself, but nevertheless I'll try to answer your questions here.

I think the "ancients" here are not needlessly trying to dominate SVR. If the newer (forum) members don't speak, that is their choice. I've been online here a couple of times at the same time of members who appearently read the postings but never or rarely post themselves. Some people just don't feel that urge .

Secondly, in the past we have had new blood in our administration, collegia and senate. Last year Xantippe was consul, Iulianus was rector of collegium Latinum and Laureatus founded collegium vitae quotidianae. Claudianus became rector of collegium religionis. This year Mencius and Ursus have taken their first steps into the administration as rogatores and Tergestus became praetor. The mentioned six did not belong to the first members!

However, what *is* true is that after a while some seem to lapse into inactivity. We do try to contact these members as to why they become inactive. Sometimes it's a sheer lack of time, as in the case of Claudianus, sometimes other reasons and sometimes they never respond at all. That's their choice and we can't help that. You can't force people, can you.

In closing, I would like to point out that although we have 85 forum members, we only have about 55 SVR members. 44 people on this forum bothered to make at least one posting and about and about 15 can be considered as truly active. This isn't bad for a small organisation. There are much bigger orgs and lists out there with over 300 or even over a 1000 members with only about 30 active members... this is more than ours but relatively speaking is much, much worse.

Of course, by this I'm not trying to say that our newer members *shouldn't* speak up, introduce themselves or make a posting... In fact, they are very very welcome to do so!

So, novi homines et feminae out there, introduce yourselves! Don't be shy We won't eat you. The worst we can do is correct your Latin, he he.

Vale bene,
Draco

[Gnaeus Dionysius Draco]

The mentioned six did not belong to the first members!

Uh, seven. I can't count.

Draco

[Q. C. Locatus Barbatus]

Don't be shy We won't eat you. The worst we can do is correct your Latin, he he.

I would like to dissociate myself from this quote. And correct it:

The worst thing HE can do is correct your Latin, he he.

(the he he seems to be correct!). I think this is a little closer to the truth.

Vale,

Loc

[Quintus Aurelius Orcus]

Salve Draco

I don't want to force anyone into something they don't want to do, but we could start a thread by welcoming any new members (by members i mean the members of our forum as of our organisation). It can be start to increase some activity. We can ask them to introduce themselves on the forum when they either join our forum or SVR or both. It wouldn't hurt asking it?
Vale

[Aldus Marius]

Salvete Romani...

As author/Instigator of the Idea Factory, may I ask that any further discussion of organizational matters be moved to the Comitia or other appropriate venue? It's a good topic, but not the one this thread was designed for, and I want to keep the lines clear for any other actual Roman project proposals (and brainstorming for same). A sure turnoff for newbies is when a thread appears to be about one thing but turns out to be mainly about something else--perhaps only tangentially related to the original topic, if at all.

As for starting a 'New Members Check In Here' thread...well, Orce, what's stopping you from doing it? It's easy; here, I'll show you...

** Marius teleports back to the General board to kick things off **

[Gnaeus Dionysius Draco]

Salve Mari,

Yes, I was actually going to propose to take this discussion to the Comitia where it belongs. The moderator is ever vigilant!

Draco

[Tiberius Dionysius Draco]

Salvete Romani,

I recently thought about an official SVR newsletter. This wouldn't be on a daily bases, rather one every two or three months with information about the site updates, new members and Ludi results.

I still need to discuss some things, for instance how you would have to subscribe, content , lay out and ,very imporant, a name four our newsletter.

If anybody has got suggestions, ideas, anything, post them or mail them.

Valete bene

[Anonymous]

Caîre poèt´ès,

how could we have lived without it! Perhaps this is worth a thread of it's own.

[Publius Dionysius Mus]

Publius Dionysius Mus omnibus salutem

To be honest... I have a newsletter ready for july...

I was planning it as a little surprise, but since the topic is brought up...

I thought to make it freely available to all members, donwloadable from our website in pdf and/or html format. I already have filled several sections, but some of our 'great leaders' can expect a mail with some questions for an interview later this week...

If it's ok for everyone, I'll just finish it, and I will make the newsletter available early July. Then everyone can comment on it.

Concerning the name of the newsletter, I thought of a small contest to search for a good name. The contest will be explained in the newsletter (so the first issue will be without a name).

Comments welcome!

Optamo vobis bene valere

[Tiberius Dionysius Draco]

Salve Mus,

oops, sorry to spoil the surprise

But I was more thinking in the line of just information and things like that. You're already talking about interview which sounds to me more like an SVR-magazine (cool )

I thought that it would be a good idea to let people subscribe to the newsletter via the site, because I think it will be a lot easier for people this way.

Vale bene,

[Anonymous]

Salvete omnes,

Not a new idea but perhaps one that can help some of us : When talking about a particular subject can the author quote his/her sources so that the interested reader can further his learning of the said topics.
Names of books and their authors, videos, movies or whatever else (even teachers at uni) would be welcome. Remember that some of us, however hard we try, do not possess a classical education and could use some guidance as to where to start when digging books at the local library...

This could even be turned into a virtual biblioteca where documents could be commented by whoever has read them...

Any thoughts on this ?

Laureatus

[Aldus Marius]

Avete amici...!

Most of my story-ideas manifest in my head out of nowhere, and then set about vigorously kicking me on the inside of the skull until I let them out.

This one has behaved more like the World-Serpent of Norse myth: slowly churning the waves of Ocean with its movements, only rarely breaking the surface. But I've spotted enough of it now, after many years of patient observation, that I've got the beginnings of a plot...
- - - - - - - - - -

Roma the She-Wolf manifests once more on Earth. (Maybe some lucky SVR member gets to be the avatar.) She takes measure of the modern era and the Romanitas, or lack thereof, of same; She finds enough of the Heritage preserved to spark a revival, and enough lost to need one. She attempts to get things going, but alas...hardly anyone takes Her seriously as a god anymore (always excepting the SVR!), so She is all but powerless.

Roma must do something that will get more people talking and thinking about the Idea of Rome. Through Wolf-worthy snooping, She picks up rumors of at least THREE Ancient Romans who have survived into the 21st Century. If She discovers them and brings them to light, surely a Roman Cultural Revival must follow...ya think? >({|;-)

- - - - - - - - - -
Questions, commentary and fleshing-out welcome; if I didn't wanna discuss it, I wouldn't have put it here!! [g]

In amicitia,