Binchester Update: Call for Exhibits

The construction and design of the Binchester build is underway. It is being designed by archaeologists involved in the excavations, but there is also a way ROMA Citizens can get involved in the design stage.

Throughout the two sims there will be several ‘stations’ dedicated to relevant aspects of Roman culture and the history of the archaeological site. Established ROMA Content Creators (active and well-known Citizens only please) can apply to create an exhibit in one of these stations. Exhibits will range from a few signs to an entire gallery. All creators will have their name and photo displayed at the station to advertise their work.

A creator will work with Torin to design an exhibit based on the following topics: (this list will be updated as projects are assigned to individuals)

[Scroll down because for some reason this stupid blog setup is casting the table clear down the page]

Topic (with necessary sub topics)	Estimated size	Assigned to
The Roman Conquest of Britain Caesar Claudius Boudicca Agricola	Gallery
Material Culture of Roman Britain Altars Small Finds Coins Etc.	Gallery
The Celtic World of Britain Brigantes Queen Cartamandua Celtic Religion Celtic Art	Gallery
The Hadrianic Frontier Hadrian's Wall Forts Stanegate Vallum Etc.	Gallery
Roman & Celtic Death & Burial Cemeteries & Tombs Funerals	Small Exhibit
Industry in the Province Mines Pottery Agriculture Etc.	Gallery
Binchester History Troops History Excavations Etc.	Gallery	Torin
Daily Life in the Fort	Gallery
Slavery in Roman World	Small Exhibit
Roman Siege Warfare	Small Exhibit or Installation	Brodbiz
The Roman Legion	Small Exhibit	Nina and Legion
The Vicus Population Purpose Etc.	Gallery
Romanization?	Small Exhibit
The End of Roman Britain	Gallery

Size Definitions:
Gallery: 8-10 signs plus some possible extras
Small Exhibit: 2-5 signs
Installation: single item

Most Gallery spaces will be indoors.

To apply to work on an installation, contact Torin directly about the topic/s you are interested in. Then work up a proposal on a notecard with the following information:

1. Summarize each sign in your proposed installation. What kind of info will it contain? Please note that there should not be too much text. People will not stand and read a great deal of text in SL.
2. Will there be anything else besides signs in your installation? Please note that prims are limited!
3. Is there anything interactive in your installation?
4. Do a mock up of a sample sign texture and include it in the notecard.

Introducing ROMA Vinovium and ROMA Vicus!

Two new sims have been added to the ROMA estate! They represent an exciting, new partnership between ROMA and RL educational institutions and academics.

The Binchester Roman Excavations is an archaeological project that, starting this summer, will be excavating the ancient Roman fort of Binchester (ancient Vinovium) and its civilian settlement (vicus). Located in the UK, this important military garrison and town guarded the supply route (Deere Street) that ran north to Hadrian’s Wall during the Roman occupation of Britain. The fort was founded around 79 CE as part of the legions’ march north into native Brigantes territory, and was occupied for around four centuries, attracting a sizable settlement outside the fort walls. The archaeological project represents an important collaboration between Stanford University in the US and Durham University in the UK, and works with the archaeological unit of Durham County Council as well as the local community. Some of their archaeologists have an interest in virtual reconstructions of the ancient world and are already in SL. ROMA will be working with them in the near future to bring an exciting new feature to ROMA.

The two new sims, ROMA Vinovium and ROMA Vicus, have joined the estate north of the ROMA Transtiberim sim. They will house a full scale reconstruction of the Roman fort at Binchester and its adjacent civilian settlement. In addition, both sims will contain interactive installations explaining the history of the site, the Roman invasion of Britain, native culture, and many other aspects, including daily updates on the progress of the excavations during the summer season. It will therefore be possible to visit these stimulating excavations virtually from anywhere in the world. There will also be areas for social and educational events, and ROMA Citizens will be encouraged to become involved in all aspects of the virtual representation of this bit of Roman archaeological heritage. The ROMA estate and its Citizenry will be a key link in forging connections between online worlds and an ongoing archaeological project.

The sims are being sponsored and paid for by Vinovium.org, the Stanford University component of the excavations. ROMA will receive no financial support from this partnership, and continue to rely solely upon its Citizenry, land rentals, and donations to keep the rest of the estate open and flourishing.

Torin Golding will be building the Binchester reconstructions for the archaeological team, although there will be an opportunity for ROMA content creators to contribute and engage with this project as well. More details will follow soon. ROMA management and several ROMA groups will be able to partner with the archaeologists of the Binchester project. For now, the sims will be closed to the public to allow Torin to build. However, you can keep informed about the developments on this blog (http://romacitizens.blogspot.com), our official Twitter feed (www.twitter.com/romacitizens), or from the following vantage points in the ROMA Transtiberim sim: the Collegium compound, the Legion XIII fort, the ROMA Hot Springs, and the Sibyl’s cave atop Mount Parnassus.

April Festivals Schedule

Saturday 17th April :

9am - Cerealia Ritual & Harvest Maze
The Cerealia is the Roman festival honouring the Goddess Ceres - she who holds sway over the fruitfulness of the Earth entire, and without whom Flora's efforts would be in vain. In keeping with this ancient tradition, we will be having a ritual in Ceres' honour, followed by a challenging Harvest Maze. The first, second, and third to find their way through the maze from the entrance to the exit will win prizes - but you must find and greet Ceres Herself before you can exit! Can you beat the Labyrinth in time? Come find out!
Location: ROMA Transtiberim sim: http://slurl.com/secondlife/ROMA%20Transtiberim/144/82/303

11am - Fox and Bunny Hunt
Part of ancient Cerealia's celebration was to let loose wild foxes to run free through the Circus Maximus. ROMA has our own fox tradition, the Cerealia Fox Hunt! We've updated this ritual this year to include the Floralia - with foxes symbolising Ceres and Bunnies symbolising Flora. The Hunter who tags the most animals wins a $L1000 prize! (There is also a prize for the fox or rabbit tagged least!)
Location: ROMA Transtiberim sim: http://slurl.com/secondlife/ROMA%20Transtiberim/58/32/45

1pm - Floralia Ritual & Spring Costume Contest
Come celebrate the Roman version of Easter with us! The Floralia is the festival of the Goddess Flora, patron of flowers and spring fertility. In Flora's honour, we will have a ritual, followed by our Floralia Costume Contest and Party. Dress in any springtime or floral related garb you choose, and dance in the springtime flowers with us - the contest winner will recieve a $L1000 prize!
Location: ROMA Transtiberim sim: http://slurl.com/secondlife/ROMA%20Transtiberim/185/113/22

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Sunday 18th April :

9am - Veneralia Ritual & Ask Cupid
Our festivals continue with a ritual for Venus Verticordia, "The Changer of Hearts" - to petition Venus for support and aid in one's lovelife. After the rite, you'll get a chance to ask all your love questions of Venus' son, Cupid - the God of Romantic Love. Our Winged Youth is flirtatious and coy, but He will guide you down the path to True Love (or at least an amusing side-trail)!
Location: ROMA Sim: http://slurl.com/secondlife/ROMA/215/25/22

11am - Venus' Bath
Venus is holding court again in ROMA! Come sport with Her in the subterranean caves beneath our fair city! But bring your swimsuits and swim HUDs, because this is a pool party! Dancing, swimming, and lunch on the beach is the order of the day at our Grand Feast pre-party - and with Venus there, it promises to be a wild time!
Location: ROMA Sim: http://slurl.com/secondlife/ROMA/33/166/22

1pm - Fortuna Oracle
The Veneralia is also the festival to honour Fortuna Virilis (who is somehow, but unclearly, connected with Venus). In general, the wealthier classes honoured Venus and the less so honoured Fortuna Virilis, but this was by no means a hard and fast rule. Today, ROMA praises Fortuna as well with a Oracle in Her honour. Do you want to know your fortune? Want to ask the Goddess a question about your life? Fortuna knows all, And Her priest will interpret Her answer to you! Do you dare to look into the future? (All oracles are given in fun, and ROMA is not responsible for their failure to manifest - or worse, if they do manifest!)
Location: ROMA Sim: http://slurl.com/secondlife/ROMA/132/176/53

4pm - Festum Veris Grand Feast
Our Spring Festival culminate with the Festum Veris (Spring Festival) Grand Feast - come dance under the springtime stars with us! We will also have live music by MarcusAurelius Merlin - to get a sneak peek of Marcus' music, go to: http://www.threepiecesuit.com and click the "Samples" link. We promise cool tunes, wild dancing, and all around good fun - so come let your hair down in true ROMA fashion!
Location: ROMA sim: http://slurl.com/secondlife/ROMA/215/25/22

Introducing the ROMA twitter box!

We now have a ROMA twitter feed dedicated to Citizen voices from the ROMA Plaza! Anyone can come to the plaza in ROMA, touch the new ROMA twitter box and post a tweet to the feed!

If you have a twitter account, you can follow the new feed at http://twitter.com/ROMA_VOX

To find the new ROMA twitter box, go to the ROMA Plaza and look right in front of the Procurators' Office.

And don't forget to follow our official feed for all the official news about ROMA: http://twitter.com/ROMACitizens. If you tweet about ROMA, be sure to use our hash-tag, #ROMASL.

(Abusers of the system will be banned)

Introducing the ROMA Subura Community Garden Project

Attention creative ROMAns with a green thumb. Announcing the opening of the ROMA Subura Community Garden Project.

Plot 29 in the Subura (right next to the park with the swan in it) has been divided into four quarter plots, ready for planting. ROMAns can rent a quarter for just $1 a week to build their own garden-themed installation. This can be any outdoor space or scene. The goal is to build something cool, exciting, and garden themed using the prims for only a quarter plot (60 total). Are you up to the challenge?

All installations will stay up only a week, and the best garden will be voted on by ROMA Citizens. The winner each week receives a special non cash prize and a unique [RAS] Achievement Badge worth 15 ponts! Not to mention the bragging rights.

Every Sunday, the quarter plots become available to rent for just $1. Builders can then get busy creating their masterpiece. If you wish to get on the wait list for a plot, contact Zelda Walpole and she will make sure you get one as soon as the next Sunday rolls around.

Citizens will be encouraged and reminded to check out the gardens and vote via a special voting board that has been set up. There will be new, dynamic builds every week!

Any current Subura renter or ROMA Citizen older than 3 months can rent a quarter plot and build a garden. The building rules are simple:

• All 12 Tables and Subura covenant rules apply
• No offensive builds and all must respect the non-Adult content rating for the Subura.
• No actual buildings. The build should be an open air garden theme with at least some plants or trees, although some things like furniture are allowed
• No deliberate blocking of paths or other people's builds
• No temp-rezzers or laggy scripts,
• No deliberately modern builds, although other ancient cultures besides Roman isallowed. Some flexibility for anachronism is allowed, but the build should be neutral or specifically ancient in design.

Rental boxes in the Community Garden are now open! Stop by today and claim your quarter, or if all are rented, see Zelda Walpole to get yours next Sunday.

March Festival Schedule

Saturday 20th March

9am- Rekindling The Vestal Flame
Our festivals begin this month with the Rekindling of the Flame in the Temple of Vesta in ROMA. After the ritual, there will be a procession to the Hippodrome for the Equirria Chariot Races!
Location: Temple of Vesta, ROMA Sim (http://slurl.com/secondlife/ROMA/215/25/22)

10:30am- Equirria Chariot Races
In honour of Mars and Equirria, we are having chariot races in the Hippodrome! ROMA's very own Agitatores will be racing for the prize! The races will be done as 3 three lap races. There will be a prize purse for the winner of each race, as well as a trophy to display in their domus!
Location: Circus Maximus Hippodrome, ROMA sim (http://slurl.com/secondlife/ROMA/202/106/26)

2pm- Quinquatria Ritual and Legion XIII Quinquatria Event
At Fort Legio Augusta in ROMA, we will be having a ritual honouring Mars & Minerva - the two paramount Gods of the Quinquatria. Minerva is the balancing force of just & honourable battle against the passionate and wild war symbolised by Mars. Our ritual today honours Her wisdom and justice, and Mars' passion and strength. After the ritual, the Legion XIII & the Ludi Romani will present a lecture about gladiatores, followed by a demonstration last-man-standing fight!
Location 1: ROMA Fort Bridge, ROMA sim (http://slurl.com/secondlife/ROMA/93/57/29)
Location 2: Lvdi Romani Arena, ROMA Transtiberim sim (http://slurl.com/secondlife/ROMA%20Transtiberim/169/152/32)


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Sunday 21st March

10am- Matronalia Ritual
Matronalia is the Roman equivalent of our Mother's Day, and this year, to honour the mothers and potential mothers of ROMA, we will be having a ritual to Juno - followed by a Garden Party. Though Matronalia is a women's celebration, men are welcome to attend - but there is a catch! All gentlemen must either dress as women, or as serving boys, in honour of this Women's Day! How you attire yourself is up to you, and while we won't ask the serving boys to be real slaves, you might want to carry some wine at least to appease the ladies. ;)
Location: Senator Maali Beck's Garden, ROMA Subura sim (http://slurl.com/secondlife/ROMA%20Subura/46/246/24)

12pm (Noon) - Bacchanalia Nymph & Satyr Hunt
Bacchus' Maenad nymphs and wild satyrs have over-run Transtiberim! The Emperor has called out all Hunters in ROMA to catch them before their drunken revelry becomes destructive! How many nymphs and satyrs can you tag? The Hunter who tags the most wins $L1000, and the nymph/satyr with the fewest tags does too!
Location: Head of the Path, ROMA Transtiberim sim (http://slurl.com/secondlife/ROMA%20Transtiberim/58/32/45)

3pm- Bacchanalia Grand Feast (This event is clothing optional)
Come join us for the Grand Feast of the Bacchanalia! We will elect a Bacchus and Chief Maenad to preside over the feast, and a Bacchanal Trivia game, presented by Melanippe Karas (standing in for trivia-master Mickey James). So come dressed in your wild man/wild woman best (or nothing at all) and party with us!
Location: Field of Mars, ROMA Transtiberim sim (http://slurl.com/secondlife/ROMA%20Transtiberim/160/101/22)

New ROMA Article

Online newspaper http://www.sl-newspaper.com has published an article on our Lupercalia festival. It quotes Torin and Melanippe. You can read the whole thing here: http://15timez.blogspot.com/2010/03/lupercalia-festival-at-roma.html

New Agitatores Video

By Alekso Minotaur

Introducing the ROMA Annales

As most of you know, the ROMA Scribae group has been busy over the last year documenting the history of ROMA and publishing the bi-weekly ACTA ROMA newsletter. Not many people know about the Scribae wiki which represents not only a growing repository of historical data about ROMA, but also a unique document regarding a venerable (in virtual terms) online community. You can access all of the pages on the Scribae wiki here: http://lingweenie.org/roma-scribae/index.php/Main_Page. The group and the wiki are managed by Citizen William Gide, and Citizen Spaciva Ivanova edits the ACTA. They are always looking for historians and reporters, so feel free to contact them in world about joining the group.

I would like to use this blog post to draw attention to a very important and very interesting feature of the Scribae wiki, the ROMA Annales. We have been focusing our attention on this aspect of the wiki for the last few months. The Annales are a listing of significant events in the life of ROMA and her community organized by year, month, and date. Often this also includes additional content such as the text from notices, links to photo albums, and notecard records. As well as this catalog, every festival day for the last four years has its own page where schedules, text, and photos are collected together to document what is probably one of the oldest, continual social celebrations in Second Life.

• Do you remember when ROMA opened to the public as its own estate? (15 October 2006)
  
• Do you remember when ROMA got chariots? (6 April 2008)
  
• Do you remember when Angelia first became estate manager? (18 January 2007)
  
• Do you remember when Achille updated the free togas in the Customs House? (10 March 2009)

The Annales contains a tremendous amount of information that should rekindle the memories of old timers and show newbies the long history and development of ROMA. You can start exploring the database here: http://lingweenie.org/roma-scribae/index.php/Annales

HOW YOU CAN HELP: Do you see something missing from the Annales, such as the date your Citizen-Run Group was founded? Just IM Torin Golding the information in world and he'll add it to the Annales. If you have a Flickr account, annotate festival images with your memories from the past events. If you are interested in helping to gather more data about the history of ROMA, including interviews with longtime Citizens and research into the vaults of the estate, contact William Gide or Spaciva Ivanova in world to be given an assignment.

Valete!

Lupercalia Festival Schedule

Saturday February 20th:

10am - Lupercalia Ritual and The Running of the Luperci
In celebration of this most ancient of festivals we will be performing a Roman ritual for Faunus Lupercus, the God of Wild Things and Lupa, the shewolf who nourished the founding fathers Romulus and Remus. After the rite, we will have the Running of The Luperci - half-naked youths who bless the young ladies of the city. The women will run ahead of the Luperci, who will lightly flog them with the goatskin floggers in hopes of fertility (both of mind and body). Following the ritual, we will have our traditional Lupercalia Feast - and clothing is optional!
Location: Lupercal Cave, ROMA Transtiberim sim (http://slurl.com/secondlife/ROMA%20Transtiberim/68/202/55)

12pm - Lupercalia Wolf Hunt
Time for another Hunt - ROMA's own version of hide and seek+tag with prizes! For Lupercalia, we will have cunning wolves for you to chase - how many can you tag in 1 hour? The Hunt begins in Transtiberim and will cover all sims except Maritima & Insula. A $L1000 Prize will be awarded to the one who has tagged the most wolves.
Location: Transtiberim Path, ROMA Transtiberim sim (http://slurl.com/secondlife/ROMA%20Transtiberim/58/32/45)

2pm - Love Poetry & Prose hosted by Venus
Our lovely Goddess, Venus, will host for us a literary gathering where we will tell short stories and poetry with a romantic theme. Bring your favourite poetry and prose to share with your fellow ROMA Citizens, or just come and enjoy the storytelling and poetry reading in the romantic atmosphere!
Location: Field of Mars, ROMA Transtiberim sim (http://slurl.com/secondlife/ROMA%20Transtiberim/160/101/21)

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Sunday February 21st:

9:30am - Equirria Legion Blessing Ritual & Venus Honour Guard
The Legio, in a time honored military display, will present arms and come to be blessed for the new year. This presentation will be attended by the lovely Goddess Venus, who will offer Her own blessing as well. After the blessing, She will be escorted by a Legion Honour Guard to the baths where citizens may consult Her. Don't miss your chance to see our beautiful Goddess and our proud Legion!
Location: Fort, ROMA sim (http://slurl.com/secondlife/ROMA/75/57/26)

10am-ish - Ask Venus
Our lovely Goddess Venus will hold court in the Baths of Caracalla for those who seek council about matters of love and romance! Please join us with your questions, or just to hang out and hear what others wish to know. No question is too personal or trivial - Venus will answer them all!
Location: The Baths of Caracalla, ROMA sim (http://slurl.com/secondlife/ROMA/154/48/27)

1pm - Cupid Archery Tournament hosted by Legion XIII
As Venus is the Goddess of Erotic Love, Her son Cupid is the God of Romantic Love - and in His honour, ROMA and the Legion are hosting an archery contest - prizes will be given to 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place winners - based on total accumulated points in each of our 3 contests. Can you hit the mark as well as Cupid? Come prove it!
Location: Legion Archery Range, ROMA Transtiberim sim (http://slurl.com/secondlife/ROMA%20Transtiberim/125/233/404)

4pm - Lupercalia Grand Feast
To top off this festival weekend, we have The Grand Feast of Lupercalia! Join us for an evening of feasting, dancing, and good company, as well as our Lupercalia Costume Contest! Our costume theme this time around is Historical or Fictional Lovers. So come as Romeo & Juliet, Tarzan & Jane, Cleopatra & Antony - whatever takes your fancy! We will vote for best male and female costume - the winners will recieve $L1000! (You don't have to have a partner to enter the contest - you can enter as one half of a couple.)
Location: Throne Room, ROMA sim (http://slurl.com/secondlife/ROMA/180/183/53)