History: Fiction or Science? (Chronology, No. 1)

Book Description

Recorded history is a finely-woven magic fabric of intricate lies about events predating the sixteenth century. There is not a single piece of evidence that can be reliably and independently traced back earlier than the eleventh century. This book details events that are substantiated by hard facts and logic, and validated by new astronomical research and statistical analysis of ancient sources.

Customer Reviews:

Calculations are only as good as your numbers.......2007-08-03

Yes, we can all agree that mainstream history is nearly 100% BS due to politics, economics, ego, problems with dating techniques, and various conspiracies. Agreed. But, I've been researching the distinct possibility that human history (in terms of civilizations) are much more ancient than we've been told, so coming across this book was very interesting to me. I wondered how Fomenko could be wrong (if at all) because he is very persuasive in his presentations. Then it dawned on me. If at previous times in prehistory, due to the various catastrophies that are well documented (comets, asteroids, planetary disruptions, plasma discharge, pole reversals, etc) the Earth was in a different position in relation to the sun, different tilt on its axis, different orbit, different rotation (in terms of velocity and DIRECTION), and the continents were in different positions, then would this not cause the ancients to see the sky (constellations) differently? In other words, is Fomenko making erronious assumptions about the physics of the Earth in pre-history, which then corrupt his data with regards to dating the relevant astrology? The last event to seriously disrupt our planet occured roughly 3500 years ago, according to other good researchers, so is it possible Fomenko has been confused by this? The vastly different physics of our planet in the not so distant past may explain this confusion, which is not to say the "mainstream" version of history is correct; on the contrary. I am not an expert in these fields, but wanted to see if this idea could spark discussion.

Pants on fire?.......2007-07-19

Will people ever read before spamming? Yes, Jesuits could not rewrite world history alone, they had help. Anyway, Dr Prof Acad A.Fomenko does not point to jesuits as the driving force of world wide history manipulation in published volumes 1,2,3;, actually he barely mentions the poor devils. Check it with 'Search inside' feature, please. China is rarely mentioned either, in fact, Dr Fomenko is completely eurocentric. Right, his theory contradicts all mainstream schools of history, because in their actual state they are all built on blatantly erroneus chronology. You don't need a mysterious cabal (conspiracy) to falsify history, the falsification is its modus operandi. It is inherent to history(ians) to falsify (distort) events, as it is inherent to humans to boast as it is inherent to power (authority) to legimize itself by referrring to glorious past made to its own order. Dr Prof Fomenko and team have identified scores of instances of such manipulation in Russian, European, etc.. history, and delivered valid statistical proof thereof. His own 'reconstruction' is completely another story. Forget c14 as a valid method of dating. W.Libby has initially discovered a brilliant method of INDEPENDENT dating. Too bad, c14 method has become a joke after a forced marrige with dendrochronology with consensual chronological scale inbuilt. Radiocarbon method can't stand blind tests, but is so very productive as a rubberstamp.

Accepted History & Chronology Must Be Changed. .......2007-04-09

There is no doubt that history as most know it is a sham, & institution's version of History both University & Church is fradulent & inaccurate. Everything was established with an agenda, The real "Dark Ages" are now when we have access to incredible amounts of information past authorities & more important 'common folk' didn't have but our institutions & educators are slow to evolve because of what has ignorantly & arrogantly been taught for too long. This is on many subjects not just Chronology.

For anyone to question "Why would a Mathematician have anything credible to say of History?" The answer is from Dr. Fomenko's preface in the book: "It would be worthwhile to remind the reader that in the XVI-XVII century Chronology was considered to be a subdivision of Mathematics." These volumes could possibly be some of the most important works to date & should be read by everyone with an interest in History, especially professors & educators who have a duty to the public. I have read both books & must say that 'Chronology 1' has some very eye opening & revolutionary information. Even if these volumes are part true the implications are profound & opens the doors to further investigations & questions which must be done. I speak several different lanquages & must say the logic Dr. Fomenko uses with "inflection" of words & words being read from left to right in one region & right to left in another then written backwards, the removal of vowels & get down to basics of words, or different cities & locations having the same name etc. is correct. Vowel usage has always been optional & varied, actually complicating linquistics & study. The first thing one has to understand is that words never had a fixed spelling in history like we do now, the spelling of words was mutable & regional, as well as names & titles of people were vast, varied & changed, NOTHING WAS FIXED or understood linear. Matters of Life & Death as well as financial profiteering yesterday & today were & are made with ignorant, illogical & conspiratorial views of history & reality, it's time people get closer to the Truth & society collectively grow up.

Very Interesting.......2007-03-07

It is a good proposal and I believe it will mature into something even better in the future. I think it deserves to be read.

History as Science Fiction.......2007-01-10

Anatoly Fomenko has written a very intriguing book, full of pictures, charts, and computer 'proof' of his thesis: backwards of AD900 we don't really know what happened or when. Between AD900 and AD1600 there is more certainty, but there is still a lot of fuzzy ground, and things don't get reliable until we get past the 1600's where the printing press made it very difficult for the perpetrators of this timeline manipulation to change anything that had been committed to print. The Dark Ages did not happen. Books were burned for a reason. One organization has doubled the actual length of its existence by expanding the real chronology. Read why.

I had always wondered why Christ died about AD33 and yet men waited until the 11th century to form the Knights Templar, the Cathars, etc and go after the Holy Land by force. Why the 1000 year gap? Turns out there wasn't more than a 10-12 year gap and he proves it using astronomy. This also implies that the planet is not as old as we have been told, and current Christian and other creationist scientists are already championing that idea without being aware of Fomenko's book. The two groups, creationist scientists and the Russian mathematical analysts corroborate each other. Fascinating.

Of course, all this flies in the face of what we have been told traditionally is the 'proper' chronology of western civilization, and most readers will experience 'cognitive dissonance' in reading this book. It means that our history going backwards from AD1600 becomes progressively more incorrect and unreliable until it cannot be trusted at all... in the space of 700-800 years.

Naturally, the curious, open-minded reader will want to know WHO did this, WHY, and did any of the events we think of as really ancient ever happen?
Dr. Fomenko is a respected scientist/mathematician at Moscow State University who has already answered these questions to the satisfaction of his initially skeptical colleagues. Most of them are now believers, a few still refuse to believe (the usual diehards), and of course the western press has ignored Fomenko's work -- for obvious reasons when you read the book. The ones who perpetrated this chronology ruse have a lot to answer for. They are still with us. That's why this book is a well-kept secret.

I gave the book a 4-star rating because I was unable to check out some of his claims; those I checked were as he said. But if even 1/3 of his claims are true, this punches a big hole in what we think is our history, the meaning of western civilization, our educational process (for repeating the ruse as gospel), and the trustworthiness of the organization that perpetrated this ruse, well-intentioned or not.

This book relates to current research into a Young Earth paradigm, to John Keel's discoveries about our planet, and Fr Malachi Martin's insights (in his now out-of-print books). We are indeed sheep who are manipulated and kept ignorant -- for a reason. While knowing what these men have to say may be the "booby prize" (as in: 'what can you do with this knowledge?'), it will provide interesting reading. Didn't someone say: "...and the Truth will set you free."?? For you to judge if this book contains the truth.

Secrets of Ancient Cultures: The Inca: Activities and Crafts from a Mysterious Land (Secrets of Ancient Cultures)

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CLASS LOVED the CRAFTS & INCA history made easier

Secrets of Ancient Cultures: The Inca: Activities and Crafts from a Mysterious Land (Secrets of Ancient Cultures)
Arlette N. Braman
Manufacturer: Jossey-Bass
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Crafts & Hobbies | Arts & Music | Children's Books | Subjects | Books

General | Ages 9-12 | Children's Books | Subjects | Books

Ancient | History & Historical Fiction | Children's Books | Subjects | Books
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A Coloring Book of Incas, Aztecs and Mayas

ASIN: 0471219800

Book Description

Discover the ancient Inca culture with these fun games and activities!

Make an Inca tunic. Prepare a quinoa snack. Create a royal headdress. You'll have a great time exploring the cultural traditions of these fascinating people as you learn to write an Inca poem, sculpt your own clay portrait in the shape of an Inca jug, and test your bluffing skills as you play Perudo.

This book is filled with activities and projects that will show you how the ancient Inca people lived and played, as well as how they managed to create an empire that extended nearly 3,000 miles! You'll learn about the bravery of Inca warriors as you construct a war shield. You'll discover how the Inca created beautiful music with panpipes and dance bells-and you'll make them yourself! You'll get to prepare a tasty Inca dish called Andean stew. Plus, you'll find lots of amazing Inca facts on topics ranging from history and religion to language, metalworking, and art. So get ready for lots of fun as you discover the ancient secrets of The Inca.

Customer Reviews:

CLASS LOVED the CRAFTS & INCA history made easier.......2006-03-02

Crafts are great, easy to do! Easy to read book, easy directions. Drawing are vivid and helpful.

During Open School night my son's teacher stated that some cultures are hard to teach to a 2nd grade class. I offered my services when ever she needed help or a helpful idea. Matthew came home and said Ms. Rayes needed help with INCAS. Book arrived fast. A day later my son came home with a note. TEACHER LOVES THE BOOK, she raved about it! She has since passed her book onto other 2nd grade teachers who have since ordered their own copies.

Mysterious Lands and Peoples (Mysteries of the Unknown)

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Mysterious Lands and Peoples (Mysteries of the Unknown)
Time-Life Books
Manufacturer: Time Life Education
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

Reference | Historical Study | History | Subjects | Books

General | World | History | Subjects | Books

General | Reference | Subjects | Books
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ASIN: 0809465205

The Land Beyond the Mountains ..an Authoritative Portrait of a Vast and Mysterious Land..siberia and Its People Today

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The Land Beyond the Mountains ..an Authoritative Portrait of a Vast and Mysterious Land..siberia and Its People Today
Leonid Shinkarev
Manufacturer: MacMillan
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000JJVE48

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Mysterious Lands and Peoples (Mysteries of the Unknown)

Manufacturer: Time Life UK
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Binding: Hardcover

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Ladakh: The mysterious land (history of Western Himalayas) (Landmarks in Indian anthropology)

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Ladakh: The mysterious land (history of Western Himalayas) (Landmarks in Indian anthropology)
August Hermann Francke
Manufacturer: Cosmo Publications
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The Lands of the Bible (Mysterious Places)

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The Lands of the Bible (Mysterious Places)
Jacqueline Dineen
Manufacturer: Belitha Press Ltd
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Mysteries of the Unknown Mysterious Lands and Peoples

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Mysteries of the Unknown Mysterious Lands and Peoples
Time Life Books
Manufacturer: Time Life Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000LC2VRC

Pagan Holiday: On the Trail of Ancient Roman Tourists
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Top companion to any European trip!

A bat-belfry of errors (From The Palm Beach Post review)

Informative, interesting, and amusing travelogue and history

Ancient Rome at High Speed

Time-travel for under $15!

Pagan Holiday: On the Trail of Ancient Roman Tourists
Tony Perrottet
Manufacturer: Random House Trade Paperbacks
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0375756396
Release Date: 2003-04-08

Book Description

The ancient Romans were responsible for many remarkable achievements—Roman numerals, straight roads—but one of their lesser-known contributions was the creation of the tourist industry. The first people in history to enjoy safe and easy travel, Romans embarked on the original Grand Tour, journeying from the lost city of Troy to the Acropolis, from the Colossus at Rhodes to Egypt, for the obligatory Nile cruise to the very edge of the empire. And, as Tony Perrottet discovers, the popularity of this route has only increased with time.

Intrigued by the possibility of re-creating the tour, Perrottet, accompanied by his pregnant girlfriend, sets off to discover life as an ancient Roman. The result is this lively blend of fascinating historical anecdotes and hilarious personal encounters, interspersed with irreverent and often eerily prescient quotes from the ancients—a vivid portrait of the Roman Empire in all its complexity and wonder.

Customer Reviews:

Top companion to any European trip!.......2006-09-13

I recently went on a three week trip to Italy and Greece (with a short visit to Turkey) and read Pagan Holiday on the way. It was both hilarious and enlightening. I never really understood the ancient Romans and Greeks until now; it's a great device to use the classical tourists to view the ruins and relics of the Mediterranean, it conjures up a world of flesh and blood so much more vividly than any guide book. In Rome, I went to the Colosseum (naturally) but also the wierd museum Tony P include, the Museo de la Civilta Romana, where an enormous model of ancient Rome c.400 AD is one of city's most spectacular sites. In Athens, a visit to the Parthenon was all the more enjoyable reading what the Acropolis was like for the ancient tourists, battling their way past souvenir vendors, priests and guides. The ruins of Greece don't make a lot of sense unless you have someone to piece them together in an imaginative way (the standard books are dry as dust). At Delphi, I could really picture the strange rituals of consulting the oracle (and who knew that the place was as filled with treasure as Fort Knox?) My one regret is that I didn't get to Arcadia, where Tony P explored the remote mountains to visit tiny but evocative ruins where magical artifacts and fantastic items (Ulysses's sword and Achilles bric-a-brac) was on display in temples, much as our modern museums. I did get over to Troy in Turkey, which was an unexpected highlight. There's not much to see in the way of ruins, but just exploring the Homeric landscape is unforgettable. For me, this was the best part of the book -- the chapter on Troy is very moving, the author seeks out the memorials to his own Australian ancestor who died there in the Gallipoli campaign, all the while musing over the Romans who came to see the tombs of Homeric heroes (not to mention their supposed letters home). In short, I found this a great primer on the ancient world (now I don't have to read Herodotus and Tacitus etc) and a truly entertaining companion to an Italian or Greek trip. The author has a genuine sense of humor and you find yourself learning a huge amount as you go.

A bat-belfry of errors (From The Palm Beach Post review).......2006-02-11

Up until this moment, Tony Perrottet has led a happy life. Gambolling along like the jolly jumbuck of his native land's anthem, "Waltzing Matilda," the Australian writer has skipped in fleecy lambkin innocence across the green meadows and bosky dells of human existence.
Joyous, exuberant, he even wrote a book, "Route 66 AD, On The Trail of Ancient Roman Tourists." He has been interviewed by NPR, he has freelanced for The New York Times, Esquire and the Sunday Times of London. All seemed sunny.
He little dreamt, that in the dark fens of Palm Beach County, there lurked an alligator in the form of a failed classicist, who had majored in Latin and minored in Greek at Columbia University. There had the monster lain for weary years, nursing its dark hunger, watchful. Within the beast's reptilian brain there lay but one primordial law: Vengeance against intruders who dared venture within the sacred precincts of the Classics, joking, unarmed and unprepared!
A cosmic convergence has brought the frisking lamb within jaw-grasp of the alligator. Reader, if you are squeamish, if you cannot stand the sight of literary gore, avert your pitying eyes! What follows will be a massacre!
Let me begin smilingly: At least 20 percent of this book is unassailably accurate. Another 30 percent might conceivably, on an overcast day, situationally, theoretically, by a long stretch of imagination, be marginally plausible. The parts about Perrottet's own journey through the Mediterranean are, I suppose, true, at least in his mind and recollection.
The rest is utterly wrong. In fact the whole book is wrong in principle. The Greeks and Romans were not, save for a few hardy exceptions, great travellers, let alone tourists. They lived in a dangerous, spooky, uncertain world, where a drink of water from a strange stream could kill you, where there were no vaccinations or American Express offices, no Hilton concierges, no borders or passports. Travel was a huge risk, to be undertaken only in dire circumstances. People who journeyed, and actually returned home again, put up votive offerings to the gods, trembling with gratitude, thanking them sincerely for a safe passage through one of the scariest, most uncertain experiences known to classical antiquity: Travel.
Because it could literally kill you, no one in their right mind traveled in antiquity unless compelled by stern necessity, or on military orders. There is a marble ship, an ex voto offering from antiquity, still standing in Rome on the Caelian Hill, in front of the church of Santa Maria in Navicella. It was a thank-offering put up in antiquity, by a grateful traveller, glad to have gotten home alive.
Perottet, fly-fixed in the amber of the present, cannot accept this. So he projects modern tourism, modern movies (he quotes "Star Wars" twice and the book is ludicrously illustrated with Hollywood stills from movies, the usual orgies and chariot races), modern souvenir-hunting, modern wanderlust, back into a past where they simply did not exist. It is a remarkable act of imaginative bravado, but it will not wash.
I have never read a livelier, more absurd farrago of untruths, half-truths, quarter-truths, mistranslated truths, misunderstood-and-taken-out-of-context truths and outright lies about Graeco-Roman antiquity than this. A graduate student, if one could be found in this dying discipline, might write a Ph.D thesis, simply seeking out and rectifying all the lunacies in Perrottet's chapter on Rome.
Let me give an example. It is a bold author who cites a source in his bibliography, then writes something ((italix)) completely contrary ((enditalix)) to the cited source. Here is Perottet describing the (in fact woefully inadequate) sewer system of Rome, and using Jerome Carcopino's excellent "Daily Life In Ancient Rome" as a source:
(Perottet, P. 46): "They... created public latrines and a magnificent system of underground sewers that some patriots insisted were engineering marvels on a par with the Pyramids."
(Carcopino, P. 57-8:) (I am translating from the 1939 French edition) "Far be it from me to sell the admiration of the network of sewers which carried to the Tiber the filth of the city... It is incontestable that the Ancients, so courageous in their enterprises, so patient in their fulfilment, were not skillful enough to do what we should have done in their place. They did not do the bare minimum to assure the cleanliness of their city, for the health and decency of its inhabitants... The All-to-the-sewer idea of the Roman house is nothing but a myth born of the complaisant imagination of modern people, and of all the slaveries which weigh upon the City, this is the one which a modern population would most forcefully reject."

Not content with imaginary sewers, Perottet builds an imaginary Latrine, the so-called "Forica," "The largest of these complexes, Forica, was as big as Notre-Dame Cathedral," he asserts on p. 40, "its marble seats heated in winter and decorated with mosaics, silver fountains and dolphin motifs."

I have spent two years in Rome, and have interested myself in Roman topography. I have a large library on the subject, for I love Rome. I have searched in vain through Platner-Ashby's Topographical Dictionary of Ancient Rome, through all of Rodolfo Lanciani's books, through all of Giuseppe Lugli's even more detailed discussions of the ancient city, through Ovid, Martial, Horace and Juvenal for this giant cathedral-sized Moby Dick of a latrine. In vain! I have scanned Italo Gismondi's great map of imperial Rome, the 1949 Forma Urbis Romae. I've run through guides, ancient and modern, Vasi, Fea, Huelsen, Melchiorri, authors of repute, men who spent their lives investigating this marvellous city. None of them mentions this Gargantuan latrine, the Forica.

So I went to Lewis & Short's large Latin dictionary and there, lowercased, was the word "forica," meaning "latrine." This, apparently, is the acorn from which Perottet's oak tree of imagination has grown.

This book simply bristles with errors. It is a bat-belfry of mistakes, and the cheery impetuosity of its author, who seems a very decent fellow, who loves his pregnant wife and takes her with him on his travels -- cannot excuse his fatal, Munchausen-like flair for tale-spinning.
Absurdities, fantasies, exaggerations, fall from Perottet's paragraphs, thick as leaves in Vallombrosa. To have studied and learned Latin and Greek, across long years, as I have, and then to open this book, is an Alice-In-Wonderland experience. His Latin is so bad, so barbarically bad, that I began to experience, vicariously, the deep fear that the beleaguered landowners of Gaul must have felt in the fourth and fifth centuries, AD, as the Visigoths and Ostrogoths closed in.
Before your amazed eyes, Rome-based satirists and poets and orators like Juvenal, Horace, Propertius and Cicero, rise, levitate and flit to places they only imagined in real life. Borne on Perottet's Ariel-wings of fantasy, people who never traveled in fact, are shanghaied hundreds of miles away in fiction. Jokes become voyages. Hyperboles and flights of fancy are solidified into geographical latitudes and longitudes.
Novelists like Apuleius and Heliodorus, wild joke-tellers like Lucian of Samosata, epigrammatists like Martial, are cited as unchallengeable eyewitnesses of places they never saw. This wonderful telekinesis occurs unpropelled by the dull machinery of footnotes. Perottet's book is innocent of footnotes and contains only a meager bibliography at the end, limited to 46 works of widely varying quality, some of which have absolutely nothing to do with the author's subject. This is bibliographical squid-ink, meant to terrify and confuse, not to illuminate or document anything. Over and over again, a reader with even a light smattering of classical literature asks in his mind: "Where is he getting this stuff?"
Freed of these earthly chains, Perottet soars like Pegasus of old. A random jest, uttered by an old poet, becomes a journey, and the journey becomes a PBS documentary, to be taken as sober-sided history. Learned, desk-bound geographers like Polemon and Dicaearchus (whose works are lost, thus allowing Perottet to make what use of them he pleases) are given Hawaiian shirts and turned into tourists. The beautiful Primaporta Augustus, unearthed in 1869, is used on the cover and a camera is draped around the statue's neck. Hey, Augustus was a tourist too! Soldiers on garrison-duty in far parts of the empire are, we are urged to believe, only there for pleasure, to gawk and sightsee, an explanation that would have angered and amazed them to hear.
Above all, Perrotet is attracted to smut. With many a deploring hand-flutter, he introduces us (again!) to Tiberius on Capri, one of the most discredited and lurid passages in Suetonius, and we get to hear about the Spintrians again, far more clumsily described than they were by Robert Graves in his "I, Claudius." We also learn how a young man masturbated in the presence of Praxiteles' masterpiece, the Aphrodite of Cnidos. This nudge-nudge, wink-wink invitation to dirty-postcard complicity is one I would prefer to decline.
Any classical author who ever mentioned another place, another country, is automatically promoted to tourist in Perottet's zany, zero-gravity universe. He crosses the line into actual dishonesty on p. 50, when he reports a comment the Roman Emperor Nero is supposed to have made, while watching Christians burn to death, as condemned criminals scapegoated for the great fire of Rome in 64 AD:
"Nero quipped that it was the first time Christianity had shed light on anything," Perottet writes glibly.
This is an arresting quote. It arrested me, because I had never read it before, and I had read both Tacitus' and Suetonius' accounts of Nero, in the original Latin. Thanks to the eventual triumph of Christianity, this grim torching episode is one of the most quoted and famous events from antiquity. The actual classical references are Tacitus' Annals XV. 44 and Suetonius' Vita Neronis chapter 38.
Neither author mentions this astonishing quip-quote. Nor does Dio Cassius, the great Greek historian of Rome. Nor does Eusebius, the Christian historian of the early church. It is not in B.H. Warmington's biography of Nero, which is cited as a source in the bibliography. In fact, it does not exist. Nero never said it. Perottet made it up. I will eat this review in public if Perottet can show me a classical source for this quote.
If he cannot, well, may the gods pardon him for so thimble-rigging a work of purported scholarship about classical antiquity. The pagans were more merciful than the Christians in this regard. I am sorry to be the Poisonous Shirt of Nessus upon his shoulders, but he can go read Marcus Aurelius for consolation and strength, against this ghastly reversal of fortune.
And if I might address him directly, I would say: You should not play with these people. They are not playthings. They are of another world, another time. They are very high. The gold they wrought is still being mined. They cannot rise from the dead to reproach you, but they can summon up allies, across the years, to rebuke you for your frivolity. And so they have. And so I do.

Informative, interesting, and amusing travelogue and history.......2005-04-06

_Pagan Holiday_ by Tony Perrottet is both an amusing and interesting travel book and an excellent history focused on the very first age of tourism, the age of Roman tourism. With the advent of a massive, highly detailed and for the time very accurate map unveiled in 5 B.C. (completed by the Roman war hero Marcus Agrippa), the completion and extension of Rome's glorious highway system, the acceptance of Roman currency even to the farthest reaches of the Empire, two unifying common languages (Greek and Latin), and the Pax Romana (the longest unbroken period of peace in European history, lasting roughly from 30 B.C. to A.D. 200), the world was open to legions of Roman tourists. These viatores or peregrinatores (wayfarers; also called spectatores or sightseers) would go on what he called the original Grand Tour, journeying to resorts in other parts of the Italian peninsula, to sacred and historical sites in Greece (the Hellenic "greatest hits" including Athens, Delphi, Olympia, Sparta, and Epidaurus), the Olympic games if possible, to the ruins of Troy, the Colossus of Rhodes, and the exotic and fantastic ruins in Egypt (which to first century A.D. spectatores were mostly enigmatic relics from a forgotten epoch, nearly as ancient to the Romans as they are to us today). Across the entire Mediterranean world a complex tourist infrastructure arose to cater to the needs of the Roman traveler. Perottet sought to both describe the experiences of the Roman tourists - who they were, what they saw, how they traveled, and the difficulties they encountered - and to replicate their travels as closely as possible, to show to the modern reader what they might have been like and to describe the ruins as they appear today.

I found the parallels between Roman and modern tourism quite striking. Perrottet provided numerous examples of Roman contemporary accounts of stays at roadside inns (where even some of the richest Roman tourists complained of hard mattresses, leaky roofs, and bad food), eating at restaurants serving highly questionable fare, visiting lavish temples (which the author noted were in many ways the equivalent of modern museums as they were often crowded with statues and all manner of artifacts), and sending home letters to friends and loved ones.

Another parallel between Roman and modern travel (particularly in the Third World) is the fact that tourists often had to deal with shysters and con artists competing for their attention at every site they visited, each one proclaiming that he can show secrets about the site and provide a true and accurate history (though that was very rarely the case). Perrottet vividly described the hordes of professional tour guides (called mystagogi) that clustered around the most significant tourist attractions, each competing for the attention of the Roman tourist, spouting memorized spiels of "facts" to the tourist, often geared towards the Roman ear by tying in local legends and ruins to Homeric accounts of the Trojan War or to the Roman gods. These guides often exasperated Roman tourists; one academic was known to have prayed to Jupiter to protect him from his guides at Olympia!

Also like today, the Roman tourists bought tacky souvenirs. Numerous painted glass vials showing the Lighthouse of Alexandria and miniatures replicas of famous statues of Apollo have been found. The author said that these were the ancient equivalent of water-filled snowscapes of famous tourist attractions.

Roman tourists were fond of leaving mementos of their journey, generally by etching graffiti onto their favorite monuments. Precisely 2,105 pieces of Roman graffiti have been noted (and studied) from the Valley of Kings alone. They often preferred to inscribe Homeric verse (some wealthy Roman tourists even brought poets along so that they could do this), while others left much simpler messages ("I was amazed" was a common inscription on notable ruins and tombs). Some sites thoughtfully provided stone carvers for hire so that these messages could be left.

Though the Romans traveled primarily by ship, this age saw the first "road trips." In particular the compact size and density of sites to see in Greece lead many Romans to hire wagons on the outskirts of Athens and travel on the excellent Roman highways to the various destinations they sought, taking advantage of roadside inns, periegesies (guidebooks), itineraria picta (graphic itineraries or maps), and even roadside markers (miliaria or milestones). Perrottett quoted a number of times from one of the most notable and thorough periegesies to survive into modern times, the _Description of Greece_ composed by the travel writer Pausanias between A.D. 130 and 180, an encyclopedic work that comprised originally ten papyrus scrolls, an amazingly thorough guidebook to the whole of mainland Greece.

Several Roman tourist destinations - notably Sparta and Troy - were but shadows of what they were in their heyday. While Sparta was a major city-state in the 5th century B.C., by the days of the Pax Romana it largely maintained its famed traditions for the tourists, with such events as the annual scourging of the youths at the festival of Artemis performed primarily for the benefit of its visitors.

One way Roman tourists differed from modern ones was in how the very richest traveled. The wealthiest aristocrats would have their private wagons for instance shipped to Greece, where they would travel in a slow and sumptuous convoy that included a huge retinue of chefs, slaves, and secretaries. These rich tourists would dine in silk-curtained tents set up each night as dining halls, eat off plates of beaten gold, and sleep in luxurious carrucae dormitoriae (sleeping carriages). The very richest and most powerful of travelers - several Roman emperors enjoyed the Grand Tour - often required years of preparatory work as entire buildings (notably baths) would be erected in anticipation of their visit. Whenever an emperor passed through a city it was nearly bankrupted by the massive expenses in entertaining him and his retinue.

A very entertaining book - Perrottet and his girlfriend had a number of interesting encounters along the way in their travels - I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Ancient Rome at High Speed.......2004-07-28

Great title, I had to read this book on that basis alone. But now I see that the paperback edition has been renamed Pagan Holiday. Ecch.

I don't know if Perrottet had any say in what his book was called, but taking his pregnant girlfriend on a cheap and energetic tour of Rome is something he did have control over. I'm sure he was exaggerating for comic effect, but Perrottet comes across as being a bit too macho Aussie. The hotels he and girlfriend Les stayed in are squalid and uncomfortable. Les tries her best to keep up with him on his Roman walkabouts, but she is apparently not in Olympic form in her later months of pregnancy. Is he crazy? Is she crazy? According to the book jacket they're married now, so maybe it wasn't as bad as it seemed.

The idea of retracing the ancient Roman route and describing it then and now was a good one, like those books they sell at Pompeii, with photos of the ruins of Pompeii today, and overlays showing Pompeii as it was in 79 A.D. Perrottet is enthusiastic, if a bit impatient, and has an infectious affection for ancient Rome.

So, if you can put aside your sympathy for Les, you will enjoy Route 66 A.D. Or Pagan Holiday. Whatever.

Time-travel for under $15!.......2004-06-30

If you have any interest in Classical history (especially the more human, socio-economic and religious aspects) and/or enjoy tongue-in-cheek travel writing by authors such as Bill Bryson (A Walk in the Woods) and Tony Horwitz (Confederates in the Attic), then pick up Tony Perrotet's illuminating and hillarious look at tourism, ancient and modern. At just under fifteen dollars, this book provides entertainment and erudition without the need for mortgaging the home on airfare, Mediterranean tourist trap hotels, Russian made rent-a-car deathtraps or dodging terrorists at the Valley of the Kings. Pagan Holiday is a a great summer escape!

Pagan Holiday: On the Trail of Ancient Roman Tourists

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Pagan Holiday: On the Trail of Ancient Roman Tourists
Tony Perrottet
Manufacturer: Random House Trade Paperbacks
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000OXLH3C

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