History questions not worth their own thread III

[Arakhor]

They certainly didn't have a separate name for volcanoes (the word is linked with the Roman festival of Vulcanalia at the end of August, glorifying Vulcan, god of fire and smiths), but they certainly knew of flaming mountains, so to speak. Vesuvius had been grumbling and smoking for years and I believe there had even been a small eruption a few years previously.

 

[Louis XXIV]

You wouldn't happen to know of a source that says that, would you?

 

[spryllino]

Diodorus Siculus IV.21.5, at least, is evidence for Roman knowledge of flaming mountains and of Vesuvius being a volcano.

 

[Masada]

Pliny the Younger wrote two letter's about the events one of which you can find here here.

 

[sydhe]

If I remember correctly, they didn't know or understand the phenomenon of volcanoes. There weren't really any other large eruptions that I can think of in Roman times, and so Vesuvius was pretty unique in its day. Pliny continually refers to "that terrible mountain" or something along those lines because he didn't have a word for a volcano, and, in Pliny the Younger's account, his uncle always behaves as though he doesn't understand the phenomenon; Pliny says that his uncle considered it "something great and worthy of closer investigation."

So I think the Romans didn't know what a volcano was (aside from isolated natural phenomena like Etna, and this isn't to say that I doubt that there are other accounts of flaming mountains here and there in sources like Pliny the Elder or Diodorus), and certainly didn't know about the possibility of large scale eruptions of that sort.

They would have known Stromboli pretty well. Here's a list of volcanos in Italy, including twins named Vulcano and Vulcanello: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_volcanoes_in_Italy

Vulcano was Vulcan's workshop and gave its name to the whole phenomenon.

 

[LightSpectra]

How exactly did the Prince de Condé end up becoming a commander for the Spanish? I know he was connected to the Fronde, but that doesn't entirely explain why the man responsible for decimating two Spanish armies would be put in charge of one later in the war.

 

[Dachs]

How exactly did the Prince de Condé end up becoming a commander for the Spanish? I know he was connected to the Fronde, but that doesn't entirely explain why the man responsible for decimating two Spanish armies would be put in charge of one later in the war.

He wasn't just connected to the Fronde, he led the royal army that attacked Paris in 1648 and which continued to fight against Turenne and the other partisans of Mazarin et al. until Turenne finally managed to force Condé out of Paris by siege in 1652. That's when he ran to the Spanish to continue the fight against Mazarin by any means necessary.

 

[spryllino]

They would have known Stromboli pretty well. Here's a list of volcanos in Italy, including twins named Vulcano and Vulcanello: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_volcanoes_in_Italy

Vulcano was Vulcan's workshop and gave its name to the whole phenomenon.

My point is, though, that they likely saw each volcano as a largely isolated phenomenon.

 

[Masada]

Just read what Pliny the Younger had to say mang.

 

[spryllino]

Just read what Pliny the Younger had to say mang.

Using only one source when there are plenty isn't necessarily commendable.

 

[Masada]

There's truth to that but when one source clearly answers your question and gives you an introduction then you should probably take heed of it.

 

[spryllino]

What's the consensus on whether or not the Romans knew Vesuvius was a volcano? Did they know it was a volcano and just think it wasn't active, not know it was a volcano, not know of volcanoes? Would we have to base this entirely on Pliny or are there other helpful accounts?

Masada: Pliny does not make it remotely clear that the Romans knew of Vesuvius's volcanism beforehand. He also does not make it clear that the Romans knew of any other volcanoes at all. Also, there are other helpful accounts. Therefore, Pliny is entirely complemented, in answering this question, by such authors as Diodorus. Diodorus also gives a perspective that is different from Pliny's because Diodorus was writing several decades before 79 AD, which means that Diodorus is necessarily more useful in allowing us to understand what Romans understood about volcanoes before 79 AD.

I'm not saying Diodorus is the best source other than Pliny the Younger, but merely that I had him on hand yesterday. If I'd looked in Pliny the Elder or maybe Strabo, then I wouldn't have been surprised to find something equally helpful on the matter.

In fact, if you didn't have any other sources, you might easily have concluded (from the fact that Pliny the Elder apparently doesn't know what's going on to start with, in his nephew's account) that volcanoes were practically unknown to the Romans before Vesuvius's eruption in 79 AD.

 

[Masada]

In fact, if you didn't have any other sources, you might easily have concluded (from the fact that Pliny the Elder apparently doesn't know what's going on to start with, in his nephew's account) that volcanoes were practically unknown to the Romans before Vesuvius's eruption in 79 AD.

Which seems to be the case and answers the question dood.

 

[spryllino]

Which seems to be the case and answers the question dood.

No, because it omits the rather important point that the Romans did know of volcanoes even if they didn't categorise or name them as such.

 

[Louis XXIV]

Yeah, I do think that's very important to think about. There also could have been people with more knowledge than Pliny about volcanoes (although he's undoubtedly the best source for what happened during the eruption).

 

[r16]

if this has not already been mentioned the relevant Doctor Who adventure hinted the word volcano was not in the language until the time lord committed genocide against an alien race and destroyed Pompeii in the process .

 

[Masada]

No, because it omits the rather important point that the Romans did know of volcanoes even if they didn't categorise or name them as such.

I don't see how this is significant though. The question was whether or not the Roman’s knew about volcanoes. Not whether or not they knew about smoking mountains. The latter is hardly a claim to knowledge of the former in any but the most tenuous sense. I could just as easily claim that the ancients knew about the nature of stars because they guessed that the sun was a burning ball. Nevermind that they imagined that Helios dragged around behind his lowrider and that it circled the earth or something.

 

[Plotinus]

I think it's a bit unreasonable to suggest that the Romans needed to understand what volcanoes actually were to count as "knowing about volcanoes". If they knew that some mountains were in the habit of exploding or shooting out fire and molten rock, which they did, then surely that counts as knowledge of volcanoes, at least in the sense implied by the questioner here. To what extent they knew that Vesuvius was one of these mountains is another matter.

 

[spryllino]

But the extract from Diodorus Siculus that I referred to, written several decades before Pliny was writing, speaks unambiguously of Vesuvius being a flaming mountain. This, Masada, quite unambigously means that the Romans had knowledge of mountains acting as volcanoes and that Vesuvius was one of them. I really don't see your objection to that.

 

[ParkCungHee]

If I could touch on a non-volcano-related topic for a minute, I was wondering if the Papal-Noman Alliance was really a relevant issue at the time Luadabiliter was issued (1155)?