To raise public revenue, Emperor Vespasian–who built the Colosseum–was the first to introduce pay toilets in the city of Rome. When his son and successor Titus protested that the toilets were raising a stink with the poor, Vespasian held a coin up to his nose and said, “money doesn’t stink.” Today, Romans still refer to public toilets as vespasiano.
Until Sunday, September 3rd, 1967, driving was done on the left-hand side on roads in Sweden. The conversion to right-hand was done on a weekend at 5 p.m. All traffic stopped as people switched sides. This time and day were chosen to prevent accidents where drivers would have gotten up in the morning and been too sleepy to realize ‘this’ was the day of the changeover.
The seven wonders of the ancient world were: … 1. Egyptian Pyramids at Giza … 2. Hanging Gardens of Babylon … 3. Statue of Zeus at Olympia … 4. Colossus of Rhodes – or huge bronze statue near the Harbor of Rhodes that honored the sun god Helios … 5. Temple of Artemis at Ephesus … 6. Mausoleum at Halicarnassus … 7. Lighthouse at Alexandria.
For decades after Emperor Nero’s death, people all over the Roman empire claimed to have spotted him. Several men even claimed to be him, and started popular movements to be reinstated as emperor. Because of his notoriety and the questionable circumstances under which he died (he purportedly stabbed himself to death in hiding outside of Rome), Nero was the Elvis Presley of ancient Rome.
Emperor Trajan, who ruled from 98–117 A.D., was celebrated as the greatest of Roman emperors. In fact, for the rest of Roman history, new emperors were honored by the Roman senate with the prayer felicior Augusto, melior Traiano, meaning “may he be more fortunate than Augustus and better than Trajan.” In Dante’s Divine Comedy, Trajan is the only emperor allowed into heaven.
In 1843, the first Christmas card was printed in England for Sir Henry Cole. He was busy man who wanted to save time in his own Christmas letters, but was also interested in encouraging the expansion of the postal system. 1000 copies of the card were sold at one shilling each. It was not until the 1860s that the production of cards accelerated, with cheaper printing methods. Then in 1870, the Post Office introduced a half penny stamp for sending cards.
Roman coins have been dug up in America, suggesting that perhaps the Vikings or Columbus weren’t the first Europeans to visit the New World. The coins were found in locations as far afield as Texas, Venezuela and Maine. One stash was found buried in a mound in Round Rock, Texas. The mound is dated to approximately 800 A.D. In the town of Heavener, Okla., a bronze tetradrachm bearing the profile of Emperor Nero was found in 1976. The coin was originally struck in Antioch, Syria, in 63 A.D.
According to tradition, the first engineer to build a bridge across the Tiber in Ancient Rome was given the name Pontifex, meaning “bridge builder.” The Pontifex was seen as someone who “connects” people, and that symbolism was so powerful that Roman high priests–including Julius Caesar–later adopted the title Pontifex Maximus. During the Roman Imperial age, the emperor was always the Pontifex Maximus. The title eventually passed from Roman emperors to the leader of the Roman Catholic Church. Today, the Pope still carries the title Pontifex Maximus
Many of Rome’s most ambitious emperors idolized Alexander the Great. When Julius Caesar was a 33 year-old general in Spain, he wept when he saw a statue of Alexander, lamenting that he had accomplished nothing, while Alexander had conquered the whole world by his age. The schizophrenic emperor Caligula built a bridge of wooden boats across the Bay of Naples and rode back and forth across it on a horse, wearing armor he stole from Alexander’s tomb. Emperor Caracalla set out to conquer the same eastern lands Alexander had conquered, and made a great show of visiting his grave in Alexandria, Egypt.
The standard U.S. railroad width (4 feet, 8.5 inches) is directly derived from the width of Roman war chariots. This is because the English expatriates who designed the U.S. railroad system based their measurements on the pre-railroad tramways built in England. Those tramways were built using the same tools used to build wagons, which were also that width. The reason wagons were built to that width is because otherwise, they would break during long treks across the old English roads. Those roads–built by the Romans–were full of ruts carved out by Roman war chariots. All Roman chariots were built to a standard width of 4 feet, 8.5 inches, and so English wagons were built so that their wheels would fit into those ruts.
Emperor Nero’s lust for excess was most evident in his elaborate parties. According to the ancient writer Seutonius, Emperor Nero’s Domus Aurea had a circular main dining room with a roof that revolved day and night, in time with the sky. In what remains of the palace today, there is a large octagonal room with a domed ceiling that some believe is this dining room. The octagonal room has a large dome with an oculus in the middle. It predates the Pantheon–and was probably the inspiration for it. The architects of the Domus Aurea developed an innovative mechanism cranked by slaves, that made the ceiling underneath this dome revolve like the heavens. While the ceiling revolved, perfume was sprayed from the ceiling and rose petals were dropped on the diners. Legend has it there were so many rose petals falling at one dinner that one of the guests was asphyxiated.
