This is a PSA that Lex Foster canonically uses She/They pronouns (or at least Angela Giarratana headcanons Lex to. However, I think there's this sort of unwritten rule that if the actor headcanons something about the character they play, it is generally accepted as pseudocanon)
Also Lex was high throughout the entirety of act one of Black Friday which is probably why she came around to Frank's bullshit during our doors are open LMAO.
The Carnyx was a brass musical instrument used as a psychological weapon of war by the ancient Celts between 300 BC and 200AD in western and central Europe and beyond.
The carnyx was once widespread throughout much of Europe, although only a dozen or so fragments are known to us.
It was carried by bands of Celtic mercenaries; it was present at the attack on the Greek sanctuary at Delphi in 279 BC; it defied Julius Caesar in Gaul; and it faced Claudius when he invaded Britain. They are even shown on a Buddhist sculpture in India, proof of the far-flung connections of the Iron Age world.
However, they were not only used by the Celts; they were also used by the Dacians in modern Romania. The term “Celtic” is a complicated one. The concept of a pan-European Celtic culture is a myth; rather, aspects of art and technology were shared across vast distances by diverse cultures. The carnyx was one example of this.
A 12-foot-long, thin bronze tube with right-angle bends on both ends made up the carnyx. The lower end ended in a mouthpiece, and the upper end flared out into a bell that was usually decorated to look like a wild boar’s had. Historians believe it had a tongue that flapped up and down, increasing the noise made by the instrument. The carnyx was played upright so that the boar’s head bell protruded well above the warriors’ heads. Its primary goal was to create more noise and confusion on the battlefield.
The Greek historian Polybius (206-126BC) was so impressed by the clamor of the Gallic army and the sound of the carnyx, he observed that “there were countless trumpeters and horn blowers and since the whole army was shouting its war cries at the same time there was such a confused sound that the noise seemed to come not only from the trumpeters and the soldiers but also from the countryside which was joining in the echo”.
And the Roman historian Diodorus Siculus wrote, “Their trumpets are also of a peculiar and barbaric kind which produce a harsh, reverberating sound suitable to the confusion of battle.”
Archaeologists discovered a hoard of ritually destroyed weapons in 2004, including a dozen swords, scabbards, spearheads, a shield, bronze helmets, an iron helmet shaped like a swan, a cauldron, animal remains, and seven carnyces. Before the Tintignac discovery, the remains of only five actual carnyces had been found.
The finest was unearthed in Deskford, Scotland in 1816. The Deskford carnyx only has the boar’s head bell and is missing the mane, tongue, and tubing. Images of Carnyx players have been found as well. A Roman denarius, dating from 48 BC bears a representation of a Carnyx. Three carnyx players are featured prominently on the Gundestrup Cauldron, which was found in a Danish peat bog.
One of the seven found at Tintignac, on the other hand, was almost entirely complete. The Tintignac Carnyx was broken into 40 pieces. When puzzled back together, it was found to be just an inch short of six feet long with a single missing section of the tube. The bell was a boar’s head with protruding tusks and large pointed ears. Once restored, the Tintignac Carnyx proved to be the first virtually complete carnyx ever found.
so. my laptop is Deceased, which means I don’t have half of my pdf library (because I wasn’t able to back it all up yet. weeping and wailing), and THAT means that I have a much smaller pool of texts to work off with and cite, so. this is a much more direct glimpse into my thoughts when I’m reading ancient sources and don’t have the poetry of scholars to direct my imagination
anyway, the tris homines alliance is also an informal club for people that had weird but formative relationships with sulla. like. a real Make Them Worse situation happened there. crassus becomes someone who is half shadowy rumor behind every dealing in the eyes of others, pompey and caesar drag rome back into civil war, sulla says that caesar resembles marius but it’s sulla’s playbook that caesar later runs. everyone dies in places where they do not expect to die.
Plutarch, Caesar
Plutarch, Pompey
Plutarch, Crassus
Rome, Blood & Power, Gareth C Sampson
Sulla: The Last Republican, Arthur Keaveney
The Defeat of Rome: Crassus, Carrhae and the Invasion of the East, Gareth C. Sampson
I was on a sunken submarine being chased by Shrek dressed like a Roman emperor when I got to a locked door, terrified for my life I spun around to see Shrek just sorta chilling on a couch.
Linda Monroe doesn’t want to become her father but both father and daughter end up running a cult devoted to a dark god, flanked by adoring cultists, disguising it as something it isn’t so it’s more palatable - a ‘Honey Festival’/‘Honey Queen Pageant’ and a ‘fun new religion’ respectively, and they both lose their romantic partners in the name of their god (presumably) - no mention of Linda’s mother (one of the first Honey Queens perhaps) and Linda dies apart from Gerald, unable to see her boys for one last time.
I understand that Linda Monroe is a bad person. I understand that the way she treats people is unacceptable.
But I also understand that she just wanted Roman to be proud of her. For once in her life, she wanted her father to see her as something other than a barn animal; a pig. Because that's all she was to him. A little piggy. She wanted his approval. She wanted to impress him. And at every chance, he took that, and turned it into an opportunity to degrade her. Make fun of her for trying. Disregard what she has to say.
At the end of Honey Queen, Linda sees that Roman is proud of her for the first time in her life, and she starts crying. She can't help it. It's all she's worked for. She is finally more than a pig to him--she's a queen. The sweetest woman in town. The way all fathers should view their daughters. For a single, happy moment, she gets what she's always dreamed of.
Only for him to betray her. To reveal that she will meet a terrible fate, a vessel for a dark lord. He is not happy for her, he's happy to give her up for something he's decided is better. More worthy. Linda is murdered by the man who should have protected her from the beginning.
And that's the tragedy of Honey Queen. Let the starving woman be picked apart, used for all she is worth, and finally discarded while her father watches and smiles.
I was thinking how everyone always does, "Paul is Richie's Uncle" why doesn't anybody ever do "Emma is Ruth's aunt" but then milliseconds later I remember that, unlike Paul, Emma actually has an established family and that would imply that either she had another sibling or Tom and Jane had another child (ie Ruth) so now I want to present 3 AUs, (if anyone's already done these I just haven't seen it sorry):
1) Ruth is Tim's older sister (i dont think this would work timeline wise for Tom/Jane's age but idgaf, maybe it was a teen pregnancy, which could add a layer or drama for Jane's while 'perfect sister' thing)
2) Emma and Jane had another sibling who was never mentioned because...insert drama here (if we want a preexisting character, I like the idea of Linda*. Maybe shes their half sibling that they dont talk to because of how elitist Linda and her father are (so like maybe her father had an affair with Emma/Jane's mom but wanted it to be a secret for reputation purposes) but then this would also mean Ruth is Linda's daughter and all of the implications of that can be explored)
3) Ruth can be like Emma's cousin or something, idk
(*either I saw a fic with this or fever dreamed it i dont remember, but I like the au of it actually being Paul and Linda being estranged half siblings. We essentially know nothing about Paul's family so maybe he never mentions them because he's not on speaking terms with them because his dad (in this case Linda's dad) considers him a bastard child or something. But what I really like about his au is the idea of Linda and Paul being half siblings and how they would interact with each other. Maybe Linda shuns him like her father or maybe they actually get along and she has a soft spot for him idk. This could also apply with Linda being Emma/Jane's sister) (idk how this post became about Linda Monroe but ok)