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Google Earth Recreates Ancient Rome 97

Posted by Soulskill from the minus-the-gladiators dept.
thefickler writes "Google Earth now includes ancient Rome circa 320 AD, thanks to Google, the University of Virginia, and Past Perfect Productions working together to bring the historical city to life. Clicking on Ancient Rome in 3D, users can revisit Rome from a bygone era and view highly detailed reconstructions of 250 buildings, as well as 5,000 other lesser detailed buildings. 'Pop-up windows provide information on the monuments and visitors also can enter some of the most important sites, including the Senate and the Colosseum, to observe the architecture and marble decorations.'"
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Google Earth Recreates Ancient Rome More

Google Earth Recreates Ancient Rome

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  • First Post! (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Lissajous ( 989738 )

    Would that be Doric, Ionic, or Corinthian??

  • Is this wise? (Score:5, Funny)

    by Waffle Iron ( 339739 ) on Saturday November 15, 2008 @11:38AM (#25770903)

    What would happen if this tool fell into the use of the wrong hands? What if Barbarians were to get a hold of this information?

  • come on, why stop at Rome? (Score:1, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward

    At that time, there was another developed culture of similar size on Earth, although at that time Han China had already split into three kingdoms. There were also other civilized peoples with developed cities in the Middle East, India and Mexico. It would be interesting to see all of them on Google Earth.

    • Re:come on, why stop at Rome? (Score:5, Informative)

      by Guido von Guido ( 548827 ) on Saturday November 15, 2008 @12:51PM (#25771335)

      At that time, there was another developed culture of similar size on Earth, although at that time Han China had already split into three kingdoms. There were also other civilized peoples with developed cities in the Middle East, India and Mexico. It would be interesting to see all of them on Google Earth.

      I think it has a lot to do with preservation. Remember, the Romans did a lot of their building with stone and Marble. Rome is strewn with buildings from the ancient Roman empire like the Colliseum and the Pantheon. The Chinese, however, used a lot of wood in their cities. Very little of the Han cities survive, making them a bit harder to reconstruct.

      I certainly hope this isn't the last, though. I personally would like to see Babylon or one of the Mayan cities like Palenque or Tikal.

      • Re:come on, why stop at Rome? (Score:4, Informative)

        by CheshireCatCO ( 185193 ) on Saturday November 15, 2008 @04:26PM (#25772555) Homepage

        The flip side of using a lot of marble and good stone in building is that a lot of Roman buildings were cannibalized for their stone. The Colesseum has been stripped, for one. (The best example I can think of is Piazza dell'Anfiteatro in Lucca, Italy [google.com], where the entire original amphitheater is totally gone, but the fossilzed shape remains in the piazza.)

        As a result, most of what we still have is from places that were buried (a la Pompeii), were converted to other uses (the Pantheon is now a church, for example), or places that were abandoned (Ephesus, for instance).

      • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

        by je ne sais quoi ( 987177 )
        It's not just construction materials. The population of Rome (the city) at its height was ~1 million (around 0 CE IIRC). After Rome, no other city equaled that until London in 1800!

    • Re:come on, why stop at Rome? (Score:4, Interesting)

      by lysergic.acid ( 845423 ) on Saturday November 15, 2008 @01:40PM (#25771595) Homepage

      and then convert Google Earth into an online RTS game that lets you pit these ancient armies against one another!

      as a side note, i wonder if it'd be possible to create an MMO RTS game given the huge server farms Google has at their disposal.

    • Re:come on, why stop at Rome? (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Petrushka ( 815171 ) on Saturday November 15, 2008 @04:26PM (#25772549)

      It would, but I think one good reason to prioritise Rome is because the layout of the city changed in infuriatingly complicated ways during the centuries it was at its peak. The enormous building works instituted under some emperors (e.g. Augustus and Nero) make it very tiresome trying to work out what was where. It's basically impossible to represent that on a paper map: you need layers of maps. Such things are available, but an electronic version would be very nice.

      If it weren't for that complexity, I reckon a single paper map would be just fine. In the case of classical Athens, say, a single paper map is basically fine, as the city's layout was fairly constant during its heyday. (Sure, they built a new acropolis, but it just occupied the site of the old one, mostly.) Conversely, studying archaeological sites whose history spans centuries or millennia -- say, Troy -- would be much easier with a diachronic map of the kind I envisage.

      Unfortunately, what they've done isn't actually a diachronic map: it's focussed just on one period (320 CE). So, while glad of this for what it is, I for one am left annoyed at what might have been ...

  • History Goggle Earth (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Doc Ruby ( 173196 ) on Saturday November 15, 2008 @11:45AM (#25770943) Homepage Journal

    I want to visit the real Rome with overlay goggles tuned to Google Earth's reconstructions, with GPS. So when I look at the ruins, there's overlay of the original sites. With animations of recreated everyday scenes, and famous scenes (like Senate arguments and speeches, revolts, Coliseum battles, etc) running for my amusement.

    In fact, I'd love to see these overlays in goggles in any museum showing artifacts. They're always in crappy shape in their cases (the intact articles are probably all in private collections, the broken ones sold off to finance them). Goggles showing them in their original condition, and in their original usage, would turn those displays from mere trophy cases of booty into actual demonstrations of history and our global heritage.

    • In fact, I'd love to see these overlays in goggles in any museum showing artifacts. They're always in crappy shape in their cases (the intact articles are probably all in private collections, the broken ones sold off to finance them). Goggles showing them in their original condition, and in their original usage, would turn those displays from mere trophy cases of booty into actual demonstrations of history and our global heritage.

      In that case, why bother to visit Rome and these museums? Just keep a case

      • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

        by Doc Ruby ( 173196 )

        The home version is exciting for that reason. But actually being there is still a blast. The point is not just the VR, but "bringing the scene to life". Actually being there, after actually going there, swings all kinds of human wetware into actually connecting with the scene. And connecting it with the current scene there. All of which connects the person to the history, with the actual artifacts as the base props that encourage the suspension of disbelief that is the most powerfully convincing special eff

    • see mona lisa overdrive by william gibson for an interesting fiction involving such goggles.

      • Gibson's _Virtual Light_ even more so. Stephenson's _Snow Crash_ is even better (as gadget, as story and as writing), and was written (just months) before VL was.

        • Spook Country by Gibson actually discusses the current state of virtual art installations and features radiation, popstars, nutropic meds, and what is by all appearances an amoral magical acrobat.

    • Goggles showing them in their original condition, and in their original usage, would turn those displays from mere trophy cases of booty into actual demonstrations of history and our global heritage.

      Whereas beer googles turn things into trophy cases of booty.

    • Already doable.

      This thing is called imagination and human children usually unlearn to use it as soon as they start seriously thinking about "growing up".

      • I have a good enough imagination to both imagine the application I just described, and to enjoy its augmentation of my senses.

        But indeed, most adults don't. Which is why goggles like these would be popular.

        • I have a good enough imagination to both imagine the application I just described, and to enjoy its augmentation of my senses.

          :)

          But indeed, most adults don't. Which is why goggles like these would be popular.

          That's right. But while one cannot grow a replacement arm if they lose one, having artificial implants to make up for the lost imagination is a step in wrong direction. Oh wait, TV and the other Media of Mass Manipulation are already setting us up on this path...

          Well, people could use such goggl

          • I notice that you're using the crutch of an actual Internet, rather than just daydreaming it. Or I'd notice (or rather, I wouldn't have).

            • Are you saying that I am saying that I think that imagination should replace the technology altogether, and people should live in caves of their own minds?

              I'm stating that I'm worried with the current tendency to do exactly the opposite - to replace the imagination with tech and make people brainless zombies (which is also sitting in caves). The TV is a brainwashing machine, yet even people who admit it still spend their days watching it. Going HD, then VR, then $whateverthenewtechofthefuture, isn't actuall

              • You do realize that the "Google Earth goggles" I described will be used by real people to communicate with each other, right? I recommended that they travel to important sites and experience them in person, which is one of the biggest stimuli to human imagination. But even if they're used as others have suggested, to visit these places virtually (goggles only, no travel to the enhanced artifacts), they will stimulate the imagination.

                And indeed that tech will be used by other people to dress up the rest of t

  • No directions? (Score:4, Funny)

    by $0.02 ( 618911 ) on Saturday November 15, 2008 @11:48AM (#25770957)
    Never mind. All the roads lead to Rome anyway.

  • SPQR game back in 90's (Score:4, Interesting)

    by HighOrbit ( 631451 ) on Saturday November 15, 2008 @11:56AM (#25770997)
    This was sort of done before. There was a myst-style game set in Ancient Rome. It came out circa 1996. You walked aroud acient rome in a myst type environment solving mysteries and puzzles. It was supposed to be geographically realistic. I think there was actually a web-based rpg type version in the 90's too.

  • Not really! (Score:5, Interesting)

    by ohell ( 821700 ) on Saturday November 15, 2008 @11:59AM (#25771019)
    I know from multiple sources that all the buildings were actually painted in bright colours (before the fell into disrepair, obviously), and archaeologists know what the colours were, from the remnants of pigments. I was hoping this reconstruction would be more than just white and beige marble veneer...
  • Ego exspectata nostrum Romanorum desparatus.

  • Visit a modern city. (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward

    Visit a modern city here [sesam.no] (Windows only).

  • It's AD 320 (Score:3, Interesting)

    by kevmeister ( 979231 ) on Saturday November 15, 2008 @12:37PM (#25771249) Homepage

    Yes, this a a nit, but one that I am seeing more and more often.

    The entry refers to Rome in "320 AD". This is simply wrong. It is AD 320. Any of you who posted Latin comments are aware of this modern mangling. 320 Anno Domini simply does not make sense. (See Wikipedia article [wikipedia.org] on "Anno Domini".)

    As with all issues involving time, it's pretty bogus, anyway, so perhaps /. should just use CE (Common Era).

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by j_sp_r ( 656354 )

      Maybe we should use bue and aue (before/after UNIX epoch) from now on

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Crazy Taco ( 1083423 )

      As with all issues involving time, it's pretty bogus, anyway, so perhaps /. should just use CE (Common Era).

      Nah, I think not. AD has been good enough for everyone for 1500 years (it was devised in AD 525), and I don't see any reason to give it up just for political correctness. There's enough politically correct garbage going on now as it is without adding dates to it.

  • Paitence (Score:2, Funny)

    by Urger ( 817972 )
    Rome wasn't rendered in a day.
  • ...I want to see it reconstructed as an Ayleid city add-on pack in TESIV:Oblivion!

  • Google Time (Score:2, Interesting)

    by YourExperiment ( 1081089 )

    How long before Google Earth simply features a slider, whereby you can not only view any part of the Earth's surface, but view it at any point in history? Drag the slider back a few centuries and watch the development (and destruction) of major population centres. Accompanied, no doubt, by a sidebar of discreet text ads offering to whisk you back via time machine to the era you appear to be interested in. Just be careful not to step on the butterfly.

  • I just went to visit the ruins of ancient Rome last week! I didn't like the smell of candles and old churches though. I also almost got stuck in the place because of the Alitalia strike [bbc.co.uk]. Virtual tours should be better solution for those planning to go there physically :)

  • Where's the "orbital ion cannon" button?

  • Who bloody cares about Rome? It is in many ways an unpleasant city, with rubbish lying around on display and where the major part of peope seem to be out to cheat as much money out of you as possible. I can think of any number of places I would rather see both in real life and on screen.

  • Ego saltem nouos Romanos dominos nostros saluere iubeo.

    • Ego saltem nouos Romanos dominos nostros saluere iubeo.

      nonne scribere vis, "salvere volo"? quod scripsisti intellegitur, "I for one command our new Roman overlords to say hello" ...

      • I wasn't sure how to say "to welcome", so I looked it up. It literally means that I order them greeted. I don't know it is an authentic idiomatic expression, or a mistake in the dictionary. Either way, take it up with Collins. ;-) Perhaps we could just go with "salueo".
        • Please forgive my brain-fart. I was thinking of salvere as being "greet" rather than "be greeted". You were right, I was wrong. D'oh!

  • Wow (Score:3, Funny)

    by sootman ( 158191 ) on Sunday November 16, 2008 @12:50PM (#25778515) Homepage Journal

    And I thought the imagery in my area was out-of-date. :-)

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