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May 08, 2006
Another French Cover-Up
This is beyond cool...
Deep beneath pavement pounded by tourists on Paris’ Left Bank lies an ancient path — a 2,000-year-old Roman road recently excavated during construction work.Remnants of private houses rigged with baths and ingeniously heated floors were among the findings, now on view in a stunning dig.
-Michel Euler / AP file
A 2,000-year-old Roman road, recently excavated during construction work on the Pierre and Marie Curie University campus, is located in Paris' Left Bank.
...right up to THIS part.
Over the next few weeks, however, archaeologists will rip up the ruins to make way for a research center.
Cripes! We stumble over a 1700's shipwreck on NAS Pensacola and completely realign the multimillion dollar project whose digging uncovered it. But find...
Archaeologists said it was the first such site discovered in the city — known as Lutetia in pre-Roman and Roman Gaul — from the reign of Roman emperor Augustus (63 B.C.-14 A.D.).
...and you'd still better be done by June 30th, 'cause we've got a building to throw up. Cherish your past, n'est pas?
Well, in their defense, the Romans weren't French.
Posted by tree hugging sister at May 8, 2006 10:22 AM
Comments
They still have a bit of an Asterix complex.
Posted by: Nightfly at May 8, 2006 10:31 AM
That's not as bad as what happened in Zeugma.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/zeugma/
Posted by: Mike Rentner at May 8, 2006 10:57 AM
Zeugma=the smegma of Zeus?
I think that they ought to blow atoll to bits in their bikinis.
Posted by: Dan Collins at May 8, 2006 11:15 AM
Either of Zeus or the citizens of Zug.
Posted by: Mr. Bingley at May 8, 2006 11:25 AM
That's just a little obscene.
Zeugma was a city on the Euphrates in present day Turkey that was re-discovered while they were building a dam to submerge the valley it was located in.
Posted by: Mike Rentner at May 8, 2006 11:30 AM
Wait, THS--in whose defense? Ancient Romans or Modern French?
Posted by: Dan Collins at May 8, 2006 11:35 AM
zeug·ma ( P ) Pronunciation Key (zgm)
n.
A construction in which a single word, especially a verb or an adjective, is applied to two or more nouns when its sense is appropriate to only one of them or to both in different ways, as in He took my advice and my wallet.
Syllepsis.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
[Latin, from Greek, a joining, bond. See yeug- in Indo-European Roots.]
It must have been confusing living in a figure of speech in the fertile crescent.
Posted by: Dan Collins at May 8, 2006 12:14 PM
Hmmm, I thought at first the French, but, now that you've asked, I guess the Romans would be thankful.
Those are GLORIOUS, Mike! I remember reading National Geographic rabidly during another archeological rescue attempt.
Posted by: tree hugging sister at May 8, 2006 01:56 PM
And Dan, don't kid yourself ~ you're confusing me now...damn cagey college professors.
Posted by: tree hugging sister at May 8, 2006 01:58 PM
The French *spit* aren't the only ones destroying the past, so are the Spanish.
Link
Posted by: Gunslinger at May 8, 2006 05:52 PM
THAT is unbelievable!! Makes me cry. What a shame.
Posted by: tree hugging sister at May 8, 2006 06:48 PM