iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Dan Diffendale @diffendale.bsky.social · 5h

ci vediamo lì per pranzo, che dite?

Vecchia pubblicità su giornale: OH! BEVITORI! Volete la salute e respirar bene? Giovedì 21 si riapre l'antica osteria DEL POVERO DIAVOLO in via della Moletta, in viale Aventino n. 1-2, con vini scelti dei Castelli, bianco e rosso a soldi 6 il mezzo litro. Fava fresca dell'orto, insalata ed altro per la magnifica. Il proprietario Marco Nicolai spera vedersi onorato da numeroso concorso.

Dan Diffendale @diffendale.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

The Etruscan tumulus of Pisa, ca. 700 BCE. Carefully excavated in the 1990s, no remains were found in the central chamber, and is interpreted as a cenotaph. An iron trident was deposited above, and a horse was sacrificed on an altar on top, which was then dismantled and interred.

Vertical photo of an open grassy area, in the middle of which is a very wide (about 30 meter diameter) low tumulus, surrounded by a ring of standing slabs of schist. In the sky is the sun, causing a lens flare that curves upwards, mirroring the curve of the tumulus.

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Dan Diffendale @diffendale.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

this tactile map at school always reminds me of @catandgirl.bsky.social

Tactile map, blue background with raised white lines, which in aggregate resemble the eponymous first character of the webcomic Cat and Girl. It is labeled Palazzo della Carovana.

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Dan Diffendale @diffendale.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

there is never enough time aka everything is too interesting

Low level photo of a white desk top, in the foreground a piece of paper with sketches of column capitals and my fingers holding a pencil, then some post-its with library call numbers and a small metal reproduction of the ancient statue known as the Warrior of Capestrano, wearing a wide brimmed hat or helmet.

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Dan Diffendale @diffendale.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

Tomb of the Golden Fibula (when the laddie smiles)

Selfie in front of an Etruscan tomb in an olive grove, covered in dry grass, reaching an arm out to a big old olive tree at the beginning of the dromos.

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Dan Diffendale @diffendale.bsky.social · 03/09/2026

but not to Livorno (the New Jersey of Tuscany)

Photo with a wetland in the foreground and a whole series of flare stacks on the horizon from a refinery.

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Dan Diffendale @diffendale.bsky.social · 03/09/2026

slipping town for the passing of my years

Photo out the window of a train, showing other tracks, an elevated road, and some buildings.

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Dan Diffendale @diffendale.bsky.social · 31/08/2026

I know it's a long shot, but does anyone recognize what this might have been? I mean, probably a box, but of what? the scraps of text are Italian ([---]iche at left, which could be various words; [---]a ed alle arti x[---] at right)

Old wooden strip with damaged paper label, framed with red scrollwork. The right-hand text runs along the edge of what is presumably a circular medallion in red.

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Dan Diffendale @diffendale.bsky.social · 30/08/2026

indeed mild by kimchi standards, but it would still kill your average Italian

My hand holding a small plastic tub labeled mild kimchi, opened to reveal said product.

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Dan Diffendale @diffendale.bsky.social · 25/08/2026

Changed trains in Civitavecchia and had time to pop into the museum, open but still in the midst of reinstallation. The epigraphy room, where the inscription repatriated from New Orleans will be, is as yet off limits. 3rd floor is other repatriations and unprovenanced stuff from the old Museo Civico

Museum gallery with cases along two walls full of artifacts, mostly pottery. To the left are some small marble statues.

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Dan Diffendale @diffendale.bsky.social · 18/08/2026

the other thing I found today is this trick jug that says "bevete se potete" (Italian for "drink if you can," in the plural). There's a very close parallel that bears the same phrase together with "St. Louis Exposition 1904", and I suspect this was also a souvenir of that fair. 1/

Old ceramic jug, with a high foot and globular body. Just below the rim with its spout are a series of openings cut in the body, which would seemingly cause any liquid in the vessel to run out the side when it is poured. It has floral decoration to either side of the text.

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Dan Diffendale @diffendale.bsky.social · 18/08/2026

went to one of the local antique stores and found an Ottoman clay pipe, red burnished, probably made either in the Tophane district of Istanbul or at Asyut in Egypt, in the late nineteenth century

An old clay pipe bowl, burnished red surface, with a vertical conical element to which joins at the base a diagonal conical element, each decorated with incised geometric designs.

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Dan Diffendale @diffendale.bsky.social · 18/08/2026

around Rome, the oldest (extrusive) igneous rocks I have to deal with are about 600,000 years old. Spending some time at my parents' in south Belchertown, I've learned we're sitting on some 380 million year old crystallized magma, the Belchertown Intrusive Complex #intrusivethoughts

Detail of the bedrock geologic map of Massachusetts in the area of Belchertown, the south part of which is occupied by a roughly circular unit labeled "Dbmd."

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Dan Diffendale @diffendale.bsky.social · 16/08/2026

Il Messaggero, mercoledì 18 novembre 1903: "Queste parole rendono quasi verosimile il bel sogno degli Stati Uniti di Europa..."

Testo di giornale: Gli Stati Uniti d'Europa
Gli orizzonti della politica internazionale, malgrado le lotte oscure e soffocate di cui ci giunge l'eco dai punti più lontani del globo, continuano ad essere rosei e brillanti. L'attuale viaggio dei sovrani d'Italia in Inghilterra vi contribuisce per buona parte. A questo proposito il deputato francese Pressensé trae argomento dal riavvicinamento franco-italiano e anglo-francese per salutare con parole assai simpatiche la nuova era di pace che il secolo ventesimo ha apportato all'Europa. Egli, nella relazione del bilancio degli esteri, distribuita ieri alla Camera francese, si felicita della scomparsa di ogni malinteso da parte della Francia coll'Italia e coll'Inghilterra e soggiunge: "Ciò costituisce un pegno che d'ora innanzi nei due gruppi di alleanze fra gli Stati europei non vi sarà soltanto la solidarietà indefettibile delle potenze monarchiche conservatrici, ma anche l'indissolubile comunanza d'idee delle potenze liberali, figlie della rivoluzione. I due gruppi di alleanze vi guadagnano influenza attenuandosi l'antagonismo fra loro." Queste parole rendono quasi verosimile il bel sogno degli Stati Uniti di Europa - nota luminosa di quanti intelletti superiori hanno lavorato e lavorano per la pace del mondo.

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Dan Diffendale @diffendale.bsky.social · 15/08/2026

you're in her DMs, I'm in her DMS. We are not the same (I am dead)

Photo of an ancient Latin inscription, beginning DMS (Dis Manibus Sacrum, "Sacred to the Shades of the Departed"), set up by a woman named Aurelia Iusta for herself while living as well as for her deceased husband Marcus Aurelius (not the emperor) and her deceased son Marcus Aurelius Aper.

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Dan Diffendale @diffendale.bsky.social · 10/08/2026

this is what happens when we stop teaching cursive

Cover of an album by Genesis, with the title, in a cursive font face, "A Trick of the Tail."

Screenshot of an Italian online secondhand shop advertising the same album as "a fuck of the jail."

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Dan Diffendale @diffendale.bsky.social · 07/08/2026

pèntima (o pèndima), lat. mediev. pentoma. (Voce del GDLI nell'immagine) (cf. il toponimo Pentima/Pentame, il villaggio sul sito dell'ant. Corfinium)

Pèntima (pèndima), sf. Dial. Terreno in pendio sulle rive dei laghi vulcanici dei Colli Albani, nei pressi di Roma. = Voce di area laziale, dal lat. mediev. pentoma (nel 1005, a Roma), di origine prelatina; è registr. dal D.E.I. (che l'attesta nel 1903).

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Dan Diffendale @diffendale.bsky.social · 07/08/2026

ci vediamo tra vent'anni alla Fontana del Quadro sotto il Sasso Tremicatore

In massi staccati alla Fontana del Quadro sotto il Sasso Tremicatore.

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Dan Diffendale @diffendale.bsky.social · 06/08/2026

look! the tops of the trees are illuminated by the schooning sun

Photo looking up at the top of a stand of tallish maple trees, mostly dark green with some lighter green bits, while at the very top edge the leaves glow greenish yellow, lit by a sun we do not see. The sky is pale blue and thickly mottled by clouds.

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Dan Diffendale @diffendale.bsky.social · 05/08/2026

I'd love a button here to get it unstuck and assign photos to albums... it's more of a pain in the ass to do in Batch Organize

Screenshot of a Flickr box that reads "Publishing...." with a pink progress bar at the bottom, seemingly very near the end, but experience teaches that it will stay stuck there forever.

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Dan Diffendale @diffendale.bsky.social · 02/08/2026

In the western central uplands for a bit

Detail of a road map from the early 1990s of the eastern part of western Massachusetts; in the center, below a reservoir (Quabbin), are four places labeled Belchertown, Bondsville, Thorndike, and Three Rivers.

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Dan Diffendale @diffendale.bsky.social · 15/07/2026

see Mari & Tomassetti 2008, "Ancora sulla ceramica decorata con paste vitree da Tivoli," Archeologia Classica 59 (2008), pp. 395-408 (www.jstor.org/stable/44367...)

Photo of a rim sherd of a ceramic vessel in red clay, with applied lettering CULE VICTO and three blue glass paste inserts below. Below the photo is a drawing showing the form of the vessel and the text reconstructed to read "Ab Hercule Victore".

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Dan Diffendale @diffendale.bsky.social · 17/06/2026

doing some work on Tufo Rosso a Scorie Nere - a tuff, or rather two of them, from the volcanos north of Rome, that were used as building material from antiquity onwards. There are two deposits from two different eruptions (both huge), only definitively distinguished a couple decades ago

Detail of a white-topped work table with photo scales and color card, a small accumulation of rock dust, and, at the margins, the edges of plastic sample bags with rocks in them.

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Dan Diffendale @diffendale.bsky.social · 07/06/2026

Be the shadow of the evening you want to see in the world

Photo with the light of an hour before sunset: a rocky landscape in which can be seen here and there regular cuts from an ancient quarry; some of the lower areas have been invaded by the sea. The shadow of the photographer stretches long, up two thirds of the frame.

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Dan Diffendale @diffendale.bsky.social · 31/05/2026

Here's an example of a lithograph adapted to ceramic form by a Kütahya potter (images from D. Kogias, _Souvenir of Kütahya_ 2021)

Photo from a book with caption: "The third dish of Minas Avramidis from the quartet illustrating the medieval legend of Saint Genevieve (Kütahya, early 20th century, Suna and İnan Kıraç Foundation, Kütahya Tiles and Ceramics Collection, Pera Museum, Istanbul)." The photo is a circular dish with image representing a bearded male figure in medieval clothing on horseback looking down at a half-clad seated female figure. Behind are a tree, a deer, and a boy. The female figure is labeled Genevieve in Greek and French, along with the abbreviation of "figure 3" in both languages.

The lithograph from which the previous image was copied. The caption reads "Lithograph by Sotiris Christidis with Image C from the legend of Saint Genevieve which Avramidis copied on the dish of fig. 9 (Athens, 1900-02)." The scene here has a much fuller scenery: the horse is standing in a stream or spring, while Genevieve is seated on a rock. The same labels in Greek and French appear below the scene.

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Dan Diffendale @diffendale.bsky.social · 20/05/2026

some of the inscriptions, which may date to the 5th-4th c. BCE, were found re-used in a later pavement of the area, while others were still in place

Photo, probably taken from a drone, showing a large open archaeological excavation area, with a team of about 25 people standing in the middle, some in high-viz clothing. Behind them and to the left is an area paved with stone blocks, while at the right and left edges of the photo are low stone building foundations.

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Dan Diffendale @diffendale.bsky.social · 20/05/2026

Archaeologists carrying out excavations ahead of the construction of a new road at Ponso, near Este in the Veneto region of Italy, have uncovered an ancient Venetic and Roman temple site, including numerous inscriptions in the Venetic language (all photos: SABAP Padova Treviso Belluno)🏺

Photo of an archaeological excavation, with the focus at center on a cut-stone block, one side of which is entirely covered with five lines of text inscribed in the ancient Venetic alphabet. A few letters spill onto another side of the block. In the background can be seen small stone pillars with architectural moldings.

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Dan Diffendale @diffendale.bsky.social · 20/05/2026

quote with a fictional band that is not spinal tap

Still from a film depicting a small English colliery band dressed in purple jackets marching down the street, a line of five tuba players making up the first row. They are led by a conductor played by Pete Postlethwaite, flanked by a person carrying a hand written sign reading "Grimley Colliery". The film is "Brassed Off".

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