iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Dr Thomas J. Derrick 🧪🌺🏛 ⛏📚 @tjderrick.bsky.social · 19/12/2025

I'm feeling generous, so the best I can do is a photo of our (earlier) head flask at the Gale History Museum. It reminds me of a death mask, almost.

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Dr Thomas J. Derrick 🧪🌺🏛 ⛏📚 @tjderrick.bsky.social · 03/09/2025

Solidarity. If you haven't done so, please consider pulling out of the EAA conference, revoking memberships (requesting reimbursement). If not, please consider making your voice heard at the AMBM (Fri 6.45pm CET). Also, write to express your concerns to the EAA exec. www.e-a-a.org/EAA/About/EA...

e-a-a.org

Executive Board

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Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 03/09/2025

your periodic reminder that “archaeology isn’t political” is a political statement

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Dr Thomas J. Derrick 🧪🌺🏛 ⛏📚 @tjderrick.bsky.social · 02/09/2025

The instructions screenshotted in the BTC blog post are gross. Making students and ECRs censor academic speech for you, is unconscionable.

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Sarah Kerr @sarahkerr.bsky.social · 02/09/2025

The email from @archaeologyeaa.bsky.social was only sent to session organisers and after the conference started. There will be presenters who are unaware of this decision - spread the word #archaeology #EAA2025 @blacktrowel.bsky.social @archagainstaparth.bsky.social

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Dr Thomas J. Derrick 🧪🌺🏛 ⛏📚 @tjderrick.bsky.social · 02/09/2025

Overturning a democratic vote and implementing a moderation style (via volunteers) that severely limits academic freedoms is awful. That this happened AFTER the conference started is even more disappointing. I will be revoking my membership and boycotting the conference.

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Durotriges Dig @durotrigesdig.bsky.social · 10/08/2025

A 6th or 7th century grave marker for #StandingStoneSunday Dedicated to Iudnne.. [Iudnnerth?] son of Qui.. [Quintus?] Carved into a Romano British column (from a villa?) Found during the demolition of an 8th century church in 1841 Now in Lady St Mary church Wareham #Dorset 📷 May 2025

Part of a Roman stone column inscribed with Latin text

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Durotriges Dig @durotrigesdig.bsky.social · 04/08/2025

Apparently wearing a raspberry beret (the kind you find in a second hand store), this cheeky red-crested, tiny-tongued tessellated serpent features on a mid 4th century #Roman mosaic from Dorchester Found in Durngate Street in 1905, it's now in @dorsetmuseum.bsky.social 📷 Sept 2024 #MosaicMonday

Depiction, from a Roman mosaic, of a red crested snake sticking out its tongue

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Dr Thomas J. Derrick 🧪🌺🏛 ⛏📚 @tjderrick.bsky.social · 31/07/2025

My new article "Looting and Destruction of Cultural Heritage in Sudan and the Glass from Sedeinga" in Glass News 55, embargo-free. It can be downloaded below (or contact me (thomas.derrick@mq.edu.au) for a copy if you don't want to use the below site). www.researchgate.net/publication/...

the front of the national museum of sudan, smashed windows and a broken door

front cover of glass news 55 showing blue tesserae

The glass flute form Sedeinga previously in the museum at Khartoum, it is a tall blue glass flute with golden decoration

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Dr Thomas J. Derrick 🧪🌺🏛 ⛏📚 @tjderrick.bsky.social · 31/07/2025

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Alison Foster @alisonfoster.bsky.social · 19/07/2025

'Baffled' archaeologists. An excellent article by Tim Penn, University of Reading, which not only describes the hypotheses and discussions which are part of the archaeological method but also addresses the use of 'baffled' and other clichés used some journalists. theconversation.com/big-roman-sh...

theconversation.com

Big Roman shoes discovered near Hadrian’s Wall – but they don’t necessarily mean big Roman feet

It’s up for debate what the big shoes found at Magna mean and that’s an integral part of archaeological research

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Elginism @elginism.bsky.social · 14/07/2025

Worrying podcast from @theguardian.com about the rapid rise of metal detecting in Syria lost Assad - and what it means for the preservation of the country's heritage. www.theguardian.com/world/audio/...

theguardian.com

Syria’s treasure hunting fever - podcast

What can be done to stop Syria’s unprecedented scramble for antiquities? William Christou reports

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Dr Thomas J. Derrick 🧪🌺🏛 ⛏📚 @tjderrick.bsky.social · 13/07/2025

📻 Fun interview with Jim Mora on national radio in New Zealand Aotearoa aired this morning. I was talking about what everyday life was like in ancient Rome, and a little about time travel!

rnz.co.nz

How smelly was ancient Rome?

Ancient Rome stank to the high heavens, according to Dr Thomas Derrick from Australia's Macquarie University.

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Dr Thomas J. Derrick 🧪🌺🏛 ⛏📚 @tjderrick.bsky.social · 13/07/2025

📻 Fun interview with Jim Mora on national radio in New Zealand Aotearoa aired this morning. I was talking about what everyday life was like in ancient Rome, and a little about time travel!

rnz.co.nz

How smelly was ancient Rome?

Ancient Rome stank to the high heavens, according to Dr Thomas Derrick from Australia's Macquarie University.

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Dr Thomas J. Derrick 🧪🌺🏛 ⛏📚 @tjderrick.bsky.social · 09/07/2025

Had fun filming a talking head interview about historical glass at Hyde Park Barracks, as part of a new (as yet unannounced) archaeological exhibition opening in Sydney late 2025. Sneak peek: this European glass 'core' was knapped by First Nations Australians to make small blades (First Gov. House).

A dark glass core which has evidence of little blades being removed off the surface.

The front of hyde park barracks (early 19th century) brick built building for housing convicts, in a large open courtyard with gravel.

Hammocks from the hyde park barracks, suspended off wooden frames.

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Dr Thomas J. Derrick 🧪🌺🏛 ⛏📚 @tjderrick.bsky.social · 09/07/2025

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Nina Willburger @drnwillburger.bsky.social · 06/07/2025

This absolutely gorgeous #Roman enamelled flask was found in a grave in Buzet (Pinguente), Istria/Croatia. It's a product of a workshop in Britain or Gaule. Enamelled objects were typical for the northwestern parts of the Roman Empire. 🧵 1/2 📷 taken by me #archaeology #RomanArchaeology 🏺

Round enamelled metal flask with a curved handle and intricate floral and geometric patterns in red, blue, orange, and green enamel. The surface is richly decorated in concentric circular designs, giving it a jewel-like appearance. The flask is displayed upright in a museum case.

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Robin Marwick @electricland.bsky.social · 06/07/2025

Stop spreading this garbage about em dashes in ACTUAL EDITED PROSE OH MY GOD. Plenty of actual human beings know how to type em dashes! We’re called “writers” and “editors” — maybe you’ve heard of us?

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Dr Thomas J. Derrick 🧪🌺🏛 ⛏📚 @tjderrick.bsky.social · 03/07/2025

Sunanda Creagh (Senior Editor) is to thank there! Cracking choice (pun intended, sorry!).

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Dr Thomas J. Derrick 🧪🌺🏛 ⛏📚 @tjderrick.bsky.social · 03/07/2025

🔊I talked about this research on ABC Hobart/Northern Tasmania Radio last night with the fab Steven White. Listen from 2:27:46: www.abc.net.au/listen/progr...

abc.net.au

Evenings - ABC listen

Ease into your evening.

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Peopling The Past @peoplingthepast.bsky.social · 01/07/2025

Is it possible to re-envision the place of Greece and Rome in the ancient world overall? In today’s new #PeoplingPodcast, we are joined by Dr. Mathura Umachandran to reimagine Classics through the lens of Critical Ancient World Studies (CAWS) /1 peoplingthepast.com/2025/07/01/p...

Mathura stands at the foot of a set of steps leading up to the porch of an imposing building behind her. The building is a mix of architectural styles, with columns and porch adorning the set of stairs. The brick appears to be painted in an orange-brown colour, with white details.

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Dr Thomas J. Derrick 🧪🌺🏛 ⛏📚 @tjderrick.bsky.social · 03/07/2025

🔊I talked about this research on ABC Hobart/Northern Tasmania Radio last night with the fab Steven White. Listen from 2:27:46: www.abc.net.au/listen/progr...

abc.net.au

Evenings - ABC listen

Ease into your evening.

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Dr Thomas J. Derrick 🧪🌺🏛 ⛏📚 @tjderrick.bsky.social · 02/07/2025

All credit to @theconversation.com's Editor Sunanda Creagh for that!

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Dr Thomas J. Derrick 🧪🌺🏛 ⛏📚 @tjderrick.bsky.social · 21/05/2025

📢 I was very lucky to be asked to be an expert on ABC Kids’ Imagine This. I help answer “How is glass made” and we go back to Egypt and Jerusalem during the Roman Empire to find out! Thanks to Nij and Soumia at ABC Kids - this is the best thing I've ever done. www.abc.net.au/kidslisten/p...

Thumbnail for ABC Kids, an illustration of a child with blue hair and lots of scientific objects on their hair looks through binoculars with planets in the glass. The podcast title is Imagine This.

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Dr Thomas J. Derrick 🧪🌺🏛 ⛏📚 @tjderrick.bsky.social · 01/05/2025

Experimental archaeology (of sorts) happening today at Macquarie with my student intern (and chemist) Evie. We are trying to replicate the fake patination found on Roman glass facsimiles in our museum.

A selection of fluids, lemon juice, vinegar, and armor etch, with mica paint, and some tiny glass bottles

Glass bottles in a beaker marked NaOH being heated

A facsimile Roman glass bottle MU3999, with a columnar body, funnel rim and zig zag decoration

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Dr Thomas J. Derrick 🧪🌺🏛 ⛏📚 @tjderrick.bsky.social · 27/02/2025

While I am still struggling with the heat in Australia, looking at ancient glass. It could be way worse. Newly published research from Herculaneum has shown that brain tissue (in the right, very rare, and very hot, circumstances) can be turned into glass 😲. www.bbc.com/news/article...

bbc.com

Man's brain turned to glass by Vesuvius volcano ash cloud

The pea-sized brain was found in the skull of a 20-year-old man killed in the volcanic eruption.

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Alison Fisk @alisonfisk.bsky.social · 21/02/2025

Gorgeous #Roman glass cups decorated with colourful enamel-painted animals from the Roman arena, AD 200s. Found in richly-furnished ‘princely’ graves in Denmark, where they are known as ‘circus beakers’. National Museum of Denmark. 📷 by me #FindsFriday #Archaeology

My photo collage shows 4 Roman clear-glass cups painted with colourful enamel-painted motifs of animals from the Roman Arena. These are known as ‘circus cups’, of which fourteen have been found in richly-furnished graves in Denmark, dated AD 200s.

The top two images show two sides of the same cup. At top left a brown lion with shaggy mane, its legs outstretched as if running at full speed. On the other side of the cup at top right, is a green spotted leopard. Out of shot is a blue goat being hunted down by the lion and the leopard.

Photo at bottom left shows a fragmentary glass cup decorated with a light brown lion with a shaggy mane. Cup at bottom right has an image of a gladiator and in front of him a large brown bear.

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Horus the Elder 𓅃𓅨𓂋 ♿ @horusofnekhen.bsky.social · 25/11/2024

Come visit my current temporary exhibition: MAPPING AN UNEVEN PATH: STORIES OF HEALTH AND DISABILITY AT VERULAMIUM 15th November 2024 - 23rd February 2025 Explore what archaeology can tell us about Roman ideas about health and disability. www.stalbansmuseums.org.uk/whats-on/map...

Portrait poster for the exhibition Mapping an Uneven Path: Stories of Health and Disability at Verulamium. In the foreground an illustration of a Roman man with a bandaged leg and walking staff walks along a jagged path. In the background, several other illustrated characters - such as a doctor, a mother and child - stand behind a green mist. Some butterflies float around the image.

A tabletop case containing a number of museum artefacts and labels. They include a small metal votive foot, some coins depicting the Roman goddess Salus, and a 20th century prayer card from a psychiatric hospital.

Two portrait panels on a wall with colourful illustrations. One depicts her mother handing her child to a wet-nurse. The other depicts two Roman veterans; one with a prosthetic arm, the other with scars along his back.

Label in a display case showing some Roman bath tiles. The label is written by a disabled person, and talks about physical access to the baths and body image in the Roman world.

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Association for the History of Glass @ahglass.bsky.social · 31/01/2025

All back issues of Glass News (to 1996!) are available open access on our site. Please do drop us a line, too, if you'd like to contribute to a future issue: glassnews@historyofglass.org.uk

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Dr Thomas J. Derrick 🧪🌺🏛 ⛏📚 @tjderrick.bsky.social · 31/01/2025

🗞️ Glass News 54 hot off the presses. Consider joining (or asking your library to subscribe) @ahglass.bsky.social (15 GBP a yr) for 2 issues a year (3 most recent are in our members area), plus other benefits. We have also bolstered our research grants pool (deadline 31 March) historyofglass.org.uk

Front page of Glass News Issue 54, with egyptian beads/ear studs/ear plugs in glass

A picture of our front matter, all the details can be found on our website in an accessible format https://historyofglass.org.uk/

Table of contents:
1. editorial
2. events and notices
3. AHG Grant Report - anna Hodgkinson
4. AHG Grant Report, Liam Richards at the European Ceramic Society
5. A glass Cinerary urn from Lincolnshire - Sally Cottam
6. In conversation with patrick degryse about antimony in ancient glass - Ian Freestone
7. Glass Down Under - ancient mediterranean and modern art in Australia - Thomas Derrick
8. The Ballidon glass experiment: 50 years on
9. Study Days on Venetian GLass, 16-18 September 2024 - Suzanne Higgott
10. Notice: Our Website

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Association for the History of Glass @ahglass.bsky.social · 28/01/2025

Hello ! Good to see you here on BlueSky. We are a charity based in the UK promoting the study of ancient and historical glass. We hold meetings, produce a magazine and discuss and celebrate all things glass. To become a member please visit our website historyofglass.org.uk - and follow us here too !

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Dr Thomas J. Derrick 🧪🌺🏛 ⛏📚 @tjderrick.bsky.social · 23/01/2025

I think they'd both hate to be referred to as Classical (read: graeco-Roman)!

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DoSSE Project @dosse-project.bsky.social · 21/01/2025

WE ARE HIRING - TWO RESEARCH ASSOCIATES FOR 15 MONTHS We are looking for someone who can use their expertise in ancient languages such as Coptic, Syriac, or Middle Persian to investigate late antique / early medieval sources for domestic slavery. Apply here: jobs.le.ac.uk/vacancies/11...

jobs.le.ac.uk

Research Associate (Domestic Slavery in Late Antiquity) - 2 positions available in Leicester | University of Leicester Recruitment Team

View details and apply for this Research Associate (Domestic Slavery in Late Antiquity) - 2 positions available vacancy in Leicester. Working as part of a collaborative and innovative researc...

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Hannah Čulík-Baird @opietasanimi.com · 21/01/2025

rescuing Romans from the idea of fascism is more important to some than confronting the real and material threat of fascism

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Theoretical Roman Archaeology Journal @traj-journal.bsky.social · 09/01/2025

NEW in #TRAJ 🪙 'Data Quality & Bias in the Coin Hoards of the Roman Empire Database: A Logistic Regression Analysis' by Philip Rademacher The author considers sources of bias in the 18,000 coin hoard database & if data quality correlates with hoard characteristics. FREE doi.org/10.16995/tra...

doi.org

Data Quality and Bias in the Coin Hoards of the Roman Empire Database: A Logistic Regression Analysis

The Coin Hoards of the Roman Empire database currently contains more than 18,000 coin hoards from all areas of the Roman Empire and beyond. This large data collection encourages data-driven approaches...

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Theoretical Roman Archaeology Journal @traj-journal.bsky.social · 18/12/2024

Call for Special Issue Proposals! Following on from Sensory Experiences in the Roman North & in-progress Cosmologies Across Boundaries, #TRAJ is pleased to invite applications for 2026: - #OpenAccess - push the boundaries of traditional approaches to studying the Roman world - Deadline 31 Jan

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Theoretical Roman Archaeology Journal @traj-journal.bsky.social · 27/12/2024

Publication day! 🎉 TRAJ Volume 7 is complete, featuring 3 research articles & 22 book reviews (with an editorial coming very soon). 👀 - Philip Rademacher's new research article on bias in the Coins of the Roman Empire database 6 new book reviews traj.openlibhums.org/issue/1279/i...

The cover of TRAJ Volume 7, featuring a Roman site in the UK.

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Dr Claire Millington ✍🏻🏺 @clairemillington.bsky.social · 17/12/2024

Io Saturnalia! Have you bought your radishes in good time? An odd question you might think, but it seems to have been an important ingredient for the festivities held at a Roman fort, almost 2000 years ago.

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Dr Thomas J. Derrick 🧪🌺🏛 ⛏📚 @tjderrick.bsky.social · 13/12/2024

The marvels of ancient #glass in the late first century BCE and CE These matching cameo glass furniture inlays from Pompeii are huge and so intricate. They depict Ariadne and Bacchus and were found in the house of Marcus Fabius Rufus (Reg. 7, Insula 16) in 1960. @ NMA's 'Pompeii' Canberra until May

A large cameo glass slab depicting Ariadne in white relief on a black background

A scene depicting Bacchus in white relief on a black background

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Dr Thomas J. Derrick 🧪🌺🏛 ⛏📚 @tjderrick.bsky.social · 13/12/2024

A great time had by all at the launch of Pompeii at the National Museum of Australia last night. I'll be posting some highlights but they won't do it justice, if you're in eastern Aus between now and May 2025, go!

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