aderam | Doctor Who 4.02 - The Fires of Pompeii!

I decided to catch up on some Doctor Who since my brain is a little too fuzzy for some proper studying and besides - this is totally studying for a Roman history exam right?

So it wasn't historically accurate at all, but it was still really fun. Someone on the writing team definitely used the Cambridge Latin Course texts because the Pompeian family they chose was Caecilius' from the texts! Although they made him a marble seller instead of a banker (actually, come to think of it Caelcilius had his fingers in many many pots, so he might have sold marble as well as being argentarius and dealing with sheep and all that stuff) and they made up a daughter. Of course all of the disappointment I had that neither Celmens nor Grumio nor, most importantly, Cerberus were present - all that was okay because Quintus in triclinio bibit! (Quintus drinks in the dining room) That was one of the first full sentences in Latin in that text (right up there with Cerberus est canus - Cerberus is a dog, and Metella est mater - Metella is the mother) and it made all of us chuckle and make jokes about Quintus having a drinking problem. Man Cambridge Latin was wicked awesome.

Also, it may have just been the language nerd in me, but I loved the conversation that Donna and the Doctor had about the translation thingy-ma-whatsit from the TARDIS and wondering what the Romans would hear if she spoke in Latin to them. And then the Doctor saying "nos mortaturus te salutamus" when he was about to be killed by Lucius (at least I'm pretty sure that's what he said, he spoke very quickly - typical Tennant - and I had to go back, but I can't think of anything else that would have made sense) and being dismissed rather quickly as being "Celtic".

It also probably improved my enjoyment of the whole thing that the entire time I was thinking "I'm going there this summer." :)

I'm totally going to find Caecilius' house while I'm there too. And I'll try not to weep at the thought of Caecilius trapped under a fallen wall and Cerberus watching over his master in vain!