"Twenty centuries are stacked in 4 meters (13 feet) of earth — or about the height of two-and-a-half Napoleon Bonapartes standing on top of one another."
Way to get history wrong in your story about history.
I actually was about to post this quote for another reason as well. Usually you make these references to “known sizes” so people can relate. But no one has seen Napoleon in the flesh _and_ they underestimate his size. This was a useless comparison.
That said, the dig itself is pretty cool and I’m excited to see what they’ll unearth. I’m pretty interested in Roman history but haven’t gone as deep into the history of the provinces.
Semi-related to that, if someone reading this is in the Toronto area, the bata shoe museum has an exhibit (Vindolanda) about unearthed Roman footwear in England
The author picked Napoleon because of the belief that he was shorter than average and included a sum showing that they think he was shorter than average.
Indeed. Obviously the author was not au fait with the latest Napoleonic height historiography, because Napoleon's non-shortness is at this point almost a meme. Either way it's not very important.
That said, the dig itself is pretty cool and I’m excited to see what they’ll unearth. I’m pretty interested in Roman history but haven’t gone as deep into the history of the provinces.
Semi-related to that, if someone reading this is in the Toronto area, the bata shoe museum has an exhibit (Vindolanda) about unearthed Roman footwear in England