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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;kaparthy, post: 732642, member: 57463&quot;]<b>Eschewing T]the Boob Tube</b></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>I stopped watching PBS Nova and the Discovery Channel and the History Channel (&quot;all Hitler, all the time&quot;)&nbsp; a long while back when I was able to tape them and run it back to see what they said.&nbsp; When it streams past you, it seems so interesting, but if you treat it like a book, the flaws are embarrassingly obvious.&nbsp; </p><p><br /></p><p>The coins of Caligula mark what they call the <i>terminus ante quem</i>: <b>end point before what</b>. In other words, the coins could not have come from before the time of Caligula.&nbsp; So, that&#039;s the earliest possible time for this camp.&nbsp; </p><p><br /></p><p>But it could be from any time after that.&nbsp; You collect ancients.&nbsp; I once bought 100 uncleaned Romans and buried the rejects with some Lincoln Cents in my back yard.&nbsp; The dates on the Lincoln Cents mark the terminus ante quem.&nbsp; So, the coins could have come from any time after Caligula.&nbsp; A soldier or more likely a civilian camp follower could have had the coins in possession for many years before burying them and not coming back for them.&nbsp; </p><p><br /></p><p>The coins could be countermarked at any time for any reason, but your intuition is correct: a newly struck coin of the present ruler from within a Roman army camp would likely be accepted as is, rather than being tested and counterstamped.&nbsp; </p><p><br /></p><p>As for the tree rings, what were they, giant sequoias?&nbsp; I mean, where do you find 2000 year old trees?&nbsp; Or maybe they had some other way to date the site and used the rings to count years within that narrow range.&nbsp; Or whatever.</p><p><br /></p><p>All in all, &quot;educational&quot; television is just not what it is advertised to be.&nbsp; Read books.&nbsp; Take a class.&nbsp; Chat here.&nbsp; Try the other trusted websites for ancients.&nbsp; Join a club.&nbsp; Subscribe to <i>The Celator</i>.&nbsp; Stay away from television.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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