About the new ''Barbarian'' settlements model that you previewed

[wangchang]

Yeah no problem. Take your time. Australia is too nice to lose time on the internet.

It was a bump just in case.

[wangchang]

Hey Brennus. I'm pretty sure your busy with other things, so it's not really a bump.

What do you think of this pic?






I send it to red devil in case he needed some inspiration. From all the images I could come up with on the Web, this one is by far the most impressive structures.

It's pretty much High Medieval age Tier, which personnaly doesn't surprise me (considering the wealth, and that they were well implented for quite some time).
For once, it's a reconstitution that doesn't look like a small time Hovel (as alway, why assume it was miserable when it had as much chances to be big and refined :P)

Apparently, it's A Succesfull gaulish Farm from 2nd century BC (belonging to a rich landowner or something).
What do you think?


PS : No pressure, but when do you think you'll be able to provide the full reply about what we started discussing ealier? I'm pretty eager :) .

[Brennus]

Salut Wanchang!

Sorry for the delay in my response, my real life encountered several unexpected hills recently that had to be climbed before I could properly reply.

I like them, they are not too different from the models Red Devil has been producing for the oppida.

A brief description of the BIG PLAN for the oppida:

1. As previously said we are using a mixture of the topography of Alesia and Bibracte,

2. The wall itself is a composite of the Murus Gallicus and Kelheim type walls. We have done this in order to create a balance between the western Celts (Aedui, Arverni), the Boii and also to consider the walls build by the Getae and Celtiberians. A ramp has not been included on the wall as it causes too many pathfinding problems.

3. Our oppida will include both single tier and double tier structures which will also be painted in colours derived from surviving pieces of Celtic metalwork (coral, enamel etc), fabric and Strabo's description of Celtic clothing patterns. Patterns for the buildings have been adopted from the Waldegesheim burial metalwork.

4. We are including a variety of features common to oppida including workshops, small farmsteads, a nearby water source and a sanctuary. In our case the sanctuary will be placed on the acropolis of the oppida, as was the case as Manching, Zavist and Bibracte. Although when Red Devil starts work on the Tier 3 (proto-oppida) I may ask him to place the sanctuary near the entrance as was the case at Gournay-sur-Aronde and Ribemont-sur-Ancre.

5. As to roads I am still undecided. Complex and large stonework was not beyond the Celts abilities (Murus Gallicus walls, the Roquepertuse sanctuary etc) but I would expect evidence of stone roads to have survived, consider that Roman roads survive to this day. Although you could be right, they could have been removed and relocated to help build the new Gallo-Roman settlements.

Is there anything else I can help you with?

[Ca Putt]

@Roads: while "urban" roadwork would have been dissembled. Roads connecting Settlements were often built over by the romans and most people(in this case archaeologists) understandably are pretty happy with finding a roman road and would not dare to dig deeper(destroying the roman road they just found) to look for possible Celtic roads underneath. Afterall Caesar would not have marched through Gaul the way he did if they did not have roads^^.
Afaik those roads would have been made of(covered with) wood rather than stone tho.

[wangchang]

Hey Brennus,

Thanks a lot.
Yes that does answer a lot of my question, I'll raise just the few that remain :

1. Vegetation, garden or whatever. When I look at those 3D reconsitutions like the Corent, I can't help but think they are incomplete. A few houses separated by vast and bland emptiness, covered in dirt. I just feel like there certainly has been something occupying those.
It would be pretty impossible to tell if there was said ''garden'' or not, since decorations would have been salvaged, and the vegetal layout obviously gone after 2000 years.

Considering the importance of nature, forest, plants, river, stream in the Celt tradition and culture, I find it highly unlikely that their settlements looked like Post apocalyptic Wasteland.

2. Large infrastructures. Gauls were not the most industrialist, I give you that, but settlements of thousands inhabitants consisting of just homes and a few gathering place is highly unlikely.
Sure, Because we can just dig a few rotten remnants of the remnants of a trace of a foundation, it's just difficult to tell anything at all. But as we spoke earlier, it's 99.99% certain that they are missing most of picture, which they admit themselves.

So what about those large infrastructures. I seem to recall that there existed ''universities'' (note the '' ''), at least in Bibactre. I've heard speculations about bathhouses. One can also expect big buildings for all the magistrature and administrative stuff. As well as as some pretty big ''mansion'' ('' '' again). I really find it unlikely again that in a 30 000 settlements there wasn't some big Building. Sometimes with 3 to 4 even 5 floors. Those would have also been the most likely to be salvaged since big usually means more capability.

3. Hygiene? Like canalisation or anything that is almost mandatory for any big town (in any part of the world).


so basically 1 and 2 are long questions with a big introduction and without a ''?''.



bonus : I guess road is indeed tricky. But one thing is even if they 100% existed for sure, they are 100% likely to have been salvaged, as you put it. Usually when people built a new paved road, they would try to use the pavement from the old one if the old one was to become obsolete.
That and the fact that after having installed a massive road system across the territory, it's weird if they can't even pave their own towns (and the road stops at the entrance). And it would also be awful when it rains a lot (by awful I mean really terrible). And the the fact that the corent had Stone canalization in the middle of each roads, which would be weird if the rest wouldn't be paved.
I'm pretty sure you thought about all those, but it can always helps to affirm your position.


PS : don't be intimidated by the size of the question, I'm not necessarily expecting a similar wall of text for the answer

And I guess I did repeat myself a lot again. Damn it, I tried no to.

[athanaric]

1. Vegetation, garden or whatever. When I look at those 3D reconsitutions like the Corent, I can't help but think they are incomplete. A few houses separated by vast and bland emptiness, covered in dirt. I just feel like there certainly has been something occupying those.
It would be pretty impossible to tell if there was said ''garden'' or not, since decorations would have been salvaged, and the vegetal layout obviously gone after 2000 years.

Considering the importance of nature, forest, plants, river, stream in the Celt tradition and culture, I find it highly unlikely that their settlements looked like Post apocalyptic Wasteland.

I agree, and I hate it when there's this "wasteland" in reconstructions, but if you actually put in vegetation as you see fit, it can lead to a host of new issues. For example, many splendid reconstructions of Greek (or Roman) sanctuaries feature vegetation, yet it is often wrongly implemented, showing many trees scattered around the area in places that are almost certainly wrong.
Generally speaking, a bit "what if" isn't really anything to go by, though in the case of EB I'd be more lenient, as it's a piece of art (not an encyclopedia) and there's only so much the creators can do.

[Ailfertes]

3. Hygiene? Like canalisation or anything that is almost mandatory for any big town (in any part of the world).

I would personally love if there were piles of sh*t lying around. After all, we imagine Greek and Roman settlements far too hygienic.

Also, although I'm no archaeologist, I think you should be careful not to overreact in wanting Gaul to be 'civilised'. Rather than adding everything you view to be civilised, you should question your definition of 'civilised'. Your wish to see a lot of floors in any particular house is a good example of that. True, the Romans did build multi-storied insulae, but they did so out of necessity, not want. Despite their being very acquinted with architecture (slightly more so than the gauls in later periods, proven by their engineers in war), those building were really really unstable and prone to collapse. Why would you build 5 floors, adding the difficulty of going upstairs with buckets of water, furniture, amphora of wine, ... if you could simply have a larger house that has only one floor? Also, wouldn't higher buildings be visible by deeper foundations?

The gardens are an interesting aspect, but could it be the 'empty spaces' were used for small-scale horticulture? That's what I've always heard.

[wangchang]

I would personally love if there were piles of sh*t lying around. After all, we imagine Greek and Roman settlements far too hygienic.

Also, although I'm no archaeologist, I think you should be careful not to overreact in wanting Gaul to be 'civilised'. Rather than adding everything you view to be civilised, you should question your definition of 'civilised'. Your wish to see a lot of floors in any particular house is a good example of that. True, the Romans did build multi-storied insulae, but they did so out of necessity, not want. Despite their being very acquinted with architecture (slightly more so than the gauls in later periods, proven by their engineers in war), those building were really really unstable and prone to collapse. Why would you build 5 floors, adding the difficulty of going upstairs with buckets of water, furniture, amphora of wine, ... if you could simply have a larger house that has only one floor? Also, wouldn't higher buildings be visible by deeper foundations?

The gardens are an interesting aspect, but could it be the 'empty spaces' were used for small-scale horticulture? That's what I've always heard.

Yes of course, civilization is not about multi floor buildings. But humans all around the world tend to build them in any developed settlements (== legit city).
The Gauls weren't as industrious as the Romans, so 5 floors insulae wouldn't have worked in their town. And the town weren't massive enough, and not as crucial as in the roman world, to need such apartment.
I won't expand too much on how that work, but usually a ''new'' settlements start with only 1 floor buildings, then more floors appear progressively as more people come, as you can't expand the settlement forever (security purpose). Not only that, but on an individual scale, those who are already in the middle of a city and wish to expand their houses will have no choice but to add 1 or 2 floors to their homes (usually they'll have to rebuild the section entirely, because foundations). Same for the public infrastructures. They have to grow as the settlement expand.
5 Floors would probably be very rare, mostly for the very important infrastructures. And it doesn't necessarily mean that it would be an homogenous repartition, the 5th floor could be much smaller.
So really, not having much multi floors building would mean that : 1. Your settlement is brand new and still have space to expand.
2. Your settlement growth has stagnated.
2. You are too stupid to build more floors.

About the foundations, problem is we haven't found most of them. But even those who found, more often then not, they do not allow us to say whether they supported 1, 2 or even 3 floors. Some do allow you to say for sure that there was only 1 floor, but it's not as common, and usually it's all uncertain.


As for the gardens, yes, a lot of people would probably use those spaces for horticulture. But at the same time, many aren't farmers, and wealthy artisans/magistrate/whatever could afford to grow a garden for aesthetics's sake. And even those doing small scale horticulture may leave some spots for a tree, or some flowers...
So in the end, it would be a bit of both.
It's all speculation, but that looks like the most plausible thing. Empty wasteland with just a few tools lying in the mud doesn't make much sense. And it's pretty ugly.

And about the sh*t, yes, we shouldn't expect those towns to be paragons of hygiene. They should look a bit trashy, especially in the most condensed zones. But there are limits, and at some point, efficient means to evacuate most of the cr*p, dirty water... are mandatory. It doesn't need to be as advanced as what the romans did, more like what was being done in the high medieval age.

Usually I tend to make comparison with High Medieval cities (HRE, france, burgundy...) . Now don't get me wrong, they are completely different things, and Medieval Age people had more advanced techniques and architecture. But they could share some similarities, due to some similarity geopolitical and social context of both society (as a whole, not just cities) (and their buildings seems to share resemblances). And yes I know I have to be careful with comparisons