Posts

Posted on

Montefortino Helmet

Montefortino Helmet

One of the most critical pieces of Roman armor, the Montefortino helmet used around the 4th century BC, was actually a design borrowed from Celtic warriors.

This helmet featured a simple but life-saving innovation: a small, protruding neck guard at the back.

In the chaos of close-quarters combat, this small flap of metal was designed to deflect downward sword or axe blows aimed at the back of a soldier’s neck.

It was a practical and efficient addition that didn’t add much complexity or cost to the helmet’s production.

The design proved so effective that the Roman Republic adopted it widely, and it became a common sight on the battlefield during major conflicts like the Punic Wars against Carthage.

Initially, soldiers often had to provide their own equipment, but the clear advantages of helmets like the Montefortino led to greater standardization.

This shows the Roman genius for recognizing, adopting, and perfecting effective military technology, regardless of its origin.

The legacy of this simple neck guard can be seen in the design of military helmets for centuries to come, a testament to a feature that saved countless lives.

What’s fascinating is that the Montefortino was not the end of the story for Roman head protection.
It was a starting point that the Romans continuously improved upon.
Later helmets, like the Coolus and the iconic Imperial Gallic types, featured even larger and more refined neck guards.
Roman armorers also added other improvements, such as reinforced brow ridges and more substantial cheek pieces, based on battlefield experience.
This practical approach to military gear, constantly adapting and improving, was a key reason for Rome’s long-standing military dominance.
It shows a deep understanding that protecting the individual soldier was essential for the success of the entire army.
Posted on

Potentially The Most Important Food Article You Will Ever Read

Wheat Gut

Was agriculture “the worst mistake in the history of the human race”? Skeletal analysis shows that early farming communities were shorter-lived and sicker than their hunter-gatherer predecessors – height dropped by 5-6 inches, life expectancy fell by seven years. Studies of prehistoric skeletons reveal a nearly 50% increase in signs of malnutrition (like enamel defects in teeth) and a fourfold rise in iron-deficiency anemia when agriculture took over.

The dark side of wheat is a story about listening – listening to our bodies, to the lessons of history, and to the emerging science that challenges nutritional orthodoxies. It urges us to reconsider the comforting narrative that has placed wheat on a pedestal. Yes, wheat nurtured civilizations and fills bellies in a hungry world. But it may also underlie a great deal of the chronic illness that plagues those very civilizations in the modern era.

https://open.substack.com/pub/sayerji/p/beyond-the-gluten-free-fad-the-unchanged

Posted on

Crisis In Psychiatry

Crying Criminals

Psychiatrists and their membership body, the Royal College of Psychiatrists, consistently lament about the growing crises in their profession. A regular narrative calling for even more Government funding could easily sway members of the public into thinking a higher proportion of their taxes should be spent on mental health. But think again.
Clever and shrewd investors consider the overall value of a service in a given industry or profession. Amongst other things, they look at value for money, the longevity of a product and its workability. Psychiatry however falls down on all of these points and it’s not because of money or staff.
Psychiatry is fundamentally flawed. A constantly revolving mental health door indicates failing and damaging outcomes of psychiatric “treatments”. Whether it’s voluntary or involuntary “treatment”, patients are being harmed and dying as a result of prescribed psychiatric drugs and brain-damaging ECT. In any other profession, these failures would result in probable closure while also generating court proceedings and custodial sentences. The fact that psychiatry continues in its same operating patterns indicates the profession is currently operating with impunity.
Silence about psychiatric damage and the abject failures is not an option.
Posted on

Paying Attention

Paying Attention

How many ways do we have of saying this?

Stay in present time.
Concentrate.
Ignore distractions.
Pay attention.
Stop dwelling on the past.
Focus.
Don’t get pulled off purpose.
Stay the path.
Discipline yourself.

And how many mental techniques and administrative tools have we developed to helps us remember and do the above?

And why is all the above it necessary?

Quite simply it is because your attention is pulled out of present time and into the past by losses and moments of pain and unconsciousness.

For instance, have you ever had a disagreement or argument with a person and walked away without resolving it, continuing to stew on it?

Ever had someone say something unkind or unpleasant to you and thought about it on and off for days?

Let’s look at how this plays out in real life. Let’s say arbitrarily that you have 1000 units of attention you can apply to thinking or any other task you are doing, like driving your car.

Let’s assume that when you have an argument, disagreement or loss you lose just one attention unit from your potential maximum that you have to focus on things. Just one in a thousand. Not a lot. Just .1 of a percent.

After you look over your past life you might be forgiven for wondering how you can still function at all, considering you’ve most likely had more than 1,000 times in your life when you have hit your arm, bumped your shin, taken the skin off your knee, been invalidated by another in school, jilted romantically, not gotten the exam result, job or promotion you expected, been rebuffed by a partner… …the list of ways you can experience loss is almost endless!

In fact, one researcher estimated that the average person has only 30% of their attention units still in present time. That 70% of the average person’s attention units were encysted or trapped in past losses.

That’s a pretty sobering thought, when you consider the average person drives around with only 30% of their available attention units available to them. On the same roads as you and me!

Sort of goes some way to explaining some of the things you see when out and about. That and a lack or personal ethics. But that’s another story for another day.

You may have even seen somebody do something pretty wild and wondered to yourself, or even out loud, “What in heaven’s name does he think he’s doing? Where IS he?” Meaning he is not here, accurately observing his environment as it is in present time.

Truth is, he actually IS someWHEN else as well as someWHERE else. Too many of his attention units are not here in present time, where he is now. They are stuck back in time and at a place where he experienced a loss.

This all seems pretty grim until you learn there is a way you can recover these attention units from the past and place them at your disposal in present time.

In a simple exercise, done at home, in your own time and at your own pace that takes just 15 minutes a day. From a book that costs less than $50 including postage.

Contact me if you would like to naturally and comfortably have more attention units in present time.