It is also an interesting example of so-called political risk: your business fortunes being tied too closely to the whims of a State.
> The edification of the sanctuary was possible when the Nabataeans enjoyed the freedom and opportunities offered by the friendship with Rome and the independence of their motherland. In this golden age, from the time of Augustus to that of Trajan (AD 98–117), the Nabataeans accumulated an enormous wealth
but then...
> the trade routes were absorbed into a general network controlled by the State, with very little space for the initiatives of a people no longer independent
In other words: Rome stopped a local vassal community from choking trade via local taxation. Today we might call that free trade, the elimination of local tariffs in favor of a national system to promote unencumbered commerce.
As an aside, historical preservation was used as a pretext for artificial housing supply restrictions in Europe much earlier than in the US. Eventually US property owners caught on. Now any old 20th century box is revered like a Haussmannian mansion in Paris.
We have areas like that here in New Zealand.
https://hamilton.govt.nz/property-rates-and-building/distric...
Probably the world’s only discount supermarket with a built-in museum.
Due to heavy construction in the last decade, there is apparently now a shortage of archaeologists; if you find something while excavating, you’re going to need one.
If you're in Maryland, please vote Alsobrooks for Senate.
That's business as usual everywhere in the world.
I find it harder to put up with when entire neighborhoods successfully lobby for that kind of crap to the detriment of an entire region and then play it off as though it's some sort of win. What really makes my blood boil is when they so thoroughly market their accomplishments like it's some sort of win that their narrative becomes the prevailing narrative.
On the one hand, you have NIMBYs who will block good development for arbitrary and self-destructive reasons, or selfishly support such measures, as long as they're in other neighborhoods.
On the other hand, you have people who redefine "NIMBY" to mean "things I don't like" and use it as a bludgeon to bully and intimidate. So, if a neighborhood doesn't want a loud outdoor concert venue built in the middle of it, then people from other neighborhoods who want the concern venue will call those who refuse in the neighborhood in question NIMBYs. This is ironic, given that they themselves are behaving exactly like NIMBYs: build the concert venue, but not in my backyard!
reminded me of a trattoria in Lecce, where the new owner just wanted to fix the toilet plumbing before its grand opening, but discovered a tomb from a Greek tribe, the remnants of a Franciscan chapel, etchings from the Knights Templar, and a Roman granary.
Who knows, it could've been the best trattoria in all of Italy, but it's another museum now.
Indicates a joke frame.
This submerged temple may lend credence to the Aquatic Ape Hypothesis.
More on this: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/030698...
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/oct/05/italy-supervol...
> Experts say the increased seismic activity is probably linked to a phenomenon known as bradyseism, when the earth rises or falls, depending on the cycle, caused by the filling or emptying of underground magma chambers.