MPJ

Not so long ago I mentioned the great city of Alexandria in the post  Constantine & Naissus when I described the horrible misfortune and death of Hypatia, one of the greatest philosophers and astronomers of the 4th century AD, who lived at the very end of the classical Greek era of prosperity. Within the same city walls, a couple of centuries before, one of the greatest and most famous scientists of all time, Claudius Ptolemy, was living, exploring, teaching, and dedicating his life to various disciplines, including astronomy and, of course, the unavoidable  astrology, which was considered to be "connected science" for centuries, especially in the old ages. Rachel Weisz as Hypatia of Alexandria in Agora (2009) Among other things, Ptolemy will be remembered as one of the first scholars who described and identified 48 constellations of clear and unpolluted nightly skies above Alexandria so many centuries ago. One of the biggest constellations in his list was the ...

A couple of centuries after Christ, Constantine was a very popular name. Especially among soldiers in the Roman and Byzantine empires, along with Greeks during their Macedonian age. Within Latin, Cōnstantīnus, and Greek, Κωνσταντῖνος (Kōnstantînos), the name literally means the one who's constant and steadfast, especially within military properties related to strength and stamina. In those times the land of my current location was called Moesia Superior , with the city of Naissus in the role of its main trade center and biggest military outpost for the Roman army. Today's name of the city is "Niš", the largest city of southern Serbia and also the city where I was born and where I have lived ever since. The Serbian usage of the name is "Konstantin", and even though it is not related to the the military anymore, the name is fairly popular nowadays among young Serbians. It was third on my list when my son was born simply because I really like names with strong ...