Studenda Mira

Bill & Ted used a time-traveling phone booth, but in a pinch, a tatty old Ford Taurus will also do. This funny series of history-themed ads for Snickers candy bars has recently begun airing in the U.S.: You can find episodes 2-8 (!) here .

An overnight fire at Rome's Cinecitta Studios has destroyed the sets of the recently-completed HBO/BBC television series, "Rome." The older areas of the studio, where "Ben Hur" was filmed, were undamaged. On a mostly unrelated note, the show's storyline ended in 30 BC, but it wasn't until AD 6 that Augustus got around to establishing a fire brigade ... Update : The original link to the Times story has vanished, but here's ABC News to the rescue. Also, a clarification on the supposed destruction of the "Rome" sets: The main set of "Rome," which includes a mock Roman forum, wasn't destroyed, but other parts were heavily damaged, said HBO spokeswoman Mara Mikialian.

Anyone considering applying to the AIRC's field school, as featured in the previous post, should know that working on a dig can be very physically demanding. The field school tuition does provide a daily meal to keep your constitution up, but it's unlikely that any actual artifacts are on the menu. Should you actually feel like chowing down on a piece of history, tonight's episode of Ace of Cakes featured a birthday cake in the shape of the helmet from the Sutton Hoo ship burial .

This is premiering on the History Channel next weekend. So much for the mostly-benign Christian metamorphoses of Late Antiquity, huh?