Ancient History Magazine

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EDITORIAL – SUN AND FUN WITH THE ANCIENTS

he past year has been difficult to say the least; for many of us, it was fraught with anxiety, loneliness, and uncertainty. After such a turbulent year, I personally longed for a little levity, and as London slowly opens back up and comes to life, a little fun, too. This issue came about through that longing; I wondered, how did the ancients have fun? Obviously, there were no Netflix series to binge, no Zoom with friends, no social media to endlessly scroll through, or a million other things that we have the luxury of escaping into in our present time, so I decided to explore that avenue and set about planning a lighter issue around summer, fun, and plain old enjoyment. There were plagues, wars, famines, and strife thousands of years ago, but surely people still knew how to have a good time? What did that look like? What games did they play? How much did their ideas of “fun” differ from ours? From wild symposia to board games, from sports to music, we will find out exactly how the ancients made the most of their free time, and what sort of fun has endured across the centuries. I don’t think we are really so vastly different when it comes

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