128. Anthemius Harasses Zeno With an Earthquake Machine, Constantinople, Byzantium 6th Century CE

Surely all of us can understand how infuriating it can be when a neighbor builds some damn thing or other that blocks our view.  And then won't take it down. And maybe even laughs. What to do? Take the case to court, obviously. But what if we lose the case, on account of our view-blocking neighbor is a lawyer? Well. We can resort to harassment. With maybe a machine we build that makes the neighbor and his guests think that a bad earthquake is happening, in a region constantly bothered by bad earthquakes. And, hey, let's add in some storm effects.  Our neighbor might be a lawyer, but we are one of the greatest architect/engineers of our day, and probably all of the days to come. Earthquake machine? Not a problem. Anne wants to talk about the history of earthquakes in Byzantium, and found an awesome cat poem written by the historian who gives us this story. Michelle explains to you just why it is that the engineering of Hagia Sophia is so extraordinary that it survives all those earthquakes. And is really big. Anthemius was a hell of an architect/engineer.