THE PROVENANCE OF DONKEY MILLS FROM ROMAN BRITAIN

Pompeiian-style (hourglass) grain mills are common at many Roman sites within the circum-Mediterranean countries. Three examples are known from Corfe Mullen, London and Hamworthy in southern Britain. Petrographic examination, chemical and microprobe analyses indicate that the Corfe Mullen millstone and the London donkey mill were imported from central France into southern Britain. The Hamworthy mill should be designated a ‘flat donkey mill’, and represents a recent (post-Roman) import from a volcanic source in Sardinia. There is no evidence of importation of Roman donkey mills from Germany or for transportation of such mills (or stylistic derivatives) north of London.     

THERMOLUMINESCENCE DATING OF MATERIALS WHICH EXHIBIT ANOMALOUS FADING

This article reports a generalised and systematic approach to the thermoluminescence (TL) dating of samples which suffer from anomalous fading. We hypothesise that the TL signal from each mineral phase is composed of a stable and an unstable portion. The decay of the unstable TL is accelerated thermally, until only stable TL remains. The dating is then carried out on this stable signal. The results, on four known-age, coeval samples, exhibiting gross anomalous fading (25-50% loss over a few days), indicate that many, if not all, samples may successfully be dated with this approach.     

WORDSWORTH and LAKE DISTRICT TOURISM: ROMANTIC RESHAPING OF LANDSCAPE

Creative literature colours popular perception of landscape and place. An analysis of English romanticism, Wordsworth's poetry in particular, illustrates how the transformation of an actual landscape into a literary landscape helped change attitudes toward wilderness and natural beauty. The romantic ideology fostered impressions of an idyllic, untamed eden. In response to public fascination with this mythologized and emotional portrait of place, a tourist landscape emerged. Thus even those unfamiliar with romantic literature are encouraged to see particular landscapes from a literary perspective.
Dans la formation d'une perception envers un paysage ou un endroit, un élément important est souvent la littérature imaginaire. Une analyse du romantisme anglais, en particulier la poésie de Wordsworth, démontre comment la transformation d'un paysage actuel sous une forme littéraire contribua fortement à un changement d'attitude envers la nature. Cette idéologie romantique encouragea la notion d'un jardin d'Eden encore sau-vage. la fascination entretenue par ce portrait mythique créa finalement un environnement touristique. Même ceux qui n'ont guère connaissance en littérature romantique ont une vision d'un paysage particulier qui dérive dune perception littéraire.     

PARETO EXTRAPOLATION USING GROUPED INCOME DATA*

ABSTRACT. The distribution of above-median income groups can be described accurately by OLS regression of the Pareto distribution. The excellent fit of log-linear regression has led some researchers to conclude that extrapolated income measures in the open end of the distribution are reliable. The analysis of income distribution data for metropolitan areas reveals: (1) that OLS tends to consistently overestimate the number of families in the tail, and (2) that the overestimation can have serious implications for hypothesis testing.     

PRODUCTION TECHNOLOGY UNCERTAINTY AND THE OPTIMAL LOCATION OF THE FIRM*

ABSTRACT This paper investigates the implication of production-technology uncertainty for the exclusion theorem. The paper presents the result that the risk-averse firm facing production technology uncertainty prefers an intermediate location to avoid risk under certain conditions. The firm chooses an intermediate location (over a corner location) particularly if its degree of risk aversion overwhelms the inherent convexity of profit with respect to location. The latter depends, in turn, on the structure of production technology characterized by the elasticity of substitution and returns to scale parameters.     

THE EFFECTS OF LOCAL TAXES AND PUBLIC SERVICES ON RESIDENTIAL DEVELOPMENT PATTERNS*

ABSTRACT. This paper incorporates an exogenous taxing and service-providing public sector into a dynamic residential land-use model in order to examine how local-government fiscal policies alter the pace and pattern of residential development. The model is used to derive the comparative-dynamic responses to variations in the income, sales, and property taxes and public-service time paths. The results show how tax and expenditure effects systematically depend upon the anticipated relative growth rates in rents to alternative uses and vary across locations within a given urban area as well as across urban areas themselves.     

MEASURING THE EFFECT OF COST VARIATION ON INDUSTRIAL OUTPUTS*

ABSTRACT. This paper introduces the household interactive variable input-output (HIVIO) model to measure the effect of cost variation on industrial outputs. The model produces a variety of cost elasticities that separate out impacts on industrial prices, imports, and outputs, with “own” and “cross” elasticity components. Like the conventional input-output multipliers, these cost elasticities can be useful parameters to evaluate the substituting behavior of firms and consumers. By using the 1980 Korean input-output transactions table, we find the wage and import price effects on industrial prices, outputs, and import demands.