The purpose of this blog is the creation of an open, international, independent and free forum, where every UFO-researcher can publish the results of his/her research. The languagues, used for this blog, are Dutch, English and French.You can find the articles of a collegue by selecting his category. Each author stays resposable for the continue of his articles. As blogmaster I have the right to refuse an addition or an article, when it attacks other collegues or UFO-groupes.
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Deze blog is opgedragen aan mijn overleden echtgenote Lucienne.
In 2012 verloor ze haar moedige strijd tegen kanker!
In 2011 startte ik deze blog, omdat ik niet mocht stoppen met mijn UFO-onderzoek.
BEDANKT!!!
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UFO'S of UAP'S, ASTRONOMIE, RUIMTEVAART, ARCHEOLOGIE, OUDHEIDKUNDE, SF-SNUFJES EN ANDERE ESOTERISCHE WETENSCHAPPEN - DE ALLERLAATSTE NIEUWTJES
UFO's of UAP'S in België en de rest van de wereld Ontdek de Fascinerende Wereld van UFO's en UAP's: Jouw Bron voor Onthullende Informatie!
Ben jij ook gefascineerd door het onbekende? Wil je meer weten over UFO's en UAP's, niet alleen in België, maar over de hele wereld? Dan ben je op de juiste plek!
België: Het Kloppend Hart van UFO-onderzoek
In België is BUFON (Belgisch UFO-Netwerk) dé autoriteit op het gebied van UFO-onderzoek. Voor betrouwbare en objectieve informatie over deze intrigerende fenomenen, bezoek je zeker onze Facebook-pagina en deze blog. Maar dat is nog niet alles! Ontdek ook het Belgisch UFO-meldpunt en Caelestia, twee organisaties die diepgaand onderzoek verrichten, al zijn ze soms kritisch of sceptisch.
Nederland: Een Schat aan Informatie
Voor onze Nederlandse buren is er de schitterende website www.ufowijzer.nl, beheerd door Paul Harmans. Deze site biedt een schat aan informatie en artikelen die je niet wilt missen!
Internationaal: MUFON - De Wereldwijde Autoriteit
Neem ook een kijkje bij MUFON (Mutual UFO Network Inc.), een gerenommeerde Amerikaanse UFO-vereniging met afdelingen in de VS en wereldwijd. MUFON is toegewijd aan de wetenschappelijke en analytische studie van het UFO-fenomeen, en hun maandelijkse tijdschrift, The MUFON UFO-Journal, is een must-read voor elke UFO-enthousiasteling. Bezoek hun website op www.mufon.com voor meer informatie.
Samenwerking en Toekomstvisie
Sinds 1 februari 2020 is Pieter niet alleen ex-president van BUFON, maar ook de voormalige nationale directeur van MUFON in Vlaanderen en Nederland. Dit creëert een sterke samenwerking met de Franse MUFON Reseau MUFON/EUROP, wat ons in staat stelt om nog meer waardevolle inzichten te delen.
Let op: Nepprofielen en Nieuwe Groeperingen
Pas op voor een nieuwe groepering die zich ook BUFON noemt, maar geen enkele connectie heeft met onze gevestigde organisatie. Hoewel zij de naam geregistreerd hebben, kunnen ze het rijke verleden en de expertise van onze groep niet evenaren. We wensen hen veel succes, maar we blijven de autoriteit in UFO-onderzoek!
Blijf Op De Hoogte!
Wil jij de laatste nieuwtjes over UFO's, ruimtevaart, archeologie, en meer? Volg ons dan en duik samen met ons in de fascinerende wereld van het onbekende! Sluit je aan bij de gemeenschap van nieuwsgierige geesten die net als jij verlangen naar antwoorden en avonturen in de sterren!
Heb je vragen of wil je meer weten? Aarzel dan niet om contact met ons op te nemen! Samen ontrafelen we het mysterie van de lucht en daarbuiten.
26-10-2022
Warriors of the Pharaoh
Warriors of the Pharaoh
The Ancient Egyptians faced many foes during their long history, including the Hyksos, the Hittites and the ‘Sea Peoples’, all of which stimulated advancements in military technology.
Hemmed in by natural barriers – the desert, the Mediterranean and the Red Sea – the ancient Egyptians were mostly concerned with staving off threats from the desert tribes and the Nubians to the south.
A ‘forward policy’ emerged, by which the Egyptians pushed aggressively into neighbouring territories, and this evolved until the Egyptians were campaigning in Syria, Libya, Nubia and the Kush. The pharaoh’s status as a warrior king became of paramount importance.
During the New Kingdom period, ancient Egyptian military might reached its zenith, with war chariots and siege craft increasingly important, although the use of actual siege engines appears to have been limited.
Charioteers
Chariots were not a traditional part of the ancient Egyptian army until they encountered them in their expeditions into Asia, along with other new military technologies.
The ancient Egyptians of the Old and Middle Kingdoms did not even make much use of horses, except for scouting and delivering messages.
The Hyksos invasion of ancient Egypt, which resulted in them gaining control over areas in the eastern delta, was originally thought to have been facilitated by the widespread use of chariots, but that is now disputed.
What is clear is that the ancient Egyptians learned about chariots and quickly embraced the concept. Steady improvements in design – the wheels were at first solid, then made with four spokes and later with six – made chariots sturdier and faster, but they remained primarily a missile platform in the ancient Egyptian army.
This contrasted with the use of chariots by other peoples. The Hittites, for example, manned heavy chariots with three men – a driver and two spear-wielding troops. For the ancient Egyptians, two-man crews in a lighter chariot worked best, with a driver and an archer teaming up.
Thousands of these chariots could harass an enemy effectively from a safe distance, and by the time of the New Kingdom, arrowheads were bronze rather than the original flint.
The chariot soon became the most prestigious element on the battlefield, and pharaohs are often depicted wielding a bow from a chariot. The gold-plated example found in the tomb of Tutankhamun confirms that they were highly regarded symbols of military prowess.
Weaponry
The heavy spear was the main weapon throughout the different phases of the ancient Egyptian army. It was used as a thrusting weapon rather than being thrown like a javelin, and used in conjunction with a wide, wooden shield. Spearheads were originally flint or copper, becoming bronze in later periods.
Heavy infantry would advance towards an enemy in formation, presenting a wall of shields over which the spears could be thrust.
This should not be mistaken for the highly disciplined use of shields and spears in the Greek phalanx tactics, however – Egyptian spears were far shorter.
A shield would typically be about 85cm (33in) in length, and heavily decorated ceremonial shields were often buried with pharaohs and other dignitaries. They were also carried by chariot drivers.
Axes were an important secondary weapon, and a variety of axehead designs were developed. Strictly a close-range weapon, a bronze axehead would be affixed to a wooden pole and used in a slashing motion.
Bows were originally made from animal horn, then wood, and the composite design had been adopted by the time of the New Kingdom.
This design added range and power, but made the weapon harder to wield, so simpler bows never fell out of use completely.
Infantry
During the New Kingdom, the ancient Egyptian military became a far more organized and effective fighting force. Nowhere was this more apparent than within the ranks of the infantry.
By the time of Ramesses II this was a highly sophisticated arm. Troops were divided into divisions of around 5,000 men. In the army Ramesses took into battle at Kadesh, he had four such divisions, named ‘Amun’, ‘Ra’, ‘Ptah’ and ‘Sutekh’.
Each division was divided into 20 companies of 250 men each, with further divisions down to platoons of 50. Platoons were commanded by the ‘great ones of the fifty’.
The heavy infantry wore no armour, but carried large shields and had spears as their main weapon, along with axes and swords.
Complementing the heavy foot soldiers were archers, by now recruited in ancient Egypt and armed with composite bows. Their job was to disrupt the enemy from a distance while the heavy infantry formations closed to engage.
Archers often went into battle on chariots, enabling them to keep their distance from the enemy. If forced to fight, they had small shields and daggers.
There was a solid logistical system to keep the men and horses fed and watered, including a sizeable baggage train and supply ships.
Navy
The ancient Egyptian navy was originally limited mainly to use on the Nile, but it did serve a function as a supply and transportation arm. It was never considered separate from the army itself.
Ships could either be made from reeds or from wooden planks, the latter being more suited to engaging in battle.
During the reign of Ramesses III, ancient Egypt was threatened by the ‘Sea Peoples’, and naval engagements were fought in which the ancient Egyptians appear to have won through superior tactics, despite having inferior ship designs.
In an echo of Egypt’s chariot tactics, they employed lighter ships to harass the enemy from a distance, peppering them with fire from bows and slingshots.
Source:
David Smith. All About History – Book of Pharaohs
Bas-relief of Thutmose III dominating his enemies. Karnak temple pylon.
Expedition ship to Punt: The ancient Egyptians sailed the high seas in large ships with oars and square sails, like this one. Papyrus copy of one of the ships sent to the country of Punt by Queen Hatshepsut, depicted at Deir el-Bahari.
Bronze Egyptian Khopesh with the name of Pharaoh Ramses II.
Bahariya Oasis: The Fabulous Valley of the Golden Mummies
Bahariya Oasis: The Fabulous Valley of the Golden Mummies
In 1996, Egyptologist Zahi Hawass noticed impressive flashes from the bottom of a hole in an oasis in Egypt’s desert. This led to the discovery of several tombs containing mummies from the Greco-Roman period; they all had incredible golden decorations.
Greco-Roman mummies
The Valley of the Golden Mummies is located 15 minutes from El Bawiti, in the Bahariya Oasis, about 400 kilometers from Cairo.
Although there are traces of a Palaeolithic population in the area, it was during the Middle Kingdom that this green dot in the middle of the desert attracted the attention of the ancient Egyptian rulers. Trade routes and nomads converged there, becoming a defensive enclave of the western borders.
Bahariya flourished most especially from the 26th dynasty and after the arrival of Alexander the Great and the Ptolemies.
Most of the mummies discovered relate to the Greco-Roman period (between the 4th century BC and the 4th century AD) when the oasis served as a center for exporting wine to the rest of the Nile Valley.
The excavation led by Hawass discovered that the oasis’s population, mostly made up of artisans and merchants, had been buried in family pantheons that had accumulated mummies of men, women, and children of various ages over time. These are the Golden Mummies and are dressed splendidly in beautiful cartonnage and masks covered with fine layers of gold on stucco.
Egyptian and Greek elements
Mummification in the Greco-Roman era emphasized the mummy’s external appearance. The corpse, once emptied, was reinforced with sticks or reeds and covered with large amounts of resin.
“You could still smell the resin used,” Hawass notes, recalling the moment he entered the tombs. Later, they would wrap the mummy in a linen bandage formed of intricate geometric patterns that gave it a sense of depth.
Sometimes, the funerary mask was modeled with papyrus cardboard plastered and painted on the torso and face of the deceased. In the case of wealthy families, this was covered with fine layers of gold.
The decoration of the bandages and masks of the Bahariya mummies shows a striking combination of Egyptian and Greek elements.
Greco-Roman hairstyles were represented alongside images of ancient Egyptian gods, such as Isis, Anubis, and Horus. A female mummy found in a wooden sarcophagus had a stele at her feet that showed the deceased dressed in a Roman style and heading for the threshold of a door that would lead her to resurrection.
Some obsidian, marble, or glass plates were placed on the face of some mummies. These symbolized the eyes and eyelids and gave life to the gaze of the deceased.
Mummies belonging to the less favored classes of the oasis have been found in very poor states of preservation—they were wrapped carelessly during mummification and were not deposited inside any sarcophagus in the tombs.
Anthropomorphic sarcophagi made of terracotta have also been found, and sometimes poignant elements appear. For example, a female mummy whose face had been cast to the side so she could contemplate the mummy of her husband, lying next to her, who had died earlier.
Tombs and grave goods
Most of the tombs discovered have a similar structure. There are access steps leading to a small room where the body of the deceased was received.
Then, a small corridor leads to the lateral niches where the corpses were deposited. Here, there are tombs resembling a kind of catacomb where the mummies were simply piled up.
Some tombs show the god Anubis weighing the heart of the deceased alongside the feather of Maat before Osiris as decoration.
Statues of mourners and of the god Bes, protector of the home, have been found in grave goods such as offering vessels with remains of wine, food, and bronze, silver, copper, faience, and ivory jewelry.
Coins from the Greco-Roman period have also been found, one of them from the reign of the famous Cleopatra VII.
Among the most notable finds is the limestone sarcophagus that hid the mummy of Bahariya’s 26th dynasty governor, Djed-Khonsu-euf-Ankh, and the mummies of his wife Nesa II, his brother, and his father.
The tombs of Ta-Nefret-Bastet, Ped-Ashtar, and Thaty are from the same period and were looted during Roman times and were later reused.
The Valley of the Golden Mummies is one of the most important discoverable sites of Egypt’s Greco-Roman period, and its study is still far from over. In the words of Hawass, the excavation in the Bahariya area could last decades and is expected to discover more than 10,000 mummies during its course.
Source: Barbara Ramirez, National Geographic
Archaeologist Mohammed Ayadi cleans some of the golden mummies found at Bahariya Oasis.
Photo: AP
View of the oasis of Bahariya, in Egypt, in the vicinity of which the Valley of the Golden Mummies was discovered.
Photo: iStock
Sarcophagus belonging to the brother of the governor of Bahariya during the 26th dynasty, discovered in 2004.
DINOSAURUSSEN KREGEN NA METEORIETINSLAG OOK NOG EEN MONSTERLIJKE TSUNAMI TE VERWERKEN
DINOSAURUSSEN KREGEN NA METEORIETINSLAG OOK NOG EEN MONSTERLIJKE TSUNAMI TE VERWERKEN
Caroline Kraaijvanger
Op sommige plekken zouden zelfs meer dan een kilometer hoge golven zijn ontstaan.
Zo’n 66 miljoen jaar geleden sloeg een enorme ruimtesteen op aarde in. De inslag leidde tot het uitsterven van tal van planten- en diersoorten, waarvan de dinosaurussen veruit de bekendste slachtoffers zijn.
Tsunami De afgelopen jaren is er veel onderzoek gedaan naar de inslag en de gevolgen daarvan. Zo gaan onderzoekers er bijvoorbeeld van uit dat de inslag grote hoeveelheden stof in de atmosfeer bracht, waardoor zonlicht werd tegengehouden en de temperaturen wereldwijd sterk daalden. Maar behalve een jarenlange winter kregen de organismen die de inslag in eerste instantie overleefden nog meer voor de kiezen, zo wijst nieuw onderzoek uit. Zo zou de inslag ook een monstertsunami hebben voortgebracht die zelfs duizenden kilometers verderop grote schade aanrichtte.
Model en geologische data De onderzoekers trekken die conclusie – eerder deze maand gepubliceerd in het blad AGU Advances – onder meer op basis van modellen. Die modellen werden ingezet om het pad en de kracht van de tsunami te achterhalen. Vervolgens gebruikten de onderzoekers geologische gegevens, verzameld op meer dan 100 plaatsen wereldwijd die de tsunami volgens het model heeft aangedaan, om na te gaan of ze sporen van die tsunami konden vinden. En dat lukte, zo vertelt onderzoeker Molly Range. “De tsunami was sterk genoeg om de sedimenten in de oceaan te verstoren of eroderen.” Het resultaat is dat onderzoekers op plekken die de tsunami heeft bezocht door elkaar gehusselde sedimentlagen aantreffen of zelfs complete sedimentlagen missen. “De distributie van de erosie en hiaten in de mariene sedimenten daterend uit het einde van het Krijt, zijn in lijn met de resultaten van ons model,” aldus onderzoeker Molly Range.
Superkrachtige tsunami Het model en de geologische gegevens schetsen zo samen een vrij eenduidig en angstaanjagend beeld. “Onze simulaties laten zien dat de tsunami zo groot was dat metershoge golven het leeuwendeel van ‘s werelds kustlijnen bereikten,” vertelt Range aan Scientias.nl. “Het is dan ook bijna onmogelijk om deze tsunami te vergelijken met moderne tsunami’s.” Maar als we dat dan toch willen proberen, komt eigenlijk zelfs de krachtigste tsunami uit de recente geschiedenis niet eens in de buurt; in vergelijking met de tsunami die in 2004 in de Indische Oceaan ontstond en honderdduizenden levens eiste, was de tsunami die zo’n 66 miljoen jaar geleden ontstond nog eens 30.000 keer krachtiger.
Golven Zo’n 2,5 minuut nadat de ruimtesteen insloeg zou ejecta – door de inslag weggeslingerd materiaal – als een soort gordijn rond de plaats van inslag hebben gehangen en een muur van water bij de inslag vandaan hebben geduwd. Die muur van water zou heel kort tot wel 4,5 kilometer hoog zijn geweest, maar zijn ingestort toen ook het ejecta weer naar beneden stortte. Het ejecta stortte daarbij deels in het water, waardoor weer nieuwe, zeer chaotische golven ontstonden. “Na tien minuten was al het ejecta gevallen en bleef er op zo’n 220 kilometer van de plaats van inslag een 1,5 kilometer hoge, ringvormige golf over die zich door dieper water bleef verspreiden,” zo schrijven de onderzoekers.
Ongeveer een uur na de inslag had deze golf zich tot buiten de hedendaagse Golf van Mexico verspreid en het noordelijke deel van de Atlantische Oceaan al bereikt. En zo’n vier uur later was ook de Stille Oceaan door de tsunami beroerd. 24 uur na de inslag hadden de golven de Atlantische en Stille Oceaan al doorkruist en – dus van twee zijden – de Indische Oceaan bereikt. Zo’n 48 uur na de inslag hadden flinke golven bijna alle kustlijnen wereldwijd aangedaan.
Overstromingen In de Golf van Mexico zouden de golven in open water een hoogte van meer dan 100 meter hebben bereikt. Op het moment dat de golven de kustlijnen langs het noordelijke deel van de Atlantische Oceaan en het zuidelijke deel van de Stille Oceaan naderden, zouden de golven al flink lager zijn geworden, maar nog wel altijd meer dan 10 meter hoog zijn geweest. Maar doordat de nog altijd hoge golven bij het naderen van de kust door ondieper water bewogen, zouden ze kort voor ze aan land gingen juist weer aanzienlijk hoger zijn geworden. “De meeste kustgebieden zouden in zekere mate overstroomd en geërodeerd zijn,” stellen de onderzoekers.
Regionale verschillen Hoewel dus sprake was van een wereldwijde tsunami, was de impact die deze op de kustgebieden had overigens niet overal even groot. Zo moeten de kustlijnen langs het noordelijke deel van de Atlantische Oceaan bijvoorbeeld veel meer te verduren hebben gehad dan de kustlijnen langs het zuidelijke deel van de Atlantische Oceaan en de Middellandse Zee. “Dat deze (laatstgenoemde, red.) gebieden enigszins gespaard werden, heeft alles te maken met de ligging van het land,” legt Range aan Scientias.nl uit. “Landen of continenten vormen een blokkade wanneer de golf door de oceaan reist. Zo zie je bijvoorbeeld dat wanneer de tsunami van de Golf van Mexico vandaan reist, er landbarrières zijn tussen de plaats van inslag en het Mediterrane gebied.”
Vervolgonderzoek Hoewel onderzoekers in grove lijnen dus wel een beeld hebben van de impact die de tsunami op kustlijnen heeft gehad, is meer onderzoek hard nodig. Zo willen de wetenschappers bijvoorbeeld gaan uitzoeken in hoeverre de tsunami op verschillende plaatsen tot overstromingen leidde. “We zijn daarbij met name geïnteresseerd in hoe ver de tsunami de Western Interior Seaway (een voormalige zeestraat die het huidige Noord-Amerika in tweeën splitste, red.) in wist te reizen.”
Het onderzoek moet uiteindelijk meer inzicht geven in de wijze waarop die enorme inslag 66 miljoen jaar geleden van invloed was op onze planeet en alles wat daarop leefde. “De inslag had veel belangrijke gevolgen die eerder al zijn gedocumenteerd,” vertelt Range. “Grote branden, enorme fluctuaties in temperatuur (zowel heel warm als heel koud), vernietiging en herschikking van overheersende levensvormen op aarde, enzovoort.En de tsunami was een ander, heel belangrijk gevolg.”
Meet the first Neanderthal FAMILY! 59,000-year-old remains of individuals discovered in a cave in Russia are confirmed to be a father, his teenage daughter and two second-degree relatives
Meet the first Neanderthal FAMILY! 59,000-year-old remains of individuals discovered in a cave in Russia are confirmed to be a father, his teenage daughter and two second-degree relatives
Remains of a family of Neanderthals have been identified in a Siberian cave
This included a father, teenage daughter and a pair of second-degree relatives
The communities living in the caves were found to have low genetic diversity
They were also primarily linked by female migration between the groups
Remains of the first ever family of Neanderthals have been discovered in a cave in southern Siberia, Russia.
Researchers from the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Germany analysed the DNA of 13 individuals from two caves in the Altai Mountains.
Individuals from the Chagyrskaya cave, who date back around 59,000 years, were found to be closely related, including a father and his teenage daughter, along with a pair of second-degree relatives.
This is the first known description of social organisation of a small community of Neanderthals.
First author Laurits Skov said: 'The fact that they were living at the same time is very exciting. This means that they likely came from the same social community.
'So, for the first time, we can use genetics to study the social organisation of a Neanderthal community.'
Remains of the first ever family of Neanderthals have been discovered in a cave in southern Siberia, Russia. Pictured: artist's interpretation of a Neanderthal father and his daughter
For the study, Dr Laurits Skov and colleagues obtained and analysed genetic data from the 17 remains of 11 Neanderthal individuals from Chagyrskaya Cave and two from Okladnikov Cave. Pictured: The remains from Okladnikov Cave discussed in this study
Relationships of the Chagyrskaya and Okladnikov remains. Each circle/square represents an individual (blue for Chagyrskaya, orange for Okladnikov). Squares indicate that the individual is male and circles indicate that the individual is female
THE CHAGYRSKAYA AND OKLADNIKOV NEANDERTHALS
Neanderthals briefly occupied the Chagyrskaya and Okladnikov caves around 54,000 years ago.
They hunted animals that migrated through the nearby river valleys, using tools made from stones that were collected dozens of miles away.
Evidence has been found of a Neanderthal family who lived in the communities, comprising of a father and his teenage daughter, as well as a pair of second degree relatives.
Short lived genetic variants that are shared between individuals suggest they all lived and died around the same time.
Genetic diversity was very low within the group, and evidence suggests that different communities were primarily linked by female migration.
Neanderthals occupied western Eurasia from around 430,000 to 40,000 years ago and are closely related to modern humans.
The species lived in Africa with early humans for millennia before moving across to Europe around 300,000 years ago.
They were later joined by humans, who entered Eurasia around 48,000 years ago.
Southern Siberia has previously been very fruitful for ancient DNA research, and is the location of the Denisova Cave, where Denisovan hominin remains were found.
Denisovans are another population of early humans who lived in Asia at least 80,000 years ago and were distantly related to Neanderthals.
The new study looked at remains found in the Chagyrskaya Cave and Okladnikov Cave, both about 60 miles (100 kilometres) away from the Denisova Cave.
Neanderthals briefly occupied these sites around 54,000 years ago, leaving several hundred thousand stone tools and animal bones.
They hunted ibex, horses, bison and other animals that migrated through the nearby river valleys, and collected raw materials for their tools from dozens of miles away.
More than 80 bone and tooth fragments of Neanderthals have also been collected, which revealed that groups inhabiting the Chagyrskaya and Okladnikov caves were closely linked.
The new study looks at remains from the Chagyrskaya Cave (left) and Okladnikov Cave (right), both about 100 kilometres away from the Denisova Cave in Siberia, Russia
Locations of all of the sites with Neanderthal remains from whom nuclear DNA has been extracted, with a close-up of the Chagyrskaya and Okladnikov caves in the Altai region of Siberia. The number of individuals is given in parentheses for sites with multiple individuals
Neanderthals briefly occupied the Chagyrskaya and Okladnikov caves around 54,000 years ago, leaving several hundred thousand stone tools (pictured) and animal bones
Since the first Neanderthal draft genome was published in 2010, researchers from the German institution have sequenced a further 18 genomes from 14 different archaeological sites in Eurasia.
While this genetic data provided insights into the broader history of the ancient people, little was revealed about individual communities.
For the study, published today in Nature, Dr Skov and colleagues obtained and analysed genetic data from the remains of 11 Neanderthal individuals from Chagyrskaya Cave and two from Okladnikov Cave.
It is the largest known genetic study of Neanderthals reported to date.
These 13 people were seven men and six women, of which eight were adults and five were children and young adolescents.
This included a Neanderthal father and his teenage daughter, as well as a pair of second degree relatives: a young boy and an adult female.
These two could be cousins, aunt and nephew or grandmother and grandson.
The researchers also looked at the DNA within the Neanderthals' mitochondria, and found special kinds of genetic variants called 'heteroplasmies' shared between individuals.
These are passed through the female line and only persist for a small number of generations, suggesting that they all lived and died at around the same time.
More than 80 bone and tooth fragments of Neanderthals have been collected from the Chagyrskaya and Okladnikov caves. Pictured: Dental (left) and other (right) remains from the Chagyrskaya Cave used in this study
Genetic diversity of the Neanderthals is much lower than those recorded for any ancient or present-day human community, and is more similar to that of a group of endangered animals that are the last of their species. Pictured: Average proportion of the genome that inherited the same versions of a genomic marker from each parent (homozygosity) for Chagyrskaya Neanderthals (blue), early modern humans (orange) and present-day gorilla (green) and human populations (coloured according to the geographical region - see colour key)
The mitochondrial DNA also gave an insight into the genetic diversity within the community, which is very low and consistent with a group size of 10 to 20 people.
This is much lower than those recorded for any ancient or present-day human community, and is more similar to that of a group of endangered animals that are the last of their species.
It was also found that the genetic diversity of Y chromosomes, which pass down the male line, was a lot lower than that of the mitochondrial DNA, which is inherited from mothers.
This suggests that the communities were primarily linked by female migration, and that at least 60 per cent of the women moved to join their mates' families while the males stayed put.
Additionally, despite the proximity to Denisova Cave, these migrations do not appear to have involved Denisovans.
No evidence was found of Denisovan gene flow into the Chagyrskaya Neanderthals in the 20,000 years before they lived.
The researchers want future studies to include more individuals from other Neanderthal communities, to see if this social organisation was widespread.
Benjamin Peter, the study's last author, said: 'Our study provides a concrete picture of what a Neanderthal community may have looked like. It makes Neanderthals seem much more human to me.'
A close relative of modern humans, Neanderthals went extinct 40,000 years ago
The Neanderthals were a close human ancestor that mysteriously died out around 40,000 years ago.
The species lived in Africa with early humans for millennia before moving across to Europe around 300,000 years ago.
They were later joined by humans, who entered Eurasia around 48,000 years ago.
The Neanderthals were a cousin species of humans but not a direct ancestor - the two species split from a common ancestor - that perished around 50,000 years ago. Pictured is a Neanderthal museum exhibit
These were the original 'cavemen', historically thought to be dim-witted and brutish compared to modern humans.
In recent years though, and especially over the last decade, it has become increasingly apparent we've been selling Neanderthals short.
A growing body of evidence points to a more sophisticated and multi-talented kind of 'caveman' than anyone thought possible.
It now seems likely that Neanderthals had told, buried their dead, painted and even interbred with humans.
They used body art such as pigments and beads, and they were the very first artists, with Neanderthal cave art (and symbolism) in Spain apparently predating the earliest modern human art by some 20,000 years.
They are thought to have hunted on land and done some fishing. However, they went extinct around 40,000 years ago following the success of Homo sapiens in Europe.
Since the first Neanderthal draft genome was published in 2010, researchers have sequenced a further 18 genomes from 14 different archaeological sites in Eurasia.
Everyone Knows the Mask of King Tut, but Have You Seen Any of the 5,000 Other Treasures from His Tomb?
Everyone Knows the Mask of King Tut, but Have You Seen Any of the 5,000 Other Treasures from His Tomb?
To his subjects, King Tutankhamenwas part man, part god. His death in 1323 BC signaled the end of an era - the end of Egypt as an imperial power. The circumstances surrounding King Tut’s death are shrouded in mystery. Equally obscure is the reason for his unusually small tomb. And yet, thanks to Howard Carter’s discovery nearly 3,000 years later, there is no Pharaoh more well-known and well-loved than King Tut. Inside the tomb, Carter discovered glorious treasures that had lain undisturbed for thousands of years. For a culture that believed being remembered was the path to eternal life, the preservation of King Tut’s tomb has ensured that his nameless and forgotten enemies failed miserably.
An Astonishing Array of Grave Goods and The Most Intact Royal Tomb Ever Found
Tutankhamen died of unknown causes in 1323 BC at the age of 20. He did not have a clear successor but the tiny mummies of two stillborn daughters, possibly twins were found in his tomb. Due to his sudden and unexpected death, the burial was hastily prepared in a somewhat less-than-grand tomb, measuring only “3.68 m or 12.07 feet high, 7.86 m or 25.78 feet wide and 30.79 m or 101.01 feet long” (History Embalmed, 2016).
For political reasons, the boy-king was to be forgotten and his name never mentioned for the rest of eternity, a fate worse than death for the ancient Egyptians. Yet by a strange stroke of luck, Tut’s obscurity preserved his tomb from grave robbers. Then, “discovered by archaeologist Howard Carter in 1922, the tomb of King Tut yielded an astonishing array of grave goods—more than 5,000 artifacts, many of them in pristine condition. It was the most intact royal tomb ever found, providing Egyptologists with an unprecedented glimpse into the material life of a king who ruled during the 14th century B.C.” (Hessler, 2016).
It took Howard Carter 10 years to clear and catalog all the riches stored in the tomb. Most spectacular of all was the golden sarcophagus of Tutankhamen and the inlaid coffins, including one made of solid gold. Inside this nesting-doll-like assembly, rested the mummified body of the boy-King. His death mask, also made of gold, has become the symbol of ancient Egyptian finery and is considered one of the greatest works of art of the ancient world. It was Carter himself who, on October 28, 1925, lifted the heavy lid of the sarcophagus to look upon a wonder that had not been seen in 3,250 years.
“The pins removed the lid was raised. The penultimate scene was disclosed - a very neatly wrapped mummy of the young king, with a golden mask of sad but tranquil expression, symbolizing Osiris. The similitude of the youthful Tut.Ankh.Amen, until now known only by name, amid that sepulchral silence, made us realize the past. By this bespangled mummy as it lies in the coffin, he must have been a tall youth - from the top of the headdress of the mask to the feet it measures 6 feet. Attached to the throat of the golden mask, beautifully wrought with juvenile countenance, are three massive gold & faience necklaces, a pendent heart-scarab placed between the hands, crossed over the breast, which hold the flail and the crook. Below this mask, which reaches as far as the hands, is the linen covering and outer bandages, strapped in place by broad longitudinal and transverse flexible bands of inlaid gold work depending from a highly decorative incrusted gold protective figure of Nekhbet. She has full spread wings reached across the body and a human head.” (Carter, 1925).
Detail of the iconic Golden Mask of Pharaoh Tutankhamun.
In addition to the sarcophagus, the tomb contained many wonders to behold. Yet the treasures were in a great deal of disorder, perhaps because of the untimely death of the Pharaoh, everything was placed helter-skelter, seemingly without logic. There were six disassembled chariots and all manner of weapons, shields, and daggers – King Tutankhamen is said to have loved the hunt. There was also a wide array of furniture, much of it covered in gold: two royal thrones, couches, chairs, ritual beds, and headrests. There were chests containing priceless pieces of jewelry and beautiful clothing made of fine linen. There were jars containing rare perfumes, precious oils, and ointments. There were elaborate shrines to the gods, including one which hosted the Canopic jars that stored King Tut’s preserved internal organs. There were musical instruments and writing implements, lamps, ostrich fans, and board games. There was food and as many as 30 bottles of wine. There were also “139 ebony, ivory, silver, and gold walking sticks” (History Embalmed, 2016). In short, every conceivable thing a young king may need in the next life could be found surrounding his body and sealed shut for eternity in the tomb. Outside it all stood a magnificent life-size, gilded statue of the god Anubis, believed to be the lord of the underworld and protector of the dead.
Because of this discovery, Tutankhamen is one of the best-known Egyptian kings. His name is referenced is TV shows, movies, and video games ranging from the Three Stooges to Transformers. And thus, despite his enemies, King Tut has achieved eternal life.
Recently, Egyptologists have been reinvestigating Tutankhamen’s tomb. Experts believe that his small, seemingly second-rate burial may, in fact, have been a decoy to distract grave robbers from the real prize. “Radar scans on those walls [of Tut’s tomb] have revealed not only the presence of hidden chambers, but also unidentified objects that lie within these rooms. These objects…seem to be composed of both metal and organic materials” (Hessler, 2016).
The most popular theory? Concealed behind Tut’s tomb could be the long lost burial chamber of the magnificent Queen Nefertiti.
Top image: Golden treasures that were found inside Tutankhamun’s tomb. ( Talking Beautiful Stuff )
Less Ice and Low Water Levels Reveal Hidden Treasures – At A Price
Less Ice and Low Water Levels Reveal Hidden Treasures – At A Price
For the world of archaeology, climate change is a double-edged sword. On the one hand, receding ice and falling water levels are bringing to the surface entire villages and ruins of civilizations. On the other hand, climate change is also causing erratic weather cycles, including wetter winters, and unseasonal humidity is wreaking havoc on ancient artifacts, causing widespread disintegration and erosion.
Once an item like wood, for example, is freed from ice, it runs the risk of rapidly crumbling unless stored immediately in a freezer. Nevertheless, as droughts, wildfires, and melting glaciers have become the norm, shipwrecks, corpses, ghost villages, bridges, monuments, have come to the fore.
Ancient Origins has been reporting on global warming related discoveries for the last ten years and here are just a few climate change changes related to archaeology.
A few of the ancient artifacts revealed by climate change on the melting Lendbreen ice patch in Norway.
Climate Change Gifts From The Melting Lendbreen Ice Patch
In Norway’s Jotunheim mountains, the Lendbreen ice patch was once a vital pass for Viking Age traffic, extensively used by the Vikings and medieval travelers from as far away as Rome. In 2011, the year of “The Great Melt,” the famously hidden pass revealed itself, and has since then provided the most archaeological finds from any ice patch in the world (though a Swiss Alps site is also worth noting). This includes hundreds of pre-historic cairns, a beeswax candle box, a 1,300 year-old-ski, an iron horseshoe, and an ancient Roman sandal .
"It's like a time machine... the ice has not been this small for many, many centuries," said Lars Piloe, the Dane heading a team of "snow patch archaeologists," in an interview with The Guardian .
In 2016, ancient reindeer hunting arrowheads were discovered in the southern Jotunheim range.
Permafrost places like Alaska and Siberia have also yielded these types of finds, including the famous Otzi “the Iceman,” found in the Italian Alps.
In February of 2022, Antarctica sea ice cover shrank to a record low, which helped solve a great maritime mystery. A research vessel from South Africa used this opportunity to explore the Weddell Sea off the Antarctica coastline, where they finally found Sir Ernest Shackleton’s ship, lost to the ice in 1915.
The sunken village of Baitings and its famous packhorse bridge, pictured below the modern car bridge, have been exposed by record drought and heat for the first time since the mid-1950s.
The UK Heatwave: Secret Gardens and a Sunken Village
As the UK comes to terms with its unprecedented heatwave, where temperatures in some places have shot up to over 40 degrees Celsius (104 degrees Fahrenheit), emergency measures are being undertaken. These include hosepipe bans and rationing of fresh water.
A secret Derbyshire garden , hidden for 300 years, was revealed by a heatwave. This florid 17th-century landscape is being called the Great Parterre and boasts an intricate display of flower beds and paths. This is after temperatures in the region crossed 38 degrees Celsius (100 degrees Fahrenheit), the highest on record for over 100 years.
Over the weekend, Ancient Origins reported on the reappearance of a sunken Yorkshire village . The reason? The water levels of the reservoir had sunken to such a low that the erstwhile village of Baitings, which had been submerged in the 1950s, was suddenly visible again. Along with the village, the famous centuries-old packhorse bridge was also exposed due to massively diminished water levels.
Aerial view of the excavations revealing the Mitani Empire settlement of Kemune,, which was revealed by huge drops in the level of the Tigris River in Iraq.
The region of Mesopotamia, one where Neolithic civilization began, has been witnessing devastating droughts for the past 20 years. The major Euphrates and Tigris rivers have been sucked dry by illegal irrigation, damming policies, and human overuse.
This year, the same story repeated itself. Extreme drought like conditions in Iraq caused the water levels of the Tigris to drop rapidly, revealing a 3,400 year old Mitani Empire settlement .
Back in 2018-19, a palace from this ancient urban center had emerged from the waters for the same reason: drought. Due to large amounts of water being drawn from the Mosul reservoir over the winter, along with the sustained drought, this year the entire city in the Kurdistan region was visible and explorable.
16th century Church Emerges From Mexican Reservoir
A 400-year-old Spanish colonial church, the Temple of Santiago, emerged in 2015 from the depths of the Nezahualcoyotl reservoir in Chiapas, Mexico. A massive drought that year caused the water level to drop by 82 feet (25 meters), revealing the colonial church which had disappeared under the reservoir water back in 1966. Also known as the Temple of Quechula, it was first built in the mid-1600s by a group of Dominican monks headed by Friar Bartolome de la Casas.
Top image: Dried up lake with boat, a scene now more common due to climate change.
Ten Incredible Mummy Discoveries That Shocked the World
Ten Incredible Mummy Discoveries That Shocked the World
Mummies of humans and other animals have been found on every continent, both as a result of natural preservation through unique climatic conditions, and as intentionally preserved corpses for religious or cultural purposes. In addition to the well-known mummy discoveries of ancient Egypt, deliberate mummification was a feature of several ancient cultures in areas of South America and Asia, as well as numerous others. Here we feature ten unique mummy discoveries from around the world.
His little face still stares upwards, as if eternally waiting for his mother. From the moment he was discovered, the little Inuit baby captured hearts with his photograph plastered on magazines and news stories around the world. When he was first found, he was believed to be a doll, but it was soon discovered that it was actually the body of a six-month old baby boy.
This boy discovered at the Qilakitsoq settlement was buried alive with his already dead mother – presumably because there was no one left to care for him. The small Inuit baby was found along with a two-year-old boy and six women of various ages, who were buried in two separate graves protected by a rock that overhung a shallow cave.
Unearthed near the city of Uummannaq in West Greenland, the bodies were naturally mummified by the sub-zero temperatures and dry, dehydrating winds, providing a remarkable opportunity to learn about the Greenland Inuit of half a millennium ago. They are the oldest preserved remains ever to be found there.
Tollund Man is the naturally mummified body of a man who lived during the 4th century BC, during the period characterized in Scandinavia as the Pre-Roman Iron Age. He was hanged as a sacrifice to the gods and placed in a peat bog where he remained preserved for more than two millennia. Today, the face of the Tollund Man is as preserved the way it was the day he died. The look upon his face is calm and peaceful, giving the sensation of looking upon a sleeping man.
When talking about body preservation and mummy discoveries, people all over the world think of Egypt and the mummified bodies of Pharaohs, such as Tutankhamun. But how many know that the world’s best preserved bodies actually come from China?
The Lady of Dai, otherwise known as The Diva Mummy, is a 2,100-year-old mummy from the Western Han Dynasty and the best preserved ancient human ever found. Just how this incredible level of preservation was accomplished has baffled and amazed scientists around the world.
Xin Zhui, the Lady of Dai, died between 178 and 145 BC, at around 50 years of age. The objects inside her tomb indicated a woman of wealth and importance, and one who enjoyed the good things in life. But it was not the precious goods and fine fabrics that immediately caught the attention of archaeologists, rather it was the extraordinarily well-preserved state of her remains.
In 1999 the remains of three Incan children were found, remarkably preserved, atop the summit of Llullaillaco Volcano in Argentina. Last year, an analysis on the bodies of the 13-year-old “Maiden” and her 4- to 5-year-old companions, Llullaillaco Boy and Lightening Girl, revealed that the children had been drugged and given alcohol on a regular basis as part of a year-long series of ceremonial processes leading up to their final sacrifice.
Evidence suggests the sacrificial ceremony may have been used as a form of social control. Being selected for the ritual was supposed to be seen as a great honor, but it probably produced a climate of fear. In fact, it was a major offense for parents to show any sadness after giving up their children for the ceremony.
Tjayasetimu is the name of a little girl who was a star singer in ancient Egypt. Nearly 3,000 years ago Tjayasetimu she was a member of the royal choir and sang for the pharaohs in temples on the Nile. The seven-year-old girl, although heartbreakingly young when she died, was important enough to merit an elaborate mummification, a process normally reserved for Egyptian royalty and elite families.
Tjayasetimu had been wrapped in painted bandages, her face covered with a delicate veil and hidden by a golden mask, and she had been placed in a gilded sarcophagus. The child star was well-preserved and still had a full head of shoulder-length hair. Researchers could even see her milk teeth pushing up through her gums. At a height of just 4 feet, Tjayasetimu was far too small for her sarcophagus, although it is not clear why a casing was not made to fit her size. Scientists believe she died as a result of a short illness, such as cholera.
Loulan was discovered in 1980, but it was 3,800 years ago that she died on the trade route known as the Silk Road . The natural dryness and salty soil preserved her and over two hundred other mummies, individuals who had lived in several closely located settlements along the trade route.
The mummy has been called the Loulan Beauty because of her amazingly preserved stately facial features that have remained quite beautiful even in death. Unfortunately, the region where she and the others were found is politically unstable and the discovery of the mummies in the Tarim Basin in China was seen as a possible instigating factor for unrest.
The Chinese government has been reluctant to allow full access to the mummies because of their racial identity. The Tarim mummies are Caucasian and this fact has given credence to the claims of the local peoples known as the Uyghur, who look more European than Asian, that they are the descendants of the original inhabitants of the area and not later arrivals, as Chinese history claims.
Ötzi the iceman , who was discovered by some German tourists in the Alps in 1991, was originally believed to be the frozen corpse of a mountaineer or soldier who died during World War I. Tests later confirmed the iceman dates back to 3,300 BC and most likely died from a blow to the back of the head.
Europe's oldest natural human mummy, remarkably, his body contained still intact blood cells, which resembled a modern sample of blood. They are the oldest blood cells ever identified. His body was so well-preserved that scientists were even able to determine that his last meal was red deer and herb bread, eaten with wheat bran, roots and fruit.
The tattooed arm of the Lady of Cao, one of the mummy discoveries found at Huaca El Brujo.
(El Brujo Project)
On the beautiful northern coastline of Peru overlooking the blue Pacific, the place known as Huaca El Brujo (Sacred place of the Wizard) gives us an incredible glimpse into the culture of the Moche and the so-called wizard buried there.
Its two main pyramids, Huaca del Sol and the Huaca de la Luna, were once the centre of social and religious functions in the area and the final resting place of a tattooed mummy who has come to be known as the Lady of Cao. Not an elderly woman, she died in her mid-twenties about fifteen hundred years ago, probably as a complication of childbirth.
The Moche did not mummify their dead purposefully, but the conditions for desiccation just happened to preserve the Lady of Cao and by doing so also preserved her intricate tattoos. Although it is not believed that the more common members of Moche society were tattooed it could certainly be inferred from this burial that the highest status members were, and the tattoos probably represented and strengthened their connection with the divine through sympathetic magic.
A cocoon with a mummy of an adult was covered with copper plates head to toe.
(Alexander Gusev)
Zeleniy Yar is a remote site near the Arctic Circle known to the indigenous Nenets people as “the end of the earth.” The unique site has revealed nearly a dozen mysterious mummies who appear to be foreign to the region and whose artifacts can be traced back to ancient Persia, nearly 6,000 kilometers (3,730 mi) away.
Scientists are undertaking genetic testing to determine the origins of the mummies and unlock the secrets of a mystery medieval civilization. The mummy discoveries were found in a well-preserved state, seemingly by accident, and wearing copper masks and covered in reindeer, beaver, wolverine, or bear fur.
Many of their skulls are shattered or missing, while the skeletons were smashed. One of the mummies is a red-haired male, protected from chest to foot by copper plating. Within his final resting place, archaeologists also unearthed an iron hatchet, furs, and a head buckle made of bronze depicting a bear.
The Capuchin Catacombs of Palermo are located in Sicily, Italy. In the 16th century, the Capuchin monks of Palermo discovered that their catacombs contained a natural preservative that helped mummify their dead. One of the most famous mummies is that of a two-year-old girl, Rosalia Lombardo.
Rosalia was placed in the catacombs when she died in 1920. Her body is so well-preserved that she looks as if she were just sleeping in her glass coffin, hence the nickname Sleeping Beauty . The secret for her excellent state of preservation was revealed a few years ago, when a hand-written memoir of the embalmer, Alfredo Salafia, was discovered.
This memoir recorded the chemicals that he injected into Rosalia’s blood. These chemicals were formalin, zinc salts, alcohol, salicylic acid, and glycerin. It has been suggested that it was the zinc salts that were most responsible for Rosalia’s amazing state of preservation.
Top image: The Mummies of Qilakitsoq at the National Museum in Nuuk.
200 years ago, Jean-Francois Champollion raced into his brother’s office and shouted ‘Je tiens l’affaire!’ – ‘I’ve got it’. After years of research, he had pieced together one of the great historical puzzles of the time; he had deciphered the hieroglyphic script of ancient Egypt.
Various objects were crucial in helping Champollion arrive at this famous moment: from the Casati Papyrus to the Philae Obelisk at Kingston Lacy. But of all the artefacts that contributed to the groundbreaking decipherment, one is more renowned than all of the rest: the Rosetta Stone.
Today on display at the British Museum, this object was central in kickstarting antiquarians such as Champollion and Thomas Young down the path of unlocking ancient Egypt’s enigmatic language within just c.20 years of the Stone’s rediscovery. Today, the Rosetta Stone ranks amongst the most famous artefacts in the world. But what exactly is it?
The Rosetta Stone
The Stone itself is a commemorative stone (stela), upon which is written a priestly decree issued on 27 March 196 BC. The early 2nd century BC was a time when non-native pharaohs ruled Egypt; the last native Egyptian ruler had been forced into exile almost 150 years before, in c.343 BC.
196 BC was the time of the Ptolemaic Dynasty, one of the most remarkable of Alexander the Great’s Successor kingdoms. Ruling from the prestigious city of Alexandria, ancient Greek was the dominant language of Ptolemaic administration. Away from the official administration however, ancient Egyptian was still a language that people spoke widely across the kingdom: in homes and temples all along the River Nile. Early 2nd century Ptolemaic Egypt was a multicultural, multilingual society.
The Rosetta Stone in the British Museum
Image Credit: Tristan Hughes
It’s this bilingual nature of Ptolemaic Egypt that explains one of the central features of the Rosetta Stone. Carved onto this great, broken slab of granodiorite was text, written in three different languages. The first language was Egyptian hieroglyphs, the second was demotic (a handwritten version of the Egyptian script that Egyptians had long used alongside hieroglyphs; demotic was the ‘script of the people’) and the third language on the Stone was ancient Greek.
The priestly decree itself was issued by a group of priests that, in essence, provided King Ptolemy V divine honours. As thanks for his good deeds as King (protecting the country, rebuilding temples, lowering taxes etc), the Stone’s decree ordered that Ptolemy’s statue be honoured inside the temple and placed alongside those of the gods. Furthermore, Ptolemy’s statue was also to appear during sacred processions, once more alongside statues of other gods. To all extents and purposes, the decree placed King Ptolemy V on the same level as the gods.
This in itself was no novel practice for the Ptolemies; Hellenistic ‘ruler cult’ is something we see repeated again and again in various Successor Kingdoms across the Eastern Mediterranean during this latter half of the 1st millennium BC, where people paid tribute to their ruler’s benefaction by bestowing them with divine honours.
Discovery
The Stone itself is named after its discovery location: Rosetta. Situated east of Alexandria near the coast of the Mediterranean today, Rosetta (Rasheed) didn’t exist in pharaonic times. But sometime in Egypt’s long and incredible history, the Stone was moved here and used in the foundations of a building. Given the strength of this granodiorite slab, someone decided that it would be a very useful building block.
It would be in 1799 that the importance of this stone was realised, when French soldiers – assigned to Napoleon’s ongoing Egyptian campaign – were restoring their fort at Rosetta and discovered this tri-lingual stela. Very quickly, both the soldiers themselves and the many scholars that Napoleon had brought with him to Egypt realised that this artefact could be the key to deciphering hieroglyphics – an ancient script that medieval Arab scholars had already been attempting to decipher for centuries.
It was rapidly realised that the Rosetta Stone was highlighting the same decree in three different languages. As ancient Greek was already known, the huge potential this Stone had for helping scholars finally decode this enigmatic ancient Egyptian script (both hieroglyphic and demotic) was quickly acknowledged.
British takeover
French soldiers had rediscovered this Ptolemaic priestly decree, but it would not remain in their hands for long. In 1801, the defeated remnants of Napoleon’s expedition to Egypt signed the Capitulation of Alexandria with the British and the Ottomans. Part of the surrender – Article 16 – demanded that the French transfer 22 Egyptian antiquities to the British. Amongst these were two giant sarcophagi – one of which was at the time believed to be the sarcophagus of Alexander the Great. But the most famous object that the French handed over to the British was the Rosetta Stone.
Experts inspecting the Rosetta Stone during the Second International Congress of Orientalists, 1874
Image Credit: British Museum, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
Although they took possession of the physical object, the British still permitted the French scholars to make copies of the Stone. This would allow many figures on both sides of the Channel Sea (including Champollion) to have access to copies of the inscription in the years ahead, as the race to decipher hieroglyphics heated up.
In 1802 the Rosetta Stone, alongside the other artefacts seized by the British, arrived in Portsmouth. Not long after they were placed in the British Museum, which at the time was still very small. The arrival of these new objects encouraged the Museum to expand – to create new galleries that would ultimately house these artefacts.
The Rosetta Stone has since left the British Museum on only two occasions. The first was during World War Two – for safety; the second occasion was in 1972, when the Stone was displayed at the Louvre.
Significance
The Rosetta Stone was the keystone for the great acceleration of decoding hieroglyphics in the early 19th century. It was thanks to this Stone that figures such as Thomas Young and Champollion worked tirelessly as they raced to be the first to crack the ancient script. Other artefacts would help these scholars fill in the final pieces of the decoding puzzle, but it was the Rosetta Stone’s discovery, and its surviving trilingual text, that kickstarted them to devote years in their mission to make Egyptology’s ultimate breakthrough.
Thomas Young made some striking early progress. Focusing on the demotic text, he was able to identify some key words such as King/ruler(basileus)and temple. Most famously of all, he correctly identified the demotic word for Ptolemy and its hieroglyphic cartouche. Attributing phonetic values to the symbols in the cartouche, he was able to make some progress. Mistakenly however, he didn’t quite translate the correct phonetic sound for each of the symbols.
Ultimately, it was Champollion who made the ultimate breakthrough on the Ptolemy cartouche on the Rosetta Stone. That is why it is Champollion today, who we associate with making the ultimate breakthrough. Young made significant progress and is heralded in some circles as the man who translated Demotic. But Champollion was the man who ‘won’ the race.
William Bankes and the Philae Obelisk
One other figure to mention here is William Bankes. An adventurer and daredevil, in the 1810s Bankes voyaged down the River Nile on two separate occasions. Bankes was an avid drawer; he and several of his companions made countless drawings of the ancient Egyptian sites he saw as he ventured up the Nile as far as the Second Cataract and Wadi Hafa.
Philae Obelisk
Image Credit: Tristan Hughes
Bankes sent countless drawings back to Young, who used them to help him in the great deciphering race. But Bankes also brought back to Britain an obelisk, which he had found fallen over at Philae. This obelisk, today visible at Kingston Lacy, had a bilingual inscription. An ancient Greek inscription on the base of the obelisk, with hieroglyphs running up the shaft. It was from this obelisk that Bankes correctly identified the cartouche for the name Cleopatra.
Champollion, using this discovery, the Ptolemy cartouche from the Rosetta Stone and other papyri was able to make the breakthrough. Although we remember Champollion and the Rosetta Stone in the story of how hieroglyphs were deciphered, let us not forget the invaluable information that William Bankes and the Philae Obelisk also provided in this story.
Enigmatic Symbols and Carvings in Man-Made Royston Cave
Enigmatic Symbols and Carvings in Man-Made Royston Cave
The Royston Cave is an artificial cave in Hertfordshire, England, which contains strange carvings. It is not known who created the cave or what it was used for, but there has been much speculation. Some believe that it was used by the Knights Templar, while others believe it may have been an Augustinian store house. Another theory posits that it was a Neolithic flint mine. None of these theories have been substantiated, and the origin of Royston Cave remains a mystery.
Royston Cave was discovered in August 1742 by a worker in the small town of Royston digging holes to build footing for a new bench at a market. He discovered a millstone while he was digging, and when he dug around to remove it, he found the shaft leading down into a man-madecave, half-filled with dirt and rock.
At the time of discovery, efforts were made to remove the dirt and rock filling the artificial cave, which was subsequently discarded. Some believed that treasure would be found within Royston Cave. However, removal of the dirt did not reveal any treasure. They did however discover sculptures and carvings within the cave. It is worth noting that had the soil not been discarded, today’s technology could have allowed for a soil analysis.
Located below the crossroads of Ermine Street and Icknield Way, the cave itself is an artificial chamber carved into chalk bedrock, measuring approximately 7.7 meters high (25 ft 6 in) and 5.2 meters (17 ft) in diameter. At the base o the cave is a raised octagonal step, which many believe was used for kneeling or prayer. Along the lower part of the wall there are unusual carvings. Experts believe that these relief carvings were originally colored, although due to the passage of time only very small traces of color remain visible.
The carved relief images are mostly religious, depicting St. Catherine , the Holy Family, the Crucifixion, St. Lawrence holding the gridiron on which he was martyred, and a figure holding a sword who could either be St. George, or St. Michael. Holes located beneath the carvings appear to have held candles or lamps which would have lit the carvings and sculptures. Several of the figures and symbols have yet to be identified, but according to Royston Town Council , a study of the designs in the cave “suggest that the carvings were likely made in the mid-1300s.”
Plate I from Joseph Beldam's book The Origins and Use of the Royston Cave, 1884 showing some of the numerous carvings.
One of the main theories as to the origin of Royston Cave, especially for those who like conspiracy theories , is that it was used by the medieval religious order known as the Knights Templar , prior to their dissolution by Pope Clement V in 1312. Bad Archaeology criticizes the way websites across the web have repeated this association between the Royston Cave and the Knights Templar, “despite the weakness of the evidence in favor of the hypothesis and the arguments in favor of a later date.”
Some believe that the cave had been split into two levels using a wooden floor. Figures near a damaged section of the cave depict two knights riding a single horse, which may be the remains of a Templar symbol. Architectural historian Nikolaus Pevsner has written that the date of the carvings "is hard to guess. They have been called Anglo-Saxon, but are more probably of various dates between the C14 and C17 (the work of unskilled men)."
Plate III from Joseph Beldam's book The Origins and Use of the Royston Cave, 1884 showing the shape and floor plan of the cave.
Another theory is that Royston Cave was used as an Augustinian store house. As their name implies, the Augustinians were an Order created by St. Augustine , Bishop of Hippo, in Africa. Founded in 1061 AD, they first came into England during the reign of Henry I . From the 12th century, Royston in Hertfordshire was a center of monastic life and the Augustinian priory continued without break there for nearly 400 years. It has been said that local Augustinian monks used Royston Cave as a cool storage space for their produce and as a chapel.
Finally, some speculate it may have been used as a Neolithic flint mine as early as 3,000 BC, where flint would have been gathered for making axes and other tools. However, the chalk in this area only provides small flint nodules, generally unsuitable for axe making, so this may cast some doubt on this theory.
Relief carving of St. Christopher at Royston Cave.
To this date there remains much mystery as to who created Royston cave and for what purpose. It is always possible that whichever group originally created the cave may have abandoned it at some point, allowing it to be used by another group. The mystery surrounding the cave and the sculptures within makes the cave an interesting location for visitors who would like to speculate as to the origins of this ancient wonder.
Royston Cave has required regular maintenance and restoration, as it was discovered that insect larvae and worms were damaging the walls and structure of the cave. By August 2014, work to prevent such damage was deemed successful. Rather than using insecticides, the preservation workers removed some of the earth, thereby eliminating the worms’ food supply. Hopefully subsequent repair work to pipes to avoid flooding, and other work to prevent vibration damage from the traffic above, will help to preserve the cave into the future.
Just 8 minutes walking from Royston train station, visits are organized by Royston Town Council and tickets must be booked online . Their opening hours of Royston Cave are limited to Saturdays and Sundays from April to September. Each tour is limited to 15 people and lasts about 30 minutes.
Top image: The mysterious and elaborately carved walls of Royston Cave.
Were Cyclopes Legends Inspired by Ancient Elephant Skulls?
Were Cyclopes Legends Inspired by Ancient Elephant Skulls?
Ancient Greek mythology is full of fantastic beasts and monsters. One of the most famous examples is the brutal one-eyed race of giants, the cyclopes. Several different cyclopes appeared in various myths. One group was instrumental in helping Zeus overcome the Titans, while another had a nasty habit of feasting on mortals. But where did the Greeks get their inspiration from? Were the cyclopes just a figment of their imaginations, or was something else at work?
What Were the Cyclopes?
In Greek mythology, there were three distinct groups of cyclopes, all appearing in different myths. The most well-known are the Homeric cyclopes that appear in the Odyssey. When we think of the cyclopes that are prevalent in pop culture today, it is the Homeric cyclopes we are thinking of.
These cyclopes were a group of one-eyed, savage giants who were man-eating shepherds. Odysseus and his men ended up on the cyclopes’ island looking for supplies during their long and eventful journey home. One of the cyclopes, Polyphemus (son of Poseidon), captured Odysseus and his men. He began eating Odysseus’s men one by one. Using his wits, Odysseus got the cyclops drunk and blinded him, before fleeing with his remaining men.
The second most famous group was the Hesiodic cyclopes. These fit the same physical description, but are quite different. In the Theogony, Hesiod described three cyclopes: Brontes, Steropes, and Arges. These were the children of Uranus and Gaia. They were also brothers to the Titans and the Hundred-Hander giants.
In the Theogony, these cyclopes were banished to Tartarus (Greek hell), but they were rescued by Zeus. They played a key role in the Greek succession myth by arming Zeus with his thunderbolts, which became his primary weapon throughout Greek mythology. They also crafted Hades’ helm of invisibility and Poseidon’s trident. Rather than savage monsters, these cyclops were subservient master craftsmen.
A first century AD head of a Cyclops, one of the sculptures adorning the Roman Colosseum
The third group was the cyclopean wall builders. The Greeks believed that the great walls of Mycenae, Tiryns, and Argos were all built by primordial cyclopes. Besides being master craftsmen, not much is known about these cyclopes. They were just used to explain something the Greeks struggled to explain otherwise - giant walls made of stone no man could lift.
In the early 21st century, the remains of a Deinotherium giganteum were found in Crete for the first time. The Deinotherium giganteum was an ancient relative of the modern elephant. It was 15 feet (4.6 meters) tall, with tusks 4.5 feet (1.3 meters) long.
Its skull showed it to be much more primitive and bulkier than its modern counterpart. Most importantly, it also had an extremely long nasal opening in the center of its skull. To paleontologists today, or anyone who has seen an elephant, the large hole points to a big trunk.
But what about the scientifically uneducated? A giant skull with a large hole in the center? Found close to large bones? That could sound a lot like a cyclops skull.
Adrienne Mayor, a historian of ancient science and a classical folklorist, believes that's what the Greeks thought when they first found a Deinotherium giganteum skull. She has argued that Greeks and Romans had a long history of using fossil evidence to support existing myths and even create new ones.
The idea that mythology and religion have been used throughout history to explain the unknown is nothing new. As a species, humans crave explanations and answers. The Greeks were farmers and would come across fossils from time to time. When a person with no understanding of evolution came across a giant bone that they couldn’t otherwise explain, it makes sense that they would reconstruct them in their minds as giant monsters.
In her book The First Fossil Hunters: Paleontology in Greek and Roman Times , Mayor took this idea and ran with it. She pointed out that the areas where many of the myths took place are home to lots of fossil beds. Furthermore, according to Mayor, many myths involve monsters coming out from beneath the ground after storms. It is not uncommon for a bad storm to erode soil and reveal the underlying fossils.
Deinotherium skull from Oxford University Museum of Natural History
Mayor wasn’t the first person to connect elephant fossils with the cyclops myth, however. A century before, the Austrian paleontologist Othenio Abel first proposed the idea. He suggested the cyclops myth had been birthed with the Greek discovery of fossilized pygmy elephant skulls.
It all seemed to line up. Pygmy elephant skulls have eye sockets that are very small when compared to the large nasal cavity left by the trunk. The fossils are also usually found with other fossilized bones. To the Greeks, this could have appeared to be evidence of the cyclops' savage diet.
Abel also claimed that the Greek writer Empedocles had seen pygmy elephant remains in caves in Sicily. There was only one problem; according to Mayor, Abel was mistaken. Empedocles made no such claim and never saw pygmy elephant fossils. So Abel was on the right track, but was perhaps wrong on the specific type of elephant fossil that inspired the myth.
We’ll never know whether Mayor and Abel are right or not. Without a time machine, there is no scientific way to confirm how the Greeks came up with the myth. The theory does make sense though. How else would the ancient Greeks explain their seemingly strange fossil discoveries other than coming up with tall tales to explain them?
The Greeks weren’t alone either. Other civilizations have done the same. Take the dragon for example. The dragon appears in the mythology of cultures all over the world. What else can be found all over the world? Dinosaur fossils. It is likely no coincidence that many depictions of dragons resemble our modern understanding of what a dinosaur looked like.
Even today, some creationists still point at fossil evidence and use it to argue that fossils are proof of creatures like the Leviathan, which appear in the Bible, rather than evidence of animals millions of years old. So in the end, it isn’t that surprising that the Greeks might have seen an old elephant skull and confused it with that of a cyclops.
Top image: The cyclopes were one-eyed mythological giants of ancient Greece. But did the myth originate from elephant skulls like this?
Over 800 Ancient Monuments Found in Polish Forest with LiDAR!
Over 800 Ancient Monuments Found in Polish Forest with LiDAR!
One of the last primeval forests in Europe, Białowieża forest in Poland, is the subject of a fascinating new LiDAR (Light Detection and Ranging) survey. It has yielded a vast and incredible array of hidden treasures from prehistory all the way up until World War II, including 577 ancient burial barrows, 246 charcoal kiln sites, 54 tar plants, 19 complexes of ancient farmlands, 51 semi-dugouts and 17 war cemeteries.
Some of the mounds are dated to the early Middle Ages, but most are from the Roman period, i.e., 2nd – 5th century AD. In total, the 800+ ancient monuments are of various functions, as explained by the team of scientists and archaeologists from the Institute of Archaeology of the Cardinal Stefan Wyszynski University (IA UKSW) in Warsaw.
The project was headed by Prof. Przemysław Urbańczyk. They have brought to a close a lengthy 5 year research project of the Polish half of the Białowieża Forest, which lies on the border with Belarus, reports PAP. The research has been funded by the National Science Center of Poland.
"Thanks to the use of innovative research methods, combined with numerous natural analyzes, we have obtained, despite the initial pessimism, amazing results”, the main project coordinator, Dr. Joanna Wawrzeniek from the IA UKSW told PAP. “In accordance with the current conservation doctrine, we mainly used non-invasive tests. The output information was provided by aerial laser scanning,” she added.
Aerial laser scanning is a highly efficient non-invasive research method, that allows for a comfortable bypassing of the need for archaeological excavations, by allowing a top-down view of the topography. Dense forests and tough terrain do not act as a hindrance and allow for all kinds of structures to be seen and identified – natural and human-made (like burial structures and mounds for example).
The purpose of the ancient barrows in the Polish forest is not certain, but they are thought to be burial mounds. This is where LiDAR’s efficiency draws a line. Therefore, archival queries, geophysical surveys, drilling, and survey research methods were also employed.
Mounds from the Middle Ages contained skeleton and cremation burials, but the ones from the ancient periods lacked human remains, reports Heritage Daily and may have been ritualistic .
Some of the ancient structures spotted with LiDAR in Białowieża Forest in Poland
(M. Szubski, M. Jakubczak)
Occupation Through Time
Earlier on in pre-history, people inhabited the forest on small elevations that had access to a river or a stream, which could be places inhabited for a long time. Evidence of habitation is also gained from two structures, first of which is located in the Strict Reserve of the Białowieża National Park, and the other is in the Wilczy Jar Forest District.
They did not play a defensive role, or act as strongholds, but are more likely to have played some kind of ritualistic role. Only archaeological excavations can provide insight into what this ritualistic role potentially could be.
The first structure that was examined has a diameter of 36 meters (118.1 feet), with a small embankment that is 3 meters (9.8 feet) wide. From this structure, Slavic pottery from the early and late Middle Ages was found, along with ancient flint relics. The second structure was less than half of the first in diameter – 17 meters (55.77 feet). Here, there is evidence of the site being used in two distinct periods – first in prehistory (4th-3rd century BC), and the second from the 7 th-10th century AD.
The second structure had, alongside it, a compact pavement, a shallow pit, and traces of a dowel discovered on the embankment. Also found was the fragment of a courtyard, with lightly burned animal bones in the vicinity. It also possessed a vessel from the Roman period, though there was no other proof of occupation from the Roman period.
Further publications are planned, which will describe the results of this exciting archaeological research, and with over 800 monuments discovered, there is still much to be revealed!
Top image: An ancient burial mound in Poland, Tumuli in Wesiory (representational image). Artur Henryk / Adobe Stock
In Ancient Mesopotamia, Sex Among The Gods Shook Heaven And Earth
In Ancient Mesopotamia, Sex Among The Gods Shook Heaven And Earth
The “Burney Relief,” which is believed to represent either Ishtar, the Mesopotamian goddess of love and war, or her older sister Ereshkigal, Queen of the underworld (c. 19th or 18th century BC).
Credit: British Museum
Sexuality was central to life in ancient Mesopotamia, an area of the Ancient Near East often described as the cradle of western civilisation roughly corresponding to modern-day Iraq, Kuwait, and parts of Syria, Iran and Turkey. It was not only so for everyday humans but for kings and even deities.
Mesopotamian deities shared many human experiences, with gods marrying, procreating and sharing households and familial duties. However when love went wrong, the consequences could be dire in both heaven and on earth.
Scholars have observed the similarities between the divine “marriage machine” found in ancient literary works and the historical courtship of mortals, although it is difficult to disentangle the two, most famously in so-called “sacred marriages”, which saw Mesopotamian kings marrying deities.
Divine sex
Gods, being immortal and generally of superior status to humans, did not strictly need sexual intercourse for population maintenance, yet the practicalities of the matter seem to have done little to curb their enthusiasm.
Sexual relationships between Mesopotamian deities provided inspiration for a rich variety of narratives. These include Sumerian myths such as Enlil and Ninlil and Enki and Ninhursag, where the complicated sexual interactions between deities was shown to involve trickery, deception and disguise.
In both myths, a male deity adopts a disguise, and then attempts to gain sexual access to the female deity — or to avoid his lover’s pursuit. In the first, the goddess Ninlil follows her lover Enlil down into the Underworld, and barters sexual favours for information on Enlil’s whereabouts. The provision of a false identity in these myths is used to circumnavigate societal expectations of sex and fidelity.
Sexual betrayal could spell doom not only for errant lovers but for the whole of society. When the Queen of the Underworld, Ereshkigal, is abandoned by her lover, Nergal, she threatens to raise the dead unless he is returned to her, alluding to her right to sexual satiety.
The goddess Ishtar makes the same threat in the face of a romantic rejection from the king of Uruk in the Epic of Gilgamesh. It is interesting to note that both Ishtar and Ereshkigal, who are sisters, use one of the most potent threats at their disposal to address matters of the heart.
The plots of these myths highlight the potential for deceit to create alienation between lovers during courtship. The less-than-smooth course of love in these myths, and their complex use of literary imagery, have drawn scholarly comparisons with the works of Shakespeare.
Love poetry
Ancient authors of Sumerian love poetry, depicting the exploits of divine couples, show a wealth of practical knowledge on the stages of female sexual arousal. It’s thought by some scholars that this poetry may have historically had an educational purpose: to teach inexperienced young lovers in ancient Mesopotamia about intercourse. It’s also been suggested the texts had religious purposes, or possibly magical potency.
Several texts write of the courtship of a divine couple, Inanna (the Semitic equivalent of Ishtar) and her lover, the shepherd deity Dumuzi. The closeness of the lovers is shown through a sophisticated combination of poetry and sensuousness imagery - perhaps providing an edifying example for this year’s Bad Sex in Fiction nominees.
Ancient Sumerian cylinder seal impression showing Dumuzid being tortured in the Underworld by the galla demons.
Credit: British Museum
In one of the poems, elements of the female lover’s arousal are catalogued, from the increased lubrication of her vulva, to the “trembling” of her climax. The male partner is presented delighting in his partner’s physical form, and speaking kindly to her. The feminine perspective on lovemaking is emphasised in the texts through the description of the goddess’ erotic fantasies. These fantasies are part of the preparations of the goddess for her union, and perhaps contribute to her sexual satisfaction.
Female and male genitals could be celebrated in poetry, the presence of dark pubic hair on the goddess’ vulva is poetically described through the symbolism of a flock of ducks on a well-watered field or a narrow doorway framed in glossy black lapis-lazuli.
The representation of genitals may also have served a religious function: temple inventories have revealed votive models of pubic triangles, some made of clay or bronze. Votive offerings in the shape of vulvae have been found in the city of Assur from before 1000 BC.
Happy goddess, happy kingdom
Divine sex was not the sole preserve of the gods, but could also involve the human king. Few topics from Mesopotamia have captured the imagination as much as the concept of sacred marriage. In this tradition, the historical Mesopotamian king would be married to the goddess of love, Ishtar. There is literary evidence for such marriages from very early Mesopotamia, before 2300 BC, and the concept persevered into much later periods.
The relationship between historical kings and Mesopotamian deities was considered crucial to the successful continuation of earthly and cosmic order. For the Mesopotamian monarch, then, the sexual relationship with the goddess of love most likely involved a certain amount of pressure to perform.
Some scholars have suggested these marriages involved a physical expression between the king and another person (such as a priestess) embodying the goddess. The general view now is that if there were a physical enactment to a sacred marriage ritual it would have been conducted on a symbolic level rather than a carnal one, with the king perhaps sharing his bed with a statue of the deity.
Agricultural imagery was often used to describe the union of goddess and king. Honey, for instance, is described as sweet like the goddess’ mouth and vulva.
A love song from the city of Ur between 2100-2000 BC is dedicated to Shu-Shin, the king, and Ishtar:
In the bedchamber dripping with honey let us enjoy over and over your allure, the sweet thing. Lad, let me do the sweetest things to you. My precious sweet, let me bring you honey.
Sex in this love poetry is depicted as a pleasurable activity that enhanced loving feelings of intimacy. This sense of increased closeness was considered to bring joy to the heart of the goddess, resulting in good fortune and abundance for the entire community — perhaps demonstrating an early Mesopotamian version of the adage “happy wife, happy life”.
The diverse presentation of divine sex creates something of a mystery around the causes for the cultural emphasis on cosmic copulation. While the presentation of divine sex and marriage in ancient Mesopotamia likely served numerous purposes, some elements of the intimate relationships between gods shows some carry-over to mortal unions.
While dishonesty between lovers could lead to alienation, positive sexual interactions held countless benefits, including greater intimacy and lasting happiness.
Written by Louise Pryke - Lecturer, Languages and Literature of Ancient Israel, Macquarie University
Creatures of the Land, Sea and Heavens: Ancient Beliefs in Animal Counterparts
Creatures of the Land, Sea and Heavens: Ancient Beliefs in Animal Counterparts
Until the Age of Enlightenment, it was widely believed that every land creature had its counterpart in the sea (and perhaps even in the heavens). The classic example of this belief is the horse, which in the sea is a seahorse and in the heavens is Pegasus. This debate was waged by some of history’s intellectual heavy weights including Pliny the Elder, Saint Augustine of Hippo, and Sir Thomas Brown. There are even said to be allusions to the issue in the Biblical Book of Job. The belief in marine counterparts on land transcended the religious divisions and was shared by pagans, Christians, and Muslims alike. Unfortunately, such unity of thought was proven to be quite wrong upon a careful examination of the world’s animal and marine life.
The belief that land animals had counterparts in the sea has long been common among the laity. The first person to really articulate the logic of this notion was Pliny the Elder (23 AD – 79 AD) in his encyclopedic Natural History, written in 77 AD. In Book IX (out of 37) Pliny discusses the Natural History of Fishes. In the opening chapter he writes:
“These seeds and first principles of being are so utterly conglomerated and so involved, the one with the other, from being whirled to and fro, now by the action of the winds and now by the waves. Hence it is that the vulgar notion may very possibly be true, that whatever is produced in any other department of Nature, is to be found in the sea as well; while, at the same time, many other productions are there to be found which nowhere else exist. That there are to be found in the sea the forms, not only of terrestrial animals, but of inanimate objects even, is easily to be understood by all who will take the trouble to examine the grape-fish, the sword-fish, the sawfish, and the cucumber-fish, which last so strongly resembles the real cucumber both in color and in smell. We shall find the less reason than to be surprised to find that in so small an object as a shell-fish the head of the horse is to be seen protruding from the shell.”
Pliny the Elder, as imagined by a 19th-century artist.
Pliny’s writings doubtless inspired the unknown author of Physiologus, a didactic Christian text written in 2nd century AD Alexandria. This beautifully illustrated book was one of the most copied manuscripts in Medieval Europe. In it, the author describes various animals, birds, and fish and also gives the moral function of each. Some, such as the Phoenix and Pelican, are good and represent Jesus.
Others, such as the Fox and the Whale, are evil and represent the devil. The allegories for the Fox and the Whale are as follows:
“The fox represents the devil, who pretends to be dead to those who retain their worldly ways, and only reveals himself when he has them in his jaws. To those with perfect faith, the devil is truly dead.” (The Medieval Bestiary, 2011)
These descriptions contributed to the popular science of bestiary in the Middle Ages. The trend supported the superstition that animals on land and sea were paired. If anyone needed further proof, they would be directed to this passage from the Book of Job, which was believed to reveal God’s divine will in designing symmetry among his creations: But ask the animals, and they will teach you; the birds of the air, and they will tell you; ask the plants of the earth, and they will teach you; and the fish of the sea will declare to you. Who among all these does not know that the hand of the Lord has done this? In his hand is the life of every living thing and the breath of every human being.”(Job
Sir Thomas Browne, a British naturalist writing in the 17th century, put an end to the matter in the short but scathing Chapter 24 of his Pseudodoxia Epidemica or Enquiries into very many received tenets and commonly presumed truths, also known simply as Pseudodoxia Epidemica or Vulgar Errors. Browne writes:
“That all Animals of the Land, are in their kind in the Sea, although received as a principle, is a tenet very questionable, and will admit of restraint. For some in the Sea are not to be matched by any enquiry at Land, and hold those shapes which terrestrial forms approach not; as may be observed in the Moon fish, or Orthragoriscus, the several sorts of Rays, Torpedos, Oysters, and many more, and some there are in the Land which were never maintained to be in the Sea, as Panthers, Hyenas, Camels, Sheep, Molls, and others … And therefore, although it be not denied that some in the water do carry a justifiable resemblance to some at Land, yet are the major part which bear their names unlike; nor do they otherwise resemble the creatures on earth, then they on earth the constellations which pass under animal names in heaven: nor the Dog-fish at Sea much more make out the Dog of the Land, then that his cognominal or name-sake in the heavens.”(Browne, 1672)
Title-page of 1658 4th edition of Pseudodoxia Epidemica. ( CC BY-SA 3.0 )
Today, there is little doubt that land and sea animals are distinct. This reflects the progress the natural sciences have made over the last 2000 years.
Top image: Secrets de l'histoire naturelle ( Public Domain )
Browne, Thomas. "Browne's Vulgar Errors III.xxiv: Animals, Land and Sea." Browne's Vulgar Errors. James Eason at the University of Chicago, 1672. Web. 13 Dec. 2016. http://penelope.uchicago.edu/pseudodoxia/pseudo324.html
Mysterious Cases of Living Fossils, Suspended Animation, and Hibernation
Mysterious Cases of Living Fossils, Suspended Animation, and Hibernation
We all know that fossils, by their very nature, are dead. Of course, nothing can survive the conditions of pressure, depth and time required to petrify wood, see saplings mature into massive trees, transmogrify vegetation into coal or metamorphose mud into solid rock. Still, living creatures seemingly from remotest antiquity keep turning up encased in stone from far beneath Earth's surface, embedded inside solid tree trunks and in other situations defying both reason and the gospel of the Great God Science.
Living Fossils Story #1: Ancient Wormhole Mine
One such case occurred April 22, 1881, when miner Joe Molino was working deep in the Wide West Mine outside Ruby Hill, Nevada. When he wedged loose a protruding hunk of stone from the tunnel wall it landed on his foot. Enraged, he grabbed a sledgehammer and smashed it to bits. Molino was stunned to see his hammer blow had exposed a baseball-sized cavity in the rock. It was half full of motionless white worms.
As a crowd of quizzical miners gathered to view the unusual artifacts the worms began to move. Within an hour they were crawling around on the floor of the tunnel.
Mine operators sent the worms (whose species apparently was never determined) and their solid stone sarcophagus to the U.S. Bureau of Mines. Several weeks later the bureau sent the mine operators a letter declaring they must have been mistaken. Since it clearly is impossible for creatures to have survived under the circumstances described, as far as the bureau was concerned there was no way the incident could have happened.
In 1892 an ore nugget found in an Arizona mine was found to contain a dead beetle from which emerged a live beetle: is that a living fossil or what?
Yet more scientific mystery was brewing in the American West when, sometime in 1892, a large beetle was found encased in a chunk of iron ore in the Longfellow Mine outside Clifton, Arizona. The ore nugget and its dead inhabitant were turned over to El Paso geologist Z. T. White, who placed the insect in a specimen case. Several days later he was shocked to see the creature move. Watching through a magnifying glass White saw a small beetle emerge from the body of the larger, dead one. He placed the small beetle in a jar where it lived for several months. When it died, he presented it, the larger beetle and the lump of ore to the Smithsonian Institution , where they may remain to this day.
Living Fossils Story #3: A Load of Bullfrog
Since the vast majority of fossils are buried, it is predictable that mines are the main source of mysterious zoological artifacts. In 1873, miners at the Black Diamond Coal Mine outside San Francisco found a large frog encased in limestone.
This common (but venerable) bullfrog was apparently blind, and able to slowly move just one leg. After several hours on the surface, it died. The frog and its entombing stone were given to the San Francisco Academy of Sciences, where its survival of what would seem an impossible stretch of time continues to defy understanding.
Yet not all living fossils are found in stone or ore.
Once in 1893 in Ontario, Canada a live toad emerged from deep inside a tree trunk!
In October 1893 workmen at the Brown and Hall Sawmill in Ontario, Canada were using a circular saw to cut a large tree trunk into planks when the blade sliced through a cavity containing (and almost cut in two) a live toad imprisoned squarely in the middle of the tree trunk. The tree was about 200 years old, and the spherical, perfectly smooth hole in which the amphibian was entombed was about 60 feet (18 meters) above the ground. The toad tumbled from its wooden prison and hopped away, seemingly none the worse for its long confinement.
Another report of a live toad in a hole comes from England. In 1829 huge granite blocks that had formed a submerged footing under the docks of Liverpool's George's Basin were being cut into small chunks to be made into steps. During one of the cuts, the stone saw revealed a little hole in the middle of a block, and a toad within it.
Workers gently enlarged the hole to free its occupant, and the amphibian made several futile attempts to get to its feet. Several hours later, after trying one last time to assume its normal crouching position, the toad sank to the pavement and died. Several scientists who later examined the small corpse confessed they were at a loss to explain how the animal could have been found alive under such airless, foodless and waterless conditions. One of these learned men took the dead animal home with him, and it was never seen again. It was not the first or last impossible fossil yielded by Britain.
Living Fossils Story #5: Newt News
In 1818 professional geologist Dr. E.D. Clark, who taught at Caius College in Cambridge, Scotland, was present at the digging of a pit on a friend's property when the workmen hit a layer of animated fossils. As one of the workers was breaking up a large chunk of chalk stone into smaller pieces so they could be removed from the hole he found three newts embedded in the rock. Clarke placed them in the bright sunlight and was stupefied when they began to move. Two of them died later in the day, and for years he exhibited them to his students during his lectures on prehistory. He placed the third newt in a nearby brook, and it "skipped and twisted about as though it had never been torpid," and escaped, he later said. Clarke was never able to identify the species to which the newts belonged.
Upon Clarke's retirement he donated the preserved newts to the university's biology department, where, for decades, other professors displayed them during lectures. During the chaos of the 1940 Nazi bombing blitz these pickled specimens turned up missing. Unless they were blown to atoms by a Luftwaffe bomb, they may remain somewhere within Cambridge University, forgotten and still unexplained.
This is a fossil of a flying dinosaur, a Pterodactylus antiquus, and a close cousin of this species was apparently still alive in France in the 1850s according to newspaper reports at the time.
The most incredible find of a living fossil is that reported by the Illustrated London Times of February 9, 1856. The incident occurred in France during the construction of a railway tunnel between the towns of Nancy and St. Dizier. According to the article, workers were breaking up a huge boulder when a goose-sized monster staggered from a freshly exposed cavity and screeched hoarsely before falling dead. It had a long beak, sharp teeth, four legs joined by membranes, and feet with long hooked talons. Its flesh was oily and glossy black.
The mysterious carcass was taken to a paleontologist who instantly recognized the animal as a Pterodactylus anas, a denizen of the Jurassic Period , which ended 135 million years ago. There is no record of whether the body was preserved and still exists.
Possibilities
Certain animals' ability to live long stretches without sustenance is possible via hibernation to escape the lean, hostile conditions of winter. Because their metabolisms are conditioned to arouse them upon the advent of the warmth and renewed food supplies of springtime, they are seldom in suspended animation for more than four or five months. What might happen if spring never arrived? What if their hibernation dens were to be buried by glaciers and/or metamorphose into rock?
Southern Methodist University professor of biology Dr. John Ubelaker, Ph.D. points out that many organisms possess the ability to lower their metabolisms, and that this function is often triggered by environmental conditions. This permits survival through difficult times.
"This is a common phenomenon among many free-living nematodes that have the ability to form a resting stage--dauer larvae--in order to survive a stressful situation," he says. "In these nematodes the ability to control water and water loss is critical, and several metabolic-biochemical processes operate."
Nematodes that have come to life are perhaps the most incredible living fossils. A colorized electron micrograph of a soybean cyst nematode and egg.
In his 1863 book History of the Supernatural noted British author and scientist William Hewitt recounted a midsummer incident he had personally witnessed several years earlier in which workmen in Nottinghamshire, England were digging a ditch and unearthed what he called "a regular stratum of frogs." The creatures were not only alive, but so animated they all hopped away.
He described the layer of mud that had held the frogs as "stiff as butter," and based on the time of year and his examination of the ground where they were buried, he estimated they had been there at least six months. As he asked his readers, "If these frogs could live six months in this nearly solid casing of viscous mud, why not six or any number of years?"
Ubelaker expands upon this premise:
"An interesting fact of life is that an organism's structure and composition can remain virtually the same even though it continuously takes in nutrients and produces wastes. Often defined as a dynamic equilibrium, life allows concentrations of the mixture of the materials in an organism to remain constant even though individual molecules are constantly shifting back and forth, increasing or decreasing in a short time scale," he says."Remember that an organism at equilibrium is dead. A common classroom comparison is often made with a river and the steady state condition of organisms--the river maintains the same level and shape even though water is constantly flowing through it. Rivers rise and change course, drop to low levels depending on the available water, but at any one point it (and its concentration of materials) remains quite constant. In organisms the structure, proteins, nucleic acid, lipids stay relatively constant even though no one molecule remains in any pool for long."
The erratic and odd sides of the natural world remind us of how much we still have to learn about Mother Earth and the processes that govern her and her multitude of children. There are doubtless many more living relics of the primordial past awaiting exhumation. When they do come to light, they should be studied meticulously in order to ascertain how they survived such extremes of time, temperature and deprivation. The possibility of harmlessly subjecting human beings to suspended animation could solve problems of surviving extended space travel, awaiting the return of loved ones from the stars, outlasting terminal illnesses until cures are discovered, or simply staying alive long enough to meet one's great-great-great-grandchildren. Before we can even start on such grand aspirations, however, we must admit this potentially priceless process exists.
Top image: Frog brooch of amber and bronze on a rock, representative of living fossils.
Eridu: The Sumerian Garden of Eden and the Oldest City in the World?
Eridu: The Sumerian Garden of Eden and the Oldest City in the World?
Today, Eridu is often considered to be one of the oldest permanent settlements in Mesopotamia, and perhaps even in the world. The ancient Sumerians also believed that Eridu was the first city in the world and they documented that belief in the Sumerian King List and the Eridu Genesis . At least 18 layers of settlement are found at the site, could the ancient Sumerian belief be possible?
Archaeological evidence shows that the earliest structures date to the 6th millennium BC. The city reached its zenith during the 4th millennium BC and continued to be inhabited until around the 7th century BC. By then, however, the city had lost its importance.
Some of the baked bricks used in the construction of the Sumerian ziggurat at Eridu, southwest of Nasiriyah, Iraq, are stamped with the name of King Ur-Nammu (2123-2106 BC).
Eridu (known today as Tell Abu Shahrain) is located about 20 km (12.5 miles) to the southwest of the famous city of Ur. As its modern name indicates, the archaeological site is a tell, which is a huge mound formed over the millennia as a result of new settlements being built over the ruins of the previous ones. The tell rises to a height to 7 meters (23 feet), and is formed by 18 levels of occupation, according to the archaeological excavations. The bulk of this has been dated to the Ubaid and Uruk periods, which lasted from the 6th to 4th millennia BC.
The ancient Sumerians themselves made mention of Eridu’s antiquity. In the Sumerian King List , for example, it is written that “After the kingship descended from heaven, the kingship was in Eridug.” In addition, in the creation myth known as the Eridu Genesis , it is said to have been one of the five cities that existed before the Deluge, the others being Bad-Tibira, Larak, Sippar, and Suruppak.
The God of Eridu Temple
The patron god of Eridu was Enki (known also in Akkadian as Ea), the god of water. According to Sumerian mythology, the settlement was founded by Enki, and it was from this city that civilization was spread to other parts of the land. Although Enki was initially a local god, he rose in importance as the city grew in influence, resulting in him being incorporated into the pantheon of other cities as well. In Eridu, Enki’s temple is known as E-Abzu (Abzu may be translated as ‘Deep Ocean’, and refers to the underground spring from which all life is believed to have begun).
Rough map of the Eridu mound showing the main ziggurat, temple, and a few buildings.
Archaeological excavations of the E-Abzu have revealed that the temple began as a small room containing what has been referred to by scholars as a ‘cult niche’ and an ‘offering table’. Over the millennia, however, the inhabitants built new temples over the ruins of the old ones, each bigger than the last. The E-Abzu eventually became a large ziggurat, an apt reflection of Enki’s status as a major deity. It has been proposed that the E-Abzu may have been the largest of the ancient Mesopotamian ziggurats.
Economic Activities
Although the E-Abzu is the focal point of the site’s archaeology, there are either elements of interest. More recent excavations, for instance, have revealed that during the Ubaid period, the city was a pottery production center. This is evident in the pottery works, which had large scatterings of pottery fragments and kiln waste. Additionally, remains of fishing nets, weights, and even models of reed boats have been found at the site, suggesting that fishing was a major economic activity carried out by the inhabitants.
There are nine lines of cuneiform inscriptions on this fired clay brick; stamp of the king Amar-Sin (Amar-Suen, previously misread as Bur-Sin), king of Ur. 2100-2000 BC. From Eridu (modern-day Tell Abu Shahrain), southern Mesopotamia, Iraq. It is currently housed in the British Museum in London.
(Osama Shukir Muhammed Amin FRCP(Glasg)/ CC BY SA 4.0 )
Eridu was the dominant city in southern Mesopotamia during the Ubaid period, but it was eventually superseded by Uruk. Nevertheless, it continued to be revered as the first city, and it retained its religious significance thanks to the E-Abzu.
It has been suggested that ecological changes, i.e. the recession of the gulf coast and the increasingly unreliable water table, were responsible for the decline of Eridu around the end of the 3rd millennium BC. The city continued to be inhabited up until around the 7th century BC, although by then it had become a mere shadow of its former glory.
In 2016, Eridu was inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, as part of the ‘Ahwar of Southern Iraq: Refuge of Biodiversity and the Relict Landscape of the Mesopotamian Cities’.
Top image: Re-creation of the port at Eridu. Source: Public Domain
The Amarnaperiod (1347 – 1336 BC) was undoubtedly one of the most unique stages in the history of ancient Egypt. The establishment of the Egyptian capital in a totally virgin territory so far, the artistic revolution in the representations of the pharaoh and his family or the changes introduced in the religious world are some of its most important aspects, but not the only ones.
At the end of the 19th century, a peasant woman discovered by chance the so-called Amarna letters, an archive of contemporary documentation to Amenhotep III (1390 – 1352 BC) and Amenhotep IV / Akhenaten (1352-1336 BC) which has become a great treasure of Egyptology.
In this article we are going to try to summarize what the Amarna letters are, what are the themes that their contents deal with or who are the protagonists who speak to us through them.
What are the Amarna Letters?
Around 1347 BC, in his fifth year as sovereign, Amenhotep IV took a radical turn in his reign by changing his name: he was renamed Akhenaten, which literally means ” one who effectively acts for the good of Aten.”
As part of his revolutionary program, the pharaoh moved the capital of the country to a newly created city in a territory never before inhabited: Tell el-Amarna, originally known as Akhetaten, that is, “horizon of Aten”.
At the same time that thousands of people of different conditions moved to live in Amarna, so did the main officials of the kingdom.
With them traveled the documents that would make up the great Tell el-Amarna archive, located in the so-called House of Correspondence of the Pharaoh.
The missives in the Amarna archive are engraved in cuneiform script and in Akkadian, one of the lingua francas for international relations.
The language used in these clay tablets flees from formalities and goes into directly analyzing issues such as the political situation of the kingdoms, marital alliances, disputes and diplomatic cordialities, war reports…
To reach their destination, they were transported by officials who sometimes had to walk hundreds of kilometers to fulfill their mission.
The discovery of the first letters occurred fortuitously during the illegal excavations that Farag Ismain was carrying out in the area in mid-1887.
Shortly after, the excavations of the Egyptologist William Flinders Petrie began to bring to light new custom letters that the remains of the Pharaoh’s House of Correspondence were identified.
We do not know the approximate number of tablets that it must have housed at the peak of the Amarnian period, but at present we conserve about four hundred which are distributed between the British Museum in London, the Old Museum in Berlin and the Museum in Cairo.
Contents of the Amarna letters
The fundamental factor that makes the Amarna archive so valuable is its uniqueness, since it is the only set of diplomatic texts that the Nile civilization has bequeathed to us.
The letters are an exceptional testimony of Egypt’s international relations with the great powers of the Middle East from the end of the reign of Amenhotep III, the entire reign of Akhenaten and the beginning of that of Tutankhamun (1336 – 1327 BC).
The scribes who were in charge of writing the Amarna letters that the ambassadors would later carry also played a fundamental role, often working as translators.
After all, the accuracy of the translation depended on whether the message arrived exactly as it should. An incorrect intonation or a badly translated word could generate a misunderstanding that could lead to an international conflict.
Example of five Amarna letters exhibited in the British Museum in London
What are the Amarna letters about?
Within the Amarna letters, one of the requests that is repeated the most, on the part of the pharaoh, is that of princesses and servants of foreign courts.
This marriage circuit was not reciprocal, since the Egyptian sovereign showed his desire to marry Asian princesses while making it clear that he was not willing to send any of his daughters out of the kingdom
However, that does not mean that they did not achieve anything. In the case of Babylon, for example, we know that they sent princesses to Egypt in exchange for large amounts of gold .
Let’s see to finalize some specific cases. One of the Amarna letters indicates that Amenhotep III requested the hand of Princess Kiluhepa of Mittani. The princess then moved to Egypt accompanied by more than three hundred servants.
Another letter specifies the long list of goods that the Mittanian king Tushratta (approx. 1375-1350 BC) contributed as a dowry to his daughter Taduhepa , who eventually traveled with 300 men and women for her personal service.
In another, King Burna-Buriash II of Babylon(approx. 1359 – 1333 BC) complained about the little pomp with which he had transferred his daughter to the country of the Nile, as if she were anybody.
Also angry, Kadashman-Enlil I of Babylon (1374 – 1360 BC) showed his indignation to Amenhotep III for not wanting to give one of his daughters as a wife.
In conclusion, the Amarna letters allow us to peek through a knowledge gap into a world of kings, princesses, courts and entanglements that we could not have accessed through archeology or the texts that were represented in stelae, temples, tombs or palaces.
For all these reasons, this archive is one of the most relevant sources of knowledge that we have when it comes to reconstructing the relationship of political forces existing in Egypt and the Middle East in the 14th century BC in particular and in the Egyptian New Kingdom in general.
Source:
GOLVIN, JC (2017): Cities of the ancient world. Madrid: Wake up Ferro.
LIVERANI, M. (2012): The ancient East. History, society and economy. Barcelona: Criticism.
LULL, J .: “The Amarna archive: the Pharaoh’s letters”, in National Geographic History, nº 193, pp. 38-49.
PADRÓ PARCERISA, J. (2019): History of Pharaonic Egypt. Madrid: Editorial Alliance.
SHAW, I. (2014): History of Ancient Egypt. Madrid.
Fragment of one of the letters between King Tushratta of Mittani and the Egyptian pharaoh
Tablet containing a letter between King Burna-Buriash II of Babylon and the Egyptian pharaoh
A Mysterious Round Structure Older Than Stonehenge Found in Prague
A Mysterious Round Structure Older Than Stonehenge Found in Prague
Paul Seaburn
The beautiful city of Prague in the Czech Republic is known for its rich history, Gothic cathedrals, medieval squares, art scene, nightlife and restaurants. On the other hand, its name rarely comes up when the discussion turns to ancient monuments and monoliths like the Great Pyramid of Giza or Britain’s Stonehenge. That may change soon as the world learns of the discovery of mysterious round monumental building on the outskirts of the city that dates back to about 4900 BCE – making it older than the Great Pyramid and Stonehenge. And, despite being well-preserved, its purpose to the people living there in the Neolithic period is a mystery.
A reconstruction of circular ditches similar to the roundels in this story (piblic domain)
“Roundels were built during the Stone Age when people had not yet discovered iron. The only tools they could use were made of stone and animal bones.”
Despite being erected by people of the New Stone Age using stone and bone tools, Jaroslav Rídký from the Institute of Archaeology of the Czech Academy of Sciences in Prague marvels that the “roundel” – a circular enclosure (‘rondely’ in Czech) – discovered recently in the Vinoř district on the outskirts of Prague is in such ‘monumental’ condition for its age of 7,000 years. Roundels are actually common structures in Central Europe – about 200 have been uncovered in total, with 35 in the Czech Republic. Despite their size, most tourists and even many Europeans have never heard of them.
“The so-called roundels are the oldest evidence of architecture in the whole of Europe. They are a series of circular ditches and they are always arranged in a circle with two, three, four or more entrances to the center, four being the most common.
The whole structure reaches an average of between 30 to 240 meters, but you most commonly find them in the range of 60 – 80 meters.”
Jaroslav Rídký has seen roundels reaching 787 feet (240 meters) in diameter, but the newest discovery in is 180 feet (55 meters) across. (Photos of it here.)
An aerial view of the Vinoř roundel near Prague, showing three separate entrances.
(Image credit: Institute of Archaeology of the Czech Academy of Sciences)
Archaeologists working on the excavation of the Stone Age roundel.
(Image credit: Institute of Archaeology of the Czech Academy of Sciences)
Open trenches undergoing excavation by a team from the Institute of Archaeology of the Czech Academy of Sciences.
(Image credit: Institute of Archaeology of the Czech Academy of Sciences)
A trench wall revealing stratigraphy (different layers) of the excavation.
(Image credit: Institute of Archaeology of the Czech Academy of Sciences)
The “ditches” – all that is left of the mysterious structures – average about one and a half meters (5 feet) in width but some of the largest span fourteen meters (46 feet) and are six meters (20 feet) deep. Only a few of the roundels discovered are well-defined – most are mere outlines of where the ditches once were. That explains why the first ones weren’t discovered until the 19th century and most were unknown until the 1980s with the advent of aerial photography, using drones and planes, and satellite imagery. As they were uncovered, the first mystery of the roundels emerged – virtually all of them across Central Europe were built during a brief 300 year period between 4900 and 4600 BCE. Here is how Jaroslav Rídký describes it:
“There was simply some kind of societal change, where the roundels could no longer fulfill the function they had before and they just stopped being used.
The structure of settlements changes in some areas, the ornamentation changes.”
What happened to cause Neolithic cultures across Central Europe to abandon such huge round structures they spent so much time building and maintaining? The largest (787 feet) is in the Czech Republic and is a series of three concentric ditches with a fourth apparently under construction when it was abandoned. The massive structure had four gates leading to the center. In addition, a second single-ditch roundel was located a mere 165 feet (50 meters) away. Another Czech Republic roundel recently located in Třebovětice in the Jičín district was hidden in a thick forest and, back in its time, was protected by ramparts (fortifying barriers) which are still visible today. It is details like these, along with the discoveries of more roundels like the one in the Vinoř district, which give Miroslav Kraus, the principal investigator of that roundel for the Institute of Archaeology of the Czech Academy of Sciences (IAP), some hints to their mysterious purpose.
“One of such theory is that it could have been used as an economic centre, a centre of trade. It could also have been a centre of some religious cult, where rites of passage or rituals connected to the time of year were performed.”
Kraus and others believe that some of the Czech roundels – and possibly more elsewhere -- were built by the so-called Stroked Pottery culture noted for making zig-zag bands on its pottery vessels. The Stroked Pottery culture existed in Poland, eastern Germany and the northern Czech Republic between 4900 and 4400 BCE, but were more known for building longhouses -- large, rectangular buildings that held 20 to 30 people. If the roundels were built the same way, the inner ditches would have been lined with wooden poles with mud between the gaps. These tightly-erected poles may have been protective fortress walls, but they could also have been load-bearing walls to hold roofs also made with wood like the longhouses. The research team is continuing to comb the area for clues.
A sketch of the layout of the Goseck circle, a similar roundel
Organic material found at the site are being carbon-dated to determine exactly when the Czeck roundel was built and if the builders were indeed part of the Stroked Potter culture. If the roundel was for social gatherings or ritual functions, the organic materials should show where the people gathering there came from, since they appear to have been too large to serve just the local population. It would be impressive to find that these Late Stone Age people living 7000 years ago – before Stonehenge or the Great Pyramid – built such impressive structures for socio-ritual purposes rather than just religious – commemorating events such as rites of passage, astronomical occurrences or economic activities. All of this was done by people working with stone and bone tools.
Who were the people of these Czech roundels? What were their purposes? How did they build them? Why did the suddenly and mysteriously abandon them? If we can answer any or all of these questions, perhaps we can apply that knowledge to other mysterious civilizations which have flourished, then vanished. Perhaps we can find some solutions to our own problems before we vanish as well.
It will be just our luck that the research into the roundels of the Czech Republic will show their builders left because of climate change.
40,000-year-old star maps with sophisticated knowledge of modern astronomy
40,000-year-old star maps with sophisticated knowledge of modern astronomy
In 2008, a scientific study revealed an astonishing fact about the palaeolithic humans ― a number cave paintings, some of which were as old as 40,000 years, were actually products of complex astronomy that our primitive ancestors had acquired in the distant past.
Some of the world’s oldest cave paintings have revealed how ancient people had relatively advanced knowledge of astronomy. Animal symbols represent star constellations in the night sky, and are used to mark dates and events such as comet strikes, analysis from the University of Edinburgh suggested. Credit: Alistair Coombs
The ancient paintings that were thought to be symbols of prehistoric animals are actually ancient star maps, according to what experts revealed in their fascinating discovery.
Early cave art shows that people had an advanced knowledge of the night sky in the last ice age. Intellectually, they were hardly different from us today. But these particular cave paintings revealed that humans had a sophisticated knowledge of stars and constellations more than 40,000 years ago.
It was during the Paleolithic Age, or also called the Old Stone Age ― a period in prehistory distinguished by the original development of stone tools that covers almost 99% of the period of human technological prehistory.
Ancient star maps
According to the breakthrough scientific study published by the University of Edinburgh, ancient humans controlled the passage of time by watching how stars change positions in the sky. The ancient works of art, found in various places in Europe, are not simply representations of wild animals, as previously thought.
Instead, animal symbols represent constellations of stars in the night sky. They are used to represent dates, marking events like asteroid collisions, eclipses, meteor showers, sunrise and sunset, solstices and equinoxes, lunar phases and etc.
The Lascaux cave painting: 17,000 years ago, the Lascaux painters offered the world a peerless work of art. However, according to a new theory, some of the paintings could also be the representations of the constellations as seen in the sky by our ancestors from the Magdalenian era. Such a hypothesis, confirmed in many others Paleolithic Caves radically transforms our conception concerning prehistoric Rock Arts.
Scientists suggest that ancient peoples perfectly understood the effect caused by the gradual change in the Earth’s axis of rotation. The discovery of this phenomenon, called the precession of the equinoxes, was previously credited to the ancient Greeks.
One of the lead researchers, Dr Martin Sweatman, from the University of Edinburgh explained, “Early cave art shows that people had an advanced knowledge of the night sky in the last ice age. Intellectually, they were no different from us today. Tese findings support a theory of multiple impacts of comets throughout human development and are likely to revolutionize the way prehistoric populations are viewed.”
Sophisticated knowledge of constellations
Experts from Edinburgh and Kent universities studied a number of renowned arts in ancient caves located in Turkey, Spain, France and Germany. In their in-depth study, they had achieved the era of those rock arts by chemically dating the paints used by ancient humans.
Then, using computer software, the researchers predicted the position of the stars exactly when the paintings were made. This revealed that what may have appeared before, as abstract representations of animals, can be interpreted as constellations as they arose in the distant past.
Scientists concluded that these incredible cave paintings are a clear evidence that ancient humans practiced a sophisticated method of timing based on astronomical calculations. All of this, although the cave paintings were separated in time by tens of thousands of years.
“The oldest sculpture in the world, the Lion-Man from the Hohlenstein-Stadel cave, from 38,000 BC, was also considered compatible with this ancient timing system,” revealed experts in a statement from the University of Edinburgh
The Löwenmensch figurine or Lion-man of the Hohlenstein-Stadel is a prehistoric ivory sculpture discovered in the Hohlenstein-Stadel, a German cave in 1939. It’s nearly 40,000 years old.
The mysterious statuette is believed to commemorate the catastrophic impact of an asteroid that occurred around 11,000 years ago, initiating the so-called Younger Dryas Event, a period of sudden cooling of the climate worldwide.
At around 12,000 years old, Göbekli Tepe in south-east Turkey has been billed as the world’s oldest temple. Various animal arts can also be seen in this prehistoric site, and the ‘Vulture Stone’ (down-right) is significantly one of them.
“The date carved in the ‘Vulture Stone’ of Göbekli Tepe is interpreted as being 10,950 BC, within 250 years,” explained the scientists in the study. “This date is written using the precession of the equinoxes, with animal symbols representing stellar constellations corresponding to this year’s four solstices and equinoxes.”
Conclusion
So, this great discovery reveals the truth that humans had a complex understanding of time and space thousands of years before the ancient Greeks, who are credited with the first studies of modern astronomy. Not only these, there are several other instances, such as the Sumerian Planisphere, the Nebra Sky Disk, Babylonian Clay Tablet etc., which imply more sophisticated knowledge of modern astronomy that our ancient ancestors once acquired.
The Great White Pyramid of Xian: Why China keeps its pyramids a secret?
The Great White Pyramid of Xian: Why China keeps its pyramids a secret?
The White Pyramid myth began during World War II, when eyewitness accounts, especially from pilot James Gaussman, mentioned the appearance of a massive “White Pyramid” near the Chinese city of Xi’an, during a flight between China and India in 1945, he is believed to have seen a white jewel-topped pyramid.
Not only was this amazing structure supposed to be the biggest pyramid in the world, but it was also said to be surrounded by dozens of smaller pyramids, some rising to almost the same height.
Walter Hain, an author, and scientific writer describe Gaussman’s initial view of the pyramid in his homepages. James Gaussman was returning to Assam, India, after flying the ‘Burma Hump,’ which transported supplies from India to Chungking, China, when engine difficulties caused him to momentarily descend to a low altitude above China.
“I banked in order to avoid a mountain, and we emerged into a flat valley. A gigantic white pyramid stood directly below. It appeared to be something from a fairy tale. It was enclosed in a gleaming white shell. This might have been made of metal or a type of stone. On both sides, it was pure white.
The capstone was amazing; it was a massive chunk of jewel-like material that may have been crystal. We could not have landed, no matter how badly we wanted to. We were taken aback by the enormity of the thing.”
The New York Times picked up the story and published an article on the pyramid on March 28, 1947. Colonel Maurice Sheahan, director of Trans World Airlines’ Far Eastern division, stated in an interview that he had seen a massive pyramid 40 miles southwest of Xian. The same newspaper published a photo two days following the report, which was eventually credited to Gaussman.
Photographs of the massive pyramid he had shot would not be released for another 45 years. Even his report would remain buried in the Secret Service archives of the United States military until then. Numerous researchers and explorers have attempted to locate the White Pyramid of Xi’an, but none have been successful.
Some claim that the White Pyramid may be hidden amidst the high mountains and deep gorges of the Qin Ling Mountains.
Chinese government designated about 400 pyramids north of Xi’an in 2000, however, the White Pyramid was not included. Many of the other sites were excavated, revealing mausoleums shaped more like Mesoamerican pyramids, which vary from Egyptian pyramids in that they are flat-topped and covered with flora.
Ancient members of China’s royal class were buried in these burial mounds, where they planned to lie in peace for eternity. The majority of the pyramids are exceedingly difficult to spot, as they are hidden by lush hillsides and hills, as well as long grass and trees. Only a few of the structures have been made available to tourists.
Photograph published in New York Times, May 30 1947, supposedly taken by James Gaussman
The Chinese government has provided easy justifications for why no one is permitted to enter, notably that enthusiastic archaeologists and visitors may do damage to the relics.
Officials believe they are waiting for technology to improve sufficiently to fully dig the pyramids and their valuable contents. After all, some of the pyramids are thought to be as old as 8,000 years.
Westerners have speculated endlessly about the pyramids’ purpose and energy, as well as their astrological significance. According Noopept stock to scholars, “the cardinal points of North, South, East, and West were all significant to certain kings.” Lining up your tomb with the axis of the world was proof that you were still number one.”
One of the rarest pictures of pyramids in the Xi’an Valley
The most common conspiracy theory includes extraterrestrials, who are said to be the original architects. Is it feasible that Erich von Däniken’s and others’ ancient astronaut theories might also apply to the Chinese pyramids? Wherever there is concealment, conspiracy theories automatically emerge.
The Phoenicians: Mysterious Merchant Mariners Whose Inventions Impacted the World Forever
The Phoenicians: Mysterious Merchant Mariners Whose Inventions Impacted the World Forever
The Phoenicians were an ancient people who once ruled the Mediterranean. Despite little being known about them as very few of their inscriptions have survived, their legacy has had an enormous impact on the world, which is still felt today.
The Phoenicians were renowned as excellent mariners and used their expertise to trade all across the Mediterranean. One of the most notable signs of their trade activity is the establishment of Carthage, in present day Tunisia. They were also the inventors of the alphabet.
The History of the Phoenicians
According to tradition, the city was founded as a colony in 814 BC by Phoenicians under the leadership of the legendary Queen Dido . The Carthaginians themselves became a dominant maritime power in the western Mediterranean, until its final destruction by Rome in 146 BC, following their defeat in the Punic Wars . Apart from Carthage, the Phoenicians founded colonies on Cyprus and in Anatolia as well.
The greater part of the territory they once occupied corresponds to modern day Lebanon, but the Phoenicians also held parts of southern Syria and northern Israel.
The Phoenician Alphabet
The Phoenicians made numerous contributions to human civilization, the most notable of which being the Phoenician alphabet , which is the ancestor of many other alphabets that are used today. Scholars have speculated that the Phoenicians referred to themselves as ‘Kena’ani’ (‘Kinahna’ in Akkadian, or ‘Canaanite’ in English). Interestingly, in Hebrew, this word also meant ‘merchant’, which is an apt description of the Phoenicians. The term ‘Phoenicians’, however, is commonly used today, as it was the Greeks who called these people by this name.
The ancient Greeks referred to the land of the Phoenicians as ‘Phoiniki’, which is derived from the Egyptian ‘Fnkhw’, meaning ‘Syrian’. The Greek ‘Phoiniki’ is phonetically similar to their word for the color purple or crimson (‘phoînix’). This is due to the fact that one of the most valuable objects produced and exported by the Phoenicians was a dye known as Tyrian purple. Thus, the Phoenicians were known also as the ‘Purple People’.
According to the Greek historian Herodotus, the Phoenicians were originally from the Red Sea area, but later emigrated to and settled along the eastern coast of the Mediterranean. Archaeologists today, however, regard Herodotus’ account of the Phoenicians’ origins as a myth. In addition, there is a lack of evidence to support the claims that the Phoenicians emigrated to the eastern Mediterranean from other areas of the ancient world. Instead, it is accepted that the Phoenicians were originally from the eastern Mediterranean and may have developed from the Ghassulian culture, which is an archaeological stage in southern Palestine dating to the Middle Chalcolithic period, i.e. the 4 th millennium BC.
The Phoenicians Flourish as Traders
The Phoenicians flourished during the 1 st millennium BC. During that time, there were other Canaanite cultures inhabiting the region as well, and archaeologists are unable to differentiate between the Phoenicians and these other cultures in terms of material culture, language, and religious beliefs. This is due to the fact that the Phoenicians were themselves Canaanites. Nevertheless, the Phoenicians distinguished themselves from their Canaanite brethren by their achievements as seafarers and traders.
The Phoenicians flourished as marine merchants. (Baddu676 / Public Domain )
As mentioned before, the Greek ‘Phoiniki’ is associated with the dye known as Tyrian purple, which was traded by the Phoenicians. Indeed, this was one of the best-known products of Phoenicia. Tyrian purple was a highly-prized dye that was made using several species of sea snails belonging to the Muricidae family (commonly known as murex snails). One legend states that it was the Greek hero Hercules who discovered this dye. According to this tale, Hercules was strolling along the beach with a nymph, Tyrus, and his dog. Hercules’ dog came across a murex shell and devoured it. When the dog returned to its master its mouth was stained a brilliant purple.
Tyrus found the color so attractive that she requested from Hercules a robe of the of the same color as the price for her hand in marriage. Hercules obliged and gathered enough murex snails to produce the dye necessary to color Tyrus’ robe. In reality, however, Tyrian purple was discovered by the Phoenician. Although nobody is certain today as to how the dye’s discovery was made, it is entirely possible that it was accidental, similar to the Hercules story.
Tyrian purple was not the only trade object that the Phoenicians were famous for. Glass was another valuable product that the Phoenicians exported to the rest of the Mediterranean. Glass was already being produced by other civilizations including the Mesopotamians and Egyptians. The glass produced by these civilizations was colored and it is speculated that the Phoenicians were the first ones to produce transparent glass.
Yet another produce of Phoenicia was cedar wood, which the region is famous for, as far back as the Mesopotamian period. One of the main consumers of cedar wood during the 1 st millennium BC was Egypt, as the demand for wood by the Egyptians was greater than the local supply. Therefore, cedar wood was imported into Egypt from Phoenicia. During the 14 th century BC, for instance, the Phoenicians paid tribute to Egypt by offering cedar wood, as attested in the Amarna Letters .
The fame of the cedar wood from Phoenicia is also seen in the Story of Wenamun . In this Egyptian tale, Wenamun, a priest from the Amun Temple in Karnak sets off in a Phoenician ship to Byblos to purchase timber for the construction of a solar boat.
As superb seafarers, the Phoenician merchants need not rely solely on the goods locally produced in Phoenicia. They were more than capable of traveling to the far corners of the Mediterranean to obtain resources that they did not have back home. The most important of these were precious metals – tin and silver from Spain (and perhaps as far as Cornwall in England) and copper from Cyprus.
Colonies were set up along the trade routes in order to facilitate the journey of the Phoenician merchants. Moreover, Phoenicia is situated in a geographically strategic position that allowed it to further increase its wealth from trade.
The land of the Phoenicians is located between Mesopotamia in the east and Egypt and Arabia in the south / southwest. Trade routes between these two areas of the ancient world had to pass through Phoenicia thereby enriching the Phoenicians even further.
Map of Phoenicia and its Mediterranean trade routes.
We do not know to whether the Phoenicians had a shared identity and if they considered themselves as a single nation. Nevertheless, we do know that they established city states which were politically independent.
The rise of these Phoenician city states occurred around 12th / 11th centuries BC. Around this time, the old powers that dominated the region, i.e. the Egyptians and the Hittites , had either been weakened or were destroyed. For instance, the arrival of the Sea Peoples led to the decline of the New Kingdom in Egypt, while the Hittite Empire was breaking up around the same time.
The Phoenicians seized the opportunity to fill the power vacuum left behind by these empires by establishing their own city states. It seems that each city state was ruled by a monarch, whose power was limited by a powerful oligarchy.
In addition, there is no evidence that the cities banded together into a federation. Instead, they operated independently. Among the most notable Phoenician city states were Tyre, Sidon, and Byblos.
Byblos (known today in Arabic as Jbail) is located about 30 kilometers (20 miles) to the north of modern day Beirut. Its history stretches way back before its rise as a powerful Phoenician city state during the 12th century BC.
Byblos is considered to be one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world and according to the archaeological evidence was settled by human beings as early as the Neolithic period. By the 4th millennium BC Byblos had grown into an extensive settlement. Byblos became the main harbor from which cedar wood was exported to Egypt. As a result of this, the city developed into an important trade center.
Byblos became an Egyptian dependency during the first half of the 2nd millennium BC and maintained close ties with Egypt in the following centuries. With the decline and subsequent collapse of the Egyptian New Kingdom during the 11th century BC, Byblos became the leading city state in Phoenicia.
By around 1000 BC, however, Byblos was eclipsed by two other independent Phoenician city states, Sidon and Tyre. Like Byblos, Sidon (known today in Arabic as Saida) was already an ancient city by the time it became an independent city state.
Sidon was established during the 3rd millennium BC and prospered in the following millennium as a result of trade. On the other hand, Tyre (known today in Arabic as Sur) was probably originally founded as a colony of Sidon. Like Byblos and Sidon, Tyre too became an independent city state when the Egyptians lost their grip over that region.
In time, Tyre surpassed Sidon as the most important Phoenician city state as it traded and established its own colonies in other parts of the Mediterranean. According to tradition, the famous city of Carthage was established as a colony of Tyre in 814 BC.
Archaeological site of Carthage, city established by the Phoenicians.
(Eric00000007 / CC BY-SA 3.0 )
Both Sidon and Tyre are also mentioned frequently in the Old Testament. For instance, the king of Tyre, Hiram, is recorded as providing Solomon the materials required for building the temple in Jerusalem.
The Phoenicians Lose Their Independence
The Phoenician city states were not able to hold on to their independence for long. The wealth of these city states must have attracted the attention of foreign powers. During the 8 th and 7 th centuries BC, the Phoenician city states came under the rule of the Neo-Assyrian Empire. In 538 BC, Phoenicia was conquered by Cyrus the Great and came under Persian rule. Although the Phoenicians had lost their independence their cities continued to flourish.
Due to their expertise in seafaring, the Phoenicians supplied ships for the Persian kings. Persian rule over Phoenicia ended during the 4th century BC, when the region fell to Alexander the Great . One of the major battles of Alexander’s campaign against the Persian Empire was the Siege of Tyre, which occurred in 332 BC. As the naval base of the Persians, Alexander knew that it would be unwise to leave it in the hands of the enemy as he continued his campaign southwards. He was also aware that Tyre would not fall so easily, as it was situated on an island off the mainland and was heavily fortified.
Therefore, he requested permission to offer sacrifices at the Temple of Melqart, the Phoenician god identified with the Greek hero Heracles, in the hopes that he would be allowed to enter the city. Alexander’s request was rejected, so he sent heralds to issue an ultimatum to the Tyrians – surrender or be conquered. In response, the Tyrians killed the heralds and threw them off the city walls.
Alexander the Great at the Siege of Tyre attacking the Phoenicians.
Enraged by the Tyrian’s defiance, Alexander proceeded to besiege the city. Due to the lack of a naval force the Macedonians were unable to assault the city directly. Instead, Alexander’s engineers began building a causeway to connect the island to the mainland. The Tyrians in turn sought to hamper the construction of the causeway, which was successful, until the arrival of a fleet of ships from Cyprus, as well as those that defected to Alexander from the Persians.
Eventually, the causeway was completed, and the Macedonians stormed and captured the city. The entire siege lasted seven months. Still furious with the Tyrians, Alexander executed about 10,000 of the city’s inhabitants, while another 30,000 were sold into slavery.
In the years following the death of Alexander the Great, Phoenicia was one of the regions fought over by the Seleucids and the Ptolemies, two of Alexander’s successors. During this period, the Phoenicians were gradually Hellenized, and their original identity was slowly being replaced. Finally, Phoenicia was incorporated by Pompey as part of the Roman province of Syria in 65 BC.
Although the Phoenicians disappeared from the pages of history, they are still remembered today as expert seafarers and merchants. This reputation, however, pales in comparison to the greatest contribution made by the Phoenicians to the modern world – the alphabet.
Like much of the Middle East during that time, the Phoenicians used a script known as cuneiform which originated in Mesopotamia. By around 1200 BC the Phoenicians had developed their own script. The earliest known example of the Phoenician script is found on the Sarcophagus of Ahiram, which was discovered in Byblos.
The Phoenician alphabet was later adopted by the Greeks who kept some characters while removing others. The Greek alphabet was in turn adopted by the Romans resulting in its spread all across Europe. Additionally, the Phoenician alphabet is considered to be the basis of other Middle Eastern, as well as Indian alphabets, either directly or indirectly.
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Over mijzelf
Ik ben Pieter, en gebruik soms ook wel de schuilnaam Peter2011.
Ik ben een man en woon in Linter (België) en mijn beroep is Ik ben op rust..
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