Gods, Graves, Glyphs
Weekly Digest #35
Saturday, March 19, 2005
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Africa
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Iron Age Pops Out Of KZN Sewer (50-100K Years Old, South Africa)
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Posted by blam
On News/Activism 09/07/2002 7:49:11 AM PDT · 14 replies · 216+ views
IOL | 9-6-2002
Iron Age pops out of KZN sewer September 06 2002 at 11:42AM Iron Age artefacts between 50,000 and 100,000 years old were unearthed while workers were digging to lay a new sewerage pipe near Amanzimtoti on Thursday. Pieces of iron smelting furnaces, slag and iron ore, arrowheads and bits of human bone had so far been found, said Gavin Anderson of the Natal Museum in Pietermaritzburg. Once the area had been fully excavated, the artefacts would be displayed in the museum, he said. - Sapa
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Ancient Egypt
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Archaeologist Discovers Ancient Ships In Egypt
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Posted by blam
On News/Activism 03/18/2005 11:32:08 AM PST · 9 replies · 521+ views
B U Bridge | 3-18-2005 | Tim Stoddard
Archaeologist discovers ancient ships in Egypt By Tim Stoddard Kathryn Bard had 'the best Christmas ever' this past December when she discovered the well-preserved timbers and riggings of pharaonic seafaring ships inside two man-made caves on Egypt's Red Sea coast. They are the first pieces ever recovered from Egyptian seagoing vessels, and along with hieroglyphic inscriptions found near one of the caves, they promise to shed light on an elaborate network of ancient Red Sea trade. Bard, a CAS associate professor of archaeology, and her former student Chen Sian Lim (CAS'01) had been shoveling sand for scarcely an hour on...
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Supplicants Send Their Mail To Unseen Powers That Be (Anthropology)
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Posted by blam
On News/Activism 03/16/2005 3:32:48 PM PST · 4 replies · 118+ views
Egypt Today | 3-16-2005 | Fayza Hassan
Supplicants send their mail to the unseen powers that be By Fayza Hassan Egypt Today ArchivesMany believe Bab Zuweila to be a mystical site CUSTOMS DIE HARD, nowhere more than in Egypt. Archaeological documents show that from as early as the Old Kingdom up to modern times, an endemic and persistent distrust in medicine and justice, as practiced in the land, often led the Egyptians to address their requests for health and legal redress directly to their dead relatives and the gods. Later, when monotheistic religions prevailed, they were addressed to saints whose extraordinary powers had become firmly rooted in...
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British Isles
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Divers Suprised By Iron Age Port (UK)
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Posted by blam
On News/Activism 09/17/2002 9:22:11 AM PDT · 16 replies · 96+ views
The Guardian (UK) | 9-17-2002 | Marv Kennedy
Divers surprised by iron age port Maev Kennedy, arts and heritage correspondent Tuesday September 17, 2002 The Guardian Archaeologists diving deep beneath the ferries and yachts criss-crossing Poole harbour have found startling evidence of the oldest working harbour in Britain, built centuries before the Roman invasion. Timber pilings excavated from a deep layer of silt on the sea bed have been radio-carbon dated at 250BC, the oldest substantial port structures by several centuries anywhere on the British coast. They suggest an iron age trading complex, with massive stone and timber jetties reaching out into the deep water channel, providing berths...
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Searching for the Welsh-Hindi link
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Posted by CarrotAndStick
On News/Activism 03/15/2005 2:58:17 AM PST · 41 replies · 675+ views
BBC | Monday, 14 March, 2005, 10:31 GMT | BBC
A BBC journalist is urging helpful linguists to come forward to help solve a mystery - why the Hindi (India's official language, along with English) accent has so much in common with Welsh. Sonia Mathur, a native Hindi speaker, had her interest sparked when she moved from India to work for the BBC in Wales - and found that two accents from countries 5,000 miles apart seemed to have something in common. It has long been known that the two languages stem from Indo-European, the "mother of all languages" - but the peculiar similarities between the two accents when spoken...
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Elam Persia, Parthia, Iran
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Nowruz: Persian New Year
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Posted by freedom44
On News/Activism 03/18/2005 9:32:35 AM PST · 7 replies · 91+ views
Payvand | 3/18/05 | Payvand
Once again Persian homes prepare for the New Year or Nowruz celebrations. All Persian households follow the practices of this, the oldest of Persian celebrations, which heralds the end of winter and cold and the coming of spring. The house goes through a spring cleaning preparing it for new events in the New Year. Fish bowls containing gold fishes, green wheat or lentil sprouts that have bloomed in decorative plates and shapes, hyacinths and tulips, red apples, mirrors and colored eggs adorn tables on decorative Persian fabrics. In the folds of the Koran fresh money notes are placed to bless...
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Origins and Prehistory
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Neanderthals Sang Like Sopranos
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Posted by blam
On News/Activism 03/15/2005 5:34:39 PM PST · 55 replies · 858+ views
ABC Science News | 3-15-2005 | Jennifer Viegas
Neanderthals sang like sopranos Jennifer Viegas Discovery News Tuesday, 15 March 2005 Neanderthals spoke in a high-pitched, sing-song voice, says one researcher. But not everyone is convinced (Image: iStockphoto) Neanderthals had strong, yet high-pitched, voices that the stocky hominins used for both singing and speaking, says a UK researcher. The theory suggests that Neanderthals, who once lived in Europe from around 200,000 to 35,000 BC, were intelligent and socially complex. It also indicates that although Neanderthals were likely to have represented a unique species, they had more in common with modern humans than previously thought. Stephen Mithen, a professor of...
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A Family Tree in Every Gene [Races DO Exist: NYT]
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Posted by Pharmboy
On News/Activism 03/14/2005 3:10:30 AM PST · 73 replies · 1,124+ views
NY Times Op-Ed Page | March 14, 2005 | ARMAND MARIE LEROI
London ó Shortly after last year's tsunami devastated the lands on the Indian Ocean, The Times of India ran an article with this headline: "Tsunami May Have Rendered Threatened Tribes Extinct." The tribes in question were the Onge, Jarawa, Great Andamanese and Sentinelese - all living on the Andaman Islands - and they numbered some 400 people in all. The article, noting that several of the archipelago's islands were low-lying, in the direct path of the wave, and that casualties were expected to be high, said, "Some beads may have just gone missing from the Emerald Necklace of India." The...
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PreColumbian, Clovis, PreClovis
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Experts Uncover Ancient Mayan Remains
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Posted by nickcarraway
On News/Activism 03/15/2005 11:49:58 PM PST · 10 replies · 387+ views
Yahoo News! | Sun Mar 6 | FREDDY CUEVAS
TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras - Scientists working at the Copan archaeological site in western Honduras said Sunday they have unearthed the 1,450-year-old remains of 69 people, as well as 30 previously undiscovered ancient Mayan buildings. Copan, about 200 miles west of Tegucigalpa, the capital, flourished between A.D. 250 and 900, part of a vast Mayan empire which stretched across parts of modern-day Mexico, Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras. The site was eventually abandoned, due at least in part to overpopulation, historians believe. Seiichi Nakamura, one of a team of Japanese scientists working alongside Honduran counterparts, said the human remains likely belong...
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Mother Of Us All, Or Sister? Olmecs A Puzzle
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Posted by blam
On News/Activism 03/15/2005 5:42:09 PM PST · 54 replies · 777+ views
Times Union | 3-15-2005 | John Noble Wilford
Mother of us all, or sister? Olmecs a puzzle By JOHN NOBLE WILFORD, New York Times First published: Tuesday, March 15, 2005 On a coastal flood plain etched by rivers flowing through swamps and alongside fields of maize and beans, the people archaeologists call the Olmecs lived in a society of emergent complexity. It was more than 3,000 years ago, along the Gulf of Mexico around Veracruz. The Olmecs moved a veritable mountain of earth to create a plateau above the plain, and there planted a city, the ruins of which are known today as San Lorenzo. The Olmecs are...
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Roots of Mesoamerican Writing
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Posted by jimtorr
On News/Activism 12/07/2002 4:54:13 AM PST · 20 replies · 128+ views
Science Magazine, Academic Press Daily "Inscight" | Posted 5 December 2002, 5 pm PST | ERIK STOKSTAD
Roots of Mesoamerican Writing For 7 centuries, the Maya recorded their history in elaborate stone carvings. Archaeologists have deciphered these hieroglyphs, but haven't been certain about their origins. Now a team describes what is potentially the oldest evidence of writing in the Americas. For many archaeologists, the two artifacts suggest that Maya script originated in an earlier culture known as the Olmec. Several clues have long suggested that the Olmec civilization, which flourished from 1200 B.C. to 400 B.C., was the first to develop cultural traditions, including writing, later adopted by the Maya, who reigned from about A.D. 300 to...
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Let's Have Jerusalem
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Genetic evidence links Jews to their ancient tribe
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Posted by Sabramerican
On News/Activism 11/19/2001 3:41:35 PM PST · 125 replies · 752+ views
JP | 11/20/2001 | By Judy Siegel
Genetic evidence links Jews to their ancient tribe By Judy Siegel JERUSALEM (November 20) - Genetic evidence continues to provide additional proof to the claims that the Jewish people are descended from a common ancient Israelite father: Despite being separated for over 1,000 years, Sephardi Jews of North African origin are genetically indistinguishable from their brethren from Iraq, according to The Hebrew University of Jerusalem. They also proved that Sephardi Jews are very close genetically to the Jews of Kurdistan, and only slight differences exist between these two groups and Ashkenazi Jews from Europe. These conclusions are reached in an ...
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The Lemba (The Black Jews Of Southern Africa)
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Posted by blam
On News/Activism 03/14/2005 6:53:09 PM PST · 50 replies · 703+ views
The Free Man Institute | 3-14-2005
T h e L e m b a The Black Jews of Southern Africa Historical Introduction Over 2,700 years ago, the Assyrians exiled the ten tribes of the Kingdom of Israel. "In the ninth year of Hoshea, the king of Assyria captured Samaria and he carried them away to Assyria and placed them in Halah, and on the Habor, the river of Gozan, and in the cities of Medes." In the years 722-721 BC (over 2700 years ago), the Ten Tribes who comprised the northern Kingdom of Israel disappeared. Conquered by the Assyrian King Shalmaneser V, they were exiled to...
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Archaeoastronomy
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Ancient Knife Proves Longer Astronomical History
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Posted by blam
On News/Activism 03/12/2005 11:40:38 AM PST · 45 replies · 901+ views
Xinhuanet/China View. | 3-12-2005
Ancient knife proves longer astronomical history www.chinaview.cn 2005-03-12 09:51:05 XINING, March 12 (Xinhuanet) -- Archaeologists in northwest China's Qinghai province claimed that a 5,000-year-old stone knife with designs of constellations will extend China's history of astronomical observation by 1,000 years. The finely-polished stone knife, six centimeters long and threecentimeters wide, was unearthed at the Laomao Ruins, a New Stone Age site nine kilometers west of Lamao Village in Qinghai. Archaeologists also unearthed many other relics from the site including pottery pieces, stone and bone tools. Liu Baoshan, head of the Qinghai Provincial Cultural Relics andArchaeology Research Institute, said seven holes...
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O So Mysteriouso
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Mystery Of Delhi's Iron Pillar Unraveled
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Posted by blam
On News/Activism 03/13/2005 1:55:06 PM PST · 43 replies · 1,264+ views
India Express | 7-18-2002
Mystery of Delhi's Iron Pillar unraveled Press Trust Of India Thursday, July 18, 2002 New Delhi, July 18: Experts at the Indian Instituteof Technology have resolved the mystery behind the 1,600-year-old iron pillar in Delhi, which has never corroded despite the capital's harsh weather. Metallurgists at Kanpur IIT have discovered that a thin layer of "misawite", a compound of iron, oxygen and hydrogen, has protected the cast iron pillar from rust. The protective film took form within three years after erection of the pillar and has been growing ever so slowly since then. After 1,600 years, the film has grown...
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Old balls still scorch
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Posted by Registered
On News/Activism 05/06/2002 1:04:11 PM PDT · 28 replies · 309+ views
Nature | 05.06.02 | David Adam
Old balls still scorch Pores made shipwrecked cannon balls glow spontaneously. 6 May 2002 DAVID ADAM Cannonball run: iron may heat rapidly in air after years in the ocean. © AP Goodness gracious! Two British chemists believe they have solved the 26-year-old mystery of how shipwrecked cannonballs that were rescued from the deep spontaneously erupted into great balls of fire."They were glowing bright red and you could feel the heat coming off them as the desk began to smoke," recalls Bob Child, now a chemist at the National Museums and Galleries of Wales in Cardiff.It all happened in 1976,...
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Is Iron Causing All the Flares?
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Posted by LibWhacker
On News/Activism 11/19/2003 9:15:52 AM PST · 174 replies · 811+ views
Universe Today | 11/18/03
Dr. Oliver Manuel, a professor of nuclear chemistry, believes that iron, not hydrogen, is the sun's most abundant element. In a paper accepted for publication in the Journal of Fusion Energy, Manuel asserts that the 'standard solar model' -- which assumes that the sun's core is made of hydrogen -- has led to misunderstandings of how such solar flares occur, as well as inaccurate views on the nature of global climate change. Recent solar flares erupting on the sun's surface have unleashed powerful geomagnetic storms -- gigantic clouds of highly charged particles that pose a threat to electric utilities, high-frequency...
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A Mission to the Earth's Core
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Posted by vannrox
On News/Activism 02/10/2005 10:59:13 AM PST · 106 replies · 1,863+ views
Published in the December-2003 issue of Analog Science Fiction & Fact Magazine | 06/22/2003 | by John G. Cramer
Adventure stories involving the exploration of the interior of Planet Earth have a long and distinguished history in science fiction. Jules Verne's Journey to the Center of the Earth (1864) was perhaps the first such tale. Despite the title, the story involves explorers following the instructions of a 17th century runic message on a trip that descends into the crater of an Icelandic volcano and into a long tunnel connecting to a vast cave containing a conveniently phosphorescent ceiling, an ocean, islands, dinosaurs, and mastodons, all in the interior of the Earth some miles beneath the surface. Following Verne's...
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Climate
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Moss Landing researchers reveal iron as key to climate change
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Posted by ckilmer
On News/Activism 04/16/2004 5:29:53 AM PDT · 29 replies · 122+ views
Moss Landing Marine Laboratories (MLML) | APRIL 15, 2004 | PRESS RELEASE
Moss Landing researchers reveal iron as key to climate change PRESS RELEASE APRIL 15, 2004 EMBARGOED: Not for release until Thursday, 15 April 2004 at 14:00 Eastern Time MOSS LANDING RESEARCHERS REVEAL IRON AS KEY TO CLIMATE CHANGE MOSS LANDING, California - A remarkable expedition to the waters of Antarctica reveals that iron supply to the Southern Ocean may have controlled Earth's climate during past ice ages. A multi-institutional group of scientists, led by Dr. Kenneth Coale of Moss Landing Marine Laboratories (MLML) and Dr. Ken Johnson of the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI), fertilized two key areas...
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Deep freeze dealt death knell to bison (Ice Age)
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Posted by Fatalis
On News/Activism 11/25/2004 7:25:47 PM PST · 32 replies · 702+ views
CBC News Online | 11/25/2004
WASHINGTON - Hunters may not be to blame for the decline in bison populations, according to a new study that points the finger at climate change. Scientists had thought bison were hunted to the brink of extinction when people first crossed an ice-free bridge between what's now Alaska and Siberia. Two subspecies of bison now live in North America. Now researchers say bison DNA shows their genetic diversity began to decline more than 20,000 years before humans reached eastern Beringia in what is now North America, according to archeological evidence.Scientists at Oxford University analysed DNA samples from 442 fossils from...
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Catastrophism and Astronomy
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Mystery object lights up Northwest sky
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Posted by Mr.Atos
On News/Activism 03/12/2005 9:33:14 PM PST · 135 replies · 5,994+ views
FOX 12 OREGON | 03.12.05 | NA
PORTLAND - A flaming object was spotted streaking through the Saturday night sky across Western Oregon and the impact was heard all the way from Salem to Medford, according to various reports. Newspapers across the western half of the state and KPTV were getting phone calls from people who saw the object. Summer Jensen of Portland said she was sitting in her living room with her father when they saw the flash of light outside and rushed to see what it was. "I've never seen anything like that," Jensen said, adding that the object appeared to be moving slowly compared...
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Thoroughly Modern Miscellany
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Medieval Norwegian church found in deepest Poland
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Posted by franksolich
On General/Chat 03/14/2005 1:54:29 AM PST · 21 replies · 369+ views
Eastern European ping list | not specified | not specified
While waiting for the morning edition of that excellent newspaper in Oslo, the Aftenposten, to pop up on the computer screen, I checked out a "lead" given me by twinself of the Eastern European ping list.There is apparently an ancient Norwegian, a Viking, church right smack in the middle of the Carpathian Mountains of Poland.I have been all over the place, and so am used to finding unusual things in unusual places, but this one seems a gem, a jewel.This church was originally built around 1180, on the shores of Lake Vang in southern Norway (Vangsmjosi), near Mount Grindafjellet. It...
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Tiny wasps save Cranach altar from woodworm
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Posted by wagglebee
On News/Activism 03/13/2005 5:05:15 PM PST · 16 replies · 664+ views
UK Telegraph | 3/13/05 | Katy Duke
A sixteenth-century altar in one of Germany's most historically important cathedrals has been saved from woodworm not by the application of chemicals, but by a swarm of wasps. The Cranach altar in the Erfurt Cathedral was being destroyed by the wood-eating insects, but officials delayed taking action because they feared that chemical treatments might damage its 11 painted panels. Instead they adopted a pioneering technique which may now be emulated in historic buildings across Europe: releasing 3,000 parasitic wasps, which feed on woodworm larvae. The towering wooden altar, riddled with holes, and the large painting above it which also showed...
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The Brass Monkey: Myth or Fact?
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Posted by WaterDragon
On News/Activism 08/04/2002 5:13:20 AM PDT · 65 replies · 663+ views
Oregon Magazine | August 4, 2002 | Larry Leonard
(Our pal, Camber, the old son-of-a-gun, found this one in his email box. It's been circulating on the net. Is it myth?) In the heyday of sailing ships, all war ships and many freighters carried iron cannons. Those cannon fired round iron balls. It was necessary to keep a good supply near the cannon. But how to keep them from rolling about the deck....?(snip) Click here to read complete article.
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end of digest #35 20050319
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