Posted on 01/21/2005 6:30:26 PM PST by blam
Shrine to Hercules unearthed
Archaeologists in Thebes discover remains of altar, dwellings used for more than 3,000 years
APPanayiotis Valmas, the head restorer at the Museum of Thebes, is pictured last month brushing a tiny ancient bronze statue of the mythological hero Hercules slaying a lion. The figure was found at an ancient prayer site. By Derek Gatopoulos - The Associated Press
THEBES - Rummaging in the dirt, Costas Kakoseos pulls up pieces of history steeped in legend.
It is an archaeological site dubbed “Hercules’ House” — the place, experts say, that the ancient Greeks may have held to be the mythological hero’s birthplace.
Thebes, an unattractive town about 70 kilometers (about 45 miles) north of Athens, stands on a spectacular buried heritage. The latest excavation, begun last February, revealed the remains of an altar and ancient dwellings used for more than 3,000 years.
Vassilis Aravantinos, head of the regional archaeological service, said finds on the site tally with descriptions by the poet Pindar some 2,500 years ago of a shrine to Hercules built on his legendary birthplace.
“We had waited for many years for this discovery but it never came... These findings support the ancient writings,” Aravantinos said. “There are signs of worship of Hercules.”
Small bronze figures, including one showing Hercules grappling with a lion — both characters standing as if posing for a photograph — are a key piece of evidence.
While shaking soil through a mesh-bottomed crate, Kakoseos throws clay chips — fragments of ancient pots — into a plastic bag. A few are put aside and marked with labels for special attention.
“We’re still finding beads, bones and coins. There are so many, you can’t imagine,” said Kakoseos, who performs much of the labor.
The illegitimate son of almighty Zeus, Hercules was best known for the 12 labors imposed on him by the gods, including slaying a lion and a nine-headed serpent.
With most of the 335-square-meter site explored, archaeologists have recovered several hundred ceramic vessels, small bronze statues, animal bones, and a thick layer of ash created from burning animals sacrificed to the gods. Objects discovered date from the third millennium BC to the late Byzantine era. The dig and the findings began when construction workers were moving earth to build a hotel.
Hotel construction has been suspended indefinitely. Development in this ancient town comes with the risk of finding more history in the foundations.
“Every bit of earth that is moved, we take a look at,” said Aravantinos, whose archaeological service is currently excavating half a dozen Theban sites. “We have to.”
He said the latest discovery was long sought by archaeologists because of the legends about Hercules’ birthplace.
Other finds are still being pieced together at a small workshop beside Thebes’ tiny museum, where cats roam around ancient marble statues in the courtyard and the inside rooms are packed with some of the finest artifacts in Greece. Restorers, dressed and equipped like dentists, repair the statuettes and assemble vases and other pottery from an enormous array of fragments. Their room is filled with glued remains in stacked crates, and the tables littered with solvents, scalpels and adhesives.
The discoveries from “Hercules’ House” will not be properly displayed until a new museum — still in the planning stage — is built.
There are several startling and disturbing statues in the Piazza Signoria, including The Perseus (beheaded Medusa), and the Rape of the Sabine Women.
Ahem. What's to dig up? I'm right here!
ROTFLMAO
bump
:'P ;')
8. Such is the account which the Scythians give of themselves, and of the country which lies above them. The Greeks who dwell about the Pontus tell a different story. According to Hercules, when he was carrying off the cows of Geryon, arrived in the region which is now inhabited by the Scyths, but which was then a desert. Geryon lived outside the Pontus, in an island called by the Greeks Erytheia, near Gades, which is beyond the Pillars of Hercules upon the Ocean.. . .From Scythes, the son of Hercules, were descended the after kings of Scythia; and from the circumstance of the goblet which hung from the belt, the Scythians to this day wear goblets at their girdles. This was the only thing which the mother of Scythes did for him. Such is the tale told by the Greeks who dwell around the Pontus.
SNIP
59. Thus abundantly are the Scythians provided with the most important necessaries. Their manners and customs come now to be described. They worship only the following gods, namely, Vesta, whom they reverence beyond all the rest, Jupiter, and Tellus, whom they consider to be the wife of Jupiter; and after these Apollo, Celestial Venus, Hercules, and Mars.
The Khazars and the Scythians [Other interesting stuff on this link--Fedora]
2. The legend, as told by Herodotus, have it that all "Scythians" were direct descendants of Hercules who had three sons from a mythical beast whose lower part was snakelike, and whose upper part was one of a hermaphrodite. Of this, let's call it 'marriage', the Hermaphrodite bore three sons: Agatirz, Gelon and Skit. (Readers will probably be aware that Hercules himself has nothing to do with the so-called Greek mythology and the Greek pantheon simply because he was a Thracian God much, much more ancient than the whole gang at Olympus Mountain.) 3. The Hercules' first son, called by Herodotus "Aga-tirz", was called by the people that descended from him "KOZAR". The Greek word "Agatirz" means "Goat-hunter" and is again a direct translation of the ethnonym "KOZAR" (goat-keeper or goat-hunter). Later, in the middle ages, in parallel with the changes in the Greek language, the pronunciation of the name of these peoples also changed and become "akatziri", "agatziri" or "agaziri". Something similar happened to the native, proto-Slav, name and it changed from "KOZAR" to "KOZAK" ("cossack"). (In antiquity, as partly in present days, they lived in the Carpathian Mountains, just to the north of the Lower Danube.) 4. In the 6th century AD, the Anonymous Chronograph of Ravenna, in its brief description of the KHAZARS, as one of the major peoples inhabiting Skitia (Scythia), specifies that, in the ancient times, they were called "akatzirs":Map showing the lands populated by the Scythians - they almost completely correspond with the state of the Khazars. From the The Scythians web site.
SNIP
THE RUSSIAN/SCYTHIAN/GREEK CONNECTION [BTW lots of nice maps on this link--Fedora]
Interestingly, we must go to Russia to begin the story of where the Celts came from. There is in Russia today, just east of the Ural Mountains on the Tobol River a town and an Oblast (Russian for province) known as Kurgan. The town and the term is Russian for tumulus, the distinctive mound-grave of the nomadic culture to whom the name Kurgan was given. The Kurgans were a pre-Celtic peoples from whom the Celts evolved. . .The people who moved in the Black Sea area when the early Kurgans moved on, where Cimmerians. They may have been a later generation of Kurgans moving west from the Russian Steppe as were those who displaced them, the Scythians. The Scythians were an outgrowth of the Kurgans. The Scythians pushed the Cimmerians in two directions, into Europe where they became known as the Cimbri, and into Asia Minor and Assyria. . .The Scythians were either a pre-Celtic peoples or a people who greatly influenced the Celts. Though the Scythians were in the Black Sea area and made raids into central Europe, Asia Minor and into southern central Asia, their original homeland was a band of land from the Dnieper River where it enters the Black Sea north to the headwaters of the Danube in central Europe, east to most of what was the southern Soviet Union and arcing north to Siberia. Their eastern boundary appeared to be the Yenesei River that feeds into Lake Baikal. The Greeks named their king after a son of Hercules, Scythes.
The Indo-Scythians (Sakas) were various Central Asian peoples who migrated into Bactria, Sogdiana, Hazara-Kashmir and finally into Arachosia and then India beginning in the middle of the 2nd century BC. Controversies abound.
SNIP
Spalahores with Spalagadames (circa 75 - 65 BC). . .Reverse: Hercules seated left. Kharosthi legend.
Also, I'm present reading Stephen Oppenheimer's book, Out Of Eden, and he states that the oldest Mongoloid body type ever found is only 10k years old and it was found in the area around Lake Baikal. There are two types of Mongoloids, the Southern and Northern. The Northern Mongoloids have the most severe of the Mongoloid features, flattest face, Sundadont teeth, light skinned and epicanthic eyelid fold. The Southern Mongoloids have all these to a lesser degree but with Sinodont teeth.
I'm persuaded there's a connection between the Tarim mummies and Caucasian migration. Whether it originated in China and spread out from there or whether it came into China from elsewhere I'm not sure.
In Oppenheimer's book, which type of Mongoloid was found at Lake Baikal, northern or southern?
Northern. He goes on to say that the Northern Mongoloid types (via the DNA trail) derived from the Southern Mongoloids.
I should have said in the previous post that the earliest undisputed Mongoloid type ever found was 10k years old. There is one skeleton that is 21k years old that some claim is Mongoloid but the discussions become so heated about it that everyone has quit talking about it, so...
Another correction: The Southern Mongoloids do not have the epicanthic eyelid, that was apparently a Northern adaptation.
Thanks for the additional information. I wonder if the divergence between the northern and southern Mongoloid lines might reflect an introduction of a Caucasian strain.
Nope, two different 'eves' (these different 'eves' are splits that occured after they were out of Africa). Still reading though, lol.
Oppenheimer says the DNA 'trails' show a southern 'beachcomer' exodus (all the way to Australia) out of Africa. Modern humans were already to Australia when Toba blew 64k years ago and it looks like all humans in India at that time were wiped out. This incident apparently created the seperation between genes that are seen in North America and Europe but, not in between.
Anyway, the southern 'beachcombers' are beginning to make their way north up the major river valleys......I'll let you know where that leads, later.
Thanks for the summary. I'll have to read the book. I tend to be skeptical of the methodology underlying DNA trail reconstructions. Sounds interesting, though.
More evidence that Greek Mythology is true! I must dust off my shrine to Zeus.
The Scythians were an Iranian people related to the Persians. Herodotus and other ancient Greek sources aren't very reliable when they try to explain the national origins of non-Greek peoples. Medieval Greek sources often use the classical names for people living in a certain area even if they are not related to the people who lived there in the first millennium B.C. Apparently the origin of the Khazars is open to dispute but they may be totally unrelated to the Scythians, apart from living in the same general area.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.