Posted on 02/09/2005 11:40:18 AM PST by blam
Science to test Argonaut myth
Gold jewelry found last year in an unplundered Mycenaean royal tomb on the outskirts of Volos will be tested for links with one of the most enduring ancient Greek myths, the Argonauts’ expedition, an archaeologist said yesterday.
The 14th century BC treasure — gold beads from necklaces and jewelry made of gold and semiprecious stones — was found with vases and other offerings in four pits inside the tholos tomb, a beehive-like subterranean structure usually associated with Late Bronze Age royal burials.
According to local antiquities director Vassiliki Adrimi-Sismani, the Culture Ministry has approved tests, to be conducted by June with Louvre Museum experts, to determine the gold’s provenance. “We want to investigate to what extent our area had contacts with the Black Sea, that is to what extent the myth of the Argonauts and the Golden Fleece has to do with the gold we found,” she said. The myth tells how King Jason of Iolkos, near Volos, led an expedition to Colchis, in modern Georgia, to steal a golden ram’s skin. This may allude to trade deals with the gold-rich region.
GGG Ping.
Fleece Navidad.
Let's see,.....Government leader takes trip to far eastern country at the taxpayers' expense......Yep! That's FLEECE!......
I heard an interesting interpretation of 'golden fleece'
Apparently, animal skins, especially sheep, were placed in rivers as a way of picking up gold flecks. In essence, it was a way of panning for gold without all the labor. Put the skin in, come back months later, and it would have a fair bit of gold on it.
so that's where clancy got it from?
Yup. I've heard/read that theory a number of times.
FYI, some consider the golden fleece to be a very real thing. It was an ancient gold placer mining method to use a sheep's wooly fleece to act as the micro riffles in slucing, (in place of what modern placer miners use today, the so called "miner's moss"). This would result in the fleece being saturated with the fines, hence the source of the "myth" of the golden fleece.
It must have been pretty spectacular sight, (as it is any time you do a "clean up").
Dunno. I saw it in a book about the truth in/behind myths.
While that might work to trap gold flecks, they certainly wouldn't stay there when you picked it up or shook it.
In fleeing she killed her own brother to keep her father from pursuing them further.
After having children with Medea, Jason grew tired of her. What a shock! She sounds like such a nice lady! He married another woman, spurring Medea to kill their children.
There are multiple myths about what happened to Medea after this. Jason lost his mind and died when the prow of his ship fell off and landed on him.
Or an early prospecting expedition which returned with evidence of their success in the form of gold-laden fleece.
Even if I'm really, really careful?
Why would I shake it if I put it there for the express purpose of collecting gold?
Miners do nutty stuff to collect the smallest amount of that mineral.
Lanolin?
Children-of-the-Hydra's-teeth Bump
Fascinating find. I've always said...next incarnation, I'm studying to be an archeologist! I've done my history tour,
so I figure I'm somewhat prepared to move on.
I'm not so sure. With a vigorous shaking you could undoubtably shake it free. But I think within a range of delicate it would stay stuck.
The guy who wrote Jason and the Argonauts probably got it from Clancy.
lol. ok, the jason tale wasn't a part of my classical education (no, not the illustrated canon).
Fines, (read "flecks" of gold), are really quite tenacious in hanging in the mat of a placer operation. Violent shaking will get MOST of the gold out of the mat, but a significant amount of gold still needs to be washed out.
Most of the fines will not just fall out of the mat. You have to work at getting them all out.
Unless, of course, you get into the paystreak very heavy, then it's a problem any miner would love to have! (The fines falling out when moving the mats, but that's why we have buckets!)
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