History Tidbits

Ancient Shoe Soles Found in Trash Pile

By Robert Roy Britt, LiveScience
posted: 8 DAYS 6 HOURS AGOcomments: 287filed under: Science News, World NewsPrintShareText SizeAAASkip over this content

(March 8) - A batch of well-preserved shoe soles have been found in an ancient trash dump in Lyon, France. They date from the 13th to the 18th centuries.
Older shoes have been found, including one from 2,000 years ago discovered in 2005 in a hollow tree trunk in southwest England. Sandals from 10,000 years ago were found in a cave in Oregon and are said to be the oldest footware ever found.

Humans began wearing shoes about 40,000 years ago, a study last year revealed.
The newfound leather soles, buried in mud, will improve understanding of how leather can be preserved and help scientists restore other leather artifacts, the discoverers said.
Michel Bardet and colleagues at the French Atomic Energy Commission detailed the findings in the American Chemical Society journal Analytical Chemistry.

Bardet explained that leather consists of collagen, a tough protein that is in human bones, too, and which can remain intact hundreds of thousands of years under ideal conditions — such as the oxygen-deprived environment in the mud. An examination of the soles found that tannin, which helps to preserve leather, had been washed out and replaced by iron oxides that leached into the leather from surrounding soil and helped preserve the soles in the absence of the tannins.
Bardet has studied ancient wood artifacts, too.

"One thing that was interesting for us ... is that both [wood and leather] are what we call 'waterlogged' materials. It's organic matter full of water," he said. "Generally, when we are working on wood found in similar conditions, the wood is in very poor condition.... Most of the cellulose has been destroyed. In the case of leather, the material seems to be in better preservation."

© Imaginova Corp. All rights reserved.
2009-03-08 12:56:33

Man Finds Images of D-Day Rehearsals
AOL
posted: 5 DAYS 3 HOURS AGOcomments: 277filed under: National News, World NewsPrintShareText SizeAAA

(March 9) - In what's turned out to be a fascinating discovery, an amateur historian has unearthed footage of American and British troops practicing for D-Day. The footage, images of which can be seen below, shows the troops in what are essentially rehearsals for the invasion of the beaches in Normandy, France, during World War II.
The footage was shot between October 1943 and June 1944 along beaches in the county of Devon, Britain, as reported by The Daily Mail of London.
Tony Koorlander, a former technical coordinator for the BBC, found the collection of 10-minute reels in a national archive in Baltimore, Md., in February. Koorlander was researching the wartime connection of his hometown of Bideford in Devon. "It's like going back and living the experience," Koorlander said in a statement.

2009 AOL LLC. All Rights Reserved.
2009-03-09 15:11:20

Cypriot Bible Could Be From Jesus' Time

Cypriot Bible Could Be From Jesus' Time
By Sarah Ktisti and Simon Bahceli, Reuters
posted: 21 DAYS 4 HOURS AGOcomments: 1235filed under: World NewsPrintShareText SizeAAANICOSIA, CYPRUS (Feb. 6) - Authorities in northern Cyprus believe they have found an ancient version of the Bible written in Syriac, a dialect of the native language of Jesus.
The manuscript was found in a police raid on suspected antiquity smugglers. Turkish Cypriot police testified in a court hearing they believe the manuscript could be about 2,000 years old.

The manuscript carries excerpts of the Bible written in gold lettering on vellum and loosely strung together, photos provided to Reuters showed. One page carries a drawing of a tree, and another eight lines of Syriac script.
Experts were however divided over the provenance of the manuscript, and whether it was an original, which would render it priceless, or a fake.
Experts said the use of gold lettering on the manuscript was likely to date it later than 2,000 years.
"I'd suspect that it is most likely to be less than 1,000 years old," leading expert Peter Williams, Warden of Tyndale House, University of Cambridge told Reuters.
Turkish Cypriot authorities seized the relic last week and nine individuals are in custody pending further investigations. More individuals are being sought in connection with the find, they said.
Further investigations turned up a prayer statue and a stone carving of Jesus believed to be from a church in the Turkish held north, as well as dynamite.
The police have charged the detainees with smuggling antiquities, illegal excavations and the possession of explosives.

Syriac is a dialect of Aramaic - the native language of Jesus - once spoken across much of the Middle East and Central Asia. It is used wherever there are Syrian Christians and still survives in the Syrian Orthodox Church in India.
Aramaic is still used in religious rituals of Maronite Christians in Cyprus.
"One very likely source (of the manuscript) could be the Tur-Abdin area of Turkey, where there is still a Syriac speaking community," Charlotte Roueche, Professor of Late Antique and Byzantine Studies at King's College London told Reuters.
Stories regarding the antiquity of manuscripts is commonplace. One case would be the Yonan Codex, carbon dated to the 12th century which people tried to pass off as earlier.
After further scrutiny of photographs of the book, manuscripts specialist at the University of Cambridge library and Fellow of Wolfson College JF Coakley suggested that the book could have been written a good deal later.
"The Syriac writing seems to be in the East Syriac script with vowel points, and you do not find such manuscripts before about the 15th century.
"On the basis of the one photo ...if I'm not mistaken some words at least seem to be in modern Syriac, a language that was not written down until the mid-19th century," he told Reuters.
Editing by Michele Kambas and Paul Casciato
Copyright 2009, Reuters
2009-02-06 11:08:25

Posts I Forgot

World's Oldest Prehistoric Axes Unearthed By JULIA ZAPPEI, AP
posted: 28 DAYS 8 HOURS AGOcomments: 555filed under: World NewsPrintShareText SizeAAAKUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia (Jan. 30) - Malaysian archeologists have unearthed prehistoric stone axes that they said Friday were the world's oldest at about 1.8 million years old.
Seven axes were found with other tools at an excavation site in Malaysia's northern Perak state in June, and tests by a Tokyo laboratory indicate they were about 1.83 million years old, said Mokhtar Saidin, director of the Center for Archaeological Research at the University of Science Malaysia.
The group released their conclusions Thursday, and other archeologists have not yet examined the results.
"It's really the first time we have such evidence (dating back) 1.83 million years," Mokhtar said, adding that the oldest axes previously discovered were 1.6 million years old in Africa.
However, other chopping tools, as well as human remains, have been found in Africa that are much older, with some dating back 4 million years, he said.
Geochronology Japan Inc., a lab in Tokyo, calculated the age of the tools by analyzing the rock that covered them, Mokhtar said. The result has a margin of error of 610,000 years, he said.
Some previous discoveries have suggested there were humans in Southeast Asia up to 1.9 million years ago, but those have been disputed, said Harry Truman Simanjuntak, a researcher at the National Research Center of Archaeology in Jakarta.
Simanjuntak cautioned that others still need to investigate claims about the axes' age.
The oldest previous evidence of human existence in Malaysia was stone tools dating back about 200,000 years, found at the same excavation site in Perak.
The archeologists are trying to find human bone remains in Perak, Mokhtar said, but stressed that it might be unlikely because of decay due to warm, humid climate conditions. The oldest bones found in Perak so far have only been about 10,000 years old.
Copyright 2009 The Associated Press. The information contained in the AP news report may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or otherwise distributed without the prior written authority of The Associated Press. Active hyperlinks have been inserted by AOL.
2009-01-30 07:47:52

Ancient Whales Gave Birth on Land By Jeanna Bryner, Senior Writer, LiveScience
posted: 22 DAYS 18 HOURS AGOcomments: 584filed under: Science NewsPrintShareText SizeAAASkip over this content

(Feb. 4) -- More than 47 million years ago, a whale was about to give birth to her young ... on land. That's according to skeletal remains of a pregnant cetacean whose fetus was positioned head-down as is the case for land mammals but not aquatic whales.
The teeth of the fetus were so well-developed that researchers who analyzed the fossils think the baby would have been born within days, had its mom not died.
The fossil discovery marks the first extinct whale and fetus combination known to date, shedding light on the lifestyle of ancient whales as they made the transition from land to sea during the Eocene Epoch (between 54.8 million and 33.7 million years ago).
Philip Gingerich, a paleontologist at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, and his team discovered the pregnant whale remains in Pakistan in 2000, and then in 2004, Gingerich's co-authors and others found the nearly complete skeleton of an adult male from the same species in those fossil beds. The adult whales are each about 8.5 feet long and weighed between 615 and 860 pounds, though the male was slightly longer and heavier than the female.
(Gingerich is also director of the University of Michigan's Museum of Paleontology.)
On the dig that ultimately yielded the pregnant whale, Gingerich and his team first spotted what looked like a line of chalk on the ground surface, which later turned out to be the teeth of the whale fetus.
"Very quickly I got into the baby's teeth," Gingerich told LiveScience. "Then I kept going around it, and the ribs seemed too big for the size of the animal and they were all going the wrong way. So I have to say I spent the whole day excavating this thing confused about what in the world was going on here."
Soon after, Gingeric discovered another, larger, skull, and he realized the fetus was still inside its mother.The new species, now called Maiacetus inuus, is a member of the Archaeoceti, a group of cetaceans (an animal group that includes whales, dolphins and porpoises) that predate modern toothed and baleen whales. Archaeocetes had mouths full of several types of teeth, as well as nostrils near the nose tip. Both features are seen in land mammals but not in today's whales.
Like other archaeocetes, the newly discovered whale was equipped with four legs modified for foot-powered swimming (sort of like climbing, or scrambling, up a steep hill but instead in water). While the whales likely could support their weight on their flipper-like limbs, they probably couldn't go far on land.
"They clearly were tied to the shore," Gingerich said. "They were living at the land-sea interface and going back and forth."
The team suggests that Maiacetus fed at sea and came ashore to rest, mate and give birth.
The head-first position of the fetus matches what is found in many land animals, particularly the artiodactyls (pigs, deer and cows), which are thought to have given rise to ancient whales. Human babies also emerge head first, ideally.
Scientists speculate that a head-first orientation allows land mammals to breathe even if they get stuck in the birth canal.
That's not the case underwater. "If you're born in the water you don't want the head out away from the mother until it's going to pop free, because you don't want it to drown,” Gingerich said.
In addition, tail-first delivery in modern whales and dolphins would ensure the baby is facing in the same direction as its mother who is likely swimming. To keep mom and baby from getting separated, tail-first delivery would be optimal, Gingerich said.
The research, published in the Feb. 4 issue of the online journal PloS ONE, was funded by the Geological Survey of Pakistan, National Geographic Society, National Science Foundation and Alexander von Humboldt Foundation. © Imaginova Corp. All rights reserved.
2009-02-04 12:52:41

Ancient Gold Coins Discovered Under Parking Lot

Rare Coins Found Under Parking Lot
CNN
posted: 23 HOURS 45 MINUTES AGOcomments: 104filed under: World News

JERUSALEM (Dec. 22) -- Some Israeli archaeologists are having a particularly happy Hanukkah.
The Israel Antiquities Authority reported a thrilling find Sunday -- the discovery of 264 ancient gold coins in Jerusalem National Park.

The coins were minted during the early 7th century.
"This is one of the largest and most impressive coin hoards ever discovered in Jerusalem -- certainly the largest and most important of its period," said Doron Ben-Ami and Yana Tchekhanovets, who are directing the excavation on behalf of the Israel Antiquities Authority.
Researchers discovered the coins at the beginning of the eight-day Jewish holiday of Hanukkah, which started at sunset on Sunday.
One of the customs of the holiday is to give "gelt," or coins, to children, and the archaeologists are referring to the find as "Hanukkah money."
The 1,400-year-old coins were found in the Giv'ati car park in the City of David in the walls around Jerusalem National Park, a site that has yielded other finds, including a well-preserved gold earring with pearls and precious stones.

They were in a collapsed building that dates back to the 7th century, the end of the Byzantine period. The coins bear a likeness of Heraclius, who was the Byzantine emperor from 610 to 641.
The authority said that while different coins had been minted during this emperor's reign, the coins found at the site represent "one well-known type."
In that style, the emperor is clad with military garb and is holding a cross in his right hand. One the other side, there is the sign of the cross.
Authorities said the excavation of the building where the hoard was discovered is in its early stages. They are attempting to learn about the building and its owner and the circumstances of its destruction.
"Since no pottery vessel was discovered adjacent to the hoard, we can assume that it was concealed inside a hidden niche in one of the walls of the building. It seems that with its collapse, the coins piled up there among the building debris," Ben-Ami and Tchekhanovets said.
CNN's Shira Medding contributed to this report.
© 2008 Cable News Network. Turner Broadcasting System, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
2008-12-22 14:53:25

King Herod's Tomb Most Likely Found

King Herod The Great's Tomb At Herodium


For those of you who missed the special on National Geographic Channel, Herod's Lost Tomb which aired Tuesday, November 25, at 9 p.m. ET, it will air again on Sun Nov 30 at 2 P---so check your local times and listings. There's more on King Herod in the December issue of National Geographic magazine. Here's an online preview of the article:

King Herod Revealed
The Holy Land's visionary builder.
By Tom Mueller



Photograph by Michael Melford

 Eight miles south of Jerusalem, where the last stunted olive trees and stony cornfields fade into the naked badlands of the Judaean desert, a hill rises abruptly, a steep cone sliced off at the top like a small volcano. This is Herodium, one of the grand architectural creations of Herod the Great, King of Judaea, who raised a low knoll into a towering memorial of snowy stonework and surrounded it with pleasure palaces, splashing pools, and terraced gardens. An astute and generous ruler, a brilliant general, and one of the most imaginative and energetic builders of the ancient world, Herod guided his kingdom to new prosperity and power. Yet today he is best known as the sly and murderous monarch of Matthew's Gospel, who slaughtered every male infant in Bethlehem in an unsuccessful attempt to kill the newborn Jesus, the prophesied King of the Jews. During the Middle Ages he became an image of the Antichrist: Illuminated manuscripts and Gothic gargoyles show him tearing his beard in mad fury and brandishing his sword at the luckless infants, with Satan whispering in his ear. Herod is almost certainly innocent of this crime, of which there is no report apart from Matthew's account. But children he certainly slew, including three of his own sons, along with his wife, his mother-in-law, and numerous other members of his court. Throughout his life, he blended creativity and cruelty, harmony and chaos, in ways that challenge the modern imagination.

Israeli archaeologist Ehud Netzer has spent the past half century searching for the real Herod, as he is portrayed not in words but in stone. He has excavated many of Herod's major building sites throughout the Holy Land, exploring the palaces where the king lived, the fortresses where he fought, the landscapes where he felt most at home. Of Herod's many imaginative building projects, Herodium was the only one that bore his name, and was perhaps the closest to his heart. It was here, at the end of his daring and bloodstained career, that he was laid to rest in a noble mausoleum.

(Read more: here).

New Finds at King Herod's Tomb: 2,000-Year-Old Frescoes

Mati Milstein in Herodium, West Bank
for National Geographic News
November 19, 2008

Archaeologists exploring King Herod's tomb complex near Jerusalem have uncovered rare Roman paintings as well as two sarcophagi, or stone coffins, that could have contained the remains of Herod's sons In May 2007, veteran Hebrew University archaeologist Ehud Netzer solved one of Israel's great archaeological mysteries when he first uncovered the remains of Herod's first century-B.C. grave at the Herodium complex, located 9 miles (15 kilometers) south of Jerusalem.

(See related: "King Herod's Tomb Unearthed Near Jerusalem, Expert Says" [May 8, 2007].)

King Herod, appointed by the Romans to rule Judea between 37 and 4 B.C., is renowned for his monumental construction projects, including the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem, the Caesarea complex, and the palace atop Masada.

Herod constructed Herodium as a massive and lavish administrative, residential, and burial center.

New Findings

Netzer revealed new discoveries at a Wednesday press conference in Jerusalem.

Recent excavations uncovered an elaborate theater dating slightly earlier than Herod's burial complex that had been demolished to enable construction of the artificial mountain that served as his tomb.

The walls of the theater's loggia—a balcony that served as a VIP room and viewing box—are decorated with well-preserved Roman paintings of windows and outdoor scenes. (See full article: here).

See also: Lost for Centuries, Herod's Tomb Comes to Light and Tomb of King Herod's wife unearthed, Israeli archaeologist says.



Bernat Armangue / Associated Press---
Israeli archaeologist Ehud Netzer walks at the fortress of Herodium in the West Bank, where archaeologists are excavating what they believe is the tomb of King Herod.

1,800-Year-Old Chariot Unearthed

1,800-Year-Old Chariot Unearthed
By VESELIN TOSHKOV, AP
posted: 2 DAYS 18 HOURS AGOcomments: 387filed under: Science News, World NewsPrintShareText SizeAAA

SOFIA, Bulgaria (Nov. 21) - Archaeologists have unearthed an elaborately decorated 1,800-year-old chariot sheathed in bronze at an ancient Thracian tomb in southeastern Bulgaria, the head of the excavation said Friday.
"The lavishly ornamented four-wheel chariot dates back to the end of the second century A.D.," Veselin Ignatov told The Associated Press in a telephone interview from the site, near the southeastern village of Karanovo.
But he said archaeologists were struggling to keep up with looters, who often ransack ancient sites before the experts can get to them.
The bronze-plated wooden chariot is decorated with scenes from Thracian mythology, including figures of a jumping panther and the carving of a mythological animal with the body of a panther and the tail of a dolphin, Ignatov said.
He said the chariot, with wheels measuring four feet across, was found during excavations in a funerary mound that archaeologists believe was the grave of a wealthy Thracian aristocrat, as he was buried along with his belongings.
The team also unearthed well-preserved wooden and leather objects, some of which the archaeologists believe were horse harnesses. The remains of horses were uncovered nearby.
In August, excavations at another ancient Thracian tomb in the same region revealed another four-wheel chariot. Daniela Agre, a senior archaeologist at the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences, had said at the time that it was the first time a completely preserved chariot had been found in Bulgaria. She said previous excavations had only unearthed single parts of chariots — often because ancient sites had been looted.
Some 10,000 Thracian mounds — part of them covering monumental stone tombs — are scattered across the country.Ignatov said up to 90 percent of the tombs in the region have been completely or partially destroyed by treasure hunters who smuggle the most precious objects abroad.
He said the country's Culture Ministry granted $12,500 for the excavation.
"The money is badly needed because we are in an uneven race with looters who are often better equipped than our teams," he said.
First mentioned in Homer's "Iliad" as allies of Troy, the Thracians were an Indo-European nomadic people who settled in the central Balkans around 5,000 years ago. They were conquered by Rome in the 1st century, and were assimilated by invading Slav peoples in the 6th century. They had no written language, and so left no records.
Fierce warriors and horse-breeders, the Thracians were also skilled goldsmiths. They established a powerful kingdom in the 5th century B.C. Its capital was thought to be Seutopolis, whose ancient ruins lie under a large artificial lake near Shipka, in an area dubbed "the Bulgarian Valley of Kings" for its many rich tombs.
Copyright 2008 The Associated Press. The information contained in the AP news report may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or otherwise distributed without the prior written authority of The Associated Press. Active hyperlinks have been inserted by AOL.
2008-11-21 17:43:51

2,000-Year-Old Gold Earring Discovered

2,000-Year-Old Gold Earring Discovered
By SHAWNA OHM, AP
posted: 1 HOUR 2 MINUTES AGOcomments: 67filed under: SCIENCE NEWS

JERUSALEM (Nov. 10) - A luxurious gold, pearl and emerald earring provides a new visual clue about the life of the elite in Jerusalem some 2,000 years ago.

And its discovery was a true eureka moment for excavators.
The piece was found beneath a parking lot next to the walls of Jerusalem's Old City. It dates to the Roman period just after the time of Jesus, said Doron Ben-Ami, who directed the dig.
The earring was uncovered in a destroyed Byzantine structure built centuries after the piece was made, showing it was likely passed down through generations, he said.
Archaeologists came upon the earring in a corner while excavating the ruins of the building under a parking lot. "Suddenly one of the excavators came up shouting 'Eureka!'" said Ben-Ami.
The find is eye-catching: A large pearl inlaid in gold with two drop pieces, each with an emerald and pearl set in gold.
"It must have belonged to someone of the elite in Jerusalem," Ben-Ami said. "Such a precious item, it couldn't be one of just ordinary people."
Archaeologist Shimon Gibson, who was not involved in the dig, said the find was truly amazing, less because of its Roman origins than for its precious nature.
"Jewelry is hardly preserved in archaeological context in Jerusalem," he said, because precious metals were often sold or melted down during the many historic takeovers of the city.
"It adds to the visual history of Jerusalem," Gibson added, saying it brings attention to the life of women in antiquity.
Ben-Ami the piece's placement in the destroyed building protected it from looters and kept it preserved. Its location also showed that it must be older than the house itself.

The Israel Antiquities Authority said the earring appeared to have been made using a technique similar to that depicted in portraits from Roman-era Egypt. Experts were able to date the earring by comparing it to similar finds in Europe.
In a statement released Monday, the Antiquities Authority said the earring was "astonishingly well-preserved." Finds from the Roman period are rare in Jerusalem, Ben-Ami said, because the city was destroyed by the Roman Empire in the first century A.D.
Though Gibson dates the piece slightly later than the antiquities authority, to sometime between the second and fourth centuries A.D., he said its quality and beauty were impressive.
And Ben-Ami said he expects more small, luxury items to turn up in future excavations.
Copyright 2008 The Associated Press. The information contained in the AP news report may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or otherwise distributed without the prior written authority of The Associated Press. Active hyperlinks have been inserted by AOL.
2008-11-10 07:36:59

Mayan Underworld Found

Scholar Finds Mayans' Path Through Hell


By MARK STEVENSON, AP
posted: 6 HOURS 4 MINUTES AGOcomments: 177filed under: Science News, World News

TZIBICHEN CENOTE, Mexico (Nov. 9) - Legend says the afterlife for ancient Mayas was a terrifying obstacle course in which the dead had to traverse rivers of blood, and chambers full of sharp knives, bats and jaguars.
Now a Mexican archaeologist using long-forgotten testimony from the Spanish Inquisition says a series of caves he has explored may be the place where the Maya actually tried to depict this highway through hell.

The network of underground chambers, roads and temples beneath farmland and jungle on the Yucatan peninsula suggests the Maya fashioned them to mimic the journey to the underworld, or Xibalba, described in ancient mythological texts such as the Popol Vuh.
"It was the place of fear, the place of cold, the place of danger, of the abyss," said University of Yucatan archaeologist Guillermo de Anda.
Searching for the names of sacred sites mentioned by Indian heretics who were put on trial by Inquisition courts, De Anda discovered what appear to be stages of the legendary journey, recreated in a half-dozen caves south of the Yucatan state capital of Merida.
Archaeologists have long known that the Maya regarded caves as sacred and built structures in some.
But De Anda's team introduced "an extremely important ingredient" by using historical records to locate and connect a series of sacred caves, and link them with the concept of the Mayan road to the afterworld, said archaeologist Bruce Dahlin of Shepherd University, who has studied other Maya sites in the Yucatan.
The Associated Press followed de Anda and his team into the caves, squeezing through tiny, overgrown entrances and rappelling down narrow shafts and slippery tree roots.
There, in the stygian darkness, a scene unfolded that was eerily reminiscent of an "Indiana Jones" movie — tottering ancient temple platforms, slippery staircases and tortuous paths that skirted underground lakes littered with Mayan pottery and ancient skulls.

The group explored walled-off sacred chambers that can only be entered by crawling along a floor populated by spiders, scorpions and toads.
To find Xibalba, De Anda spent five years combing the 450-year-old records of the Inquisition trials the Spaniards held against Indian "heretics" in Mexico.
The Spanish were outraged that the Mayas continued to practice their old religion even after the conquest. So they used the trials to make them reveal the places where they performed their ceremonies.
Time after time, the defendants mentioned the same places — but the recorded names changed over the centuries or were forgotten.
Armed with clues from trial records, the archaeologists asked locals for caves with similar-sounding names or coordinates that would place them nearby.
The Mayas used the sinkhole caves, known as cenotes, as places of worship and depositories for sacrificed humans. Many cenotes still contain pools that supply villages with water. The best-known is the broad, circular pool at the ruins of Chichen Itza.

The cenotes De Anda found were drier, better hidden and farther from villages. They seem to have had a special religious significance because even as the Maya were forced to convert to Christianity, they still traveled long distances to worship there.
Among De Anda's discoveries are a broad, perfectly paved, 100-yard underground road, a submerged temple, walled-off stone rooms and the "confusing crossroads" of the legends.
"There are a number of elements that make us think that this road is a representation of the journey to Xibalba," De Anda said. "We think it is no coincidence that the road which comes out of the crossroads leads to the west," the direction described as the way to the afterlife.
At the center of one of the underground lakes, De Anda's team found a collapsed and submerged altar with carvings indicating it was dedicated to the gods of death.
In some of the chambers, it is almost impossible to move without slashing one's skin on stalactites and stone formations projecting from the walls and ceilings, leading De Anda to believe they are a representation of the feared "room of knives" described in the Popol Vuh.
Bats are depicted in the ancient texts, and visitors have to duck to avoid swarms of them. There's the "chamber of roasting heat" which indeed leaves visitors soaked in sweat. Cool currents of surface air penetrating some caves feel almost frigid, just like the legend's "chambers of shaking cold."
While De Anda has not yet encountered a specific "jaguar chamber," jaguar bones have been found in at least one cave.

Subterranean "roads" interrupted by deep pools of water may signify the rivers of blood and pus.
But why go to the trouble of reproducing hell? "Perhaps it was to demonstrate power," De Anda speculates, or to give the living an idea of the terrors they would meet en route to paradise.
Clifford Brown, a Florida Atlantic University archaeologist who has worked in the region, agrees that the Mayas saw the cenotes as a portal to the underworld.
"Everybody has heard of the cenote of sacrifice at Chichen Itza, but it's less widely recognized that it was part of a generalized cenote worship that existed at many sites," Brown said.
"There are a number of sites in the lowlands where there are caves right underneath the principal temples, palaces and pyramids, which are thought to represent a religious 'access mundi,' where you have the pyramid representing the heavens, and the caves representing the underworld underneath."
Copyright 2008 The Associated Press. The information contained in the AP news report may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or otherwise distributed without the prior written authority of The Associated Press. Active hyperlinks have been inserted by AOL.
2008-11-09 13:14:56

4,300-Year-Old Pyramid Found in Egypt

4,300-Year-Old Pyramid Found in Egypt AP
posted: 22 HOURS 57 MINUTES AGOcomments: 288filed under: Science News, World News

SAQQARA, Egypt (Nov. 11) - Egypt's chief archaeologist has announced the discovery of a 4,300-year-old pyramid in Saqqara, the sprawling necropolis and burial site of the rulers of ancient Memphis.

The pyramid is said to belong to Queen Sesheshet, the mother of King Teti who was the founder of the 6th Dynasty of Egypt's Old Kingdom.
Egypt's antiquities chief Zahi Hawass made the announcement Tuesday at the site in Saqqara, about 12 miles south of Cairo.
Hawass' team has been excavating the site for two years. He says the discovery was only made two months ago when it became clear that the 16-foot-tall structure uncovered from the sand was a pyramid.
Hawass says the new pyramid is the 118th discovered so far in Egypt.

Copyright 2008 The Associated Press. The information contained in the AP news report may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or otherwise distributed without the prior written authority of The Associated Press. Active hyperlinks have been inserted by AOL.
2008-11-11 11:33:26

2008 seems to be the year of interesting historical events and archaeological findings.

For another interesting archaeological finding see Tony Cartledge's recent post: Baptists Today Blogs: Ashurbanipal Invades Boston.

Could Solomon's Mine Have Been Found?

Mine Dates Back to King Solomon's Time
AP posted: 9 HOURS 28 MINUTES AGO
comments: 247 filed under: Science News, World News
WASHINGTON (Oct. 28) - The fictional King Solomon's Mines held a treasure of gold and diamonds, but archaeologists say the real mines may have supplied the ancient king with copper. Researchers led by Thomas Levy of the University of California, San Diego, and Mohammad Najjar of Jordan's Friends of Archaeology, discovered a copper-production center in southern Jordan that dates to the 10th century B.C., the time of Solomon's reign.

The discovery occurred at Khirbat en-Nahas, which means "ruins of copper" in Arabic. Located south of the Dead Sea, the region was known in the Old Testament as Edom.
Research at the site in the 1970s and 1980s indicated that metalworking began there in the 7th century B.C., long after Solomon.
But Levy and Najjar dug deeper and were able to date materials such as seeds and sticks to the 10th century B.C.
"We can't believe everything ancient writings tell us," Levy said in a statement. "But this research represents a confluence between the archaeological and scientific data and the Bible."
Their findings are reported in Tuesday's issue of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Copyright 2008 The Associated Press. The information contained in the AP news report may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or otherwise distributed without the prior written authority of The Associated Press. Active hyperlinks have been inserted by AOL.
2008-10-27 20:28:29

Renowned Archaeologist Dies at Dig

Georgi Kitov, archaeologist, March 1, 1943 - Sept. 14, 2008

Renowned Archaeologist Dies at DigBy VESELIN TOSHKOV, AP
posted: 1 DAY 3 HOURS AGOcomments: 20filed under: Science NewsPrintShareText SizeAAASOFIA, Bulgaria (Sept. 19) - Archaeologist Georgi Kitov -- an expert on the treasure-rich Thracian culture of antiquity -- died of a heart attack while excavating a temple in central Bulgaria considered to be one of his greatest discoveries, his family said Thursday. He was 65.
Kitov died Sunday during the excavation of a large Thracian temple surrounded by lavishly furnished graves near the village of Starosel, according to his wife, Diana Dimitrova.

The temple, unearthed by Kitov in 2000, as well as other sensational finds over the past 16 years brought him international attention.
His discoveries include two 5th century B.C. gold funerary masks — one weighing a pound — from the Shipka valley in central Bulgaria, a bronze head from a statue of a Thracian ruler, gold and silver jewelry and a complete set of bronze armor.
But he was also criticized for using bulldozers in some of his digs.
Bulgarian archaeologist Nikolai Ovcharov described Kitov as "a phenomenon" in archaeology.
"Many disagreed with his methods, but his great discoveries will be remembered by Bulgarians," Ovcharov said.

Kitov compared the previously little-known Thracian civilization to that of ancient Greece. Though unlike the Greeks, the Thracians had no written language, and so left no records.
"We found indisputable evidence that the Thracian civilization was at least equal to the ancient Greek one," Kitov said in 2004. "In fact, we proved that Thracians were co-authors of the ancient culture, which often is called Hellenistic by mistake."
First mentioned in Homer's Iliad as allies of Troy, the Thracians were an Indo-European nomadic people that settled in the central Balkans around 5,000 years ago. They were conquered by Rome in the 1st century, and were assimilated by invading Slav peoples in the 6th century.
Fierce warriors and horse-breeders, the Thracians were also skilled goldsmiths. They established a powerful kingdom in the 5th century B.C. Its capital was thought to be Seutopolis, whose ancient ruins lie under a large artificial lake near Shipka, in an area dubbed "the Bulgarian Valley of Kings" for its many rich tombs.
Kitov once told The Associated Press that the temple at Starosel "vies with ancient Greek temples in Sparta, Athens and Mycenae."
Some other archaeologists criticized Kitov, however, for using heavy machinery in his digs. Kitov defended his high-speed technique by saying it was necessary to keep ahead of looters.
Some archaeologists also accused him of failing to adequately document or publish his finds.
In 2001, Bulgarian authorities rescinded his excavation permit for a year for allegedly digging without permission.
Sofia's National History Museum Director Bozhidar Dimitrov said Kitov regarded archaeology as a duty more than a job.
"He suffered from the widespread looting, and tried to counteract by digging more and more," Dimitrov said. "Very often he won the race against the looters."
Kitov was born on March 1, 1943, in the southwestern town of Dupnitsa. He earned a history degree from the University of Sofia, and studied art history at the St. Petersburg State University.
He is survived by his wife and 9-year-old daughter. A funeral is planned for Friday.
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2008-09-18 15:06:39