BHR-18
Brit-Am Historical Reports
20 October 2009 2 Cheshvan 5770
Contents:
1. Archaeology: Brit-Am Version of Explorator 12.26
2. Archaeologists Discover a Parthian [-Era] City in North Khorasan [North-east Iran] Province
3. Germany's stone age cannibalism
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1. Archaeology: Brit-Am Version of Explorator 12.26
From: david meadows <rogueclassicist@gmail.com>
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ANCIENT NEAR EAST AND EGYPT
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What captured the press' imagination this week was the discovery
of footprints beneath the Lod mosaic:
http://www.antiquities.org.il/about_eng.asp?Modul_id=14
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/133840
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/Flash.aspx/172529
http://jta.org/news/article/2009/10/14/1008502/footprints-discovered-underneath-ancient-mosaic
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3790252,00.html>
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1255450651533&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1121033.html
http://sify.com/news/international/fullstory.php?a=jkpb4bebcff&title=Israeli_archaeologists_discover_1%2C700-year-old_footprints
http://www.upi.com/Science_News/2009/10/14/Ancient-footprints-found-under-mosaic/UPI-90411255546541/
A Swiss team has replicated the mummification process using an "Egyptian
recipe":
http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2009/10/15/salt-mummification.html
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/33329512/ns/technology_and_science-science/
A Parthian-era town has been excavated in Iran's Khorasan Razavi
province:
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=108466§ionid=351020108
http://www.cais-soas.com/news/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=92:archaeologist-discover-a-parthian-city-in-north-khorasan-province-&catid=36
Some good follow-up blog items on that inscription from the Elah
Fortress mentioned a while back:
http://gath.wordpress.com/2009/10/15/qeiyafah-inscription-update/
http://gath.wordpress.com/2009/10/16/for-those-who-dont-know-any-biblical-hebrew/
http://blog.bibleplaces.com/2009/10/qeiyafa-inscription-update-coming.html(background)
Using technology to analyze all sorts of examples of Aramaic:
http://www.physorg.com/news174760375.html
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/10/091015112140.htm
http://news.uchicago.edu/news.php?asset_id=1732
Latest in the Temple Mount saga:
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3788668,00.html>
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ANCIENT GREECE AND ROME (AND CLASSICS)
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Asterix is 50!:
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/hit-and-run/hit--run-itrsquos-the-lsquobig-lrsquo-for-asterix-1802085.html
http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/tv/features/asterix-and-the-half-century--50-years-fighting-the-romans-1804371.html
http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5jAFFBLDsebXhYlpGaL4A6nlDjT5Q
Kim Bowes was talking about lessons we can learn from the Romans:
http://www.news.cornell.edu/stories/Oct09/RomanEmpireNYC.html
Feature on the folks who patrolled Hadrian's Wall:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/culture/charlottehigginsblog/2009/oct/13/hadrians-wall
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EUROPE AND THE UK (+ Ireland)
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Excavations at a Suffolk rugby club has revealed a Bronze Age burial:
http://www.eveningstar.co.uk/content/eveningstar/news/story.aspx?brand=ESTOnline&category=News&tBrand=ESTOnline&tCategory=xDefault&itemid=IPED14%20Oct%202009%2019%3A22%3A57%3A757
Cult place/beer hall of Viking kings?:
http://www.cphpost.dk/culture/denmark-through-the-looking-glass/47182-ancient-cult-of-the-viking-kings.html
More on the Staffordshire Hoard:
http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/the_tls/article6874497.ece
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/west_midlands/8304076.stm
http://www.expressandstar.com/2009/10/16/knot-found-in-hoard-jewels/>
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NORTH AMERICA
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Brief item on artifacts found during a New York sewer construction
project:
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,564962,00.html
http://www.1010wins.com/pages/5427646.php?contentType=4&contentId=4860091
I think we mentioned this discovery of a settlement near Jamestown
before:
http://www.dailypress.com/news/williamsburg/dp-local_digger_1017oct17,0,3654249.story?track=rss
Review of John Keegan, *The American Civil War*:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/16/books/16garner.html
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OTHER ITEMS OF INTEREST
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A UPenn archaeologist is recreating some ancient booze:
http://www.philly.com/inquirer/food/20091013_Penn_archaeologist_recreates_ancient_brews.html
A history of vodka:
http://newsfromrussia.com/russia/history/13-10-2009/109841-vodka-0
Just in case you follow the dinosaur/comet theory developments:
http://www.nature.com/news/2009/091012/full/news.2009.997.html
http://www.alphagalileo.org/ViewItem.aspx?ItemId=61939&CultureCode=en
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DIG DIARIES/BLOGS
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Taygete Atlantis excavations blogs aggregator:
http://planet.atlantides.org/taygete/
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CRIME BEAT
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Followups to that Ovdat/Avdat vandalism case:
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/Flash.aspx/172646
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=1121545
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1255450652176&pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1255450652176&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
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NUMISMATICA
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More on coin hoards and Rome's population:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/13/science/13obcoins.html?ref=science>:
More on those Joseph coins:
http://www.memri.org/bin/latestnews.cgi?ID=SD256109
2. Archaeologists Discover a Parthian [-Era] City in North Khorasan [North-east Iran] Province
<http://www.cais-soas.com/news/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=92:archaeologist-discover-a-parthian-city-in-north-khorasan-province-&catid=36>
13 October 2009
LONDON, (CAIS) -- The discovery and identification of remains of a city dating back to Parthian dynasty (248 BCE- 224 CE) in the Dargaz Subprovince in Northern Khorasan province has been announced by Mohsen Lashgari, the director of provincial Cultural Heritage and Tourism Organisation, reported the Persian service of CHN on Tuesday.
The ancient fortified city in the trapezoid plan was over 395,000 sq.m and the architectural remains suggest the mudbrick city was planned prior to its construction.
"The city is 1300 meters long, 150 meters wide at the north-east side and 450 meters at the south-western section of the city", said Lashgari.
He continued "the architectural survey shows that the ancient city was
planned prior to the construction."
According to Lashgari "within 45 days of working on the historical site, the archaeologists have succeeded in identifying the city's fortifications."
The discovery of highly decorated stuccos with patterns of plants and
animals demonstrate it was an important city with palaces and worshipping places.
Lashgari reported the discovery of a large amount of earthenware including crock, urns, pitchers, small jars, plates, rhytons and kitchenware. Among them typical Parthian wares such as Jelingi (Kelingi) and tokhm-e morghi (eggshell) types were also identified.
The city was constructed in 3rd century BCE and might have been the lost city of Dara-gerd founded by the King Tirdad I (Tiridates I). It seems the city was abandoned after the fall of the imperial dynasty in 3rd century CE, according to Lashgari.
Archaeologists led by Dr Mehdi Rahbar back in 1994 discovered a Sasanian fire-temple complex also in Dargaz known as Bandian, with the same highly decorated stuccos.
To comment on the news please visit the link above.
3. Germany's stone age cannibalism
http://sci.tech-archive.net/Archive/sci.archaeology/2009-03/msg00350.html
Extracts:
In Germany Emil Carthaus and Dr. Bruno Bernhard have observed 1,891 signs of cannibalism in the caves at the H?ne (1000 - 700 BCE). It is impossible to establish direct proof of cannibalism. But here we have systematic, repetitive gestures, which suggest that the bodies were eaten," says Boulestin. The marks of breaking, cutting, scraping and crushing indicate that the bodies were dismembered, the tendons and ligaments severed, the flesh torn off, the bones smashed. The vertebra were cut up to remove the ribs, just as butchers do today with loin chops. The tops of skulls were opened to extract the brains. Another telling clue is that there are proportionately fewer bones containing marrow, particularly vertebrae and short bones, suggesting they were set aside."
http://www.archaeologynews.org/story.asp?ID=413834&Title=Germany%27s%20stone%20age%20cannibalism
The German city of Speyer, in Rheinland-Palatinate, well known for its ?Romanesque cathedral, also boasts some much more macabre relics. A collection of skulls, shin bones and vertebrae might not seem unusual in an archaeology museum, but these particular remains are special. They all show signs of having been cut, scraped or broken, indicating that their owners were cannibalised.
All these human remains were found at the stone-age site at Herxheim, near Speyer. About 7,000 years ago farmers, who grew wheat and barley, raised pigs, sheep and cattle, settled here, building a village of four to 12 houses, the post holes of which have survived. At the time the first farmer-stockherders were moving into Europe, supplanting their hunter-gatherer predecessors. The Herxheim settlers came from the north (between 5,400 and 4,950BC) and belonged to the Linear Pottery culture.
Two lines of ditches were dug around the settlement. They can't have been defensive because they weren't continuous. Nor were they intended for use as an ossuary, as the Linear Pottery people generally buried or burned their dead. However, during a rescue dig just before the area was developed as an industrial estate, in some of the ditches archaeologists uncovered tens of thousands of human bones.
A quick investigation of the bones in neighbouring ditches showed that they had suffered the same fate. Extrapolating to the whole site, only half of which was excavated, about 1,000 people must have been butchered. There is no other example in prehistory of a mass grave of this size. "We are dealing with an exceptional event," says Zeeb-Lanz. Other cases of neolithic cannibalism have certainly been identified, in particular in France, at the caves at Fontbr?oua and Adaouste, near the south coast, or at Les Perrats, further west, but never on this scale.
What can this bloodbath mean? The potsherds found among the human remains suggest it must have occurred over a period of no longer than 50 years. There is nothing to imply the victims were killed for food. Only under extreme conditions would 100 or so farmers have been able to overcome about 10 times their number. The archaeologists have therefore concluded that this was some form of ritual killing. In some cases the tops of skulls were arranged to form a nest, scattered with pottery fragments, broken adzes, jewellery made of shells, the paws and jawbones of dogs.
The team that discovered the site have come up with another hypothesis. Members of the Linear Pottery culture deliberately gathered here, with their prisoners and pottery, to take part in sacrificial ceremonies.
"At this time, the Linear Pottery culture was undergoing a crisis, which led to its disappearance," says Zeeb-Lanz. "Perhaps they hoped to prevent the end of their world through some ceremony, of which cannibalism was just a part."
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