[SunkenCiv]

Gods, Graves, Glyphs Weekly Digest #198 Saturday, May 3, 2008
Africa
500-Year-Old Shipwreck Found By Diamond Firm
	04/30/2008 8:44:11 PM PDT · Posted by blam · 10 replies · 778+ views The Telegraph (UK) | 5-1-2008 A shipwreck, believed to be 500 years old, containing a treasure trove of coins and ivory has been discovered off the southern African coast. The site yielded a wealth of objects including thousands of Spanish and Portuguese gold coins A Namibian diamond company, Namdeb, said on Wednesday that it found the wreck during mining operations in the Atlantic. "The site yielded a wealth of objects including six bronze cannon, several tons of copper, more than 50 elephant tusks, pewter tableware, navigational instruments, weapons and thousands of Spanish and Portuguese...
Mesopotamia
Were Mesopotamians The First Brand Addicts
	04/26/2008 3:09:16 PM PDT · Posted by blam · 7 replies · 263+ views New Scientist | 4-26-2008 | Jeff Hecht Product branding first emerged in ancient Mesopotamia, the birthplace of cities and writing. So claims David Wengrow, an archaeologist at University College London, who says that bottle stops stamped with symbols some 5000 years ago are evidence of the first branded goods. Around 8000 years ago, village-dwelling Mesopotamians began making personalised stone seals, which they pressed into the caps and stoppers used to seal food and drink. Originally these goods would have been traded directly with neighbours and travellers. But when urbanisation began -...
India
Megalithic Period Pottery Found
	04/26/2008 7:21:13 PM PDT · Posted by blam · 4 replies · 366+ views Hindu.com | 4-26-2008 | T.S. Subramanian Tamil Nadu Archaeology Department leads excavation -- Significant finds: Pottery with graffiti marks found at Sembiyankandiyur village in Nagapattinam district. CHENNAI: Pottery items including bowls, dishes and urns, from the Megalithic period, have been excavated at Sembiyankandiyur near Kuthalam in Mayiladuthurai taluk of Nagapattinam district by the Tamil Nadu Archaeology Department. An important finding: eight urns aligned in a particular manner, three of them with human bones inside. These might be of members of one family, according to department officials. The pottery included black-and-red ware, black ware and red ware. The site yielded a rich...
Epigraphy and Language
From Indus Valley To Coastal Tamil Nadu
	05/02/2008 8:03:44 PM PDT · Posted by blam · 7 replies · 116+ views The Hindu | 5-2-2008 | TS Subramanian Strong resemblances between graffiti symbols in Tamil Nadu and the Indus script Continuity of tradition: Megalithic pots with arrow-work graffiti found at Sembiankandiyur village in Nagapattinam district. CHENNAI: In recent excavations in Nagapattinam district in Tamil Nadu, megalithic pottery with graffiti symbols that have a strong resemblance to a sign in the Indus script have been found. Indus script expert Iravatham Mahadevan says that what is striking about the arrow-mark graffiti on the megalithic pottery found at Sembiyankandiyur and Melaperumpallam villages is that they are always incised twice and together, just...
Egypt
A new angle on pyramids: Scientists explore whether Egyptians used concrete
	05/01/2008 11:04:55 PM PDT · Posted by SunkenCiv · 30 replies · 475+ views Boston Globe | April 22, 2008 | Colin Nickerson At MIT, Hobbs and two colleagues teach a course called Materials in Human Experience... The MIT pyramid will contain only about 280 blocks, compared with 2.3 million in the grandest of the Great Pyramids... Hobbs describes himself as "agnostic" on the issue, but believes mainstream archeologists have been too contemptuous of work by other scientists suggesting the possibility of concrete. "The degree of hostility aimed at experimentation is disturbing," he said. "Too many big egos and too many published works may be riding on the idea that every pyramid block was carved, not cast." ...In 2006, research by Michel W....
Egypt's Pyramids Packed With Seashells (Not Concrete)
	05/01/2008 2:02:14 PM PDT · Posted by blam · 43 replies · 1,067+ views Discovery Channel | 5-1-2008 | Jennifer Viegas Many of Egypt's most famous monuments, such as the Sphinx and Cheops, contain hundreds of thousands of marine fossils, most of which are fully intact and preserved in the walls of the structures, according to a new study. The study's authors suggest that the stones that make up the examined monuments at Giza plateau, Fayum and Abydos must have been carved out of natural stone since they reveal what chunks of the sea floor must have looked like over 4,000 years ago, when the buildings were...
Australia and the Pacific
Hobbit Wars (Small Islanders Show No Signs Of Growth Disorder)
	04/28/2008 2:25:37 PM PDT · Posted by blam · 11 replies · 334+ views Science News | 4-24-2008 Computer-generated reconstructions (bottom) of the fossilized skulls of the small islanders suggest that, contrary to corresponding photos (top), these "hobbits" belonged to a unique species.K. Smith/Mallinckrodt Inst. Radiology, Wash. Univ. St. Louis; E. Indriati, D. Frayer -- Defenders of a small humanlike species that lived on an Indonesian island more than 12,000 years ago have launched their latest scientific counterattacks against critics of their position. Remains of Homo floresiensis, also referred to as hobbits, display no signs of growth disorders proposed by researchers who regard the fossils as...
Neanderthal / Neandertal
Neandertals Had Big Mouths, Gaped Widely
	05/02/2008 3:01:53 PM PDT · Posted by blam · 42 replies · 1,016+ views National Geographic News | 5-2-2008 | Mati Milstein Neandertals had big mouths that they were able to open unusually wide, new research has determined. A recent study found that a combination of facial structure, forward-positioned molars, and an unusually large gap between the vertical parts of the back of the jaw allowed Neandertals (also spelled Neanderthals) to gape widely. Modern humans and our direct ancestors don't have these traits, the researchers note. But the team was unable to measure exactly how far Neandertals could open their mouths. "This ability is connected...
Diet, Nutrition, Health
Neandertals Ate Their Veggies, Tooth Study Shows
	04/29/2008 1:18:25 PM PDT · Posted by blam · 11 replies · 340+ views National Geographic News | 4-28-2008 | ShowsSara Goudarzi Tiny bits of plant material found in the teeth of a Neandertal skeleton unearthed in Iraq provide the first direct evidence that the human ancestors ate vegetation, researchers say. Little is known about diet of Neandertals (also spelled Neanderthals), although it's widely assumed that they ate more than just meat. Much of what is known about their eating habits has come from indirect evidence, such as animal remains found at Neandertal sites and chemical signatures called isotopes detected in their teeth. The new hard evidence is...
Agriculture and Animal Husbandry
Heated Debate Over Who Planted First Sunflower
	04/28/2008 7:21:53 PM PDT · Posted by blam · 16 replies · 330+ views New Scientist | 4-28-2008 | Colin Barras Could raking over the ashes of past civilisations help tackle the current food crisis? David Lentz at the University of Cincinnati, Ohio, thinks so. Genetic information from wild strains of domestic crops could help to improve crop yield, he says, making it important to identify the point of domestication. That makes his controversial theory that the sunflower was domesticated in Mexico at least 4000 years ago more than just a matter of ancient history. "If we are to improve the sunflower crop, we need...
Elam, Persia, Parthia, Iran
Iran: Seven historic synagogues in Tehran destroyed
	04/16/2008 2:44:05 PM PDT · Posted by knighthawk · 15 replies · 603+ views AKI | April 15 2008 Seven ancient synagogues in the Iranian capital, Tehran, have been destroyed by local authorities. The synagogues were in the Oudlajan suburb of Tehran, where many Iranian Jews used to live. "These buildings, which were part of our cultural, artistic and architectural heritage were burnt to the ground," said Ahmad Mohit Tabatabaii, the director of the International Council of Museums' (ICOM) office in Tehran. "With the excuse of renovating this ancient quarter, they are erasing a part of our history," said Tabatabaii. He called for the government to intervene to stop the work commissioned by the...
Let's Have Jerusalem
Jerusalem's Wailing Wall at risk of collapse
	04/28/2008 1:56:22 PM PDT · Posted by NYer · 38 replies · 639+ views Telegraph | April 28, 2008 | Carolynne Wheeler For thousands of years it has withstood fires, floods and earthquakes. But now a portion of one of Judaism's holiest sites, Jerusalem's Western Wall, is crumbling.The rabbi charged with watching over the structure, which the faith believes to be the last remnants of a retaining wall from the ancient Second Temple, has warned that a section repaired more than a century ago is again at risk of falling. † Mourning prayer: a young Jew at Jerusalem's Western Wall which is losing its mortar to the rain Because the weakened stonework is high on the 60ft wall, the danger from any...
Japan
Japanese Royal Tomb Opened To Scholars For First Time
	04/28/2008 2:33:40 PM PDT · Posted by blam · 12 replies · 410+ views National Geographic News | Tony McNicol A rare visit by archaeologists to a fifth-century imperial tomb offers hope that other closely guarded graves in Japan might soon be open to independent study. This month a group of 16 experts led by the Japanese Archaeological Association released results from their February visit inside Gosashi tomb. The event marked the first time that scholars had been allowed inside a royal tomb outside of an official excavation led by Japan's Imperial Household Agency. Archaeologists have been requesting access to Gosashi tomb...
Need This Like A...
Incan Skull Surgery
	04/26/2008 7:32:58 PM PDT · Posted by blam · 25 replies · 716+ views Science News | 4-25-2008 | Bruce Bower When Incan healers scraped or cut a hunk of bone out of a person's head, they meant business. Practitioners of this technique, known as trepanation, demonstrated great skill more than 500 years ago in treating warriors' head wounds and possibly other medical problems, rarely causing infections or killing their patients, two anthropologists find. Trepanation emerged as a promising but dangerous medical procedure by about 1,000...
PreColumbian, Clovis, and PreClovis
Tse-Whit-Zen Artifacts Languish In Storage
	05/01/2008 1:42:41 PM PDT · Posted by blam · 7 replies · 285+ views Seattle Times | 5-1-2008 | Jonathan Martin An arrowhead created by a Lower Elwha Klallam tribal member. One of the Pacific Northwest's most astonishing archaeological finds in a generation has languished for more than a year, lingering on metal shelves in a Seattle warehouse, unseen by the public and unexamined by scientists. No one questions the discoveries -- artifacts from a 2,700-year-old Native American village excavated from the Port Angeles waterfront amid great public interest -- should be exhibited, analyzed and celebrated. But the 900 boxes of artifacts -- such things as spindle whorls carved from...
Prehistory and Origins
Humans Have More Distinctive Hearing Than Animals, Study Shows
	04/02/2008 5:56:12 PM PDT · Posted by blam · 7 replies · 348+ views Science Daily | 4-2-2008 | The Hebrew University of Jerusalem Do humans hear better than animals? It is known that various species of land and water-based living creatures are capable of hearing some lower and higher frequencies than humans are capable of detecting. However, scientists from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and elsewhere have now for the first time demonstrated how the reactions of single neurons give humans the capability of detecting fine differences in frequencies better than animals. They did this by utilizing a technique for recording the activity of single neurons in the auditory...
Helix, Make Mine a Double
Iceman's DNA Linked To Coastal Aboriginals (Canada)
	04/26/2008 7:01:25 PM PDT · Posted by blam · 18 replies · 1,047+ views Leader - Post | 4-26-2008 | Judith Lavoie Sisters Sheila Clark and Pearl Callaghan held hands and blinked back tears Friday as they talked about their ancestor Kwaday Dan Ts'inchi, better known as Long Ago Person Found, a young aboriginal man whose frozen body was discovered nine years ago at the foot of a melting glacier in Northern B.C. Three hunters found the body in 1999 in Tatshenshini-Alsek Park, part of the traditional territory of the Champagne and Aishihik First Nations. And earlier this month, 17 aboriginal...
Paleontology
Shock: First Animal on Earth Was Surprisingly Complex
	04/27/2008 6:07:35 PM PDT · Posted by SunkenCiv · 184 replies · 1,595+ views Yahoo! | Thursday, April 10, 2008 | LiveScience Earth's first animal was the ocean-drifting comb jelly, not the simple sponge, according to a new find that has shocked scientists who didn't imagine the earliest critter could be so complex... scientists analyzed massive volumes of genetic data to define the earliest splits at the base of the animal tree of life... The new study surprisingly found that the comb jelly was the first animal to diverge from the base of the tree, not the less complex sponge, which had previously been given the honor... Unlike sponges, comb jellies have connective tissues and a nervous system, and so are more...
Catastrophism and Astronomy
Sun's Movement Through Milky Way... Comets Hurtling...Life Extinctions
	05/02/2008 8:53:50 AM PDT · Posted by blam · 68 replies · 1,020+ views Science Daily | 5-2-2008 | Cardiff University A large body of scientific evidence now exists that support the hypothesis that a major asteroid or comet impact occurred in the Caribbean region at the boundary of the Cretaceous and Tertiary periods in Earth's geologic history. Such an impact is suspected to be responsible for the mass extinction of many floral and faunal species, including the large dinosaurs, that marked the end of the Cretaceous period. (Credit: Art by Don Davis / Courtesy of NASA) ScienceDaily (May 2, 2008) -- The sun's movement through the Milky...
Oh So Mysterioso
Penis theft panic hits city...
	04/24/2008 10:56:48 PM PDT · Posted by Menelaus · 36 replies · 491+ views Reuters | Joe Bavier Police in Congo have arrested 13 suspected sorcerers accused of using black magic to steal or shrink men's penises after a wave of panic and attempted lynchings triggered by the alleged witchcraft. Reports of so-called penis snatching are not uncommon in West Africa, where belief in traditional religions and witchcraft remains widespread, and where ritual killings to obtain blood or body parts still occur. Rumors of penis theft began circulating last week in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo's sprawling capital of some 8 million inhabitants. They quickly dominated radio call-in shows, with listeners advised to beware of...
Geology
Geology Picture of the Week, April 27-May 3, 2008: Giant's Causeway, Ireland
	04/29/2008 3:11:51 PM PDT · Posted by cogitator · 34 replies · 675+ views simonward.com | Simon Ward
British Isles
Bronze Age Axe 'Factory' Survey
	04/29/2008 10:45:00 AM PDT · Posted by blam · 12 replies · 417+ views BBC | 4-28-2008 Part of a Bronze Age axe made from picrite rock Archaeologists are hoping to unearth evidence of what they believe to have been one of Bronze Age Britain's largest axe-making "factories". Clwyd-Powys Archaeological Trust (CPAT) said the axes, made from a distinctive type rock - known as picrite - had been found throughout the country. A three-week survey at the 4,000-year-old site will start soon in Hyssington, near Welshpool, Powys. The trust's Chris Martin said it may have been a large industrial centre. The trust carried out a preliminary survey last year, but it did...
Epidemics, Pandemics, Plagues, the Sniffles
Gloucester's Roman Mass Grave Skeletons Were Plague Victims (Smallpox?)
	04/30/2008 6:04:50 PM PDT · Posted by blam · 2 replies · 397+ views 24 Hour Museum | 4-29-2008 | Oxford Archaeology Archaeologists work to uncover the Roman mass grave in Gloucester during 2005. © Oxfod Archaeology A mass Roman grave, discovered in Gloucester in 2005, may have contained the victims of an acute disease of epidemic proportions, possibly plague. This is the startling conclusion to a new report by Oxford Archaeology and archaelogical consultancy CgMs, who have been conducting an 18-month programme of scientific study on the grave, which contained around 91 skeletons. The discovery of a mass grave of Roman date is almost unparalleled in British...
Rome and Italy
Stunning Finds On Archaeological Dig (UK)
	05/01/2008 1:53:51 PM PDT · Posted by blam · 12 replies · 882+ views The hereford Times | 5-1-2008 | By Paul Ferguson One of the bodies discovered on the site -- a 35-year-old woman, who had curvature of the spine. A ROMAN cemetery containing items of national importance has been uncovered in Herefordshire. One of the biggest historical finds in the Marches has been made at Stretton Grandison. A complete wooden coffin -- only the third to be found in the UK -- was one of the items uncovered by Leominster-based Border Archaeology (BA). A kiln, various urns and a working brooch were also unearthed, along with the remains of up...
Ancient Autopsies
Cave Woman Is Laid To Rest After 1,900 Years
	04/29/2008 1:26:02 PM PDT · Posted by blam · 15 replies · 604+ views Yorkshire Post | 4-29-2008 | Rob Preece The remains of a woman have been laid to rest in a hidden location in the Yorkshire Dales -- about 1,900 years after she died. She was returned in a special ceremony to the mysterious limestone cave where she was discovered by two Yorkshire divers more than a decade ago. Phillip Murphy, an academic at Leeds University, and his friend Andrew Goddard found the woman's skull by chance during a diving mission at the cave, dubbed the Wolf Den, in 1997. Carbon dating tests confirmed that...
Middle Ages and Renaissance
Words coined by Shakespeare
	04/28/2008 11:35:28 AM PDT · Posted by Borges · 12 replies · 330+ views Rhymezone | 1589-1611 | Shakespeare Nouns: accused addiction alligator amazement anchovies assassination backing bandit bedroom bump buzzers courtship critic dauntless dawn design dickens discontent embrace employer engagements excitements exposure eyeball fixture futurity glow gust hint immediacy investments kickshaws leapfrog luggage manager mimic misgiving mountaineer ode outbreak pageantry pedant perusal questioning reinforcement retirement roadway rumination savagery scuffles shudders switch tardiness transcendence urging watchdog wormhole zany Verbs: besmirch bet blanket cake cater champion compromise cow denote deracinate dialogue dislocate divest drug dwindle elbow enmesh film forward gossip grovel hobnob humour hurry impedes jet jig label lapse lower misquote negotiate numb pander partner petition puke rant reword secure...
Numismatism
Boy 9, And Grandfather Find Medieval Silver Treasure In Sweden
	04/28/2008 2:47:11 PM PDT · Posted by blam · 22 replies · 1,087+ views Earth Times | 4-28-2008 | DPA A 9-year-old boy's search for shrapnel on an old battlefield resulted in a huge find of medieval silver coins near the Lund in southern Sweden, local media reported Monday. Alexander Granhof, 9, and his grandfather made the recent discovery, dubbed "silverado" by archaeologists. "We went out on the field looking for cannonballs," Alexander Granhof told the online edition of the Sydsvenskan newspaper. "I found a piece of metal and thought at first it was shrapnel from a...
Holocaust Denial
France - Le Pen: Auschwitz didn't have gas chambers
	04/25/2008 9:07:30 PM PDT · Posted by HAL9000 · 83 replies · 1,331+ views Agence France-Presse (excerpt) | April 25, 2008 Extreme right-wing leader repeats claim that no Jews were gassed or burned at Nazi death camps, says Auschwitz inmates worked as laborers for factory -- Far-right leader Jean-Marie Le Pen sparked a chorus of outrage in France on Friday by repeating an incendiary claim that the Nazi gas chambers were a "detail of history." Anti-racism and Jewish groups threatened immediate legal action against the National Front chief - who already holds several similar convictions - after he made the comments in a magazine interview. "I said the gas chambers were a detail of...
World War Eleven
Scholars Run Down More Cluels to Abiding Holocaust Mystery [Fate of Raoul Wallenberg]
	04/28/2008 8:36:32 PM PDT · Posted by justiceseeker93 · 18 replies · 783+ views Yahoo! News | April, 28, 2008 | Arthur Max and Randy Herschaft (AP) Budapest, November 1944: Another German train has loaded its cargo of Jews bound for Auschwitz. A young Swedish diplomat pushes past the SS guard and scrambles onto the roof of the cattle car. Ignoring shots fired over his head, he reaches through the open door to outstretched hands, passing out dozens of bogus "passports" that extended Sweden's protection to the bearers. He orders everyone with a document off the train and into his caravan of vehicles. The guards look on dumfounded. Raoul Wallenberg was a minor official of a neutral country, with an unimposing appearance and a...
Longer Perspectives
The Left's Theft of the Open Society and the Scientific Method
	04/24/2008 1:15:40 PM PDT · Posted by neverdem · 15 replies · 570+ views American Thinker | April 24, 2008 | Jonathan David Carson The Left misappropriates intellectual capital for perverse ends, in order to lend itself a veneer of respectability and befuddle its critics. According to the website of the Open Society Institute, the George Soros funded nerve-center of today's Left, "The term 'open society' was popularized by the philosopher Karl Popper in his 1945 book Open Society and Its Enemies. Popper's work deeply influenced George Soros, the founder of the Open Society Institute, and it is upon the concept of an open society that Soros bases his philanthropic activity." But the Open Society Institute embodies Popper's idea of an open society the way...
Pages
The Forgotten Man (Required Summer Reading for ALL conservatives)
	04/30/2008 5:37:48 AM PDT · Posted by mek1959 · 10 replies · 347+ views Amitysclaes.com | 2007 | Amity Shlaes "Americans just now need what Amity Shlaes has brilliantly supplied, a fresh appraisal of what the New Deal did and did not accomplish...." -George F. Will, Columnist
Thoroughly Modern Miscellany
Father loses custody of son over lemonade
	04/28/2008 8:00:02 AM PDT · Posted by mombyprofession · 223 replies · 3,460+ views WZZM 13 Website | 4-28-08 | Brian Dickerson If you watch much television, you've probably heard of a product called Mike's Hard Lemonade. And if you ask Christopher Ratte and his wife how they lost custody of their 7-year-old son, the short version is that nobody in the Ratte family watches much television. The way police and child protection workers figure it, Ratte should have known that what a Comerica Park vendor handed over when Ratte ordered a lemonade for his boy three Saturdays ago contained alcohol, and Ratte's ignorance justified placing young Leo in foster care until his dad got up to speed on the commercial beverage...
end of digest #198 20080503

[SunkenCiv]

Gods Graves Glyphs Digest #198 20080503 · Saturday, May 3, 2008 · 32 topics · 2009527 to 2006491 · 685 members ·
	Saturday May 3 2008 v 4 n 42 view this issue	Welcome to the 198th issue. Smokin' bunch of topics again this week, many thanks to blam who posted at least 95 per cent of 'em. No, I didn't actually do the math, so don't write in, okay? As happened last week, a few topics are not all that new, but had somehow previously escaped the GGG dragnet. A new header this week, "Pages", will spotlight books which look worth reading. Naturally, these will be from existing topics on FR. FReepers love to read and recommend. Something I've meant to do for quite a while -- check out FReeper Foxhole for military history topics. Visit the Free Republic Memorial Wall -- a history-related feature of FR. No matter how it turns out, the 2008 election will be historic, which is weird, because the fall of the Berlin Wall was supposed to mark the "end of history". Heh. Defeat Hillary -- first for the White House, then for reelection to the Senate. Regarding the Demwit nominating convention, it will be ugly as an SOB. Various brainiacs in Obama's campaign continue to be that senator's biggest liability. It's almost as if some fiendish plan of Hillary is bearing fruit. Hillary is ordinarily forced to say nothing about Obama's embrace of holdover unreconstructed wild-eyed leftists (including the bomb-throwers), in order to hold the line with the left wing voters she'll need in November -- and to avoid being exposed for hypocrisy -- but as a NY Senator, she can't very well remain mute on forcing Israel to give up its very existence, which its "secret" nuclear capability ensures. The punchline is, by moving to defend Israel's right to self-defense, she moves back to the middle, which is where she'll need to be strong to win in November. I need a new job.
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[SunkenCiv]

Gods, Graves, Glyphs Weekly Digest #199 Saturday, May 10, 2008
Let's Have Jerusalem
Archaeologists find Queen of Sheba's palace at Axum, Ethiopia
	05/08/2008 6:33:17 PM PDT · Posted by HAL9000 · 35 replies · 801+ views Deutsche Presse-Agentur | May 7, 2008 Archaeologists believe they have found the Queen of Sheba's palace at Axum, Ethiopia and an altar which held the most precious treasure of ancient Judaism, the Ark of the Covenant, the University of Hamburg said Wednesday. Scientists from the German city made the startling find during their spring excavation of the site over the past three months. The Ethiopian queen was the bride of King Solomon of Israel in the 10th century before the Christian era. The royal match is among the memorable events in the Bible. Ethiopian tradition claims the Ark, which allegedly contained Moses' stone...
Neanderthal / Neandertal
Neanderthals Were Seperate Species, Says New Human Family Tree
	05/05/2008 11:38:41 AM PDT · Posted by blam · 85 replies · 1,834+ views Physorg | 5-4-2008 A wax figure representing a Neanderthal man on display at a museum. A new, simplified family tree of humanity has dealt a blow to those who contend that the enigmatic hominids known as Neanderthals intermingled with our forebears. A new, simplified family tree of humanity, published on Sunday, has dealt a blow to those who contend that the enigmatic hominids known as Neanderthals intermingled with our forebears. Neanderthals were a separate species to Homo sapiens, as anatomically modern humans are known, rather than offshoots of the same species, the new organigram...
Climate
Once Lush Sahara Dried Up Over Millennia, Study Says
	05/08/2008 7:08:12 PM PDT · Posted by blam · 24 replies · 677+ views National Geographic News | 5-8-2008 | James Owen The grassy prehistoric Sahara turned into Earth's largest hot desert more slowly than previously thought, a new report says -- and some say global warming may turn the desert green once again. The new research is based on deposits from a unique desert lake in remote northern Chad. Lake Yoa, sustained by prehistoric groundwater, has survived for millennia despite constant drought and searing heat. The body of water contains an unbroken climate record going back at least 6,000 years, said study lead author Stefan Kropelin of...
Solar Minima and Maxima
New Data on Sea Ice Contradicts Media Climate Change Reporting
	05/06/2008 7:53:13 AM PDT · Posted by Rufus2007 · 46 replies · 1,158+ views Newsbusters.org | May 6, 2008 | Jeff Poor If the Earth has a fever, as former Vice President Al Gore suggests, it's not showing signs of it. According to Climateaudit.org's Steve McIntyre, global sea ice has actually increased. "On a global basis, world sea ice in April 2008 reached levels that were "unprecedented' for the month of April in over 25 years," Steve McIntyre wrote on Climateaudit.org on May 4. "Levels are the third highest (for April) since the commencement of records in 1979, exceeded only by levels in 1979 and 1982." That data from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's (NOAA) National Snow and Ice Data Center...
Catastrophism and Astronomy
Did Comets Cause Ancient American Extinctions?
	05/07/2008 6:40:10 PM PDT · Posted by blam · 29 replies · 529+ views National Geographic News | 5-6-2008 | Anne Casselman Debate has heated up over a controversial theory that suggests huge comet impacts wiped out North America's large mammals nearly 13,000 years ago. The hypothesis, first presented in May 2007, proposes that an onslaught of extraterrestrial bodies caused the mass extinction known as the Younger Dryas event and triggered a period of climatic cooling. The theory has been debated widely since it was introduced, but it drew new scrutiny in March at the annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology annual meeting in Vancouver, Canada. Stuart...
Paleontology
Dinosaur killer may have struck oil
	05/08/2008 12:11:16 PM PDT · Posted by Berlin_Freeper · 44 replies · 856+ views Australian Broadcasting Corporation | May 07, 2008 | Larry O'Hanlon The dinosaur-killing Chicxulub meteor might have ignited an oilfield rather than forests when it slammed into the Gulf of Mexico 65 million years ago, say geologists. Smoke-related particles found in sediments formed at the time of the impact are strikingly similar to those created by modern high-temperature coal and oil burning, as opposed to forest fires, says Professor Simon Brassell of Indiana University. He and colleagues from Italy and the UK publish their report on the discovery in the May issue of the journal Geology. ...What he and his colleagues have found instead are particles called cenospheres, which resemble the...
Diet, Nutrition, Health
First Americans Thrived On Seaweed
	05/08/2008 2:07:20 PM PDT · Posted by blam · 33 replies · 412+ views New Scientist | 5-8-2008 | Jeff Hecht How times have changed. Instead of large amounts of meat and spuds, some of the first Americans enjoyed healthy doses of seaweed. The evidence comes from 27 litres of material collected from the Monte Verde site in southern Chile, widely accepted as the oldest settlement in the Americas. Nine species of seaweed, carbon dated at 13,980 to 14,220 years old, played a major role in a diet that included land plants and animals. Tom Dillehay of Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee, argues that the seaweeds were...
PreColumbian, Clovis, and PreClovis
Modern Subdivision Is Home To Ancient Village
	05/09/2008 3:41:00 PM PDT · Posted by blam · 15 replies · 169+ views Cleveland Daily Banner | 5-8-2008 | David Davis Upon entering Princeton Hills subdivision off Freewill Road, visitor's see a wide expanse of green space bordered by a circular drive. Large, expensive homes surround the green, grassy mound in an arrangement akin to a prehistoric village. In a sense, that is exactly what the mound represents. It is the five-acre site of the Candies Creek Village Archaeological Preserve owned by the Archaeological Conservancy. It contains the remains of houses, human burials and pit features. Developer Jim Sharp sold the site to the Conservancy in 2001...
Navigation
45-Foot Ancient Canoe Stuck In Muck Of Weedon Island (Tampa Bay)
	05/06/2008 10:48:16 AM PDT · Posted by blam · 53 replies · 1,442+ views MSNBC - Tampa Tribune | 5-5-2008 | KEITH MORELLI Stuck somewhere in the muck of Weedon Island is a significant piece of history. A 45-foot canoe, buried for more than a thousand years and used by a long-dead culture of Native Americans, worked its way to the surface, and now authorities are trying to figure out how best to preserve it. The vessel is carved out of a single pine tree, and archaeologists say it was used to...
Elam, Persia, Parthia, Iran
Jiroft Is Ancient City Of Marhashi: US Scholar
	05/08/2008 6:25:35 PM PDT · Posted by blam · 10 replies · 267+ views Tehran Times | 5-7-2008 Piotr Steinkeller, professor of Assyriology in Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations of Harvard University, believes that the prehistoric site of Jiroft is the lost ancient city of Marhashi. He developed the theory in his paper during the first round of the International Conference on Jiroft Civilization, which was held in Tehran on May 5 and 6. Marhashi, (in earlier sources Warahshe) was a 3rd millennium BC polity situated east of Elam,...
Rome and Italy
Italian Builders Uncover (27) 2,000 year Old Tombs (Etruscans)
	05/08/2008 1:54:01 PM PDT · Posted by blam · 13 replies · 448+ views The Scotsman | 5-7-2008 Archaeologists were yesterday celebrating the discovery of 27 2,000-year-old tombs in Italy's "Valley of the Dead". The tombs, some dating back to the 7th century BC, were found by chance while builders carried out work. The whole area was sealed off yesterday and put under police guard to prevent anyone from trying to steal artefacts inside the burial chambers. Grave robbers, or tombaroli as they are known in Italy, make a lucrative living from selling such objects to museums or private collectors. Archaeologists say there is also a "good chance" that there may well be...
Prehistory and Origins
Our Celtic Roots Lie In Spain And Portugal
	05/06/2008 8:59:53 AM PDT · Posted by blam · 29 replies · 953+ views IC Wales - Western Mail | 5-5-2008 | Darren Devine The Welsh have more in common with sun-kissed glamour pusses like actress Penelope Cruz and footballer Christiano Ronaldo than pale- faced Germans like Helmet Kohl, according to an academic. Professor John Koch suggests the Welsh can trace their ancestry back to Portugal and Spain, debunking the century-old received wisdom that our forebears came from Iron Age Germany and Austria. His radical work on Celtic origins flatly contradicts the writing of Sir John Rhys, who in the late 19th century established the idea that we...
British Isles
Irish Viking Trade Centre Unearthed
	05/07/2008 6:48:40 PM PDT · Posted by blam · 23 replies · 542+ views BBC | 5-7-2008 Almost 6,000 artefacts and a Viking chieftain's grave have been discovered -- One of the Vikings' most important trading centres has been discovered in Ireland. The settlement at Woodstown in County Waterford is estimated to be about 1,200 years old. It was discovered during archaeological excavations for a road by-pass for Waterford city, which was founded by the Vikings. The Irish government said the settlement was one of the most important early Viking age trading centres discovered in the country. Its working group, which includes archaeologists from Ireland's museum and monuments service, said it was of...
Middle Ages and Renaissance
Dive Team To Scour Danube For Queen Mary's Lost Belongings
	05/08/2008 1:59:42 PM PDT · Posted by blam · 13 replies · 433+ views All Hungarian News | 5-8-2008 The legend goes something like this: after the disastrous Battle of Mohacs in 1526, the twenty-one-year-old Queen Mary of Hungary fled the encroaching Ottoman army on a caravan of ships headed to Vienna. But, on her way up the Danube a few ships sank along with their valuable cargo. It is said that to this day they remain hidden in the murky depths of the river. Soon, any truth to this story may soon be discovered, or disproved. According to inforadio.hu, a team of...
Epidemics, Pandemics, Plagues, the Sniffles
Some Diabetics Don't Have What They Thought They Had
	05/05/2008 10:31:25 PM PDT · Posted by neverdem · 14 replies · 1,413+ views NY Times | May 6, 2008 | ANDREW POLLACK Ryan Collins of Aldie, Va., was only 10 weeks old when doctors made the diagnosis: Type 1 diabetes. That meant up to eight insulin shots per day, a big burden on him and his family. "He couldn't be anywhere unless there was someone around to give a shot," said his mother, Dana Collins. "Everything had to be planned. There was no impromptu anything." Until last month, that is, when Ryan, now almost 7, stopped needing shots. Ryan, it turns out, does not have Type 1 diabetes after all. He has a rare form of diabetes, not yet discovered when he...
Helix, Make Mine a Double
Sorry, but family history really is bunk
	05/08/2008 3:18:15 PM PDT · Posted by forkinsocket · 142 replies · 1,601+ views The Spectator | 30th April 2008 | Leo McKinstry Leo McKinstry says the current craze for genealogy reflects an unhealthy combination of snobbery and inverse snobbery, and is a poor replacement for national history When I visited the National Archives at Kew last week the place was full of them, scurrying about with their plastic wallets in hand, a look of eager concentration on their faces. It was impossible to escape their busy presence as they whispered noisily to relatives or whooped over the discovery of some new piece of information. These were the followers of one of Britain's fastest-growing craze, the mania for researching family history. Studying bloodlines...
Longer Perspectives
Is everything we know about American history wrong?
	05/09/2008 6:05:00 PM PDT · Posted by indcons · 18 replies Salon | May 9, 2008 | Louis Bayard Empire building isn't for sissies. Just ask the Spanish conquistadors of the 16th century. Before attacking Indian settlements, they were required to read a summons called the Requerimiento, which spelled out the consequences of resistance: "I assure you that, with the help of God, I will attack you mightily. I will make war against you everywhere and in every way ... I will take your wives and children, and I will make them slaves ... I will take their property. I will do all the harm and damage to you that I can ... I declare that the deaths and...
Oh So Mysterioso
Save Water To Avoid Eating Your Neighbor
	05/07/2008 6:28:29 PM PDT · Posted by blam · 31 replies · 500+ views The Telegraph (UK) | 5-2-2008 | Chris Turney It's easy to get hung up on the tag 'global warming'. There's no doubt it's a useful catchphrase for describing the challenges we face, but there's always the risk that our predicament is just seen as warming. Temperature is of course an important facet of the climate, but it's not our only concern. Downpours in the future are likely to vary around the world and throughout the year. The combined effect of changing rainfall and increasing temperature will mean that some regions will get wetter,...
The Civil War
Civil War Cannonball Kills Relic Collector
	05/02/2008 8:39:16 PM PDT · Posted by fishhound · 69 replies · 2,197+ views Aol, AP | May 2,2008 | STEVE SZKOTAK, Like many boys in the South, Sam White got hooked on the Civil War early, digging up rusting bullets and military buttons in the battle-scarred earth of his hometown As an adult, he crisscrossed the Virginia countryside in search of wartime relics -- weapons, battle flags, even artillery shells buried in the red clay. He sometimes put on diving gear to feel for treasures hidden in the black muck of river bottoms. But in February, White's hobby cost him his life: A cannonball he was restoring exploded, killing him in his driveway. More than 140...
Ancient Cannon Ball Explodes
	05/05/2008 9:46:50 AM PDT · Posted by Abathar · 41 replies · 1,222+ views strategypage.com | 05/05/08 | Unknown May 5, 2008: The U.S. Civil War continues to kill. Sam White, a Virginia based collector of Civil War munitions, died recently while cleaning up a nine inch, 75 pound, cannon ball. White had previously restored or examined over 1,500 of these shells. But the one that killed him was different. It was fired from a ship board gun, and was designed to be more waterproof than shells used by land based artillery. This kept the fuze, and black powder explosive charge, dry and viable after 150 years. Mister White was using metal tools to clean up the shell, which...
The World War
Canadian WW1 vet to become a Canadian citizen
	05/09/2008 8:14:35 PM PDT · Posted by NormsRevenge · 6 replies Reuters on Yahoo | 5/9/08 | Allan Dowd Canada's last known surviving veteran of World War One is becoming a Canadian citizen, the government said on Friday. John Babcock, 107, was born in Canada but became a U.S. citizen in 1946 and had to give up his status as a British subject - as Canadians were designated before Canada's own citizenship act came into force a year later. Canadian officials recently visited Babcock at his home in Spokane, Washington, to give him an award, and he told them he was interested in being granted citizenship in his birth country. "This means the last...
Peking Duck
Ancient bird is missing link to Archaeopteryx (rational caucus)
	05/06/2008 5:27:49 PM PDT · Posted by Soliton · 32 replies · 412+ views The New Scientist | 02 May 2008 | Jeff Hecht A spectacularly preserved new Chinese fossil reveals a previously unseen stage in the early evolution of flight. Called Eoconfuciusornis, it is a missing link between the oldest known bird, Archaeopteryx, and more advanced birds that have been discovered in the Yixian geological formation in China. The Yixian deposits have yielded remarkably diverse fauna that have revolutionised avian palaeontology, but they are limited to a period from 125 to 120 million years ago -- too narrow a time span to show much evidence of evolution within bird lineages
Thoroughly Modern Miscellany
LA Democrat Legislator Who Called Civil Rights Activist "Buckwheat" Loses Her Job
	11/18/2007 3:38:49 PM PST · Posted by DogByte6RER · 73 replies · 185+ views WWLTV.com | WWLTV.com State Representative District 51 40 of 40 Precincts 100% Joe Harrison 4,338 57% Carla Dartez (I) 3,276 43% (I) denotes incumbent candidate
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