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POPSThe Lost Cities of the Cloud People
more: Much about the Cloud People is shrouded in mystery. As recently as 2008, a lost Chachapoya city was discovered in the isolated Amazon rainforest during an archaeological expedition to Peru’s Jamalca district, about five hundred miles north-east of Lima. The fortified citadel was found to contain the walls of buildings and rock paintings, and perched on the edge of a chasm – literally carved into the Andes – it may have been used by the Cloud People to keep a lookout for enemies Little is known about the Chachapoyas as they left no written records, but it appears their culture began to prosper in the 9th century, when their towering cities were developed, possibly as defensive measures against invading Huaris. However, five hundred years on, their fortunes faltered with the spread of the Inca Empire. Despite fierce resistance, the Cloud People were conquered by the Incas, and were by turns rebelling and being suppressed when the Spanish conquistadors arrived in 1535.
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POPSThe Strangest Things Pulled Out of Peat Bogs more: Murder wasn’t all that happened out on the bogs. Multiple trepanated skulls, that is to say, skulls with holes drilled in them, have been found. Based on the use of the procedure in medieval times, one hypothesis is that the “operation may have been performed to remove a blood clot or a less-tangible thing like a spirit” from an individual. Even now, there’s still a small number of people who think drilling holes in their skulls is therapeutic. While we don’t know much about the people who wandered these bogs thousands of years ago, analytical chemistry has helped identify substances that make them seem startlingly modern.One corpse’s hair appears to have been coated with primitive hair gel, made from “vegetable oil mixed with resin from pine trees found in Spain and southwest France.” The man lived around 300 B.C.
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POPS3,000-year-old oak barrel of butter found in Kildare bog more (at source): The barrel is also split along the middle, which is common with utensils filled with butter found in the bogs. A conservator at the National Museum, Carol Smith, told that the butter expands over time, causing the split. The barrel is about three feet long and almost a foot wide, and weighs almost 35kgs, (77lbs). The butter has changed to white and is now adipocere, which is essentially animal fat, the same sort of substance that is found on well-preserved bodies of people or animals found in the bog. The two men put the barrel in the cab of their tractor and brought it back to their base. "We put it in a black plastic bag," Mr Fitzharris explained. And last Tuesday in the Conservation Department of the National Museum of Ireland in Collins Barracks, the two men were reunited with the barrel in the company of Monasterevin man and one of the museum's keepers, Pádraig Clancy and conservator Carol Smith. Mr Clancy was contacted by Bord na Móna's archaeo
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POPSNew life for ancient Syrian sculptures more: Fragments were initially reassembled with temporary glue and later more permanently attached with reversible epoxy resin. No metal framework or pins were used. Break marks remain very visible, and no attempt has been made to disguise them. Where large pieces are missing (some since antiquity), roughly shaped inserts have been added, using a mixture of ground basalt, sand and resin, in a slightly lighter shade of grey than the original stone. Some fragments of molten glass and bitumen from the Charlottenburg museum roof have been left on surfaces which will not be visible on display, since they are now part of the history of the sculptures. Conservation work is due to be concluded in October.
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POPSRemains of a 4000-year-old paraplegic found more: ''It's the most astounding thing I can imagine,'' Dr Oxenham said. ''With a lot of children dying, you wouldn't think there'd be a great deal of sympathy around. But obviously there was. It sort of makes you wonder and think was it totally altruistic, or was there something else going on did this person have some other particular ability that the community needed.'' Dr Oxenham said they had searched the literature extensively and had not found a clearcut case of paraplegia as old as this one. Full story in today's Canberra Times
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POPSThe Sutton Hoo Treasure "Sutton Hoo, (grid reference TM288487) near Woodbridge, Suffolk, is an Anglo-Saxon cemetery and the site of an early 7th century ship burial. The ship-burial was discovered in 1939 and contained a wealth of artefacts. Sutton Hoo is of primary importance to early medieval historians because it sheds light on a period in English history that otherwise has little documented evidence remaining - it has been called "page one of English history". It is one of the most remarkable archaeological finds in England because of its age, size, far reaching connections, completeness, beauty, rarity and historical importance."
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POPSRare Indian artifcats found on Lisbon property more (at source): The state Office of Archaeology has excavated portions of the property and found hundreds of artifacts, from stone tools to evidence of a pit where cremated bodies were buried. Radiocarbon dating a method used to estimate the age of remains in an archaeological site places the time of two areas containing charcoal at 3,400 and 4,000 years ago. Representatives of the Mohegan and Mashantucket Pequots tribes and the Native American Heritage Advisory Council have visited the site. The Archaeological Conservancy, a private, nonprofit organization that acquires and permanently preserves important archaeological sites across the United States, has looked at it. The conservancy publishes the quarterly magazine American Archaeology.
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POPSMysterious Book: Codex Gigas more (at source): The legend surrounding the Codex is that one of the monks from the Bohemian Benedictine Monastery had committed a terrible sin and was facing the ultimate punishment from the monastery...... to be walled up alive in is cell. To redeem himself from a terrible slow death, the monk offered a deal to the monastery leaders.....if he were to write the biggest book that the world had ever seen, in one single night, then he should be allowed to live.
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POPSFacedown Burials Widely Used to Humiliate the Dead Arcini searched existing literature to make the first ever catalog of facedown burials from around the world. She found descriptions of more than 600 bodies from 215 grave sites, from Peru to South Korea. Dating from 26,000 years ago all the way up to World War I, these so-called prone burials include men, women, and children, though the majority were men. Facedown burials occurred in all sorts of graves, including single graves, double graves, and mass graves.
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POPSExtraordinary Artifacts More than 20 of them have turned up across the American West, including one unearthed in a Colorado backyard in 2008. They have been found by construction crews, artifact collectors, and in one case by a man hand-digging an irrigation canal.
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POPSAncient Holy Land quarry uncovered, team says "We saw a hole in the ground ... and went down and discovered this giant cavern, originally a quarry, built uniquely with hall after hall," Zertal told Reuters. The team believes the stones were used in buildings and churches in the region, but Zertal said further research was necessary.
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POPSResearchers Explain the Destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah Searching for Sodom and Gomorrah - http://www.bib-arch.org/e-features/sodom-and-gomorrah.asp "As suggested by Amos Frumkin in his May/June 2009 BAR article on the salt pillar known as Lot’s Wife, the Sodom story told in the Bible likely represents an ancient memory of a single catastrophic event that affected the cities and peoples of the Dead Sea region nearly 4,000 years ago." Really interesting article.
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POPSCodex Gigas - The Devil's Bible No records about it's origin, author or reason for writing it have been preserved. It's been said the manuscript is "eerily flawless". Some think the Codex Gigas was written by the Devil himself. Oooh, creepy! :) http://www.nkp.cz/files/codex_gigas_en.pdf
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POPSSearching for Afghanistan's Third Giant Buddha I love ancient history. No matter what our present relationship with Afghanistan, we should remember that it was considered the "cradle of civilization" and there is a wealth of history, culture, and societies.
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