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explorator 5.51 April 20, 2003
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Thanks to Arthur Shippee, Bill Kennedy, Hernan Astudillo, Mike Ruggeri,
Louis A. Okin, Steve Rankin, Yonatan Nadelman, 'fireflye', Leanne
Archer, W. Richard Frahm, Dave Sowdon, Mark Morgan, Joan Pasch, John
Hill, John McMahon, Michael Oberndorf, RM Howe, Donna Hurst, Joseph
Nicholas and John McChesney-Young for headses upses this week
(a.a.h.i.h.l.n.o.o.)
N.B.: Explorator passed a milestone some time list week when it
had it's 3,000th subscriber sign up! Thanks to all you subscribers
(new and old) for your support!
N.B. 2: I believe this is the largest Explorator ever sent out ...
it was certainly the one which took the longest to put together!
Happy Easter and/or Passover and/or any other cultural celebration
you may be celebrating this week!
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AFRICA, EUROPE, AND ASIA
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As most folks know, the news from Iraq has been coming fast and
furious all week; it has also made it to a zillion newsgroups
and mailing lists already, so I'm sure most of you have seen much
of it. As such, to save you from wading through it all again -- it
is rather overwhelming -- I've put it all at the end of this week's
issue (not to be construed as a comment on its importance!).
The dating of the paintings in Chauvet Cave is being questioned:
More on that dagger found in a lake in Germany:
(photo; German text)
A Bronze Age burial has been found in northern Portugal:
,,2-13-1443_1349296,00.html
John Noble Wilford has penned a lengthy piece on the Etruscan thing
at UPenn:
"Tests" suggest that, if nothing else, the James Ossuary is from
the right period:
'S%20BROTHER%3F
National Geographic has a piece on recent controversial finds from
Israel (guess!):
Archaeologists working near the Dead Sea have found some coins
dating to the Bar Kochba revolt:
The House of the Perfume Maker has reopened in Pompeii:
One of the Avebury stones is *realllllllllly* huge, it turns out:
,3604,939115,00.html
Wall paintings from the 13th century (?) have been painstakingly restored
in a church in London:
,3604,938247,00.html
Construction of a car dealership in Lincolnshire has revealed an
850 b.p. dragon head:
The Newport Ship (now almost completely excavated) is causing
controversy:
Signs scratched on 8600 b.p. tortoise shells from China may be the
oldest writing ever found:
,4293,3255_5726_29233964,00.html (Spanish)
They've (re)excavated some Shang Dynasty oracle bones in China:
China's 'top ten discoveries for 2002' list:
The latest on the Ayodhya dig:
,000900010004.htm
Excavations at Sanjan (India) are providing some insight into one of
the first Parsi settlements:
A 300 b.p. lavatory in North York is at the center of a dispute:
,3604,938281,00.html
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THE AMERICAS
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A Peruvian gourd is (for now) the oldest religious icon ever found in
the Americas:
,4293,3255_5726_29233929,00.html (Spanish)
A recent survey in Chile has identified more than 50 potential sites:
,4293,3255_5666_29241941,00.html (Spanish)
The Telegraph has a piece on the Franklin Expedition:
A Hohokam site has been found in downtown (sort of) Phoenix:
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ALSO OF INTEREST
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On the DNA front, a certain type of cancer has been traced to
Viking genes:
,3604,937480,00.html
There's a new dating technique for metal artifacts:
There must be several levels of irony in the fact that Britain's
Arts Ministrix has placed an export ban on the diaries of Claudius
Rich:
Another side of the political side of archaeology in Israel (perhaps):
All about the stuff they've done to make Hadrian's Wall into a
major tourist attraction:
,11711,936299,00.html
Patras (Greece) is getting a new museum:
A nice piece on how the Venus de Milo was protected during WWI:
,12084,938806,00.html
A new cancer centre in Cambridge will incorporate a cast of an Iron
Age pottery kiln in its construction:
The Met has acquired a pile of medieval ivories for the Cloisters:
As might be expected in a postmodern world, Spinoza seems to be
gaining ground on Descartes:
The New York Times has a touristy thing on St. Petersburg to mark
its tricentennial:
Mersey is about to erect a giant statue of Neptune as a reflection
of its maritime heritage (very difficult to resist an editorial
comment on this one):
In a semi-related story, they've recreated the famous "Amber Room"
(another item still missing from WWII):
Robert Ballard has received a huge grant to fund broadcasting of
sites from the Black Sea this summer:
,0,5766259.story?coll=sns-technology-headlines
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MAGAZINES AND JOURNALS
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There's a new issue of Archaeology out:
[check out esp. which
is a nice piece on the Hall of Maat webboard, run by some friends
of Explorator]
.. and Archaeology Odyssey:
A new issue of Internet Archaeology:
American Journal of Philology 124.1 (abstracts; full text for Muse)
Classical Journal 98.3 (TOCS only):
Classical Quarterly 52.2 (TOCS only; full text for subscribers):
Greece and Rome 50.1 (ditto):
Wired has a piece on Steve Booras and his efforts to make manuscripts
from Herculaneum more readable:
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ON THE WEB
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The Survey and Excavation Projects in Egypt site has recently
gone up:
Discovery.com has some nice biographies on some currently-digging
archaeologist types:
(Jean-Yves Empereur)
(Joann Fletcher)
(Vassil Dobrev)
(Julie Anderson)
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NEW ONLINE BOOKS
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Nikola Moushmov, *Ancient Coins of the Balkan Peninsula*:
Mark Munn, *The Defense of Attica: The Dema Wall and the
Boiotian War of 378-375 B.C*:
Leslie MacCoull, *Dioscorus of Aphrodito: His Work and His World*
Woodhouse's English-Greek Dictionary:
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CRIME BEAT
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An illegally-excavated hoard of Greek coins has been recovered:
Russian authorities are trying to curb the activities of the 'black
diggers', who are plundering Adriatica:
,2763,936954,00.html
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AT ABOUT.COM
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Ancient History Guide N.S. Gill provides the background to that
whole Helen of Troy thing:
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BOOK REVIEWS
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Niall Ferguson, *Empire*:
David Liss, *The Coffee Trader* (Fiction):
Glyn Williams, *Voyages of Delusion: The Quest for the Northwest
Passage*:
Jon Kukla, *A Wilderness So Immense*:
Barry Unsworth, *The Songs of the Kings* (Fiction):
Jai Sen, *The Golden Vine* ("alternate history" of Alexander the Great):
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PERFORMANCES
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Heliogabalus:
Iphigeneia at Aulis:
Les Boreades:
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EXHIBITIONS
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Transmitting the Forms of Divinity: Early Buddhist Art From
Korea and Japan (New York):
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CLASSICIST'S CORNER
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I'm not quite sure how to categorize this review of "Olympias,
Mother of Alexander the Great" (which may be a book or a drama
or both):
As you're no doubt aware, a miniseries on Helen of Troy begins on
the USA Network tonight ... here's some reviews (personally I'm
not sure that face could launch a thousand ships ... a few, maybe,
but she appears a rather unHel(l)enic Helen to me!):
,1413,36~78~1321630,00.html
.. good quote from the actress herself in this one:
,0,3955184.story?coll=nyc-ent-short-navigation
Meanwhile, an actress has been chosen to play Helen in the upcoming
movie based on the Iliad (so ... was Helen blond?):
,1259,---16449,00.html
(with photo)
An interview with Christopher Logue (author of *All Day Permanent Red*):
A classics student is a murder suspect:
,1413,36~53~1333312,00.html
An attempt to see parallels between Iraq and Alexander (this one's
difficult to read):
On 'trying to be relevant':
A summary of the upcoming sword and sandal flicks:
,1413,36~78~1321618,00.html
ClassCon in a piece on pulling down statues:
Nice coverage of a school's culminating activity for their Greek
unit (with a nice (old) pun in the headline):
An item on Ovid, with a (passing) tie-in to Iraq:
A virtual reconstruction of the Odeon of Pericles suggests it had
really bad sight lines:
,11711,938396,00.html
Perfess'r Harris:
Peter Jones in the Spectator:
Akropolis News in Classical Greek:
Radio Finland's Nuntii Latini
Radio Bremen's Der Monatsr¨¹ckblick - auf Latein
U.S. Weather in Latin:
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REPEATS
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Israel in David and Solomon's Time:
Oldest Mummification:
Plato Languishing in the Basement:
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PLUNDERING IN IRAQ
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It begins with 'general' stuff -- plundering of museum and burning of
the Islamic library:
,2763,937094,00.html
(John Noble Wilford)
(audio)
.. then we hear that the "House of Wisdom", which housed much
of Ottoman interest (among other things) was also a
victim:
.. and the possible loss of the 'Sippar Library' (cuneiform texts):
The Museum at Mosul received comparatively scant coverage:
,0,3172404.story?coll=bal-news-nation
The Art Newspaper has put up a database of sorts with images of some
300 items which were lost:
There's plenty of "scholars told you so" type coverage:
,13228,937963,00.html (by McGuire Gibson)
.. and more doubts/suspicions being raised about the AACP:
There are suggestions that some looters 'knew what they were looking
for' and/or 'were hired' and/or were part of an 'inside job':
(audio)
A number of cultural policy advisors have resigned to protest
the lack of immediate reponse to the looting of the museum:
.. and, of course, there were a spate of opinion pieces:
(good photos)
,3604,936216,00.html
(written by an Assyriologist)
The U.S. has promised to help recover stolen objects:
Universities and other organizations are offering help in identifying
what was taken:
(UPenn)
(BM)
,,5944-647085,00.html (BM)
(OI)
(OI)
(SCA)
(UNESCO)
(various)
There are also hints that some items were actually hidden away
prior to the fall of Baghdad (and so not stolen?):
,,SB105053292455773900.html
There were further calls late in the week for more protection of
cultural monuments in Iraq:
And pleas for museums not to purchase any:
Some items are being recovered already:
;sz=300x250;ord=22057?
.. while others appear to have already appeared up for sale (am I
reading that correctly?):
(French)
Photos (from a message I sent to the ANE list):
(tikrit)
The Washington Post has a nice flash slideshow, but it's kind of difficult to get to ... go to:
then, in the 'War in Iraq' section, click on "in depth" ... a new window
will open; click on the 'Enter' after "Museum and Offices Plundered" ...
the first five or six are appropriate and rather nice pieces of photojournalism ...
Other items:
(NPR interview with McGuire Gibson)
(Q and A)
Francis Deblauwe's Iraq War and Archaeology site:
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EXPLORATOR is a weekly newsletter representing the fruits of
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