To: Tom Clarke who wrote (4435) | 4/1/2016 12:16:45 PM | From: Greg or e | | | Possible Viking Find Could Rewrite North American History
Archaeologist Sarah Parcak used satellite data to find the Canadian site.
A team of archaeologists say they’ve made a potentially “seismic” discovery in Canada that could “rewrite the history of Vikings in the New World” — and they did it with the help of medieval sagas and the latest satellite technology.
Medieval sagas, considered to be masterpieces of literature from the Middle Ages, capture the stories of the intrepid Vikings — the master seafarers and warriors who, starting around the 8th century, ventured beyond their Scandinavian homelands to raid and trade in foreign lands.
According to these stories, many of them featuring “larger-than-life heroes,” the Vikings had made the first European voyage to North America — at least 500 years before Christopher Columbus.
But the question has long remained: Just how much fact was interwoven into these sagas, which Icelandic monks wrote in the 13th and 14th centuries? And if laced with truth, just how much of the New World did the Norse really explore?...... Read the rest at huffingtonpost.com
|
| Archaeology | Pastime Discussion ForumsShare | RecommendKeepReplyMark as Last ReadRead Replies (1) |
|
From: Snowshoe | 4/5/2016 1:18:46 PM | | | | Has Hannibal's route across the Alps been uncovered? Scientists use 2,000-year-old trail of dung to track legendary general telegraph.co.uk
Hannibal's 30,000-strong army trudged through deep snow in the grip of winter in 218BC with more than 15,000 mules and horses before crossing into Italy where they nearly made it to the gates of ancient Rome.
But, according to experts, such a large movement of men and animals must have left what they describe as a "mass animal deposition event".
And at a patch of swampy ground near the Col de la Traversette, a narrow pass between Grenoble in France and Turin in Italy, they think they have found it in an unusual layer of muck about 16in beneath the surface.
In a blog post, Chris Allen, a senior lecturer in environmental microbiology at Queen's University Belfast, said: "Using a combination of microbial genetic analysis, environmental chemistry, pollen analysis and various geophysical techniques, we unveiled a mass animal deposition of faecal materials – probably from horses – at a site near the Col de Traversette.
|
| Archaeology | Pastime Discussion ForumsShare | RecommendKeepReplyMark as Last Read |
|
From: isopatch | 4/5/2016 10:01:20 PM | | | | Reminder from Dante for us all no matter what our personal challenges might be. That we don't sit around in idleness and shirk our responsibilities to ourselves AWA others who care about us.
OK, enough with the preaching..))
Cool 17th Century painting on marble. Don't see many of those.
Iso
Italian School, 17th Century
Dante and Virgil at the terrace of the Slothful, Purgatory; and A further scene from the Divine Comedy a pair, oil on marble
8.4 x 13.9cm (3 5/16 x 5 1/2in). (2)
http://www.bonhams.com/auctions/23252/lot/1/
|
| Archaeology | Pastime Discussion ForumsShare | RecommendKeepReplyMark as Last Read |
|
From: isopatch | 4/6/2016 8:58:50 AM | | | | Yet another discovery showing the surprising resourcefulness of the neolithic/mesolithic peoples of Northern Europe.
Extended excerpt:
<April 5, 2016
Paris (AFP) - Stone Age humans populated the Scottish islands with red deer transported "considerable distances" by boat, said researchers Wednesday who admitted surprise at our prehistoric ancestors' seafaring prowess.
DNA analysis revealed that deer on Scotland's northermost islands were unlikely to have come from the closest and seemingly most obvious places -- mainland Scotland, Ireland or Norway, said a study in the Royal Society journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B.
"Our results imply that Neolithic humans were transporting deer considerable distances, by sea, from an unknown source" some 4,500-5,500 years ago, co-author David Stanton of Cardiff University told AFP by email.
"These results are surprising... The evidence suggests that we have misunderstood our relationship with this species," he added.
"Perhaps humans managed deer, having long-term relationships with herds that allowed them to plan, capture and transport deer on longer voyages."
It was known that late Stone Age humans had transported cattle, sheep and pigs by boat, but not large wild animals, and not over such vast distances.
Red deer, said Stanton, were central to life in Britain from the end of the last Ice Age about 11,000 years ago to the arrival of the first late Stone Age farmers.
The animals provided crucial nourishment, skins, sinew, bones and antlers -- used to till the soil, among other things.
Scientists say all animals, including deer, found on the islands today must have been introduced by seafaring people.
The islands were covered in ice during the last "glacial maximum", a period of deep Earth freeze, and have since been separated from each other and the mainland by spans of ocean too wide for deer to swim.
It was therefore thought the deer must have been brought from nearby, possibly from mainland Scotland, boat-hopping from island to island with short spurts of swimming in between.
But DNA analysis of Neolithic deer bones found that those on the most distant, northern islands, were genetically dissimilar to deer from Britain, Ireland, the western European mainland or Scandinavia.
"The hunt is now on to find the ancestors of these deer," said Stanton.>
yahoo.com |
| Archaeology | Pastime Discussion ForumsShare | RecommendKeepReplyMark as Last Read |
|
From: Tom Clarke | 4/7/2016 6:44:47 PM | | | | 'Astonishing' Shakespeare first edition found
A very singular copy of the first known collection of Shakespeare's plays has been uncovered in an aristocratic country house in Scotland. The First Folio is among the most valuable books in the world.
A rare First Folio has been discovered in Scotland, the University of Oxford announced on Thursday. A First Folio is a scarce collection of 36 of William Shakespeare's plays published in 1623. It is not only in essence a "first edition," of the Bard's work but also the only reliable source for twenty of his most famous pieces, such as Macbeth and Julius Caesar.
The tome was uncovered at Mount Stuart, a large manor house on the Isle of Bute off the western coast of Scotland. The find makes a total of 234 known copies of the First Folio in the world, with nearly all the others are held by libraries and available only to academics.
"In terms of literary discoveries, they do not come much bigger than a new First Folio, and we are really excited that this has happened on Bute," said Alice Martin, head of collections at the house. The director of the Mount Stuart House Trust, Adam Ellis-Jones, described the revelation as "genuinely astonishing."
What is unique about this particular iteration, according to Oxford Professor Emma Smith, is that the First Folio has usually only been seen as one large volume. Instead, the Bute copy has been split into three, separated by categories of history, tragedy, and comedy.
"This is something that you could take to the fireside and enjoy," Smith told the BBC. "It's a book we most likely now see ... in a glass case, and one of the things that this copy ... shows us is a time when people just really used this book, they enjoyed it, they scribbled on it, they spilt their wine on it, their pet cats jumped on it."
Smith said the three volumes were worth between 2 and 2.5 million pounds ($2.8-3.5 million). She described her initially incredulous attitude towards the authenticity of the book, but said "when I went up to investigate, I could tell from the story of the book's origins, the watermarks and the idiosyncrasies of the text that it was genuine. It was a really exciting moment."
The discovery comes just in time for celebrations planned to mark the 400th anniversary of the playwright's death, which came on April 23, 1616.
dw.com |
| Archaeology | Pastime Discussion ForumsShare | RecommendKeepReplyMark as Last ReadRead Replies (1) |
|
| |