More cultural loss as a result of war. Sad photos indeed.
Pictures: Fire Destroys “Temple of Knowledge” in Egypt.
Here’s one:
Dec 222011
Can’t wait to find out more about this one. Using ground-penetrating radar, archaeologists have found a very complete gladiator training area in the area of ancient Carnuntum (east of Vienna, Austria). If size indicates importance in the community, the school was very important. There are a few pictures in the various articles posted around the internet (see one below). A brief quotation:
Mapped out by radar, the ruins of the gladiator school remain underground. Yet officials say the find rivals the famous Ludus Magnus — the largest of the gladiatorial training schools in Rome — in its structure. And they say the Austrian site is even more detailed than the well-known Roman ruin, down to the remains of a thick wooden post in the middle of the training area, a mock enemy that young, desperate gladiators hacked away at centuries ago.
Other articles (compiled by rogueclassicism):
http://www.artdaily.org/index.asp?int_sec=2&int_new=50277
http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/0,1518,784726,00.html
http://www.bbc.co.uk/go/rss/int/news/-/news/world-europe-14795756
http://english.aljazeera.net/video/europe/2011/09/2011964401518417.html
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5gc2M_D6e3-fiSCyYF4tviqmu5pDw?docId=c794ba51cdf04818a7c5cb077c86c90f
http://newsfeed.time.com/2011/09/07/sensational-discovery-ancient-gladiator-school-found-east-of-vienna/
http://www.upi.com/Science_News/2011/09/06/Roman-gladiator-school-located-in-Austria/UPI-42561315348881/
http://www.zmescience.com/science/archaeology/gladiator-school-06092011/
http://www.artmediaagency.com/en/27857/school-for-roman-gladiators-discovered-in-austria/
http://www.tampabay.com/news/ruins-in-austria-housed-gladiators/1189929
http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/history/ruins-reveal-how-roman-gladiators-won-their-spurs-2349802.html
http://news.scotsman.com/world/Massive-gladiator-school-is-found.6831299.jp
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kp65sdQcXVY (video)
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2034020/Archaeologists-discover-remains-Roman-gladiator-school-Austria.html
http://morningjournal.com/articles/2011/09/05/news/doc4e64e98a42606077849892.txt
http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/wireStory?id=14450025
http://www.physorg.com/news/2011-09-unique-roman-gladiator-unveiled-austria.html
http://www.news.com.au/technology/sci-tech/scientists-discover-gladiator-school-in-vienna-was-a-prison-for-criminals-and-slaves/story-fn5fsgyc-1226130379575
Sep 042011
There is a rather nice feature on CNN.com about the archaeological riches to be found in Libya. Just one of many challenges for the coming transitional government.
Go to article . . .
Aug 232011
From the Washington Post (via Dan Lipmann–thanks!):
Patricia Anne Murphy is a philosopher with a real-world mission.
Murphy may have a PhD and an intimate knowledge of Aristotle and Descartes, but in her snug Takoma Park bungalow, she’s helping a broken-hearted patient struggle through a divorce.
Instead of offering the wounded wife a prescription for Effexor — which she’s not licensed to do anyway — she instructs her to read Epictetus, the original cognitive therapist, who argued that humans often mistake their feelings for facts and suffer as a result.
The news about early seafaring at Crete (even as old as 100,000 years ago!) is not particularly news (see this post from last year, and here, and here), but this article from PhysOrg does a decent job of explaining how-we-know-what-we-know. In this case, how we can deduce when a human-shaped rock was put in a particular place on the shore of Crete. If correct, it also means that it probably wasn’t homo sapiens that sailed/rowed/boated to Crete, but homo erectus.
Human precursors went to sea, team says.
Aug 112011
I was delighted to see in last week’s “Explorator” (another valuable service run by David Meadows, who runs rogueclassicism) a link to an article on Thorikos. One of the first sites I visited in my summer at the American School, Thorikos stunned me as regards its importance and relative anonymity. It remains imprinted in my head as emblematic of things-I-didn’t-know-I-didn’t-know. The day we visited was very windy (as usual) on the eastern shore of Attica, but the breeze kept us cool as we trekked up the hill to the Bronze Age tombs. The thyme was blooming all over the hill, and the spicy scent filled the air as much as did the sound of the buzzing bees feeding on it.
This paragraph in the article caught my eye:
Today, visitors often make a pilgrimage to the dramatically-situated Temple of Poseidon at Cape Sounion but how many also explore nearby Thorikos? With stunning panoramic views of the southeastern Attic coast, the long island of Makronisos and the blue Aegean Sea stretching away in the distance, Thorikos is an archaeologically-rich, under-visited site just off the beaten track and well worth a closer look by specialists and laymen alike.
I’m happy to say that Thorikos made such an impression on me that I took my students there last year on our school trip to Greece. The archaeology may have been a little advanced for them, but the aesthetics of the place made a strong impression. Because it’s close to the new airport, it’s also a good place to go to fight jet lag; the physical activity and time in the sun woke us all back up. We went from there to Sounion, and spent the end of our first day swimming in view of Poseidon’s temple.
Swimming in the bay at Sounion, summer 2009
In eastern Turkey, archaeologists from the University of Toronto have uncovered a beautiful lion sculpture that once adorned a gate. It is an iron age sculpture, dated ca. 950-725 BCE, during the period in which trade and economies in the eastern Mediterranean are coming alive again. Put another way, this is the era of Homer (I think of the many lion similes in the Iliad) and the birth of Greek writing as we know it, not to mention an explosion in Greek pottery exports and colonization. It’s worth knowing what ELSE is going on in the world at that time.
Archaeologists uncover 3,000-year-old lion adorning citadel gate complex in Turkey.
“Writing is 90 percent procrastination: reading magazines, eating cereal out of the box, watching infomercials.”
—Paul Rudnick
via Prelude by Fleur Adcock | The Writer’s Almanac with Garrison Keillor.
Aug 012011
The Italian press has recently announced the discovery of mosaics from the late 1st century CE. The building has been known for a while, but the mosaics are new to us, and feature Apollo, a centaur, and perhaps the muses (as well as some architectural representations. Dorothy King’s blog features several photos of the new finds as well as some pictures of earlier finds (note especially the fresco depicting part of the city of Rome).
Dorothy King’s PhDiva: Apollo and his Muses in Rome.
Oxford has decided (finally, perhaps) to crowdsource the translation of some of their papyri. It could be quite difficult for non-specialists or beginners, if the papyri my class translated last year are any indication. Link to the project can be found in this article in the Daily Mail.
Oxford University appeals for help in transcribing 200,000 ancient Greek letters | Mail Online.
