The Earth Story

In this day and age, it is increasingly difficult to buy people cool and thoughtful gifts, mainly because everyone already has everything! But, you can be pretty sure that your loved one doesn’t have this.

Their very own mini museum!

Created by Hans Fex, as a result of a kickstarter campaign, it is a pocket-sized collection of rare specimens that are labelled and embedded into an acrylic block. Currently, they have reached the 4th edition of these museums, with this one including amino acids from a meteorite, fossil bones, water from the Amazon, a piece of the moon, and various other historical artifacts.

The museums are available in three size which contain a varying amount of specimens and thus vary in price (ranging from $99-299). But beware, there is a waiting list and obviously due to the rarity of the artifacts, there is limited availability.

Jean

You can subscribe to be a lucky owner here:http://www.minimuseum.com/

The Narmer Palette

One of the most famous artefacts found in ancient Egypt, this 60x40 cm slab of carved greenish siltstone. The stone is tough enough to carve without flaking and well consolidated, and comes from a quarry used since pre-dynastic times at Wadi Hammamat. The stone has some of the earliest examples of hieroglyphics carved on its shaped surface, along with a series of pictures whose interpretation has proved controversial. It dates from 3,100 BCE and some believe it to commemorate the unification of the two kingdoms of Upper (southern) and Lower (northern) Egypt around this time, since the pharaoh is depicted wearing the crown of one half of the empire on each side and smiting his enemies. It was found in the ancient city of Nekhen, the city of the falcon god Horus, which was the capital of Upper Egypt in the last pre-dynastic Naqada 3 period. Its artwork shows that many stylistic conventions of Egyptian art were present from the very beginning (much like the 32,000 year old painted cave at Chauvet for Palaeolithic parietal art, see http://tinyurl.com/k2jtrlu).

Its use is unknown, possibly a votive or temple treasure, though smaller palettes were used to grind minerals like stibnite into cosmetics such as kohl (see http://tinyurl.com/lj6hlxx). The name Narmer comes from a hieroglyphic rebus on the stone, depicting the syllables n'r (catfish) and mr (chisel).

Debate has continued over whether it depicts historical events, or to create a mythology for the ruling dynasty of the newly united empire, what historians such Eric Hobsbawm and others have called the invention of tradition. It is now kept in the Cairo Museum.

Loz

Image credit: Wikimedia commons

http://www.ancient-egypt.org/index.html

Original caption:

New find alters perception of human origins

Our current best educated guess of our species' appearance on the scene has yet again been transformed by the discovery of a set of unexpected fossils that has forced us to re-evaluate our assumptions that we evolved in the East African Rift Valley some 200,000 years ago before spreading outwards from there to the rest of the world. Found in Morocco and dated some 100,000 years earlier the remains of the five oldest individual humans found to date were discovered in an old Baryte mine near Marrakesh. The find suggests that rather than evolving in the Rift Valley the event happened earlier since we seem to have already occupied a wider geographic spread than previously thought (the previous record holders were found in Ethiopia and dated to 195,000 years ago). Remains had been found alongside stone tools in the 1960's but they were thought to be recent and not dated, partly since the site was then a working mine so their archaeological context and the possibility of dating was lost. Fresh excavations last year uncovered the new finds (parts of 3 adults, an adolescent and a small child) under a heap of mining debris. The flint in their tools came from some 50km away so these individuals had either travelled away from home or wandered over quite a large territory hunting gazelles and foraging though the fact that the tools were repeatedly resharpened implies that the flint was seen as hard or impossible to replace. At the time the Sahara was greener and wetter than now and the environment was of grassland with rivers slinking through and dotted with occasional lakes.

While we still most likely evolved in Africa (a tale told by the greater genetic diversity amongst humans from that continent, implying that populations elsewhere evolved from a smaller and more restricted gene pool) these fossils show that there is more of the tale to find, interpret and tell. There are similarities between these people and a 260,000 year old skull from South Africa suggesting that our dispersal at least came earlier than thought. While the face was very human, the skull shape was elongated suggesting a gradual evolution of modern traits, possibly in different parts of the continent followed by a mixing as population density increased and disparate groups met and interbred rather than evolving in one place and then diffusing outwards.  

One problem that bedevils this type of research is where the lines are drawn between quite similar species, one that I discussed in a different context as the sage of lumpers and splitters (see http://bit.ly/1PpsZnU), but recent discoveries and research worldwide suggests that rather than a clean progressive lineage of human evolution shaped like a tree is not a good analogy and that the reality of our origins was shaped more like a complex bush with many slightly different flowers interbreeding.

Loz

Image credit: 1: Jean-Jacques Hublin, MPI-EVA, Leipzig 2: Mohammed Kamal, MPI EVA Leipzig

http://bit.ly/2sZHF96 http://bit.ly/2sgphfx http://bit.ly/2sEc4KY http://bit.ly/2r74sDH http://bit.ly/2s5CtnL http://bit.ly/2sgphfx http://bit.ly/2sZHF96 Original paper, free access: http://go.nature.com/2rWRIi6_ _

The King of Stonehenge's teeth.

The Amesbury Archer was excavated near Stonehenge in 2002. This bronze age man died aged 35-45 between 2500 and 2300 BCE and was found buried with many fine arrow heads, hence the name. His burial is the richest grave of that era discovered so far, hinting at high status or wealth, though the man had survived injury and would have walked with a limp. Alongside the arrowheads other treasures were found: copper knives, pots from the Beaker culture, stone wrist guards and the earliest gold artefacts found in Britain. He was buried with a younger male, believed to be a relative as they shared a congenital illness that left traces on the skeleton. Dubbed by the press the King of Stonehenge, he is currently on display in Salisbury museum. Geoscience techniques are an essential part of modern archaeology, from recreating the paleo environment of excavation sites using geochemical and pollen analysis on sediments, through using geophysical exploration technology to trace graves and walls to determining whether animal bones in rubbish tips came from wild or domesticated versions. Over the last decade a technique using oxygen and strontium isotope analysis on tooth enamel has allowed us to start tracing the movements of historic peoples.

The technique was originally developed for police forensics, in order to trace the origin of buried John and Jane Does. Rapidly adopted by archaeologists, zapping teeth with lasers to analyse the gas that rises them off has become a standard tool, and has given us a few surprises. It works because the groundwater we drink when we grow up has a characteristic isotopic signature, which gets locked in to the mineral (apatite) that makes up our tooth enamel while our adult teeth grow. Obviously, people who have moved around alot as children will create confused readings, but during most of history such cases were very rare.

In the case of the Amesbury burial, the older man was found to originate from the Alpine area of central Europe (Switzerland, Austria or Bavaria), adding to the mystery of his human story. His relative on the other hand grew up in the area he was buried in (the Cretaceous chalklands of southern England). The implication is that the archer migrated to England for some unknown reason, and had a son here.

In another famous case, that of Otzi the 5300 year old iceman found thawing out of a glacier on the Austrian Italian border a couple of decades back turned out to have originated in Corsica or Sardinia. The reason for his murder remains unknown. What a wonderful thing that geoscience can tell us such a human story from the recent past.

Loz

Image credit: J. Brayne/Wessex archaeology

http://planetearth.nerc.ac.uk/features/story.aspx?id=675

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/travel/mystery-man-stonehenge.html

http://www.britishmuseum.org/system_pages/holding_area/explore/the_amesbury_archer.aspx

http://www.wessexarch.co.uk/projects/amesbury/tests/oxygen_isotope.html

http://bonesdontlie.wordpress.com/2011/05/24/strontium-isotopes-the-new-hot-archaeology-trend/

http://www.forensicmag.com/articles/2007/01/tracing-unidentified-skeletons-using-stable-isotopes#.UfP2_23YO4z

http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1208&context=totem

A long paper on the topic: http://media.library.ku.edu.tr/reserve/resspring10/achm507_arha411_AYener/week11.pdf

Ogham

Ogham (pronounced oh-am), also known as the “Celtic Tree Alphabet”, is an early medieval script which was carved on stones from c. 4th-6th centuries A.D. While most of the Ogham stones can be found in south-west Ireland, these monuments can also be found in Wales, England, Scotland and the Isle of Man. Thought to be the earliest attempt to write down the Irish language, the alphabet originally consisted of four groups (called aicme) of five letters (called Beith-luis-nin). Later, a fifth aicme was added. The writer of the script would have had to chisel the “letters” on to the seamline or edge of the stone monument using a pointed tool in horizontol or diagonal lines. Ogham stones are thought to have been mainly used to comemorate the dead, or to mark territorial boundaries. As it stands, the origins of the script are mysterious, and several theories have developed to explain it.

One theory suggests that early Christian communities developed the script as a neccessary complementary alphabet to the Latin alphabet, as the Irish language contained different sounds to Latin. Another theory puts forward the idea that ancient druids or military leaders developed the script as a cryptic code as a means of communication under the threat of Roman invasion. Another thoery explains that Gaulish druids created the script as a written form of codified hand signals based on the Greek alphabet, although this is contested by modern scholars.

While they were not around for a very long time, the fact that Ogham stone monuments are found in various locations in the British Isles demonstrates the fact that various cultures were able to live side by side in the tumultuous early medieval period.

-GG

Sources: http://bit.ly/2cfYELH http://bit.ly/2czpAMD http://bit.ly/2czVMME Images: Oliver Dixon http://bit.ly/2cfYe8b http://bit.ly/2d3Mg7P

Another nail in the coffin of a myth...

For decades the first Americans were thought for decades to have come across the Bering strait when it was a land bridge between Asia and America in the lower sea levels of the late ice age, and their culture was recognised by a style of stone tool making named after the site where it was first discovered: Clovis. Here enters one of the endless vagaries of consciousness associated with the practical reality rather than the delusional ideality presented to the world as 'doing science', in this case on that might be best expressed by the old joke with more than a grain of truth to it that an old paradigm does not die until all those senior scientists who have built their career around it have died (the influence said grandees have on funding decisions for junior scientists is often considerable).

We also run into another problem called cognitive dissonance, which put simply involves attachment to a theory one is involved in, and tends to seek and publish the evidence that supports it while ignoring or dismissing (sometimes vehemently in the pages of learned journals, often in a petulant and childish tone) the evidence that does not fit. So for a long time it was with any evidence older than Clovis for people having lived in the Americas. Over the last few years several incontrovertible sites have been excavated using agreed best possible practices that reveal evidence for humans at least 1,500 years before Clovis, some 14,500 to 15,000 years old.

A new excavation at a sinkhole 8 metres underwater (the site of a long gone pond) in Florida's Aucilla river turned up a bifaced hand axe amongst other clearly manufactured tools and mastodon bones (a cousin of mammoths) with marks made by during butchery, a testimony to a long ago successful hunt. The diffusion of people is assumed to be slow, so the proof of human presence so far south would suggest that if they crossed the land bridge it would have to have been some centuries at least before that hunt.

Previous excavation in the 80's and 90's had found some tools and a tusk with possible tool marks where it would have been removed from the skull, but the finds had been dismissed as inconclusive, so a team from Florida State University went back with their scuba gear to take another look and found the further evidence in a conclusively dated layer. This research is leading several groups to re investigate suites, whose evidence of older humans had been dismissed by ideologues of old, using modern techniques to evaluate better what we really know about early humans in the Americas.

While the resistance has not vanished to a pre Clovis idea (and it is partly bound up with personal rivalries and political accusations, since some of the oldest evidence is from way south in Chile, and some pretty ugly things were said about the competence of Chilean scientists over the Monte Verde site), the accumulation of evidence is seemingly reaching the point where the idea is no longer tenable, and a new exploration of American origins is needed, one that will probably reveal a complex and multifaceted series of events over the centuries and millennia by a variety of groups.

Loz

Image credit: scuba diver with mastodon bone Brendan Fenerty, Biface tool: CFSA

http://bit.ly/1TlqVmy http://bit.ly/1TCY0WY http://bit.ly/1Tbrjk1 http://bit.ly/22fdvuu Original paper, paywall access: http://bit.ly/1OnHzMM

Hampi Boulders

This site is found in India, in the central/southern portion of the peninsula. The rocks are truly ancient; they are metamorphosed granites that are part of the Dharwar Craton. This craton is a stable piece of crust assembled about 2.7 billion years ago after a series of collisions and outbreaks of volcanism. Similar gneisses outcrop in a number of places in the central part of India.

This granitic outcrop has hosted a variety of cities during the past millennia; four dynasties ruled a kingdom called Vijayanagar, with its capitol city found here. After the fall of that kingdom, the area lay neglected, leaving a variety of structures and artifacts from hundreds of years ago still in tact in the area.

-JBB

Image credit: http://bit.ly/1S1u8a0

References: http://hampi.in/history-of-vijayanagara http://bit.ly/1V9oyoI http://bit.ly/1qOUEcH

The Shigir Idol

The world's oldest wooden sculpture is a 5.3 meter (17.4 ft) tall monument, cut from a single larch tree; a stylized face glares down from its top, and geometric patterns with other faces clothe its body. Dredged from a Siberian peat bog in 1890, the Shigir Idol was originally dated to 9,500 years ago using radiocarbon analysis, but reanalysis in 2015 revealed that the true age was 11,000 years old - 6,000 years older than Stonehenge and and twice the age of the pyramids. The preservation of the monumental piece is due to the anoxic (oxygen-poor) conditions in peat bogs, which prevent decomposition. Removal from the bog proved to be more tumultuous than the preceding millenia; a 2 meter section of the original artifact was lost sometime during Russia's political upheavals in the 20th century, though sketches remain. While part of the sculpture has been lost, what remains is a magnificent example of some of the world's most ancient art. -CEL

Source: http://bit.ly/1EsDebk Image: http://bit.ly/1EsDebk

Golden bongs of the Scythians

I've been meaning to share some Scythian gold work for some time now, as they had the most sophisticated artistic ability probably ever found on the endless steppes of Central Russia and Asia. They were noted by the Greek historian Herodotus (roughly 430BCE) as a wild and pagan people, much given to indulgence in opium and cannabis (as he put it inhaling smoke that transported them), and these bongs recently excavated in southern Russia had residues of both these psychoactive products stuck on its golden walls. They were a nomadic steppe people of Persian lineage, famous for their warlike prowess and horsemanship, who roamed the grasslands between China and Hungary from the 9th century BCE to the 4th CE. They buried their chieftains in mounds called kurgans, which have produced many golden treasures (and the skeletons of sacrificed womenfolk and attendants accompanying the dead into the afterlife) over centuries of excavations. The finds were dated to roughly 2400 years ago. By 700 BCE these peoples were already offering cannabis seeds as offerings in royal tombs, and the high degree of artistry on these bongs decoration implies how important such Dionysian ecstatic rituals were in their culture. Their main surviving art is jewellery, and there are some stunningly worked pieces out there.

The bucket shaped items were found (along with some other golden odds and ends) by serendipity during the installation of new power lines. The detail on the carvings is so good that the style of stitching on the clothes can be seen. They depict amongst others the ritual slaying of prisoners and griffons attacking a horse and a stag.

Loz

Image credit: 1 Д.Колосовki 2&3: Andrei Belinsky National Geographic http://huff.to/1Q18Cmn http://bit.ly/1AJVACL http://bit.ly/1Fn21Yk http://ind.pn/1KFxFrM

Dragons, Frogs and Earthquakes

In the aftermath of the Nepal earthquake it wasn’t long before the news of the disaster had travelled globally, and aid began being sent to help those in need. In this day and age Japan even has a text alert for Tsunami warnings, which was invaluable and saved many lives in 2011.

Obviously, this ability to send information around the world at lightning speed hasn't always been the case. Previously, in large countries where the population density is sparse, it could take days to weeks for news of such a disaster to reach those capable of providing large scale aid.

In ancient China a brilliant scientist called Zhang Heng came up with a solution, he created a machine that could tell officials when and in which direction an earthquake had struck. In 132 AD Zhang produced a machine called the “Dragon Jar”.

It was a jar roughly 1 metre wide (3 feet) and 1.7 metres tall (5.5feet) that had eight dragon heads evenly spaced around the edge facing outwards. The heads represented the points of a compass, and in each of their mouths they held a ball bearing. Beneath the dragons, at the base of the jar, were 8 frogs each facing towards one of the dragons with their heads tilted upwards and their mouths open. The jars contents are unknown although many believe there to be some form of pendulum at its centre.

When an earthquake struck, even if too weak for a human to feel, the pendulum would swing with the grounds movement. This would result in one of the dragons dropping the ball into a frog’s mouth, giving an indication of the direction that the tremor had come from. It would also alert any attendants to the earthquake as the ball would make a loud noise as it landed in the frog’s mouth. With this knowledge search parties and aid could be sent out in that direction, leading to a much swifter response and the saving of many people’s lives. It is proposed that the device alerted officials to an earthquake 400miles away that had been too weak for them to feel but had been 7.0 on the Richter scale.

While Zhang was praised for his invention, his staunch belief that the tremors were a natural phenomenon and not an act of an angry god prevented him from rising through Chinese society. Unfortunately, none of his devices have been found and notes written by Chang are brief and incomplete. However, while we may not know how it worked, the invention was still a marvel of science that is impressive even today!

Reference: http://on.doi.gov/1EcsAC7

Further Reading: http://bit.ly/1EwfJfj

Image Credit (of a replica): Houfeng Didong

GeoTrivia: Classical Shear Folding Finding geology in unexpected places, this classical era Greek column sitting along the beachfront at Achilleo, Greece (yes, named after the hero Achilles) exposes an amazing view of “similar folds.” These are folds that form in relatively hot rocks undergoing metamorphism by means of a mechanism which is, well, like poking your finger into a deck of cards, and “shearing” the cards along their surfaces. The resulting pattern includes layers that are thinner along fold limbs (where more shearing occurs) and thicker at fold noses (places where less movement is facilitated).  In the region where this column is found, there are abundant supplies of plain old white marble in the hillsides. Why the ancient column maker used this spectacular rock in construction is unknown: possibly he thought it was pretty? Or – could he have been an incipient structural geologist? Annie R. My photo: column ~60 cm in diameter Reading to get started on folds: http://www.glossary.oilfield.slb.com/Display.cfm?Term=similar+fold http://www.geo.wvu.edu/~jtoro/structure/ppt342/16folds-342.pdf http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/30062467?uid=4&sid=21101508915407

Die Lotharkreutz Back in the chaos as the western Roman empire was beginning its transformation into the entity that would later become loosely known as Europe, there was considerable recycling of gems as the different tribes gradually settled into what would become more permanent homes (see our recent post on the topic athttp://tinyurl.com/o33daun). Plunder from the sacking of Roman cities was spread around the continent, and gradually cemented into the growing royal treasuries of the shifting kingdoms of groups like the Franks. They were given as dowries and tribute, and gradually assembled into new permutations that trace the development of countries through their jewellery habits and fashions. The gem encrusted gold piece known as Lothar's cross dates from around 1000CE (with a base added later in the 1300's), and was a processional cross, probably made in Cologne/Koln. Now residing in Aachen cathedral treasury along with other relics of the age of Charlemagne, the emperor of the Franks, who united what is now France and northern Germany in his growing realm, converting pagans by the sword as he consolidated his new Christian realm.  The main stone visible on the front (the rear shows an early Romanesque crucifiction) is a cameo of the Roman emperor Augustus holding an eagle, symbol of rulership. While it was recycled, it also served a political-magical purpose of associating the new ruler with the Caesars of old. When Carolus Magnus passed on, his realm was divided between his sons, being too big to rule easily with the logistical difficulties of the time (for example the Roman roads had decayed, making transport much slower than a few centuries earlier). At the base is an engraved rock crystal carved with the face and name of Lothair, who inherited the German part of the kingdom, which was itself recycled when the cross was made a century later, cementing a second sacred connection with the current ruler's ancestors. It is thought to have been Lothair's personal seal. The cross itself measures 50 x 38.5 x 2.3 cm, and has a core of oak covered in gold and adorned with 137 gems of varied origin. Other recycled stones include an amethyst carved with the three graces and an onyx lion.  Loz Image credit: Carolus Ludovicus

Haematite cylinder seal These seals were invented in Uruk (in modern Iraq) around 5,500 years ago, and their use spread rapidly throughout the ancient Near East. They were engraved with both images and letters, and had many uses both practical and religious. These varied from administrative (such as marking clay seals, for example on bundles or boxes by customs or tax agents, or on royal orders to be sent around a country as a form of official signature) through magical (as protection amulets for example) or as grave goods.  Most of them have a hole running through them, allowing them to be conveniently worn on a string as a necklace in a similar way to a signet seal ring. The most common material is carved stone, though glass and faience were also used. This example depicts a king with a mace following a goddess with an animal offering for the sun god. The style suggests it came from Sipar, and it measures 16.6x3cm. Loz Dear Readers,  Most of our posts are not reaching you in your news feed due to fb's filtering system. If you wish to enjoy our posts more often, use the following for information on how to go about it: http://tinyurl.com/qgwac8k. Image credit: Hjaltland Collection

Nephrite mere We shared one of these Maori clubs made of new Zealand jade some time ago (seehttp://tinyurl.com/k2cusou for an explanation of their cultural meaning). The jade has been upthrust from the depths of the crust where it formed in high pressure high temperature metamorphism by the rise of the southern Alps along the Alpine fault. The one we shared previously is the more usual spinach green, compared to this early 20th century 26 centimetre example that displays a variety of greyish green hues. Loz Image credit: Bamfords Auctioners

The Narmer Palette One of the most famous artefacts found in ancient Egypt, this 60x40 cm slab of carved greenish siltstone. The stone is tough enough to carve without flaking and well consolidated, and comes from a quarry used since pre-dynastic times at Wadi Hammamat. The stone has some of the earliest examples of hieroglyphics carved on its shaped surface, along with a series of pictures whose interpretation has proved controversial. It dates from 3,100 BCE and some believe it to commemorate the unification of the two kingdoms of Upper (southern) and Lower (northern) Egypt around this time, since the pharaoh is depicted wearing the crown of one half of the empire on each side and smiting his enemies. It was found in the ancient city of Nekhen, the city of the falcon god Horus, which was the capital of Upper Egypt in the last pre-dynastic Naqada 3 period. Its artwork shows that many stylistic conventions of Egyptian art were present from the very beginning (much like the 32,000 year old painted cave at Chauvet for Palaeolithic parietal art, see http://tinyurl.com/k2jtrlu). Its use is unknown, possibly a votive or temple treasure, though smaller palettes were used to grind minerals like stibnite into cosmetics such as kohl (see http://tinyurl.com/lj6hlxx). The name Narmer comes from a hieroglyphic rebus on the stone, depicting the syllables n'r (catfish) and mr (chisel). Debate has continued over whether it depicts historical events, or to create a mythology for the ruling dynasty of the newly united empire, what historians such Eric Hobsbawm and others have called the invention of tradition. It is now kept in the Cairo Museum. Loz Image credit: Wikimedia commons http://www.ancient-egypt.org/index.html