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A team of Italian and Russian archeologists says that they have made one of the most important discoveries connected with the history of Nubia. According to the Sudan Antiquities Service, the hieroglyphic inscription uncovered at Abu Erteila, may be the most important discovery in the last decade.
Meir or Asyut, Egypt, ca. 2050 BC (Middle Kingdom)
Twelve oarsmen, a helmsman, and a pilot, or look-out, ferry their passenger, the tomb-owner. Such models were associated with religious beliefs, as they symbolized the journey of the deceased to Abydos, the traditional burial place of Osiris, lord of the afterworld. The tomb-owner is clothed with a shroud and is shown with a blue beard. This boat was probably placed in the tomb to assist the deceased in navigating the Nile of the underworld. Typically, models of passenger ships found in Middle Kingdom tombs occur in pairs. One to travel south, equipped with a sail, as the wind in Egypt blows constantly from north to south, and the other (as this model shows) propelled by rowers aided by the Nile’s current, to travel north.
From the Walters Art Museum
A rare wooden boat dating to the Bronze Age has been discovered in Kent.
The log boat was unearthed at a boatyard in Hollow Shore, Faversham, on Sunday but was returned to the water to prevent it from drying out.
Local archaeologists say the craft is in exceptional condition.
Dr Paul Wilkinson, director of Swat Archaeology, was called by the boatyard owners to reports that an Anglo Saxon boat had been unearthed. But he said it was in fact a Bronze Age vessel.
He said such log boats were as “rare as hens’ teeth” and very important.
The remains were found in clay and only half of the craft was lifted, he added. He said the site still needed to be investigated to find the remaining part of the boat. Read more.
Footage of the crew on the Endurance.
Sumerian boats (Ubaid period).
Archaeologists excited by discovery of eight ‘startlingly well-preserved’ Bronze Age boats
From The Raw Story 04 June 2013 -
Archaeologistsexcited by discovery of eight ‘startlingly…
The colonists were in the boat.
Jules Férat, from L’île mystérieuse (The mysterious island), by Jules Verne, Paris, 1870.
(Source: archive.org)
The pressgang, or Jack in the bilboes (1790).
George Morland, from Humorous art : pictorial notes on the social aspects of life in the Royal Navy, With descriptive notes by Joseph Grego, London, 1891(?).
(Source: archive.org)
Clearing Ice - Resolute.
Copyright: Crown Credit: Canada. Dept. of Transport / Library and Archives Canada / e010765751 Restrictions on use: Nil
Inuit crewmen on trapboat during seal hunt [graphic material] : seal is on right, two birds straight ahead.
Cape Dorset, N.W.T., [Cape Dorset (Kinngait), Nunavut], 1960
Credit: J. Connor and M. McConnell / Library and Archives Canada / e006609569 Restrictions on use: Nil Copyright: Library and Archives Canada
Left alone for years at the beginning of the 19th Century, French soldiers taken captive during the Napoleonic Wars found an unusually hobby — fashioning ornate replicas of British ships, out of beef and human bone.
French prisoners of war obtained bones from the food rations issued to them by their English captors. After gathering bones for use in model building, prisoners boiled the bones and bleached them in the sun, to make the bones easier to shape and carve. Pigs around the POW camp also helped to supplement the prisoners’ bone supply [as they] often uncovered human skeletons that were buried in shallow graves.
Many of these artists built mechanisms into their models [which] allowed for the sails of the models to be raised with ease and retract the cannons into the ship.
In addition to human, cattle, and mutton bones, prisoners made use of their own hair to fashion sail rigging, and tissue paper to create sails. On several occasions, visitors to the camp from nearby villagers and British officers would smuggle in pieces of turtle shell, silk, tools, and metal foil for the Frenchmen to use.
British Naval Officers clamored for the opportunity to buy the largest and finest models.
The prisoners’ ship-carving habits did not bother British officials [who] felt the hobby kept the prisoners happy and busy [and] boosted morale. British officers commonly organized civilian markets within the camps — bizarre craft fairs set in the middle of an actual POW camp where the captured soldiers sold their items.
[More detailed images at the source]
The band was ready, the champagne was on hand, Time Team’s Tony Robinson was there to record the historic event, and the crowds gathered to watch as a half-size replica of Dover’s Bronze Age boat prepared to take to the water.
The only problem was, it started to sink.
A team of craftsmen and archaeologists had been working for several months to build the replica boat, using the same tools and the same methods as their ancestors would have used when the original boat was built more than 3,500 years earlier.
But time was against them,. They only completed the task a couple of hours before the launch was due to take place and there was no time to test it.
A team of rowers, complete with life-jackets, were waiting to go on board, but they were not needed.
As the boat was gently lowered into the water at Dover Marina, it soon became clear there was a problem. Read more.
Sense of Space - Picturing the North
The Canadian North continues to be one of Canada’s most mythical landscapes. During the period covered by this exhibition, Inuit were the world’s most photographed people, and their northern homelands were a constant source of intrigue for a territorial Canadian government and curious individuals alike.
The Alert Dobbin Bay, Northwest Territories (now Nunavut), April 1875 Photographer: Thomas Mitchell C-052521 Source
