VINOVIVM
Our project to explore the Roman town of Binchester – Vinovium – reached the news at Stanford today – [Link] The report took an appropriately student-centered focus. And we certainly had a wonderful team last year. Project site – VINOVIVM.ORG
“Seeing the Past” – archaeology conference at Stanford
I wound up a fine conference at Stanford today – Seeing the Past – Building knowledge of the past through acts of seeing. Congratulations to the organizers – Stacey Camp, Sarah Levin-Richardson and Lela Urquhart. All the papers are on line and available for comment – [Link]. It is a high quality collection and worth [...]
forgery and illicit antiquities – the importance of narrative
From the Guardian today – Forgers ‘tried to rewrite biblical history’ Hundreds of biblical artefacts in museums all over the world could be fakes, it has emerged after Israeli investigators uncovered what they claim is a sophisticated forgery ring. Four men have been charged with the faking of some of the most important biblical discoveries [...]
sham archaeological science in the academy
Glasgow TAG conference – the cows come home to Monte Polizzo. A few years ago now I left I field project in Sicily after just two seasons. I was very angry because I felt I had been forced out by people who didn’t want to listen to my concerns. Angry at my wasted effort, because [...]
the ancients: now available in colour
John Hooper in the Guardian reviews the “Colours of White” exhibition at the Vatican museums, Rome (until January 31) – Guardian Unlimited | Arts features | The ancients: now available in colour. For hundreds of years, Caligula’s handsome, marble face has stared out at a fascinated world. Now situated at the Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek museum [...]
Robert Sarmast – more junk about Atlantis
More fantasy archaeology in the news. Robert Sarmast has modelled underwater topographic data and sees the remains of a city. Sarmast’s Atlantis This underwater geology has been well researched and is understood as volcanic activity ([Link] [Link]). But the pictures have far more rhetorical force. As does Sarmast’s own story of the rogue amateur who [...]
Bulgaria’s golden archaeological hopes
BBC item today Bulgaria’s ancient Thracian heritage has been thrust into the spotlight this year with a number of key archaeological discoveries in the so-called “Valley of the Thracian Kings”. The golden treasures are attracting international attention and there is a push to make the Thracian heritage Bulgaria’s trademark abroad in a bid to boost [...]
Web Watch – Tom Elliott
Just come across Web Watch – a summary of web news and current items on archaeology and classics that comes from Tom Elliott and the Ancient World Mapping Center at Chapel Hill. Very smart.
Fred Dibnah – industrial archaeologist
Fred Dibnah has died [Link] [Picture Link - BBC] Steeple Jack turned uncanny acolyte of Isambard Kingdom Brunel, he knocked down chimney remnants of Victorian industrial England with a style and passion matched only by his love of steam engines. Now industrial archaeology is dogged by rather geekinsh character types who love brass fittings and [...]
Jan Assmann and ancient monotheism
A talk and dinner tonight with Jan Assmann, the great Egyptologist – the topic – ancient monotheism. Fascinating. Jan Assmann tonight I am particularly interested in the early genealogy of religion, part of my Origins project. What I came away with was Jan’s distinction between universalist and globalist monotheisms. The first centers upon an inherent [...]
another unique species?
A BBC article on the new species of homo UK | Magazine | Eton or the zoo? raises some excellent questions. How would the new species be treated? If it is such a close relative, would we give these people the vote? The discovery of homo floresiensis reiterates what anthropologists have been saying for a [...]
a new species of homo?
The discovery of remains of another species of homo that lived alongside modern humans only 18 or even 13 thousand years ago is everywhere today – Guardian Unlimited | Life | “From 18,000 years ago, the one metre-tall human that challenges history of evolution” – a new “hobbit” species found on the Indonesian island of [...]
remembering Michael Jameson
A sad occasion this afternoon – a remembrance service for Mike Jameson, my colleague in the Department of Classics here at Stanford. He died in August. It was in Stanford Church – first time I had attended any kind of event there. A good turn out. There were some very nice anecdotes told by friends [...]
Guy Sanders on the excavations at Corinth
A few days ago I took Guy Sanders, Director of excavations in Corinth, to task about a recently reported story of enormous sarcophagi at Corinth, complaining that there was so much more to the early city of Corinth than this supposed and amazing technological first [Link] He posted a comment explaining that, as we might [...]
Excavating the mind
Chris (Witmore) is back from Denmark – we are planning fieldwork in Romania, in collaboration with Gothenburg, the Swedish National Heritage Board, and other colleagues from northern Europe. This is his report on a conference at Aarhus he attended – Excavating the Mind The Department of Prehistoric Archaeology in cooperation with the Centre for Cultural [...]
Ancient Corinth and the stories archaeologists tell of the past
Ok, it’s quite an obscure source for archaeological news of Europe – NEWS.com.au – but they are running a headline at the moment about the discovery of two large sarcophagi in ancient Corinth. The story is that they are so big that ancient Greeks in 900BCE can’t have done it using only human power but [...]
Cleveland Art Museum – another case of dodgy dealing in the art market?
Another major museum may well be supporting the illicit trade in dodgy (stolen, looted, even fake) works of art. (See my comment in February on the Metropolitan in New York and some major collections of Graeco-Roman art – [Link]) CLEVELAND (AP) – Some archeologists say the Cleveland Museum of Art may encourage smuggling and the [...]
interbreeding Neanderthals?
Great story in the Washington Post a couple of days ago – Caveful of Clues About Early Humans. Archaeologists have been exploring an almost inaccessible cave in Romania, diving through icy underground sumps and making dizzying vertical climbs for the sake of a collection of fossil human remains washed into the cave 35,000 years ago. [...]
“The massacre of Mesopotamian archaeology”
More reports of the damage done to cultural heritage in the Middle East in The Daily Star (Lebanon) NASIRIYA, Iraq: In the southern Iraq desert, the standing structures of ancient archaeological cities dot the horizon – majestic monuments to times long gone.? Untouched for thousands of years, historic temples, palaces, tombs and entire dead cities [...]
land, community, heritage and Wal-Mart at Teotihuacan
Great comment from Meg (Butler) on past-present relationships in Mexico. Another interesting case of past/present relationships with landscape and monuments began getting press coverage this past week. I have provided below links to various articles. A controversial decision to build a Wal-Mart close to Teotihuacan provoked some very different responses from supporters and opponents. The [...]
forensic archaeology
At the scene of crime anything might be relevant. An item today from The Scotsman Sue Black was a teenage schoolgirl in Inverness when Renee MacRae and her son Andrew vanished in November, 1976. Yesterday, the renowned forensic anthropologist was back near her home city hoping to help solve one of Scotland’s most enduring mysteries [...]
the archaeological imagination
Some years ago back in Lampeter Julian Thomas and I used to talk about something we called the archaeological imagination. We were close to a host of superb human geographers in the next corridor who were reshaping their field (Chris Philo, Ulf Stroymeyer, Catherine Nash, Ian Cook, Tim Cresswell, Hester Parr, Miles Ogborn, Joe Painter, [...]
Doug Bailey’s new book – prehistoric figurines
Doug’s book on prehistoric figurines is now in production.[Link to Routledge] This is the blurb Prehistoric Figurines is a radical new approach to one of the most exciting but poorly understood artefacts from our prehistoric past. The book explores the ways that people use representations of human bodies to make subtle political points and to [...]
repatriation of antiquities
Latest in the concerns about artifacts as cultural property – [Link - BBC][Link - BBC] Aboriginal artefacts, including two early bark etchings, have been seized in Australia while on loan from two British museums. Members of the Dja Dja Wurrung tribe secured an emergency order preventing the items being returned to the British Museum and [...]
