Classical Archaeology News

A log of news items about archaeology of the ancient Mediterranean--Egypt, the Aegean, Greece, Rome. This site is maintained by Francesca Tronchin. Updated almost daily. sc_project=3655946; sc_invisible=1; sc_partition=43; sc_security="b0127ecc";

[archaeology]

Palmyra: Satellite image of IS destruction - BBC News

A French satellite system pictures a pile of rubble where the ancient Temple of Baalshamin at Palmyra in Syria used to stand.

"It has been flattened," spokesman Einar Bjorgo told AFP news agency. Horrific.

[archaeology]

Buyers of looted artifacts may be charged with aiding ISIS – FBI

Antiquities looted by Islamic State militants are showing up on the US market, the Federal Bureau of Investigation warned, adding that any buyers could be prosecuted for providing financial support to terrorists.

[archaeologicalnews]

Oldest Case of Heart Failure Found in Ancient Mummy

The oldest case of acute decompensated heart failure has been found in 3,500-year-old mummified remains, a research team announced at the international congress of Egyptology in Florence.

Consisting of just a head and canopic jars containing internal organs, the remains were found in a plundered tomb by the Italian Egyptologist Ernesto Schiaparelli in 1904 in the Valley of the Queens, Luxor, and are now housed at the Egyptian Museum in Turin.

They belong to an Egyptian dignitary named Nebiri, a “Chief of Stables” who lived under the reign of 18th Dynasty pharaoh Thutmoses III (1479-1424 BC).

“The head is almost completely unwrapped, but in a good state of preservation. Since the canopic jar inscribed for Hapy, the guardian of the lungs, is partially broken, we were allowed direct access for sampling,” Read more.

[archaeology]

These Rare Pictures Capture The Former Beauty Of ISIS’s Latest Target

The ancient Roman city of Palmyra, whose ruins are listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, risks destruction at the hands of ISIS after the group captured it earlier this year.

[archaeology]

The UnPopular Opinion: Alexander

THE UNPOPULAR OPINION is an ongoing column featuring different takes on films that either the writer HATED, but that the majority of film fans LOVED, or that the writer LOVED, but that most others LOATHED. We're hoping this column will promote constructive and geek fueled discussion. Enjoy!

[archaeology]

Breakthrough in world's oldest undeciphered writing - BBC News

The world's oldest undeciphered writing system, which has so far defied attempts to uncover its 5,000-year-old secrets, could be about to be decoded by Oxford University academics.

Proto-Elamite is hard, y’all.

[archaeology]

The Director-General of UNESCO firmly condemns the destruction of the ancient temple of Baalshamin, an iconic part of the Syrian site of Palmyra, a UNESCO World Heritage site.

[archaeology]

“Realise this is no time for pedantry, but (contra reports) Isis atrocities commited in theatre at Palmyra, not amphitheatre. Big difference.”

Sometimes it feels like all we scholars of antiquity can do in the face of these horrific acts of violence is to be pedantic.

[thegetty]

Just keep swimming, swimming, swimming…

[archaeology]

... but it gets better: he intended to sell it on eBay to cover the cost of an iPhone. According to the various reports, a sixteen-year-old Dutch tourist took a roof tile from a domus on the Via dell’Abbondanza but was spotted and turned in to authorities by another tourist. He was later arrested, charged with attempted theft, and handed over to his angry mother.

[archaeology]

There Is a Shortage of Certified Latin Teachers: Please Spread the Word!

by Ronnie Ancona and Kathleen Durkin There is a shortage of certified Latin teachers in the United States. Latin teaching positions at the precollegiate level sometimes cannot be filled for lack of qualified applicants. In New York State, for example, where we both teach, in 2012-2013 and 2013-2014, Latin was named specifically as a language with a teacher shortage by the United States Department of Education Office of Postsecondary Education.

[archaeology]

ARCHAEOLOGY - Dalyan’s rock tombs to be protected by fences

The world famous historical rock tombs of Dalyan become more damaged as tourists continue to sit on them while taking photos despite warnings. With a new decision, the tombs will now be surrounded with wire fences

[916gawd-deactivated20190411]

Reblog if you think public libraries are important and should be maintained.

[archaeology]

The Biggest Disappearing Act in World War II History: When Antiquities “Vanished” from the National Archaeological Museum

[archaeology]

Intriguing device to measure lunar calendar unearthed at Yeronisos - Cyprus Mail

Four weeks of excavations on Yeronisos, the tiny islet off Paphos, have just been completed with a focus on a large complex for food preparation, distribution and storage facilities built along the southern edge of the island

A large complex used for food preparation, distribution and storage facilities plus an “intriguing device” for keeping track of the 30-day lunar calendar were investigated during the latest excavations in the islet of Yeronisos off Paphos.

The complex was built along the southern edge of the island during the final years of Ptolemaic-Egyptian rule on Cyprus, the antiquities department said.

[archaeology]

The Accidental Suicide of the Roman Empire

Ever since then the end of antiquity has always been seen as about the opposition between a Roman Mediterranean and a Germanic Barbarian north.

Excerpt: ..Whatever happened to the Roman Empire, barbarians from northern Europe had a lot to do with it. And that is not surprising, because the idea of barbarians bringing down the empire is rooted in the sixteenth-century, when the Northern Renaissance and Reformation posited a virtuous northern past to contrast to a debauched and papist south. While the recently discovered manuscript of Tacitus’ Germania provided a ready-made handbook to the authentic superior vigour and virtue of the barbarous Germans. Ever since then the end of antiquity has always been seen as about the opposition between a Roman Mediterranean and a Germanic Barbarian north.

[archaeologicalnews]

Ancient Egyptian underwater treasures to be exhibited for the first time

Spectacular ancient Egyptian treasures are to be exhibited for the first time having been discovered underwater in the submerged ruins of the near-legendary cities of Thonis-Heracleion and Canopus.

A finely sculpted statuette of a pharaoh and a golden-eyed depiction of god Osiris are among antiquities to be unveiled in a major exhibition in Paris from next month.

The cities were almost erased from mankind’s memory after sinking beneath the waves in the eighth century AD following cataclysmic natural disasters including an earthquake and tidal waves.

Across a vast site in Aboukir Bay near Alexandria, the seabed has been giving up secrets from a lost world in an excavation led by Franck Goddio, a French marine archaeologist. Read more.