Archaeologists Excavate a Lost Kingdom Buried Beneath Volcanic Ash Like Pompeii, evidence shows a human settlement frozen in time by volcanic pyroclastic flows. In 1980, people began to take notice when workers from a commercial logging company began dredging up pottery fragments and bones in an area near the little village of Pancasila on the island of Sumbawa, Indonesia. Other locals began finding coins, brassware and charred timber in the same region, all buried beneath a thick layer of volcanic deposits. The finds were not far from the foot of the Tambora volcano, a volcano that, in April of 1815, produced the largest eruption in recorded history. In fact, so intense was the eruption, it's atmospheric effects influenced weather patterns across faraway Europe and North America. And in one evening alone, it destroyed at least one entire village kingdom near its feet. Sigurdsson's discovery touched off a series of formal excavations beginning in 2006 and continuing to this day under the direction of Dr M.
6 Insane Discoveries That Science Can't Explain We like to feel superior to the people who lived centuries ago, what with their shitty mud huts and curing colds by drilling a hole in their skulls. But we have to give them credit: They left behind some artifacts that have left the smartest of modern scientists scratching their heads. For instance, you have the following enigmas that we believe were created for no other purpose than to fuck with future generations. The Voynich Manuscript The Mystery: The Voynich manuscript is an ancient book that has thwarted all attempts at deciphering its contents. It appears to be a real language--just one that nobody has seen before. Translation: "...and when you get her to put the tennis racket in her mouth, have her stand in a fountain for a while. There is not even a consensus on who wrote it, or even when it was written. Why Can't They Solve It? Could you? Don't even try. As you can imagine, proposed solutions have been all over the board, from reasonable to completely clownshit. Our Guess:
Minoan Culture and its Women RWAAG Home, Minoan Culture--> Minoan Culture Advertisement: Minoan Snake Goddess Sculpture and Jewelry - Herakleion Museum, Crete, 1600BC. Shop in a catalog of almost everything Buy Greek items on Amazon.com Advertiser Specials, Discounts, Sales, and Savings If you click above and follow the links to a purchase then this site receives a commission for its support. The Minoan culture was an ancient culture that survived on the island of Crete of what is now Greece for almost 2000 years until about 1450 BCE For about 3000 years until the early part of the Twentieth Century this culture was entirely unknown. An image on a pot of a labrus image by which Evans was able to connect to the Minoan Culture to ancient writing found by him on Crete. There are a number of powerful reasons for studying the Minoan culture and its women including its obvious influence. The Romans and later European cultures knew nothing of a culture on Crete that predated the ancient Greeks. Minoan Clothing
Unexplained Mysteries of LOST LANDS Many western cultures have myths of lost lands, where once lived our great ancestors. Typical is Lyonesse, a fabled land once said to exist between Land’s End and the Scilly Isles, off the British coast. On this land stood the city of Lions and some 140 churches. Folk tales, and later poets such as Tennyson, kept the fable alive by associating it with King Arthur. Thought to be the place of his birth, his death has also been associated with the lost land. Another such fable concerns Atland. Some lost lands are more modern, and said to be rationally theorised to have existed. In the 1870s, the idea was taken up by the likes of Huxley and Wallace, leading scientists of their day. A further lost land is Mu, which, according to former Bengal Lancer, Col James Churchward, existed in the Pacific Ocean. As we can see, most of these lost lands are quite fanciful, but share a similar psychology to other forms of lost worlds. Why is this the case? © Anthony North, December 2007 Liked it ?
Erectile dysfunction in the Middle Ages – historian examines medieval impotence cases Like today, the problem of male impotence in the Middle Ages was often serious, and had important consequences for marriages and families. A recent article deals with the issue, explaining how it showed up in court cases in 14th century York. ‘Privates on Parade: Impotence Cases as Evidence for Medieval Gender’, by Frederick Pederson, a senior lecturer at the University of Aberdeen, analyses two cases where wives attempted to annul their marriages because they claimed their husbands were impotent. They are among six cases from the city’s records that deal with impotence that survive from the Middle Ages. These cases were adjudicated in ecclesiastical courts, also known as consistory courts, where decisions were based on canon law. Church officials were responsible for issues relating to marriages and could pronounce an annulment in cases of impotence. Within a few days of this testimony the court annulled the marriage. One witness, Thomas Waus, told the court that Katherine had sworn:
Famous Ancient Sunken Cities Around the World (PHOTOS) Ruins of numerous such cities, submerged beneath the sea, have been discovered across the world. Most of these finds were a result of the constant effort to find the fictional and lost city of Atlantis, which has many assumptions associated with its actual existence. In March last year, researchers claimed that Atlantis may be found in the marshlands of the Dona Ana Park, southwest Spain, while few months later another research team likened an ancient 56-million-year-old landscape found submerged beneath the North Atlantic Ocean, west of the Orkney-Shetland Islands, to Atlantis. In 1999, British historian and cartographer Jim Allen claimed that the legendary lost city of Atlantis was located where present-day Quillacas is. Be it a myth or fact, the existence of Atlantis that possibly got swamped in a massive tsunami in 9600 BC remains to be based on various hypotheses. Know more about some of the famous sunken cities around the world here. Helike, Greece Photo Credit: The Helike Project
What Vikings really looked like The fine decoration of the Oseberg ship in Norway, which was buried in the year 834, provides clues to what Vikings looked like. Inside the ship were two women and the archaeologists believe the ship has served as a sarcophagus. (Photo: Annie Dalbéra) There’s no shortage of myths about the appearance of our notorious Viking ancestors. To find out more about these myths, ScienceNordic’s Danish partner site, videnskab.dk, asked its Facebook readers to list their favourite myths about what the Vikings looked like. We have picked out five myths from the resulting debate and asked researchers to help us confirm or bust these myths. Armed with this information, our graphic designer then took a shot at drawing some examples of our infamous forefathers, which you can see in our picture gallery. The five myths are: MYTH 1: Vikings were dirty and unkempt Unwashed, rough warriors with froth hanging out of the corners of the mouth. But that’s unlikely to be true: It wasn’t enough just to be clean.
Top 10 Shocking Documentaries Movies and TV As a visual medium, documentaries frequently succeed in portraying the unimaginable far better then any book alone could do. Beaming everything from the consequences of child abuse to the horrors of nuclear warfare into the homes of millions, the following infamous documentaries shock the viewer and challenge perceptions. Please note: Almost all the videos featured contain graphic and disturbing content, relevant to the topic at hand. High on Crack Street Following the struggle of three crack addicts, ‘High on Crack Street’ digs deep into the complex daily lives of individuals striving to obtain their next fix. Aokigahara / Suicide Forest Lying at the base of Mount Fuji, Aokigahara Forest has a rather unsettling reputation as a suicide hotspot . Vicious, ruthless, remorseless, brutal, fearless, violent, disturbed and callous are just some of the words which can be used to describe serial contract killer Richard “The Iceman” Kuklinski. Nuit et Brouillard The Killing of America
ARCHAEOLOGY - Roman sarcophagus found after 20 years ISTANBUL - Hürriyet Daily News This file photo shows two guards waiting in front of Roman sarcophagus in Rome. According to Britain-based The Art Newspaper, an ancient Roman alabaster sarcophagus that had been stolen more than 20 years ago from a church south of Rome was returned to Italy July 18. It came from a London-based collection of antiquities and was flown back to Rome on a cargo flight in a container reportedly displaying the official seal of the Italian Embassy in London. A special team from the cultural heritage protection division of Italy’s police force, the Guardia di Finanza, gruppo Tutela Patrimonio Archeologico, lead by Massimo Rossi, conducted the repatriation operation, reported The Art Newspaper. The sarcophagus, which dates from between the second and third centuries BC, was presented at a press conference in Rome and then returned to its hometown of Aquino, around 100 kilometers south of the capital, where it is on display in the deconsecrated Church of Santa Marta.
LEAKED NORTH KOREAN DOCUMENTARY ‘EXPOSES WESTERN PROPAGANDA’ (AND IT’S SCARY HOW TRUE IT IS) Sabine is a YouTube user who, during a visit to family living in South Korea in April of this year, was given a DVD by a man and a woman claiming to be North Korean “defectors”, and was asked to translate the film so it could be posted on the internet and reach a wider audience. What the DVD turned out to be was something much more than Sabine, or anyone else, probably would’ve imagined, and something that certainly has found a widespread audience on the internet over the last month or so – it was a film called “PROPAGANDA”, a documentary about capitalism, imperialism, mass manipulation of western culture for the purpose of commodification, and how it permeates every aspect of the lives of blissfully ignorant, borderline zombie masses. And jesus, is it on the fucking money. From the video’s description - North Korea in the 1980s The movie opens: “This is a film about psychological warfare. And in the real world, in case you haven’t realized, everything is propaganda. Table of Contents:
Turkey to create world's largest museum of civilizations Turkey exhibits an unprecedented activity in the area of the restitution of cultural property removed from the country. The country has an excuse - the creation of the world's largest museum of civilizations. The Turks not only want to return the heritage of their ancestors, Seljuks, but also ancient artifacts of Greeks, Romans, Byzantines, Hittites - the cultures and peoples who once lived here. The Museum of Civilizations will be built in Ankara on the area of 25,000 square meters. Since the territory of modern Turkey was populated by a number of different cultures and different ethnic groups at different periods, the creation of the Museum of Civilizations will require a variety of artifacts, and if there is none in the country, they should be returned from abroad. Last spring, as a friendly gesture, Germany gave the Turkish Republic the statue of the Sphinx from Hattuša, the former capital of the Hittite Empire. In 1882 it was found in a field near the town of Samsat. Igor Bukker