TOMB OF KING SOLOMON'S
FATHER ON
MOUNT
AROUND 1880 DURING THE OTTOMAN ERA.
U.S.-Led Forces may have damaged Ancient Babylon in minor way-
according to UK News Report
LONDON (Reuters) - Jan 14/05 - U.S.-led forces, using Iraq (news - web sites)'s ancient city of Babylon as a military base, have caused "substantial damage" to one of the world's most renowned archaeological treasures, a British Museum report said.
The report, quoted in Saturday's Guardian newspaper, said U.S. and Polish military vehicles had crushed 2,600-year-old pavements in the city, a cradle of civilization and home to one of the seven wonders of the ancient world. Archaeological fragments were used to fill sand bags, it added.
John Curtis, keeper of the museum's Ancient and Near East department, invited to visit Babylon by Iraqi antiquities experts, also said he had found cracks and gaps made by people who had apparently tried to gouge out the decorated bricks forming the famous dragons of the city's Ishtar Gate.
U.S. military commanders set up a base in Babylon in April 2003, just after the invasion to topple Saddam Hussein (news - web sites), and handed it over to a Polish-led force five months later.
"This is tantamount to establishing a military camp around the Great Pyramid in Egypt or around Stonehenge in Britain," Curtis said in the report.
The camp will be formally handed over to the Iraqi culture ministry on Saturday.
Babylon was the capital of ancient Babylonia, an early civilization that existed from around 1,800 BC until 600 BC.
The report, quoted in Saturday's Guardian newspaper, said U.S. and Polish military vehicles had crushed 2,600-year-old pavements in the city, a cradle of civilization and home to one of the seven wonders of the ancient world. Archaeological fragments were used to fill sand bags, it added.
John Curtis, keeper of the museum's Ancient and Near East department, invited to visit Babylon by Iraqi antiquities experts, also said he had found cracks and gaps made by people who had apparently tried to gouge out the decorated bricks forming the famous dragons of the city's Ishtar Gate.
U.S. military commanders set up a base in Babylon in April 2003, just after the invasion to topple Saddam Hussein (news - web sites), and handed it over to a Polish-led force five months later.
"This is tantamount to establishing a military camp around the Great Pyramid in Egypt or around Stonehenge in Britain," Curtis said in the report.
The camp will be formally handed over to the Iraqi culture ministry on Saturday.
Babylon was the capital of ancient Babylonia, an early civilization that existed from around 1,800 BC until 600 BC.
Catalog will be available in English, Arabic online and in print
26 October 2004 - The U.S. National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) is funding a two-year project that could help bridge cultural and scientific barriers exacerbated by the Iraq war, according to an October 25 press release from the Field Museum in Chicago.
The Field Museum is studying, cataloging and reconciling scattered but priceless collections of materials from the 5,000-year-old archaeological site of Kish, 80 kilometers south of Baghdad. Kish is one of the world's oldest cities and site of the earliest evidence of wheeled transport.
Originally explored in the early 20th century by archaeologists from the Field Museum and Oxford University's Ashmolean Museum, Kish yielded a wealth of artifacts that were divided between the excavating museums and the Iraq Museum in Baghdad. The collections have remained divided and that division has precluded production of a full site report and hindered a full understanding of Kish's historical and archaeological significance, according to the Field Museum release.
The museum plans to create a digital catalog of more than 100,000 Kish artifacts held in Chicago, London and Baghdad. The catalog will be available in English and Arabic on the Internet and in print. A more complete database of the objects also will be created and made available on the Internet.
"This project will make possible, for the first time, a true reckoning of the site's historical and archaeological significance," said William Pestle, Field Museum collection manager and a principal investigator on the project. "It will also serve as a model for intellectual repatriation of exported archaeological collections."
The $100,000 NEH grant will allow the Field Museum to catalog objects, reconcile the collection with excavation records and field notes, match numbers assigned to objects in the field with museum numbers, stabilize at-risk objects, scan or photograph important objects and records, and disseminate the information to scholars and others around the world.
Excavators Discover 20 Mummies in Egypt
CAIRO, Egypt - Dec 11/04 - Excavators discovered 20 gilded mummies in the Bahariya oasis in western Egypt, the government's council of antiquities said Tuesday.
Oct 19/04
BEIJING (AFP) - Chinese archaeologists are unearthing a group of tombs believed to be the family cemetery of the Duke of Zhou, a de facto imperial ruler who lived about 3,000 years ago, state media said.
Archaeologists discovered the group of 22 tombs in February at Qi Mountain in the northwestern province of Shaanxi. They cover an area of about 80,000 square meters (860,800 square feet), the Xinhua news agency reported.
Ten of the tombs each have four passages -- an indication that the owner was from the highest rank in the the Western Zhou Dynasty (11th century BC - 771 BC).
"Judging from the scale of the tombs, the owner might be somebody of high rank, a duke, a prince, or even a king of the Western Zhou Dynasty," said Lei Xingshan, associate archaeology professor at Beijing University.
Archaeologists in Bulgaria say they have found hundreds of tiny gold jewels dating back 5,000 years, possible proof of Europe's earliest civilisation.
The head of Bulgaria's National Museum of History, Bozhidar Dimitrov, said the team had unearthed gold rings, beads and jewellery inlaid with tiny pearls.
He said the jewels had shown expert craftsmanship and an unexpectedly high level of technology for the time.
...The remains of an ancient Thracian temple dating back to the 5th Century BC were discovered in central Bulgaria in 2000.
The Thracian civilisation extended from the Caucasus to
south-western Europe from around 4,000 BC to the year 300.
Full
Story (BBC)
May 20/04
BBC - Kano, now the scene of anti-Christian riots, was once one of northern Nigeria's most powerful city-states.
It was converted to Islam in the 15th century but 400 years later, its Hausa leaders were accused of having lapsed and it was conquered by ethnic Fulanis in a jihad, or Holy War.
The Emir of Kano is one of the most highly respected Muslim leaders in Nigeria, whose 130 million people are roughly equally divided between Muslims and Christians.
But in Kano, Christians are now a tiny minority - around 1% of the population - and have mostly travelled there from other parts of Nigeria.
Before the riots, they mostly lived in Sabon Gari (foreigners' town) and so made an easy target for Muslim youths seeking revenge for the massacre of hundreds of Muslims in Plateau State last week.
As an Islamic centre, Kano was among the northern states to introduce strict Islamic Sharia law.
That decision also led to religious clashes, in which 100 people were killed in October 2001.
Dinosaurs were struck down in their prime
(Oct 18/04)
Rare artifacts found in Israel
UNEARTHED PAST - Rare artifacts from 6 BC, after the destruction of the first temple, were discovered in a cave in the En Gedi region last week. The discovery was announced Thursday by the Nature and National Parks Protection Authority.
Archaeologists
found objects that belonged to Jews who returned to Israel following their
Babylonian exile after King Cyrus of Persia declared that they could return in
538 BC. According to Ezra 1, Cyrus made this declaration in the first year of
his reign. The book also lists the families who had been exiled by the
Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar. The findings in the cave consisted of glass and
gold beads, a stick used for applying makeup, an alabaster bowl, a pendant,
bronze mirrors, a necklace and an oil lamp. The most impressive finding is a
Babylonian stamp bearing the figure of a priest worshiping
the moon god.
ICEJ News- Feb 20 -2004
Archaeologists unearth
4,000-year-old tomb
AP in Cairo
Thursday January 1, 2004
The Guardian
Polish and Egyptian archaeologists have unearthed a necropolis containing the
4,000-year-old stone tomb of a royal official, Egypt's supreme council of
antiquities announced yesterday.
Full Story at: http://www.guardian.co.uk/arts/news/story/0,11711,1114593,00.html
The first mummies to be discovered in Britain have been found in the Outer Hebrides.
Researchers believe islanders on South Uist started mummifying their dead at the same time as the ancient Egyptians.
full story at: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/2856399.stm
Human Sacrifice Mummies found in Peru
107 Fishermen Mummies Found in Peru
full story at: http://www.mummytombs.com/news/2002/9.peru.fishermen.htm
Thousands Of Inca Mummies Found
Thousands of Inca mummies, some of them bundled
together in groups of up to seven, have been unearthed from an ancient cemetery
under a shantytown near Lima in Peru, National Geographic announced Wednesday.
Believed to be the largest cemetery from one time period excavated in Peru, lead
archeologist Guillermo Cock said as many as 10,000 Incas were possibly buried at
the site at
full story at: http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/04/17/world/main506499.shtml
and at: http://www.rose-hulman.edu/~delacova/incas/mummies.htm
Dozens of Well-Preserved Mummies Found in Xinjiang
URUMQI, February 26 （Xinhuanet）-- A team of Chinese archaeologists recently discovered dozens of remarkably well- preserved mummies scattered about a sand dune on the western edge of Lop Nur, a desolate area in northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region.
Full story at: http://202.84.17.11/english/htm/20010226/378360.htm
Sons of Japheth in China (Mummies) ?
full story at: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/chinamum/taklamakan.html
and at: http://www.wwnorton.com/catalog/spring00/32019.htm
Spanish King's Mummy Discovered With Two-Heads
Full Story at: http://www.mummytombs.com/news/2001/6.spain.jaimeI.htm
full story at: http://www.science-frontiers.com/sf109/sf109p02.htm
KENNEWICK MAN: Court Rejects "Native" Attempt at Censorship
Feb 2004
PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) - Scientists can study the Kennewick Man — 9,300-year-old remains found in Washington state — despite the objections of some American Indian tribes, a federal appeals court ruled Wednesday.
Northwest tribes consider the bones sacred and want to bury them. But the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals agreed with a lower court that found that federal grave-protection law does not apply because there is no evidence connecting the remains with any existing tribe.
Full Story: http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20040205/ap_on_sc/kennewick_man_2
The Court case is : Bonnichsen v. United States (PDF)
Most Native American Tribes are upset about the Kennewick Man because it forces them to admit that they are neither native, nor the original settlers of North America.
Judge
temporarily bars SoCal tribe from removing members
Mummified Remains Found in 1948 Plane Wreckage
full story at: http://www.mummytombs.com/news/1999/7.alaskaplane.htm
Ancient speculations
Story at: http://www.write-on.co.uk/history/trojan_london.htm
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More Stories & News as we have time - periodically
