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Blogosphere ~ Hymn to Good Health

October 25, 2012, 2:14 am
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Blogosphere ~ The Coming of the King by M.C. Scott

October 25, 2012, 2:15 am
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Blogosphere ~ Talpiot Tomb: “The names are common”

October 25, 2012, 2:16 am
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Blogosphere ~ Odysseus and the maidens

October 25, 2012, 2:16 am
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Blogosphere ~ The Talpiot Tomb Names: A Metaphor For Mark Goodacre’s Contention

October 25, 2012, 2:17 am
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This Day in Ancient History: ante diem viii kalendas novembres

October 25, 2012, 2:20 am
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Classical Words of the

October 25, 2012, 2:25 am
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S. Van der Meeren, Lectures de Boèce. La Consolation de la Philosophie

October 25, 2012, 2:50 am
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Sophie Van der Meeren, Lectures de Boèce. La Consolation de la Philosophie, Rennes, 2012.

Éditeur : Presses Universitaires de Rennes
Collection : Études anciennes
242 pages
ISBN : 978-2-7535-2063-9
15,00 €


Le parcours proposé par Boèce dans la Consolatio est essentiellement la poursuite d'une finalité (telos) qui suppose, en termes platoniciens, une réminiscence et une pleine conscience de ce qu'est la nature humaine. Se fondant sur des analyses approfondies du concept de finalité et de ses implications, cet ouvrage envisage le déploiement de la finalité suprême au sein des rapports entre Dieu et le monde, ainsi que les aspects spécifiquement anthropologiques de la finalité et les moyens adaptés pour la réaliser.

Sophie Van der Meeren, ancienne élève de l'ENS (Ulm), agrégée de lettres classiques et docteur en philosophie, est maître de conférences en langue et littérature latines à l'université Rennes 2 (Laboratoire Cellam) et membre de l'Institut d'études augustiniennes. Elle est spécialiste de philosophie ancienne grecque et latine et, en particulier, de la tradition du protreptique à la philosophie. Elle a consacré à cette thématique plusieurs articles et ouvrages, parmi lesquels la récente monographie sur le Protreptique d'Aristote : Exhortation à la Philosophie, Les Belles Lettres, 2011.

Lire la suite...

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No Libyan Artefacts Intercepted by Dubai Auction House

October 25, 2012, 3:12 am
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Matthew Paton, Head of Communications at Christie’s has contested the story that stolen Libyan artefacts were reported to the authorities after they had been offered to Christie's Dubai office (Tom Westcott, 'No Libyan artefacts intercepted by Dubai auction house', Libya Herald 24 October 2012).The news report had been carried by a UAE English-language daily, The National.
“We don’t actually deal with classical works of art in Dubai,” Paton told Libya Herald, “so the story is irrelevant to that site.” [...] “In terms of the Libyan antiquities,” Paton said, “there was a misunderstanding between our man who was interviewed and what was interpreted from what was said, which was if anything did come to us, we would alert the authorities. But actually we haven’t had anything come to us [from Libya] .” [...] “We tend to be the last place you would ever want to go if you did happen to have something you shouldn’t,” Paton explained, “because it does tend to get identified straight away. Even if a stolen artefact makes it into the catalogue, it is then publicised on the website, sent to academics, museums, and the art loss register. This is just such a public process that it tends not to happen.”
 So David Gill, Christos Tsirogiannis and their fellows spotting and questioning items in their catalogues are doing Christie's a favour? Then they should get recompensated for the long hours of work they put in. The Libyan herald however notes somewhat sceptically that this has not always been the case with looted Libyan art. In April 2011 Christie's sold a knocked-off sculpted head of a woman with piggy eyes, probably Flavia Domitilla Minor, the daughter of Emperor Vespasian. So it went through that auction house's rigorous checking procedures. It turned out pretty rapidly that the statue had been excavated in Sabratha (World heritage Site) and on show in the local museum until thieves smashed it and made off with the head in 1990.
When the head was listed at Christie’s, the original ‘auction lot’ notes apparently stated that it was part of a private Swiss collection and had been acquired in 1988.  [Apparently]  several archaeologists alerted Christie’s to its dubious origin and theft from the Sabratha Museum. However, the auctioneers proceeded with the sale and later said they had received no such information before the head went under the hammer. The head of Flavia Domitilla was purchased by an Italian collector for £91,250. Paton told Libya Herald that the head was an exceptional case. “It had gone through the checks and we were informed after the sale that there was a concern there and so we immediately cancelled the sale,” he said.
Ummm? There are a couple of people still saying they alerted Christie's that there were problems about the piece before the sale, so whose memory is right?

One Libyan artefact that did escape the auctioneer’s scrutiny,
dreadful glue-job Flavia Domitilla. Photo: thehistoryblog.com
But Mr Paton, Director of "Communications" did not count on the effects of injuring the Arab dignity. The reply from Dubai is crushing: 'Christie's appraisal fails to find any looted Libyan', The National, Oct 24, 2012.
Suggestions by a Christie's official that antiquities looted in Libya during the Arab Spring had been offered to the auction house prompted the company to carry out a full appraisal of the offices handling such items yesterday [...] A Christie's spokesman said the remarks, made by the official during a visit to Dubai this week, were the result of a "misunderstanding".
Touché.
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Fortunatianus, Art of Rhetoric 1.1

October 25, 2012, 4:00 am
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Fortunatianus‘ 3-volume handbook of rhetoric proceeds by means of a long catechism: these are the first questions and answers.

quid est rhetorica? bene dicendi scientia.
quid est orator? vir bonus dicendi peritus.
quod est oratoris officium? bene dicere in civilibus quaestionibus.
qui finis? persuadere quatenus rerum et personarum condicio patiatur in civilibus quaestionibus.

What is rhetoric? The skill of speaking well.
What is an orator? A good man skilled in speaking.
What is the job of the orator? To speak well in public debates.
What is his aim? To persuade, to the extent that the situation of the affairs and persons allows, in public debates.


Filed under: Fortunatianus
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SLAM Belatedly Decides to do the Decent Thing?

October 25, 2012, 4:01 am
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The ever-vigilant Rick St Hilaire is reporting tonight ( SLAM Litigants Move Toward Resolving Ka Nefer Nefer Mummy Mask Case, October 24, 2012) a new and potentially significant development in the ongoing Ka Nefer-Nefer mummy mask scandal:
The St. Louis Art Museum (SLAM), the United States government, and the Republic of Egypt are in talks to settle the contest over title to the mummy mask of Ka Nefer Nefer.
At the same time the US government submitted a motion to the court a week ago requesting the suspension of the legal proceedings and announcing that "the parties believe that continued discussions will be productive and that there is a significant possibility that they will reach a resolution that would obviate the need for the appeal to continue". It is not clear at this stage whether such a settlement envisages that the mask will stay on loan at SLAM, or whether it will be taken back to Egypt. If such a settlement is reached, SLAM is to be congratulated in at last seeing its position had become wholly untenable. Too bad it took them so long, and in the process did a lot of damage to their own reputation, that of US museums generally and the city of St Louis. Let us hope this dirty little chapter will soon be closed.
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Death and Social Media: LiveTweeting a Funeral?

October 25, 2012, 4:36 am
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Recently, Steve Buttry posed a question on twitter and in his blog: “Should a journalist livetweet a funeral? If so how?” The article discusses two particular funerals that were live tweeted and further discussed in corresponding blogs. The full article by Buttry can be read here, but I will summarize his discussion and comments. Funerals … Continue reading »
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Crown of Henry VIII has been Recreated.

October 25, 2012, 4:53 am
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The lost crown of Henry VIII has been recreated in minute detail, down to the last pearl and thumbnail-sized enamelled sculpture, almost 400 years after the original was melted down along with every scrap of royal regalia Cromwell's government could lay its hands on. There is a video, but with really annoyingly anachronous music.
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The reported thoracic injuries in Homer’s Iliad

October 25, 2012, 4:54 am
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The reported thoracic injuries in Homer’s Iliad

By Efstratios Apostolakis, Georgia Apostolaki, Mary Apostolaki, and Maria Chorti

Journal of Cardiothoracic Surgery, Vol.4 (2010)

Abstract: Homer’s Iliad is considered to be a prominent and representative work of the tradition of the ancient Greek epic poetry. In this poem Homer presents the battles which took place during the last year of the 10-year lasting Trojan War between Achaeans and Trojans. We wanted to examine the chest wounds, especially those which are described in detail, according to their localization, severity and mortality. Finally, there are reported 54 consecutive thoracic injuries in the Iliad. The mostly used weapons were the spear (63%), the stones (7.4%), the arrow (5.5%) and the sword (5.5%). We divided the injuries according to their severity in mild (those which did not cause serious injury to the victim), medium (those which cause the victim to abandon the battlefield), and severe (those which cause death of the victim). According to this classification, the reported injuries were mild in 11.11%, medium in 18.52%, and severe in the last 70.37% of the reported cases. In other words, 89% of the injuries belong to the medium or severe category of thoracic injury. As far as the mortality of the injuries is concerned, 38 out of 54 thoracic injuries include death, which makes the mortality percentage reach 70.37%. Concerning the “allocation of the roles”, the Achaean were in 68% perpetrators and the Trojans in only 32%. In terms of gravity, out of 38 mortal injuries 30 involve a Trojan (78.95%) and the remaining 8 an Achaean (21.05%). The excellent and detailed description of the injuries by Homer, as well as of the symptoms, may reveal a man with knowledge of anatomy and medicine who cared for the injured warriors in the battlefield.

Introduction: “…while fighting Idomeneus stabbed at the middle of his chest with the spear, and broke the bronze armour about him which in time before had guarded his body from destruction. He cried out then, a great cry, broken, the spear in him, and fell, thunderously, and the spear in his heart was struck fast but the heart was panting still and beating to shake the butt end of the spear. Then and there Ares the huge took his life away from him…” (Book 13, verses 438-444)

The “Iliad” and “Odyssey” of Homer are the foundation stones of classical Greek literature, and therefore also of the literature of Western civilization. Homer was read, memorized and quoted throughout the great age of ancient Greece, and was regarded as the poet who surpassed all others. The Iliad and the Odyssey comprise two of the most important works of classical Greek literature and they have influenced, to a great extent, Western literature. The Iliad, in particular, is considered to be a prominent and representative work of the tradition of the ancient Greek epic poetry. By means of a vivid, unsurpassed description of the war of Troy the poet presents the battles which took place during the last year of this 10-year war. In an ambient of insufferable impatience-or even despair-as well as nostalgia for their country, the Trojans faced the Achaeans, the former being exhausted due to the long-lasting siege of the latter. Homer offers the description of a merciless and rabid combat that leads to the destructive, on the part of the Trojans, ending. The poem unravels the story of a war which proves to be a vacillating and inexpedient conflict.

Click here to read this article from PubMed Central

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Picture of the Week: Seven Species Display

October 25, 2012, 5:00 am
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(Post by Seth M. Rodriquez)

Look around where you are sitting for things that are the color brown.  Then look for things that are red or blue.  You will probably be surprised at how many things you can spot that are those colors, and you never really notice how many there are until you specifically look for them.

The same can be said for plants mentioned in the Bible.  As you are reading through the scriptures, you probably don't even notice how many times trees or flowers or wheat or weeds are mentioned.  They are just part of the warp and woof of the text.  Yet when you stop to count them, it is shocking how often they appear.

Our picture of the week comes from Volume 16 of the revised and expanded edition of the Pictorial Library of Bible Lands, which focuses on "Trees, Plants, and Flowers of the Holy Land."  This is an entirely new volume of the PLBL.  A small number of the pictures in this volume were included in the previous version but they were scattered throughout the collection based on their location.  This new volume collects these photos together in one place and adds numerous new photos, creating a powerful tool for learning about biblical plant life.  Looking over the list of pictures included in the collection (which can be found here) the collection includes photographs of:
Numerous photographs in this new volume were taken by Gloria E. M. Suess, who was a long-term volunteer at the Institute of Holy Land Studies in Jerusalem and an avid photographer of biblical plants.  Our picture of the week was taken by her and is entitled "Seven Species Display."  (Click on the photo for a higher resolution.)


The seven species represented here are the seven types referred to by Moses in Deuteronomy 8:7-10.
For the Lord your God is bringing you into a good land, a land of brooks of water, of fountains and springs, flowing out in the valleys and hills, a land of wheat and barley, of vines and fig trees and pomegranates, a land of olive trees and honey, a land in which you will eat bread without scarcity, in which you will lack nothing, a land whose stones are iron, and out of whose hills you can dig copper. And you shall eat and be full, and you shall bless the Lord your God for the good land he has given you.  (Deuteronomy 8:7-10, ESV)
This photo captures all seven varieties of products in one shot.  Barley and wheat are at the far left, each represented by its grains and a loaf of bread made from that type of grain.  Vines are represented at the top of the photo by three types of grapes, along with a cup of wine and a plate of raisins.  Figs are at the far right side of the picture: fresh figs (top) and dried figs (bottom).  Pomegranates (two whole and one opened) can be seen at the top of the photo between the grapes and figs.  Olives are shown at the lower right side: both green and black olives along with a cup of olive oil, an oil lamp (behind the cup), and a branch from an olive tree.

Lastly, honey is represented by dates at the bottom center of the photo.  The juice that was squeezed from fresh dates was known as date honey, and can be seen in the cup just above the plate of fresh and dried dates.  Some scholars believe that date honey instead of bee honey makes the most sense in this list of agricultural products.

Once again, a picture is worth a thousand words.  Seeing all seven species together on one table whets that appetite and drives home the message in a different way than merely reading the text.  Looking at this feast, it is easy to see that this truly was a "good land" that God was giving to the Israelites.

This and other photos of biblical plant life are included in Volume 16 of the Pictorial Library of Bible Lands and can be purchased here.  For further thoughts on why Moses may have chosen to mention these seven species, see my blog post on the Wild Olive Shoot blog here.
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The Babylonian Akitu Festival: Rectifying the King or Renewing the Cosmos?

October 25, 2012, 5:17 am
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The Babylonian Akitu Festival: Rectifying the King or Renewing the Cosmos?

By Benjamin Sommer

The Journal of the Ancient Near Eastern Society, Vol. 27 (2000)

Introduction: The Babylonian Akitu festival has played a pivotal role in the development of theories of religion, myth and ritual; yet the purpose of the festival remains a point of contention among both historians of religion and Assyriologists. The historian of religion J. Z. Smith has suggested that the festival functioned as a piece of national-religious propaganda. He argues that the rite asserted the legitimacy of the foreigners who ruled Babylon during the Hellenistic age. Smith thus rejects an older consensus, associated with scholars such as A. J. Wensink, M. Eliade, I. Engnell, H. Frankfort, T. H. Gaster, and W. G. Lambert, according to whom the Akitu rituals exemplify an archaic ideology of the center; through its ceremonies primeval chaos was again subdued, and the world was renewed. In spite of Smith’s stimulating challenge to the older consensus, several features of the Babylonian Akitu do show that the festival was intended to destroy and subsequently renew the cosmos. Oddly, the earlier scholars failed to cite these features and instead focused on extremely dubious data. A revised version of the older consensus best accounts for the Akitu festival described in Neo-Babylonian texts. The festival indeed exalts a sacred center, but its worldview cannot be portrayed as archaic, since it stems from a highly developed urban culture.

Click here to read this article from Academia.edu

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Binary Inventions and the collapsing of space and time

October 25, 2012, 6:20 am
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Yesterday I walked across the street to hear the panel discussion hosted by the 2012 Arts and Culture Series. The panel brought together practitioners of various forms of digital art ranging from music to animation to digital and new media journalism. The panel was packed with smart, thoughtful people. (The screening and conversation with Max Porter and Ru Kuwahata from Tiny Inventions was particular remarkable.)

The panel discussion began with an interesting question regarding the place of digital technologies as a kind of “philosopher’s stone” that could transform one media to the next. This resonated a bit with some of my thoughts regarding the role of archaeology as a mediating discipline between physical objects and ideas. Texts (and photographs, plans, drawings, and increasingly video) do much of the heavy lifting between object and idea within the archaeological discourse. As Max Porter and Ru Kuwahata and Andy Ihnatko noted at several points in their talks, the goal of the (new) media’s philosopher stone is to tell stories and create experiences. 

Another useful question that the able moderator asked is how digital technologies have transformed the rhythm of life for the artists on the panel. The journalists commented on how the digital age has created a 24 hour new cycle in which they must at least attempt to engage. Others commented on how they could now communicate in realtime with collaborators and partners around the world. Others still noted that the manual components of their work (practicing piano or making prints on paper) seemed to stubbornly resist any of the supposed efficiencies presented by a digital commons.

ProductiveSpace

I got to think about our academic pace of life on how digital technologies have transformed it. One thing that the panelists make clear, the ability of the digital world to collapse space has a clear connection with its tendency to compress or collapse time. Global workflows and instant communication have changed work patterns and professional expectations. I blog every day because not only because I think I might have something to say, but also because the digital rhythms of internet-mediated, personal publishing demands a kind of regularity in the production of content that a group of writers would have managed to fulfill the expectations of earlier media.  

This is all to set up an advertisement for myself (in a round-about way). Check out the Cyprus Research Fund Lecture today at 4 pm CST. Keeping with the theme of collapsing space and time, the talk will be streamed live on the internets. Click here to get to the talk.

If you’re old school, stop by the East Asia Room in the Chester Fritz Library at 4 pm to hear the talk live and in-person. 


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2,000 Years of history: Paris in 3D

October 25, 2012, 6:43 am
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paris3D. Image: Dassault Systèmes

The latest project from Dassault Systèmes with the help of historians and archaeologists is the remarkable Paris 3D Saga, an interactive model that guides you through two millennia of Paris’ history.

You are taken through the French capital at various stages of its’ development from 52 BC Gallic Oppida through the Roman city and on to the present day. You can witness the construction of the Bastille and Notre Dame and walk through winding stone streets in the middle ages and then visit the 1889 World’s Fair to see the Eiffel Tower just after completion.

The Paris 3D Saga let’s you experience the city like you have never seen it before. Go on a journey through more than 2000 years of history: discover Paris’ most famous monuments, with new 3D reconstructions carried out with historians, and HD clips of the documentary series “Paris, the great saga”.

Full augmented reality room. Image: Dassault Systèmes / Flammarion Full augmented reality room. Image: Dassault Systèmes / Flammarion

Immersive experience

“This is the first time we have a digital model of Paris, and this is a big advantage over what we’d had in the past,” says Mehdi Tayoubi, VP of design and experimental strategy at Dassault Systèmes. “It can be adapted as archaeologists make new discoveries. It’s a kind of living world; we’re going to add other monuments, make other representations.”

Users can take guided tours from the Paris 3D web browser or on the corresponding iPad app.

The experience was revealed earlier this month in Paris as part of a giant virtual reality show, featuring nine screens with different clips of the city during various periods with 15,000 Parisians attending the launch.

“We demonstrated that virtual reality is a real tool for research, education and cultural exploration for the general public,” Mehdi says.

Most of the documents used for Paris 3D were 2D drawings or black and white photographs, so the archaeologists had to fill in the blanks.

Before creating Paris 3D, which the Dassault team spent two years building, they had already created Giza 3D , released in May 2012 that explored and allowed the virtual exploration of the Giza Plateau in Egypt.

“The Paris 3D project is logical continuation of the Giza 3D project,” Mehdi says. “It was a great opportunity for us as a French company to collaborate, lead a scientific project and see Paris in the past like never before.”

Mehdi says Dassault has now received requests from several cities to create virtual reality versions of their histories, to be used in documentary films, set up in museums and to add a new dimension to mobile apps.

Paris3D Saga - Augmented reality book. Image: Dassault Systèmes / Flammarion Paris3D Saga – Augmented reality book. Image: Dassault Systèmes / Flammarion

Augmented reality book

In addition there is a 3D reality book, which presents the story of Paris for the first time in augmented reality.

Readers use their computer webcams in combination with some of the illustrations in the book and get a true in-depth look at Paris over the centuries, with 3D animation and augmented reality techniques the past literally comes to life.

Source: Dassault Systèmes

More Information

The full online experience: download required to use the online system

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Gospel of Thomas: The Movie

October 25, 2012, 7:17 am
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In a discussion forum about Jesus movies, Bruce Longenecker was praising the BBC’s The Passion as one of the better recent Jesus movies (not to be confused with Mel Gibson’s similarly titled film).  I had almost forgotten about it because it came out just after we moved to the UK.  I highly recommend it too.  I noticed on Youtube someone has uploaded the different episodes if you look for “The Passion Episode …” 1-1, 1-2, etc.

Also in the discussion forum was a note about a dramatized version of the Gospel of Thomas.  Since there is no narrative in the account it is 45 minutes of Jesus giving the sayings with other actors for the disciples:


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Painted Jar [Object of the Day #93]

October 25, 2012, 7:19 am
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Jar

Jar

Painted jar from Karanog. The site of Karanog was located in Lower (or Northern) Nubia, now entirely flooded beneath Lake Nasser. In 1907-1912 this region was the focus for the first excavations of the Eckley Coxe Jr. Expedition of the Penn Museum. Karanog was once a flourishing town, and the administrative capital of Lower Nubia, during the Meroitic Kingdom (ca. 300 BCE ? 300 CE). This painted jar comes from one of the many wealthy tombs in the Karanog cemetery. Meroitic Nubia had a sophisticated tradition of painted pottery which incorporates geometric designs as well as figural images: humans, animals and plants. Meroitic artists also used Egyptian style images and symbols. This charming object has a frieze of serpents on the shoulder, and grazing giraffes on the midsection. The artist has  depicted the giraffes in a slightly cumbersome way and with bovine elements, suggesting the artist may have never seen a living giraffe. At that time giraffes only lived much further south in the savannah lands of southern Nubia.

Penn Museum Object #E8183

See this and other objects like it on Penn Museum’s Online Collection Database

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