Imagine herds of mammoth wandering the tundra – it could happen, maybe even in our lifetimes.

BODIES of extinct Ice Age mammals, such as woolly mammoths, that have been frozen in permafrost for thousands of years may contain viable sperm that could be used to bring them back from the dead, scientists said yesterday.

Research has indicated that mammalian sperm can survive being frozen for much longer than was previously thought, suggesting that it could potentially be recovered from species that have died out.

Several well-preserved mammoth carcasses have been found in the permafrost of Siberia, and scientists estimate that there could be millions more.

Last year a Canadian team demonstrated that it was possible to extract DNA from the specimens, and announced the sequencing of about 1 per cent of the genome of a mammoth that died about 27,000 years ago.

With access to the mammothÂ’s genetic code, and with frozen sperm recovered from testes, it may be possible to resurrect an animal that is very similar to a mammoth.

The mammoth is a close genetic cousin of the modern Asian elephant, and scientists think that the two may be capable of interbreeding.

Why do I have visions of Fred Flintstone and a big plate of mammoth ribs?

Posted by: Greg at 12:51 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 217 words, total size 1 kb.

One of the most important pieces of space history has been misplaced in NASA's archives.

The government has misplaced the original recording of the first moon landing, including astronaut Neil Armstrong's famous "one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind," a NASA spokesman said yesterday.

Armstrong's moon walk, seen by millions of television viewers on July 20, 1969, is among the transmissions that NASA has failed to turn up in a year of searching, spokesman Grey Hautaloma said.

"We haven't seen them for quite a while. We've been looking for over a year, and they haven't turned up," Hautaloma said.

The tapes also contain data about the health of the astronauts and the condition of the spacecraft. In all, about 700 boxes of transmissions from the Apollo lunar missions are missing, he said.

"I wouldn't say we're worried -- we've got all the data. Everything on the tapes we have in one form or another," Hautaloma said.

NASA has retained copies of the TV broadcasts and offers several clips on its Web site. But those images are of lower quality than the originals stored on the missing magnetic tapes.

Because NASA's equipment was not compatible with the TV technology of the day, the original transmissions had to be displayed on a monitor and reshot by a TV camera for broadcast.

Hautaloma said it is possible the tapes will be unplayable if they are found because they have degraded significantly over the years -- a problem common to magnetic tape and other recordable media.

This will be a tragic loss if the materials are lost or damaged beyond recovery.

Posted by: Greg at 10:13 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 276 words, total size 2 kb.

Listening to these folks, you would think acting to end WWII was a bad thing.

Tens of thousands of people from around the world gathered in Hiroshima on Sunday to pray for peace and urge the world to abandon nuclear weapons on the 61st anniversary of the first atomic bombing.

In an annual ritual to mourn the more than 220,000 people who ultimately died from the blast, a crowd including survivors, children and dignitaries gathered at the Peace Memorial Park, near ground zero where the bomb was dropped.

"Radiation, heat, blast and their synergetic effects created a hell on Earth," said Hiroshima Mayor Tadatoshi Akiba.

Remember -- the planned invasion of the home islands was expected to cost the US military over one million dead soldiers, sailors, and airmen. The Japanese death toll was expected to be higher, incuding the civilian dead (the Bushido code required suicide rather than capture or surrender).

Posted by: Greg at 02:30 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 164 words, total size 1 kb.

I've never been a big student of WWII naval history -- the era of sailing ships is much more interesting to me. As a result, I never knew that the German Navy had only one aircraft carrier, the Graf Zeppelin. In fact, I was so unaware of that part of the war that I first clicked on this article believing that it had to do with the great German airship, sister to the Hindenberg. I'm glad about my mistake.

Poland's Navy said Thursday that it has identified a sunken shipwreck in the Baltic Sea as almost certainly being Nazi Germany's only aircraft carrier, the Graf Zeppelin — a find that promises to shed light on a 59-year-old mystery surrounding the ship's fate.

The Polish oil company Petrobaltic discovered the shipwreck earlier this month on the sea floor about 38 miles north of the northern port city of Gdansk.

Suspecting it could be the wreckage of the Graf Zeppelin, the Polish Navy sent out a hydrographic survey vessel on Tuesday, said Lt. Cmdr. Bartosz Zajda, a spokesman for the Polish Navy.

"We are 99 percent sure — even 99.9 percent — that these details point unambiguously to the Graf Zeppelin," said Dariusz Beczek, the Navy commander of the vessel, the ORP Arctowski, said soon after returning to port Thursday morning after the two-day expedition.

During their time at sea, naval experts used a remote-controlled underwater robot and sonar photographic and video equipment to gather digital images of the 850-foot-long ship, Zajda said.

"The analyses of the sonar pictures and the comparison to historical documents show that it is the Graf Zeppelin," Zajda told The Associated Press.

The ship never saw combat, and was last seen in 1947, when it was in Soviet control. The ship was sunk on August 16, 1947, during Soviet exercises to determine tactics for sinking American carriers.

I suppose this helps explain why most of the great naval battles of the war took place in the Pacific and involved the Japanese fleet.

Posted by: Greg at 02:06 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 345 words, total size 2 kb.

And is there a message for us today in the verses to which this incredibly old book of Scripture was opened?

Irish archaeologists Tuesday heralded the discovery of an ancient book of psalms by a construction worker while driving the shovel of his backhoe into a bog.

The approximately 20-page book has been dated to the years 800-1000. Trinity College manuscripts expert Bernard Meehan said it was the first discovery of an Irish early medieval document in two centuries.

"This is really a miracle find," said Pat Wallace, director of the National Museum of Ireland, which has the book stored in refrigeration. Researchers will conduct years of painstaking analysis before putting the book on public display.

"There's two sets of odds that make this discovery really way out," Wallace said. "First of all, it's unlikely that something this fragile could survive buried in a bog at all, and then for it to be unearthed and spotted before it was destroyed is incalculably more amazing."

It was discovered by accident, really, by an engineer digging in a bog, with the peat to become potting soil.

And perhaps most interesting is the place to which the book is open -- a very topical spot, given world events.

The book was found open to a page describing, in Latin script, Psalm 83, in which God hears complaints of other nations' attempts to wipe out the name of Israel.

The enemies of Israel failed in ancient days, and they will fail in the present day as well, for God is faithful.

Posted by: Greg at 08:21 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 267 words, total size 2 kb.

When one thinks of presidential assassinations, Abraham Lincoln and John F. Kennedy spring rapidly to mind. If one thinks a little harder, you might also remember that Teddy Roosevelt became president following the assassination of President William McKinley. But the fourth president felled by an assassin's bullet, James A. Garfield, is often overlooked by Americans. No wonder, for he had been president for less than four months when he was shot by Charles Guiteau, and died an agonizing eighty days later.

Now an exhibit has opened at the National Museum of Health and Medicine at Walter Reed Army Medical Center examining the medical treatment received by President Garfield. At the time, 1881, medicine was a changing field in the United States, and it is generally accepted by historians that Garfield's doctors, not his assailant, killed him.

Garfield was waiting at the Baltimore and Potomac Railroad Station in Washington, about to leave for New England, when he was shot twice by the assassin, Charles J. Guiteau.

The first bullet grazed GarfieldÂ’s arm, said Lenore Barbian, anatomical collections curator for the museum. But the second struck him in the right side of the back and lodged deep in the body.

“No one expected Garfield to live through the night,” Dr. Barbian said.

As the display makes clear, the second bullet pierced GarfieldÂ’s first lumbar vertebra, crossing from right to left.

At the time, however, without the benefit of modern diagnostics, Garfield’s doctors could not determine the location of the bullet. “Trying to understand its pathway became their primary concern,” Dr. Barbian said.

At least a dozen medical experts probed the presidentÂ’s wound, often with unsterilized metal instruments or bare hands, as was common at the time.

Sterile technique, developed by the British surgeon Joseph Lister in the mid-1860Â’s, was not yet widely appreciated in the United States, although it was accepted in France, Germany and other parts of Europe. Historians agree that massive infection, which resulted from unsterile practices, contributed to GarfieldÂ’s death.

Alexander Graham Bell was brought in to try to locate the bullet with one of his inventions.

The exhibit also includes an image of the metal detector designed by Alexander Graham Bell to search for the bullet. It was composed of a battery and several metal coils positioned on a wooden platform and was connected to an earpiece.

Jeffrey S. Reznick, senior curator at the museum, said the device was designed to create an electromagnetic field, which would be disrupted in the presence of a metal object. The disruption would cause the device to emit a clicking sound through the earpiece.

“Electricity and magnetism were just being appreciated as ways to explore the body’s interior,” Dr. Reznick said.

Bell’s invention failed on two occasions to pinpoint the bullet’s location. Historians say this may have been because the device picked up metal coils in the president’s mattress, or because Bell searched only on the right side of Garfield’s body, where the lead physician, Dr. Doctor Willard Bliss — Doctor was his given name — had come to believe the bullet was lodged.

In early September, the president was moved from the White House to a cottage in Elberon, N.J., on the shore.

Garfield died in New Jersey on September 19, which, fittingly enough is the closing date of this exhibit, (it opened on July 2, the 125th anniversary of the shooting).

Interestingly enough, a similar wound today would require only a brief hospital stay.

At the autopsy, it became evident that the bullet had pierced GarfieldÂ’s vertebra but missed his spinal cord. The bullet had not struck any major organs, arteries or veins, and had come to rest in adipose tissue on the left side of the presidentÂ’s back, just below the pancreas.

Dr. Ira Rutkow, a professor of surgery at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey and a medical historian, said: “Garfield had such a nonlethal wound. In today’s world, he would have gone home in a matter or two or three days.”

One part of the exhibit is a section of Garfield's spine consisting of the 12th thoracic and 1st and 2nd lumbar vertebrae -- removed at his autopsy and passed around to the jurors as an exhibit at the trial of the assassin.

If you would like to read more about the Garfield assassination, but not something that is a dry, scholarly tome, I am told that Sarah Vowell's Assasination Vacation contains an interesting and accessible account of the assassination and its aftermath. I'm planning to read it shortly.

Posted by: Greg at 05:40 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 761 words, total size 6 kb.

This is going back into pre-history -- and may be another thing I pass on to my students during the first week or two of school, as we deal with the earliest history of humanity. There is just so much we don't know, so anything we can find out is exciting.

Researchers in Germany said Thursday that they planned to collaborate with an American company in an effort to reconstruct the genome of Neanderthals, the archaic human species that occupied Europe from 300,000 years ago to 30,000 years ago until being displaced by modern humans.

Long a forlorn hope, the sequencing, or decoding, of Neanderthal DNA suddenly seems possible because of a combination of analytic work on ancient DNA by Svante Paabo, of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, and a new method of DNA sequencing developed by a Connecticut company, 454 Life Sciences.

The initial genome to be decoded comes from 45,000-year-old Neanderthal bones found in Croatia, though bones from other sites may be analyzed later. Because the genome must be kept in constant repair and starts to break up immediately after the death of the cell, the material surviving in Neanderthal bones exists in tiny fragments 100 or so DNA units in length. As it happens, this is just the length that works best with the 454 machine, which is also able to decode vast amounts of DNA at low cost.

Recovery of the Neanderthal genome, in whole or in part, would be invaluable for reconstructing many events in human prehistory and evolution. It would help address such questions as whether Neanderthals and humans interbred, whether the archaic humans had an articulate form of language, how the Neanderthal brain was constructed, if they had light or dark skin, and the total size of the Neanderthal population.

And they only have to sequence 3 billion bits of Neanderthal DNA to do it, while separating out the DNA of human handlers of the bones and the various bacteria that have entered teh bones over the course of tens of thousands of years.

But they do have some areas with which to start.

The researchers’ hope is to recover the entire sequence of the Neanderthal genome, but that will depend on whether they can recover enough DNA. From sampling so far, no particular gaps in the sequence are apparent. “We are hitting all the chromosomes and getting good coverage,” Dr. Egholm said. If no single specimen yields a full sequence, the genome might be recovered by combining DNA from several individuals.

One of the most important results that researchers are hoping for is to discover, from a three-way comparison of chimp, human and Neanderthal DNA, which genes have made humans human. The chimp and human genomes differ at just 1 percent of the sites on their DNA. At this 1 percent, Neanderthals resemble humans at 96 percent of the sites, to judge from the preliminary work, and chimps at 4 percent. Analysis of these DNA sites, at which humans differ from the two other species, will help understand the evolution of specifically human traits “and perhaps even aspects of cognitive function,” Dr. Paabo said.

The degree of resemblance between humans and Neanderthals is fiercely debated by archaeologists, and even issues like whether Neanderthals had language have not been resolved. Dr. Paabo believes that genetic analysis is the best hope of doing so. He has paid particular attention to a gene known as FOXP2, which from its mutated forms in people seems to be involved in several advanced aspects of language.

A longstanding dispute among archaeologists is whether the modern humans who first entered Europe 45,000 years ago, ultimately from Africa, interbred with the Neanderthals or forced them into extinction. Interbreeding could have been genetically advantageous to the incoming humans, says Bruce Lahn, a geneticist at the University of Chicago, because the Neanderthals were well adapted to the cold European climate — the last ice age had another 35,000 years to run — and to local diseases.

And that plays out in textbooks. My old book indicated tehre was no relationship, my new one that there was not, and much current research comes down in the middle. The recovery of the full genome might well lay that question to rest, along with the question of interbreeding.

I won't telll you what lies at the end of the article -- but it raises all sorts of moral/ethical questions that are fascinating to think about.

Posted by: Greg at 05:14 AM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
Post contains 757 words, total size 5 kb.

I'll have to pass this on to my students in a few weeks.

The pharaohs of ancient Egypt owed their existence to prehistoric climate change in the Eastern Sahara, according to an exhaustive study of archaeological data that bolsters this theory.

Starting at about 8500 B.C., researchers say, broad swaths of what are now Egypt, Chad, Libya, and Sudan experienced a "sudden onset of humid conditions."

For centuries the region supported savannahs full of wildlife, lush acacia forests, and areas so swampy they were uninhabitable.

During this time the prehistoric peoples of the Eastern Sahara followed the rains to keep pace with the most hospitable ecosystems.

But around 5300 B.C. this climate-driven environmental abundance started to decline, and most humans began leaving the increasingly arid region.

"Around 5,500 to 6,000 years ago the Egyptian Sahara became so dry that nobody could survive there," said Stefan Kröpelin, a geoarchaeologist at the University of Cologne in Germany and study co-author.

Without rain, rivers, or the ephemeral desert streams known as waddis, vegetation became sparse, and people had to leave the desert or die, Kröpelin says.

Members of this skilled human population settled near the Nile River, giving rise to the first pharaonic cultures in Egypt

This does help to explain the Neolithic Revolution that occurred around this time, as people began the transition to an agricultural society. The concentration of human beings in one region resulted in th formation of cities, specialization of labor -- and civilization.

Posted by: Greg at 11:57 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 255 words, total size 2 kb.

I've seen few defenses of the Vietnam war made so concisely and so eloquently. And it takes a Canadian writer, looking at the ignoble role of his own country in support of deserters and draft dodgers, to say it.

Let's get something clear here.

Vietnam was a moral war.

A bunch of folks written off at the time as loonies by the left predicted that if South Vietnam fell it would become a brutal Communist dictatorship that would herd dissidents into concentration camps, that other south Asian nations would also fall.

Well, after Saigon fell, those predictions came true. Life in Vietnam, particularly for ethnic Chinese, became so horrific that it gave birth to the boat people, who were thousands of desperate souls who crammed themselves and their children into leaky boats and cast themselves into the ocean to get away from the monsters who'd "liberated" their homeland.

They became fodder for sharks and pirates, but it was worth the risk to get out of yet another "people's democratic republic" under a red flag.

Another Communist, Pol Pot, who conquered Cambodia, was worse. He killed off millions of his own countrymen; their skulls are still heaped in pyramids around that nation.

After the war, North Vietnamese leaders admitted they'd been defeated militarily, but that was irrelevant. The real war was won in the streets of America.

In a very real sense, every U.S. draft dodger and deserter helped consign the millions who suffered and died under south Asian communism to their fate.

Maybe there is still hope for Soviet Kanuckistan after all.

Posted by: Greg at 07:07 AM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
Post contains 272 words, total size 2 kb.

WHEN, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume, among the powers of the Earth, the separate and equal Station to which the Laws of Nature and of nature's God entitle them, a decent Respect to the Opinions of Mankind requires that they should declare the Causes which impel them to the Separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed, by their Creator, with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness - that to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, that whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles, and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate, that governments long established, should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object, evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security. Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former systems of government. The history of the present King of Great-Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over these states. To prove this, let facts be submitted to a candid world.
more...

Posted by: Greg at 04:00 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 1527 words, total size 10 kb.

From John Adams' Letter to his wife, Abigail, written the afternoon of July 3, 1776.

The second day of July, 1776, will be memorable Epocha in the History of America. I am apt to believe that it will be celebrated by succeeding generations, as the great Anniversary Festival. It ought to be commemorated, as the day of deliverance by solemn acts of devotion to God Almighty. It ought to be solemnized with pomp, shews, games, sports, guns, bells, bonfires and illuminations, from one end of the continent to the other, from this time forward forever.

You will think me transported with enthusiasm; but I am not. I am well aware of the toil, and blood, and treasure, that it will cost us to maintain this declaration, and support and defend these states. Yet, through all the gloom, I can see the rays of light and glory; I can see that the end is more than worth all the means, and that posterity will triumph, although you and I may rue, which I hope we shall not.

So let us this day remember the work of Lee and Adams, Franklin and Jefferson, and all those patriots whose courage and love of country led to the signing of the Declaration of Independence two days later, on July 4, 1776.

This Post Will Remain At The Top Of the Page In Honor Of The Day. Newer Posts Will Appear In The Space Below.

Posted by: Greg at 05:59 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 248 words, total size 1 kb.

Noting that today, not Tuesday, is the 230th anniversary of Continental Congress' vote for independence, the New York Times' Adam Goodheart comes up with this list of 10 days that changed American history.

Take this one.

FEB. 15, 1933: The Wobbly Chair

It should have been an easy shot: five rounds at 25 feet. But the gunman, Giuseppe Zangara, an anarchist, lost his balance atop a wobbly chair, and instead of hitting President-elect Franklin D. Roosevelt, he fatally wounded the mayor of Chicago, who was shaking hands with F.D.R.

Had Roosevelt been assassinated, his conservative Texas running mate, John Nance Garner, would most likely have come to power. "The New Deal, the move toward internationalism — these would never have happened," says Alan Brinkley of Columbia University. "It would have changed the history of the world in the 20th century. I don't think the Kennedy assassination changed things as much as Roosevelt's would have."

I've often wondered about that one myself -- seems like an interesting point of departure for an alternate history novel.

As a whole, the dates selected are an interesting bunch. -- and not all based upon politics, which I think is often a failing of such lists.

Posted by: Greg at 06:10 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
Post contains 215 words, total size 2 kb.

Riggs Bank was the most important financial institution in Washington for years. Now that it has been purchased by PNC, the old records in one vault are being scrutinized -- as it contains the financial records of many well-known historical figures.

On Aug. 28, 1861, a month after the Union Army's disastrous defeat at the first Battle of Bull Run, President Abraham Lincoln sat down and wrote out a Riggs Bank check for $3 to "Mr. Johns (a sick man)."

It is not known who Johns was, where Lincoln encountered him or what prompted the beleaguered president to pause amid the opening weeks of the Civil War to give him a donation.

It is but a tantalizing shard of local history, one of the thousands that reside not in the National Archives or Library of Congress but behind the thick steel door of a 40-year-old basement bank vault in downtown Washington, where the question has become: What to do with them?

The Lincoln check is among a trove of documents gathered over the decades by Washington's venerable and now-defunct Riggs Bank -- which, along with its antecedents, had customers ranging from Davy Crockett to President George H.W. Bush.

The collection includes letters, notes and checks written by, among others, George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, Theodore Roosevelt, Eleanor Roosevelt, Dwight Eisenhower, Brigham Young and Gen. John Pershing.

Now, Pittsburgh-based PNC Bank, which took over Riggs on May 13, 2005, is in the midst of a project to gather and inventory the artifacts, which include shelves of crumbling ledgers that go back a century and a half.

John Tydings, director of the PNC-Riggs Bank archives project, said last week that PNC has never acquired such a collection. PNC "recognized the need to address this in a much more sensitive way because of the connection of these records to the history of this country, as well as the history of the bank and the history of the city," he said.

What insights into the personalities and habits of historical figures might we get? What scandals might be revealed -- or laid to rest? I envy the historian put in charge of this project -- Mary Beth Corrigan -- who will have the honor and pleasure of cataloging and preserving the precious documents.

Of particular interest to me? The Lincoln account, for it seems that the president was in the habit of wandering the streets of Washington, and he would often engage in personal works of charity as he did so, writing checks like the one mentioned earlier when he was particularly moved.

Posted by: Greg at 11:03 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 440 words, total size 3 kb.

May we always honor the sacrifices of those who step forward to serve our country in its time of need -- and honor those who die in service to America.

For 60 years, Nancy Kenney wondered what happened to her father.

The submarine that William T. Mabin was in disappeared while he and his crewmates were on a mission to attack a Japanese convoy in the last months of World War II.

Now, the Navy says a wreck found at the bottom of the Gulf of Thailand appears to be the sub, the USS Lagarto.

* * *

Navy divers on Friday completed a six-day survey of the wreckage site. They took photos and video of the 311-foot, 9-inch submarine for further analysis by naval archeologists.

The divers found twin 5-inch gun mounts on the forward and rear parts of the ship — a feature believed to be unique to the Lagarto.

They also saw the word "Manitowoc'' displayed on the submarine's propeller, providing a connection to the Manitowoc, Wis., shipyard that built the Lagarto in the 1940s.

Eighty-six sailors died when the Lagarto sank in May 1945. The Japanese minelayer Hatsutaka reported dropping depth charges and sinking a U.S. sub in the area, though it was never known what ship it destroyed.

The Navy sent its divers to examine the ship to provide the sailors' families with some answers after a British professional shipwreck diver last year found what looked like the Lagarto, said Lt. Cmdr. Jeff Davis, a spokesman for the U.S. Pacific Fleet Submarine Force.

"It was important to bring a sense of closure to these families and it was important to do it in a way that would honor our fellow submariners,'' Davis said.

And so these honored dead will continue to rest where they died, entombed in the ship on which they served.

Perhaps most poignant on the eve of Father's Day is this comment from Mrs. Kenney.

Since Kenney was just a toddler when her father went to war, she has no conscious memories of their life in LaGrange, Ill. But she said news of the Navy's dive "was the most important piece'' of a puzzle about her father that she's been trying to put together for six decades.

The children of the Lagarto sailors feel closer to their fathers now more than ever, she said.

"We feel like we've found our fathers,'' Kenney said.

From the child of one Navy man to another, I offer you the most humble of thanks for the service and sacrifiece of your father.

Lord God, our power evermore,
Whose arm doth reach the ocean floor,
Dive with our men beneath the sea;
Traverse the depths protectively.
O hear us when we pray, and keep
Them safe from peril in the deep.

THE CREW OF USS LAGARTO

Andrews, H. D. CTM
Anker, C. CMOMM
Auchard, F. L. LTJG
Bjornson, C. H. F1
Breithaupt, C. W., Jr. Y2
Britain, W. L. CRMA
Brock, A. S2
Byrer, C. R. F1
Carleton, W. E. RM1
Cathey, L. F. MOMM3
Catozzi, S. G. QM3
Clouse, G. E. TM2
Cook, C. T. MOMM1
Davis, J. E., Jr. TM2
Doud, L. M. RM2
Enns, A. H. TM3
Fisher, R. L. MOMM1
Franze, J. J. S1
Frasch, O. R. MOMM1
Gerlach, J. N. F1
Grace, R. F. F2
Graves, W. QM1
Gray, D. J. EM2
Green, R. STM2
Gregorik, R. L. EM1
Gregory, J. P. S2
Halstead, G. E. RM3
Hardegree, T. MOMM1
Harrington, G. C. MOMM3
Harrington, T. J. MOMM2
Harris, J. B. S1
Harrison, J. C. MOMM3
Hinken, W. E. TM3
Honaker, W. F. EM3
Irving, L. G. LT
Jefferson, H. S1
Jobe, J. CEMA
Johnson, F. S1
Johnson, J. R. CEMA
Jordan, W. H., Jr. S1
Keeney, A. H., Jr. LT
Kimball, P. M. RT1
Kirtley, A. STM1
Kneidl, J. W. MOMM3
Latta, F. D. CDR
Lee, N. B., Jr. S1
Lee, R. W. F1
Lewis, R. J. MOMM2
Lynch, L. J. F1
Mabin, W. T. SM1
Marriot, J. M., Jr. S1
McDonald, J. H. SC2
McGee, J. M. TM2
Mendenhall, W. H. LT
Moore, W. L. F1
Moss, W. G. S1
O'Hara, L. R. RT2
Ortega, H. E. F1
Paper, D. M. S1
Pash, J. S. LTJG
Patterson, R. R. RM3
Perry, R. C. EM3
Peterson, J. W. TM3
Peterson, R. F. QM3
Phelps, W. B. LTJG
Plushnik, H. R. F1
Price, G. A. CMOMMA
Reeves, M. D. EM2
Reichert, R. E. F1
Robinson, E. T. BM1
Root, J. H. MOMM1
Ruble, R. T. LT
Rutledge, W. J. S1
Shackelford, W. C. SM2
Simmerman, R. E. TM2
Spalding, R. B. CPHMA
Stehn, J. E. GM2
Stiegler, D. G. EM2
St. John, U. M., Jr. EM3
Tait, F. MOMM2
Todd, H. A., Jr. LTJG
Turner, F. D. CGM
Wade, A. M. S1
Warnick, W. C. S1
Wicklander, M. M. MOMM2
Williams, J. L. S1

OPEN TRACKBACKING TO: Conservative Cat, Samantha Burns, Stuck On Stupid, Bacon Bits, Adam's Blog, Dumb Ox, Lil Duck Duck, Third World County, Blue Star Chronicles, Echo9er, Cigar Intelligence Agency, Stop the ACLU, Wizbang, Gribbit's World, Assorted Babble, Pursuing Holiness

Posted by: Greg at 05:59 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
Post contains 861 words, total size 6 kb.

It used to be an article of faith among the all-knowing doubters of Scripture that the story of Uriah the Hittite was proof of the errancy of the Bible. After all, they said, the Hittites did not exist. Until archaeologists discovered the Hittite Empire in Turkey.

Now we find another proof of a civilization that doubters claimed did not exist -- an organized Edomite society in the Holly Land itself.

In biblical lore, Edom was the implacable adversary and menacing neighbor of the Israelites. The Edomites lived south of the Dead Sea and east of the desolate rift valley known as Wadi Arabah, and from time to time they had to be dealt with by force, notably by the likes of Kings David and Solomon.

Today, the Edomites are again in the thick of combat — of the scholarly kind. The conflict is heated and protracted, as is often the case with issues related to the reliability of the Bible as history.

Chronology is at the crux of the debate. Exactly when did the nomadic tribes of Edom become an organized society with the might to threaten Israel? Were David and Solomon really kings of a state with growing power in the 10th century B.C.? Had writers of the Bible magnified the stature of the two societies at such an early time in history?

An international team of archaeologists has recorded radiocarbon dates that they say show the tribes of Edom may have indeed come together in a cohesive society as early as the 12th century B.C., certainly by the 10th. The evidence was found in the ruins of a large copper-processing center and fortress at Khirbat en-Nahas, in the lowlands of what was Edom and is now part of Jordan.

Thomas E. Levy, a leader of the excavations, said in an interview last week that the findings there and at abandoned mines elsewhere in the region demonstrated that the Edomites had developed a complex state much earlier than previously thought.

Dr. Levy, an archaeologist at the University of California, San Diego, said the research had yielded not only the first high-precision dates in the region, but also such telling artifacts as scarabs, ceramics, metal arrowheads, hammers, grinding stones and slag heaps. Radiocarbon analysis of charred wood, grain and fruit in several sediment layers revealed two major phases of copper processing, first in the 12th and 11th centuries, later in the 10th and 9th.

Khirbat en-Nahas is 30 miles from the Dead Sea and 30 miles north of Petra, Jordan's most famous archaeological site. The name means "ruins of copper" in Arabic. One of the first ancient occupation sites in the Edomite lowlands to be intensively investigated, the ruins of its buildings and grounds spread over 24 acres, and the fortifications enclose an area 240 by 240 feet.

"Only a complex society such as a paramount chiefdom or primitive kingdom would have the organizational know-how to produce copper metal on such an industrial scale," Dr. Levy concluded.

Now I will be the first to concede that the archaeological evidence does not prove scrptural inspiration or inerrancy -- but it does show once again that the Bible provides a faithful testimony to historical facts.

Posted by: Greg at 11:09 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 545 words, total size 3 kb.

One senoir British military strategist has a very dim view of the future -- and one that he sees happening within the next dozen years. He compares it to the age of mass migration by the barbarian tribes that precipitated the fall of the Roman Empire.

ONE of BritainÂ’s most senior military strategists has warned that western civilisation faces a threat on a par with the barbarian invasions that destroyed the Roman empire.

In an apocalyptic vision of security dangers, Rear Admiral Chris Parry said future migrations would be comparable to the Goths and Vandals while north African "barbary" pirates could be attacking yachts and beaches in the Mediterranean within 10 years.

Europe, including Britain, could be undermined by large immigrant groups with little allegiance to their host countries — a "reverse colonisation" as Parry described it. These groups would stay connected to their homelands by the internet and cheap flights. The idea of assimilation was becoming redundant, he said.

The warnings by Parry of what could threaten Britain over the next 30 years were delivered to senior officers and industry experts at a conference last week. Parry, head of the development, concepts and doctrine centre at the Ministry of Defence, is charged with identifying the greatest challenges that will frame national security policy in the future.

If a security breakdown occurred, he said, it was likely to be brought on by environmental destruction and a population boom, coupled with technology and radical Islam. The result for Britain and Europe, Parry warned, could be "like the 5th century Roman empire facing the Goths and the Vandals".

It might be time for some of us to start looking at the end of the Classical period and the beginning of the Dark Ages if we are to understand the developments taking place among us -- and to influence our civilization to mobilize against the thread.

Posted by: Greg at 10:45 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 329 words, total size 2 kb.

I'm disgusted that this sacred site has been desecrated.

And not just by the scumbags with a racist message. But by the issuance of a permit for any sort of rally.

Calling themselves the 'ghosts of the Confederacy,' white supremacists from several groups held a rally at Antietam National Battlefield yesterday, the first time any group has been permitted to demonstrate at the site of the bloodiest day of the Civil War.

About 30 men, women and children gathered at what was a family farm at the time of the battle to commemorate their 'forefathers' who 'fought for our liberty as white men,' said Gordon Young, imperial wizard of the World Knights of the Ku Klux Klan.

A few donned the white robes characteristic of the Klan, while others identifying with the National Socialist Movement wore swastika arm bands and other mock-military uniforms.

Young, of Hagerstown, who was dressed in a brown business suit, said he had applied for a First Amendment permit so he and others could talk about 'black-on-white crime,' and his group's fight for 'equal treatment as whites.'

As he and others spoke, an assembly of local residents, bikers and activists shouted them down with a bullhorn and chants.

The soil of our nation's battlefields must be held sacred to the memories of those who fought and died there. These are not mere parks -- they are historical sites, monumnet to those whose blood was she. There should be no permits issued for any rally, demonstration, or political event.

What next? Demonstrations at Gettysburg or Bull Run?

Posted by: Greg at 06:27 AM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
Post contains 264 words, total size 2 kb.

I recently added The Federalist's Quote of the Day feature to my blog, sharing with my readers the wisdom of those who founded Our Republic, having framed the documents that provide a foundation for American liberty, such as the Declaration of Independence, Constitution, and Bill of Rights.

Today's quote, from Thomas Jefferson, deserves a special post all its own, and a place of special prominence.

Our peculiar security is in the possession of a written Constitution. Let us not make it a blank paper by construction.
-- Thomas Jefferson (letter to Wilson Nicholas, 1803)
The Writings of Thomas Jefferson (Memorial Edition), Lipscomb and Bergh, eds., 10:419.

We live in an age in which there are many, especially in the judiciary, who would make of the Constitution a blank page by construing itsclear words in a manner alien to the American political and legal tradition, and through the application of alien laws and doctrines to the matters over which that great charter of liberty is to be the supreme law. Let us remember that the touchstone is the text as it was understood by those who wrote and ratified it, not the latest academic fad, legal trend, or judicial fancy.

Posted by: Greg at 10:06 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 207 words, total size 1 kb.

A commission in the state of North Carolina acknowledges what history has long recorded -- that Democrat partisans overthrew the elected Republican city government in Wilmington, North Carolina in 1898 and engaged in a campaign of race-based murder that resulted in the deaths of over 40 black citizens who had voted for and participated in the formation of the Republican administration.

Now there is discussion of possibly giving reparations for the crimes of the racist Jim Crow Democrats who perpetrated the bloody coup.

A state-appointed commission is urging North Carolina to provide reparations for the 1898 racial violence that sparked an exodus of more than 2,000 black residents from Wilmington.

The 500-page report that was produced after six years of study also said the violence, which killed as many as 60 people, was not a spontaneous riot but rather the nation's only recorded coup d'etat.

"There is no amount of money that can repair what happened years ago and compensate for the loss of lives and the loss of property," said vice chairman Irving Joyner, a professor at N.C. Central School of Law.

The commission did not provide any cost estimates, although compensation advocate Larry Thomas of Chapel Hill estimated that the economic losses calculated today are "probably in the billions of dollars."

Along with compensation to victims' descendants, the commission also recommended incentives for minority small businesses and help for minority home ownership. It also recommended that the history of the incident be taught in public schools.

Let's be clear about the results of the racist pogrom.

The 1898 violence began when white vigilantes, resentful after years of black and Republican political rule during Reconstruction, burned the printing press of a black newspaper publisher, Alexander Manly.

Violence spread, resulting in an exodus of 2,100 blacks, the commission concluded. Then the largest city in the state, Wilmington flipped from a black majority to a white majority in the months that followed.

Before the violence, which led to a Democratic takeover from Republicans and Populists, black men in North Carolina had been able to vote for about three decades. But Democrats quickly passed voter literacy tests and a grandfather clause, which disenfranchised black voters until the civil rights movement of the 1960s.

"The growth of Wilmington was stunted as a result of what happened in 1898," Joyner said. "Wilmington has never recovered economically, socially or politically."

I don't minimize what happened in Wilmington -- and in fact wrote about it several months back (when the News & Observer wrote about this horrific event and its own involvement with it), decrying that fact that the Democrat partisans who engaged in murder, mayhem, and the suppression of civil rights of American citizens were never punished for their misdeeds.

No one was arrested for this act of rebellion against lawful authority during time of war (treaty negotiations to end the Spanish-American War were still underway in Paris), and Josephus Daniels, whose active support for white supremacy in the pages of his newspaper led to him being referred to by one historian as the "precipitator of the riot", eventually became Secretary of the Navy for the entire two terms of the Wilson administration.

It was an evil deed perpetrated by the racist members of a racist political party that practices and encourages racism to this day.

That said, I do not know how reparations can ever be properly assessed or distributed.

Those who perpetrated the misdeeds 108 years ago are long dead, as are their victims. Given that reparations are designed to "repair" or "make whole" those who have been harmed, and morally can only be legitimate if they come from those whose actions were responsible for the damage, it is impossible to repair the damage. The harm is too remote, and the connection of present day North Carolinians to the perpetrators is so tenuous, that it is impossible to do more than acknowledge the evils done in the past and make a firm resolution of purpose to ensure that such wrong-doing will never be permitted in the future.

More to the point, the only remaining "perpetrators" of this coup and campaign of murder are the Democrat Party and the News & Observer newspaper (which stirred the white supremacists to action). I suppose that the government of North Carolina could disband those two institutions, seize their assets, and distribute the proceeds to the descendants of the murder victims. But this would never happen, because anyone with common sense would recognize that such actions would be unjust (as would actions against the individual descendants of Josephus Daniels and other participants in these ugly events for their ancestors' misdeeds). The reality is that the present-day institutions are not the same as those who committed the crimes of 1898 -- the News & Observer has been owned for over a decade by a California corporation, and the Democrat Party (while still racist and disloyal to Constitutional notions of equal rights for all regardless of race) cannot really be held responsible for the actions of its members and officials over a century ago.

And neither can the twenty-first century taxpayers of North Carolina be held responsible for the failings of nineteenth-century government officials.

So I encourage the building of monuments to prick the conscience, the establishment of educational programs to dispel the ignorance that is racism, and the recommitment of our society to eradicating government imposed barriers to equality for all Americans. But financial reparations at this late date would be simply one more injustice added to the tab of those who overthrew the elected government of Wilmington, murdered its citizens, and destroyed a community.

Posted by: Greg at 05:22 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 950 words, total size 7 kb.

Who were these noble Romans, and why are they buried together, not cremated?

Archaeologists exploring one of Rome's oldest catacombs are baffled by neat piles of more than 1,000 skeletons dressed in elegant togas.

The macabre find emerged as teams of historians slowly picked their way through the complex network of underground burial chambers, which stretch for miles under the city.

They say the tomb, which has been dated to the first century AD, is the first known example of a "mass burial".

The archaeologists are unable to explain why so many apparently upper-class Romans - who would normally have been cremated - were buried in the same spot, apparently at the same time.

Forensic tests are being carried out to try to establish whether the Romans suffered violent deaths, or were victims of an undocumented epidemic or natural disaster.

There are dozens of catacombs beneath the ancient city, some dating back 2,000 years and many used as burial places by early Christians. Others were used as secret places of worship to avoid persecution.

The Vatican's Pontifical Commission for Sacred Archaeology is overseeing the dig. Its chief inspector of catacombs, Raffaella Giuliani, said: "This is the earliest example of such a mass burial. Usually two or three bodies at the most were put into holes dug out of the rock in the catacombs, but in these case we have several rooms filled with skeletons.

"They are placed one on top of the other and not in a disorderly fashion. They have been carefully buried, with dignity, but the puzzle is why so many at a time?"

The skeletons were dressed in fine robes, many containing gold thread, and wrapped in sheets covered with lime, as was common in early Christian burials.
The discovery was made at the Catacomb of SS Peter and Marcellinus on the ancient Via Labicana in south-east Rome.

Miss Giuliani said there was no obvious sign that violence was the cause. "We are trying to establish whether the skeletons were buried there following some form of epidemic or natural disaster.

It is possible they could have been persecuted and killed by the Romans and then buried there by fellow Christians - we just don't know."

The Vatican will officially present the discovery next month, along with officials from the University of Bordeaux who had been involved in the excavations.

The mysteries of history continue to be exposed and deciphered. I look forward to learning more in the months and years ahead.

Posted by: Greg at 11:25 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 424 words, total size 3 kb.

It is hard to argue against the premise that Thomas Jefferson was the greatest intellect to ever occupy the White House, as well as the author of one of the most important documents in world history. And it is equally beyond dispute that without John Adams, the need for that document would have been moot, for he was the firebrand that spurred his colleagues on to declare independence. As much as George Washington, they deserve recognition as fathers of our country. And if Adams is overshadowed by the great men whose presidencies surround his, one cannot argue that his was unimportant.

In less than a week, though, a record they set will be eclipsed by Jimmy Carter and Walter Mondale – that for longevity by a president and vice president from the same administration.

On Thursday, May 23rd, President Jimmy Carter and Vice President Walter Mondale will become the longest-living, post-administration President and Vice President in U.S. history. On that day, they will surpass President John Adams and Thomas Jefferson. Adams and Jefferson lived 25 years, 122 days after the end of their administration. Both Adams and Jefferson died on July 4th, 1826.

On Thursday, President Carter and Vice President Mondale will have lived 25 years, 123 days after leaving office.

"While breaking the Adams and Jefferson record is certainly a milestone, the important thing is how President Carter and Vice President Mondale have used that time," Carter Presidential Library Director Jay Hakes said.

Sorry, Jake – I’d have to argue that the holders of the longevity title remain mediocre and insignificant, especially when compared to their esteemed predecessors. One is an apologist for terrorists and dictators, while the other is a non-entity. Compared to Adams and Jefferson, the best they can hope for is to continue to fade deeper into murky mists of insignificance.

Posted by: Greg at 11:48 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 313 words, total size 2 kb.

There isn't enough DNA in supposed Seville remains to do research, and the Dominicans refuse to grant access to alleged remains in the New World. That means that we may never be able to figure out conclusively where the bones of Christopher Columbus really rest today.

But more than that, will we ever figure out who the "discoverer of America" really was? What were his roots, which have been clouded in mystery for centuries?

He gave new meaning to the phrase "world-class celebrity," but like Garbo, Christopher Columbus had little interest in talking about himself and dismissed queries about his origins with a rhetorical shrug: " Vine de nada" -- "I came from nothing."

It was never enough. For centuries, scholars have wondered about this enigmatic mariner whose compulsion to travel east by traveling west altered the course of Western civilization and effectively ended the Middle Ages.

He may have been born in Genoa, but he wrote in indifferent Latin or in good Spanish -- never in Italian. He had French connections, married a Portuguese woman, may have been Jewish, may have lived in Catalonia and died May 20, 500 years ago this week, in the Spanish city of Valladolid.

To commemorate this event, researchers led by Spanish forensic pathologist Jos� Antonio Lorente Acosta are comparing the DNA of Columbus's illegitimate son, Fernando, with DNA from hundreds of possible Columbus descendants in at least three countries.

The goal is to determine once and for all whether Columbus, as traditionalists hold, was the son of Genoese wool weaver Domenico Colombo, or was instead a Spaniard named Colon; or a Catalan Colom, from Barcelona; or a French Coulom or Colomb; or perhaps Corsican or Mallorcan.

"We'll get something, but it will be complicated," Lorente said in a telephone interview from his University of Granada office. "The trick is to differentiate between the Columbuses from different places -- and there's no guarantee."

The likely result? That is a good question, as there are plausible narratives to explain any of the above -- or some combination.

Or perhaps we will have to live with the mystery.

Posted by: Greg at 10:31 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
Post contains 358 words, total size 2 kb.

It might be a guy known as Donor 401 -- if you trace your ancestry back 50,000 years.

The Post has been diligently tracking the progeny of Donor 401, a man of German extraction who tans well and whose sperm is in great demand. The number of 401's children is at least 14, which would have been an impressive number to me had I not just completed Nicholas Wade's book "Before the Dawn" and learned that the late Genghis Khan had about 500 wives and concubines, producing enough children so that now, if you do the math, they have generated 16 million males alone -- or "about 0.5 percent of the world's total." Donor 401, you have a ways to go.

But on account of Wade's book, I strongly suspect that Donor 401 and Genghis Khan operated out of the same imperative -- to pass on their genes to the next generation. This, after all, is our genetic obligation, and in Wade's view -- or at least in his observation -- it is why some men go into politics. He quotes former French president Francois Mitterrand, who said, "I don't know of a single head of state who hasn't yielded to some kind of carnal temptation, small or large. That in itself is a reason to govern." Better than narrowing the deficit, I would volunteer.

In fact, from what Wade suggests, Donor 401 is a sly fellow, pulling off what in evolution is the ultimate triumph: getting others, particularly men, to raise his progeny. Those who have no biological children of their own are evolution's total losers. Their genes end with them and that, as we all know, is just a pity -- a fate truly worse than death: extinction.

For some time now, I have been excitedly inflicting this book on my friends. It is rich in scientific cynicism, the unsparing pragmatism of our cold and calculating genes. For instance, they have ensured that newborns in general are not only cute but look alike -- so the charmed but possibly cuckolded male will accept them as his own. It traces the history of mankind from the time, around 50,000 years ago, when human beings left Africa and started to spread throughout the world.

This is our prehistory. It lacks archeological or written records, but much of what happened can be discerned from our DNA. This is all relatively new to us, but by peering into our most basic living material, snoopy scientists are beginning to see how we evolved -- and why. For instance, the gene that permits us to digest lactose as adults is a relatively new development -- linked, no doubt, to the advent of agriculture. Genetically speaking, we are still on the move.

On some level, love and sex come down to a competition to spread our genes and become the dominant male. Seems to me that Donor 40was the big winner of his day.

Posted by: Greg at 10:20 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 495 words, total size 3 kb.

I guess they prefer an outhouse to the woods – and get cranky if the have to wait long.

Harold Cerda had just left an outhouse on a southern Colorado ranch when a bear swatted him to the ground and chased him to his car, where he discovered the animal had also eaten his lunch.

"He sent me a good 10 or 15 feet," Cerda told The Associated Press in a telephone interview Friday. "I'm used to hard falls because I used to ride bulls a lot. It's pretty much the hardest I've been hit."

He guessed the cinnamon-colored black bear was anywhere from 150 to 500 pounds and nearly 6½ feet tall when standing.

I'm betting it was the chicken salad sitting in the car -- that'll get you every time, hman or bear.

Posted by: Greg at 11:43 AM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
Post contains 147 words, total size 1 kb.

Shame on Spain!

To intentionally destroy archaeological treasures without giving scholars time to fully examine and study them is an act of barbarism! To do so TO BUILD A PARKING LOT is a move that shocks the conscience.

THE archeologists could barely hide their excitement. Beneath the main square of Ecija, a small town in southern Spain, they had unearthed an astounding treasure trove of Roman history.

They discovered a well-preserved Roman forum, bath house, gymnasium and temple as well as dozens of private homes and hundreds of mosaics and statues — one of them considered to be among the finest found.

But now the bulldozers have moved in. The last vestiges of the lost city known as Colonia Augusta Firma Astigi — one of the great cities of the Roman world — have been destroyed to build an underground municipal car park.

Now i'll grant you that Europe is full of Roman ruins, but this city is one o some importance.

The Roman city has proved to be one of the biggest in the ancient world. Its estimated 30,000 citizens dominated the olive oil industry. Terracotta urns from Ecija have been discovered as far away as Britain and Rome.

The region produced three Roman emperors — Trajan, Theodosius and Hadrian — and the research has shown that Ecija was almost as important in the Roman world as Cordoba and Seville.

The socialist governmetn of the town offers this appalling justification for their actions.

The socialist council says that had it not dug up the main square, Plaza de Espana, to build the car park in 1998, the remains would never have been found. But it insists the town must press ahead with the new car park.

In other words, since it was not discovered until the preparations to build began, it obviously couldn't be as important as 299 parking spaces.

“Nonsense,” says the town’s chief archeologist, Antonio Fernandez Ugalde, director of the municipal museum. “For some reason, the politicians here think it is more important to park their own cars. It simply does not make sense.”

But despite opposition from numerous other archeological groups and the Spanish Royal Academy of Art, there is now no possibility of restoring the 2,000-year-old Roman town.

The most exquisite discovery was a statue, known as the Wounded Amazon, modelled on an ancient Greek goddess of war. Only three other such statues are known to exist. The one in Ecija is in by far the best condition with some of its original decorative paint intact.

So much history -- destroyed in the name of commercial development. What the Islamists do not destroy of Western Culture, we will destroy ourselves.

Posted by: Greg at 10:31 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 451 words, total size 3 kb.

More accurately, did Thutmose III have better relations with his step-mother, Queen Hatshepsut, than has been traditionally believed by students of Egyptian history?

This find certainly raises the possibility that everything we have been taught about the issue of their relationship has been incorrect.

A team of French and Egyptian archeologists have discovered two sets of nine solid gold cartouches bearing the name of Thotmusis III (who ruled from 1479-1425 BC) near the pharaoh's stepmother Queen Hatshepsut's temple in Luxor, 700 kilometres south of Cairo.

"These cartouches... which have the names of Hatshepsut and Thotmusis III have been found near Hatshepsut's obelisk which proves that the obelisk was erected by both rulers," said Zahi Hawass, Secretary General of the Supreme Council of Antiquities.

Thotmusis III, who was Hatshepsut's stepson and co-ruler after the death of his father Thotmusis II in 1479 BC, was widely regarded as having had strained relations with the queen. Thotmusis III was a child when his father died and the rule of the kindgom was initially put in the hands of Hatsheput.

Until the latest discovery, Egyptologists believed that Thotmusis III destroyed Hatshepsut's statues out of jealousy upon her death in 1458 BC, particularly the ones in Hatshepsut's temple in el Deir el Bahary in the southern city of Luxor.

"This goes against earlier views that Thotmusis III tried to hide Hatshepsut's obelisk when he took over as ruler and that he worked to erase any traces left by the queen," Hawass said.

The new discoveries will be taken to the Luxor Museum to be put on display.

That is one of the things about a field like Egyptology -- beneath the next grain of sand might be the piece of evidence that overthrows all that we thought we knew!

Posted by: Greg at 12:16 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 304 words, total size 2 kb.

Bigger and more ravenous than T-Rex.

And it isn't called MichaelMooreasaurous.

A new dinosaur species, one of the largest known carnivorous dinosaurs, has emerged from the red sandstone of Patagonia, in Argentina, where reptilian giants seem to have thrived 100 million years ago.

Paleontologists reported yesterday that they had found the fossils of seven to nine individuals of a species they are naming Mapusaurus roseae.

An analysis of the bones showed that an adult exceeded 40 feet in length, which the discoverers said was slightly larger than specimens of both its close relative, Giganotosaurus, and Tyrannosaurus rex. Some scientists think that a Spinosaurus species from North Africa is the largest meat-eating dinosaur, but that is still debated.

The discovery was made in sediments of a 100-million-year-old water channel at a site 15 miles south of Plaza Huincul, Argentina. It was reported at a news conference in Plaza Huincul and described in the French journal Geodiversitas.

Rodolfo A. Coria of the Carmen Funes Museum in Plaza Huincul and Philip J. Currie of the University of Alberta in Edmonton, co-leaders of the excavations, said they found hundreds of Mapusaurus bones in the sediments. Nearly all of the bones were scattered, and not in their original skeletal arrangements.

The description sounds pretty fierce -- but would it be able to compete with the film-maker in a buffet line?

Posted by: Greg at 10:34 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 233 words, total size 2 kb.

That is one option noted by the NY Times in an article today on the ancient city. It makes for interesting reading for the archaeologically inclined – even though it includes the all-important anti-American slant for which the formerly great paper is now known.

In this ancient city, it is hard to tell what are ruins and what's just ruined.

Crumbling brick buildings, some 2,500 years old, look like smashed sand castles at the beach.

Famous sites, like the Tower of Babel and the Hanging Gardens, are swallowed up by river reeds.

Signs of military occupation are everywhere, including trenches, bullet casings, shiny coils of razor wire and blast walls stamped, "This side Scud protection."
Babylon, the mud-brick city with the million-dollar name, has paid the price of war. It has been ransacked, looted, torn up, paved over, neglected and roughly occupied. Archaeologists said American soldiers even used soil thick with priceless artifacts to stuff sandbags.

But Iraqi leaders and United Nations officials are not giving up on it. They are working assiduously to restore Babylon, home to one of the Seven Wonders of the World, and turn it into a cultural center and possibly even an Iraqi theme park.

Funny, though, how the article glosses over the extent of Saddam’s rape of the site during his years in power. I guess they wouldn’t want to offend their lefty-readers by suggesting that their hero was a bad guy.

Posted by: Greg at 10:07 AM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
Post contains 243 words, total size 2 kb.

That is one option noted by the NY Times in an article today on the ancient city. It makes for interesting reading for the archaeologically inclined – even though it includes the all-important anti-American slant for which the formerly great paper is now known.

In this ancient city, it is hard to tell what are ruins and what's just ruined.

Crumbling brick buildings, some 2,500 years old, look like smashed sand castles at the beach.

Famous sites, like the Tower of Babel and the Hanging Gardens, are swallowed up by river reeds.

Signs of military occupation are everywhere, including trenches, bullet casings, shiny coils of razor wire and blast walls stamped, "This side Scud protection."
Babylon, the mud-brick city with the million-dollar name, has paid the price of war. It has been ransacked, looted, torn up, paved over, neglected and roughly occupied. Archaeologists said American soldiers even used soil thick with priceless artifacts to stuff sandbags.

But Iraqi leaders and United Nations officials are not giving up on it. They are working assiduously to restore Babylon, home to one of the Seven Wonders of the World, and turn it into a cultural center and possibly even an Iraqi theme park.

Funny, though, how the article glosses over the extent of SaddamÂ’s rape of the site during his years in power. I guess they wouldnÂ’t want to offend their lefty-readers by suggesting that their hero was a bad guy.

Posted by: Greg at 10:07 AM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
Post contains 248 words, total size 2 kb.

And in the course of that service performed deeds of heroism so compelling that Desmond Doss was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor.

Not bad for a pacifist who refused to carry a weapon out of a profound respect for the word of God and human life.

Desmond T. Doss, Sr., the only conscientious objector to win the Congressional Medal of Honor during World War II, has died. He was 87 years old.

Mr. Doss never liked being called a conscientious objector. He preferred the term conscientious cooperator. Raised a Seventh-day Adventist, Mr. Doss did not believe in using a gun or killing because of the sixth commandment which states, “Thou shalt not kill” (Exodus 20:13). Doss was a patriot, however, and believed in serving his country.

During World War II, instead of accepting a deferment, Mr. Doss voluntarily joined the Army as a conscientious objector. Assigned to the 307th Infantry Division as a company medic he was harassed and ridiculed for his beliefs, yet he served with distinction and ultimately received the Congressional Medal of Honor on Oct. 12, 1945 for his fearless acts of bravery.

According to his Medal of Honor citation, time after time, Mr. DossÂ’ fellow soldiers witnessed how unafraid he was for his own safety. He was always willing to go after a wounded fellow, no matter how great the danger. On one occasion in Okinawa, he refused to take cover from enemy fire as he rescued approximately 75 wounded soldiers, carrying them one-by-one and lowering them over the edge of the 400-foot Maeda Escarpment. He did not stop until he had brought everyone to safety nearly 12 hours later.

When Mr. Doss received the Medal of Honor from President Truman, the President told him, “I’m proud of you, you really deserve this. I consider this a greater honor than being President.”

Mr. Doss’ exemplary devotion to God and his country has received nationwide attention. On July 4, 2004, a statue of Mr. Doss was placed in the National Museum of Patriotism in Atlanta, along with statues of Dr. Martin Luther King, President Jimmy Carter, and retired Marine Corps General Gray Davis, also a Medal of Honor recipient. Also in 2004, a feature-length documentary called “The Conscientious Objector,” telling Doss’ story of faith, heroism, and bravery was released. A feature movie describing Doss’ story is also being planned.

Mr. Doss died Thursday morning in Piedmont, Ala. He is survived by his wife, Frances; his son, Desmond T. Doss, Jr., and his brother, Harold Doss.

Visitation will be held from 6 to 8:30 p.m. Friday, March 31, at Heritage Funeral Home, located at 3239 Battlefield Parkway, Fort Oglethorpe.

A memorial service will be held Saturday, April 1, at 3 p.m. at the Collegedale Seventh-day Adventist Church located at 4829 College Drive East in Collegedale.

Burial will take place on Monday, April 3, at 11 a.m. at the Chattanooga National Cemetery.

In lieu of flowers, the Doss family requests that donations be sent to the Desmond Doss Museum Fund at the Georgia-Cumberland Conference office (P.O. Box 12000 Calhoun, Ga., 30703).

This man, ladies and gentlemen, was a true hero. We look at today's crop of "peace activists" and find a motley crew of ne'er-do-wells and whiners who have little respect for this country or its soldiers. Contrast the actions of Desmond Doss with the refusal of the recently rescued Christian Peacemaker team hostages to offer so much as a word of gratitude for the actions of military personnel who rescued them from terrorists who kidnapped them and murdered one of their number.

I have no doubt that Mr. Doss is this day in Paradise, in the company of the One True God.

ADDITIONAL TRIBUTES: MFVOV, Missing Link, Chaotic Synaptic Activity, Mudville Gazette, The Daily Brief, Hit and Run, Eric Berlin, Slobokan, Riehl World, Chatter, Two Malcontents, Fred Schoeneman, Blackfive

UPDATE: The Washington Post has this obituary, which is very good. It notes that Doss was not the only conscientious objector to receive thh Congressional Medal of Honor, merely the first. The other, Cpl. Thomas W. Bennett, a medical aidman who died while serving during the Vietnam War, also received the nation's highest military honor.

I urge you to click below to read the extended entry, where I have reproduced the full text of the citation that accompanied his Medal. You will be awe-struck by the degree of bravery exhibited by this man over the course of several days. Such Christ-like devotion to his fellow man in the face of his own possible death -- including while seriously wounded himself -- brought tears to my eyes. more...

Posted by: Greg at 02:51 PM | Comments (25) | Add Comment
Post contains 1338 words, total size 11 kb.

This just in from Crete, 500 BC.

A 2,500-year-old sarcophagus with vivid color illustrations from Homer's epics has been discovered in western Cyprus, archaeologists said Monday.

Construction workers found the limestone sarcophagus last week in a tomb near the village of Kouklia, in the coastal Paphos area. The tomb, which probably belonged to an ancient warrior, had been looted during antiquity.

"The style of the decoration is unique, not so much from an artistic point of view, but for the subject and the colors used," said Pavlos Flourentzos, director of the island's antiquities department.

Only two similar sarcophagi have ever been discovered in Cyprus before. One is housed in New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art and the other in the British Museum in London, but their colors are more faded, Flourentzos said.

Flourentzos said the coffin -- painted in red, black and blue on a white background -- dated to 500 B.C., when Greek cultural influence was gaining a firm hold on the eastern Mediterranean island. Pottery discovered in the tomb is expected to provide a more precise date.

Experts believe the ornate decoration features the hero Ulysses in scenes from Homer's Iliad and Odyssey -- both hugely popular throughout the Greek world.
In one large painting, Ulysses and his comrades escape from the blind Cyclops Polyphemos' cave, hidden under a flock of sheep. Another depicts a battle between Greeks and Trojans from the Iliad.

Go look at the picture.

Posted by: Greg at 01:03 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 246 words, total size 2 kb.

This just in from Crete, 500 BC.

A 2,500-year-old sarcophagus with vivid color illustrations from Homer's epics has been discovered in western Cyprus, archaeologists said Monday.

Construction workers found the limestone sarcophagus last week in a tomb near the village of Kouklia, in the coastal Paphos area. The tomb, which probably belonged to an ancient warrior, had been looted during antiquity.

"The style of the decoration is unique, not so much from an artistic point of view, but for the subject and the colors used," said Pavlos Flourentzos, director of the island's antiquities department.

Only two similar sarcophagi have ever been discovered in Cyprus before. One is housed in New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art and the other in the British Museum in London, but their colors are more faded, Flourentzos said.

Flourentzos said the coffin -- painted in red, black and blue on a white background -- dated to 500 B.C., when Greek cultural influence was gaining a firm hold on the eastern Mediterranean island. Pottery discovered in the tomb is expected to provide a more precise date.

Experts believe the ornate decoration features the hero Ulysses in scenes from Homer's Iliad and Odyssey -- both hugely popular throughout the Greek world.
In one large painting, Ulysses and his comrades escape from the blind Cyclops Polyphemos' cave, hidden under a flock of sheep. Another depicts a battle between Greeks and Trojans from the Iliad.

Go look at the picture.

Posted by: Greg at 01:03 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 252 words, total size 2 kb.

I’m not a big fan of reparations, generations-late apologies, and ethnic guilt – but I do believe that historical wrongs need to be brought to light and remembered lest we repeat them. Thus I am very happy to hear about this program.

OYSTER BAY, N.Y. — A group of mostly white seventh and eighth graders sleepily sauntered into their school library on a recent morning, soon to get a surprise awakening about a part of their town's history they never knew existed.

"Did anybody in this room know there were 60 enslaved Africans, people, human beings, buried a mile from here?" Alan Singer, a professor at Hofstra University, asked them. "Those people have been erased from history. It is as if they never existed."

Singer and Mary Carter, a retired middle school social studies teacher, were in Oyster Bay to speak to the kids — part of a quest to develop a public school curriculum guide focusing on slavery's impact in the northern U.S., specifically New York.

Their efforts have been buoyed by state legislation enacted last year creating the Amistad Commission to examine whether the slave trade is being adequately taught in New York schools.

The commission, one of a number formed around the country in recent years, is named for the slave ship Amistad, which was commandeered by slaves who eventually won their freedom in the U.S. Supreme Court.

"Many people are surprised when you talk about slavery's existence in New York," Carter said. "They're surprised because it's taught as something that happened in the South."

Yeah, that is right – slavery was a Northern phenomenon as well as a Southern one. Let’s remember that in our discussions of race, culture, and region.

Posted by: Greg at 10:03 AM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
Post contains 293 words, total size 2 kb.

That’s “Cana of Galilee” to those of us of the Christian faith – though this discovery dates to centuries before the time of Christ.

In a rare find, remnants of an ancient Israelite city that dates back three thousand years have been uncovered during excavations in the Israeli Arab village of Kfar Kana in the Lower Galilee, Israel's Antiquities Authority announced Monday.

The area, located north of Nazareth, is revered by Christians as the site where Jesus is said to have performed his first miracle.

The settlement being unearthed existed at the time of the United Kingdom of King Solomon and the Kingdom of Israel following the split between Israel and Judah, in the 10-9th centuries BCE.

A section of the ancient city wall and remains of buildings were exposed during recent excavations at the site, which began three months ago, the director of the excavation at the site, Yardenna Alexander said.

She added that evidence was found there indicating the place was destroyed during the 9th century BCE, probably by an enemy forces.

In addition to the wall, an assortment of pottery vessels, large quantities of animal bones, a scarab depicting a man surrounded by two crocodiles and a ceramic seal bearing the image of a lion were also discovered at the site.

Following the destruction the ancient Israelite city, the site was abandoned until its ruins were re-inhabited by Jewish settlers in the Early Roman period in the 1st century CE, Israel's top archaeological body said.

The identity of these residents as Galilean Jews is already known from previous excavations that were carried out at the site, and from historic information that identifies the settlement as "Kana of the Galilee" which is known from the New Testament as the site where Jesus performed his first miracle by turning water into wine at a Jewish wedding.

In the previous excavations at the site a few years ago, which identified the ancient Galilee settlement as Kana of the Galilee, archeologists discovered remnants of buildings, grinding stones, cooking ovens stone vessels and several Jewish ritual purification baths or mikvahs, one nearly 7 feet high with an arched roof.

Some of the ancient walls that were destroyed in the 9th century BCE were reused in the newer construction nearly one thousand years later in the 1st century CE and new floors were laid down.

The Jewish settlers built igloo-shaped pits on the ruins of the previous settlement, with the bedrock serving as the floor of the pit. A rock-hewn pit was discovered in one of the tunnels and in it were 11 complete storage jars characteristic of the second half of the 1st century CE.

Among the other antiquities discovered at the site include underground pits linked by short tunnels that were apparently built and hewn prior to the Great Revolt by the Jews against the Romans in 66 CE.

The pits are connected to each other by short tunnels which apparently were used as underground hiding places ahead of the revolt, Alexander noted.

Every day we learn more and more about the lives of the people whose day-to-day lives were inextricably tied to the historical events of Scripture.

Posted by: Greg at 01:59 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 543 words, total size 3 kb.

More neat Egyptian discoveries!

An Egyptian-German archaeological team has discovered 17 statues of Sekhmet, an ancient Egyptian goddess with the head of a lioness and the body of a woman.

The statues, estimated to be about 3,000 years old, were found during restoration work on the temple of Amenhotep III, in the southern city of Luxor, Culture Minister Farouk Hosni said in a statement Sunday.

Last week, the team discovered six similar black granite statues depicting Sekhmet seated on a throne and holding the "key of life" in her left hand. Two of those statues were broken, with only the lower parts found.

The condition of the 17 statues was not revealed, though the council's chief, Zahi Hawass, said in the statement that each figure will be removed from the site for maintenance. Hosni did not say when the figures were found.

Hawass said Amenhotep III's different names and titles were delicately engraved on both sides of the statues' thrones, reflecting the advanced stage of arts during the 18th dynasty rule.

Sekhmet was considered the goddess of war and recovery, which could explain why so many similar statues were found on the same site, according to Mansour Breik, the official supervising the Luxor antiquities.

These statues are from the reign immediately prior to that of Akenaten (AKA Amenhotep IV), and so were likely carved within 50 years of the reign of King Tut.

Posted by: Greg at 01:56 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 239 words, total size 2 kb.

Another one of those fascinating articles that excites this history geek teacher.

Archaeologists discovered a pharaonic sun temple with large statues believed to be of King Ramses II under an outdoor marketplace in Cairo, Egypt's antiquities chief said Sunday.

The partially uncovered site is the largest sun temple ever found in the capital's Aim Shams and Matariya districts, where the ancient city of Heliopolis _ the center of pharaonic sun worship _ was located, Zahi Hawass told The Associated Press.

Among the artifacts was a pink granite statue weighing 4 to 5 tons whose features "resemble those of Ramses II," said Hawass, head of the Supreme Council of Antiquities.

Also found was a 5-foot-high statue of a seated figure with hieroglyphics that include three cartouches with the name of Ramses II, and a 3-ton head of royal statue, the council said in a statement.

The green pavement stones of the temple's floor were also uncovered.

An Egyptian team working in cooperation with the German Archaeological Mission in Egypt discovered the site under the Souq al-Khamis, a popular market in eastern Cairo, Hawass said.

"The market has to be removed" as archeologists excavate the entire site, Hawass said. "Other significant discoveries might be waiting to be excavated now, and compensation will be paid to the shop owners."

"We are planning to make the whole area as a tourists and archaeological site, maybe after two years," he said.

King Ramses II, who ruled Egypt for 66 years from 1270 to 1213 B.C., had erected monuments up and down the Nile with records of his achievements, as well as building temples _ including Abu Simbel, erected near what is now Egypt's southern border.

Numerous temples to Egypt's sun gods _ particularly the chief god Ra _ were built in ancient Heliopolis. But little remains of what was once the ancient Egyptians' most sacred cities, since much of the stone used in the temples was later plundered.

The area is now covered with residential neighborhoods, close to a modern district called Heliopolis, in Egypt's packed capital.

Remember -- history is all around you, lying beneath your feet in the ground you walk upon. Some places, though, just have a lot more of it, and it is much more interesting.

Posted by: Greg at 01:57 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 381 words, total size 2 kb.

What killed the Bard? Tradition says his death was brought on by a night of heavy drinking. Scientific study now raises a different possibility.

Almost 400 years after he died, a final act has been added to the story of William Shakespeare.

Scientists now believe that the Bard died not of binge drinking, but cancer.

Ancient tittle-tattle in Stratford-upon-Avon had suggested that he fell into a fever after a heavy night on the town with old friend and fellow writer Ben Jonson.

But forensic tests normally used to convict criminals have discovered that he had a life-threatening tumour over his left eye.

The breakthrough came after researchers studied four images supposedly of Shakespeare, including his death mask, and a bust displayed at London's Garrick Club.

Each shows a growth on the left eyelid, which increases in size in the later pictures.

Doctors who have studied the images say that this is evidence of a slowly-growing cancerous tumour which could have caused Shakespeare's death in April, 1616, aged 52.

The death mask shows that it had grown so large that it was hanging over his eye.

The discovery came after an investigation by a German literature expert into whether the four images are actually of Shakespeare.

Amazing, isn’t it, how we can now learn all sorts of things about the lives of those who lived in centuries past?

Posted by: Greg at 02:25 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 230 words, total size 2 kb.

What killed the Bard? Tradition says his death was brought on by a night of heavy drinking. Scientific study now raises a different possibility.

Almost 400 years after he died, a final act has been added to the story of William Shakespeare.

Scientists now believe that the Bard died not of binge drinking, but cancer.

Ancient tittle-tattle in Stratford-upon-Avon had suggested that he fell into a fever after a heavy night on the town with old friend and fellow writer Ben Jonson.

But forensic tests normally used to convict criminals have discovered that he had a life-threatening tumour over his left eye.

The breakthrough came after researchers studied four images supposedly of Shakespeare, including his death mask, and a bust displayed at London's Garrick Club.

Each shows a growth on the left eyelid, which increases in size in the later pictures.

Doctors who have studied the images say that this is evidence of a slowly-growing cancerous tumour which could have caused Shakespeare's death in April, 1616, aged 52.

The death mask shows that it had grown so large that it was hanging over his eye.

The discovery came after an investigation by a German literature expert into whether the four images are actually of Shakespeare.

Amazing, isnÂ’t it, how we can now learn all sorts of things about the lives of those who lived in centuries past?

Posted by: Greg at 02:25 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 233 words, total size 2 kb.

There was a concerted effort by Northwest tribes and their PC Leftist allies to prevent the study of Kennewick Man following his discovery a decade ago. The claim was that the tribes had a legal claim to the fossilized remains because he must be an ancestor. Now studies have concluded that he is not related to any of the groups that tried to claim him – and the conclusions drawn from study of the 9,000 year old skeleton are going to revolutionize our understanding of the peopling of the Americas.

Kennewick Man was laid to rest alongside a river more than 9,000 years ago, buried by other people, a leading forensic scientist said Thursday.
The skeleton, one of the oldest and most complete ever found in North America, has been under close analysis since courts sided with researchers in a legal battle with Indian tribes in the Northwest who wanted the remains found near the Columbia River reburied without study.

Douglas Owsley, an anthropologist at the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History, discussed his findings in remarks prepared for delivery Thursday evening at a meeting of the American Academy of Forensic Sciences in Seattle.
"We know very little about this time period," Owsley said in a telephone interview. "This is a rare opportunity to try and reconstruct the life story of this man. ... This is his opportunity to tell us what life was like during that time."

Researchers have disagreed over whether Kennewick Man was buried by other people or swept up in a flood and encased in sediment.

Owsley concluded the man was deliberately buried, between two and three feet deep, his body placed in the grave, head slightly higher than feet, hands placed at his sides.

The location was riverside, with the body parallel to the river and head pointing upstream.

Using an industrial CT scanner, Owsley was able to study the skeleton in fine sections and also get a better look at a spear or dart point imbedded in Kennewick Man's hip.

The point has previously been described as a Cascade point, typical of the region, but Owsley said that is not the case. Cascade points tend to have two pointed ends and are sometimes serrated, he said, while the point in Kennewick Man has a pointed end and a stem.

The spear or dart entered the man from the front, moving downward at a 77-degree angle, Owsley said. Previous analysis had indicated it might have hit from the back, he noted.

The point was not the cause of death, he said, saying, "This is a healed injury."
"There was no clear indication in the skeleton of cause of death," Owsley said. Kennewick Man had undergone "a lot of injuries, this guy was tough as nails."

There are three types of fractures in the bones, Owsley said, ones the man suffered in his lifetime and which had healed; fractures that occurred after burial from aging of the bones and the ground settling, and breaks that occurred when the skeleton was unearthed.

A team of 20 forensic scientists has been studying the skeleton, he said, and have concluded that the skull doesn't match those of Indian tribes living in the area.

"We know very little about this time period. Who the people were that were the earliest people that came to America," Owsley said. "We are finding out they were coming thousands of years earlier than we had thought," arriving not just over the Bering Strait but by boats and other means.

"This is a very rare discovery. You could count on your fingers the number of relatively complete skeletons from this time period," Owsley said.

Following discovery of the bones in 1996, the Umatilla, Yakama, Nez Perce and Colville tribes urged that the skeleton be reburied without scientific study. They argued that the bones were covered under the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act.

Scientists sued for a chance to study the remains and a federal court ruled there was no link between the skeleton and the tribes.

The law cited above is a well-meaning but fatally-flawed attempt to show respect to tribal cultures and beliefs – but as this case shows, the presumptions in the law stand in the way of good science and good history. Human remains that date back to prehistoric periods are part of the heritage of all humanity, and should be studied to help us understand the development of human civilization and culture. To allow particular ethnic groups to veto research in the field is a travesty. The Native American Grave Protection and Repatriation Act therefore needs to be significantly modified – if not repealed completely – in the interest of allowing the advancement of human knowledge.

OPEN TRACKBACKING: Conservative Cat
, Stuck On Stupid, Blue Star, third world country, Bacon Bits, Voteswagon, Adam's Blog, Liberal Wrong Wing, Uncooperative Blogger, NIF, Stop The ACLU, Samantha Burns, Oblogatory Anecdotes, Bullwinkle Blog, Don Surber, Wizbang, Basil's Blog, Jo's Cafe, Right Wing Nation

Posted by: Greg at 02:24 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 842 words, total size 7 kb.

There was a concerted effort by Northwest tribes and their PC Leftist allies to prevent the study of Kennewick Man following his discovery a decade ago. The claim was that the tribes had a legal claim to the fossilized remains because he must be an ancestor. Now studies have concluded that he is not related to any of the groups that tried to claim him – and the conclusions drawn from study of the 9,000 year old skeleton are going to revolutionize our understanding of the peopling of the Americas.

Kennewick Man was laid to rest alongside a river more than 9,000 years ago, buried by other people, a leading forensic scientist said Thursday.
The skeleton, one of the oldest and most complete ever found in North America, has been under close analysis since courts sided with researchers in a legal battle with Indian tribes in the Northwest who wanted the remains found near the Columbia River reburied without study.

Douglas Owsley, an anthropologist at the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History, discussed his findings in remarks prepared for delivery Thursday evening at a meeting of the American Academy of Forensic Sciences in Seattle.
"We know very little about this time period," Owsley said in a telephone interview. "This is a rare opportunity to try and reconstruct the life story of this man. ... This is his opportunity to tell us what life was like during that time."

Researchers have disagreed over whether Kennewick Man was buried by other people or swept up in a flood and encased in sediment.

Owsley concluded the man was deliberately buried, between two and three feet deep, his body placed in the grave, head slightly higher than feet, hands placed at his sides.

The location was riverside, with the body parallel to the river and head pointing upstream.

Using an industrial CT scanner, Owsley was able to study the skeleton in fine sections and also get a better look at a spear or dart point imbedded in Kennewick Man's hip.

The point has previously been described as a Cascade point, typical of the region, but Owsley said that is not the case. Cascade points tend to have two pointed ends and are sometimes serrated, he said, while the point in Kennewick Man has a pointed end and a stem.

The spear or dart entered the man from the front, moving downward at a 77-degree angle, Owsley said. Previous analysis had indicated it might have hit from the back, he noted.

The point was not the cause of death, he said, saying, "This is a healed injury."
"There was no clear indication in the skeleton of cause of death," Owsley said. Kennewick Man had undergone "a lot of injuries, this guy was tough as nails."

There are three types of fractures in the bones, Owsley said, ones the man suffered in his lifetime and which had healed; fractures that occurred after burial from aging of the bones and the ground settling, and breaks that occurred when the skeleton was unearthed.

A team of 20 forensic scientists has been studying the skeleton, he said, and have concluded that the skull doesn't match those of Indian tribes living in the area.

"We know very little about this time period. Who the people were that were the earliest people that came to America," Owsley said. "We are finding out they were coming thousands of years earlier than we had thought," arriving not just over the Bering Strait but by boats and other means.

"This is a very rare discovery. You could count on your fingers the number of relatively complete skeletons from this time period," Owsley said.

Following discovery of the bones in 1996, the Umatilla, Yakama, Nez Perce and Colville tribes urged that the skeleton be reburied without scientific study. They argued that the bones were covered under the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act.

Scientists sued for a chance to study the remains and a federal court ruled there was no link between the skeleton and the tribes.

The law cited above is a well-meaning but fatally-flawed attempt to show respect to tribal cultures and beliefs – but as this case shows, the presumptions in the law stand in the way of good science and good history. Human remains that date back to prehistoric periods are part of the heritage of all humanity, and should be studied to help us understand the development of human civilization and culture. To allow particular ethnic groups to veto research in the field is a travesty. The Native American Grave Protection and Repatriation Act therefore needs to be significantly modified – if not repealed completely – in the interest of allowing the advancement of human knowledge.

OPEN TRACKBACKING: Conservative Cat
, Stuck On Stupid, Blue Star, third world country, Bacon Bits, Voteswagon, Adam's Blog, Liberal Wrong Wing, Uncooperative Blogger, NIF, Stop The ACLU, Samantha Burns, Oblogatory Anecdotes, Bullwinkle Blog, Don Surber, Wizbang, Basil's Blog, Jo's Cafe, Right Wing Nation

Posted by: Greg at 02:24 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 854 words, total size 7 kb.