A mummy of a middle-aged woman dating to Ancient Greek times has been discovered in a lead coffin inside a marble sarcophagus, the first clear indication of embalming in Greece from the era when the Romans ruled there. A research team co-led by Frank Rühli of the University of Zurich was able to show that various resins, oils and spices were used to embalm the body, dating to A.D. 300. Along with the skeleton, the methods partially preserved some soft tissues from the body, most of which are now brittle, thin and extremely desiccated, including eyebrows, a muscle in the hand, hair and blood cells. Rühli told LiveScience thatthis a "unique finding for this temporal and spatial setting." The body was covered with a gold-embroidered purple silk cloth, indicating that the woman was probably of high social status, Rühli said.
Her bones reveal that she was somewhere between 50 and 60 years old. The finding will be detailed in an upcoming issue of the Journal of Archaeological Science. The mummy currently is held at the Archaeological Museum of Thessaloniki, Greece. The sarcophagus was uncovered initially in 1962 during an archaeological dig in Northern Greece, on the eastern cemetery of Thessaloniki, which was used from the Hellenistic to the Byzantine Periods for burial and other ritual practices. In addition to macroscopic andanthropological analyses, electron microscopy and gas chromatography-mass spectrometry examinations were also performed on the remains. These showed the presence of various embalming substances including myrrh, fats and resins. The lead coffin encasing the remains might also have assisted in their preservation, though the researchers were uncertain if that was intentional or effective. The coffin was made specifically for this corpse. The body, with a stature of about 63 inches, or 5 foot, 3 inches, lay on a wooden pallet inside the coffin and was wrapped with cotton and linen bandages.To view the rest of this article, please visit the source[Source]http://www.livescience.com/history/080804-greek-embalming.html[/Source]
In Japan one can find an
ancient stone pyramid. It is a beautifully shaped monolith, about six and a half
feet tall and twelve feet at the base, practically lost in the thick forest
growth on the slope of a hill near the town of Ena, in central Honsu, largest of
the Japanese islands. Cut from a single, massive block of gray granite, the
object was a pyramidian, a smaller version of the Great Pyramid and its
full-size cousins. This trignon, as they call it, might have passed for the...
The notion of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World can be traced back to the
fifth century B.C. These creations rivaled many created by nature in their size,
majesty, and beauty. Six of the seven wonders no longer stand, having been
destroyed by natural disaster or by humans.
The Greek author Antipater of Sidon, who lived
in the 2nd century B.C., was one of several writers to list the greatest
monuments and buildings known to the classical world. He settled on seven
bec...
By Paul Tudor Angel Mystery Hill, the Upton Cave, Calendar I and Calendar II, Gungywamp and Druid’s Hill are just several of the names given some incredibly important historical sites of which many have never heard a whisper. But their existence—and their importance—is becoming harder and harder to hide as more are discovered and interested folk become exposed to their grandeur.
Sometime in the late 1600s or early 1700s, early American colonists began discovering and utilizing underground "...
Columbus' ship (forefront) compared to Zheng He's massive vessel (background)
Asian Pacific Post Feb 24, 2005 On May 16, a Canadian architect will tell the United Nations of a lost Chinese city on the Atlantic coast of North America, lending weight to the theory that the Chinese arrived in the New World some 70 years before Christopher Columbus.A Canadian architect has discovered what is believed to be the lost naval base of China?s foremost explorer on the Atlanti...
Space images taken by NASA
reveal a mysterious ancient bridge in the Palk Strait between India and Sri
Lanka. The recently discovered bridge currently named as Adam?s Bridge is made
of chain of shoals, c.18 mi (30 km) long.
The bridge's unique curvature and composition by age reveals
that it is man made.
The legends as well as Archaeological studies reveal that
the first signs of human inhabitants in Sri Lanka date back to the a
primitive age, about 1,750,000 years ago and the...
by
Anna Maria Nicholson
Mahabalipuram, India () The
destructive capacity of last year's tsunami wiped life from Earth in numbers
that defy comprehension. Each one gone dramatically altering other lives -
friends and families in a chain wrapped countless times around the world. Towns
and villages and possessions obliterated. In many parts, the very presence of
human beings simply erased, as if they were never there. The tsunamis took a
great deal away, but in one tiny corner, t...
WASHINGTON
(AMP) - A spy satellite image of Antarctica reveals an "anomaly" two miles
beneath the ice that could be a man-made structure, according to Congressional
investigators who are demanding release of the image from the Pentagon.
The explosive revelation about
the anomaly, located at the epicenter of recent
seismic
activity in East Antarctica, prompted an immediate denial from the Defense
Department and feverish speculation among members of the international
intellig...
Scientists exploring a mine have uncovered a natural Sistine chapel showing not religious paintings, but incredibly well preserved images of sprawling tree trunks and fallen leaves that once breathed life into an ancient rainforest. Replete with a diverse mix of extinct plants, the 300-million-year-old fossilized forest is revealing clues about the ecology of Earth’s first rainforests . The discovery and details of the forest are published in the May issue of the journal Geology. “We’re...
Posted by nuke on Monday, April 23 @ 06:20:41 CDT (272 reads)--
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