Virtual hacking is cool but place hacking makes it core again, brachiating across scaffolding to get the shot on your Digital SLR that maximizes your flickr stats, raking in the google adsense cash and conforming to a zerowork ethos if we get pro at it. Sleep in ruins, sell your photos of disgusting shit to tourists. Rinse off in a petrol station sink and repeat. We are the nerds that finally walked away from their computers and we are behind that scaffolding covering the building you ignore everyday when you walk by it going to work, we just loved on that place like no one has in 20 years. We are psychotopological terrorists and we will shove that masterlock up your ass.
A "reformed archaeologist" talks about
exploration of urban ruins. Modern urban ruins.
posted by Rumple
on Jan 21, 2010 -
72 comments
The Seljuk Han in Anatolia has tons of information about and pictures of the caravanserai, inns for caravans, built by the Seljuk Sultanate of Rûm in what is now Turkey. The Seljuk caravanserai, called hans, were a vital resource for trade from the middle ages to recent times. The website, by
Katherine Branning, explains
what a han is,
their origins,
their function in trade,
what life there was like and much more. The site also features 39 individual hans, such as the
Kadin Han, now a furniture store,
Dibi Delik Han, which is undergoing restoration,
Zazadin Han, which has been restored already, and the spectacular
Sultan Han Kayseri. For an academic survey of Seljuk hans, here's Ayşıl Tükel Yavuz'
The concepts that shape Anatolian Seljuq caravanserais [pdf, automatic download].
posted by Kattullus
on Jan 8, 2010 -
13 comments
Fascinated by the Orient An exhibition of the letters, photographs and maps bequeathed to the Hungarian Academy of Sciences by the great
explorer, archaeologist, geographer and
Sanskritist Sir
Marc Aurel Stein. Journeyer
in the footsteps of Alexander,
explorer of
Central Asia and
West China, surveyor of the
antiquities of India and
Iran; after a long life of journeying through and studying central Asia, Aurel Stein found
his final rest in Kabul. He is also remembered for rediscovering the oldest dated printed book still in existence, a copy of the
Diamond Sutra in
the caves at Mogao. That the latter and many thousands of other manuscripts collected by Stein now reside in the
British Library is of course, like his other
'treasure hunting', not without
controversy.
posted by Abiezer
on Jan 4, 2010 -
4 comments
Man from the Margin: Cao Cao and the Three Kingdoms You'll perhaps have
read or
watched reports that archaeologists believe they have found the tomb of Cao Cao (曹操) (of course,
not everyone agrees with the identification). Warrior, strategist, statesman and
poe
t, Cao Cao lives on in the cultural memory of China, a
by-word for cunning and of course a central character in the great historical novel
Romance of the Three Kingdoms and hence also recent John Woo blockbuster
Red Cliff. To understand the man in his historical context, there's little better in English than the 1990 George Ernest Morrison Lecture in Ethnology given by now-retired Professor
Rafe de Crespigny, one of the foremost Western scholars of the Han Dynasty and Three Kingdoms periods of Chinese history. He makes several of his vastly erudite essays on Chinese history available at the
ANU's website.
posted by Abiezer
on Dec 30, 2009 -
21 comments
Bogus! Why do fakes get made? Why do people fall for hoaxes? Greed, pride, revenge, nationalism, pranks, and gullibility mix in an archaeological setting. Archaeology Magazine examines eight classic cases, and more.
posted by amyms
on Dec 23, 2009 -
6 comments
Digital Karnak documents and digitally reconstructs "one of the largest temple complexes in the world." The site includes digital models, photographs, a "time map" (allowing you to see alterations to the site under different pharoahs), and video. For projects devoted to more specific areas of the temple complex, see the
Karnak Great Hypostyle Hall Project (University of Memphis) and the
Mut Precinct (Brooklyn Museum).
posted by thomas j wise
on Dec 16, 2009 -
6 comments
A companion to one of Europe's most eminent prehistoric monuments has been discovered just a mile away.
Bluehenge has the same rough configuration as its sister site, Stonehenge, but with 27 stones instead of 56. It is speculated that the stones of Bluehenge may have been moved to aid in
the making of Stonehenge.
[more inside]
posted by Hardcore Poser
on Oct 3, 2009 -
43 comments
Knossos: Fakes, Facts, and Mystery. "The masterpieces of
Minoan art are not what they seem... The truth is that these famous icons are largely modern. As any sharp-eyed visitor to the
Heraklion museum can spot, what survives of the original paintings amounts in most cases to no more than a few square inches. The rest is more or less imaginative reconstruction, commissioned in the first half of the twentieth century by
Sir Arthur Evans, the British excavator of the
palace of Knossos (and the man who coined the term 'Minoan' for this prehistoric
Cretan civilization, after the mythical King Minos who is said to have held the
throne there). As a general rule of thumb, the more famous the image now is, the less of it is actually ancient."
posted by homunculus
on Aug 30, 2009 -
16 comments
The University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology has put
675 reels of archival 16 mm film online via the Internet Archive. Most of the film is unedited, and stems either from Museum research, or was donated by interested amateurs. Much of it is silent, reflecting the technology of the day. One highlight are the
four surviving reels of the long-running TV show 'What in the World" (look for the episode starring Vincent Price), but the archive is full of other hidden gems, such as the
1950s archaeological expedition to Tikal, a 1940 film "
A 1000 Mile Road Trip Across America", and
Glimpses of Life Among the Catawba and Cherokee Indians of the Carolinas (1927). The films are downloadable in various formats, including MPEG2, Ogg Video, and 512Kb MPEG4. Happy browsing!
via.
posted by Rumple
on May 3, 2009 -
12 comments
Waterlines is a new online exhibit from the excellent
Burke Museum at the University of Washington, Seattle. It tells the story of the land underlying Seattle, one of the United States' most geologically active city sites, and of the human attempts to engineer this landform. Closely related are the
archaeology of West Point and
Coast Salish Villages of Puget Sound (e.g., read the
story of North Wind and Storm Wind).
posted by Rumple
on May 2, 2009 -
3 comments
Archaeologists and Native Americans race against the border fence. The REAL ID act authorized government agencies to bulldoze long-standing environmental, cultural and anthropological standards. But a team of activists worked delicately behind the scenes to win millions of dollars in federal funding and the go-ahead for a last-ditch effort to study ancient artifacts. Archaeologists have faced similarly rushed projects
elsewhere along the fence route.
posted by univac
on Mar 31, 2009 -
46 comments
Why do mummies scream? Are screaming mummies really testaments to horrific deaths? Or are they the result of natural processes, botched or ad hoc mummification jobs, or the depredations of tomb robbers? Archaeology Online examines the science and history behind the gape-mouthed "masks of agony" seen on some mummies, and explores their portrayal in entertainment and pop culture. The article includes lots of interesting and informative additional links.
posted by amyms
on Mar 30, 2009 -
33 comments
The digital collection of the
Tokyo National Museum is full of wonder. TNM is the oldest museum in Japan and collects archaeological objects and art from Japan as well as other parts of Asia. The collection can be browsed by
type or
region. Here are some of my favorites:
Buddha's life,
The name "Korin" given to pupil,
Tale of Matsuranomiya,
Coquettish type,
Tea caddy in shape of bucket with handle,
Mirror, design of sea and island,
Traditionary identified as Minamoto no Yoritomo,
Seated Monju Bosatsu (Manjusri) and attendants,
Sword mounting of kazari-tachi type and (my current desktop background)
Figures under a tree. This is but a small sampling of all that can be found in the digital collection
posted by Kattullus
on Dec 22, 2008 -
4 comments
The Foundation for the Advancement of Mesoamerican Studies is your one-stop shop for pre-Columbian Central America awesomeness. There are so, so many wondrous things on that site, I don't quite know where to begin. I suppose John Pohl's
scholarly introduction is a natural place to start. But maybe you just don't have time to read anything and just want to dive into pretty, pretty pictures. Perhaps the most user-friendly databases are Justin Kerr's photographs
Maya Vases (e.g.
1,
2,
3) and
Pre-Columbian Portfolio (e.g.
1,
2a,
2b,
3). From there you can delve into the collection of Linda Schele's
photographs (e.g.
1,
2) and
drawings (e.g.
1,
2,
3). There are more image databases but let me direct you to the collection of
old Maya, Aztec and Mixtec books which are simply stunning (e.g.
1,
2,
3,
4 [last link pdf]). You can read more about
Mayan and
Mixtec codices and download high resolution versions of the entire books. There are also Maya
dictionaries,
glyph guides,
linguistic maps and a
who's who. There is also classic
Mayan and
Aztec poetry in translation. I'm telling you, that's not even half of what this amazing site has to offer.
posted by Kattullus
on Nov 29, 2008 -
19 comments
Akhetaten (a.k.a. Amarna) was the city built by Pharaoh
Akhenaten, famous for his
monotheistic beliefs and his queen,
Nefertiti and son,
Tutankhamun.
The Amarna Letters has translations of correspondence sent to the Akhenaten, but a trove of it was found at the Amarna site. During his reign a
distinctive style of art rose to prominence, only to vanish after his death. The Boston MFA
has 40 objects from the era in its collection. Perhaps the most famous of the cultural artifacts of Akhenaten is the Great Hymn to Aten (
hieroglyphics, four different English translations:
1,
2,
3,
4). This poem was
set to music by Philip Glass for his opera Akhnaten (
information about the opera). Some see
direct parallels between The Great Hymn to Aten and Psalm 104. Though it was billed as a new beginning, like many utopias, Amarna was
no haven for the regular folk who lived there.
posted by Kattullus
on Oct 4, 2008 -
23 comments
