Here are some posts I enjoyed from around the web this week:
If Games of Thrones has been giving you nightmares, this version might be your thing. The original. A comic via Janet Rudolph I confess I’ve been binge watching because I am way behind and it’s just plain fun (if gory, etc) Click here for Mystery Fanfare “Cartoon of the Day: the Original Games of Thrones”
An enigmatic bronze mask of Pan (gorgeous), found a while back, is gaining an archaeological context during this past season’s dig: a monumental gate to what might be a large ritual complex in the Hippos, Israel. It raises an interesting question. The Roman worship of Pan, while excitingly sexy and orgiastic, is generally thought to have taken place in wild spaces. So why the big temple structure? Don’t you just love archaeology? Any suggestions for a hypothesis? Click here for “A Gateway to Pan Exposed at Hippos”
In Hittite archaeology, often one of the goals is to identify your dig with a city name from the written records in the capital city of Hattusa. This dig in the Sorgun area is being connected to Zippalanda, a major city in the Hittite Empire. Sometimes items from the dig guide this identification, sometimes only geography. They have found 4 pieces of cuneiform writing, and two large public structures, maybe a “castle” and temple. The dig is under Florence University. Trevor Bryce puts Zippalanda in the category of “holy cities, which were amongst the most important cult centres of the Hittite world, and the venues for a number of major religious festivals” So the finds will be very interesting, if the id is correct. The dig started in 2008. That’s the thing about Hittite archaeology—it’s pretty new and blossoming all over, ever so slowly! My characters in the current work in progress are negotiating regarding Nerik, another one of these holy cities, in some ways the most psychologically important to the Hittites. In this article I do like the photo of the Florence students dwarfed by the monumental foundations they are digging. A monumental civilization just now climbing back out of the earth. Click here for “Possible Hittite Structures Unearthed in Central Turkey”
Discoveries at Pompeii continue. A dig on the outskirts has uncovered 4 skeletons, some gold coins and a necklace in a workshop that may be for bronze working. Even more interesting, a rare pre-Roman burial, 4th C B.C. also came to light with male skeleton and funeral vases. So many of us have tromped through Pompeii and I don’t think of it as still an active dig, but, of course, it is to the extent that funding allows. Click here for “Skeletons, Coins found in Dig of Ancient Pompeii Shop”