belteshazzar

Archive for March 3rd, 2010

• Ancient capital aims to expand into megacity – Xinhua
  
  A city which was once the capital of ancient China aims to now expand to 13 million residents.
  
  
• Second Life as an Archaeological Tool: Ruth Tringham
  
  Second Life as an archaeological tool, worth a read. I’ve always personally wanted to create a 3D model of the city of Babylon (i’ve taken baby steps here and there but nothing substantive) … this has me thinking of the possibilities.
  
  
• Nonsense on 2012 predictions
  
  2012 … the end of the world, according to the Mayans, if you read popular culture sources, this story investigates the question: what are archaeologists and Maya scholars doing to counter such nonsense?
  
  
• Queen Behenu
  
  A burial chamber belonging to an old kingdom queen named Behenu has been discovered at Saqqara. The queen who may have been the queen of one of the kings named Pepi of the sixth dynasty.
  
  

Edward Pegler in his new* blog “Armchair Prehistory” discusses some ideas about why agriculture started in the Fertile Cresent ~8500BC but not in the Nile Valley until ~4000BC even though people are known to have inhabited the area and used the Nile for trade. Find the article here.

* it occured to me that his blog is actually older than mine! we’re both still new, go easy on us

• Stonehenge in Syria

  Dr. Mason explains that he “went for a walk” into the eastern perimeter of the site – an area that hasn’t been explored by archaeologists. What he discovered is an ancient landscape of stone circles, stone alignments and what appear to be corbelled roof tombs. From stone tools found at the site, it’s likely that the features date to some point in the Middle East’s Neolithic Period – a broad stretch of time between roughly 8500 BC – 4300 BC.

• Just go look at the photos

  Shoveling Ferret has found a great pic of Amenhotep, face first in the dirt.

• Why Academic Blogging Matters

  This is a great article by Shawn at Electric Archaeology.

• Field Museum archaeologists amend the written history of China's first emperor

  Two Field Museum scientists and their Chinese collaborator have integrated textual information with archaeological research in order to further understand the impact of the reign of China’s first emperor.

• New 'Prince of Persia Trailer' Expands the Time-Rewinding Action – Cinematical (blog)

  A new Trailer for the upcoming Prince of Persia movie has been released. This is sexy.