Egypt cracks 3,000-year-old sarcophagus

Authorities in Egypt have cracked opened a newly discovered sarcophagus to unveil a more than 3,000-year-old female mummy, still perfectly preserved. The first of the two new mummies holds the remains of a priest who would have been responsible for embalming the pharaohs.

Mummies stacked together at the site of tomb TT2

The female mummy dates from the time of Tutankhamun and Ramses IICarved wooden statues and funerary figurines called “Ushabtis” made of wood, faience and clay.

Aureus with image of Augustus

In 2016 an Israeli woman hiking in the Galilee discovered an impossibly rare gold coin - only the second such coin known. The coin, dating to the year 107 CE, bears the image of the Roman Emperor Augustus, and was unearthed in northern Israel.

On the reverse are symbols of the Roman legions next to the name of the ruler Trajan, and on the obverse – instead of an image of the emperor Trajan, as was usually the case, there is the portrait of the emperor “Augustus Deified”. The coin is part of a series of coins minted by Trajan in tribute to the emperors that preceded him. The only other example known is in the British Museum.

Trajan's Column with a statue of St. Peter installed on top in Rome.

Trajan lead the empire to attain its maximum territorial extent by the time of his death.

Historical sources say Roman soldiers were paid a high salary of three gold coins, the equivalent of 75 silver coins, each month. Due to their high monetary value, soldiers were unable to buy goods in the market as the merchants couldn't provide change. Bronze and silver coins of Trajan are common, but his gold coins are extremely rare. Trajan was Roman emperor from 98 AD until his death in 117 AD. Officially declared by the Senate optimus princeps (the best ruler), Trajan is remembered as a successful soldier-emperor who presided over the greatest military expansion in Roman history.

Trajan's Uniformed Army, frieze on Trajan's Column

Staffordshire Hoard Roman helmet recreated

Many of the fragments found in the famous Staffordshire Hoard come from the high-status helmet and experts have painstakingly spent the last 18 months reconstructing it for display. Thousands of 1,300 years old fragments were studied in a bid to build a picture of the original helmet.

He unearthed the £3.2 million ancient gold and silver haul in the summer of 2009.

It was almost a decade ago when one man and his metal detector uncovered the world's largest collection of Anglo-Saxon gold and silver metalwork. Terry Herbert struck the treasure of several lifetimes near the village of Hammerwich, near Lichfield.

Talos

In Greek mythology, Talos was a giant automaton made of bronze to protect Europa in Crete from pirates and invaders. He circled the island's shores three times daily. Talos threw rocks at any approaching ship to protect his island. The origin of Talos varies. Some accounts describe him as the last survivor of an ancient race of bronze men, but the more popular versions attribute his creation to Hephaestus, god of the forge.

Talos had one vein, which went from his neck to his ankle, bound shut by one bronze nail. The Argo, transporting Jason and the Argonauts, approached Crete after obtaining the Golden Fleece. Talos kept the Argo at bay by hurling great boulders. Talos was slain when Medea the sorceress either drove him mad with drugs, or deceived him into believing that she would make him immortal by removing the nail. He dislodged the nail, and "the ichor ran out of him like molten lead", killing him.

5th-century BCE Greek vase depicts the death of Talos

Talos makes an appearance in the 1963 motion picture "Jason and the Argonauts" thanks to stop-motion wizardry. The film, however, cast Jason as the automaton's slayer instead of Medea.

Ancient Mysteries II

Tarim Mummies. During an excavation beneath the Tarim Basin in western China, archaeologists were surprised to discover more than 100 mummified corpses that dated back 2,000 years. Victor Mair was stupefied when he found blonde-haired and long-nosed Tarim mummies after they were dug up and put on display at a museum. In 1993 Mair returned to collect DNA samples from the mummies. Test results validated his hunch that the bodies were of European genetic stock. While ancient Chinese texts describe groups of far-East dwelling Caucasian people, there is no mention of how or why they ended up there.

The Carnac Stones. With over 3,000 prehistoric standing stones, Carnac (in Brittany, France) is the largest megalithic site in the world. Not all of the Carnac stones were set up for the same purpose. There are stone circles, rows of stones aligned perfectly, and even mausoleums with roofs. Stones may have been periodically placed over thousands of years, but a rough calculation for the beginning of the stone placements is 4000 BC.

Minoan Palace Ruins at Knossos

Fall of the Minoans. The Minoans were an Aegean Bronze Age civilization that arose on the island of Crete and flourished from about 2600 to 1400 BC. The Minoan eruption on the island of Thera (Santorini) was among the largest volcanic explosions in history. The eruption is believed to have severely affected the Minoan culture. Evidence found on Crete indicate that a massive tsunami, generated by the Theran eruption, devastated the coastal areas of Crete and destroyed many Minoan settlements.

Bog Bodies. A bog body is a human cadaver that has been naturally mummified in a peat bog. Such bodies, sometimes known as bog people, are widespread. Bog bodies have retained their skin and internal organs due to the unusual conditions of the bog. These conditions include highly acidic water, low temperature, and a lack of oxygen. The overwhelming majority of bog bodies have been found in Northern Europe, particularly Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom and Ireland.

The Helike Delta with the Gulf of Corinth at left.

Lost City of Helike Helike was situated on the northwestern part of the Peloponnesian peninsula. During its heyday, Helike was an important economic, cultural and religious centre. One night during the winter of 373 B.C., the city of Helike was obliterated. The rescue party that came in the following morning found no survivors. No trace of the legendary society existed outside of ancient Greek texts until 1861 when an archaeologist found a bronze coin with the unmistakable head of Poseidon. In 2001, a pair of archaeologists located the ruins of Helike.

Rongorongo is an indecipherable hieroglyphic script used by the early inhabitants on Easter Island. While no other neighboring oceanic people possessed a written language, Rongorongo appeared mysteriously in the 1700s. The language was lost—along with the best hopes for ever deciphering it—after early European colonizers banned it.

The Anasazi appeared around 1200 BC. Over centuries they lived in the area where New Mexico, Colorado, Arizona and Utah meet. They developed advanced architecture and religion. The name Anasazi means “ancient strangers” or “ancient enemy” in the old Navajo language. They left behind many petroglyphs and other rock art. In the 13th century AD, the Anasazi mysteriously disappeared.

The Rock Ship of Masuda sits atop a steep incline of a hill near Okadera Station in Nara Prefecture of Kansai, Japan. Its purpose remains a mystery. The rock ship is 11 meters (36 feet) by 8 meters (26 feet), by 4.5 meters high (15 feet), and is made of solid granite. It weighs around 80 tons.

Venus

Botticelli's Birth of Venus

In Roman mythology, Venus was the goddess of love, sex, beauty, and fertility. She was the Roman counterpart to the Greek Aphrodite. The Roman Venus had many abilities beyond the Greek Aphrodite; she was a goddess of victory and even prostitution. According to Hesiod's Theogony, Aphrodite was born of the foam from the sea after Saturn castrated his father Uranus and threw his genitals into the sea. Her beauty became a source of tension among the gods, all of whom wanted to take her as wife. To calm matters, Zeus decided that Aphrodite would marry Hephaestus, the crippled smith god.

Hephaestus fashioned a magic girdle to ensure her fidelity. However, she proved unfaithful and had multiple affairs with both mortals and gods. Some of her offspring were the Cupids (Erotes) who were a collection of winged love deities who represented the different aspects of love. Images of Venus can be found in countless forms from sculptures to mosaics to shrines and even domestic murals and frescos. Venus, due to her beauty and sexual nature, was often depicted nude. Venus continued to be a popular subject matter for artists through antiquity and into modern times.

Wolf-Rayet star found in our galaxy

A massive triple-star system surrounded by dust could be a Wolf-Rayet star, capable of unleashing the greatest release of energy known ... a sustained gamma ray burst.(GRB) Some 8,000 light years from earth, the star system is the first discovered in our own galaxy. Lasting between a few thousandths of a second to a few hours, gamma ray bursts can release as much energy as our sun will release over its lifetime. Long-duration GRBs – longer than 2 seconds – are thought to be caused by the supernova explosions of rapidly-rotating Wolf-Rayet stars.

Alexander the Great's gold distater

Alexander the Great, born in 356 BC, was one of the most successful military leaders in history. He conquered a large part of Asia and ruled a kingdom that spanned from the Ionian sea to the Himalayas before he was 30 years old. One of his many achievements was the establishment of a single currency across his empire. Flush with massive hoards of Persian gold he struck the largest Greek gold coin issued up to that time: the gold distater. Sources says he was determined to outdo the hero Hercules.

Sarcophagus of King Abdalonymos of Sidon

Athena was the protector of Hercules and other heroes, and Alexander adopted her image on his gold coinage, showing her wearing a Corinthian helmet decorated with a coiled snake. The reverse is a representation of Nike, the goddess of victory. Gold distaters were extremely valuable. This proved inconvenient for normal daily spending, so many were melted down.

Gold Staters weighed roughly 8.6g of .997 fine purity. Exceptional examples are always in high demand. Coins that were struck during his reign (lifetime issues) are the most desirable by collectors and often the rarest.
See ----->Top Macedonian Artifacts

Spectacular 'Leda and the Swan' found in Pompeii

Archaeologists have found a watercolor fresco depicting 'Leda and the Swan' in Pompeii. Amazingly preserved it has brilliant detail and color despite being buried for nearly 2,000 years. 'Leda and the Swan' is a common theme. The swan is an embodiment of the Roman god Zeus, who is impregnating Leda. The Orto dei fuggiaschi (The garden of the Fugitives)

The Sutton Hoo Treasure

Mrs Edith Pretty of the village of Sutton Hoo, overlooking the River Deben and the town of Woodbridge in Suffolk, had long believed that there were important ancient burial mounds on her property. In 1938 she asked an archaeologist to excavate several of the barrows. Three of the mounds had been robbed in ancient times but one still contained a spectacular Anglo Saxon burial chamber built inside a 30 metre long wooden ship.

The treasure included armour, weapons, gold coins, gold jewellery with garnet settings, silver cups and silver-supported drinking horns, a leather purse with a jewelled cover containing thirty-seven golden Merovingian coins, three coin-sized blanks and two ingots. The Sutton Hoo Treasure is considered one of the most important finds in British history.

The burial chamber was probably constructed for an East Anglian monarch (bretwalda) - most likely King Rædwald.

The site has been vital to historians for understanding of the Anglo-Saxon Kingdom of East Anglia and the early Anglo-Saxon period in the 6th and early 7th-century centuries.