An eclectic assortment of stuff: food, archaeology, fun, books, history, geekery, etc.
Posted in miscellaneous on Mar 30th, 2007
From the Proceedings of the Athanasius Kircher Society: Le Mont Solaire.
This past September the French army installed 600 one meter square reflective panels in the shape of Roman numerals on the sands of Mont Saint-Michel, a small rocky island off the coast of Normandy. The island’s 150-foot abbey spire cast a shadow three quarters of [...]
Posted in history & archaeology on Mar 28th, 2007
From discovery.com: Cavemen preferred full-figured ladies.
Thin may be in now, but prehistoric men 15,000 years ago prefered full-figured gals, suggest dozens of flint figurines excavated from a Paleolithic hunting site in Poland.
Since almost identical depictions have been found elsewhere throughout Europe, the figurines indicate a shared artistic tradition existed even then.
The findings are published in [...]
Posted in history & archaeology on Mar 28th, 2007
From iol.co.za: Archaeologists find ‘lost’ Islamic kingdom.
French archaeologists said on Tuesday that they had uncovered the remains of three large towns that may have been the heart of a legendary Islamic kingdom in Ethiopia.
Ancient manuscripts have long told of the kingdom of Shoa, which between the 10th and 16th centuries straddled key trade routes between [...]
Posted in history & archaeology, science on Mar 25th, 2007
From the Times Online: Dung-eating mites throw light on Inca civilisation.
Mites that eat llama dung are providing scientists with critical new clues to the rise and fall of the Inca empire and the civilisations that preceded it.
The soil invertebrates are allowing researchers to trace the growth and decline of the peoples of the Andes several [...]
The Victoria Times Colonist notes that "an evolutionary biologist at the University of Victoria is working on the hypothesis that a kinder, gentler breed of wolf was developed in half a century." Here’s the article: We didn’t go to the dogs — canines went to the people.
That dogs descended from wolves is commonly accepted. So [...]
Posted in history & archaeology, science on Mar 24th, 2007
From nature.com: Why the Greeks could hear plays from the back row.
The wonderful acoustics for which the ancient Greek theatre of Epidaurus is renowned may come from exploiting complex acoustic physics, new research shows.
The theatre, discovered under a layer of earth on the Peloponnese peninsula in 1881 and excavated, has the classic semicircular shape of [...]
Posted in technology on Mar 22nd, 2007
From the BBC: GPS navigation plan to help blind.
An Italian technology company is pioneering a GPS satellite system that will give blind people greater independence and mobility. [continue]
Posted in unusual musical instruments on Mar 22nd, 2007
The astonishing world of musical instruments is a fun place to noodle around for a few minutes. There are photos and descriptions of the mvet, the njembe, the kadandzi sanza, and a bunch of other instruments as well. Wouldn’t you love to try playing a few of them?
Posted in BC, outdoors, strange stuff on Mar 22nd, 2007
From E-Flora BC we have this fascinating article on slime mould.
In an environment that is varying hues of brown and green, hot pink or coral red is hard to miss, so even the most preoccupied of hikers will stop agog having come across a slime mold, one of nature’s most mysterious creations.
The typical first reaction [...]
Posted in religion on Mar 21st, 2007
From the Guardian: The priest who gave his flock £1,600.
When your church roof needs to be repaired, doling out envelopes full of cash is not the most obvious way to get it fixed. But Father Stuart Lee stunned his congregation at St Matthew’s church in Raynes Park, south-west London, on Sunday when he handed them [...]
From the Vancouver Sun: Harvest of luxury.
Traditionally, the highest pedigreed truffles — black Perigords and white Albas — come from France and Italy and sell for more than $1,000 and $3,000 a pound, fluctuating with supply and demand. Order pasta with paper-thin shavings of white Alba truffles drifting on the surface and you’re looking at [...]
Posted in language on Mar 21st, 2007
From the Guardian: And now for the news … in Latin
It is, famously, a dead language. But it seems that Latin is on the brink of an unlikely comeback. The conservative Pope Benedict XVI is poised to authorise wider use of the Latin mass. And, perhaps to ingratiate themselves with the boss, the managers of [...]
Posted in dogs on Mar 21st, 2007
By now you’ve heard about the pet food recall, yes? From ctv.ca: Owners fear for their pets after huge food recall.
Concern among pet owners is growing as officials look for the source of contamination that prompted the recall of more than 90 dog and cat foods across North America.
The recall by Menu Foods, based in [...]
Posted in history & archaeology on Mar 21st, 2007
From iol.co.za: New map proves Cook didn’t discover Australia.
A 16th century maritime map in a Los Angeles library vault proves that Portuguese adventurers, not British or Dutch, were the first Europeans to discover Australia, says a new book which details the secret discovery of Australia.
The book "Beyond Capricorn" says the map, which accurately marks geographical [...]
Posted in technology on Mar 21st, 2007
From the BBC: Hiding messages in plain sight.
A technology that can "hide" information in plain sight on printed images has begun to see the first commercial applications.
Japanese firm Fujitsu is pushing a technology that can encode data into a picture that is invisible to the human eye but can be decoded by a mobile phone [...]
Posted in history & archaeology on Mar 20th, 2007
From iol.co.za: Bosnian archaeologists discover fabled ships
A team of Bosnia-Herzegovina’s archaeologists have discovered for the first time the remnants of fabled Illyrian ships in a marshland in southern Herzegovina, the team’s head said on Tuesday.
Snjezana Vasilj told local media in Mostar that the ships were discovered about eight metres under the water of Hutovo blato, [...]
Posted in coffee on Mar 20th, 2007
The National Geographic’s coffee pages contain a few interesting things: legends page with fascinating historical tidbits, a map of coffee-producing nations , and their The Bonanza Bean article. From the latter, here is a bit of weirdness for you:
The Japanese gentlemen buried me up to the chin in a shallow grave and left me to [...]
Posted in history & archaeology on Mar 19th, 2007
From the Globe and Mail: Alberta’s development boom helps fossil hunters hit pay dirt.
CALGARY — On the hunt for a new quarry, an Alberta gravel company recently rumbled toward a stone outcropping not far from the oil sands north of Fort McMurray. Among the rock and dirt, workers found a curious collection of ancient implements.
Archeologists [...]
Posted in animals, birds, insects, etc, history & archaeology on Mar 19th, 2007
From the Guardian: Hidden fossil, flying dragon.
Around 120m years ago, as the dinosaurs neared the climax of their dominion, high above their heads an extraordinary creature flitted from tree to tree. The bizarre lizard, named the "flying dragon" by its Chinese discoverers, glided using a flap of skin spread over eight ribs.
The find is remarkable [...]
Oooh, it’s Santa Maria Maggiore in Rome, in one of those Quicktime panorama things. Give it a moment to load, then click, hold, and drag your mouse in any direction. Amazing, isn’t it? Zoom in on any details you like.
Posted in BC, history & archaeology on Mar 18th, 2007
From Graveyard of the Pacific:
The captain strained his eyes into the darkness, but no lights were in sight. White water crashed over the deck. The ship listed, its cargo shifted, and the boat grazed rock on its port side. Waves pushed the vessel further upon the jagged outcropping with a snap of splintering wood as [...]
Posted in history & archaeology on Mar 17th, 2007
From Pharaoh’s pots give up their secrets.
For a century, they have been on display in the Louvre museum in Paris, labelled as Canopic jars holding the embalmed innards of the great Egyptian pharaoh Rameses II. But the four pots, covered in hieroglyphs, are not what they seem.
An analysis by French chemists has revealed that the [...]
Posted in DNA, history & archaeology, science on Mar 16th, 2007
From physorg.com: Pig study forces rethink of Pacific colonisation.
A survey of wild and domestic pigs has caused archaeologists to reconsider both the origins of the first Pacific colonists and the migration routes humans travelled to reach the remote Pacific.
Scientists from Durham University and the University of Oxford, studying DNA and tooth shape in modern and [...]
Posted in history & archaeology, science on Mar 16th, 2007
From The Scientist: Mummies’ parasites.
Enterobius vermicularis, or pinworm, is an itchy but harmless intestinal parasite that has been with humans since before they were human. Pinworm eggs have been recovered from a communal latrine near the ancient Dead Sea settlement of Qumran, from fossilized feces in Dust Devil Cave in southern Utah, and from the [...]
Posted in dogs on Mar 16th, 2007
From the New York Times: Can Your Dog Humanize the Office?.
Take Your Dog to Work began as a quirk of the dot-com boom — another perk that employers could offer to employees to persuade them to stay.
It had been thought that the patter of paws would go the way of casual Fridays and massages at [...]