Sweet Sacrifice

In some Ancient Cultures, when times were tough, human sacrifices were made to appease the gods. So to hell with sitting around saving our pennies, all we need to do to escape the GFC is knock off a few millionaires/CEO/Media Moguls and all will be right in the world again.

Okay, maybe not. So you can all return the people you’ve kidnapped back to their families, no arguments!

Anyway, on the subject of sacrifice research in Peru has revealed a mass grave of 33 mummies from the site of Chotuna Huaca, recovered earlier this year. Reports suggest most of the mummified remains were wonderfully preserved, with even hair and teeth surviving.

While sacrifice was not an uncommon event in Andean pre-Hispanic civilisations, archaeologists and anthropologists are puzzled by the huge number of victims which appear to have been killed simultaneously, a phenomena not yet observed in the region.

Further puzzling is that the remains belong to young females, some being no more than nine years old. Preliminary theories suggest the victims were probably sacrificed to bring fertility to farmlands.

http://images.google.com.au/imgres?imgurl=http://www.greatarchaeology.com/news/wp-content/mummy-peru_big.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.greatarchaeology.com/news/archaeology/33-peru-mummies-victim-of-human-sacrifices/&usg=__TrByWrLBScjFWEPUtHfkHCPwGAg=&h=307&w=461&sz=36&hl=en&start=1&um=1&tbnid=N4PoCq3Wsy_AcM:&tbnh=85&tbnw=128&prev=/images%3Fq%3D33%2Bmummies%2Bperu%26hl%3Den%26rlz%3D1T4GGIK_enAU272AU272%26sa%3DN%26um%3D1

The Sardonic Grin

A recent study has revealed the toxin behind the smiling death. Phoenician colonists on the Island of Sardinia created one big CF* for contemporary societies by creating some damn freaky smiles on faces of the dead, both enemies and friends.

What eluded scientists until now was how they did it.

Enter hungry Shepherd.

Let us call this shepherd Bob.

Pulling a double shift one overcast afternoon, Bob realises that he forgot his lunch. So poor and tired Bob, almost delirious with hunger, stumbled upon this:






Sniff.
Mmmmmmm, well it smells okay, thought Bob.
So, after brushing off excess dirt and pollen, Bob proceeded to scoff down the sweet smelling flowers and the juicy, juicy roots of the pretty swamp flower. And oh boy was it yummy!

A few hours later, Bob was found dead, with a grin on his face.

Now I personally think this would make a great story to tell your children to teach them not to eat just anything because you can DIE! Its like the Cry Wolf story really.

Anyway, Bob’s unintentional suicide lead scientists closer to the secret identity of the Sardonic herb.

And so, now we know NOT to eat the Hemlock Water-Dropwort, and that there will undoubtedly be a new cosmetic method in the fight against aging.

And you thought inserting botulism was bad! Take that wrinkles! Muahahahaha!





*CF=clusterfuck, but I'm trying to keep this blog PG

To whom it may concern,

Okay, so I know I said more blogging and I have been meaning to I’ve just been busy!
And I have proof! “A Method for the Quantified Analysis of Fragmented Faunal Remains and the Application of this Model to Body Size Classes” Yeah that’s right!
I give the seminar for this project tomorrow, so I intend to be back in the blogosphere by the end of the week.
Strap yourselves in!

The Peter Pan PNR

It was a cool night on the 11th of May this year when I came to the realisation that I'd spent my last day as a teenager cleaning fish tanks and writing a report on a statistical method to distinguish fragmented faunal bones.
It was quite depressing! If someone asks me what I did on my last day as a teenager, I wanted to be able to say something at least remotely cool! Like "I was kidnapped by the CIA and ordered to seduce an evil terrorist that looked like David Tennant."
But no, i cleaned fish tanks and wrote a report.
The second sad realisation came when I realised that I could now never live in Neverland as one of the lost children of no specific gender (look what political correctness has done to that fairytale).
So, on the 12th of May 2009, I turned 20.
I did have a request for birthday gifts this year: David Wenham/David Tennant/Josh Lucas wrapped in pink ribbon and a TARDIS. As yet, I haven't received any of those, but I figure there should be at least a two week grace period for shipping.
But anyway, happy birthday to me.
More blogging is on the way, so stay tuned!

Breaking the Silence

Hey everyone!

Just a quick one to let you know two more studies arguing that 'Flo' is a new species have been released. From memory i think the stories are published in the journal 'Nature'. I'll have to get back to you on that one anyway.

Ordinarily I would love to sit down and have a little rant about our dear friend Flo, but I've got to go to work, and then I have to finish my Advanced Research Project -_-.

Life just isn't fair.

P.S. K.RUDD! Where’s my stimulus package huh?!

I'm not [Dead]!

Heya Space Cowboys/Cowgirls!

Yes, I am alive!

I apologise for the lack of blogging rants, I’ve been otherwise preoccupied….

I wish I had an awesome excuse involving the economic downturn and espionage work for people who wear black suits and shoes that squeak… but unfortunately I’m boring.

The reason I’ve been quiet is because I’ve got my hands full of antelope bones! Wallaby and Kangaroo soon to join! Now if that’s not a party I don’t know what is….
It is a long story, but needless to say things have been a little hectic.

But there have been so many new and exciting things happening in archaeology that I’m truly regretting my absence from the blogosphere. Not because anyone actually reads this, but because now my brain is doing this thing where I try to write an essay only to ramble incoherently and then pursue weird tangents that end in…well, let’s just say it gets pretty messy.

Anyway, I’ll get back to the point. Here are some stories that I think you folks might be interested in.

Cleo and Ant, where art thou?! http://www.google.com/hostednews/canadianpress/article/ALeqM5gYKMmuL5ZHmbklSW5GCtfIYFtxeg

Anything you can do, I can do better
http://www.livescience.com/animals/090413-human-climbers.html

Just when you thought British archaeology had enough problems
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/scotland/glasgow_and_west/7992300.stm

Will your child be the first to join the x-men?!
http://news.yahoo.com/s/mcclatchy/20090408/sc_mcclatchy/3208192

For the lit crowd…and all of you lovely people searing with art wank
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/7931823.stm

More mummies than you can poke a stick at
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7879366.stm

Dinosaurs in Cambodia…FTW?! ….okay this one I just thought was funny
http://grinding.be/2009/04/09/cambodia-dinosaur-images-noticed-in-temple-ruin/

Spike = Keanu?? Eh?! - Some would argue that this isn't archaeological, i disagree. People will dig up dvds in the future and when they figure out how to recovery the images they will say "well, now we know why it was in the garbage!"

No, I'm sorry!

I shall wait until the movie surfaces until i pass judgement.

http://www.scificool.com/keanu-reeves-as-spike-in-cowboy-bebop-live-action-movie/

Okay, I seriously have to stop procrastinating! But I’m hoping that will keep you entertained until next Friday at least.

I promise to keep up my crazy talk. So those of you, YES YOU, who started to think I was dead, fear not! You may sleep well from this night on!

[Insert cricket buzz/hum here]

Do crickets buzz? Hum? Chirp? Whistle? Hum and whistle simultaneously?

Someone enlighten me.

Or better yet, record a cricket impersonation! That would be two kinds of awesome….slash weird.

LOST AND FOUND...AGAIN!

Remember that time when I lost the Temple of Jordania* and I started freaking out, searching high and low and in the middle only to find it stuffed down under the seat of the couch?

No?....Okay, just trying to create an analogy.
Here’s the story.

Once upon a time, in a mystical land of sand and spice, a young and handsome**
Swedish Egyptologist named Karl Piehl discovered a tomb.

On his hands and knees
Karl painstakingly removed grain after grain of sand using only a toothbrush and
a dustpan*** from an excavation site at the city of Luxor, to uncover beautiful
tomb.

Karl soon realised that it was not just any old tomb; no
he had found the tomb belonging to deputy seal bearer of Tuthmosis
III.

“WHOOPIE!” said Karl.****
But Karl was so excited about his discovery that whilst doing his victory dance he didn’t even notice the tomb sink beneath the golden sands, to be lost to all for over a century.

But fear not my beautiful people, the tomb has been rediscovered! Yes, a Belgium team has rediscovered the tomb and all is right again! Unfortunately, the inscriptions on the walls of the tomb have been damaged, leading archaeologists to believe that the tomb has been plundered, probably sometime during the early 19th century.

Now, I’d like to think that on occasion I do raise some kind of valid, if not quirky point about archaeology and the state of the world. With that in mind, I ask you, oh humble readers, HOW DO YOU LOSE A TOMB?!

Car keys, bobby pins and loose change I can understand, but a tomb?! That’s a pretty big target. Do I smell a conspiracy here?

Please enlighten me.

*Figment of my imagination.
**I don’t know if Karl was indeed young or handsome…well obviously he was young at one stage (or was he? [Insert dramatic music here]), but I don’t know about the handsome part. But I just thought I’d put in a good word.
***Probably used more than just a toothbrush and dustpan.
****Probably didn’t say this at all.

http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/capress/090301/science/science_egypt_tomb_1
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20090301/sc_nm/us_archaeology_egypt_tomb;_ylt=AmYptKSqZBAdoUVnurApOnEhANEA