Why I like hiking

A Greek hiker just found a 6500 year-old amulet/necklace/thingy. I have to ask, why does every ancient artifact have to be religious in nature? Maybe people made pretty things because they were pretty! The item appears to me to look like an abstract ankh, the model for the Torino medals, or the headpiece of the Staff of Ra, which, I suppose, would make it a religious item.

This one looks interesting too..."Archaeologists Unveil Staircase in Tivoli." This appears to be related to the headless sphinx mentioned a few days ago, but still, a giant staircase at Tivoli is something to get excited about.

That's it for now, I'll probably have some more to say after I watch Seth Wescott, a high school classmate of mine, win the gold in snowboard cross.

Happy Lupercalia!

Well, it's that time of the year again, when young men run around in loinclothes and young women get whipped with leather thongs. No, not those kinds of thongs. Once again we are celebrating the Lupercalia, that festival to Februs that lasted for 1000 years and found its zenith (or nadir, I suppose) in the Hallmark Company.

I'm sure there are a plethora of links out there concerning this festival, but here's one I found particularly useful. Thanks to Pope Gelasius, we have the feast of the martyr St. Valentine to celebrate today instead of the much more sexy Lupercalia. As you may know, St. Valentine is the patron young lovers. But he is not only the patron of young lovers, you see, but also of engaged couples, beekeepers, epilepsy, fainting, and plague! I suppose all of them are related in some way, but far be it from me to understand why.

For those that might need them today, here's a helpful list of patron saints you can turn to:

St. Therese of Lisieux - patron saint of florists
St. Catharine of Alexandria - patron saint of young women
St. Monica - patron saint of mothers

and depending on who you pissed off:

St. John the Apostle - patron saint of sufferers of poison
St. Raymond Nonnatus - patron saint of the falsely accused
St. Justin Martyr - patron saint of apologists
St. Jude - patron saint of lost or hopeless causes

FINALLY

I don't know how I missed this one the first time, but finally someone talking some sense. Fortuitously dated a week before President Bush's "We're gonna break our oil dependency but not really" State of the Union address, here's an article about ethanol. Now I don't claim to have a degree in economics, chemistry, finance, or business, but it seems to me that using biomass makes sense. It's renewable, it's cleaner by all accounts, and since we're already putting in the gas out here and making cars that can run on it, why not look into using it on a large scale? Oh wait, that's right, oil companies would get hurt by not using oil.

Hunka hunka burnin' sand...

They've found a new tomb in the Valley of the Kings, the first since Tut in 1922. Yet another reason why I need to go to the Tut exhibit in Chicago this summer.

Here's the kind of thing that just warms my heart. Dedicated teachers doing amazing things. This teacher took her kids out a boat trip in order to help them understand the Odyssey. Innovative, dangerous, and highly effective, I wish I had come up with it. Being stuck in the middle of Illinois, however, I don't know where I would get a boat and an ocean.

Unfortunately, the time comes for the work for the day. Fridays off from teaching is a wonderful thing, but it is often spent in prep for the next week. The upshot is that I get Saturday and Sunday for research! Hopefully I can get everything done so I can watch the Opening Ceremonies of the XXth Olympic Winter Games without guilt.

Back in Black

I'll get better about this regular posting business. I've been out of town for the last couple of days, and finally able to get back to the blogosphere. What should appear first but this nifty little find, a headless sphinx! Glaukopis has a link to another version of the article, this one with pictures. Call me crazy, but I'm not sure we should get all that excited about a headless ancient marble statue, but I suppose knocking the block off of a Sphinx is fairly ununsual...unless this is some sort of slap against Domitian. It's tough to keep ahead of the Classics news, since there are so many out there that do a terrific job consolidating the information, but I'll do what I can.

We've got Eta Sigma Phi inductions tomorrow, the resurgence (I hope) of a dormant chapter. I'm looking forward to seeing the standard these folks have created. If anyone notices a missing redbird statue in the morning, I have no idea where it is, I swear.

The books keep rolling in, and the money keeps rolling out. God bless Schoenhof's for their sale books in Latin, Greek, Latin studies, and just about anything else you can imagine. Half-price Teubners are nothing to scoff at. I'll hopefully be getting into the business of unofficial book reviews here, once my schedule returns to its normal state.

Underwater archaeology and other news

Here's an interesting article, "Robot Spots Ancient Greek Shipwreck," and a spiffy slide show from the MIT team in charge. You know it's news when it's on Fark.com! Considering the amount of shipping traffic that had to be lost during antiquity, it's pretty exciting to think of what might be out there. Too bad manuscripts don't take too well to water.

As I mentioned, the new King Tut exhibit is coming to Chicago in May. I just ran across this article claiming that ol' Tut was killed by a swordblow to the knee. I'm not sure I buy the logic behind it, but dammit Jim, I'm a philologist, not a doctor!

One more article I found interesting was this one from the Middle East times announcing the discovery of 4th-century BC fortifications on Crete.

That's enough procrastinating for now, I think. I've got to give a 45 minute talk on Cicero's political theory on Monday, which will hopefully help me land a tenure-track job. Saturnalia's over, time for this slave to get back to work.