57 replies to this topic

[the L]

Banksy Boy, on 26 January 2013 - 11:09 AM, said:

You forgetting they where Egyptians, they could probably knock that lot out within a week or so

They always win on ancient contests and olympics. They were fastest and strongest.

[kharga]

See

and http://www.aucegypt....se.aspx?rid=337

and http://books.google....TcC&redir_esc=y

PS I have worked with Salima in the Western Desert in Egypt - see http://www.aucegypt....es/default.aspx

and http://news.national...rga/photo2.html

[the L]

kharga, on 26 January 2013 - 11:00 PM, said:

See

and http://www.aucegypt....se.aspx?rid=337

and http://books.google....TcC&redir_esc=y

PS I have worked with Salima in the Western Desert in Egypt - see http://www.aucegypt....es/default.aspx

and http://news.national...rga/photo2.html

Horus appeared on her balcony and took mummies.  
Thanks for video. Im sure it was pleasure working with her. I hope after Kharga work you went somewhere nice like in Hurghada for deserving vaccation.
So can you solve mystery for us...In what period they wrapped 8 million dogs?
What else people say about this finding? Isnt 8 million huge number?
It would takes milleniums.

Edited by the L, 26 January 2013 - 11:30 PM.

[Alcibiades9]

Can anyone confirm or deny a "fact" I read when I was young about so many bitumen-rich cat mummies being unearthed in 19th century Egypt that the British used them as fuel in their locomotives?  I've since read something about this being debunked, an "urban myth" if you like, but cannot find any definitive source.

[kmt_sesh]

Alcibiades9, on 02 February 2013 - 10:47 PM, said:

Can anyone confirm or deny a "fact" I read when I was young about so many bitumen-rich cat mummies being unearthed in 19th century Egypt that the British used them as fuel in their locomotives?  I've since read something about this being debunked, an "urban myth" if you like, but cannot find any definitive source.

I haven't quite heard that take on it in my studies, but something close. In the nineteenth century the Brits excavated the area of Bubastis, the cult center for the ancient cat goddess Bastet, and recovered many thousands of cat mummies. They filled a ship's ballast with the cat mummies, brought them back to the UK, and promptly ground most into mummy-dust to be used as fertilizer in gardens. Only a small percentage of the cat mummies survived for scientific research.

Alternatively, there is the yarn about using human mummies as fuel for locomotives.  It comes from Mark Twain, the great American writer, who visited certain parts of the Middle East in the nineteenth century. In 1869 Twain published his book The Innocents Abroad, in which the mummy-fuel yarn was included. Twain writes:

The fuel use for the locomotive is composed of mummies three thousand years old, purchased by the ton or by the graveyard for that purpose, and . . . sometimes one hears the profane engineer call out pettishly, 'Damn these plebeians, they don't burn worth a cent—pass out a King!

Twain was famous for his ability to tell a story, but of course this was not real. I have no doubt that mummies burn quite well, but enough to fuel locomotives? Purchased by the ton? LOL Great story, but that's all it is.

[the L]

@kmt_sesh (and possibly anyone who wants to share his knowledge)

I read that Islam historians al Tabari, Sibt ibn al Jawzi, Ibn Abd Hakem and Muhammad Khwandamir wrote that AE pyramids had been built by the races before flood. And that Egyptians as we know them with their temples came in Nile river later. Since I dont know arabic I cant test this claim but maybe you know something more.
Also Diodorus of Sicily wrote :
"The Egyptians were strangers, who, in remote times, settled on the banks of the Nile, bringing with them the civilization of their mother country , the art of writing, and a polished language. They had come from the direction of the setting sun  and were the most ancient of men."

So did they came as sophisticated civilization? Are you familiar with works of those Islamic historians?

[kmt_sesh]

the L, on 03 February 2013 - 09:04 PM, said:

@kmt_sesh (and possibly anyone who wants to share his knowledge)

I read that Islam historians al Tabari, Sibt ibn al Jawzi, Ibn Abd Hakem and Muhammad Khwandamir wrote that AE pyramids had been built by the races before flood. And that Egyptians as we know them with their temples came in Nile river later. Since I dont know arabic I cant test this claim but maybe you know something more.
Also Diodorus of Sicily wrote :
"The Egyptians were strangers, who, in remote times, settled on the banks of the Nile, bringing with them the civilization of their mother country , the art of writing, and a polished language. They had come from the direction of the setting sun  and were the most ancient of men."

So did they came as sophisticated civilization? Are you familiar with works of those Islamic historians?

I'm not as familiar with the writings of early Muslim historians as I am with the works of Classical authors like Diodorus, but one has to consider the biases and motivations of such individuals as well as their separation in time from the events about which they were writing. The biblical flood, for instance, has worked its way into all of the Abrahamic religions, but that doesn't mean it was a reality to begin with. It was not.

While such works are a delight to read and I personally recommend that people do so, I would issue a cautionary note about the writings of ancient Greeks and the later Muslim historians. They are composed largely of fiction (not entirely, I admit, but largely). More important is to delve into modern research. After all, modern researchers and archaeologists and historians have at their disposal a wide array of scientific tools to analyze and make sense of the ancient past.

That said, the sum total of evidence clearly points to the Nile Valley origin of the Egyptians. In other words, they were there all along, and they were the folks who formed the pharaonic kingdom and built the monuments for which they were (and are) famous for the next 3,000-plus years. There is no evidence in the archaeological record, or the textual record for that matter, of an advanced civilization in the Nile Valley pre-existing the pharaonic Egyptians. Science alone has demonstrated that the Giza pyramids were built in the mid-third millennium BCE, so obviously it would be incorrect to attribute them to some ancient, lost civilization.

[Pineapple Milk]

That's so strange?

[Alcibiades9]

kmt_sesh, on 03 February 2013 - 02:10 AM, said:

I haven't quite heard that take on it in my studies, but something close. In the nineteenth century the Brits excavated the area of Bubastis, the cult center for the ancient cat goddess Bastet, and recovered many thousands of cat mummies. They filled a ship's ballast with the cat mummies, brought them back to the UK, and promptly ground most into mummy-dust to be used as fertilizer in gardens. Only a small percentage of the cat mummies survived for scientific research.

Alternatively, there is the yarn about using human mummies as fuel for locomotives.  It comes from Mark Twain, the great American writer, who visited certain parts of the Middle East in the nineteenth century. In 1869 Twain published his book The Innocents Abroad, in which the mummy-fuel yarn was included. Twain writes:

The fuel use for the locomotive is composed of mummies three thousand years old, purchased by the ton or by the graveyard for that purpose, and . . . sometimes one hears the profane engineer call out pettishly, 'Damn these plebeians, they don't burn worth a cent—pass out a King!

Twain was famous for his ability to tell a story, but of course this was not real. I have no doubt that mummies burn quite well, but enough to fuel locomotives? Purchased by the ton? LOL Great story, but that's all it is.

I share your skeptism... there seems to be a strange mixture of alleged complete disrespect for the past (burning mummies for fuel) and a lack of primary sources for this one.

For instance, this site http://www.historybu...er/april8.html ("History Buff" - hardly highbrow I know!) states:

"Not all bodies mummified were human. Some were cows, crocodiles, scorpions, or cats to name a few. For example, when a cat that belonged to them died it was mummified to prepare them for the afterworld. In 1888, 300,000 mummified cats were found at Beni Hassan and were promptly scooped up by tractors and sold at $18.43 per ton.
In the late 1800’s, millions of mummies were used as fuel for locomotives because wood and coal were so scarce and mummified remains were so plentiful. Egyptians also used them as fertilizer and even to thatch the roofs of their homes. The wood from the coffins were used by poor people as firewood to cook on."

Where are they getting this stuff?

[simijkaktoka]

how can anybody count 8 million decayed dog mummies? it seems outrageous. Even if they were neatly buried, it just seems impossible to count so many. But the story is fascinating.

[The Unseen]

8 million,what? Did they sit there and count each and everyone ?

[Tutankhaten-pasheri]

They see how many mummies are in a certain volume of the cemetery, a few cubic metres for instance, then measure the area of the entire cemetery to gets it's volume and divide by the excavated volume, and then multiply that number by the number of mummies found in the excavated area. Not accurate really, just a good guess.

[third_eye]

'meow' ?