Newsgroup sci.archaeology 48094

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Hello!
I am a college student focusing on archaeology and would like to know if there 
are any specific ways I can get in touch with people who need fieldworkers on 
excavations -- I am interested in working anywhere around the globe and 
payment is not necessary (but appreciated!)  If anyone can help me out on 
this, I'd be ever so grateful -- I want to get my foot in the door but am a 
bit in the dark as to how to go about doing so!
Thank you,
Stephen P Ryder

whittet@shore.net (Steve Whittet) wrote:
>In article <533juo$hfp@halley.pi.net>, mcv@pi.netÁ says...
>>
>>c. 7000 BC >
>>============
>>
>>Anatolia    Coyonu/Catal Huyuk
>>  Mallory: -- 
>>  Renfrew: Proto-IE (Proto-Anatolian)
>>  Whittet: [ ] 
>At Catal Hyuk c 7000 BC we have the very earliest strata which 
>should not be confused with the later levels [...]
>Did people here speak a distinct language with a classifiable structure?
>I would suggest they did not. No real grammar, very little vocabulary [..]
Well, that's pretty much how you answer the whole "questionnaire" up
to about 3000 BC (maybe 4000).  Or more concisely:
>Nothing to indicate linguistics c 7000 BC.
>Much later c 4000-2000 BC
So we can fill in:
W: [grunts]
everywhere, up to 4000/3000 BC.
>After 3000 BC we get into historic times and need not speculate.
>As you can see by the agreement between Rebfrew and Mallory.
>This is when I feel language makes a sort of quantum jump with
>structured grammars and expanded vocabularies.
>Lanquage spread by trade from urban centers with the metals of 
>the Bronze Age along the coasts and up the rivers of every 
>region we have discussed thus far.
So all languages (at least in the Europe/Near East/North African area)
are 5000 years old.  Objection: there is historical evidence for
languages spoken c. 2500 - 1500 BC (Sumerian, Akkadian, Egyptian,
Elamite, Hittite, Hurrian, Greek, ...), a mere 500 - 1500 years after
the "invention" of language.  Now bear in mind: 500 years is roughly
Shakespeare, 1500 years is roughly Beowulf.  Is that by any stretch of
the imagination the distance we find between Sumerian and Akkadian?
Of course not.  Counterargument: they were independently "invented"!
So what about Akkadian and Egyptian then?  They are clearly related,
but there's NO way a mere 1500 years would be enough to account for
the differences.  The gap between them is several millennia at the
least.
==
Miguel Carrasquer Vidal                     ~ ~
Amsterdam                   _____________  ~ ~
mcv@pi.net                 |_____________|||
========================== Ce .sig n'est pas une .cig

Yuri,
Some people like Waldeck, for example, suggested that the Mayan
civilization sprang intact from that of the Egyptians.  Shall we dig up
this stalk of papyrus again?
Paul 
Yuri Kuchinsky  wrote in article <53b8pd$pko@news1.io.org>...
> Dear Peter,
>  
> A while back, I promised to send you some refs in regard to the
> theories that the Mayan writing system may have been based on some
> Chinese prototypes. I have investigated this matter further, and I
> must say that I found quite little work that has been done in this
> area. Nevertheless, there's some...
>  
> Joseph Needham writes in TRANS-PACIFIC ECHOES:
>  
>       That the pictographic and ideographic principle of the
>       scripts of the Meso-American people evoked the parallels
>       of the Old World, has been appreciated for nearly two
>       centuries. In 1813 Alexander von Humboldt wrote [about
>       it] ... (p. 16)
>  
> Also:
>  
>       ...the pictographic/ideographic principles might not
>       alone attain our collocative level [indicating
>       diffusion] if it were not for the squareness of the Maya
>       glyphs so much recalling Chinese, the reading order
>       which goes downwards in nearly all cases, and sometimes
>       right to left, and even indentations, recalling Chinese
>       practices. On the pictographic side some of the writings
>       from the Shih-chai Shan culture (4th to 1st centuries
>       bce) are notably similar to those of the Aztec codices
>       (Fig. 1) [the illustration at the back of the book shows
>       some Chinese ideograms remarkably similar to some of
>       Meso-American ones] By the same token, Meso-American
>       cylinder-seals recall those so common in ancient
>       Babylonia and the Indus Valley. (p. 16)
>  
> Needham gives the following further refs:
>  
> Chiang Khang-Hu, ON CHINESE STUDIES, (Shanghai: Com. Press, 1934).
> p. 380.
>  
> E. C. Bunker, THE TIEN CULTURE AND SOME ASPECTS OF ITS RELATINSHIP
> TO THE DONG-SON CULTURE, in EARLY CHINESE ART AND ITS POSSIBLE
> INFLUENCE IN THE PACIFIC BASIN, ed. N. Barnard, (1974), p. 296.
>  
> R. C. Rudolph, REGIONAL REPORT: CHINA MAINLAND -- AN IMPORTANT DONG-
> SON SITE IN YUNNAN [SHIH-CHAI SHAN], in ASIAN PERSPECTIVES
> (Honolulu), 4 (no. 1), (1961), p. 47.
>  
> As you may notice, these books are not recent, and may not
> necessarily be easily available. Nobody said these theories are
> fashionable, and that they can find publishers easily. But they
> exist.
>  
> Also, I would like to make it clear that I never claimed that
> decisive proof exists that Mayan writing was derived from Asian
> prototypes. All I said was that _some people_ suggested it. Such
> evidence as exists is extremely intriguing and deserves further
> investigation. I hope someone can research these matters further.
>  
> Yours truly,
>  
> Yuri.
> 
>              #%    Yuri Kuchinsky in Toronto    %#
>   --  a webpage like any other...  http://www.io.org/~yuku  --
> 
> The world is governed more by appearance than by realities, so 
> that it is fully as necessary to seem to know something as it 
> is to know it              =========            Daniel Webster
> 
> 

Saida wrote:
> 
> Troy Sagrillo wrote:
[snip]
> > But you *have* claimed in a previous post:
> 
> No, Troy, never.
I then apologise. I thought the quote given below was yours. That person
is claiming that "Egyptian IS partly an Indo-European language". I have
great problems with this idea.
> > > >that Egyptian IS partly an Indo-European language.  It
> > > >is also partly Semitic.  This is precisely what troubled scholars when
> > > >they first began to study it.  It just wouldn't be classified.
> >
> > Just because there are a handful of Egyptian words that find their ways
> > into English does **not** make Egyptian "partly IE". There are a large
> > number of Arabic words in English as well (mainly via Latin and Spanish,
> > some French too) -- does that make Arabic "partly IE"?
> 
> The number of Arabic words in English does not seem large to me--perhaps
> because I am not aware of them, although I do have a fair knowledge of
> Arabic.
Arabic? English is filled with words of Arabic origin, though many of
them are via Spanish, Italian, French, and Mediaeval Latin. A few basic
ones: 
admiral, albacore, alchemy, alcohol, alcove, alembic, alfalfa, algebra,
algorism, alkali, almanac, amalgam, aniline, arsenal, artichoke,
assassin, attar, aubergine, azimuth, azure, bard (horse armour, not the
singer -- that's Gaelic), bedouin, benzoin, borax, burnoose, cable,
calabash, calibre, calif, camphor, candy (from Farsi via Arabic),
carafe, caraway, carob, carrack, cinnabar, cipher, coffee, cotton,
crimson, crocus, cumin, damask, elixir, gauze, gazelle, genii, gerbil,
ghoul, giraffe, guitar, halva, hareem, hashish, henna, howdah, jar,
jasmine, julep, kismet, kohl, lacquer, lapis lazuli (only the "lazuli"
part, and that is prob. of Farsi origin), lemon, lilac, lime, lute,
magazine, marzipan, mattress, minaret, mohair, monsoon, mosque, mummy,
myrrh, nadir, natron, olibanum, orange (goes back to Farsi actually),
popinjay, racket (as in 'tennis'), ream (as in 'paper') safari, saffron,
sap (as in "to dig/mine"), satin (Chinese via Arabic), sash, scallion,
sequin, sesame, sherbert, sofa, spinach, sugar, sumac, syrup, talc,
tabby, talisman, tamarind, tambourine, tarboosh, tariff, typhoon
(Chinese via Arabic), zenith, zero......
This is just a basic list -- there are many others (mainly having to do
with astronomy (like the names of most stars (Vega, Deneb, Rigel,
etc.)), chemistry, mathematics, the military, music, and spices/foods. I
don't think that Egyptian compares to this small list in the slightest.
If English has all these words of Arabic origin, why don't you consider
Arabic to be "partly IE" or English "partly AA", or say that Arabic
can't be classified as being AA (I'm just following the line of
reasoning I have been seeing here).
> > >  I challenge anyone
> > > in this group to say that, as far as they know, NO Egyptian terms are
> > > found in the English language.
> >
> > No one is claiming that at all. But a few **borrowed** words does not
> > change the fact that English is IE and Egyptian is AA.
> 
> I see this differently than you do, Troy.  I see a substantial number of
> Egyptian words that remind me of English and German words of like or
> exact meaning.  Egyptologists of 60-odd and more years ago, like Budge,
> saw this same thing, but, of course, they were all *idiots* and we ought
> to take no notice of them. 
No, they were not idiots, but that was 60 yrs ago. Things have changed
considerably in terms of scholarship, though a good modern scholar will
look at their contibutions as well (as I said, they were not idiots). [I
have other problems with Budge, such as the fact that he made up stuff,
including complete passages in texts (including the glyphs) and fails to
let his reader know this "detail"].
> Just remember, though, in Egyptology it
> always seems that today's sage turns out to be tomorrow's fool.  For the
> last time, I do not believe Egyptian is an IE language--no more do I
> believe it is a Semitic one or Afro-Asiatic.
Fine, I *agree* with you that Egyptian is NOT IE or Semitic. However it
has truck-loads of things **in common with** Semitic (and with Berber,
Chadic, and Cushitic, &c.;, as well) -- which makes it Afroasiatic -- and
very, very little in common with that of IE. IMO, and that of most
scholars, Egyptian has as much to do with Afroasiatic as Anatolian,
Armenian, Indo-Iranian, Albanian, Greek, Italic, Celtic, Germanic, and
Balto-Slavic have to do with IE. No modern linguist is trying to force
Egyptian into any Semitic mould, or that of Berber, or Chadic, or
anything else **except** for AA; Egyptian is its **own** branch of the
AA family, just as Albanian is its own branch of IE. Egyptian is its own
branch percisely because there *are* significant differences between it
and Semitic, &c;, but still has *plenty* in common with them to be
closely related (certainly much more closely than IE).
[snip]
Troy

Saida wrote:
[snip]
> Don't get too carried away with Egyptian's resemblance to Semitic.  There are a lot more
> words in Egyptian that don't resemble Semitic in any way. 
Of course there are, otherwise Egyptian would *be* Semitic. However,
Loren was commenting on my list of Afroasiatic words with Egyptian AND
Semitic AND Chadic AND Omotic AND Cushitic cognates, not *just* Semitic.
If an Egyptian word doesn't have a cognate in Semitic, it may very well
have one in other branch of Afroasiatic. The word /z3/ ("son") in
Egyptian is a good example. It is not in Semitic, but it *is* in a bunch
of Central Chadic languages. Same goes for Egyptian /z/ "man", though
here the cognates are in West, Eastern, and Central Chadic. And yes, of
course Egyptian has its *own* words not known in any other language
(just as English does), but the majority have a AA root of some sort.
Troy

In article <539eh9$f9v@trojan.neta.com>, blair@trojan.neta.com (Blair P Houghton) wrote:
>Bob Casanova  wrote:

>
>>I've gotten the impression (from my admittedly sparse reading on the period) 
>>that hunger wasn't usually a major problem in the area, due to the regularity 
>>of the Nile flood and the associated regular harvest, and the techniques 
>>developed for food storage.
>
>Correct.  Still, to those who are in their off-season,
>a job is something to be competed for.
Sounds reasonable (at least from a modern perspective).
>
>>The labor force would thus consist of all of the 
>>agricultural workers during that part of the year when agriculture wasn't 
>>being practiced. Is this incorrect?
>
>Probably not all.  It wouldn't take that many to build
>the pyramids.  And some of the pyramid-building force
>would have been skilled craftsmen and engineers.
Granted. There would have been a fair number of common laborers, though.
>
>                                --Blair
>                                  "Or maybe it was Sontarans
>                                   with hyperspatial chisels
>                                   and levitating backhoes..."
Or Jedi Knights using The Force (tm)...
(Note followups)
Bob C.
"No one's life, liberty or property is safe while
 the legislature is in session." - Mark Twain

Martin Stower  wrote:
>fmurray@pobox,com (frank murray) wrote:
>
>[Sekhemkhet]
>
>>ok...that's one sealed sarcophagus with no body in it, but with
>>treasure left laying about...that sarcophagus was found in the middle
>>of a necropolis surrounded by the tombs of lesser officals...
>
>That's one sarcophagus in an unfinished pyramid, which seems itself to have
>been entered and resealed (this from the masonry blocking the passage).
>
>The treasure was hardly `left laying around'.
>
>Was this unfinished pyramid really surrounded by tombs?
Sekhemkhet unfinished pyramid was insdie an enclosure much 
like Zoser's.  Neither were surrounded by tombs in the 
sense that Khufu's was surrounded though obviously there 
are an enormous number of burials at Saqqarra.  However, 
Sek. pyramid did have a south tomb inside the enclosure 
which had the remains of a small boy inside.  This tomb was 
also robbed.  Sek. pyramid was resealed about Dynasty 26 
based on papyrus found in the rubble of the vertical shaft. 
 It was apparently not entered between than and 1951 when 
it was rediscovered.  Why a almost empty pyramid was 
resealed is byond me.  Any ideas?
Charlie

Linda Dietrich wrote:
> 
> On 29 Sep 1996, Blair P Houghton wrote:
> 
> > Jiri Mruzek   wrote:
> > >Kevin D. Quitt wrote:
> > >> Again, I'm not trying to say it's trivial or easy; it's not.  It's a hell of
> > >> a lot of work, but it can be done in a straightforward manner by not an
> > >> unresaonable number of people.
> > >
> > >Up to a certain weight that might be true. But, we're talking about
> > >stones bigger than that.
> >
> > Comes the question:  Can Jiri Mruzek imagine a stone
> > so large that Egypt can not lift it?
> >
> > That is to say, "bigger than what?"
> >
> > If I claim that a million-kilogram rock is a piece of cake
> > to cut, carve, transport, and erect, do you state that
> > oh you meant a two-million-kilogram rock, which is unquestionably
> > impossible even to comprehend?
> 
> Actually, NASA has a VEHICLE bigger than that. It is used to transport the
> space shuttle to the launching pad. It weigs 3000 tons, which is to say 6
> million pounds, ~ 2,727,272 kilograms (1 kg=2.2 lbs)
>  >
> > >It would matter greatly with the Baalbek Trilithons. How many people
> > >does it take to pull these. How many ropes? How big would the wheels
> > >be? It would matter greatly with smaller blocks under more difficult
> > >circumstances.
> >
> > You'd make a depressing leader.
> >
> > >>It might mean you need
> > >> 11 people instead of ten (whatever), but isn't insurmountable.  On a level
> > >> surface I don't think it would make a lot of difference.  Uphill it might,
> > >> but then again you can add more people.
> > >
> > >Here you are talking small blocks.
> >
> > It might mean you need 1100 people instead of 1000.
> >
> >>>For moving the blocks up the ramps, sledges or mechanical advantage from A
> >>>frames could be used.  Lots of things could be; I haven't really looked at
> >
> > Wooden sledges on greased wooden crossbeams.
> >
> > Just don't let go.
> >
>  With people behind it using logs a brace -- not a bad idea.
> 
> >>> As far as I know, the builders never described how they did their work.  Too
> >>> mundane for the nobility to worry about and record.  My goal was to show
> >>> that the materials can be transported via low-tech means, without magic or
> >>> alien intervention.  I believe we've agreed on that much.
> > >
> > >Yes, and no. As to the records, how come the Egyptian folklore
> > >did not become enriched by sundry stories from the Pyramid?
> > >Mighty strange isn't it? Of course, I presume that there is such
> > >a thing as Egyptian folklore.
> >
> > Not an extant one from that period.  That's what happens
> > when a civilization dies.  The oral traditions that molds
> > its social order disappear.  To modern Egypt, the pyramids
> > are an Archaeological curiosity, like the Anasazi are to
> > natives of the American southwest, and the Incas and Aztecs
> > are to the Mestizo and Mesquite of Mexico.
> >
> > If there was any folklore remaining from that time, I doubt
> > you'd be able to make statements about how it is not possible
> > to erect large structures without anachronistic technology.
> >
> > >> >We still can't duplicate the Pyramid with Lo-Tech methods and
> > >> >materials.
> > >
> > >> Do you have any idea how much that would cost, to the labor unions alone?!
> > >
> > >But you seem to think the Egyptians were economical idiots?  Face it,
> > >it would be idiotic to engage an entire economy for decades in the
> > >production of one tomb.
> >
> > Not the *entire* economy.  The seasonally unemployed.
> > Those not disposed to agricultural work.  Those with
> > masonic, engineering, or managerial skill.  They had the
> > luxury of being able to utilize this excess manpower
> > because the valley of the Nile was the richest, most
> > productive place on Earth.
> >
> > As for who's an economical (or in this case astronomical)
> > idiot, I think you're better off not leaving easy gainsay
> > lying about.
> >
> > >Why, they could have built magnificent
> > >granite forts instead, from which they could have laughed at their
> > >enemies for  millenia.
> >
> > They didn't have enemies of any worth.  They ruled the
> > entire civilized world.
> >
> > >Like I say, accusations of numerology do not faze me, I've faced them
> > >before. See here old excerpts from Fidonet-Science, in which the
> > >moderator, Jeff Sterling tries to stick me with a witchdoctor label.
> > >
> > > JM   But, did I do it? Nope. I'd rather step into the lion's den -
> > > JM till the lion miauies! (Lion's den meant Fidonet -Science)
> > >
> > > JS> Actually, pal, my good natured humor is one reason you haven't been
> > > JS> told to take your "numerology" to another echo, post haste!  Your
> > > JS> post was presented in a manner that at least -looked- like science
> > > JS> (which is the worst thing about it... less knowledgable individuals
> > > JS> might be suckered into thinking it really -is- science
> > > JS>, which it most definitely is not
> > >
> > > JM   You look like an Angel, talk like an Angel, walk like an Angel.
> > > JM   You're nothing but a DEVIL IN DISGUISE!
> >
> > You tell him, Jiri.  Just do it without losing
> > your place in the soup line...
> >
> > >Next, the moderator issued the first plea to  Fido mathematicians,
> > >since there were always a few math professors there:
> > >JS> appeared to swallow his bunk about ancient cavemen hiding the secrets
> > >JS> of the universe in "mathematical" relationships that were supposedly
> > >JS> buried within their artwork. (Sigh!)
> >
> > Jiri! You've been holding out on us, you hoodoo.
> >
> > How can you let Fidonet have all the fun?
> >
> > >And so Jeff just banned me on his own authority.. (for being impolite)
> >
> > For asking for it.
> >
> > >Jiri Mruzek  355/113=3.141592..(Now, that's what I call Numerology!)
> >
> > Pi has a perfectly reasonable value without needing to be
> > approximated by arbitrary fractions.
> >
> >                               --Blair
> >                                 "Speaking of holes."
> >
> >
try egyptology 466...meade has a reasonable idea of the hows and whys...
he knows enough to realise he doesn't know all...a lesson we should
learn!...

In article <3259001B.7D9B@utoronto.ca>, t.sagrillo@utoronto.ca says...
>
>Steve Whittet wrote:
>> 
>> In article , petrich@netcom.com says...
>> ...snip...
>> >
>> >In article <538g5e$f9e@shore.shore.net>,
>> >Steve Whittet  wrote:
>> >
>> >>I was thinking of "Ptah r" where "r" is more of a verb
>> >
>> >        Actually, Mr. Whittet shows his ignorance of the structure of the
>> >Egyptian language, whose preferred syntax was verb-subject-object.
>
>And by claming that /r/ is a verb to begin with....
Gardiner page 214 Section 281 Tetiae Infirmae verbs
"(iri) make; do; is usually written without the expected phonetic
complent (r)"
So...is Gardiners Egyptian Grammar incorrect...?
>
>[snip]
>
>Troy
steve

ayma@tip.nl wrote:
> 
> Saida  wrote:
> 
> >In the linguistic threads we have been talking about the possible extent
> >of the influence of the Egyptian language or how far Egyptians reached
> >in their commerce and or communications.  There are a couple of stories
> >that make some intriguing suggestions.  One is contained in the writings
> >of Hecataeus of Abdera, who travelled to Thebes in the time of Ptolemy
> >Soter and visited the mausoleum of Ramesses II there, the Ramesseum.
> >Hecataeus claimed he saw a library therein and also a wall decoration
> >depicting Ramesses' Bactrian campaign.  That would have put the pharaoh
> >in Afganistan, I believe!
> 
> ***Interesting, I didn't know this reference. Can you quote it
> verbatim, or better give a reference? My quess would be it deals with
> the legendary figure Sesostris, about whom the Greeks told all kind of
> fantastic stories, like they did around the mesopotamian Ninus.
> So not  real history.....
You may read about it in an interesting new book called "The Vanished 
Library" by Luciano Canfora (University of California Press)
> 
> >Another tale, held to be apocryphal, but perhaps, like all such stories,
> >contains elements of truth. Here it is as described by Budge in his
> >book, "The Mummy":
> 
> ***This so called Bentresh Stela is generally to be held a
> propogandistic forgery of the Persian/Ptolomaic time, to boost the
> prestige of the god Chonsu. So it is a mixture of fact and fiction
> (as indicated below)
> The full text of the stela  you can find in Lichtheim's Ancient
> Egyptian Literature.
It would be interesting to know at what point the stele was dubbed a 
forgery and who reached this conclusion.  Can you enlighten us?
> 
> >"The reigns of Rameses X and Ramses XI are of no interest.  Of the reign
> >of Ramses XII, their successor, an interesting though fabulous story is
> >recorded.
> 
> ***This is odd: the Stela is generally accepted to deal with
> Ramses II !!
> In the text, the royal names of Ramses ii are named, being however
> mixed up with some names of Tuthmosis IV (one of the things showing
> the stela to be a forgery) -  fact 1 + fiction 1.
Whoa!  Ramesses the Second's throne name was User-ma'at-Re Setep-en-Re 
Mery-Amun and that of Thutmose IV was Menkheperure.  Kind of difficult 
to confuse, I would think.  Now the throne name of the rather shadowy 
Ramesses XII was supposed to be Sekha-en-Re Mery-Amun.  Again, what do 
you suppose would have accounted for the mix-up?
> Also it is accepted that some popular story was used, that had some
> historical basis.
> 
>   A stele found near the temple of Chonsu at Karnak states that
> >the king was paying his usual visit to Mesopotamia to receive tribute
> >from the tribes subject to him.
> 
> ***Ramses II never visited Naharina (Mesopotamia) - fiction 2
No, it is not attested that he did.
> 
> >>Each chief brought his offering of
> >gold, etc., but the chief of Bechten brought his eldest daughter, who
> >was a most beautiful girl and gave her to the king.  She found favour in
> >his sight and he married her, and gave her the official title of "royal
> >spouse".
> >Sometime after they had returned to Egypt, a messenger came to the king
> >from Bechten saying that a young sister of his wife, Ra-Neferu, called
> >Bentresh, was grievously ill, and entreated him to send a physician to
> >heal her.  A very learned scribe called Tehuti-em-heb was despatched,
> 
> ***A person with the name Thotemheb actually really lived during
> Ramses ii 's reign - fact 2
Interesting.  Where is it attested and what was this person's function?
> ***The prinses was called Nefrure. This shows the source of the
> whole story: in his 32nd year Ramses II married a princes of Hatti
> (Hittite, Anatolia), who was given the name: Ma'at-Nefrure !
> So:
> marriage with foreign princess and name of the girl - fact 3 + 4
> date of the marriage is 32nd year, not  23th (or 15th) as the stela
> says - fiction 3
Ramesses II married a girl named Ma'athorneferure, which is similar to 
the name of the princess in the story.  But I would have to have a 
little more evidence to convince me of a mix-up between Ramesses II and 
XII.
> 
> >but when he arrived in Bechten he found that the illness of Bentresh was
> >caused by an evil spirit, and he was unable to cure her.  Another
> >messenger was sent to Egypt and he asked that the god Chonsu himself
> >might be sent to cure Bentresh, and the king having asked the god to
> >consent to this proposition, prepared a suitable shrine and sent the god
> >to Bechten, where he arrived AFTER A JOURNEY OF ONE YEAR AND FIVE
> >MONTHS.
> 
> **Yes, a fairytale lenght.....fiction 4
> Notice the scribe messes up with the 'year 15' at the beginning;
> Chonsu is back home  33th year, after travel of 1 year 5 months;
> he is in Bechten 3 years and 9 months, after having arrived after a
> travel of 1 year 5 months, having left Egypt in 26th year.
> So the marriage must have been 2 times (1 y 5 m) before that, being
> the time it needs Thutemheb to travel back and forth - so it should
> have read 'year 23' instead of 'year 15'.
> 
> >As soon as the god was brought into the sick maiden's chamber, he
> >addressed the demon who possessed her and drove him out of her.  The
> >demon acknowledged the authority of the god, and promised to depart to
> >his own place if a great feast was prepared in his honour; the chief of
> >Bechten gladly made a feast, and the demon departed.  The god Vhonsu was
> >detained in Bechten for three years and nine months, and at the end of
> >that time he returned to Egypt, his priests bringing rich gifts with
> >them..."
> 
> >A journey of seventeen months--even for a god!  Where could Chonsu have
> >gone that took that long?
> 
> ***fairytale land?? :)
> 
> > At the beginning of the story, Ramesses XII
> >was in Mesopotamia.  I don't much about ancient travel, but that does
> >not seem like it was seventeen months away from Egypt--unless Chonsu and
> >his priests were held up somewhere in a mountainous area by heavy snows
> >and were forced to wait for more clement weather.
> 
> ***On both travels?? Not likely....
> 
> >  Where was Bechten and
> >what sort of name is Bentresh?  Does it contain the Arabic element of
> >"bint" or "daughter"?  Does Bechten have anything to do with Bactria,
> >that land alledgedly conquered by the long-ago Ramesses II?
> 
> ***You are quoting the tradition of Hecataeus, which as said is no
> history. But his text is interesting, as it shows a contemporous clue
> as to the origin of the name Bechten, like you say below. Of course
> Bactria was a toponym not known in Ramses' time, only after the
> Persian time. Thus showing the forgery again. The scribe just picked
> the farest location he had heard of in HIS time - some eastern Perzian
> province; even messing up the name -  fiction 5
Hecataeus is no more liar than Herodotus.  Or maybe even less.
> 
> > Bactria was
> >called in Egyptian "Bakhter", as written on the Maskhutah Stele.  My
> >dictionary also gives the Persian and Babylonian cunieform spellings of
> >this word.  Bechten is "bekhten" in Budge's dictionary and the two place
> >names are spelled nothing alike in glyphs. "Bekhten" is described as "an
> >Asiatic country; situation unknown" and it is taken from the Bekhten
> >Stele.
> 
> **I think not even the travel to Afganistan would take a year and 5
> months, although perhaps a cart of oxen with a statue would, i could't
> tell.
> 
> >Also, if the name of the possessed girl had the prefix of "Bint", then
> >her father's name would have had to be something like "Tarash".  Maybe
> >someone can come up with something related to all this.  All I can think
> >of is Taras, as in Bulba, but that seems to be a Mongol name.
> 
> **The name Bentresh is thought enigmatic, and judged Aramaic in form.
Meaning what?
> You suggest:  'Daughter of Tresh'
> The latter then should rather be a god's name rather than a father's
> name. I know of none.
God?  What god?
> 
> The bottomline of all the above being:
> the historical fact of the marriage of Ramses II with an Hittite
> princess, is mixed with the fictious deeds of the mythological
> Sesostris [=who was based on the three greatest conquering faraos
> in Egyptian history: Sesostris III, Tuthmosis II and  Ramses II] to
> bolster some  theological claims.
How do you figure this?
> Please Saida. keep in mind not to take the Bentresh Stela  for history
> as it stands!
If Budge didn't, why should I???  I was interested, primarily, in the 
place Bechten, assuming that, too, is not a figment of someone's 
imagination.
> 
> kind regards,
> 
> AaykoSaida

In article , petrich@netcom.com says...
>
>In article <539rqu$6qk@shore.shore.net>,
>Steve Whittet  wrote:
>>In article , petrich@netcom.com says...
>
>>>>By itself "p" has the sense of base or pedestal. The god Ptah
>>>>built the base or pedestal on which the sky is supported of iron.
>
>>>>"t" by itself is a phonetic "t" and represents a loaf of bread rising
>>>>which now that I think of it is a well known image of genesis.
>
>>>>"h" is the twisted flax which forms the wick of a candle so in a
>>>>way it has the sense of potential energy
>
>>>        Where does all this come from?
>
>>Gardiner, with a little Faulkner and Budge thrown in for good measure.
>
>        All that's going on here is taking the phonetic spelling of 
>"Ptah" and interpreting it ideographically -- and coming up with some 
>absolutely perverted semantics.
No. Ptah exists as an Egyptian word. The concept represented by
that word is cognate with the Biblical sense of the word father.
as in "Our father who art in heaven hallowed be thy name"
Ptah is the creator of the structure which supports the sky.
He is "sky father", "creator", "Our father who art in heaven", etc.
The phoenetic structure and the cognate are present.
>
>        Try doing that with English some time, using the ideographic 
>meanings of the letters in the ultimate ancestor of the Roman alphabet.
Yes, its not a bad idea really. Indeed it is the basis of the Platonic
Dialoge Cratylus. The idea is that more complex words are formed of
clusters of what originated as very simple words. That is why language
needs to recognize the ideographic origins of the letters in which it
is written.
Just as cells contain within them (in the structure of the DNA which
allows them to replicate), their entire evolutionary history, so do
words contain within them their evolutionary history.
>Thus, "bad" becomes house-ox-door, "bag" becomes house-ox-camel, 
>etc. I'm sure that one can go further and find Whittetian 
>etymologies for many English words this way.
To really know the etymology of a word you do need to trace
it all the way back to its origins, not just stop at relatively
recent Latin and Greek.
>
>>>>"pt" "sky", or "heaven"
>>>        Doesn't fit your hypothesis of pedestal + rising bread.
>>Doesn't it? Look at an elementary science text trying to explain
>>the Big Bang. See the Raisin's move apart as the bread rises...
>
>        The Big Bang was not proposed until this century.
"pt" expreses the concept "pedestal" plus the concept "rise"
How does this associate with sky? The Egyptians saw the horizon
as a pedestal supporting the sky. As it got dark and the stars
began to twinkle into existence and rise in the night sky the
simple logo "pt" contained two thoughts related to this process.
That the stars rose and that there was something holding them up.
The Egyptians viewed this as a watery or transparent medium
in which the stars were supported like raisins in a loaf of bread.
They called the watery mass "nu" 
>>>        Mr. Whittet, I don't see the relevance of that comment.
It would be much easier to explain to you if you would read some
of the elementary source material such as Gardiner and Faulkner
or even Budge.
>>> Now why don't you learn some Latin grammar and see for 
>>>yourself where the -ptor of emptor came from?
>
>>The point, Loren, is where did it come from before it reached 
>>your latin grammar. Emo, ere, emi, emptus...
>
>        Indo-European.
>
>>aptus,= fitted, suitable, apt (well made crafted) a pt, ptah
>
>        From Latin apere "to fasten".
The point is where did the Latin come from?
>
>>creator, craftor, cra ftor, 'ptor, (or craftah, ptah)
>
>Absolute crap. English "creator" is borrowed from Latin, 
Gee Loren, no kidding. You asked me to take a look at the Latin...
so I did,... then you want to turn around and tell me its Latin?
What I saw when I looked at it was that creator is similar to crafter,
similar but yet a little different. A craftsman creates things well.
where it 
>is an agent noun formed from crea:re "to create", and this is from IE 
>*ker- "to grow".
krft = bag (with the determinative Gardiner S28) "strip
of cloth with fringe combined with the folded cloth"
"clothe, clothing," sew, weave, embroider, needlework, craft
k3t = work, craft, profession,
k3ry = gardiner
>
>>It's your basic Boston accent...:)
>
>        Sure, sure [sarcasm].
...:)
>-- 
>Loren Petrich  
steve

In article <539l28$pm4@shore.shore.net>,
Steve Whittet  wrote:
:In article , petrich@netcom.com says...
:>In article <53925c$685@shore.shore.net>,
:>Steve Whittet  wrote:
 [ betrothe ]
:>>>be- is a common Germanic prefix.  The root is "troth", related to
:>>>"truth".
:>
:>>hmmm, you mean as in the Egyptian Thoth? ...
:>
:>        Then how did that r get in there???
:
:That's a good question. I think the answer is the Egyptian verb
:"iri" meaning to make or do, is usually written without the expected
:phonetic compliment as "r". Thoth (thought) in action makes "truth"
I've always heard that "true" is related to "tree" in the sense of
being firm, steady, sound (true to form, true navigation, etc.)
Truth, then would be "true" plus noun suffix "th" (filth, death,
breadth, etc).
Marc.

Can anyone tell me what the latest is regarding the Sphinx chamber and
Pyramid shaft.  I have no idea where to look for recent events.
All the best
Derek.

Martin Stower wrote:
> Steve_Graham@setanta.ac.ie (Steve Graham) wrote:
 [. . .]
> >I think that von Daniken's emphasis on non-European sites was more
> >because he could only spin theories where facts were sparse and his
> >readership was unfamiliar with the subject.
> >By using examples remote from Europe and North America, he could sell
> >his books in Europe and North America...
> >My opinion: Not a Nazi, just a buffoon.
> A vulgarian repeating vulgar prejudice, and recycling a genre stuffed with
> vulgar prejudice.
Jiri Mruzek wrote:
Danniken's only semi-original idea is not that we were visited by
Aliens, but that they had engineered us genetically. Such idea
translates to a vulgarity from many a viewpoint. E.v.D also omits 
to include the Apes in the said gen. engineering to account for
the tiny difference between the genes of humans and chimpanzees. 
Curiously, at the time of Daniken's going public, it was fashionable
to discuss the inevitability of genetical engineering in order
to "improve" one's populations to compete with other rival nations
also "improving" their own standards. 
On the whole, such theories strike me by their introduction of
artificial differences into humankind.
Imagine that everyone believes  E.v.D.'s theory of "improvement
through genetical ingineering": Then, how do you account for racial
differences, and for differences between many other subgroups? 
Who is the "Latest Model"? Who was designed primarily as a slave?
Such beliefs would indeed quickly lead to attitudes, which humanists
don't see as pretty..
IMO, Danniken's rise to stardom was due not so much to his books, 
as to his TV-film.
Jiri
==============Bob Tarantino, 10/7/96=============
What Von Danniken appeals to is our sense of a lost history.  His opinions
seem to upset some people, but it is without a doubt that previous cultures
had knowledge that is beyond our own, while living a primitive lifestyle by
our standards.  It may be true that the Egyptians and the Mayans were not
helped by extraterrestials, but it is a possibility whether we think it is
likely or not.  There are five caves in France with cigar shaped drawings on
the ceilings, which could be interpreted to be flying saucers, one in which I
have seen is quite disturbing since it shows two craft and one with a v-shaped
formation of dots comming from the end as to signify flight or movement. 
These drawing are over 10,000 years old and resemble a UFO in a photograph
taken in New Jersey in 1952 of a UFO.
Also, it is not out of the question that the human race has been genetically
altered based on our knowledge of evolution.  There are genetisists who agree
with the theory and there is I believe a controversy in the scientific
community concerning Lucy, which is the remains found by Dr. Leaky.  I would
argue that we are involved in genetic engineering right now.  I have heard
that human cells have been cloned in France and that people with certain
disorders refrain from having children because of our predictions from
technology is well known.  Are there no sperm banks with donor profiles?
-bob

In article , piotrm@umich.edu says...
>
>In article <536f04$npu@shore.shore.net> whittet@shore.net (Steve Whittet) 
writes:
>>>
>>>-- lots and lots snipped --
>>What stratigraphic evidence?'
>
>>In 1894 clay tablets were found at Bogazkov in Anatolia by the French 
>>archaeologist Ernest Chantre.
>
>The clay tablets are mostly in "Hittite" (Nesite), and that is not Luwian.
>
>>In 1945 in Karatepe in southern Turkey inscriptians in Hittite-Luwian
>>and in the Phoenician alphabetic script were found.
>
>>The dating is by reference to the Armana letters.
>
>I do not understand how Karatepe is dated by the Amarna letters.  Please 
>elaborate,
>
I was refering to the dating of the tablets found at Bogazkoy.
"The Royal archives of Tell el Armana, a city occupied between
1375 and 1360 BC comprised the official letters of two Egyptian 
Pharoahs, Amenhotep III and Akhenaten and included some 400 
cuneiform tablets mostly in Akkadian."... "Among these were some 
written in the same language as those from Bogazkoy."
"The Hittites of Anatolia" Ewa Wasilewska
The ideographic Karatepe inscriptions present the same text
in Luwian and Phoenician alphabetic script 
steve

R. Gaenssmantel wrote:
> 
> Rodney Small (rsmall@erols.com) wrote:
> : Stella Nemeth wrote:
> [...]
> : > They weren't built using bronze saws.  They were built using wet
> : > wooden wedges to split the stone and rope dipped in something sticky
> : > and then into sand for sawing stone and round rocks used as hammers to
> : > finish the stone.  And lots of sand, of course, as a polishing medium.
> : >
> : > I haven't studied the subject heavily, but the books I've seen
> : > generally point out that bronze tools are not particularly useful when
> : > working stone, but stone tools (including that sandy rope for sawing
> : > stone) are very useful.
> : >
> : > Stella Nemeth
> : > s.nemeth@ix.netcom.com
> 
> : Whatever the tools used, it's obvious that was has been found is totally
> : inadequate to explain the vast amount of work done at Gizeh.  Moreover,
> : this thread is directed at one particular artifact.  So far, there have
> : been several caustic comments, but no one has attempted an alternative
> : explanation to the ultrasonic machining hypothesis set forth by Dunn.
> : Does anyone have one?
> 
> Given that you actually found Stella's post - and quoted it - I'm surprised
> that you can't read it. Otherwise you wouldn't ask this question.
> 
> Also, what makes you so sure about US tools? Have you found any? Why not - say
> - lasers, masers, phasers? Or how about electron, ion, molecular beams? Maybe
> sandblasting (put the stones in a dessert storm)??
> 
> Ralf
Respectfully, I've read both Stella's post and yours, and find no 
explanation for the granite hole and core found by Petrie.  However, I 
have now posted Petrie's comments on these artifacts, and invite comments 
on Petrie's findings.
P.S. It's desert, not dessert -- unless you're talking about some sort of 
exotic new after-dinner treat featuring stones.

On 7 Oct 1996 21:33:50 GMT, Charlie Rigano  wrote:
>
>Sekhemkhet unfinished pyramid was insdie an enclosure much 
>like Zoser's.  Neither were surrounded by tombs in the 
>sense that Khufu's was surrounded though obviously there 
>are an enormous number of burials at Saqqarra.  
yes...i did not mean exact congruence with the pattern of lesser
burials at khufu...excuse me if my language was imprecise...but then
again, our knowledge of the areas outside the walls of the zoser
enclosure and more so outside of sek's walls is far from
complete...our knowledge of what might still be buried to the west of
sek being particularly scant...one would hope that new technologies
will soon reveal much through non-destructive scanning techniques...
>.......Sek. pyramid was resealed about Dynasty 26 
>based on papyrus found in the rubble of the vertical shaft. 
> It was apparently not entered between than and 1951 when 
>it was rediscovered.  Why a almost empty pyramid was 
>resealed is byond me.  Any ideas?
>
my understanding is that beyond the shaft area where the papyri from
the xxvi were found, the chambers contained the still sealed
sarcophagus...quoting the 1993 edition of edwards:
	"In spite of the unfinished condition of this pyramid, hopes
were raised in the course of its excavation that it would prove to
contain the body of a king.  Not only was the corridor sealed in three
places, at its entrance, below the shaft, and at the doorway of the
burial chamber  by thick blocking walls of stone, which were still
intact, but also there was no trace of any tunnel by which robbers
could have circumvented these obstacles.  Most significantly of all,
however, seemed to be the fact that a closed sarcophagus, on which a
wreath had been placed, was discovered in the burial
chamber.........."
.........(skipping description of sarcophagus)........
"............Some plaster which could be seen in the grooves suggested
that the panel had not been moved since it was ceremonially closed at
the time of the funeral.  All these indications, however, proved
deceptive: the sarcophagus when opened was found to be empty. Unless
it is to be assumed that the body and its costly appurtenances were
stolen with the connivance of those in charge of the burial, it seems
necessary to suppose that the tomb, or at least the sarcophagus, was
intended as a dummy."
in short, the still sealed sarcophagus, but no body buried there...
frank

>Egyptian is its own
> branch percisely because there *are* significant differences between it
> and Semitic, &c;, but still has *plenty* in common with them to be
> closely related (certainly much more closely than IE).
> 
> [snip]
> 
> Troy
Well, Troy you certainly have given quite a list of Arabic contributions 
to English.  I appreciate this and all your comments, but you really 
must read my posts more carefully.  Of course Egyptian has a lot in 
common with Semitic.  Again, I never said it didn't and I also didn't 
say there were more IE in it than Semitic.  Still, I can come up with as 
big a list of Egyptian and Anglo-Saxon commonalities as you have done 
with Arabic and then some.  And those are only the more obvious ones.  
And even if it could be admitted that Egyptian contributed as much to 
English as Arabic, that would satisfy me.  
As far as Egyptian being partly IE--that is another matter than 
contributions and is not an impossibility.  I would really like to see 
some more written by Budge on why he reached the conclusion of Egyptian 
being IE rather than Semitic "in its roots".

In article <53b7cn$rr9@lyra.csx.cam.ac.uk>, rg10003@cus.cam.ac.uk says...
>
>Steve Whittet (whittet@shore.net) wrote:
>[...]
>: The question is why would people from Cental Asia want to
>: migrate to Turkey in the first place? Once you realise that
>
>I don't think this question appropriate for any half educated adult. Why 
would 
>the Turks start migrating? For exactly the same reasons that caused all 
>migartions: Hunger!
It might help if you took a fast look at "Migration in Archaeology"
by David W. Anthony, which looks in particular at the Black Sea region
in the 4th millenium BC. His study does not support your hypothesis
and indeed has resulted in a new paridigm in migration theory.
> All the migration movemants in Europe and Asia (and most 
>likely in any other part of the world) can be traced to 
>famines (caused by several dry years or desaters).
The Lapita colonized the Pacific because of a lack of water?
The Phoenicians colonized the Mediterranian in search of salt?
The Mongols and Huns were Hungry that's why they went there?
This theory would explain the religious jihad of the Arabs which
led to the Moors fighting their way into Spain and several
centuries of crusades?
The Nestorians migrating into Transoxania Turkestan, Mongolia, 
and Tibet or the Syrians of St Thomas who went to Malabar?
Care to discuss the expansion of Christianity c 600 to 1500 AD?
> One people would suffer and decide to go for new land - however, 
>that was already claimed by others. 
As in the expansion of the Clovis across North America
in no time at all?
>The restult were wars, peoples displaced and chased out of 
>their land, moving on and doing the same to 
>others. Read up on the great migartions and you'll see yourself.
Your view is simplistic. There are many causes for the movements 
of people besides hunger. Religious Freedom comes to mind...
>
>: there is a major trade route from the Namazga culture across
>: the Caspian to what is to the Kura or Aras river leading to 
>: Mt Arat as documented by a line of closely associated sites 
>: dating to the 3rd millenium BC it seems simplistic to hypothesis 
>: this had no role in the decision making process.
>
>Well, actually it didn't. When you're pushed out of your land 
>you go to werever else you think is reasonably fertile - otherwise 
>you'll have a hard time surviving.
Your model is again simplistic. Migration often goes back and forth.
First some "scouts" go and return to report on what they have seen.
Then households are established and kin come to vist. It is the
knowledge that kin are established in a new place who can provide 
support for the immigrant which often leads to a more permanent move.
Anthony says "Migration may occur when a dependent population is
exploited by a dominent population" The slave trade comes to mind.
>
>: > If you can speak Turkish you can basically talk and understand 
>: >all the Turkic peoples between Turkey and West China.
>
>: That is because of a much later development called the Silk Road
>: which provides a mechanism connecting these peoples together.
>
>That's in a word crap! Turkic peoples originated in central Asia. 
I think you missed the point. Take a look at the expansion of the 
Tang dynasty in the 8th century. Trade was a major factor.
>Thats where the Turks initially came from, and that's why the 
>Kirgises (sp) and Uigurs (sp?) speak (and spoke!) Turkic languges 
So what? The thing which drives the movement of people here is trade.
I don't know of any example of people moving because the place where 
they are going other people speak the same language.
>- which are up to the present day so similar, that you can actually 
>talk in Turkish to these people. Only problem: make sure if you do 
>it in western China that there are no Chinese officials around, 
>since the government is trying to supress these peoples cultures.
>
>: > There was no need for trade links to spread the same language 
>: >between related peoples - connections help keep it up, but they 
>: >were'nt necessary for establishing it.
>
>: The question is what relation can you produce prior to the 
>: 3rd millenium BC when the trade route appears?
>
>Ever thought about common ancestory of related peoples??
The common ancestry of related peoples is a redundancy. 
>
>Ralf
>
>: >
>: >Ralf 
>: >
>: >: >-- 
>: >: >Loren Petrich    
>: >
>: >: steve
>: >
>: >
>: >--
>: steve
>
>
>--
steve

Bob Casanova (casanova@crosslink.net) wrote:
: In article <539eh9$f9v@trojan.neta.com>, blair@trojan.neta.com (Blair P Houghton) wrote:
: >Bob Casanova  wrote:
: 
: >
: >>I've gotten the impression (from my admittedly sparse reading on the period) 
: >>that hunger wasn't usually a major problem in the area, due to the regularity 
: >>of the Nile flood and the associated regular harvest, and the techniques 
: >>developed for food storage.
: >
: >Correct.  Still, to those who are in their off-season,
: >a job is something to be competed for.
: Sounds reasonable (at least from a modern perspective).
Correct.  At least, according to my friend the 
amateur Egyptologist, the pyramids (and other 
tombs and monuments) were public works projects 
keeping people employed during the "winter" 
(for lack of a better term; the non-growing 
season).  
: >                                --Blair
: >                                  "Or maybe it was Sontarans
: >                                   with hyperspatial chisels
: >                                   and levitating backhoes..."
: Or Jedi Knights using The Force (tm)...
No, no!  It was the Vorlons!  
RLR 

In article <53bu9r$l4m@shore.shore.net>,
Steve Whittet  wrote:
>In article , petrich@netcom.com says...
>>        All that's going on here is taking the phonetic spelling of 
>>"Ptah" and interpreting it ideographically -- and coming up with some 
>>absolutely perverted semantics.
>No. Ptah exists as an Egyptian word. The concept represented by
>that word is cognate with the Biblical sense of the word father. ...
	That's news to a lot of Egyptologists, since the standard 
Egyptian word for "father" was iti, and not ptah.
>>        Try doing that with English some time, using the ideographic 
>>meanings of the letters in the ultimate ancestor of the Roman alphabet.
>Yes, its not a bad idea really. Indeed it is the basis of the Platonic
>Dialoge Cratylus. The idea is that more complex words are formed of
>clusters of what originated as very simple words. That is why language
>needs to recognize the ideographic origins of the letters in which it
>is written.
	Total camel dung -- confusing language and writing -- which is 
especially horrible when one considers that a lot of language has existed 
without writing. Consider the gap between Latin and the Romance 
languages, for example. Or the gap between Mycenaean and Classical Greek.
	[a lot of imaginative pseudo-etymology deleted...]
>>>>        Mr. Whittet, I don't see the relevance of that comment.
>It would be much easier to explain to you if you would read some
>of the elementary source material such as Gardiner and Faulkner
>or even Budge.
	I've done a *little* bit of looking at Egyptian writing and 
language, and they don't fit the Whittetian model of some grandiose 
schema, let alone some great ur-language.
	[A lot of stuff about "creator", "craft", etc. deleted]
	It seems to me that Mr. Whittet can find Egyptian derivations of 
just about *any* word in *any* language.
-- 
Loren Petrich				Happiness is a fast Macintosh
petrich@netcom.com			And a fast train
My home page: http://www.webcom.com/petrich/home.html
Mirrored at: ftp://ftp.netcom.com/pub/pe/petrich/home.html

Baron Szabo wrote:
> 
> August Matthusen wrote:
> > I wrote:
> 
> > > Again, how does Gauri et al explain the vertical fissures that appear on
> > > the Sphinx well above the pit enclosure?
> >
> > These would probably be part of the "...two sets of intersecting, nearly
> > vertical, irregulary spaced joints." (page 123)
> 
> Uh, maybe.  What caused those?
A joint is a surface of fracture or parting in a rock, without 
displacement.  They usually result from extensional tectonic 
stresses.  Gauri et al. state on page 123:  "Eocene tectonism
produced a dip of the strata in a southeasterly direction with a 
slope of 2.5 to 5 degrees."  and  "The structural deformation 
which produced the dip described above also created two sets of 
intersecting, nearly vertical, irregulary spaced joints.  These
joints, or fractures, are well developed in the more rigid strata
and feather out in the softer strata.  Thus, the lowest unit and 
the uper parts of the the layers in the middle unit reveal well-
developed fractures."
> > > Also, how is the roughly 400 year period (according to the show) of
> > > weathering, between its creation and restoration, accounted for.  The
> > > show showed about 2.5 to 3 feet of weathering in that time, and stated
> > > that Egyptologists account for it as weathering within about 400 years.
> > > Do you think this is correct?
> >
> > I'm not exactly sure what is being asked here or upon exactly what
> > information this query is based.
> 
> Well I wouldn't bet anything important upon what the info was based on.
> Reread the quote from my previous post for the answer...
> 
> > Is this supposed to be 2.5 to 3
> > feet of material eroded from the original shape to a degraded shape
> > which is then restored?
> 
> Yes, correcto.
> 
> Is the show claiming that this much
> > erosion couldn't have occurred in the 400 years from the conventional
> > chronology?
> 
> Yes, correcto.
> 
> > How did they know what the outline of the original shape
> > was?
> 
> I guess they were assuming that since it required restoration (along one
> part of a side), it had been restored to a previous shape.  In reality,
> I don't know.
This is the problem as I saw it.  Anytime you want to estimate a rate 
of material removed over time, you need to know how long of a time 
period (so you need a start time and end time) and you need to know 
the original surface and the ending surface.  It appears like the 
show is erecting a strawman argument with regards to the amount of
material removed and the time period (per Stella's post).  To really 
discuss this, I'd like to know from where the values came.
FWIW, erosion rates for in situ limestones in arid and semiarid 
environments: Cole and Mayer (1982, _Geology_, vol 10, pp 597-599) 
indicate the Redwall Limestone at the Grand Canyon has eroded between 
18-72 cm per thousand years (cm/ka)  averaging 45 cm/ka.  Gerson 
(1982, _Israel Journal of Earth Sciences_, vol 31, pp 123-132) indicates 
limestones, igneous, and metamorphic rocks in Israel have eroded at 
rates of 100-600 cm/ka.  Yair and Gerson (1983, _Annals of Geomorphology_, 
Supplement 21, pp 202-215.) indicate 10 to 40 cm/ka for limestones and 
dolomites in Israel.  
> 
> > How did they know whether or not additional material was removed by the
> > restorers during the restoration?  Could you clarify this, Peter?
> 
> Why would they remove more material only to restore it again?
It depends on what was being restored and how the restoration 
was being accomplished.  For example, if they want to restore 
it to be similar to the original shape after weathering has 
altered the outline, you may have strata where more material 
was removed by erosion.  To get back to a shape resembling the 
original, you could chisel away at the strata where less material 
was removed.  You would end up with a smaller carving but similar 
in shape.  Or if you are adding material (plaster, cement, or 
some such) on to the structure, you'll need a clean unweathered 
surface to give the patching material a better chance to stick.  
To get to this clean unweathered surface, some existing material 
will probably have to be removed.
> > Something else to think about: if Schoch's weathering profile is
> > supposed to be from the time when rainfall was the *incredibly high*
> > rate of 10 to 20 inches per year (how much rain do you get in BC?),
>                                                 [probably similar]
Web site at 
http://bizserve.com/canadian-detroit/tourism/busbtrav/busntr_e.html
indicates 42 inches per year for Vancouver and a web site at
http://yvrwww1.pwc.bc.doe.ca/es/education/education.b.html
indicates some of the following fun facts regarding Canadian weather
records which tend to suggest that BC isn't semi-arid:
Greatest Precipitation in 24 Hours
489.2 mm at Ucluelet/Brynnor Mines, British Columbia - October 6, 1967 
Greatest Precipitation in One Month
2235.5 mm Swanson Bay, British Columbia - November 1917 
Greatest Precipitation in One Year
8122.6 mm Henderson Lake, British Columbia - 1931 
Greatest Average Annual Precipitation
6655 mm Henderson Lake, British Columbia 
> > then why didn't the later restoration destroy that weathered profile?
> 
> I would think that the restored section is a seperate part from the
> heavily weathered parts.  And I don't think it did destroy the weathered
> profile, as in the show they were looking at a part of the restored
> section that had been dismantled, revealing the 2.5 to 3 feet of
> weathering between original and restoration.
> 
> Clearly I need to read more about the Sphinx before I can hope to
> productively discuss it.   :)
> 
> > I've never seen this wonderful show, just read Schoch's work and much
> > of the other work.
> 
> Have you seen as much as you've read?   ;)
"I've seen fire and I've seen rain, I've seen sunny days that
I thought...." oops, sorry, got carried away. ;-)
Regards,
August Matthusen

Jiri Mruzek  wrote:
>Stella Nemeth wrote:
> 
>> Jiri Mruzek  wrote:
> 
>> >Stella Nemeth wrote:
>> >> Jiri Mruzek  wrote:
>> >> There are two small problems with this objection to the Egyptians
>> >> building the pyramids.
> 
>> >Sheesh, Stella it's not an objection to the Egyptians building
>> >the pyramids..
> 
>> No?  Don't tell me that we've finally convinced you...  Should I
>> declare victory??  
> 
>If you enjoy Pyrrhic victories  :)
It was worth a try....  
>> Kindly remember that we are not them and they are not us.  You would
>> consider it senseless labor to work on building a pyramid.  They
>> thought it was a good job with great benefits.  After all, if you
>> worked for the living god, you got to serve him in the afterlife too.
>If you had to slave on the pyramid hauling blocks, you probably dreaded
>his afterlife projects.. You'd rather go to Hell!
Not one of their options.  There was working for the king and there
was nothingness.  Those were the options, living or dead.
>> >However, were the kingdom's subjects imbued with some spirit, such
>> >as dwells in the Pyramid, and only if their own children would have
>> >some benefit from all this labor - they would pull the hempen ropes
>> >with some heart.
> 
>> Well, the kids did get to eat well and live in a nice "suburban" town.
>> We've found the ration lists and a workman's village.
>Sensational - ration lists from the Great Pyramid - found!
>How come I haven't heard of this stupendous discovery?
How come you haven't heard of most of the background you need to
really understand who built the pyramids and why?
>> We don't know if there was a body or not originally.  The three
>> pyramids at Giza have been open for so many centuries we have no idea
>> what was found when they were first opened even where we do have some
>> records as a result of the opening. 
>The material evidence - the tunnels - is still there. We see the tunnel
>Al Mamoun's men had dug in bypassing the granite plugs enroute to 
>the King's  chamber. There is no other possible approach.
The material evidence for what?  I'm afraid your paragraph above has
lost me.
>> The absence of a body for each pyramid today means nothing.
>Just the absence of a lid from the coffer in the K.C. eclipses all
>doubts by itself, as there is no opening for the lid to have been
>taken out through. Yet, the pyramid was completed and sealed..
Just because the lid is missing today doesn't mean there never was
one.  (If it is missing.  I'll admit I don't know if this particular
lid is missing or not.)  It is easy enough to remove anything from
anyplace. Just break it up and take it away.  Why would anyone have to
remove it in one piece?
>> We don't even know if we have located all of the chambers in all of
>> the pyramids.
> 
>Where is the secret chamber containing flexible glass, non-rusting
>weapons, super-accurate maps, secrets of magic (science), etc? So said
>rumours collected on the streets of 8th century Cairo by Al Mamoun's
>informers. 
I don't know.  Where is it?  
>Isn't this amazing? It means that there were "pyramidiots" on the 
>streets of Cairo in 800's A.D.! Can this be the same Christian population,
>which had burned down the Alexandrian library, led by fanatics? Did some
>actually read the books while burning them?
You've got a problem with time warp here.  Two different populations
in two different centuries.
>> >> very easy to tell when the economy was in trouble in Egypt.  The tombs
>> >> got smaller.
> 
>> >I don't think so, because temples got bigger.
> 
>> Actually when the temples got bigger, so did the tombs.  When the
>> tombs got really small (late in the Third Intermediate Pyramid, for
>> example) they weren't building much in the way of temples either.
>Mastery of architecture didn't cease after the IV. dynasty. Many big 
>and fabulous structures were built later. And many MINI-pyramids.
>Those must have been razor-sharpening shops! :)
My point exactly.  However pyramids weren't the only type of tomb
built by the Egyptians for their kings.  And I was thinking of Dynasty
22 and not Dynasty 4 when I started talking about small royal tombs.
>> Actually not.  They weren't invaded from all over.  And it was several
>> centuries later.  It only looks like a short time because it was all
>> so very long ago.  But put it into perspective.  Just how much use
>> would a 300 year old fort do us today if we were invaded tomorrow?
>An Egyptian granite fort would protect admirably from Scuds, etc.
>Recall, how a building in Grozny, Chechnya lasted through lengthy 
>bombardment recently. It was built of granite. We witnessed it on TV.
Since there were no Egyptian granite forts (as far as I know) how
would we know if they could protect anyone from Scuds?
I haven't followed the Chechnya bombings.  If you say the building
survived, I believe you.  However, it doesn't have anything to do with
why the Egyptians didn't build them.
Stella Nemeth
s.nemeth@ix.netcom.com

In article <53c0aj$l4m@shore.shore.net> whittet@shore.net (Steve Whittet) writes:
>>>What stratigraphic evidence?'
>>
>>>In 1894 clay tablets were found at Bogazkov in Anatolia by the French 
>>>archaeologist Ernest Chantre.
>>>In 1945 in Karatepe in southern Turkey inscriptians in Hittite-Luwian
>>>and in the Phoenician alphabetic script were found.
>>
>>>The dating is by reference to the Armana letters.
>>
>>I do not understand how Karatepe is dated by the Amarna letters.  Please 
>>elaborate,
>>
>I was refering to the dating of the tablets found at Bogazkoy.
>"The Royal archives of Tell el Armana, a city occupied between
>1375 and 1360 BC comprised the official letters of two Egyptian 
>Pharoahs, Amenhotep III and Akhenaten and included some 400 
>cuneiform tablets mostly in Akkadian."... "Among these were some 
>written in the same language as those from Bogazkoy."
>"The Hittites of Anatolia" Ewa Wasilewska
>The ideographic Karatepe inscriptions present the same text
>in Luwian and Phoenician alphabetic script 
So what--we all know these basic facts.
None of this answers the question that was posed, namely that of stratigraphy, 
and your early date of Luwian.  What was the point?  Karatepe is certainly 
not that early, unless you are going to redate it for us.   As for Amarna, it 
is all very intereting, but that is not how one dates the archives from the 
Hittite capilol, which span a much longer time than do the short-lived, and 
relatively sparse archives of Tell el-Amarna (compared to those from 
Boghazkoy).

Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law.
Anyone interested in a new WWW Page dedicated to Magick and Thelema 
should check out my page
  http:\\ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/bystandr
                    Thankyou
                    Dcorrell@msn.com
Love is the law. Love under will.

In article <53bdu0$5ok@halley.pi.net>, mcv@pi.netÁ says...
>
>whittet@shore.net (Steve Whittet) wrote:
>
>>Why is the diffusion of language presumed to be something which
>>happened slowly a long time ago rather than rapidly fairly recently?
>
>Let me try to explain with an example.
>
>Let's take Linear B.  I think we're all agreed the language of the
>Linear B tablets is Greek.
Yes, But what is Greek at that point in time? 
Mycenean Greek? (With Myceneans spread all the way to Palestine)
Minoan Greek? (Language of the Kretani)
Minas Greek? (The town on the Phoenician coast where the earliest
examples of Greek script are found)
Classic Greek?
Modern Greek?
>  If we compare with the roughly
>contemporary Hittite texts found at Hattusas, we see certain
>similarities in the language (linguists explain this by the fact that
>both Greek and Hittite are Indo-European languages), but it's equally
>clear that the Hattusas tablets are *not* written in Greek: they're in
>Hittite.  The differences are obvious enough.
There are both similarities and differences. At least as many 
similarities and differences in language as in script seems likely.
>
>As a matter of fact, one could argue that the Linear B tablets are so
>characteristically Greek, that in many ways they more closely resemble
>Modern Greek than they do Hittite.
To me Linear A and B resemble a hieratic form of the characters seen
in Hieroglyphic form on the Phaistoes Disk. This has a resemblence
to Luwian, Hieroglyphic Egyptian, even Pictographic Akkadian. That
admittedly does not mean the languages are related, but it does
show some cultural interface and contact.
  Linguistics is not an exact
>science, I'm afraid, so I cannot scientifically quantify this
>assertion.  All I can appeal to is the innate (or at least acquired
>very early on) "feel" for language that humans have.  And if I were to
>compare an Athens newspaper [A] with a Linear B tablet [B] and a
>Hittite Cuneiform tablet [C], I think I would be able to spot the
>"Greekness" in the first two.  Very few people would maintain that
>Linear B is definitely closer to Hittite.  Maybe about equally close.
Here I think you are talking script as oposed to language
>
>Now let's put it graphically:
>
>  [A] ------------ [B] --------------- [C]
>
>We know that the distance between A and B is about 3500 years.
>The distance between B and C can thus be estimated at 3500 to 4000
>years.
I don't know that this necessarily follows. Suppose that language 
changes at a decreasing rate as writing becomes more common
locking in the grammar and vocabulary. 
>
>That takes us to approximately 5000 BC as the point where Greek and
>Hittite "meet", give or take a thousand years (Renfrew argues for
>7000/6500 BC, Mallory for 4000/3500 BC).
Suppose that Greek and Hittite meet c 1500 BC. Suppose that at that
time there is a great deal of liguistic flux like the chatter before a 
meeting is called to order but that later on things quiet down and
after that point things proceed with but a single voice speaking.
>The calculations are not exact.  Some linguists, the so-called
>"glottochronologists", thought they *could* make exact calculations,
>but they were dead wrong.  However, there are certain "tolerance
>limits".  There are 2000 years between Latin and the modern Romance
>languages, which, as anyone can see, are closely related.  Now if
>someone were to say (hypothetical example) that Phoenicians landed in
>the Aegean c. 2500 BC, and that by 1500 BC this had resulted in the
>Greek language, then c. 500 BC Phoenician and Greek should have been
>about as close to each other as Spanish and Italian, or about as far
>from each other as Spanish and Romanian.  The distance between Greek
>and Phoenician is of course incalculably greater than that, by several
>magnitudes.
I don't think there are any Phoenicians before c 1200 BC. But let's say
that the The Mycenean Greeks and the Sea Peoples on the Palestinian
coast along with cities like Sideon and Tyre and Byblos, and some 
Egyptians, Mittani, Hurrians, Hittites, Amurru etc; are all engaged
in the copper trade for some time prior to that and that this babel
of languages is roughly analagous to competing computer standards.
How long does it take before we get out of the beta phase?
>
>
>==
>Miguel Carrasquer Vidal   
steve

In article <53bomi$ji2@halley.pi.net>, mcv@pi.netÁ says...
>
>whittet@shore.net (Steve Whittet) wrote:
>
>>In article <533juo$hfp@halley.pi.net>, mcv@pi.netÁ says...
>>>
>>>c. 7000 BC >
>>>============
>>>
>>>Anatolia    Coyonu/Catal Huyuk
>>>  Mallory: -- 
>>>  Renfrew: Proto-IE (Proto-Anatolian)
>>>  Whittet: [ ] 
>
>>At Catal Hyuk c 7000 BC we have the very earliest strata which 
>>should not be confused with the later levels [...]
>>Did people here speak a distinct language with a classifiable structure?
>>I would suggest they did not. No real grammar, very little vocabulary [..]
>
>Well, that's pretty much how you answer the whole "questionnaire" up
>to about 3000 BC (maybe 4000).  Or more concisely:
>
>>Nothing to indicate linguistics c 7000 BC.
>>Much later c 4000-2000 BC
>
>So we can fill in:
>
>W: [grunts]
>
>everywhere, up to 4000/3000 BC.
No, actually I started at 6,500 BC in Anatolia and Greece
and worked forward from there so my answer is prior to c 
8,500 BP "grunts", after that it depends on where you are talking.
>
>
>>After 3000 BC we get into historic times and need not speculate.
>>As you can see by the agreement between Renfrew and Mallory.
>
>>This is when I feel language makes a sort of quantum jump with
>>structured grammars and expanded vocabularies.
>
>>Lanquage spread by trade from urban centers with the metals of 
>>the Bronze Age along the coasts and up the rivers of every 
>>region we have discussed thus far.
>
>So all languages (at least in the Europe/Near East/North African area)
>are 5000 years old. 
No, the languages Mallory and Renfrew agree on are in that range.
> Objection: there is historical evidence for
>languages spoken c. 2500 - 1500 BC (Sumerian, Akkadian, Egyptian,
>Elamite, Hittite, Hurrian, Greek, ...), a mere 500 - 1500 years after
>the "invention" of language.
I tend to think that it was like when you go to a meeting 
and everyone is chattering away and then when the speaker 
comes to the podium everyone hushes up and listens. 
The question is who chaired the discussion?
> Now bear in mind: 500 years is roughly
>Shakespeare, 1500 years is roughly Beowulf.  Is that by any stretch of
>the imagination the distance we find between Sumerian and Akkadian?
What makes you think the developments occured at the same pace
on both ends of the linguistic spectrum?
>Of course not.  Counterargument: they were independently "invented"!
>So what about Akkadian and Egyptian then?  They are clearly related,
>but there's NO way a mere 1500 years would be enough to account for
>the differences.  The gap between them is several millennia at the
>least.
Starting c 3,000 BC by 1,500 BC both independently invented and 
closely related (double interacting causuality with lots of
diffusion both ways)
>
>
>==
>Miguel Carrasquer Vidal 
steve

>I think that the fact that most of the diseases used are still highly
>dangerous for adults who contract them tends to deal a rather
>overwhelming blow to your hypothesis.  Sorry!
No need for apologies -- you've made some very enlightening points.  But I 
suppose the question would then be why were the indians so drastically 
affected then, but similar outbreaks have rarely (to my knowledge) occurred 
elsewhere.   
If I were to focus on "everyday" sicknesses like mumps and measles, are there 
any specific studies which might shed some more light on the topic?  
Thanks again,
Stephen P Ryder

In article  petrich@netcom.com (Loren Petrich) writes:
>In article ,
>John A. Halloran  wrote:
>... I don't think that linguists can 
>>prove any language family to be older than 10,000 years old.
>        The Nostraticists claim *exactly* that.
Loren,
I will not deny the accomplishments being made by Nostratic scholars.  I 
have also read and saved your valuable review article on the Nostratic 
field.  But these scholars are unifying proto-languages dated on the basis of 
common late technology words to around 5500 years ago.  So this says that 
Nostratic is older than 5500 years old.
I would also ask you to consider that language families that have similar 
elements with major differences can have borrowed elements during the 
formative process while being exposed to the concept of speaking.  So there 
can be a combination of basic-level similarities and differences not because 
of the time elapsed since divergence from one common ancestor language, but 
because the languages in question are sister languages (to use one of Miguel's 
expressions).
To respond partially to Piotr's criticisms about linguistic methodology, how 
much methodology can one follow when the question of how populations go from 
nonspeaking to speaking is not one that linguists address?  The only reason I 
got into the situation of having to learn more about language and linguistics 
than the classes that I took in college is that I wanted to find out from 
where the Sumerians originally came -- knowing that Indo-European scholars 
had made deductions about the original home of the proto-Indo-Europeans, I 
thought that I would look at the Sumerian vocabulary for clues.  I had to 
research and assemble my own Sumerian vocabulary since this did not exist in 
English.  It did not take too long before I started to notice that the 
words with simpler phonetic structures appeared to be older than the words 
with more complex phonetic structures.  Thorough collection of the Sumerian 
vocabulary confirmed that the simpler words described an earlier period of 
civilization.  Additional analysis even revealed how the original speakers of 
the language had created the first words on the basis of articulatory 
symbolism.  My thinking about the Sumerian vocabulary is that if they had been 
exposed to other populations that already used consonants, that the first 
words of their language for water, food, and sex would not have been 
vowel-only words, or that if they had been exposed to a population with 
multi-consonantal words, the first words of their language would not have been 
single-consonant words.  There is no methodology to follow in this other than 
analysis and deduction.
The web site with the lexicon of Sumerian logograms and my analysis of how the 
Sumerians invented their vocabulary is at:
http://www.primenet.com/~seagoat/sumerian/sumerian.htm
Regards,
John Halloran

In article <53cats$c2p@shore.shore.net>,
Steve Whittet  wrote:
>In article <53bdu0$5ok@halley.pi.net>, mcv@pi.netÁ says...
>>Let's take Linear B.  I think we're all agreed the language of the
>>Linear B tablets is Greek.
>Yes, But what is Greek at that point in time? 
	Mycenaean Greek.
	[Hittite being noticeably different from Mycenaean Greek despite 
them being contemporaries...]
>There are both similarities and differences. At least as many 
>similarities and differences in language as in script seems likely.
	A trivial statement. And let us NEVER forget that language != writing.
>>As a matter of fact, one could argue that the Linear B tablets are so
>>characteristically Greek, that in many ways they more closely resemble
>>Modern Greek than they do Hittite.
>To me Linear A and B resemble a hieratic form of the characters seen
>in Hieroglyphic form on the Phaistoes Disk. This has a resemblence
>to Luwian, Hieroglyphic Egyptian, even Pictographic Akkadian. That
>admittedly does not mean the languages are related, but it does
>show some cultural interface and contact.
	Resemblances in Mr. Whittet's imagination more than anything else.
	If he's so sure the resemblances exist, he ought to make pictures 
from all the writing systems and put them up on his website 
(black-and-white GIFs would be fine). I've been willing to post detailed 
discussions of Proto-Indo-European; why can't Mr. Whittet do anything 
else but obfuscate like some ink-squirting squid?
	[Language distances...]
>I don't know that this necessarily follows. Suppose that language 
>changes at a decreasing rate as writing becomes more common
>locking in the grammar and vocabulary. 
>>That takes us to approximately 5000 BC as the point where Greek and
>>Hittite "meet", give or take a thousand years (Renfrew argues for
>>7000/6500 BC, Mallory for 4000/3500 BC).
>Suppose that Greek and Hittite meet c 1500 BC. Suppose that at that
>time there is a great deal of liguistic flux like the chatter before a 
>meeting is called to order but that later on things quiet down and
>after that point things proceed with but a single voice speaking.
	That's bullshit! Compare Greek and Hittite some time -- they are
just too damn different to diverge so fast. If you want historical
examples, consider languages and language families with a long paper
trail, like Latin and the Romance languages, Greek, Sanskrit and the 
modern Indo-Aryan languages such as Hindi, etc.
	[some more ink-squirting obfuscation deleted...]
-- 
Loren Petrich				Happiness is a fast Macintosh
petrich@netcom.com			And a fast train
My home page: http://www.webcom.com/petrich/home.html
Mirrored at: ftp://ftp.netcom.com/pub/pe/petrich/home.html

In article <53cats$c2p@shore.shore.net> whittet@shore.net (Steve Whittet) writes:
>To me Linear A and B resemble a hieratic form of the characters seen
>in Hieroglyphic form on the Phaistoes Disk. This has a resemblence
>to Luwian, Hieroglyphic Egyptian, even Pictographic Akkadian. That
>admittedly does not mean the languages are related, but it does
>show some cultural interface and contact.
Here we go again.  Aside from the fact that it is Phaistos, the point has been 
made repeatedly to you, but of course repeating errors is a trademark here, 
but I will repeat it once again.  There never was, repeat, never any such 
thing as "Pictographic Akkadian."   By the time cuneiform was adapted to 
Semitic languages such as Eblaite and Akkadian, it had long lost any 
pictographic qualities.  The whole scheme is rather strange.  Can you show any 
other examples of the Frankenstein creation of a writing system from three 
completely different scripts?  Even more bizarre is the claim that it could 
have had any relationship with a "pictographic" form of cuneiform, since the 
pictographic elements of that writing system had ceased to be used hundreds of 
years before?  Others have asked you to show the existence of "Luwian," that 
is the monumental Hittite Hieroglyphic before the proposed date of the 
Phaistos disk and you answered with a series of unrelated facts.  You just 
lectured me about moving on with work, but you only repeat the same mistakes 
again and again, so where is the movement going? 

Charlie Rigano  wrote:
>Sekhemkhet unfinished pyramid was insdie an enclosure much 
>like Zoser's.  Neither were surrounded by tombs in the 
>sense that Khufu's was surrounded though obviously there 
>are an enormous number of burials at Saqqarra.  However, 
>Sek. pyramid did have a south tomb inside the enclosure 
>which had the remains of a small boy inside.  This tomb was 
>also robbed.  Sek. pyramid was resealed about Dynasty 26 
>based on papyrus found in the rubble of the vertical shaft. 
> It was apparently not entered between than and 1951 when 
>it was rediscovered.  Why a almost empty pyramid was 
>resealed is byond me.  Any ideas?
>
>Charlie
>
>
Ideas as to "why a almost empty pyramid was resealed"... 
The body of the King had been destroyed or had been buried elsewhere so 
that the coffer was sealed in honor of his being. The south tomb is a 
different story. The infant may have been a magical offering as part of 
the renewel of the King during his Heb Sed. At Djosers Southern tomb in 
his complex the sarcophagus is to small to contain a man lying in a prone 
position. On ly a person in a fetal position could fit within it. This of 
course in imitation of the ancient burials and in imitiation of rebirth.
Both in Djosers Southern tomb and under his step pyramid are enigmatic 
scenes showing the king visiting shrines of his Heb Sed and running the 
course associated with that festival. Scenes mention visiting a (re) 
birthing chamber which was probably the "burial" chamber in the Southern 
Tomb. This rebirthing ceremony was meant to take place during the King's 
lifetime so as to rejuvenate the King and all of Egypt. Hence the 
neessity of building the pyramid complex both for his rejuvenation and to 
contain his mortal remains upon his death. Again as for the Southern Tomb 
of Sekhemkhet this rebirthing ceremony involved the king becoming young 
again so that the  the body of the infant may have replaced the 
body of rejuvenated king  after his "resurrection" from the tomb. If you 
are interested in the Heb Sed and other utilizations of pyramid complexes
other than just the burial of the king see my article  " "Ritualized 
Death and Rebirth: Running the Heb Sed ", in KMT Winter 1993-94.
-- 
Greg Reeder
On the WWW
at Reeder's Egypt Page
---------------->http://www.sirius.com/~reeder/egypt.html
reeder@sirius.com

And for non-place-name words, the book *Cosmos* (by Carl Sagan) mentions 
a German Word, apparently used by Einstein, meaning "tram that moves at 
the speed of light" (or would that be "tramthatmovesatthespeedoflight"), 
supposedly using 50+ letters.
Cheers,
Rebecca Lynn Johnson
Ph.D. cand., Dept. of Anthropology, U Iowa

On 4 Oct 1996 bb05282@binghamton.edu wrote:
> Recent PhD in Neareastern Archaeology with teaching experience seeks 
> employment. What suggestions do you have have to achieve this goal?! All 
> your advice will be well recd. Thanks in advance.
Wait 'til the next large Near Eastern archaeology conference.  Then, 
don't attend.  Instead, pull an Oklahoma City on the conference center.  
There will be jobs galore.  (I am already planning this for the annual 
meeting of the SAA in 1999 -- have to act a year in advance because of 
the hiring process).
If you quail at the thought of having so many ex-colleagues, just take 
out one of the Thursday afternoon flights to the conference city.
Cheers,
Rebecca Lynn Johnson
Ph.D. cand., Dept. of Anthropology, U Iowa

Dave,
   > I'm after some info on what life was like in biblical times in the
   > Middle East, their culture etc.  Pictures would be good also.
	Pictures? Reader's Digest puts out books with great pictures.
Two that you might find very interesting are _Jesus and His Times_
and _Great People of the Bible and How They Lived_.
	Best wishes.
Virgil Brown