Evidence of 1st Dynasty Human Sacrifice Unearthed At Abydos

The practice of human sacrificial burials in Egypt, presumably to coincide with the pharaoh's own funeral, had long been suspected but never substantiated. Now it has been for the first time, and Dr. David O'Connor of New York University's Institute of Fine Arts said the discovery was 'dramatic proof of the great increase in the prestige and power of both kings and the elite' as early as the first dynasty of the Egyptian civilization, beginning about 2950 B.C.

A discovery team, organized by N.Y.U., Yale and the University of Pennsylvania, found six graves next to the ruins of a mortuary ritual site dedicated to the departed Aha, the first pharaoh of the first dynasty, and not far from his tomb. Five of the graves have been excavated, yielding skeletons of court officials, servants and artisans that appear to have been sacrificed to meet the king's needs in the afterlife.

Although the graves at the Aha site were separate, their wooden roofs were covered by a continuous mud plaster layer applied at about the same time that the adjacent mortuary ritual structure was erected. "This makes a strong case," Dr. O'Connor said, "that all these people died and were put in the graves at the same time."

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Sculpting Cleisthenes - Democracy Personified

Columbus, Ohio artist and sculptor Anna Christoforidis has been given a daunting assignment. Aristotle Hutras, a proud Greek-American who has spent much of his adult life around the Ohio Statehouse was watching a PBS documentary on the early Greeks featuring Cleisthenes and decided that this relatively unknown founder of democracy should be immortalized in a sculpture enshrined at the local statehouse.

Hutras contacted Christoforidis about "his Cleisthenes Project". But, upon telephoning Athens, Christoforidis learned that there were no portraits or busts of Cleisthenes on record in the ancient collections. She called art historians she knew around the world. No images to be found.

Jim McGlew, a professor of classical studies at Iowa State University and a specialist in ancient Greek democracy, was not surprised to hear Cleisthenes had never been memorialized in art.

"Cleisthenes' fundamental aim was to deny his personal existence. He taught people that through their interconnections and their daily lives, and who they were, that they really were the demos, which is where the word democracy comes from," said McGlew, author of "Tyranny and Political Culture in Ancient Greece."

So, Christoforidis envisioned an Everyman, placed in the dress and artistic style of his period, the late 6th century B.C. - and looking distinctly Greek. She began to sculpt democracy personified, she said, an image of stability and permanence with touches of personality lent by her four sons - one each modeling the eyes, ears, nose and lips. If you enjoyed this post, never miss out on future posts by following me by email!

Mt. Sinai Monastery Digitizes Some of World's Oldest Manuscripts

"Working in an eight-by-eight-foot plastic tent, Rev. Justin Sinaites, using a special 75 megapixel digital camera, shoots images that practically replicate the original manuscripts from the 3,300 work collection of St. Catherine's monastery. St. Catherine's is the world's oldest continuously inhabited Christian monastic community. The collection includes some of the world's oldest Bibles, dating from the fifth century, and books in 11 languages, including Greek, Latin, Arabic, Persian and Slavonic.

With the specially designed camera produced by Swiss company Sinar, a 64-exposure image of a 10th-century manuscript of the Gospels, written in gold leaf, reveals a luster on the Greek letters that seems as realistic as if one were viewing the actual book, and in a close-up the uneven texture of the gold leaf is crystal clear.

At a cost of around $50,000, donated by European and American institutions and individuals, digitizing the manuscripts is part of a comprehensive conservation program that involves conservators' approving all manuscripts before they are photographed. Eventually some of the work may also be put online. The ultimate goal of St. Catherine's digitization project is to photograph all 1.8 million pages in the monastery's manuscript collection.

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