The Dispilio Tablet, dug out of a swamp somewhere, has been carbon-dated to approximately 5.200 B.C. That makes it the world’s oldest writing… that we know about so far.
Well, what does it say? We don’t know! Unknown language in an unknown script–it can be read, the experts say. For now, all we can do is speculate as to what it might say/
I open the floor to guesses.
The Narmer Palette
Well, we can at least say it’s a famous artifact–the Narmer Palette, produced in the time of King Narmer, the first ruler of a united Egypt, circa 3150 B.C.
But then we look at the pictures…
In the middle of the composition we find two wranglers using halters to control a pair of animals with very long necks. No, they’re not giraffes. The ancient Egyptians had zoos. Their artists depicted animals realistically.
Either the long-necked creatures on the Narmer Palette were totally imaginary,,, or they were real.
And if they were real… what the dickens were they?
The Daughter of Time by Josephine Tey (ages 12 and up)
Did King Richard III really murder his two nephews, “the princes in the Tower”? Classic mystery writer Josephine Tey didn’t think so, and in 1951 she wrote and published a book to prove it: The Daughter of Time. “Truth is the daughter of time”–and in time the truth comes out.
But history can be very, very tricky. Finding out “what really happened,” Thucydides wrote, over 2,000 years ago, is the hardest thing about studying history. And he ought to know!
The week between Christmas and New Year’s is just about the best week in the year–at least in the Northern Hemisphere, when it’s so terribly cold–for snuggling up with a good book. And given that the mortal remains of King Richard were only recently discovered under an English parking lot, this 15th-century mystery seems quite timely.
In Tey’s novel, Inspector Alan Grant (not the one from Jurassic Park) of Scotland Yard, laid up with a broken leg, applies modern police methods to investigate the claim against Richard. All I can tell you about it, without spoiling the fun, is that he does a very thorough job and I find his conclusion 100% convincing. So do a lot of people. The book is full of insights into history–how facts are gathered, the role of propaganda, how to decide whom to believe and whom to dismiss… I mean, how do we “know” what we think we know? How many things that we’re sure we know… just ain’t so?
History is chock-full of stuff like that. That’s why I love it.
Many critics think Daughter of Time is one of the four or five best mystery novels ever written–out of many thousands. I’ve probably read hundreds… and I agree!
Even the trees look funny there.
Socotra is an island in the middle of the Arabian Sea, hundreds of miles from the nearest land.
So how did a lot of ultra-primitive stone tools get there? Who brought them? And where did they go?
I’m not trying to sell you any particular version of history. The stone tools have been found on Socotra. Whose were they, and how did they get there? (I’m sure I’d have heard of it if they’d found fossil cavemen, or any other sign of ridiculously ancient human settlement.) How do we account for this?
Or don’t we?
Who says a Ph. D. in Gender Studies is worthless?
The world of archaeology is buzzing with a new theory advanced by Dr. Ringly Fungo, professor of Gender Studies at Hooza University. Who was the great Sphinx? Scholars have puzzled over this for centuries.
Now Dr. Fungo has the answer.
“It’s some guy with a lion’s body!” he declares. “It’s not some lion with a human head. Those were very, very rare!”
But who was it? A pharaoh? A prince? A high priest of Amun-Ra?
“For that information, we have to turn to Superhero Studies,” Dr. Fungo says. “That narrows it down considerable-like. The ancient Egyptians, who were all racists, concealed the statue’s identity. They also gave their superheroes silly names. But it’s either The Mighty Thor–who, it turns out, was a woman–or a superhero from Atlantis named Brandon.”
How did he come to that conclusion?
“You are triggering me with that question!” he replies. “I no longer feel welcome here! I no longer feel affirmed. Don’t even think of following me into my safe space!”
Ruins on Potbelly Hill
I’ll return to this topic later today, when I have more time. Rodney Stark has some intriguing insights into how we ought to view the remains of extinct civilizations.
Anyhow, where did civilization come from? What got it started in the first place?
That Potbelly Hill site in Turkey, Gobekli Tepe, is a gold mine–but we don’t know yet how to evaluate the treasure. It’s so far off what was expected, scientists are still trying to wrap their minds around it.
Maybe they ought to read Genesis.
This ancient sculpture has been named “The Wrestler.” Scholars think it probably isn’t a wrestler, but it looks like a wrestler warming up for a match. It dates from 1,500 B.C. to 400 B.C.–which is to say they have no idea how old it is. All that can be said for sure is that it’s a piece of great art.
It comes from the Olmec civilization, on the east coast of Mexico–which was not its name, it was a name the Aztecs gave to people living in the country 2,000 years later, we only use it now for convenience: we do not know what the “Olmecs” called themselves.
They had writing that we cannot read today. They had beautiful paintings which we cannot understand. They invented a rubber ball game that was played throughout Central America until modern times. We do not know a single word of their language, we don’t know the name of anyone who lived there, we have no historical record of what the Olmecs did, or achieved, or failed to do. The quality of their art insists on a high level of civilization. Their buildings were ambitious.
Obviously it was a great civilization. And yet we know nothing, nothing at all, about it. Probably it influenced later civilizations in the area. But in what ways, we don’t know.
The “Olmecs” are gone, leaving behind the works of their hands but nothing else.
A civilization dies, and is erased from history? Yes, it can happen. And yes, it has.
Anybody got a decoder ring?
For most of my lifetime, the Sumerians got the credit for inventing writing. With some modifications, their “cuneiform” system was used throughout the Ancient Near East for several thousand years.
But a find from northern Greece is older than that.
What does it say? What did somebody take the trouble to write down by carving it into a block of wood, maybe seven thousand years ago? Was it a grocery list? A things-to-do list? There’s just no way to tell. Maybe if we had dozens of samples, and a guess that the language was some form of ancient Greek turned out to be right, we might someday apply enough computer analysis to read this.
Who knows? It might be something important.
This was big, big news in 1991–the discovery of Alexander the Great’s tomb. No end of excitement!
The excitement went away when the discoverer mentioned that mystical talking snakes had revealed the secret to her. Nor did it help her cause, that she couldn’t show the tomb to anybody.
If you’re planning to unveil a centuries-old mystery, try not to rely on the testimony of talking snakes.
Conferring with Susan, my editor, this morning, her advice to me was to top off my sanity tank by letting go of the nooze and working on my book all day. I’ve been doing that, and I feel saner already.
My current villain, Ysbott the Snake, fleeing a well-earned execution, has found a young girl named Qeqa living all alone in a strange, uninhabited sector of Lintum Forest. How has she managed to survive? She claims she’s been protected by “gnomes” who are only visible when they choose to be. It’s got to be a lie–but how else could she be living there? She’s strong and healthy, well-fed… and she just might turn out to be a more dangerous character than Ysbott himself.
Meanwhile, special to Joshua–
You can’t spend much time with the Lady of the Lake without encountering a pre-Christian tradition among the Celtic peoples that certain lakes, ponds, and bogs were sacred places endowed with spiritual energy. Celtic chieftains threw valuable items into those pools as sacrifices. Kings sometimes sacrificed their finest swords.
Might Arthur’s sword, Excalibur, have been recovered from such a place? That would certainly explain why people believed the sword to have special qualities. I think that might resonate with anyone familiar with Japan’s sword tradition.
Well, the landlord’s done mowing the lawn, so I’ll go back outside for another session with my book.