Vandals damaged a shell midden, or garbage dump, at the site of a centuries-old Squaxin Island tribal fishing village over the July Fourth weekend, disrupting student archaeologists' work there and violating a place considered sacred by the tribe.
No artifacts were taken, but part of the historic record told through oyster shells, clam shells and fish bones was destroyed, said Dale Croes, the South Puget Sound Community College anthropology professor whose summer class began its seventh seasonal dig at the site this week.
The village site, considered one of the most significant records of tribal life in the South Sound, is on the property of former Secretary of State Ralph Munro and his wife, Karen Munro.
Of course, one wonders how one can tell that a stupid shell midden has been disturbed. . . . .
Underwater archaeology update Archaeologists make major discovery... underwater
When most people think about Mayan archaeology they imagine excavations in royal tombs or trenches cut into tree covered mounds. Few of us would expect that a significant find could be made underwater... particularly in a swamp. But Belizean archaeology is a many-faceted field, as the presentations at this year's Archaeology Symposium, now underway in San Ignacio, amply reveal. Among the updates to last year's reports is a startling discovery made by a team from Louisiana State University. It is a find unlike any in all of the Meso-American world, and it was made right here in Belize.
And now. .. .the weekly news from the EEF
Clues of climate and the Bible's seven lean years
The scientists used new statistical techniques to fill in gaps in 1,300 years of Nile River water levels recorded from AD 622 through 1922. They then searched these data for climatically significant cycles. Their results, reported in Geophysical Research Letters, suggest "quite strongly" that North Atlantic circulation influences East African climate. The scientists add that "most strikingly," their analysis picked out a North Atlantic driven seven-year cycle of high and low river levels that is "possibly related to the biblical cycle of lean and fat years."
[Eds. There's not much to this article and it might just be a short summary of a longer one. The work seems interesting though.]
Press report: "Priceless GEM - The plan for a Grand Egyptian Museum calls for massive - and so far scarce - funding"
http://snipurl.com/g3is
"Questions remain regarding who will pay the estimated $550 million initial investment and $12.5 million in annual operation costs."(...) "When it begins operation, the museum will employ an estimated 400 people directly and thousands more in support industries. Authorities hope that it will draw an additional two million tourists per year, bringing an estimated $11.5 million in revenue in its first year."
Online Master's thesis: Lauren Elizabeth Lippiello, Symbolic Perceptions of New Kingdom Watercraft: Building Boats from Gods, Department of Anthropology, College of Arts and Sciences, The Florida State University, 2004. xi, 111 pp., ills. - pdf-files: 12.4 MB
http://etd.lib.fsu.edu/theses/available/etd-04162004-224224/
"This thesis examines the specific relationship between analogous god parts
and boat parts in Spell 99 from the Book of Dead. I provide a general
discussion on the prevalence of watercraft in cosmology followed by an
analysis of the individual elements of the mXnt boat described in Spell 99.
I develop a predictive model for the relationship between corporeal elements
of the gods and boat parts based upon primary and secondary associations of
form, the location of the deity in mythical geography, and the boat part's
placement relative to the deckline ... I determine that the mXnt boat
represents a microcosm of the ancient Egyptian cosmos and functions as a
source of power for the deceased over impotency, chaos, and mortality."
End of EEF news
Not much else going on.