Here are some posts I enjoyed from around the web this week:
In my world, this is pretty exciting. A stamp seal was found at the site of Tatarli in southern Turkey, dating to the period of the queen I have turned into a sleuth of sorts in my upcoming mystery series, Queen Puduhepa (who gets in my books the more reader-friendly nickname of Tesha). Tatarli archaeological mound is the current best candidate as the hometown of this queen and thus is where I set the first book of the series, an ancient city called Lawazantiya. I spent a lot of time with the director of this site, Serdar Girginer, on the mound and in the surrounding area and am continually grateful to him for his generosity. This newly discovered stamp seal is particularly interesting to me because it is a woman’s, and the context has led one archaeologist to suggest that this woman, Pati, was a priestess who has healing powers and conducts magical rituals. As many of you know, that’s a very good description of the main character, Briseis, from my novel, Hand of Fire, and Queen Puduhepa was also a priestess and I have her performing a remarkably hair-raising rite early on in the mystery, although that’s not typically the kind of rite she performs. It’s always good to put your characters into uncomfortable and dangerous situations! Here’s the quote about Pati from Professor Meltem Doğan Alparslan of the Faculty of Hittitology at Istanbul University:
“The stamp seal implies that Pati was an influential person in the Hittite court. Taking the other finds into consideration, Pati might well have been a priestess, possibly the mysterious person mentioned in cuneiform scripts as MUNUSŠU.GI who has healing powers and conducts magical rituals.” Click here for “Hittite Stamp Seal Found in southern Turkey”
Athenian symposium from a black figure vase (500 BCE) brought to life (sort of) by animation. This very brief video is amusing, but I’m not sure it provides the immersive experience in Athenian life that the project aimed at J Historical fiction still beats this effort for that, I think. Opinions? Yes, no? Click here for “Animation brings 2500 year old Greek vase to Life” on Archaeology News Network
From the Great Pyramid comes a wooden beam from a boat with metal in it. This is the first time metal has been found in ancient Egyptian boats. The theory is these loops are to hold the oars in place so there is no wood on wood damage. Nice, quick video with a long shot of a reconstructed boat, for those who enjoy such sights. I have to say I hadn’t thought about metal or no metal in boat construction before, although I’ve had to “build” Mycenaean boats in my writing before. All the minutiae to consider, but which generally doesn’t actually appear on the page, just in the well-informed mind of the writer. There’s always that balance of not overloading or slowing the story, but painting in quick strokes a vivid and accurate picture of these details that a reader wouldn’t know. Historical fiction is not like modern fiction where you can say a make of a car and get a mental picture in your reader’s mind. I find if there isn’t a whole lot I know that I don’t say but that somehow haunts my description anyway, then my description isn’t going to work very well. Thoughts? Click here for “Ancient Egyptians Used Metal in Wooden Boats” from Archaeology News Network
Website devoted to the study of Roman stoneworking. Lots of photos of Roman monuments and detailed discussion of tools and processes. Romanphiliacs? Anyone writing a stonemason? Hard details from a slave’s life? Anyway, this is probably a good site for a few of my friends out there. I’m thinking this is beyond informed tourism, but… Click here for Art of Making Website on Roman Stoneworking
Toward the end of the period and places in which I set my fiction—that is the end of the 12th century BCE, Late Bronze Age in the Eastern Mediterranean and Near East—civilization suffered a widespread collapse. The elaborate palaces, extensive empires, complex trade networks and gorgeous cultural heritages were fairly quickly brought to an end. This destruction has, since the 19th century, been blamed on the “Sea Peoples.” But that’s a simplistic answer that isn’t really an answer since no one knew who these people actually were or why they came along at that point. If you want a well-informed, intriguing discussion of this system collapse (which has some alarmingly modern parallels…), here’s a blog post by Eric Cline on the ASOR website. Click here for ASOR blog “Ask a Near East Professional: Who are the Sea Peoples and what role did they play in the devastation of civilizations?”