Unruly History in the News #2
We’re back for another issue of history acting wild! Thanks for making last week’s such a success—love that y’all are so into this.
Our round up includes DNA tests, Egypt and Britain competing for who has more history stuff, and evidence for legends. Without further ado, this week in unruly history…
Images of King Charles’ new 50 pence coin have been released. The coin is making waves because his portrait doesn’t include a crown.
If you’re online at all, you might have heard that Lizzo played a rare historical crystal flute. (And she slayed, duh.)
Legends of King Solomon’s gold mines were probably inspired by real copper mines in the Timna Valley. We’re now realizing that it was a man-made climate disaster that led to them being abandoned for over 1000 years.
A very cool facial reconstrcution of a 17-year-old girl who lived 31,000 years ago has been released.
In stories that feel a little *too* relevant to today: WIN versus NIM—Gerald Ford’s truly terribly plan to combat inflation.
A guy in Maine bought a prettily framed piece of paper at an estate sale for $75… and it turned out to be a missing page from a Medieval text. The single page is worth about $10,000.
If you thought beach front property was ostentatious, ancient elites in the British Isles used to build artificial islands for their parties!
Speaking of the British Isles—DNA’s proving itself useful again. Extracting DNA from ancienct skeletons proves a theory of ancient migration from northern Europe to the British islands during the early Medieval era.
The FBI also used DNA to determine if a mysterious 4000-year-old mummy’s head was “Mr or Mrs Djehutynakht.”
Evidence of earliest know opium use has been found in Israel. Traces of the drug were found in containers at a burial site dating to 16,000 years ago. Archaeologists theorize that the drug may have been an offering to the gods or a necessity for humans in the afterlife.
You remember the tragic irony of the sinking of the Titanic, right? Another ship tried to warn the crew about the dangerous icebergs ahead, but the warning never made it to the captain? That ship, the S.S. Meshaba, continued sailing for another six years, until it was sank by a German u-boat during World War I. Well, the wreckage was finally found.
Archaeologists working on Mayan cities are facing a new problem: Many of the sites are severely polluted with mercury. The Maya used mercury for centuries, and it probably impacted their health.
Seems like there’s always news out of Egypt. This time it’s that the sarcophagus of Ptah-M-Wia, Ramses II’s Chief Treasurer has been found.
A Medieval ‘coffin birth’ is evidence for early treatments for preeclampsia. Someone performed neurosurgery—trepanation, to be exact—on a 25-year-old woman who was about 38-weeks pregnant, probably to relieve pressure she might have felt in her head if she was experiencing preeclampsia. The surgery was not successful though, and the woman and fetus died.
Did I miss anything? Drop your favorite history story from this week in the comments!