September 16, 2007

A couple of articles about the latest look at evidence concerning the migration of people: New Evidence from Texas Pushes Entrance Date Back and Unravelling Mysteries of Ancient Human Migrations.

Chicken Bones Suggest Polynesians Found Americas before Columbus

An intact burial was discovered in March (first being publicized now) in a much-looted Tiwanaku pyramid in Bolivia.

The Ancient and Mysterious History of Tattoos A fascinating look at this ancient art form. According to Joann Fletcher, research fellow in the department of archaeology at the University of York in Britain, tattooing in ancient Egypt was restricted to women who, she believes, used the symbols as talismans against the dangers of child-bearing.

Is Ancient People's End a Warning for the Future? A look at the most recent archaeological findings points to sustained drought as the demise of the Anasazi culture.

Gateway on the western border of China to the Tarim Basin (home of the mummies of Urumchi and other mummies of a European-featured people who lived in the Basin area beginning c. 4,000 years ago), the ancient city of Dunhuang is threatened as never before by climate change.

She is one of the most recognized faces and one of the most beautiful women of all time. New findings have now revealed that the famous bust of Nefertiti (Egyptian Museum, Berlin, Germany), wife/queen of the heretic Pharaoh Akhenaten, underwent at least four different modifications, one of which gave her slight wrinkles around her eyes..

September 9, 2007

Chess with God (and others) The Guardian has an entertaining review of three books about chess: David Shenk's "The Immortal Game: A History of Chess," Michael Weinreb's "The Kings of New York: A Year Among the Oddballs, Geeks, and Geniuses Who Make Up America's Top High School Chess Team,", and Kasparov's "How Chess Imitates Life."

China's "First Emperor" The British Museum will be hosting a new exhibit from September 13, 2007 through April 6, 2008 on China's "first emperor." This once-in-a-lifetime exhibition will explore one of the greatest archaeological discoveries of the 20th century and provide an insight into China's First Emperor, Qin Shihuangdi, and his legacy. Objects featured in the exhibition will include a number of the world-famous terracotta warriors from Xi'an, China, which were buried alongside the First Emperor in readiness for the afterlife.

Rare find of textiles in mass grave excavated in China, including evidence of vermillion-dyed cloth, some thousand years before the Arabs discovered a technique for dying cloth vermillion (in the 8th century CE). Several human remains were recovered from the mass burial site, including the bodies of four young women who were probably buried alive as a sacrifice.

A Hunting We Will Go...Hi Ho the Merry-o a Hunting We Will Go Hunting modern-day ocean-going pirates at the Smithsonian Magazine online. And hunting treasure - "Profiteers on the High Seas" at Archaeology Magazine.

You can keep your Bluebeards and your Blackbeards. The most successful pirate of all time controlled a fleet of more than 1,500 ships and upwards of 80,000 sailors -- and she did it all without the help of facial hair.

MORE! Words to the Wise...
Compiled by Archaeology Magazine, some useful sites:

www.ancientscripts.com
Created by a software engineer who moonlights as an amateur linguist, this site not only covers ancient writing systems-complete with illustrations, translations, and maps-but also offers games and downloadable fonts based on ancient scripts.

www.historyworld.net
A search for "writing" at HistoryWorld turns up pages devoted to everything from cuneiform to the "talking leaves" of the Cherokee.

www.ancient-egypt.org/language
The Ancient Egypt Site is brimming with information on writing and literature from the Early Dynastic period up to Greek and Roman times. Its most useful feature is a handy list of heiroglyphs.

www.harappa.com/script
An excellent compendium with links to all the information in cyberspace related to the undeciphered Indus Valley script, this site also features interviews with preeminent linguists and a "dictionary" that offers possible intepretations of the enigmatic signs.

Sold at Sotheby's (London, New Bond Street), on November 2, 2001, Lot 1 in Sale L01292 for GBP 5,760.

Description: Persian, 9th/10th century four ivory chess pieces of geometric form, the knight of conical shape with beaked protuberance and decorated with concentric rings, the rook with deep cut in the centre creating two castle-like projections 3 to 4cm., 1 1/8 to 1 1/2 in.

Compare with related pieces in the Ashmolean Museum and those excavated at Nishapur in the Metropolitan, Museum, New York illustrated by A. Contadini. Related Literature: A.Contadini, 'Islamic Ivory Chess Pieces, Draughtsmen & Dice' in Islamic Art in the Ashmolean, Oxford Studies in Islamic Art, Volume X, Part I edited. J.W.Allan.

September 2, 2007

Blogs - love 'em or hate 'em, they're probably here to stay, but they also come and go like the wind, here today, gone tomorrow. Here are a couple of blogs on archaeology in Egypt: trained archaeologist and grad student Andie Byrnes' Egyptology News and Egyptologist Margaret Maitland's The Eloquent Peasant (the name is from an old Egyptian tale) - excellent content!

Have you ever wondered what your name "means?" Behindthename.com has first names in English, Spanish, French, Arabic, Italian, India, other languages and different categories (i.e., Irish names, Biblical names, names from mythology, etc.)

Author and former reporter Shun Akiba wants to know why the Japanese authorities are deliberately hiding the existence of secret tunnels under Tokyo - or are they...

Words to the Wise Compiled by Archaeology Magazine - some useful sites at Ancient Scripts.

Part of the Arc of Ancient Civilizations
The Umm Al Nar Culture (2600 - 2000 BCE) is the most important period concerning the development of civilisation in the UAE. Evidence suggests that trade in copper with Mesopotamia and the Indus valley made the area of the United Arab Emirates wealthy during that period and Mesopotamian sources mentioned it as the "Land of Magan".

Pyramid News
Philip Coppens has a new book out, "The New Pyramid Age." Among other things, Coppens claims that the so-called "Bosnian Pyramid" is an "artificial structure." Contra this view is a book published by professional geologist Robert Schoch in 2005, "Voyages of the Pyramid Builders." Schoch himself has taken plenty of heat over the past ten years in orthodox academia for his views. Chapter four of Schoch's book presents the current anthropological data on the entrance of humans into the Americas, as well as introducing the idea that other contacts were made in the intervening years between the original migration and the arrival of Columbus. The subsequent two chapters then delve into the heretical idea of trans-oceanic influence in detail, the first discussing possible contacts across the Atlantic, and the second across the Pacific.

CAIS reports that Iranian archaeologists working on the Kangelu Fortress in northern Iran's Mazandaran Province have put forward the idea that the Sasanian fortress was built to be waterproof as a suitable site for holding rituals in honour of Anahita, the Zoroastrian deity of fertility, water and rivers.

August 26, 2007

Experts Survey Seabed Off Gujarat for Dwarka Evidence A group of archaeological experts and Indian Navy divers have conducted the first scientific survey off the Gujarat coast to establish whether or not the ruins on the seabed are of the mythological city of Dwarka, the capital of Hindu god Krishna. A report on the survey will be presented at a seminar on the Maritime Heritage of the Indian Ocean Aug 23-24.

Isaac Newton Scooped by Indian Astronomers
A little known school of scholars on the coast of southwest India discovered one of the founding principles of modern mathematics hundreds of years before Newton published them, according to a new study.

Worthy Quote: "The prevailing dogmas may be right, but they still need to be challenged. I am proud to be a heretic. The world always needs heretics to challenge the prevailing orthodoxies. Since I am heretic, I am accustomed to being in the minority. If I could persuade everyone to agree with me, I would not be a heretic." From "Heretical Thoughts About Science and Society", Dr. Freeman Dyson, full article at The Edge.

Oh Mata, whither art thou? The barbarians put you to death - by firing squad at dawn, but you faced them down with courage and elan, and you've never been forgotten. A new biography by Pat Shipman of the much maligned Mata Hari strongly suggests that she was set up to take a fall as a spy.

Archaeologists are now considering the possibility that there was an "arc" of civilizations that reached from Mestopotamia to the Indus Valley regions in Pakistan and India between 3,000 and 2,000 years ago that shared trade, iconography, and architecture. Well, duh! (Jiroft, mentioned in the article and a subject of a prior Goddesschess article and Random Round-up reports, is on the Halirood River. Not included in the summary is Egypt along the mighty Nile). CAIS also reported on the Lawler article.

"Blast in the Past" Did a comet or asteroid explode over North America 13,000 years ago, wiping out the large mammals and the Clovis culture?

Two Intact Burials Half a World Apart Great news, and hope that more are still out there, unravaged by ancient and/or modern thieves and destroyers of culture. A Mayan burial discovered in 2005, but only just now being announced, dated to circa 650 CE. An Egyptian "courtier" from the First Intermediate Period (circa 2181 to 2050 BCE). Update: More details on the discovery of the intact tomb of Henu (First Intermediate Period).

Another crop circle!

...this time, in close proximity to a white horse (the "new" Pewsey white horse, created in 1937, can be seen on the hillside to the north) reported August 4, 2007 (Pewsey, Wiltshire). See "Pyramid-style crop circle points the way to Wiltshire's White Horse" from our June 24, 2007 Random Round-up.

August 19, 2007

Gifts for the Gods: Images from Egyptian Temples
Upcoming exhibition at the Met October 16, 2007 - February 18, 2008 Throughout their long history, the ancient Egyptians used copper, bronze, gold, and silver to create lustrous, graceful statuary that, most characteristically, stood at the crux of their interactions with their gods, from ritual dramas that took place within the temples and chapels that dotted the landscape everywhere, to the festival processions through the towns and countryside that were thronged by believers. This is the first exhibition to focus on the art and significance of Egyptian metal statuary and marshals fresh insights to present a new understanding of this type of statuary, its influences, and its meaning. On view from domestic and international collections will be some 70 superb statues and statuettes created in precious metals and copper alloys over more than two millennia.

Stories about the Copper Scroll crop up from time to time, mostly involving intrigue and conspiracies, and are the subject of several websites. Who can resist the allure of possible buried treasure worth $1 billion? Here's the latest from an expert at the University of Denver who has worked on the scroll.

The Copper Scroll Back in the News Hershel Shanks, erstwhile editor of the Biblical Archaeology Review, has written a book on the Copper Scroll and the hunt for the Temple Treasure, appropriately titled "The Copper Scroll and the Search for Temple Treasure" - released at the same time as Dr. Sean Kingley's new book on the same subject entitled "God's Gold." Expect to see news reports coming out of Rome, the Middle East and Israel in the coming months about roving bands of treasure hunters attempting to dig up sacred landmarks...

Serpent Mound Discovered In Great Britain A 4,000 year old Bronze Age serpent mound discovered in western England during road construction. And here's a brief article about the Mother of all Serpent Mounds, in Ohio USA.

Starry, starry night... It must have really been something to see. On July 4, 1054 CE, Chinese astronomers noted the presence of a bright new star in the sky, a "guest star" (supernova) that was visible during daylight for 23 days, and visible to the naked eye in the night sky for 653 days before "disappearing." What the Chinese observed was light from an exploding star that gave birth to the Crab Nebula, some 5,246 years before the light finally reached Earth. It was probably also recorded by Anasazi Indian artists (in present-day Arizona and New Mexico), as findings in Navaho Canyon and White Mesa as well as in the Chaco Canyon National Park (NM) indicate.

Chess Princess

She's fourteen year old Sheila Dines from Croydon, Surrey, in the U.K. In 2006 she split a 1,000 BPS prize with another young lady as Britain's "top girl" in the UK Chess Challenge, and she is again taking part in the Challenge again this year.

August 13, 2007

There's another theory being proposed for how the great pyramids were built.

Did the Egyptian Use "Cast" Stone to Built the Pyramids? Yet another theory about how the pyramids were built - verrrrryyyyy interesting...

The Institute of Egyptian Art and Archaeology at the University of Memphis (Tennessee, USA) has some useful tools at its website, including a Brief Timeline of Ancient Egypt and a tour (in color photographs) of famous archaeological sites in Egypt.

The Ancient World Conference Reading University will host The Ancient World Conference September 15-16, 2007. The conference presents a series of illustrated lectures from a panel of experts covering a range of subjects, from prehistory to the present day examining, archaeology and history from new and intriguing angles. Experts will include Michael Wood, Kent Weeks, Bettany Hughes and many others.

Old Gods Don't Get No Respect The gods of yesterday are forgotten today. Stone images of ancient gods are being used to make buffalo sheds and other buildings in Nepal.

Ships and Boats...Update - A replica of a 1,000 year old Viking long-boat left the Danish port of Roskilde headed to Ireland on July 2, 2007. Aboard the new Sea Stallion is a mixed crew of 65 men and women, who will be living on the 30 meter long ship with no shelter and no privacy for about 3-1/2 months. On the other side of the Atlantic, the Abora III is due to set sale for Spain from New York on July 11, 2007. First stop on the Abora's projected 3-1/2 month journey is the Azore islands, where the navigator hopes to put in for fresh provisions by August 10, and then to Cadiz on Spain's southern tip and the Canary Islands. The boat will be equipped with modern navigation and communications equipment, but the ship was made out of reeds on Lake Titicaca using ancient techniques.

Call for ASOR Papers from BAR
The Biblical Archaeology Society announces two prizes of $10,000 each for the best academic papers presented at the 2007 Annual Meeting of the American Schools of Oriental Research (ASOR), to be held this November in San Diego.

The John Mancini Prize, named for John Mancini of Albuquerque, New Mexico, will be awarded for the best paper on the Archaeology of Early Christianity and the Patristic Period.

The other prize of $10,000 is supported by a contribution from Sami Rohr of Bal Harbour, Florida, who made it a condition of his support that it be named for Biblical Archaeology Review editor Hershel Shanks. The Hershel Shanks prize will be awarded for the best paper on the Archaeology of Late Antique Judaism and the Talmudic Period.

A paper may be nominated by the presenter or anyone else. A copy of the paper must be sent to the Biblical Archaeology Society, publisher of BAR, by January 31, 2008.

Another Crop Circle

How could we pass this one up !? - it's got a checkerboard in it and - depending upon one's perspective, it's either a columned hall with a timbered ceiling and a checkerboard floor, or a bipolar pyramid... Discovered in a wheat field at Silbury Hill, Wiltshire, southern England, published on July 3, 2007. It also a embodies the ancient Chinese conception of the four quarters of the "square" earth (the geometric plain formed by the four cardinal directions) encompassed within the three-dimensional "circle" of the universe. From this conception arose the invention of the magnetic compass.

July 15, 2007

SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT

Susan Hollis “Holly” Bloom Heisman (1953-1994) was Dan Heisman's first wife, who passed away from breast cancer. Holly worked as a social worker, helping women in need such as runaway teenagers and battered wives. After her passing, Dan’s sister Eileen Heisman, a professional gift trust fundraiser, arranged to start a charitable trust in Holly’s name at the Philadelphia Foundation (www.philafound.org) to support women in need, specifically those with breast cancer, battered wives, and runaway teens. This was done in 1995 and Eileen was appointed as the primary point of contact with the Foundation.

Dan looked for ways to make the Fund more active. Soon after, he helped create the first charitable chess tournament. Dan asked some of his contacts to donate prizes. In turn, the players were asked to voluntarily make contributions to The Holly Heisman Fund. The first event was held in the summer of 2003.

Over the years the Holly Heisman Fund has raised over $14,000 towards these charitable ends for the Philadelphia Foundation. About half those funds have been raised via the Holly Heisman Memorial Tournament. Among the prize donors this year are
Susan Polgar Foundation and Susan Polgar, Chessville, Plunder Chess, Bookup, House of Staunton, the Internet Chess Club, John Bain, and IM Igor Khmelnitsky. This year is the fifth annual event, and it features two major new sponsors: USCF Executive Director Bill Hall donated a free Tournament Life Announcement (TLA) and radio personality Howard Stern has donated a prize of a tour of his radio studio/show (limited to adults only!)

In 2005 Dan decided to create a second charitable Fund at the Philadelphia Foundation, The Dan Heisman Chess Support Fund, which supports scholastic events in the Philadelphia area through the Philadelphia Foundation and the PA State Chess Federation.

The 2007 Holly Heisman Memorial tournament will be held Aug 12. It is a five-round swiss, G/30, with three sections: Open, Under 1500, and Scholastic Under 900.

More on the event:

To make mail or online donations:
(under the Chess Support Fund)

Thanks! - Dan Heisman

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The Giza Archives Project (Boston Museum of Fine Arts) Read about the project in this recent article (in PDF).

Nothing New Under the Sun Those flashy "grills" that some people wear (think diamond studded braces) - well they ain't got nothing on an ancient Roman woman with a golden smile...

Iran's Shar-i Sokhtah (the "Burnt City") is back in the news - this time, for an artificial eyeball.

Is an Inca Indian buried in Norway - in a 1,000 year old grave? Read all about it here - and here.

Several intact burials were excavated in east China's Jiangxi Province, dating to the Eastern Zhou Dynasty (770-221 BC). It is the largest group of coffins ever discovered in a single tomb and the excavation has been dubbed "the most important archaeology project of the year" by cultural experts and media.

Spiegel Online has an excellent story/review on the Archimedes Manuscript/palimpsest. "In October 1998, when a fragile, handwritten manuscript with mold spots and blackened edges was offered for sale in an auction at Christie's in New York. After a contentious bidding war, the auctioneer's hammer fell at a price of $2.2 million. An anonymous "billionaire from the computer industry" had apparently purchased the rare work..."

Faked image? Real? Buddha? The Virgin Mary?
Image photographed on July 1, 2007 at Zushan Mountain after a heavy rainfall in Qinhuangdao, North China's Heibei Province. Maybe it's Xi Wang Mu, Queen of the Heavens, Queen Mother of the Western Mountains and goddess of the ancient Chinese game Liubo.

7-year-old already a chess queen!

Local girl has the skills, drive and strategic forethought to become a chess master An insightful article on Arissa Jade Torres by the Bakersfield Californian. Arissa recently won the 2007 Susan Polgar World Open Chess Championship in Las Vegas in the under-8 category.

July 8, 2007

The Art and Archaeology website offers reviews of museum exhibitions from around the world.

News: 19 June 2007 Chicago
Gold Processing Center Discovered in the Ancient Kingdom of Kush Archaeologists have discovered a gold processing center in Sudan that documents the ancient African kingdom of Kush.

For Love or Money
The Egyptian government is going to "crack down" on young Egyptian men in Luxor marrying foreign women of a "certain" age. Hmmmm, do these "foreign" women then move to Egypt and actually live with their young husbands - or do they just send money every month to support their stud-muffins and visit once a year on vacation???

Blast from the Past: Shelby Lyman, From "Chess - Are Girls too Nice to Excel in Chess?"

Chess historian Edgar Winter has written a review on the 1989 smash hit book "Searching for Bobby Fischer." For those of you who haven't read it, we highly recommend it. For those of you who aren't particularly chess fans but are fans of Goddesschess, we recommend the movie - it's chess' version of "Rocky."

The 'Kings of New York' Win Again
The Edward R. Murrow High School chess team that inspired the book by Michael Weinreb has won the 2007 National High School Chess Championships!

Boulder covered with petroglyphs stolen near Yuma, Arizona - It seems likely the boulder was stolen by someone looking to sell it on the black market. Keeping sacred relics "on site" is, unfortunately, not working - particularly in this day and age, when modern technology and communications make it easier than ever for antiquities thieves and looters to ascertain the location of valuable sacred relics and archaeological finds. Are Native American tribes jeopardizing their cultural heritage by refusing to allow objects such as this boulder to be removed for safekeeping and further study to museums?

The Dragon and the Pearl: One of the great mysteries of world mythology and symbolism is the universal association of a cosmic serpent with a glowing sphere in the heavens. The association is too consistent to be explained as accidental convergence.

Darrian Robinson is 12 years old, ranked third in the United States among girls under 13. Last year, Darrian represented the United States at the World Youth Chess Tournament in 2006 in the Democratic Republic of Georgia. She was the only Black from the United States, which it is common for her to be in competitions. At nationals, boys can outnumber girls at least 15-to-1. At invitationals, such as the World Youth Chess Tournament, girls and boys are equally represented. Read Darrian's story.

July 1,2007

Egyptians, not Greeks were true fathers of medicine Scientists examining documents dating back 3,500 years say they have found proof that the origins of modern medicine lie in ancient Egypt and not with Hippocrates and the Greeks.

Did the ancients cross the Atlantic?
In July a reed ship will leave Jersey City, New Jersey (USA) and head east across the Atlantic. This grass boat, the Abora III, will help the Germany-based Association for Experimental Archaeology and Research attempt to prove that trade existed 14,000 years ago.

35,000-Year-Old Mammoth Sculpture Found in Germany - In southwestern Germany, an American archaeologist and his German colleagues have found
the oldest mammoth-ivory carving known to modern science. And even at 35,000 years old, it's still intact.

An Italian archaeologist claims to know the location of the "Holy Grail."

American taxpayer dollars at work, funding those geniuses in the Pentagon. The U.S. military is issuing "archaeological" decks of playing cards to the troops in Iraq and Afghanistan to "educate" them about the countries' antiquities. Unbelievable.

Mummy of Egyptian Queen Hatshepsut found!!
Dr. Zahi Hawass, Secretary General of the Supreme Council of Antiquities in Egypt, sent out this announcement:

A Maze of Morris Essays: Well, just two, actually... but a maze of amazing facts and speculations...

1) Some Notes and Thoughts on The Daunce of Nine-Men's-Morris and the Boundaries Between Worlds by Tracy Boyd© 2004

2) From Circle and Square to the Image of the World: A Possible Interpretation for some Petroglyphs of Merels Boards by Friedrich Berger

The Nebra Disc is back in the news (and the ongoing debate "it's a fraud", "no it's not", "it's a fraud", "no it's not...")

 

June 24,2007

Free Online Chess Coaching - in India
For the first time in the country a unique online chess coaching camp organised by cyberchess.co. in was formally inaugurated by Sanjay Jaju, Special Commissioner, Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation, in his official chambers here on Tuesday. The camp is free for all chess players and the salient features include a direct interaction with Grandmaster Tejas Bakre. The site has players from Denmark, Malaysia, USA and Finland registered with the website designed by Andhra's first IM Lanka Ravi. Ravi says that very soon many more Grandmasters and International Masters will be joining the line up to provide a rich variety to chess players of different age groups.

Fascinating Chess Prodigies
Experts say the four greatest prodigies in chess history have been Paul Morphy, Jose Raul Capablanca, Samuel Reshevsky and Bobby Fischer.

Are They Real or Are They Fakes?
Hershel Shenks and the Biblical Archaeology Society recently convened a symposium of experts on the authenticity of certain well-publicized relics, including the James Ossuary. He is now offering a downloadable report on the group's findings (free of charge) or you can order a hard copy for a reasonable price.

Does the Phaistos Disk Contain a Message Left by Extraterrestrial Visitors? (Pssst...guys, it's probably just a board game variant...)

Rock Etchings Discovered
Discovery of some c. 8000 year old rock etchings in Algeria gets scant coverage while discovery of some rock etchings in Egypt that may be about 15,000 years old gets rock star coverage (heh heh).

13th century text hides words of Archimedes: The pages of a medieval prayer text also contain words of ancient Greek engineer Archimedes. It takes high-tech imaging to read between the lines.By Jia-Rui Chong, Times Staff Writer

Satellites hovering above Egypt have zoomed in on a 1,600-year-old metropolis, archaeologists say. Images captured from space pinpoint telltale signs of previous habitation in the swatch of land 200 miles south of Cairo, which digging recently confirmed as an ancient settlement dating from about 400 A.D.

Pyramid-style crop circle
points the way to Wiltshire's White Horse

We don't often write about crop-circles, but this one is a real beauty, as is the white horse (not carved in antiquity). This was reported on June 19, 2007 in The Daily Mail. If you want more information, the New York Times published a "travelogue" about the white horses carved out of the chalk hills in Britain. How do these kinds of formations show up overnight?

June 17,2007

The IPCC report on the future effects of global warming is out and, even watered down, the news ain't good. Given that there is plenty of archaeological evidence showing that climate change wiped out previously thriving civilizations all over the world throughout the millennia, will our governments listen and act? (We're not holding our breath...) For lots of information on climate change, check out New Scientist/Environment's Special Report on Climate Change.

So - what does climate change have to do with chess? A blast from the past courtesy of The International Chessoid muses over ice age chess. Well... it happened before, didn't it?

News from CAIS
Who's that lady with the golden eye? Archaeologists working in the continuing excavations of the "Burnt City" have some thoughts on the subject. That famous "oldest backgammon board" is back, too - Goddesschess has it's own take on that!

Smugglers eye underwater treasures
Shan Jixiang, director of the State Administration of Cultural Heritage, told China Daily that the illegal foreign salvage ships were often equipped with the most advanced technology, in contrast with rudimentary ships and equipment used by Chinese archaeologists and conservationists, who are trying to protect China's underwater heritage.

A salvage operation on a sunken Chinese merchant ship is the first of its kind. Related: Experts believe the wooden merchant vessel belonged to the Southern Song Dynasty (1127-1279) in the Xisha Islands in the South China Sea, and the discovery provides important evidence that there was an established trade route between China and the rest of the world even at that time.

Check out this list of power chess couples.

Under the "We couldn't make this kind of story up" category - Ohio inmate executed for killing cellmate after they fought over chess game.

Oh my - now even octogenarians are getting involved in antiquities fraud: A couple in their 80s and their sons were charged with conning a council into buying a fake ancient Egyptian statue that was supposed to put the Louvre's similar piece of art in the shade.

Film Series on Alexander the Great

The Oriental Institute will screen the acclaimed PBS series In the Footsteps of Alexander the Great, which retraces the 20,000-mile trek of Alexander as he conquered the world from Greece to India. Free admission. August 5: Part 1: Son of God; August 12: Part 2: Lord of Asia;August 19: Part 3: Across the Hindu Kush;August 26: Part 4: To the Ends of the Earth.