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Random Roundup Archives
A clearinghouse of Random Roundup files
May 2009 |
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May 31, 2009
Mate :: a brief history of the human race
October 13, 2008 in videoGene for glowing passed along to monkey offspring
By Malcom Ritter, AP Science Writer Wednesday, May 27, 2009 - Scientists gave marmosets a gene that made their feet glow green, and one of the animals passed it along to its offspring — the first time that an added gene has been inherited by a monkey.The Marx Brothers : Monkey Business
Harpo and Chico offer some entirely unwanted assistance before escaping with the board and pieceMonkey King Chinese Chess Xiangqi Set
The Monkey King is the lead character in the classic Chinese epic ''Journey to the West'', and is the subject of countless anime, manga, and television characters. This Chinese chess set contains the Monkey King and numerous other characters from ''Journey to the West.''Philodor's Monkey Shines! (at chess) A legend tells an interesting story about Philodor (First unofficial world champion).
The Monkey's Bum is a variation of the Modern Defense, a chess opening. Although it may also be loosely defined as any approach against the Modern Defense involving an early Bc4 and Qf3, threatening "scholar's mate", it is strictly defined by the sequence of moves: 1.e4 g6 2.Bc4 Bg7 3.Qf3 e6 4.d4 Bxd4 5.Ne2 Bg7 6.Nbc3,
The following spectacular game is probably the most famous success of the Monkey's Bum Deferred and forced it to be considered with respect by the chess world: Polgar-Shirov, Donner Memorial, Amsterdam, 1995
1.e4 g6 2.d4 Bg7 3.Nc3 c6 4.Bc4 d6 5.Qf3 e6 6.Nge2 b5 7.Bb3 a5 8.a3 Ba6 9.d5 cxd5 10.exd5 e5 11.Ne4 Qc7 12.c4 bxc4 13.Ba4+ Nd7 14.N2c3 Ke7 15.Nxd6 Qxd6 16.Ne4 Qxd5 17.Bg5+ Ndf6 18.Rd1 Qb7 19.Rd7+ Qxd7 20.Bxd7 h6 21.Qd1 1-0So a red monkey and a two headed alligator are playing chess
MONKEY CHESS
by Peter Joseph Swanson
Monkey chess at the witch's house
we sit and sip and stare
The tea is hot, the game unique
and we try to wait out our player
The wasp moves slowly from piece to piece
And stops at the one we move next
Our brains are in our mouths and laps
We don't know the rules or the hex
It all just does everything all on its own
So we just sip stinging herbs and we wait
We wait through the brewing, the storms and the clap
And it somehow ends in a checkmate
The Book of the Courtier By Baldassare Castiglione
... of whom I told you affirmed that he had seen a monkey of a form very different from those we are accustomed to see, which played chess most admirablyAs a young chimp, Stanley wandered onto a game preserve in Africa where he met a boy named Justin. The two became fast friends. Stanley has shown Justin many chimpanzee pastimes like climbing trees and how to find the best bananas. In return, Justin has taught Stanley some human things, like how to program a VCR and how to play chess. ..."
The Baboons and Monkeys of Ancient Egypt by Royce Hiller "In ancient Egypt, baboons and monkeys often play a significant and mysterious role in religion and elsewhere."
Primate Discovery of Higher Causality Created Religious Belief Sully highlights a very interesting idea on the origins of religious belief from biologist Lewis Wolpert:
Lotus Temple Theatre is currently gathering together a band of performing nomads to travel the Silk Road for performance healing. Silk Road performers will be performing divination opera, which will be used as scenes in docu-drama film projects. ...The Bone Oracle Code - a theatrical presentation in which: "The alchemist of the Present, astral projects through past-life regression into the monkey-king in order to transform the future."Wild Animals of Africa - chess sets.
Dinosaur chess sets From the Age of the Dinosaurs we have developed this 32 piece chess set. Re-enact your strategic game plan with the ferocity of the meat eating King Tyrannosaur and Steadfast Rook of the herbivore TriceratopsChess - A Living Fossil (pdf) by Gerhard Josten "Written sources and statuary artefacts on the one hand as well as theories, speculations and legends on the other have formed the more or less well-founded basis for the past thousand years for all those looking for the answer to the question as to how the game of chess came into being."
The Greatest Chess Puzzle - by Aryan Argandewal
The Kushan Empire has a central place in Josten’s work. The Kushans were particularly keen on merging elements of different cultures. It was the ‘liberal’ Kushan Empire where ideas could flourish, where all religions were permissible and well respected.The politics of chess by Gregor Stronach - "It’s a funny game, chess. Like a Mandelbrot set, there’s more to it than meets the eye – the more you look at a chess as a game, the more it really gets into your soul."
Alpha Apes and Alpha Men
Who is this monkey Hanuman? Rama has let him loose in the world. He knows Rama and Rama knows him. Hanuman can break in or break out of anywhere. He cannot be stopped, like the free wind in flight.
People dressed as the Hanuman (white monkey) character perform during a culture parade in central Jakarta August 19, 2008 as part of the country's 63rd Independence Day celebrations.
Hanuman is by for the most important monkey. Therefore, his mask will be described in detail. Hanuman's mask has many features which indicate he is a monkey with very special powers.
Statues of Murugan; the Son of Shiva and the Detroyer of Evil Forces The son of Shiva, Kartikeya, is also known as Kumara, Skanda, Subramanya, Shanmukha or Murugan (used in Tamil Nadu). As Kartikeya he is designated the deity of war, guarding right and destroying evil. As Shanmukha, the six headed, he teaches that we have five senses and the mind, and only when all six are in harmony is there spiritual growth.
Ancient Dravidian in origin (see Dravidians), Murugan or Murukan is an important god among the Tamils (see Tamil Mythology) of southern India.
Kataragama also Katharagama,and Katirkamam (Tamil ??????????) is a regionally popular place of pilgrimage of Hindu, Buddhist, Muslim and indigenous Vedda communities of Sri Lanka and South India, where the god Muruga is the main deity.
The Law Lie – 6 – Law & Order – 1
Zen of Zero on the Alpha Male Complex 2009/05/23 "Fundamentalist behaviors are familiar because we’ve all seen them so many times. These men are acting the role of “alpha males” who define the boundaries of their group’s territory and the norms and behaviors that define members of their in-group."Decoding antiquity: Eight scripts that still can't be read - These dead scripts tantalise us. We can see that they are writing, but what do they say?"
A Saraswati Rebus (REBUS - Latin: ‘by means of things’) is a graphemic expression of the phonetic shape of a word or syllable. Rebus uses words pronounced alike (homophones) but with different meanings. Sumerian script was phonetized using the rebus principle. So were the Egyptian hieroglyphs based on the rebus principle.
In a culture where women are often restricted to their houses, carpets become a place to express their feelings and dreams. Every motif, handed down over generations, is carefully woven into the carpets. Part of the joy of looking at carpets is decoding the heartful messages woven into them.
Mimeoliths - Compiled by R. V. Dietrich, Professor Emeritus "Nearly everyone has, I suspect, looked at one thing and imagined it looked like something else. Indeed, many observations of this kind have been recorded. ... always that same pretext is offered -- it looks like the thing.";
Seven pyramids identified on the African island of Mauritius Sunday, 29 March 2009 Seven pyramids have been identified on the African island of Mauritius. Remarkably, in construction, they are identical to the ones found on the island of Tenerife, an island on the opposite side of the continent. It underlines the likelihood that one civilisation sailed to various islands off the coast of Africa and constructed these structures.
Eden? Maybe. But Where’s the Apple Tree? - by Nicholas Wade Published: April 30, 2009 Locations for the Garden of Eden have been offered many times before, but seldom in the somewhat inhospitable borderland where Angola and Namibia meet. A new genetic survey of people in Africa, the largest of its kind, suggests, however, that the region in southwest Africa seems, on the present evidence, to be the origin of modern humans.
Prehistoric chess? A link is made between magic traps found in other panels where they accompany animals...
The Secret Language of the Hunters: One of the Twelve Secrets of the Caucasus - by Amjad Jaimoukha -
Language of the chase ..."A curious aspect of Circassian, which it shares with its sister languages, Abkhaz and Ubykh, is the secret language of the hunters, Schak’webze, which was used by the princes and the nobles in their hunting expeditions. This language was not comprehended by the masses of the people. It was not a different language as such, but rather it had a lexicon made up of transposed and other distorted words with the basic syntactical structure unaffected. It was believed that, by switching to the cryptic tongue, the senses of the animals would be dulled as to the purpose of the hunters, and thus a plentiful bag would be assured.'(Amjad Jaimoukha, The Circassians: A Handbook, London: RoutledgeCurzon (Taylor & Francis); New York: Palgrave and Routledge, 2001, p251.)
May 24, 2009
"A computer once beat me at chess, but it was no match for me at kick boxing." - Emo Philips
Stop Smiling Magazine The History of Backgammon, from Mesopotamia to Groucho Marx Friday, June 20, 2008 By Danny Magariel “The history of Backgammon is long, complicated. Very incomplete — and fascinating. The exact origins of the game remain unknown, through there is much conjecture, a good deal of it both ingenious and farfetched.” - The Backgammon Book by Oswald Jacoby & John Crawford
Most Expensive Backgammon Set Artist Bernard Maquin has crafted a backgammon set resembling the exotic traditions of the Middle East. More of a luxurious work of art than a board-game, the inspiration for the design of this expensive Backgammon board and game pieces came from fusing geometric patterns with eastern art and architectural designs. See also - The Charles Hollander Collection
Ancient Gem-Studded Teeth Show Skill of Early Dentists May 18, 2009—The glittering "grills" of some hip-hop stars aren't exactly unprecedented. Sophisticated dentistry allowed Native Americans to add bling to their teeth as far back as 2,500 years ago, a new study says.
Tooth Tattoos - What Would the Tooth Fairy Think? "We have found that there is a lack of true artists in our industry. Our technicians were trained first to be artists and then taught how to construct teeth."
Battle of Helm's Deep made of candy This past Christmas Vacation my brothers, sister, myself and my girlfriend built a scale replica of the battle of Helms Deep, from the second book of the Lord of the Rings Trilogy, The Two Towers penned by the late, great, J.R.R. Tolkien. (Raincoaster sez, "The site has an awesome collection of photos and brief, but hilarious commentary.")
Crocodile Dentist features – you guessed it – a cute green crocodile. This poor croc has a tooth ache, and it’s your child’s job to help him out. Your child will have to put his finger in the crocodile’s mouth, very carefully, and feel around for the sore tooth...
Antiquities returned to Greece Tue May 19, 2009 Greece has campaigned for decades to get back from the British Museum the Parthenon sculptures, also known as Elgin marbles, saying they are an integral part of one of the world's most important monuments.
Mystery Of Horse Domestication Solved? ScienceDaily (Apr. 24, 2009) — Wild horses were domesticated in the Ponto-Caspian steppe region (today Russia, Kazakhstan, Ukraine, Romania) in the 3rd millennium B.C. Despite the pivotal role horses have played in the history of human societies, the process of their domestication is not well understood
Key Archaeological Findings Discovered in UAQ
18 May 2009 DUBAI - A team of national archaeologists have made a major discovery including potshards dating back to the Umm Al Nar Civilisation, around 3000 BC, at Ed-Dur site in Umm Al Quwain.Race to preserve the world's oldest submerged town
May 11th, 2009 (PhysOrg.com) -- The oldest submerged town in the world is about to give up its secrets — with the help of equipment that could revolutionise underwater archaeology.Culture Minister: 132 archaeological sites in Egypt not excavated Monday, May 11, 2009 - Culture Minister Farouk Hosni said that the researches conducted via satellites have confirmed the existence of 132 archaeological sites in Egypt that witnessed no excavations until now.
World’s biggest puzzle made in consul’s house at Ephesus The marble hall of the palace-like house in Efes has begun to be restored, putting back together walls that are now broken into 120,000 pieces. One of the biggest ancient cities of the Mediterranean, Efes (Ephesus), is now undergoing important restoration
World’s Oldest Manufactured Beads Are Older Than Previously Thought ScienceDaily (May 7, 2009) — A team of archaeologists has uncovered some of the world’s earliest shell ornaments in a limestone cave in Eastern Morocco.
New pathway' for African exodus By Paul Rincon - Science reporter, BBC News - Modern humans had reached the Levant by 100,000 years ago. Researchers have found a possible new route taken by early modern humans as they expanded out of Africa to colonise the rest of the world.
Recent single-origin hypothesis The single-origin hypothesis (or Out-of-Africa model) is one of two accounts of the origin of anatomically modern humans, Homo sapiens.
Study Rejects "Eve Theory" And Supports Diverse Ancestry Of Modern Humans ScienceDaily (Jan. 12, 2001) — ANN ARBOR --- The ancestors of modern humans came from many different regions of the world, not just a single area, according to a University of Michigan study published in the current (Jan. 12) issue of Science.
Origins Of Maya Blue In Mexico ScienceDaily (Apr. 23, 2009) — The ancient Maya civilisation used a rare type of clay called "palygorskite" to produce Maya blue.
Was A 'Mistress Of The Lionesses' A King In Ancient Canaan? ScienceDaily (Apr. 11, 2009) — The legend is that the great rulers of Canaan, the ancient land of Israel, were all men. But a recent dig by Tel Aviv University archaeologists at Tel Beth-Shemesh uncovered possible evidence of a mysterious female ruler.
Archaeologists Discover Temple That Sheds Light On So-called Dark Age ScienceDaily (Apr. 16, 2009) — The discovery of a remarkably well-preserved monumental temple in Turkey — thought to be constructed during the time of King Solomon in the 10th/9th-centuries BCE — sheds light on the so-called Dark Age.
5,100 YEAR OLD CHEMICAL EVIDENCE FOR ANCIENT MEDICINAL REMEDIES—DISCOVERED IN ANCIENT EGYPTIAN WINE JARS Penn Museum and Penn Medicine Researchers Collaborate To Test Promising Medicinal Compounds Once Employed by Our Ancestors - Hippocrates (ca. 460-370 BCE), the most famous of ancient physicians, once noted: "Wine is fit for man in a wonderful way provided that it is taken with good sense by the sick as well as the healthy."
Brooklyn Museum Exhibitions
December 19, 2008–May 31, 2009
Elizabeth A. Sackler Center for Feminist Art, Herstory Gallery, 4th Floor Who is she? A goddess, a ritual object, a votive offering, a vehicle for working magic or fulfilling wishes, a talisman for protection, a teaching or initiation device, or simply an ancient woman's embodiment of herself?Extra! Goddesschess braves the New York subway system for a special visit to The Brooklyn Museum!
May 3, 2009
Our Tenth Anniversary Special!!
And we're on vacation for a couple of weeks - so
A triple helping of Random Round Up as The Goddesschess Four ("guided by the light of their faithful dog, Quagsmuir") prepares to frolic in the fabled New York City Woods.... where the deer and the metrognomes play!!Dwarves? Gnomes? Nomes? Names? Who Knew?
Apparently EVERYONE!!
• Egyptian
Ancient Egyptians Held Dwarves in High Esteem
"Mock not the blind nor deride the dwarf nor block the cripple's path; don't tease a man made ill by a god nor make outcry when he blunders.The ancient Egyptian god, Bes, who may not have originated in Egypt but who was certainly made into a pure Egyptian god, had a number of attributes which changed over time.
Isis and the Seven Scorpions
This is one of the stories of the Delta Cycle, a group of tales from the mythical period called the 'First Time', when the gods wandered upon the earth and ruled it.
The "Followers of Horus"
... were a group of beings who were closely connected with Osiris, and having "followed" him in this world they passed after him into the Other World, where they became his ministrants and messengers, partaking of his immortal nature, and sharing his life.• Indo-Persian - via Hamlet's Mill
"THE PARALLEL between the Tale of Kai Khusrau and the final plot of the vast Hindu epic, the Mahabharata, has received attention for over a century. It was noticed by the great Orientalist James Darmesteter. The translators of Firdausi are not unaware of it...""The fire brothers, with Draupadi forming the sixth [she was the joint wife of the brothers], and a dog forming the seventh, set out on their journey..." " the faithful dog... turns out to be Dharma (the Law), in disguise ..."
•Vedic ancestry
Astronomy in Ancient India - History and Introduction: According to Asko Parpola, Indus~Saraswati seal 430 (reasonably datable to the 24th century BC) depicting the Seven Sisters seems to refer to the observation of the Pleiades.
Indus imagery...
"The guarding trees / lotus stalks are sometime called Asvins = friends and they are growing helpers. Kneeling is the young man and behind him a ram and below seven sisters. Seeing them as the asterisms Auriga, Perseus, Aries, and Pleiades is easy."• The Maori
YESTERDAY AND TO-DAY CHAPTER VII. — ON STARS, AND STAR LORE
One of the Waikato Kingite Flags at Waahi. The canoe represents the Tainui; the rainbow is the symbol of the god Uenuku, and the seven stars above the rainbow are the Pleiades (Matariki).
• North American Native
Tribal Names for Celestial Objects Many of the tribes are divided into distinct clans, each with their own names for the celestial objects.
• Yesterday and Today...
White Dwarf is a magazine published by British games manufacturer Games Workshop. ... the magazine is now dedicated exclusively to the miniature wargames produced by Games Workshop, mainly the core systems of Warhammer Fantasy Battle, Warhammer 40,000 and The Lord of the Rings Strategy Battle Game.
A Blog about Japanese toys and toy culture. Enjoy an an endless and entertaining array of Japanese toys, mecha, action figures, trading figures, designer toys,video games anime and toy culture .... includes a "Bes" - "White Dwarf" figurine for the year 2009... (awfully awesome)
These "little people" are tricky... maybe even dangerous!
Better to laugh with them than at them...• Hilaria
In Ancient Roman religious tradition, the hilaria (Greek: ?λ?ρια; Latin: hilaris, "hilarious") were festivals celebrated on the vernal equinox to honor Cybele. ...The manner of its celebration during the time of the republic is unknown, except that Valerius Maximus mentions games in honour of the mother of the gods.
"Gnomes" (often referred to as "Underpants Gnomes") is the 30th episode of Comedy Central's animated series South Park. It was originally broadcast on December 16, 1998
Gnomes are often associated with the world of finance; several commentators suggested the gnomes in South Park could be a reference to the phrase Gnomes of Zürich, a disparaging term for Swiss bankers.
The Invisible Gnomes and the Invisible Hand: South Park and Libertarian Philosophy by Paul Cantor "We laugh precisely because the comedian momentarily liberates us from the restrictions that conventional society imposes on us. We applaud the comedian because he says right out in front of an audience what, supposedly, nobody is allowed to say in public."
Consider yourself Smurfed!
by the Narts
andLady Nart Sana, the Forest Mother
Recall, if you will, the Roman soldier's personal deposition to the goddess Hananeftis of "Hnefatfl" fame - a conspicuous, albeit obscure reference to "Amazon Chess"... A great deal of the Nart sagas are "Amazonian" - and so....
If we include Persian references to NARD and transpose to NART - we find a new goddess, Nart Sana - and have probably "captured" nard/backgammon through disambiguation of the misdirecting term NARD/nardashir etc.
No images of Nart Sana appear of which we are currently aware - although, she was considered a Great Goddess archetype and associated with the Attis - Cybele cult.
Related myths and imagery make for a sinewy goddess and Nart Sana's Epos becomes a mythic world where a combination of Great White Goddess, Amazons, horse-riding dwarves (resembling Bes) and Sana (soma) prevail.
The beer (Sana) is probably the same as that which drugged Sekhmet in the Egyptian "Destruction of Mankind" epic. Indian Soma and Greek Ambrosia appear to have been distilled from the same mythic hops.
NARD and NART: The two terms are not mutually exclusive and Persian dialect may account for the subtle difference of one letter. The Nart Saga was most definitely known to Persia of very ancient times. Prof. John Colarusso's Nart Epos connects with Egypt on a number of important fronts and geographically, Ur and Sumer-Babylon and various regions of Anatolia can't be excluded. However resonant, there is no effort made to compare Egyptian and Nart myths in his work.
When the question who gave what to whom arises it's difficult to come up with any hard and fast decision. Ancient Egypt would complicate an otherwise neat and tidy INDO-ARYAN classification and the exclusion of Egypt is not uncommon in comparative examinations of contemporaneous religious and folkloric cultures. In any case, there is a huge echo effect coming from a common "meme" and Egypt (like India and Persia) can claim a large portion of the Nart myths - and memes...
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