Spelling
quiz ....
How
do you spell heroes?
United States military, as in closing down shop
in Afghanistan ....
How
do you spell dumb ass?
Joseph Robinette Biden Jr., as in closing down
shop in Afghanistan ....
The truth of Homer's "Iliad"
Since mentioning
it in a post long/long ago (September 11, which probably is long/long ago to
some people), I have been perusing Kurt Wilhelm Marek's book, "Gods, Graves and
Scholars," which is to say an archaeological "masterpiece" from C. W. Ceram. Marek
was a German journalist and writer and student of archaeology who used the pseudonym
Ceram when publishing most of his books.
(Does anyone
besides me think "perusing" is a weird word? I suppose it depends upon the context in which the word is used ....)
"Gods/Graves” covers
Greek, Egyptian, Mesopotamian archaeology and that in other regions, as well,
including the Americas. It also offers biographical material about several
notable figures in the field.
Using Homer's
books "The Odyssey" and "The Iliad" and the writings of other "ancients," a German
millionaire merchant, Heinrich Schliemann, excavated
Hisarlık, "Place of Fortresses," often spelled Hissarlik, in modern Turkey beginning in 1870. He believed it to be the Troy
of Priam and Paris and Helen and Hector and Achilles and Odysseus. He found nine
cities stacked one atop another and concluded the Trojan War Troy was either
the second or third level city. Level VIIa, first suggested by Minnesota
native, archaeologist Carl Blegen, is now considered the actual Troy of 1200
BCE.
As an aside, one
of Blegen's younger brothers, Theodore, was a noted historian/author/teacher.
His resume included being first managing editor of the Norwegian-American
Historical Association, in which "our friend," Ole Edvart Rølvaag, was a
central player as the first secretary and
archivist, and being knighted into the Royal Norwegian Order of St. Olav. Theodore's
papers are housed at the Minnesota Historical Society and the University of
Minnesota.
I am not sure at
what age history and archaeology became one of my interests, but a sixth grade
teacher turned them into near-obsessions through numerous field trips to Indian
and early white settlement sites. The past and the present here are laden with the names of famous and near-famous
individuals and events.
The intent of
this post is not to elaborate on Ceram/ Marek or Schliemann or Troy, but,
hopefully, to stir a bit of interest in archaeology and the study of "our" past,
and for me to be a link in the love of history chain for which my sixth grade
teacher was a remarkable envoy. There is a three-segment program produced by
the BBC on YouTube entitled "Heinrich Schliemann and the discovery of Troy,"
for anyone who is curious to learn more.
For the
literary-types among you, Ceram's "Gods, Graves and Scholars" is an exceptional
place to taste the hors d'oeuvres of history. The book was first published in German in
1949, with an English translation appearing in 1951. An expanded edition was
published in 1994, which is the copy I have and use. As must be expected,
discoveries and technologies have progressed since then and might affect
Ceram's work, which he readily warns about .... but, it still serves as an
valuable archaeological primer and resource. Here are some of Ceram's own
words:
While
cruising the unfathomable domain of "believe-it-or-not" -- commonly called the
internet -- on an otherwise lackluster day, I sort of stumbled onto "Our Banner
in the Sky," originally oil on paper by Frederick Edwin Church. Church painted
this dramatic and symbolic colorful sunset in 1861 to reflect "divine" support
for the Union during the American Civil War. Seems just as relevant today,
would you not agree? Our fundamental problem seems to stem from a lack of
consensus about good guys and bad guys and our inability to agree to disagree
in a cultured manner. Church, by the way, was a central figure in the Hudson
River School of American landscape painters and, for a time, the most renowned
American artist."Oh baby, I really gotta go now"
"Every time you
dig up something from the past, you give more meaning to the present."
That sentence
was spoken by Robert Taylor portraying archaeologist Mark Brandon in "Valley of
the Kings," a 1954 adventure film written and directed by Robert Pirosh from a
screenplay by Pirosh and Karl Tunberg, "suggested by historical data"
in the book, "Gods, Graves and Scholars," by C. W. Ceram.
I watched the
film a few days ago and, since my life is a series of "what ifs," pulled out my
copy of “Gods/Graves” to try for an "imaginary glimpse" of what life would have
been like for me had I followed my "once-upon-a-time" plan to degree in and to
pursue a career in archaeology.
Ceram was German
journalist and writer Kurt Wilhelm Marek, who published "Götter, Gräber und
Gelehrte" in 1949. In translation, it became "Gods, Graves and Scholars: The
Story of Archaeology," an account of the historical development of archaeology.
Marek chose to use a pseudonym to mask his earlier work as a propagandist for
the Third Reich. (Probably a good idea.)
The book covers
Greek, Egyptian, Mesopotamian archaeology and other regions, as well. It also provides short
biographies of several notable figures in the field, including Heinrich
Schliemann, a German businessman and archaeological pioneer, who excavated Hisarlik,
now presumed to be the site of Troy, along with Mycenae and Tiryns, and English
Egyptologist Howard Carter, who found the intact tomb of Tutankhamun in 1922 in
the Valley of the Kings.
Ceram later published more books, including
"Yestermorrow: Notes on Man's Progress." Never read it, so far, but the title
has hold of my curiosity ....
Yestermorrow .... what a great word, I think .... from Wiktionary:
"Noun
yestermorrow (plural yestermorrows) A day in the sequence of days from past to
future, emphasizing the connection between past and future events .... a time
outside of time .... a time that cannot be fit into the normal timeline, possibly
due to relativistic effects."
Author and
screenwriter Ray Bradbury, known primarily for science fiction and fantasy
novels and short-stories, such as "Fahrenheit 451" and "The Martian Chronicles,"
also had a book titled "Yestermorrow." His was a series of essays, poetry and
philosophical reflections, a few of which make stimulating reading, while
others are pretty much a drag.
Back on point
(whatever it might be .... your guess is as good as mine): I do keep up with what
is happening in the field of archaeology to a degree, and recently have been
feeling engulfed by the near-countless finds these days .... cemetery after cemetery
in Great Britain; 400,000-year-old bone tools in Italy; hundreds of Bronze Age
artifacts uncovered in France; thousands of previously unknown campsites and
towns pinpointed in Europe and Africa through study of satellite photographs.
Well, you get my
drift .....
My thought has
been that at some point any shovelful of earth will reveal some manner of
"archaeological treasures," most of them items not worthy of storage, much less
of display.
I still think
that, but I also think about the sentence: "Every time you
dig up something from the past, you give more meaning to the present."
Could be, but are there such things as too much knowledge about the past, too many often trivial artifacts from eras stretching back even into prehistory?
