MUMMIFIED dogs are not rare in Egypt, but dogs rolled up and buried in pots is extraordinary, and now archaeologists have found two well preserved dogs buried in pots some 3,000 years ago — and they have no idea how the Egyptians got them in the pots.
Nicknamed Houdini and Chewie, the potted dogs were discovered at Shunet ez Zebib, a large mud-brick structure located at Abydos — one of the most sacred cities in Ancient Egypt, legendary location of the the fabled Tomb of Osiris. The site was built around 2750 BC and was dedicated to Khasekhemwy, a second dynasty king.
It is also known for the the thousands of ibis burials in jars that had been recovered in the dunes nearby, and for the interments of other animals, mostly raptors and canines.
"The site provided a very secure structure, with conveniently soft, sandy fill that was easy for quick burials within a sacred space," Salima Ikram, professor of Egyptology at The American University in Cairo, wrote in a recently published Festschrift in honor of Dieter Kessler, a renowned scholar in the field of animal cults and Egyptian religion.
"Of the many jars that were recovered, only 13 have thus far been properly investigated. Of these, four were empty, three contained ibises, and five were filled with dogs," Ikram said.
While three pots contained skeletonized remains of dogs, the last two housed Houdini and Chewie, two animals with their fur largely intact.
"Although it is common to find birds in pots, it is rare to find other animals buried in this way," Ikram told Discovery News.
In particular, no canine burials in pots have been recorded in the many dog cemeteries scattered throughout Egypt.
"These jars were probably made and used for some sort of storage, and then re-used as coffins for the dogs. They are quite charming as the dogs are curled up in the pots," Ikra said.
According to the researcher, both animals were mature, probably around five years of age.
"They were probably votive offerings unless they held the position of sacred animals — perhaps the pot burials are indicative of their being Sacred rather than just Votive," Ikram said.
How the two animals were pushed into pots from which they cannot be extracted now remains a mystery.
"Without further examination and chemical testing it is not possible to understand the process by which these two animals were preserved," Ikram said.
LEGIONS of terracotta soldiers were left on guard in Chinese Emperor Qin Shihuang's underground tomb. Researchers now say they were influenced by Greek art.
The Terracotta Warriors, along with other life-size sculptures built for the First Emperor of China, were inspired by Greek art, new research indicates.
Now, new research indicates the armies of Alexander the Great may have made contact with China.
"It is perfectly possible and actually likely that the sculptures of the First Emperor are the result of early contact between Greece and China," writes Lukas Nickel of the School of Oriental and African Studies at the University of London, in the most recent edition of the journal Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies.
Nickel's evidence includes newly translated ancient records that tell a fantastic tale of giant statues that "appeared" in the far west, inspiring the first emperor of China to duplicate them in front of his palace.
This story offers evidence of early contact between China and the West, contacts that Nickel says inspired the First Emperor Qin Shi Huangdi not only to duplicate the 12 giant statues but to build the massive Terracotta Army along with other life-size sculptures.
Before the First Emperor's time, life-size sculptures were not built in China, and Nickel argues the idea to build so many of them, so suddenly, came from kingdoms in Asia that had been created and influenced by Alexander the Great's campaigns.
Nickel translated ancient Chinese records that tell a tale of 12 giant statues, clad in "foreign robes" that "appeared" in Lintao in what was the westernmost part of China. (The word "Lintao" can also mean any place far to the west.)
The records do not say how this appearance happened, who brought them there or who exactly the statues depicted; they do reveal the statues were larger than life, rising about 38 feet (11.55 meters) high, with feet that were 4.5 feet long (1.38 m).
They so impressed the First Emperor that he decided to build 12 duplicates in front of his palace by melting down bronze weapons that had been used for war.
On each duplicate an inscription was created telling of the "giants" (the original statues) that appeared in Lintao. The inscriptions, recorded by Yan Shigu, who lived around 1,400 years ago and used an earlier written source, said that in the "26th Year of the Emperor, when he first brought together all-under-heaven, divided the principalities into provinces and districts, and unified the weights and measures, (these) giants appeared in Lintao …"
These giant duplicates no longer exist, having been destroyed in the centuries after the First Emperor's death. Because the duplicates were displayed publicly in front of the First Emperor's palace, ancient writers left records of them behind, Nickel told LiveScience.
Meanwhile, the Terracotta Warriors, though they survive to present day, were buried in pits out of sight and, as such, no record of them survives today.
Even so, the newly translated records suggest contact, of some form, occurred between ancient China and kingdoms in Central Asia that had been influenced by Greek culture and its sculpture-building tradition.
THERE are Catholic rosary beads, Eastern Orthodox beads, Swedish Lutheran Frälserkransen beads, Islamic prayer beads, Buddhist meditation beads, Hindu japa mala beads and even Wiccan prayer beads ... now several adherents of Antinous are designing prayer beads.
Earlier we unveiled the FLAMEN ANTONIUS SUBIA PRAYER BEADS.
Today we show you the beads designed by Priest Hernestus ... his "Antinous Moon Magic" beads.
They consist of 52 beads symbolizing the 52 primary annual lunar phases, each of which represents a specific archetypal spirit in Antinous Moon Magic.
In addition, there are some 30 additional beads representing various major "Saints of Antinous," "Blessed Souls of Antinous" and also what Hernestus calls his "Sorgenkinder" (German for "special needs children") ... beads for persons or situations which require urgent spiritual attention.
The beads have a very Egyptian flavor, reflecting the mysteries of the Land of the Nile where Antinous died and was deified. The strand has beads of quartz crystal, amber, carneol, turquoise and red-green glass.
A gold filigree Egyptian ankh with six semi-precious gemstones dangles from the keystone bead at the end of the strand ... a bead which Hernestus calls the "Rekhenef" bead symbolizing the KA of the prayer beads.
Each bead represents a particular lunar phase of the year or saint or individual person/situation.
The strand is over three feet long ... nearly one meter long.
The length means that it variously can be worn around the neck during most hours of the day or wrapped around the wrist during intensive prayer or spell work.
"During the cycle of a lunar phase, of course, I meditate on that particular moon," says Priest Hernestus.
"But the whole point of Antinous Moon Magic is to be able to call down the power of Antinous the Moon God at any time of the lunar year."
He explains, "So, for example, if someone consults me about asking their boss for a pay increase, I focus my attention on the 'Merchant Moon' representing the employer, and the 'Denarius Moon' for money as well as a special bead representing that person asking for a pay hike."
He says it does not matter that the Merchant Moon and Denarius Moon are lunar phases which occur at two totally different times of the year.
"Antinous Moon Magic exists beyond linear time. Antinous himself dwells in the Egyptian occult concept of SEP TEPY ... a state beyond Time and Space in which the universe is being created on a continual basis," Hernestus says.
"The job of the magician-priest of Antinous, both in ancient times and now, has always been to enter into SEP TEPY and cast the prayer spell there."
He adds that the beads have a way of communicating special needs which require his attention.
"I wrap the beads around my wrist at random, paying no attention to the order of the beads," Hernestus. "Then during meditation, I look down and notice which bead or beads are right over my pulse on the underside of my wrist ... those beads indicate a person or situation that needs my attention."
He has found that the prayer beads can use this means to alert him to a person who is thinking of him or who is about to contact him very shortly.
"I beads tell me a certain person is in trouble. So I consult the Antinous Oracle and go deep within myself to see what the specific situation is. Then when the person calls me, they are surprised to learn that I am already on top of their plight," he says.
"They seem to think I am psychic or something, but in fact, it is just the Antinous Moon Magic beads ... they really do work," he insists.
ON December 11th the Religion of Antinous honors SAINT ALESSANDRO ALBANI, who was an Italian aristocrat and cardinal, and a collector and patron of the arts.
It is largely thanks to Cardinal Albani that Antinous experienced a resurgence of interest in the 18th Century which continues to this day.
It is also believed that Albani secretly worshiped the Beauteous Boy as a gay god.
Albani became a trend-setter and an arbiter of taste. Albani, whose sexuality was ambivalent, and the openly gay Winkelmann more or less single-handedly launched a craze throughout the European aristocracy for Classical art.
When he was 29, by special dispensation from his uncle Pope Clement XI, Alessandro Albani was made a Cardinal, although he had never been a priest or member of a lower order.
Indeed, he would have preferred to pursue a military career. But chronic eye problems, which eventually resulted in total blindness in old age, convinced him to take up his uncle's generous offer.
He is said to have been a continuing cause of great concern to his uncle, due to his wordly and irreligious obsessions, first among these his passion for art.
Cardinal Albani used his vast wealth to collect Classical art, and to patronize artists of his day, such as Anton Raphael Mengs, and the "Father of Archaeology" Johann Joachim Winckelmann, who was an open homosexual.
The art collection of Cardinal Albani contained an extraordinary number of statues of Antinous, and these were studied by Winckelmann, who had taken up residence in the sprawling and very lavish Villa Albani outside of Rome (pictured at right).
And Antinous was the pre-eminent example of male beauty in Classical art.
Every aristocrat in Europe wanted a statue or Antinous. And monarchs such as Frederick the Great of Prussia (who never married and favored intimate friendships with males) sent out experts to find statues of Antinous.
Thus, the science of archaeology was born largely through a desire by aristocrats to furnish their palaces with the sort of Antinous-style Classical art which Albani had made fashionable.
By the time he died on December 11th in the year 1779, it was rumored that Cardinal Albani, along with his intimate friends Winckelmann and neo-classicist painter Anton Mengs, had been secret worshippers of Antinous and Priapus.
It was asserted that they reinstated the religion of the Beloved Boy as a kind of underground cult along with other, unnamed persons.
For this reason, though based largely on rumor, Cardinal Alessandro Albani is sanctified as a Saint of the Religion of Antinous.
Although he was a Cardinal of the Catholic Faith, he may in fact have been the first High Priest of Antinous since the extermination of the ancient religion 1,300 years before.
Albani's secret cult ... assuming it truly existed ... is the only known predecessor since ancient times to the current Religion of Antinous.
EGYPT has recovered a statue of pharaoh Tutankhamun's sister looted from a museum near Antinoopolis during riots by supporters of ousted president Mohamed Morsi.
The 32 centimetre (12.6 inches) limestone statue of Ankhesamun, sister of the famous boy king and daughter of pharaoh Akhenaten, who ruled around 1,500 BC, was stolen on August 14 when a MOB LOOTED THE MALLAWI MUSEUM only a few kilometres from the city sacred to Antinous.
"The piece is one of the most important in the museum," said antiquities minister Mohamed Ibrahim in a statement.
Authorities have recovered 800 of the 1,050 artefacts stolen from the museum in southern Egypt during nationwide riots on August 14 after police clashed with Islamists in Cairo, he added.
Supporters of Morsi attacked the museum, police stations and Christian churches across the country after police dispersed two Islamist protest camps in Cairo, killing hundreds.
The minister also said that a statue dating back over 2,500 years that was stolen from the Cairo Museum during the 2011 revolt against Hosni Mubarak was found in Belgium.
The statue, that dates to the 26th dynasty, more than 500 BC, and made from earthenware was stolen on January 28, 2011, when looting and violence erupted in Cairo's iconic Tahrir Square, the epicentre of the anti-Mubarak revolt.
The piece was smuggled to Belgium where a French expert analysed it and contacted Egypt authorities.
In November, Egypt announced the recovery of 90 artefacts that had been put on sale by a Jerusalem auction house. Others pieces have been returned by Britain and Germany.
I have just finished my ANTINOUS PRAYER BEADS, first attempt, with many others yet to come.
It took about three days to finish.
Day first my fingers hurt, day two my fingers hurt worse, so I took a break for a day, and then today I went back at them, this time the pain was minimal...
On day two I felt like this was last set of beads I would ever make with steel wire...but then today I made two sets of 13, half the necklace in less time that it took to make the other half.
And when I was finished my hands didn't really hurt at all, and I thought that I could probably sit here and make another whole necklace before midnight!
So then I drilled a hole in this Antinous replica coin and made a link for him to the chain...and it was done just like that!
This is my version of Priest Hernestus's 52 prayer beads, one for each moon of year. Only in my version I used 12mm olive wood beads linked together with steel bailing wire!
It has a very excellent New Mexican Hermanos Penitentes style, very harsh, Hispanic and self-flagellant ... as you might expect from someone as self-tormenting as I am towards myself.
This is how I will pray to Antinous to save us all on the day when our heart is placed on the scale against the weight of the feather of Maat...like we even have a chance! Well here's my chance!....Take That!...devourer of souls! I whip you with my Antinous Chain!
I was actually thinking about getting right to work on bead set number two, and then I took a look at my hands ... It doesn't even hurt really ... but look at that!
Antinous devotion! I'm turning into an Antinous Penitent Flagellant!
~SVBIA
THE mystery of a "possessed" rotating statue in a Manchester museum that had experts in a spin due to its unexplained movement during the night has been solved following a scientific investigation.
Or has it?
The 4,000-year-old Egyptian statue, donated to the Manchester Museum by Annie Barlow, from Bolton, in 1933, had curators at Manchester Museum puzzled after it began to mysteriously rotate overnight, despite being housed in a secure glass case.
Neb-Senu is a 10in (25cm) statuette made in about 1800 BC as a medium for the soul of an ancient Egyptian man.
Explanations for its movement ranged from mystical and magical ancient myths, curses and spirits to the object being possessed.
But, following an investigation, a far more 21st century reason has been unearthed - that the figure rotated as a result of vibrations from passing footfall and traffic.
ITV's Mystery Map, which investigates myths and mysterious stories, enlisted specialists to place sensors under the cabinet to detect vibrations, which dispelled some of the more outlandish claims.
Vibration expert Steve Gosling undertook a 24-hour test by placing a specialist three-axis sensor under the wall-mounted cabinet containing the relic, to record any vibrations present.
Beginning the test at 6:00 pm, he found there was a peak in vibration level which correlated with movement at this time.
Overnight the vibrations stopped and the statue stopped rotating. Movement began again at 7 a.m. the following day - at the same time the vibrations also started again.
Mr Gosling said: "The vibration is a combination of multiple sources so there's buses outside on the busy road, there's footfall activity. And it's all of those things combined."
When asked why other displays were not rotating, he added: "This statue has a convex base. There's a lump at the bottom which makes it more susceptible to vibrations than the others which have a flat base. This is conclusive."
Anna Garnett, an Egyptology curator, previously attributed the mysterious movement to "a force beyond the physical" whilst Yulan Li, a student, ascribed the motion to magic.
Professor Brian Cox previously said he thought the movement was a result of friction between the carved serpentine figure and the glass shelf.
