10 surprising facts about the ancient world that scientists learned from found documents

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

The ancients documented their lives by making records in a variety of ways, from stone slabs to leather scrolls. Thanks to such a document that has survived to this day, scientists often open new chapters of history and learn about unexpected aspects of the life of the ancients. Sometimes one such document can radically change the idea of a particular historical period.

1. "One Hundred Rules of War"

Tsukahara Bokuden was a great samurai and is possibly the author of the curious book One Hundred Rules of War, which was recently translated into English. The guide gives advice on fighting skills and how a "real" samurai should behave. Among the descriptions of cowardly behavior unworthy of a samurai were such habits as not drinking alcohol and dislike of horseback riding. Although the authorship is now impossible to prove, many believe that the book was compiled in the last year of Bokuden's life (1489-1571).

Interestingly, this tutorial is not just a set of rules, but rather a collection of songs. These songs focus on many areas of samurai life, from the best name for a child born in the warrior class, to remembering that neither life nor death is the most important thing, and that you always have to move forward. This paper also presents fascinating topics about training and war preparation. For example, rice with hot water, dried plums and fried beans were recommended as the best "camping" food.

2. The marriage contract

About 4,000 years ago, the couple captured their marriage contract on clay. When this clay tablet was found in 2017 at the Kultepe Kanish archaeological site in Turkey, it soon became clear that most of the contract was for children. An Assyrian couple, Lakipum and Khatala, agreed to try to produce their own offspring within two years.

If there were no children, then the wife had to find a surrogate mother. More specifically, Hatala had to buy a female slave for her husband. After the birth of the child, Lakipum was allowed to sell the mother if he wanted to.

The contract is the oldest that mentions surrogacy and infertility, albeit in a slightly different light than today. While this reflects the ancient belief that infertility was the wife's fault, the contract provided for divorce. The person who initiated the divorce had to pay the other person five measures of silver.

3. Tax documents and shopping lists

The Egyptian mummy of Chadingstone Castle in Kent has long been a mystery to experts. To read the name of the deceased, it was necessary to unfold the burial cover from strips of papyrus pages, which was impossible without damaging the mummy. In 2017, researchers developed a scanning method that made it possible to read hidden text without harming the mummy.

3,000-year-old mummy of a human named Iretirore. Used papyrus was used to form the windings of the mummy, but the text on it was hidden with putty and plaster, so the content remained unknown for centuries. During the scan, scientists saw, in addition to the name, records of the life of the Egyptians, including tax documents and shopping lists.

4. "The sun and the moon have ceased to shine …"

Egyptology is a fairly well-researched field of science, but even there the rule of each pharaoh is a matter of controversy. For example, one of the most famous pharaohs was Ramses the Great. In 2017, scholars compared a passage from the Bible with a description of the battle on the stele. Pharaoh Merneptah, son of Ramses, described how he defeated the Israelites. What these two texts have in common is the mention of the oldest solar eclipse.

The passage from the Book of Joshua describes how Joshua led the Israelites to Canaan. To defeat his enemies, he successfully ordered the Sun and Moon to stop moving. The text discouraged scholars until they realized that the original translation from Hebrew to English translation could be interpreted in two ways. Alternatively, this meant that the Sun and Moon stopped glowing. The inscriptions on the stele testified to the appearance of the Israelites in Canaan between 1500-1050. BC.

If the event Jesus described was an eclipse, then the only eclipse seen in Canaan at that time happened on October 30, 1207 BC. The stele stated that it was carved during the fifth year of the reign of Merneptah. If this research is correct, then Ramses ruled from 1276 to 1210 BC.

5. "Voyage to the South Sea"

Scraps of paper were found aboard the Queen Anne's Revenge, commanded by the famous pirate Blackbeard. In 1718, the ship sank near North Carolina and has been the subject of painstaking analysis since its discovery in 1996. A lot of common material was found - weapons, tools, and personal artifacts. But the most unexpected discovery was 16 scraps of paper hammered into a cannon.

This was an extremely rare find, given that the paper almost never survives under water, let alone stayed at the bottom for three centuries. It turned out that the pages were torn from Voyage to the South Sea, an adventure story about a captain who, among other things, describes a coastal settlement in Peru. It is a suitable addition to any pirate library. But which sailor owned the book and why it was driven into the cannon is a mystery.

6. Horror vacui

Apparently, many ancient maps were made by artists more interested in decorating maps than in conveying information accurately. They are decorated with sea monsters, imaginary cities and incorrect written "facts". While wealthy shoppers expected the maps to be decorated, the explorers needed the correct geography, not dragons in place of the mountains.

The reason was the fear of looking ignorant. In this context, cartographers could experience what historians call Horror vacui (literally translated from Latin as "fear of emptiness") - unwillingness to leave empty spaces on maps. Interestingly, the cartographers themselves did not make any mention of horror vacui, except in one case.

Dutchman Peter Planzius added an accurate map of the southern hemisphere's sky to his 1592 world map. Although he never mentioned the "fear of emptiness," Plancius included a note explaining that the constellations replaced the southern hemisphere so that it would not remain empty. By the middle of the 18th century, the horror vacui had almost disappeared, and the maps had become more accurate. Unexplored places began to be painted empty.

7. "War of the Roses"

The hugely successful Game of Thrones series (and the book it was based on) is inspired by a real power struggle. In England, the Houses of Lancaster and York fought for supremacy for nearly 30 years (later known as the "War of the Roses") Both sides of the conflict have contributed to a unique and remarkable piece of art.

The Canterbury Scroll was created by one side of the conflict and supplemented by the other. The 5-meter Canterbury Scroll is an excellent account of the mythical beginnings of England before the War of the Roses. It was compiled by the House of Lancaster in the 1420s. During the conflict, it was acquired by the Yorkists, who partially rewrote the document.

It has been in the possession of the University of Canterbury in New Zealand for over a century. Researchers believe there are still secrets in the carefully scrutinized manuscript. They plan to use new techniques like advanced visualization to find hidden phrases in 2018.

8. Mini Bibles

During the 13th century, thousands of mini-Bibles were produced that could be carried in a pocket. The tiny books were made using technology that was hitherto unknown. Although the pages were made of leather, they were stunningly thin and were claimed to be made from fetal calf skin. But the number of books made that impossible.

The researchers suggested that the sources of the skin for the books were rabbits, rats and squirrels. But it turned out that the pages were made not from the skin of rodents, but from the skin of cows, goats and sheep. This solved one of the biggest mysteries of the pre-press era (Bibles were handwritten). While some of the skin may indeed have been taken from unborn animals, this has not been confirmed for most of the books.

This raised the question of how pages that were tough enough to last 800 years could be so thin (some were 0.03 millimeters thick). But by the time medieval sources began to record methods for creating pages, the process was already lost.

9. Tolis-shada grave

In 2017, a stone monument dedicated to a powerful man and the struggle for power was found in the Mongolian steppe. It consists of 14 pillars located around a 1,300-year-old sarcophagus, which is now empty. Like columns, it is covered with Turkic writings documenting data about a certain person.

For centuries before Genghis Khan, the influence of this person was second only to the ruler, Kagan Bilge Khan Bogy (ruled the East Turkic Kaganate in 716-734). On the pillars it was written that the deceased held the title of "yagbu" ("governor's governor"). After the poisoning of Bilge, the man was promoted to "tolis-shad" ("ruler of the East"). This murder is mentioned in historical records, and it is unclear whether the governor figured in it.

10. "The Black Book of Carmarthen"

The oldest manuscript that mentions King Arthur and Merlin is The Black Book of Carmarthen. The book is considered a collection of poems from the 9th-12th centuries. In 2015, the pages were examined using ultraviolet light and photo editing.

To the delight of the researchers, they discovered something invisible to the naked eye. Among the lines were hidden human faces and poems. Also, notes were made in the margins by medieval readers (mainly at the end of the 16th century). The manuscript is the earliest manuscript written in Welsh around 1250 AD.

It was probably created by a single author who collected poems about Welsh folk stories and legends of the Dark Ages. But the greatest value of the Black Book is how it demonstrates that even well-studied manuscripts can provide a wealth of new information.

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