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Why Do So Many Egyptian Statues Have Broken Noses?

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Re: Why Do So Many Egyptian Statues Have Broken Noses?

#71

Post by fwip »

danans wrote: post #64
novacole wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the surviving representations of noses in statuary don't look particularly "black" I think this says the exact opposite of what you want it to say. The fact that they survived, may be that they were sufficiently non-"black" looking to leave them alone. Phenotypes come in ranges especially for black people, so a "black" nose is anything from the nose of a random Scandinavian to that of a Sudanese persons.

Sure, that's another interpretation, and I agree that the notion of a single "black" phenotype is fundamentally incorrect, which is why I qualified it. Anyways, the theory would be easily tested by finding examples of statues with the supposedly unacceptable noses that survive today, and see if they can be correlated with the ones Europeans took. The other thing that doesn't make sense about the theory is that if the…

Most of the people bringing the statues back aimed to sell them.

Re: Why Do So Many Egyptian Statues Have Broken Noses?

#72

Post by iaabtpbtpnn »

pathseeker wrote: post #61
NelsonMinar wrote: post #40

The computer geniuses here at Hacker News have decided the main argument of this article are wrong. But among archaeologists ritual defacement is understood to be a regular thing that happens to art all over the world. Roman coins defaced: https://www.coinsweekly.com/en/Defacing-the-past-damnation-a... Teotihuacan icons demolished and destroyed by fire: https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2017/sep/24/teotihu...

>The computer geniuses here at Hacker News have decided Don't do this

Do more of this

Re: Why Do So Many Egyptian Statues Have Broken Noses?

#73

Post by NelsonMinar »

pathseeker wrote: post #61
NelsonMinar wrote: post #40

The computer geniuses here at Hacker News have decided the main argument of this article are wrong. But among archaeologists ritual defacement is understood to be a regular thing that happens to art all over the world. Roman coins defaced: https://www.coinsweekly.com/en/Defacing-the-past-damnation-a... Teotihuacan icons demolished and destroyed by fire: https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2017/sep/24/teotihu...

>The computer geniuses here at Hacker News have decided Don't do this

I did exactly what I intended, thank you.

Re: Why Do So Many Egyptian Statues Have Broken Noses?

#74

Post by twic »

atomical wrote: post #68
pathseeker wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The computer geniuses here at Hacker News have decided Don't do this

It is laughably true in the comments section on anything diet related.

Or economics-related. Or government-related. Or science-related.

Or, to be honest, computer-related.

Re: Why Do So Many Egyptian Statues Have Broken Noses?

#75

Post by InclinedPlane »

NelsonMinar wrote: post #40

The computer geniuses here at Hacker News have decided the main argument of this article are wrong. But among archaeologists ritual defacement is understood to be a regular thing that happens to art all over the world. Roman coins defaced: https://www.coinsweekly.com/en/Defacing-the-past-damnation-a... Teotihuacan icons demolished and destroyed by fire: https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2017/sep/24/teotihu...

The great thing about the geniuses here is they don't seem to think that Dunning-Kruger applies to them.

Re: Why Do So Many Egyptian Statues Have Broken Noses?

#77

Post by danans »

fwip wrote: post #71
danans wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, that's another interpretation, and I agree that the notion of a single "black" phenotype is fundamentally incorrect, which is why I qualified it. Anyways, the theory would be easily tested by finding examples of statues with the supposedly unacceptable noses that survive today, and see if they can be correlated with the ones Europeans took. The other thing that doesn't make sense about the theory is that if the…

Most of the people bringing the statues back aimed to sell them.

Even still, why would you deface something you want to sell?

Re: Why Do So Many Egyptian Statues Have Broken Noses?

#78

Post by novacole »

danans wrote: post #64
novacole wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the surviving representations of noses in statuary don't look particularly "black" I think this says the exact opposite of what you want it to say. The fact that they survived, may be that they were sufficiently non-"black" looking to leave them alone. Phenotypes come in ranges especially for black people, so a "black" nose is anything from the nose of a random Scandinavian to that of a Sudanese persons.

Sure, that's another interpretation, and I agree that the notion of a single "black" phenotype is fundamentally incorrect, which is why I qualified it. Anyways, the theory would be easily tested by finding examples of statues with the supposedly unacceptable noses that survive today, and see if they can be correlated with the ones Europeans took. The other thing that doesn't make sense about the theory is that if the…

The only reason there is any confusion about this is because the modern day Egyptian looks non African. And the only reason for this is because the indigenous population was displaced by Arab people during the spread of Islam.

Whether or not the noses were intentionally destroyed or not it is most parsimonious to believe that the indigenous people of Egypt were African people. Thinking they werent would be like looking at the population of The United States today and believing the Native Americans were white (and if we didn’t have photographic evidence of the natives we can be sure that would have been suggested, and if anyone suggested otherwise they would have been met with “what a crackpot theory!”).

In either case, the Europeans revered ancient Egypt for sure. But this is only because of their mention in the Bible and their interaction with the Ancient Greeks. But when Western Europeans got there, the people who lived in Egypt looked more like them than Africans. But this is only because of the displacement of the indigenous population serval centuries earlier.

Re: Why Do So Many Egyptian Statues Have Broken Noses?

#79

Post by Kaiyou »

novacole wrote: post #57
aaaaaaaaaaab wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, and they didn't mention other crackpot theories either, like ancient aliens destroying the statue's faces with zero-point energy weapons. I wonder why?

Why would it be a crackpot theory to suggest that for Western Europeans, whose civilization as we know it starts in the late 1400s, who convinced themselves of African inferiority for the purpose of justifying their theft, rape, and murder of those people, upon seeing Black looking people in Egypt from thousands of years before their civilization started, would want to erase signs of it? Sounds just about right to me…

Because it's unnecessary. To them these people looked so much inferior, that they even put them into zoos. Now ask yourself, if you found ruins indicating that [insert animal, maybe elephants] used to have an ancient civilization would you find that incredibly interesting or would you want to destroy evidence of that because it might affect the way we think of elephants today?

Re: Why Do So Many Egyptian Statues Have Broken Noses?

#80

Post by gameswithgo »

pathseeker wrote: post #61
NelsonMinar wrote: post #40

The computer geniuses here at Hacker News have decided the main argument of this article are wrong. But among archaeologists ritual defacement is understood to be a regular thing that happens to art all over the world. Roman coins defaced: https://www.coinsweekly.com/en/Defacing-the-past-damnation-a... Teotihuacan icons demolished and destroyed by fire: https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2017/sep/24/teotihu...

>The computer geniuses here at Hacker News have decided Don't do this

Like all "smart" professions, the practitioners tend to think their smart extends beyond their domain of expertise.

It doesn't.

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