This reminds me of a piece I just saw at the Legion of Honor (SF) special exhibit on the etruscans. They have a Etruscan manuscript, written on linen, that was used to wrap a mummy. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liber_Linteus
Iliad fragment found in Roman-era mummy
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Re: Iliad fragment found in Roman-era mummy
#102>>If Christopher Nolan’s coming adaptation of the Odyssey happens to do well enough to get Hollywood back on its feet,
A typical laconic reply works here: "If"
Re: Iliad fragment found in Roman-era mummy
#103I am a little disappointed the tomb where the mummy was found is from the time where Egypt was part of the Roman Empire. At this point ancient Egypt had been a colony of Rome for quite some time and beforehand a Greek/Macedonian colony for a few more centuries (under the Ptolemaic dynasty, founded by a general of Alexander the Great). If it was from a previous era, it would have been a much more interesting find (in…
The article describes the veneration Roman -> (old) Greek -> (old) Egyptian and this finding appears to show that the veneration went both ways.
Frankly I can understand that: Homer really did smash out an absolute banger with Iliad. I might ask for a copy in my grave too, when the time comes.
The whole point of the article appears to be that when civilizations overlap, the "good old days" becomes a two way street (to gargle metaphors). I do find that interpretation very interesting and it fits in with my world view that history ("historia" - Latin for "story") is generally rather more complicated than many would like it to be to fit their current (or current as was) world view.
Re: Iliad fragment found in Roman-era mummy
#104I am a little disappointed the tomb where the mummy was found is from the time where Egypt was part of the Roman Empire. At this point ancient Egypt had been a colony of Rome for quite some time and beforehand a Greek/Macedonian colony for a few more centuries (under the Ptolemaic dynasty, founded by a general of Alexander the Great). If it was from a previous era, it would have been a much more interesting find (in…
The Iliad was written after the classical era of Bronze Age Egypt, so no classical age mummy could be buried with the Iliad because it didn't exist yet.
Re: Iliad fragment found in Roman-era mummy
#105This reminds me of a piece I just saw at the Legion of Honor (SF) special exhibit on the etruscans. They have a Etruscan manuscript, written on linen, that was used to wrap a mummy. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liber_Linteus
Ironically a huge percentage of the historical documents we had came from "the garbage", and/or other cases of people reusing documents for other purposes.
In large part this was because paper was incredibly expensive back then, so it got used for one purpose, used again for another, and that continued until you were out of room ... at which point it may get used yet again (for say mummy wrapping).
Another classic example: Jews believed you couldn't burn a piece of paper once you wrote the name of God on it, so there were special towers in ancient cities for Jews to throw away their paper. But again, because paper was so expensive, each paper often had lots of other things on it.
Because these towers were sometimes preserved better than libraries were, historians have found huge treasure troves of saved papers in them. Like the mummy wrappings, they only still exist due to a special quirk of ancient peoples ... but because of the price of paper they have lots of other non-mummy-wrapping/non-God's name stuff.
Re: Iliad fragment found in Roman-era mummy
#106I am a little disappointed the tomb where the mummy was found is from the time where Egypt was part of the Roman Empire. At this point ancient Egypt had been a colony of Rome for quite some time and beforehand a Greek/Macedonian colony for a few more centuries (under the Ptolemaic dynasty, founded by a general of Alexander the Great). If it was from a previous era, it would have been a much more interesting find (in…
I would hope for some further fragment of the Cypria to be uncovered.
Re: Iliad fragment found in Roman-era mummy
#107>>If Christopher Nolan’s coming adaptation of the Odyssey happens to do well enough to get Hollywood back on its feet, A typical laconic reply works here: "If"
Because Nolan is known for his hits and misses
Re: Iliad fragment found in Roman-era mummy
#108The Catalog of Ships is certainly the section I want to be buried with.
Re: Iliad fragment found in Roman-era mummy
#109This reminds me of a piece I just saw at the Legion of Honor (SF) special exhibit on the etruscans. They have a Etruscan manuscript, written on linen, that was used to wrap a mummy. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liber_Linteus
Ironically a huge percentage of the historical documents we had came from "the garbage", and/or other cases of people reusing documents for other purposes. In large part this was because paper was incredibly expensive back then, so it got used for one purpose, used again for another, and that continued until you were out of room ... at which point it may get used yet again (for say mummy wrapping). Another classic ex…
> Jews believed you couldn't burn a piece of paper once you wrote the name of God on it, so there were special towers in ancient cities for Jews to throw away their paper.
Fascinating!
The Cairo Genizah
Located in the Ben Ezra Synagogue in Fustat (Old Cairo), Egypt, this particular Genizah was a massive, windowless attic room built high into the structure. To put papers in it, the synagogue's caretaker had to climb a tall ladder and drop the documents through a hole in the wall. Because the local community never got around to burying the papers, this high, hidden room acted like a time capsule for over a thousand years. When it was rediscovered in the late 19th century, it contained nearly 300,000 manuscript fragments.
Re: Iliad fragment found in Roman-era mummy
#110Unearthed from a 1,600-year-old Roman-era tomb
That's c. 400 AD. Closer to today, than to the time of King Tut...and King Tut was closer to the TFA mummy than to the First Dynasty.
Ancient Egypt is really really old. The Great pyramid was 3000 years old at the time of the TFA mummy.
The TFA mummy is about equidistant between today and the events of the Iliad and the book was already more than 1000 years old in 400 CE.