Roman Dodecahedron By Lokilech – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0
It seems we know so much about the Roman Empire. We read many of their works from daily letters to poetry to speeches to architectural design notes. Yet it’s the simple things that stymie us. Take the Roman dodecahedrons found everywhere in all sizes. There is nothing written to explain what they are, why are they so ubiquitous that it seems the average Roman soldier carried a few small ones with him and houses would have containers full of various sizes? This common everyday objects of Roman life remain a mystery to us.
Today’s Freaky Friday isn’t about Cosmonauts that were edited out of Soviet photos for misbehavior, expelled from program, and medical reasons. Which is interesting in and of itself but is hardly Freaky given the well know editing of the May Day parade reviews in the 1960s and 1970s were how the West got clues as to who was in favor and who was out. What is is about is the idea that there deaths in the Soviet space program that were covered up except for a pair of Italian brothers who happened to record their transmissions with improvised radio equipment they built to listen in on the Soviet space program. (more…)
The required US legal disclaimer: All images are the property of their owners I reproduce them here under the Fair Use Doctrine of the copyright law for commentary and critique The required US legal disclaimer: All images are the property of their owners I reproduce them here under the Fair Use Doctrine of the copyright law for commentary and critique
When it comes to mysteries the Elisa Lam case is an unique one. She was a Canadian on her own touring the United States with her own plan. She was young and out to see the world. Then she disappeared. Then she was found in a shocking manner that made world news. How did she end up in the water tanks that serviced the Cecil Hotel in Los Angles? Was it murder or suicide? Either one was it intentional or accidental? What was Elisa doing in that eerie elevator video hours before her death? Was there a cover up or just shoddily run security system? These are topics that are still discussed today among mystery aficionados. What happened to Elisa Lam?
I’ve always been facinated with ancient Egypt. I wanted to read heiroglyphics because these people had something to say that has reached us, I wanted to read it for myself. So I took several classes at a local museum and now if it’s Middle Kingdom I can tease out the meaning of hypergraphia of ancient Egypt.
One woman who felt not just an interest in ancient Egypt but a kinship was Dorthy Louise Eady Maguid (1904-1981). She was not only a great Egyptologist who contributed greatly to field in chartography of tombs and temples, refining heirglyphic translation, and understanding customs practiced today that trace back to ancient Egypty (thus starting a whole new field of study). She also believed she was a reincarnated Priestess of Isis and once lover of Seti I. Her interesting life and even more intriguing story still amazes people today. Did she know so much from a previous life or just a quick study with intiuntive insight into the ways of Ancient Egypt?
Being a history buff I’ve still not gotten over the burning of the Alexandria Library by the Romans. I know, I know it’s been a while I should let it go but honestly, I mourn the loss and suppression of knowledge. Where could be be if humans built on what they learned rather than lost or suppressed it? Just as the burned library is a symbol of lost knowledge a touch stone of it is the Antikythera Mechanism. What’s that you ask? I’m so glad you did because there are more answers now than there where 10 years ago but not as many as there were 3,000 years ago when it was used. THAT’S what’s freaky about it.
The required US legal disclaimer: All images are the property of their owners I reproduce them here under the Fair Use Doctrine of the copyright law for commentary and critique The required US legal disclaimer: All images are the property of their owners I reproduce them here under the Fair Use Doctrine of the copyright law for commentary and critique
Honestly I don’t know where to start on this story or what I think of it. I will do my best to relay what I found and my thoughts. I spent the most time yet researching it hoping I’d find an answer I felt was the right one. I didn’t. As much as I like mysteries I don’t like them when it takes nine gifted live loving people’s lives. That’s what happened to these nine Russian hikers in 1959. They set out doing something they loved and wound up dead not from hazards of the arduous hike but from something unexplainable. Why was Lyuda’s tongue removed while she was still alive? How did two of them wind up with radioactive clothes? What removed both eyes from two? What crushed the chest of three? What flailed the chest of one? Why was their tent cut from the inside? What happened? What compelled these highly experienced hikers to do what they did? Why was the region closed for three years after the event? Why were the documents related to it classified until after the fall of the Soviet Union? If after this you favor a theory or have one let me know. The more I found out the less I felt I knew except as the coroner ruled “an unknown compelling force” caused their deaths.
Edward Kelley in one of his hats with his hair covering his ears.
The required US legal disclaimer: All images are the property of their owners I reproduce them here under the Fair Use Doctrine of the copyright law for commentary and critique The required US legal disclaimer: All images are the property of their owners I reproduce them here under the Fair Use Doctrine of the copyright law for commentary and critique
History is full of strange partnerships. Some change the world, others just perplex it. This is the story of the latter. The tale of Dee and Kelley is one of an educated man and a con man. How the two became involved and what it did for each is something told again and again. It has been fuel for many fictional works and even showed up subtly in the X-Men movies on Kurt’s skin. Yet some wonder did this odd couple stumble upon something or did Kelley run the longest most successful con of his career on Dee?
Mary Louise Eklund 