This Week in the Ancient Near East

Carbs, The Lower Paleolithic Breakfast of Champions, Or, Pass the Acorns and Water Lillies, Please

New research shows that prehumans collected and prepared carb heavy foods around 780,000 years ago. So who says that processed foods are bad for you? After all, it made their brains bigger. With a shoutout to everyone’s favorite starch, the potato!

The Case of the Very Long Roman Legal Papyrus from the Judean Desert, Or, Do You Really Have to Pay Sales Tax on Slaves?

The publication of a really long Roman legal document from the Judean Desert has us wondering about crime. Is changing a location on a contract really forgery? How about a little light counterfeiting of silver coins? Ok fine, but there’s sales tax on slaves? That makes all this even worse.

The Mysterious Giant Astronomical Observatory of Stone That Wasn't, or Rujm el-Hiri and the Spirit in the Sky

You know that giant prehistoric stone circle on the Golan Heights, Rujm el Hiri? Yeah, its not really aligned with the sun and stars and isn't the only big stone thing up there. So what is it? Beats us, but never underestimate the human need to get other people to pile up stones. And really, aren't we all aligned with the sun and stars?

The Art of Cursing Your Rivals in Ancient Athens, Or, How to Say #$@#!&! in Greek

In 4^th and 3^rd century BCE Athens lead curse tablets were snuck into cemeteries so the dead could take the messages to the underworld. Asking the departed to help put a hit on a business or romantic rival seems like a lot of responsibility. Pretty good business if you were a living sorcerer though.

The Early Alphabet (™) in Third Millennium Syria? Or, Spelling it Out, Lightly Baked Edition

Some lightly baked clay cylinders from a late third millennium tomb in Syria have alphabetic markings. They’ve got us thinking. Does this mean -the- alphabet originated hundreds of years earlier than we thought? What is -the- alphabet anyway? Why did we think we understood any of this? Who, in fact, is lightly baked in this scenario? 

Between Death and Taxes in the 8th Century BCE, or Hezekiah’s Beltway Politics

An excavation in southern Jerusalem revealed a tax office belonging to Hezekiah. This raises a question, was Jerusalem really a capitol district and not just a city? A more pressing question, however, is why Hezekiah thought rebelling against the Assyrians was a good idea in the first place.

The Mesopotamian Map of Mystery, Or, From Babylon to the Boondocks and Back Again, Hopefully

A wonderful newish video about the famous 6^th century Babylonian tablet showing a map of the world has us thinking. Sure, there are a bunch of Mesopotamian field and building plans, more of a zoning and taxes thing, but why aren’t there more maps? Maybe they knew that no matter where you go, there you are.

See the video here!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LUxFzh8r384

How to Go from Spindle Whorls to Wagon Wheels in Just 6,000 Years, or Rotational Energy and the Wheel of Destiny

New studies on the origins of the wheel have us wondering, why did it take thousands of years to go from 10^th millennium BCE spindle whorls in Israel to 4^th millennium BCE wheels in the Carpathian mountains, were rollers and copper mining really involved, and how much rotational energy is really provided courtesy of Fred Flintstone’s two feet?