The first known person to discover an element relied on pee and actually was looking for the Philosopher’s Stone. Henning Brand used up the financial resources of three people – himself, his first wife, and his second wife – in the focused pursuit of finding a way to turn base metals into gold. Alchemy favored […]
Alchemist Henning Brand and Phosphorous Read More »
In the Sufi tradition of Islam, the role of Satan takes a very different direction than other Abrahamic traditions. Called Iblis, this angel is a true monotheist – unlike all the other angels, Iblis refused to prostrate himself to Adam. True, God had commanded the angels to do so, but whereas in most branches of
Iblis Traditions of Islam Read More »
Statue of Shiva from West Bengal, 1100. The vertical third eye and matted hair are typical features of the Hindu deity – his face on the right represents benevolence, on the left fierce protectiveness, and in the center his serenity – when this universal aspect of Shiva is emphasized his title is “Sadashiva.” From the
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The Hindu Goddess Durga was the original demon-slayer. As this sandstone carving made about 750 CE (from India) shows, she has a multitude of weapons that help her take down her opponents – in this case, the buffalo-demon Mahishasuramardini. The legend goes that the buffalo demon – who represents ignorance – was destroying the whole
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This terracotta figure of a merchant dates from seventh-to-eighth century Tang China and is testimony to the role of long-distance trade along the Silk Road and other conduits. I also think this guy looks like Dr. Strange, so there’s that.
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The scholar-elite class of dynastic China were not always engrossed in studying or affairs of state. This gourd with ivory-carved lid held live crickets, who were set to fight in staged cricket matches for the amusement of the Chinese intelligentsia. From 19th-century Qing China, the Philadelphia Museum of Art.
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This drawing shows Jesus as a child, taking the birds he has just shaped out of clay and turning them into real sparrows. It is a sweet story, part of a passage from a (possibly late first century) text known as “The Infancy Gospel of St Thomas,” never accepted as cannonical by the Church. We
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Eighth-century Spain witnessed the conquest of the Christian kingdom of the Visigoths by Muslims and the fracturing of the Iberian peninsula into various kingdoms. It was in this era the Spanish monk Beatus of Liebana (d. 785) wrote a book called _Commentary on the Apocolypse_, and depicted here is an extremely rare painting from a
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“Greek Fire,” the famous naval weapon of the Byzantine Empire, was a liquid projectile that burst into flames after spewing out of pressurized nozzles, and kept burning as it floated on water. This is a twelfth-century illustration of Greek Fire in action. The eleventh-century historian Anna Komnene has a great description of the theatrics involved
Greek Fire by the Byzantine Empire Read More »
What you see here is an example of the finest type of Anglo-Scandinavian sculpture known as “Hogbacks.” After the Scandinavian viking invasions, Hogbacks emerged in the tenth century as a style of grave marker that reveals the Celtic influences of the British Isles along with the Danish homeland of the recent settlers. You can make
Anglo-Scandinavian Hogbacks Read More »
A 17th-century wooden sculpture of Vishnu beginning the world. Symbolic features include the snake that Vishnu sleeps upon, the multi-headed Ananta, who has existed throughout the cycles of birth and destruction that permeate the universe. Also featured are seven sages so enlightened that they have transcended the episodic cycles of birth and decay, and nine
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In the environs of modern Iraq the Yazidi peoples have continuously practiced Sharfadin, an ancient and swiftly diminishing (because of horrific religious persecution) religion, for thousands of years. Although elements of the Abrahamic religions and Zoroastrianism appear in Sharfadin, it it a religion into its own self. It teaches monotheism, but also that seven angels
The “Peacock Angel” of Sharfadin Read More »
This bottle of Chateau Margaux from 1787 has the initials “Th.J.” etched onto its side, which stand for the owner’s name: Thomas Jefferson. That is why, when a restaurant server took a bump that upended it, the insurance company ponied up $225,000, making it the most expensive bottle of wine never sold.
Thomas Jefferson’s Chateau Margaux Wine Read More »
This is a portrait of Emilie du Chatelet (d. 1749), a brilliant mathematician and physicist from the French Enlightenment. Multi-talented (by age twelve she knew six languages, she studied fencing and astronomy), Emilie supported her scientific interests like buying textbooks and lab equipment by using her math abilities to succeed at gambling. One of her
French Mathematician and Physicist – Emilie du Chatelet Read More »
In the midst of the Gila National Forest in New Mexico stands this cross-topped mound. It marks the crypt and burial site of Sergeant James Cooney, and the marker besides the grave tells readers that Cooney was killed by Indians in 1880 as he tried to warn settlers about an upcoming Indian raid. What the
New Mexico’s Gila National Forest Read More »
Squint a bit, and you will be able to see things that look like white circles along a horizontal axis in the center of this photo. They are not raindrops, but six of the twenty-seven enormous radio telescopes that make up the Very Large Array. Located on a remote plain off Highway 60 in central
Very Large Array Telescopes of New Mexico Read More »
10,000 years ago is young in geological history. This relatively small number seems counterintuitive when one encounters the vast space of white sands in the Tularosa Basin of southern New Mexico. The dunes here make up the world’s largest gypsum fields: at 275 square miles, they can be seen by astronauts from space.
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You are looking at the footprint of a giant sloth – one of the megafauna mammals that died out by the end of the last ice age over 11,700 years ago. Nestled inside is a contemporary human footprint, one of the first concrete pieces of evidence that giant sloths interacted with people. At eight feet
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Astrolabes were the medieval version of a GPS. Although still fashioned today in various manifestations, the most famous versions were those created by Muslim scientists living in the Medieval Middle East. If you’ve ever seen one, this photo from the Islamic world circa 1480 CE might look different: usually astrolabes were two-dimensional celestial spheres. I
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This hooked metal tool was called a “strigil” by Ancient Romans. Centuries ago, such instruments were used in the process of bathing: you would scrape dirt, sweat, and the ubiquitous Mediterranean olive oil off your skin with it before your bath.
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