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ASCLEPIADES

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  3. The mummy's curse: historical cohort study

    in Archaeological News: The World

    Posted

    Salve, guys! Following, the full article (part 2 ):

    Methods

    The mummy's curse is assumed to be a physical rather than a metaphysical entity and therefore only those people physically present at the breach of sacred seals in a previously undisturbed area of the pharaoh's tomb were deemed at risk. It is also assumed that exposure is finite so only those who visit and enter the same day were said to be exposed. The tomb of Tutankhamen had been raided in ancient times, possibly on more than one occasion (fig 1). Therefore the opening of the first door, clearing of the passageway, the opening of the second and fourth door, and the clearing of the antechamber and annexe were not thought to put individuals at risk.

    I defined exposure to the curse as those Western individuals recorded in the writings of Howard Carter as present at the breaking of the seals and the opening of the third door on 17 February 1923, the opening of the sarcophagus on 3 February 1926, the opening of the coffins on 10 October 1926, and the examination of the mummy on 11 November 1926. 1 3 4 Thus people could have had from one to four exposures to the curse.

    For unexposed individuals I used Westerners recorded in Carter's writings as being in Egypt at the time but not recorded by him to have been present at the site at the aforementioned times. I included only Western individuals in the analysis as documentation of this group was more likely to be complete and the life expectancy of Egyptians would be expected to differ from that of Westerners.

    Dates of birth and death were identified by biographical texts, newspaper obituaries (the Times, New York Times, Le Monde) and a Google web based search.5-16 I searched with the keywords archaeology, Egyptology, personal name, Egypt, Tutankhamun, and Tutankhamen. For non-archaeologists I searched genealogy, royal, military, and other occupational websites. When I could not establish precise dates, individuals were assumed to have been born or died on June 30 of the year recorded.

    Women were mostly ignored in the biographical texts of the time. Therefore it was often possible to identify a date of marriage only through a husband's entry. In such circumstances I assumed a woman to have been born at least 16 years (the legal age for marriage) before this date.

    Data were analysed with SPSS for Windows (version 11.0.0). I divided records into those who survived less than or greater than 10 years. I chose the cut off of 10 years because if there was an effect of exposure this would probably occur in the first 10 years. Comparisons were then made by age, sex, and exposure. Survival was analysed by any or no exposure and by number of exposures by logistic regression

    TO BE CONTINUED

  4. The mummy's curse: historical cohort study

    in Archaeological News: The World

    Posted

    Salve, guys! Following, the full article (part1 ):

    BMJ 2002;325:1482-1484 ( 21 December )

    The mummy's curse: historical cohort study

    Mark R Nelson, NHMRC fellow.

    Department of Epidemiology and Preventive Medicine, Monash University, Alfred Hospital, Prahran 3181, Australia

    mark.nelson@med.monash.edu.au

    "Can you see anything?" It was all I could do to get out the words, "Yes, wonderful things."

    Howard Carter1

    The death in 1923 of George Herbert (Lord Carnarvon), the financier of the expedition that unearthed the tomb of Tutankhamen, unleashed a sensation in the international newspapers. He had developed erysipelas at the site of a mosquito bite, which resulted in septicaemia and pneumonia. The speculation was that his death was due to a "mummy's curse." The press reports of the time had the death of every man and his dog being associated with the curse, no matter how obscure the connection. This was literally the case for Lord Carnarvon as his three legged canine was said to have bayed at the very time his master succumbed and promptly turned up his paws.

    As Alb Lythgoe, another individual exposed to the tomb, lay in his hospital bed dying from a stroke, Herbert Winlock, the Director of the Egyptian Section of the Metropolitan Museum of Modern Art in New York, felt compelled to refute the so called curse.2 He pointed out that at the time (1934) only six of the original 24 people present when the tomb was opened had died. He noted also that Carter had had swabs taken from the sarcophagus and sampled "specimens of air" because of fear of contagion but these had been "absolutely sterile." While we may doubt the veracity of the last statement it is fair to say that there was considerable scepticism by those considered at risk. However the mummy's curse still persists as an urban myth. I investigated whether such a phenomenon exists by comparing the survival of those exposed and unexposed to the mummy's curse using a retrospective cohort design.

    Most tombs in Egypt were opened and ransacked in ancient times, usually as "inside jobs" soon after burial. Therefore it is impossible to ascertain if the mummy's curse also applied to these grave robbers. In modern times only one pharaoh's tomb has been discovered relatively undisturbed, that of Tutankhamen. It was found in November 1922 by the British archaeologist Howard Carter, unobtrusively concealed by 20th Dynasty workers' huts in the Valley of the Kings, Luxor. He was leading a dig under the patronage of Lord Carnarvon.

    TO BE CONTINUED

  5. The mummy's curse: historical cohort study

    in Archaeological News: The World

    Posted

    Mark R Nelson

     

    Objective: To examine survival of individuals exposed to the "mummy's curse" reputedly associated with the opening of the tomb of Tutankhamen in Luxor, Egypt, between February 1923 and November 1926.

    Design: Retrospective cohort study.

    Participants: 44 Westerners identified by Howard Carter as present in Egypt at the specified dates, 25 of whom were potentially exposed to the curse.

    Main outcome measures: Length of survival after date of potential exposure.

    Results: In the 25 people exposed to the curse the mean age at death was 70 years (SD 12) compared with 75 (13) in those not exposed (P=0.87 for difference). Survival after the date of exposure was 20.8 (15.2) v 28.9 (13.6) years respectively (P=0.95 for difference). Female sex was a predictor for survival (P=0.02).

    Conclusions: There was no significant association between exposure to the mummy's curse and survival and thus no evidence to support the existence of a mummy's curse.

     

    FULL ARTICLE IS HERE.

     

    Salve, guys! What do you think about this study?

  6. Length of life in the ancient world: a controlled study

    in Romana Humanitas

    Posted

    J D Montagu

    The length of life for a population of ancient Greek

    and Roman men with quoted dates of birth and death

    has been compared statistically with three sample

    populations from different periods. It was found that

    the ancients who were born before 100 BC lived as

    long as the moderns who died before 1950; they lived

    significantly shorter lives than those who have died

    in the present half century.

     

    FULL ARTICLE HERE

     

    Salve, guys! What do think about this study?

  8. Ambushes

    in Gloria Exercitus - 'Glory of the Army'

    Posted

    I'm sure the Romans had encountered ambushes, especially in the northern regions of Germania and Gaul which were heavily forested. I still don't know if they had a way of dealing with the issue. Would they send scouts to suvey the land or did they have intelligence on the situation?

     

    Discuss.

    Salve, RG! I think you can easily find a lot of evidence that the Roman Army had usually an X-traordinary performance in both activities, including here at UNVR. Unfortunately (for the Romans), they can always became overconfident, as P. Varro in Kallikriese or J. Civilis with the Batavians ( or M. L. Crassus in Carrhae at the other side of the empire, BTW).

  10. Pope: Other denominations not true churches

    in Hora Postilla Thermae

    Posted · Edited by ASCLEPIADES

    Salve, Guys! I think that the concept of religious tolerance and freedom as individual human rights was virtually unknown to the ancients; it would probably had been considered nonsense by most of them, irrespectively of their creed. This concept is a relatively recent developement,HERE is a very good debate about this issue in the BBC's "In Our Time".

  21. Pope: Other denominations not true churches

    in Hora Postilla Thermae

    Posted

    Salve, guys!

    I think that the matters of the faith (any faith, BTW) tend to be categorical because of its own nature; you believe the same as me ... or you don't. Period! (Even for some atheist, for god sake!).

    Any kind of negotiations among different denominations will always be hot topic, because the True Believers may consider that, if you admit other creeds to be right, maybe you should change of temple.

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