M.J. Rose

Pretty much the best news ever…

From Smithsonian.com,

Ancient Egyptian Stories Will Be Published in English for the First Time

Translated from hieroglyphics on monuments, tombs and papyri, the book will present tales few outside of academia have read

By Jason Daley

“While people may view inscriptions in Greek or Latin as pretty, they still recognize their merit as text. Indeed, writings from ancient Greece and Rome are revered and considered classics of Western literature. Egyptian hieroglyphics, however, are often seen as mere decoration. Sometimes, the characters are literally used as wallpaper.

One reason is that schoolchildren and classicists alike have read Greek and Latin widely for centuries. But hieroglyphics and the stories they tell have remained accessible only to a handful of trained scholars. That’s one reason Penguin Classics has published Writings from Ancient Egypt in Great Britain (it will be available in the US in January), the first literary English translation of some of the texts that cover thousands of square feet of monuments and tomb walls.

Egyptologist Toby Wilkinson, a fellow of Clare College at Cambridge University, tells Dalya Alberge at The Guardian that the ancient Egyptian writing is just as compelling and layered as those written by the Romans. “What will surprise people are the insights behind the well-known facade of ancient Egypt, behind the image that everyone has of the pharaohs, Tutankhamun’s mask and the pyramids,” Wilkinson says…”

Read more here.

What do Shakespeare, the Bowery gangs, and the train have in common?

From Atlas Obscura…

The Forgotten Entrance to Clinton Hall
Hidden in one of New York’s oldest subway stations is the final remnant of the site of the bizarre Shakespeare Riots.

“This blocked up doorway on a subway station holds a secret that is still felt on the streets of New York today.

The Astor Place subway station on the IRT Lexington Avenue line is home to some of the most distinctive tile work on the New York metropolitan subway system. One of the original 28 subway stations, the walls are decorated with plaques depicting beavers, in honour of the pelt trade in which John Jacob Astor made his fortune.

But often overlooked on the south bound entrance is a bricked up doorway which recalls the tale of one of the most unusual events in New York history. Above the blocked off door is a lintel inscribed “Clinton Hall.” At one point this led directly into the old New York Mercantile Library in the former Astor Place Opera House. The library, known as Clinton Hall, at 21 Astor Place, was created for the growing number of clerks in the city. With a membership of 12,000, the library held over 120,000 volumes, one of the largest periodical subscriptions in the city, cabinets of curiosities, and held lectures by such luminaries as Ralph Waldo Emerson, Frederick Douglass, and Mark Twain.

But the address, named after America’s once-richest man, was the site of one of the most bizarre events in New York history…”

For the rest, click here.

If there is an ancient faerie language, this must be it…

From Ancient Origins,

The Celtic Ogham: An Ancient Tree Alphabet that May Disappear Before Showing its Roots
by Kerry Sullivan

“In secluded fields, on the walls of churches, and beneath construction sites, stones have been found with intricate markings that rise from the lower left up to the center and then down to the lower right. This is the ancient Celtic Tree Alphabet known as Ogham (pronounced owam). Archaeological linguists have managed to translate the symbols, yet no one knows for certain how or why this language came into existence. Efforts are being made to preserve the relics, however, the stones are weathering and crumbling at an alarming rate.

There are roughly 400 stones known to contain Ogham markings, 360 of which are in Ireland. The rest have been discovered scattered across Wales, Scotland, and the Isle of Man. The oldest relic is believed to date back to the 4th century AD, but one must assume that earlier examples existed on perishable mediums, such as wood, possibly as far back as the 1st century AD…”

For the rest, click here.