Aboriginal art has been a dominant movement in contemporary Australian art over the last 10 years. This statement would have been almost unthinkable 20 – or even 15 – years ago as Australia’s indigenous populations struggled for mainstream recognition of the importance of their culture to their very existence. Here were a people decimated by the arrival of Europeans, people whose land had been stripped from them and their families torn apart by official government policy. Not only in the 18th or 19th centuries, but well into the 20th as well. Tens of thousands of years of Dreaming washed away by a flood of convicts and settlers, their diseases, their ideas, their intentions, both good and bad.
Aboriginal people – like many prehistoric cultures – had expressed themselves through rock and cave art prior to European settlement, but the transition from ancient expression to modern art is a relatively recent phenomenon.
Indigenous peoples have occupied the Australian continent for more than 40,000 years. The Australian continent and Asia were never completely joined by land, meaning that these immigrants would have at some point travelled across the open seas to reach their new home. Archaeological evidence suggests that several groups moved to the continent during the Ice Ages of the 35,000 and 8,000 years when the water level would have been at its lowest, making passage possible.
Before the arrival of the Europeans in 1788, around 300,000 Aborigines lived all over Australia. This population consisted of about 500 tribal groups, each speaking a different language or dialect. This further backs up the theory that they not only had different origins, but also likely at different times.
The Desert Fathers of ancient Egypt were some of the world's first hermits. Despite the modern ideal of the hermit, these didn't live in total isolation. However, they did live a sparse, hard life in the country's early Christian monasteries. If women chose to enter their sphere, they would do so dressed as men. Who were these scholastic men of the desert, and how did their form of worship influence Christianity for millenia to come?
In the fourth century AD, Egypt was a province of the Roman Empire (in modern terms, an occupied territory) vital to Roman security, since the Nile valley supplied most of the grain for the "bread and circuses" that kept Rome's proletariat quiet. But that didn't get Egypt any preferential treatment. It was rigorously controlled, ruthlessly taxed; many small farmers, too poor to pay, abandoned their land, and Egypt's economy slowly deteriorated.
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A contemporary joke: What are the only two things a hermit flees from? Answer, a woman and a bishop.
Yazd is an important centre for Persian architecture, and has one of the largest networks of qanats (a type of ancient water irrigation system) in the world.
Yazd's heritage as a centre of Zoroastrianism is also important. There is a Tower of Silence on the outskirts of the city, which also has a Fire Temple with a fire that has been kept alight since 470 AD.
Ice was manufactured during the cold winter months and stored in an ice house or 'yakhchal' – or an ancient refrigerator.
The structures had a domed shape, and was usually used to store ice (although food was sometimes also preserved within their walls). The subterranean space coupled with the thick heat-resistant material insulated the space year round.
These structures were found throughout ancient Persia, and several hundred have survived.
Gilf Kebir is the most arid and desolate places on Earth, but thousands of years ago, the site had water and was inhabited by humans and animals. In the 1930s, Hungarian explorer László Almásy discovered prehistoric paintings in the Cave of the Swimmers, which gave a view into the life of a long forgotten civilisation. The video takes us inside the Foggini-Mestekawi cave, discovered in January 2003, and gives us an insight into its ancient, mysterious past.
Back in August, I covered the news that Electronic Arts is to release the latest in their popular The Sims games - The Sims 3: World Adventures. Speculating on what may be offered in their foray into Egypt, the games publishing giant has been steadily releasing small details to whet our appetites! They're still a little late (and not as factually correct - but this is just a game!) as we launched our King Tut Virtual exhibit many months ago, but no harm in a little fun, right?
The Desert Fathers of ancient Egypt were some of the world's first hermits. Despite the 
Back in August, 
