Pytheas was a Ancient Greek geographer, navigator, astronomer and explorer during the 4th century BC. Pytheas was from the Greek colony of Massilia, which is modern day Marseilles. He explored the Atlantic coasts of Spain and France,and in about 325 BC he made a voyage of exploration to northwestern Europe, travelling around and visiting a vast part of Great Britian. Pytheas made the earliest report of Stonehenge, and was the first person on record to describe the Midnight Sun, Polar Ice and to study alternative cultures such as the Germanic tribes. He was also the first person to state that the tides of the sea are controlled by the moon.
An exhibition of life-size reconstructions of Tutankhamun's tomb and more than 1,000 replicas of treasures from within it.
Includes a replica of the golden death mask, sarcophagi, and the royal crown Tutankhamen wore during his reign. Other highlights include golden coffinettes, bows, arrows and jewellery.
Dominican Church of Perpignan, France
February 6 to 21, 10am-19pm
Meroë – situated on the Nile in Sudan, two hundred kilometers north of present-day Khartoum – was an important royal capital where African, Egyptian and Greco-Roman influences mingled fascinatingly between 270 BC and 350 AD. The Louvre will for the very first time present an exhibition dedicated exclusively to this ancient seat of regional power, comprising loans mainly from the Museum of Khartoum as well as the British Museum in London, the World and Garstang museums in Liverpool, and other institutions in Munich, Berlin and Leiden. Highlights will include a celebrated gilt bronze statue of an archer-king, and a special focus on the discovery of the ruins of the Meroë pyramids by Frédéric Cailliaud in 1821.
Submitted by Sean Williams on Tue, 12/01/2009 - 13:03
Brits might scoff at the suggestion they're from the same continent as their mainland European neighbours. But a new report claims the two masses are linked by a low-lying range of hills that flooded over thousands of years, leaving the English Channel that separates England and France today.
Thousands of layers of sheet (ice)
An Anglo-French study (would you believe it) has revealed that the hilly range ran between Kent and Artois, in northern France, some half a million years ago. Yet ice ages beginning 450,000 years ago coated northern Europe in thick layers of ice, trapping water in a giant lake between Kent and France's Artois region.
This 6,500 year-old two-sided stone tool - made by lithic reduction (gradual whittling with a hammer stone) - was discovered in France. It would have been used by prehistoric man as a primitive instrument for hacking at plants and animal flesh.
It is one of many impressive items in the Museum of Prehistory and Early History at the newly reopened (as of October 2009) Neues Museum in Berlin, which features a range of artefacts dating back to man's earliest history, from the Stone Age through the Neolithic to the Bronze Age.
It doesn't happen all that often that the battle over 'mere tomb paintings' makes headline news - why would they, when they have the highly debated return of the Elgin Marbles to the Acropolis Museum to write about? But the whole world was shocked last week, when Dr. Zahi Hawass accused France's most famous museum of theft. Or at least, of purchasing looted artefacts and then refusing to return them to Egypt. Dr. Hawass hit back by refusing to let the Louvre's Saqqara team dig in Egypt.
The Louvre stated that it was forced to wait for permission to return the artefacts. But now the committee has advised that the fragments from Tetiki's tomb are to be returned - President Sarkozy has even phoned President Mubarak to ensure they'll be shipped to Egypt in six days' time. Dr. Hawass says: "When the objects return I will be very happy to renew our archaeological relationship with the Louvre and allow them to excavate again at Saqqara."
Brits might scoff at the suggestion they're from the same continent as their mainland 
It doesn't happen all that often that the battle over 'mere tomb paintings' makes headline news - why would they, when they have the highly debated return of the Elgin Marbles to the Acropolis Museum to write about? But the whole world was shocked last week, 
