Each year up to 40,000 pour into Stonehenge for the Summer Solstice, banging drums, singing songs and generally having a wild time (here’s a guide on taking photographs at Stonehenge). But it’s just one of four times each year that the stone circle is open to the public, the other…
- Part 40
The Mysterious Adventures of MacMummy – Mummies for the Return of the Rosetta Stone
Help! In just twenty-four hours, my mummy has developed a will of his own and became politically active. MacMummy refuses to open his coffin until the Rosetta Stone is returned to Egypt, and is even rallying other mummies to join in on the protest and urging them to become a…
Watch Restoration of Riace Bronzes Live and Online
The Riace Bronzes, a pair of fifth-century BC statues of bearded warriors from the ancient Greek world, are undergoing restoration that experts hope will help them to answer some of the questions that have puzzled them ever since the statues were found off the coast of Calabria almost 40 years…
Giant Anubis Poses as Ticket Tout in New York King Tut Exhibition Stunt
You live long enough in this city and you’ll see things you couldn’t even imagine – like a 25-foot tall Anubis statue being towed around New York harbour, which is what happened yesterday morning. Anubis’s arrival heralds the one-month countdown for the exhibition, Tutankhamun and the Golden Age of the…
Why some of King Tut’s Treasures should be in the British Museum
When I’m strolling through the British Museum’s Egyptian Sculpture Gallery taking in its ancient statues, stelae and scriptures, it’s hard not to think something’s missing. For among its rows of exotic artefacts, nothing on display relates to Egypt’s most famous king in modern times, Tutankhamun. And I think Britain deserves…
Haiti Charity Fundraiser Concert Live at Stonehenge Virtual with Kirsty Hawkshaw
Singer and songwriter Kirsty Hawkshaw is going to be playing a special concert to raise money in aid of the crisis in Haiti on Saturday 27th March 2010 at 8PM(GMT). Heritage Key will be streaming the concert at Stonehenge Virtual where you too can listen and donate to the cause…
The Mysterious Adventures of MacMummy – Birth, Burton Style
Should you start panicking when your colleague donates you the mummies that their kids are too grown-up for to play with? Of course not! (or so I kid myself.) Thanks to Meral I now am the proud owner of my first ever mummy, which we named ‘MacMummy’ because of his…
Anglo-Saxon Aloud – Add some Old English to your iPhone
I believe I’ve found the ideal solution to ‘what music will we play in the office’. As we never seem to be able to reach agreement on the channel (really? Brit pop? Sounds from outer-space?), for tomorrow, I suggest we tune in on ‘Anglo-Saxon Aloud’, a website by Michael Drout…
Boudicca, Boadicea or Queen Victoria? What to Call the Warrior Queen
“What’s in a name?” opined a portly Englishman recently, whose entire family had been handed ASBOs for verbally abusing their neighbours. This sort of stoic ignorance blights the English, much like bad hair or David Cameron, and it’s been going on for centuries. Boudicca was a Celtic warrior queen, a…
Mummies, Pterodactyl and Occultism! The Extraordinary Adventures of Adele Dry-White
Good news for all fans of ‘light’ historical films such as The Mummy, Return of the Mummy and 10,000 BC. Even greater news for fans of the – sublime – comic (although BD, ‘bande dessine’ is more correct) series by Tardi. ‘Les Aventures Extraordinaires d’Adle Blanc-Sec‘ has been made into…