- Part 93

Plumb With the Sun: Is Karnak Temple Egypt’s Stonehenge?

New research suggests some of Egypt’s most famous ancient temples charted the heavens in much the same way as Stonehenge, with many built to align with various stars as well as the sun and moon. One of the country’s most recognisable landmarks, Luxor‘s Karnak Temple, was constructed so that New…

HBO’s Rome to Make Movie Comeback as Bona Dea

Exciting news for fans of HBO’s Rome series: it looks like a film is currently in development, with script writer Bruno Heller penning the project. The film, whose working title is Bona Dea, is due to start filming in Summer 2010 and is scheduled for release in 2011. For those…

The Volcano Hats of Easter Island

It’s a question that’s bamboozled archaeologists for centuries – just where did the Moai of Easter Island get those big red hats? The answer, two British experts have claimed this week, is one of sacred quarries, iconic top-knots and volcanic highways. Sounds a bit too far-fetched for reality? Bear in…

Check out Stonehenge with this Awesome Blender Reconstruction

The Heritage Key office may be bristling with excitement at the prospect of our own Virtual Stonehenge – the progress of which you can see right here each week.. errr.. starting next week. But the anticipation has clearly proved too much for this online architect, who thought he’d have a…

First Farmers Didn’t Hunt or Gather

A century-old case may have been closed – DNA evidence appears to show Europe’s first farmers were not related to their hunter-gatherer forebears. Teams from the University of Mainz, Cambridge University and University College London have been comparing the genetic make-up of central and northern European hunter-gatherers with ancient farmers…

Sandro Vannini’s Photography – King Tut’s Golden Death Mask

The Golden Mask of King Tutankhamun may just be the most stunning artefact from ancient times that archaeologists have ever excavated. The fact that King Tut was a mere minor Pharaoh leaves the funerary gifts offered to the great ones up to our imagination, insofar as imagining such splendour and…

Ramesses, Thutmose or Nerfertiti? The Search for KV64

The designation KV is part of the naming convention used for tombs in the Valley of the Kingsinthe necropolis across the Nile from Luxor. Tombs discovered in the Kings Valley are given a KV number, in the order of their discovery, and tombs found in the West Valley receive a…

Lord Byron, Poetry on the Elgin Marbles

Lord Byron has been described as “mad, bad, and dangerous to know”, but there is an other reason – besides his regular escapades – why the British may have deemed this famous poet to be ‘wicked’. Byron was a bitter opponent of Lord Elgin’s removal of the Parthenon marbles from…

Ventotene’s Graveyard of Roman Ships

A team of archaeologists using sonar technology to scan the seabed have discovered a graveyard of five pristine ancient Roman shipwrecks off the small Italian island of Ventotene. The trading vessels, dating from the first century BC to the fifth century AD, lie more than 100 meters underwater and are…