New book on dark tourism...

Image: the wreckage of the World Trade Centre, Steve McCurry

Edited by Philip Stone and Richard Sharpley of the Dark Tourism Forum, Tourist Experience: Contemporary Perspectives features three chapters dedicated to thanatourism. Set to be published in September, you can pre-order a copy here!

Heritage that hurts...

Image: 'Work sets you free', the gate at Auschwitz, Kvinnonet

From Auschwitz to Ground Zero: dealing with heritage that hurts is a new weekend-long course being offered by the Institute of Continuing Education at the University of Cambridge. The course examines how and why sites wounded by violent events have been remembered - or not. It will also explore why historic sites and monuments are specifically targeted for destruction. For more information and booking details, see here.

Using the Killing Fields of Cambodia, the Oklahoma City National Memorial, Ground Zero, Auschwitz and the Soviet Gulags among others as case-studies, we will reflect on how these 'dark tourism' sites are 'produced' and 'consumed'. We will ask: why tourists visit, what they experience while they are there and what messages they walk away with.

Book of the Dead...

Image: Catatonic Man, Magenta Magazine 

This photograph is one of 52 images captured by Canadian photographer James Burman in his provocative new book, The Dead. The book is a collection of memento moris and post-mortem photography that documents his travels from the catacombs of Sicily to the gas chambers of Poland. You can read more about the book and the man in question here, which alas, is only available in the US and Canada at this time.

Skeletons do pin-up...

Images: Style Noir

Medical imaging firm EIZO decided to make their own version of the infamous Pirelli calendar for 2010 as a marketing give-away, highlighting their expertise in the field.With 12 images of naked women literally baring all, what do you think of the end result? As an ardent admirer of the pin-up aesthetic and obviously, a self-confessed fan of the, er, skeleton, I can't help feeling that this just verges on the ever-so-slighty creepy...

New thinking on what killed the people of Pompeii...

Image: the plaster cast of a man sits amid urns and fountains inside one of the storage rooms at the site of Pompeii, Global Post

New research shows that the population died from the extreme temperature carried by the volvano's pyroclastic flow, rather than suffocation by ash. For the full story, see here...

Oetzi the Iceman...

Image: hosae.ch

Straight from the BBC website...

Oetzi, the 5,000 year old "Iceman" found in the Italian Alps, may have been ceremonially buried, archaeologists claim. An autopsy showed that Oetzi had been murdered, dying of an arrow wound. While this is not disputed, a new study suggests that months after his death, Oetzi's corpse was carried to the high mountain pass where it was found. The discovery site therefore may not be a murder scene after all, but a burial ground. The new study, led by Professor Luca Bondioli of the National Museum of Prehistory and Ethnology in Rome and his US-Italian team, is published in the journal Antiquity.

Oetzi was discovered on the alpine border between Italy and Austria in 1991. Although thought at first to be the corpse of a modern climber, scientists later proved that the mummified body was more than 5,000 years old. An autopsy in 2001 further showed that he had been killed by an arrow wound to the shoulder.

Dead and buried

In the new study, researchers produced a detailed map of where the corpse and artefacts were found. Based on guesses about how the artefacts had dispersed down slope over time, they inferred that the body had originated on a rock platform nearby. They argued that this was a later burial site, and not the original scene of his murder. This "burial theory" may explain some perplexing facts about Oetzi. For example, analysis suggests he died in the spring because the pollen of plants that bloom at that time of year is found in his gut. However, pollen within the ice suggests that the corpse was deposited in the late summer. Professor Bondioli and his team say that these facts makes most sense if the body was deliberately carried to its site of discovery many months after death. This suggests a burial. Professor Bondioli elaborated: "Oetzi must have been a very important person to be taken to this high mountain pass for burial. Perhaps he was some sort of a chieftan."

Not bullet proof

However, Professor Frank Ruehli of the University of Zurich, the medical doctor who performed the original autopsy, is not totally convinced by the burial theory. He remarked: "The left arm of the corpse is in a weird position. This must have happened at the time of death. If Oetzi was a chieftan, why did his people not move the twisted arm into a more natural position?" he told BBC News. "This would be expected in the burial of an important person". Also somewhat sceptical is Dr Wolfgang Muller of Royal Holloway University of London. He studied the chemistry of Oetzi's teeth and bones to track his migration route through the Alps.

"It's an interesting new interpretation but it's not bullet proof," he said. "However, if Oetzi was buried they must have carried the body a long way because the nearby villages would have been at a low altitude."

While much remains to be learned about the enigmatic Iceman - as the mummified corpse has been dubbed - one thing is certain: This famous mummy will remain the subject of intense speculation and new research for decades to come.

Queen of the Inch...

Image: BBC News

A 4,000-year-old skeleton, known as the Queen of the Inch, is to be re-interred in the tiny island of Inchmarnock, at the northern end of the Sound of Bute on the west coast of Scotland.

The grave was found by a farmer in the 1950s as he ploughed a field- Preserved in an ancient cist, the remains included a necklace and dagger. Despite being examined by archaeologists and reburied in the 1960s, the skeleton was recently exhumed again and studied using modern research techniques. Scientists have since been able to determine that the woman lived on Inchmarnock and came from the Clyde Estuary and that she did not eat seafood, despite the fact she lived on an island.

"She must have been a queen or chieftain or something very important in her own right. There were plenty of people who lived on the island but very very few were given cist burials and with something as spectacular as the necklace, which obviously she was allowed to keep. It was buried with her. It didn't pass on to anyone else," Anne Spiers, curator of archaeology at Bute Museum, said.

The reconstruction of the queen's head and the necklace, which was found to be made of Whitby jet, are now on show at Bute Museum. The current owner of Inchmarnock Island, Lord Smith of Kelvin, said it was now time for the remains to be reburied. He said: "It right that she goes back. When you speak with the researchers and scientists, obviously they wanted her for a period of time. But I was always clear that once they had actually looked at her properly, because we all need to understand what her forebears were like and what they did and so on, she had to go back."

Source: Stone Pages

Teenage undertakers...

Image: The Arts Desk

Interesting programme on last night about teenage undertakers...if you've ever fancied a nose behind closed doors, check out the programme here.

Bronze Age man speaks...

Image: Culture 24

In 2005, academics moved the skeleton of a Bronze Age man found in 1834 in a makeshift grave of a hollowed-out Yorkshire tree to the Division of Archaeological Sciences at Bradford University.

Their aim was to end 170 years of conjecture by carrying out tests on the gangly skeleton, including a CT scan on his skull courtesy of Bradford Royal Infirmary.

As he heads back to his original home at Scarborough's decadent Rotunda Museum, a few of Gristhorpe Man's secrets have been rumbled, and he’s even about to speak for the first time in 4,000 years.

"Investigations by a team of us at Bradford showed that he was in his early 60s, had lived in the area most of his life and had usually been in good health," says Dr Alan Ogden, a dentist and osteologist who credits the corpse with being "the best preserved 4,000-year-old skeleton in Britain."

"He was tall and muscular and had lived on a rich and carefully prepared diet. We presume, therefore, that he was part of a local ruling family. His death was relatively sudden, and was probably related to a brain tumour revealed by our examinations."

Ogden wasn't finished with the skull. He used it to build a facial reconstruction of the skeleton which he’s installed at the Rotunda, complete with "software techniques" to animate Gristhorpe Man's face as he speaks in English.

"He would actually have spoken a form of Proto-Celtic that we can only guess at," concedes Ogden.

"Unfortunately such a model bears only as much likeness to a living person as a formal passport photograph. But by this means I hope that visitors to the Museum can visualise him as a living man, a senior figure in his society, used to being obeyed and probably even revered."

Karen Snowden, Head of Collections for Scarborough Museums Trust, says organisers at the museum are "really excited" about their more expressive returning son.

"His skeleton, grave goods and coffin are one of the most important group of objects in Scarborough’s collections, and we have been working with Bradford University for a few years now to fully understand this unique man and his history," she reflects.

"The story is now made more real with the addition of his voice."

Open 10am – 5pm (closed Mondays). Admission £4.50/£4 (£9/£8 for free re-entry for a year, free for under-18s.)

Source: Culture 24

Skeleton of dismembered child found by archaeologists...

Image: Dr Jill Eyers, Bucks Free Press

Archaeologists re-investigating a mass burial of 97 infants have discovered the skeleton of a dismembered child. The group has been carrying out tests on excavation finds from 1912 at the Yewden villa, examining the remains of the infants which were rediscovered in boxes kept at Buckinghamshire County Museum. The examination has revealed that the infants died at 40 weeks gestation, leading Chiltern archaeologists to suspect that the site in Hambleden could have been a Roman brothelm, where unwanted children were systematically killed.

For more on this story, see here or alternatively, check out the new BBC series 'Digging for Britain' which features the excavations at Yewden villa in the first episode.