Archaeology Odyssey

Count Minandre Zizania was the Belgian consul in Egypt.

For information on wax tablets a thousand years older than the Vindolanda tablets, see Dorit Symington, “Recovered! The World’s Oldest Book,” Archaeology Odyssey, September/October 1999.

R.G. Collingwood and R.P. Wright, The Roman Inscriptions of Britain (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 1965).

The name “January” was chosen to honor Janus, a two-headed god who looked both toward the past and toward the future.

Although the year is common to cultures around the world, ancient and modern, it is sometimes defined differently. For example, the lunar year is defined by the cycles of the moon, rather than by the earth’s orbit around the sun. Some lunar calendars make use of intercalation (the adding of days or months) to reorient the lunar year to the solar year. But the Islamic lunar calendar does not, meaning that every successive new year begins on a different day of the solar year.

Lewis-Williams is not able, however, to explain Upper Paleolithic sculpture in terms of shamanic ritual. Most sculpture is found on practical objects—arrow straighteners, knife handles—or in domestic contexts. Lewis-Williams doesn’t discuss these items or the ubiquitous nude female figurines.