Mummies as medicinal tools

2005 ◽  
Vol 80 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Rosanna Gorini
Keyword(s):  
Pharmaceutical Company ◽  
Roman Period ◽  
Late Period ◽  
Resinous Substance ◽  
Medicinal Properties ◽  
The Mediterranean

The term “mummy” is thought to be derived from the Persian or Arab word “moumiya”, meaning pitch or bitumen. It likely referred to the black, hard, and resinous substance probably used by the Egyptians in their embalming procedures during the late period and Ptolemaic Roman period. During medieval times and later, Arab and European physicians thought that mummies had medicinal properties. Egyptian mummies dug out of their tombs were sometimes grinded into powder and shipped across the Mediterranean to be sold as medicine for the cure of different diseases; for example epilepsy, abscesses, rashes, migraine, nausea etc. From the 12th to the 17th centuries, mummy remains could be found in apothecaries’ shops, and as late as 1908 they could be ordered from the catalogue of the Merck pharmaceutical company.

The Planets in Ancient Egypt

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joachim Friedrich Quack
Keyword(s):  
Mathematical Models ◽  
Ancient Egypt ◽  
Roman Period ◽  
Maximum Power ◽  
The Sun ◽  
Late Period ◽  
Religious Texts ◽  
Greco Roman ◽  
Religious Associations ◽  
Night Sky

The five visible planets are certainly attested to in Egyptian sources from about 2000 bce. The three outer ones are religiously connected with the falcon-headed god Horus, Venus with his father Osiris, and Mercury with Seth, the brother and murderer of Osiris. Clear attestations of the planets are largely limited to decoration programs covering the whole night sky. There are a number of passages in religious texts where planets may be mentioned, but many of them are uncertain because the names given to the planets are for most of them not specific enough to exclude other interpretations. There may have been a few treatises giving a more detailed religious interpretation of the planets and their behavior, but they are badly preserved and hardly understandable in the details. In the Late Period, probably under Mesopotamian influence, the sequence of the planets as well as their religious associations could change; at least one source links Saturn with the Sun god, Mars with Miysis, Mercury with Thot, Venus with Horus, son of Isis, and Jupiter with Amun, arranging the planets with those considered negative in astrology first, separated from the positive ones by the vacillating Mercury. Late monuments depicting the zodiac place the planets in positions which are considered important in astrology, especially the houses or the place of maximum power (hypsoma; i.e., “exaltation”). Probably under Babylonian influence, in the Greco-Roman Period mathematical models for calculating the positions and phases of the planets arose. These were used for calculating horoscopes, of which a number in demotic Egyptian are attested. There are also astrological treatises (most still unpublished) in the Egyptian language which indicate the relevance of planets for forecasts, especially for the fate of individuals born under a certain constellation, but also for events important for the king and the country in general; they could be relevant also for enterprises begun at a certain date. There is some reception of supposedly or actually specific Egyptian planet sequences, names and religious associations in Greek sources.

Popular lexicon of Greek origin in Italian varieties

2018 ◽  
Vol 33 (1) ◽  
pp. 95-120
Author(s):  
Francesco Crifò
Keyword(s):  
Southern Italy ◽  
Northern Italy ◽  
Roman Period ◽  
The Other ◽  
Historical Background ◽  
Romance Languages ◽  
The Status ◽  
The Mediterranean ◽  
The Many ◽  
The One

AbstractGreek-speaking people have been sailing the Mediterranean for millennia. At various stages of their development from Latin, the Romance languages have been influenced by their idiom. In Italy and in its islands, this role has been particularly evident due to the many rich and culturally active colonies in Southern Italy before and during the Roman period on the one hand, and through the later Byzantine occupation, which lasted several centuries in some areas, on the other. In this article, after a brief summary of the historical background (2.), the characteristics of the lexical borrowings from Greek in the local idioms of Southern (3.) as well as of Central and Northern Italy (4.) will be sketched. Here and there, and in the conclusions (5.), the status quaestionis and the latest orientations of the research will also be broadly outlined.

scholarly journals Roman Malta

1915 ◽  
Vol 5 ◽  
pp. 23-80 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas Ashby
Keyword(s):  
Middle Ages ◽  
Roman Period ◽  
Isle Of Wight ◽  
Maltese Islands ◽  
African Coast ◽  
East And West ◽  
The Mediterranean ◽  
North And South ◽  
Clear Weather ◽  
The Middle Ages

The Maltese islands, Malta, the ancient Melite, Gozo, the ancient Gaulus, and three lesser islets, lie in the centre of the Mediterranean in a significant position. They command the highway of sea-borne traffic between east and west, and they form a link between north and south, between Sicily and Tunis. They are small, indeed; their whole area is about four-fifths that of the Isle of Wight, but they are in their own fashion very fertile, their seas are rich in fish, and their coasts have many harbours. Naturally they have long been inhabited; they have a real and, for certain centuries, a stirring history. Their closest geographical kinship is with Sicily, which is less than sixty miles north of Gozo, and can easily be seen in clear weather from the higher parts of the islands. Hence, perhaps, it was that during seven centuries of the Roman period, just as during five centuries of the middle ages, they were connected especially with Sicily; but their relations with the more distant African coast and with the eastern and western waters of the Mediterranean are too strong to allow them to be called purely Sicilian or even purely European, and they have often owned other allegiance.

Herodotus and an Egyptian mirage: the genealogies of the Theban priests

2002 ◽  
Vol 122 ◽  
pp. 70-90 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ian S. Moyer
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Awareness ◽  
Late Period ◽  
The Third ◽  
The Past ◽  
Mediterranean World ◽  
The Mediterranean ◽  
Historical Moment ◽  
Scholarly Discourse ◽  
Historical Past ◽  
Egyptian History

AbstractThis article re-evaluates the significance attributed to Hecataeus' encounter with the Theban priests described by Herodotus (2.143) by setting it against the evidence of Late Period Egyptian representations of the past. In the first part a critique is offered of various approaches Classicists have taken to this episode and its impact on Greek historiography. Classicists have generally imagined this as an encounter in which the young, dynamic and creative Greeks construct an image of the static, ossified and incredibly old culture of the Egyptians, a move which reveals deeper assumptions in the scholarly discourse on Greeks and ‘other’ cultures in the Mediterranean world. But the civilization that Herodotus confronted in his long excursus on Egypt was not an abstract, eternal Egypt. Rather, it was the Egypt of his own day, at a specific historical moment – a culture with a particular understanding of its own long history. The second part presents evidence of lengthy Late Period priestly genealogies, and more general archaizing tendencies. Remarkable examples survive of the sort of visual genealogy which would have impressed upon the travelling Greek historians the long continuum of the Egyptian past. These include statues with genealogical inscriptions and relief sculptures representing generations of priests succeeding to their fathers' office. These priestly evocations of a present firmly anchored in the Egyptian past are part of a wider pattern of cultivating links with the historical past in the Late Period of Egyptian history. Thus, it is not simply the marvel of a massive expanse of time which Herodotus encountered in Egypt, but a mediated cultural awareness of that time. The third part of the essay argues that Herodotus used this long human past presented by the Egyptian priests in order to criticize genealogical and mythical representations of the past and develop the notion of an historical past. On the basis of this example, the article concludes by urging a reconsideration of the scholarly paradigm for imagining the encounter between Greeks and ‘others’ in ethnographic discourse in order to recognize the agency of the Egyptian priests, and other non-Greek ‘informants’.

scholarly journals Finding Meaning in the Past: Reinterpretation of the Late Roman Artifact, the Golden Ring with a Carnelian Intaglio from the Museum of Georgia

2019 ◽  
Vol 13 (2) ◽  
pp. 503-512
Author(s):  
Eka Avaliani
Keyword(s):  
Historical Context ◽  
Roman Period ◽  
The Public ◽  
Political Situation ◽  
Female Individual ◽  
The Past ◽  
Finding Meaning ◽  
The Mediterranean ◽  
Late Roman ◽  
Roman East

This paper offers a novel interpretation of the luxury golden ring with a carnelian intaglio depicting a woman's profile and an engraved Greek inscription, ΒΑCIΛICCΑ ΟΥΛΠIAΝΑ(Ζ)IA (or AΣIA E.A.), found in cist grave 14, in Mtskheta, Georgia, dated to the Roman period, the 3rd century AD. In consideration of the then contemporary political situation in the Mediterranean and Roman East, through the putting and interpreting sources into broad historical context, the author identifies the female individual as the Roman Empress Ulpia Severina. The very inclusion of royal woman within public propaganda during this period signifies her prominence within, and significance outside of, the imperial metropolis. This deliberate inclusion proved to the public that this empress was not mere figurehead but could have been a very influential person in the Empire.

CULT OF WATER IN ANCIENT GREECE AND ROME. BRIDGES AND HYDRAULIC STRUCTURESAND

2020 ◽  
pp. 43-55
Author(s):  
T.P. Meer ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Water Supply ◽  
Mediterranean Sea ◽  
Significant Role ◽  
Ancient Greece ◽  
Roman Period ◽  
The Mediterranean ◽  
Local Traditions ◽  
Main Factor

Water was the main factor in choosing where to build settlements. Large civilizations - Mesopotamian, Egyptian, Greek and Roman, settled around the Mediterranean Sea and developed thanks to the waters of rivers and seas. The power of water was embodied by the Greeks in Gods and small deities, such as: Poseidon, Aphrodite, Naiades and others. The heyday of large ancient cities during the Roman period is associated with the construction of bridges and aqueducts. Water was assigned a significant role in the culture of local traditions. Residents of ancient cities have built many technical structures designed for water supply, irrigation of fields, sewerage and simply in honor of the worship of gods, patrons of water.

Diaspora and the “Assimilated” Jew

Early Judaism ◽  
2018 ◽  
pp. 52-70
Author(s):  
Erich S. Gruen
Keyword(s):  
Jewish Identity ◽  
Mediterranean Basin ◽  
Roman Period ◽  
Religious Institutions ◽  
Cultural Interaction ◽  
Greco Roman ◽  
The Mediterranean ◽  
The Mediterranean Basin

There were Jews throughout the Mediterranean basin during the Greco-Roman period. Inscriptions and other writings demonstrate that they were well integrated into the communities where they lived but did not give up their Jewish identity. Despite claims to the contrary, the evidence points to social and cultural interaction rather than assimilation, as Jews and non-Jews supported each other’s religious institutions without compromising their respective identities.

The Swahili and the Mediterranean worlds: pottery of the late Roman period from Zanzibar

Antiquity ◽  
1996 ◽  
Vol 70 (267) ◽  
pp. 148-154 ◽  
Author(s):  
Abdurahman M. Juma
Keyword(s):  
South India ◽  
Roman Period ◽  
Ancient Rome ◽  
East African ◽  
East African Coast ◽  
Ancient India ◽  
African Coast ◽  
The Mediterranean ◽  
Late Roman Period ◽  
Late Roman

Mortimer Wheeler famously tied together the worlds of ancient Rome and ancient India by finding Roman ceramics stratified into levels at Arikamedu, in south India. Late Roman pottery from far down the East African coast now permits the same kind of matching link from the Mediterranean to a distant shore, this one in the Swahili world.

exploration

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Duane W. Roller
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Central Africa ◽  
Western Mediterranean ◽  
Roman Period ◽  
The Black Sea ◽  
Military Operations ◽  
The North ◽  
Eastern Hemisphere ◽  
The Mediterranean ◽  
The Bronze Age

Exploration in antiquity was largely the result of commercial or military endeavours, rather than any pure quest for knowledge or scholarship. Nevertheless, from the first efforts of Greeks to move beyond the Greek heartland into the Black Sea and western Mediterranean, which began as early as the end of the Bronze Age, Greeks and Romans steadily explored around and beyond their world. By the late Roman period, almost all of the Eastern Hemisphere was known, with the exception of interior southern Africa and the far northeastern portions of Asia, and it was suggested that there might be other continents across the ocean. Despite an emphasis on trade and commercial contacts, there was also an increase in scientific and other scholarly knowledge. The beginnings of Greek exploration are apparent in the Odyssey of Homer and may go back to the latter part of the Bronze Age. By the latter 7th century bce, Greeks were moving outside of the Mediterranean to the Phoenician (later Carthaginian) trading cities such as Gadeira on the Atlantic. With the rise of the Persians, they began to learn about what lay to their east, and Alexander the Great created awareness of a world stretching as far as India. At the same time, Pytheas of Massalia explored the northern Atlantic as far as Iceland. The discipline of geography was invented by Eratosthenes of Cyrene in the latter 3rd century bce, and in the following century the explorer Polybius reached the Equator. Roman military operations in the north of Europe and the British Isles and trade journeys into central Africa meant those regions were brought into the sphere of knowledge of the Mediterranean world. Realization that the inhabited world, however vast, was only a small part of the total surface of the Earth led to theorization about other lands across the ocean, but there is no solid evidence that anyone from the ancient Mediterranean reached them and was able to report on them. By the latter 1st century bce traders became aware of Southeast Asia and China, and there were occasional contacts during the Roman period, but by the 2nd century ce the era of ancient exploration was at an end, and there was little further expansion of geographical knowledge until the Islamic period.

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