Neolithic rock art in northern Britain

More than 100 elaborate carvings dating back thousands of years have been discovered on rocks and boulders in the North of England.

The Neolithic art - found at several sites across Durham and Northumberland - includes a series of intricate designs of concentric circles, interlocking rings and hollowed cups.

They are among only 2,500 examples which exist in England - having survived natural erosion, quarrying and field clearance.

Full article here, with pictures. The mother lode website for Neolithic rock art in this area, however, is here.

Iraqi museum displays blown up

[The Mines Advisory Group] MAG has destroyed 16 mortars, two projectiles and three 'VS -50' anti-personnel mines, following an urgent request from a museum director who suspected that a display of military vehicles contained live items.

Amna Sooraka museum was the site of the Sulaimaniyah Security Department under Saddam's regime. It now provides a memorial to the victims of the Anfal campaign, a military operation against Kurdish villages between 1986 and 1989 in which tens of thousands of civilians died or were moved to collective towns.

Full article here.

Oldie but not a goodie

The world's oldest recorded joke has been traced back to 1900 BC and suggests toilet humor was as popular with the ancients as it is today.

Actually, what it suggests is that ancient humor was staggeringly lame. The Reuters article continues:

It heads the world's oldest top 10 joke list published by the University of Wolverhampton Thursday.

A 1600 BC gag about a pharaoh, said to be King Snofru, comes second -- "How do you entertain a bored pharaoh? You sail a boatload of young women dressed only in fishing nets down the Nile and urge the pharaoh to go catch a fish."

The full list of ten is here, but I wonder if most of these should not have been categorized as jokes at all, but rather as examples of wit.

Divers desecrating U-boat victims' wreck sites

Merchant ships and Royal Navy vessels are among the wrecks lying off the coast of America which were sunk by German U-boats during the Battle of the Atlantic.

The stretch of seabed off North Carolina and Virginia contains up to 90 wrecks, most lying at relatively shallow depths, offering divers and maritime historians unique opportunities for exploration.

However, experts have warned that the wrecks are increasingly being disturbed by divers, some of whom are removing items to keep as souvenirs.

Weapons and other artefacts have been looted and divers are even said to have removed the skeleton of a German sailor from a sunken U-boat in the area.

From the Telegraph.

D-Day museums targeted by thieves

A BURGEONING international market for second world war memorabilia is putting strain on the numerous small museums that commemorate the 1944 D-Day landings, which are increasingly under the eye of unscrupulous collectors, French police say.

Two recent thefts have highlighted poor security at the more than 25 collections - mainly in private hands - which draw thousands of summer visitors along the Normandy coast. In one incident, the booty included a rare German "Enigma" encoding machine which investigators suspect was stolen to order.

In the other, scores of items - including several weapons - were replaced by fakes and then resold to dealers.

And if it isn't thieves, it's the government -- though in all fairness, there are a fair number of "museums' out there which are really nothing more than private collections that generate income through paid admissions (and whose ostensible status gives the "curators" an edge over ordinary collectors and dealers in getting desirable material).

Frederick Fourqumen, owner of the Dead Man's Corner museum at Saint-Come-du-Mont near Utah beach . . . has had his own difficulties after customs inspectors raided Dead Man's Corner last month on a tip-off. They confiscated 15 second world war firearms as well as explosives and bullets, which they said contravened regulations as they were still in working order. The museum is demanding their return - they include an extremely rare German FG-42 paratrooper's automatic rifle valued at £50,000.

Full article here.

Nazi bunkers rise from the sands

THE long Krylen beach in Denmark, which is peppered with Nazi bunkers, has become the big attraction this summer, drawing thousands of tourists for guided tours.

Four bunkers, entombed under the sand dunes of Houvig since 1945, were uncovered a few months ago in a violent storm, when giant waves swept away the sand, exposing glimpses of the cement and iron structures . . .

"What's so fantastic is that we found them completely furnished with beds, communication systems and the personal effects of the soldiers," says Jens Andersen, the curator of the Hanstholm museum that specialises in Nazi fortifications. . .

The discovery of the bunkers, untouched after 63 years under the sand, is considered unique in Europe, says Bent Anthonisen, a bunker expert.

Full article here.