Photo of the day

Potd-21-12-20.jpg

A parcel from Saudi Arabia this afternoon - from my mate - I asked him to get me a thobe - I think it is called that - as opposed to a dishdash - but they might be the same thing?. I'm not sure. The garment drops collar to ankles - unlike a shalwar kameez - which are my normal pajamas - dirt cheap in an Indian or Pakistani bazaar. Part of the deal - was that he insisted that I wear the full fig on Christmas day - that's okay - I'll get dragged up like Lawrence of Arabia - thankfully - living in Govanhill in Glasgow - nobody is going to look twice at you. Weird is normal here - lace up shoes with no socks - what the fuck is that about?. The most ethnically diverse postcode in Scotland - all well and good. That's why I live here. He also sent me - stuff he picked up in the sand - what looks to me - like fossilised shark teeth, an upper Paleolithic axe head and a human flaked cutting tool - which kind of looks like amber - but it couldn't be in that part of the world. It is translucent - and still razor sharp. I'm trying to get them dated - worth a separate picture. Yours - I.

@Missoni @Scotshave
 
Digimonkey said:
View attachment 62327

A parcel from Saudi Arabia this afternoon - from my mate - I asked him to get me a thobe - I think it is called that - as opposed to a dishdash - but they might be the same thing?. I'm not sure. The garment drops collar to ankles - unlike a shalwar kameez - which are my normal pajamas - dirt cheap in an Indian or Pakistani bazaar. Part of the deal - was that he insisted that I wear the full fig on Christmas day - that's okay - I'll get dragged up like Lawrence of Arabia - thankfully - living in Govanhill in Glasgow - nobody is going to look twice at you. Weird is normal here - lace up shoes with no socks - what the fuck is that about?. The most ethnically diverse postcode in Scotland - all well and good. That's why I live here. He also sent me - stuff he picked up in the sand - what looks to me - like fossilised shark teeth, an upper Paleolithic axe head and a human flaked cutting tool - which kind of looks like amber - but it couldn't be in that part of the world. It is translucent - and still razor sharp. I'm trying to get them dated - worth a separate picture. Yours - I.

@Missoni @Scotshave
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You'll be one of the wise men from the east!
Reminds me of my late oldest brother, many many years ago he worked on oil tankers and one day my late mother got the shock of her life when he walked into the lounge dressed in full white Moroccan traditional garb. I wish I had a photo of that scene.
Merry Christmas!
 
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From centre - and clockwise - that's a hand axe - from the point of view of ubiquity and longevity - the most important tool - humans ever came up with - all the rest of our tools stem from this. You don't need to take my word for it - I did this sort of shit at Uni level - please feel free to disagree. Moving on - past the most interesting artefact - fossilised shark's teeth - let us consider that - these were dug out the sand in Saudi Arabia - next one around. A bivalve - a sea shell - climate change - anybody? Back to the most important - the flake - this is astonishing - it is still razor sharp - I picked up and held it - I felt a connection with the last person to do so - I have no idea what it is made out of - I've tried flint knapping - it is fucking hard work - mostly - what I ended up with was skint knuckles, mostly. In Scotland - we don't find flint - so our Mesolithic ancestors used to travel to the island of Rum - where you get Bloodstone - I sat on a beach there for hours - trying to knap my own stones - as I say - bloody hands - I couldn't make an arrow head to save me. Hubris - they knew more about staying alive than we do. I.

@Missoni @Scotshave @Claus3428
 
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Digimonkey said:
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From centre - and clockwise - that's a hand axe - from the point of view of ubiquity and longevity - the most important tool - humans ever came up with - all the rest of our tools stem from this. You don't need to take my word for it - I did this sort of shit at Uni level - please feel free to disagree. Moving on - past the most interesting artefact - fossilised shark's teeth - let us consider that - these were dug out the sand in Saudi Arabia - next one around. A bivalve - a sea shell - climate change - anybody? Back to the most important - the flake - this is astonishing - it is still razor sharp - I picked up and held it - I felt a connection with the last person to do so - I have no idea what it is made out of - I've tried flint napping - it is fucking hard work - mostly - what I ended up with was skint knuckles, mostly. In Scotland - we don't find flint - so our Mesolithic ancestors used to travel to the island of Rum - where you get Bloodstone - I sat on a beach there for hours - trying to nap my own stones - as I say - bloody hands - I couldn't make an arrow head to save me. Hubris - they knew more about staying alive than we do. I.

@Missoni @Scotshave @Claus3428
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This is tremendous content, Iain.

Best, S.
 
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I did some research - the stone tool - as above - is probably upper paleolithic - it is difficult to say definitely - technologies did not spread evenly - the date range for it being made - is between fifty and twelve thousand years ago. To some degree - it is crude - but would have functioned well - it is still razor sharp. Maybe a burin? It was flaked from a chert core - I had no idea of the stone it was fashioned from - I took the simple step of phoning the guy that found it - helpfully, a geologist - who explained this to me. We can approach the idea of dating from this - it came from a core - a bigger lump of rock - that was split with a percussion tool - you can see the percussion waves in the finished object - to result in this. That would suggest to me upper paleolithic - before then - stone tools were - basically - just the right shape of rock tarted up. Making flaked tools - requires abstract thought - you would need to imagine what was inside - and the potential. About the same time in human evolution - we invented art, music and religion. I don't think these things are unconnected. I've been holding it my hand - as I have typed this - the stone warms up - it takes your body heat. This is an ancient object. Yours - I.

@Scotshave @Missoni @Claus3428@Satanfriendly
 
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Digimonkey said:
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I did some research - the stone tool - as above - is probably upper paleolithic - it is difficult to say definitely - technologies did not spread evenly - the date range for it being made - is between fifty and twelve thousand years ago. To some degree - it is crude - but would have functioned well - it is still razor sharp. Maybe a burin? It was flaked from a chert core - I had no idea of the stone it was fashioned from - I took the simple step of phoning the guy that found it - helpfully, a geologist - who explained this to me. We can approach the idea of dating from this - it came from a core - a bigger lump of rock - that was split with a percussion tool - you can see the percussion waves in the finished object - to result in this. That would suggest to me upper paleolithic - before then - stone tools were - basically - just the right shape of rock tarted up. Making flaked tools - requires abstract thought - you would need to imagine what was inside - and the potential. About the same time in human evolution - we invented art, music and religion. I don't think these things are unconnected. I've been holding it my hand - as I have typed this - the stone warms up - it takes your body heat. This is an ancient object. Yours - I.

@Scotshave @Missoni @Claus3428@Satanfriendly
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I have tried flint knapping myself with similar results, a pile of flakes and bloody fingers. :)
 
Potd-25-12-20.jpg

I loathe Christmas - it is just another day to me - and my partner - but this object found hanging on my door handle tonight - sort of changed that - an orange studded with mace and clove - it smells wonderful - left for me - and all my neighbours - individually - one hanging on every door by somebody that lives in the close. What a wonderful gesture - 2020 - total shite - apart from the fact people can be really nice to each other - for no reason - other than being nice. I almost burst into tears - I did actually - but - wrote a note - my best paper - with my best fountain pen - my best handwriting - to thank her. How lovely was she? None more. That made my day. - I
 
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Digimonkey said:
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I loathe Christmas - it is just another day to me - and my partner - but this object found hanging on my door handle tonight - sort of changed that - an orange studded with mace and clove - it smells wonderful - left for me - and all my neighbours - individually - one hanging on every door by somebody that lives in the close. What a wonderful gesture - 2020 - total shite - apart from the fact people can be really nice to each other - for no reason - other than being nice. I almost burst into tears - I did actually - but - wrote a note - my best paper - with my best fountain pen - my best handwriting - to thank her. How lovely was she? None more. That made my day. - I
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...wishing you the very best for 2021...
 
Digimonkey said:
@Missoni

Thank you - where can we go? The wicked witch is dead - but - another aged white millionaire in the White House - fuck - is that going to help? I don't think so - we are all fucked. Happy Christmas. I.
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...well in that alternative festive spirit let me reciprocate by keeping it just as real...“One of the most pathetic aspects of human history,” Reinhold Niebuhr wrote, “is that every civilization expresses itself most pretentiously, compounds its partial and universal values most convincingly, and claims immortality for its finite existence at the very moment when the decay which leads to death has already begun.” But as we know, we are here for such a brief moment in time, so chill and let's find joy wherever and whenever we can :)
 
Manstein said:
It says a lot for the Ottomans tolerant view of other religions that work like this survived after they took the city in 1453.
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Indeed - when Mehmet took the city - he gave an order - upon pain of death - that not one of his troops was to touch anything in the Hagia Sophia - let's compare and contrast with the behaviour of the Venetians during the fourth crusade. Dandolo - one of the most loathsome creatures to have lived in the medieval period - and that's up against some pretty stiff competition. He was interred there - but the Greeks got the last laugh - they dug his body up and fed his bones to stray dogs. I.
 
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