I might be too late for the @Leon@Richard_Tyndall discussion about Graham Hancock - but I remember first reading Fingerprints of the Gods and was first amazed - then went back and read it two or three more times and started to see the cracks. He does make some good points but maybe half of his assertions just dont stand up to the slightest scrutiny. But a good yarn.
Underworld (2002) is a much better yarn, first got me interested in his work. There was even a C4 documentary series.
Yes, the key thing is that he's a story-teller. He's got a narrative to sell, and he does it entertainingly
As long as you remember that - don't treat him like an academic - then he's definitely worth reading. Because he unearths gems, even as he spins the woowoo nonsense
The criticism he has received - esp the "OMG he's a Nazi" gibberish - is absolutely absurd, and surely comes from envy of his financial success, and pompous professional pride at an "amateur" intruding on clerical matters. He doesn't even claim to be an archaeologist
An interesting question is whether Trump would go on the ballot in States with Democratic contol.
Constitution 14th Amendment, Section 3, has been pointed out:
Section 3. .
The way that reads, he needs a double 2/3 majority in Congress to get on the ballot.
Firstly, that doesn't actually bar anyone from being President following insurrection. It refers to (i) Senators; (ii) Representatives; and (iii) ELECTORS OF President or VP - that is the electoral college. So this is about members of Congress seating other members of Congress and accepting electoral college voters (a rather hot topic). It very much does not cover the executive arm itself (President and VP).
Secondly, it doesn't refer to getting on the ballot. So take a candidate for Senator who had committed some kind of treason offence. Absent anything in a state constitution, she could be on the ballot for Senate... it's just when it comes to being seated by Congress the following January if elected.
Firstly I think the general clause amply covers the office of President and the behaviour of Trump.:
No person shall ... hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, ... who, having previously taken an oath, ... as an officer of the United States, ... to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof.
Secondly, I think that inability to hold an office has some impact on being on the ballot for that office. The dots and tittles of that one will be Court-fodder, I think.
I think you're almost certainly wrong because the specifics of a Senator, a Representative, and electors of President/VP are listed before the generality. You'd always argue legally that a glaring omission like that is a deliberate one, and you'd be very likely succeed.
It's a non-runner both on legal and political grounds.
Actually, sod it, I will allow myself one photo - by me, from 2022 - of the Notorious Penis Chamber at Karahan Tepe. Mainly coz I’ll do anything to stop people talking about fricking ULEZ, also coz I just like writing “notorious penis chamber”
See here
What is this 12,000 year old room? WTF is it for?
At the moment, the best archaeological guess is that it is an initiation room for young adult males. It would have been roofed and dark. The boys would have stepped through the small door on the left, the room would have been half full of liquid piped in using the circled water channel. The liquid might have been animal blood - so one archaeologist told me. It might have poured through the mouth of the weird “head” acting as a spout. Then some ritual - sacrifice? Circumcision? Baptism? - would have been enacted. The boy becomes a man - a hunter - and then returns to the “audience room” just outside
This is 12,000 years old!!! Anyone who doesn’t find this seriously weird, brilliant, spooky, compelling and, yes, a *bit Graham Hancocky* is lacking a soul
Water tank? Why does everything unexplained have to be for 'rituals' of some bizarre kind?
A neolithic wooden trackway was discovered here in the Flatlands - it had been preserved in the peat. Quite a remarkable find really but as it was in a forgotten corner of the country not a lot was made of it.
Apparently - despite the lack of any artifacts - archaeologists say it must have been a route to a 'ritual platform'. Not the rather obvious purpose of a track to get to the other side of a wet area...
Most archaeologists agree that the Tas Tepeler are sacred sites. Stone circles, after all
There is near-zero evidence of human habitation at Gobekli Tepe (there is evidence at the other Tas Tepeler). Why build it? It is surely a temple; it is also, it seems, aligned astronomically
Some kind of penis worshipping hunter-warrior cult (with human sacrifice?) is the best guess at the moment
I admit to knowing almost nothing about these sites other than that they exist.
But how do you build a temple without living there, at least for some of the time?
And if you know how to build things, why not build houses?
The archaeology changes every year as they find amazing new stuff (which is one reason it’s so exciting)
For many years it was thought Gobekli Tepe was a singular miracle. A temple complex built by remarkably gifted cavemen who lived in temporary tents/shelters during the building season
Now at the other Tas Tepeler they have found permanent homes - besides the ritual shrines and cultic chambers. So it looks more and more like a civilisation, from 10,000 BC (or even earlier)
Worth pointing out that by the definition of 'civilisation' in that case it is not much different to the early pre-ceramic Neolithic of Northern Syria. The only big difference is the presence of temples. Jericho as a settlement dates back to 10,000 BC and the walled town dates to around 8,500 BC (and that wall is VERY impressive).
Even that is not the oldest structures in the area. Tell Qaramel has 5 towers dating back to around 10,000 BC and shows continuous occupation throughout the whole of the proto-Neolithic and pre-pottery Neolithic A & B (from around 10,500 to 9,000BC). These sites have been known since the 1970s.
The temples are, certainly, something else. But as I said before, this is not the revolutionary news that Hancock and others would have you believe.
Ian Hodder of Stanford Uni disagrees with you:
‘Gobekli Tepe changes everything.’
As an amateur archeologist with an interest in Syria, you’ll have heard of him
'Changes everything' is one of those phrases that can mean anything to anyone. Yes it is spectacular. No it does not mean an ancient 'civilisation' in Hancockian terms any more than the discovery of the Northern Syrian villages did.
That does not at all detract from the sites, nor does it mean the temples are not amazing. But when we have Sunil of this parish writing articles about Atlantis you have to stop and take a sniff of the smelling salts.
GT and the other sites push back the dates for large scale man made structures by a few hundred years. Not the 15,000 or so Hancock is regularly heard to claim.
I’m not batting for Hancock, you misconstrue me. I will indeed say that the Tas Tepeler are absolutely revolutionary, coz it is the case
Incidentally if you are interested in this stuff - and you obviously are - why don’t you go have a look? Seriously. See for yourself
These days Gobekli Tepe is now walled off and sheltered and gets a million visitors a year and that miraculous quality has largely gone (tho it is still a gob smacking site). When I first went I was the only non archaeologist there and we could wander between the stones drinking tea!
But at a site like Karahan Tepe you can still do that. Simply rock up. Wander about. You might be alone - or you can watch the archaeologists digging
Go on, do it! It would make an amazing holiday (combine it with a beach). Blow your mind!
If you want details on how to do it, DM me
It is definetely on my list. Along with various sites around Lake Van and in Kurdistan. My problem is time. I have had one 3 week holiday in 10 years. The joys of consultancy. I am hoping to do a bit more travelling again for pleasure rather than work but as always it is mañana.
3 weeks.... in ten years?!
That's insane. Life is for living, not working. Find the time before you keel over
Oh, for God's sake.
For [A PLURAL NUMBER OF DECADES SINCE 18] I had approx six periods, each a week or less, which could be described as a "holiday". It's only in my new job where they will not let you sell them that I have to take them, which are inevitably taken up with work.
You've never had a full-time job (or, arguably even a job as we would understand it) and you fail to understand the responsibility of people relying on you. Life is not like the movies and holidays are for children, not adults.
Can't tell if you're serious, I kind of hope you're not
I don't deny I have been lucky, but I have also made my own luck, to an extent. Don't let the man take you down
He doesn't strike me as poor, and he seems to be self-employed as a consultant - and therefore able to carve out time. A trip to go see the Tas Tepeler would cost less than £1000, could be done in as little as a week, even five days if you're mad, and would blow your mind - and his mind - like nothing else on this green earth, in terms of archaeology. A spectacular archaeological site, probably the most important on the planet, maybe the most important in all human history (these are some expert opinions, not mine) is happening RIGHT NOW. And you can just drive up and watch them doing it. Mazin!
I have to agree with you on this. I can't really afford the time away either, but I'm taking three weeks out to visit S Korea shortly.
An interesting question is whether Trump would go on the ballot in States with Democratic contol.
Constitution 14th Amendment, Section 3, has been pointed out:
Section 3. No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any state, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any state legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any state, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.
The way that reads, he needs a double 2/3 majority in Congress to get on the ballot.
Firstly, that doesn't actually bar anyone from being President following insurrection. It refers to (i) Senators; (ii) Representatives; and (iii) ELECTORS OF President or VP - that is the electoral college. So this is about members of Congress seating other members of Congress and accepting electoral college voters (a rather hot topic). It very much does not cover the executive arm itself (President and VP).
Secondly, it doesn't refer to getting on the ballot. So take a candidate for Senator who had committed some kind of treason offence. Absent anything in a state constitution, she could be on the ballot for Senate... it's just when it comes to being seated by Congress the following January if elected.
So the first issue (aside from whether he took part in an insurrection) is whether the president is an "officer of the United States" which seems to be controversial.
On the second issue, whether you have to satisfy the eligibility requirements to be on the ballot is decided by each state independently, but I think their laws generally say that you do?
On the first of those point, I think the fact that Senators, Representatives, and electors of the President/VP are specifically named makes it very unlikely that President/VP themselves fall within the catch all of other offices (especially when those specific roles are mentioned elsewhere in the Constitution).
On the second point, which is moot anyway due to the first, this is not a qualification for being President under Article 2 (age 35+, natural born citizen, resident in US for 14 years). If those qualifications are not met, a person cannot be President full stop. Under this provision (assuming I am wrong on the first point) they can still be President... subject to a 2/3rds vote. There's no mechanism (short of a full constitutional amendment) for a 30 year old or a natural born Welshman to become President of the US, for instance, even if Congress was fully behind him.
I'd add it would be insane for a Democrat state to bar Trump from the ballot on these (incredibly flimsy) grounds anyway. Not only would it almost certainly not survive legal challenge, it would only be likely to pass in deep blue states (not the purples that matter), and would rather undermine the moral credibility of Democrat criticism of Trump over trying to use a fig leaf of legality to nakedly attempt to overturn the 2020 election.
Somewhere there's a long, scholarly article written about it by peeps from I think the Federalist Society.
Though I'll happily admit this and who are the most important US legal scholars is not my specialist area!
The enforcement is the interesting side; I've seen mention of one lawsuit already started in Florida. But US Judges are always interesting, and US Law is very unpredictable.
This is a time will tell thing, I think.
There are also a couple of "defund the Public Prosecutors holding Trump to account" proposals floating around the Republican side pf Congress.
The discussion on ancient civilisations, religions etc is interesting. Granddaughter Two wants (or did the last time I discussed it with her) to read History, specifically Ancient Civilisations, starting Jan 2006, at Melbourne. I shall remember this discussion for when I next talk to her.
If, of course, I live that long! (I’m older than Joe Biden!)
Jan 2006 isn't that ancient really. I mean, I know it was before Brexit, so it feels a long time ago, but even so.
An interesting question is whether Trump would go on the ballot in States with Democratic contol.
Constitution 14th Amendment, Section 3, has been pointed out:
Section 3. No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any state, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any state legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any state, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.
The way that reads, he needs a double 2/3 majority in Congress to get on the ballot.
Firstly, that doesn't actually bar anyone from being President following insurrection. It refers to (i) Senators; (ii) Representatives; and (iii) ELECTORS OF President or VP - that is the electoral college. So this is about members of Congress seating other members of Congress and accepting electoral college voters (a rather hot topic). It very much does not cover the executive arm itself (President and VP).
Secondly, it doesn't refer to getting on the ballot. So take a candidate for Senator who had committed some kind of treason offence. Absent anything in a state constitution, she could be on the ballot for Senate... it's just when it comes to being seated by Congress the following January if elected.
So the first issue (aside from whether he took part in an insurrection) is whether the president is an "officer of the United States" which seems to be controversial.
On the second issue, whether you have to satisfy the eligibility requirements to be on the ballot is decided by each state independently, but I think their laws generally say that you do?
On the first of those point, I think the fact that Senators, Representatives, and electors of the President/VP are specifically named makes it very unlikely that President/VP themselves fall within the catch all of other offices (especially when those specific roles are mentioned elsewhere in the Constitution).
On the second point, which is moot anyway due to the first, this is not a qualification for being President under Article 2 (age 35+, natural born citizen, resident in US for 14 years). If those qualifications are not met, a person cannot be President full stop. Under this provision (assuming I am wrong on the first point) they can still be President... subject to a 2/3rds vote. There's no mechanism (short of a full constitutional amendment) for a 30 year old or a natural born Welshman to become President of the US, for instance, even if Congress was fully behind him.
I'd add it would be insane for a Democrat state to bar Trump from the ballot on these (incredibly flimsy) grounds anyway. Not only would it almost certainly not survive legal challenge, it would only be likely to pass in deep blue states (not the purples that matter), and would rather undermine the moral credibility of Democrat criticism of Trump over trying to use a fig leaf of legality to nakedly attempt to overturn the 2020 election.
Somewhere there's a long, scholarly article written about it by peeps from I think the Federalist Society.
Though I'll happily admit this and who are the most important US legal scholars is not my specialist area!
The enforcement is the interesting side; I've seen mention of one lawsuit already started in Florida. But US Judges are always interesting, and US Law is very unpredictable.
This is a time will tell thing, I think.
There are also a couple of "defund the Public Prosecutors holding Trump to account" proposals floating around the Republican side pf Congress.
Clearly, time will tell on almost everything we discuss on this site.
But I don't think you need to wait for time to tell on this one. It's pretty clear cut legally as well as being a crazy tactic politically.
Actually, sod it, I will allow myself one photo - by me, from 2022 - of the Notorious Penis Chamber at Karahan Tepe. Mainly coz I’ll do anything to stop people talking about fricking ULEZ, also coz I just like writing “notorious penis chamber”
See here
What is this 12,000 year old room? WTF is it for?
At the moment, the best archaeological guess is that it is an initiation room for young adult males. It would have been roofed and dark. The boys would have stepped through the small door on the left, the room would have been half full of liquid piped in using the circled water channel. The liquid might have been animal blood - so one archaeologist told me. It might have poured through the mouth of the weird “head” acting as a spout. Then some ritual - sacrifice? Circumcision? Baptism? - would have been enacted. The boy becomes a man - a hunter - and then returns to the “audience room” just outside
This is 12,000 years old!!! Anyone who doesn’t find this seriously weird, brilliant, spooky, compelling and, yes, a *bit Graham Hancocky* is lacking a soul
Water tank? Why does everything unexplained have to be for 'rituals' of some bizarre kind?
A neolithic wooden trackway was discovered here in the Flatlands - it had been preserved in the peat. Quite a remarkable find really but as it was in a forgotten corner of the country not a lot was made of it.
Apparently - despite the lack of any artifacts - archaeologists say it must have been a route to a 'ritual platform'. Not the rather obvious purpose of a track to get to the other side of a wet area...
Most archaeologists agree that the Tas Tepeler are sacred sites. Stone circles, after all
There is near-zero evidence of human habitation at Gobekli Tepe (there is evidence at the other Tas Tepeler). Why build it? It is surely a temple; it is also, it seems, aligned astronomically
Some kind of penis worshipping hunter-warrior cult (with human sacrifice?) is the best guess at the moment
I admit to knowing almost nothing about these sites other than that they exist.
But how do you build a temple without living there, at least for some of the time?
And if you know how to build things, why not build houses?
The archaeology changes every year as they find amazing new stuff (which is one reason it’s so exciting)
For many years it was thought Gobekli Tepe was a singular miracle. A temple complex built by remarkably gifted cavemen who lived in temporary tents/shelters during the building season
Now at the other Tas Tepeler they have found permanent homes - besides the ritual shrines and cultic chambers. So it looks more and more like a civilisation, from 10,000 BC (or even earlier)
Worth pointing out that by the definition of 'civilisation' in that case it is not much different to the early pre-ceramic Neolithic of Northern Syria. The only big difference is the presence of temples. Jericho as a settlement dates back to 10,000 BC and the walled town dates to around 8,500 BC (and that wall is VERY impressive).
Even that is not the oldest structures in the area. Tell Qaramel has 5 towers dating back to around 10,000 BC and shows continuous occupation throughout the whole of the proto-Neolithic and pre-pottery Neolithic A & B (from around 10,500 to 9,000BC). These sites have been known since the 1970s.
The temples are, certainly, something else. But as I said before, this is not the revolutionary news that Hancock and others would have you believe.
Ian Hodder of Stanford Uni disagrees with you:
‘Gobekli Tepe changes everything.’
As an amateur archeologist with an interest in Syria, you’ll have heard of him
'Changes everything' is one of those phrases that can mean anything to anyone. Yes it is spectacular. No it does not mean an ancient 'civilisation' in Hancockian terms any more than the discovery of the Northern Syrian villages did.
That does not at all detract from the sites, nor does it mean the temples are not amazing. But when we have Sunil of this parish writing articles about Atlantis you have to stop and take a sniff of the smelling salts.
GT and the other sites push back the dates for large scale man made structures by a few hundred years. Not the 15,000 or so Hancock is regularly heard to claim.
I’m not batting for Hancock, you misconstrue me. I will indeed say that the Tas Tepeler are absolutely revolutionary, coz it is the case
Incidentally if you are interested in this stuff - and you obviously are - why don’t you go have a look? Seriously. See for yourself
These days Gobekli Tepe is now walled off and sheltered and gets a million visitors a year and that miraculous quality has largely gone (tho it is still a gob smacking site). When I first went I was the only non archaeologist there and we could wander between the stones drinking tea!
But at a site like Karahan Tepe you can still do that. Simply rock up. Wander about. You might be alone - or you can watch the archaeologists digging
Go on, do it! It would make an amazing holiday (combine it with a beach). Blow your mind!
If you want details on how to do it, DM me
It is definetely on my list. Along with various sites around Lake Van and in Kurdistan. My problem is time. I have had one 3 week holiday in 10 years. The joys of consultancy. I am hoping to do a bit more travelling again for pleasure rather than work but as always it is mañana.
3 weeks.... in ten years?!
That's insane. Life is for living, not working. Find the time before you keel over
Oh, for God's sake.
For [A PLURAL NUMBER OF DECADES SINCE 18] I had approx six periods, each a week or less, which could be described as a "holiday". It's only in my new job where they will not let you sell them that I have to take them, which are inevitably taken up with work.
You've never had a full-time job (or, arguably even a job as we would understand it) and you fail to understand the responsibility of people relying on you. Life is not like the movies and holidays are for children, not adults.
Can't tell if you're serious, I kind of hope you're not
I don't deny I have been lucky, but I have also made my own luck, to an extent. Don't let the man take you down
He doesn't strike me as poor, and he seems to be self-employed as a consultant - and therefore able to carve out time. A trip to go see the Tas Tepeler would cost less than £1000, could be done in as little as a week, even five days if you're mad, and would blow your mind - and his mind - like nothing else on this green earth, in terms of archaeology. A spectacular archaeological site, probably the most important on the planet, maybe the most important in all human history (these are some expert opinions, not mine) is happening RIGHT NOW. And you can just drive up and watch them doing it. Mazin!
I've not had a 'holiday' since the start of the pandemic. The odd day out, maybe.
There are more reasons than just work to be tied down.
Whilst I do have a number of places I'd like to go given the chance, I do wonder about some friends that are forever travelling the planet. What are they searching for? I don't think the answer to life the universe and everything lies in the Peruvian jungle (or wherever they are this week).
Actually, sod it, I will allow myself one photo - by me, from 2022 - of the Notorious Penis Chamber at Karahan Tepe. Mainly coz I’ll do anything to stop people talking about fricking ULEZ, also coz I just like writing “notorious penis chamber”
See here
What is this 12,000 year old room? WTF is it for?
At the moment, the best archaeological guess is that it is an initiation room for young adult males. It would have been roofed and dark. The boys would have stepped through the small door on the left, the room would have been half full of liquid piped in using the circled water channel. The liquid might have been animal blood - so one archaeologist told me. It might have poured through the mouth of the weird “head” acting as a spout. Then some ritual - sacrifice? Circumcision? Baptism? - would have been enacted. The boy becomes a man - a hunter - and then returns to the “audience room” just outside
This is 12,000 years old!!! Anyone who doesn’t find this seriously weird, brilliant, spooky, compelling and, yes, a *bit Graham Hancocky* is lacking a soul
Water tank? Why does everything unexplained have to be for 'rituals' of some bizarre kind?
A neolithic wooden trackway was discovered here in the Flatlands - it had been preserved in the peat. Quite a remarkable find really but as it was in a forgotten corner of the country not a lot was made of it.
Apparently - despite the lack of any artifacts - archaeologists say it must have been a route to a 'ritual platform'. Not the rather obvious purpose of a track to get to the other side of a wet area...
Most archaeologists agree that the Tas Tepeler are sacred sites. Stone circles, after all
There is near-zero evidence of human habitation at Gobekli Tepe (there is evidence at the other Tas Tepeler). Why build it? It is surely a temple; it is also, it seems, aligned astronomically
Some kind of penis worshipping hunter-warrior cult (with human sacrifice?) is the best guess at the moment
I admit to knowing almost nothing about these sites other than that they exist.
But how do you build a temple without living there, at least for some of the time?
And if you know how to build things, why not build houses?
The archaeology changes every year as they find amazing new stuff (which is one reason it’s so exciting)
For many years it was thought Gobekli Tepe was a singular miracle. A temple complex built by remarkably gifted cavemen who lived in temporary tents/shelters during the building season
Now at the other Tas Tepeler they have found permanent homes - besides the ritual shrines and cultic chambers. So it looks more and more like a civilisation, from 10,000 BC (or even earlier)
Worth pointing out that by the definition of 'civilisation' in that case it is not much different to the early pre-ceramic Neolithic of Northern Syria. The only big difference is the presence of temples. Jericho as a settlement dates back to 10,000 BC and the walled town dates to around 8,500 BC (and that wall is VERY impressive).
Even that is not the oldest structures in the area. Tell Qaramel has 5 towers dating back to around 10,000 BC and shows continuous occupation throughout the whole of the proto-Neolithic and pre-pottery Neolithic A & B (from around 10,500 to 9,000BC). These sites have been known since the 1970s.
The temples are, certainly, something else. But as I said before, this is not the revolutionary news that Hancock and others would have you believe.
Ian Hodder of Stanford Uni disagrees with you:
‘Gobekli Tepe changes everything.’
As an amateur archeologist with an interest in Syria, you’ll have heard of him
'Changes everything' is one of those phrases that can mean anything to anyone. Yes it is spectacular. No it does not mean an ancient 'civilisation' in Hancockian terms any more than the discovery of the Northern Syrian villages did.
That does not at all detract from the sites, nor does it mean the temples are not amazing. But when we have Sunil of this parish writing articles about Atlantis you have to stop and take a sniff of the smelling salts.
GT and the other sites push back the dates for large scale man made structures by a few hundred years. Not the 15,000 or so Hancock is regularly heard to claim.
I’m not batting for Hancock, you misconstrue me. I will indeed say that the Tas Tepeler are absolutely revolutionary, coz it is the case
Incidentally if you are interested in this stuff - and you obviously are - why don’t you go have a look? Seriously. See for yourself
These days Gobekli Tepe is now walled off and sheltered and gets a million visitors a year and that miraculous quality has largely gone (tho it is still a gob smacking site). When I first went I was the only non archaeologist there and we could wander between the stones drinking tea!
But at a site like Karahan Tepe you can still do that. Simply rock up. Wander about. You might be alone - or you can watch the archaeologists digging
Go on, do it! It would make an amazing holiday (combine it with a beach). Blow your mind!
If you want details on how to do it, DM me
It is definetely on my list. Along with various sites around Lake Van and in Kurdistan. My problem is time. I have had one 3 week holiday in 10 years. The joys of consultancy. I am hoping to do a bit more travelling again for pleasure rather than work but as always it is mañana.
3 weeks.... in ten years?!
That's insane. Life is for living, not working. Find the time before you keel over
Oh, for God's sake.
For [A PLURAL NUMBER OF DECADES SINCE 18] I had approx six periods, each a week or less, which could be described as a "holiday". It's only in my new job where they will not let you sell them that I have to take them, which are inevitably taken up with work.
You've never had a full-time job (or, arguably even a job as we would understand it) and you fail to understand the responsibility of people relying on you. Life is not like the movies and holidays are for children, not adults.
Can't tell if you're serious, I kind of hope you're not
I don't deny I have been lucky, but I have also made my own luck, to an extent. Don't let the man take you down
He doesn't strike me as poor, and he seems to be self-employed as a consultant - and therefore able to carve out time. A trip to go see the Tas Tepeler would cost less than £1000, could be done in as little as a week, even five days if you're mad, and would blow your mind - and his mind - like nothing else on this green earth, in terms of archaeology. A spectacular archaeological site, probably the most important on the planet, maybe the most important in all human history (these are some expert opinions, not mine) is happening RIGHT NOW. And you can just drive up and watch them doing it. Mazin!
Speaking as another consultant, time very much equals money (unless it is PB in which case you get my time FOC...). Not working = not getting paid. Or at least that is the mentality I started with. A few years in and what I get paid is not directly connected with the revenue I earn for my company.
I took two weeks off in July, revenue that month was obviously much lower, but that had no impact on what I pull out. I still take opportunistic work where I can get it - a weekend gig meant doing 12 days without a break earlier this month. Output for that client was limited at best by the end of that, but they are happy to pay so I am happy to invoice.
Holidays are ok. Time off relaxing is more important. And I get bored easily. Best option is combining travel and work - something you excel at of course!
Actually, sod it, I will allow myself one photo - by me, from 2022 - of the Notorious Penis Chamber at Karahan Tepe. Mainly coz I’ll do anything to stop people talking about fricking ULEZ, also coz I just like writing “notorious penis chamber”
See here
What is this 12,000 year old room? WTF is it for?
At the moment, the best archaeological guess is that it is an initiation room for young adult males. It would have been roofed and dark. The boys would have stepped through the small door on the left, the room would have been half full of liquid piped in using the circled water channel. The liquid might have been animal blood - so one archaeologist told me. It might have poured through the mouth of the weird “head” acting as a spout. Then some ritual - sacrifice? Circumcision? Baptism? - would have been enacted. The boy becomes a man - a hunter - and then returns to the “audience room” just outside
This is 12,000 years old!!! Anyone who doesn’t find this seriously weird, brilliant, spooky, compelling and, yes, a *bit Graham Hancocky* is lacking a soul
Water tank? Why does everything unexplained have to be for 'rituals' of some bizarre kind?
A neolithic wooden trackway was discovered here in the Flatlands - it had been preserved in the peat. Quite a remarkable find really but as it was in a forgotten corner of the country not a lot was made of it.
Apparently - despite the lack of any artifacts - archaeologists say it must have been a route to a 'ritual platform'. Not the rather obvious purpose of a track to get to the other side of a wet area...
Most archaeologists agree that the Tas Tepeler are sacred sites. Stone circles, after all
There is near-zero evidence of human habitation at Gobekli Tepe (there is evidence at the other Tas Tepeler). Why build it? It is surely a temple; it is also, it seems, aligned astronomically
Some kind of penis worshipping hunter-warrior cult (with human sacrifice?) is the best guess at the moment
I admit to knowing almost nothing about these sites other than that they exist.
But how do you build a temple without living there, at least for some of the time?
And if you know how to build things, why not build houses?
The archaeology changes every year as they find amazing new stuff (which is one reason it’s so exciting)
For many years it was thought Gobekli Tepe was a singular miracle. A temple complex built by remarkably gifted cavemen who lived in temporary tents/shelters during the building season
Now at the other Tas Tepeler they have found permanent homes - besides the ritual shrines and cultic chambers. So it looks more and more like a civilisation, from 10,000 BC (or even earlier)
Worth pointing out that by the definition of 'civilisation' in that case it is not much different to the early pre-ceramic Neolithic of Northern Syria. The only big difference is the presence of temples. Jericho as a settlement dates back to 10,000 BC and the walled town dates to around 8,500 BC (and that wall is VERY impressive).
Even that is not the oldest structures in the area. Tell Qaramel has 5 towers dating back to around 10,000 BC and shows continuous occupation throughout the whole of the proto-Neolithic and pre-pottery Neolithic A & B (from around 10,500 to 9,000BC). These sites have been known since the 1970s.
The temples are, certainly, something else. But as I said before, this is not the revolutionary news that Hancock and others would have you believe.
Ian Hodder of Stanford Uni disagrees with you:
‘Gobekli Tepe changes everything.’
As an amateur archeologist with an interest in Syria, you’ll have heard of him
'Changes everything' is one of those phrases that can mean anything to anyone. Yes it is spectacular. No it does not mean an ancient 'civilisation' in Hancockian terms any more than the discovery of the Northern Syrian villages did.
That does not at all detract from the sites, nor does it mean the temples are not amazing. But when we have Sunil of this parish writing articles about Atlantis you have to stop and take a sniff of the smelling salts.
GT and the other sites push back the dates for large scale man made structures by a few hundred years. Not the 15,000 or so Hancock is regularly heard to claim.
I’m not batting for Hancock, you misconstrue me. I will indeed say that the Tas Tepeler are absolutely revolutionary, coz it is the case
Incidentally if you are interested in this stuff - and you obviously are - why don’t you go have a look? Seriously. See for yourself
These days Gobekli Tepe is now walled off and sheltered and gets a million visitors a year and that miraculous quality has largely gone (tho it is still a gob smacking site). When I first went I was the only non archaeologist there and we could wander between the stones drinking tea!
But at a site like Karahan Tepe you can still do that. Simply rock up. Wander about. You might be alone - or you can watch the archaeologists digging
Go on, do it! It would make an amazing holiday (combine it with a beach). Blow your mind!
If you want details on how to do it, DM me
It is definetely on my list. Along with various sites around Lake Van and in Kurdistan. My problem is time. I have had one 3 week holiday in 10 years. The joys of consultancy. I am hoping to do a bit more travelling again for pleasure rather than work but as always it is mañana.
3 weeks.... in ten years?!
That's insane. Life is for living, not working. Find the time before you keel over
Oh, for God's sake.
For [A PLURAL NUMBER OF DECADES SINCE 18] I had approx six periods, each a week or less, which could be described as a "holiday". It's only in my new job where they will not let you sell them that I have to take them, which are inevitably taken up with work.
You've never had a full-time job (or, arguably even a job as we would understand it) and you fail to understand the responsibility of people relying on you. Life is not like the movies and holidays are for children, not adults.
Can't tell if you're serious, I kind of hope you're not
I don't deny I have been lucky, but I have also made my own luck, to an extent. Don't let the man take you down
He doesn't strike me as poor, and he seems to be self-employed as a consultant - and therefore able to carve out time. A trip to go see the Tas Tepeler would cost less than £1000, could be done in as little as a week, even five days if you're mad, and would blow your mind - and his mind - like nothing else on this green earth, in terms of archaeology. A spectacular archaeological site, probably the most important on the planet, maybe the most important in all human history (these are some expert opinions, not mine) is happening RIGHT NOW. And you can just drive up and watch them doing it. Mazin!
Of course combining work with leisure is a good way to square the circle, but relies on having a job that regularly takes you to exotic and interesting travel destinations. I'm aware there's plenty of oil in Kurdistan to presumably there's some sort of consultancy gig that could land one within striking distance of these sites.
Before Covid I had one of those jobs - lots of short haul and a few long haul trips each year, some to fairly boring places but plenty to cities that were close enough to tack on a couple of days of exploration afterwards. Sadly since the pandemic that's no longer the case. Perhaps 6 or 7 short haul trips a year mainly to European capitals, and one or two long haul to well trodden places like NY or Singapore.
But working for a large organisation has its benefits too. I have 30 days holiday a year. For entrepreneurs and self-employed consultants it's difficult to drag yourself away for that much time. That said I have a good friend who runs a D&I consultancy and he is off on his travels more often than he's in the office. He recently had a honeymoon in Timor Leste and is off to Djibouti and Somaliland in November.
I hear you
That said, even somewhere like Singapore means you are only an hour's boat ride from some exquisite and lesser known destinations. Like the Riau/Anambas Archipelago
Yes and mostly no. Labour has more than one objective, and these do not perfectly align. It needs to win an election, it needs the wealth/job creating establishment on its side, it needs the market makers, movers and shakers to allow it the width it did not give Truss, and it needs the real support and votes of the middle class and above who are centre left, have fashionable views but are also fond of their position and status. This last group is massively represented among the talking heads of society.
'No wealth tax' is aimed at all four groups. Few ordinary voters will shift their vote to LD or Tory on account of there being no wealth tax. The other groups will, privately, find it most acceptable.
Meanwhile Labour turns into a noiseless and personality free version of Blair. The good news is that this lot is less likely to invade middle eastern countries than their more excitable predecessors.
Labour will, however need to find ways of taxing wealth. Local taxation of housing would be the optimal means. The gap between the Accrington terrace and the Mayfair mansion is too small.
Most of all it needs to join EFTA/EEA or go Swiss. As this aligns with the Brexit vote the detail can be kept until after the election.
Agree with all of this.
Yes - seems sensible.
My concern is that Mr Starmer is turning far too much into Brown or Tory Lite on a whole range of questions.
Actually, sod it, I will allow myself one photo - by me, from 2022 - of the Notorious Penis Chamber at Karahan Tepe. Mainly coz I’ll do anything to stop people talking about fricking ULEZ, also coz I just like writing “notorious penis chamber”
See here
What is this 12,000 year old room? WTF is it for?
At the moment, the best archaeological guess is that it is an initiation room for young adult males. It would have been roofed and dark. The boys would have stepped through the small door on the left, the room would have been half full of liquid piped in using the circled water channel. The liquid might have been animal blood - so one archaeologist told me. It might have poured through the mouth of the weird “head” acting as a spout. Then some ritual - sacrifice? Circumcision? Baptism? - would have been enacted. The boy becomes a man - a hunter - and then returns to the “audience room” just outside
This is 12,000 years old!!! Anyone who doesn’t find this seriously weird, brilliant, spooky, compelling and, yes, a *bit Graham Hancocky* is lacking a soul
Water tank? Why does everything unexplained have to be for 'rituals' of some bizarre kind?
A neolithic wooden trackway was discovered here in the Flatlands - it had been preserved in the peat. Quite a remarkable find really but as it was in a forgotten corner of the country not a lot was made of it.
Apparently - despite the lack of any artifacts - archaeologists say it must have been a route to a 'ritual platform'. Not the rather obvious purpose of a track to get to the other side of a wet area...
Most archaeologists agree that the Tas Tepeler are sacred sites. Stone circles, after all
There is near-zero evidence of human habitation at Gobekli Tepe (there is evidence at the other Tas Tepeler). Why build it? It is surely a temple; it is also, it seems, aligned astronomically
Some kind of penis worshipping hunter-warrior cult (with human sacrifice?) is the best guess at the moment
I admit to knowing almost nothing about these sites other than that they exist.
But how do you build a temple without living there, at least for some of the time?
And if you know how to build things, why not build houses?
The archaeology changes every year as they find amazing new stuff (which is one reason it’s so exciting)
For many years it was thought Gobekli Tepe was a singular miracle. A temple complex built by remarkably gifted cavemen who lived in temporary tents/shelters during the building season
Now at the other Tas Tepeler they have found permanent homes - besides the ritual shrines and cultic chambers. So it looks more and more like a civilisation, from 10,000 BC (or even earlier)
Worth pointing out that by the definition of 'civilisation' in that case it is not much different to the early pre-ceramic Neolithic of Northern Syria. The only big difference is the presence of temples. Jericho as a settlement dates back to 10,000 BC and the walled town dates to around 8,500 BC (and that wall is VERY impressive).
Even that is not the oldest structures in the area. Tell Qaramel has 5 towers dating back to around 10,000 BC and shows continuous occupation throughout the whole of the proto-Neolithic and pre-pottery Neolithic A & B (from around 10,500 to 9,000BC). These sites have been known since the 1970s.
The temples are, certainly, something else. But as I said before, this is not the revolutionary news that Hancock and others would have you believe.
Ian Hodder of Stanford Uni disagrees with you:
‘Gobekli Tepe changes everything.’
As an amateur archeologist with an interest in Syria, you’ll have heard of him
'Changes everything' is one of those phrases that can mean anything to anyone. Yes it is spectacular. No it does not mean an ancient 'civilisation' in Hancockian terms any more than the discovery of the Northern Syrian villages did.
That does not at all detract from the sites, nor does it mean the temples are not amazing. But when we have Sunil of this parish writing articles about Atlantis you have to stop and take a sniff of the smelling salts.
GT and the other sites push back the dates for large scale man made structures by a few hundred years. Not the 15,000 or so Hancock is regularly heard to claim.
I’m not batting for Hancock, you misconstrue me. I will indeed say that the Tas Tepeler are absolutely revolutionary, coz it is the case
Incidentally if you are interested in this stuff - and you obviously are - why don’t you go have a look? Seriously. See for yourself
These days Gobekli Tepe is now walled off and sheltered and gets a million visitors a year and that miraculous quality has largely gone (tho it is still a gob smacking site). When I first went I was the only non archaeologist there and we could wander between the stones drinking tea!
But at a site like Karahan Tepe you can still do that. Simply rock up. Wander about. You might be alone - or you can watch the archaeologists digging
Go on, do it! It would make an amazing holiday (combine it with a beach). Blow your mind!
If you want details on how to do it, DM me
It is definetely on my list. Along with various sites around Lake Van and in Kurdistan. My problem is time. I have had one 3 week holiday in 10 years. The joys of consultancy. I am hoping to do a bit more travelling again for pleasure rather than work but as always it is mañana.
3 weeks.... in ten years?!
That's insane. Life is for living, not working. Find the time before you keel over
Oh, for God's sake.
For [A PLURAL NUMBER OF DECADES SINCE 18] I had approx six periods, each a week or less, which could be described as a "holiday". It's only in my new job where they will not let you sell them that I have to take them, which are inevitably taken up with work.
You've never had a full-time job (or, arguably even a job as we would understand it) and you fail to understand the responsibility of people relying on you. Life is not like the movies and holidays are for children, not adults.
Can't tell if you're serious, I kind of hope you're not
I don't deny I have been lucky, but I have also made my own luck, to an extent. Don't let the man take you down
He doesn't strike me as poor, and he seems to be self-employed as a consultant - and therefore able to carve out time. A trip to go see the Tas Tepeler would cost less than £1000, could be done in as little as a week, even five days if you're mad, and would blow your mind - and his mind - like nothing else on this green earth, in terms of archaeology. A spectacular archaeological site, probably the most important on the planet, maybe the most important in all human history (these are some expert opinions, not mine) is happening RIGHT NOW. And you can just drive up and watch them doing it. Mazin!
Of course combining work with leisure is a good way to square the circle, but relies on having a job that regularly takes you to exotic and interesting travel destinations. I'm aware there's plenty of oil in Kurdistan to presumably there's some sort of consultancy gig that could land one within striking distance of these sites.
Before Covid I had one of those jobs - lots of short haul and a few long haul trips each year, some to fairly boring places but plenty to cities that were close enough to tack on a couple of days of exploration afterwards. Sadly since the pandemic that's no longer the case. Perhaps 6 or 7 short haul trips a year mainly to European capitals, and one or two long haul to well trodden places like NY or Singapore.
But working for a large organisation has its benefits too. I have 30 days holiday a year. For entrepreneurs and self-employed consultants it's difficult to drag yourself away for that much time. That said I have a good friend who runs a D&I consultancy and he is off on his travels more often than he's in the office. He recently had a honeymoon in Timor Leste and is off to Djibouti and Somaliland in November.
I hear you
That said, even somewhere like Singapore means you are only an hour's boat ride from some exquisite and lesser known destinations. Like the Riau/Anambas Archipelago
I did once do a fairly bog standard trip from Singapore on the ferry to Batam, a fairly humdrum sort of place, but managed to find myself in the middle of a riot over land rights. I had a whale of a time and got some good photos. Felt like a photojournalist. The rioters were very friendly and happy to have a random westerner to pose for. Only time I've felt mild effects of tear gas too.
Actually, sod it, I will allow myself one photo - by me, from 2022 - of the Notorious Penis Chamber at Karahan Tepe. Mainly coz I’ll do anything to stop people talking about fricking ULEZ, also coz I just like writing “notorious penis chamber”
See here
What is this 12,000 year old room? WTF is it for?
At the moment, the best archaeological guess is that it is an initiation room for young adult males. It would have been roofed and dark. The boys would have stepped through the small door on the left, the room would have been half full of liquid piped in using the circled water channel. The liquid might have been animal blood - so one archaeologist told me. It might have poured through the mouth of the weird “head” acting as a spout. Then some ritual - sacrifice? Circumcision? Baptism? - would have been enacted. The boy becomes a man - a hunter - and then returns to the “audience room” just outside
This is 12,000 years old!!! Anyone who doesn’t find this seriously weird, brilliant, spooky, compelling and, yes, a *bit Graham Hancocky* is lacking a soul
Water tank? Why does everything unexplained have to be for 'rituals' of some bizarre kind?
A neolithic wooden trackway was discovered here in the Flatlands - it had been preserved in the peat. Quite a remarkable find really but as it was in a forgotten corner of the country not a lot was made of it.
Apparently - despite the lack of any artifacts - archaeologists say it must have been a route to a 'ritual platform'. Not the rather obvious purpose of a track to get to the other side of a wet area...
Most archaeologists agree that the Tas Tepeler are sacred sites. Stone circles, after all
There is near-zero evidence of human habitation at Gobekli Tepe (there is evidence at the other Tas Tepeler). Why build it? It is surely a temple; it is also, it seems, aligned astronomically
Some kind of penis worshipping hunter-warrior cult (with human sacrifice?) is the best guess at the moment
I admit to knowing almost nothing about these sites other than that they exist.
But how do you build a temple without living there, at least for some of the time?
And if you know how to build things, why not build houses?
The archaeology changes every year as they find amazing new stuff (which is one reason it’s so exciting)
For many years it was thought Gobekli Tepe was a singular miracle. A temple complex built by remarkably gifted cavemen who lived in temporary tents/shelters during the building season
Now at the other Tas Tepeler they have found permanent homes - besides the ritual shrines and cultic chambers. So it looks more and more like a civilisation, from 10,000 BC (or even earlier)
Worth pointing out that by the definition of 'civilisation' in that case it is not much different to the early pre-ceramic Neolithic of Northern Syria. The only big difference is the presence of temples. Jericho as a settlement dates back to 10,000 BC and the walled town dates to around 8,500 BC (and that wall is VERY impressive).
Even that is not the oldest structures in the area. Tell Qaramel has 5 towers dating back to around 10,000 BC and shows continuous occupation throughout the whole of the proto-Neolithic and pre-pottery Neolithic A & B (from around 10,500 to 9,000BC). These sites have been known since the 1970s.
The temples are, certainly, something else. But as I said before, this is not the revolutionary news that Hancock and others would have you believe.
Ian Hodder of Stanford Uni disagrees with you:
‘Gobekli Tepe changes everything.’
As an amateur archeologist with an interest in Syria, you’ll have heard of him
'Changes everything' is one of those phrases that can mean anything to anyone. Yes it is spectacular. No it does not mean an ancient 'civilisation' in Hancockian terms any more than the discovery of the Northern Syrian villages did.
That does not at all detract from the sites, nor does it mean the temples are not amazing. But when we have Sunil of this parish writing articles about Atlantis you have to stop and take a sniff of the smelling salts.
GT and the other sites push back the dates for large scale man made structures by a few hundred years. Not the 15,000 or so Hancock is regularly heard to claim.
I’m not batting for Hancock, you misconstrue me. I will indeed say that the Tas Tepeler are absolutely revolutionary, coz it is the case
Incidentally if you are interested in this stuff - and you obviously are - why don’t you go have a look? Seriously. See for yourself
These days Gobekli Tepe is now walled off and sheltered and gets a million visitors a year and that miraculous quality has largely gone (tho it is still a gob smacking site). When I first went I was the only non archaeologist there and we could wander between the stones drinking tea!
But at a site like Karahan Tepe you can still do that. Simply rock up. Wander about. You might be alone - or you can watch the archaeologists digging
Go on, do it! It would make an amazing holiday (combine it with a beach). Blow your mind!
If you want details on how to do it, DM me
It is definetely on my list. Along with various sites around Lake Van and in Kurdistan. My problem is time. I have had one 3 week holiday in 10 years. The joys of consultancy. I am hoping to do a bit more travelling again for pleasure rather than work but as always it is mañana.
3 weeks.... in ten years?!
That's insane. Life is for living, not working. Find the time before you keel over
Oh, for God's sake.
For [A PLURAL NUMBER OF DECADES SINCE 18] I had approx six periods, each a week or less, which could be described as a "holiday". It's only in my new job where they will not let you sell them that I have to take them, which are inevitably taken up with work.
You've never had a full-time job (or, arguably even a job as we would understand it) and you fail to understand the responsibility of people relying on you. Life is not like the movies and holidays are for children, not adults.
Can't tell if you're serious, I kind of hope you're not
I don't deny I have been lucky, but I have also made my own luck, to an extent. Don't let the man take you down
He doesn't strike me as poor, and he seems to be self-employed as a consultant - and therefore able to carve out time. A trip to go see the Tas Tepeler would cost less than £1000, could be done in as little as a week, even five days if you're mad, and would blow your mind - and his mind - like nothing else on this green earth, in terms of archaeology. A spectacular archaeological site, probably the most important on the planet, maybe the most important in all human history (these are some expert opinions, not mine) is happening RIGHT NOW. And you can just drive up and watch them doing it. Mazin!
Speaking as another consultant, time very much equals money (unless it is PB in which case you get my time FOC...). Not working = not getting paid. Or at least that is the mentality I started with. A few years in and what I get paid is not directly connected with the revenue I earn for my company.
I took two weeks off in July, revenue that month was obviously much lower, but that had no impact on what I pull out. I still take opportunistic work where I can get it - a weekend gig meant doing 12 days without a break earlier this month. Output for that client was limited at best by the end of that, but they are happy to pay so I am happy to invoice.
Holidays are ok. Time off relaxing is more important. And I get bored easily. Best option is combining travel and work - something you excel at of course!
The whole concept of holidays is a bit weird. Someone pays you for not going to work? What’s in it for them?
When you add the foregone income to the cost of the holiday it becomes somewhat expensive. In fairness, @Leon seems to make money out of most of his trips. Good luck to him.
Actually, sod it, I will allow myself one photo - by me, from 2022 - of the Notorious Penis Chamber at Karahan Tepe. Mainly coz I’ll do anything to stop people talking about fricking ULEZ, also coz I just like writing “notorious penis chamber”
See here
What is this 12,000 year old room? WTF is it for?
At the moment, the best archaeological guess is that it is an initiation room for young adult males. It would have been roofed and dark. The boys would have stepped through the small door on the left, the room would have been half full of liquid piped in using the circled water channel. The liquid might have been animal blood - so one archaeologist told me. It might have poured through the mouth of the weird “head” acting as a spout. Then some ritual - sacrifice? Circumcision? Baptism? - would have been enacted. The boy becomes a man - a hunter - and then returns to the “audience room” just outside
This is 12,000 years old!!! Anyone who doesn’t find this seriously weird, brilliant, spooky, compelling and, yes, a *bit Graham Hancocky* is lacking a soul
Water tank? Why does everything unexplained have to be for 'rituals' of some bizarre kind?
A neolithic wooden trackway was discovered here in the Flatlands - it had been preserved in the peat. Quite a remarkable find really but as it was in a forgotten corner of the country not a lot was made of it.
Apparently - despite the lack of any artifacts - archaeologists say it must have been a route to a 'ritual platform'. Not the rather obvious purpose of a track to get to the other side of a wet area...
Most archaeologists agree that the Tas Tepeler are sacred sites. Stone circles, after all
There is near-zero evidence of human habitation at Gobekli Tepe (there is evidence at the other Tas Tepeler). Why build it? It is surely a temple; it is also, it seems, aligned astronomically
Some kind of penis worshipping hunter-warrior cult (with human sacrifice?) is the best guess at the moment
I admit to knowing almost nothing about these sites other than that they exist.
But how do you build a temple without living there, at least for some of the time?
And if you know how to build things, why not build houses?
The archaeology changes every year as they find amazing new stuff (which is one reason it’s so exciting)
For many years it was thought Gobekli Tepe was a singular miracle. A temple complex built by remarkably gifted cavemen who lived in temporary tents/shelters during the building season
Now at the other Tas Tepeler they have found permanent homes - besides the ritual shrines and cultic chambers. So it looks more and more like a civilisation, from 10,000 BC (or even earlier)
Worth pointing out that by the definition of 'civilisation' in that case it is not much different to the early pre-ceramic Neolithic of Northern Syria. The only big difference is the presence of temples. Jericho as a settlement dates back to 10,000 BC and the walled town dates to around 8,500 BC (and that wall is VERY impressive).
Even that is not the oldest structures in the area. Tell Qaramel has 5 towers dating back to around 10,000 BC and shows continuous occupation throughout the whole of the proto-Neolithic and pre-pottery Neolithic A & B (from around 10,500 to 9,000BC). These sites have been known since the 1970s.
The temples are, certainly, something else. But as I said before, this is not the revolutionary news that Hancock and others would have you believe.
Ian Hodder of Stanford Uni disagrees with you:
‘Gobekli Tepe changes everything.’
As an amateur archeologist with an interest in Syria, you’ll have heard of him
'Changes everything' is one of those phrases that can mean anything to anyone. Yes it is spectacular. No it does not mean an ancient 'civilisation' in Hancockian terms any more than the discovery of the Northern Syrian villages did.
That does not at all detract from the sites, nor does it mean the temples are not amazing. But when we have Sunil of this parish writing articles about Atlantis you have to stop and take a sniff of the smelling salts.
GT and the other sites push back the dates for large scale man made structures by a few hundred years. Not the 15,000 or so Hancock is regularly heard to claim.
I’m not batting for Hancock, you misconstrue me. I will indeed say that the Tas Tepeler are absolutely revolutionary, coz it is the case
Incidentally if you are interested in this stuff - and you obviously are - why don’t you go have a look? Seriously. See for yourself
These days Gobekli Tepe is now walled off and sheltered and gets a million visitors a year and that miraculous quality has largely gone (tho it is still a gob smacking site). When I first went I was the only non archaeologist there and we could wander between the stones drinking tea!
But at a site like Karahan Tepe you can still do that. Simply rock up. Wander about. You might be alone - or you can watch the archaeologists digging
Go on, do it! It would make an amazing holiday (combine it with a beach). Blow your mind!
If you want details on how to do it, DM me
It is definetely on my list. Along with various sites around Lake Van and in Kurdistan. My problem is time. I have had one 3 week holiday in 10 years. The joys of consultancy. I am hoping to do a bit more travelling again for pleasure rather than work but as always it is mañana.
Is the answer to that one not just that it is your decision what you do with the time you have, and how you set your priorities?
Actually, sod it, I will allow myself one photo - by me, from 2022 - of the Notorious Penis Chamber at Karahan Tepe. Mainly coz I’ll do anything to stop people talking about fricking ULEZ, also coz I just like writing “notorious penis chamber”
See here
What is this 12,000 year old room? WTF is it for?
At the moment, the best archaeological guess is that it is an initiation room for young adult males. It would have been roofed and dark. The boys would have stepped through the small door on the left, the room would have been half full of liquid piped in using the circled water channel. The liquid might have been animal blood - so one archaeologist told me. It might have poured through the mouth of the weird “head” acting as a spout. Then some ritual - sacrifice? Circumcision? Baptism? - would have been enacted. The boy becomes a man - a hunter - and then returns to the “audience room” just outside
This is 12,000 years old!!! Anyone who doesn’t find this seriously weird, brilliant, spooky, compelling and, yes, a *bit Graham Hancocky* is lacking a soul
Water tank? Why does everything unexplained have to be for 'rituals' of some bizarre kind?
A neolithic wooden trackway was discovered here in the Flatlands - it had been preserved in the peat. Quite a remarkable find really but as it was in a forgotten corner of the country not a lot was made of it.
Apparently - despite the lack of any artifacts - archaeologists say it must have been a route to a 'ritual platform'. Not the rather obvious purpose of a track to get to the other side of a wet area...
Most archaeologists agree that the Tas Tepeler are sacred sites. Stone circles, after all
There is near-zero evidence of human habitation at Gobekli Tepe (there is evidence at the other Tas Tepeler). Why build it? It is surely a temple; it is also, it seems, aligned astronomically
Some kind of penis worshipping hunter-warrior cult (with human sacrifice?) is the best guess at the moment
I admit to knowing almost nothing about these sites other than that they exist.
But how do you build a temple without living there, at least for some of the time?
And if you know how to build things, why not build houses?
The archaeology changes every year as they find amazing new stuff (which is one reason it’s so exciting)
For many years it was thought Gobekli Tepe was a singular miracle. A temple complex built by remarkably gifted cavemen who lived in temporary tents/shelters during the building season
Now at the other Tas Tepeler they have found permanent homes - besides the ritual shrines and cultic chambers. So it looks more and more like a civilisation, from 10,000 BC (or even earlier)
Worth pointing out that by the definition of 'civilisation' in that case it is not much different to the early pre-ceramic Neolithic of Northern Syria. The only big difference is the presence of temples. Jericho as a settlement dates back to 10,000 BC and the walled town dates to around 8,500 BC (and that wall is VERY impressive).
Even that is not the oldest structures in the area. Tell Qaramel has 5 towers dating back to around 10,000 BC and shows continuous occupation throughout the whole of the proto-Neolithic and pre-pottery Neolithic A & B (from around 10,500 to 9,000BC). These sites have been known since the 1970s.
The temples are, certainly, something else. But as I said before, this is not the revolutionary news that Hancock and others would have you believe.
Ian Hodder of Stanford Uni disagrees with you:
‘Gobekli Tepe changes everything.’
As an amateur archeologist with an interest in Syria, you’ll have heard of him
'Changes everything' is one of those phrases that can mean anything to anyone. Yes it is spectacular. No it does not mean an ancient 'civilisation' in Hancockian terms any more than the discovery of the Northern Syrian villages did.
That does not at all detract from the sites, nor does it mean the temples are not amazing. But when we have Sunil of this parish writing articles about Atlantis you have to stop and take a sniff of the smelling salts.
GT and the other sites push back the dates for large scale man made structures by a few hundred years. Not the 15,000 or so Hancock is regularly heard to claim.
I’m not batting for Hancock, you misconstrue me. I will indeed say that the Tas Tepeler are absolutely revolutionary, coz it is the case
Incidentally if you are interested in this stuff - and you obviously are - why don’t you go have a look? Seriously. See for yourself
These days Gobekli Tepe is now walled off and sheltered and gets a million visitors a year and that miraculous quality has largely gone (tho it is still a gob smacking site). When I first went I was the only non archaeologist there and we could wander between the stones drinking tea!
But at a site like Karahan Tepe you can still do that. Simply rock up. Wander about. You might be alone - or you can watch the archaeologists digging
Go on, do it! It would make an amazing holiday (combine it with a beach). Blow your mind!
If you want details on how to do it, DM me
It is definetely on my list. Along with various sites around Lake Van and in Kurdistan. My problem is time. I have had one 3 week holiday in 10 years. The joys of consultancy. I am hoping to do a bit more travelling again for pleasure rather than work but as always it is mañana.
3 weeks.... in ten years?!
That's insane. Life is for living, not working. Find the time before you keel over
Oh, for God's sake.
For [A PLURAL NUMBER OF DECADES SINCE 18] I had approx six periods, each a week or less, which could be described as a "holiday". It's only in my new job where they will not let you sell them that I have to take them, which are inevitably taken up with work.
You've never had a full-time job (or, arguably even a job as we would understand it) and you fail to understand the responsibility of people relying on you. Life is not like the movies and holidays are for children, not adults.
Can't tell if you're serious, I kind of hope you're not
I don't deny I have been lucky, but I have also made my own luck, to an extent. Don't let the man take you down
He doesn't strike me as poor, and he seems to be self-employed as a consultant - and therefore able to carve out time. A trip to go see the Tas Tepeler would cost less than £1000, could be done in as little as a week, even five days if you're mad, and would blow your mind - and his mind - like nothing else on this green earth, in terms of archaeology. A spectacular archaeological site, probably the most important on the planet, maybe the most important in all human history (these are some expert opinions, not mine) is happening RIGHT NOW. And you can just drive up and watch them doing it. Mazin!
Speaking as another consultant, time very much equals money (unless it is PB in which case you get my time FOC...). Not working = not getting paid. Or at least that is the mentality I started with. A few years in and what I get paid is not directly connected with the revenue I earn for my company.
I took two weeks off in July, revenue that month was obviously much lower, but that had no impact on what I pull out. I still take opportunistic work where I can get it - a weekend gig meant doing 12 days without a break earlier this month. Output for that client was limited at best by the end of that, but they are happy to pay so I am happy to invoice.
Holidays are ok. Time off relaxing is more important. And I get bored easily. Best option is combining travel and work - something you excel at of course!
I didn't have a single day off between April 10th and the last week in May.
Made a lot of money, don't get me wrong, but also resolved never to do that again.
Actually, sod it, I will allow myself one photo - by me, from 2022 - of the Notorious Penis Chamber at Karahan Tepe. Mainly coz I’ll do anything to stop people talking about fricking ULEZ, also coz I just like writing “notorious penis chamber”
See here
What is this 12,000 year old room? WTF is it for?
At the moment, the best archaeological guess is that it is an initiation room for young adult males. It would have been roofed and dark. The boys would have stepped through the small door on the left, the room would have been half full of liquid piped in using the circled water channel. The liquid might have been animal blood - so one archaeologist told me. It might have poured through the mouth of the weird “head” acting as a spout. Then some ritual - sacrifice? Circumcision? Baptism? - would have been enacted. The boy becomes a man - a hunter - and then returns to the “audience room” just outside
This is 12,000 years old!!! Anyone who doesn’t find this seriously weird, brilliant, spooky, compelling and, yes, a *bit Graham Hancocky* is lacking a soul
Water tank? Why does everything unexplained have to be for 'rituals' of some bizarre kind?
A neolithic wooden trackway was discovered here in the Flatlands - it had been preserved in the peat. Quite a remarkable find really but as it was in a forgotten corner of the country not a lot was made of it.
Apparently - despite the lack of any artifacts - archaeologists say it must have been a route to a 'ritual platform'. Not the rather obvious purpose of a track to get to the other side of a wet area...
Most archaeologists agree that the Tas Tepeler are sacred sites. Stone circles, after all
There is near-zero evidence of human habitation at Gobekli Tepe (there is evidence at the other Tas Tepeler). Why build it? It is surely a temple; it is also, it seems, aligned astronomically
Some kind of penis worshipping hunter-warrior cult (with human sacrifice?) is the best guess at the moment
I admit to knowing almost nothing about these sites other than that they exist.
But how do you build a temple without living there, at least for some of the time?
And if you know how to build things, why not build houses?
The archaeology changes every year as they find amazing new stuff (which is one reason it’s so exciting)
For many years it was thought Gobekli Tepe was a singular miracle. A temple complex built by remarkably gifted cavemen who lived in temporary tents/shelters during the building season
Now at the other Tas Tepeler they have found permanent homes - besides the ritual shrines and cultic chambers. So it looks more and more like a civilisation, from 10,000 BC (or even earlier)
Worth pointing out that by the definition of 'civilisation' in that case it is not much different to the early pre-ceramic Neolithic of Northern Syria. The only big difference is the presence of temples. Jericho as a settlement dates back to 10,000 BC and the walled town dates to around 8,500 BC (and that wall is VERY impressive).
Even that is not the oldest structures in the area. Tell Qaramel has 5 towers dating back to around 10,000 BC and shows continuous occupation throughout the whole of the proto-Neolithic and pre-pottery Neolithic A & B (from around 10,500 to 9,000BC). These sites have been known since the 1970s.
The temples are, certainly, something else. But as I said before, this is not the revolutionary news that Hancock and others would have you believe.
Ian Hodder of Stanford Uni disagrees with you:
‘Gobekli Tepe changes everything.’
As an amateur archeologist with an interest in Syria, you’ll have heard of him
'Changes everything' is one of those phrases that can mean anything to anyone. Yes it is spectacular. No it does not mean an ancient 'civilisation' in Hancockian terms any more than the discovery of the Northern Syrian villages did.
That does not at all detract from the sites, nor does it mean the temples are not amazing. But when we have Sunil of this parish writing articles about Atlantis you have to stop and take a sniff of the smelling salts.
GT and the other sites push back the dates for large scale man made structures by a few hundred years. Not the 15,000 or so Hancock is regularly heard to claim.
I’m not batting for Hancock, you misconstrue me. I will indeed say that the Tas Tepeler are absolutely revolutionary, coz it is the case
Incidentally if you are interested in this stuff - and you obviously are - why don’t you go have a look? Seriously. See for yourself
These days Gobekli Tepe is now walled off and sheltered and gets a million visitors a year and that miraculous quality has largely gone (tho it is still a gob smacking site). When I first went I was the only non archaeologist there and we could wander between the stones drinking tea!
But at a site like Karahan Tepe you can still do that. Simply rock up. Wander about. You might be alone - or you can watch the archaeologists digging
Go on, do it! It would make an amazing holiday (combine it with a beach). Blow your mind!
If you want details on how to do it, DM me
It is definetely on my list. Along with various sites around Lake Van and in Kurdistan. My problem is time. I have had one 3 week holiday in 10 years. The joys of consultancy. I am hoping to do a bit more travelling again for pleasure rather than work but as always it is mañana.
3 weeks.... in ten years?!
That's insane. Life is for living, not working. Find the time before you keel over
Oh, for God's sake.
For [A PLURAL NUMBER OF DECADES SINCE 18] I had approx six periods, each a week or less, which could be described as a "holiday". It's only in my new job where they will not let you sell them that I have to take them, which are inevitably taken up with work.
You've never had a full-time job (or, arguably even a job as we would understand it) and you fail to understand the responsibility of people relying on you. Life is not like the movies and holidays are for children, not adults.
Can't tell if you're serious, I kind of hope you're not
I don't deny I have been lucky, but I have also made my own luck, to an extent. Don't let the man take you down
He doesn't strike me as poor, and he seems to be self-employed as a consultant - and therefore able to carve out time. A trip to go see the Tas Tepeler would cost less than £1000, could be done in as little as a week, even five days if you're mad, and would blow your mind - and his mind - like nothing else on this green earth, in terms of archaeology. A spectacular archaeological site, probably the most important on the planet, maybe the most important in all human history (these are some expert opinions, not mine) is happening RIGHT NOW. And you can just drive up and watch them doing it. Mazin!
Speaking as another consultant, time very much equals money (unless it is PB in which case you get my time FOC...). Not working = not getting paid. Or at least that is the mentality I started with. A few years in and what I get paid is not directly connected with the revenue I earn for my company.
I took two weeks off in July, revenue that month was obviously much lower, but that had no impact on what I pull out. I still take opportunistic work where I can get it - a weekend gig meant doing 12 days without a break earlier this month. Output for that client was limited at best by the end of that, but they are happy to pay so I am happy to invoice.
Holidays are ok. Time off relaxing is more important. And I get bored easily. Best option is combining travel and work - something you excel at of course!
The whole concept of holidays is a bit weird. Someone pays you for not going to work? What’s in it for them?
When you add the foregone income to the cost of the holiday it becomes somewhat expensive. In fairness, @Leon seems to make money out of most of his trips. Good luck to him.
What's in it for them? Being able to recruit and retain employees.
Actually, sod it, I will allow myself one photo - by me, from 2022 - of the Notorious Penis Chamber at Karahan Tepe. Mainly coz I’ll do anything to stop people talking about fricking ULEZ, also coz I just like writing “notorious penis chamber”
See here
What is this 12,000 year old room? WTF is it for?
At the moment, the best archaeological guess is that it is an initiation room for young adult males. It would have been roofed and dark. The boys would have stepped through the small door on the left, the room would have been half full of liquid piped in using the circled water channel. The liquid might have been animal blood - so one archaeologist told me. It might have poured through the mouth of the weird “head” acting as a spout. Then some ritual - sacrifice? Circumcision? Baptism? - would have been enacted. The boy becomes a man - a hunter - and then returns to the “audience room” just outside
This is 12,000 years old!!! Anyone who doesn’t find this seriously weird, brilliant, spooky, compelling and, yes, a *bit Graham Hancocky* is lacking a soul
Water tank? Why does everything unexplained have to be for 'rituals' of some bizarre kind?
A neolithic wooden trackway was discovered here in the Flatlands - it had been preserved in the peat. Quite a remarkable find really but as it was in a forgotten corner of the country not a lot was made of it.
Apparently - despite the lack of any artifacts - archaeologists say it must have been a route to a 'ritual platform'. Not the rather obvious purpose of a track to get to the other side of a wet area...
Most archaeologists agree that the Tas Tepeler are sacred sites. Stone circles, after all
There is near-zero evidence of human habitation at Gobekli Tepe (there is evidence at the other Tas Tepeler). Why build it? It is surely a temple; it is also, it seems, aligned astronomically
Some kind of penis worshipping hunter-warrior cult (with human sacrifice?) is the best guess at the moment
I admit to knowing almost nothing about these sites other than that they exist.
But how do you build a temple without living there, at least for some of the time?
And if you know how to build things, why not build houses?
The archaeology changes every year as they find amazing new stuff (which is one reason it’s so exciting)
For many years it was thought Gobekli Tepe was a singular miracle. A temple complex built by remarkably gifted cavemen who lived in temporary tents/shelters during the building season
Now at the other Tas Tepeler they have found permanent homes - besides the ritual shrines and cultic chambers. So it looks more and more like a civilisation, from 10,000 BC (or even earlier)
Worth pointing out that by the definition of 'civilisation' in that case it is not much different to the early pre-ceramic Neolithic of Northern Syria. The only big difference is the presence of temples. Jericho as a settlement dates back to 10,000 BC and the walled town dates to around 8,500 BC (and that wall is VERY impressive).
Even that is not the oldest structures in the area. Tell Qaramel has 5 towers dating back to around 10,000 BC and shows continuous occupation throughout the whole of the proto-Neolithic and pre-pottery Neolithic A & B (from around 10,500 to 9,000BC). These sites have been known since the 1970s.
The temples are, certainly, something else. But as I said before, this is not the revolutionary news that Hancock and others would have you believe.
Ian Hodder of Stanford Uni disagrees with you:
‘Gobekli Tepe changes everything.’
As an amateur archeologist with an interest in Syria, you’ll have heard of him
'Changes everything' is one of those phrases that can mean anything to anyone. Yes it is spectacular. No it does not mean an ancient 'civilisation' in Hancockian terms any more than the discovery of the Northern Syrian villages did.
That does not at all detract from the sites, nor does it mean the temples are not amazing. But when we have Sunil of this parish writing articles about Atlantis you have to stop and take a sniff of the smelling salts.
GT and the other sites push back the dates for large scale man made structures by a few hundred years. Not the 15,000 or so Hancock is regularly heard to claim.
I’m not batting for Hancock, you misconstrue me. I will indeed say that the Tas Tepeler are absolutely revolutionary, coz it is the case
Incidentally if you are interested in this stuff - and you obviously are - why don’t you go have a look? Seriously. See for yourself
These days Gobekli Tepe is now walled off and sheltered and gets a million visitors a year and that miraculous quality has largely gone (tho it is still a gob smacking site). When I first went I was the only non archaeologist there and we could wander between the stones drinking tea!
But at a site like Karahan Tepe you can still do that. Simply rock up. Wander about. You might be alone - or you can watch the archaeologists digging
Go on, do it! It would make an amazing holiday (combine it with a beach). Blow your mind!
If you want details on how to do it, DM me
It is definetely on my list. Along with various sites around Lake Van and in Kurdistan. My problem is time. I have had one 3 week holiday in 10 years. The joys of consultancy. I am hoping to do a bit more travelling again for pleasure rather than work but as always it is mañana.
3 weeks.... in ten years?!
That's insane. Life is for living, not working. Find the time before you keel over
Oh, for God's sake.
For [A PLURAL NUMBER OF DECADES SINCE 18] I had approx six periods, each a week or less, which could be described as a "holiday". It's only in my new job where they will not let you sell them that I have to take them, which are inevitably taken up with work.
You've never had a full-time job (or, arguably even a job as we would understand it) and you fail to understand the responsibility of people relying on you. Life is not like the movies and holidays are for children, not adults.
Can't tell if you're serious, I kind of hope you're not
I don't deny I have been lucky, but I have also made my own luck, to an extent. Don't let the man take you down
He doesn't strike me as poor, and he seems to be self-employed as a consultant - and therefore able to carve out time. A trip to go see the Tas Tepeler would cost less than £1000, could be done in as little as a week, even five days if you're mad, and would blow your mind - and his mind - like nothing else on this green earth, in terms of archaeology. A spectacular archaeological site, probably the most important on the planet, maybe the most important in all human history (these are some expert opinions, not mine) is happening RIGHT NOW. And you can just drive up and watch them doing it. Mazin!
Of course combining work with leisure is a good way to square the circle, but relies on having a job that regularly takes you to exotic and interesting travel destinations. I'm aware there's plenty of oil in Kurdistan to presumably there's some sort of consultancy gig that could land one within striking distance of these sites.
Before Covid I had one of those jobs - lots of short haul and a few long haul trips each year, some to fairly boring places but plenty to cities that were close enough to tack on a couple of days of exploration afterwards. Sadly since the pandemic that's no longer the case. Perhaps 6 or 7 short haul trips a year mainly to European capitals, and one or two long haul to well trodden places like NY or Singapore.
But working for a large organisation has its benefits too. I have 30 days holiday a year. For entrepreneurs and self-employed consultants it's difficult to drag yourself away for that much time. That said I have a good friend who runs a D&I consultancy and he is off on his travels more often than he's in the office. He recently had a honeymoon in Timor Leste and is off to Djibouti and Somaliland in November.
I hear you
That said, even somewhere like Singapore means you are only an hour's boat ride from some exquisite and lesser known destinations. Like the Riau/Anambas Archipelago
I did once do a fairly bog standard trip from Singapore on the ferry to Batam, a fairly humdrum sort of place, but managed to find myself in the middle of a riot over land rights. I had a whale of a time and got some good photos. Felt like a photojournalist. The rioters were very friendly and happy to have a random westerner to pose for. Only time I've felt mild effects of tear gas too.
I know Batam, I agree it's not that exciting. Bintang used to be lovely but I hear it's overdeveloped. But there are hundreds of these islands, dotted around Singapore, just needs a bit of intrepid exploring....
Actually, sod it, I will allow myself one photo - by me, from 2022 - of the Notorious Penis Chamber at Karahan Tepe. Mainly coz I’ll do anything to stop people talking about fricking ULEZ, also coz I just like writing “notorious penis chamber”
See here
What is this 12,000 year old room? WTF is it for?
At the moment, the best archaeological guess is that it is an initiation room for young adult males. It would have been roofed and dark. The boys would have stepped through the small door on the left, the room would have been half full of liquid piped in using the circled water channel. The liquid might have been animal blood - so one archaeologist told me. It might have poured through the mouth of the weird “head” acting as a spout. Then some ritual - sacrifice? Circumcision? Baptism? - would have been enacted. The boy becomes a man - a hunter - and then returns to the “audience room” just outside
This is 12,000 years old!!! Anyone who doesn’t find this seriously weird, brilliant, spooky, compelling and, yes, a *bit Graham Hancocky* is lacking a soul
Water tank? Why does everything unexplained have to be for 'rituals' of some bizarre kind?
A neolithic wooden trackway was discovered here in the Flatlands - it had been preserved in the peat. Quite a remarkable find really but as it was in a forgotten corner of the country not a lot was made of it.
Apparently - despite the lack of any artifacts - archaeologists say it must have been a route to a 'ritual platform'. Not the rather obvious purpose of a track to get to the other side of a wet area...
Most archaeologists agree that the Tas Tepeler are sacred sites. Stone circles, after all
There is near-zero evidence of human habitation at Gobekli Tepe (there is evidence at the other Tas Tepeler). Why build it? It is surely a temple; it is also, it seems, aligned astronomically
Some kind of penis worshipping hunter-warrior cult (with human sacrifice?) is the best guess at the moment
I admit to knowing almost nothing about these sites other than that they exist.
But how do you build a temple without living there, at least for some of the time?
And if you know how to build things, why not build houses?
The archaeology changes every year as they find amazing new stuff (which is one reason it’s so exciting)
For many years it was thought Gobekli Tepe was a singular miracle. A temple complex built by remarkably gifted cavemen who lived in temporary tents/shelters during the building season
Now at the other Tas Tepeler they have found permanent homes - besides the ritual shrines and cultic chambers. So it looks more and more like a civilisation, from 10,000 BC (or even earlier)
Worth pointing out that by the definition of 'civilisation' in that case it is not much different to the early pre-ceramic Neolithic of Northern Syria. The only big difference is the presence of temples. Jericho as a settlement dates back to 10,000 BC and the walled town dates to around 8,500 BC (and that wall is VERY impressive).
Even that is not the oldest structures in the area. Tell Qaramel has 5 towers dating back to around 10,000 BC and shows continuous occupation throughout the whole of the proto-Neolithic and pre-pottery Neolithic A & B (from around 10,500 to 9,000BC). These sites have been known since the 1970s.
The temples are, certainly, something else. But as I said before, this is not the revolutionary news that Hancock and others would have you believe.
Ian Hodder of Stanford Uni disagrees with you:
‘Gobekli Tepe changes everything.’
As an amateur archeologist with an interest in Syria, you’ll have heard of him
'Changes everything' is one of those phrases that can mean anything to anyone. Yes it is spectacular. No it does not mean an ancient 'civilisation' in Hancockian terms any more than the discovery of the Northern Syrian villages did.
That does not at all detract from the sites, nor does it mean the temples are not amazing. But when we have Sunil of this parish writing articles about Atlantis you have to stop and take a sniff of the smelling salts.
GT and the other sites push back the dates for large scale man made structures by a few hundred years. Not the 15,000 or so Hancock is regularly heard to claim.
I’m not batting for Hancock, you misconstrue me. I will indeed say that the Tas Tepeler are absolutely revolutionary, coz it is the case
Incidentally if you are interested in this stuff - and you obviously are - why don’t you go have a look? Seriously. See for yourself
These days Gobekli Tepe is now walled off and sheltered and gets a million visitors a year and that miraculous quality has largely gone (tho it is still a gob smacking site). When I first went I was the only non archaeologist there and we could wander between the stones drinking tea!
But at a site like Karahan Tepe you can still do that. Simply rock up. Wander about. You might be alone - or you can watch the archaeologists digging
Go on, do it! It would make an amazing holiday (combine it with a beach). Blow your mind!
If you want details on how to do it, DM me
It is definetely on my list. Along with various sites around Lake Van and in Kurdistan. My problem is time. I have had one 3 week holiday in 10 years. The joys of consultancy. I am hoping to do a bit more travelling again for pleasure rather than work but as always it is mañana.
3 weeks.... in ten years?!
That's insane. Life is for living, not working. Find the time before you keel over
Oh, for God's sake.
For [A PLURAL NUMBER OF DECADES SINCE 18] I had approx six periods, each a week or less, which could be described as a "holiday". It's only in my new job where they will not let you sell them that I have to take them, which are inevitably taken up with work.
You've never had a full-time job (or, arguably even a job as we would understand it) and you fail to understand the responsibility of people relying on you. Life is not like the movies and holidays are for children, not adults.
Can't tell if you're serious, I kind of hope you're not
I don't deny I have been lucky, but I have also made my own luck, to an extent. Don't let the man take you down
He doesn't strike me as poor, and he seems to be self-employed as a consultant - and therefore able to carve out time. A trip to go see the Tas Tepeler would cost less than £1000, could be done in as little as a week, even five days if you're mad, and would blow your mind - and his mind - like nothing else on this green earth, in terms of archaeology. A spectacular archaeological site, probably the most important on the planet, maybe the most important in all human history (these are some expert opinions, not mine) is happening RIGHT NOW. And you can just drive up and watch them doing it. Mazin!
I have to agree with you on this. I can't really afford the time away either, but I'm taking three weeks out to visit S Korea shortly.
When you read accounts of people on their deathbeds (from nurses, doctors, hospice people etc) there are usually two major regrets that are near-universal (or so it is reported). Namely:
1. Should have spent more time with my kids and/or friends
2. I worked too hard, I should have travelled more
They are probably unavoidable, we will all die with regrets. But you can mitigate the remorse
Actually, sod it, I will allow myself one photo - by me, from 2022 - of the Notorious Penis Chamber at Karahan Tepe. Mainly coz I’ll do anything to stop people talking about fricking ULEZ, also coz I just like writing “notorious penis chamber”
See here
What is this 12,000 year old room? WTF is it for?
At the moment, the best archaeological guess is that it is an initiation room for young adult males. It would have been roofed and dark. The boys would have stepped through the small door on the left, the room would have been half full of liquid piped in using the circled water channel. The liquid might have been animal blood - so one archaeologist told me. It might have poured through the mouth of the weird “head” acting as a spout. Then some ritual - sacrifice? Circumcision? Baptism? - would have been enacted. The boy becomes a man - a hunter - and then returns to the “audience room” just outside
This is 12,000 years old!!! Anyone who doesn’t find this seriously weird, brilliant, spooky, compelling and, yes, a *bit Graham Hancocky* is lacking a soul
Water tank? Why does everything unexplained have to be for 'rituals' of some bizarre kind?
A neolithic wooden trackway was discovered here in the Flatlands - it had been preserved in the peat. Quite a remarkable find really but as it was in a forgotten corner of the country not a lot was made of it.
Apparently - despite the lack of any artifacts - archaeologists say it must have been a route to a 'ritual platform'. Not the rather obvious purpose of a track to get to the other side of a wet area...
Most archaeologists agree that the Tas Tepeler are sacred sites. Stone circles, after all
There is near-zero evidence of human habitation at Gobekli Tepe (there is evidence at the other Tas Tepeler). Why build it? It is surely a temple; it is also, it seems, aligned astronomically
Some kind of penis worshipping hunter-warrior cult (with human sacrifice?) is the best guess at the moment
I admit to knowing almost nothing about these sites other than that they exist.
But how do you build a temple without living there, at least for some of the time?
And if you know how to build things, why not build houses?
The archaeology changes every year as they find amazing new stuff (which is one reason it’s so exciting)
For many years it was thought Gobekli Tepe was a singular miracle. A temple complex built by remarkably gifted cavemen who lived in temporary tents/shelters during the building season
Now at the other Tas Tepeler they have found permanent homes - besides the ritual shrines and cultic chambers. So it looks more and more like a civilisation, from 10,000 BC (or even earlier)
Worth pointing out that by the definition of 'civilisation' in that case it is not much different to the early pre-ceramic Neolithic of Northern Syria. The only big difference is the presence of temples. Jericho as a settlement dates back to 10,000 BC and the walled town dates to around 8,500 BC (and that wall is VERY impressive).
Even that is not the oldest structures in the area. Tell Qaramel has 5 towers dating back to around 10,000 BC and shows continuous occupation throughout the whole of the proto-Neolithic and pre-pottery Neolithic A & B (from around 10,500 to 9,000BC). These sites have been known since the 1970s.
The temples are, certainly, something else. But as I said before, this is not the revolutionary news that Hancock and others would have you believe.
Ian Hodder of Stanford Uni disagrees with you:
‘Gobekli Tepe changes everything.’
As an amateur archeologist with an interest in Syria, you’ll have heard of him
'Changes everything' is one of those phrases that can mean anything to anyone. Yes it is spectacular. No it does not mean an ancient 'civilisation' in Hancockian terms any more than the discovery of the Northern Syrian villages did.
That does not at all detract from the sites, nor does it mean the temples are not amazing. But when we have Sunil of this parish writing articles about Atlantis you have to stop and take a sniff of the smelling salts.
GT and the other sites push back the dates for large scale man made structures by a few hundred years. Not the 15,000 or so Hancock is regularly heard to claim.
I’m not batting for Hancock, you misconstrue me. I will indeed say that the Tas Tepeler are absolutely revolutionary, coz it is the case
Incidentally if you are interested in this stuff - and you obviously are - why don’t you go have a look? Seriously. See for yourself
These days Gobekli Tepe is now walled off and sheltered and gets a million visitors a year and that miraculous quality has largely gone (tho it is still a gob smacking site). When I first went I was the only non archaeologist there and we could wander between the stones drinking tea!
But at a site like Karahan Tepe you can still do that. Simply rock up. Wander about. You might be alone - or you can watch the archaeologists digging
Go on, do it! It would make an amazing holiday (combine it with a beach). Blow your mind!
If you want details on how to do it, DM me
It is definetely on my list. Along with various sites around Lake Van and in Kurdistan. My problem is time. I have had one 3 week holiday in 10 years. The joys of consultancy. I am hoping to do a bit more travelling again for pleasure rather than work but as always it is mañana.
3 weeks.... in ten years?!
That's insane. Life is for living, not working. Find the time before you keel over
Oh, for God's sake.
For [A PLURAL NUMBER OF DECADES SINCE 18] I had approx six periods, each a week or less, which could be described as a "holiday". It's only in my new job where they will not let you sell them that I have to take them, which are inevitably taken up with work.
You've never had a full-time job (or, arguably even a job as we would understand it) and you fail to understand the responsibility of people relying on you. Life is not like the movies and holidays are for children, not adults.
Can't tell if you're serious, I kind of hope you're not
I don't deny I have been lucky, but I have also made my own luck, to an extent. Don't let the man take you down
He doesn't strike me as poor, and he seems to be self-employed as a consultant - and therefore able to carve out time. A trip to go see the Tas Tepeler would cost less than £1000, could be done in as little as a week, even five days if you're mad, and would blow your mind - and his mind - like nothing else on this green earth, in terms of archaeology. A spectacular archaeological site, probably the most important on the planet, maybe the most important in all human history (these are some expert opinions, not mine) is happening RIGHT NOW. And you can just drive up and watch them doing it. Mazin!
I've not had a 'holiday' since the start of the pandemic. The odd day out, maybe.
There are more reasons than just work to be tied down.
Whilst I do have a number of places I'd like to go given the chance, I do wonder about some friends that are forever travelling the planet. What are they searching for? I don't think the answer to life the universe and everything lies in the Peruvian jungle (or wherever they are this week).
In my friend's case it's to tick off every country on the planet. He has done most of the easy ones and is now finding it progressively more difficult. As we're all officially spectrumy on this forum, I assume others can appreciate the sentiment.
Actually, sod it, I will allow myself one photo - by me, from 2022 - of the Notorious Penis Chamber at Karahan Tepe. Mainly coz I’ll do anything to stop people talking about fricking ULEZ, also coz I just like writing “notorious penis chamber”
See here
What is this 12,000 year old room? WTF is it for?
At the moment, the best archaeological guess is that it is an initiation room for young adult males. It would have been roofed and dark. The boys would have stepped through the small door on the left, the room would have been half full of liquid piped in using the circled water channel. The liquid might have been animal blood - so one archaeologist told me. It might have poured through the mouth of the weird “head” acting as a spout. Then some ritual - sacrifice? Circumcision? Baptism? - would have been enacted. The boy becomes a man - a hunter - and then returns to the “audience room” just outside
This is 12,000 years old!!! Anyone who doesn’t find this seriously weird, brilliant, spooky, compelling and, yes, a *bit Graham Hancocky* is lacking a soul
Water tank? Why does everything unexplained have to be for 'rituals' of some bizarre kind?
A neolithic wooden trackway was discovered here in the Flatlands - it had been preserved in the peat. Quite a remarkable find really but as it was in a forgotten corner of the country not a lot was made of it.
Apparently - despite the lack of any artifacts - archaeologists say it must have been a route to a 'ritual platform'. Not the rather obvious purpose of a track to get to the other side of a wet area...
Most archaeologists agree that the Tas Tepeler are sacred sites. Stone circles, after all
There is near-zero evidence of human habitation at Gobekli Tepe (there is evidence at the other Tas Tepeler). Why build it? It is surely a temple; it is also, it seems, aligned astronomically
Some kind of penis worshipping hunter-warrior cult (with human sacrifice?) is the best guess at the moment
I admit to knowing almost nothing about these sites other than that they exist.
But how do you build a temple without living there, at least for some of the time?
And if you know how to build things, why not build houses?
The archaeology changes every year as they find amazing new stuff (which is one reason it’s so exciting)
For many years it was thought Gobekli Tepe was a singular miracle. A temple complex built by remarkably gifted cavemen who lived in temporary tents/shelters during the building season
Now at the other Tas Tepeler they have found permanent homes - besides the ritual shrines and cultic chambers. So it looks more and more like a civilisation, from 10,000 BC (or even earlier)
Worth pointing out that by the definition of 'civilisation' in that case it is not much different to the early pre-ceramic Neolithic of Northern Syria. The only big difference is the presence of temples. Jericho as a settlement dates back to 10,000 BC and the walled town dates to around 8,500 BC (and that wall is VERY impressive).
Even that is not the oldest structures in the area. Tell Qaramel has 5 towers dating back to around 10,000 BC and shows continuous occupation throughout the whole of the proto-Neolithic and pre-pottery Neolithic A & B (from around 10,500 to 9,000BC). These sites have been known since the 1970s.
The temples are, certainly, something else. But as I said before, this is not the revolutionary news that Hancock and others would have you believe.
Ian Hodder of Stanford Uni disagrees with you:
‘Gobekli Tepe changes everything.’
As an amateur archeologist with an interest in Syria, you’ll have heard of him
'Changes everything' is one of those phrases that can mean anything to anyone. Yes it is spectacular. No it does not mean an ancient 'civilisation' in Hancockian terms any more than the discovery of the Northern Syrian villages did.
That does not at all detract from the sites, nor does it mean the temples are not amazing. But when we have Sunil of this parish writing articles about Atlantis you have to stop and take a sniff of the smelling salts.
GT and the other sites push back the dates for large scale man made structures by a few hundred years. Not the 15,000 or so Hancock is regularly heard to claim.
I’m not batting for Hancock, you misconstrue me. I will indeed say that the Tas Tepeler are absolutely revolutionary, coz it is the case
Incidentally if you are interested in this stuff - and you obviously are - why don’t you go have a look? Seriously. See for yourself
These days Gobekli Tepe is now walled off and sheltered and gets a million visitors a year and that miraculous quality has largely gone (tho it is still a gob smacking site). When I first went I was the only non archaeologist there and we could wander between the stones drinking tea!
But at a site like Karahan Tepe you can still do that. Simply rock up. Wander about. You might be alone - or you can watch the archaeologists digging
Go on, do it! It would make an amazing holiday (combine it with a beach). Blow your mind!
If you want details on how to do it, DM me
It is definetely on my list. Along with various sites around Lake Van and in Kurdistan. My problem is time. I have had one 3 week holiday in 10 years. The joys of consultancy. I am hoping to do a bit more travelling again for pleasure rather than work but as always it is mañana.
3 weeks.... in ten years?!
That's insane. Life is for living, not working. Find the time before you keel over
Oh, for God's sake.
For [A PLURAL NUMBER OF DECADES SINCE 18] I had approx six periods, each a week or less, which could be described as a "holiday". It's only in my new job where they will not let you sell them that I have to take them, which are inevitably taken up with work.
You've never had a full-time job (or, arguably even a job as we would understand it) and you fail to understand the responsibility of people relying on you. Life is not like the movies and holidays are for children, not adults.
Can't tell if you're serious, I kind of hope you're not
I don't deny I have been lucky, but I have also made my own luck, to an extent. Don't let the man take you down
He doesn't strike me as poor, and he seems to be self-employed as a consultant - and therefore able to carve out time. A trip to go see the Tas Tepeler would cost less than £1000, could be done in as little as a week, even five days if you're mad, and would blow your mind - and his mind - like nothing else on this green earth, in terms of archaeology. A spectacular archaeological site, probably the most important on the planet, maybe the most important in all human history (these are some expert opinions, not mine) is happening RIGHT NOW. And you can just drive up and watch them doing it. Mazin!
Speaking as another consultant, time very much equals money (unless it is PB in which case you get my time FOC...). Not working = not getting paid. Or at least that is the mentality I started with. A few years in and what I get paid is not directly connected with the revenue I earn for my company.
I took two weeks off in July, revenue that month was obviously much lower, but that had no impact on what I pull out. I still take opportunistic work where I can get it - a weekend gig meant doing 12 days without a break earlier this month. Output for that client was limited at best by the end of that, but they are happy to pay so I am happy to invoice.
Holidays are ok. Time off relaxing is more important. And I get bored easily. Best option is combining travel and work - something you excel at of course!
The whole concept of holidays is a bit weird. Someone pays you for not going to work? What’s in it for them?
When you add the foregone income to the cost of the holiday it becomes somewhat expensive. In fairness, @Leon seems to make money out of most of his trips. Good luck to him.
I'm crazy enough to find excursions like Home > Aberdeen > Gatwick > London > Coventry and return later the same day to be fun. Which is handy! Have got 2 days in London next week and a 5 day roadtrip as far as Warwick the week after as the next work trips. Its not exotic, but its a hell of a lot more time out and about than I would get otherwise.
Can I just point out that I have successfully stopped us talking about ULEZ?
You’re welcome
In that case I won't mention that I am unable to sell my non-ULEZ compliant diesel and the £2k scrappage fee beckons.
What is it, and what state is it in? If it's got a test and runs most stuff can be flogged without too much trouble.
Scrapping cars which run ok is economic madness, no matter how much the idiots in government and their mates in the car industry want to tell us otherwise.
Actually, sod it, I will allow myself one photo - by me, from 2022 - of the Notorious Penis Chamber at Karahan Tepe. Mainly coz I’ll do anything to stop people talking about fricking ULEZ, also coz I just like writing “notorious penis chamber”
See here
What is this 12,000 year old room? WTF is it for?
At the moment, the best archaeological guess is that it is an initiation room for young adult males. It would have been roofed and dark. The boys would have stepped through the small door on the left, the room would have been half full of liquid piped in using the circled water channel. The liquid might have been animal blood - so one archaeologist told me. It might have poured through the mouth of the weird “head” acting as a spout. Then some ritual - sacrifice? Circumcision? Baptism? - would have been enacted. The boy becomes a man - a hunter - and then returns to the “audience room” just outside
This is 12,000 years old!!! Anyone who doesn’t find this seriously weird, brilliant, spooky, compelling and, yes, a *bit Graham Hancocky* is lacking a soul
Water tank? Why does everything unexplained have to be for 'rituals' of some bizarre kind?
A neolithic wooden trackway was discovered here in the Flatlands - it had been preserved in the peat. Quite a remarkable find really but as it was in a forgotten corner of the country not a lot was made of it.
Apparently - despite the lack of any artifacts - archaeologists say it must have been a route to a 'ritual platform'. Not the rather obvious purpose of a track to get to the other side of a wet area...
Most archaeologists agree that the Tas Tepeler are sacred sites. Stone circles, after all
There is near-zero evidence of human habitation at Gobekli Tepe (there is evidence at the other Tas Tepeler). Why build it? It is surely a temple; it is also, it seems, aligned astronomically
Some kind of penis worshipping hunter-warrior cult (with human sacrifice?) is the best guess at the moment
I admit to knowing almost nothing about these sites other than that they exist.
But how do you build a temple without living there, at least for some of the time?
And if you know how to build things, why not build houses?
The archaeology changes every year as they find amazing new stuff (which is one reason it’s so exciting)
For many years it was thought Gobekli Tepe was a singular miracle. A temple complex built by remarkably gifted cavemen who lived in temporary tents/shelters during the building season
Now at the other Tas Tepeler they have found permanent homes - besides the ritual shrines and cultic chambers. So it looks more and more like a civilisation, from 10,000 BC (or even earlier)
Worth pointing out that by the definition of 'civilisation' in that case it is not much different to the early pre-ceramic Neolithic of Northern Syria. The only big difference is the presence of temples. Jericho as a settlement dates back to 10,000 BC and the walled town dates to around 8,500 BC (and that wall is VERY impressive).
Even that is not the oldest structures in the area. Tell Qaramel has 5 towers dating back to around 10,000 BC and shows continuous occupation throughout the whole of the proto-Neolithic and pre-pottery Neolithic A & B (from around 10,500 to 9,000BC). These sites have been known since the 1970s.
The temples are, certainly, something else. But as I said before, this is not the revolutionary news that Hancock and others would have you believe.
Ian Hodder of Stanford Uni disagrees with you:
‘Gobekli Tepe changes everything.’
As an amateur archeologist with an interest in Syria, you’ll have heard of him
'Changes everything' is one of those phrases that can mean anything to anyone. Yes it is spectacular. No it does not mean an ancient 'civilisation' in Hancockian terms any more than the discovery of the Northern Syrian villages did.
That does not at all detract from the sites, nor does it mean the temples are not amazing. But when we have Sunil of this parish writing articles about Atlantis you have to stop and take a sniff of the smelling salts.
GT and the other sites push back the dates for large scale man made structures by a few hundred years. Not the 15,000 or so Hancock is regularly heard to claim.
I’m not batting for Hancock, you misconstrue me. I will indeed say that the Tas Tepeler are absolutely revolutionary, coz it is the case
Incidentally if you are interested in this stuff - and you obviously are - why don’t you go have a look? Seriously. See for yourself
These days Gobekli Tepe is now walled off and sheltered and gets a million visitors a year and that miraculous quality has largely gone (tho it is still a gob smacking site). When I first went I was the only non archaeologist there and we could wander between the stones drinking tea!
But at a site like Karahan Tepe you can still do that. Simply rock up. Wander about. You might be alone - or you can watch the archaeologists digging
Go on, do it! It would make an amazing holiday (combine it with a beach). Blow your mind!
If you want details on how to do it, DM me
It is definetely on my list. Along with various sites around Lake Van and in Kurdistan. My problem is time. I have had one 3 week holiday in 10 years. The joys of consultancy. I am hoping to do a bit more travelling again for pleasure rather than work but as always it is mañana.
3 weeks.... in ten years?!
That's insane. Life is for living, not working. Find the time before you keel over
Oh, for God's sake.
For [A PLURAL NUMBER OF DECADES SINCE 18] I had approx six periods, each a week or less, which could be described as a "holiday". It's only in my new job where they will not let you sell them that I have to take them, which are inevitably taken up with work.
You've never had a full-time job (or, arguably even a job as we would understand it) and you fail to understand the responsibility of people relying on you. Life is not like the movies and holidays are for children, not adults.
Can't tell if you're serious, I kind of hope you're not
I don't deny I have been lucky, but I have also made my own luck, to an extent. Don't let the man take you down
He doesn't strike me as poor, and he seems to be self-employed as a consultant - and therefore able to carve out time. A trip to go see the Tas Tepeler would cost less than £1000, could be done in as little as a week, even five days if you're mad, and would blow your mind - and his mind - like nothing else on this green earth, in terms of archaeology. A spectacular archaeological site, probably the most important on the planet, maybe the most important in all human history (these are some expert opinions, not mine) is happening RIGHT NOW. And you can just drive up and watch them doing it. Mazin!
Speaking as another consultant, time very much equals money (unless it is PB in which case you get my time FOC...). Not working = not getting paid. Or at least that is the mentality I started with. A few years in and what I get paid is not directly connected with the revenue I earn for my company.
I took two weeks off in July, revenue that month was obviously much lower, but that had no impact on what I pull out. I still take opportunistic work where I can get it - a weekend gig meant doing 12 days without a break earlier this month. Output for that client was limited at best by the end of that, but they are happy to pay so I am happy to invoice.
Holidays are ok. Time off relaxing is more important. And I get bored easily. Best option is combining travel and work - something you excel at of course!
I didn't have a single day off between April 10th and the last week in May.
Made a lot of money, don't get me wrong, but also resolved never to do that again.
Is that working weekends as well? Blimey! I'm happy to work a weekend here and there, but not on the bounce.
Well, as I do YouTube and need to maintain my network I have had several weekend trips which count as "work". My company pays anyway. Pity that entertaining isn't tax deductible, but at least it is pre-tax expenditure...
Having said all of that next week I am going to the exotic and fascinating Ashford for a week. Canterbury, Dover and Hastings are already on the list. Anyone got some less well known suggestions?
Actually, sod it, I will allow myself one photo - by me, from 2022 - of the Notorious Penis Chamber at Karahan Tepe. Mainly coz I’ll do anything to stop people talking about fricking ULEZ, also coz I just like writing “notorious penis chamber”
See here
What is this 12,000 year old room? WTF is it for?
At the moment, the best archaeological guess is that it is an initiation room for young adult males. It would have been roofed and dark. The boys would have stepped through the small door on the left, the room would have been half full of liquid piped in using the circled water channel. The liquid might have been animal blood - so one archaeologist told me. It might have poured through the mouth of the weird “head” acting as a spout. Then some ritual - sacrifice? Circumcision? Baptism? - would have been enacted. The boy becomes a man - a hunter - and then returns to the “audience room” just outside
This is 12,000 years old!!! Anyone who doesn’t find this seriously weird, brilliant, spooky, compelling and, yes, a *bit Graham Hancocky* is lacking a soul
Water tank? Why does everything unexplained have to be for 'rituals' of some bizarre kind?
A neolithic wooden trackway was discovered here in the Flatlands - it had been preserved in the peat. Quite a remarkable find really but as it was in a forgotten corner of the country not a lot was made of it.
Apparently - despite the lack of any artifacts - archaeologists say it must have been a route to a 'ritual platform'. Not the rather obvious purpose of a track to get to the other side of a wet area...
Most archaeologists agree that the Tas Tepeler are sacred sites. Stone circles, after all
There is near-zero evidence of human habitation at Gobekli Tepe (there is evidence at the other Tas Tepeler). Why build it? It is surely a temple; it is also, it seems, aligned astronomically
Some kind of penis worshipping hunter-warrior cult (with human sacrifice?) is the best guess at the moment
I admit to knowing almost nothing about these sites other than that they exist.
But how do you build a temple without living there, at least for some of the time?
And if you know how to build things, why not build houses?
The archaeology changes every year as they find amazing new stuff (which is one reason it’s so exciting)
For many years it was thought Gobekli Tepe was a singular miracle. A temple complex built by remarkably gifted cavemen who lived in temporary tents/shelters during the building season
Now at the other Tas Tepeler they have found permanent homes - besides the ritual shrines and cultic chambers. So it looks more and more like a civilisation, from 10,000 BC (or even earlier)
Worth pointing out that by the definition of 'civilisation' in that case it is not much different to the early pre-ceramic Neolithic of Northern Syria. The only big difference is the presence of temples. Jericho as a settlement dates back to 10,000 BC and the walled town dates to around 8,500 BC (and that wall is VERY impressive).
Even that is not the oldest structures in the area. Tell Qaramel has 5 towers dating back to around 10,000 BC and shows continuous occupation throughout the whole of the proto-Neolithic and pre-pottery Neolithic A & B (from around 10,500 to 9,000BC). These sites have been known since the 1970s.
The temples are, certainly, something else. But as I said before, this is not the revolutionary news that Hancock and others would have you believe.
Ian Hodder of Stanford Uni disagrees with you:
‘Gobekli Tepe changes everything.’
As an amateur archeologist with an interest in Syria, you’ll have heard of him
'Changes everything' is one of those phrases that can mean anything to anyone. Yes it is spectacular. No it does not mean an ancient 'civilisation' in Hancockian terms any more than the discovery of the Northern Syrian villages did.
That does not at all detract from the sites, nor does it mean the temples are not amazing. But when we have Sunil of this parish writing articles about Atlantis you have to stop and take a sniff of the smelling salts.
GT and the other sites push back the dates for large scale man made structures by a few hundred years. Not the 15,000 or so Hancock is regularly heard to claim.
I’m not batting for Hancock, you misconstrue me. I will indeed say that the Tas Tepeler are absolutely revolutionary, coz it is the case
Incidentally if you are interested in this stuff - and you obviously are - why don’t you go have a look? Seriously. See for yourself
These days Gobekli Tepe is now walled off and sheltered and gets a million visitors a year and that miraculous quality has largely gone (tho it is still a gob smacking site). When I first went I was the only non archaeologist there and we could wander between the stones drinking tea!
But at a site like Karahan Tepe you can still do that. Simply rock up. Wander about. You might be alone - or you can watch the archaeologists digging
Go on, do it! It would make an amazing holiday (combine it with a beach). Blow your mind!
If you want details on how to do it, DM me
It is definetely on my list. Along with various sites around Lake Van and in Kurdistan. My problem is time. I have had one 3 week holiday in 10 years. The joys of consultancy. I am hoping to do a bit more travelling again for pleasure rather than work but as always it is mañana.
3 weeks.... in ten years?!
That's insane. Life is for living, not working. Find the time before you keel over
Oh, for God's sake.
For [A PLURAL NUMBER OF DECADES SINCE 18] I had approx six periods, each a week or less, which could be described as a "holiday". It's only in my new job where they will not let you sell them that I have to take them, which are inevitably taken up with work.
You've never had a full-time job (or, arguably even a job as we would understand it) and you fail to understand the responsibility of people relying on you. Life is not like the movies and holidays are for children, not adults.
Can't tell if you're serious, I kind of hope you're not
I don't deny I have been lucky, but I have also made my own luck, to an extent. Don't let the man take you down
He doesn't strike me as poor, and he seems to be self-employed as a consultant - and therefore able to carve out time. A trip to go see the Tas Tepeler would cost less than £1000, could be done in as little as a week, even five days if you're mad, and would blow your mind - and his mind - like nothing else on this green earth, in terms of archaeology. A spectacular archaeological site, probably the most important on the planet, maybe the most important in all human history (these are some expert opinions, not mine) is happening RIGHT NOW. And you can just drive up and watch them doing it. Mazin!
I've not had a 'holiday' since the start of the pandemic. The odd day out, maybe.
There are more reasons than just work to be tied down.
Whilst I do have a number of places I'd like to go given the chance, I do wonder about some friends that are forever travelling the planet. What are they searching for? I don't think the answer to life the universe and everything lies in the Peruvian jungle (or wherever they are this week).
In my friend's case it's to tick off every country on the planet. He has done most of the easy ones and is now finding it progressively more difficult. As we're all officially spectrumy on this forum, I assume others can appreciate the sentiment.
i entirely appreciate that sentiment. I also love remote weird places, so I'm well jel of Somaliland and Djibouti, even tho I am reliably informed they are Total Shitholes. Often the Total Shitholes turn out to be the most fun, partly because no one else goes there
Parts of Russia are like this. Or, say, Darfur in Ethiopia
Actually, sod it, I will allow myself one photo - by me, from 2022 - of the Notorious Penis Chamber at Karahan Tepe. Mainly coz I’ll do anything to stop people talking about fricking ULEZ, also coz I just like writing “notorious penis chamber”
See here
What is this 12,000 year old room? WTF is it for?
At the moment, the best archaeological guess is that it is an initiation room for young adult males. It would have been roofed and dark. The boys would have stepped through the small door on the left, the room would have been half full of liquid piped in using the circled water channel. The liquid might have been animal blood - so one archaeologist told me. It might have poured through the mouth of the weird “head” acting as a spout. Then some ritual - sacrifice? Circumcision? Baptism? - would have been enacted. The boy becomes a man - a hunter - and then returns to the “audience room” just outside
This is 12,000 years old!!! Anyone who doesn’t find this seriously weird, brilliant, spooky, compelling and, yes, a *bit Graham Hancocky* is lacking a soul
Water tank? Why does everything unexplained have to be for 'rituals' of some bizarre kind?
A neolithic wooden trackway was discovered here in the Flatlands - it had been preserved in the peat. Quite a remarkable find really but as it was in a forgotten corner of the country not a lot was made of it.
Apparently - despite the lack of any artifacts - archaeologists say it must have been a route to a 'ritual platform'. Not the rather obvious purpose of a track to get to the other side of a wet area...
Most archaeologists agree that the Tas Tepeler are sacred sites. Stone circles, after all
There is near-zero evidence of human habitation at Gobekli Tepe (there is evidence at the other Tas Tepeler). Why build it? It is surely a temple; it is also, it seems, aligned astronomically
Some kind of penis worshipping hunter-warrior cult (with human sacrifice?) is the best guess at the moment
I admit to knowing almost nothing about these sites other than that they exist.
But how do you build a temple without living there, at least for some of the time?
And if you know how to build things, why not build houses?
The archaeology changes every year as they find amazing new stuff (which is one reason it’s so exciting)
For many years it was thought Gobekli Tepe was a singular miracle. A temple complex built by remarkably gifted cavemen who lived in temporary tents/shelters during the building season
Now at the other Tas Tepeler they have found permanent homes - besides the ritual shrines and cultic chambers. So it looks more and more like a civilisation, from 10,000 BC (or even earlier)
Worth pointing out that by the definition of 'civilisation' in that case it is not much different to the early pre-ceramic Neolithic of Northern Syria. The only big difference is the presence of temples. Jericho as a settlement dates back to 10,000 BC and the walled town dates to around 8,500 BC (and that wall is VERY impressive).
Even that is not the oldest structures in the area. Tell Qaramel has 5 towers dating back to around 10,000 BC and shows continuous occupation throughout the whole of the proto-Neolithic and pre-pottery Neolithic A & B (from around 10,500 to 9,000BC). These sites have been known since the 1970s.
The temples are, certainly, something else. But as I said before, this is not the revolutionary news that Hancock and others would have you believe.
Ian Hodder of Stanford Uni disagrees with you:
‘Gobekli Tepe changes everything.’
As an amateur archeologist with an interest in Syria, you’ll have heard of him
'Changes everything' is one of those phrases that can mean anything to anyone. Yes it is spectacular. No it does not mean an ancient 'civilisation' in Hancockian terms any more than the discovery of the Northern Syrian villages did.
That does not at all detract from the sites, nor does it mean the temples are not amazing. But when we have Sunil of this parish writing articles about Atlantis you have to stop and take a sniff of the smelling salts.
GT and the other sites push back the dates for large scale man made structures by a few hundred years. Not the 15,000 or so Hancock is regularly heard to claim.
I’m not batting for Hancock, you misconstrue me. I will indeed say that the Tas Tepeler are absolutely revolutionary, coz it is the case
Incidentally if you are interested in this stuff - and you obviously are - why don’t you go have a look? Seriously. See for yourself
These days Gobekli Tepe is now walled off and sheltered and gets a million visitors a year and that miraculous quality has largely gone (tho it is still a gob smacking site). When I first went I was the only non archaeologist there and we could wander between the stones drinking tea!
But at a site like Karahan Tepe you can still do that. Simply rock up. Wander about. You might be alone - or you can watch the archaeologists digging
Go on, do it! It would make an amazing holiday (combine it with a beach). Blow your mind!
If you want details on how to do it, DM me
It is definetely on my list. Along with various sites around Lake Van and in Kurdistan. My problem is time. I have had one 3 week holiday in 10 years. The joys of consultancy. I am hoping to do a bit more travelling again for pleasure rather than work but as always it is mañana.
3 weeks.... in ten years?!
That's insane. Life is for living, not working. Find the time before you keel over
Oh, for God's sake.
For [A PLURAL NUMBER OF DECADES SINCE 18] I had approx six periods, each a week or less, which could be described as a "holiday". It's only in my new job where they will not let you sell them that I have to take them, which are inevitably taken up with work.
You've never had a full-time job (or, arguably even a job as we would understand it) and you fail to understand the responsibility of people relying on you. Life is not like the movies and holidays are for children, not adults.
Can't tell if you're serious, I kind of hope you're not
I don't deny I have been lucky, but I have also made my own luck, to an extent. Don't let the man take you down
He doesn't strike me as poor, and he seems to be self-employed as a consultant - and therefore able to carve out time. A trip to go see the Tas Tepeler would cost less than £1000, could be done in as little as a week, even five days if you're mad, and would blow your mind - and his mind - like nothing else on this green earth, in terms of archaeology. A spectacular archaeological site, probably the most important on the planet, maybe the most important in all human history (these are some expert opinions, not mine) is happening RIGHT NOW. And you can just drive up and watch them doing it. Mazin!
Speaking as another consultant, time very much equals money (unless it is PB in which case you get my time FOC...). Not working = not getting paid. Or at least that is the mentality I started with. A few years in and what I get paid is not directly connected with the revenue I earn for my company.
I took two weeks off in July, revenue that month was obviously much lower, but that had no impact on what I pull out. I still take opportunistic work where I can get it - a weekend gig meant doing 12 days without a break earlier this month. Output for that client was limited at best by the end of that, but they are happy to pay so I am happy to invoice.
Holidays are ok. Time off relaxing is more important. And I get bored easily. Best option is combining travel and work - something you excel at of course!
The whole concept of holidays is a bit weird. Someone pays you for not going to work? What’s in it for them?
When you add the foregone income to the cost of the holiday it becomes somewhat expensive. In fairness, @Leon seems to make money out of most of his trips. Good luck to him.
I'm crazy enough to find excursions like Home > Aberdeen > Gatwick > London > Coventry and return later the same day to be fun. Which is handy! Have got 2 days in London next week and a 5 day roadtrip as far as Warwick the week after as the next work trips. Its not exotic, but its a hell of a lot more time out and about than I would get otherwise.
That just sounds exhausting. I am increasingly less enthralled with planes. I haven’t been on one since before Covid.
Having said all of that next week I am going to the exotic and fascinating Ashford for a week. Canterbury, Dover and Hastings are already on the list. Anyone got some less well known suggestions?
Nearby vineyards that do interesting tours and tastings: Westwell, Gusbourne, Barnsole, Terlingham (and a few more further afield)
Actually, sod it, I will allow myself one photo - by me, from 2022 - of the Notorious Penis Chamber at Karahan Tepe. Mainly coz I’ll do anything to stop people talking about fricking ULEZ, also coz I just like writing “notorious penis chamber”
See here
What is this 12,000 year old room? WTF is it for?
At the moment, the best archaeological guess is that it is an initiation room for young adult males. It would have been roofed and dark. The boys would have stepped through the small door on the left, the room would have been half full of liquid piped in using the circled water channel. The liquid might have been animal blood - so one archaeologist told me. It might have poured through the mouth of the weird “head” acting as a spout. Then some ritual - sacrifice? Circumcision? Baptism? - would have been enacted. The boy becomes a man - a hunter - and then returns to the “audience room” just outside
This is 12,000 years old!!! Anyone who doesn’t find this seriously weird, brilliant, spooky, compelling and, yes, a *bit Graham Hancocky* is lacking a soul
Water tank? Why does everything unexplained have to be for 'rituals' of some bizarre kind?
A neolithic wooden trackway was discovered here in the Flatlands - it had been preserved in the peat. Quite a remarkable find really but as it was in a forgotten corner of the country not a lot was made of it.
Apparently - despite the lack of any artifacts - archaeologists say it must have been a route to a 'ritual platform'. Not the rather obvious purpose of a track to get to the other side of a wet area...
Most archaeologists agree that the Tas Tepeler are sacred sites. Stone circles, after all
There is near-zero evidence of human habitation at Gobekli Tepe (there is evidence at the other Tas Tepeler). Why build it? It is surely a temple; it is also, it seems, aligned astronomically
Some kind of penis worshipping hunter-warrior cult (with human sacrifice?) is the best guess at the moment
I admit to knowing almost nothing about these sites other than that they exist.
But how do you build a temple without living there, at least for some of the time?
And if you know how to build things, why not build houses?
The archaeology changes every year as they find amazing new stuff (which is one reason it’s so exciting)
For many years it was thought Gobekli Tepe was a singular miracle. A temple complex built by remarkably gifted cavemen who lived in temporary tents/shelters during the building season
Now at the other Tas Tepeler they have found permanent homes - besides the ritual shrines and cultic chambers. So it looks more and more like a civilisation, from 10,000 BC (or even earlier)
Worth pointing out that by the definition of 'civilisation' in that case it is not much different to the early pre-ceramic Neolithic of Northern Syria. The only big difference is the presence of temples. Jericho as a settlement dates back to 10,000 BC and the walled town dates to around 8,500 BC (and that wall is VERY impressive).
Even that is not the oldest structures in the area. Tell Qaramel has 5 towers dating back to around 10,000 BC and shows continuous occupation throughout the whole of the proto-Neolithic and pre-pottery Neolithic A & B (from around 10,500 to 9,000BC). These sites have been known since the 1970s.
The temples are, certainly, something else. But as I said before, this is not the revolutionary news that Hancock and others would have you believe.
Ian Hodder of Stanford Uni disagrees with you:
‘Gobekli Tepe changes everything.’
As an amateur archeologist with an interest in Syria, you’ll have heard of him
'Changes everything' is one of those phrases that can mean anything to anyone. Yes it is spectacular. No it does not mean an ancient 'civilisation' in Hancockian terms any more than the discovery of the Northern Syrian villages did.
That does not at all detract from the sites, nor does it mean the temples are not amazing. But when we have Sunil of this parish writing articles about Atlantis you have to stop and take a sniff of the smelling salts.
GT and the other sites push back the dates for large scale man made structures by a few hundred years. Not the 15,000 or so Hancock is regularly heard to claim.
I’m not batting for Hancock, you misconstrue me. I will indeed say that the Tas Tepeler are absolutely revolutionary, coz it is the case
Incidentally if you are interested in this stuff - and you obviously are - why don’t you go have a look? Seriously. See for yourself
These days Gobekli Tepe is now walled off and sheltered and gets a million visitors a year and that miraculous quality has largely gone (tho it is still a gob smacking site). When I first went I was the only non archaeologist there and we could wander between the stones drinking tea!
But at a site like Karahan Tepe you can still do that. Simply rock up. Wander about. You might be alone - or you can watch the archaeologists digging
Go on, do it! It would make an amazing holiday (combine it with a beach). Blow your mind!
If you want details on how to do it, DM me
It is definetely on my list. Along with various sites around Lake Van and in Kurdistan. My problem is time. I have had one 3 week holiday in 10 years. The joys of consultancy. I am hoping to do a bit more travelling again for pleasure rather than work but as always it is mañana.
3 weeks.... in ten years?!
That's insane. Life is for living, not working. Find the time before you keel over
Oh, for God's sake.
For [A PLURAL NUMBER OF DECADES SINCE 18] I had approx six periods, each a week or less, which could be described as a "holiday". It's only in my new job where they will not let you sell them that I have to take them, which are inevitably taken up with work.
You've never had a full-time job (or, arguably even a job as we would understand it) and you fail to understand the responsibility of people relying on you. Life is not like the movies and holidays are for children, not adults.
Can't tell if you're serious, I kind of hope you're not
I don't deny I have been lucky, but I have also made my own luck, to an extent. Don't let the man take you down
He doesn't strike me as poor, and he seems to be self-employed as a consultant - and therefore able to carve out time. A trip to go see the Tas Tepeler would cost less than £1000, could be done in as little as a week, even five days if you're mad, and would blow your mind - and his mind - like nothing else on this green earth, in terms of archaeology. A spectacular archaeological site, probably the most important on the planet, maybe the most important in all human history (these are some expert opinions, not mine) is happening RIGHT NOW. And you can just drive up and watch them doing it. Mazin!
I have to agree with you on this. I can't really afford the time away either, but I'm taking three weeks out to visit S Korea shortly.
When you read accounts of people on their deathbeds (from nurses, doctors, hospice people etc) there are usually two major regrets that are near-universal (or so it is reported). Namely:
1. Should have spent more time with my kids and/or friends
2. I worked too hard, I should have travelled more
They are probably unavoidable, we will all die with regrets. But you can mitigate the remorse
I spend a lot of time with my children. Travel is more problematic.
Actually, sod it, I will allow myself one photo - by me, from 2022 - of the Notorious Penis Chamber at Karahan Tepe. Mainly coz I’ll do anything to stop people talking about fricking ULEZ, also coz I just like writing “notorious penis chamber”
See here
What is this 12,000 year old room? WTF is it for?
At the moment, the best archaeological guess is that it is an initiation room for young adult males. It would have been roofed and dark. The boys would have stepped through the small door on the left, the room would have been half full of liquid piped in using the circled water channel. The liquid might have been animal blood - so one archaeologist told me. It might have poured through the mouth of the weird “head” acting as a spout. Then some ritual - sacrifice? Circumcision? Baptism? - would have been enacted. The boy becomes a man - a hunter - and then returns to the “audience room” just outside
This is 12,000 years old!!! Anyone who doesn’t find this seriously weird, brilliant, spooky, compelling and, yes, a *bit Graham Hancocky* is lacking a soul
Water tank? Why does everything unexplained have to be for 'rituals' of some bizarre kind?
A neolithic wooden trackway was discovered here in the Flatlands - it had been preserved in the peat. Quite a remarkable find really but as it was in a forgotten corner of the country not a lot was made of it.
Apparently - despite the lack of any artifacts - archaeologists say it must have been a route to a 'ritual platform'. Not the rather obvious purpose of a track to get to the other side of a wet area...
Most archaeologists agree that the Tas Tepeler are sacred sites. Stone circles, after all
There is near-zero evidence of human habitation at Gobekli Tepe (there is evidence at the other Tas Tepeler). Why build it? It is surely a temple; it is also, it seems, aligned astronomically
Some kind of penis worshipping hunter-warrior cult (with human sacrifice?) is the best guess at the moment
I admit to knowing almost nothing about these sites other than that they exist.
But how do you build a temple without living there, at least for some of the time?
And if you know how to build things, why not build houses?
The archaeology changes every year as they find amazing new stuff (which is one reason it’s so exciting)
For many years it was thought Gobekli Tepe was a singular miracle. A temple complex built by remarkably gifted cavemen who lived in temporary tents/shelters during the building season
Now at the other Tas Tepeler they have found permanent homes - besides the ritual shrines and cultic chambers. So it looks more and more like a civilisation, from 10,000 BC (or even earlier)
Worth pointing out that by the definition of 'civilisation' in that case it is not much different to the early pre-ceramic Neolithic of Northern Syria. The only big difference is the presence of temples. Jericho as a settlement dates back to 10,000 BC and the walled town dates to around 8,500 BC (and that wall is VERY impressive).
Even that is not the oldest structures in the area. Tell Qaramel has 5 towers dating back to around 10,000 BC and shows continuous occupation throughout the whole of the proto-Neolithic and pre-pottery Neolithic A & B (from around 10,500 to 9,000BC). These sites have been known since the 1970s.
The temples are, certainly, something else. But as I said before, this is not the revolutionary news that Hancock and others would have you believe.
Ian Hodder of Stanford Uni disagrees with you:
‘Gobekli Tepe changes everything.’
As an amateur archeologist with an interest in Syria, you’ll have heard of him
'Changes everything' is one of those phrases that can mean anything to anyone. Yes it is spectacular. No it does not mean an ancient 'civilisation' in Hancockian terms any more than the discovery of the Northern Syrian villages did.
That does not at all detract from the sites, nor does it mean the temples are not amazing. But when we have Sunil of this parish writing articles about Atlantis you have to stop and take a sniff of the smelling salts.
GT and the other sites push back the dates for large scale man made structures by a few hundred years. Not the 15,000 or so Hancock is regularly heard to claim.
I’m not batting for Hancock, you misconstrue me. I will indeed say that the Tas Tepeler are absolutely revolutionary, coz it is the case
Incidentally if you are interested in this stuff - and you obviously are - why don’t you go have a look? Seriously. See for yourself
These days Gobekli Tepe is now walled off and sheltered and gets a million visitors a year and that miraculous quality has largely gone (tho it is still a gob smacking site). When I first went I was the only non archaeologist there and we could wander between the stones drinking tea!
But at a site like Karahan Tepe you can still do that. Simply rock up. Wander about. You might be alone - or you can watch the archaeologists digging
Go on, do it! It would make an amazing holiday (combine it with a beach). Blow your mind!
If you want details on how to do it, DM me
It is definetely on my list. Along with various sites around Lake Van and in Kurdistan. My problem is time. I have had one 3 week holiday in 10 years. The joys of consultancy. I am hoping to do a bit more travelling again for pleasure rather than work but as always it is mañana.
3 weeks.... in ten years?!
That's insane. Life is for living, not working. Find the time before you keel over
Oh, for God's sake.
For [A PLURAL NUMBER OF DECADES SINCE 18] I had approx six periods, each a week or less, which could be described as a "holiday". It's only in my new job where they will not let you sell them that I have to take them, which are inevitably taken up with work.
You've never had a full-time job (or, arguably even a job as we would understand it) and you fail to understand the responsibility of people relying on you. Life is not like the movies and holidays are for children, not adults.
Can't tell if you're serious, I kind of hope you're not
I don't deny I have been lucky, but I have also made my own luck, to an extent. Don't let the man take you down
He doesn't strike me as poor, and he seems to be self-employed as a consultant - and therefore able to carve out time. A trip to go see the Tas Tepeler would cost less than £1000, could be done in as little as a week, even five days if you're mad, and would blow your mind - and his mind - like nothing else on this green earth, in terms of archaeology. A spectacular archaeological site, probably the most important on the planet, maybe the most important in all human history (these are some expert opinions, not mine) is happening RIGHT NOW. And you can just drive up and watch them doing it. Mazin!
I have to agree with you on this. I can't really afford the time away either, but I'm taking three weeks out to visit S Korea shortly.
When you read accounts of people on their deathbeds (from nurses, doctors, hospice people etc) there are usually two major regrets that are near-universal (or so it is reported). Namely:
1. Should have spent more time with my kids and/or friends
2. I worked too hard, I should have travelled more
They are probably unavoidable, we will all die with regrets. But you can mitigate the remorse
I spend a lot of time with my children. Travel is more problematic.
I have been exactly the opposite, tho there wasn't much I could do about it, in the circs
So I've made the best of it, and gone pretty much EVERYWHERE
Actually, sod it, I will allow myself one photo - by me, from 2022 - of the Notorious Penis Chamber at Karahan Tepe. Mainly coz I’ll do anything to stop people talking about fricking ULEZ, also coz I just like writing “notorious penis chamber”
See here
What is this 12,000 year old room? WTF is it for?
At the moment, the best archaeological guess is that it is an initiation room for young adult males. It would have been roofed and dark. The boys would have stepped through the small door on the left, the room would have been half full of liquid piped in using the circled water channel. The liquid might have been animal blood - so one archaeologist told me. It might have poured through the mouth of the weird “head” acting as a spout. Then some ritual - sacrifice? Circumcision? Baptism? - would have been enacted. The boy becomes a man - a hunter - and then returns to the “audience room” just outside
This is 12,000 years old!!! Anyone who doesn’t find this seriously weird, brilliant, spooky, compelling and, yes, a *bit Graham Hancocky* is lacking a soul
Water tank? Why does everything unexplained have to be for 'rituals' of some bizarre kind?
A neolithic wooden trackway was discovered here in the Flatlands - it had been preserved in the peat. Quite a remarkable find really but as it was in a forgotten corner of the country not a lot was made of it.
Apparently - despite the lack of any artifacts - archaeologists say it must have been a route to a 'ritual platform'. Not the rather obvious purpose of a track to get to the other side of a wet area...
Most archaeologists agree that the Tas Tepeler are sacred sites. Stone circles, after all
There is near-zero evidence of human habitation at Gobekli Tepe (there is evidence at the other Tas Tepeler). Why build it? It is surely a temple; it is also, it seems, aligned astronomically
Some kind of penis worshipping hunter-warrior cult (with human sacrifice?) is the best guess at the moment
I admit to knowing almost nothing about these sites other than that they exist.
But how do you build a temple without living there, at least for some of the time?
And if you know how to build things, why not build houses?
The archaeology changes every year as they find amazing new stuff (which is one reason it’s so exciting)
For many years it was thought Gobekli Tepe was a singular miracle. A temple complex built by remarkably gifted cavemen who lived in temporary tents/shelters during the building season
Now at the other Tas Tepeler they have found permanent homes - besides the ritual shrines and cultic chambers. So it looks more and more like a civilisation, from 10,000 BC (or even earlier)
Worth pointing out that by the definition of 'civilisation' in that case it is not much different to the early pre-ceramic Neolithic of Northern Syria. The only big difference is the presence of temples. Jericho as a settlement dates back to 10,000 BC and the walled town dates to around 8,500 BC (and that wall is VERY impressive).
Even that is not the oldest structures in the area. Tell Qaramel has 5 towers dating back to around 10,000 BC and shows continuous occupation throughout the whole of the proto-Neolithic and pre-pottery Neolithic A & B (from around 10,500 to 9,000BC). These sites have been known since the 1970s.
The temples are, certainly, something else. But as I said before, this is not the revolutionary news that Hancock and others would have you believe.
Ian Hodder of Stanford Uni disagrees with you:
‘Gobekli Tepe changes everything.’
As an amateur archeologist with an interest in Syria, you’ll have heard of him
'Changes everything' is one of those phrases that can mean anything to anyone. Yes it is spectacular. No it does not mean an ancient 'civilisation' in Hancockian terms any more than the discovery of the Northern Syrian villages did.
That does not at all detract from the sites, nor does it mean the temples are not amazing. But when we have Sunil of this parish writing articles about Atlantis you have to stop and take a sniff of the smelling salts.
GT and the other sites push back the dates for large scale man made structures by a few hundred years. Not the 15,000 or so Hancock is regularly heard to claim.
I’m not batting for Hancock, you misconstrue me. I will indeed say that the Tas Tepeler are absolutely revolutionary, coz it is the case
Incidentally if you are interested in this stuff - and you obviously are - why don’t you go have a look? Seriously. See for yourself
These days Gobekli Tepe is now walled off and sheltered and gets a million visitors a year and that miraculous quality has largely gone (tho it is still a gob smacking site). When I first went I was the only non archaeologist there and we could wander between the stones drinking tea!
But at a site like Karahan Tepe you can still do that. Simply rock up. Wander about. You might be alone - or you can watch the archaeologists digging
Go on, do it! It would make an amazing holiday (combine it with a beach). Blow your mind!
If you want details on how to do it, DM me
It is definetely on my list. Along with various sites around Lake Van and in Kurdistan. My problem is time. I have had one 3 week holiday in 10 years. The joys of consultancy. I am hoping to do a bit more travelling again for pleasure rather than work but as always it is mañana.
3 weeks.... in ten years?!
That's insane. Life is for living, not working. Find the time before you keel over
Oh, for God's sake.
For [A PLURAL NUMBER OF DECADES SINCE 18] I had approx six periods, each a week or less, which could be described as a "holiday". It's only in my new job where they will not let you sell them that I have to take them, which are inevitably taken up with work.
You've never had a full-time job (or, arguably even a job as we would understand it) and you fail to understand the responsibility of people relying on you. Life is not like the movies and holidays are for children, not adults.
Can't tell if you're serious, I kind of hope you're not
I don't deny I have been lucky, but I have also made my own luck, to an extent. Don't let the man take you down
He doesn't strike me as poor, and he seems to be self-employed as a consultant - and therefore able to carve out time. A trip to go see the Tas Tepeler would cost less than £1000, could be done in as little as a week, even five days if you're mad, and would blow your mind - and his mind - like nothing else on this green earth, in terms of archaeology. A spectacular archaeological site, probably the most important on the planet, maybe the most important in all human history (these are some expert opinions, not mine) is happening RIGHT NOW. And you can just drive up and watch them doing it. Mazin!
Speaking as another consultant, time very much equals money (unless it is PB in which case you get my time FOC...). Not working = not getting paid. Or at least that is the mentality I started with. A few years in and what I get paid is not directly connected with the revenue I earn for my company.
I took two weeks off in July, revenue that month was obviously much lower, but that had no impact on what I pull out. I still take opportunistic work where I can get it - a weekend gig meant doing 12 days without a break earlier this month. Output for that client was limited at best by the end of that, but they are happy to pay so I am happy to invoice.
Holidays are ok. Time off relaxing is more important. And I get bored easily. Best option is combining travel and work - something you excel at of course!
I didn't have a single day off between April 10th and the last week in May.
Made a lot of money, don't get me wrong, but also resolved never to do that again.
Is that working weekends as well? Blimey! I'm happy to work a weekend here and there, but not on the bounce.
Well, as I do YouTube and need to maintain my network I have had several weekend trips which count as "work". My company pays anyway. Pity that entertaining isn't tax deductible, but at least it is pre-tax expenditure...
Having said all of that next week I am going to the exotic and fascinating Ashford for a week. Canterbury, Dover and Hastings are already on the list. Anyone got some less well known suggestions?
Nearby vineyards that do interesting tours and tastings: Westwell, Gusbourne, Barnsole, Terlingham (and a few more further afield)
Actually, sod it, I will allow myself one photo - by me, from 2022 - of the Notorious Penis Chamber at Karahan Tepe. Mainly coz I’ll do anything to stop people talking about fricking ULEZ, also coz I just like writing “notorious penis chamber”
See here
What is this 12,000 year old room? WTF is it for?
At the moment, the best archaeological guess is that it is an initiation room for young adult males. It would have been roofed and dark. The boys would have stepped through the small door on the left, the room would have been half full of liquid piped in using the circled water channel. The liquid might have been animal blood - so one archaeologist told me. It might have poured through the mouth of the weird “head” acting as a spout. Then some ritual - sacrifice? Circumcision? Baptism? - would have been enacted. The boy becomes a man - a hunter - and then returns to the “audience room” just outside
This is 12,000 years old!!! Anyone who doesn’t find this seriously weird, brilliant, spooky, compelling and, yes, a *bit Graham Hancocky* is lacking a soul
Water tank? Why does everything unexplained have to be for 'rituals' of some bizarre kind?
A neolithic wooden trackway was discovered here in the Flatlands - it had been preserved in the peat. Quite a remarkable find really but as it was in a forgotten corner of the country not a lot was made of it.
Apparently - despite the lack of any artifacts - archaeologists say it must have been a route to a 'ritual platform'. Not the rather obvious purpose of a track to get to the other side of a wet area...
Most archaeologists agree that the Tas Tepeler are sacred sites. Stone circles, after all
There is near-zero evidence of human habitation at Gobekli Tepe (there is evidence at the other Tas Tepeler). Why build it? It is surely a temple; it is also, it seems, aligned astronomically
Some kind of penis worshipping hunter-warrior cult (with human sacrifice?) is the best guess at the moment
I admit to knowing almost nothing about these sites other than that they exist.
But how do you build a temple without living there, at least for some of the time?
And if you know how to build things, why not build houses?
The archaeology changes every year as they find amazing new stuff (which is one reason it’s so exciting)
For many years it was thought Gobekli Tepe was a singular miracle. A temple complex built by remarkably gifted cavemen who lived in temporary tents/shelters during the building season
Now at the other Tas Tepeler they have found permanent homes - besides the ritual shrines and cultic chambers. So it looks more and more like a civilisation, from 10,000 BC (or even earlier)
Worth pointing out that by the definition of 'civilisation' in that case it is not much different to the early pre-ceramic Neolithic of Northern Syria. The only big difference is the presence of temples. Jericho as a settlement dates back to 10,000 BC and the walled town dates to around 8,500 BC (and that wall is VERY impressive).
Even that is not the oldest structures in the area. Tell Qaramel has 5 towers dating back to around 10,000 BC and shows continuous occupation throughout the whole of the proto-Neolithic and pre-pottery Neolithic A & B (from around 10,500 to 9,000BC). These sites have been known since the 1970s.
The temples are, certainly, something else. But as I said before, this is not the revolutionary news that Hancock and others would have you believe.
Ian Hodder of Stanford Uni disagrees with you:
‘Gobekli Tepe changes everything.’
As an amateur archeologist with an interest in Syria, you’ll have heard of him
'Changes everything' is one of those phrases that can mean anything to anyone. Yes it is spectacular. No it does not mean an ancient 'civilisation' in Hancockian terms any more than the discovery of the Northern Syrian villages did.
That does not at all detract from the sites, nor does it mean the temples are not amazing. But when we have Sunil of this parish writing articles about Atlantis you have to stop and take a sniff of the smelling salts.
GT and the other sites push back the dates for large scale man made structures by a few hundred years. Not the 15,000 or so Hancock is regularly heard to claim.
I’m not batting for Hancock, you misconstrue me. I will indeed say that the Tas Tepeler are absolutely revolutionary, coz it is the case
Incidentally if you are interested in this stuff - and you obviously are - why don’t you go have a look? Seriously. See for yourself
These days Gobekli Tepe is now walled off and sheltered and gets a million visitors a year and that miraculous quality has largely gone (tho it is still a gob smacking site). When I first went I was the only non archaeologist there and we could wander between the stones drinking tea!
But at a site like Karahan Tepe you can still do that. Simply rock up. Wander about. You might be alone - or you can watch the archaeologists digging
Go on, do it! It would make an amazing holiday (combine it with a beach). Blow your mind!
If you want details on how to do it, DM me
It is definetely on my list. Along with various sites around Lake Van and in Kurdistan. My problem is time. I have had one 3 week holiday in 10 years. The joys of consultancy. I am hoping to do a bit more travelling again for pleasure rather than work but as always it is mañana.
3 weeks.... in ten years?!
That's insane. Life is for living, not working. Find the time before you keel over
Oh, for God's sake.
For [A PLURAL NUMBER OF DECADES SINCE 18] I had approx six periods, each a week or less, which could be described as a "holiday". It's only in my new job where they will not let you sell them that I have to take them, which are inevitably taken up with work.
You've never had a full-time job (or, arguably even a job as we would understand it) and you fail to understand the responsibility of people relying on you. Life is not like the movies and holidays are for children, not adults.
Can't tell if you're serious, I kind of hope you're not
I don't deny I have been lucky, but I have also made my own luck, to an extent. Don't let the man take you down
He doesn't strike me as poor, and he seems to be self-employed as a consultant - and therefore able to carve out time. A trip to go see the Tas Tepeler would cost less than £1000, could be done in as little as a week, even five days if you're mad, and would blow your mind - and his mind - like nothing else on this green earth, in terms of archaeology. A spectacular archaeological site, probably the most important on the planet, maybe the most important in all human history (these are some expert opinions, not mine) is happening RIGHT NOW. And you can just drive up and watch them doing it. Mazin!
I've not had a 'holiday' since the start of the pandemic. The odd day out, maybe.
There are more reasons than just work to be tied down.
Whilst I do have a number of places I'd like to go given the chance, I do wonder about some friends that are forever travelling the planet. What are they searching for? I don't think the answer to life the universe and everything lies in the Peruvian jungle (or wherever they are this week).
In my friend's case it's to tick off every country on the planet. He has done most of the easy ones and is now finding it progressively more difficult. As we're all officially spectrumy on this forum, I assume others can appreciate the sentiment.
An acquaintance of mine set himself the target of having a pint of Guinness in every European capital. Some were easy... some less so. I recall the Vatican was a difficult one.
Having said all of that next week I am going to the exotic and fascinating Ashford for a week. Canterbury, Dover and Hastings are already on the list. Anyone got some less well known suggestions?
Ightham Mote is fantastic if you haven't been. Also Sissinghurst and Leeds Castle
Actually, sod it, I will allow myself one photo - by me, from 2022 - of the Notorious Penis Chamber at Karahan Tepe. Mainly coz I’ll do anything to stop people talking about fricking ULEZ, also coz I just like writing “notorious penis chamber”
See here
What is this 12,000 year old room? WTF is it for?
At the moment, the best archaeological guess is that it is an initiation room for young adult males. It would have been roofed and dark. The boys would have stepped through the small door on the left, the room would have been half full of liquid piped in using the circled water channel. The liquid might have been animal blood - so one archaeologist told me. It might have poured through the mouth of the weird “head” acting as a spout. Then some ritual - sacrifice? Circumcision? Baptism? - would have been enacted. The boy becomes a man - a hunter - and then returns to the “audience room” just outside
This is 12,000 years old!!! Anyone who doesn’t find this seriously weird, brilliant, spooky, compelling and, yes, a *bit Graham Hancocky* is lacking a soul
Water tank? Why does everything unexplained have to be for 'rituals' of some bizarre kind?
A neolithic wooden trackway was discovered here in the Flatlands - it had been preserved in the peat. Quite a remarkable find really but as it was in a forgotten corner of the country not a lot was made of it.
Apparently - despite the lack of any artifacts - archaeologists say it must have been a route to a 'ritual platform'. Not the rather obvious purpose of a track to get to the other side of a wet area...
Most archaeologists agree that the Tas Tepeler are sacred sites. Stone circles, after all
There is near-zero evidence of human habitation at Gobekli Tepe (there is evidence at the other Tas Tepeler). Why build it? It is surely a temple; it is also, it seems, aligned astronomically
Some kind of penis worshipping hunter-warrior cult (with human sacrifice?) is the best guess at the moment
I admit to knowing almost nothing about these sites other than that they exist.
But how do you build a temple without living there, at least for some of the time?
And if you know how to build things, why not build houses?
The archaeology changes every year as they find amazing new stuff (which is one reason it’s so exciting)
For many years it was thought Gobekli Tepe was a singular miracle. A temple complex built by remarkably gifted cavemen who lived in temporary tents/shelters during the building season
Now at the other Tas Tepeler they have found permanent homes - besides the ritual shrines and cultic chambers. So it looks more and more like a civilisation, from 10,000 BC (or even earlier)
Worth pointing out that by the definition of 'civilisation' in that case it is not much different to the early pre-ceramic Neolithic of Northern Syria. The only big difference is the presence of temples. Jericho as a settlement dates back to 10,000 BC and the walled town dates to around 8,500 BC (and that wall is VERY impressive).
Even that is not the oldest structures in the area. Tell Qaramel has 5 towers dating back to around 10,000 BC and shows continuous occupation throughout the whole of the proto-Neolithic and pre-pottery Neolithic A & B (from around 10,500 to 9,000BC). These sites have been known since the 1970s.
The temples are, certainly, something else. But as I said before, this is not the revolutionary news that Hancock and others would have you believe.
Ian Hodder of Stanford Uni disagrees with you:
‘Gobekli Tepe changes everything.’
As an amateur archeologist with an interest in Syria, you’ll have heard of him
'Changes everything' is one of those phrases that can mean anything to anyone. Yes it is spectacular. No it does not mean an ancient 'civilisation' in Hancockian terms any more than the discovery of the Northern Syrian villages did.
That does not at all detract from the sites, nor does it mean the temples are not amazing. But when we have Sunil of this parish writing articles about Atlantis you have to stop and take a sniff of the smelling salts.
GT and the other sites push back the dates for large scale man made structures by a few hundred years. Not the 15,000 or so Hancock is regularly heard to claim.
I’m not batting for Hancock, you misconstrue me. I will indeed say that the Tas Tepeler are absolutely revolutionary, coz it is the case
Incidentally if you are interested in this stuff - and you obviously are - why don’t you go have a look? Seriously. See for yourself
These days Gobekli Tepe is now walled off and sheltered and gets a million visitors a year and that miraculous quality has largely gone (tho it is still a gob smacking site). When I first went I was the only non archaeologist there and we could wander between the stones drinking tea!
But at a site like Karahan Tepe you can still do that. Simply rock up. Wander about. You might be alone - or you can watch the archaeologists digging
Go on, do it! It would make an amazing holiday (combine it with a beach). Blow your mind!
If you want details on how to do it, DM me
It is definetely on my list. Along with various sites around Lake Van and in Kurdistan. My problem is time. I have had one 3 week holiday in 10 years. The joys of consultancy. I am hoping to do a bit more travelling again for pleasure rather than work but as always it is mañana.
3 weeks.... in ten years?!
That's insane. Life is for living, not working. Find the time before you keel over
Oh, for God's sake.
For [A PLURAL NUMBER OF DECADES SINCE 18] I had approx six periods, each a week or less, which could be described as a "holiday". It's only in my new job where they will not let you sell them that I have to take them, which are inevitably taken up with work.
You've never had a full-time job (or, arguably even a job as we would understand it) and you fail to understand the responsibility of people relying on you. Life is not like the movies and holidays are for children, not adults.
Can't tell if you're serious, I kind of hope you're not
I don't deny I have been lucky, but I have also made my own luck, to an extent. Don't let the man take you down
He doesn't strike me as poor, and he seems to be self-employed as a consultant - and therefore able to carve out time. A trip to go see the Tas Tepeler would cost less than £1000, could be done in as little as a week, even five days if you're mad, and would blow your mind - and his mind - like nothing else on this green earth, in terms of archaeology. A spectacular archaeological site, probably the most important on the planet, maybe the most important in all human history (these are some expert opinions, not mine) is happening RIGHT NOW. And you can just drive up and watch them doing it. Mazin!
I have to agree with you on this. I can't really afford the time away either, but I'm taking three weeks out to visit S Korea shortly.
When you read accounts of people on their deathbeds (from nurses, doctors, hospice people etc) there are usually two major regrets that are near-universal (or so it is reported). Namely:
1. Should have spent more time with my kids and/or friends
2. I worked too hard, I should have travelled more
They are probably unavoidable, we will all die with regrets. But you can mitigate the remorse
I spend a lot of time with my children. Travel is more problematic.
I have been exactly the opposite, tho there wasn't much I could do about it, in the circs
So I've made the best of it, and gone pretty much EVERYWHERE
Having said all of that next week I am going to the exotic and fascinating Ashford for a week. Canterbury, Dover and Hastings are already on the list. Anyone got some less well known suggestions?
Rochester cathedral is worth a visit, and Bodiam is not too far away.
Actually, sod it, I will allow myself one photo - by me, from 2022 - of the Notorious Penis Chamber at Karahan Tepe. Mainly coz I’ll do anything to stop people talking about fricking ULEZ, also coz I just like writing “notorious penis chamber”
See here
What is this 12,000 year old room? WTF is it for?
At the moment, the best archaeological guess is that it is an initiation room for young adult males. It would have been roofed and dark. The boys would have stepped through the small door on the left, the room would have been half full of liquid piped in using the circled water channel. The liquid might have been animal blood - so one archaeologist told me. It might have poured through the mouth of the weird “head” acting as a spout. Then some ritual - sacrifice? Circumcision? Baptism? - would have been enacted. The boy becomes a man - a hunter - and then returns to the “audience room” just outside
This is 12,000 years old!!! Anyone who doesn’t find this seriously weird, brilliant, spooky, compelling and, yes, a *bit Graham Hancocky* is lacking a soul
Water tank? Why does everything unexplained have to be for 'rituals' of some bizarre kind?
A neolithic wooden trackway was discovered here in the Flatlands - it had been preserved in the peat. Quite a remarkable find really but as it was in a forgotten corner of the country not a lot was made of it.
Apparently - despite the lack of any artifacts - archaeologists say it must have been a route to a 'ritual platform'. Not the rather obvious purpose of a track to get to the other side of a wet area...
Most archaeologists agree that the Tas Tepeler are sacred sites. Stone circles, after all
There is near-zero evidence of human habitation at Gobekli Tepe (there is evidence at the other Tas Tepeler). Why build it? It is surely a temple; it is also, it seems, aligned astronomically
Some kind of penis worshipping hunter-warrior cult (with human sacrifice?) is the best guess at the moment
I admit to knowing almost nothing about these sites other than that they exist.
But how do you build a temple without living there, at least for some of the time?
And if you know how to build things, why not build houses?
The archaeology changes every year as they find amazing new stuff (which is one reason it’s so exciting)
For many years it was thought Gobekli Tepe was a singular miracle. A temple complex built by remarkably gifted cavemen who lived in temporary tents/shelters during the building season
Now at the other Tas Tepeler they have found permanent homes - besides the ritual shrines and cultic chambers. So it looks more and more like a civilisation, from 10,000 BC (or even earlier)
Worth pointing out that by the definition of 'civilisation' in that case it is not much different to the early pre-ceramic Neolithic of Northern Syria. The only big difference is the presence of temples. Jericho as a settlement dates back to 10,000 BC and the walled town dates to around 8,500 BC (and that wall is VERY impressive).
Even that is not the oldest structures in the area. Tell Qaramel has 5 towers dating back to around 10,000 BC and shows continuous occupation throughout the whole of the proto-Neolithic and pre-pottery Neolithic A & B (from around 10,500 to 9,000BC). These sites have been known since the 1970s.
The temples are, certainly, something else. But as I said before, this is not the revolutionary news that Hancock and others would have you believe.
Ian Hodder of Stanford Uni disagrees with you:
‘Gobekli Tepe changes everything.’
As an amateur archeologist with an interest in Syria, you’ll have heard of him
'Changes everything' is one of those phrases that can mean anything to anyone. Yes it is spectacular. No it does not mean an ancient 'civilisation' in Hancockian terms any more than the discovery of the Northern Syrian villages did.
That does not at all detract from the sites, nor does it mean the temples are not amazing. But when we have Sunil of this parish writing articles about Atlantis you have to stop and take a sniff of the smelling salts.
GT and the other sites push back the dates for large scale man made structures by a few hundred years. Not the 15,000 or so Hancock is regularly heard to claim.
I’m not batting for Hancock, you misconstrue me. I will indeed say that the Tas Tepeler are absolutely revolutionary, coz it is the case
Incidentally if you are interested in this stuff - and you obviously are - why don’t you go have a look? Seriously. See for yourself
These days Gobekli Tepe is now walled off and sheltered and gets a million visitors a year and that miraculous quality has largely gone (tho it is still a gob smacking site). When I first went I was the only non archaeologist there and we could wander between the stones drinking tea!
But at a site like Karahan Tepe you can still do that. Simply rock up. Wander about. You might be alone - or you can watch the archaeologists digging
Go on, do it! It would make an amazing holiday (combine it with a beach). Blow your mind!
If you want details on how to do it, DM me
It is definetely on my list. Along with various sites around Lake Van and in Kurdistan. My problem is time. I have had one 3 week holiday in 10 years. The joys of consultancy. I am hoping to do a bit more travelling again for pleasure rather than work but as always it is mañana.
3 weeks.... in ten years?!
That's insane. Life is for living, not working. Find the time before you keel over
Oh, for God's sake.
For [A PLURAL NUMBER OF DECADES SINCE 18] I had approx six periods, each a week or less, which could be described as a "holiday". It's only in my new job where they will not let you sell them that I have to take them, which are inevitably taken up with work.
You've never had a full-time job (or, arguably even a job as we would understand it) and you fail to understand the responsibility of people relying on you. Life is not like the movies and holidays are for children, not adults.
Can't tell if you're serious, I kind of hope you're not
I don't deny I have been lucky, but I have also made my own luck, to an extent. Don't let the man take you down
He doesn't strike me as poor, and he seems to be self-employed as a consultant - and therefore able to carve out time. A trip to go see the Tas Tepeler would cost less than £1000, could be done in as little as a week, even five days if you're mad, and would blow your mind - and his mind - like nothing else on this green earth, in terms of archaeology. A spectacular archaeological site, probably the most important on the planet, maybe the most important in all human history (these are some expert opinions, not mine) is happening RIGHT NOW. And you can just drive up and watch them doing it. Mazin!
I have to agree with you on this. I can't really afford the time away either, but I'm taking three weeks out to visit S Korea shortly.
When you read accounts of people on their deathbeds (from nurses, doctors, hospice people etc) there are usually two major regrets that are near-universal (or so it is reported). Namely:
1. Should have spent more time with my kids and/or friends
2. I worked too hard, I should have travelled more
They are probably unavoidable, we will all die with regrets. But you can mitigate the remorse
I spend a lot of time with my children. Travel is more problematic.
I have been exactly the opposite, tho there wasn't much I could do about it, in the circs
So I've made the best of it, and gone pretty much EVERYWHERE
"Flash, where have you been?" "Where HAVEN'T I been! WOOF WOOF"
Actually, sod it, I will allow myself one photo - by me, from 2022 - of the Notorious Penis Chamber at Karahan Tepe. Mainly coz I’ll do anything to stop people talking about fricking ULEZ, also coz I just like writing “notorious penis chamber”
See here
What is this 12,000 year old room? WTF is it for?
At the moment, the best archaeological guess is that it is an initiation room for young adult males. It would have been roofed and dark. The boys would have stepped through the small door on the left, the room would have been half full of liquid piped in using the circled water channel. The liquid might have been animal blood - so one archaeologist told me. It might have poured through the mouth of the weird “head” acting as a spout. Then some ritual - sacrifice? Circumcision? Baptism? - would have been enacted. The boy becomes a man - a hunter - and then returns to the “audience room” just outside
This is 12,000 years old!!! Anyone who doesn’t find this seriously weird, brilliant, spooky, compelling and, yes, a *bit Graham Hancocky* is lacking a soul
Water tank? Why does everything unexplained have to be for 'rituals' of some bizarre kind?
A neolithic wooden trackway was discovered here in the Flatlands - it had been preserved in the peat. Quite a remarkable find really but as it was in a forgotten corner of the country not a lot was made of it.
Apparently - despite the lack of any artifacts - archaeologists say it must have been a route to a 'ritual platform'. Not the rather obvious purpose of a track to get to the other side of a wet area...
Most archaeologists agree that the Tas Tepeler are sacred sites. Stone circles, after all
There is near-zero evidence of human habitation at Gobekli Tepe (there is evidence at the other Tas Tepeler). Why build it? It is surely a temple; it is also, it seems, aligned astronomically
Some kind of penis worshipping hunter-warrior cult (with human sacrifice?) is the best guess at the moment
I admit to knowing almost nothing about these sites other than that they exist.
But how do you build a temple without living there, at least for some of the time?
And if you know how to build things, why not build houses?
The archaeology changes every year as they find amazing new stuff (which is one reason it’s so exciting)
For many years it was thought Gobekli Tepe was a singular miracle. A temple complex built by remarkably gifted cavemen who lived in temporary tents/shelters during the building season
Now at the other Tas Tepeler they have found permanent homes - besides the ritual shrines and cultic chambers. So it looks more and more like a civilisation, from 10,000 BC (or even earlier)
Worth pointing out that by the definition of 'civilisation' in that case it is not much different to the early pre-ceramic Neolithic of Northern Syria. The only big difference is the presence of temples. Jericho as a settlement dates back to 10,000 BC and the walled town dates to around 8,500 BC (and that wall is VERY impressive).
Even that is not the oldest structures in the area. Tell Qaramel has 5 towers dating back to around 10,000 BC and shows continuous occupation throughout the whole of the proto-Neolithic and pre-pottery Neolithic A & B (from around 10,500 to 9,000BC). These sites have been known since the 1970s.
The temples are, certainly, something else. But as I said before, this is not the revolutionary news that Hancock and others would have you believe.
Ian Hodder of Stanford Uni disagrees with you:
‘Gobekli Tepe changes everything.’
As an amateur archeologist with an interest in Syria, you’ll have heard of him
'Changes everything' is one of those phrases that can mean anything to anyone. Yes it is spectacular. No it does not mean an ancient 'civilisation' in Hancockian terms any more than the discovery of the Northern Syrian villages did.
That does not at all detract from the sites, nor does it mean the temples are not amazing. But when we have Sunil of this parish writing articles about Atlantis you have to stop and take a sniff of the smelling salts.
GT and the other sites push back the dates for large scale man made structures by a few hundred years. Not the 15,000 or so Hancock is regularly heard to claim.
I’m not batting for Hancock, you misconstrue me. I will indeed say that the Tas Tepeler are absolutely revolutionary, coz it is the case
Incidentally if you are interested in this stuff - and you obviously are - why don’t you go have a look? Seriously. See for yourself
These days Gobekli Tepe is now walled off and sheltered and gets a million visitors a year and that miraculous quality has largely gone (tho it is still a gob smacking site). When I first went I was the only non archaeologist there and we could wander between the stones drinking tea!
But at a site like Karahan Tepe you can still do that. Simply rock up. Wander about. You might be alone - or you can watch the archaeologists digging
Go on, do it! It would make an amazing holiday (combine it with a beach). Blow your mind!
If you want details on how to do it, DM me
It is definetely on my list. Along with various sites around Lake Van and in Kurdistan. My problem is time. I have had one 3 week holiday in 10 years. The joys of consultancy. I am hoping to do a bit more travelling again for pleasure rather than work but as always it is mañana.
3 weeks.... in ten years?!
That's insane. Life is for living, not working. Find the time before you keel over
Oh, for God's sake.
For [A PLURAL NUMBER OF DECADES SINCE 18] I had approx six periods, each a week or less, which could be described as a "holiday". It's only in my new job where they will not let you sell them that I have to take them, which are inevitably taken up with work.
You've never had a full-time job (or, arguably even a job as we would understand it) and you fail to understand the responsibility of people relying on you. Life is not like the movies and holidays are for children, not adults.
Can't tell if you're serious, I kind of hope you're not
I don't deny I have been lucky, but I have also made my own luck, to an extent. Don't let the man take you down
He doesn't strike me as poor, and he seems to be self-employed as a consultant - and therefore able to carve out time. A trip to go see the Tas Tepeler would cost less than £1000, could be done in as little as a week, even five days if you're mad, and would blow your mind - and his mind - like nothing else on this green earth, in terms of archaeology. A spectacular archaeological site, probably the most important on the planet, maybe the most important in all human history (these are some expert opinions, not mine) is happening RIGHT NOW. And you can just drive up and watch them doing it. Mazin!
I've not had a 'holiday' since the start of the pandemic. The odd day out, maybe.
There are more reasons than just work to be tied down.
Whilst I do have a number of places I'd like to go given the chance, I do wonder about some friends that are forever travelling the planet. What are they searching for? I don't think the answer to life the universe and everything lies in the Peruvian jungle (or wherever they are this week).
In my friend's case it's to tick off every country on the planet. He has done most of the easy ones and is now finding it progressively more difficult. As we're all officially spectrumy on this forum, I assume others can appreciate the sentiment.
Looks at Munro chart. Hmm. Can kind of appreciate that one.
I can think of self-challenges involving less jet fuel though.
Actually, sod it, I will allow myself one photo - by me, from 2022 - of the Notorious Penis Chamber at Karahan Tepe. Mainly coz I’ll do anything to stop people talking about fricking ULEZ, also coz I just like writing “notorious penis chamber”
See here
What is this 12,000 year old room? WTF is it for?
At the moment, the best archaeological guess is that it is an initiation room for young adult males. It would have been roofed and dark. The boys would have stepped through the small door on the left, the room would have been half full of liquid piped in using the circled water channel. The liquid might have been animal blood - so one archaeologist told me. It might have poured through the mouth of the weird “head” acting as a spout. Then some ritual - sacrifice? Circumcision? Baptism? - would have been enacted. The boy becomes a man - a hunter - and then returns to the “audience room” just outside
This is 12,000 years old!!! Anyone who doesn’t find this seriously weird, brilliant, spooky, compelling and, yes, a *bit Graham Hancocky* is lacking a soul
Water tank? Why does everything unexplained have to be for 'rituals' of some bizarre kind?
A neolithic wooden trackway was discovered here in the Flatlands - it had been preserved in the peat. Quite a remarkable find really but as it was in a forgotten corner of the country not a lot was made of it.
Apparently - despite the lack of any artifacts - archaeologists say it must have been a route to a 'ritual platform'. Not the rather obvious purpose of a track to get to the other side of a wet area...
Most archaeologists agree that the Tas Tepeler are sacred sites. Stone circles, after all
There is near-zero evidence of human habitation at Gobekli Tepe (there is evidence at the other Tas Tepeler). Why build it? It is surely a temple; it is also, it seems, aligned astronomically
Some kind of penis worshipping hunter-warrior cult (with human sacrifice?) is the best guess at the moment
I admit to knowing almost nothing about these sites other than that they exist.
But how do you build a temple without living there, at least for some of the time?
And if you know how to build things, why not build houses?
The archaeology changes every year as they find amazing new stuff (which is one reason it’s so exciting)
For many years it was thought Gobekli Tepe was a singular miracle. A temple complex built by remarkably gifted cavemen who lived in temporary tents/shelters during the building season
Now at the other Tas Tepeler they have found permanent homes - besides the ritual shrines and cultic chambers. So it looks more and more like a civilisation, from 10,000 BC (or even earlier)
Worth pointing out that by the definition of 'civilisation' in that case it is not much different to the early pre-ceramic Neolithic of Northern Syria. The only big difference is the presence of temples. Jericho as a settlement dates back to 10,000 BC and the walled town dates to around 8,500 BC (and that wall is VERY impressive).
Even that is not the oldest structures in the area. Tell Qaramel has 5 towers dating back to around 10,000 BC and shows continuous occupation throughout the whole of the proto-Neolithic and pre-pottery Neolithic A & B (from around 10,500 to 9,000BC). These sites have been known since the 1970s.
The temples are, certainly, something else. But as I said before, this is not the revolutionary news that Hancock and others would have you believe.
Ian Hodder of Stanford Uni disagrees with you:
‘Gobekli Tepe changes everything.’
As an amateur archeologist with an interest in Syria, you’ll have heard of him
'Changes everything' is one of those phrases that can mean anything to anyone. Yes it is spectacular. No it does not mean an ancient 'civilisation' in Hancockian terms any more than the discovery of the Northern Syrian villages did.
That does not at all detract from the sites, nor does it mean the temples are not amazing. But when we have Sunil of this parish writing articles about Atlantis you have to stop and take a sniff of the smelling salts.
GT and the other sites push back the dates for large scale man made structures by a few hundred years. Not the 15,000 or so Hancock is regularly heard to claim.
I’m not batting for Hancock, you misconstrue me. I will indeed say that the Tas Tepeler are absolutely revolutionary, coz it is the case
Incidentally if you are interested in this stuff - and you obviously are - why don’t you go have a look? Seriously. See for yourself
These days Gobekli Tepe is now walled off and sheltered and gets a million visitors a year and that miraculous quality has largely gone (tho it is still a gob smacking site). When I first went I was the only non archaeologist there and we could wander between the stones drinking tea!
But at a site like Karahan Tepe you can still do that. Simply rock up. Wander about. You might be alone - or you can watch the archaeologists digging
Go on, do it! It would make an amazing holiday (combine it with a beach). Blow your mind!
If you want details on how to do it, DM me
It is definetely on my list. Along with various sites around Lake Van and in Kurdistan. My problem is time. I have had one 3 week holiday in 10 years. The joys of consultancy. I am hoping to do a bit more travelling again for pleasure rather than work but as always it is mañana.
3 weeks.... in ten years?!
That's insane. Life is for living, not working. Find the time before you keel over
Oh, for God's sake.
For [A PLURAL NUMBER OF DECADES SINCE 18] I had approx six periods, each a week or less, which could be described as a "holiday". It's only in my new job where they will not let you sell them that I have to take them, which are inevitably taken up with work.
You've never had a full-time job (or, arguably even a job as we would understand it) and you fail to understand the responsibility of people relying on you. Life is not like the movies and holidays are for children, not adults.
Can't tell if you're serious, I kind of hope you're not
I don't deny I have been lucky, but I have also made my own luck, to an extent. Don't let the man take you down
He doesn't strike me as poor, and he seems to be self-employed as a consultant - and therefore able to carve out time. A trip to go see the Tas Tepeler would cost less than £1000, could be done in as little as a week, even five days if you're mad, and would blow your mind - and his mind - like nothing else on this green earth, in terms of archaeology. A spectacular archaeological site, probably the most important on the planet, maybe the most important in all human history (these are some expert opinions, not mine) is happening RIGHT NOW. And you can just drive up and watch them doing it. Mazin!
I have to agree with you on this. I can't really afford the time away either, but I'm taking three weeks out to visit S Korea shortly.
When you read accounts of people on their deathbeds (from nurses, doctors, hospice people etc) there are usually two major regrets that are near-universal (or so it is reported). Namely:
1. Should have spent more time with my kids and/or friends
2. I worked too hard, I should have travelled more
They are probably unavoidable, we will all die with regrets. But you can mitigate the remorse
I spend a lot of time with my children. Travel is more problematic.
I have been exactly the opposite, tho there wasn't much I could do about it, in the circs
So I've made the best of it, and gone pretty much EVERYWHERE
Which countries haven't you been to?
Still got quite a few to go. Northern south America, central America, the Stans, and most of central/west Africa, Polynesia
I've been everywhere else, more or less. eg All seven continents
Furthermore, we’re all going to pay for it: Taxpayers will pick up the bill for pollution by housebuilders, government officials have admitted, as rules on chemical releases into waterways are scrapped.
If an amendment in the House of Lords tabled on Tuesday passes, developers will no longer have to offset the nutrient pollution caused by sewage from new homes. The government has said it will double Natural England’s wetland funding to £280m in order to show it is trying to meet the requirements of its legally binding Environment Act.
This extra £140m will come from the public purse, the government confirmed. When asked by the Guardian whether this meant the taxpayer was now picking up the bill for pollution caused by developers, a government official responded “yes”, adding that while “the polluter pays principle is very important”, it was having too many adverse impacts on small- and medium-sized housebuilders
Actually, sod it, I will allow myself one photo - by me, from 2022 - of the Notorious Penis Chamber at Karahan Tepe. Mainly coz I’ll do anything to stop people talking about fricking ULEZ, also coz I just like writing “notorious penis chamber”
See here
What is this 12,000 year old room? WTF is it for?
At the moment, the best archaeological guess is that it is an initiation room for young adult males. It would have been roofed and dark. The boys would have stepped through the small door on the left, the room would have been half full of liquid piped in using the circled water channel. The liquid might have been animal blood - so one archaeologist told me. It might have poured through the mouth of the weird “head” acting as a spout. Then some ritual - sacrifice? Circumcision? Baptism? - would have been enacted. The boy becomes a man - a hunter - and then returns to the “audience room” just outside
This is 12,000 years old!!! Anyone who doesn’t find this seriously weird, brilliant, spooky, compelling and, yes, a *bit Graham Hancocky* is lacking a soul
Water tank? Why does everything unexplained have to be for 'rituals' of some bizarre kind?
A neolithic wooden trackway was discovered here in the Flatlands - it had been preserved in the peat. Quite a remarkable find really but as it was in a forgotten corner of the country not a lot was made of it.
Apparently - despite the lack of any artifacts - archaeologists say it must have been a route to a 'ritual platform'. Not the rather obvious purpose of a track to get to the other side of a wet area...
Most archaeologists agree that the Tas Tepeler are sacred sites. Stone circles, after all
There is near-zero evidence of human habitation at Gobekli Tepe (there is evidence at the other Tas Tepeler). Why build it? It is surely a temple; it is also, it seems, aligned astronomically
Some kind of penis worshipping hunter-warrior cult (with human sacrifice?) is the best guess at the moment
I admit to knowing almost nothing about these sites other than that they exist.
But how do you build a temple without living there, at least for some of the time?
And if you know how to build things, why not build houses?
The archaeology changes every year as they find amazing new stuff (which is one reason it’s so exciting)
For many years it was thought Gobekli Tepe was a singular miracle. A temple complex built by remarkably gifted cavemen who lived in temporary tents/shelters during the building season
Now at the other Tas Tepeler they have found permanent homes - besides the ritual shrines and cultic chambers. So it looks more and more like a civilisation, from 10,000 BC (or even earlier)
Worth pointing out that by the definition of 'civilisation' in that case it is not much different to the early pre-ceramic Neolithic of Northern Syria. The only big difference is the presence of temples. Jericho as a settlement dates back to 10,000 BC and the walled town dates to around 8,500 BC (and that wall is VERY impressive).
Even that is not the oldest structures in the area. Tell Qaramel has 5 towers dating back to around 10,000 BC and shows continuous occupation throughout the whole of the proto-Neolithic and pre-pottery Neolithic A & B (from around 10,500 to 9,000BC). These sites have been known since the 1970s.
The temples are, certainly, something else. But as I said before, this is not the revolutionary news that Hancock and others would have you believe.
Ian Hodder of Stanford Uni disagrees with you:
‘Gobekli Tepe changes everything.’
As an amateur archeologist with an interest in Syria, you’ll have heard of him
'Changes everything' is one of those phrases that can mean anything to anyone. Yes it is spectacular. No it does not mean an ancient 'civilisation' in Hancockian terms any more than the discovery of the Northern Syrian villages did.
That does not at all detract from the sites, nor does it mean the temples are not amazing. But when we have Sunil of this parish writing articles about Atlantis you have to stop and take a sniff of the smelling salts.
GT and the other sites push back the dates for large scale man made structures by a few hundred years. Not the 15,000 or so Hancock is regularly heard to claim.
I’m not batting for Hancock, you misconstrue me. I will indeed say that the Tas Tepeler are absolutely revolutionary, coz it is the case
Incidentally if you are interested in this stuff - and you obviously are - why don’t you go have a look? Seriously. See for yourself
These days Gobekli Tepe is now walled off and sheltered and gets a million visitors a year and that miraculous quality has largely gone (tho it is still a gob smacking site). When I first went I was the only non archaeologist there and we could wander between the stones drinking tea!
But at a site like Karahan Tepe you can still do that. Simply rock up. Wander about. You might be alone - or you can watch the archaeologists digging
Go on, do it! It would make an amazing holiday (combine it with a beach). Blow your mind!
If you want details on how to do it, DM me
It is definetely on my list. Along with various sites around Lake Van and in Kurdistan. My problem is time. I have had one 3 week holiday in 10 years. The joys of consultancy. I am hoping to do a bit more travelling again for pleasure rather than work but as always it is mañana.
3 weeks.... in ten years?!
That's insane. Life is for living, not working. Find the time before you keel over
Oh, for God's sake.
For [A PLURAL NUMBER OF DECADES SINCE 18] I had approx six periods, each a week or less, which could be described as a "holiday". It's only in my new job where they will not let you sell them that I have to take them, which are inevitably taken up with work.
You've never had a full-time job (or, arguably even a job as we would understand it) and you fail to understand the responsibility of people relying on you. Life is not like the movies and holidays are for children, not adults.
Can't tell if you're serious, I kind of hope you're not
I don't deny I have been lucky, but I have also made my own luck, to an extent. Don't let the man take you down
He doesn't strike me as poor, and he seems to be self-employed as a consultant - and therefore able to carve out time. A trip to go see the Tas Tepeler would cost less than £1000, could be done in as little as a week, even five days if you're mad, and would blow your mind - and his mind - like nothing else on this green earth, in terms of archaeology. A spectacular archaeological site, probably the most important on the planet, maybe the most important in all human history (these are some expert opinions, not mine) is happening RIGHT NOW. And you can just drive up and watch them doing it. Mazin!
I have to agree with you on this. I can't really afford the time away either, but I'm taking three weeks out to visit S Korea shortly.
When you read accounts of people on their deathbeds (from nurses, doctors, hospice people etc) there are usually two major regrets that are near-universal (or so it is reported). Namely:
1. Should have spent more time with my kids and/or friends
2. I worked too hard, I should have travelled more
They are probably unavoidable, we will all die with regrets. But you can mitigate the remorse
I spend a lot of time with my children. Travel is more problematic.
I have been exactly the opposite, tho there wasn't much I could do about it, in the circs
So I've made the best of it, and gone pretty much EVERYWHERE
Which countries haven't you been to?
Still got quite a few to go. Northern south America, central America, the Stans, and most of central/west Africa, Polynesia
I've been everywhere else, more or less. eg All seven continents
The Stans are my ultimate aim. Ever since I was young I have wanted to travel the Silk Road.
WHen I was young I wanted to walk it. Later I wanted to do it on horseback. The as I got older I shifted towards a 4WD. Nowadays it is train. But I do still want to travel as much of it as possible.
Having said all of that next week I am going to the exotic and fascinating Ashford for a week. Canterbury, Dover and Hastings are already on the list. Anyone got some less well known suggestions?
Nearby vineyards that do interesting tours and tastings: Westwell, Gusbourne, Barnsole, Terlingham (and a few more further afield)
And of course the legendary Pett Bottom valley with its little privately owned vineyards.
TBH I wouldn't bother with Hastings. Once a fine mediaeval town, it was largely wrecked by local council 'improvements' in the 60s.
If you're going in that direction from Ashford, much higher priorities IMO would be Rye including Rye harbour (although it gets very crowded with tourists), and Winchelsea, which is small but fantastic, with a quite extraordinary church formed out of the choir and apse of what was once a huge church, sacked by the French.
Actually, sod it, I will allow myself one photo - by me, from 2022 - of the Notorious Penis Chamber at Karahan Tepe. Mainly coz I’ll do anything to stop people talking about fricking ULEZ, also coz I just like writing “notorious penis chamber”
See here
What is this 12,000 year old room? WTF is it for?
At the moment, the best archaeological guess is that it is an initiation room for young adult males. It would have been roofed and dark. The boys would have stepped through the small door on the left, the room would have been half full of liquid piped in using the circled water channel. The liquid might have been animal blood - so one archaeologist told me. It might have poured through the mouth of the weird “head” acting as a spout. Then some ritual - sacrifice? Circumcision? Baptism? - would have been enacted. The boy becomes a man - a hunter - and then returns to the “audience room” just outside
This is 12,000 years old!!! Anyone who doesn’t find this seriously weird, brilliant, spooky, compelling and, yes, a *bit Graham Hancocky* is lacking a soul
Water tank? Why does everything unexplained have to be for 'rituals' of some bizarre kind?
A neolithic wooden trackway was discovered here in the Flatlands - it had been preserved in the peat. Quite a remarkable find really but as it was in a forgotten corner of the country not a lot was made of it.
Apparently - despite the lack of any artifacts - archaeologists say it must have been a route to a 'ritual platform'. Not the rather obvious purpose of a track to get to the other side of a wet area...
Most archaeologists agree that the Tas Tepeler are sacred sites. Stone circles, after all
There is near-zero evidence of human habitation at Gobekli Tepe (there is evidence at the other Tas Tepeler). Why build it? It is surely a temple; it is also, it seems, aligned astronomically
Some kind of penis worshipping hunter-warrior cult (with human sacrifice?) is the best guess at the moment
I admit to knowing almost nothing about these sites other than that they exist.
But how do you build a temple without living there, at least for some of the time?
And if you know how to build things, why not build houses?
The archaeology changes every year as they find amazing new stuff (which is one reason it’s so exciting)
For many years it was thought Gobekli Tepe was a singular miracle. A temple complex built by remarkably gifted cavemen who lived in temporary tents/shelters during the building season
Now at the other Tas Tepeler they have found permanent homes - besides the ritual shrines and cultic chambers. So it looks more and more like a civilisation, from 10,000 BC (or even earlier)
Worth pointing out that by the definition of 'civilisation' in that case it is not much different to the early pre-ceramic Neolithic of Northern Syria. The only big difference is the presence of temples. Jericho as a settlement dates back to 10,000 BC and the walled town dates to around 8,500 BC (and that wall is VERY impressive).
Even that is not the oldest structures in the area. Tell Qaramel has 5 towers dating back to around 10,000 BC and shows continuous occupation throughout the whole of the proto-Neolithic and pre-pottery Neolithic A & B (from around 10,500 to 9,000BC). These sites have been known since the 1970s.
The temples are, certainly, something else. But as I said before, this is not the revolutionary news that Hancock and others would have you believe.
Ian Hodder of Stanford Uni disagrees with you:
‘Gobekli Tepe changes everything.’
As an amateur archeologist with an interest in Syria, you’ll have heard of him
'Changes everything' is one of those phrases that can mean anything to anyone. Yes it is spectacular. No it does not mean an ancient 'civilisation' in Hancockian terms any more than the discovery of the Northern Syrian villages did.
That does not at all detract from the sites, nor does it mean the temples are not amazing. But when we have Sunil of this parish writing articles about Atlantis you have to stop and take a sniff of the smelling salts.
GT and the other sites push back the dates for large scale man made structures by a few hundred years. Not the 15,000 or so Hancock is regularly heard to claim.
I’m not batting for Hancock, you misconstrue me. I will indeed say that the Tas Tepeler are absolutely revolutionary, coz it is the case
Incidentally if you are interested in this stuff - and you obviously are - why don’t you go have a look? Seriously. See for yourself
These days Gobekli Tepe is now walled off and sheltered and gets a million visitors a year and that miraculous quality has largely gone (tho it is still a gob smacking site). When I first went I was the only non archaeologist there and we could wander between the stones drinking tea!
But at a site like Karahan Tepe you can still do that. Simply rock up. Wander about. You might be alone - or you can watch the archaeologists digging
Go on, do it! It would make an amazing holiday (combine it with a beach). Blow your mind!
If you want details on how to do it, DM me
It is definetely on my list. Along with various sites around Lake Van and in Kurdistan. My problem is time. I have had one 3 week holiday in 10 years. The joys of consultancy. I am hoping to do a bit more travelling again for pleasure rather than work but as always it is mañana.
3 weeks.... in ten years?!
That's insane. Life is for living, not working. Find the time before you keel over
Oh, for God's sake.
For [A PLURAL NUMBER OF DECADES SINCE 18] I had approx six periods, each a week or less, which could be described as a "holiday". It's only in my new job where they will not let you sell them that I have to take them, which are inevitably taken up with work.
You've never had a full-time job (or, arguably even a job as we would understand it) and you fail to understand the responsibility of people relying on you. Life is not like the movies and holidays are for children, not adults.
Can't tell if you're serious, I kind of hope you're not
I don't deny I have been lucky, but I have also made my own luck, to an extent. Don't let the man take you down
He doesn't strike me as poor, and he seems to be self-employed as a consultant - and therefore able to carve out time. A trip to go see the Tas Tepeler would cost less than £1000, could be done in as little as a week, even five days if you're mad, and would blow your mind - and his mind - like nothing else on this green earth, in terms of archaeology. A spectacular archaeological site, probably the most important on the planet, maybe the most important in all human history (these are some expert opinions, not mine) is happening RIGHT NOW. And you can just drive up and watch them doing it. Mazin!
I've not had a 'holiday' since the start of the pandemic. The odd day out, maybe.
There are more reasons than just work to be tied down.
Whilst I do have a number of places I'd like to go given the chance, I do wonder about some friends that are forever travelling the planet. What are they searching for? I don't think the answer to life the universe and everything lies in the Peruvian jungle (or wherever they are this week).
In my friend's case it's to tick off every country on the planet. He has done most of the easy ones and is now finding it progressively more difficult. As we're all officially spectrumy on this forum, I assume others can appreciate the sentiment.
Looks at Munro chart. Hmm. Can kind of appreciate that one.
I can think of self-challenges involving less jet fuel though.
Twenty-five years ago I set myself to do all the county tops of the mainland. I got about halfway through, then dropped it when live intervened. One of the things I want to complete, though, when I get the time to go on long trips. I think the hardest is the one up north which is on a military range with limited access (though I did pass near it whilst doing the Pennine Way).
I also wanted to take a trip on every ferry in the UK. I guess I might have to wait 25 years until the Scottish ferries are complete...
Actually, sod it, I will allow myself one photo - by me, from 2022 - of the Notorious Penis Chamber at Karahan Tepe. Mainly coz I’ll do anything to stop people talking about fricking ULEZ, also coz I just like writing “notorious penis chamber”
See here
What is this 12,000 year old room? WTF is it for?
At the moment, the best archaeological guess is that it is an initiation room for young adult males. It would have been roofed and dark. The boys would have stepped through the small door on the left, the room would have been half full of liquid piped in using the circled water channel. The liquid might have been animal blood - so one archaeologist told me. It might have poured through the mouth of the weird “head” acting as a spout. Then some ritual - sacrifice? Circumcision? Baptism? - would have been enacted. The boy becomes a man - a hunter - and then returns to the “audience room” just outside
This is 12,000 years old!!! Anyone who doesn’t find this seriously weird, brilliant, spooky, compelling and, yes, a *bit Graham Hancocky* is lacking a soul
Water tank? Why does everything unexplained have to be for 'rituals' of some bizarre kind?
A neolithic wooden trackway was discovered here in the Flatlands - it had been preserved in the peat. Quite a remarkable find really but as it was in a forgotten corner of the country not a lot was made of it.
Apparently - despite the lack of any artifacts - archaeologists say it must have been a route to a 'ritual platform'. Not the rather obvious purpose of a track to get to the other side of a wet area...
Most archaeologists agree that the Tas Tepeler are sacred sites. Stone circles, after all
There is near-zero evidence of human habitation at Gobekli Tepe (there is evidence at the other Tas Tepeler). Why build it? It is surely a temple; it is also, it seems, aligned astronomically
Some kind of penis worshipping hunter-warrior cult (with human sacrifice?) is the best guess at the moment
I admit to knowing almost nothing about these sites other than that they exist.
But how do you build a temple without living there, at least for some of the time?
And if you know how to build things, why not build houses?
The archaeology changes every year as they find amazing new stuff (which is one reason it’s so exciting)
For many years it was thought Gobekli Tepe was a singular miracle. A temple complex built by remarkably gifted cavemen who lived in temporary tents/shelters during the building season
Now at the other Tas Tepeler they have found permanent homes - besides the ritual shrines and cultic chambers. So it looks more and more like a civilisation, from 10,000 BC (or even earlier)
Worth pointing out that by the definition of 'civilisation' in that case it is not much different to the early pre-ceramic Neolithic of Northern Syria. The only big difference is the presence of temples. Jericho as a settlement dates back to 10,000 BC and the walled town dates to around 8,500 BC (and that wall is VERY impressive).
Even that is not the oldest structures in the area. Tell Qaramel has 5 towers dating back to around 10,000 BC and shows continuous occupation throughout the whole of the proto-Neolithic and pre-pottery Neolithic A & B (from around 10,500 to 9,000BC). These sites have been known since the 1970s.
The temples are, certainly, something else. But as I said before, this is not the revolutionary news that Hancock and others would have you believe.
Ian Hodder of Stanford Uni disagrees with you:
‘Gobekli Tepe changes everything.’
As an amateur archeologist with an interest in Syria, you’ll have heard of him
'Changes everything' is one of those phrases that can mean anything to anyone. Yes it is spectacular. No it does not mean an ancient 'civilisation' in Hancockian terms any more than the discovery of the Northern Syrian villages did.
That does not at all detract from the sites, nor does it mean the temples are not amazing. But when we have Sunil of this parish writing articles about Atlantis you have to stop and take a sniff of the smelling salts.
GT and the other sites push back the dates for large scale man made structures by a few hundred years. Not the 15,000 or so Hancock is regularly heard to claim.
I’m not batting for Hancock, you misconstrue me. I will indeed say that the Tas Tepeler are absolutely revolutionary, coz it is the case
Incidentally if you are interested in this stuff - and you obviously are - why don’t you go have a look? Seriously. See for yourself
These days Gobekli Tepe is now walled off and sheltered and gets a million visitors a year and that miraculous quality has largely gone (tho it is still a gob smacking site). When I first went I was the only non archaeologist there and we could wander between the stones drinking tea!
But at a site like Karahan Tepe you can still do that. Simply rock up. Wander about. You might be alone - or you can watch the archaeologists digging
Go on, do it! It would make an amazing holiday (combine it with a beach). Blow your mind!
If you want details on how to do it, DM me
It is definetely on my list. Along with various sites around Lake Van and in Kurdistan. My problem is time. I have had one 3 week holiday in 10 years. The joys of consultancy. I am hoping to do a bit more travelling again for pleasure rather than work but as always it is mañana.
3 weeks.... in ten years?!
That's insane. Life is for living, not working. Find the time before you keel over
Oh, for God's sake.
For [A PLURAL NUMBER OF DECADES SINCE 18] I had approx six periods, each a week or less, which could be described as a "holiday". It's only in my new job where they will not let you sell them that I have to take them, which are inevitably taken up with work.
You've never had a full-time job (or, arguably even a job as we would understand it) and you fail to understand the responsibility of people relying on you. Life is not like the movies and holidays are for children, not adults.
Can't tell if you're serious, I kind of hope you're not
I don't deny I have been lucky, but I have also made my own luck, to an extent. Don't let the man take you down
He doesn't strike me as poor, and he seems to be self-employed as a consultant - and therefore able to carve out time. A trip to go see the Tas Tepeler would cost less than £1000, could be done in as little as a week, even five days if you're mad, and would blow your mind - and his mind - like nothing else on this green earth, in terms of archaeology. A spectacular archaeological site, probably the most important on the planet, maybe the most important in all human history (these are some expert opinions, not mine) is happening RIGHT NOW. And you can just drive up and watch them doing it. Mazin!
Speaking as another consultant, time very much equals money (unless it is PB in which case you get my time FOC...). Not working = not getting paid. Or at least that is the mentality I started with. A few years in and what I get paid is not directly connected with the revenue I earn for my company.
I took two weeks off in July, revenue that month was obviously much lower, but that had no impact on what I pull out. I still take opportunistic work where I can get it - a weekend gig meant doing 12 days without a break earlier this month. Output for that client was limited at best by the end of that, but they are happy to pay so I am happy to invoice.
Holidays are ok. Time off relaxing is more important. And I get bored easily. Best option is combining travel and work - something you excel at of course!
The whole concept of holidays is a bit weird. Someone pays you for not going to work? What’s in it for them?
When you add the foregone income to the cost of the holiday it becomes somewhat expensive. In fairness, @Leon seems to make money out of most of his trips. Good luck to him.
I'm crazy enough to find excursions like Home > Aberdeen > Gatwick > London > Coventry and return later the same day to be fun. Which is handy! Have got 2 days in London next week and a 5 day roadtrip as far as Warwick the week after as the next work trips. Its not exotic, but its a hell of a lot more time out and about than I would get otherwise.
That just sounds exhausting. I am increasingly less enthralled with planes. I haven’t been on one since before Covid.
I don't understand this. I agree air travel can be exhausting and annoying. Indeed, it is this most of the time
But the travel! Just the sense of sitting in an airport, with all the world (or at least half of it) merely a plane flight away. We forget how lucky we are in Britain, location wise. Right in the "middle"
A travel writer friend of mine, a Brit based in New Orleans, mentioned this the other day, enviously. In the UK (esp London and SE England)) you are only an hour or two in flying time from a trillion amazing destinations. For him in Nawlins he is two hours from Cleveland Ohio
Actually, sod it, I will allow myself one photo - by me, from 2022 - of the Notorious Penis Chamber at Karahan Tepe. Mainly coz I’ll do anything to stop people talking about fricking ULEZ, also coz I just like writing “notorious penis chamber”
See here
What is this 12,000 year old room? WTF is it for?
At the moment, the best archaeological guess is that it is an initiation room for young adult males. It would have been roofed and dark. The boys would have stepped through the small door on the left, the room would have been half full of liquid piped in using the circled water channel. The liquid might have been animal blood - so one archaeologist told me. It might have poured through the mouth of the weird “head” acting as a spout. Then some ritual - sacrifice? Circumcision? Baptism? - would have been enacted. The boy becomes a man - a hunter - and then returns to the “audience room” just outside
This is 12,000 years old!!! Anyone who doesn’t find this seriously weird, brilliant, spooky, compelling and, yes, a *bit Graham Hancocky* is lacking a soul
Water tank? Why does everything unexplained have to be for 'rituals' of some bizarre kind?
A neolithic wooden trackway was discovered here in the Flatlands - it had been preserved in the peat. Quite a remarkable find really but as it was in a forgotten corner of the country not a lot was made of it.
Apparently - despite the lack of any artifacts - archaeologists say it must have been a route to a 'ritual platform'. Not the rather obvious purpose of a track to get to the other side of a wet area...
Most archaeologists agree that the Tas Tepeler are sacred sites. Stone circles, after all
There is near-zero evidence of human habitation at Gobekli Tepe (there is evidence at the other Tas Tepeler). Why build it? It is surely a temple; it is also, it seems, aligned astronomically
Some kind of penis worshipping hunter-warrior cult (with human sacrifice?) is the best guess at the moment
I admit to knowing almost nothing about these sites other than that they exist.
But how do you build a temple without living there, at least for some of the time?
And if you know how to build things, why not build houses?
The archaeology changes every year as they find amazing new stuff (which is one reason it’s so exciting)
For many years it was thought Gobekli Tepe was a singular miracle. A temple complex built by remarkably gifted cavemen who lived in temporary tents/shelters during the building season
Now at the other Tas Tepeler they have found permanent homes - besides the ritual shrines and cultic chambers. So it looks more and more like a civilisation, from 10,000 BC (or even earlier)
Worth pointing out that by the definition of 'civilisation' in that case it is not much different to the early pre-ceramic Neolithic of Northern Syria. The only big difference is the presence of temples. Jericho as a settlement dates back to 10,000 BC and the walled town dates to around 8,500 BC (and that wall is VERY impressive).
Even that is not the oldest structures in the area. Tell Qaramel has 5 towers dating back to around 10,000 BC and shows continuous occupation throughout the whole of the proto-Neolithic and pre-pottery Neolithic A & B (from around 10,500 to 9,000BC). These sites have been known since the 1970s.
The temples are, certainly, something else. But as I said before, this is not the revolutionary news that Hancock and others would have you believe.
Ian Hodder of Stanford Uni disagrees with you:
‘Gobekli Tepe changes everything.’
As an amateur archeologist with an interest in Syria, you’ll have heard of him
'Changes everything' is one of those phrases that can mean anything to anyone. Yes it is spectacular. No it does not mean an ancient 'civilisation' in Hancockian terms any more than the discovery of the Northern Syrian villages did.
That does not at all detract from the sites, nor does it mean the temples are not amazing. But when we have Sunil of this parish writing articles about Atlantis you have to stop and take a sniff of the smelling salts.
GT and the other sites push back the dates for large scale man made structures by a few hundred years. Not the 15,000 or so Hancock is regularly heard to claim.
I’m not batting for Hancock, you misconstrue me. I will indeed say that the Tas Tepeler are absolutely revolutionary, coz it is the case
Incidentally if you are interested in this stuff - and you obviously are - why don’t you go have a look? Seriously. See for yourself
These days Gobekli Tepe is now walled off and sheltered and gets a million visitors a year and that miraculous quality has largely gone (tho it is still a gob smacking site). When I first went I was the only non archaeologist there and we could wander between the stones drinking tea!
But at a site like Karahan Tepe you can still do that. Simply rock up. Wander about. You might be alone - or you can watch the archaeologists digging
Go on, do it! It would make an amazing holiday (combine it with a beach). Blow your mind!
If you want details on how to do it, DM me
It is definetely on my list. Along with various sites around Lake Van and in Kurdistan. My problem is time. I have had one 3 week holiday in 10 years. The joys of consultancy. I am hoping to do a bit more travelling again for pleasure rather than work but as always it is mañana.
3 weeks.... in ten years?!
That's insane. Life is for living, not working. Find the time before you keel over
Oh, for God's sake.
For [A PLURAL NUMBER OF DECADES SINCE 18] I had approx six periods, each a week or less, which could be described as a "holiday". It's only in my new job where they will not let you sell them that I have to take them, which are inevitably taken up with work.
You've never had a full-time job (or, arguably even a job as we would understand it) and you fail to understand the responsibility of people relying on you. Life is not like the movies and holidays are for children, not adults.
Can't tell if you're serious, I kind of hope you're not
I don't deny I have been lucky, but I have also made my own luck, to an extent. Don't let the man take you down
He doesn't strike me as poor, and he seems to be self-employed as a consultant - and therefore able to carve out time. A trip to go see the Tas Tepeler would cost less than £1000, could be done in as little as a week, even five days if you're mad, and would blow your mind - and his mind - like nothing else on this green earth, in terms of archaeology. A spectacular archaeological site, probably the most important on the planet, maybe the most important in all human history (these are some expert opinions, not mine) is happening RIGHT NOW. And you can just drive up and watch them doing it. Mazin!
I have to agree with you on this. I can't really afford the time away either, but I'm taking three weeks out to visit S Korea shortly.
When you read accounts of people on their deathbeds (from nurses, doctors, hospice people etc) there are usually two major regrets that are near-universal (or so it is reported). Namely:
1. Should have spent more time with my kids and/or friends
2. I worked too hard, I should have travelled more
They are probably unavoidable, we will all die with regrets. But you can mitigate the remorse
I spend a lot of time with my children. Travel is more problematic.
I have been exactly the opposite, tho there wasn't much I could do about it, in the circs
So I've made the best of it, and gone pretty much EVERYWHERE
"Flash, where have you been?" "Where HAVEN'T I been! WOOF WOOF"
"Lord Sunil, where have you been?" [flicking through GB Rail Atlas] "Where haven't I been? Woof!"
Actually, sod it, I will allow myself one photo - by me, from 2022 - of the Notorious Penis Chamber at Karahan Tepe. Mainly coz I’ll do anything to stop people talking about fricking ULEZ, also coz I just like writing “notorious penis chamber”
See here
What is this 12,000 year old room? WTF is it for?
At the moment, the best archaeological guess is that it is an initiation room for young adult males. It would have been roofed and dark. The boys would have stepped through the small door on the left, the room would have been half full of liquid piped in using the circled water channel. The liquid might have been animal blood - so one archaeologist told me. It might have poured through the mouth of the weird “head” acting as a spout. Then some ritual - sacrifice? Circumcision? Baptism? - would have been enacted. The boy becomes a man - a hunter - and then returns to the “audience room” just outside
This is 12,000 years old!!! Anyone who doesn’t find this seriously weird, brilliant, spooky, compelling and, yes, a *bit Graham Hancocky* is lacking a soul
Water tank? Why does everything unexplained have to be for 'rituals' of some bizarre kind?
A neolithic wooden trackway was discovered here in the Flatlands - it had been preserved in the peat. Quite a remarkable find really but as it was in a forgotten corner of the country not a lot was made of it.
Apparently - despite the lack of any artifacts - archaeologists say it must have been a route to a 'ritual platform'. Not the rather obvious purpose of a track to get to the other side of a wet area...
Most archaeologists agree that the Tas Tepeler are sacred sites. Stone circles, after all
There is near-zero evidence of human habitation at Gobekli Tepe (there is evidence at the other Tas Tepeler). Why build it? It is surely a temple; it is also, it seems, aligned astronomically
Some kind of penis worshipping hunter-warrior cult (with human sacrifice?) is the best guess at the moment
I admit to knowing almost nothing about these sites other than that they exist.
But how do you build a temple without living there, at least for some of the time?
And if you know how to build things, why not build houses?
The archaeology changes every year as they find amazing new stuff (which is one reason it’s so exciting)
For many years it was thought Gobekli Tepe was a singular miracle. A temple complex built by remarkably gifted cavemen who lived in temporary tents/shelters during the building season
Now at the other Tas Tepeler they have found permanent homes - besides the ritual shrines and cultic chambers. So it looks more and more like a civilisation, from 10,000 BC (or even earlier)
Worth pointing out that by the definition of 'civilisation' in that case it is not much different to the early pre-ceramic Neolithic of Northern Syria. The only big difference is the presence of temples. Jericho as a settlement dates back to 10,000 BC and the walled town dates to around 8,500 BC (and that wall is VERY impressive).
Even that is not the oldest structures in the area. Tell Qaramel has 5 towers dating back to around 10,000 BC and shows continuous occupation throughout the whole of the proto-Neolithic and pre-pottery Neolithic A & B (from around 10,500 to 9,000BC). These sites have been known since the 1970s.
The temples are, certainly, something else. But as I said before, this is not the revolutionary news that Hancock and others would have you believe.
Ian Hodder of Stanford Uni disagrees with you:
‘Gobekli Tepe changes everything.’
As an amateur archeologist with an interest in Syria, you’ll have heard of him
'Changes everything' is one of those phrases that can mean anything to anyone. Yes it is spectacular. No it does not mean an ancient 'civilisation' in Hancockian terms any more than the discovery of the Northern Syrian villages did.
That does not at all detract from the sites, nor does it mean the temples are not amazing. But when we have Sunil of this parish writing articles about Atlantis you have to stop and take a sniff of the smelling salts.
GT and the other sites push back the dates for large scale man made structures by a few hundred years. Not the 15,000 or so Hancock is regularly heard to claim.
I’m not batting for Hancock, you misconstrue me. I will indeed say that the Tas Tepeler are absolutely revolutionary, coz it is the case
Incidentally if you are interested in this stuff - and you obviously are - why don’t you go have a look? Seriously. See for yourself
These days Gobekli Tepe is now walled off and sheltered and gets a million visitors a year and that miraculous quality has largely gone (tho it is still a gob smacking site). When I first went I was the only non archaeologist there and we could wander between the stones drinking tea!
But at a site like Karahan Tepe you can still do that. Simply rock up. Wander about. You might be alone - or you can watch the archaeologists digging
Go on, do it! It would make an amazing holiday (combine it with a beach). Blow your mind!
If you want details on how to do it, DM me
It is definetely on my list. Along with various sites around Lake Van and in Kurdistan. My problem is time. I have had one 3 week holiday in 10 years. The joys of consultancy. I am hoping to do a bit more travelling again for pleasure rather than work but as always it is mañana.
3 weeks.... in ten years?!
That's insane. Life is for living, not working. Find the time before you keel over
Its the nature of the beast. Either you do all the work offered or someone else will and you get none. And it has served the family well, particularly since the vast majority of it has been done from home.
But I was on call with one or another company running drilling operations every day from September 2014 to February of this year. 365 days a year doing morning reports and calls. It just kind of became the norm.
It was very strange in March this year to wake up at 5.30 am and realise I had absolutely no need to get out of bed and turn on the computer.
Having said all of that next week I am going to the exotic and fascinating Ashford for a week. Canterbury, Dover and Hastings are already on the list. Anyone got some less well known suggestions?
Nearby vineyards that do interesting tours and tastings: Westwell, Gusbourne, Barnsole, Terlingham (and a few more further afield)
And of course the legendary Pett Bottom valley with its little privately owned vineyards.
Vineyards is not something that I would have thought of in this country. Thanks.
There are some excellent white wines in the South East. The reds, in my experience, are a little thin, but they’re one or two in Essex and Suffolk which are getting there. But the white’s, and often the sparkling, can be very good indeed.
Having said all of that next week I am going to the exotic and fascinating Ashford for a week. Canterbury, Dover and Hastings are already on the list. Anyone got some less well known suggestions?
Rochester cathedral is worth a visit, and Bodiam is not too far away.
Rochester castle is not bad at all, certainly for the view from the top, a brutalist keep. Chatham Dockyard and its ships is just downriver if inclined that way.
Dover - Castle, certainly; and if you are that way inclined the Western Heights and Drop Shaft if open (public footpath and view from the top good, though_. White Cliffs National Trust (scenic, concrete sound mirrors, etc.) apparently ditto. IIf you like ancient boats the Dover ship in the museum is very well worth seeing. Had a very pleasant lunch in the back room of the White Horse which as I understand it is down in the mediaeval core, but that was some years ago now.
Lympne Castlke if you like Roman + mediaeval and a seaside outing?
Actually, sod it, I will allow myself one photo - by me, from 2022 - of the Notorious Penis Chamber at Karahan Tepe. Mainly coz I’ll do anything to stop people talking about fricking ULEZ, also coz I just like writing “notorious penis chamber”
See here
What is this 12,000 year old room? WTF is it for?
At the moment, the best archaeological guess is that it is an initiation room for young adult males. It would have been roofed and dark. The boys would have stepped through the small door on the left, the room would have been half full of liquid piped in using the circled water channel. The liquid might have been animal blood - so one archaeologist told me. It might have poured through the mouth of the weird “head” acting as a spout. Then some ritual - sacrifice? Circumcision? Baptism? - would have been enacted. The boy becomes a man - a hunter - and then returns to the “audience room” just outside
This is 12,000 years old!!! Anyone who doesn’t find this seriously weird, brilliant, spooky, compelling and, yes, a *bit Graham Hancocky* is lacking a soul
Water tank? Why does everything unexplained have to be for 'rituals' of some bizarre kind?
A neolithic wooden trackway was discovered here in the Flatlands - it had been preserved in the peat. Quite a remarkable find really but as it was in a forgotten corner of the country not a lot was made of it.
Apparently - despite the lack of any artifacts - archaeologists say it must have been a route to a 'ritual platform'. Not the rather obvious purpose of a track to get to the other side of a wet area...
Most archaeologists agree that the Tas Tepeler are sacred sites. Stone circles, after all
There is near-zero evidence of human habitation at Gobekli Tepe (there is evidence at the other Tas Tepeler). Why build it? It is surely a temple; it is also, it seems, aligned astronomically
Some kind of penis worshipping hunter-warrior cult (with human sacrifice?) is the best guess at the moment
I admit to knowing almost nothing about these sites other than that they exist.
But how do you build a temple without living there, at least for some of the time?
And if you know how to build things, why not build houses?
The archaeology changes every year as they find amazing new stuff (which is one reason it’s so exciting)
For many years it was thought Gobekli Tepe was a singular miracle. A temple complex built by remarkably gifted cavemen who lived in temporary tents/shelters during the building season
Now at the other Tas Tepeler they have found permanent homes - besides the ritual shrines and cultic chambers. So it looks more and more like a civilisation, from 10,000 BC (or even earlier)
Worth pointing out that by the definition of 'civilisation' in that case it is not much different to the early pre-ceramic Neolithic of Northern Syria. The only big difference is the presence of temples. Jericho as a settlement dates back to 10,000 BC and the walled town dates to around 8,500 BC (and that wall is VERY impressive).
Even that is not the oldest structures in the area. Tell Qaramel has 5 towers dating back to around 10,000 BC and shows continuous occupation throughout the whole of the proto-Neolithic and pre-pottery Neolithic A & B (from around 10,500 to 9,000BC). These sites have been known since the 1970s.
The temples are, certainly, something else. But as I said before, this is not the revolutionary news that Hancock and others would have you believe.
Ian Hodder of Stanford Uni disagrees with you:
‘Gobekli Tepe changes everything.’
As an amateur archeologist with an interest in Syria, you’ll have heard of him
'Changes everything' is one of those phrases that can mean anything to anyone. Yes it is spectacular. No it does not mean an ancient 'civilisation' in Hancockian terms any more than the discovery of the Northern Syrian villages did.
That does not at all detract from the sites, nor does it mean the temples are not amazing. But when we have Sunil of this parish writing articles about Atlantis you have to stop and take a sniff of the smelling salts.
GT and the other sites push back the dates for large scale man made structures by a few hundred years. Not the 15,000 or so Hancock is regularly heard to claim.
I’m not batting for Hancock, you misconstrue me. I will indeed say that the Tas Tepeler are absolutely revolutionary, coz it is the case
Incidentally if you are interested in this stuff - and you obviously are - why don’t you go have a look? Seriously. See for yourself
These days Gobekli Tepe is now walled off and sheltered and gets a million visitors a year and that miraculous quality has largely gone (tho it is still a gob smacking site). When I first went I was the only non archaeologist there and we could wander between the stones drinking tea!
But at a site like Karahan Tepe you can still do that. Simply rock up. Wander about. You might be alone - or you can watch the archaeologists digging
Go on, do it! It would make an amazing holiday (combine it with a beach). Blow your mind!
If you want details on how to do it, DM me
It is definetely on my list. Along with various sites around Lake Van and in Kurdistan. My problem is time. I have had one 3 week holiday in 10 years. The joys of consultancy. I am hoping to do a bit more travelling again for pleasure rather than work but as always it is mañana.
3 weeks.... in ten years?!
That's insane. Life is for living, not working. Find the time before you keel over
Oh, for God's sake.
For [A PLURAL NUMBER OF DECADES SINCE 18] I had approx six periods, each a week or less, which could be described as a "holiday". It's only in my new job where they will not let you sell them that I have to take them, which are inevitably taken up with work.
You've never had a full-time job (or, arguably even a job as we would understand it) and you fail to understand the responsibility of people relying on you. Life is not like the movies and holidays are for children, not adults.
Can't tell if you're serious, I kind of hope you're not
I don't deny I have been lucky, but I have also made my own luck, to an extent. Don't let the man take you down
He doesn't strike me as poor, and he seems to be self-employed as a consultant - and therefore able to carve out time. A trip to go see the Tas Tepeler would cost less than £1000, could be done in as little as a week, even five days if you're mad, and would blow your mind - and his mind - like nothing else on this green earth, in terms of archaeology. A spectacular archaeological site, probably the most important on the planet, maybe the most important in all human history (these are some expert opinions, not mine) is happening RIGHT NOW. And you can just drive up and watch them doing it. Mazin!
I have to agree with you on this. I can't really afford the time away either, but I'm taking three weeks out to visit S Korea shortly.
When you read accounts of people on their deathbeds (from nurses, doctors, hospice people etc) there are usually two major regrets that are near-universal (or so it is reported). Namely:
1. Should have spent more time with my kids and/or friends
2. I worked too hard, I should have travelled more
They are probably unavoidable, we will all die with regrets. But you can mitigate the remorse
I spend a lot of time with my children. Travel is more problematic.
I have been exactly the opposite, tho there wasn't much I could do about it, in the circs
So I've made the best of it, and gone pretty much EVERYWHERE
Which countries haven't you been to?
Still got quite a few to go. Northern south America, central America, the Stans, and most of central/west Africa, Polynesia
I've been everywhere else, more or less. eg All seven continents
The Stans are my ultimate aim. Ever since I was young I have wanted to travel the Silk Road.
WHen I was young I wanted to walk it. Later I wanted to do it on horseback. The as I got older I shifted towards a 4WD. Nowadays it is train. But I do still want to travel as much of it as possible.
Yes, I yearn for the Stans! I was gonna go this summer but then the option of Ukraine came up, and that was even MORE compelling (and it was a good choice), so maybe next summer. They get a bit cold (and often impassable) in winter
I wanna see Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan in particular. Uzbekistan now has a reliable high speed train network. High speed train to Samarkand! And we are still struggling to build one to Watford
Having said all of that next week I am going to the exotic and fascinating Ashford for a week. Canterbury, Dover and Hastings are already on the list. Anyone got some less well known suggestions?
Ightham Mote is fantastic if you haven't been. Also Sissinghurst and Leeds Castle
That just sounds exhausting. I am increasingly less enthralled with planes. I haven’t been on one since before Covid.
I don't understand this. I agree air travel can be exhausting and annoying. Indeed, it is this most of the time
But the travel! Just the sense of sitting in an airport, with all the world (or at least half of it) merely a plane flight away. We forget how lucky we are in Britain, location wise. Right in the "middle"
A travel writer friend of mine, a Brit based in New Orleans, mentioned this the other day, enviously. In the UK (esp London and SE England)) you are only an hour or two in flying time from a trillion amazing destinations. For him in Nawlins he is two hours from Cleveland Ohio
I have become comfortable being uncomfortable flying. Helps that Aberdeen is a fantastic little airport. Into that London is a choice of Luton or Gatwick. Luton is much quicker to get through but I no longer care which.
Flying internally in the UK is something I will happily defend. I can't get to and from where I need to be on land without it taking hours. So I fly.
geoffw asked: "But what does it mean to get carded?"
Sorry, I should have explained that bit of slang. In the US one "gets carded" if they are asked to show an ID card to prove that they are old enough (21) to buy alcoholic beverages or, more recently, tobacco products.
For decades I have looked old enough so that I wasn't asked to show an ID, when, for example, I bought a bottle of wine. But, in the last year or so, one of the local stores has been asking everyone to show IDs in such purchases. So on my birthday I made a point of buying a bottle of wine at that store, as I might have done, had I just turned 21.
Actually, sod it, I will allow myself one photo - by me, from 2022 - of the Notorious Penis Chamber at Karahan Tepe. Mainly coz I’ll do anything to stop people talking about fricking ULEZ, also coz I just like writing “notorious penis chamber”
See here
What is this 12,000 year old room? WTF is it for?
At the moment, the best archaeological guess is that it is an initiation room for young adult males. It would have been roofed and dark. The boys would have stepped through the small door on the left, the room would have been half full of liquid piped in using the circled water channel. The liquid might have been animal blood - so one archaeologist told me. It might have poured through the mouth of the weird “head” acting as a spout. Then some ritual - sacrifice? Circumcision? Baptism? - would have been enacted. The boy becomes a man - a hunter - and then returns to the “audience room” just outside
This is 12,000 years old!!! Anyone who doesn’t find this seriously weird, brilliant, spooky, compelling and, yes, a *bit Graham Hancocky* is lacking a soul
Water tank? Why does everything unexplained have to be for 'rituals' of some bizarre kind?
A neolithic wooden trackway was discovered here in the Flatlands - it had been preserved in the peat. Quite a remarkable find really but as it was in a forgotten corner of the country not a lot was made of it.
Apparently - despite the lack of any artifacts - archaeologists say it must have been a route to a 'ritual platform'. Not the rather obvious purpose of a track to get to the other side of a wet area...
Most archaeologists agree that the Tas Tepeler are sacred sites. Stone circles, after all
There is near-zero evidence of human habitation at Gobekli Tepe (there is evidence at the other Tas Tepeler). Why build it? It is surely a temple; it is also, it seems, aligned astronomically
Some kind of penis worshipping hunter-warrior cult (with human sacrifice?) is the best guess at the moment
I admit to knowing almost nothing about these sites other than that they exist.
But how do you build a temple without living there, at least for some of the time?
And if you know how to build things, why not build houses?
The archaeology changes every year as they find amazing new stuff (which is one reason it’s so exciting)
For many years it was thought Gobekli Tepe was a singular miracle. A temple complex built by remarkably gifted cavemen who lived in temporary tents/shelters during the building season
Now at the other Tas Tepeler they have found permanent homes - besides the ritual shrines and cultic chambers. So it looks more and more like a civilisation, from 10,000 BC (or even earlier)
Worth pointing out that by the definition of 'civilisation' in that case it is not much different to the early pre-ceramic Neolithic of Northern Syria. The only big difference is the presence of temples. Jericho as a settlement dates back to 10,000 BC and the walled town dates to around 8,500 BC (and that wall is VERY impressive).
Even that is not the oldest structures in the area. Tell Qaramel has 5 towers dating back to around 10,000 BC and shows continuous occupation throughout the whole of the proto-Neolithic and pre-pottery Neolithic A & B (from around 10,500 to 9,000BC). These sites have been known since the 1970s.
The temples are, certainly, something else. But as I said before, this is not the revolutionary news that Hancock and others would have you believe.
Ian Hodder of Stanford Uni disagrees with you:
‘Gobekli Tepe changes everything.’
As an amateur archeologist with an interest in Syria, you’ll have heard of him
'Changes everything' is one of those phrases that can mean anything to anyone. Yes it is spectacular. No it does not mean an ancient 'civilisation' in Hancockian terms any more than the discovery of the Northern Syrian villages did.
That does not at all detract from the sites, nor does it mean the temples are not amazing. But when we have Sunil of this parish writing articles about Atlantis you have to stop and take a sniff of the smelling salts.
GT and the other sites push back the dates for large scale man made structures by a few hundred years. Not the 15,000 or so Hancock is regularly heard to claim.
I’m not batting for Hancock, you misconstrue me. I will indeed say that the Tas Tepeler are absolutely revolutionary, coz it is the case
Incidentally if you are interested in this stuff - and you obviously are - why don’t you go have a look? Seriously. See for yourself
These days Gobekli Tepe is now walled off and sheltered and gets a million visitors a year and that miraculous quality has largely gone (tho it is still a gob smacking site). When I first went I was the only non archaeologist there and we could wander between the stones drinking tea!
But at a site like Karahan Tepe you can still do that. Simply rock up. Wander about. You might be alone - or you can watch the archaeologists digging
Go on, do it! It would make an amazing holiday (combine it with a beach). Blow your mind!
If you want details on how to do it, DM me
It is definetely on my list. Along with various sites around Lake Van and in Kurdistan. My problem is time. I have had one 3 week holiday in 10 years. The joys of consultancy. I am hoping to do a bit more travelling again for pleasure rather than work but as always it is mañana.
3 weeks.... in ten years?!
That's insane. Life is for living, not working. Find the time before you keel over
Oh, for God's sake.
For [A PLURAL NUMBER OF DECADES SINCE 18] I had approx six periods, each a week or less, which could be described as a "holiday". It's only in my new job where they will not let you sell them that I have to take them, which are inevitably taken up with work.
You've never had a full-time job (or, arguably even a job as we would understand it) and you fail to understand the responsibility of people relying on you. Life is not like the movies and holidays are for children, not adults.
Can't tell if you're serious, I kind of hope you're not
I don't deny I have been lucky, but I have also made my own luck, to an extent. Don't let the man take you down
He doesn't strike me as poor, and he seems to be self-employed as a consultant - and therefore able to carve out time. A trip to go see the Tas Tepeler would cost less than £1000, could be done in as little as a week, even five days if you're mad, and would blow your mind - and his mind - like nothing else on this green earth, in terms of archaeology. A spectacular archaeological site, probably the most important on the planet, maybe the most important in all human history (these are some expert opinions, not mine) is happening RIGHT NOW. And you can just drive up and watch them doing it. Mazin!
I have to agree with you on this. I can't really afford the time away either, but I'm taking three weeks out to visit S Korea shortly.
When you read accounts of people on their deathbeds (from nurses, doctors, hospice people etc) there are usually two major regrets that are near-universal (or so it is reported). Namely:
1. Should have spent more time with my kids and/or friends
2. I worked too hard, I should have travelled more
They are probably unavoidable, we will all die with regrets. But you can mitigate the remorse
I spend a lot of time with my children. Travel is more problematic.
I have been exactly the opposite, tho there wasn't much I could do about it, in the circs
So I've made the best of it, and gone pretty much EVERYWHERE
"Flash, where have you been?" "Where HAVEN'T I been! WOOF WOOF"
"Lord Sunil, where have you been?" [flicking through GB Rail Atlas] "Where haven't I been? Woof!"
I've long since stopped doing highlighter pen trips. I have thought about doing things like the Epsom Downs / Tattenham Corner loop a few times. But honestly can't be arsed.
Having said all of that next week I am going to the exotic and fascinating Ashford for a week. Canterbury, Dover and Hastings are already on the list. Anyone got some less well known suggestions?
Ightham Mote is fantastic if you haven't been. Also Sissinghurst and Leeds Castle
Deal is quite charming, likewise Sandwich
Hythe and the miniature railway.
Want to go there and see the 1930s Sound Mirrors, but some idiot put them in the middle of a nature reserve, or maybe it was the other way round, and I never seem to be able to be down there when there is an open day ...
That just sounds exhausting. I am increasingly less enthralled with planes. I haven’t been on one since before Covid.
I don't understand this. I agree air travel can be exhausting and annoying. Indeed, it is this most of the time
But the travel! Just the sense of sitting in an airport, with all the world (or at least half of it) merely a plane flight away. We forget how lucky we are in Britain, location wise. Right in the "middle"
A travel writer friend of mine, a Brit based in New Orleans, mentioned this the other day, enviously. In the UK (esp London and SE England)) you are only an hour or two in flying time from a trillion amazing destinations. For him in Nawlins he is two hours from Cleveland Ohio
I have become comfortable being uncomfortable flying. Helps that Aberdeen is a fantastic little airport. Into that London is a choice of Luton or Gatwick. Luton is much quicker to get through but I no longer care which.
Flying internally in the UK is something I will happily defend. I can't get to and from where I need to be on land without it taking hours. So I fly.
Oh, in order to do the "trans-Inverness" lines to Kyle, Thurso and Wick, I flew from London Gatwick to Inverness last summer. It was just a day after the heatwave which severely fucked up the railways! Or at least that's my excuse!
That just sounds exhausting. I am increasingly less enthralled with planes. I haven’t been on one since before Covid.
I don't understand this. I agree air travel can be exhausting and annoying. Indeed, it is this most of the time
But the travel! Just the sense of sitting in an airport, with all the world (or at least half of it) merely a plane flight away. We forget how lucky we are in Britain, location wise. Right in the "middle"
A travel writer friend of mine, a Brit based in New Orleans, mentioned this the other day, enviously. In the UK (esp London and SE England)) you are only an hour or two in flying time from a trillion amazing destinations. For him in Nawlins he is two hours from Cleveland Ohio
I have become comfortable being uncomfortable flying. Helps that Aberdeen is a fantastic little airport. Into that London is a choice of Luton or Gatwick. Luton is much quicker to get through but I no longer care which.
Flying internally in the UK is something I will happily defend. I can't get to and from where I need to be on land without it taking hours. So I fly.
It’s some time since I’ve used Stansted, but apart from, for me, accessibility, it is undesirable. Massive shopping arcade and nowhere to sit.
Can I just point out that I have successfully stopped us talking about ULEZ?
You’re welcome
In that case I won't mention that I am unable to sell my non-ULEZ compliant diesel and the £2k scrappage fee beckons.
What is it, and what state is it in? If it's got a test and runs most stuff can be flogged without too much trouble.
Scrapping cars which run ok is economic madness, no matter how much the idiots in government and their mates in the car industry want to tell us otherwise.
10 year old Mondeo, a bit scuffed on the outside because I wasn't planning to sell it until it rusted out so wasn't precious about it. Low mileage, 60,000 and plenty of life in it annoyingly
That just sounds exhausting. I am increasingly less enthralled with planes. I haven’t been on one since before Covid.
I don't understand this. I agree air travel can be exhausting and annoying. Indeed, it is this most of the time
But the travel! Just the sense of sitting in an airport, with all the world (or at least half of it) merely a plane flight away. We forget how lucky we are in Britain, location wise. Right in the "middle"
A travel writer friend of mine, a Brit based in New Orleans, mentioned this the other day, enviously. In the UK (esp London and SE England)) you are only an hour or two in flying time from a trillion amazing destinations. For him in Nawlins he is two hours from Cleveland Ohio
I have become comfortable being uncomfortable flying. Helps that Aberdeen is a fantastic little airport. Into that London is a choice of Luton or Gatwick. Luton is much quicker to get through but I no longer care which.
Flying internally in the UK is something I will happily defend. I can't get to and from where I need to be on land without it taking hours. So I fly.
It’s some time since I’ve used Stansted, but apart from, for me, accessibility, it is undesirable. Massive shopping arcade and nowhere to sit.
The worst airport I have experienced in the UK. Even worse that Dirty Leeds Bradford, and that is a big statement to make...
Having said all of that next week I am going to the exotic and fascinating Ashford for a week. Canterbury, Dover and Hastings are already on the list. Anyone got some less well known suggestions?
Battle Abbey, Ightham Mote, Great Dixter, Rye, Leeds Castle, Sissinghurst.
Biden will run again. He is the only Democrat who has proven he can beat Trump, who is still leading the GOP nomination polls and is nearly 80 himself anyway.
Even if Trump does not end up GOP nominee Biden would benefit from Trump voters staying home as well
That just sounds exhausting. I am increasingly less enthralled with planes. I haven’t been on one since before Covid.
I don't understand this. I agree air travel can be exhausting and annoying. Indeed, it is this most of the time
But the travel! Just the sense of sitting in an airport, with all the world (or at least half of it) merely a plane flight away. We forget how lucky we are in Britain, location wise. Right in the "middle"
A travel writer friend of mine, a Brit based in New Orleans, mentioned this the other day, enviously. In the UK (esp London and SE England)) you are only an hour or two in flying time from a trillion amazing destinations. For him in Nawlins he is two hours from Cleveland Ohio
I have become comfortable being uncomfortable flying. Helps that Aberdeen is a fantastic little airport. Into that London is a choice of Luton or Gatwick. Luton is much quicker to get through but I no longer care which.
Flying internally in the UK is something I will happily defend. I can't get to and from where I need to be on land without it taking hours. So I fly.
Oh, in order to do the "trans-Inverness" lines to Kyle, Thurso and Wick, I flew from London Gatwick to Inverness last summer. It was just a day after the heatwave which severely fucked up the railways! Or at least that's my excuse!
For winning Cities of London and Westminster and Kensington at the next general election, no. For balancing the books and funding any extra spending pledges and firing up Starmer's leftwing base then yes
Furthermore, we’re all going to pay for it: Taxpayers will pick up the bill for pollution by housebuilders, government officials have admitted, as rules on chemical releases into waterways are scrapped.
If an amendment in the House of Lords tabled on Tuesday passes, developers will no longer have to offset the nutrient pollution caused by sewage from new homes. The government has said it will double Natural England’s wetland funding to £280m in order to show it is trying to meet the requirements of its legally binding Environment Act.
This extra £140m will come from the public purse, the government confirmed. When asked by the Guardian whether this meant the taxpayer was now picking up the bill for pollution caused by developers, a government official responded “yes”, adding that while “the polluter pays principle is very important”, it was having too many adverse impacts on small- and medium-sized housebuilders
Brexit - delivered through lies, shovelling money to wealthy Tory donors, degrading the world you live in and charging you for the privilege.
Absolutely fantastic Brexit dividend if that change happens!
We need more houses and this rule in particular is a ridiculous rule that should never have been implemented in the first place.
Besides while being constructed, houses don't generate or consume water - people do. Just like houses don't require schooling - people do. Just like houses don't require care homes - people do.
10 people in 1 house require the same number of school places, and approximately the same amount of water and waste, as 10 people in 2 houses.
Overcrowding is not a solution to a failure to invest in schools, or water, or anything else.
Construction is not the problem. A growing population needs more water, more schooling and more houses. Simply refusing to build the houses due to a lack of schooling, or water, or anything else is merely compounding a problem not solving it.
Actually, sod it, I will allow myself one photo - by me, from 2022 - of the Notorious Penis Chamber at Karahan Tepe. Mainly coz I’ll do anything to stop people talking about fricking ULEZ, also coz I just like writing “notorious penis chamber”
See here
What is this 12,000 year old room? WTF is it for?
At the moment, the best archaeological guess is that it is an initiation room for young adult males. It would have been roofed and dark. The boys would have stepped through the small door on the left, the room would have been half full of liquid piped in using the circled water channel. The liquid might have been animal blood - so one archaeologist told me. It might have poured through the mouth of the weird “head” acting as a spout. Then some ritual - sacrifice? Circumcision? Baptism? - would have been enacted. The boy becomes a man - a hunter - and then returns to the “audience room” just outside
This is 12,000 years old!!! Anyone who doesn’t find this seriously weird, brilliant, spooky, compelling and, yes, a *bit Graham Hancocky* is lacking a soul
Water tank? Why does everything unexplained have to be for 'rituals' of some bizarre kind?
A neolithic wooden trackway was discovered here in the Flatlands - it had been preserved in the peat. Quite a remarkable find really but as it was in a forgotten corner of the country not a lot was made of it.
Apparently - despite the lack of any artifacts - archaeologists say it must have been a route to a 'ritual platform'. Not the rather obvious purpose of a track to get to the other side of a wet area...
Most archaeologists agree that the Tas Tepeler are sacred sites. Stone circles, after all
There is near-zero evidence of human habitation at Gobekli Tepe (there is evidence at the other Tas Tepeler). Why build it? It is surely a temple; it is also, it seems, aligned astronomically
Some kind of penis worshipping hunter-warrior cult (with human sacrifice?) is the best guess at the moment
I admit to knowing almost nothing about these sites other than that they exist.
But how do you build a temple without living there, at least for some of the time?
And if you know how to build things, why not build houses?
The archaeology changes every year as they find amazing new stuff (which is one reason it’s so exciting)
For many years it was thought Gobekli Tepe was a singular miracle. A temple complex built by remarkably gifted cavemen who lived in temporary tents/shelters during the building season
Now at the other Tas Tepeler they have found permanent homes - besides the ritual shrines and cultic chambers. So it looks more and more like a civilisation, from 10,000 BC (or even earlier)
Worth pointing out that by the definition of 'civilisation' in that case it is not much different to the early pre-ceramic Neolithic of Northern Syria. The only big difference is the presence of temples. Jericho as a settlement dates back to 10,000 BC and the walled town dates to around 8,500 BC (and that wall is VERY impressive).
Even that is not the oldest structures in the area. Tell Qaramel has 5 towers dating back to around 10,000 BC and shows continuous occupation throughout the whole of the proto-Neolithic and pre-pottery Neolithic A & B (from around 10,500 to 9,000BC). These sites have been known since the 1970s.
The temples are, certainly, something else. But as I said before, this is not the revolutionary news that Hancock and others would have you believe.
Ian Hodder of Stanford Uni disagrees with you:
‘Gobekli Tepe changes everything.’
As an amateur archeologist with an interest in Syria, you’ll have heard of him
'Changes everything' is one of those phrases that can mean anything to anyone. Yes it is spectacular. No it does not mean an ancient 'civilisation' in Hancockian terms any more than the discovery of the Northern Syrian villages did.
That does not at all detract from the sites, nor does it mean the temples are not amazing. But when we have Sunil of this parish writing articles about Atlantis you have to stop and take a sniff of the smelling salts.
GT and the other sites push back the dates for large scale man made structures by a few hundred years. Not the 15,000 or so Hancock is regularly heard to claim.
I’m not batting for Hancock, you misconstrue me. I will indeed say that the Tas Tepeler are absolutely revolutionary, coz it is the case
Incidentally if you are interested in this stuff - and you obviously are - why don’t you go have a look? Seriously. See for yourself
These days Gobekli Tepe is now walled off and sheltered and gets a million visitors a year and that miraculous quality has largely gone (tho it is still a gob smacking site). When I first went I was the only non archaeologist there and we could wander between the stones drinking tea!
But at a site like Karahan Tepe you can still do that. Simply rock up. Wander about. You might be alone - or you can watch the archaeologists digging
Go on, do it! It would make an amazing holiday (combine it with a beach). Blow your mind!
If you want details on how to do it, DM me
It is definetely on my list. Along with various sites around Lake Van and in Kurdistan. My problem is time. I have had one 3 week holiday in 10 years. The joys of consultancy. I am hoping to do a bit more travelling again for pleasure rather than work but as always it is mañana.
Is the answer to that one not just that it is your decision what you do with the time you have, and how you set your priorities?
Its the nature of the beast as I said. Still having a mortgage and kids going through university the fear is that if you pass up a contract you don't know where the next one will come from. And at the same time for some of the ongoing contracts it was very much a case of do it all or we find someone else.
When I found myself without any contracts in March it was very scary. The first time in 35 years without a job either ongoing or lined up. I have picked up more contracts now but it will still be a rough year - maybe a quarter of my normal turnover.
Actually, sod it, I will allow myself one photo - by me, from 2022 - of the Notorious Penis Chamber at Karahan Tepe. Mainly coz I’ll do anything to stop people talking about fricking ULEZ, also coz I just like writing “notorious penis chamber”
See here
What is this 12,000 year old room? WTF is it for?
At the moment, the best archaeological guess is that it is an initiation room for young adult males. It would have been roofed and dark. The boys would have stepped through the small door on the left, the room would have been half full of liquid piped in using the circled water channel. The liquid might have been animal blood - so one archaeologist told me. It might have poured through the mouth of the weird “head” acting as a spout. Then some ritual - sacrifice? Circumcision? Baptism? - would have been enacted. The boy becomes a man - a hunter - and then returns to the “audience room” just outside
This is 12,000 years old!!! Anyone who doesn’t find this seriously weird, brilliant, spooky, compelling and, yes, a *bit Graham Hancocky* is lacking a soul
Water tank? Why does everything unexplained have to be for 'rituals' of some bizarre kind?
A neolithic wooden trackway was discovered here in the Flatlands - it had been preserved in the peat. Quite a remarkable find really but as it was in a forgotten corner of the country not a lot was made of it.
Apparently - despite the lack of any artifacts - archaeologists say it must have been a route to a 'ritual platform'. Not the rather obvious purpose of a track to get to the other side of a wet area...
Most archaeologists agree that the Tas Tepeler are sacred sites. Stone circles, after all
There is near-zero evidence of human habitation at Gobekli Tepe (there is evidence at the other Tas Tepeler). Why build it? It is surely a temple; it is also, it seems, aligned astronomically
Some kind of penis worshipping hunter-warrior cult (with human sacrifice?) is the best guess at the moment
I admit to knowing almost nothing about these sites other than that they exist.
But how do you build a temple without living there, at least for some of the time?
And if you know how to build things, why not build houses?
The archaeology changes every year as they find amazing new stuff (which is one reason it’s so exciting)
For many years it was thought Gobekli Tepe was a singular miracle. A temple complex built by remarkably gifted cavemen who lived in temporary tents/shelters during the building season
Now at the other Tas Tepeler they have found permanent homes - besides the ritual shrines and cultic chambers. So it looks more and more like a civilisation, from 10,000 BC (or even earlier)
Worth pointing out that by the definition of 'civilisation' in that case it is not much different to the early pre-ceramic Neolithic of Northern Syria. The only big difference is the presence of temples. Jericho as a settlement dates back to 10,000 BC and the walled town dates to around 8,500 BC (and that wall is VERY impressive).
Even that is not the oldest structures in the area. Tell Qaramel has 5 towers dating back to around 10,000 BC and shows continuous occupation throughout the whole of the proto-Neolithic and pre-pottery Neolithic A & B (from around 10,500 to 9,000BC). These sites have been known since the 1970s.
The temples are, certainly, something else. But as I said before, this is not the revolutionary news that Hancock and others would have you believe.
Ian Hodder of Stanford Uni disagrees with you:
‘Gobekli Tepe changes everything.’
As an amateur archeologist with an interest in Syria, you’ll have heard of him
'Changes everything' is one of those phrases that can mean anything to anyone. Yes it is spectacular. No it does not mean an ancient 'civilisation' in Hancockian terms any more than the discovery of the Northern Syrian villages did.
That does not at all detract from the sites, nor does it mean the temples are not amazing. But when we have Sunil of this parish writing articles about Atlantis you have to stop and take a sniff of the smelling salts.
GT and the other sites push back the dates for large scale man made structures by a few hundred years. Not the 15,000 or so Hancock is regularly heard to claim.
I’m not batting for Hancock, you misconstrue me. I will indeed say that the Tas Tepeler are absolutely revolutionary, coz it is the case
Incidentally if you are interested in this stuff - and you obviously are - why don’t you go have a look? Seriously. See for yourself
These days Gobekli Tepe is now walled off and sheltered and gets a million visitors a year and that miraculous quality has largely gone (tho it is still a gob smacking site). When I first went I was the only non archaeologist there and we could wander between the stones drinking tea!
But at a site like Karahan Tepe you can still do that. Simply rock up. Wander about. You might be alone - or you can watch the archaeologists digging
Go on, do it! It would make an amazing holiday (combine it with a beach). Blow your mind!
If you want details on how to do it, DM me
It is definetely on my list. Along with various sites around Lake Van and in Kurdistan. My problem is time. I have had one 3 week holiday in 10 years. The joys of consultancy. I am hoping to do a bit more travelling again for pleasure rather than work but as always it is mañana.
3 weeks.... in ten years?!
That's insane. Life is for living, not working. Find the time before you keel over
Oh, for God's sake.
For [A PLURAL NUMBER OF DECADES SINCE 18] I had approx six periods, each a week or less, which could be described as a "holiday". It's only in my new job where they will not let you sell them that I have to take them, which are inevitably taken up with work.
You've never had a full-time job (or, arguably even a job as we would understand it) and you fail to understand the responsibility of people relying on you. Life is not like the movies and holidays are for children, not adults.
Can't tell if you're serious, I kind of hope you're not
I don't deny I have been lucky, but I have also made my own luck, to an extent. Don't let the man take you down
He doesn't strike me as poor, and he seems to be self-employed as a consultant - and therefore able to carve out time. A trip to go see the Tas Tepeler would cost less than £1000, could be done in as little as a week, even five days if you're mad, and would blow your mind - and his mind - like nothing else on this green earth, in terms of archaeology. A spectacular archaeological site, probably the most important on the planet, maybe the most important in all human history (these are some expert opinions, not mine) is happening RIGHT NOW. And you can just drive up and watch them doing it. Mazin!
Speaking as another consultant, time very much equals money (unless it is PB in which case you get my time FOC...). Not working = not getting paid. Or at least that is the mentality I started with. A few years in and what I get paid is not directly connected with the revenue I earn for my company.
I took two weeks off in July, revenue that month was obviously much lower, but that had no impact on what I pull out. I still take opportunistic work where I can get it - a weekend gig meant doing 12 days without a break earlier this month. Output for that client was limited at best by the end of that, but they are happy to pay so I am happy to invoice.
Holidays are ok. Time off relaxing is more important. And I get bored easily. Best option is combining travel and work - something you excel at of course!
The whole concept of holidays is a bit weird. Someone pays you for not going to work? What’s in it for them?
When you add the foregone income to the cost of the holiday it becomes somewhat expensive. In fairness, @Leon seems to make money out of most of his trips. Good luck to him.
I'm crazy enough to find excursions like Home > Aberdeen > Gatwick > London > Coventry and return later the same day to be fun. Which is handy! Have got 2 days in London next week and a 5 day roadtrip as far as Warwick the week after as the next work trips. Its not exotic, but its a hell of a lot more time out and about than I would get otherwise.
That just sounds exhausting. I am increasingly less enthralled with planes. I haven’t been on one since before Covid.
I don't understand this. I agree air travel can be exhausting and annoying. Indeed, it is this most of the time
But the travel! Just the sense of sitting in an airport, with all the world (or at least half of it) merely a plane flight away. We forget how lucky we are in Britain, location wise. Right in the "middle"
A travel writer friend of mine, a Brit based in New Orleans, mentioned this the other day, enviously. In the UK (esp London and SE England)) you are only an hour or two in flying time from a trillion amazing destinations. For him in Nawlins he is two hours from Cleveland Ohio
If you are quite tall and find planes claustrophic my advice is to pay for the front row seats, it really improves the experience, even on Ryanair.
Having said all of that next week I am going to the exotic and fascinating Ashford for a week. Canterbury, Dover and Hastings are already on the list. Anyone got some less well known suggestions?
Ightham Mote is fantastic if you haven't been. Also Sissinghurst and Leeds Castle
Deal is quite charming, likewise Sandwich
Hythe and the miniature railway.
And if you go on the railway, give yourself time at Dungeness, very unusual and strange place but also a very significant nature reserve
Furthermore, we’re all going to pay for it: Taxpayers will pick up the bill for pollution by housebuilders, government officials have admitted, as rules on chemical releases into waterways are scrapped.
If an amendment in the House of Lords tabled on Tuesday passes, developers will no longer have to offset the nutrient pollution caused by sewage from new homes. The government has said it will double Natural England’s wetland funding to £280m in order to show it is trying to meet the requirements of its legally binding Environment Act.
This extra £140m will come from the public purse, the government confirmed. When asked by the Guardian whether this meant the taxpayer was now picking up the bill for pollution caused by developers, a government official responded “yes”, adding that while “the polluter pays principle is very important”, it was having too many adverse impacts on small- and medium-sized housebuilders
Brexit - delivered through lies, shovelling money to wealthy Tory donors, degrading the world you live in and charging you for the privilege.
Absolutely fantastic Brexit dividend if that change happens!
We need more houses and this rule in particular is a ridiculous rule that should never have been implemented in the first place.
Besides while being constructed, houses don't generate or consume water - people do. Just like houses don't require schooling - people do. Just like houses don't require care homes - people do.
10 people in 1 house require the same number of school places, and approximately the same amount of water and waste, as 10 people in 2 houses.
Overcrowding is not a solution to a failure to invest in schools, or water, or anything else.
Construction is not the problem. A growing population needs more water, more schooling and more houses. Simply refusing to build the houses due to a lack of schooling, or water, or anything else is merely compounding a problem not solving it.
But if the houses are built they do create a permanent demand for water and an output of sewage. In that particular spot. So the public pay for that now. Not the builders.
Furthermore, we’re all going to pay for it: Taxpayers will pick up the bill for pollution by housebuilders, government officials have admitted, as rules on chemical releases into waterways are scrapped.
If an amendment in the House of Lords tabled on Tuesday passes, developers will no longer have to offset the nutrient pollution caused by sewage from new homes. The government has said it will double Natural England’s wetland funding to £280m in order to show it is trying to meet the requirements of its legally binding Environment Act.
This extra £140m will come from the public purse, the government confirmed. When asked by the Guardian whether this meant the taxpayer was now picking up the bill for pollution caused by developers, a government official responded “yes”, adding that while “the polluter pays principle is very important”, it was having too many adverse impacts on small- and medium-sized housebuilders
Brexit - delivered through lies, shovelling money to wealthy Tory donors, degrading the world you live in and charging you for the privilege.
Absolutely fantastic Brexit dividend if that change happens!
We need more houses and this rule in particular is a ridiculous rule that should never have been implemented in the first place.
Besides while being constructed, houses don't generate or consume water - people do. Just like houses don't require schooling - people do. Just like houses don't require care homes - people do.
10 people in 1 house require the same number of school places, and approximately the same amount of water and waste, as 10 people in 2 houses.
Overcrowding is not a solution to a failure to invest in schools, or water, or anything else.
Construction is not the problem. A growing population needs more water, more schooling and more houses. Simply refusing to build the houses due to a lack of schooling, or water, or anything else is merely compounding a problem not solving it.
Hard to be outraged by the fact taxpayers will be footing the bill for pollution caused by, er, taxpayers.
For those like Leon who are looking for travel adventures, let me recommend this annual event: " Donna Kalil was creeping toward the end of the levee, heading out of the swampy wilderness and back to civilization, when she spotted it. There along the canal, nearly invisible amid the brush, was the elusive tan and brown pattern she’d been after all night. . . . It was just before 4 a.m. on Day 5 of the 2023 Python Challenge, a trademarked, only-in-Florida hunting bonanza held in August, and across the Glades, hunters were pulling long hours in search of snakes that can stretch to 20 feet. The 10-day competition is among several unusual strategies the state has devised to try to wrangle a monster problem: Burmese pythons are swallowing the Everglades whole." source$: https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-solutions/2023/08/25/invasive-python-snakes-hunt-florida/
You'll have some fun, meet some interesting people, help the environment, and could win the $10,000 prize given to the person who catches the most pythons.
Furthermore, we’re all going to pay for it: Taxpayers will pick up the bill for pollution by housebuilders, government officials have admitted, as rules on chemical releases into waterways are scrapped.
If an amendment in the House of Lords tabled on Tuesday passes, developers will no longer have to offset the nutrient pollution caused by sewage from new homes. The government has said it will double Natural England’s wetland funding to £280m in order to show it is trying to meet the requirements of its legally binding Environment Act.
This extra £140m will come from the public purse, the government confirmed. When asked by the Guardian whether this meant the taxpayer was now picking up the bill for pollution caused by developers, a government official responded “yes”, adding that while “the polluter pays principle is very important”, it was having too many adverse impacts on small- and medium-sized housebuilders
Brexit - delivered through lies, shovelling money to wealthy Tory donors, degrading the world you live in and charging you for the privilege.
Absolutely fantastic Brexit dividend if that change happens!
We need more houses and this rule in particular is a ridiculous rule that should never have been implemented in the first place.
Besides while being constructed, houses don't generate or consume water - people do. Just like houses don't require schooling - people do. Just like houses don't require care homes - people do.
10 people in 1 house require the same number of school places, and approximately the same amount of water and waste, as 10 people in 2 houses.
Overcrowding is not a solution to a failure to invest in schools, or water, or anything else.
Construction is not the problem. A growing population needs more water, more schooling and more houses. Simply refusing to build the houses due to a lack of schooling, or water, or anything else is merely compounding a problem not solving it.
Hard to be outraged by the fact taxpayers will be footing the bill for pollution caused by, er, taxpayers.
Excerpt it's new pollution caysed in that particular spot, and demanding new capital investment. Which is more likely to have been caused by that particular builder's demands.
That just sounds exhausting. I am increasingly less enthralled with planes. I haven’t been on one since before Covid.
I don't understand this. I agree air travel can be exhausting and annoying. Indeed, it is this most of the time
But the travel! Just the sense of sitting in an airport, with all the world (or at least half of it) merely a plane flight away. We forget how lucky we are in Britain, location wise. Right in the "middle"
A travel writer friend of mine, a Brit based in New Orleans, mentioned this the other day, enviously. In the UK (esp London and SE England)) you are only an hour or two in flying time from a trillion amazing destinations. For him in Nawlins he is two hours from Cleveland Ohio
I have become comfortable being uncomfortable flying. Helps that Aberdeen is a fantastic little airport. Into that London is a choice of Luton or Gatwick. Luton is much quicker to get through but I no longer care which.
Flying internally in the UK is something I will happily defend. I can't get to and from where I need to be on land without it taking hours. So I fly.
You fly when there is a perfectly good overnight train, offering Class 73 and Class 92 haulage?
Furthermore, we’re all going to pay for it: Taxpayers will pick up the bill for pollution by housebuilders, government officials have admitted, as rules on chemical releases into waterways are scrapped.
If an amendment in the House of Lords tabled on Tuesday passes, developers will no longer have to offset the nutrient pollution caused by sewage from new homes. The government has said it will double Natural England’s wetland funding to £280m in order to show it is trying to meet the requirements of its legally binding Environment Act.
This extra £140m will come from the public purse, the government confirmed. When asked by the Guardian whether this meant the taxpayer was now picking up the bill for pollution caused by developers, a government official responded “yes”, adding that while “the polluter pays principle is very important”, it was having too many adverse impacts on small- and medium-sized housebuilders
Brexit - delivered through lies, shovelling money to wealthy Tory donors, degrading the world you live in and charging you for the privilege.
Absolutely fantastic Brexit dividend if that change happens!
We need more houses and this rule in particular is a ridiculous rule that should never have been implemented in the first place.
Besides while being constructed, houses don't generate or consume water - people do. Just like houses don't require schooling - people do. Just like houses don't require care homes - people do.
10 people in 1 house require the same number of school places, and approximately the same amount of water and waste, as 10 people in 2 houses.
Overcrowding is not a solution to a failure to invest in schools, or water, or anything else.
Construction is not the problem. A growing population needs more water, more schooling and more houses. Simply refusing to build the houses due to a lack of schooling, or water, or anything else is merely compounding a problem not solving it.
But if the houses are built they do create a permanent demand for water and an output of sewage. In that particular spot. So the public pay for that now. Not the builders.
What permanent demand for water and sewage does a building (as opposed to the people) create?
When I moved into our house we had to read our meter readings. Our water meter reading was 0. For the entire time between our home being constructed and us moving in a grand total of 0 units of water had been used.
I don't know bout you, but I flush the toilet when I go to it. I run the sink when I want a drink of water, or wash my hands, or brush my teeth, or wash my dishes. I turn the shower on when I have it. My house does none of that, I do it. It is the person consuming water.
Furthermore, we’re all going to pay for it: Taxpayers will pick up the bill for pollution by housebuilders, government officials have admitted, as rules on chemical releases into waterways are scrapped.
If an amendment in the House of Lords tabled on Tuesday passes, developers will no longer have to offset the nutrient pollution caused by sewage from new homes. The government has said it will double Natural England’s wetland funding to £280m in order to show it is trying to meet the requirements of its legally binding Environment Act.
This extra £140m will come from the public purse, the government confirmed. When asked by the Guardian whether this meant the taxpayer was now picking up the bill for pollution caused by developers, a government official responded “yes”, adding that while “the polluter pays principle is very important”, it was having too many adverse impacts on small- and medium-sized housebuilders
Brexit - delivered through lies, shovelling money to wealthy Tory donors, degrading the world you live in and charging you for the privilege.
Absolutely fantastic Brexit dividend if that change happens!
We need more houses and this rule in particular is a ridiculous rule that should never have been implemented in the first place.
Besides while being constructed, houses don't generate or consume water - people do. Just like houses don't require schooling - people do. Just like houses don't require care homes - people do.
10 people in 1 house require the same number of school places, and approximately the same amount of water and waste, as 10 people in 2 houses.
Overcrowding is not a solution to a failure to invest in schools, or water, or anything else.
Construction is not the problem. A growing population needs more water, more schooling and more houses. Simply refusing to build the houses due to a lack of schooling, or water, or anything else is merely compounding a problem not solving it.
But if the houses are built they do create a permanent demand for water and an output of sewage. In that particular spot. So the public pay for that now. Not the builders.
What permanent demand for water and sewage does a building (as opposed to the people) create?
When I moved into our house we had to read our meter readings. Our water meter reading was 0. For the entire time between our home being constructed and us moving in a grand total of 0 units of water had been used.
I don't know bout you, but I flush the toilet when I go to it. I run the sink when I want a drink of water, or wash my hands, or brush my teeth, or wash my dishes. I turn the shower on when I have it. My house does none of that, I do it. It is the person consuming water.
Because there would be nobosy there if the builders didn't build the house. And the facilities are needed *before* anyone moves in. For rather obvious reasons.
The lack of education facilities, sewerage, treatment plants, etc. is a huge issue with new developments.
Actually, sod it, I will allow myself one photo - by me, from 2022 - of the Notorious Penis Chamber at Karahan Tepe. Mainly coz I’ll do anything to stop people talking about fricking ULEZ, also coz I just like writing “notorious penis chamber”
See here
What is this 12,000 year old room? WTF is it for?
At the moment, the best archaeological guess is that it is an initiation room for young adult males. It would have been roofed and dark. The boys would have stepped through the small door on the left, the room would have been half full of liquid piped in using the circled water channel. The liquid might have been animal blood - so one archaeologist told me. It might have poured through the mouth of the weird “head” acting as a spout. Then some ritual - sacrifice? Circumcision? Baptism? - would have been enacted. The boy becomes a man - a hunter - and then returns to the “audience room” just outside
This is 12,000 years old!!! Anyone who doesn’t find this seriously weird, brilliant, spooky, compelling and, yes, a *bit Graham Hancocky* is lacking a soul
Water tank? Why does everything unexplained have to be for 'rituals' of some bizarre kind?
A neolithic wooden trackway was discovered here in the Flatlands - it had been preserved in the peat. Quite a remarkable find really but as it was in a forgotten corner of the country not a lot was made of it.
Apparently - despite the lack of any artifacts - archaeologists say it must have been a route to a 'ritual platform'. Not the rather obvious purpose of a track to get to the other side of a wet area...
Most archaeologists agree that the Tas Tepeler are sacred sites. Stone circles, after all
There is near-zero evidence of human habitation at Gobekli Tepe (there is evidence at the other Tas Tepeler). Why build it? It is surely a temple; it is also, it seems, aligned astronomically
Some kind of penis worshipping hunter-warrior cult (with human sacrifice?) is the best guess at the moment
I admit to knowing almost nothing about these sites other than that they exist.
But how do you build a temple without living there, at least for some of the time?
And if you know how to build things, why not build houses?
The archaeology changes every year as they find amazing new stuff (which is one reason it’s so exciting)
For many years it was thought Gobekli Tepe was a singular miracle. A temple complex built by remarkably gifted cavemen who lived in temporary tents/shelters during the building season
Now at the other Tas Tepeler they have found permanent homes - besides the ritual shrines and cultic chambers. So it looks more and more like a civilisation, from 10,000 BC (or even earlier)
Worth pointing out that by the definition of 'civilisation' in that case it is not much different to the early pre-ceramic Neolithic of Northern Syria. The only big difference is the presence of temples. Jericho as a settlement dates back to 10,000 BC and the walled town dates to around 8,500 BC (and that wall is VERY impressive).
Even that is not the oldest structures in the area. Tell Qaramel has 5 towers dating back to around 10,000 BC and shows continuous occupation throughout the whole of the proto-Neolithic and pre-pottery Neolithic A & B (from around 10,500 to 9,000BC). These sites have been known since the 1970s.
The temples are, certainly, something else. But as I said before, this is not the revolutionary news that Hancock and others would have you believe.
Ian Hodder of Stanford Uni disagrees with you:
‘Gobekli Tepe changes everything.’
As an amateur archeologist with an interest in Syria, you’ll have heard of him
'Changes everything' is one of those phrases that can mean anything to anyone. Yes it is spectacular. No it does not mean an ancient 'civilisation' in Hancockian terms any more than the discovery of the Northern Syrian villages did.
That does not at all detract from the sites, nor does it mean the temples are not amazing. But when we have Sunil of this parish writing articles about Atlantis you have to stop and take a sniff of the smelling salts.
GT and the other sites push back the dates for large scale man made structures by a few hundred years. Not the 15,000 or so Hancock is regularly heard to claim.
I’m not batting for Hancock, you misconstrue me. I will indeed say that the Tas Tepeler are absolutely revolutionary, coz it is the case
Incidentally if you are interested in this stuff - and you obviously are - why don’t you go have a look? Seriously. See for yourself
These days Gobekli Tepe is now walled off and sheltered and gets a million visitors a year and that miraculous quality has largely gone (tho it is still a gob smacking site). When I first went I was the only non archaeologist there and we could wander between the stones drinking tea!
But at a site like Karahan Tepe you can still do that. Simply rock up. Wander about. You might be alone - or you can watch the archaeologists digging
Go on, do it! It would make an amazing holiday (combine it with a beach). Blow your mind!
If you want details on how to do it, DM me
It is definetely on my list. Along with various sites around Lake Van and in Kurdistan. My problem is time. I have had one 3 week holiday in 10 years. The joys of consultancy. I am hoping to do a bit more travelling again for pleasure rather than work but as always it is mañana.
3 weeks.... in ten years?!
That's insane. Life is for living, not working. Find the time before you keel over
Oh, for God's sake.
For [A PLURAL NUMBER OF DECADES SINCE 18] I had approx six periods, each a week or less, which could be described as a "holiday". It's only in my new job where they will not let you sell them that I have to take them, which are inevitably taken up with work.
You've never had a full-time job (or, arguably even a job as we would understand it) and you fail to understand the responsibility of people relying on you. Life is not like the movies and holidays are for children, not adults.
Can't tell if you're serious, I kind of hope you're not
I don't deny I have been lucky, but I have also made my own luck, to an extent. Don't let the man take you down
He doesn't strike me as poor, and he seems to be self-employed as a consultant - and therefore able to carve out time. A trip to go see the Tas Tepeler would cost less than £1000, could be done in as little as a week, even five days if you're mad, and would blow your mind - and his mind - like nothing else on this green earth, in terms of archaeology. A spectacular archaeological site, probably the most important on the planet, maybe the most important in all human history (these are some expert opinions, not mine) is happening RIGHT NOW. And you can just drive up and watch them doing it. Mazin!
Speaking as another consultant, time very much equals money (unless it is PB in which case you get my time FOC...). Not working = not getting paid. Or at least that is the mentality I started with. A few years in and what I get paid is not directly connected with the revenue I earn for my company.
I took two weeks off in July, revenue that month was obviously much lower, but that had no impact on what I pull out. I still take opportunistic work where I can get it - a weekend gig meant doing 12 days without a break earlier this month. Output for that client was limited at best by the end of that, but they are happy to pay so I am happy to invoice.
Holidays are ok. Time off relaxing is more important. And I get bored easily. Best option is combining travel and work - something you excel at of course!
The whole concept of holidays is a bit weird. Someone pays you for not going to work? What’s in it for them?
When you add the foregone income to the cost of the holiday it becomes somewhat expensive. In fairness, @Leon seems to make money out of most of his trips. Good luck to him.
I'm crazy enough to find excursions like Home > Aberdeen > Gatwick > London > Coventry and return later the same day to be fun. Which is handy! Have got 2 days in London next week and a 5 day roadtrip as far as Warwick the week after as the next work trips. Its not exotic, but its a hell of a lot more time out and about than I would get otherwise.
That just sounds exhausting. I am increasingly less enthralled with planes. I haven’t been on one since before Covid.
When going to an airport, pretend it's 1977 and you're flying on Concorde.
Furthermore, we’re all going to pay for it: Taxpayers will pick up the bill for pollution by housebuilders, government officials have admitted, as rules on chemical releases into waterways are scrapped.
If an amendment in the House of Lords tabled on Tuesday passes, developers will no longer have to offset the nutrient pollution caused by sewage from new homes. The government has said it will double Natural England’s wetland funding to £280m in order to show it is trying to meet the requirements of its legally binding Environment Act.
This extra £140m will come from the public purse, the government confirmed. When asked by the Guardian whether this meant the taxpayer was now picking up the bill for pollution caused by developers, a government official responded “yes”, adding that while “the polluter pays principle is very important”, it was having too many adverse impacts on small- and medium-sized housebuilders
Brexit - delivered through lies, shovelling money to wealthy Tory donors, degrading the world you live in and charging you for the privilege.
Absolutely fantastic Brexit dividend if that change happens!
We need more houses and this rule in particular is a ridiculous rule that should never have been implemented in the first place.
Besides while being constructed, houses don't generate or consume water - people do. Just like houses don't require schooling - people do. Just like houses don't require care homes - people do.
10 people in 1 house require the same number of school places, and approximately the same amount of water and waste, as 10 people in 2 houses.
Overcrowding is not a solution to a failure to invest in schools, or water, or anything else.
Construction is not the problem. A growing population needs more water, more schooling and more houses. Simply refusing to build the houses due to a lack of schooling, or water, or anything else is merely compounding a problem not solving it.
Hard to be outraged by the fact taxpayers will be footing the bill for pollution caused by, er, taxpayers.
Excerpt it's new pollution caysed in that particular spot, and demanding new capital investment. Which is more likely to have been caused by that particular builder's demands.
No, there is zero extra pollution.
A house that is left unoccupied will have no water usage for as long as the taps are turned off. You could build a thousand unoccupied homes and between them they should be consuming zero water.
Across Europe over 10% of homes on average are empty. Our housing crisis is caused by the lack of empty homes and we need to construct millions to have a healthy amount of empty homes even without population growth. All those homes should be consuming no water.
People moving from overcrowded homes to new homes just take their own personal water consumption with them. That's not the building's responsibility, its theirs.
Actually, sod it, I will allow myself one photo - by me, from 2022 - of the Notorious Penis Chamber at Karahan Tepe. Mainly coz I’ll do anything to stop people talking about fricking ULEZ, also coz I just like writing “notorious penis chamber”
See here
What is this 12,000 year old room? WTF is it for?
At the moment, the best archaeological guess is that it is an initiation room for young adult males. It would have been roofed and dark. The boys would have stepped through the small door on the left, the room would have been half full of liquid piped in using the circled water channel. The liquid might have been animal blood - so one archaeologist told me. It might have poured through the mouth of the weird “head” acting as a spout. Then some ritual - sacrifice? Circumcision? Baptism? - would have been enacted. The boy becomes a man - a hunter - and then returns to the “audience room” just outside
This is 12,000 years old!!! Anyone who doesn’t find this seriously weird, brilliant, spooky, compelling and, yes, a *bit Graham Hancocky* is lacking a soul
Water tank? Why does everything unexplained have to be for 'rituals' of some bizarre kind?
A neolithic wooden trackway was discovered here in the Flatlands - it had been preserved in the peat. Quite a remarkable find really but as it was in a forgotten corner of the country not a lot was made of it.
Apparently - despite the lack of any artifacts - archaeologists say it must have been a route to a 'ritual platform'. Not the rather obvious purpose of a track to get to the other side of a wet area...
Most archaeologists agree that the Tas Tepeler are sacred sites. Stone circles, after all
There is near-zero evidence of human habitation at Gobekli Tepe (there is evidence at the other Tas Tepeler). Why build it? It is surely a temple; it is also, it seems, aligned astronomically
Some kind of penis worshipping hunter-warrior cult (with human sacrifice?) is the best guess at the moment
I admit to knowing almost nothing about these sites other than that they exist.
But how do you build a temple without living there, at least for some of the time?
And if you know how to build things, why not build houses?
The archaeology changes every year as they find amazing new stuff (which is one reason it’s so exciting)
For many years it was thought Gobekli Tepe was a singular miracle. A temple complex built by remarkably gifted cavemen who lived in temporary tents/shelters during the building season
Now at the other Tas Tepeler they have found permanent homes - besides the ritual shrines and cultic chambers. So it looks more and more like a civilisation, from 10,000 BC (or even earlier)
Worth pointing out that by the definition of 'civilisation' in that case it is not much different to the early pre-ceramic Neolithic of Northern Syria. The only big difference is the presence of temples. Jericho as a settlement dates back to 10,000 BC and the walled town dates to around 8,500 BC (and that wall is VERY impressive).
Even that is not the oldest structures in the area. Tell Qaramel has 5 towers dating back to around 10,000 BC and shows continuous occupation throughout the whole of the proto-Neolithic and pre-pottery Neolithic A & B (from around 10,500 to 9,000BC). These sites have been known since the 1970s.
The temples are, certainly, something else. But as I said before, this is not the revolutionary news that Hancock and others would have you believe.
Ian Hodder of Stanford Uni disagrees with you:
‘Gobekli Tepe changes everything.’
As an amateur archeologist with an interest in Syria, you’ll have heard of him
'Changes everything' is one of those phrases that can mean anything to anyone. Yes it is spectacular. No it does not mean an ancient 'civilisation' in Hancockian terms any more than the discovery of the Northern Syrian villages did.
That does not at all detract from the sites, nor does it mean the temples are not amazing. But when we have Sunil of this parish writing articles about Atlantis you have to stop and take a sniff of the smelling salts.
GT and the other sites push back the dates for large scale man made structures by a few hundred years. Not the 15,000 or so Hancock is regularly heard to claim.
I’m not batting for Hancock, you misconstrue me. I will indeed say that the Tas Tepeler are absolutely revolutionary, coz it is the case
Incidentally if you are interested in this stuff - and you obviously are - why don’t you go have a look? Seriously. See for yourself
These days Gobekli Tepe is now walled off and sheltered and gets a million visitors a year and that miraculous quality has largely gone (tho it is still a gob smacking site). When I first went I was the only non archaeologist there and we could wander between the stones drinking tea!
But at a site like Karahan Tepe you can still do that. Simply rock up. Wander about. You might be alone - or you can watch the archaeologists digging
Go on, do it! It would make an amazing holiday (combine it with a beach). Blow your mind!
If you want details on how to do it, DM me
It is definetely on my list. Along with various sites around Lake Van and in Kurdistan. My problem is time. I have had one 3 week holiday in 10 years. The joys of consultancy. I am hoping to do a bit more travelling again for pleasure rather than work but as always it is mañana.
3 weeks.... in ten years?!
That's insane. Life is for living, not working. Find the time before you keel over
Oh, for God's sake.
For [A PLURAL NUMBER OF DECADES SINCE 18] I had approx six periods, each a week or less, which could be described as a "holiday". It's only in my new job where they will not let you sell them that I have to take them, which are inevitably taken up with work.
You've never had a full-time job (or, arguably even a job as we would understand it) and you fail to understand the responsibility of people relying on you. Life is not like the movies and holidays are for children, not adults.
Can't tell if you're serious, I kind of hope you're not
I don't deny I have been lucky, but I have also made my own luck, to an extent. Don't let the man take you down
He doesn't strike me as poor, and he seems to be self-employed as a consultant - and therefore able to carve out time. A trip to go see the Tas Tepeler would cost less than £1000, could be done in as little as a week, even five days if you're mad, and would blow your mind - and his mind - like nothing else on this green earth, in terms of archaeology. A spectacular archaeological site, probably the most important on the planet, maybe the most important in all human history (these are some expert opinions, not mine) is happening RIGHT NOW. And you can just drive up and watch them doing it. Mazin!
I've not had a 'holiday' since the start of the pandemic. The odd day out, maybe.
There are more reasons than just work to be tied down.
Whilst I do have a number of places I'd like to go given the chance, I do wonder about some friends that are forever travelling the planet. What are they searching for? I don't think the answer to life the universe and everything lies in the Peruvian jungle (or wherever they are this week).
In my friend's case it's to tick off every country on the planet. He has done most of the easy ones and is now finding it progressively more difficult. As we're all officially spectrumy on this forum, I assume others can appreciate the sentiment.
Looks at Munro chart. Hmm. Can kind of appreciate that one.
I can think of self-challenges involving less jet fuel though.
Twenty-five years ago I set myself to do all the county tops of the mainland. I got about halfway through, then dropped it when live intervened. One of the things I want to complete, though, when I get the time to go on long trips. I think the hardest is the one up north which is on a military range with limited access (though I did pass near it whilst doing the Pennine Way).
I also wanted to take a trip on every ferry in the UK. I guess I might have to wait 25 years until the Scottish ferries are complete...
Ferry trips are great. I have collected a few random ones in recent years and they are always a treat. Except Corsica Ferries last summer which was stiflingly hot, and more so on deck.
I am working my way down the Atlantic islands on landmark birthdays. 2 down, hopefully several to go. 30 was Iceland. 40 was Sao Miguel in the Azores. 50, not long now, we are still debating but probably one of the more dramatic Cape Verde islands, like Fogo. By the time I'm 80 I may be catching the RAF flight to Port Stanley.
A long trip around the Atlantic rim would be interesting and I don't think anyone prominent has done that (a few have done the Pacific rim, including Michael Palin). Start at Lands end, up through Ireland, NW Scotland, Faeroes, Iceland, Greenland, down through Canadian Maritimes and Eastern US, Caribbean, Brazil, Patagonia, the sub-Antacrtic islands and then a fun but challenging run up from the Cape via West Africa and Iberia.
Furthermore, we’re all going to pay for it: Taxpayers will pick up the bill for pollution by housebuilders, government officials have admitted, as rules on chemical releases into waterways are scrapped.
If an amendment in the House of Lords tabled on Tuesday passes, developers will no longer have to offset the nutrient pollution caused by sewage from new homes. The government has said it will double Natural England’s wetland funding to £280m in order to show it is trying to meet the requirements of its legally binding Environment Act.
This extra £140m will come from the public purse, the government confirmed. When asked by the Guardian whether this meant the taxpayer was now picking up the bill for pollution caused by developers, a government official responded “yes”, adding that while “the polluter pays principle is very important”, it was having too many adverse impacts on small- and medium-sized housebuilders
Brexit - delivered through lies, shovelling money to wealthy Tory donors, degrading the world you live in and charging you for the privilege.
Absolutely fantastic Brexit dividend if that change happens!
We need more houses and this rule in particular is a ridiculous rule that should never have been implemented in the first place.
Besides while being constructed, houses don't generate or consume water - people do. Just like houses don't require schooling - people do. Just like houses don't require care homes - people do.
10 people in 1 house require the same number of school places, and approximately the same amount of water and waste, as 10 people in 2 houses.
Overcrowding is not a solution to a failure to invest in schools, or water, or anything else.
Construction is not the problem. A growing population needs more water, more schooling and more houses. Simply refusing to build the houses due to a lack of schooling, or water, or anything else is merely compounding a problem not solving it.
But if the houses are built they do create a permanent demand for water and an output of sewage. In that particular spot. So the public pay for that now. Not the builders.
What permanent demand for water and sewage does a building (as opposed to the people) create?
When I moved into our house we had to read our meter readings. Our water meter reading was 0. For the entire time between our home being constructed and us moving in a grand total of 0 units of water had been used.
I don't know bout you, but I flush the toilet when I go to it. I run the sink when I want a drink of water, or wash my hands, or brush my teeth, or wash my dishes. I turn the shower on when I have it. My house does none of that, I do it. It is the person consuming water.
Also: as for Brexit dividends, I see from the Graun feed that the Government have postponed completing customs controls for the UK. Because they have realised it will add to inflation.
Furthermore, we’re all going to pay for it: Taxpayers will pick up the bill for pollution by housebuilders, government officials have admitted, as rules on chemical releases into waterways are scrapped.
If an amendment in the House of Lords tabled on Tuesday passes, developers will no longer have to offset the nutrient pollution caused by sewage from new homes. The government has said it will double Natural England’s wetland funding to £280m in order to show it is trying to meet the requirements of its legally binding Environment Act.
This extra £140m will come from the public purse, the government confirmed. When asked by the Guardian whether this meant the taxpayer was now picking up the bill for pollution caused by developers, a government official responded “yes”, adding that while “the polluter pays principle is very important”, it was having too many adverse impacts on small- and medium-sized housebuilders
Brexit - delivered through lies, shovelling money to wealthy Tory donors, degrading the world you live in and charging you for the privilege.
Isn't this mainly to placate the big 5 builders who have stopped donating to the Tory party? The Conservative Party needs an election warchest so one can understand why the fragrant Gove has made this decision. Trebles all round.
Also good work from Harper today, rewriting Grant Shapps history over ULEZ/ TfL.
Furthermore, we’re all going to pay for it: Taxpayers will pick up the bill for pollution by housebuilders, government officials have admitted, as rules on chemical releases into waterways are scrapped.
If an amendment in the House of Lords tabled on Tuesday passes, developers will no longer have to offset the nutrient pollution caused by sewage from new homes. The government has said it will double Natural England’s wetland funding to £280m in order to show it is trying to meet the requirements of its legally binding Environment Act.
This extra £140m will come from the public purse, the government confirmed. When asked by the Guardian whether this meant the taxpayer was now picking up the bill for pollution caused by developers, a government official responded “yes”, adding that while “the polluter pays principle is very important”, it was having too many adverse impacts on small- and medium-sized housebuilders
Brexit - delivered through lies, shovelling money to wealthy Tory donors, degrading the world you live in and charging you for the privilege.
Absolutely fantastic Brexit dividend if that change happens!
We need more houses and this rule in particular is a ridiculous rule that should never have been implemented in the first place.
Besides while being constructed, houses don't generate or consume water - people do. Just like houses don't require schooling - people do. Just like houses don't require care homes - people do.
10 people in 1 house require the same number of school places, and approximately the same amount of water and waste, as 10 people in 2 houses.
Overcrowding is not a solution to a failure to invest in schools, or water, or anything else.
Construction is not the problem. A growing population needs more water, more schooling and more houses. Simply refusing to build the houses due to a lack of schooling, or water, or anything else is merely compounding a problem not solving it.
Hard to be outraged by the fact taxpayers will be footing the bill for pollution caused by, er, taxpayers.
Excerpt it's new pollution caysed in that particular spot, and demanding new capital investment. Which is more likely to have been caused by that particular builder's demands.
No, there is zero extra pollution.
A house that is left unoccupied will have no water usage for as long as the taps are turned off. You could build a thousand unoccupied homes and between them they should be consuming zero water.
Across Europe over 10% of homes on average are empty. All those homes should be consuming no water.
People moving from overcrowded homes to new homes just take their own personal water consumption with them. That's not the building's responsibility, its theirs.
That really is scraping the barrel. The builders create new and permanent demand by building the houses. It's as simple as that. In places it didn't exist before in many cases.
Furthermore, we’re all going to pay for it: Taxpayers will pick up the bill for pollution by housebuilders, government officials have admitted, as rules on chemical releases into waterways are scrapped.
If an amendment in the House of Lords tabled on Tuesday passes, developers will no longer have to offset the nutrient pollution caused by sewage from new homes. The government has said it will double Natural England’s wetland funding to £280m in order to show it is trying to meet the requirements of its legally binding Environment Act.
This extra £140m will come from the public purse, the government confirmed. When asked by the Guardian whether this meant the taxpayer was now picking up the bill for pollution caused by developers, a government official responded “yes”, adding that while “the polluter pays principle is very important”, it was having too many adverse impacts on small- and medium-sized housebuilders
Brexit - delivered through lies, shovelling money to wealthy Tory donors, degrading the world you live in and charging you for the privilege.
Absolutely fantastic Brexit dividend if that change happens!
We need more houses and this rule in particular is a ridiculous rule that should never have been implemented in the first place.
Besides while being constructed, houses don't generate or consume water - people do. Just like houses don't require schooling - people do. Just like houses don't require care homes - people do.
10 people in 1 house require the same number of school places, and approximately the same amount of water and waste, as 10 people in 2 houses.
Overcrowding is not a solution to a failure to invest in schools, or water, or anything else.
Construction is not the problem. A growing population needs more water, more schooling and more houses. Simply refusing to build the houses due to a lack of schooling, or water, or anything else is merely compounding a problem not solving it.
But if the houses are built they do create a permanent demand for water and an output of sewage. In that particular spot. So the public pay for that now. Not the builders.
What permanent demand for water and sewage does a building (as opposed to the people) create?
When I moved into our house we had to read our meter readings. Our water meter reading was 0. For the entire time between our home being constructed and us moving in a grand total of 0 units of water had been used.
I don't know bout you, but I flush the toilet when I go to it. I run the sink when I want a drink of water, or wash my hands, or brush my teeth, or wash my dishes. I turn the shower on when I have it. My house does none of that, I do it. It is the person consuming water.
Because there would be nobosy there if the builders didn't build the house. And the facilities are needed *before* anyone moves in. For rather obvious reasons.
The lack of education facilities, sewerage, treatment plants, etc. is a huge issue with new developments.
Wrong, they'd be there but living in overcrowded accomodation.
Where do you think they were living before? The streets?
And if the house is built but remains empty, it has zero demand for schools, or water.
Furthermore, we’re all going to pay for it: Taxpayers will pick up the bill for pollution by housebuilders, government officials have admitted, as rules on chemical releases into waterways are scrapped.
If an amendment in the House of Lords tabled on Tuesday passes, developers will no longer have to offset the nutrient pollution caused by sewage from new homes. The government has said it will double Natural England’s wetland funding to £280m in order to show it is trying to meet the requirements of its legally binding Environment Act.
This extra £140m will come from the public purse, the government confirmed. When asked by the Guardian whether this meant the taxpayer was now picking up the bill for pollution caused by developers, a government official responded “yes”, adding that while “the polluter pays principle is very important”, it was having too many adverse impacts on small- and medium-sized housebuilders
Brexit - delivered through lies, shovelling money to wealthy Tory donors, degrading the world you live in and charging you for the privilege.
Absolutely fantastic Brexit dividend if that change happens!
We need more houses and this rule in particular is a ridiculous rule that should never have been implemented in the first place.
Besides while being constructed, houses don't generate or consume water - people do. Just like houses don't require schooling - people do. Just like houses don't require care homes - people do.
10 people in 1 house require the same number of school places, and approximately the same amount of water and waste, as 10 people in 2 houses.
Overcrowding is not a solution to a failure to invest in schools, or water, or anything else.
Construction is not the problem. A growing population needs more water, more schooling and more houses. Simply refusing to build the houses due to a lack of schooling, or water, or anything else is merely compounding a problem not solving it.
Hard to be outraged by the fact taxpayers will be footing the bill for pollution caused by, er, taxpayers.
Excerpt it's new pollution caysed in that particular spot, and demanding new capital investment. Which is more likely to have been caused by that particular builder's demands.
No, there is zero extra pollution.
A house that is left unoccupied will have no water usage for as long as the taps are turned off. You could build a thousand unoccupied homes and between them they should be consuming zero water.
Across Europe over 10% of homes on average are empty. All those homes should be consuming no water.
People moving from overcrowded homes to new homes just take their own personal water consumption with them. That's not the building's responsibility, its theirs.
That really is scraping the barrel. The builders create new and permanent demand by building the houses. It's as simple as that. In places it didn't exist before in many cases.
The builders create a grand total of zero extra demand.
People having sex and creating babies adds demand.
People migrating into this country adds demand.
People not dying and living longer adds demand.
Construction does not. You're just shuffling the deckchairs on the titanic, cramming people into overcrowded accommodation does not reduce demand at all.
That just sounds exhausting. I am increasingly less enthralled with planes. I haven’t been on one since before Covid.
I don't understand this. I agree air travel can be exhausting and annoying. Indeed, it is this most of the time
But the travel! Just the sense of sitting in an airport, with all the world (or at least half of it) merely a plane flight away. We forget how lucky we are in Britain, location wise. Right in the "middle"
A travel writer friend of mine, a Brit based in New Orleans, mentioned this the other day, enviously. In the UK (esp London and SE England)) you are only an hour or two in flying time from a trillion amazing destinations. For him in Nawlins he is two hours from Cleveland Ohio
I have become comfortable being uncomfortable flying. Helps that Aberdeen is a fantastic little airport. Into that London is a choice of Luton or Gatwick. Luton is much quicker to get through but I no longer care which.
Flying internally in the UK is something I will happily defend. I can't get to and from where I need to be on land without it taking hours. So I fly.
It’s some time since I’ve used Stansted, but apart from, for me, accessibility, it is undesirable. Massive shopping arcade and nowhere to sit.
The worst airport I have experienced in the UK. Even worse that Dirty Leeds Bradford, and that is a big statement to make...
Norwich airport was barely better than an RAF station last time I flew from there, but that was 1984. It may have improved since....
That just sounds exhausting. I am increasingly less enthralled with planes. I haven’t been on one since before Covid.
I don't understand this. I agree air travel can be exhausting and annoying. Indeed, it is this most of the time
But the travel! Just the sense of sitting in an airport, with all the world (or at least half of it) merely a plane flight away. We forget how lucky we are in Britain, location wise. Right in the "middle"
A travel writer friend of mine, a Brit based in New Orleans, mentioned this the other day, enviously. In the UK (esp London and SE England)) you are only an hour or two in flying time from a trillion amazing destinations. For him in Nawlins he is two hours from Cleveland Ohio
I have become comfortable being uncomfortable flying. Helps that Aberdeen is a fantastic little airport. Into that London is a choice of Luton or Gatwick. Luton is much quicker to get through but I no longer care which.
Flying internally in the UK is something I will happily defend. I can't get to and from where I need to be on land without it taking hours. So I fly.
It’s some time since I’ve used Stansted, but apart from, for me, accessibility, it is undesirable. Massive shopping arcade and nowhere to sit.
The worst airport I have experienced in the UK. Even worse that Dirty Leeds Bradford, and that is a big statement to make...
Once landed there in a crosswind. The pilot had three goes at it.
Comments
As long as you remember that - don't treat him like an academic - then he's definitely worth reading. Because he unearths gems, even as he spins the woowoo nonsense
The criticism he has received - esp the "OMG he's a Nazi" gibberish - is absolutely absurd, and surely comes from envy of his financial success, and pompous professional pride at an "amateur" intruding on clerical matters. He doesn't even claim to be an archaeologist
It's a non-runner both on legal and political grounds.
I can't really afford the time away either, but I'm taking three weeks out to visit S Korea shortly.
Though I'll happily admit this and who are the most important US legal scholars is not my specialist area!
The enforcement is the interesting side; I've seen mention of one lawsuit already started in Florida. But US Judges are always interesting, and US Law is very unpredictable.
This is a time will tell thing, I think.
There are also a couple of "defund the Public Prosecutors holding Trump to account" proposals floating around the Republican side pf Congress.
Sorry ‘bout that!
But I don't think you need to wait for time to tell on this one. It's pretty clear cut legally as well as being a crazy tactic politically.
There are more reasons than just work to be tied down.
Whilst I do have a number of places I'd like to go given the chance, I do wonder about some friends that are forever travelling the planet. What are they searching for? I don't think the answer to life the universe and everything lies in the Peruvian jungle (or wherever they are this week).
I took two weeks off in July, revenue that month was obviously much lower, but that had no impact on what I pull out. I still take opportunistic work where I can get it - a weekend gig meant doing 12 days without a break earlier this month. Output for that client was limited at best by the end of that, but they are happy to pay so I am happy to invoice.
Holidays are ok. Time off relaxing is more important. And I get bored easily. Best option is combining travel and work - something you excel at of course!
That said, even somewhere like Singapore means you are only an hour's boat ride from some exquisite and lesser known destinations. Like the Riau/Anambas Archipelago
https://www.bambootravel.co.uk/holidays-to-indonesia/Holidays-to-the-Riau-Archipelago/Holidays-to-the-Anambas-Archipelago
My concern is that Mr Starmer is turning far too much into Brown or Tory Lite on a whole range of questions.
She's failed me time and again on this, and I'm sorry to say but she's a very lazy old woman.
When you add the foregone income to the cost of the holiday it becomes somewhat expensive. In fairness, @Leon seems to make money out of most of his trips. Good luck to him.
Made a lot of money, don't get me wrong, but also resolved never to do that again.
Gloucestershire: 'Hold our beers.'
1. Should have spent more time with my kids and/or friends
2. I worked too hard, I should have travelled more
They are probably unavoidable, we will all die with regrets. But you can mitigate the remorse
Scrapping cars which run ok is economic madness, no matter how much the idiots in government and their mates in the car industry want to tell us otherwise.
Well, as I do YouTube and need to maintain my network I have had several weekend trips which count as "work". My company pays anyway. Pity that entertaining isn't tax deductible, but at least it is pre-tax expenditure...
Canterbury, Dover and Hastings are already on the list. Anyone got some less well known suggestions?
Parts of Russia are like this. Or, say, Darfur in Ethiopia
Worth visiting Thanet (Margate, Broadstairs, Ramsgate).
And of course the legendary Pett Bottom valley with its little privately owned vineyards.
Travel is more problematic.
So I've made the best of it, and gone pretty much EVERYWHERE
Deal is quite charming, likewise Sandwich
"Where HAVEN'T I been! WOOF WOOF"
I can think of self-challenges involving less jet fuel though.
I've been everywhere else, more or less. eg All seven continents
Furthermore, we’re all going to pay for it: Taxpayers will pick up the bill for pollution by housebuilders, government officials have admitted, as rules on chemical releases into waterways are scrapped.
If an amendment in the House of Lords tabled on Tuesday passes, developers will no longer have to offset the nutrient pollution caused by sewage from new homes. The government has said it will double Natural England’s wetland funding to £280m in order to show it is trying to meet the requirements of its legally binding Environment Act.
This extra £140m will come from the public purse, the government confirmed. When asked by the Guardian whether this meant the taxpayer was now picking up the bill for pollution caused by developers, a government official responded “yes”, adding that while “the polluter pays principle is very important”, it was having too many adverse impacts on small- and medium-sized housebuilders
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2023/aug/29/scrapping-of-housebuilder-water-pollution-rules-to-cost-taxpayer-140m
Brexit - delivered through lies, shovelling money to wealthy Tory donors, degrading the world you live in and charging you for the privilege.
WHen I was young I wanted to walk it. Later I wanted to do it on horseback. The as I got older I shifted towards a 4WD. Nowadays it is train. But I do still want to travel as much of it as possible.
Google and Ginkgo: Foundry-Scale Data Meets AI
Today Ginkgo Bioworks announced a new partnership with Google Cloud to build a generative AI platform for engineering biology and for biosecurity.
https://www.ginkgobioworks.com/2023/08/29/google-and-ginkgo-foundry-scale-data-meets-ai/
If you're going in that direction from Ashford, much higher priorities IMO would be Rye including Rye harbour (although it gets very crowded with tourists), and Winchelsea, which is small but fantastic, with a quite extraordinary church formed out of the choir and apse of what was once a huge church, sacked by the French.
I also wanted to take a trip on every ferry in the UK. I guess I might have to wait 25 years until the Scottish ferries are complete...
But the travel! Just the sense of sitting in an airport, with all the world (or at least half of it) merely a plane flight away. We forget how lucky we are in Britain, location wise. Right in the "middle"
A travel writer friend of mine, a Brit based in New Orleans, mentioned this the other day, enviously. In the UK (esp London and SE England)) you are only an hour or two in flying time from a trillion amazing destinations. For him in Nawlins he is two hours from Cleveland Ohio
[flicking through GB Rail Atlas] "Where haven't I been? Woof!"
But I was on call with one or another company running drilling operations every day from September 2014 to February of this year. 365 days a year doing morning reports and calls. It just kind of became the norm.
It was very strange in March this year to wake up at 5.30 am and realise I had absolutely no need to get out of bed and turn on the computer.
But the white’s, and often the sparkling, can be very good indeed.
Dover - Castle, certainly; and if you are that way inclined the Western Heights and Drop Shaft if open (public footpath and view from the top good, though_. White Cliffs National Trust (scenic, concrete sound mirrors, etc.) apparently ditto. IIf you like ancient boats the Dover ship in the museum is very well worth seeing. Had a very pleasant lunch in the back room of the White Horse which as I understand it is down in the mediaeval core, but that was some years ago now.
Lympne Castlke if you like Roman + mediaeval and a seaside outing?
I wanna see Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan in particular. Uzbekistan now has a reliable high speed train network. High speed train to Samarkand! And we are still struggling to build one to Watford
It were the British wot done it is much speedier than that eliminate the impossible stuff.
Flying internally in the UK is something I will happily defend. I can't get to and from where I need to be on land without it taking hours. So I fly.
Sorry, I should have explained that bit of slang. In the US one "gets carded" if they are asked to show an ID card to prove that they are old enough (21) to buy alcoholic beverages or, more recently, tobacco products.
For decades I have looked old enough so that I wasn't asked to show an ID, when, for example, I bought a bottle of wine. But, in the last year or so, one of the local stores has been asking everyone to show IDs in such purchases. So on my birthday I made a point of buying a bottle of wine at that store, as I might have done, had I just turned 21.
(Yellowtail chardonnay, for the curious.)
Even if Trump does not end up GOP nominee Biden would benefit from Trump voters staying home as well
Ross Clark"
https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/is-one-badly-filed-flight-plan-really-to-blame-for-the-airport-chaos/
We need more houses and this rule in particular is a ridiculous rule that should never have been implemented in the first place.
Besides while being constructed, houses don't generate or consume water - people do.
Just like houses don't require schooling - people do.
Just like houses don't require care homes - people do.
10 people in 1 house require the same number of school places, and approximately the same amount of water and waste, as 10 people in 2 houses.
Overcrowding is not a solution to a failure to invest in schools, or water, or anything else.
Construction is not the problem. A growing population needs more water, more schooling and more houses. Simply refusing to build the houses due to a lack of schooling, or water, or anything else is merely compounding a problem not solving it.
When I found myself without any contracts in March it was very scary. The first time in 35 years without a job either ongoing or lined up. I have picked up more contracts now but it will still be a rough year - maybe a quarter of my normal turnover.
If you are quite tall and find planes claustrophic my advice is to pay for the front row seats, it really improves the experience, even on Ryanair.
. . .
It was just before 4 a.m. on Day 5 of the 2023 Python Challenge, a trademarked, only-in-Florida hunting bonanza held in August, and across the Glades, hunters were pulling long hours in search of snakes that can stretch to 20 feet. The 10-day competition is among several unusual strategies the state has devised to try to wrangle a monster problem: Burmese pythons are swallowing the Everglades whole."
source$: https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-solutions/2023/08/25/invasive-python-snakes-hunt-florida/
You'll have some fun, meet some interesting people, help the environment, and could win the $10,000 prize given to the person who catches the most pythons.
(Official site: https://flpythonchallenge.org/ )
Although you'd have to rule out changes to bin collections and ULEZ, as those are a given.
Wrong choice!
When I moved into our house we had to read our meter readings. Our water meter reading was 0. For the entire time between our home being constructed and us moving in a grand total of 0 units of water had been used.
I don't know bout you, but I flush the toilet when I go to it. I run the sink when I want a drink of water, or wash my hands, or brush my teeth, or wash my dishes. I turn the shower on when I have it. My house does none of that, I do it. It is the person consuming water.
Labour campaign co-ordinator Peter Kyle says Lib Dems are "pig-headed" for thinking they can win.
Libs say only they can beat the Tories.'
https://twitter.com/KevinASchofield/status/1696216633797169368?s=20
The lack of education facilities, sewerage, treatment plants, etc. is a huge issue with new developments.
A house that is left unoccupied will have no water usage for as long as the taps are turned off. You could build a thousand unoccupied homes and between them they should be consuming zero water.
Across Europe over 10% of homes on average are empty. Our housing crisis is caused by the lack of empty homes and we need to construct millions to have a healthy amount of empty homes even without population growth. All those homes should be consuming no water.
People moving from overcrowded homes to new homes just take their own personal water consumption with them. That's not the building's responsibility, its theirs.
I am working my way down the Atlantic islands on landmark birthdays. 2 down, hopefully several to go. 30 was Iceland. 40 was Sao Miguel in the Azores. 50, not long now, we are still debating but probably one of the more dramatic Cape Verde islands, like Fogo. By the time I'm 80 I may be catching the RAF flight to Port Stanley.
A long trip around the Atlantic rim would be interesting and I don't think anyone prominent has done that (a few have done the Pacific rim, including Michael Palin). Start at Lands end, up through Ireland, NW Scotland, Faeroes, Iceland, Greenland, down through Canadian Maritimes and Eastern US, Caribbean, Brazil, Patagonia, the sub-Antacrtic islands and then a fun but challenging run up from the Cape via West Africa and Iberia.
Also good work from Harper today, rewriting Grant Shapps history over ULEZ/ TfL.
Where do you think they were living before? The streets?
And if the house is built but remains empty, it has zero demand for schools, or water.
People having sex and creating babies adds demand.
People migrating into this country adds demand.
People not dying and living longer adds demand.
Construction does not. You're just shuffling the deckchairs on the titanic, cramming people into overcrowded accommodation does not reduce demand at all.
The pilot had three goes at it.
Moderately terrifying.