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| KIRK PAPERS REVEAL CHARMED COWS |
JULY 20, 2008: Responsible animal husbandry is practised on today's farms. Kirk session records have revealed examples of Highlanders using so-called good and bad magic on cattle.
Dr Karen Cullen, of higher education institute UHI, trawled the papers in her research for a lecture - Charmed Cows and Contentious Neighbours.
She found one minister who "dressed up" practical advice on better hygiene as a charm to allay a parishioner's fears.
The practice of charming to either protect or harm livestock was used during the 17th and 18th centuries.
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| WOOLY MAMMOTH SKELETON WOWS SCIENTISTS |
JULY 9, 2008: A 14,500-year-old woolly mammoth skeleton dug up in 1994 has been unveiled at the Milwaukee Public Museum, giving locals a glimpse of perhaps the most intact specimen discovered in North America. Milwaukee Public Museum officials put the final tusk in place on the Hebior woolly mammoth. Few paleontological specimens are as complete as the Hebior mammoth. The skeleton lacks a rib as well as a few bones in the tail and feet, but is otherwise nearly whole. [Associated Press] |
| RECORD TOURISM COULD HARM EASTER ISLAND STATUES |
 JUNE 24, 2008: It's earth's most remote inhabited land, a South Pacific speck of volcanic rock so isolated the locals call it "Te Pito O Te Henua," or "The Navel of the World." Giant volcanic rock statues called Moais draw visitors to Easter Island. But Easter Island is a bellybutton experiencing a tourist boom -- and some are worried the onslaught of outsiders could take a toll on the very things they come to see, the gigantic stone heads known as Moais. [Associated Press] [For more on Easter Island, see Rapa Nui.]
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| DIVERS FIND 1780 BRITISH WARSHIP |
JUNE 14, 2008: Deep sea divers have found the wreck of a Royal Navy warship which sank during the American Revolution.
The discovery of HMS Ontario, at the bottom of one of the Great Lakes on the US-Canada border, has been hailed an "archaeological miracle". [BBC] |
| 4,000-YEAR-OLD "MISSING PYRAMID" FOUND |
JUNE 6, 2008:
Egyptian archaeologists unveiled on Thursday a 4,000-year-old "missing pyramid" that is believed to have been discovered by an archaeologist almost 200 years ago and never seen again.
Zahi Hawass, Egypt's antiquities chief, said the pyramid appears to have been built by King Menkauhor, an obscure pharaoh who ruled for only eight years.
In 1842, German archaeologist Karl Richard Lepsius mentioned it among his finds at Saqqara, referring to it as number 29 and calling it the "Headless Pyramid" because only its base remains. But the desert sands covered the discovery, and no archaeologist since has been able to find Menkauhor's resting place. [Associated Press] [For more on this and related topics, see Outcast Earth Enewsletter: Secrets Beneath the Sands.] |
| GOLD CUP AUCTION SALE FOR £50,000 |
JUNE 5, 2008: A 2,500-year-old gold cup which had spent 60 years in a box under the owner's bed has sold for £50,000 at auction.
The cup was given to John Webber by his rag-and-bone man grandfather, William Sparks, who acquired it in the 1930s.
Mr Webber, 70, said he remembered the cup as a small boy and "it's been quite exciting finding out what it was". [BBC]
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| NAVY HOPES TO SOLVE WWII PLANE MYSTERY |
MAY 29, 2008: Naval experts will begin searching Friday for an airliner that crashed into the Baltic in June 1940 with nine people on board, including a U.S. diplomatic courier considered one of the first American casualties of World War II. The USNS Pathfinder is one of the ships set to search for an airplane that crashed into the Baltic Sea in 1940. [Associated Press] |
| TSAR'S LOST CHILDREN IDENTIFIED |
 APRIL 30, 2008: Scientific tests have confirmed that bones found last year in Russia belong to the two missing children of Tsar Nicholas II, Russian officials say. [BBC] |
| EARLY HUMANS NEARLY WIPED OUT 70,000 YEARS AGO, STUDY SAYS |
APRIL 24, 2008:
Human beings may have had a brush with extinction 70,000 years ago, an extensive genetic study suggests. The human population at that time was reduced to small isolated groups in Africa, apparently because of drought, according to an analysis released Thursday. [Associated Press] |
| OLDEST RECORDED VOICES SING AGAIN |
MARCH 28, 2008: The recording of "Au Clair de la Lune", recorded in 1860, is thought to be the oldest known recorded human voice. [BBC] |
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MARCH 1, 2008: A South Carolina couple isn't sure what's responsible for the damage to their car; some speculate it's the Lizard Man. [CNN.com] |
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FEBRUARY 28, 2008: Four weeks after a tragic fire claimed a 4-year-old boy, the boy's father talks about his efforts to save his son and the supernatural guidance that he said saved his life.
Jamie Hughes said that he thought he would die, trapped in his burning house. He said he would have died had the spirit of the son he was trying to save not guided him. [WLWT.com] |
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FEBRUARY 27, 2008: A fossilised "sea monster" unearthed on an Arctic island is the largest marine reptile known to science, Norwegian scientists have announced. [BBC News] |
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 FEBRUARY 26, 2008: Digging has resumed at a site in the southeastern German town of Deutschneudorf, where treasure hunters believe there are almost 2 tons of Nazi gold and possibly clues to the whereabouts of the legendary Amber Room, a prize taken from a Russian castle during World War II. [CNN] |
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FEBRUARY 22, 2008: A fishing crew was surprised to find a wallet inside of a large shark. [KCRA.com] |
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FEBRUARY 1, 2008: A new species of mammal has been discovered in the mountains of Tanzania, scientists report.
The bizarre-looking creature, dubbed Rhynochocyon udzungwensis, is a type of giant elephant shrew, or sengi. [BBC News] |
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JANUARY 29, 2008: An asteroid that exploded over Siberia a century ago, leaving 800 square miles of scorched or blown down trees, wasn't nearly as large as previously thought, a researcher concludes, suggesting a greater danger for Earth. [CNN] |
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 OCTOBER 12, 2007: Teleportation, long a staple of the world of science fiction -- what episode of Star Trek would be complete without Captain Kirk et al "beaming" off the Enterprise onto the surface of some distant planet? -- is being talked of as a serious scientific possibility. [CNN] |
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SEPTEMBER 28, 2007: Attacking several tons of woolly mammoth with stone-tipped spears must have taken extraordinary courage -- and ancient people left paintings to prove they did it. Mammoth hair seems to be an excellent source of well-preserved DNA, researchers report. Now, scientists are approaching mammoths in a different way, extracting DNA from their dense coats in an effort to learn more about them. [Associated Press] |
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 SEPTEMBER 27, 2007: Alan Alda almost died in 2003. He was in a remote area of Chile, doing an episode of "Scientific American Frontiers," and he developed an intestinal obstruction that came within hours of killing him. It was his good fortune that he survived the whole ordeal. Alan Alda rummages through his life in his new book, "Things I Overheard While Talking to Myself." Some time later, after he'd returned to the United States and resumed his acting career, he started digging through his house for old speeches and memorabilia. Decades ago, the existentialist philosophers brooded about life's meaninglessness; Alda wanted to find some meaning. [CNN] |
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SEPTEMBER 14, 2008: A poltergeist that has forced a terrified Carlisle family to flee their home is to be "cleansed" by a vicar. Spooky happenings prompted Allison Marshall, 27, to bundle her family out of the house in Mardale Road, Raffles, in the middle of the night. Carlisle Housing Association, which owns the property, has now arranged for a priest to step in and end the family's nightmare... The drama began last week with a catalogue of inexplicable happenings, which included household objects hurtling around the room and sudden and unexplained drops in the temperature in the house. [www.24dash.com] |
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SEPTEMBER 12, 2008: A kilogram just isn't what it used to be. Physicist Richard Davis of the International Bureau of Weights and Measures with the reference kilogram. The 118-year-old cylinder that is the international prototype for the metric mass, kept tightly under lock and key outside Paris, is mysteriously losing weight -- if ever so slightly. Physicist Richard Davis of the International Bureau of Weights and Measures in Sevres, southwest of Paris, says the reference kilo appears to have lost 50 micrograms compared with the average of dozens of copies. [Associated Press] |
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 SEPTEMBER 9, 2008: A television reporter claims to have discovered China's answer to the Loch Ness monster, state press reported Sunday.
Local journalist Zhuo Yongsheng shot footage of six "seal-like" creatures in the northeastern Tianchi lake, which local legend has long said is home to Loch Ness-style monsters. "They could swim as fast as yachts and at times they would all disappear in the water," the Xinhua news agency quoted Zhuo as saying. "Their fins, or maybe wings, were longer than their bodies." [AFP] |
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SEPTEMBER 7, 2008: A mummy of an Inca girl, described as "perfect" by the archaeologists who found her in 1999, has gone on display for the first time in Argentina.
Hundreds of people crowded into a museum in the north-western city of Salta to see "la Doncella", the Maiden. The remains of the girl, who was 15 when she died, were found in an icy pit on top of a volcano in the Andes, along with a younger boy and girl. Researchers believe they were sacrificed by the Incas 500 years ago. [BBC] |
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 SEPTEMBER 4, 2007: An alleged chupacabra carcass
found in Texas is likely a hoax to sell
T-shirts say dog experts. The animal, described in an Associated
Press report last week as "a cross
between two or three different things",
was found as road kill last month near the
Texas town of Cuero. The woman who
discovered the carcass has been using it
to market chupacabra T-shirts. In lively Internet discussions dog breeders
say the carcass appears to be that of a
Xoloitzcuintle or Xolo, otherwise known
as a Mexican Hairless dog, rather than the
blood-sucking creature of legend. "The overwhelming consensus on the Xolo discussion list -- which includes several hundred people -- is that this animal is a Xolo," said a top dog breeder... |
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SEPTEMBER 6, 2007: Remains of a petite dinosaur reveal that some of the ancestors of birds had already shrunk in size before flight evolved. The dinosaur, a mere 2 feet long (70 centimeters) and weighing the equivalent of two cans of soda, roamed the Earth 80 million years ago during the Cretaceous period (between 146 and 65 million years ago). "This specimen shows that dinosaurs evolved small size earlier than we previously thought," said study team member Julia Clarke, a paleontologist at North Carolina State University and the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences. [LiveScience] |
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 AUGUST 15, 2007: The basic process for developing fingers and toes in land animals may have existed for more than 500 million years in shark genes, according to a new study. Researchers identified genetic activity in spotted catsharks embryos that signal the creation of digits. When a gene—essentially a set of instructions—is translated into a trait, such as red hair or an arm, it is said to be expressed. Scientists have long believed that the gene for digit development was first expressed some 365 million years ago in the earliest tetrapodsthe first vertebrates to walk on land. [National Geographic News] |
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JULY 4, 2007: In the mystery surrounding one of the sea's most elusive creatures, this body is more of a clue than a victim. One of the largest giant squid ever found washed up on a beach in southern Australia yesterday, offering potentially crucial insights into the animal's habits and habitat, scientists said. The squid was discovered on a beach late at night on the western coast of Tasmania. Biologists who inspected the squid said it weighed some 550 pounds (250 kilograms) and stretched 26 feet (8 meters) from head to tentacle—about as long as a school bus. [National Geographic] |
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JUNE 9, 2007: The first photographic evidence that the yeti, or abominable snowman, might be more than a flight of Himalayan fancy has surfaced in public and is to be offered at auction later this month. Four photographs of large paw prints in the snow beneath Mount Everest are to be sold at Christie's in London on September 26. The images were taken by the legendary British mountaineer Eric Shipton on a reconaissance trip to Everest in 1951, in preparation for the first successful ascent of the 29,028 ft peak two years later. [Telegraph UK] |
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