Ireland worker finds ancient psalms in bog

[superconnected]

Excerpt -

"There's two sets of odds that make this discovery really way out. First of all, it's unlikely that something this fragile could survive buried in a bog at all, and then for it to be unearthed and spotted before it was destroyed is incalculably more amazing."

"The owner of the bog has had dealings with us in past and is very much in favor of archaeological discovery and reporting it," Wallace said.

Crucially, he said, the bog owner covered up the book with damp soil. Had it been left exposed overnight, he said, "it could have dried out and just vanished, blown away."

The book was found open to a page describing, in Latin script, Psalm 83, in which God hears complaints of other nations' attempts to wipe out the name of Israel."


more...

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060725/ap_on_sc/ireland_ancient_book

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BS Alert.

[babylonsister]

1. You had me until here:

The book was found open to a page describing, in Latin script, Psalm 83, in which God hears complaints of other nations' attempts to wipe out the name of Israel."

[Scairp]

3. Well, AP thinks it's legit

Who knows if it's real or not, but not being April 1st, I have no clue why a joke would be put out as an authentic story of an archaeological find. I'd like to wait and see.

[Name removed]

6. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[The_Casual_Observer]

2. The legend of Boggy Creek.

No point in getting bogged down in the details of this one. Was it a peet bog or Wade Bogs?

[Drum]

12. Too deep for wading, methinks.

;)

[DontBlameMe]

37. Fuck the boots...

save the watch.

[Drum]

44. lol! nt

[Monkeyman]

4. You know us Irish we drink fall down and drink again

They all so tell whoppers LOL

[Henny Penny]

24. Speak for yourself....

"Discovery in midlands bog 'of staggering importance'

The discovery of an ancient manuscript in a bog in the midlands has been described by the National Museum of Ireland as of "staggering importance", writes Ruadhán Mac Cormaic.

Fragments of what appear to be an ancient psalter, or Book of Psalms, were uncovered by a bulldozer in a bog in the south midlands last Thursday."

http://www.ireland.com/newspaper/front/2006/0726/1153813781160.html

[mcscajun]

5. Checking Psalm 83

Psalm 83:1-4

1. O God! keep not silence with thyself; hold not thy peace, and be not still, O God! 2. For, behold! Thy enemies are tumultuous: and those who hate thee have lifted up the head. 3. They have formed a crafty design against thy people, and have consulted against thy hidden ones. 4. They have said, Come and let us cut them off from being a nation; and let the name of Israel be no more remembered.

Required disclaimer: I'm a collapsed Catholic (who spent a fair amount of free time as a child actually reading the Bible out of sheer curiosity), one time atheist, generally agnostic, part-time pagan, ask-me-next-week-what-I-believe-in-IST. :) I'm against organized religion generally; not against religious (or more properly, spiritual) people. I count the latter among my friends.

[zanne]

8. So they found a copy of this psalm in a peat bog?

This is all a little too coincidental for me. (Especially where the bog owner covered it up with soil). And it's a little too topical, y'know?

[rodeodance]

15. rather ironic it would be one that it was opened to.

[PassingFair]

19. WMD's

Words of MASS destruction?

[Zhade]

26. This propaganda is a weapon of mass distraction.

NT!

[Henny Penny]

25. The find is legit but the story about which page was open is

probably a bit opportunism on the part of someone...

[MichiganVote]

7. :) Yeah sure, my Irish uncles told better whoppers than that

[Benhurst]

9. What cynics you people are! Next you'll be telling us there

are no Leprechauns. Jeez!

[DoYouEverWonder]

10. This is right up there with the Lock Ness Monster

and Virgin Mary sightings.

[catzies]

11. And Mohammed Atta's intact passport on a pile of rubble on 9/11

n/t

[AliceWonderland]

13. Hee! Well said!

Absurdities...

[Zhade]

27. Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities.

NT!

[Canuckistanian]

32. OT, but

it's "(font color="red")......(/font)"

[TomInTib]

17. Bingo! And burned on all four sides, no less. nt

[Straight Shooter]

14. Well, that's it for me. I'm convinced. God works in mysterious ways.

:sarcasm:

[daleo]

16. And then I suppose God smote those other nations.

It is a miracle and proves that God is OK with Israel killing Lebanese civilians and UN peacekeepers. Praise Jesus! :sarcasm:

[daleo]

18. The book doesn't look open to any page in the photo

I just see the covers. I think the part of the story that the book was open to that psalm is made up.

[struggle4progress]

20. Ancient prayer book dug out of Irish bog

.. The Irish discovery, recovered from bog land last Thursday, comprises extensive fragments of what is thought to be an Irish Early Christian Psalter, written on vellum, a fine animal skin parchment.

"In my wildest hopes, I could only have dreamed of a discovery as fragile and rare as this," Museum Director Pat Wallace said ..

Part of Psalm 83, a lament to God over other nations' attempts to wipe out Israel, is legible but the museum says the extent to which other Psalms or additional texts are preserved will only be determined by lengthy work by a team of experts ..

http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/latest/200607261536/2869c89

[Penance]

21. Why all the skepticism?

Bogs, particularly in Ireland, have a long history of revealing strange things. There have been plenty of "bog men" found in Irish bogs rather well-preserved. It's an anoxic environment that also ends up acting as a natural tanning agent. Some of these bodies have been dated as being over 2000 years old. It's not inconceivable that a book may have been preserved the same way.

[Bridget Burke]

36. Ignorance.

Check out this forum at P45.net to measure the level of Irish approval of Israel's "over-reaction."

www.p45rant.net/boards/showthread.php?t=84331

The approval level is pretty low.

[lumpy]

39. I am not skeptical at all.

The leaves of the book are made of vellum (animal skin), the jacket is leather. Peat bogs contain elements that preserve such leathers. Human bodies have been found in peat bogs that have been preserved in astounishing detailed condition, some there since a 1000years ago. They have been found in Denmark as well as Ireland. It would be very diffcult to dupicate a find such as this, if that is what some might be thinking. The book is tattered and fragile. The finder had the good sense to cover the book with material to prevent it from drying which would increase it's fragile condition. It is no doubt a important find. I really don't know why I'm even bothering to write any of this...ohwell http://www.archaeology.org/online/features/bog/

[Ouabache]

22. Damn good thing it was opened to THAT Psalm otherwise

Israel might have bombed it.

[Roland99]

30. Rather coincidental that that psalm was the one it was opened, to, eh?

No agenda by those that found it?

[BlueIris]

23. What I read: "...finds ancient psalms in blog."

I was like, "Damn, I mean, I know Ireland's having a great rebound economically, but their bloggers can find scripture in HTML code, now?"

[Vinca]

28. Was there a Virgin Mary grilled cheese on a plate next to the psalms? nt

[Bridget Burke]

29. Daev at Blather.net comments on the find.

Ancient Irish book found in bog

Posted by daev

Found while cleaning the toilets in the National Museum. We should be thankful they didn't run short of loo paper...

www.blather.net/zeitgeist/archives/2006/07/ancient_irish_book_found_in_bo.html

I believe that "bog" has a modern alternate definition.

[Lisa]

42. I used to work for an archaeologist ...

... and she said that they'd found some well-preserved items (fabric, etc.) buried in old latrine pits, from Roman times! Probably a higher bacterial count than you'd find in actual peat, but anaerobic at any rate (plus nobody would have wanted to go in and disturb it). So even that kind of "bog" might yield some interesting finds.

[LibertyLover]

31. Some amazing things have been found in bogs

Not just the so-called "bog bodies", but clothes, wood, shoes, leather and even butter. A bog is an anaerobic environment and preserves organic material very nicely. There is absolutely no reason that a book written on vellum (animal skin) and bound in leather (more animal skin) could not have survived. As for finding it with a backhoe, that's how most recent finds in bogs, including bog bodies have been found. In Ireland, Scandinavia and England, where these bogs occur and are harvested for peat, most people are aware of the possibility of finding something archaeologically important. The owner did the correct thing in covering the psalm book back up until competent conservators could stabilize it. By putting it back in the bog, he kept it hydrated and relatively free of bacterial contamination. I wonder if the experts will be able to tell at what monastery scriptorium it was produced. That is sometimes possible because of letter style and other factors. Still, a fascinating find.

[Coventina]

33. Ok, before all of you are convinced of this massive "conspiracy"

The Book of Psalms has always been one of the most popular books of the Bible. Back in the Middle Ages, when it was pretty impossible to make a complete Bible as one codex, it was very common to do the Book Of Psalms on its own. These are called "Psalters".

And, a large percentage of the Psalms deal with the trials of the nation of Israel. Scholars believe that many of them were written by Jewish exiles in Babylonia, after the Babylonians attacked Jerusalem and forcibly exiled the Jews to Babylon. So, it is not improbable in the least that the manuscript would be found open to a page about the woes of Israel.

I really don't think it's a conspiracy.

:eyes:

[MadHound]

35. Thank you for being the one to inject some historical sanity

I was going to do so, but you beat me to it. Good job!:thumbsup:

[Lydia Leftcoast]

38. Thank you LostinVa and Coventina

Yes, I've seen PBS documentaries on the "bog people," who were either sacrificed or executed as criminals (or maybe a combination of both) ca. 2000 years ago and are still in a remarkable stage of preservation. Imagine a shriveled person made of leather. Their clothing and even the ropes they were evidently strangled with are still recognizable. Why not vellum?

And yes, if you've ever read the Psalms, a LOT of them are about protecting Israel from its enemies. Finding one of those is no more fishy than picking out a DU post at random and finding that it criticizes Bush.

[Lisa]

41. great analogy!

Or unearthing a random newspaper headline that reads "Unrest in the Middle East".

[Javaman]

34. Okay so, what does this put the rapture index at now?

The fundies must be going apeshit over this find.

[Bridget Burke]

43. I'm sure the fundies are just as sceptical as the ignorant at DU....

The Republic is much too Cath'lic for them.

And I doubt manuscript uses the King James Version.

[lumpy]

40. Sad that people can't take a rest

from political posturing, even on this forum. This treasure from the bogs has nothing to do with the present Mideast conflict.

[MagickMuffin]

45. CNN or CBN? They are already on it!

CNN is running all kinds of stories about the "Apocalypse Now?" & "Revelations"

They are busy trying to scare the "public" before the mid term elections?

Everybody should read the transcript provided at link to try and make sense of this infotainment! Very funny as well as scary that a major "news?" station would use this platform without anyone else on the show to balance the Fundie Fanatics!

Phillips asks apocalypse authors: "Are we living in the last days?"
Summary: With Kyra Phillips's discussion of the Apocalypse and the Middle East conflict with Christian authors Jerry Jenkins and Joel C. Rosenberg -- who share the view that the Rapture is nigh -- CNN has, for the second time in three days, featured a segment on the potential coming of the Apocalypse, as indicated by current conflicts in the Middle East.

As Media Matters for America documented, the July 24 edition of CNN's Paula Zahn Now featured a segment examining what "the Book of Revelation tells us about what's happening right now in the Middle East." CNN re-aired this segment the next day. Media Matters also noted that Rosenberg is just one of several conservative media figures who have identified and expounded upon the purported signs of the Apocalypse to be found in the Israel-Hezbollah conflict. During his appearance on Live From ..., Rosenberg claimed that he had been invited to the White House, Capitol Hill, and the CIA to discuss the Rapture and the Middle East, and noted -- several times -- that the apocalyptic events described in his novels keep coming true.

http://mediamatters.org/items/200607270001?src=item200607270001