These Are the Earliest Human Paintings Ever

(Gizmodo.com)

According to new dating tests, these are the first paintings ever made by humans. They are seals painted more than 42,000 years ago, located in the Cave of Nerja, in Málaga, Spain. And they may change our ideas about humanity’s evolution.

Until now, archeologists thought that the oldest art was created during the Aurignacian period, by modern humans. But these are way older, way more primitive than the ones in Chauvet-Pont-d’Arc Cave, the 32,000-year-old paintings featured in Herzog’s Cave of Forgotten Dreams.

According to the latest dating of the charcoal found next to the paintings—used either to make the paintings or illuminate them—these seals may have been made more than 42,300 years ago. In fact, they may be as old as 43,500 years.

For the complete story, click here to go to Gizmodo.

Mona Lisa’s ‘twin sister’ is discovered – 500 years late

The Mona Lisa at the Prado in Madrid was thought to be just

another fine copy, with added eyebrows and an odd black background.

But curators at Spain’s national art museum yesterday announced a

startling discovery: the painting was actually executed by an

artist in Leonardo da Vinci’s workshop at the same time as the

original.

It is the first known copy of the most famous painting in history, and a discovery that curators believe sheds new light on the creation of the masterpiece.

Deputy conservator, Gabriele Finaldi, said: “It’s as if we were standing in the workshop itself, and at the next easel. You can see that the artist was working step by step with Leonardo. When Leonardo made a change, he made a change.”

The copy sits in a dimly-lit room awaiting the finishing touches of a two-year restoration, during which its true origin was revealed….

Click here for the complete story.

An idea! If You Blog:  Why not write a post about the mysteries you have encountered recently?  Send a trackback to this blog and leave a comment below so we can share the mystery!

Depressed? Go dig in the dirt…

How to Get High on Soil

by Pagan Kennedy (The Atlantic)

M. vaccae, a living creature that resides in your backyard compost pile, acts like a mind-altering drug once it enters the human body, functioning like antidepressant pills to boost your mood.

I’m holding a bowl of dirt up to my nose, in hopes of getting high on the fumes of my backyard compost pile. The microbe that I’m after today is M. vaccae, a living creature that acts like a mind-altering drug once it enters the human body. It has been shown to boost the levels of serotonin and norepinephrine circulating in the systems of both humans and mice. In other words, it works in much the same manner as antidepressant pills. And yes, it is possible to dose yourself by simply breathing in the smell of good dirt.

The drug-like effects of this soil bacteria were discovered, quite by accident, about a decade ago. A doctor named Mary O’Brien created a serum out of the bacteria and gave it to lung-cancer patients, in hopes that it might boost their immune systems. Instead, she noticed another effect: The hospital patients perked up. They reported feeling happier and suffered from less pain than the patients who did not receive doses of bacteria. Further studies in mice confirmed the mood-boosting effect of the soil bugs….

For the complete article click here.

Here is some more everyday amazingness, courtesy of Rob Brezsny’s Facebook newsfeed (Free Will Astrology):

“You have at least a million relatives as close as tenth cousin, and no one on Earth is any further removed than your fiftieth cousin. With each breath, you take into your body 10 sextillion atoms, and, owing to the wind’s circulation, every year you have intimate relations with oxygen molecules exhaled by every person alive, as well as by everyone who ever lived” (Source: Guy Murchie, “The Seven Mysteries of Life”)

“And our atoms, born in stars, are so vigorously recycled, we each contain a few that once belonged to William Shakespeare, Buddha, or Genghis Khan.” (Source: Bill Bryson, “A Short History of Nearly Everything”)

Could it be?

Mystery object found on Baltic Sea floor

A renowned shipwreck surveyor has come across a large unidentified object at the bottom of the Baltic Sea, leading to speculation it could be anything from an underwater Stonehenge to a crashed UFO.

Swedish firm, Ocean Explorer, located the mystery object in an undisclosed part of the Baltic Sea near Sweden, using sonar technology, Daily Mail reports.

However, due to insufficient funding the Swedes cannot launch an operation to find out what the object is.

Sonar images reveal the object is a 60m cylinder, about the same size as a jumbo jet, with about 400m of drag marks.

A similar disc shaped object was observed 200m away…

For the complete story and to watch a video on the discovery, click here.

By the way!

The Book of Lost Fragrances will be a Starbucks book club pick the week of March 20th and a summer pick for the amazing Pulpwood Queens! (You can pre-order your copy and get a sample of the fragrance it inspired here.)

Our friends at the Long Now Foundation never cease to amaze. You will see what I mean in this segment from Through the Wormhole with Morgan Freeman…

Long Now on Through the Wormhole with Morgan Freeman

Through the Wormhole with Morgan Freeman is a show on Discovery’s Science Channel that features cosmological and metaphysical questions about science and the universe.

Mr. Freeman, as it turns out, is quite the geek.

An episode from the show’s second season recently asked, “Can We Live Forever?” Well known scientists such as Michio Kaku and Aubrey de Grey provided perspective on the challenges and research underlying the the science of human life extension. (Coincidentally, a newly announced DARPA research initiative on the subject, called Biochronicity, was mentioned on Long Views just last month.)…

Click here to watch the segment and to read more from the Long Now blog. Curious about what the Long Now Foundation is? Click here.

We love discoveries like this! And with a name like “the Ness of Brodgar” it can’t help but have an air of mystery and an intriguing long lost history…

Stonehenge Precursor Found? Island Complex Predates Famous Site

by James Owen for National Geographic News

On an island off Britain’s northern tip, new discoveries suggest a huge Stone Age ritual complex is older than Stonehenge.

But age is only the half of it. Researchers say the site may have in fact been the original model for Stonehenge and other later, better-known British complexes to the south.

First discovered in 2002, the waterside site—called the Ness of Brodgar (“Brodgar promontory”)—lies on Mainland, the largest of Scotland’s Orkney Islands (map).

According to recent radiocarbon dating of burned-wood remains, the Ness was first occupied around 3200 B.C. and went on to include up to a hundred buildings within a monumental walled enclosure…

For the complete article click here.

If you’re interested in the mystery of the Nazca lines, you will also find these fascinating -

 Visible Only From Above, Mystifying ‘Nazca Lines’ Discovered in Mideast

By Owen Jarus | LiveScience.com

The giant stone structures form wheel shapes with spokes often radiating inside. Here a cluster of wheels in the Azraq Oasis. CREDIT: David D. Boyer

Okay, suspend your disbelief for a second and imagine that for political reasons the United States may have needed to cloak the true nature of its lunar program by creating fake landings and moon walks. Now imagine that they would have needed to find the most precocious filmmaker alive in order to do the job.

There’s a lot of talk lately about whether or not it’s possible that Stanley Kubrick was hired to direct the fake moon landings. Here’s an article from Reality Sandwich that goes into great detail on the matter. I am still a bit skeptical, but this article has really got me thinking.

Judge this mystery for yourself and please let us know what you think…

How Stanley Kubrick Faked the Apollo Moon Landings

by Jay Weidner

“There are great ideas, undiscovered breakthroughs available, to those who can remove one of truth’s protective layers.”

–Neil Armstrong, “First Man on the Moon”

It has now been forty years since the fabled moon landings by NASA and the Apollo gang. When it comes to the subject of the moon landings, people tend to fall into two belief groups. The first group, by far the bigger of the two groups, accepts the fact that NASA successfully landed on the moon six times and that 12 human beings have actually walked on the surface of the moon. The second group, though far smaller, is more vocal about their beliefs. This group says that we never went to the moon and that the entire thing was faked.

This essay presents a third position on this issue. This third point of view falls somewhere between these two assertions. This third position postulates that humans did go to the moon but what we saw on TV and in photographs was completely faked.

Furthermore, this third position reveals that the great filmmaker Stanley Kubrick is the genius who directed the hoaxed landings…

For the complete piece click here.

Find the related documentary film here.

A few weeks ago, M.J.’s upcoming new novel, THE BOOK OF LOST FRAGRANCES, got Indie Next Pick for March! It also received a starred and boxed PW review – and to celebrate, M.J. decided to offer something very intriguing to her readers. The giveaway continues through February and the details are below in case you missed our post about this earlier in the month…

But first, The Story straight from M.J.:

Cleopatra, the last pharaoh of Ancient Egypt, was fascinated with and some say obsessed by scent. Marc Anthony built her a fragrance factory and the famous queen was said to have kept a recipe book for her perfumes, entitled Cleopatra gynaeciarum libri. That book has been described in writings by historians Dioscorides, Homer and Pliny the Elder.

No known copy of the book exists today.

That missing book stirred my imagination and became the seed for THE BOOK OF LOST FRAGRANCES. While writing, to remain in the world of the novel, I burned incense and my favorite candles – those created by Frederick Boucharday. When the novel was finished I searched out Boucharday to give him a copy of the yet to be published novel.

Boucharday was intstantly intrugued by THE BOOK OF LOST FRAGRANCES. First, as a reader, he said he was taken with the mystery and romance of the story. In my tale scent plays a strong role when it comes to ones memory. Boucharday, who creates using oils and classic ingredients, said that it spoke to him as a perfumer.

The ancient fictional fragrance at the heart of my novel is called, Âmes Sœurs, which means “Soul Mates” in French. Inspired by the book, Boucharday has brought the scent to life with his version of Âmes Sœurs , the scent of soul mates. Âmes Sœurs hints of Frankincense, Myrrh, Orange Blossom and Jasmine. It’s smoky uncommon finish suggests the past and the future, and lost souls reunited.

In what I hope will be a perfect combination of fragrance, fact and fiction, Boucharday and I have brought both perfume and storytelling to a new place.

We’d like to give our readers a sample of Âmes Sœurs, the scent of soul mates, the exclusive, mystical fragrance, inspired by THE BOOK OF LOST FRAGRANCES (coming in March). Publishers Weekly has called the book a “deliciously sensual novel of paranormal suspense…”

So…

For every one of you that pre-orders THE BOOK OF LOST FRAGRANCES using the instructions below, we will send a sample of Âmes Sœurs. This is a mesmerizing read, a provocative fragrance, a unique collaboration and something special for you.

How does it work?

1. Just click on the preferred website and pre-order THE BOOK OF LOST FRAGRANCES from the links below.

2. Email the receipt or a scan of it to LostFragrances@gmail.com along with your name and your snail mail address for fragrance delivery.

Your sample of Âmes Sœurs will be shipped to you on or before March 13th. The book will arrive separately, from the store of your choice, at the same time so you can enjoy both together.

Amazon

Barnes & Noble

Your favorite Independent Bookstore

Books A Million

*Offer ends March 1st, is limited numbers of supplies available and only to readers in the US and Canada.

Here are more of the excellent reviews we mentioned! -

“An amazing novel… utterly engrossing.Elegantly written, with unforgettable characters and flawlessly realized international settings, here is a novel that will keep you up all night—and leave you with powerful feelings of revelation, wonder, and the infinitude of human possibility.” —New York Times bestselling author Douglas Preston

“A book full of delicious surprises, superb research, and brilliantly drawn characters that will live on in your heart long after you turn the last page.” —Anne Fortier, author of Juliet

“A spellbinding love story and historical novel of mystery, reincarnation, ancient Egypt. Rose’s in-depth research about fragrance adds to the pleasure in what I think is her most exciting book yet. Being immersed in Rose’s fictional world is one of those times when you don’t want to come back to the real world.” —Susan Wasson of Bookworks, Albuquerque, NM

“Smoothly blends historical events, compelling characters, and international intrigue into an absorbing and thrilling ride through the centuries.” —Library Journal

Maillardet’s Automaton

“In November of 1928, a truck pulled up to The Franklin Institute science museum in Philadelphia and unloaded the pieces of an interesting, complex, but totally ruined brass machine. Donated by the estate of John Penn Brock, a wealthy Philadelphian, the machine was studied and the museum began to realize the treasure it had been given.

This Automaton, known as the “Draughtsman-Writer” was built by Henri Maillardet, a Swiss mechanician of the 18th century who worked in London producing clocks and other mechanisms. It is believed that Maillardet built this extraordinary Automaton around 1800 and it has the largest “memory” of any such machine ever constructed…”

Read the rest and learn more about The Franklin Institute’s automaton here.