The Garden of Eden Has Been Found

The Macau Daily News is reporting that a mysterious circles of phallic-shaped carved stone figures, known as “The Ikom Monoliths,” have been identified as being the “remnants of a glorious civilization made up in equal parts of ancient Egypt and the Old Testament.” According to the report, archaeologists used carbon dating to date the stones and estimated the age of the monoliths to be 4,500 years old, “that is, roughly as old as the Egyptian pyramids.”

The report also says that according to a book about to be published on the Ikom Monoliths, the stones, which contain “a form of writing and a complex system of codified information,” give “evidence that the biblical Garden of Eden lay in what is now Nigeria,” and that Adam and Eve were Nigerians.

Nigerian bloggers have been writing about a “high technology civilization based in the present-day location of the Sahara desert.” According to the bloggers, this civilization, whose “hallmarks included the Sphinx and the Great Pyramid of Egypt,” was “decimated by the deluge.”

This news report is too good to be true. For years scholars have been looking for the location of the Garden of Eden in Mesopotamia and now we discover that it was located in Nigeria. The “out of Africa” movement continues to promote that Africa was the cradle of humanity. Notwithstanding the scientific model that declares that modern humans evolved relatively recently in Africa, migrated into Eurasia and became the dominant population, I believe that the Ikom Monoliths prove nothing.

To me, this story is similar to all the Nigerian scams that appear in your email box in the form of chain letters informing you that you are the beneficiary of millions of dollars left behind by a late millionaire. A word to the wise: caveat emptor. This is just another Nigerian scam.

Claude Mariottini
Professor of Old Testament
Northern Baptist Seminary

Tags: Archeology, Garden of Eden, Ikom Monoliths

Found: A Temple Built by Ramses II

National Geographic is announcing that parts of a temple dating to the reign of pharaoh Ramses II have been discovered inside a mosque in Luxor, Egypt.

The following is an excerpt from the news report:

Experts restoring the historic mosque uncovered sections of columns, capitals, and elaborately inscribed reliefs from one of the ancient temple's courtyards built around 1250 B.C.

The previously concealed architectural elements reveal well-preserved hieroglyphics and unique scenes depicting the powerful pharaoh.

Among the most important scenes are those that feature Ramses II offering the sun god Amun Re two obelisks to be installed at the temple's front facade. One of those obelisks still stands at the temple, and the other is now at the Place de la Concorde in Paris.

Another relief shows three statues of Ramses II wearing his traditional white crown.

Experts say the carved inscriptions provide some of best examples of cryptographic or enigmatic writing, an unusual form of hieroglyphic text in which each glyph could stand for an entire word, phrase, or concept.

Visit National Geographic and read the news report.

Claude Mariottini
Professor of Old Testament
Northern Baptist Seminary

Tags: Archeology, Egypt, Luxor, Ramses II

The Lycians

Very few people today have heard of the Lycians. The Lycians lived in Anatolia, in southwest Turkey, in the second millennium B.C. They remain one of the most enigmatic people in the Ancient Near East. They have left little historical record behind to help us understand their history and culture. However, some recent archaeological discoveries reveal a fascinating people culturally distinct from the rest of the ancient world.

What follow is a brief introduction to the Lycians:

The Lycians were most likely in origin an Anatolian people since they spoke their own Indo-European language closely related to Luwian and Hittite.

From archaelogical excavations in the Karatas,-Semahoyuk area near Elmali, examples of earthenware pottery have been found reveal that the region was settled by the third millennium BC. Moreover, the fact that Lycian place names containing, "-nd", "-nt", "-ss" (Kalynda, Arykanda, Telmessos, Idebessos) occur in a number of Anatolian sites also dated to the fourth millennium B.C. verifes this early settlement date linguistically. An axe has also been found at Tlos, dated around 2000 BC.

We know that the Lycians had powerful sea and land forces by the second millennium BC and had already established an independent state. The earliest historical references to the Lycians date back to the Late Bronze Age (ca 1500-1200 BC) in numerous Egyptian, Hittite and Ugaritic texts. It is known from these that the Lycians (called ‘Lukka’ in these sources) were involved in acts of piracy against Cyprus around 1400 BC, that they fought against Egypt in the ranks of the Hittites during the battle of Kadesh in 1295 BC and that they participated with the Libyans. What is interesting is that in early records, the Lycians are referred to as 'Lukka', 'Lukki' or 'Ruw-ku', while the Lycians themselves never used these terms, instead calling themselves Trmmli (Termilae in Greek) and their country Trmmisa.

For a good introduction to the Lycians, their history and culture, visit Lycian Turkey - Discover the Beauty of Ancient Lycia.

Claude Mariottini
Professor of Old Testament
Northern Baptist Seminary

Tags: Archaeology, Lycia, Lycians

The History of Archaeology

Kris Hirst is writing a history of archaeology. In part 3 of the series, she writes about “The Tyranny of the Text.” She begins part 3 of the series by asking: “Is the Bible fact or fiction?”

Hirst wrote:

This is one of the most common questions I get asked as an archaeologist and it is one for which I have yet to find a good answer. And yet the question is at the absolute heart of archaeology, central to the growth and development of archaeology, and it is the one that gets more archaeologists into trouble than any other. And, more to the point, it brings us back to the history of archaeology.

Read Hirst’s “The History of Archaeology,” Part 3 by clicking here.

Read the whole series by clicking here.

Claude Mariottini
Professor of Old Testament
Northern Baptist Seminary

Tag: Archaeology