Situated between the Red Sea and the Dead Sea and inhabited since prehistoric times, the rock-cut capital city of the Nabateans, became during Hellenistic and Roman times a major caravan centre for the incense of Arabia, the silks of China and the spices of India, a crossroads between Arabia, Egypt and Syria-Phoenicia.  Petra is half-built, half-carved into the rock, and is surrounded by mountains riddled with passages and gorges.  An ingenious water management system allowed extensive settlement of an essentially arid area during the Nabataean, Roman and Byzantine periods.  It is one of the world's richest and largest archaeological sites set in a dominating red sandstone landscape.  The Outstanding Universal Value of Petra resides in the vast extent of elaborate tomb and temple architecture; religious high places; the remnant channels, tunnels and diversion dams that combined with a vast network of cisterns and reservoirs which controlled and conserved seasonal rains, and the extensive archaeological remains including of copper mining, temples, churches and other public buildings.  The fusion of Hellenistic architectural facades with traditional Nabataean rock-cut temple/tombs including the Khasneh, the Urn Tomb, the Palace Tomb, the Corinthian Tomb and the Deir ("monastery") represents a unique artistic achievement and an outstanding architectural ensemble of the first centuries BC to AD.  All the main freestanding and rock-cut monuments and extensive archaeological remains within the arid landscape of red sandstone cliffs and gorges lie within the boundaries of the property that coincide with the boundaries of the Petra National Park.  The monuments are subject to ongoing erosion due to wind and rain, exacerbated in the past by windblown sand due to grazing animals reducing ground cover.  They are also vulnerable to flash flooding along Wadi Musa through the winding gorge (Siq) if the Nabataean diversion system is not continually monitored, repaired and maintained.  The property is under pressure from tourism, which has increased greatly since the time of inscription, particularly congestion points such as the Siq which is the main entrance to the city from the east.  The property is also vulnerable to the infrastructure needs of local communities and tourists.  https://whc.unesco.org/en/list/326/   

Petra is a historic and archaeological city in southern Jordan.  Famous for its rock-cut architecture and water conduit system, Petra is also called the "Rose City" because of the colour of the sandstone from which it is carved; it was famously called "a rose-red city half as old as time" in a poem of 1845 by John Burgon.  It is adjacent to the mountain of Jabal Al-Madbah, in a basin surrounded by mountains forming the eastern flank of the Arabah valley running from the Dead Sea to the Gulf of Aqaba.  The area around Petra has been inhabited from as early as 7000 BC, and the Nabataeans might have settled in what would become the capital city of their kingdom as early as the 4th century BC.  Archaeological work has only discovered evidence of Nabataean presence dating back to the second century BC, by which time Petra had become their capital.  The Nabataeans were nomadic Arabs who invested in Petra's proximity to the incense trade routes by establishing it as a major regional trading hub.  See graphics at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Petra   

Gung ho is an English term, with the current meaning of 'overly enthusiastic or energetic'.  It originated during the Second Sino-Japanese War (1937–1945) from a Chinese term, 工合 (pinyin: gōnghé; lit. 'to work together'), short for Chinese Industrial Cooperatives.  The linguist Albert Moe concluded that the term is an "Americanism that is derived from the Chinese, but its several accepted American meanings have no resemblance whatsoever to the recognized meaning in the original language", and that its "various linguistic uses, as they have developed in the United States, have been peculiar to American speech".  In Chinese, concludes Moe, "this is neither a slogan nor a battle cry; it is only a name for an organization".  The term was picked up by United States Marine Corps Major Evans Carlson from his New Zealand friend, Rewi Alley, one of the founders of the Chinese Industrial Cooperatives.  Carlson explained in a 1943 interview:  "I was trying to build up the same sort of working spirit I had seen in China where all the soldiers dedicated themselves to one idea and worked together to put that idea over.  I told the boys about it again and again.  I told them of the motto of the Chinese Cooperatives, Gung Ho.  It means Work Together—Work in Harmony."  Carlson used gung ho as a motto during his unconventional command of the 2nd Marine Raider Battalion, leading to other marines adopting the term to mean overly enthusiastic.  From there, it spread throughout the U.S. Marine Corps, where it was used as an expression of spirit, and then into American society as a whole when the term was the title of a 1943 war film, Gung Ho!, about the 2nd Raider Battalion's raid on Makin Island in 1942.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gung_ho     

Noodle kugel, also simply called kugel, is a baked casserole of egg noodles and a custardy sauce, usually made with a combo of cottage cheese, sour cream, and eggs.  It is sweet rather than savory, with sugar added to the creamy base and dried fruit (like apricots, figs, and raisins) sometimes studded throughout.  As it bakes, the sauce becomes fluffy thanks to the eggs, and the noodles at the edges get crisp and golden brown (just like the corner pieces of a lasagna).  A crunchy topping is also often added to the casserole before baking.  This kugel recipe uses a topping that’s less traditional than the familiar corn flakes and has won raves from new and traditionalist fans alike.  Recipe by Ann  https://www.allrecipes.com/recipe/25228/kugel/ 

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 2771  January 17, 2024  

 

Book Review:  The Manuscripts Club--the people behind a thousand years of medieval manuscripts by Christopher de Hamel      

Manuscript devotees get the star treatment in this fascinating and multilayered art history, a natural follow-up to de Hamel’s award-winning previous book, Meetings With Remarkable Manuscripts.  The "club" includes 12 historical figures featured in short biographical chapters.  The author begins with Saint Anselm, the Archbishop of Canterbury from 1093 to 1109.  In the 15th century, Vespasiano da Bisticci, "the most successful bookseller in Europe," turned Renaissance Italy’s rediscovery of ancient classics into a business.  Simon Bening, active in 16th-century Bruges, is one of the few manuscript illuminators whose name we know.  Sir Robert Cotton, an early modern antiquary, owned hundreds of manuscripts, and his classification numbers are still used by the British Library.  

https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/christopher-de-hamel/the-manuscripts-club/    

Achillea millefolium, commonly known as yarrow or common yarrow, is a flowering plant in the family Asteraceae.  Other common names include old man's pepper, devil's nettle, sanguinary, milfoil, soldier's woundwort, and thousand seal.  The plant is native to temperate regions of the Northern Hemisphere in Asia, Europe, and North America.  It has been introduced as a feed for livestock in New Zealand and Australia.  The genus name Achillea is derived from mythical Greek character Achilles, who reportedly carried it with his army to treat battle wounds.  The specific epithet millefolium as well as the common names milfoil and thousand leaf come from the featherlike leaves which are minutely divided.   The English name yarrow comes from its Saxon (Old English) name gearwe, which is related to both the Dutch word gerw (alternately yerw) and the Old High German word garawa.   In the eastern counties it may be called yarroway.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Achillea_millefolium

Sylvia Plath’s The Bell Jar is published under the name Victoria Lucas (January 14, 1963) • Victor Hugo finishes writing The Hunchback of Notre Dame (January 15, 1831) • The first edition of El ingenioso hidalgo Don Quijote de la Mancha (Book One of Don Quixote) by Miguel de Cervantes—a ”sloppy, inconsistent, baffling, perfect” novel—is published in Madrid (January 16, 1605) • Anton Chekhov’s last play, The Cherry Orchard, premieres at the Moscow Art Theatre under the direction of Konstantin Stanislavski (January 17, 1904) • Virginia Woolf stages her only play (January 19, 1935) • Isaac Asimov’s first full-length novel, Pebble in the Sky, is published by Doubleday (January 19, 1950) • Robert Frost recites his poem “The Greatest Gift” from memory at the inauguration of President John F. Kennedy; it was the first time a poet had ever read at an inauguration (January 20, 1961) .  Literary Hub January 14, 2024 

Queen of Persian Dishes   Persian cuisine is famous for its slow-cooked meat braises.  For centuries, braises have been an integral and expansive class of dishes within the Persian culinary landscape.  The Persian word for a meat braise is khoresh (also called khoresht). There is a wide range of Persian khoreshes incorporating different types of meat, vegetables, fruit, nuts, grains, beans, and legumes, in addition to regional specialties and those requiring fresh short-lived seasonal ingredients.  One of the most famous khoreshes is fesenjān (a.k.a. fesenjoon or khoresh-e-fesanjān), a uniquely Persian sweet-and-sour meat braise that incorporates ground walnuts and pomegranate molasses.  The contrasting textures and flavors of the pomegranate molasses and the ground walnuts come together to create a thick and rich braise with an eye-catching dark brown color and subtle sweet-and-sour flavor.  This type of gentle sweet-and-sour flavor is characteristic of several Persian dishes.  In fact, there is a single word for it in Persian:  malass.  There are two popular vegetarian versions where the meat is replaced with eggplant or butternut squash.  The dish’s fame comes in part from the fact that prior to the 20th century, fesenjān was known as the “food of royals” because its ingredients were considered luxurious and therefore beyond the reach of most people.  Despite its royal reputation, fesanjān can be a simple dish to make.  There are only three key ingredients: pomegranate molasses, walnuts, and meat, which collectively create a uniquely sumptuous dish.  Although the most famous (and ancient) version is made with duck, it is equally delicious with lamb, beef, chicken, turkey, other fowl, fish, and even with tiny meatballs.  Don’t be discouraged about the amount of time it takes to make this dish.  Once everything is cooking in the pot, all you have to do is let it simmer gently on the stovetop.  Read history and find recipe at:  https://www.seriouseats.com/fesenjan-persian-pomegranate-and-walnut-meat-braise-recipe-8425670  Thank you, Muse reader!    

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 2770  January 15, 2024 

 

'Ambrosia' is a cultivar of apple originating in British Columbia, Canada in the early 1990s.  The original tree was first cultivated by the Mennell family of Similkameen Valley, British Columbia, who discovered it growing in their orchard.  The fruit is medium to large, weighing about 215 grams (0.474 lb), and has mostly red, glossy colouration, with yellow patches.  It has cream-coloured, firm meat with a sweet flavour reminiscent of pear and low acidity.  'Ambrosia' harvest is mid to late season.  Ambrosia is most common in British Columbia, where it was discovered, and is the third most-produced apple in the province.  It is also being produced in Ontario and Nova Scotia, as well as many other places around the world.  The patent provides additional background.  Parentage is suspected to be 'Starking Delicious' × 'Golden Delicious' because those apples existed in the orchard where the 'Ambrosia' was discovered growing.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ambrosia_(apple)    

Quipu (also spelled khipu) are recording devices fashioned from strings historically used by a number of cultures in the region of Andean South America.  A quipu usually consisted of cotton or camelid fiber strings.  The Inca people used them for collecting data and keeping records, monitoring tax obligations, collecting census records, calendrical information, and for military organization.  The cords stored numeric and other values encoded as knots, often in a base ten positional system.  A quipu could have only a few or thousands of cords.  The configuration of the quipus has been "compared to string mops."  Archaeological evidence has also shown the use of finely carved wood as a supplemental, and perhaps sturdier, base to which the color-coded cords would be attached.  A relatively small number have survived.  Knotted strings unrelated to quipu have been used to record information by the ancient Chinese, Tibetans and Japanese.  Quipu is the Spanish spelling and the most common spelling in English.  Khipu is the word for "knot" in Cusco Quechua.  In most Quechua varieties, the term is kipu.   "Quipu" is a Quechua word meaning "knot" or "to knot".  The terms "quipu" and "khipu" are simply spelling variations on the same word.  "Quipu" is the traditional Spanish spelling, while "khipu" reflects the recent Quechuan and Aymaran spelling shift.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quipu   

One of Naum Gabo’s (Russian-American sculptor, designer, and architect) most important discoveries was that empty space could be used as an element of sculpture.  Constructing his sculptures from sets of interlocking components rather than carving or moulding them from inert mass allowed him to incorporate into poetry, and John Cage's incorporation of silence into music, in epitomizing a modern, secular concern with expressing what is unknown as well as what is known:  with void as well as form, or static elements which strongly suggested movement, Gabo's work stands at the forefront of a whole artistic tradition, Kinetic Art, which uses art to represent time as well as space.  Indeed, his Kinetic Construction of 1920 is often considered the first work of Kinetic Art.  From this point onwards, Gabo's work incorporated or suggested what he called space into his work more easily.  Gabo's use of space within sculpture stands alongside Stéphane Mallarmé's incorporation of page-space "kinetic rhythms", reminding the viewer of a quintessentially modern discovery first made by Albert Einstein, that time and space only exist in relation to each other.  https://www.theartstory.org/artist/gabo-naum/

derring-do  Action displaying heroic courage.  The term comes (in the late 16th century) from late Middle English dorryng do ‘daring to do’, used by Chaucer, and, in a passage by Lydgate based on Chaucer's work, misprinted in 16th-century editions as derrynge do; this was misinterpreted by Spenser to mean ‘manhood, chivalry’, and subsequently taken up and popularized by Sir Walter Scott.  https://www.oxfordreference.com/display/10.1093/oi/authority.20110803095712317   

One hundred thirty-two Guggenheim Fellowships were awarded in 1946. Sixty of these were awarded as part of the post-service program, which provided fellowships to otherwise qualified artists and scholars who were taken away from their studies due to the war.  The list includes:  Carson McCullers, Gian Carlo Menotti, Ansel Adams, Alice Elizabeth Kober, Alan Lomax, Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. and James Alfred Van Allen.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Guggenheim_Fellowships_awarded_in_1946   

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com   Issue 2769  January 12, 2024 

Alice Elizabeth Kober (1906–1950) was an American classicist best known for her work on the decipherment of Linear B.  Educated at Hunter College and Columbia University, Kober taught classics at Brooklyn College from 1930 until her death. In the 1940s, she published three major papers on the script, demonstrating evidence of inflection; her discovery allowed for the deduction of phonetic relationships between different signs without assigning them phonetic values, and would be a key step in the eventual decipherment of the script.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alice_Kober   

Linear B was one of the most tantalizing puzzles of any era, and for half a century, some of the world’s foremost scholars tried coax the tablets to yield up their secrets.  Then, in 1952, the script was deciphered seemingly in a single stroke—not by a scholar but by Michael Ventris, an impassioned amateur whose obsession with the tablets had begun in childhood.  The decipherment brought him worldwide acclaim.  But it also cost him his architectural career, his ties to his family, and, quite possibly, his life.  That is the story of the decipherment as it has been known so far.  But a major actor in the drama has long been missing:  Alice Kober, a classicist at Brooklyn College.  Though largely forgotten today, Kober came within a hair’s breadth of deciphering Linear B before her own untimely death in 1950.  Yet, as The Riddle of the Labyrinth reveals, it was she who built the foundation on which Ventris’s decipherment stood, an achievement that until now has been all but lost to history.  Drawing on a newly opened archive of Kober’s papers, The Riddle of the Labyrinth restores this unsung heroine to her rightful place at last.  http://margalitfox.com/books/the-riddle-of-the-labyrinth   

Linear A is a writing system that was used by the Minoans of Crete from 1800 to 1450 BC to write the hypothesized Minoan language or languages.  Linear A was the primary script used in palace and religious writings of the Minoan civilization. It was succeeded by Linear B, which was used by the Mycenaeans to write an early form of Greek.  It was discovered by archaeologist Sir Arthur Evans in 1900. No texts in Linear A have yet been deciphered.  The term linear refers to the fact that the script was written using a stylus to cut lines into a tablet of clay, as opposed to cuneiform, which was written by using a stylus to press wedges into the clay.  Linear A belongs to a group of scripts that evolved independently of the Egyptian and Mesopotamian systems.  During the second millennium BC, there were four major branches:  Linear A, Linear B, Cypro-Minoan, and Cretan hieroglyphic.  In the 1950s, Linear B was deciphered as Mycenaean Greek. Linear B shares many symbols with Linear A, and they may notate similar syllabic values, but neither those nor any other proposed readings lead to a language that scholars can read.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linear_A    

The Riddle of the Labyrinth was named to The New York Times Editor's Choice list in June 2013, and was named one of the Times 100 Notable Books of 2013.  It was awarded the William Saroyan International Prize for Writing in 2014.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Riddle_of_the_Labyrinth 

"Every language glimmers with sparks of earlier ones . . . Though tiny, the sparks can illuminate a history of invasion, conquest, trade, and the wholesale movement of populations."  "A writing system is a woven fabric, an interlaced network of sounds and symbols."  The Riddle of the Labyrinth:  the Quest to Crack an Ancient Code by Margalit Fox   

Tom Gauld (born 1976) is a Scottish cartoonist and illustrator.  His style reflects his self-professed fondness of "deadpan comedy, flat dialogue, things happening offstage and impressive characters".  Others note that his work "combines pathos with the farcical" and exhibits "a casual reduction of visual keys into a more rudimentary drawing style".  Gauld is best known for his comic books Goliath and Mooncop as well as his collections of one-page cartoons.  He has also authored a number of smaller-scale books such as Guardians of the Kingdom, Robots, Monsters etc., Hunter and Painter and his cartoon Move to the City, which ran weekly in London's Time Out in 2001–2002.  Gauld studied illustration at Edinburgh College of Art, where he first started to draw comics "seriously", and the Royal College of Art.  At the Royal College of Art, he worked with friend Simone Lia.  Together they self-published the comics First and Second under their Cabanon Press, which they started in 2001.  (The two volumes were subsequently published together by Bloomsbury Publishing in 2003, as Both.)  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Gauld 

Revenge of the Librarians:  Book Review   Tom Gauld returns with his wittiest and most trenchant collection of literary cartoons to date.  Some particularly favored targets include the pretentious procrastinating novelist, the commercial mercenary of the dispassionate editor, the willful obscurantism of the vainglorious poet.  Quake in the presence of the stack of bedside books as it grows taller!  Gnash your teeth at the ever-moving deadline that the writer never meets!  Quail before the critic’s incisive dissection of the manuscript!  And most important, seethe with envy at the paragon of creative productivity!  See graphics of six other Tom Gauld’s rantings at https://drawnandquarterly.com/books/revenge-of-the-librarians/  Thank you, Muse reader! 

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 2768  January 10, 2024

 

Al pastor (from Spanish, "shepherd style"), tacos al pastor, or tacos de trompo is a preparation of spit-grilled slices of pork originating in the Central Mexican region of Puebla and Mexico City, although today it is a common menu item found in taquerías throughout Mexico.  The method of preparing and cooking al pastor is based on the lamb shawarma brought by Lebanese immigrants to the region.  Al pastor features a flavor palate that uses traditional Mexican adobada (marinade).  It is a popular street food that has spread to the United States.  In some places of northern Mexico and coastal Mexico, such as in Baja California, taco al pastor is known as taco de trompo or taco de adobada.  Pork is marinated in a combination of dried chilies, spices, pineapple, and typically achiote paste, then slowly cooked with charcoal or gas flame on a vertical rotisserie called a trompo (lit. 'spinning top'), the meat is shaved off as the outside is browned.  A variety of the dish uses a combination of Middle Eastern spices and indigenous central Mexican ingredients and is called tacos árabe.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al_pastor#   

The earliest known use of the verb flim-flam is in the mid 1600s.  OED's earliest evidence for flim-flam is from 1660, in the writing of Samuel Fisher, Quaker preacher and writer.  It is also recorded as a noun from the mid 1500s.  https://www.oed.com/dictionary/flim-flam_v?tl=true   

The Flim-Flam Man (titled One Born Every Minute in some countries) is a 1967 American comedy film directed by Irvin Kershner, featuring George C. Scott, Michael Sarrazin, and Sue Lyon, based on the 1965 novel The Ballad of the Flim-Flam Man by Guy Owen.  The movie has well-known character actors in supporting roles, including Jack Albertson, Slim Pickens, Strother Martin, Harry Morgan, and Albert Salmi.  The movie is set in the countryside and small towns of the American South, and it was filmed in the Anderson and Clark counties, Kentucky, area.  It is also noted for its folksy musical score by composer Jerry Goldsmith.  The movie's title song "Flim Flam Man," written by Laura Nyro, later became a hit for Barbra Streisand.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Flim-Flam_Man   

A linchpin, also spelled linch pin, lynchpin, or lynch pin, is a fastener used to prevent a wheel or other part from sliding off the axle upon which it is riding.  The word is first attested in the late fourteenth century and derives from Middle English elements meaning "axletree pin".  Securing implements onto the three-point hitch of a tractor is an example of application.  Linchpins may also be used in place of an R-clip for securing hitch pins.  The word "linchpin" is also used figuratively to mean "something [or someone] that holds the various elements of a complicated structure together".  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linchpin    

Sir Arthur Evans, (1851, Hertfordshire, England—died 1941, Youlbury, near Oxford, Oxfordshire), British archaeologist who excavated the ruins of the ancient city of Knossos in Crete and uncovered evidence of a sophisticated Bronze Age civilization, which he named Minoan.  His work was one of archaeology’s major achievements and greatly advanced the study of European and eastern Mediterranean prehistory.  A distinguished scholar, Evans was curator of the Ashmolean Museum, University of Oxford, from 1884 to 1908 and became extraordinary professor of prehistoric archaeology at Oxford in 1909.  His interest in ancient coins and the writing on stone seals from Crete lured him to the island for the first time in 1894.  The following year he published Cretan Pictographs and Prae-Phoenician Script.  https://www.britannica.com/biography/Arthur-Evans   

PENCIL SHARPENER MUSEUM  Stop by the Hocking Hills Regional Welcome Center and visit one of the more unique museums you will see, the Paul A. Johnson Pencil Sharpener Museum.  Reverend Paul Johnson began his collection more than 20 years ago.  This amazing collection of more than 3,400 pencil sharpeners has been featured in national magazines and is reputed to be the largest collection in America.  Thank you, Muse reader!  https://www.explorehockinghills.com/things-to-do/arts-museums/museums/pencil-sharpener-museum/   

Logan is a city in and county seat of Hocking County, Ohio, along the Hocking River about 43 miles (69 km) southeast of Columbus.  The population was 7,296 at the time of the 2020 census.  Residents named the town in honor of Chief Logan of the Mingo Indian tribe.  He and his band lived in this area at the time of European-American settlement. Ohio Governor Thomas Worthington established the community in 1816.  Logan was incorporated as a city in 1839.   Logan was the first city in the state of Ohio to install a double roundabout.  Located at the interchange of Ohio State Route 664 and U.S. Route 33, the roundabouts were officially opened to traffic on December 4, 2013.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logan,_Ohio 

http://librariansmuse.blogpost.com  Issue  2767  January 8, 2024