Photo by Galen C. Dalrymple, copyright 2024. All Rights Reserved.
If you love history like I do, there’s no better place for you to go to experience it than Egypt. The ancient Egyptian civilization coalesced around 3150 BC when upper (think southern) and lower (think northern) Egypt unified to become one nation under the first pharaoh of the first dynasty (Narmer, or Menes). Native Egyptians ruled exclusively until the sixth century BC. Later on, the country would be ruled by the Achaemenids, then Alexander the Great, then the Romans and others. There really is no other place where we have such a rich history to explore.
I was in the Cairo museum when I took today’s photo. Some of the sculptures are situated in areas that are dark, like the one in today’s picture. It struck me that as I was looking at these ancient statues, I was peering back into the darkest times of recorded human history. It made me wonder if they had staged this image in that particular setting to evoke that very sentiment – almost as if this person was coming out of the darkness to greet visitors.
One more note: check out the beard. See the curved end? That means that this statue was completed after the death of the person depicted. If the person was still alive, the beard would be straight.
ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY: in 2014, 43 people died when a portion of a hill suddenly collapsed and buried a neighborhood in the small community of Oso, Washington, some 55 miles northeast of Seattle. It was one of the deadliest mudslides in U.S. history.
The collapse occurred shortly after 10:30 a.m., when, following weeks of rain, a massive, fast-moving wall of mud and debris crashed down the hillside, destroying 49 homes and killing entire families. One recovery worker said the force of the mudslide caused cars to be “compacted down to about the size of a refrigerator, just smashed to the point where you can hardly tell it was a vehicle,” according to a Reuters report. The debris field from the slide covered a square mile and was estimated to be 80 feet deep in some places. In July 2014, search and rescue workers discovered what was believed to be the last body of the 43 victims killed in the disaster.
Investigators indicated heavy rainfall in the weeks prior to March 22 helped trigger the slide, although they did not blame the disaster on one specific factor. The Oso area has long been prone to mudslides, some dating back thousands of years. Prior to the 2014 incident, a significant slide took place at the same site in 2006, although efforts later were made to reinforce the area.
Mudslides, also known as mudflows, are a common type of landslide. Each year in the United States, more than 25 people on average die due to landslides, while thousands more are killed elsewhere around the world. In 1969, Hurricane Camille created flash floods and mudslides that killed an estimated 150 people in Nelson Country, Virginia. In 1985, a landslide set off by heavy rains in Puerto Rico killed some 130 people. In 2013, some 5,700 people in northern India perished as a result of landslides and flash floods caused by monsoon rains. – The History Channel
TRIVIA FOR TODAY: A “mega-tsunami” is a tsunami with extremely high waves and is usually caused by a landslide. A mega-tsunami occurred at Lituya Bay, Alaska, in 1958, creating the tallest tsunami ever recorded at 1,700 feet (534 m) high. Miraculously, only two people died.
Twolfgcd's Blog (Galen Dalrymple) 