[HN Gopher] Ziggurats are temple platforms of ancient Mesopotamia
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Ziggurats are temple platforms of ancient Mesopotamia
Author : akbarnama
Score : 42 points
Date : 2022-06-23 07:01 UTC (15 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.deseret.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.deseret.com)
| mcguire wrote:
| Saw the title and was thinking, "Yes, and?" It's not exactly a
| crazy surprise.
|
| On the other hand, the article is good as a general introduction,
| and I hadn't heard of the Great Mosque of Samarra
| (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Mosque_of_Samarra) before.
| Neat.
| mojomark wrote:
| Shocking how much the Great Mosque of Samarra looks like the
| depictions of the Tower of Babel [1]. That reminds me of the
| awesome Bad Religion song Skyscraper [2].
|
| I really need some ADHD medication.
|
| 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tower_of_Babel
|
| 2. Skyscraper. https://youtu.be/ELBjwltRp3E
| voz_ wrote:
| That depiction of Babel is by Peter Bruegel, a fantastic
| artist but obviously just making stuff up (1563) vs supposed
| biblical occurrence (far before that - but probably not real
| at all).
|
| Its also far closer to the Colosseum, if we are comparing
| structures in reality vs art.
| mdturnerphys wrote:
| "Seeing this minaret, medieval Europeans mistook it for the
| biblical Tower of Babel (Gen. 11:1-9), and, as such, it lent
| its form to medieval and Renaissance representations of the
| tower, as in the famous "Tower of Babel" by Bruegel (1563)."
| drewcoo wrote:
| Consider the source: Deseret News. It's likely a subject not
| because of surprise but because it's a shallow exploration of
| other faiths.
| an1sotropy wrote:
| indeed, and with LDS sometimes it's even less than an
| exploration of other faiths, and more about hoping to project
| their own faith on others' histories. e.g.
| https://www.science.org/content/article/how-mormon-lawyer-
| tr...
| cogman10 wrote:
| Sometimes? It's more of an almost always thing. Mormons
| will try and bend every single ancient american
| archeological nugget into a faith promoting confirmation of
| the Book of Mormon narrative.
|
| A mezoamerican city buried in the jungle? Obviously a
| confirmation that zerahelma was real!
|
| The foundation of mormonism is confirmation bias.
| allemagne wrote:
| Anything notable about this article I'm missing? Just seems
| pretty tame for being on the front page
| blipvert wrote:
| Ziggurat Vertigo.
|
| Good times ......
| brundolf wrote:
| Anybody else learn the word via this videogame?
|
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ziggurat_(video_game)
| danans wrote:
| Ha! I learned the word from a video game _26 years older_ than
| that one:
|
| https://obscurevideogames.tumblr.com/post/186676108700
|
| Who's old now?
| ThalesX wrote:
| World of Warcraft for me, Plaguelands.
| Archelaos wrote:
| > Most religions have attempted to build their sanctuaries on
| prominent heights to be visible to all the faithful.
|
| Most? Can we even count religions?
| tablespoon wrote:
| The article photo looks like it's actually of a Mayan pyramid,
| which is silly since it seems like there are perfectly impressive
| pictures of actual Ziggurats:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ziggurat.
| ncmncm wrote:
| Nobody knows what any particular ziggurat looked like, or what
| features were common to them. It is mostly speculation.
|
| The article mentions the Hanging Gardens of "Babylon", but no
| contemporary source mentions any such thing in any Babylon of
| history. The best evidence we do have suggests that classical
| mentions, which don't say where, describe what was found
| archaeologically in Nineveh, present day Mosul 400 mi north of
| the ancient site of Babylon. Nineveh, in the time of the Neo-
| assyrians, had what may have been the first aquaduct (centuries
| before any of Rome's) feeding water to their elevated gardens.
| The Neo-assyrians cultivated a reputation for genocide of
| defeated people, and public torture of their leaders.
| throwaway894345 wrote:
| There was some documentary I watched about how disparate
| cultures all over the world independently invented pyramids and
| similar structures. Basically covergent evolution applied to
| ideas.
| contingencies wrote:
| I think the idea is pre-cognitively expressed in hominid
| behavioral patterns: sweeping views + army of allies beneath
| and around you = physical safety. Well, since pterodactyls
| died out, anyway.
| AlotOfReading wrote:
| Evo-psych is usually pretty hard to nail down into a
| singular argument that isn't simply projecting your own
| assumptions back out.
|
| Take the case of Teotihuacan for example, which is at the
| bottom of a large valley surrounded by mountains. The
| famous avenue of the dead is oriented to point directly at
| one of those mountains, Cerro Gordo. It's a lot of effort
| to go to for a shitty vantage point when you can just build
| a hillfort a few miles away, like they did at Monte Alban.
| duped wrote:
| Another way to look at them is a great example of
| survivorship bias.
|
| There's not much in the way of buildings that humans can
| build tall with hand tools and preindustrial materials that
| last thousands of years but stone pyramids. Even masonry
| doesn't hold up to history, unless it gets buried (people
| like to tear buildings down and reuse small, light pieces - a
| limestone block isn't exactly portable).
| thaumasiotes wrote:
| > it seems like there are perfectly impressive pictures of
| actual Ziggurats: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ziggurat
|
| Well, that might be true, but if there are they don't appear on
| that page. We see a ziggurat that is still underground, a
| sketch of a ziggurat, a ziggurat that has been reconstructed in
| modern times, a model of a ziggurat, the back wall of a
| ziggurat (that is otherwise still underground), and a rather
| different-looking building from the 1970s which is apparently
| inspired by ziggurats.
|
| The reconstructed Ziggurat of Ur is very impressive indeed, but
| it's understandable that the article might have wanted a
| picture of an ancient structure rather than a modern
| reconstruction.
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(page generated 2022-06-23 23:01 UTC)