[HN Gopher] 2k-year-old wine and the uncanny immediacy of the past
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2k-year-old wine and the uncanny immediacy of the past
Author : benbreen
Score : 234 points
Date : 2025-01-15 21:35 UTC (2 days ago)
(HTM) web link (resobscura.substack.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (resobscura.substack.com)
| bglazer wrote:
| Nice article about artifacts that make the past more immediate,
| that allow us to connect our experiences to people hundreds or
| thousands of years ago.
|
| My favorite example is the writings of Onfim, who was a little
| boy in the 1200s in present day Russia whose scribbling and
| homework were exquisitely preserved on birch bark fragments. It's
| so immediately recognizable as a little boy's endearing doodles
| about knights and imaginary beasts, yet its 800 years old.
|
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Onfim
| morkalork wrote:
| I like the adorable animal shaped sippy cups for babies:
|
| https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/25/science/prehistoric-baby-...
| romanhn wrote:
| Wow, haven't seen this before, thank you. Amazing that the
| writing can still be read by a modern reader (that said, really
| helps to know what it's supposed to say though). The note I
| found most relatable is the one with greetings to his
| classmate.
| ge96 wrote:
| Do some eyebrows convey emotion or coincidence? (near bottom
| of page)
|
| Edit: I'm also curious how much time (thousands of years) for
| there to be noticeable difference in the capability of the
| brain like abstract thinking. Language may be the real
| problem.
| thaumasiotes wrote:
| > I'm also curious how much time (thousands of years) for
| there to be noticeable difference in the capability of the
| brain like abstract thinking.
|
| It's not thousands of years. French Canadians are enriched
| for some of the same brain-related defects that Ashkenazi
| Jews can get; we assume for the same reasons.
| Vampiero wrote:
| Which defects? What reasons? _Who is assuming?_
| thaumasiotes wrote:
| You know, you can just look these things up. This isn't
| some piece of obscure trivia.
|
| > Which defects?
|
| Ashkenazi Jews are prone to a whole host of genetic
| defects that affect the brain, of which the most famous
| is Tay-Sachs.
|
| > What reasons?
|
| A lifestyle focused on commerce as opposed to foraging or
| agriculture.
|
| > _Who is assuming?_
|
| Everyone, basically.
|
| In the case of the Ashkenazi Jews, as far as we can tell
| they've been like that for as long as records of the
| group have existed. But the French Canadian
| specialization in commerce postdates the discovery of
| North America.
| DiggyJohnson wrote:
| Uhhhh what?
| methyl wrote:
| I've had similar feeling when realizing that the bells that we
| sometimes hear in old cities of Europe are exact same bells
| producing exact same sound as 1000 years ago
| zehaeva wrote:
| Similarly, when I read Meditations by Marcus Aurelius I was
| struck by how normal everything seemed. While he was an Emperor
| the everyday banality of what he talked about going through
| 2,000 years ago was amazing.
|
| Humans really haven't changed that much at all.
| thesz wrote:
| > Humans really haven't changed that much at all.
|
| I guess you are quoting Woland from The Master and Margarita
| [1], the words he said in a show at the Variety theater.
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Master_and_Margarita
|
| Woland is _the_ Satan in the novel. What he said has a deeper
| meaning, but superficial one is most probably wrong.
| willy_k wrote:
| I think they're just saying that humans haven't really
| changed much at all, if I had to guess they weren't
| referencing any one quote. The only thing that's really
| changed is the tools we can use, but we've made little
| (some would say backwards compared to certain reference
| points) progress in why and what we use them for.
| jazzyjackson wrote:
| I don't know that OP was quoting a Russian satire but I'm
| glad you turned me onto the book, I never would have heard
| of it but sounds intriguing. There's a wealth of covers to
| choose from on eBay, Goodreads lists over 1,200 editions. I
| got the one with the cat holding the playing cards smoking
| a cigar while a topless woman sails past the moon on a
| flying pig. at least I think it's a pig. Published in '97
| by Picador.
| voihannena wrote:
| It's such a great book, both hilarious and sad at times.
| I also went to eBay to search for a copy before realizing
| I already own the book.
| gunian wrote:
| Where is ChatGPT when you need it smh think of the time
| wasted instead of diving deep into a masterpiece
| internet_points wrote:
| The one translated by O'Connor and Burgin? That's a good
| translation.
| rcxdude wrote:
| I'm sure it's been said at many points by many people,
| fictional or real. It's not a particularly unique insight
| (especially amongst historians and archeologists), though
| one I think that bears repeating often as it's easy to lose
| sight of it.
| zehaeva wrote:
| For as well read as I am, I am not so clever to quote the
| works that have influenced me.
|
| No, I am afraid that I was being more of a follower of
| Wallace here, I was being sincere with my words. I truly do
| marvel that humans really haven't changed that much at all.
| whenc wrote:
| We come mentally of age when we discover that the great minds
| of the past, whom we have patronized, are not less
| intelligent than we are because they happen to be dead --
| Cyril Connolly, The Unquiet Grave
| alexvoda wrote:
| Does that(the patronization) happen frequently? I far more
| frequently witness people lionizing people of the past in
| all sorts of benign and malign ways.
| bigstrat2003 wrote:
| One of the things which really brought that into focus for me
| was when I was old enough to look past the flowery language
| of Shakespeare and understand the meaning of what the
| characters were going through. It first hit me when I
| realized that Hamlet's famous "to be or not to be" speech was
| really about him wanting to commit suicide, but being afraid
| that he might go to hell. It's not really an earth shattering
| insight, but as a young man it blew my mind. I had never
| really thought about the fact that humans living in the past
| might have had the same psychological struggles and problems
| we still have to confront to this day.
|
| Honestly, learning about how little humans have changed
| throughout history has been both one of the most delightful
| and sad things I have learned. It's wonderful to think about
| the real kinship we have with people long since dead, but
| it's also sobering to realize we still make a lot of the same
| mistakes despite their example. But regardless of whether
| it's good or bad, I find the relatable humanity of historical
| people to be endlessly fascinating.
| Terr_ wrote:
| > has been both one of the most delightful and sad things I
| have learned
|
| Reminds me of this exchange between an adoptive maternal
| figure and a troubled youth with low self-esteem.
|
| > "[He] is a great man. [...] I don't confuse greatness
| with perfection. To be great anyhow is... the higher
| achievement." She gave him a crooked smile. "It should give
| you hope, eh?"
|
| "Huh. Block me from escape, you mean. Are you saying that
| no matter how screwed up I was, you'd still expect me to
| work wonders?" _Appalling._
|
| She considered this. "Yes," she said serenely. "In fact,
| since no one is perfect, it follows that all great deeds
| have been accomplished out of imperfection. Yet they were
| accomplished, somehow, all the same."
|
| -- _Mirror Dance_ by Lois McMaster Bujold
| adynaton wrote:
| Vorkosigan Saga is one of the most underrated sci fi
| universes. It should be way more popular.
| thaumasiotes wrote:
| I like the extreme modesty in the wikipedia article:
|
| > One of the drawings features a knight on a horse, with
| Onfim's name written next to him, stabbing someone on the
| ground with a lance, with scholars speculating that Onfim
| pictured himself as the knight.
| edgarvaldes wrote:
| Not as old, but I loved reading about this:
|
| 350 year old paper cuttings found under Sutton House
| floorboards go on display [0]
|
| It really feels immediate
|
| [0] https://museumsandheritage.com/advisor/posts/350-year-old-
| pa...
| gunian wrote:
| Kids had school 800 years ago? If he didn't work in the fields
| musta been rich
|
| _insert David Lynch quote about red ants_
| bearded_comrade wrote:
| It seems like that region had a particularly high literacy
| rate. Texts from all classes and genders were found. The kid
| could have been a peasant.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Novgorod_Republic#Literature_a.
| ..
| gunian wrote:
| How likely is that vs works written by the rich folk
| survive? A cursory GPT search implies not a lot of medieval
| works written by poor people in general
| int_19h wrote:
| The point is that it's not your average medieval polity.
| Novgorod was a merchant republic in which literacy was
| seemingly held in high esteem in and of itself, resulting
| in a social pressure to acquire it. And then on top of
| that they had access to plenty of birch bark, which
| happens to be a very convenient and _cheap_ writing
| material where it 's available, and does not require any
| ink or fancy tools to use; just a sharp stylus.
|
| As far as survival, because of how common birch bark
| notes were in Novgorod, they were used for mundane
| everyday matters like instructions to servants to
| purchase such and such goods, or even just a one-liner
| greeting, and a lot of those were then discarded and
| ended up buried underground. So, again, a very different
| slice compared to the more typical story of expensive
| manuscripts in libraries, or personal correspondence of
| nobility.
| internet_points wrote:
| Or the rune-rods which were "the medieval snapchat"
| https://www.nrk.no/vestland/gamle_-norske-ord-for-kjonnsorga...
| (google translate isn't half bad on this article)
|
| or a more PG version
| https://sprakprat.no/2017/06/22/middelalderkvinner-og-runeku...
| where a rune-rod simply says "Gyda says you have to come home"
| (I guess hubby had been out too late with his no-good friends?)
| sriacha wrote:
| Wonderful, here's another similar example I saw recently, 14000
| year old cave art doodling by kids:
| https://www.science.org/content/article/enigmatic-cave-art-w...
| abeppu wrote:
| The inscription on the Sword of Goujian, the translation for
| which is displayed in the article, says that the King of Yue made
| and used the sword himself. How literally do people with
| knowledge of the period take that? Is it surprising / unlikely
| for a king of that period to make anything themselves, especially
| something so ornate, rather than commission it?
| tokai wrote:
| Well kings have always said they made/build anything they
| ordered. I would simply not believe Yue's claim. It's much like
| the things Wolfram "creates".
| rsynnott wrote:
| Well, everyone needs a hobby :)
|
| Here's another one, different king, similar inscription:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spear_of_Fuchai - seems likely it
| should be read more as "caused this to be made".
| codemonkey-zeta wrote:
| Julius Caesar made the dang calendar. People had a lot of free
| time.
| rsynnott wrote:
| That was kind of his job (as pontifex maximus), tho.
| scottLobster wrote:
| When you have some sort of divine right to rule, the most
| money, a palace filled with servants and responsibilities that
| can be neglected with no immediate consequences, well you have
| a lot of free time.
|
| That said, while it's possible this King was really into
| swordsmithing, more likely he's just taking credit for the work
| or something gets lost in the translation. Like if Elon said he
| "built the Falcon 9". It's not explicitly true, he certainly
| wasn't machining parts or writing code for it, but he was
| involved enough that no one would really call it a lie either.
| ryandrake wrote:
| > Like if Elon said he "built the Falcon 9". It's not
| explicitly true, he certainly wasn't machining parts or
| writing code for it, but he was involved enough that no one
| would really call it a lie either.
|
| Yea, that would be the way I read it: He "built" the sword
| just like the executives of your company "built" its
| products. It's like those home remodeling TV shows, where the
| remodelers don't really do anything besides write checks and
| drive around talking on their phones to other people who
| don't really do anything either. All the actual building is
| done by silent building contractors who are mostly off-
| camera.
| OJFord wrote:
| I don't even think it's an foreign concept or lost to time
| - Trump said he would build a wall (and 'did' a bit,
| afaiu?); British PMs have said they'll build Hinkley Point,
| HS2, Northern powerhouses, etc. It's understood what their
| role is in building such a thing, I think it's just the
| unfamiliarity with kings commissioning swords that makes
| that example read more literally, and if it were something
| more unusual then the language would be less ambiguous
| ('used swords he _even_ made himself ').
| wqaatwt wrote:
| Swords are usually made a by a single or a handful of
| people at most.
|
| Nuclear power plants or walls that are supposed to cover
| an entire border require thousands of workers and
| engineers. At that point the organizational/management
| aspects, acquiring of funding etc. become much more
| important than the direct contribution of any specific
| engineer or craftsman.
| keybored wrote:
| > It's not explicitly true, he certainly wasn't machining
| parts or writing code for it, but he was involved enough that
| no one would really call it a lie either.
|
| Or you've been taught well.
| libraryofbabel wrote:
| _Who built the seven gates of Thebes?_
|
| _The books are filled with names of kings._
|
| _Was it the kings who hauled the craggy blocks of stone?_
|
| - Bertolt Brecht, _Questions of a Worker who Reads_
| klik99 wrote:
| Honestly I wouldn't be surprised if he actually made it himself
| (though I agree the inscription is hardly proof). We have this
| view of Kings as fat, lazy bureaucratic blowhards because we're
| closest to the tailend of the history of monarchy. When this
| King was around there were a lot more regional leaders who
| fought and strength was admired the most, if a King was seen as
| weak he had just as much internal attempts that were way more
| physical than the political coups of today. You could not be a
| king or survive being a king without being a good fighter and
| knowing a bit about how weapons are made and used.
| Frummy wrote:
| Even recent kings have this grand education from the best of
| the best if not from actual geniuses, examples abound like
| Alexander the great and Aristotle, and usually there's other
| examples in wikipedia articles for most recent kings, even
| without tutoring here's a list of books that could have been
| used to educate royalty in less ancient times than this case
| but of course maybe a book wont teach craftsmanship
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mirrors_for_princes
|
| The elite/aristocracy of these old ages was at the top for
| reasons that make some sort of sense even though it could be
| violent it would be perhaps not completely uncorrelated with
| ability, if a prince is born into it they'd sometimes get
| taught multiple languages, music, poetry, on top of the
| reasonable politics and warfare, strategy etc. As for
| craftsmanship that is a good question since it's working with
| ones hands but with the examples here so far it would make
| sense if they could just get instructed by the best craftsmen
| as well to learn that too of course this is maybe too far
| backwards and another continent to extrapolate
| kragen wrote:
| I don't think anyone knows enough about the period to answer
| that question. Our main written source is the Annals of Spring
| and Autumn (Chun Qiu ), from Lu (not Yue
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yue_(state)) which spends 18000
| words on 242 years, in chronological order. For many of those
| years it simply says something like "Zhong " ("locusts"). It
| does not go into any detail on questions like which hobbies the
| kings of other countries spent their spare time on, and that's
| a difficult thing to infer from archaeological evidence, too.
| The written records of Yue were destroyed by order of Qin Shi
| Huang in the Fen Shu Keng Ru .
|
| So we kind of have to guess. My guesses are not the most
| informed.
|
| The sword (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sword_of_Goujian) is
| bronze, so it was probably cast (you _can_ forge bronze but the
| cost /benefit ratio is terrible). You could imagine a king
| pouring the hot bronze into the mold--that would be much
| quicker than forging an iron sword--but you probably wouldn't
| want him to make a habit of it, because contaminants in the
| metals would expose him to arsenic vapor, though this sword in
| particular is almost arsenic-free.
|
| Then all that's left is sharpening the blade, which any warrior
| has to be good at, and what is a king if not a warrior
| foremost? So it's plausible that a king might have put in most
| of the work embodied in the blade himself, with a grindstone,
| even if he didn't go around casting bronze regularly.
| int_19h wrote:
| It wouldn't be unprecedented. Every now and then you get a
| monarch who just happens to like doing something with his
| hands. It's rare enough that it's usually specifically noted
| when it happens, but e.g. consider Peter the Great of Russia,
| who famously partook in building ships for his fleet as a
| carpenter (although in his case it seems to have been driven
| more by relentless perfectionism and dissatisfaction with
| quality of other people's work).
| dmix wrote:
| The bakers stamp on the bread is interesting branding
|
| https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_webp,q_...
| Aloha wrote:
| I think it was the equivalent of a tax stamp
| binarycrusader wrote:
| My recollection from a previous article was that in many
| cases, ovens were communal, so the mark was so that they knew
| which items belonged to a particular baker:
|
| https://wheatbeat.com/bread-stamps/
| pezezin wrote:
| That is correct. In my home country, Spain, such ovens
| still exist, although nowadays they are few and far
| between. The few people who still use them keep signing
| their bread, a tradition that goes back to at least the
| Ancient Egypt. You can read a bit more in this Wikipedia
| article (no English version, sorry)
|
| https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sello_de_pan
| dmix wrote:
| Interesting, do you have to stamp it at a certain point
| in the baking process? I'm guessing after it expands at a
| certain point
| rcostin2k2 wrote:
| At certain religious events, even today, Orthodox
| Christians serve a handmade bread that has such a seal
| applied after it is shaped into a cross but before it
| rises and is baked in the oven. Once it rises, the mark
| expands but remains clearly visible after baking.
| gunian wrote:
| I guess the share your home BS started hundreds of years
| before my time makes life seem more futyl
| LeftHandPath wrote:
| It is! I found the sword quite fascinating as well. The older
| Chinese lettering on it looks really neat, too
| j_bum wrote:
| Agreed, this was the most poignant object for me in the
| article!
| int_19h wrote:
| While we're on the subject of ancient bread, ACOUP had a nice
| and extensive series of posts detailing how it was made and
| distributed, with a lot of info on Romans specifically:
|
| https://acoup.blog/2020/07/24/collections-bread-how-did-they...
| mcswell wrote:
| 41 AD was a very good year.
| insane_dreamer wrote:
| While the tomb was sealed it wasn't a vacuum, so how did the
| liquid not evaporate over time?
| Karellen wrote:
| Looking at the images in the article, I think c), d) and e) in
| the first group, and the close-up image a couple of paragraphs
| later, are all the same item.
|
| So. e) looks like d) with a top covering taken off. And, from
| the curved "handles" visible in c), e) and the close-up, they
| could all be the same glass vessel. We can see in c) that the
| vessel does have a lid. In e) and the close-up, there appears
| to be a residue where the lid rested against the container.
|
| So it's possible that liquid from the jar got to the join,
| evaporated, and left behind a substance that sealed the
| container against further evaporation?
|
| You'd probably have to read the full report for an actual
| explanation, but that's my guess from what's reported in the
| linked article itself.
| chrisco255 wrote:
| The vessel was probably sealed intentionally by the Romans.
| They certainly knew how to seal wine and glass containers.
| But it was also in a lead case and the tomb itself was sealed
| allowing for very little air transfer over the years.
| thom wrote:
| I agree these objects (just like colourised photos) help bridge
| the distance to the past. But I've had the same experience purely
| with text. If you read Cicero's letters and diaries, and then
| just imagine him - suffering writer's block, wracked with anxiety
| and self-doubt, desperate for his friends to cheer him up - as a
| neurotic, terminally-online Twitter user, it fits perfectly and
| breathes life into his every word.
| teddyh wrote:
| It is always fascinating when Americans re-discover that old
| things actually exist.
|
| But, as they say, an American thinks that 100 years is a long
| time while a European thinks that 100 miles is a long way.
| dang wrote:
| Please don't post nationalistic flamebait to HN. That's a
| pretty insulting variant of it.
|
| (I love the adage you quote, though. When I first heard it it
| said "Canadian" and "Englishman", which probably says something
| about how far back it goes.)
| poulpy123 wrote:
| I didn't even notice the author was American. You don't need to
| be one to be fascinated by archaeology.
| ThinkingGuy wrote:
| One of the most interesting parts of Pompeii for me was seeing
| the area where they've restored a vineyard, to the point of
| planting the rows of vines in the exact spots that held vines
| 2000 years ago. While large areas of the city consists of ruins
| of buildings that you kind of have to infer the layout of from
| the floorplans, the vineyard was the one of the spots where I
| most felt like I was looking back in time, and seeing the spot
| more-or-less as it would have looked in 79CE.
| duskwuff wrote:
| One interesting recent discovery at Pompeii was what appears to
| have been, for all intents and purposes, a fast food restaurant
| - complete with a serving counter set up much like a modern-day
| steam table. Many of the original wall paintings are intact -
| it's not hard to imagine what it would have looked like, and
| it's surprisingly familiar.
|
| https://arstechnica.com/science/2020/12/archaeologists-excav...
| gunian wrote:
| Make fast food great again respect the ancestors
| sedatk wrote:
| "All this has happened before, and all this will happen again"
| --Battlestar Galactica (originally from Peter Pan though)
| taneliv wrote:
| "What has been is what will be, and what has been done is what
| will be done, and there is nothing new under the sun."[1] from
| Ecclesiastes 1:9. Apparently the quote not only describes the
| phenomenon, but has become witness to itself.
|
| [1]
| https://www.chabad.org/library/bible_cdo/aid/16462/jewish/Ch...
| dyauspitr wrote:
| Just as it was before, so it will be again. -Vashista
|
| The same events will repeat in every Yuga -Vishnu Purana
| (1.3.1-2)
| NL807 wrote:
| How on earth did the wine not evaporate out of the vessel over
| such a long period of time?
| chrisco255 wrote:
| The vessel was made of glass and airtight. It was also in a
| lead case in a sealed tomb underground.
| CyberDildonics wrote:
| I can't wait to read about the uncanny immediacy of the
| unreasonable effectiveness of the timeless aesthetic of the past.
| pea wrote:
| I'm curious how dangerous it would be to drink the wine?
| temp0826 wrote:
| Wine? More likely vinegar I'd guess
| postexitus wrote:
| Oh mon dieu, since when did Spanish make anything other than
| vinegar. ah ah ah.
| tmountain wrote:
| Probably not that dangerous. The ethanol has likely evaporated
| leaving behind vinegar and unpleasant byproducts. There's a
| risk of mold and bacterial contamination depending on how well
| the seal has remained intact. Depending on the process used,
| it's possible the wine could contain lead salts (for
| sweetness), which are toxic. I doubt it would kill you, but
| it'd likely be very unpleasant to drink.
| myrandomcomment wrote:
| OMG! The only question is did anyone try it?
| carlob wrote:
| According to wikipedia:
|
| > Analysis of mineral salts in the wine revealed a high
| concentration of potassium salts, indicative of the cremains in
| the wine
|
| I kinda wanted to try it too before I read this.
| scaglio wrote:
| Fascinating! The wine discovery reminds me one scene from the
| book 'The Dark Forest'[0] when the protagonist drinks a wine from
| some centuries before... spoiler: it wasn't good.
|
| [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Dark_Forest
| metalman wrote:
| The most profound story of this type is the account of finding a
| leaf, in 10's of million year old clay, that when exposed, was
| green, but then very very rapidly oxidised and crumbled.Ref: from
| somewhere in the great lakes region? 90's mag, likely sciam.Also
| similar storys of other very ancient soft tissues, somewhat
| contentious, though it is understood that,unless lithified,
| ancient organic remains are exceptionaly fragile and do crumble
| quickly without meticulous and complicated preservation
| tecniques, the three common reasons for presevation in situ are
| freezing ,water saturation, or drying/mumification. The shear
| volume of artifacts that humans have, and are leaving behind,
| insures plenty of interesting finds availible into the far
| future.
| throwaway63203 wrote:
| There are a few unconfirmed stories about people eating mammoth
| meat that had been frozen in ice for thousands of years
|
| https://strangeanimalspodcast.blubrry.net/2023/12/04/episode...
| poulpy123 wrote:
| The thing that surprised me the most was to discover that there
| was patchouli perfume. I always associated it hippies and the
| hippie trail from the 60s and was thinking it was from Asia
| poulpy123 wrote:
| After checking patchouli is indeed a south Asian plant, that is
| not endemic from the Mediterranean area, so it's even more
| fascinating than the wine
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