Word: archaeologists
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...within the city limits the petrified-ash shells of the bodies of some 40 victims. Formed by the gradual decay of the body inside its ash wrappings, the shells retained over the years a near-perfect negative impression of the figure they had enclosed. By a technique refined by Archaeologist Amedeo Maiuri. currently in charge of Pompeii excavations, the presence of the ash cavities is detected by cautiously tapping the ground with blunted pickaxes. When the excavators spot a hollow, they drill several holes through the stratum of ash, pour thinned plaster of Paris into the cavity. After allowing...
...victim removed last week was a strongly built man sprawling on his belly, legs wide apart, hands covering his face, neck drawn in. The minutely defined muscles of legs, arms and chest were bulging in their final death spasm. Theorized Archaeologist Maiuri: "Judging from the body's musculature and from the fact that the man was fleeing alone, I would say that he was a workman or a servant. He waited under some shaky roof or vault, hoping that the storm of lapilli, pumice and ash would pass over. Then, in the midst of the blinding storm and blackening...
Encouraged by his find, Archaeologist Maiuri has already started tapping for more cavities outside Pompeii's walls. The sepulchres of hundreds of other victims, he reasons, may lie between the city gates...
...contrast to later-day Mayan works, writes Mexican Painter-Archaeologist Miguel Covarrubías, Mezcala objects are "highly stylized and schematic, and their coarse, vigorous character makes them readily identifiable" (see cut). Probably sculpted between 200 B.C.-800 A.D., surviving examples of Mezcala workmanship are small (many only 2-in. to 7-in. tall) and were made from the same hard stone used for chisels. But primitive as are the small masks, figures and votive animals, they pass the test of good sculpture. Even magnified in size, they keep their proportion and acquire a monumental gravity...
...erected in Israel, linking the busy present to the Old Testament past. Thus they will give modern Israelis a morale-boosting sense of their ancient glories. Still more important, perhaps, they will make tourism more rewarding for tourists-and tourists more rewarding for Israel. General Yigael Yadin, archaeologist and war hero who advises the government on historical matters, spelled it out for reporters. "Put yourself in the shoes of a person who was weaned on Bible stories. He dreams of visiting the places he has heard about since childhood. When he gets to Israel . . . nobody seems to know where they...