Word: monumentality
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...however, a newly discovered threat to the 4,500-year-old monument poses fresh problems for conservationists. It has also triggered a scientific and political controversy. A chemical analysis of the Sphinx by K. Lal Gauri, 48, a stone-preservation expert at the University of Louisville, suggests that salt, not wind, is the main cause behind the statue's decay...
...within the stone. In recent years, scientists agree, the salt damage has been accelerated by the Aswan High Dam, more than 400 miles upriver. The new dam has raised the water table throughout the Nile Valley. Another villain has been the high-salt mortar used to restore the flaking monument. "Walking on top of the Sphinx in the morning," says Gauri, "you can hear the stones popping like potato chips...
Gauri's analysis was prompted by the American Research Center in Egypt (ARCE) and the Egyptian Antiquities Organization (EAO). The agencies set out jointly in 1979 to clean and map the monument. The task of producing a detailed architectural chart of the Sphinx was taken on by Mark Lehner, 32, ARCE's field director. At Lehner's invitation, Gauri visited the site...
...Jerusalem! A monument to the world's three great religions-and a reminder that there is nothing so divisive as believers who are convinced that they alone are doing the will of God [April...
...tears and the trust had been replaced by heartbreak, anger, resentment and confusion. I also carried with me an overwhelming love and respect for the young men who, like me, carried on the best they could in the most miserable physical and psychological situations. If there is one monument [Feb. 22] to one soldier on the face of this, earth, there must be one for the G.I.s of Viet Nam, who gave as much as any who fought in earlier conflicts and, so far, have been rewarded only with medals of contempt and disinterest...