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Animal Sacrifice
Animal sacrifice is the ritual killing and offering of animals, usually as part of a religious ritual or to appease or maintain favour with a deity. Animal sacrifices were common throughout Europe and the Ancient Near East until the spread of Christianity in Late Antiquity, and continue in some cultures or religions today. Human sacrifice, where it existed, was always much rarer. All or only part of a sacrificial animal may be offered; some cultures, like the Ancient Greeks ate most of the edible parts of the sacrifice in a feast, and burnt the rest as an offering. Others burnt the whole animal offering, called a Holocaust (sacrifice), holocaust. Usually, the best animal or best share of the animal is the one presented for offering. Animal sacrifice should generally be distinguished from the religiously prescribed methods of ritual slaughter of animals for normal consumption as food. During the Neolithic Revolution, early humans began to move from hunter-gatherer cultures toward ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sacrifice Boar Louvre G112
Sacrifice is an act or offering made to a deity. A sacrifice can serve as propitiation, or a sacrifice can be an offering of praise and thanksgiving. Evidence of ritual animal sacrifice has been seen at least since ancient Hebrews and Greeks, and possibly existed before that. Evidence of ritual human sacrifice can also be found back to at least pre-Columbian civilizations of Mesoamerica as well as in European civilizations. Varieties of ritual non-human sacrifices are practiced by numerous religions today. Terminology The Latin term ''sacrificium'' (a sacrifice) derived from Latin ''sacrificus'' (performing priestly functions or sacrifices), which combined the concepts ''sacra'' (sacred things) and ''facere'' (to make, to do). The Latin word ''sacrificium'' came to apply to the Christian eucharist in particular, sometimes named a "bloodless sacrifice" to distinguish it from blood sacrifices. In individual non-Christian ethnic religions, terms translated as "sacrifice" incl ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Walter Burkert
Walter Burkert (; 2 February 1931 – 11 March 2015) was a German scholar of Greek mythology and cult. A professor of classics at the University of Zurich, Switzerland, he taught in the UK and the US. He has influenced generations of students of religion since the 1960s, combining in the modern way the findings of archaeology and epigraphy with the work of poets, historians, and philosophers. He was a member of both the American Philosophical Society and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He published books on the balance between lore and science among the followers of Pythagoras, and more extensively on ritual and archaic cult survival, on the ritual killing at the heart of religion, on mystery religions, and on the reception in the Hellenic world of Near Eastern and Persian culture, which sets Greek religion in its wider Aegean and Near Eastern context. Personal life Burkert was born in Neuendettelsau. He married Maria Bosch in 1957 and they had three childr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Chalcolithic
The Chalcolithic ( ) (also called the Copper Age and Eneolithic) was an archaeological period characterized by the increasing use of smelted copper. It followed the Neolithic and preceded the Bronze Age. It occurred at different periods in different areas, but was absent in some parts of the world, such as Russia, where there was no well-defined Copper Age between the Stone and Bronze Ages. Stone tools were still predominantly used during this period. The Chalcolithic covers both the early cold working (hammering) of near pure copper ores, as exhibited by the likes of North American Great Lakes Old Copper complex, from around 6,500 BC, through the later copper smelting cultures. The archaeological site of Belovode, on Rudnik mountain in Serbia, has the world's oldest securely dated evidence of copper smelting at high temperature, from . The transition from Copper Age to Bronze Age in Europe occurred between the late 5th and the late In the Ancient Near East the Copper ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
List Of Ancient Egyptian Dynasties
In ancient Egyptian history, dynasties are series of rulers sharing a common origin. They are usually, but not always, traditionally divided into 33 pharaonic dynasties; these dynasties are commonly grouped by modern scholars into "kingdoms" and "intermediate periods". The first 30 divisions come from the 3rd century BC Egyptian priest Manetho, whose history ''Aegyptaiaca'' was probably written for a Greek-speaking Ptolemaic ruler of Egypt but survives only in fragments and summaries. The names of the last two, the short-lived Persian-ruled 31st Dynasty and the longer-lasting Ptolemaic Dynasty, are later coinings. While widely used and useful, the system does have its shortcomings. Some dynasties only ruled part of Egypt and existed concurrently with other dynasties based in other cities. The 7th might not have existed at all (or may have been a continuation of the 8th), the 10th seems to be a continuation of the 9th, and there might have been one or several Upper Egyptian ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Herodotus
Herodotus (; BC) was a Greek historian and geographer from the Greek city of Halicarnassus (now Bodrum, Turkey), under Persian control in the 5th century BC, and a later citizen of Thurii in modern Calabria, Italy. He wrote the '' Histories'', a detailed account of the Greco-Persian Wars, among other subjects such as the rise of the Achaemenid dynasty of Cyrus. He has been described as " The Father of History", a title conferred on him by the ancient Roman orator Cicero, and the " Father of Lies" by others. The ''Histories'' primarily cover the lives of prominent kings and famous battles such as Marathon, Thermopylae, Artemisium, Salamis, Plataea, and Mycale. His work deviates from the main topics to provide a cultural, ethnographical, geographical, and historiographical background that forms an essential part of the narrative and provides readers with a wellspring of additional information. Herodotus was criticized in his times for his inclusion of "legends an ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hippopotami
The hippopotamus (''Hippopotamus amphibius;'' ; : hippopotamuses), often shortened to hippo (: hippos), further qualified as the common hippopotamus, Nile hippopotamus and river hippopotamus, is a large semiaquatic mammal native to sub-Saharan Africa. It is one of only two extant species in the family Hippopotamidae, the other being the pygmy hippopotamus (''Choeropsis liberiensis'' or ''Hexaprotodon liberiensis''). Its name comes from the ancient Greek for "river horse" (). After elephants and rhinoceroses, the hippopotamus is the next largest land mammal. It is also the largest extant land artiodactyl. Despite their physical resemblance to pigs and other terrestrial even-toed ungulates, the closest living relatives of the hippopotamids are cetaceans (whales, dolphins, porpoises, etc.), from which they diverged about 55 million years ago. Hippos are recognisable for their barrel-shaped torsos, wide-opening mouths with large canine tusks, nearly hairless bodies, pillar-like le ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Baboons
Baboons are primates comprising the genus ''Papio'', one of the 23 genera of Old World monkeys, in the family Cercopithecidae. There are six species of baboon: the hamadryas baboon, the Guinea baboon, the olive baboon, the yellow baboon, the Kinda baboon and the chacma baboon. Each species is native to one of six areas of Africa and the hamadryas baboon is also native to part of the Arabian Peninsula. Baboons are among the largest non- hominoid primates and have existed for at least two million years. Baboons vary in size and weight depending on the species. The smallest, the Kinda baboon, is in length and weighs only , while the largest, the chacma baboon, is up to in length and weighs . All baboons have long, dog-like muzzles, heavy, powerful jaws with sharp canine teeth, close-set eyes, thick fur except on their muzzles, short tails, and nerveless, hairless pads of skin on their protruding buttocks called ischial callosities that provide for sitting comfort. M ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hierakonpolis
Nekhen (, ), also known as Hierakonpolis (; , meaning City of Hawks or City of Falcons, a reference to Horus; ) was the religious and political capital of Upper Egypt at the end of prehistoric Egypt ( 3200–3100 BC) and probably also during the Early Dynastic Period ( 3100–2686 BC). Located in Upper Egypt about 100 kilometers south of the modern-day city of Luxor, Nekhen has been the subject of extensive archeological research over the past one and half centuries, and has yielded a large number of artifacts that give a greater understanding to this period of ancient Egyptian history. The city was the center of cult worship of the god Horus, who is said to have his origins in Nekhen as its tutelary deity. Tombs, temples, breweries, houses, and other structures have all been discovered that date back to the predynastic era. The oldest known tomb with painted decoration, known as the Painted Tomb, is located in Nekhen and is thought to date to c. 3500–3200 BC. It shares disti ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gazelle
A gazelle is one of many antelope species in the genus ''Gazella'' . There are also seven species included in two further genera; '' Eudorcas'' and '' Nanger'', which were formerly considered subgenera of ''Gazella''. A third former subgenus, '' Procapra'', includes three living species of Asian gazelles. Gazelles are known as swift animals. Some can run at bursts as high as or run at a sustained speed of . Gazelles are found mostly in the deserts, grasslands, and savannas of Africa, but they are also found in southwest and central Asia and the Indian subcontinent. They tend to live in herds, and eat fine, easily digestible plants and leaves. Gazelles are relatively small antelopes, most standing high at the shoulder, and are generally fawn-colored. The gazelle genera are ''Gazella'', ''Eudorcas'', and ''Nanger''. The taxonomy of these genera is confused, and the classification of species and subspecies has been an unsettled issue. Currently, the genus ''Gazella'' is widely ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Upper Egypt
Upper Egypt ( ', shortened to , , locally: ) is the southern portion of Egypt and is composed of the Nile River valley south of the delta and the 30th parallel North. It thus consists of the entire Nile River valley from Cairo south to Lake Nasser (formed by the Aswan High Dam). Name In ancient Egypt, Upper Egypt was known as ''tꜣ šmꜣw'', literally "the Land of Reeds" or "the Sedgeland", named for the sedges that grow there. In Biblical Hebrew it was known as and in Akkadian it was known as . Both names originate from the Egyptian '' pꜣ- tꜣ- rsj'', meaning "the southern land". In Arabic, the region is called Sa'id or Sahid, from صعيد meaning "uplands", from the root صعد meaning to go up, ascend, or rise. Inhabitants of Upper Egypt are known as Sa'idis and they generally speak Sa'idi Egyptian Arabic. Geography Upper Egypt is between the Cataracts of the Nile beyond modern-day Aswan, downriver (northward) to the area of El-Ayait, which places modern- ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Badari Culture
The Badarian culture provides the earliest direct evidence of agriculture in Upper Egypt during the Predynastic Era.Holmes, D., & Friedman, R. (1994). Survey and Test Excavations in the Badari Region, Egypt. Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society, 60(1), 105-142. doi:10.1017/S0079497X0000342X It flourished between 4400 and 4000 BC, and might have already emerged by 5000 BC. Location and excavation Badari culture is so named because of its discovery at El-Badari (), an area in the Asyut Governorate in Upper Egypt. It is located between Matmar and Qau, approximately northwest of present-day Luxor (ancient Thebes). includes numerous Predynastic cemeteries (notably Mostagedda, Deir Tasa and the cemetery of itself), as well as at least one early Predynastic settlement at Hemamieh. The area stretches for along the east bank of the Nile. Some Badarian sites also show evidence of later predynastic use. It was first excavated by Guy Brunton and Gertrude Caton-Th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ancient Egypt
Ancient Egypt () was a cradle of civilization concentrated along the lower reaches of the Nile River in Northeast Africa. It emerged from prehistoric Egypt around 3150BC (according to conventional Egyptian chronology), when Upper and Lower Egypt were amalgamated by Menes, who is believed by the majority of List of Egyptologists, Egyptologists to have been the same person as Narmer. The history of ancient Egypt unfolded as a series of stable kingdoms interspersed by the "Periodization of ancient Egypt, Intermediate Periods" of relative instability. These stable kingdoms existed in one of three periods: the Old Kingdom of Egypt, Old Kingdom of the Early Bronze Age; the Middle Kingdom of Egypt, Middle Kingdom of the Middle Bronze Age; or the New Kingdom of Egypt, New Kingdom of the Late Bronze Age. The pinnacle of ancient Egyptian power was achieved during the New Kingdom, which extended its rule to much of Nubia and a considerable portion of the Levant. After this period, Egypt ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
