Jewels From an Ethiopian Grave Reveal 2,000-Year-Old Link To Rome

An anonymous reader writes: Archaeologists have discovered jewels from an Ethiopian grave that revealed a 2,000-year-old link to Rome. Louise Schofield, a former British Museum curator, and her team of 11 excavated the ancient city of Aksum for six weeks where the artifacts were found. The treasures offer evidence that the Romans were trading in Aksum hundreds of years earlier than previously thought. Schofield said: “Every day we had shed-loads of treasure coming out of all the graves. I was blown away: I’d been confident we’d find something, but not on this scale."

Comments

And next

[Attila Dimedici]

Next they will announce the startling revelation that there was trade between the United States and Mexico over 100 years ago.
Seriously, have these people never looked at a map? The Roman Empire shared a border with the Empire mentioned in the article. Of course they were trading. That's what people do.

Re:And next

[Attila Dimedici]

Personally, as a long-time reader of Archaeology magazine and enthusiastic amateur in the field, what I keep being surprised by is the field's routine assumptions that people before us were somehow stupid.

It derives from the "progressive" view that is taught so thoroughly in most schools (especially colleges and universities) that "new" means "better" and that history is irrevocably moving from worse to better.

Re:Six Weeks

[LoyalOpposition]

We've, in my opinion, moved into an era where knowledge and research that has no practical application equates to something that's not worth all that much. Capitalism seems to be the dominant (economic) system that drives modern research and I hate it. If there is no concrete monetary profit from a venture then good luck pursuing an avenue of research that does not yield a "return on investment".

I understand your concern, but I think you're looking at things wrongly. I'm having a little trouble putting it into words, but maybe it'll help if you look at things this way. Imagine a world in which everyone was doing research that had no immediate benefits, or any expected return for the next two or three score years. You'd starve to death. People eat immediate food, and go to immediate doctors, and live in immediate houses, and wear immediate clothes. The inescapable conclusion is that only a fraction of people can be employed in that kind of research. The way that we, as an economic system, reach an equilibrium on the amount of that kind of research is by not over-stimulating it by excessive investment in it.

Or if you can't sympathize with that explanation, then let me ask this question. If avenues of research with no return are so important, then why are you demanding a high salary and large raises?

~Loyal