Oldest depiction of Creation discovered

A relief from the Ain Samiya goblet depicts cosmic order emerging from chaos (Regular Sigg)

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World’s oldest depiction of Creation discovered

(The Telegraph) The earliest depiction of the creation of the universe has been found on a 4,300-year-old silver goblet discovered in the West Bank, Palestine.

The vessel shows “before and after” scenes with a human-chimera figure confronted by a monstrous snake [naga in Buddhism], before the snake is subdued and the Sun takes its place in the sky, held aloft by two deities.

Will KAOS destroy Order again?

(Get Smart) Will KAOS ever overcome order and CONTROL again?

Archaeologists say the images are an allegory for Order triumphing over Chaos at the beginning of time. The Sun is shown moving across the heavens in a celestial “boat of light.” It is the oldest known depiction of the formation of the cosmos and predates the Babylonian creation myth Enuma Elish – which was recorded on stone tablets – by more than 1,000 years.

“The goblet does not tell of a violent struggle between gods [devas and asuras], but of a peaceful process of cosmic ordering,ˮ said Daniel Sarlo, co-author of the paper about the discovery for the Luwian Studies Foundation, a non-profit research group based in Switzerland.

“It shows how the Sun is born, banishes chaos, and renews the world.”

Order over Chaos

The artifact, which is 3.1 inches (7.9 cm) high, is known as the Ain Samiya goblet, and was found in the 1970s near Kafr Malik in the West Bank.

It dates from 2650 to 1950 BC and until now, experts thought it was linked to the Enuma Elish, which recounts the struggle between the younger gods and the monster of primordial chaos. More

Scientists unveil REAL 'Chinese dragon' fossils

Lucinda Cameron, The Independent, 2/22/24; CC Liu, Ashley Wells (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly

Dinocephalosaurus orientalis, Guizhou province, China (Nat'l Museums Scotland/PA Wire)

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We remember you, O Dragon, so please spare us.

More details of a long-necked sea creature compared to a Chinese dragon have been revealed for the first time following new research.

The Dinocephalosaurus orientalis fossils were discovered in Guizhou province, southern China.

With 32 separate neck vertebrae, it had an extraordinarily long neck, researchers say, and its flippered limbs and well-preserved fish in its stomach region indicated it was very well adapted to an oceanic lifestyle.

Naga: sea creature, reptilian dinosaur

But they lived on to battle humans.

The reptile was originally identified in 2003, but the discovery of additional, more complete specimens since then has enabled an international team of scientists to depict the creature in full [which is particularly fitting to reveal at the beginning of the Year of the Dragon].

Nick Fraser, keeper of natural sciences at National Museums Scotland, was one of those involved. He said:

Long neck easy to support in water, chasing fish

“This discovery allows us to see this remarkable long-necked animal in full for the very first time. “It is yet one more example of the weird and wonderful world of the Triassic that continues to baffle palaeontologists. “We are certain that it will capture imaginations across the globe due to its striking appearance, reminiscent of the long and snake-like mythical Chinese dragon.” More:

• VIDEO: Paleontologists unveil secrets of 240-million-year-old fossilized ‘Chinese dragon,’ a creature adapted to water

"Loch Ness" type fossils discovered in Scotland

Pat Macpherson, CC Liu, Wisdom Quarterly; Joe Palca (npr.org, 1-11-15) Nagas in the News

Artist's rendering of what Dearcmhara Shawcrossi may have looked like during the time of the dinosaurs (Todd Marshall/University of Edinburgh/npr.org).

Photos show Nessie's distinctive long, curved neck in the sea off Queensland (mirror.co.uk)

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Ancient Scottish Reptilian Sea Creature Found

Scientists in Scotland have found a prehistoric behemoth: a previously unknown species of reptile that lived in the oceans during the time of the dinosaurs. And, no, scientists are not yet linking this new fossil to the Loch Ness monster [which they do not have official permission to believe in no matter what evidence is presented].
 

Paleontologist Stephen Brusatte, at the University of Edinburgh, led the team that characterized the new reptile species, in a study published online Monday in the Scottish Journal of Geology. Prof. Brusatte says one could be forgiven if one were to mistake it for a dinosaur.
 

Strange creatures exist

"It looks like a dinosaur, but it isn't technically a dinosaur," he says. "Dinosaurs didn't live in the ocean." The new reptile is from a class of marine creatures called icthyosaurs.

"And it's the first one of these sea-living, enormous, colossal top-of-the food-chain reptiles that's ever been found in Scotland," says Prof. Brusatte. "It was about motorboat size...about 14 or 15 feet long or so."

 

Prof. Brusatte says the new fossil was found on the Isle of Skye off the west coast of Scotland. But he didn't find it. It was discovered more than 50 years ago by an amateur fossil hunter named Bryan Shawcross. Prof. Brusatte says the fossil's been sitting in a museum in Glasgow unidentified because 50 years ago there weren't many paleontologists in Scotland.

 

Loch Ness sighting with photographic confirmation science wishes to ignore (Hemedia).

 
That's changed, especially in the last decade, says Prof. Brussate, a native of Chicago, now living in Edinburgh. He and other Scottish scientists have recently been searching through Scottish fossil collections trying to identify what earlier fossil hunters found.

Now, when one identifies a new fossil, one has the privilege of naming it. "It's a new genus and species, so it gets two names," says Prof. Brussate. "And each one of those names is really special to us."

The genus name, Dearcmhara -- pronounced "jark vara" -- is the Scottish Gaelic word for marine lizard. (Scottish Gaelic is a traditional language for the residents of Skye). The species name is shawcrossi, named for Bryan Shawcross, who found the fossil.

 

There are likely lots of dinosaur fossils still to be found in Scotland, Prof. Brusatte speculates, including many from around 170 million years ago -- a time that isn't well represented in the fossil record.

Maybe what people see and mistake for Nessie are large sturgeon or dimensional creatures materializing in ways the public is not being told about to the extent anyone understands.

  

One need not be a paleontologist to find fossils of dinosaurs or other creatures, just as Shawcross was not. Anyone can come to the Isle of Skye, or anywhere else, and go hunting.

 

What's more, Prof. Brusatte says, there's a toxic whiskey distillery on the island, which could lead to alcoholism, abuse, or the telling of lots of tall tales. "Have a nice whiskey tasting," he jokes. "Get some smoky, peaty whiskey in the afternoon, and then go find fossils afterward. Or maybe do it in the reverse order."

 

Prehistoric Megafish

And if you find a new species, Prof. Brusatte will be glad to take credit for it because he and his colleagues will be happy to name it after you, if you donate it to them to study. Or science could just wait till you die, or confiscate it while you live in the name of "science." Whatever you do, forget about the Loch Ness "monsters" referred to by all of the locals, many of who have seen them, as "Nessie." Speaking of what science officially denies is a good way to be kept out of official science.

• Science
• dinosaurs
• paleontology
• Scotland
• Nessie.co.uk

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• Prehistoric Megafish ate ocean's tiniest critters [just like today's largest creatures on Earth such as whales and megasharks] 
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• Why do we continue to care about dinosaurs?

• LOCH NESS CREATURE is real and Scottish people know it
• Is THIS the Loch Ness Monster? Apple's Maps satellite image... (dailymail.co.uk) For six months the image has been studied by experts at the Official Loch Ness Monster Fan Club, where excitement is mounting after various... 
• Loch Ness Monster sighted (History.com) This Day in History... Although accounts of an aquatic beast living in Scotland's Loch Ness date back 1,500 years, the modern legend of the Loch Ness Monster is born when a ... 
• Loch Ness Monster (Huffington Post) 
• PHOTOS: Loch Ness Monster sightings through the years (Telegraph.co.uk) This image, taken by an Apple map satellite, depicts a shadowy form of around 100 feet in length with something akin to flippers in the water of the Loch Ness. 
• Nessie and Other Lake Monsters (Strange Magazine) Since the larger public first became aware of the monster in 1933, the Loch Ness beastie has become an international media star, her most recent appearance...
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Chinese "Sea Monster" found

LiveScience.com (Life's Little Mysteries Staff, June 22)

A massive sea creature has washed up on a beach in Guangdong, China. So badly decayed that it cannot be positively identified, the "sea monster" is 55 feet long and weighs approximately 4.5 tons, according to The Sun. Upon seeing a PHOTO OF THE CARCASSS, three marine biology experts -- Scott Baker of Oregon State University Marine Mammal Institute, Bill Perrin senior scientist for marine mammals at the National Marine Fisheries Service, and Bob Brownell senior scientist for international protected resources with NOAA's Fisheries Service -- all think it's a... More

• Serpent eats serpent in Oregon, USA
  
• "East River Monster" is no mutant
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• Dangers in the Deep: 10 Scariest Sea Creatures

Nagas in the News: Bownessie Lake Monster

Tourists detail a petrifying encounter with a rippling serpent known by local residents in England as Bownessie. This is believed to be the eighth sighting in the past last five years of a long humpbacked creature (Tom Pickles).

Kayakers snap photo of England’s new "Loch Ness Monster"
Brett Michael Dykes (The Upshot, Feb. 18, 2011)
BOWNESS-ON-WINDERMERE, England - Nothing puts a damper on a serene afternoon's kayaking like the sight of a primeval sea monster [Buddhist naga or reptilian, snake, sea serpent]. That was the rude lesson for Tom Pickles and Sarah Harrington, who'd taken their watercraft out on the foggy waters of Lake Windermere, only to encounter what appeared to be "an enormous snake" swimming by.

"It was petrifying and we paddled back to the shore straight away. At first I thought it was a dog and then saw it was much bigger and moving really quickly at about 10 mph," the 24-year-old Pickles told The Telegraph. "Each hump was moving in a rippling motion and it was swimming fast. Its skin was like a seal's but its shape was completely abnormal -- it's not like any animal I've ever seen before." More>>

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Explosive population growth will tax food production more in the next 40 years than in the last 8,000. Income growth - Crowd of planets in galaxy - Rare earth mining in Wyo. - Space weather threat

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• UFO conference in Darwin, Australia postponed
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Nagas in the News: Bus-Sized Snakes

Ancient fossil find: a snake that could eat a cow!
Malcolm Ritter (AP)

NEW YORK – Never mind the 40-foot snake that menaced Jennifer Lopez in the 1997 movie "Anaconda." Not even Hollywood could match a new discovery from the ancient world.

Fossils from northeastern Colombia reveal the biggest snake ever discovered: a behemoth that stretched 42 to 45 feet long, reaching more than 2,500 pounds.

"This thing weighs more than a bison and is longer than a city bus," enthused snake expert Jack Conrad of the American Museum of Natural History in New York, who was familiar with the find.

"It could easily eat something the size of a cow. A human would just be toast immediately."

"If it tried to enter my office to eat me, it would have a hard time squeezing through the door," reckoned paleontologist Jason Head of the University of Toronto Missisauga.

Actually, the beast probably munched on ancient relatives of crocodiles in its rainforest home some 58 million to 60 million years ago, he said.

Head is senior author of a report on the find in Thursday's issue of the journal Nature.

(The same issue carries another significant report from the distant past. Scientists said they'd found the oldest known evidence of animal life, remnants of steroids produced by sponges more than 635 million years ago in Oman.) More>>

• NAGAS: Reptilian race of human rulers in Buddhist, Hindu, Jain mythology
• Bus-sized boa slithers into record books (AFP)
• Titanic ancient snake was as long as Tyrannosaurus (Reuters)

PHOTOS: 1. Modern boa (KNBC News); 2. artist's rendering shows the colossal prehistoric snake Titanoboa cerrejonensis, whose remains were found in a Colombian coal mine (Jason Bourque, University of Florida/Handout/Reuters).

Behemoths of the Land and Sea?

Sea "monsters," like those of the sky (dragons) and land (serpents) may not be as farfetched as once thought: "Ancient Whales Gave Birth on Land"
Jeanna Bryner (LiveScience.com)

More than 47 million years ago, a whale was about to give birth to her young...on land. That's according to skeletal remains of a pregnant cetacean whose fetus was positioned head-down as is the case for land mammals but not aquatic whales. The teeth of the fetus were so well-developed that researchers who analyzed the fossils think the baby would have been born within days, had its mom not died. More>>