Brit-Am Research Sources (14 August, 2014, 18 Av, 5774)
Contents:
1. Interesting Paraphrase of the Prophecy of Balaam by Josephus
(brought to our attention by Sylvia Halpert)
2. Proposal of Benjamin Franklin for Design of the Great Seal
3. Finds at Skara Brae (Scotland) show links to general neighborhood of Ancient Israel
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1. Interesting Paraphrase of the Prophecy of Balaam by Josephus (brought to our attention by Sylvia Halpert)
Josephus Flavius: Antiquities of the Jews
http://www.biblestudytools.com/history/flavius-josephus/antiquities-jews/book-4/chapter-6.html
Book 4; Chapter 6:
4. When God had given him this charge, he came to Balak; and when the king had entertained him in a magnificent manner, he desired him to go to one of the mountains to take a view of the state of the camp of the Hebrews. Balak himself also came to the mountain, and brought the prophet along with him, with a royal attendance. This mountain lay over their heads, and was distant sixty furlongs from the camp. Now when he saw them, he desired the king to build him seven altars, and to bring him as many bulls and rams; to which desire the king did presently conform. He then slew the sacrifices, and offered them as burnt- offerings, that he might observe some signal of the flight of the Hebrews.
Then said he,
"Happy is this people, on whom God bestows the possession of innumerable good things, and grants them his own providence to be their assistant and their guide; so that there is not any nation among mankind but you will be esteemed superior to them in virtue, and in the earnest prosecution of the best rules of life, and of such as are pure from wickedness, and will leave those rules to your excellent children; and this out of the regard that God bears to you, and the provision of such things for you as may render you happier than any other people under the sun. You shall retain that land to which he hath sent you, and it shall ever be under the command of your children; and both all the earth, as well as the seas, shall be filled with your glory: and you shall be sufficiently numerous to supply the world in general, and every region of it in particular, with inhabitants out of your stock. However, O blessed army! wonder that you are become so many from one father: and truly, the land of Canaan can now hold you, as being yet comparatively few; but know ye that the whole world is proposed to be your place of habitation for ever. The multitude of your posterity also shall live as well in the islands as on the continent, and that more in number than are the stars of heaven. And when you are become so many, God will not relinquish the care of you, but will afford you an abundance of all good things in times of peace, with victory and dominion in times of war. May the children of your enemies have an inclination to fight against you; and may they be so hardy as to come to arms, and to assault you in battle, for they will not return with victory, nor will their return be agreeable to their children and wives. To so great a degree of valor will you be raised by the providence of God, who is able to diminish the affluence of some, and to supply the wants of others."
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2. Proposal of Benjamin Franklin for Design of the Great Seal
http://weatherstone61.wordpress.com/tag/american-revolution/
Interestingly, E Pluribus Unum was the motto of the United States of America until 1956, when it replaced with In God We Trust. Until then, it appears on most U.S. coinage since it was mandated by law in 1873. It first appeared on U.S. coinage in 1795 even though it was first proposed for the Great Seal of the U.S. in August of 1776 and finally formally adopted in 1782. In the 1776 proposal, which Benjamin Franklin had a hand in, the seal had a shield with six symbols; each symbol representing the six main countries that provided immigrants to the colonies: the rose (England), thistle (Scotland), harp (Ireland), fleur-de-lis (France), lion (Holland), and an imperial two-headed eagle (Germany). Those six symbols were surrounded by thirteen smaller shields, which were to represent 'the thirteen independent States of America.' Of course, the 'independence' of those states and the others to follow would greatly change with the new constitution of 1883...
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3. Finds at Skara Brae (Scotland) show links to general neighborhood of Ancient Israel
Skara Brae is one of the Orkney Islands to the Northeast of Scotland. It is the site of important archaeological findings. At first site it would appear a rather isolated area but it is habitable, accessible by sea, blessed with plentiful stocks of fish, edible seaweed, and rich agricultural soil.
Finds at Skara Brae show similarities and contacts with surrounding islands, with Scotland, and with Ireland especially.
Indications of cultural contacts with Ancient Mediterranean, Egypt, Crete. Neolithic type buildings and therefore dated very early (ca. 2000 BCE) BUT Gordon Childe had at first dated it to ca. 500 BCE. This would seem to have been the more correct appraisal even though Childe later revised it to a much earlier date.
Skara Brae is a large stone-built Neolithic settlement, located on the Bay of Skaill on the west coast of Mainland, Orkney, Scotland. It consists of ten clustered houses.
Skara Brae's inhabitants were apparently makers and users of grooved ware, a distinctive style of pottery that appeared in northern Scotland not long before the establishment of the village.
In one of the wall cupboards a horde of 2,400 inscribed beads and pendants that must have had great value, had been abandoned.
Australian-born archaeologist Vere Gordon Childe (1892-1957), in, Pre-historic Monuments of the British Isles, writing about the finds at Skara Brae, one the Orkney Islands off Scotland's coast, wrote, 'The courtyard homes represent an Atlantic-Mediterranean plan, traceable to Minoan Crete by 2000 B.C.'
The dwellings contain a number of stone-built pieces of furniture, including cupboards, dressers, seats, and storage boxes. Each dwelling was entered through a low doorway that had a stone slab door that could be closed "by a bar that slid in bar-holes cut in the stone door jambs". A sophisticated drainage system was even incorporated into the village's design, one that included a primitive form of toilet with its own drainage system in each dwelling. A sewer ran under the village reached by inspection chambers.
The houses contained stone tanks that may have contained limpets for bait rather than eating.
#These gasteropod molluscs have been regarded as a food supply onluy in times of famine in northern Scotland. In 1814 Sir Walter Scott noted in his diary while visiting the Northern Isles that the 'rest of the inhabitants of the Orcades despise those of Swona because they eat limpets, as being the last of human meanness.' # (Laing p.104).
A carved Stone ball similar to others found in northern Sctoland and from their spiral ornament associated with the Boyne valley in Ireland.
A large number of apparently unrelated cultures seem to have produced urns which have characteristic grooves near the top rim, hence the name grooved ware people.
In Orkney, a variation on grooved ware, Unstan ware, emerged. The people who used Unstan Ware had totally different burial practices, but still managed to co-exist with their Grooved Ware counterparts. Some hybrid chambered cairns have emerged in this region, containing architectural features of both the Maeshowe subclass and the Orkney-Cromarty stalled subclasses of cairn.
Skara Brae used a mixture of Grooved Ware and Unstan ware. Grooved Ware is also known as Rinyo (Orcades)-Clacton (Essex) culture.
At first Childe ascribed the village to the Picts and dated it at ca. 500 BCE.
# In hut 7 Childe uncovered a slab with curious incised marks cult along its edge that looked uncommonly like runic writing. Other geometirc designs can be seen on stones in the main passage. # (Laing p.104).
Similar symbols have been found carved into stone lintels and bed posts.[6] These symbols, sometimes referred to as "runic writings", have been subjected to controversial translations. For example, Castleden suggested that "colons" found punctuating vertical and diagonal symbols may represent separations between words.[30]
Other artefacts excavated on site made of animal, fish, bird, and whalebone, whale and walrus ivory, and killer whale teeth included awls, needles, knives, beads, adzes, shovels, small bowls and, most remarkably, ivory pins up to 10 inches (25 cm) long.[33] These pins are very similar to examples found in passage graves in the Boyne Valley, another piece of evidence suggesting a linkage between the two cultures.[34] So-called Skaill knives were commonly used tools in Skara Brae; these consist of large flakes knocked off sandstone cobbles.[35] Skaill knives are found throughout Orkney and Shetland.
http://www.orkneyjar.com/history/skarabrae/
The Lost Village of Skara Brae (Skerraba)
http://unmyst3.blogspot.com/2009/11/lost-village-of-skara-brae.html
Proposed that the writings at Skara Brae were Egyptian.
All the hieroglyphs correspond to Egyptian hieroglyphs.
The neolithic building and type of plumbing corresponds to that of Egypt.
The corbelled walls are exactly like those of Ancient Egypt.
The Lost Builders of Skara Brae. by Peter King
http://atlantisrisingmagazine.com/2006/01/01/the-lost-builders-of-skara-brae/
The scale and type of construction of these Neolithic buildings match those of Ancient Egypt. The plumbing, rare in the Ancient World, is also identical in the two cultures. The grooved pottery ware found at Skara Brae is said to be identical to that in Ancient Egypt. Stone spheres found at Skara Brae have pyramids all over their surface. The corbelled walls outside the houses of Skara Brae is said to be exactly like that used in Ancient Egypt. ('Corbelling' is placing flat stones on top of one another so that each layer projects further out than the layer below it.)
Cladh Hallan, a Bronze Age settlement on South Uist [Hebrides] is the only site in the UK where prehistoric mummies have been found.
http://web.me.com/kbolman/EarlyScotland/09Skara_Brae:an_Ancient_EgyptianSettlement___.html
This is because in Ancient Egypt the Dead were buried on the West Bank of the Nile where the Sun set ... and Great Britain was considered to be "The Land of the Westerners/The Land of the Dead". The Ancient Egyptian Priest Astronomers in the Orkneys were paying Homage to the Setting Sun. Furthermore, Mainland Orkney came to be considered by them, in their isolation, as the Land of the Westerners, the Land of the Dead.
Sources:
Runes
http://ads.ahds.ac.uk/catalogue/adsdata/arch-769-1/ahds/dissemination/pdf/vol28/28_183_185.pdf
Skara Brae
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skara_Brae
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia