This page features brief excerpts of stories published by the mainstream
media and, less frequently, blogs, alternative media, and even obviously
biased sources. The excerpts are taken directly from the websites cited in
each source note. Quotation marks are not used.
Source: BBC
Jun 1, 2011
A rare Michelangelo drawing is expected to sell for up to £5 million in London next month, according to Christie's.The male nude is one of only 24 sheets relating to The Battle of Cascina, an uncompleted work described by the auction house as "one of the greatest Western masterpieces that never was".The only time the drawing has been seen in public was in Vienna last year....
Source: BBC
Jun 1, 2011
Analysis of early human-like populations in southern Africa suggests females left their childhood homes, while males stayed at home.An international team examined tooth samples for metallic traces which can be linked to the geological areas in which individuals grew up.The conclusion was that while most the males lived and died around the same river valley, the females moved on.Similar patterns have been observed in chimpanzees, bonobos and modern humans.
Source: BBC
Jun 1, 2011
On 1 June 1941, a Nazi-inspired pogrom erupted in Baghdad, bringing to an end more than two millennia of peaceful existence for the city's Jewish minority. Some Jewish children witnessed the bloodshed, and retain vivid memories 70 years later.
Source: Telegraph (UK)
Jun 1, 2011
Military prosecutors have refiled terrorism and murder charges against Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the accused mastermind of September 11, at Guantánamo Bay.
The charges against Mohammed and four others allege that they were responsible for planning the attacks that sent hijacked commercial airliners into New York's World Trade Center, the Pentagon and a field in Pennsylvania, killing nearly 3,000 people.
Prosecutors have recommended that the trial be a capital case, which could bring the death penalty.
Source: Telegraph (UK)
Jun 1, 2011
A Pakistani doctor has said he was shocked to learn he had unwittingly been Osama bin Laden's family GP for up to five years. Dr Mehar Dil Wazir, an eminent paediatrician in Abbotabad, said he had not known the children he had treated for three years were the al-Qaeda leader's.
Source: Telegraph (UK)
Jun 1, 2011
Iran's defence minister was forced to leave Bolivia during a diplomatic trip after Argentina demanded his arrest in connection with the deadly 1994 bombing of a Jewish centre in Buenos Aires.
Source: Telegraph (UK)
Jun 1, 2011
UN war crimes prosecutors have demanded that Serbia identify and arrest the "protective network" that hid Ratko Mladic from justice as allegations that his capture was a "set up" grow.
Serge Brammertz, the chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, said he was waiting for "verifications" of how he had evaded an international manhunt, particularly in the period since 2006.
Source: AP
May 31, 2011
A team of Egyptian and European archaeologists has unearthed a statue of the ancient Egyptian king Amenhotep III at his funerary temple in Luxor.The 2.5-meter alabaster head of the 18th dynastic king remains intact, Zahi Hawass, antiquities minister, said in a statement Tuesday. Amenhotep III ruled from 1390-1352 B.C.Hawass described the statue’s face as a masterpiece of royal portraiture. It has almond shaped eyes outlined with cosmetic bands, a short nose and a large mouth with wide lips....
Source: Livescience
May 31, 2011
Incan fortresses built some 500 years ago have been discovered along an extinct volcano in northern Ecuador, revealing evidence of a war fought by the Inca just before the Spanish conquistadors arrived in the Andes."We're seeing evidence for a pre-Columbian frontier, or borderline, that we think existed between Inca fortresses and Ecuadorian people's fortresses," project director Samuel Connell, of Foothill College in California, told LiveScience.
Source: PRI
May 31, 2011
On a warm spring morning about 50 miles north of Berlin, Union troops and their Confederate rivals prepare for battle. They are camped out for the weekend at a Wild West theme park in Templin.About 60 people, mostly Germans, are dressed head to toe in 1860s-period clothing. Women wear hoop skirts. The men are in handmade uniforms with lots of colorful piping and brass buttons. A few young soldiers swing their bayonets.
"I'm a simple soldier, a private," said Tobias Melchurs.
Source: Nature
May 31, 2011
A Roman ship found with a lead pipe piercing its hull has mystified archaeologists. Italian researchers now suggest that the pipe was part of an ingenious pumping system, designed to feed on-board fish tanks with a continuous supply of oxygenated water.
Source: Discovery News
May 31, 2011
A team of Egyptian and European archaeologists has unearthed a unique colossal statue of King Amenhotep III at his funerary temple on the west bank of the Nile near Luxor, according to a statement released on Tuesday by Egypt's ministry of state for antiquities.Finely carved in alabaster, a stone hewn in the quarries of Hatnub in Middle Egypt, the sculpture shows King Amenhotep III seated, wearing the Nemes headdress (a striped headcloth that pharaohs put on), a pleated kilt and a royal beard.
Source: BBC
May 31, 2011
The extradition of Ratko Mladic to the Netherlands for trial on genocide charges is particularly poignant.The Dutch have a special interest in bringing him to justice because of their role - some would call it complicity - in the Srebrenica massacre.More than any other nation, the Netherlands - whose peacekeepers failed to protect Muslim refugees in Srebrenica - has agitated for his arrest.
Source: NYT
May 31, 2011
A group of mothers demanding justice for the victims of the Tiananmen Square massacre of June 4, 1989, said Tuesday that police officials in Beijing had contacted one family in April to discuss giving compensation for the death in that family. It was a rare instance in which officials had mentioned compensation in relation to the killings....
Source: Cleveland Historical
May 31, 2011
CLEVELAND, May 31, 2011 -- /PRNewswire/ -- The launch of Cleveland Historical, a free mobile walking tour app for Android and iPhone users and the first of its kind for Cleveland, brings the city's history right to users' fingertips. The National Council on Public History recently recognized the project as one of the best in the world.
Source: BBC News
May 31, 2011
No other ship comes close to rivalling the gigantic shadow cast by the Titanic. A hundred years after its completion, it's still the most iconic vessel to have set sail.Its tragic maiden voyage has become shorthand for catastrophic hubris - the "unsinkable" ship that hit an iceberg and sank, causing the deaths of 1,503 passengers and crew. And yet in one corner of the UK, the Titanic is a byword not for disaster but a source of pride and nostalgia.
Source: Pew Research Center
May 31, 2011
Just one-in-ten Americans (9%) have a positive reaction when they see the Confederate flag displayed. Fewer than a third (30%) have a negative reaction, though. A 58%-majority say they have neither a positive or negative reaction when seeing the Confederate flag....
Source: Times of India
May 31, 2011
LONDON: It was Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler who actually gave the go-ahead to Rudolf Hess's mission to the UK during World War II to secure peace with Britain's wartime PM Winston Churchill, according to new documents.
Source: New-York Historical Society
May 31, 2011
New York, NY, May 31, 2011—At an auction held on Friday, May 20, at Sotheby’s, the Chairman of the New-York Historical Society, Roger Hertog, purchased the Constitutional Convention notebooks of
Source: Reuters
May 30, 2011
A cold snap in Greenland in the 12th century may help explain why Viking settlers vanished from the island, scientists said on Monday.
The report, reconstructing temperatures by examining lake sediment cores in west Greenland dating back 5,600 years, also indicated that earlier, pre-historic settlers also had to contend with vicious swings in climate on icy Greenland.
Researchers have scant written or archaeological records to figure out why Viking settlers abandoned colonies on the western side of the island in the
