Today I set off for Iona, with backpack and suitcase and passport. What new old things will I find today? It seems everything is both new and old. One child at a parish I served, reflecting on how we are all part of God*s vine, summed it up with: Even in Antarctica... we*re all connected. Even in Antarctica, everything is old and new.
Cave paintings were discovered in Lascaux, France, on this date in 1940. Four French teenagers and their dog, Robot, stumbled upon the caves while they were out exploring one day. The main cave is approximately6 feet wide and 16 feet high, and is connected to a number of smaller chambers. Assigning a precise date to the art on the cave walls has been difficult. Scientists used carbon dating to estimate the age of some charcoal found in the caves, and according to that method, the drawings are about 17,000 years old.
There are about 2,000 drawings and engravings, mostly of animals: horses, bison, red deer, stags, cats, and aurochs — large, black cattle-like animals that are now extinct.
Source: The Writer*s Almanac for September 12, 2012 http://writersalmanac.publicradio.org/
Is anything new
Under the sun?
Today is the anniversary
Of finding the cave paintings
In France.
Four teenagers and their dog, Robot,
Scouted out the caves
On a hike.
The pictures are thousands of years old.
They only found them in 1940.
They show we have been drawing
Forever.
Is anything new under the sun?
The Russians explore a frozen Antarctic lake.
They drill two miles
For signs of old life
Under the ice.
Even in this world we think we know
There are new things
To find,
New things to conjecture.
New improbable things:
Did the Nazis have
A secret cloning facility
In Antarctica?
Questions I would never think
To ask.
What will be discovered today?
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