CT Scans Reveal 'Faces' of Mummies

Modern technology has revealed the faces of four people embalmed 2,000 years ago.

A group of New York scientists combined CT scans and the artwork of a crime artist to create sketches of the faces of those embalmed. Then, the scientists compared the new sketches to the portraits that were stored next to the mummies. In two of the four cases, the matches were nearly exact.

The artist, who knew only the age and gender of the deceased, took seven days to produce each sketch. The sketches of the two mummies from the British Museum matched their portraits almost exactly. The other two mummies, one from the Glyptotek Museum in Copenhagen and the other from New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art, didn't fare so well in the portrait-matching department. Still, they weren't far away.

The art historians involved will be happy to have some evidence that portrait production was more about realism in the 1st Century A.D.

The relative success of the sketching suggests more uses for modern technology.

Study: Alexandria City Design Followed the Sun

Leave it to Alexander to bring the Aten into it.

The Egyptian metropolis of Alexandria was built so that the main road aligned with the rising Sun on Alexander's birthday, according to a study out of Italy. The study, which was reported in the Oxford Journal of Archaeology, quoted computer simulation data that reinforced the idea that the Canopic Road, the city's main east-west road, was so oriented on July 20, the day of Alexander's birth.

Using sophisticated equipment and calculations, a team led by Milan archaeoastronomer Giulio Magli found that in the fourth century B.C., the Sun rose less than half a degree off the direction of the road. (Alexander was born in 356 B.C., and he founded Alexandria in 331 B.C.) The study also found that a second star, Regulus, would have risen in the same part of the sky at about the same time on that date. Incorporating Regulus, known as the "King's Star," would have been a nice touch for Alexander and his city planners.

Using the Sun as an architectural tool would have been nothing new to the Egyptians, who often cited Ra (or, in Akhenaten's terms, the Aten) as inspiration for all manner of things, including rulers and their grand buildings. That Alexander chose to do so would have been entirely in keeping with his status as the new pharaoh of Egypt.

Cat's Grotto Hideaway an Ancient Tomb

In a story of the living and the dead, two Romans followed a cat into a grotto and discovered a 2,000-year-old tomb. This happened not many years ago but mere days ago.

Seems the men found a cat in a residential area near one of the city's main streets and then, when the cat disappeared into a grotto, followed it inside. What they found was human bones in various places on the floor and niches on the walls similar to what ancient Romans used to hold funeral urns.

Sure enough, archaeologists arriving at the scene later confirmed the discovery of a burial chamber, dating from between the 1st Century B.C. and the 2nd Century A.D. The bones, the archaeologists said, probably fell from a higher spot.

As to why the tomb hadn't been discovered before, the theory is that recent heavy rains have caused erosion that sheared away what had been rocks that, intentionally or not, had concealed the chamber.

What to call the newly found chamber? A cat - a - comb, of course.

Bonnie & Clyde Guns Bound Together at Auction

Their owners were lovers and partners, and their guns stay together as well.

They are Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow. Their guns survive them as a pair, thanks to an anonymous Texas collector who paid a collective $504,000 for the two pistols sold at a New Hampshire auction.

Barrow was 25 and Parker 23 when they were killed in 1934, the result of a two-year manhunt following a multi-state crime spree involving killings, kidnappings, bank robberies, auto thefts, and a prison break. A combination of Louisiana police and Texas Rangers found Bonnie and Clyde in a northern Louisiana hideout, and the following firefight left the outlaws dead.

The two were lovers, and their story captured the popular imagination for a time during the Great Depression. But it's the tangible things they left behind that were on display at auction.

Parker's gun, a .38 special that was found taped to the inside of her thigh, brought in $264,000, slightly more than the $240,000 paid for Barrow's gun, a Colt .45 that was found in his waistband.

The guns came from the collection of another memorabilia enthusiast, who bought them for about $100,000 total in 1986.

Other items sold at this most recent auction included Barrow's gold pocket watch ($36,000), a silver dollar taken from his pocket ($32,400), and one of Parker's silk stockings ($11,400).