Ripley Entertainment Inc.'s Blog, page 193
July 14, 2020
One Ring To Curse Them All
Featured in Ripley's Believe It or Not!
In 2013, an enigmatic gold ring associated with an ancient Roman curse resurfaced in Great Britain, going on exhibition to the pleasure of diehard J.R.R. Tolkien fans. The show was put on by Britain’s National Trust at The Vyne, and the Tolkien fandom flocked from the four corners of (Middle) Earth to see the magnificent, maledicted relic.
Discovered in 1785 in a southern English field near the remains of an ancient Roman settlement, some scholars claim this is the artifact that inspired J.R.R. Tolkien’s iconic verse:
One Ring to rule them all,
One Ring to find them,
One Ring to bring them all
and in the darkness bind them.
But is there any truth to the idea that Tolkien knew about this archaeological find or its associated hex? Here’s what we know about the “Ring of Silvianus.”
One Ring to Curse Them All
Today, you’ll find countless gold and silver rings dating to Roman times in museums and archives around the world. There is one, however, that stands apart from the rest. The Ring of Silvianus, known alternately as the Ring of Senicianus and the Vyne Ring, comes with a remarkable story and a cursed past.
What we know about the ring’s origins are somewhat scant. In the 4th century AD, a Roman soldier stationed in Gloucestershire, England, by the name of Silvianus visited baths dedicated to the Celtic god Nodens. The Temple of Nodens sat on a hill above the River Severn at Lidney and celebrated the Roman-British deity associated with hunting, dogs, healing, and the sea.
Nodens boasts many literary and cultural references, including links to the Fisher King of Arthurian legends. Associations also exist with the Norse god Njord of the Vanir (god of wine, sailing, fishing, and fertile land), the Roman god Mars, and Nuada Airgetlam, the first king of the Tuatha Dé Danann.
Silvianus’s Desperate Plea to Nodens
While at the Temple, Silvianus’s golden ring vanished. Believing the culprit to be an individual named Senicianus, Silvianus made an appeal for supernatural justice. At the Temple, he left money before crafting a lead plate known as a curse tablet or defixio. On the tablet, he wrote the words:
Devo Nodenti Silvianus anilum perdedit demediam partem donavit Nodenti inter quibus nomen Seniciani nollis petmittas sanitatem donec perfera(t) usque templum [No-] dentis
Rediviva
In English, the script reads:
To the god Nodens. Silvianus has lost his ring and given half (its value) to Nodens. Among those who are called Senicianus do not allow health until he brings it to the temple of Nodens.
(This curse) comes into force again.
Why Silvianus believed Senicianus stole his ring remains a mystery. Nonetheless, a later inscription placed on the object provides evidence for Senicianus’s ownership of the anathematized artifact.
The Re-Emergence of an Ancient Treasure
Silvianus’s ring has a diameter of one inch (25 mm) and weighs 0.4 ounces (12 grams). It has ten facets and a square bezel engraved with an image of Venus, the Roman goddess. Because of the ring’s impressive size, some have speculated the owner wore it on a thumb or over a glove. When owned by the pagan Silvianus, the ring’s ten gold sides remained bare.
A later Christian owner placed a crudely executed inscription on the ring reading, “SENICIANE VIVAS IIN DE” or “Senicianus, may you live with God.” This message contains misspellings ([i]in de[o]) and may represent the work of the accused thief. Here’s where the story of the ring’s trail goes cold for 1,300 years.
Rediscovered in the late 18th-century, the artifact gleamed tantalizingly in a plowed field on a farm near Silchester. This English town boasts Roman origins and sits 80 miles (128 kilometers) from Lydney, the site of the Temple of Nodens. Whether the ring was lost or intentionally discarded by Senicianus or another individual remains a mystery. As for whether or not the thief fell victim to Silvianus’s curse? The story has been lost to history.
From Ancient Controversy to Tantalizing History
After falling on hard times, the Silchester farmer sold the ring to his neighbors, the Chutes, who lived in a grand Tudor house known as The Vyne. Despite their interest in history and antiquities, the Chutes paid little attention to the ring until 1888 when Chaloner Chute began studying it. He soon wrote a paper on its history.
The curse tablet would turn up in the early 19th century, but nobody would make the connection between these two artifacts for nearly a century. Then, in 1929, the archaeologist Sir Mortimer Wheeler first associated the Vyne Ring and Silvianus’s curse tablet. Although Wheeler could never definitively prove the ring’s connection to the curse, material evidence supports his theory. The name Senicianus is quite rare in Roman texts. What’s more, the artifacts date to the same period.
To confirm his suspicions and learn more about the curse tablet’s connection to the ring, Wheeler called in his friend and colleague, J.R.R. Tolkien. Wheeler hoped Tolkien, a professor of Anglo-Saxon at Oxford University, would help him better understand the origins of the name Nodens. On several occasions, Tolkien visited the Temple of Nodens as he worked on uncovering the mystery of the name. During these research trips, it is likely Tolkien learned about the Vyne Ring (a.k.a. Ring of Silvanius).
More Than a Ring
Within a year, Tolkien started writing The Hobbit. In the story, Bilbo Baggins comes across “one very beautiful thing, very beautiful, very wonderful. He had a ring, a golden ring, a precious ring.” Tolkien also peopled his novel with dwarves who mined the depths of the earth. The remains of the Temple of Nodens sits atop an iron-age site with ancient tunnels and mine workings, known as “Dwarf’s Hill.” (Of course, the Shire represents an idealized version of the rural English countryside.)
But wasn’t the “One Ring” in Tolkien’s novels inspired by another found in the Germanic Nibelungenlied saga? If we’re to take Tolkien at his word, such was not the case. When asked about the ring of Germanic mythology, he stated, “Both rings were round, and there the resemblance ceased.”
Some compelling similarities between the Vyne Ring and that of the “One Ring” in The Hobbit exist. Professor of archaeology, Mark Horton, of the University of Bristol, and Dr. Lynn Forest-Hill have published work on the subject.
Fascinating Similarities Beg the Question
Horton and Forest-Hill note that both rings were made of gold and mysteriously disappeared.
Silvianus lost his in Lydney as Gollum did under the Misty Mountains. Both the real-life Roman and the fictional Gollum then went on to suspect thieves whose names they openly cursed. After discovering Bilbo had the ring, Gollum raged, “Thief, thief, thief! Baggins! We hates it. we hates it, we hates it forever!”
Coupled with the author’s close association with the ring and curse tablet, the evidence provides a fascinating new take on what inspired The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. While Silvianus’s curse certainly proved more articulate than Gollum’s rants, some say the spirit of the defixio shines through in these passages from Tolkien. Fortunately, there have been no sightings of Sauron near The Vyne.
By Engrid Barnett, contributor for Ripleys.com
EXPLORE THE ODD IN PERSON!
Discover hundreds of strange and unusual artifacts and get hands-on with unbelievable interactives when you visit a Ripley’s Odditorium!
Source: One Ring To Curse Them All
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July 10, 2020
Watch An Entire Living Room Paraglide Through The Sky
Featured in Ripley's Believe It or Not!
This Week
[July 6-July 12, 2020] A living room in the sky, fantasy flight, elephant that will give you hair envy, and the rest of the week’s weird news from Ripley’s Believe It or Not!
Essential Goodest Boy
A mini-mart in the Colombian neighborhood Tulipanes is giving all the boops to eight-year-old Eros, a chocolate Labrador retriever. Eros scurries back and forth through the streets of this hilltop town with a straw basket in his mouth, delivering goods to the customers of El Porvenir mini-market. He may not know how to navigate a map or read house numbers, but Eros does remember the customers who have previously rewarded his services with treats—so much so, he can find their houses on his own to make a delivery! The market’s intent is that Eros helps maintain social distancing with his deliveries.
Fantasy of Flight
You always want what you can’t have, right? Well, with international travel restrictions currently in place, 66 lucky “passengers” from Taiwan have found a way to fill the voyage void. To help educate on virus prevention and the new procedures in place at Taipei International Airport, Taiwan’s Civil Aviation Administration held an online drawing for a mock flight. Winning a seat through an online drawing, participants went through the full airport process. They had to check in, get boarding passes, and go through customs and security, all before boarding an actual flight. While the craft remained stationary, the deputy director of the airport suggested “people who want to fly abroad have long been suffering.” He hopes this event will help safely fill future international flights.
Is it Possible to be Jealous of an Elephant’s Bangs?
Meet Bob-Cut Sengamalam, an Elephant famous for her fringe! With a single tweet, Sengamalam now has her own online fame thanks to her tamed mane, but she has been being pampered at the Rajagopalaswamy Temple in the town of Mannargudi since 2003. Sengamalam’s hair is washed three times a day during the summers and at least once a day in other seasons. Her hair, and the hair all elephants have on their head (although not as stylish), helps carry heat away from her body.
She is famously known as “Bob-cut Sengamalam” who has a huge fan club just for her hair style. You can see her at Sri Rajagopalaswamy Temple, Mannargudi, Tamilnadu.
Pics from Internet. pic.twitter.com/KINN8FHOV3
— Sudha Ramen IFS
Hip-Hop Music Makes Cheese Taste Better And More Weird True Facts!
Featured in Ripley's Believe It or Not!
Science frequently teeters on the edge of the unbelievable, often leaving people—even scientists—thinking, “What the…?” Weird True Facts by Ripley’s Believe It or Not! and IFL Science is a collaboration of two amazing brands to create one unbelievable book and help you answer that expletive question!
From historical oddities to cutting‑edge technology and cosmic conundrums, the book’s 192 pages are filled with the strangest stories Ripley’s and IFL’s editors could find. Some of our favorite Weird True Facts you ask?
Stars Do Not Actually “Twinkle”
If you left the Earth’s atmosphere and looked at the stars, they wouldn’t twinkle. That’s because that signature shimmer isn’t a property of stars—it’s a property of our own atmosphere.
There’s even a technical term for it: astronomical scintillation. Our atmosphere is made up of several different layers, each with its own temperatures, densities, and other variables that cause the light from faraway stars to bend and refract. Planets don’t appear to twinkle from our point of view on Earth because they are much closer to us and appear larger, making the changes in light caused by our atmosphere not visible to the human eye.
Why You Can’t Stand Your Own Voice
When our voice is played back to us via a speaker, we are hearing air-conducted vibrations. A lot of what we hear when we speak is perceived in the same way as external noise, but we also pick up on vibrations that have come through our jawbone and skull. This is known as inertial bone conduction, which tends to “bring out” the lower-frequency vibrations, making your voice sound deeper and less squeaky than it actually is.
In all likelihood, the fact you don’t like the sound of it is simply because you are not used to it. Unfortunately, the depressing reality is that the awful noise you hear when you play back a recording of your voice is actually how your voice sounds to the 7.6 billion other humans on Earth. Sorry about that, folks.
Hip-Hop Music Makes Cheese Taste Better
According to researchers in Switzerland, not only does music affect the flavor of maturing cheeses, but hip hop produces the best.
Sound bonkers? Well, yes. But, also, not so fast. Sonochemistry is a real field of scientific exploration looking at the influences of sound waves and the effect of sound on solid bodies, using ultrasound to alter chemical reactions. And cheese is essentially a chemical reaction, so perhaps sound waves can have some kind of influence.
To test out this theory, researchers and a cheesemaker placed nine 22-lb (10-kg) Emmental cheese wheels in individual wooden crates in a cheese cellar, and each was played a different 24-hour loop of one song using a mini transducer that directed the sound waves directly into the cheese.
Six months later, the cheeses were analyzed by food technologists, followed by a blind taste test by a panel of culinary experts. The result? Hip-hop cheese topped them all in terms of fruitiness and was the strongest in smell and taste—with the panel also concluding that a clear difference could be discerned between the cheeses. No word on if leaving a speaker on in your fridge will make those processed slices taste any better, though.
Weird True Facts goes on sale on July 14, 2020, at major retailers and on Amazon.com. With the science behind the stories and the stories behind the science, there is something for both IFL Science and Ripley fans.
Source: Hip-Hop Music Makes Cheese Taste Better And More Weird True Facts!
CARTOON 07-10-2020
July 9, 2020
Have You Been Overworking With 10,000 Steps A Day?
Featured in Ripley's Believe It or Not!
Many Americans have made packing in 10,000 steps a day a part of their regular fitness routine. Countless fitness trackers and apps laud the importance of this golden standard, providing ways to track how close you get each day. The benefits of this regimen? According to 10,000-step supporters, a healthier heart, a slimmer waistline, and a longer life. Sounds good, right?
There’s one small problem with the 10,000 steps-a-day rule, however. The figure isn’t based on sound scientific evidence. Let’s dive into this myth and separate the fact from the fantasy.
The Origins of the “Golden Standard” in Fitness
We can all agree that many Americans suffer from the health effects of poor nutrition and a sedentary lifestyle. So, the 10,000 steps-a-day rule sounds pretty good. After all, how often does health advice come packaged in such a handy, round number? It’s the ultimate one-size-fits-all advice. As we all know from hats to tank tops, though, one-size-fits-all often proves an ill-fitting option for most people.
It begs the question: where did the 10,000 steps-a-day concept come from in the first place? Countless hours of research? Years of scientific experimentation and documentation? Ummmmm…nope.
It started with a marketing team in Japan. Can I get a collective “Doh?” In 1964, a Japanese company wanted to leverage momentum from the 1964 Olympics to sell their pedometer called “manpo-kei.” It translates into “10,000 step meter.” Sound familiar? The team had skills that would make Mad Men jealous. They transformed the pedometer into an indispensable part of American culture by presenting it in “scientific” sheep’s clothing. Today, this metric has overtaken most other fitness markers as a sign of well-being.
The Truth About 10,000 Steps-a-Day
What does all of this mean? As Dr. Matthew Mintz, MD, FACP, points out, “There is no recommended daily step count from a medical standpoint.” The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) recommend getting in 150 minutes of moderate exercise each week. This activity may include brisk walking. What does this recommendation look like over five days? Walking 1.5 miles, or 3,000 steps, at a moderate pace. Of course, this also assumes you’ll be taking slower steps each day at work and home.
So, why do medical doctors often recommend the 10,000 steps-a-day rule for patients attempting to control blood pressure, weight gain, and cardiovascular disease? Scientists who study the benefits of walking use 10,000 steps as a baseline. A study in 2000 published in Hypertension Research showed a correlation between improved blood pressure and health after a 12-week regimen of walking at least 10,000 steps per day.
What’s more, many researchers point to this figure as an achievable goal that’s hard easy to remember. According to Dr. Susa Besser, MD, “Counting steps is probably the easiest metric, since most people have a step counter on their smartphone.”
What the Research Says
Here’s where the topic starts to get tricky. According to research published by JAMA Internal Medicine, a mere 4,400 steps per day lowered mortality rates among older women as compared to their less active counterparts. The study included 16,000 participants. Their ultimate conclusion? The 10,000 step-a-day goal remains little more than a marketing ploy with no scientific backing.
While a correlation existed between increased activity and longevity, researchers concluded the 10,000 step-a-day objective was too daunting. Instead, they focused on the minimum increase in steps necessary to significantly lower mortality in older women. Fortunately, this study coincides closely with the 4,774 average daily steps most Americans take, according to Stanford University.
So, why do so many of us fight with expanding waistlines? Exercise alone is not enough when it comes to weight loss. A study in the Journal of Obesity recently concluded that no matter how many steps you take, you’ll still gain weight without a focus on proper nutrition. What does all of this mean? Ten thousand step-a-day won’t hurt you, and you will see health benefits. But even half that number comes advantages. So, don’t get discouraged when your pedometer reading looks low. What’s more, when trying to lose weight, pay more attention to your calorie counter.
By Engrid Barnett, contributor for Ripleys.com
EXPLORE THE ODD IN PERSON!
Discover hundreds of strange and unusual artifacts and get hands-on with unbelievable interactives when you visit a Ripley’s Odditorium!
CARTOON 07-09-2020
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