varnam

It was under Cyrus II (576 or 590 BC �?? July 529 BC), a contemporary of Buddha, that the Iranian Plateau was united for the first time under a single leader. Till then, for about two millennia, Mesopotamia was the lone superpower in the world.

Babylon, one of the civilizations in Mesopotamia, sacked Jerusalem at the start of the 6th century BCE. The last King of Babyblon was Nabonidus, who was more interested in history than politics. (He would have made a great guest blogger here on varnam). Nabonidus had relocated to Arabia and then Cyrus II decided to attack his empire. On hearing the news, Nabonidus came back to Babylon, but it was too late.

The Persians took the city in 539 BCE without any resistance and were greeted by the people are liberators, pretty much the way the neo-cons expected the people of present day Babylon to treat them. Cyrus was benevolent compared to other kings  and freed most of his captives, including Jews. He encouraged them to return to Jerusalem and rebuild the temple, and even offered to pay for it. In the Book of Ezra, a book of Bible in the Old Testament, Persia or Trans-Euphrates is portrayed as a tolerant place and Cyrus is mentioned about twenty five times, in glorified terms.

Fast forward 2500 years and you have the current ruler of Persia speaking at a conference titled The World Without Zionism calling Israel a "disgraceful blot" to be "wiped off the map "

Reference: Where God Was Born : A Journey by Land to the Roots of Religion by Bruce Feiler

The association between Emperor Asoka and Orissa go much beyond the Kalinga war.  There are people who suggest that Asoka had never ever been to Orissa , even though there are statues with the inscription that it was unveiled by Asoka himself.   When Huen Tsang visited Orissa in the 6th century, he saw ten stupas in the Odra country, established by Asoka and present day archaeology in that region have given lot of artifacts, dating to the time of Asoka. Excavations done by the Orissa Institute of Maritime and South East-Asian Studies are revealing new facts about the capital of Kalinga, the city of Tosali and if Vajragiri had ties with Japan.

The organisation had extensively surveyed the Brahmani-Kelua river valley since 1996 to explore and excavate Buddhist sites. It had excavated Langudi hill site and discovered the ancient Pushpagiri Vihara, an Ashokan Stupa, two rare statues believed to be that of Emperor Ashoka himself, besides 54 rock-cut votive Stupas, five Dhyani Buddha statues and remains of two monasteries.

The excavation of the fort of Radhanagar indicated that it could be the ancient capital of Kalinga, Pradhan said. The excavation of the fort of Radhanagar indicated that it could be the ancient capital of Kalinga, Pradhan, also the curator of state archaeology, said.

The artefacts discovered from last year's excavation established that Radhanagar or Tosali was a fort city. But interesting findings of this year indicated that it could be a Port city. �??The discovery of Roman Bullae (an earthen ornament) and Roman Rowlletted pottery, suggested that the place had connections with Rome. And it could not have happened had Tosali not been a Port city,�?� Pradhan Said. He, however, made it clear that only around five per cent of total excavation had been completed.

The current excavation also threw up broken Buddhist images, votive Stupas and collection of pottery remains from the surface near Vajragiri. Pradhan said Vajragiri could have had close cultural contacts with Japan because the highest temple of Japan was the Vajragiri temple (Kongobu-Ji) at Kuito, the ancient capital of that country. Interestingly, at the foot of the present Vajragiri a big ancient village Kotpur was situated, he said adding more research was necessary to establish the connection. [2,300 year-old artefacts may change Ashoka-Buddhist history ]

There are many advantages of not having to depend on oil for fuel needs. For a nation like India, energy independence will remove the need to bow before the middle-east dictators  and remove this competition with China to grab all oil wells in the world. With this freedom, United States could ignore the lunatic statements from Hugo Chavez and we all could live to see the day when Saudi Arabia's major business is exporting camels. The problem though is in finding a cost effective alternative.

The market for alternative energies is huge and Venture Capitalists in the Bay Area like Kleiner Perkins and Khosla Ventures have invested in biofuels companies like Altra and Cilion. With companies like VeraSun and Aventine going IPO, ethanol is getting focus as that major alternative. Using E85 (85% ethanol, 15% gasoline) could also revive the slumping American car industry and give a boost to farmers.  Going by market trends, Ethanol seems to be the silver bullet as even Wal-Mart is planning to pump ethanol based fuel in gas stations around the country.

But corn based ethanol is not without problems. Ethanol is expensive to make. The fuel efficiency for E85 based vehicles are less compared to the ones running on gas. Besides this ethanol has to be carried in trucks or trains (as there are no pipelines) which requires more fuel to be spent. 

In Back To The Future II  or III, Dr. Emmet Brown comes back from the future , flying in his time machine and is seen scavenging the garbage carts for fuel. He find some soda cans and other pieces of garbage and stuffs it into the fuel tank. This future is near and soon we will all be doing the same , if we are going to use cellulosic ethanol as fuel.

In corn based ethanol, the corn is ground and mixed with water. The enzymes convert the starch to sugar and sugar eating micro-organisms  excrete ethanol, which is distilled and used. With cellulosic ethanol, we don't have to depend entirely on corn. Farm waste like corn kennel, wheat and barley straw, leaves and stalks of plants can also be used as the source of ethanol.

Finally the cost of cellulosic ethanol is expected to be $1.35/gallon compared to $3.20/gallon right now for regular gasoline. This should be a big boost to consumers who can then buy Ford Explorers and H3s without guilt. Since cellulosic ethanol depends on farm waste, these giant SUV owners can claim that they are clearing waste instead of creating it. In Kerala where we stay, throwing garbage over the wall to the road is considered  good civic sense. If it turns out that this garbage can be used as fuel, then my neighborhood will be the cleanest place in India.

According to the Book of Exodus in the Hebrew Bible, Moses led the Israelites out of slavery in Egypt and  received the Ten Commandments from God. There are sceptics who suggest that Moses never existed as a historical figure and that the Exodus too is mythical. Now in a new documentary titled The Exodus Decoded, filmmaker Simcha Jacobovici suggests that the Exodus did happen, and it happened around 1500 BCE.

Jacobovici set out on his Exodus quest after doing a documentary in the 1990s on a group of people on the Indian-Burma border who claim to be the lost Israelite tribe of Menashe. That film was met with widespread criticism by people Jacobovici branded as "so-called experts." Jacobovici said he himself was skeptical of the tribe's Israelite claims until he researched the subject.

Similarly with the new Exodus documentary, he asserted that with his hefty $3.5 million budget, a lack of preconceptions, and none of the restrictions of conventional archeological wisdom, he was free to reach what he insists are credible conclusions about the Exodus. The 55-year-old director, whose original claim to fame was his first-ever documentary Falasha: Exile of the Black Jews, made two and half decades ago and which focused on Ethiopian Jewry, said his research for the lost tribes film spurred him to question the widely accepted assumptions about what he called "the founding story of Western civilization" - the Exodus of the Jews from Egypt.

Six years later, mixing science, religion and a variety of archeological findings, Jacobovici is convinced that he has seen the light. Most of the archeological findings cited come from Egypt, with others from Greece. He said he researched in six countries, including Israel and the UK.

The 10 plagues that smote the Egyptians, according to the Bible, are explained in the documentary to be the result of a volcanic eruption on a Greek island that occurred 3,500 years ago. [Documentary sets new date for Exodus]

In Buddhism education was usually monastery based, as opposed to the home based education or gurukul in Hinduism. One monastery which evolved into a world famous university was Nalanda, which was founded during the  times of the Guptas. Information about Nalanda comes from the writings of Huen Tsang or Xuanzang who visited the place in the 7th century.

According to his notes, the monastery was full of intellectual activity and it did not restrict the training to Buddhists. Vedas, Hindu philosophy, logic, grammar and medicine were also taught and students belonging to other faiths were also admitted, provided they passed an oral examination. Arjun Singh was not there to enforce reservation and it was purely merit based admission.

Nalanda was supported by the revenues of an estate of hundred villages and by patrons like Harsha. From Nalanda, the missionary monk Padmasambhava went to Tibet to convert them to Buddhism in the 8th century, while students came from China and South-East Asia to study there. Nalanda remained an important center of learning till it was destroyed by invading Turkish Muslims under the leadership of Bakhtiyar Khalji.

Now based on an idea by President A P J Abdul Kalam, the ruins of Nalanda will be developed and upgraded to  international standard, whatever that means.

The ancient Nalanda University was spread over an area having a radius of about 16 km out of which an area of only 1.6 km radius has been excavated so far.

"A team of experts will soon conduct fresh survey and properly map some of the nearby mounds at Rukiministhan, Jwarfardih, Kool and Balaur villages within a radius of 16 km from the present excavated site of the university before initiating proper exploration work," Vaidya said, adding that a systematic study of some of the adjoining villages will give an idea of the history of the settlement pattern of Nalanda.

Only recently, a Japanese delegation came to Patna after meeting Kalam in Delhi. The Bihar government has already identified 450 acres of land located between Rajgir and Nalanda for the proposed university that would impart quality teaching in philosophy and value education, among others. [ASI move to develop ancient Nalanda varsity site]

Reference: The Wonder That Was India by A. L. Basham

Terrorists (not militants as the MSM likes to call it), have struck Mumbai. Amit Varma has the updates and he points to Mumbai Help for getting additional help and information.

Update 1: Amit mentions an incident where a correspondent asks a victim if this was a terrorist attack and remarks how would he know in five minutes. B. Raman has guessed who is behind the blasts instantly.

Update 2: Indian Intelligence believes that Dawood Ibrahim was behind the serial attacks. (via Counter Terrorism Blog)

Indian intelligence believes the attacks on Mumbai�??s commuter train network on Tuesday, killing scores during the evening rush hour, might be the work of Dawood Ibrahim, an Indian Muslim with ties to al-Qaida.

Ibrahim is believed to have been responsible for the 1993 attacks that killed 260 in Mumbai, India�??s commercial hub formerly known as Bombay.

Update 3: Apparently the authorities knew that this was coming. Sadly no one told them the time and place.

Indian Home Minister Shivraj Patil said the government had some advance knowledge that such an attack might take place. "What we didn't have was the place and the time," Patil said.

Update 4: Suspect in custody? No one else seems to have the news.

AP Reports: Police were also reportedly carrying out raids across the country following the explosions, presumably in search of suspects. A television report said a suspect was in custody.

Update 5: LeT and SIMI behind the blasts.

The terror attack on Mumbai trains was carried out by Lashkar-e-Toiba and local Students Islamic Movement of India (SIMI) activists and was designed to trigger communal conflagration in the country�??s financial capital, intelligence sources said.

Update 6:Terrorist arrested in Delhi

A terrorist was on Tuesday arrested in south Delhi and 2.5 kg RDX seized from his possession, police said.

Aijaz Hussain, hailing from Baramulla district of Jammu and Kashmir, was arrested from Lodhi road area after police received a tip-off about his movement, Deputy Commissioner of Police (Special Cell) Alok Kumar said.

Police was interrogating him to find out if he has any links with the serial blasts in Srinagar and Mumbai and to find which terrorist outfit he belonged to, he said.

Update 7: Gaurav writes

And like last year, Mumbaikars are out on the street helping people out. Distributing samosas, biscuits, water etc to people stuck in the traffic.

Even the vehicles are packed. Cars and bikes which usually go half-empty are giving rides to people going in their directions. And of course, shopkeepers and residents along the road are on the streets with food and water, helping the travellers out.

Update 8:In times like these political parties can do one simple thing to help - shut up.

Main Opposition Bharatiya Janata Party on Tuesday blamed the ruling United Progressive Alliance government's 'soft approach' on terrorism for the serial bombings in Mumbai and Srinagar.

Update 9:The attacks were masterminded from abroad

According to him, "The level of sophistication and organisation needed to carry out such a widespread and tightly coordinated attack is beyond the known capabilities of any of the Islamic groups operating in either Kashmir or elsewhere in India."

In an e-mail to rediff.com immediately after the blasts, he said, "This has all the hallmarks of a Special Forces/Intelligence operation... it may have been carried out by expendable extremists, but those who were the promoters and brains have military training."

Continued here

Continuing from where we left off yesterday, The Acorn points to a piece by Praveen Swamy

what evidence is available, though, suggests that the tactics and techniques used in the Mumbai bombings are similar to those deployed in the wave of strikes that have taken place across India since the end of 2005. Fabricated from easily-available chemicals such as potassium permanganate or aluminium chlorate, with small amounts of RDX to accelerate the detonation, the kinds of explosives that seem to have been used in Mumbai are easy to manufacture — and lethal when used in crowded locations.

If recent experience is a guide, investigators are likely to find that the real architects of the bombing are outside its reach: the Lashkar is headquartered at Muridke, near Lahore, while the HuJI operates out of bases in Dhaka and Chittagong. More likely than not, though, the operation will have been facilitated by local operatives of these terror groups — part of a subterranean but still enormously dangerous movement of small numbers of recruits into the ranks of Islamist terror groups.

Update 1: According to the Prime Minister, Manmohan Singh (not Sonia Gandhi), India will win the war on terror. Terrorists must be surrendering in droves after hearing his pathetic speech.

Update 2: Mumbai Politician suspected?

He, however, dodged a query on a media report that claimed a south Mumbai politician, who has considerable clout in a minority community, was under the scanner of intelligence agencies for his suspected role in yesterday's serial blasts in suburban trains.

The report quoted intelligence sources as saying that the politician could have instigated the blasts in retaliation for a recent strife in a minority-dominated area of Thane district.

Update 3: Premature to blame LeT

The director general of police in Maharashtra, the Indian state that includes Mumbai, said that officers had �??no concrete evidence�?� to implicate Lashkar-e-Toiba, an Islamic militant organization that is fighting Indian rule in Kashmir, a mostly Muslim state that is also claimed, and is partly occupied, by Pakistan.

But the director general, P. S. Pasricha, said �??the modus operandi does suggest their involvement.�?� The organization and scale of the attacks, the type of explosive involved and the use of remote control devices all suggested that Lashkar-e-Toiba may have been involved, perhaps in conjunction with local groups, he said.

�??Parcel train mey chhodke sab Malad mey milengey.�?� Sandeep Singh, a Ghatkopar resident in his mid-20s, overheard this seemingly innocuous piece of conversation between three men outside the Churchgate station at 5.30 pm on Tuesday. It was only after he reached home (around 7 pm) and switched on the television that he realised the full implications of the conversation he had eavesdropped on.

According to Singh�??s statement, two of the three men had been bearded and were wearing Pathan suits. All three were carrying similar-looking parcels which looked like gift boxes.

Update 6: What previously captured terrorists have told could give clues

Central intelligence agencies believe that the serial blasts in Mumbai were most likely triggered by Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT), acting on the direction of Pakistan�??s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI).

An official source said inputs about the re-emergence of the ISI hand have come from miscreants arrested in connection with recent terrorist strikes in north India.

Those in custody have told interrogators that they were taken across the border to Karachi and then sent to training camps in Baluchistan, after which they were sent back to India to await orders.

The Mumbai Police on Wednesday claimed a major headway in the serial train blasts probe with the preparation of over half a dozen sketches of suspects involved in Tuesday's blasts, sources said.

"The sketches have been prepared after getting details from an eyewitness and scores of persons injured in the blast," a senior crime branch official told PTI in Mumbai.

The sketches are unlikely to be released to public to maintain confidentiality of the probe, sources added.

After Andhra Pradesh High Court, it is time for Madras High Court to lecture the Govt. on their "secular" decision to ban The Da Vinci Code

"It would be dangerous to allow the State to straightjacket the right to Freedom of Expression, as artistic expressions may be asphyxiated by law if a petulant group of self-appointed `censors' prescribes the paradigms for suspending the screening of a film, which has got the approval of the Censor Board," said Justice Prabha Sridevan.

Rejecting the submission that the State had material to show that there would be a "breach of peace" if the film was exhibited, the judge said, "the inability of the State to maintain law and order or to avert a violation of breach of peace can never be a ground to throttle the Fundamental Rights."

She said the order did not satisfy the "compelling State interest test," and added: "When highly respected members of the Christian community have seen the film and have not expressed any apprehension that it may result in breach of peace, and when the Censor Board has certified that the film is worthy of being exhibited, the compulsion that forced the State to pass the impugned order is inexplicable and does not justify the violation of the Fundamental Right of the petitioners." [Madras High Court quashes ban on film via Reporter's Diary]

After the Mumbai Bomb Blasts, which CNN calls Terror on Tracks, the authorities were not sure about the perpetrators. Initially it was said to be Dawood Ibrahim. Then the suspects were LeT and SIMI. Some suggested that it could be angry Muslims seeking revenge for the Gujarat riots. Most of these were speculation, based on common sense and pattern analysis.

Now based on investigations, the Anti-Terror Squad has released the photos of two suspects,Sayyad Zabiuddin and Zulfeqar Fayyaz. There is no information about their nationalities or affiliation. The Home Ministry has concluded that SIMI has provided logical support for the blasts . According to Mulayam Singh Yadav, Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh  it would be improper to call SIMI a terrorist organization since his Muslim vote bank is more precious than the life of 200 people who died and hundreds of others who have been wounded. SIMI, though a banned organization has been flourishing without any issues under various secular Governments in Kerala too showing how much resolve the elected officials have in protecting the life of Indian Citizens.

In a news conference in Delhi, a Simi leader, Shahid Badr Falahi, described the attacks as deplorable and said his organisation had no part in them. If SIMI is a banned organization and if they have been found to provide support for the blasts, what is a SIMI leader doing in public, giving news conferences in Delhi?

Currently CCTVs have been installed in seven stations and a  security agency has been hired to setup international standard security. Meanwhile Al-Qaeda has announced their office opening ceremony in India  and have praised the murderers of innocent civilians.

Police rounded up 350 people for questioning in Mumbai. Meanwhile Zaibuddin Ansari, Lashkar-e-Toiba module leader, suspected to be the link between LeT and SIMI is being searched for by Anti-Terrorists Squad of Mumbai Police and central intelligence agencies. Police also suspect Rahil, a Lashkar-e-Tayiba operative who was behind the October 2005, pre-Diwali bomb blasts. Nepal Police has arrested two Pakistanis, Aftar Moiddin Siddiqui and Gulam Hussain Cheema in Kathmandu and are investigating if they have any connection to the Mumbai blasts. In India, a man on a train in Hyderabad - identified as Abdullah - was arrested in connection with the bombings.

Meanwhile Police from Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh and Rajasthan have reached Bangalore following reports that the terrorists behind the blasts could have reached the city to hide. When Prime Minister Rajeev Gandhi was assassinated, his murderers also found it convenient to hide in Bangalore.

Immediately after condemning the terrorist attacks in Mumbai, Pakistani Foreign Minister, Khurshid Kasuri suggested that the best way to deal with terrorism was to tackle the real issue of Jammu and Kashmir. What has a bomb blast in Mumbai got to do with Kashmir, you may wonder, but that seems to be the association in the Western World as well. When Michael Krasny made this association in Forum the Consul General of India, B.S. Prakash, asked him the same question.

Note that all this association was already made, very prematurely, even before the Police had clues connecting SIMI and LeT and before the congratulatory phone calls were traced. Even before this, suggestions came from various experts that the peace process should not suffer due to such terrorist activities and even thinking about reviewing the process would be falling into the terrorist trap.

Echoing the insensitive line by Khurshid Kasuri , Xenia Dormandy suggested that Kashmir is the problem and India needs to step up in offering something in Kashmir. To give her credit, and she said the right things  on her interview with Neil Conan on Talk of the Nation, that the terrorist infrastructure in Pakistan is a big problem. Now the Economist too has suggested that India and Pakistan should solve the Kashmir issue.

All this faith in the peace process is built on the assumption that once the Kashmir resolved, with major "compromises" (code word for land donation), there will be ever lasting peace process in the sub-continent. Israel has learned the hard way this week that making such compromises do not guarantee anything, other than an escalation in violence.

Last September Israel withdrew from the Gaza strip and Gaza became the first completely independent Palestinian territory. The Palestinians fired rockets from Gaza, and then later dug a tunnel from there and kidnapped an Israeli soldier. Israel withdrew from Lebanon in 2000. United Nations verified the withdrawal and was satisfied with it. Now from Lebanon, Hezbollah entered Israel and kidnapped two soldiers. Now Israel is fighting a war on two fronts.

What is the guarantee that Gaza and Lebanon will not happen to India. How can you trust a nation which does not want to dismantle the terrorist infrastructure and  which was planning Kargil, while yet another peace process was going on?<

Even though the Harappas had a script it still remains undeciphered. Brāhmī, the script in which the Asokan edicts were written is considered to be one of the earliest known scripts in India. While some Indian authorities maintain that it was derived from the Harappan script [13], the popular notion is that it was derived from a Semitic script like the Imperial Aramaic alphabet. Indo-Greek bi-lingual coins usually had  the name of the King in Greek on one side and in Brāhmī on the other side.

The script used in the earliest inscriptions in Tamil were in Tamil Brahmi or Tamili script and it varied from the Asokan Brahmi. The Brāhmī script, originally was believed to be bought to South India by Buddhist and Jain monks in the post-Asokan period. Tamil Brahmi scripts dating to 3rd century BCE have been found in the caves of Jain monks in Tamil Nadu. Last year, urns containing human skeletons were found in Adichanallur in Tamil Nadu and those urns dating to 500 BCE were found to have Tamil Brāhmī inscriptions which means that the script reached Tamil Nadu during the time of the Buddha. In fact, there has been evidence that the script reached Sri Lanka also around the same time.

Now in an exciting discovery, Tamil-Brāhmī inscriptions dating to second century AD have been found in pottery in Thailand.

At the request of the archaeologists, Iravatham Mahadevan, an expert in Tamil Epigraphy, has examined the inscription. He has confirmed that the pottery inscription is in Tamil and written in Tamil-Brahmi characters of about the second century AD. Only three letters have survived on the pottery fragment. They read tu Ra o... , possibly part of the Tamil word turavon meaning `monk.'

The presence of the characteristic letter Ra confirms that the language is Tamil and the script is Tamil-Brahmi. It is possible that the inscription recorded the name of a Buddhist monk who travelled to Thailand from Tamil Nadu. This is the earliest Tamil inscription found so far in South East Asia and attests to the maritime contacts of the Tamils with the Far East even in the early centuries AD.

Prof. Richard Salomon of the University of Washington, U.S., an expert in Indian Epigraphy, has made the following comment on the inscription:

"I am happy to hear that the inscription in question is in fact Tamil-Brahmi, as I had suspected. This is important, among other reasons, because it presents a parallel with the situation with Indian inscriptions in Egypt and the Red Sea area. There we find both Tamil-Brahmi inscriptions and standard-Brahmi insciptions; and we now see the same in Vietnam and South-East Asia. This indicates that the overseas trade between India to both the West and the East involved people from the Tamil country and also other regions." [Tamil-Brahmi inscription on pottery found in Thailand]

The Last Cato : A Novel by Matilde Asensi , Rayo (April 4, 2006), 464 pages

Like the beginning of The Da Vinci Code, Angels and Demons, and The Secret Supper, this religious mystery also starts with a death. This time the dead person is an Ethiopian who was implicated in a serious crime against the Catholic Church. When this person's body was discovered, it had seven Greek characters distributed on the body. There was a large chrismon , the first two Greek letters of Christ's name XP, chi and rho on his body and next to the body there was a silver ornate box containing some strange pieces of wood.

Puzzled, the Vatican requests the services of Dr. Ottavia Salina, a nun and paleographer working in the archives, a captain of the Pope's Swiss Guard, Kaspar Glauser-Roïst, and an Egyptian archaeologist, Farag Boswell to investigate the death. The Pope too was highly interested in this investigation since the wooden pieces were not ordinary pieces, but pieces from the original cross on which Christ died.

According to history, Saint Helen (248 - 329 CE) went looking for the Holy Sepulchre (burial chamber) and discovered the True Cross of Christ in 326 CE during a trip to Jerusalem. Two hundred years before this, Emperor Adriano had built a temple dedicated to Venus over the location, which was demolished by Helen. During the excavation, they found the original cross and over centuries fragments of it were distributed all over the world. Now in the past twenty four hours, pieces of this Ligna Crucis had disappeared from various churches around the world and the assignment given to Dr. Salina, Captain Glauser-Roïst and Professor Boswell was to find who was behind  this.

The symbols on the dead man's body lead them to The Monastery of Saint Catherine of Sinai, which has the most valuable ancient codices in the world, second to Vatican. The location of the monastery is  considered to be the place where Yaweh in the form of the burning bush gave the Ten Commandments to Moses. From a document which they stole from the monastery they find that a secret brotherhood called  Staurofilakes was formed in 341 CE to guard the Cross and the leader of the group was called Cato.

Decoding the codices they also learn that over the years the Staurofilakes had set initiation tests for anyone wishing to join them. The tests were to be conducted in seven cities, Rome, Ravenna, Jerusalem, Athens, Constantinople, Alexandria, and Antioch. The only problem was that they needed to find the details of the tests and they find it in hidden in Dante's Divine Comedy and thankfully, not in any of Leonardo da Vinci's paintings.

According to Captain Glauser-Roïst, Dante was a member of Fidei d'Amore, a secret society interested in the spiritual renewal of Christianity. He also knew the Staurofilakes and belonged to the order, but he later betrayed them by revealing their secrets in The Divine Comedy, like how Mozart revealed the Mason's initiation rituals in The Magic Flute.  Armed with this knowledge, the three of them set off to take the tests for which they have to find the location of the test, details of the test and how to get over it all by reading The Divine Comedy.

These tests turn out to be brutal, physically intensive and mentally challenging and the seven tests occupy the major portion of the book. For one of the tests in Constantinople, they visit The Mosque of the Conquerer, spot the chrismon in the drain of the water fountain, turn on all the fountains and drop down a tunnel into a pool deep below. They spot Emperor Constantine's tomb there and while walking through the tunnels are swept by gales of wind, generated by something. They almost lose their way, and face death, but thanks to a line in Divine Comedy, they find the right path and move to the next test, till they find if the Staurofilakes exist and if they are behind the murder of the Ethiopian and the stealing of the cross.

Unlike The Da Vinci Code, this book does not have a cliff hanger at the end of every third page. It moves a bit slower, but not so slow as to bore you. The story told in the first person by Dr. Salina, takes time to establish the personality of each of the characters, mainly the Professor and the Captain. We get to know a great deal about her, her family and her faith.  While the mysteries are being solved, the secret codes in Divine Comedy are broken and ancient cities around the world are visited, personal transformations too happen. The nun falls for the Professor and is caught between the faith and love and has to decide. Similarly, the Captain who starts out as a serious task master undergoes a major transformation at the end, which was pleasant. In usual page turners, you barely get to know the characters, but this book is quite different.

Even though the build up was great and the travel and history very informative, the ending was a bit of a let down for me. Normally in such thrillers you expect a Hollywood like climax where the villain is holding everyone hostage and one man has to save the world. The ending of this book is quite the opposite. Even though the book starts with a death, that person is just discarded after a few pages and the story moves completely into the puzzles in Divine Comedy.

The Divine Comedy is analyzed in great depth and each Canto is memorized by the characters before the start of each test. If you are not interested in poetry like me, then you will find those sections tedious to read. Still the author has made sure that only the relevant lines are quoted and not the entire book. This book which was originally written in Spanish, was published much before the more popular The Da Vinci Code and is worth a read.

In 1999, yet another peace process was started by India. This time Prime Minister Vajyapee decided to take a bus to Lahore and sing a few poems for peace. The idea it seems was to attack the Jihadi heart, not with bullets, but with words. The Indian Prime Minister or the genius who came up with the idea hoped that under the impact of the bus trip, Pakistan would give up claims on Kashmir and maybe even donate Karachi to India.

While Indians were planning the bus trip, the Pakistanis were also into  planning the Kargil War, under the leadership of the current dictator Musharraff. The Indian Prime Minister was received by Nawaz Sharif, who was the alleged Prime Minister of Pakistan at that time. They sang songs, lighted candles and danced around the trees, while Pakistani soldiers and terrorists crossed the border into India.

We called Nawaz Sharif, the alleged Prime Minister because he came to know of this whole incident of incursion from Prime Minister Vajpayee. You cannot blame him also since no one bothered to tell him about the the planned Army operation since he was just, you know, the Prime Minister. Now in a new book, Ghaddar Kaun? Nawaz Sharif ki Kahani unki Zubani, which sounds like the title of a Sunny Deol-Anil Sharma movie, Nawaz Sharif has revealed all.

Giving his account of the 1999 conflict in the book Ghaddar Kaun? Nawaz Sharif ki Kahani unki Zubani, Sharif has reiterated his contention that Musharraf, the then Army chief, did not take him into confidence on the situation in Kargil and that he learnt the details from his Indian counterpart, Atal Behari Vajpayee.

�??As a prime minister, I was not taken into confidence on Kargil. I came to know what the Army was doing from Prime Minister Vajpayee. Even the Air and Naval chiefs as well as many Corps Commanders of the Army did not know about the Kargil operation,�?� Sharif is reported to have said. [General: Kargil was on before Vajpayee�??s Lahore visit]

 

Update:LeT carried out 7/11 blasts, Pak Fidayeen confess

Last year some researchers from Oman tried to sail along an ocean route used by traders about four millennia back. They didn't reach the other end as the boat sank. One of the best captured travels along an ancient route is the one done by the Japanese and Chinese along the silk route which resulted in a wonderful documentary, The Silk Road DVD Collection.

Another well known path is that traveled by Xuanzang (Huen Tsang) who spent a good part of his life in India visiting places like Nalanda, Punjab and Gaya. A recent travelogue on this route was Ten Thousand Miles Without a Cloud by Sun Shuyun. Now two Chinese Buddhist monks have decided to retrace those steps again. While Xuanzang did his trip entirely on foot, these monks will use all modes of travel. Their trip will  be televised and they will also blog.

They will travel through Pakistan and Nepal and are expected to arrive at Nalanda in Bihar of India, the ancient center of Buddhist learning, in mid-November.

In addition to religious studies in Nalanda during their stay, the two monks will present a handwritten sutra by famous Chinese calligraphers to the Indian temple.

"The trip is of great significance in religious and cultural exchanges between the two nations," Monk Mingxian said. Xuanzang's pilgrimage to India, which was full of trials and tribulations, has become known to more people of coming generations in China largely through the classical fiction "Journey to the west", commonly known to western readers as "Monkey King".

Written by Wu Cheng'en ( 1510-1582), "Journey to the west" is one of the four Chinese literary classics. The other three are "The Water Margins", "Dream of the Red Mansion" and "Romance of Three Kingdoms". [Chinese monks begin pilgrimage to India]

See Also: Along Huen Tsang's path, Following Huen Tsang's Steps

1. PutVote.com: The digg equivalent for Indian Blogosphere by Kingsleyand Ravages. Which one of you is Hobbit Hob?
2. Kamat News Portal: An alternative for the ad infested Sulekha Newshopper

Climate was an important factor in the rise and decline of ancient civilizations. The decline of the Indus Valley Civilization in 1700 BCE has been attributed to tectonic activity along the Indo-Asian plate boundary, the drying up of the Ghaggar-Hakra river system, and the failure of monsoons. While the decline of the Indus Valley Civilization lead to the rise of the city states in the Gangetic plain, it seems a pre-historic climate change in Eastern Sahara resulted in the rise of the Egyptian civilization.

Starting at about 8500 B.C., researchers say, broad swaths of what are now Egypt, Chad, Libya, and Sudan experienced a "sudden onset of humid conditions."  For centuries the region supported savannahs full of wildlife, lush acacia forests, and areas so swampy they were uninhabitable. During this time the prehistoric peoples of the eastern Sahara followed the rains to keep pace with the most hospitable ecosystems.

But around 5300 B.C. this climate-driven environmental abundance started to decline, and most humans began leaving the increasingly arid region. "Around 5,500 to 6,000 years ago the Egyptian Sahara became so dry that nobody could survive there," said Stefan Kröpelin, a geoarchaeologist at the University of Cologne in Germany and study co-author. Without rain, rivers, or the ephemeral desert streams known as waddis, vegetation became sparse, and people had to leave the desert or die, Kröpelin says. [Exodus From Drying Sahara Gave Rise to Pharaohs, Study Says ]

How could a small state, Athens, with no great military might in the 6th century BCE transform itself into a powerful nation which could defeat even the mighty Persian empire? How could Athens, which was not as powerful as Argos, Corinthia or Sparta, survive and hold out invasions? Why did democracy first set its roots here?

The PBS Documentary, The Greeks: Crucible of Civilization starts with the history of Athens beginning with the rule of Peisistratos (607 - 528 BCE) under whom this small town prospered. While great civilizations like Egypt and Persia prospered around rivers, Athens was a mountainous region. Peisistratos encouraged farming and provided loans and soon Athens was exporting the hot commodity of the times - olive oil to nations around the Mediterranian to Egypt, Persia, and Phoenicia. The booming trade made Athens wealthy and prosperous.

After the death of Peisistratos, his son Hippias took over. He ruled fairly initially, but after his brother's death, he turned to be a tyrant. Self-Preservation was his only motive and since his only threat was from aristocrats, he turned against them. The aristocrats under the leadership of a nobleman called Cleisthenes captured Hippias and banished him from Athens in 510 BCE. As Cleisthenes became famous, he faced a rebellion under Isagoras. Isagoras with the help of  Spartans, the enemies of Athens,  assumed power and banished Cleisthenes.

The people of Athens then took destiny into their own hands. Isagoras and his partners locked themselves in the Acropolis, but they were forced to surrender  and he was forced into exile in 508 BCE. Cleisthenes was recalled from exile and asked to form a Government. He came up with the idea of people, both rich and poor, discussing the issues facing them and casting votes to make a decision. This was quite revolutionary at that time. On issues like raising of taxes, building of roads and going to war, votes were cast, with a white stone for yes and a black one for no and the seeds of democracy were sown.

During· school days, history was not my favorite topic due to the simple reason that history books were boring. For example, the chapter on Mughal Emperors would read like this:

Akbar ruled India from 1560 to 1605. His full name was Jalaluddin Mohammed Akbar Padshah Ghazi. He built many roads (from 1561-1563), planted trees (1564 -1567) and dug wells for travelers (1570 -1571). Akbar was succeeded by his son Jahangir. He planted trees (1606), dug wells (1609 -1610) and built roads (1611 -1623). Test question: What was Akbar doing in 1567?

When you find history books outside the school book realm, you find that they are mostly written by �??Eminent Historians�?�. According to them, there were Dravidians who were uncivilized and along came the Aryans from somewhere in Central Asia, in their chariots. They inflicted terror and caused the Dravidians to flee to South India, where they lived happily ever after building temples to Khusboo and Nagma.

Now a days no one seriously believes the Aryan Invasion/Migration/Tourist theory, including people doing excavations in the Indus Valley. During the time of the NDA Administration in India, Jagmohan, who was the Culture Minister started the Saraswati Heritage Project. The aim of the project was to excavate the sites along the path of the mythical Saraswati river and learn more about Indian history. The excavations in Adi Badri along the path had revealed a 300 AD Kushan Site and from Dholavira we got the remains of one of the oldest stadiums in the world and some sign boards. This project was immediately tagged as the �??saffronization of Indian history�?� and an attempt to push the antiquity of Indian Civilization. The current Government has scrapped the project.

The Aryan Invasion theory and Saraswati excavations makes you aware that there are many versions of history and lot of politics behind it. At this point you would like to find information for yourself, rather than depend on some biased scholars. You wish you could be an archaeologist like Indiana Jones, running from Kathmandu to Cairo, fighting evil Nazis and snakes and dating beautiful women along the way. Then you realize that you have a day job, a family to feed and your wife may not take kindly to the idea of you dating other women.

Then you turn to the blogosophere for help and guidance and find that there are almost zero to no blogs dealing with the subject. Thus varnam.org started tracking news related to Indian history and archaeology, in an attempt to understand the events more clearly. This made varnam the most boring blog in Indian blogosphere, for which thankfully there is no category in IndiBloggies.

Starting the history section got me in touch with other history buffs who have been wandering aimlessly and the first benefit was the introduction to the wonderful India Archaeology mailing list on Yahoo!. This is a place where people actually know what they are talking about and experts debate endlessly on the similarity between Brahmi and Aramic, the relationship between Lion and Rashtrakuta rulers, and if Steve Farmer is an idiot or not.

A beginner in Indian history is overwhelmed by the amount of literature available. The blog served as a place for people to drop book suggestions and thus I read The Gem in the Lotus by Abraham Eraly, and The Lives of the Jain Elders by Hemacandra (the only book which describes how Chanakya died). Eminent Historians: Their Technology, Their Line, Their Fraud by Arun Shourie taught a great deal about the politics of history. A non-boring way to get introduced to history is to read historical fiction and thanks to some other comments, I read the English translation of Kalki�??s wonderful Chola epic Ponniyin Selvan, and also came to know of a genre called speculative alternate history.

Sometimes even professional historians have doubts and I was shocked a few times when such people asked me for help. Fortunately, through the network of historians now available on mailing lists and as commentators on varnam, I was able to redirect their queries to experts in the field. Half the time you don�??t understand the question or the answer, but the blog has provided a venue for collaboration.

More than professional historians, it is amateurs who have found this site useful. Our history crazy blogger Ravages roams around Tamil Nadu on his bike snapping photographs of historical monuments and stones with inscriptions and comes up with questions like, �??What is an Arabic numeral doing in the middle of a 10th century Tamil text �??. Fortunately we were able to get help for him promptly allowing him to continue photographing other landmarks, like the Khushboo temple.

While learning from others, varnam has also produced many wonderful articles on history, as certified by the guy who runs varnam. The site exposed the myth behind Cheraman Perumal�??s conversion to Islam, and took Ayaz Amir to task for suggesting that India had no historical writing till Muslims arrived. Besides this, the site has been keeping track of the archaeology of burial urns in Tamil Nadu , the beginning of farming, the spread of Indus Valley Civilization, Buddhism, various dynasties in Kerala, and the archaeology in Dwaraka, just to mention a few topics. The focus of the site is on ancient Indian history, with emphasis on the time from Buddha to the Mauryas, though we would very much like to know how Subhash Chandra Bose died .

With all these efforts do I know for sure about the truth behind the Aryan theory or what happened to the civilization around Saraswati. No. Through the website I know that I am not alone in this search and that is very reassuring. When people write the history of Indian Blogosphere, they will write

A website named varnam wrote about Indus Valley (2002-2003), temple inscriptions (2002- 2004) and Subhash Bose (2004-2006).

(Written originally for DesiPundit)

Normally when terrorists want to trigger communal violence they attack places of worship, usually Hindu temples or holy cities. On September 2002, terrorists attacked the Akshardham temple in Gujarat, killing 31. On July 2005 there was a two-hour gun fight between LeT terrorists and Indian police on the site of the Ram Janmabhoomi in Ayodhya in which six terrorists were killed. On March 7, 2006, a series of blasts occurred in the Hindu holy city of Varanasi. On April 14, 2006 two blasts occured in the Jama Masjid in Old Delhi killing five people and injuring thirteen.

When terrorists attack Mumbai trains in which people of all religions travel how do you find a communal angle to it? You can if you want to and if you are the editor of a major newspaper. This is exactly what Shekhar Gupta did in his opinion piece in Newsweek. Shekhar Gupta wants to believe that the Mumbai terrorist attacks were an attack on secularism and is connected to the 2001 Gujarat riots in which both Hindus and Muslims were killed. His reasoning is that people who travel in first class compartments are rich upper-caste Gujarati Hindus.

This explains why one of my friends survived the bombing. He was traveling in one of the trains in which the bomb exploded. Fortunately he was in a different first class compartment. Probably the terrorists after realizing that he was a upper-caste Malayali Hindu moved the bomb to another compartment. And if the aim of terrorists was to murder upper-caste Gujarati Hindus why did they come to Mumbai when Gujarat is right next door, as Sandeep asks.

But finally we have an answer to The Acorn's question: who is the bigger fool?

While the Harappans were known to burry the dead, in South India, there was this custom of burrying the dead in urns. In the past few years there were discoveries of burrial urns in various places in Tamil Nadu. Burrial urns, 2800 years old were found in Adichanallur with the urns having inscriptions in Tamil-Brahmi. Later urns dating from 3rd century BCE to 3rd century AD were found in Palani.  This practice of burrying people in urns was common in ancient Greece as well as in Sri Lanka and Southeast Asia.

Now three types of burrial urns, believed to date back to between 6th century BCE and 2nd century AD have been found in Kaladi (Adi Shankara's birth place) in Kerala.

The urns were excavated by a team of researchers led by B. Ramesh, Director of the Research Centre at Sree Sankara College in Kalady. "Three types of earthen urn burials and some pots were found in a single day's excavation. Due to heavy downpour, the contents were severely affected. The biggest urn is 4.5 feet high and 2.75 ft in diameter," Dr. Ramesh said.

He said that its lower half had a height of 2.75 ft. The height of the upper half cannot be ascertained due to the damage that has occurred to it over the years. This was found 2.5 feet beneath the surface. It is a handmade red-and-black ware having a shape similar to that of an egg, with an ovoid lid. A prominent rim is seen on the middle part that joins the two halves.

The second urn (a medium-sized) was 3 ft high and has an inner diameter of 1.5 ft. It was situated on the northeast side of the main urn and three feet beneath the ground level. It also has a lid similar to the big one. But the bottom portion is a flattened one.

The third urn, smaller in size, also was 2.75 ft away from the main urn. Small earthen plates in broken conditions are also seen near the urns. Dr. Ramesh said the research team had conducted similar excavations near the present site on the banks of the Periyar. The team had found tools of varying sizes and shapes belonging to the Neolithic period. Various black and red pots and pot shreds were also retrieved.

The research team is now trying to identify more sites in the area that bear the relics of ancient culture and civilisations. They have also started a project to collect evidence that mark the presence of such age-old remains dating back to the Neolithic and Megalithic periods.

Archaeologists say the burial urns found in Kalady indicate that a civilised society lived there more than 2,500 years ago and the excavation also reflects the typical south Indian megalithic culture. [Burial urns of Megalithic period excavated]