strata and stenograph

A Japanese company whose main business is the production of architectural models brings the thrill of seeing of a vision realised to the broader public with the series of ingenious, laser-cut note pads, which as the sheets are used up, the act of taking and passing notes excavates a famous landscape and building ensemble. Be sure to visit Spoon & Tamago at the link above for further information and exquisite omoshiro (meaning interesting or fun) blocks that reveals miniatures of the Osaka castle and the Kiyomizudera Temple (pictured). These would make fine and useful keepsakes, we think, for any landmark.

dugong show

Despite rejection by the scientific and curatorial community as hoaxes, the manufactured chimera known as Fiji mermaids are stubborn objects of fascination and still prized acquisitions in serious collections, as Hyperallergic contributor Allison Meier experienced.
Marketed to the public like sea-monkeys, perhaps some of that enduring celebrity and academic interest can be sourced to that dissonance between expectation and reality. Specimens are even subjected to a rigorous battery of testing, including DNA and x-rays. What do you think? Plenty of reliquaries have sideshow status as well but we wonder if such spectacles and mascots aren’t contributing to the idea of museums as backdrops over places of scholarship and learning. Perhaps the sense of balance is most important.

hallstattzeit

No plunder and tomb-raiding for us of course, but we were taken aback to discover rather casually that there is an ancient Celtic ensemble of burial mounds (Hügelgra- bernfeld) to explore essentially in our backyard. The substantial artefacts and grave-goods recovered here are late iron age and correspond to the ascendency of the Frankish Merovingian dynasty. Apparently this one site is part of a larger trail that extends over sixty kilometres through the region and once the weather turns fairer, I think that that’s a path we’ll embark on.

we have thought proper by these presents, to notify the good citizens of these united states

Though preliminary articles of peace were drawn up by the Continental Congress the previous April, the American Revolutionary War did not officially end until this day in 1784 with the ratification of the Treaty of Paris by the colonies’ assent in the Maryland State House in Annapolis, the then capitol. According to the rules on entering into treaties and accords established in the Articles of Confederation, delegates from at least nine colonies (states) were needed to comprise a quorum but due to the severity of the winter weather, only seven were present and it seemed unlikely any more could make the arduous journey.
The reason that more than a simple majority was stipulated and the cause for Thomas Jefferson’s insistence was that with only a bald majority’s acquiescing, Britain could later reasonably declare the terms of the treaty invalid and renege on the deal. Going ahead with just seven and compromising constitutional law this early on in the nation’s history was, according to Jefferson, a dishonourable prostitution of the Great Seal of the United States. Finally, a deal was reached whereby a stay of three months would be requested until such time as other representatives could arrive, or that if Great Britain were to sue for immediate resolution, that the matter be agreed to with seven members but without the competency of precedence nor of the legislature.