Yet Another Cycling Forum

Off Topic => The Pub => Arts and Entertainment => Topic started by: Wowbagger on 09 May, 2019, 09:29:55 am

Title: "UK's Tutenkhamun"
Post by: Wowbagger on 09 May, 2019, 09:29:55 am

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2019/may/09/britains-equivalent-to-tutankhamun-found-in-southend-on-sea?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Facebook&fbclid=IwAR1NTm6xHZE6HP_kKCvivOF0puYIGTAdBvBM6hJ_DziFrrIE8zS0KzGjZ3c

This burial chamber was discovered when Southend Borough Council wanted to build a dual carriageway through a local park. There was a massive public outcry in which we submitted a petition of some 22,000 signatures against the scheme (I was chairman of the Priory Park Preservation Society, which was formed especially to fight the council's plans). A protest camp was formed ("Camp Bling") and it became the world's longest-serving successful road protest camp. The road remains a fully functional single carriageway. In the end it was the spiralling costs which stopped the Council's plans, aided and abetted by Tom Brake, the Lib Dem transport spokesman at the time, who made an excellent speech in the Commons in which he said "It would be cheaper to pave it with gold."

It's a remarkable thing that not only did the artefacts found in the burial chamber come from as far afield as Sri Lanka but also that whoever was buried there had adopted Christianity some 15 years before St. Augustine turned up (assuming the accuracy of the carbon dating). It's also incredible that the position of the chamber, as it was between the railway (1872ish) and the road (1923) was just sitting there with tens of thousands of people passing within about 20 feet of it. The mound shown in that article was built by Southend Council in about 2010.

Title: Re: "UK's Tutenkhamun"
Post by: Cudzoziemiec on 09 May, 2019, 09:35:35 am

The hanging bowl intrigues me. Was it purely ornamental or did people actually cook in it?

Title: Re: "UK's Tutenkhamun"
Post by: orienteer on 09 May, 2019, 09:39:31 am

Now just need to find the lost Prittlewell Pyramids to revive the Southend tourist trade. :)

Title: Re: "UK's Tutenkhamun"
Post by: Wowbagger on 09 May, 2019, 09:53:11 am

Southend has a sphinx - it is it a sphincter?

Title: Re: "UK's Tutenkhamun"
Post by: Canardly on 09 May, 2019, 09:57:14 am

Time to get the metal detector out in the back garden WB.

Title: Re: "UK's Tutenkhamun"
Post by: PeteB99 on 09 May, 2019, 10:49:39 am

Shows at least there once was a civilization in Southend. Pity about how it turned out  ;D