$40 estate sale find by early African-American silversmith sells for $24,000

By: SGK ADVERTISING ADDA on February 04, 2026 / comment : 0

A unique silver pap boat made by pioneering American silversmith of African descent Peter Bentzon has been sold to an as-yet unnamed “prominent American institution” for $24,000 after being discovered at an estate sale in Minnesota in a $40 box labelled “silverplate.” The young buyer spotted Bentzon’s hallmark and realized he’d hit the estate sale jackpot.

A pap boat is a shallow elongated bowl with a pouring rim on one side that was used to feed babies or sick people with a thin porridge (aka pap). The pap was highly digestible nourishment that could be given to someone who was too young or too ill to chew. The boat-like shape and pouring lip made holding the bowl and feeding easier. This one is less than five inches long and three inches wide. It weighs 69 grams. The flat bottom of the boat is stamped P. BENTZON in capital letters embedded in a rectangle. It dates to between 1810 and 1820.

Peter Bentzon was the only silversmith of African descent working in early America whose silver pieces can be identified by his personal hallmark. He was born on the island of Saint Thomas to a mother of mixed Afro-Caribbean heritage and a white European father believed to have been Norwegian Jacob Bentzon, a lawyer and royal judge advocate on the island. Peter was just eight years old when he was sent to Philadelphia to become an apprentice to a silversmith. He worked there from 1799 to 1806, then moved back to the Caribbean where he opened his own shop in Christiansted, St. Croix. He worked there for 10 years, marrying Rachel de la Motta, a free woman of color from a prominent family and ultimately having seven children.

Bentzon and his family moved back and forth between St. Croix and Philadelphia. He had an active trading business as well as the silversmith shop. He must have passed for white in Philadelphia as the 1820 census listed both him and his mixed wife as white. They last appear on the census in 1850, and there are no records of his death.

Fewer than 30 pieces of Bentzon silver are known to survive today. Most of them are small flatware (teaspoons) or implements like a nutmeg grater that sold for $40,000 at Sotheby’s in 2021. His two largest and most famous pieces are a pair of identical teapots made for Rebecca Dawson, member of a prominent Philadelphia Quaker abolitionist family, in 1817. One of them is now in the Saint Louis Art Museum; the other in the National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington, D.C. Even his teaspoons are in museums. The Philadelphia Art Museum has one, and another well-known piece: a footed cup he made in 1841 for Reverend Benjamin Lucock, a presentation gift from the superintendent and teachers of St. John’s Episcopal Church Sunday School in St. Croix.

* This article was originally published here

Jack Thorne on 'remarkably tender' Lord of the Flies

By: SGK ADVERTISING ADDA on February 04, 2026 / comment : 0 news, films E

Award winners Jack Thorne and Marc Munden on their adaptation of William Golding's Lord of the Flies.

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Complete gilded Book of the Dead on display for the first time

By: SGK ADVERTISING ADDA on February 03, 2026 / comment : 0

One of the only complete and gilded copies of the Egyptian Book of the Dead has gone on public display for the first time at the Brooklyn Museum. There are only ten known gilded papyri of the Book of the Dead, and most of them are fragmentary. This one is by far the best condition gilded version in existence.

The new exhibition, Unrolling Eternity: The Brooklyn Books of the Dead, showcases the papyrus in the funerary gallery of the museum’s Egyptian wing. The gallery has been refreshed with new exhibits to illustrate ancient Egyptian funerary practices and beliefs, including the richly decorated coffin and mummy board of Pasebakhaienipet, mayor of Thebes, several mummified people and animals, wall reliefs from the tomb of the vizier Nespeqashuty, one of the earliest examples of the Book of the Dead (1500–1480 B.C.). A selection of smaller objects like gold amulets, reed pens and preparatory sketches.

The gilded Book of the Dead dates to the Ptolemaic period (305–30 B.C) and is 21 feet long. It contains almost all of the 162 known spells from the surviving examples of the Book of the Dead. They are written in hieratic (cursive hieroglyphics) and illustrated with ink scenes and figures accented with gold. The script and double borders around the columns and illustrations identify the book as an example of the Memphite style of Lower Egypt. Some of the vignettes show visible underdrawings and rare traces of yellow orpiment pigment. We know the manuscript is complete because it retains the blank opening and closing pages that are usually lost.

The papyrus was bought by a British doctor, Henry Abbott, in the 19th century. He was an avid collector of Egyptian artifacts and had amassed thousands of objects when he put them on display in the first exhibition of Egyptian art in New York City in 1853. The entire collection was transferred to the New York Historical Society after Doctor Abbott’s death and was then loaned to the Brooklyn Museum in 1937. The museum officially acquired it in 1948.

The papyrus was too fragile to be displayed. It had been mounted on acidic paper backing that was putting strain on the delicate fibers. Only six inches of the scroll were even visible. The rest was still rolled up and could not be unrolled without risking too much damage. The museum embarked on a comprehensive conservation of the document three years ago, and experts were finally able to open the papyrus scroll all the way. They discovered it belonged to one Ankhmerwer (“may the god Mnevis live”), son of Taneferher (“the one beautiful of face”).

This video from the Brooklyn Museum goes into detail about the complex conservation process and the discoveries the team made in their study of the manuscript.

* This article was originally published here

The Fratellis cancel 20th anniversary tour due to singer's illness

By: SGK ADVERTISING ADDA on February 03, 2026 / comment : 0 BBC News, news

Known for their hits Chelsea Dagger and Whistle for the Choir, the Glasgow band said the tour would be rescheduled.

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The Fratellis cancel 20th anniversary tour due to singer's illness

By: SGK ADVERTISING ADDA on February 03, 2026 / comment : 0 news, films E

Known for their hits Chelsea Dagger and Whistle for the Choir, the Glasgow band said the tour would be rescheduled.

from BBC News https://ift.tt/5mQz3j0

The Night Manager villain inspired by John le Carré's own father

By: SGK ADVERTISING ADDA on February 03, 2026 / comment : 0 news, films E

The son of The Night Manager author has said the series' villain is inspired by his own "evil" grandfather.

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The Night Manager villain inspired by John le Carré's own father

By: SGK ADVERTISING ADDA on February 03, 2026 / comment : 0 BBC News, news

The son of The Night Manager author has said the series' villain is inspired by his own "evil" grandfather.

from BBC News https://ift.tt/4LXZ0eb

Neolithic teen “prince” was mauled by a bear

By: SGK ADVERTISING ADDA on February 02, 2026 / comment : 0

A new study of the remains of a 15-year-old boy buried with luxurious grave goods in the Arena Candide Cave in Liguria, northwestern Italy, 27,000 years ago has found evidence that he was mauled to death by a bear. This is some of the first physical evidence of a violent interaction between prehistoric humans and megafauna, and the only one that is an articulated skeleton in a grave rather than a small bone fragment.

The grave was first discovered in 1942. The body of an adolescent male was placed supine on a bed of red ochre with a lump of yellow ochre below the jaw. The most ornate artifact found in the grave was the boy’s headdress made of hundreds of perforated shells and several deer canines. His grave also contained ivory pendants, four antler bâtons percés (spear-throwers) and a large flint blade held in his right hand. He was dubbed “Il Principe” (the Prince) because of this remarkable funerary assemblage. It is one of the most richly adorned graves of the Gravettian culture ever found in Italy.

Severe trauma to the skeleton was immediately evident to the archaeologists who unearthed it. The left scapula, left humerus, the left clavicle and left mandible had missing or damaged parts. The damage was so severe there was a hole between the neck, left shoulder and mandible. The yellow ochre lump placed there was likely connected to the wound, either to cover the disfiguring injury or as a ritual healing or restoration of wholeness.

From the start, the prevailing hypothesis was that the youth had been attacked by a wild animal during a hunt gone wrong. No comprehensive studies of the bones and injuries has been done, however, and when the skeleton was reassembled for display at the Ligurian Archaeological Museum after World War II, it was patched with resins and glues that obscured some of the fractures.

A team of researchers obtained authorization from the museum to remove the bones for thorough analysis with modern technology. In addition to the known fractured and missing bones, the team found perimortem bite marks and a linear mark on the skull consistent with a claw swipe, that could not be explained by other potentially fatal scenarios (a fall from a great height, violence inflicted by another human). Given the large carnivores that were found in the region during the Late Pleistocene, the likeliest candidates for the perpetrator are a brown bear or a cave bear.

The researchers concluded that lesions on the boy’s skull and ankle were bite and claw marks, likely from a cave or brown bear, based on their patterns. “He was probably a budding hunter still learning his skills when this happened,” says lead study author Vitale Stefano Sparacello, a biological anthropologist at the University of Cagliari in Italy.

The animal dislodged the boy’s mandible, left a groove in his skull, broke his clavicle and left a bite mark on his right ankle. Even the boy’s left pinky toe had been fractured. Though we don’t know for sure, Sparacello contends that the injuries are indicative of a bear who would have viewed the boy as more of a menace that needed to be neutralized than a meal because these bears mostly ate plants.

Microscopic examination found evidence of a small amount of bone healing. This means the poor youth lived for a few days, no more than three, after he was absolutely savaged by the animal. That means despite having face and shoulder torn up and his foot bitten, the prince’s major blood vessels remained intact or he would have bled to death right away. He must have been saved by his companions and brought to safety.

The study had been published in the Journal of Anthropological Sciences and can be read here (pdf).

* This article was originally published here

Alan Carr accidentally revealed Traitors victory hours after filming

By: SGK ADVERTISING ADDA on February 02, 2026 / comment : 0 news, films E

The comedian inadvertently revealed his victory to a cameraman while working the following day.

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Alan Carr accidentally revealed Traitors victory hours after filming

By: SGK ADVERTISING ADDA on February 02, 2026 / comment : 0 BBC News, news

The comedian inadvertently revealed his victory to a cameraman while working the following day.

from BBC News https://ift.tt/vbHA6Ka