Monday, August 7, 2017

Stories from Sicily: The Final Chapter

Our final blogpost from this summer's field school is written by Alexis Kelly. Our last two days were a little hectic, so she will be filling you in on the events of both yesterday and today!

Statue of the Madonna of the Snow that was carried down and back up the hill during the procession.

Sunday, August 6th, 2017

Lunch at the yummy pizzaria in Milazzo.


Have you ever been woken at 7 a.m. by the sound of cannons? Yeah, it's about as terrifying as it sounds, but that's what happens when it's festival day in Santa Lucia del Mela. I, being the jumpy person that I am, woke up in a panic to the seven cannon shots. Most of the students were leaving that day, so we were going to have to get up early anyway. For those of us that weren't leaving, it was an adventure day. We made plans to go to Milazzo for shopping and the beach before the festivities began. Why is that such an adventure you may ask? Well, we were taking the bus and didn't actually know where we were going. With the help of the friendly people of Santa Lucia del Mela, we made it to the bus stop and only had to wait a little bit. Our first stop in Milazzo was a food stop (of course). We stopped at a pizzeria that was a delicious choice and one of the best pizzas I have had on this trip.

Underwater high five!
We milked the time a little to spend some extra minutes in the air conditioning before the walk to the beach. Walking on the pebbles was quite the struggle for some of us because of how hot they were, but getting in the water was definitely worth the burning of the feet. Because we wanted to make it back in time for the procession in Santa Lucia del Mela, we only swam for a little while. Our time was also cut a little short because we needed a gelato and granita stop before heading to the bus stop.

The beginning of the beautiful colored sand,
wood shavings, and salt "carpet" for the procession.

Another smooth bus ride and quick like a bunny we were back in Santa Lucia climbing the "Black Diamond" path up to the convent. We made it in perfect timing to see the procession of the Madonna of the Snow. This is one of the most important days of the year in Santa Lucia del Mela. On August 5th every year, there is a procession from the castle at the top of the hill to the church at the bottom of the hill. The procession was unlike anything I had ever seen. The whole town was involved whether, part of the procession or just spectating. There was a band playing as well as prayers being said throughout the procession.


The "Tree of Life" featured in the decorations for the procession.
Another part of the beautiful decorations for the procession.

The light show projected onto the
building in the square was amazing!


We watched the procession go by and then went to shower and change to head down to the rest of the festival. Since Dr. Meier and Dr. Reinhard were regulars down at Nicotina, we had a table reserved in the middle of the square to see it all. We talked and had a good time together until 1:00am when the light show began. According to Dr. Piombino-Mascali, this was a new addition. An amazing light show was done against a building. All I can say is that that was one of the best things I had seen, but just when I thought it couldn't get any better, the fireworks started. These were by far the absolute best fireworks I have ever seen. The sky was lit up and beautiful for 15 minutes. Absolutely breathtaking and there are no words that will ever be able to explain it to anyone. In case you were wondering, the fireworks didn't start until 1:30 and ended at 1:45 (this was very late for me and the latest I think I have stayed up).

Pictures cannot do this phenomenal firework show justice.

Sleepy students are sleepy on the train back to Palermo.

Sunday morning was an early one since we did not get to bed until late. But our devotion to the Poker Bar continued today and we made sure to say good-bye to all those that we have gotten to see every morning. After some needed caffeine, those of us leaving caught the bus to get to the train station. Couldn't tell you how the train ride went because I have a tendency to sleep as soon as I get on one here. (I wasn't the only one though, so no one can judge me.) We got to Palermo in one piece and that is where this journey both began and ends. Now begins the long rides home. While I am so excited to go home and see my family and friends, I am going to miss the food, people, views, and did I say food? Here's to the memories, experiences, opportunities and friendships that I made on this trip. It was a trip that I will never forget. Arrivederci, Sicily! It's been real!

One of the many beautiful buildings in Palermo.

Friday, August 4, 2017

Stories from Sicily: Presentations and the Tradition of Singing Karaoke

Today we are reintroducing our friend Christina Coon for our blogpost.

A view of the castle, church, and convent (on the far right) as seen from Nicotina in the square.
Thursday, August 3, 2017

Today, we are coming to the end of our field school experience. We worked all morning on our final presentations, which was pretty stressful, but it was nice to kind of have a chill morning without anything scheduled for us to do as a class. My morning consisted of not having to set an alarm to wake up, then I went to get coffee with Chase and Alexis. I got my two cappuccinos so I felt twenty times better after my caffeine. Then, until about 4:30 pm we worked on our presentations. 

Pasta with mushrooms and meatballs 
Students settling in before their presentations




Once 4:30pm came around, we sat in a circle and just made it super casual so it was not as stressful as I thought it would be. I went third so I could get it out of the way, and it was nice not having to worry about repeating things. We had presentations until about 8:45pm because Chase took 32 minutes. Then we had dinner which was sausages and left over pasta which was soooooooo good. 


Christina presents her findings and observations about the mummies, the crypts, and what she learned in the field school 
Sausage!
To end our night, we went down to Nicotina with Dr. Reinhard, and got some yummy gelato. After that we went to the Karaoke Bar, which was a very good time. Dr. Reinhard and Alexis sang Time of My Life, which was awesome! Me, Tommy, Kylie, Ruth, Maggie, and Emily sang some Spice Girls, which was super fun because I love the Spice Girls. Then, we sang Beauty and the Beast, but we were supposed to sing How Far Will I Go from Moana, but it got mixed up with Haley, but we still sang in the background. We did not do as much today as we have done other days, but it was a super fun day and ended it with Karaoke with some awesome people! 

Thursday, August 3, 2017

Stories from Sicily: Chocolate Croissants and The Cappuccini Catacombs

Today's blogpost is from our cat loving friend Chase Horn.

Wednesday, August 2, 2017

Visiting the cathedral in Palermo
Today, we went back to Palermo for our second round of adventures in the city. It was a hot, sweaty day, but we got to see one of the coolest catacombs in the world! We also got to see some awe-inspiring cathedrals and a very famous mummy. But before we get to the action, let me drag you along another typical morning in Santa Lucia, where we have spent the past couple of weeks studying mummies.

If you haven’t been reading these posts, then you may be unfamiliar with the Poker Bar, however, if you do pay attention, you’ll know that we eat breakfast there basically every day. Today was no different in that aspect, as well as, the fact that I woke up later than I should’ve (no, surprises there). Anyway, I had a chocolate croissant and a coke (I know, not the breakfast of champions, but I was running late and they don’t serve coffee on the go here), which was followed up by a cold bottle of water, for good measure. Everyone then met back up at the convent where we waited for orders to head down the daunting hill towards our bus, where we would spend about three hours traveling to Palermo. Most of the bus ride is a blur considering I was sleeping, but we did take one break at a gas station, which oddly enough, was a high point in my day. "Why would a gas station be so exciting?" you may be asking, dear reader, well, let me fill you in friends. In Sicily, there are a lot of neat things, but they don’t live life quite the way we do back home, so a lot of the simple things we take for granted aren’t as accessible. And today, at that gas station, I ran into a Snickers bar, a blue Powerade, and a neck pillow. Needless to say, I was one happy camper.

Power up with Powerade 

Beautiful paintings on the cathedral ceiling





When we arrived in Palermo, we were dropped off and then made our way over to a huge cathedral in the middle of town. There were a lot of amazing things there, including various altars and relics honoring saints. The coolest altar, in my opinion, had the relics of seven different saints. Another interesting tid-bit about this cathedral is that there is one public bathroom. Not that interesting of a fact until you realize that that one bathroom costs half a euro to use and is completely hidden behind an altar. Using that bathroom is one cultural experience that I won’t soon forget. Soon, we would be heading over to the catacombs, which was one of the greatest places we’ve gotten to visit so far.






Blessed Guiseppe Puglisi, a martyred priest killed by the mafia
Saint Rosalia, the patron saint of Palermo

A hall of saints in the cathedral
Touring the cemetery



Before entering the Capuchin catacombs, we took a small tour around the cemetery that lies just outside of it. The cemeteries here are a little bit different, as most plots aren’t for individuals, but rather for families. Dr. Piombino-Mascali showed us some famous graves, including one belonging to a person related to someone that he knew who was killed by the mafia. He also talked to us a bit about the history of the mafia in Sicily.




Mausoleum of an important judge murdered by the mafia 
I want to throw in a mini side note here before I go on to the catacombs. I haven’t sweated through a shirt as bad as I did today since the days of high school football practices. I’m telling you, it was a steaming hot day out today.

Alright, let’s move on to the Capuchin catacombs, a place filled with over a thousand mummies, some of which were preserved in ways that are quite literally unbelievable. Dr. Piombino-Mascali gave us a tour, showing us the various corridors, some reserved for priests, others for children, virgins, women, men, and military. There were a lot of mummies... a lot of mummies. The coolest part was getting to see the mummy of Rosalia Lombardo, a child who died of pneumonia in 1920 and is one of the best-preserved mummies in the world. Honestly, if you have never heard of her, look her up and see how amazing she looks, it’s incredible.

A quick pic. before entering the Cappuccini catacombs 
After our tour, the students were given the opportunity to look around the catacombs and pick two or three mummies to analyze. I was given the duty of taking temperature and humidity readings in the catacombs to compare to the data that we have seen in other crypts. For my mummies, I chose two adult males with incredible facial tissue preservation. Both still had hair, a nose, ears, lips, and most of their teeth. One still had a mustache, eyebrows, and eyelashes, which I thought was incredible. I know for sure one that I analyzed was a priest, and I believe the other was probably a middle-class man who paid his way into the catacombs. I was fascinated by both men, their clothes, and the preservation of their faces and hair.

After our analyses were done, we went and got a quick snack at a little café just down the street. I got a coke and a pork and cheese filled croissant-type of thing. It was delicious whatever it was. We then proceeded back on the bus to endure another three-hour ride back to Santa Lucia. I slept most of the way, but it was a little bit of a bumpy ride. We got back and soon were treated to our supper and guess what just happened to be on the menu… the meatballs that I wrote about in my first post! I couldn’t have been any happier. Seriously, I love those things. They’re so good. So, so, so good. A little bit later, a few of us went down to Nicotina to have some gelato and observe the local celebration going on. We were lucky to come during a time of year where there are a lot of celebrations and I really enjoy being able to witness these events taking place. Despite the heat and the humidity and the sore feet from all of the walking and climbing, today was a fun day. It was also our last day of activities, as tomorrow we start working on final projects and reflections. Soon, we will be back home, and even though I love this experience, I would be lying if I said I didn’t miss home, my family, my girlfriend, and especially Kevin the cat.

Pasta with tomato sauce 
Meatballs!
Five meatballs and counting...Ten meatballs total consumed 

Tuesday, August 1, 2017

Stories from Sicily: Of Lice and Ancient Men

Today's blogpost is from our friend Haley Carr

A Milazzo sunset from the water
Tuesday, August 1st, 2017

Today was very productive. We started the day with a series of lectures from Dr. Reinhard and Dr. Morrow about parasites. We learned about some of the history of the field, some parasite recovering techniques, and a few case studies ranging from a bog body in Denmark to mummies in southern Peru.
Dr. Reinhard talks about parasites from different sites
It was interesting to learn about how ectoparasites can be just as damaging as endoparasites, and that many historic diseases were caused by viruses who used lice, ticks, and other ectoparasites as a vector for infection.

Dr. Morrow also gives a presentation on parasites
We then had our Italian lesson where we learned a very long list of verbs and how to conjugate them. It expanded our Italian vocabulary and will hopefully allow us to communicate better with the locals here in Santa Lucia.
Pasta with red pepper sauce




When Italian was over we had lunch which was red pepper pasta. We all liked it a lot and wanted to get the recipe. We also had little balls of what appeared to be fried bread. Some of the students commented it looked like a hush puppy without the filling. They were also delicious.





Fried almost-hushpuppies
After lunch we started our lab activities. We were broken up into pairs and rotated between a crypt activity and a parasite activity. In the crypt we analyzed a few of the ossuaries per group and tried to determine how many individuals were present in each ossuary, whether they were male or female, how old they were, if they had any pathologies, and if there was any soft tissue preservation or insect activity. After we analyzed the ossuaries, many of us found that each one often had more than one person's remains inside. Some of them had mismatched skulls and mandibles. This activity will be important later on so the bones can be rearranged. Each group also analyzed a niche, which had more soft tissue preservation and usually only one individual present.

Ruth looks for lice in a sample






For the parasite activity, we looked at three different hair/scalp samples from Chinchorro mummies. Using a square template, we counted the number of louse nits in three different areas along the sample, took an average, then divided by two in order to get the number of nits per centimeter squared. The samples ranged from being heavily concentrated in lice to having none at all.







After the labs were done, we got ready to go to Milazzo. It was very hot so we walked fairly rapidly through the city and saw a few of the historic sites including a Bronze Age excavation site, a museum of artifacts collected there, a church, and another church that had the patron saint of Milazzo's body inside. However, there was a wedding going on inside so we had to crash the wedding in our sweaty clothes to observe the saint which was probably not appreciated by the wedding attendees, but that's what you have to do in the name of science I guess.

Touring around Milazzo
A Bronze Age archaeological site

Beautiful paintings on the ceiling of a church 
Pottery at the museum 
After we saw everything we had time to see, we walked down to the beach and went for a swim. After the hot hike around the city, we were happy to be in the refreshing water. It was so clear you could see the bottom and we spent a couple of hours swimming around and laying on the beach enjoying the excellent view of the ocean and the castle before it was time to head back to the convent.

Clear water and the pebbles beneath it

Selfie with the group
Being cool...somewhat

Recapturing last years group photo with this year's students
After an arduous hike back up to the convent in Santa Lucia, we had a delicious meal prepared by the wonderful Carmelina of mushrooms and tuna salad. After all the hiking and swimming we did it was good to have something to eat. All in all, it was a great day and we accomplished a lot while still having a lot of fun.
Meat, mushrooms, and carrots in a yummy sauce

Salami
Tomato and tuna salad

Stories from Sicily: Research and Reflections

Today's entry was written by our friend from the UK, Dr. Emuobosa Orijemie.

The altar and painting in the crypt by candlelight 
Monday, July 31, 2017

The day started at the Porker Bar where participants usually have breakfast—brioche with cappuccino or gelato. We converged in the “lecture room” at 10:30 a.m. as against the usual 9:00 a.m.; Dr. Reinhard thought it would be better for the group to have more hours of rest having attended the “Eggplant Festival” the night before. Dr. Reinhard introduced the topic by providing the history of dietary analyses of mummies which began in the 1930s by Danish palaeobotanist, Helbaek. The mummies that Helbaek studied were wet so that it was easy for him to empty their intestinal contents, which had well-preserved seeds. In England, Dr. Holden was cited as one of the major contributors to the field; it was he who published a summary of the processes and contexts of regarding dietary remains of humans during the 1980s.

Dr. Reinhard talks about dietary analysis
In the United States, Callen and Cameron were among the pioneers in studying Peruvian human remains especially coprolites. With the unfortunate and untimely death of Callen due to health complications associated with the altitude of the site, Dr. Vaughan Bryant was invited to continue Callen’s work. Subsequently, Dr. Reinhard was introduced to dietary analysis by Dr. Bryant. An important point highlighted by Dr. Reinhard was the standards in dietary analysis of human remains. He indicated that stable isotopes emphasized meat intake and could not detect undigested plant food remains (fibers) which constituted a major percentage of the diet of early Native Americans. Hence, this technique would likely produce some error as it was with the case of Ötzi, the individual who was initially thought to have lived a vegetarian or vegan life style. However, the discovery of remains of wheat, plant fibers, and charred meat indicated that Ötzi was neither a vegetarian nor a vegan. A second case was when Bryant and Reinhard found that some of the mummies they studied yielded abundant plant remains. Their results were in contrast to those of stable isotope analysis, which had indicated that the individuals had 95% of their food resources from the ocean. Hence, where possible stable isotope analysis should be complemented by archaeobotanical analyses i.e. macro- and microbotanical analyses.

Dr. Orijemie gives his presentation on dietary reconstruction




After Dr. Reinhard's talk, there were three presentations namely by myself, Brianna Haberyan, and Ruth Grady. I talked about my experiment in Nigeria where pollen analysis was conducted on freshly collected faecal matter of two human subjects, a ram, and chicken. The main results were that few pollen grains were recovered from one of the human subjects, which indicated that it had most likely consumed processed foods. The other human and animal subjects had a diversified amount of pollen grains from which their diet and environment were reconstructed. 

Students ask questions at the end of Dr. Orijemie's presentation
Brianna talked about an America POW soldier in Korea who died in 1951 and became mummified. He was repatriated in 1954 and exhumed in 2006. A coprolite sample, 3cm in diameter, from this mummy was analysed. It yielded two kinds of seeds, which were initially thought to be Perilla frutescens and Brassica juncea (mustard seeds), but after scrutiny turned out to be inaccurate. Other plant remains recovered included the pollen of Rosaceae and Oryza sp., and fibers from a kimchi-like source. In addition, remains of military government-issued foods were absent, while very little starch grains were found. These findings were in sharp contrast to testimonies of Korean War veterans who indicated that they were fed starch-rich foods. The study, which is still ongoing, has the potential of becoming a classic upon completion.

Brie presents her research on a Korean War POW
Before Ruth Grady’s presentation, Dr. Reinhard talked about “Pollen in Mummy: New Methods”. He discussed the mummified remains of a 5-6 year old boy belonging to the Ventana Cave Burial 5 of the Tohono O’Odham group of Southern Arizona. It was excavated in 1941 and initially analysed between 1981 and 1984. A re-analysis of four coprolites was conducted by Dr. Reinhard where seeds of mesquites (Prosopis juliflora var. glandulosa) and saguaro (Carnegiea gagentica) were recovered. It was concluded that the child was fed with seed cakes of these two plants shortly before his death, while the fresh pollen of saguaro indicated that the child died between Mid-May and July, which is the flowering period of the plant.

Dr. Reinhard gives his second presentation on pollen in mummies
Ruth presents research done on the Piraino 1 mummy



Ruth Grady presented a paper on the dietary remains of the Piraino I, Sicily mummy who suffered cancer at the end of its life. Analysis of the intestinal remains revealed an absence of wheat starch and environmental pollen grains. There was occurrence of the eggs of the parasitic worm Trichuris trichiura, seeds and stones of grapes, wheat chaff, and the pollen of Polygala, a medicinal plant. The main conclusions were that (i) the individual was heavily infected with Trichuris trichiura, (ii) absence of environmental pollen was suggestive of death during winter and (iii) the abundant Polygala was probably used as treatment for  stomach disorder and for the reduction of tumor size. 

Lunch was served at about 1:15 p.m. It was pasta covered in pesto (basil, cheese, and pine nuts), cheese, fresh tomatoes, and bread. Work was to resume at 2:45 p.m.

Some tomatoes, mozzarella, and bread to go with your pesto?
Pasta Pesto!
From 2:45-3:55 p.m., Dr. Morrow set up glass bottles containing seeds, fly puparia, and other insect fragments. We hoped to use the dissecting microscope, which unfortunately did not come up because of issues with converting the currents of our electronic devices. Hence, we had to improvise by using hand-held magnifying glasses and an Optivisor. In addition, a sample from a Lithuanian mummy was “analysed” by students. With Dr. Morrow’s supervision, faecal matter of rodents and/or small reptiles, small twigs, and the exoskeleton of unidentified insects were recovered.
Students look at macroscopic remains
At 4:00 p.m., our Italian lessons began. The instructor, Katia Trifirò, taught numeral figures, months, and years after which we were all engaged in specific tasks regarding constructing sentences using numbers, months, and birth dates. This was, as usual, challenging but exciting, particularly because I had erroneously indicated in Italian that my date of birth was 31st August 1908. This, indeed, almost scared the instructor. Half-way into the lesson, Dr. Reinhard requested that Katia Trifirò teach us terms (such as dead, skeleton, death, blood, embalming process, coffin, fire, window, clothing, St. Francis, art paintings, niche, ribs etc) found on and/or associated with the crypt and the mummies. We returned to the Italian lecture at 5:41 p.m. and ended at 6:12 p.m. at which point several students were experiencing slight headaches and had become fatigued.
The struggle is real..."Sono nato il trentuno agosto mille nove otto" I was born on 31st of August, 1908.
Katia gives the Italian names for items in  the crypt
Dinner was served at 8:20 p.m. with lettuce, flattened fried pork, pears, peaches, and chocolate dessert Salami.

Fried pork!
And for the Vegetarian in you, some fried eggplant
One of the crypt candles


At 9:30 p.m., the group, led by Dr. Piombino-Mascali, re-enacted the visitation scene at the crypt. Dr. Piombino-Mascali explained that on the 2nd of November every year it was the custom of Sicilian people to visit the crypt to have some form of symbolic relationship with the beloved relative who had passed away. Candles were lit, which gave the crypt a kind of ambiance reflective of “sacredness”. Every student was asked to reflect on the situation and the common thought was that it was “peaceful, quiet, and reassuring to see one’s beloved relative who had passed to the great beyond with the hope that one day it would be our turn.” A German journalist friend of Dr. Piombino-Mascali's, Michael Stang, was there to record the event. We left the crypt at about 10:20 p.m., and that was how we rounded off the day.



Reflecting on the dead