Osiris-Themed Roller Coaster

"Fly Osiris", the new roller coaster at 'Parc Astérix' in France. The "new PHARAONIC attraction"! Whatever you want to say about the French, at least they like a little archaeology in their theme parks. Spotted in the Paris Metro. Bonus points for the ironic graffiti (Osiris = god of the dead)

Telecom Italia Mobile Goes Ancient

Telecom Italia Mobile has this fantastic series of ads with ancient Romans chilling out and talking on their cell phones. Love the costume design, good production value trumps the cheerful banality any day.






From the marketing text:

"The secret of Julius Caesar's success? A smartphone for navigating online, chatting with Cleopatra, and uploading battle photos to Facebook! But among the senators, there are some who doubt his supremacy...;)"

Genghis Khan Week: Genghis smokes a Century

"Hi, I'm Genghis Khan. In the 1100s we built the Mongolian Empire and changed the face of the world. It was fun! But I'm only doing this commercial to tell you of a real impressive century. This century. When your usual cigarette loses its charm, smoke a century."

One of many, many amusing historically-themed ads for Century 100s produced in the 1960s. Kudos to Youtube user Meatpies62.

Elginism: For or Against?

From a 2001 print ad by TBWA\Athens highlighting the plight of the Parthenon Marbles. There seems to be no elginism.org any more, but you should definitely be reading elginism.com, a great source of news on repatriation struggles from all over the world. Lord Elgin was the man who ripped the Parthenon Marbles from the Parthenon and brought them back to Britain in 1801.

Via someone's Facebook feed (sorry, forgot who!)

Nefertiti Cigarettes

A 1970 TV ad from Egypt for Nefertiti cigarettes, posted by dianamherrera on Youtube.


It's got cartoons AND stop motion AND a funky song AND pyramids. 'Nuff said.
(Via Heritage Key)

Not so newsy newsflash

Il Messaggero newspaper reports the assassination of Julius Caesar. ("Suetonius' Shock: 'It was a stab in the back'".) Part of their ad campaign to convince you that it's Rome's 'traditional' newspaper. I wonder where Alitalia was flying in 44 BC?


Photo: me. Spotted in the Coliseo subway station, Rome.

Helen of Troy's Bladder Control Secrets

Whoopi Goldberg = Helen of Troy = urinary control pads. I'm not sure I totally understand this equation. But it's one of a series, so stay tuned!

The Pepsi-drinking Archaeologists of 1986

"This class, is perhaps the greatest archaeological discovery of our time - a dwelling called the 'Split-level Ranch'."



As much as Pepsi would like this to happen, Coke bottles will not be an unusual artifact in the future - we'll be finding them for literally millions of years.

Herc lost his Dongle

These days it seems like all I have to do is look at my Facebook feed to get ideas for Archaeopop. Patrick Crowley over at Columbia put this chortle-worthy gem on his feed today, and I'm pirating it!


Patrick sez:

I think this image came from some technology nostalgia blog, but for the life of me I don't think I could find it again. I suppose I liked not only the comparison between the dongle-less new technology and the penis-less Hercules Farnese, but also the further implication that because "dongles are history," so is the "complete" statue in its ancient state. At the risk of reading too much into the ad, I think it's a cute document in the history of sculptural restoration!

Heh, you said dongle.