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Radosaw TusznioArchaeologist Zofia Kowarska photographing some of the game boards thatd been carved into the ruins of Ptolemais.The ruins of the ancient city of Ptolemais in modern-day Libya have long produced a wealth of exciting archaeological discoveries. In recent years alone, archaeologists have studied the citys acropolis and conducted underwater dives to examine an ancient shipwreck. But one of the citys most curious discoveries, which has just been made public now, is a collection of more than 100 game boards carved directly into the ruins.Likely used in games that were similar to checkers and tic-tac-toe, these boards may have been carved by shepherds who inhabited the region after the fall of Ptolemais in the 7th century C.E. To pass the time, they carved game boards into the stones of old buildings, the remains of which are still visible to this day.The Many Game Boards Found Carved Into The Ancient Greek Ruins Of PtolemaisAccording to Science in Poland, the game boards were discovered by archaeologists from the University of Warsaw, whose excavations resumed in 2023 after a long dormant period due to civil unrest in the area. One of the archaeologists, Zofia Kowarska, began documenting boards likely used for a game known as siza.Zofia KowarskaOne of the dozens of game boards that archaeologists from the University of Warsaw discovered in Ptolemais.There are many different variations of the game, some of which can resemble modern-day checkers or tic-tac-toe. But though Kowarska only expected to find a couple boards, she was surprised to discover dozens of them scattered across the ruins.When I began my research, I thought I would find only a few copies of the boards, but after a few days I had over 100, and this is not the end, as we will continue our research, she said. The boards carved in the ruins suggest that these games were a fairly common form of entertainment. Sometimes we find a dozen, even twenty, or thirty boards side by side in one place.Though the game boards are difficult to date, archaeologists are confident that they were carved into the city ruins long after Ptolemais fell in the 7th century following the Arab conquest. They believe that the game boards were carved by shepherds who played simple games in order to pass the time while keeping an eye on their grazing flocks.Zofia KowarskaA close look at one of the game boards found in Ptolemais which may have been used in a pastime that resembled modern-day checkers or tic-tac-toe.The area of the ancient city is undeveloped, but it is surrounded by vast expanses of land that have always been excellent places for grazing animals, goats, and sheep, Kowarska said. We find boards on the ruins of buildings, which are often located higher than the surrounding terrain, and on the corners of buildings. We believe that people grazing animals would sit in this elevated spot to conveniently observe the terrain and the animals. They spent some time there, while also entertaining themselves with games.But while Ptolemais became a quiet site in the modern-era, a place for shepherds to peacefully play board games while watching their herds, it was a powerful and bustling city in the ancient world.The Rise And Fall Of Ptolemais During AntiquityAs UNESCO reports, Ptolemais was founded in the 7th century B.C.E. as a Greek settlement, and was initially used as a port for the inland city of Barka. It was formally established and named in the Hellenistic period by either Ptolemy I or Ptolemy III, the Macedonian rulers who took over ancient Egypt following the death of Alexander the Great in 323 B.C.E.Ptolemais flourished in the years that followed including during the Roman period and became an important Christian bishopric as Christianity began to spread across the region. Because of its Greek roots, the city had a number of Hellenistic features, including defensive walls, city blocks, large houses, statues, and many public baths. However, Ptolemais fell into ruins after the Arab conquest of the 7th century C.E.Radosaw TusznioZofia Kowarska examining the ruins of Ptolemais for evidence of game boards carved into the stone.Though it had once been a bustling metropolis, it soon became the domain of shepherds and their flocks. The carved boards are a relic of this era and, though the games played with them likely bore a resemblance to modern-day games still played in the region, archaeologists noted that these traditions are quickly becoming a thing of the past.A few inhabitants of present-day Tolmeita [a nearby village in Libya] still know the rules of these games, Kowarska remarked to Science in Poland, but unfortunately, they are disappearing as traditional pastimes are fading away, and other activities, including mobile phone games, take over.After reading about the game boards found amid the ruins of an ancient city in Libya, see how the Berbers of North Africa have preserved their traditional way of life over the centuries. Then, learn about Queen Dido, the legendary founder of the city of Carthage.The post Archaeologists Exploring Ancient Greek Ruins In Libya Just Uncovered More Than 100 Game Boards Thatd Been Carved Right Onto The Citys Surfaces appeared first on All That's Interesting.

In 1994, boxing champion Evander Holyfield stood in front of a crowd who had gathered to witness the miracles of televangelist Benny Hinn. Before Hinn and the crowd, Holyfield begged for Gods healing. He had just been diagnosed with a condition in which the left ventricle of his heart could not work properly and so his blood struggled to pump.A wave of Hinns hand did what countless heavyweights had been unable to do and knocked Holyfield to the ground. Holyfield reported a warm feeling flood his chest as he collapsed. He heard Hinn turn to the cheering crowd: The lord is telling me now: he is repairing Holyfields heart completely.Benny Hinn heals the heart of Evander Holyfield on stage so that the boxer could later take on Mike Tyson. Holyfield beat Mike Tyson the following year.When Holyfield returned to the doctors, his heart was indeed pumping once more. Although doctors reported that hed been misdiagnosed, Holyfield credited no one but Benny Hinn for his return to the ring. Holyfield was so thrilled that he even agreed to write Hinn a check for $265,000, needed, as Hinn told him, to underwrite the costs of the crusade.This was hardly the first time Benny Hinn had performed a miracle and hardly the first he had been so generously compensated for one. Millions had packed stadiums and millions more tuned in to Hinns show This Is Your Day as he demonstrated what many believed was his God-given power to heal.Benny Hinn, as far as his followers were concerned, was a prophet of the Lord. But could it be that the faith healer is really a con man?Benny Hinn Becomes A HealerBenny Hinn was born Toufik Benedictus Hinn in Jaffa, Israel in 1952. He and his seven siblings moved to Toronto in 1968 where Hinns career in the divine began. Despite opposition from his family, Hinn fell into a religious crowd and converted to Born Again Christianity at 18.Hinn claimed he was a social outcast for much of his early life, but journalists later debunked this self-made myth. It would be one among a million little lies Hinn delivered in order to craft his persona. At 21, he went to see faith healer Kathyrn Kuhlman live on stage. There he assisted a crippled old woman to the show and claimed to witness her untwist as she was healed by Kuhlman. Hinn was so inspired that modeled much of his later career off of Kuhlmans methods.FlickrBenny Hinn claims his gift for healing came to him at 11 or 18. The details of his past vary even by Hinns own accounts.From his home in Toronto Hinn began to televise his first healing sessions on local stations. When he traveled to Florida and met married his first wife, Suzanne, the daughter of a pastor, Hinn established his first evangelical congregation in 1983.His reputation exploded. By 1990, Hinns program, This Is Your Day, aired daily on the Christian TV network.Deadly Faith In Benny HinnBenny Hinn was a global sensation for much of the 80s and 90s. Heres a recording of his work in South Africa in the 1990s.Not everyone, though, shared Holyfields great experience with Hinn. When one woman, Ella Peppard, went to Hinn for healing, he didnt just fail to heal her. He caused her death.While Peppard was waiting her turn, Benny Hinn struck another man in the head and cried out that the had been slain of the spirit! The man fell back and toppled over Peppard, who then crashed down onto the stage shattering her hip.Hinns staff didnt call an ambulance, and Peppard, believing that Hinns healing powers would take care of her, didnt bother seeing a doctor. The fracture in her leg got worse and blocked her arteries and, 15 days later, Peppard died.Tony Bock/Toronto Star via Getty ImagesI dont get a cent of this offering, multi-millionaire Benny Hinn said before ushers passed white buckets through the Maple Leaf Gardens crowd in Canada.She wasnt the only person to die after Benny Hinns Revival, either. In 2001, an HBO documentary crew followed seven of the people Hinn claimed to have healed to see what happened to them. In every case, Hinns healing powers were short-lived.One of the women they followed was so convinced that Benny Hinn had cured her of lung cancer that she refused to ever see her doctor again. But the cancer was still there, a left untreated, killed her within a year.The director, Anthony Thomas, came to this grim conclusion:If I had seen miracles, I would have been happy to trumpet it, but in retrospect, I think they do more damage to Christianity than the most committed atheist.The Power Of God Or The Placebo Effect?In 1999, the show The Fifth Estate managed to interview one of the men Benny Hinn hired to screen the people he cured on stage. He explained the process they used to keep the truly sick from ever making it onto the stage:They have staff members that go through, give them a quick interview, and theyll ask them: Whats wrong with you? Oh, Ive had rheumatoid arthritis of my left shoulder. I cant lift it Can you lift your shoulder? Because if you cant lift your shoulder, you cant go on stage.'The only people allowed on stage with Hinn were those with psychosomatic problems or physical pains that could be temporarily dampened through the euphoria of believing that they were having a religious experience before a cheering crowd.Hinns nephew goes on a radio show to discuss his problem with the fortune his uncle has made.To test the information that the guard at given the Fifth Estate, the crew snuck a hidden camera on a young girl with cerebral palsy and tried to get her on stage.As told, security guards swarmed the sick little girl and physically restrained her from approaching the man who claimed he could make the lame walk.Heavenly PleasuresOfficially, Benny Hinn leads a non-profit religious charity. Every penny of the $100 million he brings in each year, he claims, is put toward the church and his healing services. Hinn, though, owns two multi-million dollar mansions, a small fleet of Mercedes Benz vehicles, and a private personal chef. The Fifth Estate also uncovered Hinns hotel bills from a layover in London. In a single night, hed racked up over $4,000 in hotel bills, and hed left the concierge and the bellmen a $2,000 tip.Hinn has a private jet, as well, which is paid for by his followers. In 2006, he sent them a letter saying: I am asking the Lord Jesus to speak to 6,000 of my precious partners to sow a seed of $1,000 in the next ninety days. {"div_id":"benny-hinn-magic-jacket.gif.50dad","plugin_url":"https:\/\/allthatsinteresting.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/plugins\/gif-dog","attrs":{"src":"https:\/\/allthatsinteresting.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/benny-hinn-magic-jacket.gif","alt":"Benny Hinn Magic Jacket","width":"400","height":"300","class":"size-full wp-image-236829 post-img-landscape"},"base_url":"https:\/\/allthatsinteresting.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/benny-hinn-magic-jacket.gif","base_dir":"\/vhosts\/all-that-is-interesting\/wordpress\/\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/benny-hinn-magic-jacket.gif"}YouTubeA typical prayer session with Benny Hinn.The $6,000,000 he was asking for didnt even reflect the full cost of the jet. It would only cover part of the down payment.This spending was enough to raise a few questions. In 2007, Senator Charles Grassley ran an investigation into Hinn and five other non-profit religious leaders who registered for the right to keep their finances tax-free and lived in multi-million dollar homes.Hinn was one of the few who gave up his financial records but before he did, he told the Senate hearing that he would need a year to get them ready. Since he was registered as a tax-exempt religious charity, the Senate couldnt rush him. The books they finally received didnt reveal enough to press charges against Hinn. Grassley was forced to drop his investigation.Benny Hinns Nephew Speak OutExposing Charlatans/YouTubeCosti Hinn, Benny Hinns nephew, during an interview.In recent years, Benny Hinns nephew Costi Hinn has publicly discussed what its like to follow the faith healer on his tours around the world and to benefit from his fame.We lived the dream. Expensive hotels, car, travel. The biggest being that Jesus provided all of that.'As a child, Costi Hinn reported to Faithwire in 2018 that he accepted this life of luxury as something his family had earned. They were servants of God, he believed, and they were being rewarded with wealth from heaven. But his faith was shaken when, for the first time, he saw a young girl his uncle promised to heal hadnt gotten any better at all.They brought her to the back. We prayed for her, my uncle prayed for her. I was bawling my eyes out later that night saying God why didnt you heal her?! Everyone was supposed to get healed.For Costi Hinn, it was enough to shatter his faith. He gave up on his familys brand of Charismatic Christianity and paved his own path, away from the faith healings and the mansions bought from religious donations.Millions more still attend Benny Hinns Revivals, praying that hell bring the Holy Spirit upon them and heal them of the illnesses, and countless people still insist that Hinns powers really did heal them.Benny Hinn has never been proven a fraud, and though the IRS has investigated him many times, no charges have ever been filed against him.Next, find out about the televangelist who asked his followers for a $54 million jet or learn about Braco, the man who claims he can heal people by staring at them.The post How Televangelist Benny Hinn Makes Millions By Curing People Through Faith Healing appeared first on All That's Interesting.

Wikimedia CommonsDr. J. Marion Sims is often praised as the father of modern gynecology but he made all his breakthroughs by experimenting on enslaved women and girls.In the 1840s and 50s, an Alabama surgeon named J. Marion Sims successfully performed the first surgery to correct a condition that had long ostracized women after childbirth. Then, he invented the tool that every gynecologist uses in their exams to this day: the speculum. For these contributions and more, Sims was hailed the father of modern gynecology.But how James Marion Sims came to patent his experimental surgeries and tools has been scrutinized in recent years because his subjects were enslaved Black women and girls who couldnt truly consent, who were used as test subjects without being given anesthesia, and some of whom he even owned.The Medical Breakthroughs Of J. Marion SimsBorn in 1813, James Marion Sims attended medical school in Philadelphia before settling in Alabama to practice medicine in 1835.Sims reportedly had little interest in the diseases of women. He once wrote, If there is anything I hated, it was investigating the organs of the female pelvis.John Rose/Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Folk Art MuseumA late 18th-century depiction of slaves on a plantation. As a doctor in the deep south, J. Marion Sims had his pick of enslaved test subjects who couldnt protest.But in 1845, a slave owner called on Sims to help an 18-year-old enslaved woman of his named Anarcha who had been suffering through 72 hours of labor. Sims successfully delivered the newborn only to discover that the hard labor had left Anarcha with a condition called a vesicovaginal fistula.Vesicovaginal fistulas, common in women who had a difficult time in labors, were holes that formed between a womans vagina and bladder that resulted in incontinence, an embarrassing and often isolating condition. It was once considered to be impossible to cure.Over the next four years, Sims performed 30 experimental operations on Anarcha to cure her condition. When he did, he even went on to relieve Empress Eugenia of France of this condition, as well.As other owners called on Sims to treat their enslaved women, the surgeon developed a new system: He purchased these patients for the purpose of surgical experimentation. Sims explained that, The owners agree[d] to let me keep them (at my own expense).The surgeon saw this as a major advantage because there was never a time that I could not, at any day, have had a subject for operation.Sims later became reputable enough to open a private clinic in New York where he served wealthy, white clientele. He became a decorated surgeon in his time and invented the speculum, a tool that all gynecologists use to examine the vagina to this day.In 1855, he opened the nations first Womans Hospital in New York City.The Black Women And Children Behind Sims AchievementsThis is purportedly the only depiction of Lucy, Anarcha, and Betsey, as painted by Robert Thom in the Great Moments in Medicine series.J. Marion Sims recorded the names of some of the Black women who served as his subjects: Anarcha, Lucy, and Betsey. The identities of his other subjects have vanished.All three of these women were young mothers suffering from incurable fistulas. And all served as Sims experimental subjects.Sims invited about a dozen doctors to witness his experiments on Lucy, a teenager whod recently given birth. All the doctors agreed that I was on the eve of a great discovery, and every one of them was interested in seeing me operate, Sims recorded.On Lucy, Sims performed an hour-long surgery without anesthesia. The poor girl, on her knees, bore the operation with great heroism and bravery, Sims wrote. Lucys agony was extreme, and she fell ill with a fever within days of the operation. I thought she was going to die, Sims admitted. It took months for her to recover.Meanwhile, between 1845 and 1849, Sims performed the 30 surgeries on Anarcha to cure her fistula, all without anesthesia.When Sims created the speculum, from a spoon, he first tested it on Betsey. The device was made to hold the vagina open so that the doctor could use both their hands to examine the patient. During his first exam with the speculum, Sims marveled, I saw everything as no man had ever seen it before.But even before and after Sims experimented on enslaved women, he operated inhumanely on Black children. Sims didnt believe that Black people could feel or think as astutely as white people and so he used a shoemakers tool to pry childrens bones apart and loosen their skulls for examination.The Ethics Of Consent And Denying Anesthesia In J. Marion Sims WorkUnknown/Wikimedia CommonsThe Sims Speculum, originally based on a bent spoon.Sims claimed that all of his subjects consented to his experiments. He allegedly promised one slave owner, If you will give me Anarcha and Betsey for experiment, I agree to perform no experiment or operation on either of them to endanger their lives.He also purportedly asked his enslaved subjects if he could test on them before he did, he wrote that they willingly consented.Yet as slaves, women like Anarcha, Betsey, and Lucy could only consent. As property, what other choice did they have? Today, medical ethics standards require informed consent which Sims could not have obtained from a slave.Sims also performed his experimental surgeries on enslaved women without anesthesia, even though he routinely used anesthesia on his paying, white patients at the Womans Hospital in New York.Like other 19th-century physicians, J. Marion Sims assumed that Black people simply had higher pain tolerances than white people and therefore, didnt require painkillers for these immensely uncomfortable surgeries.Encyclopedia of AlabamaWorking out of his backyard hospital throughout the 1840s and 50s, Sims experimented on at least 12 enslaved women and girls.Those who defend Sims choices, point out that anesthesia was new in the 1840s and rarely used in the United States. It was only by the time Sims moved to New York in the 1850s that the treatment became more common.However, Sims routinely denied women anesthesia for fistula operations even after it had become readily available. In 1857, Sims told the New York Academy of Medicine that fistula operations are not painful enough to justify the trouble.He also rarely took responsibility when his patients died after an operation, instead, he blamed the sloth and ignorance of their mothers and the black midwives.James Marion Sims saw no problem with how he conducted his experiments. Indeed, modern researchers marvel at the casualness in his tone while recording his disturbing practices. As one doctor put it, he was perhaps just a product of his era.The Evolving Reputation Of James Marion Sims In The 21st CenturyBibliothque interuniversitaire de Sant/Wikimedia CommonsA late 19th-century statue of J. Marion Sims, originally displayed in New Yorks Bryant Park and later moved to Central Park. It was removed in 2018.Modern historians debate the legacy of James Marion Sims.His defenders argue that he was a man of his time who nevertheless obtained consent from, and cured, his patients.The American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology acknowledged in 1978 that, His original three subjects might never have tolerated the pain and misery of the repeated operations had they not been slaves. Yet, the piece concluded, In the long run, they had reason to be grateful to Sims.In 1981, the Journal of South Carolina Medical Association lauded Sims for creating a new surgical procedure almost with a magic wand.In 2006, Washington University surgeon Lewis Wall defended Sims in the Journal of Medical Ethics, writing, J. Marion Sims was a dedicated and conscientious physician who lived and worked in a slaveholding society.But that same year, the University of Alabama at Birmingham removed Sims from their display of the Medical Giants of Alabama.Ferdinand Freiherr von Miller/Wikimedia CommonsThe statue of J. Marion Sims before it was relocated to Greenwood Cemetery in Brooklyn.In 2017, a vandal sprayed RACIST on a statue of J. Marion Sims in New Yorks Central Park. In response to calls to remove the statue, the prestigious journal Nature published an unsigned editorial defending Sims statue, which declared Removing Statues of Historical Figures Risks Whitewashing History. After the editorial created a firestorm of criticism, Nature reversed itself, retitling the editorial, Science Must Acknowledge Its Past Mistakes and Crimes.Reassessing the legacy of James Marion Sims in the 21st century does not mean denying his medical contributions, but it does require that we place them in a social context. Instead of ignoring the Black women subjected to Sims experimental treatments, we must acknowledge them.In 2018, New York removed the J. Marion Sims statue from Central Park, relocating it to Sims burial site in a Brooklyn cemetery.The city also replaced the original plaque that only told of Sims medical achievements. In its place, the new plaque recognizes the roles of Betsey, Lucy, Anarcha, and others in the history of medicine.J. Marion Sims wasnt the only doctor who violated medical ethics. Next, learn about the history of body snatching and then, read about the Tuskegee syphilis study that used Black Americans as guinea pigs.The post J. Marion Sims, The Pioneering Doctor Who Exploited Human Subjects appeared first on All That's Interesting.

When drug lord and King of Coke Pablo Escobar agreed to a prison sentence in Colombia, he did so on his own terms. He constructed a jail so lavish it was referred to as Hotel Escobar or Club Medellin, but the enduring name has been La Catedral, The Cathedral and with good reason.RAUL ARBOLEDA/AFP/Getty ImagesThe prison known as La Catedral (The Cathedral), where Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar was held near Medellin, Colombia.The prison featured a football field, jacuzzi, and waterfall. Indeed, La Catedral was more a fortress than prison, as Escobar effectively kept his enemies out rather than lock himself in and continued to conduct his grisly business.The Contentious Surrender Of Pablo EscobarThe Colombian government struggled to prosecute Escobars Medellin cartel because Pablo Escobar himself was so popular amongst certain segments of the public. Even today, Escobars memory is reviled by those who deplore the violence and devastation he wrought, while it is revered by others, who remember his acts of charity in his home city.However, a small group of politicians and policemen devoted to imposing rule of law in Colombia refused to be intimidated by Escobar. Things eventually came to something of a deadlock with both sides refusing to give up any ground until a new policy was tentatively agreed upon: negotiated surrender.The terms of surrender stipulated that Escobar and his cronies would cease their domestic terrorism and give themselves up to the authorities in exchange for the promise that they would not be extradited to the United States. Extradition meant being tried in a U.S. court which Escobar wanted to avoid.During negotiations, Escobar also added in conditions that reduced his jail time to five years and that would ensure he served his sentence in a prison of his own construction, surrounded by hand-picked guards as well as protected from his enemies by Colombian soldiers.Wikimedia ComonsPablo Escobar agreed to give himself up to Colombian authorities in order to avoid extradition to the United States.Despite opposition from hard-liners claiming the negotiated surrender policy was nothing but a farce, the Colombian government added an amendment to the constitution which banned the extradition of citizens in June of 1991.Escobar kept up his end of the bargain and turned himself in a few days afterward with President Cesar Gaviria declaring that the narcos treatment will not be any different from what the law demands.La Catedral, The Prison That Held Pablo EscobarEscobar would quickly give proof to the lie behind Gavirias declaration. On June 19, the drug lord was helicoptered to the mountaintop upon which he had chosen for strategic purposes to construct his prison. He bade his family farewell, strode past the armed guards through the 10-foot high barbed-wire fences, and went into the compound where he officially signed his surrender document. To all outward appearances, it seemed like a fairly standard prisoner surrender. The facade of barbed wire and concrete, however, was a thin cover for a very different reality.Timothy Ross/The LIFE Images Collection/Getty ImagesLa Catedral, the special prison where Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar is under arrest, guarded by his own keepers, in luxurious view of his hometown.While most federal prisoners in the United States do have access to a gym, for example, they do not usually also have access to a sauna, jacuzzi, and pool with a waterfall. Nor do they have access to outdoor sports facilities grand enough to host national sports teams, as Escobar did when he invited the entire Colombian National Team to play on his personal soccer pitch. La Catedral was so extravagant, in fact, that it also boasted an industrial kitchen, a billiards room, several bars with big-screen TVs, and a disco where the drug kingpin actually hosted wedding receptions during his imprisonment. He feasted on stuffed turkey, caviar, fresh salmon, and smoked trout while in the arms of beauty queens.Escobars Escape From La Catedral And The Prison TodayAs opponents to the policy of negotiated surrender had predicted, imprisonment did not prevent Escobar from running his drug empire. During his time at Hotel Escobar, the kingpin received more than 300 unauthorized guests, including several wanted criminals. But it wasnt until 1992 when Escobar ordered the murder of several cartel leaders along with their entourages and families from the security of his luxurious La Catedral that the Colombian government decided it was time to end the charade. By the time army troops descended on Club Medellin though, Escobar was long gone after having just walked out the door unmolested. He had served just thirteen months of a five-year sentence.RAUL ARBOLEDA/AFP/GettyImagesGeneral view of the Benedictine monks convent taken during the opening of the first mausoleum for victims of violence in Colombia.Pablo Escobar was famously killed a year later in a shootout while still on the run.But as for La Catedral, Escobars luxury prison remained deserted for years until the government loaned the property to a group of Benedictine monks, some of whom claim that the ghost of the former owner still makes nighttime appearances.After this look at La Catedral, read the bloody story behind Pablo Escobar and Los Extraditables. Then learn some of the craziest facts about Escobar. Finally, read up on Escobars cousin and colleague, Gustavo Gaviria.The post La Catedral: Inside The Luxurious Prison That Colombia Allowed Pablo Escobar To Construct For Himself appeared first on All That's Interesting.