Pests in an ancient Egyptian harbor

Our investigations combine detailed identification and interpretation of plant remains and associated fauna and their mode of arrival in one of the rock-cut galleries, Cave 3, at the site of Mersa/Wadi Gawasis on Egypt’s Red Sea coast. The site served as a staging area and harbor from which Middle Kingdom pharaohs launched seafaring expeditions to the land of Punt in the early second millennium BC. Quantities of wood, including ship timbers, fastenings, debris related to ship dismantling and reworking, and charcoal were excavated and analyzed. Evidence of marine mollusk infestation (shipworm) was abundant in Cave 3, as were the remains of insect pests of stored foods. We also report on a unique find of a plaster “spill” that preserved the floor of Cave 3 as it was when people worked in the gallery ca. 3800 years ago. The plaster spill created a sealed deposit of plant and insect remains with a diagnostic ceramic fragment, allowing us to securely associate insect remains and “hollow” spikelets of emmer wheat (Triticum dicoccum) recovered from the gallery. An impression of the beetle Trachyderma hispida and its associated exoskeleton fragments provide new evidence of this species as a potential pest not yet reported from an archaeological grain storage site in Egypt. The finding of Tenebroides mauritanicus from the same deposit is the earliest known association of this pest with stored grains. These unique finds shed new light on the risks associated with preserving food supplies, combating pest infestation, and dealing with marine organisms on land and at sea in the pharaonic harbor.     

Book reviews

“AFTERMATH” (FRANCE, GERMANY, AUSTRIA, JUGOSLAVIA, 1945 and 1946). By Francesca M. Wilson. 1947. (Penguin series).

CO‐OPERATIVE COMMUNITIES AT WORK. By Hendrick F. Infield. 1948. (Kegan Paul & Co., London, pp. 182).

THE CHINESE IN MALAYA. By Victor Purcell. 1948. (Geoffrey Cumberlege, Oxford University Press, London, pp. 327 + xvi).

THE BRITISH COMMONWEALTH AND INTERNATIONAL SECURITY THE ROLE OF THE DOMINIONS, 1919–1939. By Gwendolen Carter. Issued under the auspices of the Canadian Institute of International Affairs. Ryerson Press, Toronto, pp. xx + 326).

OLD CHINA HANDS AND THE FOREIGN OFFICE. By Nathan A. Pelcovits. 1948. (King's Crown Press under the auspices of the American Institute of Pacific Relations, New York, pp. xiv + 349, one map).

POST‐WAR GOVERNMENTS OF THE FAR EAST. Edited by Taylor Cole and John H. Hallowell. 1947. (Reprinted from the Journal of Politics, ed. Taylor Cole, Vol. 9, No. 4, pp. 473–744).

THE BRITISH YEAR BOOK OF INTERNATIONAL LAW, 1946, Vol. XXIII —Issued under the auspices of the Royal Institute of International Affairs. (Geoffrey Cumberlege, Oxford University Press).

RICHER BY ASIA. By Edmond Taylor. 1948. (Secker & Warburg Ltd., London, pp.432).     

Reception of the Easter Rising in British and American little magazines

This article examines the reactions of writers and readers to the Easter Rising in five British and American little magazines. The New Age, The Egoist, The Little Review, The Masses and The Phoenix have been chosen due to their links with Irish writers and culture, and because they were established periodicals that published over several years. Little magazines have been described as counterpublic spheres, in which oppositional opinions could be given voice against the conventional narratives of the mainstream. Though the politics of these journals was extremely divergent, collectively they operated as discursive spaces for a range of alternative voices. The reactions published in these journals give us a sense of the interaction between modernism and the Easter Rising in its immediate aftermath.     

Constructing British Authority in Australasia: Charles Cooper and the Legal Status of Aborigines in the South Australian Supreme Court,c. 1840–60

In 1840 the South Australian judge Charles Cooper wrote an opinion in which he suggested that Aborigines who had not been in contact with British settlers were not within the jurisdiction of the Supreme Court. The resulting controversy led the Colonial Office to clarify its view on the subjecthood of Aborigines within the colony and the colonial courts' jurisdiction over all subjects in the colony. The criminal jurisdiction of the Supreme Court over Aborigines became politically important because it raised wider questions of imperial authority and colonial policy. By placing Cooper's views in a broader Australasian perspective, the formation of Colonial Office policy and the distinctions between legal categories that informed that policy may be better appreciated. Cooper continued to question the general application of Supreme Court jurisdiction to Aborigines into the late 1840s. This caused a clash with Lieutenant-Governor Robe, who felt that any weakness in the formal authority or jurisdiction of the courts threatened the ability of the government to implement effective policies.