Ancient Sounds Stored in Pottery?

  • Thread starter Ivan Seeking
  • Start date
In summary: The vibrations of the pottery were picked up and turned into sound."This hoax has been around for a while. I remember seeing it on the X-Files a few years ago.
  • #1
Ivan Seeking
Staff Emeritus
Science Advisor
Gold Member
8,142
1,757
I am at a complete disadvantage on this one. I have seen this idea toyed with on the X-Files but have no idea if there is any validity to it whatsoever. The basic idea is that as the pottery is made, sounds could translate directly into the pottery due to vibrations acting on the wheel, tools used, etc.

Unknown Country [a highly dubious source IMO]
http://www.unknowncountry.com/news/?id=5153

has linked this French TV blip which seems to confirm that the claim is made, that a real archaeologist has obtained ancient sounds stored in pottery -
made at Pompeii over 2,000 years ago
.
http://www.zalea.org/article.php3?id_article=496
 
Last edited:
Physics news on Phys.org
  • #2
Ok ok hold on... let me telecharge the video?

I still don't understand what's going on here.
 
  • #3
telecharge? Sorry, you lost me.

Is this pengwuin humor again? :biggrin:
 
  • #4
Oh, I see it. What does that do?
 
  • #5
ok telecharge is the audio of the video. The one above it is the actual video.

Are they saying that the pottery is acting like a vinyl record?
 
  • #6
Pengwuino said:
Are they saying that the pottery is acting like a vinyl record?

That's the basic idea - that using modern technology we can now extract the information buried in the clay.
 
  • #7
http://tecfa.unige.ch/perso/staf/nova/blog/2006/02/19/sound-and-ceramics-6500-yo-voices-recorded-in-pottery/
says it was an April Fools joke last year. I didn't look at any of the links or video yet. I think it's a neat idea.
 
  • #8
Any time-variant developing media can potentially record audio influences, BUT, audio signals such as from talking are very low-power, and unlikely to substantively influence a given developing media without a specific, sensitive apparatus to "imprint" the signal.
I see nothing in ancient pottery making, even on a rotational wheel, that would provide sufficient intervention to "record" ambient pressure waves apart from the artisans finger/tool pressure.
COULD one make a pottery developing experiment that WOULD record ambient sound waves? Sure, but in order to do so one would have to utilize techniques unavailable or unwanted by the early artisans.
 
  • #9
Well well, Mr Strieber earns a Brownie point.

The idea was so fascinating that we didn't stop to read the website involved carefully enough. It's actually a brilliant hoax posted last April 1.
http://www.unknowncountry.com/news/?id=5155

I wonder if he learned about it here. :biggrin:

However, X-Files doesn't usually create the ideas seen on the show, so it would seem that this idea has been around for at least four or five years.

IIRC, in the show, the words of Jesus were recorded in clay as he called Lazareth to rise from the dead. :biggrin:
 
Last edited:
  • #10
Ivan Seeking said:
Well well, Mr Strieber earns a Brownie point.


http://www.unknowncountry.com/news/?id=5155

I wonder if he learned about it here. :biggrin:
Is that your way of saying you are the alert reader who informed him it was a hoax?
 
  • #11
zoobyshoe said:
Is that your way of saying you are the alert reader who informed him it was a hoax?

Nope, wasn't me. :biggrin:
 
  • #12
Also, I should have said that I think the X-Files mentioned is what I saw four or five years ago. It would be interesting to find the origin of this concept.
 
  • #13
ive seen this x-files episode yesturday. and I've seen this done on lots of other shows. CSI included.

I don't know if its true or not.
 
  • #14
It's been rattling around in the Sci-Fi genre since the fifties, probably long before that --- like, since Edison.
 
  • #15
Bystander said:
It's been rattling around in the Sci-Fi genre since the fifties, probably long before that --- like, since Edison.

Wow! Well, I guess that shouldn't be surprising in that the basic idea is obvious enough.
 
Last edited:
  • #17
Awesome.
[edit] so it's a hoax. French...
 
  • #18
honestrosewater said:
Heehee. I just came across this organizing my blewsies (blog + news + -y). I was planning on looking into this eventually, but it turns out that others already have. :smile:

And just last year CSI: Crime Scene Investigation had a similar plot ("Committed," Apr. 28, 2005), where the CSI team is able to recover voices from a pot made by a mental patient. On Digg, one of the forums discussing the Bilge Sehir hoax, a screenwriter for the CSI episode named Uttam Narsu wrote into share this footnote he included in the original story treatment:

Recovering sound from pottery was suggested by Richard Woodbridge in "Acoustic Recordings from Antiquity", Proceedings of the I.E.E.E. 1969, pp. 1465-6). Years later, similar experiments were made in Gothenburg, Sweden, by archeology professor Paul Åström and acoustics professor Mendel Kleiner (see The Brittle Sound of Ceramics - Can Vases Speak? by Mendel Kleiner and Paul Åström, Archeology and Natural Science, vol. 1, 1993, pp. 66-72, Göteborg: Scandinavian Archaeometry Center, Jonsered, ISSN: 1104-3121). They were able to recover some sounds.

Narsu said he included the footnote "so the staff was sure it was science, not science-fiction." And sure enough, in the script for the episode, Grissom explains: "In the '60s, experiments were done on clay pots and painted canvas. Scientists were able to ferret out sounds that were captured during the creative process in the clay and the paint." So Woodbridge's tenuous claims live on in popular science-y fiction.

From:

http://tenser.typepad.com/tenser_said_the_tensor/2006/02/pottery_recordi.html

I soooo groaned when I saw this episode. The whole show lost all credibility.
 
  • #19
zoobyshoe said:
I soooo groaned when I saw this episode. The whole show lost all credibility.
THAT's when it lost credibility? :smile:

I was shocked into disillusionment when I heard Grissom utter the following phrase:

"Well, terminal velocity is 9.8m/s..."

And apparently, in another ep, he pulled a fish out of a db's throat - a fish that was clearly at-a-glance a Betta (the third most recognizable fish in the animal kingdom), saying they would have to do forensic tests to identify it! Whereupon he proudly proclaimed "Betta Splendens". Way to know you stuff, Gus...

I am actually in the process of developing a website called Gus Grissom is not God's Gift.
I would be interested in any other eps wherein he makes outlandishly dumb mistakes. (Really.)
 
  • #20
DaveC426913 said:
Way to know you stuff, Gus...

I am actually in the process of developing a website called Gus Grissom is not God's Gift.
I would be interested in any other eps wherein he makes outlandishly dumb mistakes. (Really.)
Is you calling Gil Gus part of the joke? If not, I think it's pretty funny. :biggrin:

Incidentally, that quote was from the other one, Langauge Log.
 
  • #21
DaveC426913 said:
THAT's when it lost credibility? :smile:

I was shocked into disillusionment when I heard Grissom utter the following phrase:

"Well, terminal velocity is 9.8m/s..."
I never caught that one, I guess.

And apparently, in another ep, he pulled a fish out of a db's throat - a fish that was clearly at-a-glance a Betta (the third most recognizable fish in the animal kingdom), saying they would have to do forensic tests to identify it! Whereupon he proudly proclaimed "Betta Splendens". Way to know you stuff, Gus...
I don't think I saw this episode either, but here I have to disagree with you. Not being sure what species it is at a glance is quite different than propagating bunk (pottery recordings) or a gross misunderstanding of basic physics. It isn't any kind of mistake. I myself have a huge catalog of miscellaneous knowledge but the ability to identify any aquarium fish outside of a goldfish isn't part of it. Ask me about Native American quill work. I mean, how often do aquarium fish figure in homocides?
 
  • #22
honestrosewater said:
Is you calling Gil Gus part of the joke?
D'oh. Gil. Slip of the hand.
 
  • #23
zoobyshoe said:
I never caught that one, I guess.


I don't think I saw this episode either, but here I have to disagree with you. Not being sure what species it is at a glance is quite different than propagating bunk (pottery recordings) or a gross misunderstanding of basic physics. It isn't any kind of mistake. I myself have a huge catalog of miscellaneous knowledge but the ability to identify any aquarium fish outside of a goldfish isn't part of it. Ask me about Native American quill work. I mean, how often do aquarium fish figure in homocides?
True, it is of a lower order of dumbness, since it is not actually wrong, merely a display of completely improbable ignorance.

But one of the primary jobs of the forensic scientist is to know a bit about absolutely everything. Really, that's the core of their expertise.

For Gil to not know this is tantamount to him seeing a dog and having to find in a book that it's a German Shepherd.

zoobyshoe said:
...quite different than propagating bunk (pottery recordings) ...?
Well, I wouldn't call that bunk, since it can't really be disproven. In it's defense (albeit a weak one) the pottery on the show was recent, not ancient, so no degradation, and made on much more precise equipment.

(Also, that's the storyline, not Gil's expertise - and criticising the story is a whole 'nother ball of worms.)

zoobyshoe said:
I mean, how often do aquarium fish figure in homocides?
Forget homicide, Gil is nothing if not a scientist. Particularly a biologist (bugs).
 
Last edited:
  • #24
DaveC426913 said:
THAT's when it lost credibility? :smile:

I was shocked into disillusionment when I heard Grissom utter the following phrase:

"Well, terminal velocity is 9.8m/s..."

And apparently, in another ep, he pulled a fish out of a db's throat - a fish that was clearly at-a-glance a Betta (the third most recognizable fish in the animal kingdom), saying they would have to do forensic tests to identify it! Whereupon he proudly proclaimed "Betta Splendens". Way to know you stuff, Gus...

I am actually in the process of developing a website called Gus Grissom is not God's Gift.
I would be interested in any other eps wherein he makes outlandishly dumb mistakes. (Really.)

Actually, the episode where the dead guy swallowed three Bettas was a CSI: New York episode, not an original CSI episode. The episode is called "Risk" and it's from the second season. Mac Taylor (the supervisor) was the one who talked about the betta fish.

And yes, Grissom's first name is Gil, not Gus.
 
  • #25
Temperance said:
Actually, the episode where the dead guy swallowed three Bettas was a CSI: New York episode, not an original CSI episode. The episode is called "Risk" and it's from the second season. Mac Taylor (the supervisor) was the one who talked about the betta fish.
That's what I get for going on word-of-mouth. My sister isn't the fan I am.

Temperance said:
And yes, Grissom's first name is Gil, not Gus.
Yes. Typo.
 
  • #26
I remember about 25 years ago seeing a documentary about how some researchers in northern England believed that types of ancient stone/metal buildings could act as a phonograph where acoustic vibrations caused metal fittings to rub stone and record audio- years later the wind would cause the buildings to 'play-back' the ancient recordings making the inhabitants think they were haunted- I don't know if this was pferdscheiß or not- but perhaps it was the motivation for the X-files episode and pottery hoax?
 
Last edited:
  • #27
A truly noble pursuit, an entire website dedicated to debunking the abilities and knowledge of a fictional character... :rolleyes:
 

Related to Ancient Sounds Stored in Pottery?

1. What are ancient sounds stored in pottery?

Ancient sounds stored in pottery refer to the practice of using pottery as a medium for recording and preserving sounds in ancient civilizations. This was often done by creating patterns or grooves on the surface of the pottery, which would produce a sound when played with a tool or stick.

2. How were these sounds stored in pottery?

The sounds were stored by etching or carving patterns or grooves into the surface of the pottery. This was typically done with a sharp tool or stick, and the resulting sound would be produced when the pottery was played with another tool or stick. In some cases, the pottery was also used as a type of drum, with the sound being created by tapping or hitting the surface.

3. What was the purpose of storing sounds in pottery?

The purpose of storing sounds in pottery varied among ancient civilizations. In some cases, it was used as a form of communication or messaging, with different patterns or grooves representing different words or ideas. It was also used for entertainment, with the sounds being played during rituals or ceremonies. Additionally, it may have been used for religious or spiritual purposes, as some believe that the sounds produced by the pottery had special meanings or powers.

4. How do we know about these ancient sounds stored in pottery?

Archaeologists and researchers have discovered various examples of pottery with etchings or patterns that are believed to have been used for storing sounds. These artifacts have been studied and analyzed using various technologies, such as microscopy and spectroscopy, to determine how the sounds were created and what they may have represented. Additionally, some ancient texts and documents also mention the use of pottery for storing sounds, providing further evidence.

5. Can we still hear these ancient sounds stored in pottery?

In some cases, yes, we can still hear these ancient sounds stored in pottery. Some of the pottery artifacts have been preserved well enough for the sounds to still be produced when played with the appropriate tools. However, many of the sounds may have been lost over time due to decay or damage to the pottery. Additionally, the meaning and interpretation of these sounds may be lost to us, as they were created and used by ancient civilizations with different cultural beliefs and practices.

Similar threads

Can You Stomach These Extreme Global Delicacies?
    • General Discussion
3
Replies
78
Views
9K

Hot Threads

Recent Insights

Back
Top