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Today's featured article

Burial chamber of Kha and Merit as discovered in 1906

The tomb of Kha and Merit is the funerary chapel and burial place of the ancient Egyptian foreman Kha and his wife Merit, in the northern cemetery of the workmen's village of Deir el-Medina. Kha supervised the workforce who constructed royal tombs during the reigns of the pharaohs Amenhotep II, Thutmose IV and Amenhotep III (r. 1425 – 1353 BC) in the mid–Eighteenth Dynasty of the early New Kingdom of Egypt. He died in his 60s, while Merit died before him in her 20s or 30s. The couple's pyramid-shaped chapel has been known since at least 1818. The tomb was cut into the base of the cliffs. This position allowed the entrance to be quickly buried by debris deposited by landslides and later tomb construction, hiding its location from ancient robbers. Almost all of the contents of the tomb were awarded to the excavators and were shipped to Italy soon after the discovery. They have been displayed in the Museo Egizio in Turin since their arrival, and an entire gallery is devoted to them. (Full article...)

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Today's featured picture

The Tocopilla railway was a mountain railway built to serve the sodium nitrate mines in the Toco area of the Antofagasta Region in Chile. With a gauge of 3 ft 6 in (1,067 mm), it ran from the port of Tocopilla on the Pacific coast up to a height of 4,902 feet (1,494 metres), with gradients up to 1 in 24. The railway was built by a joint-stock company founded in London and was designed by William Stirling of Lima, with a detailed description of the initial operation of the railway published by his brother Robert in 1900. The line was electrified in the mid-1920s and expanded in 1930 with the addition of lines serving new areas of mining. It continued operating into the 21st century, but was forced to close in 2015 when flash flooding caused numerous washouts on the electrified section of the railroad. With the declining prospects for nitrate, it was not economical for the line to be repaired. This photograph taken in 2013 shows a boxcab on the Tocopilla railway, leading a train down towards the coast.

Photograph credit: David Gubler

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In the News

Joseph Aoun

Joseph Aoun (pictured) is elected president of Lebanon after a two-year vacancy.
A series of wildfires in Southern California, United States, leaves at least 11 people dead and forces the evacuation of nearly 180,000 others.
A 7.1-magnitude earthquake hits Tingri County in the Tibet Autonomous Region, China, leaving at least 126 people dead.
Indonesia becomes a full member of BRICS.
Justin Trudeau announces his intention to resign as prime minister of Canada.

Did you know?

Lilium lophophorum flower

... that the unique flower shape of Lilium lophophorum (pictured) is adapted to protect its reproductive organs from the harsh ultraviolet light and torrential rains of its habitat?
... that with the Green Bay Packers' loss in the 2020 NFC Championship Game, Aaron Rodgers "became the first quarterback in NFL history to lose four straight NFC Championship Games"?
... that The House of Bijapur has been called a "painted curtain call" since the dynasty it depicts was overthrown only a few years later?
... that Dethloff Willrodt fought for the Union army on the first day of the Battle of Gettysburg on July 1, 1863, having previously been a soldier in the Confederate army?
... that in Greek mythology, Achilles promised to marry Pisidice if she would help him conquer her homeland, but afterwards he had her executed for treason?
... that blogger Charles LeBlanc interviewed a man who carried out a mass shooting the following year?
... that for cultural reasons the jijin was permitted to be worn by Catholic priests in China even while celebrating Mass?
... that in 1927 Berta Persson became the first woman bus driver in Sweden and was nicknamed "Buss-Berta"?
... that both the comedy film Starbuck, and the Holstein bull it was named after, had cloned remakes?

On this day...

January 11: Prithvi Jayanti in Nepal

Cover of Smoking and Health

1654 – Arauco War: The Mapuche-Huilliche of southern Chile defeated a slave-hunting Spanish army at the Battle of Río Bueno.
1693 – The most powerful earthquake recorded in Italy struck the island of Sicily, causing 60,000 deaths and prompting a period of architectural revival.
1914 – The Karluk, the flagship of the Canadian Arctic Expedition, sank after being crushed by ice.
1964 – In a landmark report (cover pictured), U.S. surgeon general Luther Terry issued a warning that tobacco smoking may be hazardous to health, concluding that it has a causative role in lung cancer, chronic bronchitis, and other illnesses.
2003 – After Chicago police detective Jon Burge was discovered to have extracted forced confessions from more than 200 suspects, the governor of Illinois commuted the death sentences of 167 prisoners and pardoned four others.

Min Bin (d. 1554)
Socrates Nelson (b. 1814)
Eva Le Gallienne (b. 1899)
Eva Tanguay (d. 1947)

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