Always wandering and wondering

A naked eye 3D pterosaur installation at Shanghai Natural History Museum

I gestured a hand across an explanation of a Scottish field geologist character named Ken(dal Mint Cake) stating that he always has a packet of Kendal mint cake somewhere and received a message from a friend saying “I didn’t know you also knew (guy that Ken could conceivably be based on)”. I didn’t. This is just a portrait of too many extant guys.

There are several species of this man crashing cheerfully around the UK receiving deep spiritual pleasure from crouching in a puddle in a howling gale up a mountain nibbling pieces of violent mint sugar and apparently metabolising sufficient joy from this to polish off Kendal Mint Cake in marketable quantities for over 100 years.

Unless they made too much of it originally and are still selling it.

Step 1: go on an entirely optional adventure

Step 2: get into an unpleasant condition in bad weather

Step 3: become very uncomfortable and hateful

Step 4: Kendal mint cake

Step 5: access stratosphere with tits blown off

Step 6: summit

Luo Yunxi as Tang Lici

Someone on the Raffles discord us this pic (about Louvre robbery)

Did you see what i see

The eyes

and the colleague is like "oh no, he's falling hard for this fancy detective"

And indeed the Fancy Detective is the burglar ( @unwillingadventurer idea)

The find was made by local hobby archaeologist and licensed metal detectorist Constantin Fried on a field near Petershagen and turned over to the appropriate governing body, the LWL-Archäologie für Westfalen, in 2023. Since then, it has been subjected to a variety of analysis methods. We now know that it worked, that the internal mechanism is made of iron, and that it probably dates to the 3rd or 4th century BC. Here, have some cool pictures:

Yes, that is how it was found. Come to Germany and bother a farmer enough that he lets you walk over his field, and you too could find 1,600 year old gold artefacts! (Don't actually do this, the farmers will get mad at you and the archaeologists don't like it either. You need a license for metal detectoring in many German states and fieldwalking with the intent to find and keep archaeological material as a private person is illegal, yes, literally.)

This is the large-scale brass reproduction made by one of the restorers at LWL-Archäologie. Since the original was found with a single gold link, it was possible to reconstruct the chain that would have held the lock to whatever it was supposed to hold closed (probably a small box, maybe a jewellery box). In order to work, the chain would have needed a minimum of six links. Also not found but added to the reconstruction: The key.

There's still a lot of unsolved questions around this find: Where is it from? Was it actually used as a lock, or did its owner wear it as a piece of curious jewellery? The lock seems to have been forced at least once, was this because someone stole the contents of the box it was locking, or was something stuck in the mechanism and the owner couldn't get at their stuff? And maybe most interesting of all: How was it made? Because, as far as we know, the Romans did not have magnifiying glasses, and this thing is TINY!!! It's TINY!!!!

Sources (apart from the article link I'm reblogging):

Tagesschau, Archäologische Sensation. Goldenes Minischloss aus der Römerzeit gefunden (article uploaded Jan 28, 2025).