PRAECO: [Web] Iz casopisa Archeology : Artifact

Tuesday, May 24, 2011

[Web] Iz casopisa Archeology : Artifact

Artifact : Volume 64 Number 3, May/June 2011

(Courtesy of University of Manchester)

WHAT IS IT?
An artificial toe

DATE
950—710 B.C.

MATERIAL
Wood and leather

DISCOVERED
2,000, tomb of Tabeketenmut in necropolis of Thebes, near Luxor

SIZE
4.7 inches, from tip of toe to point of attachment

CURRENTLY LOCATED
Egyptian Museum, Cairo

Egyptians appear to have taken great pains to have the bodies of their dead buried intact. Some mummified remains are found with makeshift limbs and false eyes to replace missing parts. This artificial toe, attached to the right foot of a priest's daughter, is so well made, however, it's unlikely it was only intended to prepare her for the afterlife.

The dense hardwood used in the toe's construction is robust enough to withstand bodily forces—while walking, a big toe must bear up to 40 percent of a person's body weight. It also has a beveled edge at its attachment point, indicating it was deliberately designed to maximize comfort, says Jacqueline Finch, a visiting scientist at the University of Manchester's KNH Centre for Biomedical Egyptology. She recruited two volunteers who are missing their right big toes to wear a reproduction of this device along with replica Egyptian sandals. Both reported that it was comfortable and assisted them in walking.

Until now, an artificial leg made of bronze and wood and found buried with a Roman aristocrat in southern Italy dating to 300 B.C. was thought to be the first prosthesis. Finch's work suggests, however, that the Egyptians be credited with pioneering prosthetic medicine.

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PRAECONES

PRAECOʹNES, criers, were employed for various purposes:

1. In sales by auction, they frequently advertised the time, place, and conditions of sale: they seem also to have acted the part of the modern auctioneer, so far as calling out the biddings and amusing the company, though the property was knocked down by the magister auctionis (Hor. Ars Poet. 419; Cic. ad Att. XII.40, de Off. II.23). [Auctio.]

2. In all public assemblies they ordered silence (Liv. III.47; Plaut. Poen. prol. 11).

3. In the comitia they called the centuries one by one to give their votes, pronounced the vote of each century, and called out the names of those who were elected (Cic. c. Verr. V.15, pro Mil. 35). They also recited the laws that were to be passed.

4. In trials, they summoned the accuser and the accused, the plaintiff and defendant (Suet. Tib. 11).

5. In the public games, they invited the people to attend, and proclaimed the victors (Cic. ad Fam. V.12).

6. In solemn funerals they also invited people to attend by a certain form; hence these funerals were called Funera Indictiva (Festus, s.v. Quirites; Suet. Jul. 84).

7. When things were lost, they cried them and searched for them (Plaut. Merc. III.4.78; Petron. 57).

8. In the infliction of capital punishment, they sometimes conveyed the commands of the magistrates to the lictors (Liv. XXVI.15).

Their office, called praeconium, appears to have been regarded as rather disreputable: in the time of Cicero a law was passed preventing all persons who had been praecones from becoming decuriones in the municipia (Cic. ad Fam. VI.18). Under the early emperors, however, it became very profitable (Juv. III.157, VII.6; Martial, V.56.11, VI.8.5), which was no doubt partly owing to the bribes which they received from the suitors, &c.

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