Weird Weekend, "Tooth of enigmatic origin" crowdsourced identification

Archives de Zoologie Experimentale et Generale, 4th series, volume VII, October 1907 (for non-commericial purposes)



Copyright Horniman Museum & Gardens, used with permission. THe specimen at the bottom is accession no. NH.A3008

The "Tooth of enigmatic origin" in the drawing at the top was found in the ivory market at Addis Ababa in 1904 by Maurice de Rothschild's East Africa expedition will be the subject of my talk at Weird Weekend 2014 this August. See the programme for Weird Weekend 2014.

I'm on at 12 noon on Sunday 17 August, so if you're going, don't go getting too much of a hangover on Weird Saturday. For background, see my short article on the "enigmatic" tooth here.

My talk is down on the programme as "Baron Maurice de Rothschild's dionthere caper". At the time CFZ director Jon Downes and I put together the "pitch" for the talk, an article in the journal La Nature from 1910 suggested the "tusk of enigmatic origin" resembled that of a long-extinct group of elephant relatives, the dinotheres. Closer examination shows a misidentification may have been at work. Jon and I agreed to keep the title, it may not be a dinothere anymore but it's still a caper.

The original title for the talk had the wrong Rothschild - Walter, he of the zoo at Tring, and not Maurice (better known for racehorses, his art collection and being a Senator of the Republic of France.) As I plough slowly through the 50+ pages of the original French that is "Tooth of enigmatic origin", it has become apparent that Walter Rothschild does feature after all. He expressed enthusiasm for Maurice's find, and reportedly gave a presentation on this to the Zoological Society of London in September 1905. The ZSL library are on the case, but it's all still on card indexes so it'll take a while.

As a result of a Twitter appeal some crowdsourced identification of the "enigmatic" tooth has come in from three zoologists and a professor of paleonotology. I don't want to give away too much away ahead of the Weird Weekend talk, except to reproduce here, by kind permission of Paolo Viscardi, natural history curator at the Horniman Museum & Gardens, a photo (above) of their specimen of a walrus tusk (bottom of photo) compared to a hippo tooth (top of photo).

Meanwhile, there was a report on Maurice de Rothschild's East Africa expedition in book form, Voyage du Baron Maurice de Rothschild en Afrique orientale 1904–1905, and a very rare English language edition, Maurice de Rothschild’s Journey to East Africa 1904–1905. This is so rare that the British Library don't have a copy, the only place that has it is the Rothschild Archive in the City of London.

(Fortean Times are interested in a short "Forum" piece on this.)

Can anyone help identify this "tooth (tusk?) of enigmatic origin"?

Above is a sketch of "a tooth of enigmatic origin ("une dent d'origine énigmatique" in the original French). It was obtained by Baron Maurice de Rothschild and Henri Neuville (he worked on the preparation of specimens at the National Museum of National History, Paris, and was a comparative anatomist and by some accounts an anthropologist too.) It was bought from Indian ivory merchants in the ivory market at Addis Ababa, Ethiopia in 1905. Its discoverers do refer to it as a "tusk" ("defense"), but they hesitate to describe it even as a tusk in most of their write-up, which is in the Archives de Zoologie Experimentale et Generale, 4th series, volume VII, October 1907.

The Indian ivory merchants from whom Rothschild and Neuville bought the tusk had no idea of its origin, and had trouble selling it as it was smaller than most elephant tusks that came their way. (The drawing is "life size" and is just under 60cm, or 24 inches, across.) Neuville said that he had talked to Somali herders and hunters who told him that it was from a big animal with an "aquatic" lifestyle, "of singular strength" and "of great size more or less comparable to a hippo" that lived in the bigger lakes of that region. Mention was made of Lake Marguerite (now known as Lake Arbeya, and a lake on the Kenya-Uganda border.

The above quotes are from my own translation, which I am still working on (it's a work of over 50 pages.) A glance at the photographs suggests that Neuville compared the tusk to numerous "anomalous" elephant tusks, mostly from the Natural History Museum London's collection, and that it didn't look anything like the tusk of a hippo, elephant or any kind of pig, and that the tusk "does not resemble any tooth of a fossil or living animal up to the present." It was not fossilised.

Other photo captions in the article suggest that a cross-section of the tusk under a microscope did not match the "grain" of a hippo, elephant or any kind of pig either.

Michel Raynal, of the Institut Virtuel de Cryptozoologie, told me he'd been in touch with Bernard Heuvelmans about this enigmatic tusk some 20 years ago, and that Heuvelmans had told him the Museum in Paris had a "numero de registration" (presumably an accession log number) for the specimen, but that "the piece was not there (lost??)"

The enigmatic tusk will be the subject of my talk at Weird Weekend this August.

Any suggestions as to the tusk's possible identity greatly appreciated. Any tips as to who to approach at the Natural History Museum, Paris also appreciated. (I understand French well, and with the help of a French-speaking colleague at work I can put a letter together, if I know what to ask.) And any offers to write a letter for me explaining what I am researching, for the benefit of the Rothschild Archive in the City of London would also be gratefully received. They need two letterheads from academics to let me look at their archive, which has a copy of the English edition of Voyage du Baron Maurice de Rothschild en Afrique orientale - so rare that the British Library don't have a copy.

On the provisional programme for Weird Weekend, I got the wrong Rothschild. Maurice was best known for owning winning racehorses and for his art collection, and for being a Senator of the Republic of France. Apart from a specimen collecting trip in Egypt, his East Africa expedition was his only zoological venture. He did sent flea specimens to his distant cousin Charles Rothschild, and I have found a reference to correspondence between Maurice de Rothschild's team and Walter Rothschild's Zoological Museum in Tring (now the Natural History Museum, Tring.)

Haringey Paleontology Museum in reduced circumstances

The Museum's glass display cases from the side


The Haringey Paleontology Museum's collection of over 300 scale model dinosaurs (and skeletons, and other prehistoric animals that aren't dinosaurs) has been forced to move from its current accommodation in Haringey, just round the corner from The Salisbury pub.



Sauropods (left), Cetiosaurus (in dark blue, a British sauropod, by Invicta, for the Natural History Museum, centre) and one of the Haringey collection's more recent acquisitions, a Siberian mammoth skeleton. Photo from a couple of weeks ago, when they were all still on display.


Birds and dino-birds from the Haringey collection, including a 1980s "terror bird" in purple and an Archaeopteryx, with some miscellaneous armoured dinosaurs (bottom, centre).



The Hall of Therapods. The big one is a Gigantosaurus, and the grey-green one on the left with the narrowish snout and the ridge along its back is a rare Acrocanthosaurus model. There are also overflows from the iguanodonts (front, to the left) and from the Hall of Mammals, including Andrewsarchus (the one that looks like a dog) and a modern aardvark.


Well over a dozen Dimetrodons, left, including one dating from the early 1960s that I found in the garden. Other non-dinosaur reptiles are shown, including a rare Longisquama model from Poundland, Moschops (a licensed Marx retread from Dapol from their factory shop in Llangollen, and several takes on mammal-like reptile Cynognathus. And some modern reptiles.



In the centre is a rather expensive Kaidyo model of a Camarasaurus all the way from Japan.



The diplodocus annex.


Iguanadonts, some in the kangaroo-like pose of early 1970s reconstructions. Centre left is a rare Camptosaurus model by Mini-Machines.



Numerous ceratopsians and iguanadonts.


Top left: headbutting dinosaurs including Stygmoloch, centre: terror birds, bottom right: ankylosaurs, nodosaurs, Scelidosaurus, armoured dinosaurs. Background right: standing Diplodocus model by Safari. The big, mostly white long-necked mammal is a very expensive indriocothere (aka Baluchitherium).



The Hall of Marine Reptiles




The Pterosaur Wing


Therapods, including "strange therapods", Baryonyx, and a scratch-built Crylophosaurus conversion (with yellow crest,from a pound shop Dilophosaurus). In the background in various shades of grey is an obscure Delta Dromeaosaurus



Top left: Camarasaurus, case of therapods at the top, top right: an obscure ceratopsian and a Natural History Museum Troodon, in the case at the bottom left: giant ground sloth (a Marx Toys knock-off?), Brontotherium (ditto?), Saltasaurus, Triceratops, head of a Plateosaurus.

The collection, some of whose dinosaur models date to the early 1960s, was mostly built-up when cheap dinos flooded the market in the wake of the first Jurassic Park film. A surprising number of really obscure species of dinosaur turn up as models on sale in poundshops to this day.

Negotiations are currently under way for a limited Haringey Museum of Paleontology display, that will eventually be established in Finsbury Park. In its new form, it will be a rotating display, with - for examples - "This month: therapods" or "This month: Dimetrodons" or "This month: prehistoric probiscidians", or "This month: Dinosaurs from Africa" or some such.


Some of the Museum's collection already boxed up for the move.

For another Haringey Museum facing homelessness,the Haringey Museum of Egytpology for Under £5, see here.

Belief in genies ‘helps English’

From the EL Gazette archives. This appeared in EL Gazette back in 2012.
(My recent news stories for EL Gazette are now here).


TRADITIONAL BELIEF in djinns – genies or supernatural beings created out of ‘smokeless fire’ and mentioned in the Koran – is helping candidates pass English exams in the Klang Valley surrounding the Malaysian capital of Kuala Lumpur, according to national newspaper the Star, quoting the local Harian Metro newspaper.

For 350 Malaysian ringgit (£72), local bomoh (shamans) reportedly sell a charm made from a betel leaf, which they claim contains the spirit of a djinn.

A student giving his name as Azman testified to djinn’s power in getting him through English exams at the unnamed institute of higher learning where he studied, saying, ‘It does not matter if others believe in it or not. But for my friends and I, the results proved it is effective.’

Another student, ‘Rashid’, said djinn charms had improved his English exam performance from the ‘borderline passes’ he previously achieved, and knew of ten other satisfied djinn charm customers.

Haringey Museum of Egyptology for Under £5 faces uncertain future

ONE OF THE London Borough of Haringey's lesser-known museums, the Haringey Museum of Egyptology for Under £5, faces an uncertain future as its owner prepares to move out of his flat in St Ann's Ward.

The by-appointment-only Museum has showcased Egyptology gathered from the secondhand shops of the capital over many years, as well as some items that were briefly on special offer in souvenir shops around the British Museum, and from poundshops as far away as Dalston.

This sarcophagus pencil case, priced at well under £5, is a recent acquisition

Now, as London rents become beyond ludicrous, the collection has to move out of its current location on top of the wardrobe, with a particularly popular attraction - the poundshop Anubis collection - housed in a special annex on top of the chest of drawers, which it shares with the Hall of Globes. (See also here.)

The poundshop Anubis collection was one of the Museum's particularly big draws. Also shown is the Hall of Globes, also acquired cheaply from charity shops

The current collection features numerous takes on Rameses, Nefertiti, sphinxes, several versions of the cat goddess Bast, one particularly cheap-looking plastic representation of the god Horus, and some artefacts that appear to have actually come form modern Egypt, via secondhand shops. The news of the collection's imminent move has put on hold an imminent acquisition from Norway, where the curator's brother assures him that every Norwegian over 40, particularly the slightly flakey ones, went on holiday in Egypt before the revolution, resulting in the charity shops of Oslo being absolutely jammed with Egyptology tat for only a few kronor a piece.

The Museum's collection may now have to go into storage in a probably not very big box. There are negotiations underway aimed at finding the Museum a temporary home in Islington, while other talks are in progress around the possibility of a temporary Suffolk Coastal District Museum of Egyptology for Under £5. A third possibility is a permanent Finsbury Park Museum of Low Priced Egyptology somewhere on the borders of Haringey and Islington.

In a previous incarnation at another address in Haringey, the Egyptology Collection was curated by Smute the cat (below), an expert on the 18th and 19th dynasties in particular

Photos: Copyright Matt Salusbury. Original Egyptian sculptures understood to be out of copyright

From the pages of Fortean Times

There's an index of my articles that have appeared in Fortean Times over the years here

Writing English Language Teaching books by algorithm?​

MATT SALUSBURY
writes

(This first appeared in EL Gazette, April 2013)




MACHINES that can write language learning coursebooks? It’s not as sci-fi as it sounds. A California-based business professor has developed a cottage industry in books generated by algorithms.



An algorithm-like very hard sum

Unlike the months or even years that language learning books take to develop, books written by Professor Phil Parker’s Method and Apparatus for Automated Authoring and Marketing
(Maaam) program are authored from scratch ‘in about twenty minutes or so’, and he’s cut development costs per title down to 15–20 US cents. Should the ELT publishing industry tremble at the prospect of its business model being destroyed overnight, replaced by titles churned out by the hour by a ‘method and apparatus’ that can do the job for pennies?

Well, no – not for the moment at least – but the phenomenon is still one to watch.

The Gazette attempted to contact Prof Parker via the INSEAD business school in Fontainebleau, France, where he is chair professor of management science. The faculty secretary told us that the
professor’s duties had taken him to Dubai, but that he would be in touch with us by email on his
return. We still await his reply.

Meanwhile, a video interview with him on INSEAD's website explains in detail how he machine-writes his books. The secret, he says in the interview is deconstructing ‘genres’ and ‘sub-genres’.

Maaam writes ‘certain very particular types of books’, for example ‘high-end business reports’ of over 200 pages – the sort that would normally be written by the likes of accountants Price Waterhouse Coopers. Maaam works by ‘reverse engineering what a financial analyst does’, in Prof Parker’s words. The program then does ‘quick editing of itself’ using small computer scripts to sort out ‘dangling widows’ and other typography that needs cleaning up.

Having cracked the ‘genre’ of business reports, he was able to use tools to other genres – limericks, sonnets, botanical factsheets, radio scripts for educational programmes for farmers, and then language learning books – and ‘develop the application for that sub-genres.'

His novel business model entails him putting his books on Amazon in the expectation that the vast majority of them don’t sell any copies, ‘but there’s enough that sell to enough people’ to finance the next project to ‘create another genre’.



In the event that someone does want to buy one of his many titles, Prof Parker’s books are printed on demand ‘someplace in Tennessee’. Automated software does the marketing for Prof Parker too, as well as the distribution and online advertising of works with snappy titles such as The 2007 Import and Export Market for Waste and Scrap of Unbleached Kraft Paper or Paperboard or of Corrugated Paper of Paperboard in Spain.



US-based dictionary publishers Webster’s are partners on Prof Parker for some language titles, including the Webster’s Online Dictionary: The Rosetta Edition. But the range of algorithm-generated language learning books offered is currently somewhat limited, restricted to compilations of bilingual crosswords (clues in one language, eliciting answers in another), and bilingual thesaurus dictionaries in languages for which little by way of teaching materials exists. No global coursebook series publisher need break into a sweat over Prof Parker’s Webster’s Sorbian (Upper Dialect) – English Thesaurus Dictionary or Webster’s Xhosa to English Crossword Puzzles: Level 1.



Prof Parker sees his algorithm-generated books as an activity in his spare time, but were a major multinational educational publisher to put some serious resources into algorithm-generated ELT books, one could imagine some sort of algorithm arms race, with competitors developing ever more sophisticated tools in this area.

Meanwhile, recent tech start-ups such as Palantir, Kaggle and Narrative Science are able to produce news stories from raw data through algorithms, freeing up journalists for more important tasks. And the iBooks 2 platform for textbooks on iPads already has a function that randomly generates ‘digital flashcards’ to test students’ understanding.

It’s in the area of taking the slog out of ELT textbook development, the grammer drills and so on – thereby liberating human textbook authors to concentrate on the creative side of the operation – that book-writing algorithms may become ubiquitous in ELT publishing.



Images for the purposes of a critique or review - Copyright, Trademarks and Patents Act 1988)