Whitechapel - Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

MarshallQuicksand — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 18:12:12 -0700

This happened last summer, and the thing is still to be cracked open for fears of damaging its contents. It will be subjected to endoscopy and, if necessary, MRI scans in order to divine it's contents.

A thousand pounds of metal is an enormous amount of wealth in this era. To waste so much of it in a burial is pretty unusual.

There isn't really any precedent for this. The Romans apparently used coffins very rarely and when they did, they were wooden. This anomaly is compounded in strangeness by the sheer bloody size of the thing. An inch thick and 1000 pounds in weight.

So what's in the box? I'm almost hoping for some insane conjecture about the Romans using trial and error to surmise that lead blocks sickness-causing radiation, so they choose that as the material that they'll entomb their mysterious time-travelling astronaut in.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

Seantaclaus — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 18:18:21 -0700

Add one more thing to the list of stuff that I'd love to see thorough scans of (another being the chamber they've discovered under one of the Sphinx's feet).

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

Scribe — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 18:38:59 -0700

Screw all the scans and stuff, I have a crowbar and willing to travel.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

Brendan McGinley — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 19:11:23 -0700

Oh man, this thing is going to punch its way out of its slumber hungry for blood.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

Finagle — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 20:07:11 -0700

There are some things best left buried.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

Draug — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 20:20:24 -0700

Wasn't Osiris tricked into a sealed in a lead coffin?

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

James Puckett — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 20:56:54 -0700

There are some things best left buried.

Dammit, this is a Tales From the Crypt waiting to happen.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

StefanJ — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 21:11:27 -0700

When I was a kid, a movie theatre in the next town had a $1.00 Saturday afternoon horror movie double feature. One of them was a Hammer Films (I think) movie in which the hero accepts delivery of a skeleton from New Guinea. It had been buried way, way deep and was an object of great fear to the natives.

Turns out that the skeleton regenerated its flesh when it got wet.

This scared the hell out of me. And it makes me hope they open that coffin in a nice dry area.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

rickiep00h — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 21:28:20 -0700

The obvious answer is that there is a cat in there. Now: is it alive, or is it dead.

My only other theory is that Romans actually invented some kind of nuclear power, and we're all going to be right fucked once it cracks open.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

Audley Strange — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 22:29:57 -0700

I'm guessing David Blane, Lazarus or a dead Grey.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

SilentObjector — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 22:40:41 -0700

My god, it's going to be full of fucking stars.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

Alan Tyson — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 22:43:26 -0700

JFK. A million space bucks on JFK.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

oddbill — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 22:58:44 -0700

My favorite line from the article:

"It's hard but satisfying work. How many people can say they uncovered an ancient burial?"

The answer, of course, is a finite number (x) that diminishes by one (-1) each night (n) following the opening of the box...

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

chris g — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 23:18:13 -0700

the bones of teh Bat-man

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

rough night — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 23:43:11 -0700

My ~~complete lack of~~ money is on the aforementioned radioactive time travel equipment/astronaut. Who else is making bets?

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

Dario — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 00:02:56 -0700

Crap ancient game show prop, in vein of:

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

jamesturner125 — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 00:15:47 -0700

Interesting find... Now I cant wait to read what's inside that coffin! free online games pokies

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

keyofsilence — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 01:44:21 -0700

Zombie Jesus.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

texture — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 02:12:01 -0700

Ultimate Namor.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

William George — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 05:11:15 -0700

So what's in the box?

The Vatican's morality.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

3millionyears — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 05:49:47 -0700

The box would be smaller

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

mister hex — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 06:18:57 -0700

I second Ultimate Namor.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

RenThing — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 07:30:41 -0700

A shoggoth.

Hey, I can dream, right?

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

mthemordant — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 07:36:36 -0700

Does anyone have a link to the article? All I could find was THIS story about a LEAD BURRITO BURIAL.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

MarshallQuicksand — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 08:20:01 -0700

@mthemordant - The very first word of the post is linked. I should probably extend it.

EDIT: There, done.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

Rootfireember — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 09:36:47 -0700

From the Burrito Article Mordant posted:
, x-ray and CT scans—the preferred methods of coffin analysis—cannot penetrate the thick lead, leaving researchers pondering other, potentially dangerous ways to examine the remains inside. Since there is apparently a hold in the bottom of the coffin through witch a foot bone can be examined, I'm guessing they'll end up snaking a scope up into the coffin.

edit: N/M. AT the bottom of the article it says that's what they plan on doing next.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

Scrymgeour — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 09:41:19 -0700

i know someone who got the plague by opening a lead coffin.
I want to make it my mission in life to open all lead coffins to achieve the same thing. Imagine the possibilities for picking up girls and impressing drunk people

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

Fearlessfoz — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 10:40:46 -0700

@ RenThing
I'll see your Shoggoth (which would be awesome) and raise you...
THE SPAWN OF CTHULHU!!!
He's coming out with his mouth tentacles waving, drooling for our souls, spreading death with just a glance of his insane yellow eyes...
The pope will address the world saying: "Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn"
... then he'll finish with...
Long Live the God Damn Bat Man

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

Dewey Decibel — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 11:05:25 -0700

Hoffa.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

BOODOFFSTAGE — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 12:06:50 -0700

An all powerful immortal alien that was worshipped as a god by the local populace and ruled an ancient kingdom for hundreds of year before being taken down while he was at his weakest and trapped inside the metal coffin. But. 'im just guessing. No real proof.

We are all gonna be disapointed when all they'll find is a mummified body possibly of the royalty variety.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

Dario — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 12:08:17 -0700

It contains lots of smaller lead boxes, gradually leading up to a solitary IOU note.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

Verissimus — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 12:15:08 -0700

Maybe it's that guy from that fictional reality from Planetary #9.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

JJH — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 12:26:01 -0700

It's a fart.

A thousands of years old fart, and it's been trapped in there, all this time... stewing... It's the culmination of the greatest practical joke in the history of the world!

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

Dani — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 12:28:46 -0700

I'm seconding Hoffa...

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

rough night — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 13:51:25 -0700

BOODOFFSTAGE - Royal types generally prefer the shinier metals. Surely lead coffins are meant for sinister and hard to kill grand vizier types, perhaps an ancient Rasputin?

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

BOODOFFSTAGE — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 14:12:31 -0700

Surely lead coffins are meant for sinister and hard to kill grand vizier types

I didn't know there was a protocol for this kind of thing.

Still.....I am a dead cat.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

Rootfireember — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 15:28:57 -0700

They say lead coffins were usually used for adolescents or females of the somewhat important variety. So maybe it's a SHE in there? And lead was worth more back then.

...I'm still betting it's a zombie. Waiting to be freed, to release the zombie apocalypse upon us.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

bjacques — Sat, 03 Apr 2010 10:36:56 -0700

An Etruscan noble catwoman. A thirsty one.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

costa_k — Sat, 03 Apr 2010 12:31:07 -0700

It's actually an ancient automaton in it's transformed non-humanoid dormancy mode. Watch, they're gonna wake it up and it's gonna turn into this;

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

Rootfireember — Thu, 08 Apr 2010 13:20:14 -0700

feh they keep on describing it as a burrito. maybe it just IS agiant metal burrito. With a foot in it. :D
"Yeh we dont know how that foot got into your lunch, mr.monster, we're sorry..."

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

3millionyears — Thu, 08 Apr 2010 13:38:26 -0700

Its Jean Grey - call Matt Fraction

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

SonOfCann — Thu, 08 Apr 2010 13:42:35 -0700

@3millionyears I just spat cheap cola all over my laptop.

This story makes me wonder what the people of the future will make of the stuff we've buried. That is if they haven't all buggered off into space or fully digitized themselves.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

256 — Sun, 18 Apr 2010 17:50:29 -0700

@oddbill

The answer, of course, is a finite number (x) that diminishes by one (-1) each night (n) following the opening of the box...

I get a weird feeling that only a maths or physics graduate would describe something this eldritch in those terms... If not, good knowledge anyway.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

D.J. — Sun, 18 Apr 2010 18:08:05 -0700

Tracy Mills' head.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

space scoundrel — Wed, 02 Jun 2010 20:13:23 -0700

It's an imperial Roman nuclear toaster. Motherfuckers had to toast bread made from grains grown in soil with hundreds of years of Carthaginian and Etruscan blood soaked up in it. Makes for pretty tough-as-nails wheat.

Either that or we'll find Starbuck and actually get an explanation of what the hell she is.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

Brendan McGinley — Wed, 02 Jun 2010 22:00:35 -0700

Carthage didn't lose many of their own on Italian soil. Hannibal liked to let the Celts take the brunt. They got reamed at Zama, though.

Supposing it's a Roman god?

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

VanSaint — Fri, 04 Jun 2010 20:28:23 -0700

First thing I thought of, it's like that coffin from The Strain (a vampire novel co-written by Guillero Del Toro).

Somewhere in Rome, there is a giant homeless vampire sleeping in a seedy hotel room.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

Finagle — Sat, 05 Jun 2010 06:48:53 -0700

I can't imagine how insane some immortal being would be, if there actually were an entity in that coffin that had spent a few hundred to a couple of thousand years in a box. Superboy from /Crisis/ would look like a model of emotional maturity.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

~lis — Sat, 05 Jun 2010 08:11:53 -0700

"There are only a handful of other examples from Italy of lead coffins from this age---the second, third or fourth century A.D."

why didn't they say what they found in those? <:/

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

David Matthew — Sat, 05 Jun 2010 21:56:35 -0700

I would presume they found, to their complete lack of surprise, dead people.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

Rootfireember — Sun, 06 Jun 2010 11:26:50 -0700

-well we know at least there's someone's foot in there, so I'm assuming that it's the rest of the body.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

Brendan McGinley — Sun, 06 Jun 2010 15:19:40 -0700

Maybe whatever's in there eating people just left the foot so it wouldn't look like a pig.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

46&2 — Wed, 11 Aug 2010 15:50:46 -0700

Whatever it is it's got to be more exciting than what's inside that USAF container in the trailer of "Super 8".

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

purvision — Wed, 11 Aug 2010 17:07:56 -0700

I'd settle with what's in there being just a few scrolls of books. A lost comedy of Aristophanes, anyone? Maybe it's the reburial of Alexander the Great. We never did find where they moved him.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

Jigsy Q — Thu, 12 Aug 2010 06:35:53 -0700

I hope it's filled with even more lead

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

Brendan McGinley — Thu, 12 Aug 2010 11:13:30 -0700

Or more, tinier coffins.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

Artenshiur — Thu, 12 Aug 2010 13:46:13 -0700

It's coffins all the way down.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

oddbill — Fri, 13 Aug 2010 22:01:29 -0700

That last post is the sum of all plausible metaphysics.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

funranium — Sat, 14 Aug 2010 00:10:08 -0700

This is a coffin of exceptional scientific value beyond archaeology. Lead that clean with 2000+ years to let all the radio-lead decay out makes for the best detector shielding. The Italian physics programs make extensive joint use of Roman & Greek lead ballast for shielding enclosures, with the cooperation of the board of antiquities. This could make a hell of a creepy high purity germanium rig.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

David Matthew — Sat, 14 Aug 2010 23:21:44 -0700

@funranium: that's actually fascinating. Mining the past to build the high-energy physics of tomorrow!

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

funranium — Sun, 15 Aug 2010 01:52:33 -0700

Clean metal, particularly virgin lead and iron, is a bit of a cherished commodity post-Manhattan project. One of the solutions to Co-60 waste from activated construction materials was to do mixed smelting with other steel, i.e. "dilution is the solution". As a result, there's a lot of elevated background steel in the world; if you want to build a detector with a very low background count rate, you obviously can't use that steel. This mean reprocessing antiques into new steel. Cuba did brisk trade selling their pre-Revolution GM & Ford land behemoths for this purpose.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

Purple Wyrm — Sun, 15 Aug 2010 05:27:32 -0700

The WWI German ships at the bottom of Scapa Flow are a similar source of uncontaminated steel.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

Verissimus — Sun, 15 Aug 2010 12:47:37 -0700

This is a coffin of exceptional scientific value beyond archaeology. Lead that clean with 2000+ years to let all the radio-lead decay out makes for the best detector shielding. The Italian physics programs make extensive joint use of Roman & Greek lead ballast for shielding enclosures, with the cooperation of the board of antiquities. This could make a hell of a creepy high purity germanium rig.

Why is it so valuable? Is newly mined lead unsuitable?

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

funranium — Tue, 17 Aug 2010 18:35:30 -0700

Newly mined lead ore is in radioactive equilibrium with the radionuclides of radium/thorium/uranium daughters it is mixed with. Once you smelt and separate down to mostly lead, the daughters start decaying out until it is nearly inert lead. After 2000 years, it's pretty quiet.

Directly making lead this clean is a laborious and, above all, expensive process. As long as the Romans aren't using their ballast anymore, why not?

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

marcolopez — Sat, 18 Dec 2010 09:17:54 -0800

I've really got nothing interesting to add other than to say this is pretty damn exciting.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

oddbill — Sat, 18 Dec 2010 10:01:52 -0800

Half-Ton Dead Discussion Thread Unearthed at Whitechapel.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

marcolopez — Sat, 18 Dec 2010 11:17:45 -0800

Ha Ha Ha

I didnt even notice the dates on the comments.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

Zeebo — Sat, 15 Jan 2011 07:09:36 -0800

Surprised no one ever mentioned grave liquor, the best liquor.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

Flup — Mon, 24 Jan 2011 16:18:57 -0800

Would be nice to get an update on this

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

RenThing — Mon, 24 Jan 2011 16:58:15 -0800

Same here, most of the posts I've found have been current with the one at the start of the thread though, doesn't look like an update has hit the web

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

Joe B — Tue, 25 Jan 2011 08:50:27 -0800

Because the one's who opened it are on the run with it, trying to keep it from all the criminal/corporate/governments that want to use it for world domination.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

RenThing — Tue, 25 Jan 2011 08:57:43 -0800

Or were eaten by some horrible, unspeakable evil sealed away inside it.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

stsparky — Tue, 25 Jan 2011 20:12:10 -0800

http://www.facebook.com/gabii.project would be one place for it.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

MikiM — Tue, 25 Jan 2011 23:12:26 -0800

Not a fart or Schrödinger's cat: "The coffin contains human remains. These will have to be examined in greater detail at Rome."
http://lapisgabinus.blogspot.com/2010/11/german-tv-coverage-of-lead-sarcophagus.html

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

BrianMowrey — Wed, 26 Jan 2011 02:48:39 -0800

thread RUINED

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

Oxbrow — Wed, 26 Jan 2011 06:00:26 -0800

Damn you, Facts!

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

MikiM — Wed, 26 Jan 2011 21:37:26 -0800

**hangs head in shame**

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

Oxbrow — Thu, 27 Jan 2011 02:32:20 -0800

Och well, thanks for the non-apocalyptic news.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

MikiM — Thu, 27 Jan 2011 02:34:26 -0800

**flutters eyelashes***

I can't help it. I bring teh facts. :D

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

Joe B — Thu, 27 Jan 2011 07:49:26 -0800

grumble grumble grumble. If I wanted facts, I'd watch Fox News.
*tries to keep straight face*ROFLMAO

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

rough night — Thu, 27 Jan 2011 10:53:25 -0800

To be fair, I saw nothing in that article that really eliminates the possibility of it containing a lost time traveler or hard to kill Grand Vizier.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

Greg Sullivan — Thu, 27 Jan 2011 11:05:42 -0800

Or a fart.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

MikiM — Thu, 27 Jan 2011 12:53:25 -0800

...or both.

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

Phranky — Thu, 27 Jan 2011 16:42:57 -0800

It says - in November - that it'll be opened in a few weeks.

?

Half-Ton Lead Coffin Unearthed in Rome

Rootfireember — Thu, 27 Jan 2011 18:36:46 -0800

Considering that there was a human foot visible from the coffin from the get go, you're surprised it has human remains in it?
meh.