theautumnalnearasymposiumwas

The Autumnal NEARA Symposium* was a tremendous success!
By Manuel Luciano da Silva, M. D.

NEARA stands for “New England Antiquities Research Association, Inc.” It is an organization composed of Amateurs (archeologists, geologists, and variety of other professions) – and has about five hundred members spread throughout U.S.A., Canada and several overseas countries.

Mr. Richard Fonseca Lynch
HstrclRsch@aol.com

NEARA is now presided by a Portuguese American: Mr. Richard Fonseca Lynch. He is dynamic, witty and very well spoken. He has a pleasant way of coordinating the efforts of all the members and handled the Symposium program in a delightful and pleasant manner! Very well done!

Some of the hard workers and dedicated Directors of NEARA

Roslyn Strong, an excellent past president and continues to be a hard worker	Don Gilmore, another excellent Past President and continues to work even with more enthusiasm	Sue Carlson, a member of the Editorial Board, always ready to work in any project.

My wife, Sílvia, and I went to Norwich, Ct. to attend the Autumnal Symposium of the New England Antiquities Association, -- NEARA -- which was held on November 14-16, 2003, at Ramada Inn, in Norwich, Ct.

From our house, in Bristol, R.I., a distance of 83 miles took us 3 hours because we were caught in the heavy traffic caused by the big fire in Pawtucket. Coming back the same distance we made it in 90 minutes.

We enjoyed meeting again several active members of NEARA and also the variety of presentations.

I have been a member of this organization for almost 40 years. I have enjoyed its symposia because they are conducted in a free FORUM. You can present a novel idea or theory, but then you will be subject to the challenges of many experts in the attendance.

In the NEARA we do not need any “phony professors” to test or grade the various presentations. The members of NEARA have enough scholarship to function in a healthy environment with their scientific maturity and common sense of archaeological knowledge! This is great! This pleases me very much!

I have been honored to give several lectures in the past NEARA Symposia. At this Symposium, I was given the opportunity to give a lecture describing the lies that Gavin Menzies published in his book entitled : “ 1421 -- The year the Chinese discovered America”.

This is an illustrated presentation showing how Gavin Menzies falsified historical maps to fit his preconceived hypothesis and also a list of his maritime mistakes described on his book, “1421-The Year the Chinese Discovered America”. More discussion about Dighton Rock and the Portuguese discoveries and counter points to Gavin Menzies is included.

Click here to see my detailed article
concerning the subject matter of my presentation.

The speaker after me was Dr. William Penhallow, an astronomer retired from URI. He gave an excellent lecture how to predict the various lunar eclipses. Before he started his presentation he said about my lecture: “That’s a tough act to follow!”

The most enjoyable lecture for my wife and for me was the one presented by Dr. Jelle Zeilinga de Boer: “The Secretes of the Oracle of Delphi Revealed”. Fascinating! Not only loaded with scientific explanations, but all the slides were excellent and very well coordinated. We could listen to the same lecture again with great pleasure. Congratulations to him and to NEARA for inviting him.

Delphi served for many centuries as the most sacred site in the classical world and was home to the principal oracle of Greece, who performed her functions inside the Temple of Apollo. Plutarch left clear records about how the oracle worked. It was spoken by a local woman, who entered a trance while seated on a tripod inside a small chamber. Plutarch says the oracle inhaled sweet-smelling vapors from a fissure or spring. In other words, the oracles of Delphi made their prognostications and pronouncements under the influence of hallucinogenic gas. When the temple was excavated in the 19^th century, archaeologists found no fissure or vapor emissions, which have since led to a discounting of the ancient accounts. Jelle Zeilinga de Boer and co-workers have discovered a previously unknown geological fault passing straight through the Sanctuary and Temple of Apollo. The fault is punctuated by both active and dried-up springs. The newfound fault crosses the long-known Delphi fault, directly below the temple. This crossing makes the bitumen-rich limestone there more permeable to gases and groundwater. Water from a spring northwest of the temple has been found to contain methane and traces of ethylene, a sweet-smelling gas that stimulates the central nervous system. The recent research has confirmed the validity of the ancient sources in virtually every detail.

Jelle Zeilinga de Boer is a geologist at Wesleyan University. His recent research on the Temple of Delphi has been widely publicized and has been featured on the History Channel and the National Geographic Channel. He is coauthor of an article on the subject in the August issue of SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN, and is the author of Volcanoes In Human History: The Far-Reaching Effects of Major Eruptions.

Instead of “Meeting” the NEARA should use the term “Symposium” for the Fall and the Spring conferences. Why? Here it is the explanation:

*Symposium [ sym, together with + posion , to drink ] = meaning “to drink together”. Webster’s Third New International Dictionary of the English Language – Unabridged.

Symposium = (1) a drinking party; esp: one following a banquet and providing music, singing, and conversation; a banquet or other social gathering at which several speakers deliver short addresses on related topics or on various aspects of the same topic; (2) a meeting at which several speakers deliver a collection of opinions on a subject.