Laser Engraving in Ancient Greece?

This is a fascinating story, the piece it is talking about is shown about half-way down.

Anyone feel like trying to engrave an agate in response?

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lol, saw it this afternoon and already tucked it into the Artsy folder.
Looks pretty detailed

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For something hand-carved with bronze tools it appears almost miraculous

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Wow. An archeologist’s dream. And they are not done with the excavation and cleaning–imagine what else could be in there.

Thanks for the link!

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That is extraordinary. What astounds me is the detail in the muscles of the Human body. I have 30+ years experience with crafting precious metal and gems into jewelry with the cutting power of diamond and modern tools. Lapidary is among those skills and I know I couldn’t come close to this level.

In terms of the wonder this inspires, it’s on the level of the Antikythera mechanism.

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That was the first thing I thought of, too.

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I’d give that a like, but i’m exhausted in supply. :+1:

Edit; because there is too much going on here now and not enough likes @dan

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How little we know, and how odd we give our ancestors so little credit for being driven by the same imagination that drives us.

John

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You said it much better than I could. I tend to think of our ancestors as people who were only concerned about how to keep themselves and their families alive for another day in a world that was usually harsh and unforgiving. Then I see something like this and it reminds me that they loved beauty as much as we do – maybe more for the very reason that life was so much harder then.

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And they weren’t distracted by TV :grinning:

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Would reply to this, but currently watching a movie while surfing the Internet…

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Wow!

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What a thing of beauty and aww. Just had to do it.

(Edited to add this was done done the “photo” engrave settings on draftboard. I saved the picture from the article. Converted to grey-scale, adjusted the contrast, highlights and shadows and sharpened it. I then did a lot of touching up with a the paintbrush. Added black lines that were missing and, more importantly, used white to clean up some of the muddy grey pixles in the face and other dark areas.)

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Amazing!

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Another must-have after the founder’s ruler ?
Badge for forgers ?

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Ancient Astronauts :nerd_face:

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great read and incredible art :slight_smile:

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What’s wrong, can’t multitask? :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

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Well I was also having a drink, so that’s three things at once!

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Hahaha the “I have slayed the GF” badge for advanced users lol

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