Content-Type: text/shitpost


Subject: The Liver of Piacenza
Path: you​!your-host​!walldrug​!prime-radiant​!computer​!hal9000​!plovergw​!shitpost​!mjd
Date: 2018-01-24T11:08:53
Newsgroup: alt.binaries.liver-of-piacenza
Message-ID: <b802ff6124942aa4@shitpost.plover.com>
Content-Type: text/shitpost

Excerpted from the Wikipedia article:

The Liver of Piacenza is a life-sized bronze model of a sheep's liver covered in Etruscan inscriptions, measuring 126 mm by 76 mm by 60 mm and dated to the late 2nd century BC.

A bronze artifact in the
shape of a sheep's liver, with lobes visible. The surface is mostly
flat, but with three geometric protrusions representing anatomic
features of the liver. Grooves divide the surface of the artifact into
labeled regions.  The labels are incised into the bronze, and are in
Etruscan script.

The liver is subdivided into sections for the purposes of performing haruspicy; the sections are inscribed with names of individual Etruscan deities. The Piacenza liver parallels the Babylonian artefact [in the British Museum collection] by representing the major anatomical features the gall bladder, caudate lobe and posterior vena cava, of the liver as sculpted protrusions.

The outer rim of the Piacenza liver is divided into 16 sections; since according to the testimony of Pliny and Cicero, the Etruscan divided the heavens into 16 astrological houses, it has been suggested that the liver is supposed to represent a model of the cosmos, and its parts should be identified as constellations or astrological signs. Each of the 16 houses was the "dwelling place" of an individual deity.

(Complete article)

I now crave a replica of the Liver, to keep on my desk, and I was going to complain that there was no way to fulfil this desire. But I found one on Etsy, which sounds like a joke, but isn't. The price is even reasonable. Truly, we live in an age of marvels.