Abstract The polygenetic Albano maar is the most recent centre of the Colli Albani volcano. Phreatic activity at the maar occurred throughout the Holocene. This paper summarises the close relationships between the activity of the maar and the history of settlement in the Roman region. Repeated lahars associated to the lake overflows occurred along the northwestern slope of the maar. The last catastrophic overflow occurred in 398 B.C.E., after which the Romans excavated a 1.5 km long drain-tunnel through the maar crater wall, which has since kept the lake 70 m below the lowest point of the rim. This tunnel drain may be regarded as the first construction made to mitigate a volcanic hazard in history. The surprising and still largely unknown results of this study are very important to understand the history of settlement of the area and to assess the hazard of the Roman region.

Abstract In all the Indian legends, whether it is the Ramayana or Mahabharata, one can find embedded elements of geological processes. Perhaps due to the lack of a sound scientific basis for recognizing geological processes in ancient Indian civilization, such processes were believed to be the acts of ‘Gods’ (Suras) and ‘Demons’ (Asuras) and hence they formed an integral part of these legends. Even in the present age where science is able to explain several geological processes, the Hindu faith is such that these myths and legends continue to be passed on to succeeding generations. The fact that these geological processes are contained in these epics helps to sustain truth (dharma) and maintain harmony. Ancient Indian civilization adopted this doctrine and its continuance will remain a fresh and vital part of future generations in India.

Abstract The presence of fossil echinoids in archaeological sites in southern England that range from the Palaeolithic through the Neolithic, Bronze and Iron Ages, Romano-British to Anglo-Saxon indicates that humans have long had a propensity for collecting these fossils. The palaeoethnological significance of fossil echinoids can be determined from a number of criteria. The fossils may occur with the dead, either in burials or cremations, or be associated with past activities of the living. These include presence on a flint worked as a tool; artificial alteration of the fossil; association with human habitation; or occurrence outside the area of natural geological occurrence. Their archaeological association provides an indication that these fossils have been collected by people for hundreds of thousands of years and, at times, attained a high degree of spiritual significance. Moreover, recent folklore associated with them, particularly their folk names, such as shepherd’s crowns, fairy loaves and thunderstones, provides a further insight into the myths that were associated with them. These indicate the use of fossil echinoids in both ‘Celtic’ and Norse mythologies where they played a role in resurrection myths. The occurrence of fossil echinoids in a medieval church is indicative of retention of ‘pagan’ belief systems in a Christian context.

ABSTRACT The nineteenth century was the dawn of scientific and systematic paleontology. The foundation of Natural History Museums—built as microcosmic “Books of Nature”—not only contributed to the establishment of this new discipline but also to its visual dissemination. This paper will take the metaphor of the “book” as a starting point for an examination of the paleontological exhibition at the Natural History Museum in Vienna. In keeping with “Natural Theology,” the earliest natural science museums in Britain were designed as expressions of the medieval idea of the “Holy Book of Nature.” Contrary to this, the Natural History Museum Vienna, opened in 1889, wanted to be a nonreligious museum of evolution. Nevertheless, the idea of the “book” was also influential for its design. According to the architects and the first director, it should be a modern “walk-in textbook” instructive for everyone. The most prominent exhibition hall in the museum is dedicated to paleontology. The hall’s decorative scheme forms a unique “Paleo-Gesamtkunstwerk” (Gesamtkunstwerk: total piece of art). The use of grotesque and mythological elements is a particularly striking feature of the hall’s decoration and raises the question of how this relates to the museum’s claim to be a hard-core science institution. As it was paleontology’s task to demystify the monsters and riddles of Earth history systematically, it seems odd that the decorative program connected explicitly to this world. This chapter sheds light on the cultural traditions that led to the creation of this ambiguous program that oscillates between science and imagination. Looking at the results of the research on the nature of the earth, one looks into a book that contains the oldest history we humans know. With amazement, we see the wonders of the first epochs of the earth arising before our mind’s eyes, and what until recently have been incomprehensible hieroglyphs is now almost completely clear to us. How many fables may have been created by the sudden appearance of prehistoric structures in the form of animals and plants? No fairy tales, no fantasies, tangible reality now stands before us and yet no less wonderful, even more wonderful, and this miracle has been achieved by science, the restless seeker. —J. Hoffmann (undated, ca. 1885, p. 1; translation from German)