Exham Priory/Summerisle Discovered, or Centuries of Human Sacrifice in Kent

Martin Rundkvist discusses Cliffs End, excavated by Wessex Archaeology in 2004-2005. They uncovered centuries of what appears to be ritual human sacrifice. Bodies of at least 24 humans, as well as animals, were ritually manipulated after being killed. Based on stable isotope analysis, many of the victims were from Scandinavia, possibly slaves. The striking thing is the duration: It continued for eight centuries.

This work has been ongoing, and you can read about it from Wessex Archaeology's website (they also have a flickr account with images). Notably, this doesn't take the same tack as either the original blog post, nor from the description in the magazine's table of contents, the popular article that inspired the blog post.

The Physics of Cthulhu

This paper is a bit of a doozy. Dr. Benjamin Tippett, a physicist at the University of New Brunswick, examines the eyewitness and other descriptions given in accounts relating to Francis Wayland Thurston's correlated narrative "The Call of Cthulhu." He finds descriptions of gravitational lensing and other exotic phenomena, phenomena not identified until decades after Thurston's manuscript was written. This realization leads to an settling conclusion in a must read paper.

"Possible Bubbles of Spacetime Curvature in the South Pacific"

Tesla Lightning Gun (Human, not Yithian, in Origin)

Ever wondered what a Yithian lightning gun might look like? Well, not only can you see this one built by Rob Flickenger, but you can read about how he built it (it involves many dangerous processes. And Nerf).

Here it is in action

Behold Nanocthulhu lovecrafti

Matthew Buffington of the Smithsonian has published the description of a new genus and species of wasp, named Nanocthulhu lovecrafti, a name partially inspired by the shape of the mandibles. You can see pictures of it, and an explanation for the name, at this entry at WaspWeb (a site whose existence disturbs me somewhat).

Elder Thing Discovered in Kentucky. No, Really.

How can this possibly go wrong?

An amateur fossil hunter, working with two professors of geology, just presented their findings of an organism even they are calling a "monster." I'll let them describe it.

"Around 450 million years ago, shallow seas covered the Cincinnati region and harbored one very large and now very mysterious organism. Despite its size, no one has ever found a fossil of this "monster" until its discovery by an amateur paleontologist last year. The fossilized specimen, a roughly elliptical shape with multiple lobes, totaling almost seven feet in length,"

...

""I knew right away that I had found an unusual fossil," Fine said. "Imagine a saguaro cactus with flattened branches and horizontal stripes in place of the usual vertical stripes. That's the best description I can give.""

Yeah, um ... might it have looked like this?

UPDATE: Better image here.