GROUP TRIP to OOi/N HOUSE

A DAY IN FIESOLE cont: Ill

We ~ld hardly agree with Abbe Lanzi that the worderful ruins of Fiesole M.ich of the reconare of ''Little relevance" The first -struction was no doubt a figment of archaeological map designed by a local his imagination. Nevertheless, after man, Angelo Bibi in 1815 shows an :i.rnµ)sing 200 years of digging now have, within city,with a stronghold surroorrled by quite a small area, evidence of the triple bourdary walls• presence of man on that hill since the cegining of the secorrl millenilllll B.C. am this presence appears uninterrupted throoghout the Bronze Age tmtil typical ''Villanovan" fragments bring u& to the threshold of the actual Etruscan Age.

The site, at present, contains ~11 preserved remains of an Etruscan temple, an almost canplete Ranan amphitheatre, am equally ~11 preserved Ranan Bathes, dating fran the 1st century A.D. The many graves discovered in the aear close to the village have yielded a large munber of artifacts airl many every day life articles for which a tm.lsealllll was b..tilt in the fonn of a temple. The objects are exhibited in 3 roans am are all tagged with precise arrl ample infonnation

It is not my µ.irpose to descrice here in detail the magnificent excavat-ions. Suffice it to say that anyone who finds himself in Tuscany could ~11 sperrl a day enjoying a grunpse into the past in the brilliant(usually) Italian sunshine.

In addition to the archaeological site, the little ta-m contains a 13th Century Church, a nruselllll of art with many ceautiful painting::; fran the Florence Cathedral am other galleries, a Cath--edral finished in 1028, am a Church which was the birthplace of the Franciscan order.

Where else can yru get a cetter 25p' s worth of archeology, with a 100st magnificent view of the whole of Florence thra-m in free ?

A.S.

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Chernobyl 'deaths • in Bible' By Ian in New Ball York

ASCRIPTURE Revelations text fr_om which speak of "a star called wormwood" causing a con• flagration and poisoning the waters so that "many men died." is being read and r~read by atheists and believ~ ers across the Soviet Unioh in the wake of the ChemQ• byl nuclear catastrophe.

Chernobyl is the Ukrai~ian word for wormwood. a bitter herb used in rural Russia as a tonic. Before the nuclear a1e came to the Ukraine and the banks of the Dnieper. womt• wood grew in abundance ~re hence the name Chemob:4; for the site of four power plantl. ·

The reference to .:_ in , Ukrainian - •·the star . called Chernobyl" occurs in

Revelations chapter 8, verses 10, 11. In the authorised version they read: .

And the third angel sounded, and there fell a great star from hea11en. burning as i·t u:ere a lamp, and it fell upon the third parL of the rivers, and upon the f oantaina of waters.

And the 11ame of the star_ is called Wormwood: and tlw tliird part of the waters bP.came wonnwood; and many men diP.d of the waters, because they were made bitter.

As a result, Ukrainian dictionaries are being pored over throughout Russia-along witn the relevant passage frorn::tHe scriptures in Russia~ Soviet citizens who wa~ check that .. Chernobyl" meilfi-' wormwood in Ukrainian. , ':-:: "With the uncanny sp~~ common to rumour in the Soviet Union, the discovery had sprelid across the Soviet land, conU-ibuting to the swelling body of lor~ that has shaped the public consciousness of the disaster at the Chernobyl atomic power plant in the Ukraine." the New York Times reported from Mol>cow.

Facts; Facts; /

THe Bi~ho1> of Tlurham, Dr I

IJavid .Jenkin~. ha~ pred(·hcd in

York minster for rhe lir\l time sinte it caught firr a few dd.YS .tltcr his consecration there two yt•ars ago. lie seems to have learned little from that experience. He told the congregation that the writers of the Gospels were more ronrerned ~ith pas~ing on thrir faith than getting their facts right. "The story i~ important ( sicJ not for its historical acrnrac.v", he said, "still less its srkntilic dcsniption. It's important for its message" ..

Studirs, he went on, have shown that the early Christians \,ere not bothered about histo!'ic.: acc-uracy the way people .,re today. but not many "studies". surely, were needed to ~how this.

How could the early Christians have br.en concerned 1, ith scientific facts and historic accuracy? Such an attitude to the world, a beli<'f in "lacts" dbove all things, though we are supposed to take it for ~ranted now. scarcely existed in their tla_v.

Come to that, how manv prople are all that concerned about "historic accuracv'' now? Thr Bishop ~hould get about n10rr. listen to wh.tt "ordinary p<'oplc" arc saying. He would be surprised by their slight concern for historic accuracy, even about the events of their own lifetime. When was it I overheard someone on a bus main• tain that the Vietnam war was fought in Central America?

The Bishop should also bear in mind that ~ome real scientists (not the old-fashioned Yirtorian rationalists he is thinking of) are beginning to doubt whether there are any "farts" in his sense of the word at all.