The old weird, and somewhat more recent weird

[nancylebov]

http://the-red-shoes.livejournal.com/1211935.html?nc=47

the_red_shoes rants about Giant Ants in Herodotus.

Other Indians dwell near the town of Kaspatyros and the Paktyic country, north of the rest of India; these live like the Baktrians; they are of all Indians the most warlike, and it is they who are sent for the gold; for in these parts all is desolate because of the sand.

Got that? Fine. Listen up, next is the part about GIANT.ANTS.

In this sandy desert are ants, not as big as dogs but bigger than foxes; the Persian king has some of these, which have been caught there.

NOT JUST ANTS. BUT GIANT ONES. WAIT, WHAT DO THESE GIANT ANTS DO?

These ants live underground, digging out the sand in the same way as the ants in Greece, to which they are very similar in shape, and the sand which they carry from the holes is full of gold.

Got that? They are GOLD-MINING.GIANT.ANTS.

Read the rest. It builds nicely.

Then read the comments. St. John's College is a strange place where the idea is to read the Great Books without "outside material"....so that looking at a map was like cheating.

Comments

[madfilkentist]

That puts me in mind of another old book which many consider totally accurate, and which has stories about a world-destroying flood and a religious leader who rose from the dead.

[(Anonymous)]

If my memory hasn't garbled it all, someone figured out recently that Herodotus was remarkably accurate about the giant gold-mining ants. The main thing wrong was, they were some kind of mammal. (I've forgotten where I read this.)

[madfilkentist]

Here's an account which says that the "ants" were marmots and a linguistic confusion was involved. I offer no guarantees of accuracy; it's just the first thing that turned up in Google.

[fidelioscabinet.livejournal.com]

Right now, all I can think is "Why did Ray Harryhausen never get a chance to do GIANT GOLD-MINING ANTS?"