Penn Museum

For those worried about an apocalypse supposedly predicted by the Maya calendar and coming at the end of the year 2012, there's very good news at a spectacular exhibition that opens in the Penn Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology this weekend. That notion of the world's end is firmly debunked in "Maya 2012: Lords of Time. " So those stressed about what might happen come late December can exhale, thanks to the scholars involved in this fascinating study of the Maya culture - and their calendar.

Beer experts - among them the author of the new book Uncorking the Past - will bring ancient ales to life Thursday at the Penn Museum, with a lively discussion accompanied by ample quaffing. "If people want to taste the oldest chemically attested alcoholic beverage in the world, 'Chateau Jiahu' from 7000 B.C. China, this may well be one of their few chances," said Patrick McGovern, biomolecular archaeologist at the museum and a leading authority on ancient fermented beverages. He will be joined by Sam Calagione, founder and president of Dogfish Head Brewery in Rehoboth Beach, Del., maker of Chateau Jiahu, which won a gold medal at the Great American Beer Festival last week in Denver.

PHILADELPHIA - The Penn Museum will indefinitely lend ancient jewelry known as "Troy gold" to Turkey in exchange for a future exhibition of King Midas artifacts, officials announced Tuesday. The deal is part of what Penn Museum officials call a landmark agreement to work more collaboratively with Turkey's Ministry of Culture and Tourism. The Penn Museum acquired the early Bronze Age jewelry in 1966. But it wasn't until 2009 that scholars identified the items as likely being from the historic city of Troy.

No tiptoeing Saturday-evening spiders had disturbed the dominoes, no rumbling trucks passing in the dark. "Nothing overnight," Steve Perrucci said. "The mice were kind, the spiders. " But early Sunday afternoon, a 2-year-old boy dropped a ball no bigger than a cough drop and knocked over a short line of Perrucci's dominoes. Quickly repaired, the line was made upright. And so at 3 p.m. Sunday, about 100 folks clustered around a maze of, yes, 10,000 dominoes on the third-floor rotunda of the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology.

It's all about the story. Each item in the Penn Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology - each statue, pitcher, mummy, mosaic, and sphinx - comes with one. The story of how it got here - "you won't find a museum comparable to it anywhere," in the words of new director Julian Siggers. The story of how it was found. "Much of the time, you're digging in the wrong place," says C. Brian Rose, curator of the Mediterranean section and a man who has done his share of digging. "When you find the right place, it's exciting.

Following a scientific analysis that suggested its collection of ancient, Trojan-style gold jewelry was looted from northwestern Turkey, the University of Pennsylvania announced this week that it had lent the 24 items to that country for an indefinite period. In exchange, the Turkish government pledged to lend other artifacts for a one-year exhibit at Penn's Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, including priceless items from Gordion, seat of power of King Midas. The country also promised support for ongoing excavations by Penn scholars within its borders.

Walk through one door at the Penn Museum this weekend and you'll feel as if you've strolled into a before-and-after advertisement. Near the door is the museum's African exhibit - a cluster of tall glass cases filled when W. Wilson Goode was Philadelphia's mayor. About 350 artifacts are on display - a driblet of the museum's stash of 42,000 Egyptian objects and 20,000 objects from elsewhere in Africa. On the other side of the wall is the new "Imagine Africa" exhibit, stuffed into a corridor.

Fine Arts Maya 2012: Lords of Time. The origins of intricate Maya timekeeping systems are an integral part of the Penn Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology's exploration of a civilization that flourished, with cities already in existence by 500 B.C., in what is now southern Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, Belize, and El Salvador. At 10 a.m. Saturday, Porfirio Lobo Sosa, president of Honduras, will join Penn Museum director Richard Hodges at a ceremony to open the exhibition. — Sally Friedman Exhibition hours: 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesdays, 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. Wednesdays, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Thursday through Sunday, through Jan. 13 at 3260 South St. Timed tickets, which include admission to the rest of the museum, are $22.50, $18.50 for ages 65 and older and military, and $16.50 for students (full-time with ID)

Despite a major diplomatic pratfall that caused artifacts to be spirited back to their homeland two months early, the Penn Museum's Secrets of the Silk Road exhibition managed to draw 42,807 visitors during the 39 days its Chinese materials were in residence. The highly touted show, featuring two mummies and about 130 artifacts from remote desert regions of western China, was originally scheduled to open Feb. 5. But a few days before that, Chinese authorities told Penn that the show had not been approved for Philadelphia and that the artifacts had to be returned, still packed, to China.

Faced with a worsening deficit, the venerable, research-driven University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaelogy and Anthropology is seeking to reinvent itself as an updated "tourist magnet. " As an initial step, the director has laid off 18 researchers, though some may stay if grant money can be found to cover their salaries. "We were living beyond our means," said Director Richard Hodges. He said the museum's finances are unsustainable, and that the museum must refurbish its exhibits and "get its income up. " News of the potential layoffs dismayed scholars inside the museum and out. The 120-year-old Penn museum has a worldwide reputation for its scholarship and for supporting expeditions - from the tombs of Egypt to the temples of the Mayans to the remains of Babylon, Gordion and Troy.

FAMILY Aberdeen Dad Vail Regatta Today begins the 75th anniversary of America's biggest collegiate rowing meet. The two-day affair will dot the Schuylkill with some of the country's best rowers. Free shuttle buses run every 20 minutes from the Art Museum to the race's main attractions, including the Grand Stand. (Note: Kelly Drive is closed until 8 p.m. tomorrow between Strawberry Mansion and Fountain Green drives.) Grand Stand, 2200 Kelly Dr. (2 miles north of Boathouse Row)

The fiftyish woman led a rugged existence in the desert, likely getting plenty of exercise and a diet heavy in grains as she scraped a living from the land more than 1,500 years ago. Her arteries, however, look like what you might expect from someone who sits on the couch all day eating ice cream. And she apparently was not unusual. Researchers performed CT scans on the mummified remains of this woman - now a resident of the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology - and 136 other people from around the world, and found evidence of hardening of the arteries in 47 of them.

On a snowy day before the Feb. 10 opening of "Unearthing a Masterpiece" at the Penn Museum, exhibition coordinator Kate Quinn stood on South Street, watching the enormous crane that was to lift the star of the show - the magnificent late-Roman Lod mosaic - into the museum. South Street was closed to cars, but pedestrians continued to walk by even as, moments later, the first of the 17-by-24-foot floor mosaic's seven pieces rose into the air. "They were on their phones and not noticing the almost-2,000-year-old floor flying above their heads," Quinn recalls.

BLACK HISTORY MONTH Unsung heroine Moonstone Art Center wraps up its commemoration of the life and accomplishments of antilynching crusader, suffragist, journalist and speaker Ida B. Wells with a discussion of the relationship between 19th-century lynching and modern-day capital punishment. Criminal defense attorney Michael Coard, Witness to Innocence activist Shujaa Graham and others to speak. Ethical Humanist Society of Philadelphia, 1906 S. Rittenhouse Square, 2 p.m. Sunday, free, 215-735-3456, moonstoneartscenter.org.

Enjoy hands-on science and engineering activities at Drexel University on Saturday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. during Philly Materials Science and Engineering Day. Learn about materials science, expressed in laymen's terms as "the study of stuff," and learn what everyday things we use are made of and how they work. The event is free and presented by the departments of Materials Science and Engineering at Drexel University and the University of Pennsylvania.   Philly Materials Science and Engineering Day, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday at Bossone Research Enterprise Center on Market Street between 31st and 32d. Event is free.

Children have a playdate with the Sprout Network Saturday for the Super WHY Celebration at the Market & Shops at Comcast Center. Activities include storytime, and children can watch the network's favorite Super WHY episodes. There will be a meet and greet with Super WHY and Princess Presto and photo opportunities. Market merchants will have arts and crafts, kid-friendly lunch specials, an interactive gaming station, and more. Playdate is from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m.   KidsinCenterCity.com playdate with Sprout: The Super WHY Celebration, 11 a.m. to 1 p.m., Saturday on the lower level of the Market & Shops at Comcast Center, 1701 JFK Blvd.

Friday-Saturday Sounds of the season The Philadelphia Orchestra will celebrate the holidays with "The Glorious Sound of Christmas. " Join the orchestra for favorites at the Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts' Verizon Hall, 300 S. Broad St. Admission: $40-$119. Time: 7 p.m. Information: 215-893-1999, www.philorch.org .   Friday Party like there's no tomorrow Join the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology as it holds a celebration for the end of the world ... 12-21-12, according to an ancient Maya calendar.

By Julian Siggers It's Dec. 21, and for some, that means it must be the end of the world. At the Penn Museum, where we've been presenting the exhibition "Maya 2012: Lords of Time" since May, talk of apocalyptic prophecy and consequent media coverage has been building steadily. We've certainly had our own fun with the "phenomenon," even going so far as to bring DJ Scribble out tonight for a final countdown dance party (no word yet on what that last song will be). "Maya 2012: Lords of Time" draws upon the Penn Museum's own extensive Maya scholarship and recent archaeological discoveries at the UNESCO World Heritage site of Copan, Honduras, to examine what the ancient Maya understood about time, the calendar, and the cycles of life.

It's all about the story. Each item in the Penn Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology - each statue, pitcher, mummy, mosaic, and sphinx - comes with one. The story of how it got here - "you won't find a museum comparable to it anywhere," in the words of new director Julian Siggers. The story of how it was found. "Much of the time, you're digging in the wrong place," says C. Brian Rose, curator of the Mediterranean section and a man who has done his share of digging. "When you find the right place, it's exciting.

Elizabeth Messaros beamed as she ran her hands over Egyptian relics thousands of years old at the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology. The sightless teen, a student at the Overbrook School for the Blind, had a similar experience once at an art museum - but had to wear gloves. "There, we were relying on rubber!" she said. Not so at Penn, where blind and visually impaired visitors had only to wipe their hands clean in between the half-dozen artifacts featured on a "touch tour" designed by Trish Maunder, coordinator of special tours.