Lydia Pyne
@lydiapyne.bsky.social
Writer, Historian, Tortoise Enthusiast. Currently writing about ochre. Author of ENDLINGS ('22.) Also, GENUINE FAKES, BOOKSHELF, & SEVEN SKELETONS, etc.
Reposted by Lydia Pyne
Love, love, love this drawing by Giovanni Bruzzo of paleolithic children in front of the Balzi Rossi caves! (courtesy of Fabio Negrino)
November 12, 2025 at 4:40 PM
Love, love, love this drawing by Giovanni Bruzzo of paleolithic children in front of the Balzi Rossi caves! (courtesy of Fabio Negrino)
Reposted by Lydia Pyne
Can a mountain really be cursed? @amayor.bsky.social explores the folklore behind natural history.
Cursed Mountains and Deathly Lakes: When Nature Is Explained By Myth
The drive to explain perplexing things in nature, and the desire to understand earthshaking events of unfathomable scale are timeless human impulses. Found in cultures around the world, geomyths at…
buff.ly
October 22, 2025 at 5:30 PM
Can a mountain really be cursed? @amayor.bsky.social explores the folklore behind natural history.
Hahaha for that #GenuineFake vibe
@lydiapyne.bsky.social This would be an interesting approach...
Very sneaky of them.
October 26, 2024 at 10:29 PM
Hahaha for that #GenuineFake vibe
Reposted by Lydia Pyne
Our 70% Off Sale is live! 📚
Save on thousands of select titles & editions across subjects until October 31. Explore the books on sale and refresh your shelves this autumn.
press.princeton.edu/autumn-sale
Save on thousands of select titles & editions across subjects until October 31. Explore the books on sale and refresh your shelves this autumn.
press.princeton.edu/autumn-sale
October 1, 2024 at 4:21 PM
Our 70% Off Sale is live! 📚
Save on thousands of select titles & editions across subjects until October 31. Explore the books on sale and refresh your shelves this autumn.
press.princeton.edu/autumn-sale
Save on thousands of select titles & editions across subjects until October 31. Explore the books on sale and refresh your shelves this autumn.
press.princeton.edu/autumn-sale
CONGRATS!!!
It's publication day for WHAT TO SAVE AND WHY! A book for anyone and everyone who has ever cared about saving something. I hope you enjoy! #philsky
www.amazon.com/What-Save-Wh...
www.amazon.com/What-Save-Wh...
October 1, 2024 at 12:52 PM
CONGRATS!!!
Some cave and ochre scenes from this month’s research trip in Spain. 🎨😍🥾✨
September 20, 2024 at 7:50 PM
Some cave and ochre scenes from this month’s research trip in Spain. 🎨😍🥾✨
Bienvenidos al Pliestoceno
September 14, 2024 at 5:09 PM
Bienvenidos al Pliestoceno
Tito Bustillo & El Pindal Caves. Replica of mural. And me scraping cave sediment off my shoe to make pigment powder.
September 13, 2024 at 8:36 PM
Tito Bustillo & El Pindal Caves. Replica of mural. And me scraping cave sediment off my shoe to make pigment powder.
Reposted by Lydia Pyne
Ocher forming on fresh pyrite-infused metavolcaniclastics in the Oakland Hills. Before Contact, the gossan here was a strategic trade asset for the local Ohlone tribe. Americans mined it out for paint pigment, then mined the pyrite lode beneath it for ~30 years.
September 13, 2024 at 12:04 AM
Ocher forming on fresh pyrite-infused metavolcaniclastics in the Oakland Hills. Before Contact, the gossan here was a strategic trade asset for the local Ohlone tribe. Americans mined it out for paint pigment, then mined the pyrite lode beneath it for ~30 years.
Atapuerca and experimental archaeology!
September 11, 2024 at 5:35 AM
Atapuerca and experimental archaeology!
This set of Ugandan pigments from Paintmakers of Lira is STUNNING!!! Taking time out of writing this morning to play around with the beautiful red-orange-brown Bala Maroon.
September 6, 2024 at 4:09 PM
This set of Ugandan pigments from Paintmakers of Lira is STUNNING!!! Taking time out of writing this morning to play around with the beautiful red-orange-brown Bala Maroon.
Can’t wait for this!
September 4, 2024 at 1:49 PM
Can’t wait for this!
Day 5 (last day!) of Ochre Research Recap from this year’s NEH Public Scholar grant. Pigments, ochres, and bits of earth that I’ve collected over the past year.
August 30, 2024 at 4:08 PM
Day 5 (last day!) of Ochre Research Recap from this year’s NEH Public Scholar grant. Pigments, ochres, and bits of earth that I’ve collected over the past year.
Day 4 of Ochre Research Recap from this year’s NEH Public Scholar grant. Bonjour Roussillon! The Luberon region has a rainbow landscape of ochres that have been mined for centuries. Today, they are part of the region’s eco-tourism efforts to connect visitors to landscape and history.
August 29, 2024 at 4:20 PM
Day 4 of Ochre Research Recap from this year’s NEH Public Scholar grant. Bonjour Roussillon! The Luberon region has a rainbow landscape of ochres that have been mined for centuries. Today, they are part of the region’s eco-tourism efforts to connect visitors to landscape and history.
Day 3 Ochre Research Recap via this year’s NEH Public Scholar grant. In March, I attended a Wild Pigments and Foraged Paints workshop in Venice taught by the brilliant Caroline Ross and hosted by Artisans of Now. This was all about the “here and now” of earth pigments!
August 28, 2024 at 2:48 PM
Day 3 Ochre Research Recap via this year’s NEH Public Scholar grant. In March, I attended a Wild Pigments and Foraged Paints workshop in Venice taught by the brilliant Caroline Ross and hosted by Artisans of Now. This was all about the “here and now” of earth pigments!
Day 2 of ochre research recap from NEH Public Scholar grant: Hello, Paviland Cave & the Red Lady!The site was excavated in 1823 by a team that included William Buckland, Lewis Dillwyn, & Mary Talbot. They uncovered the burial of an individual, beads, ivory rods, flints, & mammoth skull. And ochre.
August 27, 2024 at 4:02 PM
Day 2 of ochre research recap from NEH Public Scholar grant: Hello, Paviland Cave & the Red Lady!The site was excavated in 1823 by a team that included William Buckland, Lewis Dillwyn, & Mary Talbot. They uncovered the burial of an individual, beads, ivory rods, flints, & mammoth skull. And ochre.
Over the past year, work for my ochre book has been supported by the NEH through a Public Scholar grant. As the grant wraps up this week, I want to share parts of the ochre research I’ve explored these past twelve months. First up, an urban ochrescape – London!
August 26, 2024 at 7:54 PM
Over the past year, work for my ochre book has been supported by the NEH through a Public Scholar grant. As the grant wraps up this week, I want to share parts of the ochre research I’ve explored these past twelve months. First up, an urban ochrescape – London!
And the puff quilt is finally finished! 🥳🧵🪡
Designed with my beloved Canyonlands geology in mind, each color is a different geologic strata. #artsci #geology #canyonlands
Designed with my beloved Canyonlands geology in mind, each color is a different geologic strata. #artsci #geology #canyonlands
August 25, 2024 at 9:12 PM
And the puff quilt is finally finished! 🥳🧵🪡
Designed with my beloved Canyonlands geology in mind, each color is a different geologic strata. #artsci #geology #canyonlands
Designed with my beloved Canyonlands geology in mind, each color is a different geologic strata. #artsci #geology #canyonlands
Reposted by Lydia Pyne
It’s UK pub day for Women In the Valley of the Kings! (Been out in the US since July 16.) So excited!!!
www.amazon.co.uk/gp/aw/d/1250...
www.amazon.co.uk/gp/aw/d/1250...
Women in the Valley of the Kings: The Untold Story of Women Egyptologists in the Gilded Age: Amazon.co.uk: Sheppard, Kathleen: 9781250284358: Books
Buy Women in the Valley of the Kings: The Untold Story of Women Egyptologists in the Gilded Age by Sheppard, Kathleen (ISBN: 9781250284358) from Amazon's Book Store. Everyday low prices and free deliv...
www.amazon.co.uk
August 19, 2024 at 1:29 PM
It’s UK pub day for Women In the Valley of the Kings! (Been out in the US since July 16.) So excited!!!
www.amazon.co.uk/gp/aw/d/1250...
www.amazon.co.uk/gp/aw/d/1250...
Reposted by Lydia Pyne
Still another six months to go until the book is available (via UCL Press as an open access publication!), but we now have a catalogue page and a cover - by @markwitton.bsky.social, and featuring Gertie the Dinosaur in centre stage
www.uclpress.co.uk/collections/...
www.uclpress.co.uk/collections/...
June 29, 2024 at 10:25 AM
Still another six months to go until the book is available (via UCL Press as an open access publication!), but we now have a catalogue page and a cover - by @markwitton.bsky.social, and featuring Gertie the Dinosaur in centre stage
www.uclpress.co.uk/collections/...
www.uclpress.co.uk/collections/...
Reposted by Lydia Pyne
I just love this story.
My latest in Nature: ‘Rainbow’, ‘like a cricket’: every bird in South Africa now has an isiZulu name
www.nature.com/articles/d41...
My latest in Nature: ‘Rainbow’, ‘like a cricket’: every bird in South Africa now has an isiZulu name
www.nature.com/articles/d41...
‘Rainbow’, ‘like a cricket’: every bird in South Africa now has an isiZulu name
An effort to create names for wild bird species in the Indigenous language hopes to strengthen conservation research. An effort to create names for wild bird species in the Indigenous language hopes t...
www.nature.com
June 6, 2024 at 1:49 PM
I just love this story.
My latest in Nature: ‘Rainbow’, ‘like a cricket’: every bird in South Africa now has an isiZulu name
www.nature.com/articles/d41...
My latest in Nature: ‘Rainbow’, ‘like a cricket’: every bird in South Africa now has an isiZulu name
www.nature.com/articles/d41...
"Postcards? Does anyone send postcards anymore??" This was such a common question when I was writing POSTCARDS. I love seeing how, in 2024, the technology of a postcard is **as it alway has been** profoundly robust and egalitarian. Also, love the originally linked article.
“The nonprofit 🗞️ industry has seen an uptick of interesting — + decidedly more analog — experiments to distribute jrnlsm to new + often underserved audiences.” The City distrib’ed 📰 re: rent stabilization + tenant rights via postcard. The TX Trib goes to laundromats, ⛪️ in communities it reports on
Postcards and laundromat visits: The Texas Tribune audience team experiments with IRL distribution
As social platforms falter for news, a number of nonprofit outlets are rethinking distribution for impact and in-person engagement.
www.niemanlab.org
May 24, 2024 at 5:03 PM
"Postcards? Does anyone send postcards anymore??" This was such a common question when I was writing POSTCARDS. I love seeing how, in 2024, the technology of a postcard is **as it alway has been** profoundly robust and egalitarian. Also, love the originally linked article.
Reposted by Lydia Pyne
"Of #dinosaurs and intergenerational culture wars: dinomania, nostalgia, and the ‘missionary lizards’ of young earth #creationism" by Alison Laurence: tinyurl.com/2yldt6c6 #histsci #museums @NCSE
Of dinosaurs and intergenerational culture wars: dinomania, nostalgia, and the ‘missionary lizards’ of young earth creationism - Alison Laurence, 2024
For over a century, dinosaurs have drawn crowds to natural history museums, where visitors learn about evolution and deep time. Towards the end of the twentieth...
tinyurl.com
May 24, 2024 at 2:00 PM
"Of #dinosaurs and intergenerational culture wars: dinomania, nostalgia, and the ‘missionary lizards’ of young earth #creationism" by Alison Laurence: tinyurl.com/2yldt6c6 #histsci #museums @NCSE
So thrilled to have a home for The First Color, repped by
Anna Sproul-Latimer at Neon Literary. For project updates and all things ochre, feel free to follow along via IG @lydiavpyne
Anna Sproul-Latimer at Neon Literary. For project updates and all things ochre, feel free to follow along via IG @lydiavpyne
May 23, 2024 at 5:31 PM
So thrilled to have a home for The First Color, repped by
Anna Sproul-Latimer at Neon Literary. For project updates and all things ochre, feel free to follow along via IG @lydiavpyne
Anna Sproul-Latimer at Neon Literary. For project updates and all things ochre, feel free to follow along via IG @lydiavpyne
Reposted by Lydia Pyne
Beth Linker discusses the significance of archival silence, with white elites strategically missing from the record and marginalized peoples in full view, not having the power to erase themselves at will. @BethLinker #history
press.princeton.edu/ideas/the-po...
press.princeton.edu/ideas/the-po...
May 18, 2024 at 11:03 PM
Beth Linker discusses the significance of archival silence, with white elites strategically missing from the record and marginalized peoples in full view, not having the power to erase themselves at will. @BethLinker #history
press.princeton.edu/ideas/the-po...
press.princeton.edu/ideas/the-po...