Ligabue Magazine 8

18.00

First semester 1986
Year V

The actual date has now faded in the mists of time and anyway I would rather not remember it: wrapped in my schoolboy explorations of «De Bello Gallico» and the lyrical verses of the still nova I would often dream of travelling to distant lands, and one Christmas, when asked what present I wanted, I replied: «A subscription to the National Geographic Magazine». Though today’s young have many more opportunities to find out about the world they live in, both in person and through television, the National Geographic Magazine has lost none of its fascination; on the contrary, its circulation throughout the five continents has increased enormously and it offers a consistent example of editorial wisdom and journalistic skill, managing to combine scientific accuracy with readable clarity.

Also included in the price is the digital version *

* Digital versions from no. 1 to 57 are obtained from a scan of the Magazine. They may therefore have imperfections in the display of texts and images.

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I might have said more simply tanto nomini nullum par elogium, but my brief panegyric has an egoistic purpose that I had better reveal straight away by admitting how much pleasure we derived from a letter Mr. Wilbur E. Garrett, the editor of the National Geographic Magazine wrote to us on 11th February to offer his congratulations and compliments on the progress of Ligabue Magazine.

I am well aware of having left myself wide open to cynical comment here: literary figures and actors are all too well known for their habit of concocting wildly exaggerated praise for colleagues on the expectation of receiving so much and more flattery in return. Luckily, our case is different and I am sure our readers will acquit me of having such base motives here;

after all, the appreciative comments of the National Geographic Magazine came «before» I launched into my introduction to this issue. In early February this year, two of our friends and collaborators, Viviano Domenici and Marc Lucien Paris, happened to be in Washington D.C., so they called in at the head office of the National Geographic Magazine with modest intentions rather similar to those with which Enrico Fermi paid bis first visit to Einstein: « If you could spare a few minutes, we should like to show you what we are doing back in Italy». A few minutes? Domenici and Paris spent eight whole days in that building, from dawn to dusk or even later, describing and illustrating the activities of the Research and Study Centre of the Ligabue Foundation, the publications of Erizzo and Ligabue Magazine and they were naturally gratified, at the end, to be asked to explore the possibilities of collaborative exchange between their magazine and ours.

I don’t say that it’s quite as difficult to arrange an appointment to see Wilbur E. Garrett in Washington as it is to get to speak to President Reagan, but there’s not much in it, and Domenici and Paris spent almost an hour with Mr. Garrett; they also met Miss Susan Canby, the head of the library, George Stuart, head of the archaeological section, Priit Vaselind, who is responsible for the European section, Mary Smith, in charge of research and expedition finance, Mercer Cross and Paul Sampson (news service and external relations), Bob Madden (layout), Dean Conger (photographer and head of the audio-visual section), Bill Graves («adventures»), Tom Kennedy (photograph selection) and Lou Mazzatenta (photographer and planning control); and it is by no means out of the realms of possibility that some of these experts may work with Ligabue Magazine at some time in the future.

With this issue of Ligabue Magazine we reach number 8, and I think it not unreasonable to suggest that the basic structure, the skeleton, is now fully developed, and muscle-building exercises continue with such enthusiasm that one might think we were training for the Olympics; and again, this time I think we have lived up to the expectations of our readers. Since I have already used the name Ligabue five times in as many paragraphs let me hasten to add that you will find two articles by him in the following pages, one on the shamans of the Amazonian forests (page 24) and the other, which I specifically asked him to write, on the monitor lizards of Komodo (page 96). And there is a particular reason why we just had to include this latter article:

Giangi Poli, the journalist and RAI-TV producer, gave us the transcript of a debate he himself chaired on the subject of the catastrophes of the past, with four famous scientists. Their conversation covers terrestrial and extra-terrestrial events which took place millions and millions of years ago and they speak also of radical changes in animal species, including the complete disappearance of the dinosaurs (page 104). Well, dinosaurs as such certainly have become extinct but on the island of Komodo Giancarlo Ligabue has seen with his own eyes the monitor, the only existing reptile which resembles, albeit in smaller form, the dinosaurs of hundreds of millions of years ago – hence my determination that we really had to include his report in the same issue alongside the interview conducted by Giangi Poli.

Palaeontologists and anthropologists, who until recently have concentrated their attention on East Africa, are now finding that Western Central Africa is also fruitful ground for exploration. Alberto Angela, a graduate of the University of Rome in natural sciences and an expert in anthropology, writes (page 42) of the many fossils brought to light in north-eastern Zaire.

Laura Laurencich Minelli, who teaches Pre-Colombian history and civilization at the University of Bologna, offers a fascinating introduction to the development of the almost unknown Moche civilization, which flourished in Peru between 200 B. C. and 100 A. D. African art, despite the serious attention now being paid to it in Italy, still tends to be the object of superficial, even snobbish, enthusiasms in some parts. Fortunately, it also has many distinguished and authoritative supporters, one of the most eminent of these being Professor Joseph Cornet, the Director of the Musées Nationaux of Zaire. On page 66 he tells the engrossing story of the kingdom of Kuba, of the birth of what became the Belgian Congo of Leopold II and through to the present king of the Bakubas.

Read the description of the island of the stone money by Maurizio Leigheb, journalist, photographer, anthropologist and explorer on page 78. Mention of the River Indus immediately arouses images of a glorious past, of the marvels of lands visited or just glimpsed by Alexander the Great, and the excavations at Harappa and Mohenjo-daro have yielded surprising results. The article about these forgotten cities (page 118) is by Massimo Vidale, who is preparing doctorate research at the University Institute for Oriental Studies, Naples, and has taken part in excavation expeditions in the area.

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