Archaeology

May 31st, 2023 - A bracelet (right) in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston showing a butterfly inlaid with turquoise, lapis lazuli and carnelian. The bracelet on the left is an electrotype reproduction made in 1947. Credit: Harvard University - Boston Museum of Fine Arts Expedition; Photographs © May 2023 Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. New information on trade networks in Old Kingdom Egypt has been revealed by an analysis of bracelets found in the tomb of ancient Egyptian Queen Hetepheres I. Hetepheres was one ... [Read More]

May 30th, 2023 - Scientists drilled into teeth and extracted dental pulp, which can trap DNA remnants of infectious diseases. Plague DNA has been found dating back 4,000 years, making it the oldest evidence of the disease in Britain. The discovery by researchers could help to understand which genes are "important in the spread of infectious diseases", one of them said. Scientists from the Francis Crick Institute (FCI) have identified three cases of Yersinia pestis - the bacteria that causes plague - in human ... [Read More]

May 30th, 2023 - The 2,700-year-old stone carvings in Sweden include a 13-foot image of a boat and elaborate scenes with an unclear meaning. Archaeologists have discovered about 40 stunning rock carvings of ships, people, and animals that were etched into the granite cliffs of a Swedish island some 2,700 years ago. The Bronze Age carvings, which are known as petroglyphs, were found earlier this May in Bohuslän, a province in western Sweden that is famous for its abundant rock art, according to the public ... [Read More]

May 30th, 2023 - Stone Age humans may have made extended maritime voyages on the Caspian Sea, according to a new study published in the journal Open Archaeology . The research analyzed ornamental beads made from the disk-shaped shells of a species of cockle (Didacna sp.) found at the Kaylu rock shelter, a cave-like burial site near the eastern shoreline of the Caspian Sea. Kaylu was used by Stone Age people over an extended period in the late Mesolithic and Neolithic periods. The transition between these ... [Read More]

May 30th, 2023 - Researchers have found the earliest known occurrence in Britain of Yersinia pestis, the bacteria that causes bubonic and pneumonic plague. The bacteria has been spotted in three 4,000-year-old corpses, from two different burial sites. Yersinia pestis is thought to be behind many of the most devastating disease outbreaks in recorded history, including the 14 th -century Black Death and the 6 th -century Justinianic plague. Yersinia pestis has also been implicated in plagues that happened long ... [Read More]

May 27th, 2023 - CAIRO -- Egyptian antiquities authorities Saturday unveiled ancient workshops and tombs they say were discovered recently at a Pharaonic necropolis just outside the capital Cairo. The spaces were found in the sprawling necropolis of Saqqara, which is a part of Egypt's ancient capital of Memphis, a UNESCO World Heritage site. Mostafa Waziri, secretary-general of the Supreme Council of Antiquities, said the workshops had been used to mummify humans and sacred animals. They date back to the 30th ... [Read More]

May 26th, 2023 - Last fall, when researchers unearthed the remains of a 3,000-year-old structure in the western Armenian town of Metsamor, they faced two mysteries: First, they didn't know what purpose the structure had served. Beyond that, a strange powdery substance covering the area left them stumped. "We knew it was something organic and collected about four to five sacks worth of the material,"  Krzysztof Jakubiak , an archaeologist at the University of Warsaw who led the excavation, tells  Live ... [Read More]

May 26th, 2023 - The remains of a long-lost church submerged by floodwaters almost 700 years ago have been discovered by researchers. The medieval church is thought to have once formed part of the medieval trading settlement of Rungholt, which has sometimes been referred to as the "Atlantis of the North Sea." The sunken settlement was reportedly submerged during a devastating storm surge in A.D. 1362. It lies just off the coast of modern-day Germany beneath the Wadden Sea—an intertidal zone in the ... [Read More]

May 26th, 2023 - Thanks to finding bits of bone, tools, and other aspects of human existence , archeologists have been able to reconstruct much of what life looked like in various times and locations around the globe. But in terms of how things smelled all those years ago, information is a lot more scarce. A new finding of ointment in a perfectly sealed quartz crystal container from over 2,000 years ago is now shedding a bit more light on the scent you might have encountered on the streets of ancient Rome. It's ... [Read More]

May 18th, 2023 - The submerged ruins of a 7,000-year-old road are hiding underwater off the coast of the Croatian island of Korčula. The Neolithic structure once connected the island to an ancient, artificial landmass. Archaeologists announced the discovery of the "strange structures" in a May 6 post on Facebook , describing them as the remains of a roadway that are now submerged about 16 feet (5 meters) beneath the Adriatic Sea. The road consists of "carefully stacked stone plates" measuring roughly 13 ... [Read More]

May 18th, 2023 - Archaeologists have discovered two skeletons buried beneath a collapsed wall in Pompeii and think that their deaths were the result of an earthquake that coincided with Mount Vesuvius' deadly eruption in A.D. 79. The skeletons were found during excavations at the House of the Chaste Lovers, a block of buildings that were part of the once-thriving Roman resort city. Researchers think that the remains are those of two men who were at least 55 years old and that they likely took refuge inside the ... [Read More]

May 15th, 2023 - Archaeologists have discovered a 5,400-year-old megalithic tomb near a prominent lone mountain in southern Spain, suggesting the peak may have been meaningful to prehistoric people there. The area, in the countryside near the city of Antequera, is renowned for its megaliths — prehistoric monuments made from large stones — and the newly found tomb seems to solve one of the mysteries of their alignment. The tomb was designed to funnel light from the rising midsummer sun into a ... [Read More]

May 10th, 2023 - A groundbreaking new study suggests that the migration of ancient humans to the Americas occurred 26,000 years ago, a full 10,000 years earlier than previously believed.  The research, carried out by scientists from the Chinese Academy of Sciences , provides evidence that the first migrants originated from the northern coastal region of China, debunking the longstanding theory that ancient Siberians who crossed the Bering Strait land bridge were the sole ancestors of Native Americans. The ... [Read More]

May 6th, 2023 - Underneath a temple in the ancient ruined city of Taposiris Magna on the Egyptian coast, archaeologists discovered a vast, spectacular tunnel in 2022, a tunnel that experts called a "geometric miracle". During ongoing excavations and exploration of the temple, Kathleen Martinez of the University of Santo Domingo in the Dominican Republic and colleagues uncovered the structure 13 meters (43 feet) below the ground. The 2-meter tall tunnel had been hewn through an incredible 1,305 meters (4,281 ... [Read More]

May 2nd, 2023 - Cosmic rays and lasers have revealed that deep underneath the city streets of Naples, Italy, lie the remains of the Greeks who originally settled the area, as well as the catacombs of Christians who lived there during the Roman era nearly two millennia ago, a new study finds.  Researchers have long known that ancient Greek burials were hidden beneath the city, but weren't able to access all of them. Now, these cutting-edge techniques have enabled researchers to peer into the earth without ... [Read More]

Apr 28th, 2023 - Researchers have provided new insights into Scotland's mysterious Picts. The people, known for creating ornately carved symbol stones, left little written material of their own to offer clues on their lives and history. Since Medieval times, some writers have claimed the Picts were migrants with "exotic origins". But the first extensive analysis of Pictish genomes has found the Picts belonged to regions of the British Isles. The researchers said the DNA results also suggested present-day people ... [Read More]