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Whether you are a human being or an orangutan, tools can be a big help in getting what you need to survive. However, a review of current research into the use of tools by non-human primates suggests that ecological opportunity, rather than necessity, is the main driver behind primates such as chimpanzees picking up a stone to crack open nuts.

An opinion piece by Dr Kathelijne Koops of the University of Cambridge and others, published today (12 November 2014) in Biology Letters, challenges the assumption that necessity is the mother of invention. She and her colleagues argue that research into tool use by primates should look at the opportunities for tool use provided by the local environment.

Koops and colleagues reviewed studies on tool use among the three habitual tool-using primates – chimpanzees, orangutans and bearded capuchins.

Chimpanzees use a variety of tools in a range of contexts, including stones to crack open nuts, and sticks to harvest aggressive army ants. Orangutans also use stick tools to prey on insects, as well as to extract seeds from fruits. Bearded capuchin monkeys living in savannah-like environments also use a variety of tools, including stones to crack open nuts and sticks to dig for tubers.

The researchers’ review of the published literature, including their own studies, revealed that, against expectations, tool use did not increase in times when food was scarce. Instead, tool use appears to be determined by ecological opportunity – with calorie-rich but hard-to-reach foodstuffs appearing to act as an incentive for an ingenious use of materials.

“By ecological opportunity, we mean the likelihood of encountering tool materials and resources whose exploitation requires the use of tools. We showed that these ecological opportunities influence the occurrence of tool use. The resources extracted using tools, such as nuts and honey, are among the richest in primate habitats. Hence, extraction pays off, and not just during times of food scarcity,” said Koops.

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This image shows a chimpanzee using a stone to crack a nut. Courtesy Kathelijine Koops

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Tool use—and transmission of tool-making and tool-using skills between individuals—is seen as an important marker in the development of culture. “Given our close genetic links to our primate cousins, their tool use may provide valuable insights into how humans developed their extraordinary material culture and technology,” said Koops.

It has been argued that culture is present among wild primates because simple ecological and genetic differences alone cannot account for the variation of behaviour – such as tool use – observed across populations of the same species.

Koops and co-researchers argue that this ‘method of exclusion’ may present a misleading picture when applied to the material aspects of culture.

“The local environment may exert a powerful influence on culture and may, in fact, be critical for understanding the occurrence and distribution of material culture. In forests with plenty of nut trees, we are more likely to find chimpanzees cracking nuts, which is the textbook example of chimpanzee material culture,” said Koops.

“Our study suggests that published research on primate cultures, which depend on the ‘method of exclusion’, may well underestimate the cultural repertoires of primates in the wild, perhaps by a wide margin. We propose a model in which the environment is explicitly recognised as a possible influence on material culture.”

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The opinion piece ‘Ecological conditions influence primate cultures’ is published by Biology Letters. The authors are Kathelijine Koops (University of Cambridge, Archaeology and Anthropology and University of Zurich, Anthropological Institute and Museum), Elisabetta Visalberghi (CNR, Institute of Cognitive Sciences) and Carel van Schaik (University of Zurich, Anthropological Institute and Museum).

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Source: University of Cambridge Press Release

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Popular Archaeology’s annual Discovery Edition eBook is a selection of the best stories published in Popular Archaeology Magazine in past issues, with an emphasis on some of the most significant, groundbreaking, or fascinating discoveries in the fields of archaeology and paleoanthropology and related fields. At least some of the articles have been updated or revised specifically for the Discovery edition.  We can confidently say that there is no other single issue of an archaeology-related magazine, paper print or online, that contains as much major feature article content as this one. The latest issue, volume 2, has just been released. Go to the Discovery edition page for more information.

A team of archaeologists have unearthed new evidence of massive, monumental defensive works at the Citadel Mound site of ancient Gordion in Turkey. Excavations have also revealed ancient industrial activity dating back to the 11th century BCE.

Located about 70–80 km southwest of Ankara in western Turkey, Gordion, the ancient city best known as the residence of the legendary King Midas, has been the focus of on-and-off excavations since it was discovered in 1893 by Alfred Körte, who initiated exploratory excavations at the site in 1900. Now, Brian Rose of the University of Pennsylvania and colleagues have uncovered massive defensive walls, part of a road, and industrial work spaces dated back to some of the earliest periods of the site. During the early first millennium B.C., Gordion was the power center of the Phrygian kingdom, ruling much of Asia Minor. It was under King Midas and later rulers that the kingdom reached its apogee. 

“Gordion’s historical significance derives from its very long and complex sequence of occupation, with seven successive settlements spanning a period of nearly 4500 years,” says Rose. “What we discovered was a large glacis or stepped terrace wall over 2.5 m in height, dating to the Early Phrygian period, that supported a substantial fortification wall nearly 3 m. wide. This had proven that the western side of the mound was fortified, and that those fortifications had already been established in the Early Phrygian period (9th c. B.C.), neither of which had been known previously.”*

Other massive fortifications, particularly on the eastern side of the Citadel Mound, were uncovered through previous expeditions. But in the last two seasons, beginning in 2013 under Rose’s renewed excavations at the south side of the Citadel Mound, solid new evidence has emerged for additional defensive works. 

Most significantly, the excavations have also now revealed fortifications spanning the entire time period of Phrygian rule in the region.  “We were fortunate this year in uncovering new fortifications dating to three different periods: Early Phrygian (9th c. BC), Middle Phrygian (8th c. BC) and Late Phrygian (6th c. BC)…….it is already clear that the scale of the citadel fortifications throughout the entire Phrygian period was much more ambitious than formerly suspected.”*

Additionally, Rose’s team excavated a sondage trench through what has been designated the Terrace Building, a structure discovered during previous excavations and thought to be a building where industrial activities occurred. They uncovered a large industrial kiln surrounded by ceramic remains that helped to date the feature to the Early Iron Age, or the 11th century BCE. Above and east of the kiln they excavated an Early Iron Age house structure, which contained objects related to textile manufacture, such as spindle whorls and loom weights, and a bell-shaped pit that contained fragments of Early Iron Age handmade wares and animal bones. “The evidence yielded by the sondage demonstrates that there was considerable industrial activity in this area before the Terrace Building was constructed, beginning in the 11th c. B.C.,” wrote Rose in a recent newsletter report.*

The Outer Town

Concurrent with the excavations and conservation efforts at Gordion, a team under the direction of Stefan Giese and Christian Huebner of GGH in Freiburg, Germany, has been conducting a geophysical survey of the ‘Outer Town’  using magnetometry and electric resistivity techniques. The Outer Town is a second residential area with detected remains just west of the Lower Town, another residential area that extends below the Citadel Mound. What they found has been no less revelatory than the Citadel Mound discoveries. They detected signs that the Outer Town was “bordered by a ditch with a defensive wall on its interior”*, which the team believes surrounded the entire Outer Town. The findings include other features that suggest a monumental fort. These preliminary finds are similar to those previously discovered in the Lower Town, which also features a defensive wall and ditch.

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View of the Gordion Citadel Mound and previously excavated fortifications. Note the scaffolding at the Citadel Gateway in the background, a visible reminder of the ongoing architectural conservation and restoration work at the site. Vikicizer, Wikimedia Commons

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Elevated overview of the Citadel Mound area. Stipich Bela, Wikimedia Commons

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Although archaeological excavations have taken place at Gordion over decades through a number of expeditionary endeavors, the best known excavations were conducted under the directorship of Rodney Young of the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology (Penn Museum) beginning in the 1950’s. His excavations over 17 seasons uncovered major sections of the Phrygian period Citadel Mound, including overlying Hellenistic towns, and a mudbrick fortress and defensive walls of a Lower Town near the Citadel. During the first years of his excavations, he encountered earlier Bronze Age settlement remains, but investigations of these levels were limited. Young also uncovered 30 burial tumuli, which included the sensational royal ‘Tumulus MM‘ (Midas Mound) and a nearby tomb of a wealthy Phrygian child (Tumulus P). 

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The Tumulus MM, showing entrance to the associated museum. Tipich Bela, Wikimedia Commons

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Rose will be continuing excavations at the site in 2015 and ensuing years under the auspices of the Penn Museum, efforts that have included extensive architectural conservation and restoration work, notably at the spectacular Early Phrygian Gate, considered the best preserved citadel gate of Iron Age Asia Minor. 

“We have not yet determined the city plan of the settlement,” says Rose, “but by combining excavation with remote sensing (radar, magnetic prospection), we should be able to do it.”

More information about the Gordion Archaeological Project can be found at the website. In addition, an in-depth article about Gordion and the excavations will be published in the Winter 2014/2015 issue of Popular Archaeology Magazine.

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* Rose, C. Brian and Gürsan-Salzman, Ayse, Friends of Gordion Newsletter, September 2014

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Just released!

The special new premium quality print edition of Popular Archaeology Magazine. A beautiful volume for the coffee table.

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Read about the most fascinating discoveries with a premium subscription to Popular Archaeology Magazine.  Find out what Popular Archaeology Magazine is all about.  AND MORE:

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Popular Archaeology’s annual Discovery Edition eBook is a selection of the best stories published in Popular Archaeology Magazine in past issues, with an emphasis on some of the most significant, groundbreaking, or fascinating discoveries in the fields of archaeology and paleoanthropology and related fields. At least some of the articles have been updated or revised specifically for the Discovery edition.  We can confidently say that there is no other single issue of an archaeology-related magazine, paper print or online, that contains as much major feature article content as this one. The latest issue, volume 2, has just been released. Go to the Discovery edition page for more information.

GREENVILLE, N.C. — Just in from the Atlantic Ocean, the 23rd cannon recovered from the
Queen Anne’s Revenge wreck site will be one of the stars of the free Open House at the Queen Anne’s Revenge Conservation Lab in Greenville Nov. 15, 11 a.m.-3 p.m. The 4 foot cannon and other artifacts recovered during the Oct. 6-27 expedition will be displayed. It’s an ideal opportunity for those fascinated by pirates, archaeology and interested in conservation. No registration is required.

The Queen Anne’s Revenge was the flagship of the famous pirate known as Blackbeard, or Edward Teach, whose ship ran aground and sunk off Beaufort Inlent, North Carolina in 1718.
 
The open house will allow visitors of all ages to learn about recovery and conservation of Blackbeard’s cannons, and even take a picture with the cannon most recently recovered. Guests can look through a microscope at the smallest objects recovered over the years and see mysteries revealed in x-rays.
 
Archaeologists with the Underwater Archaeology Branch (UAB) in the N.C. Department of Cultural Resources executed the most recent excavation operation in the fall, 2014, at the wreck site of Blackbeard’s flagship, Queen Anne’s Revenge (QAR), near Beaufort. In addition to the cannon, nine cannonballs, bar shot halves, an iron bolt and a grenade were recovered.

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The cannon raised during the October, 2014 expedition. Credit N.C. Department of Cultural Resources

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A cannon as it was being raised from the site of QAR during a previous expedition. Credit North Carolina Department of Cultural Resources

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Among researchers on the excavation was Conservator Kimberly Kenyon, who recorded and tagged each artifact as it was reclaimed from the sea. The cannon was an expected recovery, the grenade was not.
 
“We knew cannonballs were attached to the cannon, but the grenade was something of a surprise,” Kenyon observes. “It’s hollow in the center and would have been filled with gunpowder. Now we have recovered seven grenades and 23 cannons. We brought them all to the conservation lab for treatment.”
 
Kenyon and UAB Archaeologist/Conservator Nathan Henry did much of the work to prepare the cannon for lifting. The initial plan had been to recover two cannons, but weather conditions and the difficulty of separating the two cannons prevented that. The team was working on one complex mass at the site composed of four cannons and an anchor held together by a coating of sand, marine life and shells called concretion.
 
Another surprise awaited the team. When the recovered cannon was lifted, yet another small cannon was discovered under the one left behind. Historical records indicate that Blackbeard equipped the QAR with 40 guns, so additional cannons not yet mapped may be discovered. Donations to help the project and research can be made to the Friends of Queen Anne’s Revenge.
 
Archaeologists and historians with the N.C. Department of Cultural Resources have led recovery efforts at the shipwreck site since 1997. Cannons, platters, medical and scientific instruments used by 18th century pirates have rested on the floor of the Atlantic since 1718. Tens of thousands of artifacts have been recovered.

Intersal, Inc., a private research firm, discovered the site believed to be Queen Anne’s Revenge Nov. 21, 1996. QAR was located near Beaufort Inlet, N.C., by Intersal’s director of operations, Mike Daniel, who used historical research provided by Intersal’s president, Phil Masters. Daniel now heads up Maritime Research Institute, the nonprofit corporation formed to work on the project in cooperation with state archaeologists and historians of the N.C. Department of Cultural Resources, Division of Archives and History.
 
For additional information, please call (252) 744-6721. The Queen Anne’s Revenge Shipwreck Project is within the Office of State Archaeology in the N.C. Department of Cultural Resources. In-depth information about the excavations can be obtained in this article and at the project website.

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Source: Adapted and edited from a press release of the North Carolina Department of Cultural Resources.

About the North Carolina Department of Cultural Resources

The N.C. Department of Cultural Resources (NCDCR) is the state agency with a vision to be the leader in using the state’s cultural resources to build the social, cultural and economic future of North Carolina. Led by Secretary Susan W. Kluttz, NCDCR’s mission is to enrich lives and communities by creating opportunities to experience excellence in the arts, history and libraries in North Carolina that will spark creativity, stimulate learning, preserve the state’s history and promote the creative economy. NCDCR was the first state organization in the nation to include all agencies for arts and culture under one umbrella.

Through arts efforts led by the N.C. Arts Council, the N.C. Symphony and the N.C. Museum of Art, NCDCR offers the opportunity for enriching arts education for young and old alike and spurring the economic stimulus engine for our state’s communities. NCDCR’s Divisions of State Archives, Historical Resources, State Historic Sites and State History Museums preserve, document and interpret North Carolina’s rich cultural heritage to offer experiences of learning and reflection. NCDCR’s State Library of North Carolina is the principal library of state government and builds the capacity of all libraries in our state to develop and to offer access to educational resources through traditional and online collections including genealogy and resources for people who are blind and have physical disabilities.  
 
NCDCR annually serves more than 19 million people through its 27 historic sites, seven history museums, two art museums, the nation’s first state-supported Symphony Orchestra, the State Library, the N.C. Arts Council and the State Archives. NCDCR champions our state’s creative industry that accounts for more than 300,000 jobs and generates nearly $18.5 billion in revenues. For more information, please call (919) 807-7300 or visit www.ncdcr.gov.
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Read about the most fascinating discoveries with a premium subscription to Popular Archaeology Magazine.  Find out what Popular Archaeology Magazine is all about.  AND MORE:

On the go?  Get the smartphone version of Popular Archaeology as an app or as an ebook.

Popular Archaeology’s annual Discovery Edition eBook is a selection of the best stories published in Popular Archaeology Magazine in past issues, with an emphasis on some of the most significant, groundbreaking, or fascinating discoveries in the fields of archaeology and paleoanthropology and related fields. At least some of the articles have been updated or revised specifically for the Discovery edition.  We can confidently say that there is no other single issue of an archaeology-related magazine, paper print or online, that contains as much major feature article content as this one. The latest issue, volume 2, has just been released. Go to the Discovery edition page for more information.

The exhibition also presents a variety of precious objects from the collection of the Cabinet des médailles at the Bibliothèque nationale de France, one of the premier repositories of ancient luxury arts. The objects on display include the four newly restored Late Antique missoria, cameos, intaglios, gold coins and jewelry, marbles, and bronzes. These surviving artifacts from the Cabinet’s collection not only demonstrate the skills of Roman craftsmen but also provide valuable information about social relations at the height of the empire in the first to sixth centuries A.D.

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Read about the most fascinating discoveries with a premium subscription to Popular Archaeology Magazine.  Find out what Popular Archaeology Magazine is all about.  AND MORE:

On the go?  Get the smartphone version of Popular Archaeology as an app or as an ebook.

Popular Archaeology’s annual Discovery Edition eBook is a selection of the best stories published in Popular Archaeology Magazine in past issues, with an emphasis on some of the most significant, groundbreaking, or fascinating discoveries in the fields of archaeology and paleoanthropology and related fields. At least some of the articles have been updated or revised specifically for the Discovery edition.  We can confidently say that there is no other single issue of an archaeology-related magazine, paper print or online, that contains as much major feature article content as this one. The latest issue, volume 2, has just been released. Go to the Discovery edition page for more information.

Perched atop Sussita Mountain near the eastern bank of the Sea of Galilee, the city’s ruins afford a commanding view of this ancient lake. One of the ten cities of the Decapolis, it was a Roman/Hellenistic enclave in ancient Palestine during the height of the Roman Empire. Known then as Antiochia Hippos, its ruins are now being explored and excavated by teams of archaeologists, students and volunteers. To date, they have unearthed a wealth of artifacts and an array of Hellenistic, Roman, Byzantine, and Ummayad structures spanning a period of a thousand years—from the 2nd century BCE to the 8th century CE. Among the excavated remains are toppled columns and damaged structures, evidence of a violent earthquake that destroyed the city in 749 CE. It was the end of Antiochia Hippos. Its citizens abandoned it, never to return.

But excavators have recently uncovered evidence of another, earlier earthquake at Hippos. This one, occurring in 363 CE, left the city seriously damaged, but recoverable. During the last season of excavations the team uncovered a number of crushed human skeletal remains beneath a collapsed roof of the city Basilica, considered the largest structure of the city and the main public building and market center. Among the skeletal remains were those of a woman with a golden, dove-shaped pendant. The skeletons were dated to the earlier, 363 earthquake because of coins found between the Basilica floor and other architectural elements. At another location, they discovered evidence of the same earthquake destruction within a Roman bath complex. “Under the debris of the 363 earthquake we found part of a Roman statue. Superb Roman craftsmanship in marble, but just the right leg of a muscular man leaning on a trunk was found,” Eisenberg told Discovery News. Examination of the statue remains suggested a height of over 6 feet, but there were no indications related to the identity of the subject.

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The gold pendant found with the skeletal remains of a woman under the earthquake-caused debris of the Basilica of Antiochia Hippos. Credit Michael Eisenberg and the Hippos-Sussita Excavation Project

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Near these beautiful excavators, the right leg of the Roman statue found in the earthquake destruction of the Roman bathhouse. Credit Michael Eisenberg and the Hippos-Sussita Excavation Project

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The excavated remains of the Roman Basilica. Credit Michael Eisenberg and the Hippos-Sussita Excavation Project

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The excavations have shown that Hippos underwent a period of rebuiding after the first, 363 CE earthquake, but there was a gap of about 20 years before reconstruction occurred in at least some sections of the city. This was indicated by dozens of coins found in Byzantine construction about three feet above the Roman Basilica remains dated to about 383 CE., with no intervening reconstruction. The bathhouse was never rebuilt at its original location but another bathhouse was built later about 500 ft north-east.

The excavated evidence from previous seasons combined with the most recent finds are now beginning to paint a picture of a Roman/Hellenistic city before, during, and after two major earthquakes. “Finally the findings are coming together to form a clear historical-archeological picture,” Eisenberg told the Jerusalem Post.

Established initially by the Seleucids as a Greco-Roman enclave, Antiochia Hippos once controlled two port facilities on the lake and its surrounding countryside. Hippos was part of the “Decapolis“, a group of ten cities in Roman Palestine that were maintained as Greco-Roman cultural islands in the Near East. The damage the latest, 749 CE earthquake caused Hippos was so severe that it was left to the ages with no succeeding settlement and, coupled with its relative isolation and enduring basaltic construction, it was preserved much like it was left in the 8th century for today’s archaeologists to explore.  Since the year 2000, a team of archaeologists, specialists, students and volunteers from the Zinman Institute of Archaeology, University of Haifa and other institutions have been excavating the site.

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Above and below, aerial views of the ancient site of Hippos-Sussita. Credit Michael Eisenberg and the Hippos-Sussita Excavation Project

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Eisenberg hopes the team will find additional parts of the statue in the upcoming 2015 season once they clear more debris left by the earthquake. He and his team will also continue excavations at the Basilica, the Bastion (fortification), the Roman-Byzantine southern bathhouse, and the west decumanus maximus (the main east-west road of the city), in addition to preservation work on structures that have previously been exposed through the excavations.

More information about the Hippos-Sussita Excavation Project can be acquired at their website. They are currently calling for new particpants for the summer 2015 season, which begins July 19, 2015.

A detailed feature article about Hippos-Sussita and the excavations can also be found in Popular Archaeology Magazine.

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Read about the most fascinating discoveries with a premium subscription to Popular Archaeology Magazine.  Find out what Popular Archaeology Magazine is all about.  AND MORE:

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Popular Archaeology’s annual Discovery Edition eBook is a selection of the best stories published in Popular Archaeology Magazine in past issues, with an emphasis on some of the most significant, groundbreaking, or fascinating discoveries in the fields of archaeology and paleoanthropology and related fields. At least some of the articles have been updated or revised specifically for the Discovery edition.  We can confidently say that there is no other single issue of an archaeology-related magazine, paper print or online, that contains as much major feature article content as this one. The latest issue, volume 2, has just been released. Go to the Discovery edition page for more information.

Snubbing its nose at long-held ethical standards established by the U.S. archaeological community, the St Louis Chapter of the Archaeological Society of America has placed entrusted Mesoamerican and Egyptian artifacts for sale on the antiquities market.

Recently consigned for sale at the Bonhams Auction House in London, the artifacts included the “Treasure of Harageh”( a tomb group from the ancient site of Harageh), an Egyptian alabaster-travertine headrest, a limestone double-sided relief fragment for Nefertiti (the ca. 1370 BC – ca. 1330 BC Royal Wife (chief consort) of Akhenaten, an Egyptian Pharaoh), a Maya effigy vase from the ancient site of Quirigua, Guatemala, and a Zapotec seated figural urn from the ancient site of Monte Albán, Mexico.

While the Treasure of Harageh has already been purchased ‘under the table’ by the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, essentially ‘coming to the rescue’ within the rules of archaeological ethics and resulting in the items being withdrawn from sale, all other items remain on the auction block.

It is reported that the Governing Board of the St. Louis Chapter, a chartered society of the AIA but independently operated as a separately incorporated non-profit organization, made the decision to place the artifacts up for sale without the support or consent of the membership. “The Governing Board of the AIA [Archaeological Institute of America] at its meeting on October 25, 2014, in Providence, R.I., unanimously expressed its dismay at the recent sale of Egyptian artifacts by the AIA St. Louis Society in contravention of the ethical standards current in archaeology,” announced the AIA. “The decision of its Board of Directors to sell the objects was taken without consulting the AIA or the Society’s members, many of whom have expressed consternation at what has happened……..The AIA made every effort to determine a solution that would enable the objects to remain in St. Louis. Unfortunately, the St Louis Society rejected such an outcome. The AIA reserves all rights to take any action or actions available to it to address this situation.”

The local St. Louis Board has made no public comments on the issue as of this writing.

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One of the many locations of Bonhams. This one in the UK. David Stowell, Wikimedia Commons

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The sale of artifacts on the antiquities market, especially those with provenance (a record relating to their recovery in archaeological excavations or other contexts) has long been considered a crime from the perspective of the international archaeological community, and in many countries legislation and measures have been put in place to address antiquities trafficking. In a reinforcement of this, The Egypt Exploration Society, which has publicly condemned the sale action by the St. Louis Society, announced that “public museums offer the best hope that ancient objects are safeguarded against loss or deterioration to their condition, and that they will remain accessible to scholars and the wider public for study and enjoyment. Objects which are sold on the open market may be transferred to collections which are not required to provide such safeguards, and which have no obligations to make the material they contain accessible.”

“These Mesoamerican items are on the market, with their sterling provenance,” says Donna Yates, speaking specifically of the Pre-columbian artifacts. She is an archaeologist who specializes in antiquities trafficking at the Scottish Centre for Crime and Justice Research in Glasgow, Scotland. “They will likely go into a private collection and they will inspire future sales of dirty [illicitly acquired and/or sold] Mesoamerican antiquities. And, let me repeat, almost all of the Mesoamerican antiquities on the market are dirty in some way.”

Donna speaks of a serious problem when it comes to the trade and sale of pre-Columbian objects. But the problem also applies to the care and management of all objects representing a collective world heritage, be it Egyptian, Mesoamerican, Mesopotamian, Chinese, or any other region in the world with an ancient pedigree.

“The AIA believes that it is the responsibility of all to protect and preserve the record of the past for the benefit of people today and in the future,” announced the AIA in an affirmation of its principles. “Disposing of artifacts through a public sale puts those artifacts at risk of being removed from public access.”

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Travel and learn with Far Horizons.

Read about the most fascinating discoveries with a premium subscription to Popular Archaeology Magazine.  Find out what Popular Archaeology Magazine is all about.  AND MORE:

On the go?  Get the smartphone version of Popular Archaeology as an app or as an ebook.

Popular Archaeology’s annual Discovery Edition eBook is a selection of the best stories published in Popular Archaeology Magazine in past issues, with an emphasis on some of the most significant, groundbreaking, or fascinating discoveries in the fields of archaeology and paleoanthropology and related fields. At least some of the articles have been updated or revised specifically for the Discovery edition.  We can confidently say that there is no other single issue of an archaeology-related magazine, paper print or online, that contains as much major feature article content as this one. The latest issue, volume 2, has just been released. Go to the Discovery edition page for more information.

During a meeting of the Acoustical Society of America in Indianapolis October 27 – 31, 2014, Steven J. Waller of Rock Art Acoustics describes how prehistoric people may have interpreted sound phenomena as supernatural occurrences, and then reflected them in their culture as depicted on cave walls and in stone architecture.*

“Ancient mythology explained echoes from the mouths of caves as replies from spirits, so our ancestors may have made cave paintings in response to these echoes and their belief that echo spirits inhabited rocky places such as caves or canyons,” explains Waller.

Just as light reflection gives an illusion of seeing yourself duplicated in a mirror, sound waves reflecting off a surface are mathematically identical to sound waves emanating from a virtual sound source behind a reflecting plane such as a large cliff face. “This can result in an auditory illusion of somebody answering you from within the rock,” Waller says.

Echoes of clapping can sound similar to hoof beats, as Waller points out, while multiple echoes within a cavern can blur together into a thunderous reverberation that mimics the sound of a herd of stampeding hoofed animals.

“Many ancient cultures attributed thunder in the sky to ‘hoofed thunder gods,’ so it makes sense that the reverberation within the caves was interpreted as thunder and inspired paintings of those same hoofed thunder gods on cave walls,” says Waller. “This theory is supported by acoustic measurements, which show statistically significant correspondence between the rock art sites and locations with the strongest sound reflection.”

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Prehistoric paintings of hoofed animals in a cave with thunderous reverberations, located in Bhimbetka, India. Courtesy S. Waller

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Other acoustical characteristics may have also been misinterpreted by ancient cultures unaware of sound wave theory. Waller noticed a resemblance between an interference pattern and Stonehenge, so he set up an interference pattern in an open field with just two flutes “droning the same note” to explore what it would sound like.

“The quiet regions of destructive sound wave cancellation, in which the high pressure from one flute cancelled the low pressure from the other flute, gave blindfolded subjects the illusion of a giant ring of rocks or ‘pillars’ casting acoustic shadows,” Waller says.

He traveled to England and demonstrated that Stonehenge does indeed radiate acoustic shadows that recreate the same pattern as interference. “My theory that musical interference patterns served as blueprints for megalithic stone circles—many of which are called Pipers’ Stones—is supported by ancient legends of two magic pipers who enticed maidens to dance in a circle and turned them all into stones,” he notes.

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Stonehenge  Julie Anne Workman, Wikimedia Commons

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There are several important implications of Waller’s research. Perhaps most significantly, it demonstrates that acoustical phenomena were culturally significant to early humans—leading to the immediate conclusion that the natural soundscapes of archaeological sites should be preserved in their natural state for further study and greater appreciation.

Waller’s observations and conclusions are among a number of other research findings by other scientists exploring this phenomena. Beginning in 2008, a recent and ongoing study of the massive 6,000-year-old stone structure complex known as the Hal Saflieni Hypogeum on the island of Malta, for example, has produced some revelatory results. Like its related prehistoric temple structures on Malta, this structure features central corridors and curved chambers. But this structure is unique in that it is subterranean, created through the removal of an estimated 2,000 tons of stone carved out with stone hammers and antler picks. Low voices within its walls create eerie, reverberating echoes, and a sound made or words spoken in certain places can be clearly heard throughout all of its three levels. Some scientists have suggested, based on research experimentation, that certain sound vibration frequencies created when sound is emitted within its walls may have actually altered human brain functions of those within earshot.

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Interior view of the Hal Saflieni Hypogeum. Помещенеи гипогея, Wikimedia Commons

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But the Hypogeum is not alone in its peculiar sound effects. A study conducted in 1994 by a consortium from Princeton University found that acoustic behavior in ancient chambers at megalithic sites such as Newgrange in Ireland and Wayland’s Smithy in England was characterized by a strong sustained resonance, or “standing wave” in a frequency range between 90 Hz and 120 Hz.  “When this happens,” says Linda Eneix, President of the Old Temples Study Foundation, “what we hear becomes distorted, eerie. The exact pitch for this behavior varies with the dimensions of the room and the quality of the stone.”  Going further back in time, she points to the ancient 10,000 B.C. site of Göbekli Tepe in southern Turkey. Built by hunter-gatherers, the site is thought by many scientists to be located in the area transitional to the first development of agriculture and domesticated livestock. Located on a hilltop, it consists of 20 round stone-built structures which had been buried. Excavation has revealed massive, T-shaped standing limestone pillars. “In the center of a circular shrine,” she says, “a limestone pillar “sings” when smacked with the flat of the hand. Obviously made to represent a human with a decorated belt and hands carved in relief at its waist, it bears unexplained symbols in the area of the throat.”

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Panoramic view of Göbekli Tepe  Rolf Cosar, Wikimedia Commons

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Moreover, findings of another archaeoacoustic study suggests that the ancients of the 3,000-year-old Andean ceremonial center at Chavín de Huántar, in the central highlands of Peru, practiced a fine art and science of manipulating sound with architecture to produce desired sensory effects. With the assistance of architectural form and placement, and sounds emitted from conch-shell trumpets, the “oracle” of Chavín de Huántar “spoke” to the ancient center’s listeners.

Says Dr. Miriam Kolar, leader of the study and an expert on the human perception of sound in cultural contexts: 

”At Chavín, we have discovered acoustic evidence for selective sound transmission between the site’s Lanzon monolith and the Circular Plaza: an architectural acoustic filter system that favors sound frequencies of the Chavín pututus [conch-shell trumpets] and human voice.”

The Lanzon is a sacred statue or stela depicting the central deity of the ancient Chavín culture. Thought to be Chavin’s central “oracle” for its inhabitants, it is housed in a chamber, part of a series of underground passages within the Old Temple of the ceremonial and religious center of Chavín de Huántar. A central duct was built to connect the area of the Lanzon monolith with that of the Circular Plaza, an open-air place of ceremonial activity and significance. The duct was specifically designed to filter and magnify or conduct to a certain sound range—namely, the special range emitted by the Chavín pututu instrument. The specific reasons for this acoustical configuration are not entirely understood, but studies involving human participants within the context of the site indicated that the resultant sound effects may have been related to intentional auditory perceptual effects of sound and space on humans.

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View of Chavín de Huántar  Sharon odb, Wikimedia Commons

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The Lanzon within its interior chamber at Chavín de Huántar Reto Luescher, Wikimedia Commons

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The circular plaza at Chavín de Huántar  Martin St.-Amant, Wikimedia Commons

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So what does all of this mean? What explains these similar, yet chronologically, geographically and culturally disparate finds? 

“How curious that such varied ancient structures, separated by so much time and distance, should have common features which imply sophisticated knowledge”, observes Eneix. “Did the architects of the day each make and develop their own discoveries or did they inherit a concept from some older school of learning?”

Scientists may never have the answer to that question, but the accumulating evidence suggests that there is a real story to tell about humans and their fascination with sound. 

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Presentation: “Virtual sound images and virtual sound absorbers misinterpreted as supernatural objects,” by Stephen J. Waller,  Tuesday, October 28, 2014 at the Indianapolis Mariott Downtown Hotel Marriott.

Cover Photo, Top Left: Prehistoric paintings of hoofed animals in a cave with thunderous reverberations, located in Bhimbetka, India. Courtesy S. Waller

Source: Adpated and edited from a press release of the Acoustical Society of America, with additional material added.

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Hundreds of years before Dutch commander Jakob Roggeveen and his ships arrived at Easter Island in the Pacific in 1722, the native Rapa Nui islanders had already made contact with South Americans.

So suggests an international team of researchers led by Anna-Sapfo Malaspinas and Eske Willerslev of the Natural History Museum of Denmark’s Centre for GeoGenetics, who analyzed genome-wide data for 27 Rapa Nui individuals. While they detected mostly Polynesian ancestry, they also found “genome-wide patterns consistent with Native American and European admixture”, and that the “Native American admixture occurred before the European admixture.” By comparing their data with other data set proportions, they determined that the Native American proportion was significantly greater than that detected in other Polynesians and Europeans. Moreover, “by considering the distribution of local ancestry tracts of eight unrelated Rapa Nui, we found statistical support for Native American admixture dating to AD 1280 – 1495 and European admixture dating to AD 1850 – 1895.”* The research study is published in the Cell Press journal, Current Biology.

The results are consistent with other archaeological evidence that suggests contact, such as the finding that crops that were native to the Americas existed in Polynesia, including the Andean sweet potato, long before European contact. The results of another study (also published in Current Biology) by Malaspinas and Eske Willerslev and their colleagues, wherein they examined two human skulls of the indigenous “Botocudos” of Brazil, found that their genomic ancestry is Polynesian, with no detectable Native American component.

“These genetic results,” report the researchers in their published study, “can be explained by one or more pre-European trans-Pacific contacts.”*

Easter Island,a Polynesian island in the southeastern Pacific Ocean, is well-known for its monumental statues called moai, created by the early Rapa Nui people. Archaeological evidence shows that Polynesian people settled on Easter Island in the first millennium AD and developed a sustained civilization there. But the Rapa Nui significantly declined due to the introduction of the Polynesian rat, and overpopulation led to gradual deforestation and extinction of natural resources, leading to the demise of its civilization. 

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Above and below: The Rapanui are best known for building giant stone platforms and statues. Courtesy Natalia Solar

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Archaeological studies and evidence has shown that the Polynesians had the technological and knowledge capacity to execute long-range voyages across the Pacific, consistent with the time range results of the genetic study. This new evidence related to the Rapa Nui suggests one of two scenarios, according to the study authors: either Native Americans sailed to Rapa Nui or Polynesians sailed to the Americas and back. The researchers suggest that it was more likely that the Rapanui successfully made the trip back and forth, given simulations presented in previous studies showing that “all sailing voyages heading intentionally east from Rapa Nui would always reach the Americas, with a trip lasting from two weeks to approximately two months.” On the other hand, the trip from the Americas to Rapa Nui is much more challenging, given that Rapanui is a small target, making it likely to fail or miss the island completely.

For Malaspinas, the findings are a reminder that “early human populations extensively explored the planet. Textbook versions of human colonization events—the peopling of the Americas, for example—need to be re-evaluated utilizing genomic data.”

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* http://www.cell.com/current-biology/abstract/S0960-9822(14)01220-2

Also adapted and edited from a Cell Press news release.

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At two sites high in the southern Peruvian Andes, scientists have discovered remains that suggest human settlement about 12,000 years ago. At more than 4,000 meters above sea level (masl), they are now the highest sites for continuous human occupation ever recorded, predating the earliest known settlements by almost 900 years.

Led by Kurt Rademaker, a University of Maine visiting assistant professor in anthropology, the team investigated one site at 4,355 masl that yielded 260 stone tools such as projectile points, nondiagnostic bifaces and unifacial scrapers, which they dated to as much as 12,800 years old. The other site, the Cuncaicha rockshelter at 4,480 masl, contained lithic tools made from locally available obsidian, andesite and jasper, as well as plant remains, bones of vicuña and guanaco camelids and the taruca deer. The site also featured sooted ceilings and rock art, indicating that it was likely a base camp. It had a “robust, well-preserved and well-dated occupation sequence” up to 12,400 years old.

“We don’t know if people were living there year round, but we strongly suspect they were not just going there to hunt for a few days, then leaving,” says archaeologist Sonia Zarrillo of the University of Calgary, a key member of the research team. “There were possibly even families living at these sites, because we’ve found evidence of a whole range of activities.” This is a significant finding that lends important clues, because previous archaeological and anthropological studies have indicated that “hunters passing through an area will take the meat back to campsites and leave the carcass in the field,” adds Zarrillo. “In Cuncaicha we found remains representing whole animals, indicating they were living close to where the animals were killed. And the types of stone tools we’ve found are not only hunting tools but also scraping tools used for processing hides to make things like clothing, bags or blankets.”

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Nevado Coropuna, the highland area of the sites. Courtesy Kurt Rademaker

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Cuncaicha Rock Shelter. Courtesy Kurt Rademaker

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Excavations at Cuncaicha Rock Shelter. Courtesy Kurt Rademaker

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But the biggest takeaway from the sites has to do with their remote, high altitude locations, the physiology of humans, and the date ranges of the remains recovered. A widely held theory suggests that humans must adapt genetically to high altitudes before they can sustain their presence there as permanent living environments. Given the commonly accepted theory that people first entered the Americas around 14-15,000 years ago, the age of the site archaeological remains suggests a relatively rapid genetic adaptation. The Andeans of today have genetically adapted to their high altitude environment, Zarrillo notes. The key differences between the Andeans and most other Native Americans in this regard include a higher metabolic rate, larger lung capacity and higher hemoglobin concentrations than the former. These adaptations have allowed them to overcome a lack of oxygen.

“Was this adaptation present 12,400 years ago? We don’t know for certain,” says Zarrillo. “What we’re demonstrating is that these people either already developed that adaptation, or, it was possible for them to live in these altitudes for extended periods of time regardless.”

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University of Calgary archaeologist Sonia Zarrillo uses ground penetrating radar at a Peruvian rock shelter. She is accompanied by Peter Leach, one of her co-authors for the paper published in the October 24th edition of the academic journal Science. Courtesy Walter Beckwith

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Finding the anwers to these questions will be among the objectives of future research.

Write the researchers in the report, “the Pucuncho Basin sites suggest that Pleistocene humans lived successfully at extreme high altitude, initiating organismal selection, developmental functional adaptations and lasting biogeographic expansion in the Andes. As new studies identify potential genetic signatures of high-altitude adaptation in modern Andean populations, comparative genomic, physiologic and archaeological research will be needed to understand when and how these adaptations evolved.”*

The detailed study report is published in the journal Science.

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Kurt Rademaker (University of Maine, University of Tubingen), who led the expedition high in the Peruvian Andes. Courtesy Walter Beckwith

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*”Paleoindian settlement of the high-altitude Peruvian Andes,” by K. Rademaker; G.R.M. Bromley; D.H. Sandweiss at University of Maine in Orono, ME; G. Hodgins at University of Arizona in Tucson, AZ; K. Moore at University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, PA; S. Zarrillo at University of Calgary in Calgary, BC, Canada; C. Miller at University of Tübingen in Tübingen, Germany; P. Leach at University of Connecticut in Storrs, CT; D.A. Reid at University of Illinois-Chicago in Chicago, IL; W.Y. Álvarez. Published in the journal Science. http://www.sciencemag.org/lookup/doi/10.1126/science.1258260

Source: Adapted and edited from press releases of the University of Maine and the University of Calgary.

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Looking down from space in earth orbit, the Nefud Desert appears as an arid oval depression across the northern reaches of the Arabian Peninsula. On the ground, it is known for its sudden violent winds, large crescent-shaped dunes, and brick-red colored sand. It is 290 km (180 miles) long and 225 km (140 miles) wide, with an area of 103,600 km² (40,000 square miles). It sees rain only once or twice a year.

But in antiquity, there were lakes scattered across this otherwise unforgiving land.

Dr. Eleanor M.L. Scerri of the University of Bordeaux and her colleagues call them ‘paleolakes’. Today these ancient lakes are only arid areas with sediments and other stratigraphic features that tell us that there was once water in these places. But investigating scientists have also found that they contain fossil flora, fauna and archaeological features and artifacts— evidence that, at one time, tens of thousands of years ago, there were also plants, animals, and humans along their shores.

In a research report published online in the journal Quaternary International, Scerri and colleagues detail their discovery of 13 sites dated to Lower (2.5 m to 300,000 years ago) and Middle (300,000 to 30,000 years ago) Palaeolithic times that are associated with palaeolake basins. “One of the sites, T’is al Ghadah, may feature the earliest Middle Palaeolithic assemblage of Arabia,” writes Scerri, et al.*. The sites were discovered during a regional survey conducted under the auspices of the Palaeodeserts Project.

“Preliminary analyses show that the Lower and Middle Palaeolithic sites discovered display diverse technological characteristics, indicating that the Nefud was important for population turnovers and exchanges throughout the Pleistocene. Periodic environmental amelioration [improvement, or wet periods] appears to have attracted hominin [early human] incursions into the region, and subsequent ephemeral (short-term) occupations structured around lakes and, to a lesser extent, raw material sources.”*

In other words, according to Scerri and her research colleagues, ancient humans came and went in this region, following the rivers and settling around the lakes during wet periods, bringing with them stone tool cultures that differed among groups depending upon the time period of their arrival and their culture and, perhaps, where they originally came from. Who were these ancient humans? What human species did they represent? This is still a question open to debate among scholars…………thus far, no human fossils have been found at any of the sites.

Despite the diversity in their technologies, the researchers suggest that there was at least one common characteristic among these various ancient groups. “A rarity of formal tools, but strong similarities in lithic production techniques, are also suggestive of demographic affinities across the Nefud during the Pleistocene, and perhaps beyond”.* So how they produced their tools could give clues to their cross-cultural relationship, and perhaps their common origins.

The recent survey is one of a number of efforts by researchers under the Palaeodeserts Project designed to collect data that could eventually either support or refute their research model of human dispersal and habitation from northeastern Africa through Arabia and beyond. For Scerri, including Palaeodeserts Project head Michael Petraglia, early modern humans may have arrived at various times from northeastern Africa, traversing what is called the ‘Saharo-Arabian belt’ via land routes perhaps as early as more than 100,000 years ago and eventually crossing or settling in India. It is a theory, based on years of past research, that may help to explain how Southwest Asia saw the presence of early modern humans in prehistory. Considered controversial by some scholars, it contrasts with one widely-held theory that holds that early modern humans dispersed rapidly out of Africa into South Asia primarily along the coasts about 55,000 years ago. Championed by scholars such as Sir Paul Mellars, the evidence for this movement shows up in small blade technologies, very similar to stone tools made in what is called the ‘Howiesons Poort‘ industries of southern Africa, and symbolic items such as beads, incised and decorated items and bone tools. But Scerri, Petraglia, and others suggest a different scenario. “Human movements across Southern Asia would have been slow, continental advances during humid periods, and contractions (and even extinctions) during arid periods. This is opposed to the view that modern humans moved rapidly out of Africa and across Asia circa 60,000 years ago using coastal corridors. Mapping of environments from Arabia to Southeast Asia indicate dramatic variability in habitats. We argue that differences in environments would have shaped demographic responses through time.” Moreover, write the Paleodeserts Project authors, “major revisions in genetic coalescence ages, based on nuclear genome studies, suggest that Out of Africa movements may date to 120,000 years ago, which would correspond with fossils of Homo sapiens in the Levant and Middle Palaeolithic technologies in southern Asia.”** 

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View of area being surveyed for archaeological sites in the western part of the Nefud desert. (credit: Eleanor Scerri/Palaeodeserts Project)

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Sediments at the Jubbah site, a site excavated in the Nefud Desert, show environmental change through time. Young orange sand is on the surface; white sediments represent a phase of lake formation around 125,000 years ago; the fine sands below this date to more than 200,000 thousand years ago and contain some of the oldest identified Middle Palaeolithic artifacts in Arabia. (credit: Huw Groucutt/Palaeodeserts Project)

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Above: Topographic map showing locations of lithic artifacts around the Jubbah Paleolake. Jubbah is one among a number of sites in the Nefud that provide evidence of a Middle Palaeolithic human presence.

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Answering the questions revolving around whether or not early modern humans crossed over into Asia from Africa via coastal or inland routs, or both—and when—will be left to further research. But evidence thus far suggests an ancient human presence in the Nefud that may bear significantly on the study of prehistoric human dispersal. Conclude the report authors:

“These preliminary results support the view that the Arabian Peninsula was a critically important region of southwest Asia during the Late Pleistocene, in which demographic responses to climatic amelioration may have structured connectivity across the Saharo-Arabian belt, the Levant and as far as India.”*

But as Scerri, Petraglia, and other scholars would likely say, time and more research will tell the story.

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For a more extensive review of the discoveries now being made in Saudi Arabia, see the featured premium article published in the June 2014 issue of Popular Archaeology Magazine.

*Abstract from: Eleanor M.L. Scerri, Paul S. Breeze, Ash Parton, Huw S. Groucutt,Tom S. White, Christopher Stimpson, Laine Clark-Balzan, Richard Jennings, Abdullah Alsharekh, Michael D. Petraglia, Middle to Late Pleistocene human habitation in the western Nefud Desert, Saudi Arabia, DOI: 10.1016/j.quaint.2014.09.036  2014 Quaternary International

**http://trackingourancestors.com/

Cover Photo, Top Left: View of area being surveyed for archaeological sites in the western part of the Nefud desert. (credit: Eleanor Scerri/Palaeodeserts Project)

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It is an archaeological site, but one needs some imagination to picture an ancient Roman fort abutting a major waterway at this place.

“When you first enter the site you are on a very small hill, about three meters at the most above the surrounding farmland to the north and east,” writes blogger Lucy MacDonald, who spent part of her summer as a volunteer excavator at the site. It is known as the location of ancient Halmyris, a Roman frontier stronghold in present-day Romania. “Those farm fields used to be the Danube river; however, the river has receded about 300 meters from where it used to be. We know this because there are two man-made harbours at Halmyris, therefore the Danube would have come right up to the fort. The fort had approximately twelve towers, and with good reason. The location of Halmyris is important because it intersects two important commercial shipping waters, the Danube and the Black Sea. However, this also made it a target for Roman enemies—which was EVERYONE.”*

In a real sense, the site of Halmyris tells a story of an empire under siege from enemies without—and as anyone with a knowledge of classical history knows, Rome had many enemies. Strategically located Halmyris, at its fortified height, was a target for Germanic tribes, Goths, and Huns, to name a few of the most prominent. Halmyris, however, was also more anciently a point of trade and contact between the more indigenous inhabitants of the region and colonizing, merchant Greeks. Much later, it was also a Byzantine fortification and settlement. But Halmyris is perhaps best known by visitors and pilgrims alike as a place of martyrdom. In 290 CE, two Christian missionaries, Astion and Epictet, were imprisoned, tortured, and executed by the Romans here. They were later reburied under orders of the emperor Constantine I (c 324/325) in a crypt under the altar of a newly built basilica within the fort. The Church later canonized them, and today pilgrims of the Romanian Orthodox Church visit a nearby monastery built in honor of the saints.  “Dirt delivered by the river eventually spread over the site, until only the jagged tops of the towers and walls were visible to those wandering the hills south of the Danube,” reports the Halmyris excavation project at its project website. “Hundreds of years later, locals would tell stories about the treasure hidden inside the mysterious walls, and of the spirits that guarded the site. These stories were perhaps vindicated, when Professor M. Zahariade [currently with the Vasile Parvan Institute of Archaeology, Bucharest] later discovered the remains of the Christian martyrs in a hidden crypt within Halmyris.”**

Today, Zahariade is meticulously recovering and researching the remains of Halmyris with the help of a team of scholars, archaeologists, students and volunteers. To date, they have uncovered a significant amount of new edifices and artifacts, including features of the ancient harbor located below the walls of the fort, a structure adjacent to the walls, a 6^th century defensive tower, other well-preserved architectural features and numerous small finds including coins, weaponry, and ceramics indicating intense activity related to Roman occupation. 

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Above, excavators hard at work at Halmyris. Photo credit Lucy MacDonald from her blog, Istanbul not Constantinople.

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“For the field season of 2015, we hope to concentrate efforts in multiple areas of the site, including the monumental entrance-way, the northeastern wall, two defensive towers/bastions and, last but not least, on areas of the urban (civilian) center,” reports project management. “We also intend to begin work on an especially large structure (as revealed by a GPR survey) near the western gate. This will undoubtedly be a season of particular significance and proliferation of finds, as the nearby areas have proven especially rich in archaeological material.”**

More information about the Halmyris project can be obtained at the website.  In addition, one can read the personal account of dig volunteer Lucy MacDonald at her blog site.

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* http://instanbulnotconstantinoople.blogspot.co.uk/2014/07/romans-in-romania.html

** http://www.halmyris.org/

Cover Photo, Top Left: Excavators hard at work at Halmyris. Photo credit Lucy MacDonald

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Read about the most fascinating discoveries with a premium subscription to Popular Archaeology Magazine.  Find out what Popular Archaeology Magazine is all about.  AND MORE:

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Popular Archaeology’s annual Discovery Edition eBook is a selection of the best stories published in Popular Archaeology Magazine in past issues, with an emphasis on some of the most significant, groundbreaking, or fascinating discoveries in the fields of archaeology and paleoanthropology and related fields. At least some of the articles have been updated or revised specifically for the Discovery edition.  We can confidently say that there is no other single issue of an archaeology-related magazine, paper print or online, that contains as much major feature article content as this one. The latest issue, volume 2, has just been released. Go to the Discovery edition page for more information.

It wasn’t a buried cache of gold or silver that excavators came across as they methodically dug down through the remains of one of Scotland’s most ancient archaeological sites. But in a very important sense, the discovery was equally exciting.

They were the skeletal remains of an animal—a very, very big one. And a very old one.

“It is so big that there was an immediate need for an expert opinion,” reported the Dig Diary blogger for the Ness of Brodgar Excavations project. 

So they called upon Jen Harland, an expert at identifying faunal remains.

“She has confirmed that the bones belong to an enormous cow—so big indeed that it is probably off the scale for the biggest known modern cow and into the range for an aurochs.”*

This is considered big news, because the aurochs, a huge, prehistoric ancestor to the modern day cow, is now extinct, the last one having died in the Jaktorów Forest, Poland in 1627. But even during Neolithic times, they had already become relatively rare. 

Thus far, the animal’s massive horn core has been revealed, along with part of the skull. But much more work needs to be done when the excavators return for the next season.  “Further identification will be needed and this will have to wait until next year when the contexts can be properly excavated without the need to rush,” continues the blog report. “However, it will have important implications for our understanding of the agricultural economy of the Neolithic in Orkney, and for the range of animals present at that time.”*

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The aurochs pictured above is dated to about 7500 BC and is one of two very well preserved aurochs skeletons found in Denmark. The Vig-aurochs can be seen at the National Museum of Denmark. The circles indicate where the animal was wounded by arrows in antiquity.  Malene Thyssen, Wikimedia Commons

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View of the excavation site of Ness of Brodgar. Genevieve Romier, Wikimedia Commons

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Archaeologists have been excavating in earnest at this now famous Neolithic Era site in the West Mainland of Orkney in northern Scotland ever since a geophysical survey in 2002 revealed anomalies that indicated a buried settlement complex, and then ploughing turned up a large, notched stone slab in a field in 2003. Radiocarbon dates from excavations have since shown that the site was a prehistoric complex that was used for 1,000 years—from at least 3200 BC to 2300 BC.

The animal remains are among the latest of a string of remarkable finds. Other discoveries have revealed a sequence of Neolithic structures, including a large oval structure enclosed by a monumental wall, a symmetrical building, and a structure measuring 25 metres (82 feet) long by 20 meters (65 feet) wide, with the remains of five-meter-thick outer walls still standing at a height of about one meter (three feet). The latter is considered “one of the largest, if not the largest, stone-built Neolithic non-funerary structures in Britain.”* Site investigators have also found evidence that the Neolithic people who lived at the site were using paint to decorate the buildings.

More information about the Ness of Brodgar excavations can be found here.

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*http://www.orkneyjar.com/archaeology/nessofbrodgar/

Cover Photo, Top Left: View of excavation at Ness of Brodgar. Tine, Wikimedia Commons

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Upland areas, far from the more accommodating lowland environments featuring streams, lakes and valleys, have not been as comparatively rich in yielding evidence for early Native American, or Paleoindian, habitation—at least in terms of permanent, ongoing settlement bases. But archaeological excavations at a rock shelter in the Upper Cumberland Plateau (UCP) of Tennessee are revealing finds that could show otherwise.  

“At Rock Creek Mortar Shelter on the UCP, we have recorded a more or less continuous record of human occupation from at least the end of the Pleistocene around 11,500 years ago to about AD 1000,” reports Jay Franklin, Associate Professor of Archaeology at East Tennessee University and colleagues. It is unusual because, as they report, “upland areas do not typically fit into conventional models of human settlement, except in cases where they are invoked as marginal areas used for hunting and gathering forays by ancient peoples only to return to their lowland homes.”*

Franklin has been conducting archaeological research in the UCP for well over a decade. At an elevation as much as 1,000 feet above the Tennessee River Valley, it comprises part of a larger region of Appalachia historically known as the “Great Wilderness”, a cultural backwater. But, for Franklin, this “could not be farther from the truth. Prehistoric Native Americans used and occupied these rock shelters and caves for 12,000 years.”*

From within the shelter, Franklin and his team recovered more than a dozen blades from deposits about 1.25 – 2 meters below the surface. They date them to the late Pleistocene and early Holocene periods. Examination of the blades has provided some clues to reconstructing the prehistoric scenario at the location. “A few of the well made blades would be at home in European Late & Epi-Paleolithic assemblages, while a few are poorly executed,” report Franklin and colleagues. “This suggests a family group as opposed to simply a group of male hunters. It may have been that older, skilled knappers were teaching younger novices to make blades on site. It may also be that these earliest inhabitants of the UCP were coping with the constraints of using the small rounded local cobbles of Monteagle Chert for blade production (as opposed to large tabular cherts encountered in the lower Tennessee River drainage).”

“So far, 50 tools/pieces have been analyzed for microscopic use wear,” Franklin continues. “Activities represented in the late Pleistocene/early Holocene levels include early stage hide and meat processing and scraping wood. Two tools possess some sort of residue which we think may be blood. We might tentatively suggest a temporary hunting camp occupied by residentially mobile families.”*

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East Tennessee State University team hard at work at excavations at the Rock Creek Mortar Shelter site.  Photo credit Alan Cressler.

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Franklin plans to return to the site in December, 2014, to continue excavations. “We hope to recover blade cores in the coming field season so that we may reconstruct the entire blade production sequence,” he says. “More generally, we will continue to explore why these early people ventured onto this rugged, upland landscape far removed from a major stream and tens of kilometers from primary raw material sources.”*

More information about the Rock Creek Mortar Shelter excavation project, field school, and how one can participate, can be found here.

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*http://faculty.etsu.edu/franklij/etsu_archaeological_field_school_10.htm

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A central consideration related to prehistoric human settlement of coastal areas worldwide has revolved around climate change. In a paper published online on October 3 in the Journal of Human Evolution, Emilie Campmas of the Université de Bordeaux and colleagues suggest that early modern humans who occupied caves in the Témara region near the coast of Northern Morocco came and went, at least in terms of the intensity of their occupation, in correlation with major shifts in the climate of the region.

“The study area was selected for two main reasons,” write the study authors in their report abstract. “First, it contains numerous caves with Upper Pleistocene deposits, which have yielded remains of anatomically modern humans in association with Aterian and Iberomaurusian artifacts. Second, these caves are currently located on the shore, thus this region is particularly sensitive to major climate change and sea level fluctuations.”*

The researchers conducted a diachronic taphonomic study of the faunal remains recovered from two sites in the Témara region, the El Harhoura 2 and El Mnasra caves. Their study showed alternating human and non-human predator occupations of the sites. They found that the lower layers of the El Mnasra Cave, dating to Oxygen Isotope Stage (OIS) 5 [between 80,000 and 130,000 years ago], yielded the remains of a diverse range of ungulates and that at least some of the remains featured significant “anthropogenic impact marks”, or cut-marks due to human activity, such as the application of stone cutting tools. This evidence was associated with mollusk shells, Nassarius shell beads, hearths, lithics, bone tools, and pigments. They also found that faunal remains in the upper layers dating to later periods in the El Harhoura 2 and El Mnasra caves were predominantly gazelles, showing significant evidence of non-human carnivore activities, “such as tooth marks, numerous semi-digested bones and coprolites” along with significantly fewer anthropogenic signatures (cut marks caused by humans and burnt bones). Moreover, analysis of the lithic evidence at El Harhoura 2 dated to the later periods indicated a less intensive human occupation.  “The ‘intensive’ human occupations date to OIS 5 and could have taken place during wet periods in connection with high sea levels, which allowed the exploitation of shellfish in this area,” write the study authors. “‘Non-intensive’ human occupations generally correspond to arid periods and lower sea levels, during which the Témara area was further inland and may have been less attractive to humans”.*

The study may have some implications for understanding or reinforcing the influence of climate change or fluctuations in the scientific modeling of ancient coastal human settlements or migrations/movements in other parts of the world.

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*Emilie Campmas, Patrick Michel, Sandrine Costamagno, Fethi Amani, Emmanuelle Stoetzel, Roland Nespoulet, Mohamed Abdeljalil El Hajraoui, Were Upper Pleistocene human/non-human predator occupations at the Témara caves (El Harhoura 2 and El Mnasra, Morocco) influenced by climate change?, Journal of Human Evolution, 2014, DOI: 10.1016/j.jhevol.2014.08.008

Cover Photo, Top Left: Satellite image of Morocco, Wikimedia Commons

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Thanks to the efforts of Polish archaeologists and a massive UNESCO-led international campaign, a unique assemblage of Nubian art and cultural artifacts from the Christian period (ca. mid-6th-14th centuries) was uncovered. Working under the direction of Prof Kazimierz Michałowski in the ancient city of Faras near the present-day Sudanese-Egyptian border, the team discovered well-preserved ruins of an 8th-century cathedral church. Its walls were decorated with magnificent mural paintings on religious themes, dating from the 8th-14th centuries. The discovery was hailed as the ‘miracle of Faras’. Over 120 paintings were preserved, 67 of which are today in the collection of the National Museum in Warsaw. This collection is accompanied by other finds from Faras. Together they form what is the largest and most valuable collection of archaeological artifacts from overseas excavations that has ever been acquired by a Polish museum.

Now, following an extensive redevelopment, the National Museum in Warsaw’s new Professor Kazimierz Michałowski Faras Gallery will open to the public on October 18, showcasing the finds. This makes the Faras Gallery home to Europe’s only display of Nubian art and cultural artifacts from the Christian period (ca. mid-6th-14th centuries). In a modern design, using multimedia presentations, including 3D film, it will present the most exquisite treasures of a civilization that developed some 1,500 years ago in what is today’s northern Sudan. The opening ceremony will be held under the patronage of UNESCO. It will also be the only place in the world outside Khartoum where paintings of Christian-era Nubian art are on view. The depictions of saints, archangels and Nubian bishops are originally from a cathedral church in Faras (formerly Pachoras), a city that was an important administrative and cultural center of the medieval African kingdom of Nobadia in the Nile Valley.

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ARCHANGEL  Sudan, Faras, 9^th c. – 1^st quarter of the 10^th c. AD  Mud plaster, tempera; From Polish excavations in Faras, in the National Museum in Warsaw since 1964

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VIRGIN MARY WITH CHILD  Sudan, Faras, 9^th c. – 1st half of 10^th c. AD  Mud plaster, tempera; h. 146; w. 130.5  From Polish excavations in Faras, in the National Museum in Warsaw since 1964

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BISHOP PETROS WITH SAINT PETER  Sudan, Faras, AD 974–997  Mud plaster, tempera; h. 244.5, w. 113  From Polish excavations in Faras, in the National Museum in Warsaw since 1964

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BISHOP MARIANOS WITH VIRGIN MARY WITH CHILD AND CHRIST  Sudan, Faras, AD 1005–1036  Mud plaster, tempera; h. 247, w. 155.5  From Polish excavations in Faras, in the National Museum in Warsaw since 1964

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FRAGMENTS OF THE FRIEZE FROM THE APSE OF THE FIRST CATHEDRAL  Block decorated with relief representation of birds, altars and columns.  Sudan, Faras, 1^st quarter of the 7^th c. AD  Sandstone;  h. 24, l. 41  From Polish excavations in Faras, in the National Museum in Warsaw since 1964

The priceless works will be presented according to a new exhibition scenario. A room designed to evoke a temple interior will present the wall paintings in an arrangement similar to their original one at the Faras cathedral, with the sound of authentic Coptic liturgical chants heightening the experience for visitors. In a dedicated space, with special consideration for handicapped patrons, multimedia presentations will allow viewers to learn about the history of Christian Nubia, its architecture, the cathedral paintings and their interesting iconography. A digital reconstruction of the cathedral interior in 3D stereoscopy offers the first opportunity to enter a Nubian church in more than 1,000 years. State-of-the-art digital renderings will show the presbytery, the aisles, the chapels and the vestibule, explaining the original location of the paintings as they covered the church’s walls for centuries. The film shows not only works from the National Museum in Warsaw but also those kept at the National Museum of Sudan in Khartoum. The exhibition will be accompanied by presentations of archaeological films and archival photographs from the 1960s excavations.

“Our goal was to recreate, using simple and, in a way, timeless architectural solutions, the mood of the historical sacral interior of an early Christian temple. We were also keen to avoid literal references to the architecture of the Faras cathedral,” said Mirosław Orzechowski and Grzegorz Rytel, architects and authors of the new exhibition design.

So extensive a redevelopment would not have been possible without unprecedented support from a private individual – the Donor of the New Faras Gallery.

Just as with temporary exhibitions, the opening of the new Faras Gallery will be accompanied by an extensive program of educational events: Thursday evening meetings, family workshops, film screenings. Renowned archaeologists, lecturers, conservators and researchers will speak about the successes of Polish archaeology.

The Opening of the Faras Gallery is under UNESCO’s honorary patronage.

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The Nubian Campaign has become a strong symbol of UNESCO’s successful efforts to mobilize joint, high-profile international action for the protection of humanity’s common heritage. This Campaign led to the adoption of UNESCO’s World Heritage Convention in 1972 (Irina Bokova, Director-General of UNESCO).

Exhibition content concept: Bożena Mierzejewska, Collection of Ancient and Eastern Christian Art

Exhibition design: Mirosław Orzechowski, Grzegorz Rytel

Curator of Collection of Ancient and Eastern Christian Art: Alfred Twardecki

News source: Adapted and edited from a National Museum in Warsaw press release

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A new study published in the Cell Press journal Current Biology on October 2 may help to rewrite the story of ape and human brain evolution. While the neocortex of the brain has been called “the crowning achievement of evolution and the biological substrate of human mental prowess,” newly reported evolutionary rate comparisons show that the cerebellum expanded up to six times faster than anticipated throughout the evolution of apes, including humans.

The findings* suggest that technical intelligence was likely at least as important as social intelligence in human cognitive evolution, the researchers say.

“Our results highlight a previously unappreciated role of the cerebellum in ape and human brain evolution that has the potential to refocus researchers’ thinking about how and why the brains in these species have become distinct and to shift attention away from an almost exclusive focus on the neocortex as the seat of our humanity,” says Robert Barton of Durham University in the United Kingdom.

The cerebellum had been seen primarily as a brain region involved in movement control, adds Chris Venditti of the University of Reading. But more recent evidence has begun to suggest that the cerebellum has a broader range of functions. The cerebellum also contains an intriguingly large number of densely packed neurons.

“In humans, the cerebellum contains about 70 billion neurons—four times more than in the neocortex,” Barton says. “Nobody really knows what all these neurons are for, but they must be doing something important.”

The neocortex had gotten most of the attention in part because it is such a large structure to begin with. As a result, in looking at variation in the size of various brain regions, the neocortex appeared to show the most expansion. But much of that increase in size could be explained away by the size of the animal as a whole. Sperm whales have a neocortex that is proportionally larger than that of humans, for example.

By using a comparative method that controlled for those differences in the way the two brain structures correlate, Barton and Venditti uncovered a striking pattern: both nonhuman apes and humans depart from the otherwise tight correlation in size between the cerebellum and neocortex found across other primates due to relatively rapid evolutionary expansion of the cerebellum.

Barton and Venditti say that the cerebellum seems to be particularly involved in the temporal organization of complex behavioral sequences, such as those involved in making and using tools, for instance. Interestingly, evidence is now emerging for a critical role of the cerebellum in language, too.

While plenty of work remains, the new study establishes the cerebellum as “a new frontier for investigations into the neural basis of advanced cognitive abilities,” the researchers say.

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*Current Biology Barton et al.: “Rapid evolution of the cerebellum in humans and other great apes.”  http://www.cell.com/current-biology/abstract/S0960-9822(14)01069-0

Source: Edited and adapted from a Cell Press news release, Unexpectedly speedy expansion of human, ape cerebellum

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Popular Archaeology’s annual Discovery Edition eBook is a selection of the best stories published in Popular Archaeology Magazine in past issues, with an emphasis on some of the most significant, groundbreaking, or fascinating discoveries in the fields of archaeology and paleoanthropology and related fields. At least some of the articles have been updated or revised specifically for the Discovery edition.  We can confidently say that there is no other single issue of an archaeology-related magazine, paper print or online, that contains as much major feature article content as this one. The latest issue, volume 2, has just been released. Go to the Discovery edition page for more information.

PHILADELPHIA, PA 2014—This fall, the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, in conjunction with Penn Arts and Sciences, launches the Center for the Analysis of Archaeological Materials (CAAM), housed in a newly renovated suite of conservation and teaching laboratories in the Museum’s West Wing. The new Center will offer the facilities, materials, equipment, and expert personnel to teach and mentor undergraduate and graduate students in a range of scientific techniques crucial to archaeologists and other scholars as they seek to interpret the past. Study will be arranged around eight disciplines: ceramics, digital archaeology, archaeobotany, archaeozoology, human skeletal analysis, lithics, archaeometallurgy, and conservation.

“With the teaching of materials examination and analysis—as well as digital archaeology—added to our existing capacity for teaching with collections, extensive and varied fieldwork opportunities, a renowned program in historic preservation, and established archaeological coursework across several departments and programs, CAAM sets Penn and its Museum apart as a leading teaching center for archaeology throughout the world,” said Julian Siggers, Penn Museum Williams Director. “The new Center will bring together the laboratories, equipment, and teaching personnel who will enable exciting learning and discovery to take place at all levels, from introductory courses to Ph.D. theses.”

“The Museum is one of Penn’s unique assets, and its research agenda and collections integrate powerfully with the research and teaching mission of the School,” said Arts and Sciences Dean Steven J. Fluharty. “This Center will create incredible new opportunities for our undergraduates, graduate students, and faculty and advance Penn’s reputation further in an area where we have long excelled.”

New Facilities Made Possible by Visionary Support

The Center is housed in a suite of new laboratories and teaching spaces on the first floor of the Penn Museum’s West Wing, renovated this summer in the final phase of an expansive, $18-million project initiated in 2010. The full project has included renovation of the West Wing’s five public galleries, HVAC installation, and the restoration of the Widener Lecture Room (which can accommodate up to 140 students for lectures or classes in conjunction with lab-based instruction, and also can be used for a wide range of public events).

A Ceramics lab, completed in 2011, provides a research, teaching and mentoring space that already has been put to use by ceramics expert Dr. Marie-Claude Boileau. The newly renovated teaching spaces include a general-purpose teaching and research lab with a fume hood; a lab designed for the teaching of Human Skeletal Analysis and other specialties, a general-purpose wet lab, and a larger classroom. The adjacent Kowalski Digital Media Center contains a Digitization Lab which will be adapted to house Digital Archaeology courses as CAAM brings its full course roster online over the next several years.

The West Wing renovation has also provided state-of-the-art work spaces for Penn Museum’s Conservation Department, which now has a large new laboratory complemented by specialist rooms for x-ray and photography, and a seminar room/library—facilities that will greatly enhance the Department’s ability to care for the nearly one million objects in the Museum’s Collection. The Department has played a leading role in conservation training, having hosted more than 50 interns and fellows since 1971, and conservation courses will be offered as part of the CAAM curriculum.  

The newly renovated laboratories, teaching spaces, and amenities are housed in a space of about 8,000 square feet.

Renovation of the Conservation and Teaching Laboratories, which enabled CAAM to go from vision to reality, was made possible by a host of generous donors with a deep commitment to the future of archaeological research. Lead supporters were A. Bruce and Margaret Mainwaring, Charles K. Williams, II, Daniel G. Kamin, Frederick J. Manning, Carrie and Ken Cox, Joseph and Bonnie Lundy, Bayard and Frances Storey, and two anonymous donors.

Teaching and Learning Program

Steve Tinney, Museum Deputy Director, Associate Curator-in-Charge, Babylonian Section, and Clark Research Associate Professor of Assyriology in the Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations, is the new Director of CAAM.  Guided by a Faculty Steering Committee, CAAM is the major new initiative in the Museum’s Teaching and Learning Program.

Through the Teaching and Learning Program, the Museum offers hands-on collections access to students and faculty for a wide range of research activities in addition to the materials analysis that will be offered by CAAM. Examples of courses enhanced by the study of objects in the Museum’s Collections Study Room last spring included Age of the Samurai; Artists, Exhibitions, and Museums; and Images in Conflict: A Visual History of Violence.  Since its opening in 2012, the Collections Study Room has hosted more than 2,200 Penn students and 56 faculty from 17 departments, providing hands-on, object based learning experiences with the Museum’s international Collection.

A Penn Faculty Steering Committee drawn from several departments in Arts and Sciences and from the School of Design guided the selection of specialties around which CAAM will be structured.  In addition to courses, independent study and research mentoring will be offered from introductory to advanced levels, enabling both undergraduate and graduate students to develop from their first experiences with laboratory-based analysis into independent researchers. CAAM teaching specialists will be available to make contributions to a wide array of courses in a range of departments, and will support the research mission and activities of the Museum.

Penn Freshmen who selected to participate in a new seminar course, “Food and Fire: Archaeology in the Laboratory,” will be among the first to explore and learn in the new Center. Taught by Mainwaring Teaching Specialist Dr. Kate Moore, an archaeozoology expert experienced both in the laboratory and in the field, the course will make extensive use of the Museum’s collections and facilities, introducing students to a range of analytical techniques practiced in CAAM. This introductory course will prepare students to continue to second-tier courses in Organic and Inorganic Analysis, and then to intensive laboratory courses in the eight CAAM specialties.

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Students use microscopes with guidance from Dr. Marie-Claude Boileau in the Ceramics lab, part of the new Center for the Analysis of Archaeological Materials housed in the Penn Museum (Photo: Mark Stehle).

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Conservator Julia Lawson examines objects from the Penn Museum’s collections, in the new Conservation Studio at the Penn Museum (Photo: Penn Museum).

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Dr. Katherine Moore, Mainwaring Teaching Specialist, speaks to students in her “Food and Fire: Archaeology in the Laboratory” seminar for freshmen at the University of Pennsylvania. The class is held in the new classroom in the Center for the Analysis of Archaeological Materials at the Penn Museum (Photo: Penn Museum).

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A Public Open House

The Museum is offering the public a chance to see the new labs and learn more about the kind of work that will take place in CAAM.  On Saturday, October 18, from 1:00 to 4:00 pm, the Museum celebrates International Archaeology Day with a host of activities designed to interest all ages.  Guests can sign up for behind-the-scenes tours of the Conservation and Teaching Labs, where conservators, researchers and students will demonstrate equipment and talk about their work. International Archaeology Day also includes an up-closed look at an ancient mummy at an interactive station, short talks on archaeology, a “What in the World” game show, a family craft station, and a kid-friendly obstacle course worthy of Indiana Jones. The afternoon is co-sponsored by the Philadelphia Chapter of the American Institute of Archaeology.

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About the Penn Museum

Founded in 1887, the Penn Museum (the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology), located at 3260 South Street in Philadelphia, is one of the world’s great archaeology and anthropology research museums, and the largest university museum in the United States. With nearly one million objects in the collection, the Penn Museum encapsulates and illustrates the human story: who we are and where we came from. A dynamic research institution with many ongoing research projects, the Museum is an engaging place of discovery. The Museum’s mandate of research, teaching, collections stewardship, and public engagement are the four “pillars” of the Museum’s expansive mission: to transform understanding of the human experience.

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Cover Photo: A wide shot of the new Conservation Studio at the Penn Museum (Photo: Penn Museum).

Source: University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology press release.

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Popular Archaeology’s annual Discovery Edition eBook is a selection of the best stories published in Popular Archaeology Magazine in past issues, with an emphasis on some of the most significant, groundbreaking, or fascinating discoveries in the fields of archaeology and paleoanthropology and related fields. At least some of the articles have been updated or revised specifically for the Discovery edition.  We can confidently say that there is no other single issue of an archaeology-related magazine, paper print or online, that contains as much major feature article content as this one. The latest issue, volume 2, has just been released. Go to the Discovery edition page for more information.

Evidence of new behaviour being adopted and transmitted socially from one individual to another within a wild chimpanzee community was published on September 30 in the open access journal PLOS Biology. This is the first instance of social learning recorded in the wild.

Scientists from the University of St Andrews, University of Neuchâtel, Anglia Ruskin University, and Université du Quebec studied the spread of two novel tool-use behaviours among the Sonso chimpanzee community living in Uganda’s Budongo Forest. Dr Catherine Hobaiter, Lecturer in Psychology at the University of St Andrews, said: “researchers have been fascinated for decades by the differences in behaviour between chimpanzee communities; some use tools, some don’t, some use different tools for the same job. These behavioural variations have been described as ‘cultural’, which in human terms would mean they spread when one individual learns from another; but in most cases they’re long established and it’s hard to know how they originally spread within a group. We were incredibly lucky to be in the right place at the right time to document the appearance and spread of two novel tool-use behaviours, something that is extraordinarily rare in the wild.”

The researchers investigated the spread of new variations of ‘leaf-sponges’, which are tools dipped in water to drink from, commonly manufactured by the Sonso chimpanzees by folding leaves in their mouth. Different individuals were observed to develop two novel variants: moss-sponging (a sponge made of moss or a mixture of leaves and moss) and leaf-sponge re-use (using a sponge left behind on a previous visit). Neither moss-sponging nor leaf-sponge re-use had been previously observed in Sonso in over twenty years of continuous observation. Chimpanzees are widely considered to be the most ‘cultural’ of all non-human animals, but most studies examining how behaviour is transmitted are carried out in captive groups. This has long been a focus for critics of arguments for chimpanzee culture, who point out that without similar evidence from the wild it is difficult to argue for an evolutionary connection between human and chimpanzee ‘culture’. Here, for the first time, researchers tracked in real time how a new natural behaviour was passed from individual to individual in a wild community. Dr William Hoppitt, Senior Lecturer in Zoology at Anglia Ruskin University said: “Our results provide strong evidence for social transmission along the chimpanzees’ social network, demonstrating that wild chimpanzees learn novel tool-use from each other and support the claim that some of the observed behavioural diversity in wild chimpanzees should be interpreted as ‘cultural’.”

The analysis began when Nick, a 29-year-old alpha male chimpanzee, made a moss sponge while being watched by Nambi, a dominant adult female. Over the next six days a further seven individuals made and used moss sponges. Six of these had observed the behaviour before adopting it and the seventh was seen to re-use a discarded moss sponge so may have learned about the novel behaviour in this way. The scientists also recorded a 12-year-old sub-adult male retrieve and use a discarded leaf sponge. A further eight individuals adopted the re-use technique, but only four of them observed another individual re-using a sponge first. By using a technique called network-based diffusion analysis the researchers estimated that each time a ‘naïve’ chimpanzee observed moss-sponging, this individual was 15 times more likely to develop the behaviour. This striking effect contrasted with the re-use behaviour in which social learning played much less of a role.

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This is individual ‘KB’ of the Sonso chimpanzee community of the Budongo Forest in Uganda, using a moss-sponge in November 2011, a behavior she learned by observing her mother. Photo by Catherine Hobaiter

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The study indicates that group-specific behavioural variants in wild chimpanzees can be socially learned, adding to the evidence that this prerequisite for culture originated in a common ancestor of great apes and humans, before the advent of humans. Dr Thibaud Gruber, Marie Curie Fellow at the University of Neuchâtel, said: “This study tells us that chimpanzee culture changes over time, little by little, by building on previous knowledge found within the community. This is probably how our early ancestors’ cultures also changed over time. In this respect, this is a great example of how studying chimpanzee culture can help us model the evolution of human culture. Nevertheless, something must have subsequently happened in our evolution that caused a qualitative shift in what we could transmit, rendering our culture much more complex than anything found in wild apes. Understanding this qualitative jump in our evolutionary history is what we need to investigate now.”

Individual KZ (right of the screen) picks a leaf-sponge from the ground while his mother KW is extracting water from the waterhole. He then chews the used LS before leaf-sponging himself at the waterhole (video by Catherine Hobaiter).

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Source: Edited from a press release of PLOS Biology. All works published in PLOS Biology are open access, which means that everything is immediately and freely available. See the published article* for details at http://www.plosbiology.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pbio.1001960

 * Hobaiter C, Poisot T, Zuberbühler K, Hoppitt W, Gruber T (2014) Social Network Analysis Shows Direct Evidence for Social Transmission of Tool Use in Wild Chimpanzees. PLoS Biol 12(9): e1001960. doi:10.1371/journal.pbio.1001960

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It wasn’t exclusively the arrival of new people from Africa with new technology that changed the stone tool repertoire of early humans in Eurasia a few hundred thousand years ago—it was local populations in different places and times gradually and independently wising up to a better industry on their own.

So suggests Daniel Adler, associate professor of Anthropology at the University of Connecticut, and colleagues based on a recently completed study in which the researchers examined thousands of stone artifacts recovered from Nor Geghi 1, an Armenian Southern Caucasus archaeological site that features preserved lava flows and artifact-bearing sediments dated to between 200,000 and 400,000 years ago.  The artifacts, dated at 325,000 – 335,000 years old, were a mix of two distinct stone tool technology traditions—bifacial tools, such as hand axes, which were common among early human populations during the Lower Paleolithic, and Levallois, a stone tool production method typically attributed to the Middle Stone Age in Africa and the Middle Paleolithic in Eurasia. The researchers argue that the coexistence of two technologies at Nor Geghi 1 provides the first clear evidence that local populations developed Levallois technology out of existing biface technology.

“The combination of these different technologies in one place suggests to us that, about 325,000 years ago, people at the site were innovative,” says Adler.

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The discovery of Nor Geghi 1 (NG1), July 2008, with Basalt 1 (top) and stratigraphic Units 1–5. N. Researchers Wales and P. Glauberman are pictured. Credit: Daniel S. Adler

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Representative stratigraphic section of Nor Geghi 1 (NG1), with Basalt 1 (top) and Units 1–5, following the 2009 field season. Credit: Daniel S. Adler

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The paper documenting the research, published in the 26 September 2014 issue of Science, presents the argument that biface and Levallois technology, while distinct, share a common evolutionary line. In biface technology, a stone is shaped through the removal of flakes from two opposite surfaces of the stone to produce a tool such as a hand axe. The detached flakes are discarded as waste products. In Levallois technology, the stone is shaped through the removal of flakes to produce a central convex surface tool, or core. The flakes are produced in predetermined sizes and shapes and used as tools. Archaeologists have suggested that Levallois technology is optimal in terms of raw material. The flakes are relatively small and easy to carry, useful for the highly mobile hunter-gatherers of the time. It has been interpreted as an advancement or innovative improvement on the biface technology.

Based on comparisons of archaeological data from sites in Africa, the Middle East, and Europe, the study authors suggest that this change was gradual and intermittent, and that it occurred independently within different human populations who shared a common technological ancestry. In other words Levallois technology evolved out of pre-existing biface technology in different places at different times.

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Technological variability at Nor Geghi 1 (NG1). A) Biface with two biface resharpening/thinning flakes. B–C) Levallois cores with Levallois flakes. D) Blade core with blade. A) The biface is the desired product, with the flakes detached during shaping and resharpening treated as waste. B–D) The flakes and blades are the desired products and were used in an unmodified state or retouched into a variety of tool types. Credit: Daniel S. Adler

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Technological evolution and variability at Nor Geghi 1 (NG1). A) bifaces, B) Levallois cores. Credit: Daniel S. Adler

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Their conclusion challenges the view that technological change resulted from population change (the introduction of or replacement of an older population by a new population) during this period. “If I were to take all the artifacts from the site and show them to an archaeologist, they would immediately begin to categorize them into chronologically distinct groups,” Adler says. However, he suggests that the artifacts found at Nor Geghi 1 actually reflect the technological flexibility and variability of a single population, speaking to the antiquity of the human capacity for innovation.

Early modern humans inhabited the region of what is today known as Austria around 43,500 years ago, living in an environment that was cold and steppe-like, according to a recent study. 

Philip Nigst and colleagues of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology and other institutions analyzed stone tools and their context after a re-excavation of the famous Willendorf site in Austria, the site best known for the discovery in 1908 of the Venus of Willendorf figurine. Between 2006 and 2011 archaeologists uncovered an assemblage of 32 lithic artifacts and 23 faunal remains. The authors identified the tools as belonging to the Aurignacian culture, generally accepted as associated with modern humans. The researchers determined this through systematic morphological and technological analysis. They assign the artifacts to a very early archaeological horizon of modern human occupation.

“By using stratigraphic, paleoenvironmental, and chronological data, AH 3 [the archaeological horizon assigned to this assemblage] is ascribed to the onset of Greenland Interstadial 11, around 43,500 cal B.P., and thus is older than any other Aurignacian assemblage,” wrote the study authors. “Most importantly,” the study authors continued, “for the first time to our knowledge, we have a high-resolution environmental context for an Early Aurignacian in Central Europe, demonstrating an early appearance of behaviorally modern humans in a medium-cold steppe-type environment with some boreal trees along valleys around 43,500 cal B.P.”*

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Archaeologist Philip R. Nigst and geologist Paul Haesaerts in a test trench at Willendorf II.  Credit: Image courtesy of The Willendorf Project, Philip R. Nigst and Bence Viola.

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Excavations at Willendorf II. Credit: Image courtesy of The Willendorf Project, Philip R. Nigst and Bence Viola

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Section at Willendorf II showing the succession of brown paleosols (medium-cold steppe environment) and yellow loess (cold periglacial steppe to deep frost environment). Holes in the section are sample holes. Credit: Image courtesy of The Willendorf Project, Philip R. Nigst and Bence Viola.

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The age of the artifacts suggests that modern humans may have coexisted with Neanderthals in Europe for several thousand years, and the location of the assemblage in what was a cold and steppe-like environment over 43,000 years ago also suggests that early modern human settlers, who may have come from the warmer climate of southern Europe, were well-adapted to a variety of climates, according to the authors.

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*Article #14-12201: “Early modern human settlement of Europe north of the Alps occurred 43,500 years ago in a cold steppe-type environment,” by Philip R. Nigst et al.

Source: Adapted and edited from the abtract and excerpts of the in-press full document versions of the article*, to be published in the Journal of Human Evolution.

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