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JULY 2014—In addition to the high toll that Syria’s four-year-old civil war has had on its people and infrastructure, Syria’s cultural heritage has been and continues to be destroyed at an unprecedented rate. World Heritage sites like the historic city of Aleppo and Krak des Chevaliers, as well as medieval Christian cemeteries and numerous archaeological sites and museums, have been subjected to extensive raiding and looting.

In an effort to help stem the loss of the region’s significant cultural heritage, Penn Museum’s Penn Cultural Heritage Center, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and the Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C., in cooperation with the Syrian Interim Government’s Heritage Task Force, have come together to offer assistance for museum curators, heritage experts, and civilians working to protect cultural heritage inside Syria. A three-day training program, “Emergency Care for Syrian Museum Collections,” focusing on safeguarding high risk collections, was completed in late June; additional training programs are being planned, pending funding.

“While it is very difficult for international heritage organizations to travel into Syria today, there are a number of Syrians who regularly risk their lives to protect their cultural heritage,” noted Brian Daniels, Ph.D., Director of Research and Programs, Penn Cultural Heritage Center at the Penn Museum. “This workshop and other efforts going forward are designed to support these individuals and their efforts.”

About 20 people from several Syrian provinces attended the first training, held in an undisclosed location outside of Syria, and facilitated by Dr. Daniels; Corine Wegener, cultural heritage preservation officer, Smithsonian Institution; and Robert Patterson, exhibits specialist, National Museum of the American Indian, Smithsonian Institution. Workshop leaders were joined by Syrian scholars Salam al-Kuntar, lecturer, University of Pennsylvania; Amr Al-Azm, chair of the Syrian Interim Government’s Heritage Task Force and associate professor, Shawnee State University; and Ali Othman, researcher, Université of Paris I. Technical assistance for the program was provided by the U.S. Institute of Peace (Washington, D.C.) and The Day After Association (Brussels, Belgium), a Syrian-led civil society NGO. The training was funded by the Smithsonian and the J. M. Kaplan Fund (New York).

The objectives of the workshop were three-fold: to offer information on how to secure museum collections safely during emergencies; to provide participants with basic supplies for packing and securing museum collections, and to begin a dialogue among Syrian participants about emergency responses. “This workshop fits the model of heritage preservation promoted by the Penn Cultural Heritage Center,” said Richard M. Leventhal, the Center’s Executive Director. “Local communities are best equipped to identify heritage in need of preservation and protection, and this is precisely what is happening in Syria. We are pleased to work alongside communities in Syria and other places around the world to support these efforts.”

Conditions at the Ma’arra Museum in Idlib province, famous for its collections of Byzantine mosaics, were a subject of much discussion and concern. The museum has received collateral damage in the fighting and come under direct attack by ISIS units. The workshop was able to offer some suggestions for stabilization in the current situation and provide emergency conservation supplies.

Ms. Wegener stressed the importance of bringing people together in a collaborative environment to address situations like those in Syria. “Workshops like these allow us to work directly with the cultural heritage professionals and activists who are on the ground caring for damaged and at-risk collections. We provide them practical information about protecting collections and sites, along with critically needed supplies and equipment. In return, we learn a great deal from our Syrian colleagues.”

Excavations at a Roman site in County Durham have revealed the ‘Pompeii of the north’, say archaeologists. The spectacular discoveries at Binchester Roman Fort near Bishop Auckland have uncovered some of the most well preserved remnants of an empire dating back some 1800 years ago, including one of the earliest pieces of evidence for Christianity in Roman Britain in the shape of a silver ring.

The archaeologists have also discovered a bath house with seven-foot high walls, which were once covered with brightly covered painted designs, the original floor, doorways and window openings, as well as an inscribed altar dedicated to the Roman Goddess, Fortune the Home-bringer.

Dr. David Mason, principal archaeologist, Durham County Council, said: “These findings are hugely significant as they are virtually intact and present a graphic illustration of life under the Roman Empire. They are so stunning and spectacular that we can claim we have our very own ‘Pompeii of the north’ right on our doorstep.”

The excavation project, now in its sixth year, is a joint venture between archaeologists at Durham County Council, Durham University, the Architectural and Archaeological Society of Durham and Northumberland land and several American universities.

Project coordinator, Dr David Petts, lecturer in archaeology at Durham University, said: “Our excavations have uncovered parts of one of the best preserved Roman buildings in Britain. The building itself and the wonderful array of artefacts we have recovered from Binchester give us an unparalleled opportunity to better understand life on the northern frontier in the Roman period.

“For example, the altar is a reminder that bath houses were about more than keeping clean and exercising and were actually social centres – a bit like our modern day leisure centres.

“The most unique feature of these remains is the sheer scale of their preservation. It is possible to walk through a series of Roman rooms with walls all above head height; this is pretty exceptional for Roman Britain.”

The altar has been inscribed by a retired trooper who served with a unit of the Spanish cavalry based at Binchester. The trooper described his rank as “architectus” and this is the only example from the whole of the Roman Empire, outside of Rome itself, which shows that architects were on the staff of auxiliary cavalry units and not just the legions of the Emperor’s personal protection unit, the Praetorian Guard. 

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Bath house structure unearthed during excavations at Binchester Fort. Courtesy Durham University and Binchester Research Project

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The ring with Christian symbol. Courtesy Durham University and Binchester Research Project

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The findings coincide with the Roman festival being held at Binchester next weekend (July 26 and 27), where there will be guided tours of the recent excavations. The festival also features several re-enactment groups.

Last year, a first year Durham University student working at Binchester found a 1,800-year-old carved stone head of what is believed to be a Roman god.

The Roman fort at Binchester lies above the River Wear just outside the town of Bishop Auckland in County Durham. Known to the Romans as Vinovia, it commanded the main road that ran from the legionary headquarters at York northwards to Hadrian’s Wall. It formed a key element of the complex frontier system that lay both sides of the Wall that marked the northern-most edge of the Roman Empire for nearly four hundred years. The fort itself was built to house a cavalry regiment in the early years of Roman control in Northern England. It housed troops from across the Empire, including Spain and Germany. It was not just a military site—a thriving civilian settlement (vicus) grew up at its gates.

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Source: Edited and adapted from a Durham University press release.

Cover Photo, Top Left: Excavations showing bath house structure. Courtesy Durham University and Binchester Research Project

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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 beautifully and precisely rendered 3D map of an emerging new archaeological site;

An exact replica of a rare and priceless artifact you can hold in your hand, for study or to just set on your shelf;

An authentically fact-based image of an ancient palace, reconstructed digitally to show how it would have looked in its full splendor before it became a ruin for study by archaeologists following the ravages of time;

High-tech “eyes” that can see ancient structures hidden from the naked eye by thick forest overgrowth.

These are but a few examples of what the emerging new science of digital archaeology can offer the interested scholar and public alike. It is, in a very real sense, revolutionizing the way scientists do archaeology, and the way the general public can see and share in the experience of the discoveries in the field.  

One archaeologist is on a mission to bring the new science out of its ivory tower and before the public eye. Ashley Richter, who worked and studied as a researcher in cultural heritage diagnostics at the University of California San Diego’s Center of Interdisciplinary Science for Art, Architecture and Archaeology, describes herself as “a laser scanning, 3D printing, digital archaeologist and artist”. She’s seen field work in the United States, the United Kingdom, Jordan, Cyprus, Greece, and most recently, all over Italy. Now, she’s capitalizing on her digital expertise to promote a concept she calls “Open Access Antiquarianism“.  

“It’s a collaborative project between archaeologists and computer scientists on the intersection between art, archaeology and technology to encourage people to access and become active with digital heritage,” Richter explains. “After pushing the technological limits of data capture and archaeological visualization at sites like Petra and Palazzo Vecchio, we’d like to take the tools and methodologies we’ve been building and promote archaeology with it in the public sphere.”  

To kickstart the movement, she is digitally organizing a Cabinet of Curiosities show of archaeological LiDAR printed furniture (what she calls “literal armchair archaeology”), 3D printed archaeological artifacts, and point cloud visualization for anyone to peruse. In addition, she has joined with Popular Archaeology in a collaborative effort to get the word out on the world of digital archaeology through her blog, Adventures in Digital Archaeology, which can be reached directly at the original website or an ongoing basis at the magazine site. 

But whether or not Richter’s campaign gains traction, it is clear that the field of digital archaeology is here to stay as an increasingly important element in archaeological research and presentation— not to mention that it will—at least for those of us who are not into digging in the dirt and reading technical reports—make it all a whole lot more fun.

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Richter’s compilation of recent data for display on the Qualcomm Institute V-Room Wall for UCSD’s TEDX open forum (In the foreground: one of the CISA3 drones used in data collection).

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Richter laser scanning the exterior of the Baptistery of St. Giovanni, Florence.

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Above: 3D printer model Richter helped to develop as part of a “Russian Dolls” series building up from a mini size to an eventual large diagnostic dollhouse of the Baptistery of St. Giovanni in Florence. It was built from photos during a diagnostic survey in 2013 with the Center of Interdisciplinary Science for Art, Architecture, and Archaeology at the University of California, San Diego.

* Images provided courtesy Ashley Richter

Below, Richer shows what digital archaeology can do for mapping ‘hard-to-get-to’ places, especially if they’re due for imminent destruction by modern day plans:

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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.

It remained a mystery for decades.

Since archaeologist F.Ll. Griffith’s excavations in the 1920’s at the ancient site of the pharaoh Akhenaten’s short-lived new capital city of Akhetaten (modern Amarna), archaeologists have been puzzled about the whereabouts of the remains of the city’s commoner population – the people who toiled to build and maintain Akhenaten’s sacred edifices and infrastructure — and more specifically, the estimated 6,000 people who died during the short 15-year period of the city’s construction and development.

“A will-of-the-wisp, the dream of a rich unplundered cemetery of the middle classes at El-Amarneh, full of choice vases and amulets, beckons to each successive explorer,” wrote Griffith in the report for his 1923 excavation season.*

Many of the elaborate unfinished rock-cut tombs of Akhenaten’s elite courtiers and high officials had already been found. They grace the cliff faces of the northern end of the Amarna city plain and the face of a low escarpment at the southern end of the ancient city. They can be plainly seen today by modern visitors.

But the burials of the deceased of the estimated 30,000 commoners and laborers remained elusive – until 2001, when archaeologist Barry Kemp of the University of Cambridge began to see the first signs. Kemp has directed excavations and surveys at Amarna for the Egypt Exploration Society since 1977.

“The puzzle seems now to have been solved,” says Kemp. “ It has come about through the desert GPS survey begun in 2001 and continued in subsequent years. First came the discovery of two cemeteries (clearly robbed) of what must be relatively poor graves on the flat desert not far from tomb no. 6 (of Panehesy), the southernmost of the North Tombs. The surface pottery is appropriate to the Amarna period. In 2003 a third cemetery was discovered on the east side of a narrow wadi which runs back into the low escarpment behind tomb 25 of the South Tombs group. In 2004 two further cemeteries likely to be of the Amarna Period were located on the floor of another wadi which cuts through the cliffs where the North Tombs are located.”**

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Project map of Akhetaten, showing locations of tomb areas and progress as of 2006. Courtesy the Amarna Project

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Above: Plan of the South Tombs Cemetery showing excavation areas. Courtesy Helen Fenwick and the Amarna Project

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View of the interior of the tomb of Panehesy. Mutnedjet, Wikimedia Commons

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Most recently, from 2006 to 2013, Kemp’s excavation team has uncovered artifacts and bones from a cemetery site located near the South Tombs, a site where preliminary evidence indicated that it held the burials of a poorer class of people. “Of the various cemeteries located it is the one that has the most varied material present on the surface, including late 18^th Dynasty sherds, a few pieces of glass vessel and faience, and mud bricks,” states Kemp and colleagues. But, Kemp continues, “it has been partly washed away by occasional floods that have swept down it and across the desert plain in front. The floods left behind a scatter of human bones along both the sandy floor of the wadi and the watercourses that cross the desert plain beyond.”**

Flooding hasn’t been the only challenge faced by researchers at the site. Extensive looting has taken its toll, resulting in additional bones and sherds scattered out of their original contexts across the site and creating urgent pressure to record what remains before it is lost.

Under the direction of Jerry Rose of the University of Arkansas, Project experts have been examining the skeletal remains. “Preliminary indications are that they lived hard, short lives,” reports Kemp and colleagues.**  In 2015, examination of the skeletal remains will continue, and Kemp hopes to begin excavating at locations near the North Tomb.

The pharaoh Akhenaten, best known as the ‘heretic pharaoh’, employed thousands of workers and officials to build and administer the city of Akhetaten (Amarna) as his new capital on virgin land north of Thebes in Middle Egypt. Dedicated to the veneration of his new monotheistic religion of worship to the Aten, construction commenced in or around Year 5 of his reign (1346 BC) and is thought to have been completed by Year 9 (1341 BC). Unlike all other ancient Egyptian cities, it is the only one that preserved details of its internal plans. This city, however, was short-lived, lasting only 15 years until Akhenaten’s death. Akhenaten’s son Tutankhamun moved the capital back to Thebes upon his father’s death and returned Egyptian worship to its former pantheon of gods.

More information about the Amarna Project can be obtained at the website, where individuals may also find a utility to donate to support the project efforts. Those interested in participating in the project may also visit the applicable University of Arkansas website.

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* JEA 10, 1924, 303-304.

** _{http://www.amarnaproject.com/} 

Cover Image, Top Left: View of the South Tomb area at Amarna. Kurohito, Wikimedia Commons

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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.

At a prehistoric site called Al Khiday, set along the White Nile in Central Sudan, archaeologist have uncovered evidence that shows prehistoric inhabitants there consumed significant quantities of a plant that contains both nutritional and medicinal qualities.

By sampling and analyzing chemical compounds and microfossils from the calcified dental plaque of human teeth from 14 individuals in burial grounds at the site spanning three different periods, the pre-Mesolithic, Neolithic, and Later Meroitic age, they were able to determine that humans ingested a specific plant, known as purple nut sedge, for at least 7,000 years, incorporating both pre-agricultural and agricultural periods. Widely regarded today as a weed and a nuisance, purple nut sedge apparently was an important staple in the diet of this prehistoric population, say the researchers in a study recently published in the journal PLOS ONE.

“By extracting material from samples of ancient dental calculus, we have found that rather than being a nuisance in the past, the purple nut sedge’s value as a food, and possibly its abundant medicinal qualities, were known,” says lead study author Karen Hardy. “We also discovered that these people ate several other plants, and we found traces of smoke, evidence for cooking, and for chewing plant fibres to prepare raw materials. These small biographical details add to the growing evidence that prehistoric people had a detailed understanding of plants long before the development of agriculture.”

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Above: One of the Late Meroitic graves excavated at the cemetery, that of a young male. Courtesy Donatella Usai/Centro Studi Sudanesi and Sub-Sahariani (CSSeS)

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The finding provides insight about how much prehistoric people knew about the ecology and potential therapeutic properties of plants. In addition to the nutritional benefits of purple nut sedge, for example, it inhibits a specific kind of Streptococcus that helps to lower the level of cavities. It explains why the teeth of the excavated skeletons at the site exhibited comparatively low levels of cavity formation.

The study is published in the July 16, 2014 issue of the open-access journal PLOS ONE  by Stephen Buckley from the University of York and colleagues.

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Source: Adapted and edited from a University of York press release.

The study: Buckley S, Usai D, Jakob T, Radini A, Hardy K (2014) Dental Calculus Reveals Unique Insights into Food Items, Cooking and Plant Processing in Prehistoric Central Sudan. PLoS ONE 9(7): e100808. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0100808

Funding: Archaeological fieldwork was funded by The Italian Minister of Foreign Affairs, Istituto Italiano per l’Africa e l’Oriente, Centro Studi Sudanesi e SubSahariani. The equipment used belongs to Pharos Research (UK) and Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation research project (grant number HAR2012-35376). The research described in this submission was unfunded. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.

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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.

When University of Arizona archaeologist Vance Holliday and colleagues began uncovering large fossilized bones at the site of El Fin del Mundo in the Sonoran Desert of northwestern Mexico in 2007, they weren’t sure what kind of animal they were unearthing. 

“At first, just based on the size of the bone, we thought maybe it was a bison, because the extinct bison were a little bigger than our modern bison,” said Holliday, who has been researching geoarchaeology at Paleoindian sites across the U.S. for years.

Then, in 2008, they discovered something that clinched it for them.

“We finally found the mandible, and that’s what told the tale,” Holliday said.

It was a gomphothere. Actually, two of them. About the same size as a modern elephant, but smaller than their extinct cousins the mammoths, gomphotheres were once widespread in North America but were thought to have disappeared from the fossil record long before humans arrived in North America some 13,000 to 13,500 years ago.

Until now.

Radiocarbon dating of charcoal flecks and burned bone found within the context of the fossils indicated a reliable age of 13,390 years. This made these two gomphotheres the last known gomphotheres in North America.

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Gomphothere mandible in place, upside down, at El Fin del Mundo excavation site. The fossil was fully prepared at the INAH zooarchaeology lab in Mexico City. Image courtesy of Vance T. Holliday.

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The fully excavated and prepared gomphothere mandible. Courtesy Joaquin Arroyo-Cabrales/Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia

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These sculptures, made by Mexican artist Sergio de la Rosa, show three elephant ancestors: (from left to right) the mastodon, the mammoth and the gomphothere. Courtesy Sergio de la Rosa

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But there was more.

As they excavated among the bones, they also uncovered human artifacts—Clovis artifacts, to be specific—including 7 projectile points, some stone cutting tools and 21 flint flakes from stone tool-making. The position and proximity of the Clovis fragments relative to the gomphothere bones at the site suggested that humans did in fact kill the two animals there. Of the seven points found at the site, four were in place among the bones, including one with bone and teeth fragments above and below. The other three points had eroded away from the bone bed and were found scattered nearby. This suggested that the gomphomeres were likely hunted and thus constituted a Clovis prey species, along with mammoths, mastodons, and bison, already known to have been hunted by the Clovis.

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A clear quartz Clovis point found near the bone bed at El Fin del Mundo. Although very difficult to shape into a tool, quartz was used by Clovis tool makers at several sites.  Courtesy INAH Sonora.

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 “This is the first Clovis gomphothere, it’s the first archaeological gomphothere found in North America, it’s the first evidence that people were hunting gomphotheres in North America, and it adds another item to the Clovis menu,” Holliday said.

The Clovis culture, today considered the oldest clearly defined and recognized Paleoindian culture in the Americas, is characterized by its distinctive stone tools, particularly the fluted projectile points. The first examples of this culture were discovered by archaeologists near Clovis, New Mexico, in the 1930s. The El Fin del Mundo site, along with the Aubrey site in Texas, is now among two sites that show the earliest solid evidence of Clovis hunting in North America, indicating that the earliest widespread and recognizable group of hunter-gatherers were already in place 13,390 years ago in the North American Southwest.

Holliday and colleagues suggest that the finds support the model of an American southwestern origin for the Clovis material culture. As they conclude in the study, published this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences:

“These data expand our understanding of the age range for Clovis, Clovis diet, raw material preference, and the late Pleistocene megafaunal assemblage of North America, and provide evidence for a southern origin of the Clovis technocomplex.”*

Holliday and the study team report that the radiocarbon ages from El Fin del Mundo were made based on testing the site’s charcoal, shell, and organic matter at the Arizona Accelerator Mass Spectrometry Laboratory.

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*Article #14-04546: “Human (Clovis)–gomphothere (Cuvieronius sp.) association ~13,390 calibrated yBP in Sonora, Mexico,” by Vance T. Holliday et al.

In addition to Holliday, authors of the PNAS paper include: lead author Guadalupe Sanchez, who has a doctorate in anthropology from the UA; UA alumni Edmund P. Gaines and Susan M. Mentzer; UA doctoral candidates Natalia Martínez-Tagüeña and Andrew Kowler; UA master’s student Ismael Sanchez-Morales; UA scientists Todd Lange and Gregory Hodgins; and Joaquin Arroyo-Cabrales at the Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia.

The dig at El Fin del Mundo, a joint effort between the U.S. and Mexico, was funded by the UA School of Anthropology’s Argonaut Archaeological Research Fund, the National Geographic Society, the Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia and The Center for Desert Archaeology in Tucson.

Source: Some material for this article was adapted and edited from a University of Arizona press release, Meet the gomphothere: UA archaeologist involved in discovery of bones of elephant ancestor

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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.

A team of archaeologists is surveying and excavating the remains of a major ancient Mycenaean citadel—an archaeological site featuring ruins that are turning out to be much more extensive than what meets the naked eye.

Under the leadership of Associate Professor Christofilis Maggidis of Dickinson College and the auspices of the Athens Archaeological Society, teams of specialists have been systematically surveying an imposing, island-like, flat-topped bedrock outcrop that rises 20-40 meters above a surrounding plain with a summit area stretching 49.5 acres at the northeastern edge of the Kopais basin in southeastern Greece. Known as the citadel of Glas and identified as consisting of ancient Mycenaean structures, the summit area featuring the ruins is estimated to measure ten times the size of the ancient citadel of Mycenaean Tiryns and seven times that of Mycenae, the famed city of Agamemnon of Homer’s Iliad.

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Map shows the region (red) of Greece wherein the Kopais basin and Glas are located. Wikimedia Commons

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Boeotia, where the Kopais basin and Glas are located, in the context of the nearby ancient central regions of Greece. Ministerofbadtimes, Wikimedia Commons

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Aerial view of Glas in the midst of the surrounding plain, showing massive Cyclopean walls enclosing and defining the site of the ancient remains. Courtesy Christofilis Maggidis

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“I first excavated at Glas in 1990 as a graduate student with my mentor, the late Spyros Iakovidis,” said Maggidis. “The unparalleled size of the citadel, its connection with the gigantic drainage project of Kopais, and the discovery of such important but few remains in the citadel indicating that the rest of the citadel was left vacant puzzled me since then.”

Begun in the 14th century BC, the drainage project of Kopais was a large-scale engineering effort of massive proportions which transformed the Kopais basin into what became the most fertile plain on mainland Greece. The ancient engineers drained marshland through a complex drainage control system, diverting six rivers and streams from the basin into two enormous canals that converged at the northeastern edge of the Kopais basin. The canals were flanked by massive embankments reinforced at some locations with double Cyclopean revetments that supported roads and were supplied with underground drains and channels directing water overflow into artificial polders, natural cavities and sinkholes, or to the Larymna bay. Archaeologists estimate that as much as 2,000,000 cubic meters of earth were moved to build dykes and embankments along the periphery of the basin, with more than 250,000 cubic meters of stone used to face the embankments.

Thought to be the administrative center for this expansive system, the citadel of Glas was protected by a massive Cyclopean wall about 5.50-5.80 meters thick, running along the edge of the natural outcrop summit platform and defining the periphery of the citadel for approximately 3 kilometers, featuring four gates and a cluster of three adjacent central enclosures. But, said Maggidis, “the citadel of Glas presented the lay-out of a fort with certain spatial peculiarities: only one third or less of the total area of the citadel (49.5 acres) seemed to be occupied by various buildings and structures (administrative buildings, storage facilities, workshops, kitchens, personnel residence quarters), whereas no other ruins had been located so far by surface survey anywhere else in the citadel.” The space outside the central enclosures, in other words, appeared to be void of structures. Why?

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The ancient gate structures of Glas. Courtesy Christofilis Maggidis

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General plan of the Glas site. Note the gaps where no structures are visible. Courtesy Christofilis Maggidis

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Structures excavated in area A (see the larger plan above this image) at the site. Courtesy Christofilis Maggidis

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For Maggidis, this just didn’t add up.

“I was convinced that Glas was much more than a fort administrating the drainage works of the Kopais lake and the local agricultural production, and decided to investigate the site further.”

And investigate he did.

Beginning in 2010, Maggidis and colleagues conducted a systematic geophysical survey of the citadel using ground penetrating radar (GPR), a Fluxgate gradiometer, electrical resistivity, and satellite imagery. The team focused primarily on unexplored areas and some already excavated sectors.

The results were illuminating.

“The citadel of Glas was not left void of structures outside the central enclosures after all, but was apparently covered with many buildings of various uses, including at least five large and well-built complexes, extensive residential quarters and clusters of buildings stretching between these complexes, (semi)circular structures (silos?), a cistern, staircases, retaining walls and terraces. This is the picture of a fortified town.”

Maggidis and colleagues had come much closer to uncovering the true proportions and complexity of the citadel. But looking ahead, he sees much more to be done.

“The systematic investigation of the Mycenaean citadel of Glas will continue and intensify in the next decade,” says Magiddis. “The geophysical survey will focus on the eastern (Sector IV) and the western part of the citadel (Sector V), while systematic excavation will target select building complexes, clusters, and structures.”

More information about the Glas survey and excavations can be obtained at the project website. A detailed article about the discoveries at the citadel of Glas will be published in the upcoming September issue of Popular Archaeology Magazine.

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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.

Original hand-written working notes of Bram Stoker on paper, grist that would find its way into his famous signature book, Dracula;

An original manuscript of James Joyce’s Ulysses;

The first and only existing printing of Benjamin Franklin’s Poor Richard’s Almanac; 

More than 100 personally inscribed letters of George Washington;

Parts of manuscripts from Charles Dickens’ Pickwick Papers and Nicholas Nickleby…………

These are but a tiny sampling of the holdings of the Rosenbach of the Free Library of Philadelphia, tucked almost inconspicuously among a row of 19th-century townhouses in the Rittenhouse-Fitler historic district in the center of bustling Philadelphia. It presents a streetside appearance that doesn’t turn heads like other major tourist sites in this city.

But make no mistake. Its outward appearance belies its significance. Within its walls is a collection of thousands of the original first-print books, manuscripts, letters, illustrations and other works of art of some the most famous and noteworthy literary, historical and artistic figures of the past, a treasure house for historians, historical archaeologists, others doing primary research………and for you and me. What arguably distinguishes it from most museums and archives of its kind is its offering of an up-close and personal experience: With a scheduled Hands-on Tour, the museum curators will permit the visitor to hold and turn the pages of an early printing of a book like Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland, or read from an original manuscript like Joseph Conrad’s Lord Jim, or view drawings made by William Blake himself. 

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The Rosenbach of the Free Library of Philadelphia. Wikimedia Commons

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The namesake institution was founded in 1954 by Dr. A.S.W. Rosenbach and his brother, Philip. As book, manuscript, and fine art dealers, they were also instrumental in the establishment of private libraries that became the repository for important rare books. Among these libraries are the well known Folger and Huntington Libraries. In the 1970’s, the Rosenbach became the central repository for the works of Maurice Sendak (author and illustrator of the book, Where the Wild Things Are, among others), and remains so today. 

Now, for the first time, the Rosenbach has opened a special exhibit for the general public displaying pages from the manuscript of James Joyce’s Ulysses, side-by-side with the Shakespearean plays and poems that inspired it. It will show until August 31, 2014. And until November 2, 2014, visitors can view an exhibit that relates how Maurice Sendak’s art reflected the effects of events in his life that caused personal turmoil. 

For those of us who like books, old things, and history, it could pleasantly top off a memorable visit to this historic city.

For more information about the Rosenbach of the Free Library of Philadelphia, go to the website, or visit the museum at 2008 Delancey Place in Philadelphia, not far from Rittenhouse Square.

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Cover Photo, Top Left: Fall of Princes by John Lydgate England, probably London, c. 1465–75, Boccaccio Has a Vision of Adam and Eve. Boccaccio’s tale of the fall of noble persons begins with Adam and Eve. The opening miniature shows Boccaccio seated at his desk as Adam steps into the room. Outside, Eve receives the apple from a human-headed serpent twisted around the Tree of Knowledge. Document housed in the Rosenbach Museum

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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.

Popular Archaeology Magazine, an exclusively digital, U.S.-based magazine dedicated to publishing new discoveries, developments and opportunites in archaeology and anthropology for a general and scholarly readership, has released two new versions of its quarterly publication designed for access through smartphones and tablets. The most recent issue, published in June, 2014, features stories about the news-making discoveries related to early humans in the Arabian Peninsula; excavations at a massive Bronze Age city-state site in Jordan; new discoveries at Mycenae, the city of Agamemnon; the excavation and preservation of a lost city in South America; a scientific report on excavations at Sima de las Palomas, a Neanderthal site in Spain; and a scientific report on excavations that have turned up 800,000-year-old early human remains, also in Spain. Readers can access the magazine app at The App and the ebook version at Amazon.com.

Once again, scientists examining an ancient human fossil are finding that the path of human evolution, at least over the last 100,000 years, is not as simple as evolutionists have thought.

In a recent study, researchers Xiu-Jie Wu, Wu Liu and Song Xing of the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology, Beijing, Isabelle Crevecoeur of PACEA, Université de Bordeaux, France, and Erik Trinkaus of Washington University in St. Louis, re-examined a circa 100,000-year-old archaic human skull originally found during excavations 35 years ago at the Xujiayao site in China’s Nihewan Basin. Based on their micro-CT scans of the interior configuration of the temporal bone, they found that the inner-ear formation closely resembled a formation long thought to occur only in Neanderthals.

“We were completely surprised,” Trinkaus said. “We fully expected the scan to reveal a temporal labyrinth that looked much like a modern human one, but what we saw was clearly typical of a Neandertal. This discovery places into question whether this arrangement of the semicircular canals is truly unique to the Neandertals.” Moreover, he said, “the discovery places into question a whole suite of scenarios of later Pleistocene human population dispersals and interconnections based on tracing isolated anatomical or genetic features in fragmentary fossils. It suggests, instead, that the later phases of human evolution were more of a labyrinth of biology and peoples than simple lines on maps would suggest.”

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The Xujiayao 15 late archaic human temporal bone from northern China, with the extracted temporal labyrinth, superimposed on a view of the Xujiayao site. Credit: Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology, Chinese Academy of Science

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The Xujiayao 15 temporal bone, with the extracted temporal labyrinth and its position in the temporal bone. Credit: Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology, Chinese Academy of Science

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Often well-preserved in mammal skull fossils, the semicircular canals are remnants of a fluid-filled sensing system that helps humans maintain balance when they change their spatial orientations, such as when running, bending over or turning the head from side-to-side.

Since the mid-1990s, when early CT-scan research confirmed its existence, the presence of a particular arrangement of the semicircular canals in the temporal labyrinth has been considered enough to securely identify fossilized skull fragments as being from a Neanderthal. This pattern is present in almost all of the known Neanderthal labyrinths. It has been widely used as a marker to set them apart from both earlier and modern humans.

The skull at the center of this study, known as Xujiayao 15, was found along with an assortment of other human teeth and bone fragments, all of which seemed to have characteristics typical of an early non-Neanderthal form of late archaic humans.

Trinkaus, who has studied Neanderthal and early human fossils from around the globe, said this discovery only adds to the rich confusion of theories that attempt to explain human origins, migrations patterns and possible interbreedings.

“The study of human evolution has always been messy, and these findings just make it all the messier,” Trinkaus said. “It shows that human populations in the real world don’t act in nice simple patterns.”

Research details are published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

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Source: Adapted and edited from a Washington University in St. Louis press release, Discovery of Neandertal trait in ancient skull raises new questions about human evolution.

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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.

Gone are the days when paleoanthropologists could characterize the path of human evolution as a simple, single homogenous line of progressive changes in human morphology and behavior. Or so suggests a collaborative group of scientists who, as detailed in a study published in the July 4, 2014 issue of Science, came up with a new synthesis, or at least the rudimentary framework of one. It is a developing scenario that, they argue, more accurately explains how earlier forms of Homo (early humans) and their Australopithecus forerunners eventually led to the emergence of Homo sapiens (modern humans), the last surviving hominin.

Led jointly by Susan Antón, professor of anthropology at New York University, paleoanthropologist Richard Potts, curator of anthropology and director of the Human Origins Program at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History, and Leslie Aiello, president of the Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research, the team studied paleoclimate, fossil, and stone tool evidence, leading to a developing consensus that suggests a rethinking of long-held assumptions about human origins and evolution. Based on a synthesis of the data, the researchers point to change and diversity of environmental conditions and the compelling need to survive by adapting to the changing conditions as a key to understanding how early humans were able to vary, survive and begin spreading from Africa to Eurasia 1.85 million years ago. The process entailed a diversification of species and genera differentiating and overlapping in time and morphology, beginning with some key elements once thought to define Homo but actually evolving in earlier Australopithecus ancestors between 3 and 4 million years ago.

Significant to the development of the new synthesis, Potts developed a new climate framework for East African human evolution that depicts most of the era from 2.5 million to 1.5 million years ago as a time of strong climate instability and shifting intensity of annual wet and dry seasons.

“Unstable climate conditions favored the evolution of the roots of human flexibility in our ancestors,” said Potts.  “The narrative of human evolution that arises from our analyses stresses the importance of adaptability to changing environments, rather than adaptation to any one environment, in the early success of the genus Homo.”

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Between 2.1 and 1.8 million years ago, the oldest known species of the human genus, Homo, exhibited diverse traits. These species include the 1470 Group and the 1813 Group, based on the Kenyan fossils KNM-ER 1470 (left) and KNM-ER 1813 (second from left), respectively. By 1.8 to 1.9 million years ago, the species Homo erectus had evolved in Africa and started to spread to Eurasia. Early populations of this long-lived species are represented by the Kenyan fossil KNM- ER 3733 (right) and the Georgian fossil Dmanisi Skull 5 (second from right). The three lineages — the 1470 group, the 1813 group, and Homo erectus — overlapped in time for several hundred thousand years. The Kenyan fossils, from the site of Koobi Fora in the Lake Turkana region of Kenya, are housed in the National Museums of Kenya. Fossils from Dmanisi are housed in the Georgian National Museum. Credits: Kenyan fossil casts – Chip Clark, Smithsonian Human Origins Program; Dmanisi Skull 5 – Guram Bumbiashvili, Georgian National Museum

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Hominin evolution from 3.0 to 1.5 Ma. Green: Australopithecus, Yellow: Paranthropus, Red: Homo. The icons indicate from the bottom the first appearance of stone tools at ~2.6 Ma, the dispersal of Homo to Eurasia at ~1.85 Ma, and the appearance of the Acheulean technology at ~1.76 Ma. The number of contemporaneous hominin taxa during this period reflects different strategies of adaptation to habitat variability. The cultural milestones do not correlate with the known first appearances of any of the currently recognized Homo taxa. Image courtesy of Antón et al., Science/AAAS 2014

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Evolutionary timeline of important anatomical, behavioral and life history characteristics that
were once thought to be associated with the origin of the genus Homo or earliest H. erectus. Image courtesy of Antón et al., Science/AAAS 2014

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Their analysis and conclusions could explain, at least in part, much of the new evidence that has emerged in recent years suggesting that multiple coexisting species of Homo overlapped geographically and developed differentiating morphological and behavioral characeristics. It contrasts with the long-held model of a large brain, long legs, the ability to craft tools and prolonged maturation periods evolving together as a single package at the start of the Homo lineage as African grasslands expanded and Earth’s climate became cooler and drier.

The researchers also analyzed ancient stone tools, isotopes found in teeth and cut marks found on animal bones in East Africa.

“Taken together, these data suggest that species of early Homo were more flexible in their dietary choices than other species,” said Aiello. “Their flexible diet—probably containing meat—was aided by stone tool-assisted foraging that allowed our ancestors to exploit a range of resources.”

The study authors concluded that flexibility likely strengthened the ability of human ancestors to successfully adapt to changing environments and emerge out of Africa, and explains the ability of the modern human species to occupy diverse habitats throughout the world.

The detailed study is published in the July 4, 2014 issue of Science magazine.

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Source: Adapted and edited from a press release of the Smithsonian Institution, Smithsonian scientist and collaborators revise timeline of human origins, 3 July 2014; and Early Human Traits Not Delivered in Single Package, Science, 3 July 2014.

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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? Purchase the mobile version of a recent issue of Popular Archaeology Magazine here for only $2.99.

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.

Tibetans were able to adapt to high altitudes thanks to a gene acquired when their ancestors mated with a species of human they helped push to extinction, according to a new report by University of California, Berkeley, scientists.

An unusual variant of a gene involved in regulating the body’s production of hemoglobin – the molecule that carries oxygen in the blood – became widespread in Tibetans after they moved onto the high-altitude plateau several thousand years ago. This variant allowed them to survive despite low oxygen levels at elevations of 15,000 feet or more, whereas most people develop thick blood at high altitudes, leading to cardiovascular problems.

“We have very clear evidence that this version of the gene came from Denisovans,” a mysterious human relative that went extinct 40,000-50,000 years ago, around the same time as the more well-known Neanderthals, under pressure from modern humans, said principal author Rasmus Nielsen, UC Berkeley professor of integrative biology. “This shows very clearly and directly that humans evolved and adapted to new environments by getting their genes from another species.”

This is the first time a gene from another species of human has been shown unequivocally to have helped modern humans adapt to their environment, he said.

Nielsen and his colleagues at BGI-Shenzhen in China will report their findings online July 2 in advance of publication in the journal Nature.

The gene, called EPAS1, is activated when oxygen levels in the blood drop, triggering production of more hemoglobin. The gene has been referred to as the superathlete gene because at low elevations, some variants of it help athletes quickly boost hemoglobin and thus the oxygen-carrying capacity of their blood, upping endurance. At high altitude, however, the common variants of the gene boost hemoglobin and its carrier, red blood cells, too much, increasing the thickness of the blood and leading to hypertension and heart attacks as well as low-birth-weight babies and increased infant mortality. The variant or allele found in Tibetans raises hemoglobin and red blood cell levels only slightly at high elevation, avoiding the side-effects seen in most people who relocate to elevations above 13,000 feet.

“We found part of the EPAS1 gene in Tibetans is almost identical to the gene in Denisovans and very different from all other humans,” Nielsen said. “We can do a statistical analysis to show that this must have come from Denisovans. There is no other way of explaining the data.”

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A Chinese researcher collects a blood sample from an ethnic Tibetan man participating in the DNA study. Credit: Beijing Genomics Institute (BGI-Shenzhen) photo

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The researchers first reported the prevalence of a high-altitude version of EPAS1 in Tibetans in 2010, based on sequencing of the genomes of numerous Han Chinese and Tibetans. Nielsen and his colleagues argued that this was the result of natural selection to adapt to about 40 percent lower oxygen levels on the Tibetan plateau. That is, people without the variant died before reproducing at a much higher rate than those with it. About 87 percent of Tibetans now have the high-altitude version, compared to only 9 percent of Han Chinese, who have the same common ancestor as Tibetans.

Nielsen and his colleagues subsequently sequenced the EPAS1 gene in an additional 40 Tibetans and 40 Han Chinese. The data revealed that the high-altitude variant of EPAS1 is so unusual that it could only have come from Denisovans. Aside from its low frequency in Han Chinese, it occurs in no other known humans, not even Melanesians, whose genomes are nearly 5 percent Denisovan. A high quality sequence of the Denisovan genome was published in 2012.

Nielsen sketched out a possible scenario leading to this result: modern humans coming out of Africa interbred with Denisovan populations in Eurasia as they passed through that area into China, and their descendants still retain a small percentage – perhaps 0.1 percent – Denisovan DNA. The group that invaded China eventually split, with one population moving into Tibet and the other, now known as Han Chinese, dominating the lower elevations.

He and his colleagues are analyzing other genomes to pin down the time of Denisovan interbreeding, which probably happened over a rather short period of time.

“There might be many other species from which we also got DNA, but we don’t know because we don’t have the genomes,” Nielsen said. “The only reason we can say that this bit of DNA is Denisovan is because of this lucky accident of sequencing DNA from a little bone found in a cave in Siberia. We found the Denisovan species at the DNA level, but how many other species are out there that we haven’t sequenced?”

Nielsen’s coauthors include former UC Berkeley postdoctoral fellow Emilia Huerta-Sánchez, now at UC Merced; postdocs Benjamin Peter and Nicolas Vinckenbosch of UC Berkeley’s Department of Integrative Biology; and colleagues in China, Hong Kong, Denmark, Saudi Arabia and Turkey.

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Source: Adapted and edited from a University of California press release: Extinct human cousin gave Tibetans advantage at high elevation

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On the go? Purchase the mobile version of a recent issue of Popular Archaeology Magazine here for only $2.99.

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.

For the Indiana Jones in all of us, the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, arguably the finest museum of its kind in the United States, is offering a summer packed with special guided tours, musical performances and other activities for all ages during the summer of 2014. Events and activities will include such things as Egyptian gallery tours, a Mexico and Central American gallery tour, summer night concerts, and special performances for children. This, of course, is in addition to the usual offering of galleries and exhibits always available to visitors on a regular basis.

Otherwise known as the Penn Museum, it is located at 3260 South Street, Philadelphia, PA 19104 at the intersection of Spruce Street and 33rd Street. Nearby landmarks include Franklin Field, across South Street, and the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, across 34th Street.

See the schedule and the website for more information about the museum.

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Cover Photo, Top Left: View of the Penn Museum. Mefman00, Wikimedia Commons

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On the go? Purchase the mobile version of a recent issue of Popular Archaeology Magazine here for only $2.99.

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.

Researchers have found that birth rates and life expectancy in the American Southwest between 900 BC and 1400 AD indicated a period of rapid population growth between about 500 AD and 1100 AD followed by a significant decline after 1300 AD, never again to recover the former growth.

The study, conducted with National Science Foundation funding by anthropology professor Tim Kohler and graduate student Kelsey Reese, both of Washington State University, analyzed data on thousands of human remains found at hundreds of sites across the Four Corners region of the Southwest. The data helped to create a chronology of the region’s “Neolithic Demographic Transition” — a time period when stone tool artifacts signaled the agricultural transition from cutting meat to pounding grain.  

“It’s the first step towards all the trappings of civilization that we currently see,” said Kohler.

Maize (corn), the region’s staple crop, was introduced as early as 2000 BC, but productivity was slow to rise until about 400 BC, said Kohler, when the crop is estimated to have provided around 80 percent of the regional population’s calories. A corresponding gradual rise in birth rates ensued until about 500 A.D.

Then, growth rates varied across the region. People in the Sonoran Desert and Tonto Basin, in what is today Arizona, were more culturally advanced, with irrigation, ball courts, and eventually elevated platform mounds and compounds housing elite families. Yet birth rates were higher among people to the north and east, in the San Juan basin and northern San Juan regions of northwest New Mexico and southwest Colorado.

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Aerial view of Pueblo Bonito in Chaco Canyon, New Mexico. Bob Adams, Wikimedia Commons

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Kohler suggested that the Sonoran and Tonto people might have had difficulty finding new farming opportunities for their posterity, as corn farming required irrigation. Water from canals may have also carried harmful protozoa, bacteria and viruses. But groups to the northeast would have been able to expand maize production into new areas as their populations grew, he said.

Around 900 A.D., populations remained high but birth rates began to fluctuate. The mid-1100s saw one of the largest known droughts in the Southwest, when the region had likely hit its carrying capacity, with continued population growth and limited resources similar to what Thomas Malthus predicted for the industrial world in 1798.

From the mid-1000s to 1280—by which time all the farmers had left—evidence indicates that conflicts raged across the northern Southwest, but birth rates remained high.

“They didn’t slow down—birth rates were expanding right up to the depopulation,” said Kohler. “Why not limit growth? Maybe groups needed to be big to protect their villages and fields.”

“It was a trap,” said Kohler. “A Malthusian trap but also a violence trap.”

The northern Southwest had as many as 40,000 people in the mid-1200s, but within 30 years it was empty. Kohler hypothesizes that the population may have become too large to be sustained as climates deteriorated, and the lower population would not have adequately maintained the social unity needed for defense and new infrastructure.

But whatever the reason, he said, the experience of the ancient Puebloans could suggest that “population growth has its consequences.”

The paper is published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences as “Long and spatially variable Neolithic Demographic Transition in the North American Southwest,” by Timothy A. Kohler and Kelsey M. Reese.

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Edited and adapted from a Washington State University press release, “WSU Researchers chart an ancient baby boom”.

Cover Photo, Top Left: A digital model of ancient Pueblo Bonito (Chaco Canyon, New Mexico, U.S.) before it was abandoned. Wikimedia Commons

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On the go? Purchase the mobile version of the current issue of Popular Archaeology Magazine here for only $2.99.

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.

Researchers continue to make progress in their efforts to understand an essential aspect of prehistoric lifeways and a major contributing factor in the dynamics of human evolution — the human diet. In two studies, one focusing on an archaeological site in Spain, the other in the Turkana Basin in Africa, scientists are suggesting that early humans had a more diverse diet than traditionally thought.

In the first study, published June 25 in the open access journal PLOS ONE, Ainara Sistiaga from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and University of La Laguna and colleagues examine human fecal matter (poop) detected in sediment samples taken from different occupational floor levels at the site of El Salt in Spain, a site known to have been inhabited by Neanderthals 50,000 years ago. The fecal matter indicated, based on the analysis of fecal biomarkers, that these Neanderthals predominantly consumed meat, consistent with the widely accepted dietary model for Neanderthals, but that they also consumed plant foods. One of the fecal biomarkers was formed by the bacterial reduction of cholesterol in the gut (coprostanol), an indicator of meat consumption, but the other showed the presence of a compound found in plant sources, evidence of significant plant intake.

“Taken together, these data suggest that the Neanderthals from El Salt consumed both meat and vegetables, in agreement with recent hypotheses based on indirect evidence,” conclude Sistiaga and colleagues in the study. “Future studies in Middle Palaeolithic sites using the fecal biomarker approach will help clarify the nature, role and proportion of the plant component in the Neanderthal diet, and allow us to assess whether our results reflect occasional consumption or can be representative of their staple diet.”*

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View of El Salt archeological site. Credit: Ainara Sistiaga

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In another study, to be published soon in the Journal of Human Evolution, scientists have found that aquatic fauna (fish and other water-based animals) may have been a highly nutritious source of food for early Pleistocene humans living in the Turkana Basin of East Africa almost 2 million years ago. In this case, Will Archer of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology and colleagues employed multiple datasets to examine aquatic resource use in the early Pleistocene by focusing on four components of aquatic faunal assemblages: taxonomic diversity; skeletal element proportions; bone fragmentation; and bone surface modification from tool use. These components were used to identify associations between early Pleistocene aquatic remains and hominin behavior at the site of FwJj20 in the Koobi Fora Formation of the Turkana Basin in Kenya. The researchers focused on two dominant aquatic species: catfish and turtles.

Based on their findings, the researchers suggest that aquatic food sources provided hominins (early humans) with a significant alternative or supplement to other, terrestrial food sources. They also suggest that aquatic food sources provided some important advantages, such as “(1) a probable reduction in required investment of energy relative to economic return in the form of nutritionally dense food items, (2) a decrease in the technological costs of resource acquisition, and (3) a reduced level of inter-specific competition associated with carcass access and an associated reduction of predation risk relative to terrestrial sources of food.”**

The Turkana Basin, which includes Lake Turkana and the Koobi Fora (ridge) Formation, is well known in human evolution studies as one of the richest and most important sources of hominin fossils shedding light on the evolution of man over the past 4.2 million years.

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Lake Turkana in the Turkana Basin. Near the ancient shores of this lake, some of the most important early human finds were discovered. Doron, Wikimedia Commons

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*Sistiaga A, Mallol C, Galvan B, Summons RE (2014) The Neanderthal Meal: A New Perspective Using Faecal Biomarkers. PLOS ONE 9(6): e101045. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0101045  http://dx.plos.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0101045

** Will Archera, David R. Braunb, Jack W.K. Harrisc, Jack T. McCoyd, Brian G. Richmond, Early Pleistocene aquatic resource use in the Turkana Basin http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S004724841400056

Cover Photo, Top Left: View of El Salt archeological site. Credit: Ainara Sistiaga

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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? Purchase the mobile version of the current issue of Popular Archaeology Magazine here for only $2.99.

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.

Archaeologists are now onsite at Tel Megiddo, in northern Israel, to continue large-scale excavations at what has often been called the “crown jewel” of archaeological sites of the Levant, or Eastern Mediterranean region.

Led by well-known archaeologists Israel Finkelstein of Tel Aviv University and Eric Cline of the George Washington University, a team of archaeologists, students, volunteers and other specialists will be excavating where they left off in 2012, when they encountered a large building featuring 18 pillars dated to the Iron Age IIA period, (around 1000 BCE).  South of the building they uncovered a hoard of six iron daggers and two bronze bowls, dating to the Iron Age I (1200 – 1000 BCE).

Tel Megiddo, a World Heritage site, is best known for the remains of a large Canaanite center that once ruled at a location strategically placed at one of the most important military and trade routes in the ancient Near East, the Via Maris, dominating trade and commercial traffic for over 6,000 years beginning around 7000 BCE. The city is often mentioned in ancient literature and documents such as the Hebrew Bible and the el-Amarna letters of ancient Egypt, particularly as the site of epic battles that changed the course of ancient history in the region. As the inspiration for James Michener’s novel, The Source, the site affords a layer-cake of remains of ancient civilizations that came and went at the location, each succeeding civilization building upon the ruins of predecessors. This has created a treasure for archaeologists and their sponsors, who for decades have been unearthing monumental temples, palace complexes, massive fortifications, and sophisticated water systems, adding to our understanding of Bronze Age and Iron Age settlement and lifeways in the Levant. Some of the major finds of recent seasons have included a hoard of gold, silver and bronze jewelry, all wrapped in fabric and hidden in a vessel dated to around 1100 B.C.; and an Early Christian prayer hall with a mosaic floor discovered at a prison site near the Tel.

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The Iron Age city gate at Megiddo, one of the main attractors for toursits at the site. Golf Bravo, Wikimedia Commons

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Model of Megiddo in its ancient fortified glory. Alma Guinness, Wikimedia Commons

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For the 2014 season, archaeologists will continue work on the pillared structure exposed in 2012; expose some late Middle Bronze Age (1800 – 1540 BCE) domestic architecture; continue to excavate parts of the early Middle Bronze Age fortification system which includes a massive mudbrick wall and glacis (defensive slope construction); study areas related to Late Bronze-Iron Age street levels; expose more of the Late Bronze Age levels excavated previously; and conduct exploratory soundings in three new locations.

The Tel Megiddo Expedition offers one of the best field school and excavation experiences for students and volunteers in the Levant. More information about the Expedition and the field school can be obtained at their website.

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Cover Photo, Top Left: The Megiddo altar. James Emery, Wikimedia Commons

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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? Purchase the mobile version of the current issue of Popular Archaeology Magazine here for only $2.99.

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.

Stonehenge’s Singing Stones 

Could the massive standing stones of Stonehenge also have made sounds? The New York Times 

Archaeologists to Assess Condition of Kedarnath Temple

A team of archaeologists and officials left Wednesday for the Kedarnath temple in Uttarakhand to assess the condition of the shrine that was badly damaged in flash floods a year ago……. Mid-Day

The Last Biblical Frontier

Archeologists unearth findings in biblical site dating back to Joshua and the Judges. The Jerusalem Post

Archaeologists discover 4,000-year-old necklace was made from dog whelk and tusk shells

Bronze Age Brits were wearing bling around 4,000 years before today’s flashy pop stars and footballers, reveals new research. Daily Mail

The recent recovery and analysis of 17 early human fossil skulls from the Sima de los Huesos (“Pit of Bones”) cave pit site in the Sierra de Atapuerca cave system of northern Spain have illuminated our understanding of how Neandertals, a more ancient, extinct sister species of Homo sapiens (modern humans), actually evolved, according to a study report published this week in Science.

Currently led by Juan Luis Arsuaga of the Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Spain, archaeological teams have been excavating at the site for four decades, and have recovered the largest assemblage of early human fossils ever discovered at any one site in the world. 

“After thirty years, we have recovered nearly 7,000 human fossils corresponding to all skeletal regions of at least 28 individuals,” says study co-author Ignacio Martinez, Professor of Paleontology at the University of Alcalá. “This extraordinary collection includes 17 fragmentary skulls, many of which are very complete.”

The 17 skulls, according to the researchers, represent a single population of a hominin (early human) species. Although some of have been studied before, seven are presented anew here, and six are more complete than ever before, after many hours of painstaking assemblage in the lab. Now, with the mostly intact samples for study, the researchers have been able to more clearly define the common features of what they believe to be a single population. 

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The Sima de los Huesos site. Image courtesy Javier Trueba / Madrid Scientific Films

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The fossils exhibited a mosaic of physical characteristics that could not be wholly attributed to any single, recognized human species to date. The skull samples showed clear Neandertal features in the face and teeth. The researchers suggest these ‘Neandertal-derived’ features were functionally related to mastication, or chewing. “It seems these modifications had to do with an intensive use of the frontal teeth,” Arsuaga said. “The incisors show a great wear as if they had been used as a ‘third hand,” typical of Neanderthals.” But elsewhere, the skulls showed characteristics that diverted from the Neandertal model. The braincase itself, for example, still showed features associated with more primitive hominins.

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Skull 17 from the Sima de los Huesos site in Sierra de Atapuerca, Spain. Image courtesy Javier Trueba / Madrid Scientific Films

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Skull 15. Image courtesy Javier Trueba / Madrid Scientific Films

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Skull 9. Image courtesy Javier Trueba / Madrid Scientific Films

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Observations like these led the researchers to suggest support for the ‘accretion model’ of Neandertal evolution, or something similar to cladogenesis, wherein evolution takes place through a splitting of species into branches or “clades”, leading to the development of a greater variety of sister species.

However, according to Arsuaga,”we think based on the morphology that the Sima people were part of the Neanderthal clade, although not necessarily direct ancestors to the classic Neanderthals.”

“One thing that surprised me about the skulls we analyzed,” Arsuaga continued, “is how similar the different individuals were. The other fossils of the same geological period are different and don’t fit in the Sima pattern. This means that there was a lot of diversity among different populations in the Middle Pleistocene.”

In other words, because other European Middle Pleistocene fossil specimens found in Europe do not exhibit the suite of features seen in this fossil group, the researchers suggest that more than one evolutionary lineage appears to have coexisted during the European Middle Pleistocene, with that represented by the Sima sample being closer to the Neandertals. The work of Arsuaga et al. suggests that facial modification was the first step in Neandertal evolution, a mosaic pattern fitting the prediction of the accretion model.

Key to the study findings was the homogeneity of the Sima samples. “All of the individuals recovered at the site represent the same biological population which makes it possible for anthropologists to study individual variation as well as sexual differences in the skeleton and patterns of growth and development, among other aspects,” report Arsuaga, et al. in a press release of the Centro Mixto UCM-ISCIII de Evolución y Comportamiento Humano. “While considerable differences in size are apparent within the collection, with some larger skulls and some smaller ones, the anatomical features that anthropologists study to examine evolutionary relationships do not vary much within the Sima population. This combination of mosaic evolution and anatomical homogeneity led the authors to favor a branching pattern of evolution, known as cladogenesis in evolutionary studies, in the European Middle Pleistocene.”

So what species do these Sima fossils represent? The study authors do not assign the fossils to any specific species. But mitochondrial DNA was recently extracted and analyzed from one of the Sima fossils. The results suggest that this population was not a group of “early Neandertals”. Nor, as has been previously suggested, were they representatives of another early human species called Homo heidelbergensis, thought to be ancestral to the Neandertals. The Sima jawbones (mandibles) were observed to be anatomically distinct from that of heidelbergensis. 

But there is much more to come from the Pit of Bones.

“With excavations continuing and new fossils being discovered each field season,” report Arsuaga, et al., “there is certainly reason to believe that the Sima de los Huesos will yield more surprising findings in the future.”

A detailed feature article about the work and latest findings at Sima de los Huesos will be published in the upcoming September 2014 issue of Popular Archaeology Magazine.

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Information Sources: Press releases of the Centro Mixto UCM-ISCIII de Evolución y Comportamiento Humano and the American Association for the Advancement of Science

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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? Purchase the mobile version of the current issue of Popular Archaeology Magazine here for only $2.99.

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.

Joseph Smith Cabin Foundation Excavated at Historic Site

Archaeologists are excavating the early nineteenth-century cabin of Joseph Smith Sr. and wife Lucy Mack, who were parents of Joseph Smith, the founder of the Mormon church. They have also uncovered prehistoric artifacts. The Quincy Herald-Whig 

Tiwanaku Tombs Uncovered in Peru

Archaeologists have discovered tombs from the Tiwanaku culture in Peru’s Tambo Valley. Peru This Week

Archaeologists Dig Outside the James Fort

Excavations at historic Jamestown in Virginia are now focusing on searching for evidence of the outlying palisades, soldiers’ tents, and other structures. The Daily Press

Remains of Plague Victims Discovered at Thebes in Egypt

Archaeologists have unearthed the remains of third-century plague victims at the Funerary Complex of Harwa and Akhimenru of ancient Thebes.  Live Science

Teams of archaeologists, students and volunteers will return this month to the site of ancient Jaffa on the central coast of Israel to pick up where they left off in 2013, when they uncovered more of the sensational evidence of a fiery destruction at the site’s ancient Amarna period New Kingdom Egyptian fortress gate. The continuing investigations will also include new elements — the search for the ancient harbor complex, and excavation of evidence of a 14th century B.C. destruction layer at the remains of the site’s Lion Temple. 

Under the direction of project co-directors Aaron Burke, Associate Professor of the Archaeology of Ancient Israel at the University of California, Los Angeles, and Martin Peilstöcker of the Isral Antiquities Authority, one team will continue the excavations at the famous fourteenth century B.C. Egyptian fortress gate complex, where in 2013 they uncovered the stark remains of an extensive violent destruction.

Excavations in 2012 first revealed the evidence, with clues to its extent indicated when excavators discovered a commemorative scarab of Amenhotep III dated to the mid-fourteenth century B.C., found within the upper destruction layers and apparently fallen from what the archaeologists interpreted as a second story administrative office floor. A year later, in 2013, they exposed the city gate’s passageway below more than 1.5 meters of destruction debris. The finds included arrowheads, a spearhead and lead weight, decorative ivory inlays, numerous charred seeds, a number of ceramic vessels, antlers from deer, and nearly two dozen cedar timbers thought to have once made up the gate’s roof and upper story. The seeds, identified as those of barley, olive pits, grape pips, and chick peas were a welcome find, as they provide an insight to the foods consumed at the site.

The assortment of artifacts paint a picture of a city gate that functioned as something more than purely a defensive structure — a complex that housed administrators, storerooms, and other support facilities. Speaking of the antlers, for example, Burke and Peilstöcker noted that they “suggest that the gate was not a stark and utilitarian space as many reconstructions of Egyptian gates suggest. Instead, it would seem that Egyptian soldiers hung these items within the passageway as trophies of their hunting around Jaffa.”**

The timbers, the earliest and largest such ancient timbers from that time period found in Israel to date, are thought to have been used in the construction of the gate’s second story and roof. Reported Burke and Peilstöcker in a press release: “They will provide not only important chronological data such as evidence for the date of the construction of the gate complex but also will contribute to refining our understanding of the evolution of Egyptian rule in Canaan since the gate is one in a sequence of gates providing evidence for the earliest Egyptian fortress in Canaan. As important proxies for climate change, the timbers also offer a unique opportunity for an improved study of the Late Bronze Age environment.”**

Burke and Peilstöcker hope to shed light on the nature of coexistence between the Egyptian occupiers and the native Canaanite inhabitants of the area. “New archaeological data combined with well-known historical texts of the Late Bronze Age are now shedding light on the nature of interactions between the Canaanite inhabitants of Jaffa and its environs and the Egyptian inhabitants of the New Kingdom fortress built atop the city’s earlier remains,” reports Burke and Peilstöcker. “The resulting picture is one colored by episodes of violence and peaceful social interactions in Jaffa over a period of more than 300 years, from ca. 1460 to 1130 BC.”*

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Above: The Gate passageway and south tower following excavations in July 2013. Photo 2013-P0408, courtesy Jaffa Cultural Heritage Project.
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The charred remains of cedar timber/beams were encountered during the 2013 excavation. Courtesy Jaffa Cultural Heritage Project

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The city of Jaffa has been an important port city for over 4,000 years. By the Late Bronze Age, Jaffa had become a principal port and garrison for the New Kingdom Egyptian empire. Mentioned four times in the Hebrew Bible, it was named as one of the cities given to the Hebrew Tribe of Dan (Book of Joshua 19:46), as a port-of-entry for the cedars of Lebanon for Solomon’s Temple (2 Chronicles 2:16), as the place from which the prophet Jonah embarked for Tarshish (Book of Jonah 1:3) and as the port-of-entry for the cedars of Lebanon that were used in the construction of the Second Temple of Jerusalem (Book of Ezra 3:7). The city is also mentioned in the ancient Egyptian Amarna letters.

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The view of Jaffa from the sea (as seen in 1895). From the Detroit Publishing Company Collection, Trialsanderrors, Wikimedia Commons

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Additional investigation at the site will entail excavation in the area of the “Lion Temple”, a structure thought to exhibit characteristics of a sacred or religious nature. The structure acquired its name from the discovery of a lion skull in its southeastern corner by Jacob Kaplan during his excavations there in the early 1970’s. It is thought to be a Caananite building.

The 2014 season will also see exploratory efforts under Shelley Wachsmann of Texas A&M University, whose team will be investigating the area thought to contain the remains of the ancient harbor of Jaffa. The team will use remote-sensing in a deep-water survey for ancient shipwrecks, testing the application of archaeogeophysical and geoarchaeological techniques to identify the ancient harbor. The investigation will also employ a Remotely Operated Vehicle (ROV) to verify anomalies at the 50 to 300 meter depth range that were previously detected.

More information about the Jaffa project can be obtained at the Jaffa Cultural Heritage Project website, and a detailed article about the Jaffa excavations was published in the March 2013 issue of Popular Archaeology.

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* https://popular-archaeology.com/issue/march-2013/article/the-egyptian-fortress-in-jaffa

** http://www.nelc.ucla.edu/jaffa/assets/2013_JCHP_Press_Release.pdf (2013 excavation summary)

Cover Photo, Top Left: Excavations of the 14th century BC destruction debris in the Egyptian gateway in Jaffa during fourth week. — with Kandis Gordon, Kris Kowa, Molly Stevens, Kayla Allen, Amy Karoll, Nadia Ben-Marzouk, Jon Schadeberg, Tania Fenwick, Heidi Dodgen and Dani Zwang in Jaffa, Israel. Caption text and photo courtesy Jaffa Cultural Heritage Project

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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? Purchase the mobile version of the current issue of Popular Archaeology Magazine here for only $2.99.

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.