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Known as Vada Volaterrana, it has been identified as a key port system located in present-day Tuscany, Italy, used anciently by the Romans of the city of Volaterrae (today’s Volterra) for the import and export of trade goods throughout the Mediterranean. The main harbor was located north of the mouth of the Cecina river, at S. Gaetano di Vada. Here, the University of Pisa has been excavating, since the 1980s, a significant commercial quarter that has yielded major structures and numerous artifacts that have testified to a facility built during the Augustan age but lasting through to the sixth-seventh centuries, C.E. 

Currently led by Simonetta Menchelli of the Laboratory of Ancient Topography of the University of Pisa and Stephano Genovesi of the Archaeological Superintendences of Tuscany, Liguria and Sardinia, the team has uncovered two thermal baths, a large warehouse (horreum) with about 36 cells, a large water tank, a monumental fountain, and a building with three large apses, decorated with remarkable wall paintings and surrounding an open squared courtyard. 

“The findings of amphorae, pottery, coins, glass vessels and marbles testify to the intensive trade activities; every kind of goods arrived from the entire Mediterranean Sea basin, to be redistributed from the port to the countryside and the city of Volaterrae, and here local products were shipped out,” report the excavation directors. “[The] production of wine was especially developed; [we found] many workshops where amphorae were made. The main trade route of Volterra’s wine led to the South of France and, further north, to the river Rhine, where the wine was consumed mainly by Roman legionaries stationed in the camps guarding the borders of the Empire.”*

The ancient city of Volterra, or Volaterrae, which was served by the Vada Volaterrana port system, was first settled by the Etruscans in the 8th century B.C.E. During the succeeding centuries the village had developed into a major city with power over a vast territory, rich in mineral resources and salines. Tombs excavated in the area revealed the existence of a wealthy Etruscan aristocracy, with the means to acquire bronze and ceramic objects from the cities of Southern Etruria, and from Greece. During the 3rd century, B.C.E, the city was absorbed under the rule of Rome. Eventually, some of the members of the Volterran aristocracy became Roman senators, injecting influence into the affairs of an expanding Roman Empire. The city features an ancient Roman theater and thermal baths and houses, which have been the subject of previous archaeological investigations.

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View of the Roman theater at Volterra. Jean-Christophe Benoist, Wikimedia Commons

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The most recent excavations of the port system commercial facilities in 2013 revealed the remains of a rectangular structure with thick (90 cm) walls. Three rooms have thus far been identified, with a northern-most room exhibiting a semi-circular apse-like feature, tentatively interpreted as a possible small shrine. Within the same excavation area archaeologists have unearthed some remains of a Late Antiquity (fifth-sixth century C.E.) necropolis, where they found two burials featuring bodies that were interred using large re-used amphorae. Not uncommon, it is a burial type called enchytrismós. “A few bones allowed us to identify one of them as the burial of a 4 – 5-year-old child,” reported the directors.**

In 2014, archaeologists hope to continue their excavations at the newly discovered structure to develop a better understanding of the stratigraphic sequence and construction phases of the building; further explore the tombs containing amphorae burials; conduct GPR surveys to identify workshop structures; and survey other areas with an eye toward extending investigations around the settlement.  

For more information about the project and how one can participate and otherwise support the work at the site, go to the website for more information.

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*http://www.diggingvada.com/

**http://www.diggingvada.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/Report_Vada_2013.pdf

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Because the structure of human bones can inform us about the lifestyles of the individuals they belong to, they can provide valuable clues for biological anthropologists looking at past cultures. Research by Alison Macintosh, a PhD candidate in Cambridge University’s Department of Archaeology and Anthropology, shows that after the emergence of agriculture in Central Europe from around 5300 BC, the bones of those living in the fertile soils of the Danube river valley became progressively less strong, pointing to a decline in mobility and loading.

Macintosh presents some of her results at the Annual Meeting of the American Association of Physical Anthropologists in Calgary, Alberta on April 8-12, 2014. Her research shows that mobility and lower limb loading in male agriculturalists declined progressively and consistently through time and were more significantly affected by culture change in Central Europe than they were in females.

Work published by Cambridge University’s biological anthropologist Dr.  Colin Shaw has enabled Macintosh to interpret this male decline in relation to Cambridge University students. Using Shaw’s study of bone rigidity among modern Cambridge University undergraduates, Macintosh suggests that male mobility among the earliest farmers (around 7,300 years ago) was, on average, at a level near that of today’s student cross-country runners. However, within just over 3,000 years, average mobility had dropped to the level of those students rated as sedentary, after which the decline slowed.

“Long-term biomechanical analyses of bones following the transition to farming in Central Europe haven’t been carried out. But elsewhere in the world they show regional variability in trends. Sometimes mobility increases, sometimes it declines, depending on culture and environmental context. After the transition to farming, cultural change was prolonged and its pace was rapid. My research in Central Europe explores whether – and how – this long term pressure continued to drive adaptation in bones,” said Macintosh.

Archaeological evidence has shown that the gradual intensification of agriculture was accompanied by rising production and complexity of metal goods, technological innovation and the extension of trade and exchange networks. “These developments are likely to have brought about changes in divisions of labour by sex and socioeconomic organisation as men and women began to specialise in certain tasks and activities – such as metalworking, pottery, crop production, tending and rearing livestock,” said Macintosh.

“I’m interested in how the skeleton adapted to people’s specific behaviours during life, and how this adaptation can be used to reconstruct long-term changes in behaviour and mobility patterns with cultural diversification, technological innovation, and increasingly more complex and stratified societies since the advent of farming.”

As a means of tracking changes in the structure of bones over time, Macintosh laser-scanned skeletons found in cemeteries across Central Europe, concentrating in particular on an analysis of engineering-based cross-sectional geometric properties as measures of the loading imposed on the lower limb bones during life. Her research took her to Germany, Hungary, Austria, the Czech Republic and Serbia. The earliest skeletons she examined date from around 5300 BC and the most recent from around 850 AD – a time span of 6,150 years.

Using a portable desktop 3D laser surface scanner to scan femora and tibiae, she found that male tibiae became less rigid and that bones in both males and females became less strengthened to loads in one direction more than another, such as front-to-back in walking. These findings all indicate a drop in mobility. In other words, it is likely that the people to whom the skeletons belonged became, over generations, less intensely active and probably covered less distance, or carried out less physically demanding tasks, than those who had lived before them.

“Both sexes exhibited a decline in anteroposterior, or front-to-back, strengthening of the femur and tibia through time, while the ability of male tibiae to resist bending, twisting, and compression declined as well,” said Macintosh.

This supports previous findings that human bones are remarkably plastic and respond surprisingly quickly to change. For example, when placed under stress through physical exertion – such as long-distance walking or running – they gain in strength as the fibres are added or redistributed according to where strains are highest. The ability of bone to adapt to loading is shown by analysis of the skeletons of modern athletes, whose bones show remarkably rapid adaptation to both the intensity and direction of strains.

“My results suggest that, following the transition to agriculture in Central Europe, males were more affected than females by cultural and technological changes that reduced the need for long-distance travel or heavy physical work. This also means that, as people began to specialise in tasks other than just farming and food production, such as metalworking, fewer people were regularly doing tasks that were very strenuous on their legs.”

Although there was some evidence for declining mobility in females as well, trends were inconsistent through time in most properties. Macintosh believes that this variation may indicate that women in these early farming cultures were performing a great variety of tasks – multi-tasking, in fact – or at least undertaking fewer tasks necessitating significant lower limb loading. There is evidence from two of the earliest cemeteries studied that females were using their teeth in processing activities to carry out tasks unlikely to have loaded their lower limbs much.

Interesting comparisons can be made between the archaeological evidence from Central European skeletons dating from around 7,300-1,150 years ago and data from modern farming populations elsewhere in the world. For example, a study by Panter-Brick in 1996 found that relative workload (as exhibited by time allocation and energy expenditure) between males and females in modern farming populations is much more variable than in foraging groups. As in early Central European farming communities, higher physical activity is recorded among males than females in Indian and Nepalese farming communities, but females have a higher relative workload than males in farming communities in the Upper Volta and the Gambia.

“This variability in the sexual division of labour in living agro-pastoralist groups shows the importance of context, ecology, and various cultural factors on sex differences in physical activity. So it is important when studying long-term trends in behavioural change between the sexes that the geographic region is kept small, to help control for some of this variability,” said Macintosh.

Female skeletons showed a major change in femoral bending and torsional rigidity from the Bronze Age into the Iron Age – between about 1450 BC and 850 BC in the samples studied– when women had the strongest femora of all the females examined in the study. This could be because the Iron Age sample included skeletons of Hungarian Scythians, a group for whom large animal husbandry, horsemanship and archery were particularly important. Scythian females are thought to have performed heavy physical work and were known to participate in combat.

“However, if this high Iron Age female bone strength in the femur was due to high mobility, it would also probably be visible in the tibia as well, which it was not. In that case, it could be something other than mobility that is driving this Iron Age female bone strength, possibly a difference in body size or genetics,” said Macintosh.

The Big Picture Conclusion

Because the skeleton holds a record of the loading it experiences during life, it can provide important clues about the behaviour of past people through prolonged cultural change. Overall, in the first 6,150 years of farming in Central Europe, the prosperity generated by intensive agriculture drove socioeconomic change and allowed for people to specialise in tasks other than food production.

Macintosh said: “In Central Europe, adaptations in human leg bones spanning this time frame show that it was initially men who were performing the majority of high-mobility tasks, probably associated with tending crops and livestock. But with task specialisation, as more and more people began doing a wider variety of crafts and behaviours, fewer people needed to be highly mobile, and with technological innovation, physically strenuous tasks were likely made easier. The overall result is a reduction in mobility of the population as a whole, accompanied by a reduction in the strength of the lower limb bones.”

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Source: Edited from a University of Cambridge press release.

Cover Photo, Top Left: Bones inside the Sedlec Ossuary, Czech Republic. Jan Kamenicek, Wikimedia Commons

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.

And, Popular Archaeology’s annual Discovery edition 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.

Subscription Price: A very affordable $5.75 for those who are not already premium subscribers of Popular Archaeology Magazine (It is FREE for premium subscribers to Popular Archaeology). Premium subscribers should email [email protected] and request the special coupon code. Or, for the e-Book version, it can be purchased for only $3.99 at Amazon.com. 

Is it just pseudoscience, or something that will stand the test of additional research? 

According to one researcher’s analysis, there was an astronomically-based purpose to the curious yet incredibly precise way the massive stones of the 600-year-old Sacsayhuamán terrace walls were constructed high above and overlooking the ancient Inca capital of Cusco in Peru.  

The massive adjoining blocks of stone that constitute the Sacsayhuamán walls were placed so precisely and tightly together that, in many places, an individual cannot negotiate a piece of paper between them. But equally fascinating are the angles of their adjoining ends or sides. These angles defy, through an apparent randomness, the usual sense of regularity that comes from 90-degree angle ends or corners, characteristic of the vast majority of hewn stones that form the building blocks of ancient and modern structures world-wide. The curious angles formed by these stones, suggests Dr. Derek Cunningham, a published author and researcher, might possibly reflect, or illustrate, the ancient Inca knowledge of astronomical alignments of the moon, sun and the earth, as well as knowledge of lunar and solar eclipses.

Cunningham is not an archaeologist—-he stumbled into this research by accident. In his capacity as a clan historian for Clan Cunningham, he first noted a series of unusual ground patterns located close to some Scottish sites. His curiosity drove him on to look at other sites.

Speaking of the significance of the Sacsayhuamán stone angles, Cunningham continues: “Each astronomical value (there are 9 standard values in total) was chosen by ancient astronomers to aid the prediction of eclipses. These astronomical terms are a mixture of values astronomers use to measure time (the 27.32-day sidereal month) and values to determine when the moon, earth and sun align at nodes. This includes the use of the 18.6-year nodal cycle of the moon, the 6.511 draconic months period between eclipse seasons, and also the 5.1-degree angle of inclination of the moon’s orbit. The remaining values typically are either half-values of various lunar terms, or values connected to the 11-day difference between the lunar and solar years.”

As one example, Cunningham illustrates this idea with three drawings taken from various images, showing striking similarity in the angular values:

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Above: One Sacsayhuamán wall example. Drawing courtesy Derek Cunningham

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 Second Sacsayhuamán wall example. Drawing courtesy Derek Cunningham 

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 Above: View of a portion of the Sacsayhuamán complex. Wikimedia Commons

Above : Overhead drawing view of the Sacsayhuamán complex showing angular values. Drawing courtesy Derek Cunningham

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Cunningham suggests that his analysis of the Sacsayhuamán Temple is just one case of Stone Age astronomical ‘writing’, a form of writing that he maintains has been found on a large number of other much older artifacts distributed across several continents. His hypothesis revolves around the thought that our ancient ancestors developed ‘writing’ at least 30,000 years ago from a geometrical form of text that is based on the motion of the moon and the sun. He asserts that such ancient astronomical text, identical to that seen at Sacsayhuamán, is also found in both Lascaux and Chauvet caves in Europe, the African carved Ishango tally bone, and a circa 30,000-year-old carved stone found at the Shuidonggou Paleolithic Site in China.

“Now, substantial evidence has also been discovered that this archaic writing was used, perhaps almost continuously, until 500 years ago,” states Cunningham. “Recently the analysis of the Muisca Tunjo figurines from Columbia uncovered evidence that they were constructed to the exact same astronomical design as Bronze Age figurines uncovered in Cyprus. This discovery of such possible “recent” use of a Stone Age text thus prompted me to take a new look at circa 15th to 16th century Inca architecture, which is famous for its fabulous over-complex interlocking walls. The question I asked was could the massive polygonal walls of Sacsayhuamán align to the exact same astronomical values used in the Columbian Muiscan figurines, and the Atacama Giant of Chile? The surprising result is yes.”

“What is powerful about this new theory is that it is very simple and easy to test,” adds Cunningham. “Further work is of course required. Satellite images cannot clearly take the place of direct field work, and photographs placed online may have become distorted, but so far the data obtained appears highly consistent.” 

But is Cunningham reading things into all of these archaeological finds and structures that are really not there? One can imagine most scholars shaking their heads with a smirk of doubt. But Cunningham seems to be undaunted, and he makes clear that he is not trying to prove anything as gospel truth.

“I honestly do not care whether I am right or wrong about this,” he concludes. “All I have found so far is that the data is what it is. The potential of the idea to explain some things about so many sites from the pyramids of Egypt to the Atacama Giant in Chile is obviously very controversial, and it should be. But if correct, it could rewrite some aspects of our understanding of not only the Stone Age but also world history. If, on the other hand, scholars prove this specific astronomical theory wrong, then we can move on, knowing that it has been sufficiently tested. What is most intriguing is that a complete new window may have been opened into the past.”

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 The incredible Sacsayhuamán walls. Hakan Svensson, 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.

And, Popular Archaeology’s annual Discovery edition 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.

Subscription Price: A very affordable $5.75 for those who are not already premium subscribers of Popular Archaeology Magazine (It is FREE for premium subscribers to Popular Archaeology). Premium subscribers should email [email protected] and request the special coupon code. Or, for the e-Book version, it can be purchased for only $3.99 at Amazon.com. 

April 6th, 2014

Researcher Suggests Famous Ancient Inca Monumental Complex Exhibits Astronomical Values

Is it just pseudoscience, or something that will stand the test of additional research? According to one researcher’s analysis, there was an astronomically-based purpose to the curious yet incredibly precise way the massive stones of the 600-year-old Sacsayhuamán terrace walls were constructed high above and overlooking the ancient Inca capital of Cusco in Peru. (Popular Archaeology)

Archaeology | A single tooth can tell a lot about ancient people

What can you learn from a single tooth? Quite a lot, actually. University of Toronto archaeologist Susan Pfeiffer and an international team of scholars are recovering DNA as well as chemical isotopes from ancient American Indian teeth to sort out what happened in the northern Iroquoian communities of southern Ontario between the 13th and 16th centuries. (The Columbus Dispatch)

 Archaeological dig uncovers some of St. Louis’ first homes

A cool discovery underneath the Poplar Street Bridge where crews are preparing to replace two ramps.
A MoDot archaeological dig has uncovered evidence of two homes. The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports the log homes were built around 1770, only six years after St. Louis was founded. (KPLR St. Louis)

Ancient stormy weather: World’s oldest weather report could revise bronze age chronology

An inscription on a 3,500-year-old stone block from Egypt may be one of the world’s oldest weather reports — and could provide new evidence about the chronology of events in the ancient Middle East. A new translation of a 40-line inscription on the 6-foot-tall calcite block called the Tempest Stela describes rain, darkness and “the sky being in storm without cessation, louder than the cries of the masses.” (Science Daily)

The Çatalhöyük Research Project, an effort that consists of an international team of archaeologists and other experts from a consortium of universities and research institutions, has announced upcoming conferences to showcase and discuss the latest thinking about the excavation results at the iconic Neolithic and Chalcolithic proto-city settlement in southern Anatolia, in present-day Turkey. 

On location near the excavation site, the meetings will take place among two separate but adjoining conference sessions from August 2 through August 4, 2014. The first is part of a Templeton-funded project that is exploring the role of religion and ritual in the origin of settled life. Conference organizers are interested in addressing three foci related to this theme:  The first concerning the repetitive building of houses or cult buildings in the same place; the second, the possible cosmological layout of settlements; and the third, the timing of the emergence of a concern with history-making in a place, and its cosmological layout. “At what point in regional sequences do such features emerge and with what does their appearance correlate?”, write the organizers. “Can such correlations be used to suggest the causal processes that produced such features; causal processes such as agricultural intensification, population increase, social competition and so on?” The second conference is part of a Polish National Science Center grant aimed at investigating the upper Late Neolithic strata of the East mound at Çatalhöyük and recognizing the demise of the previously vibrant mega-city. This conference aims to address three intertwined issues: The first concerns the character of changes in other parts of the Near East in the second half of the 7th millennium BCE in relation to the developments at Çatalhöyük in a broader regional context; the second issue comprises social and ideological changes taking place at the end of the Neolithic and the beginning of the Chalcolithic; and the third concerns the changes in lifeways, subsistence basis, environment exploitation, and the modes of procurement, consumption and distribution of different resources.  “Did the Late Neolithic farmers,” added the organizers, “start to exploit a different set of resources originating from previously unexplored areas? Did the end of the 7th millennium BCE involve changes in farming strategies and shifts in the consumption patterns?” 

Çatalhöyük has been considered by scholars as a key example of the development of the world’s earliest societies. Initially excavated by James Mellaart in the early 1960s, the site has been widely recognised as one of the first urban centers in the world (at 7400 BCE) and exhibits some of the first wall paintings and mural art. The spectacular art provides a direct window into life 9,000 years ago, and the site has become an internationally important key for our understanding of the origins of agriculture and civilization. The aims of the current international project at Çatalhöyük involve full-scale modern archaeological excavation and conservation, and promotion of the site for visitor access. More recently, archaeological excavation and conservation was begun by an international team beginning in 1993 under the direction of Dr. Ian Hodder of the Çatalhöyük Research Project, Stanford University, under the auspices of the British Institute of Archaeology at Ankara, with a permit from the Turkish Ministry of Culture and Tourism, and in close collaboration with the University of California at Berkeley, University of London, Istanbul and Selcuk Universities in Turkey, and Poznan University in Poland. The work is currently focusing on extensive excavation of new areas of the site and the recovery, conservation and presentation of its paintings and sculpture. The work is planned to continue over 25 years.

The most recent excavations of 2013 led to a number of remarkable discoveries, including  a piece of cloth that was placed within a burial and preserved due to the conflagration of the building. “This cloth was actually wrapped around an infant and was preserved due to its partial carbonization,” wrote the excavation directors in a recent report. “In the same burial, a wooden bowl was preserved, placed on the head of another infant.”* The cloth was analyzed within laboratories on-site, and have been identified as linen made from flax. Scholars suggest that the finely woven material was likely traded from the Levant all the way to central Anatolia. Archaeologists have long known of long-distance trade of obsidian and shells at this time period in the Middle East, but this is the first indication that cloth or textile may have been part of that trade, perhaps exchanged for the obsidian from Cappadocia. 

Other discoveries emerged through excavations of additional Neolithic buildings. Wrote excavations director Ian Hodder: “Here we found buildings that indeed did differ very much from earlier buildings (with, for example very thick walls built with large flat bricks) and which had not been burned on abandonment. One of the buildings at this late phase had walls painted with designs not seen before. Normally the paintings at Çatalhöyük are made using dark paint (red or black mostly) on a white background, but in this case very regular white lines had been painted on a darker background. This painting continued along at least the east and north walls of the main room: it must have been a very bright and vibrant space.”*

More information about the Çatalhöyük Research Project and the conferences can be obtained at their website.

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Excavation staff discuss plans while overlooking the excavation in Trenches 1 and 2 of the ‘TP Connection’ during the 2013 season. Photo credit Jason Quinlan. Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

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Burial excavation: Excavators remove and record skeleton during 2013 excavations. Photo credit Jason Quinlan. Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

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Child burial covered with wood and fabric remains. Photo credit Jason Quinlan. Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

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The child burial with wood and fabric remains abutting the adult. Photo credit Jason Quinlan. Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

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Neolithic wall painting discovered in 2011. Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License

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Flavia from the Conservation Team carefully scrapes away wall plaster to reveal a wall painting. Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License

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Wide view of excavation underneath the shelter. Photo credit Jason Quinlan. Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

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Source: Edited from information provided by the Çatalhöyük Research Project. All information and images courtesy of the project’s Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. 

*http://www.catalhoyuk.com/index.html

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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.

And, Popular Archaeology’s annual Discovery edition 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.

Subscription Price: A very affordable $5.75 for those who are not already premium subscribers of Popular Archaeology Magazine (It is FREE for premium subscribers to Popular Archaeology). Premium subscribers should email [email protected] and request the special coupon code. Or, for the e-Book version, it can be purchased for only $3.99 at Amazon.com. 

Charred grains of barley, millet and wheat deposited nearly 5,000 years ago at campsites in the high plains of Kazakhstan show that nomadic sheepherders played a surprisingly important role in the early spread of domesticated crops throughout a mountainous east-west corridor along the historic Silk Road, suggests new research from Washington University in St. Louis.

“Our findings indicate that ancient nomadic pastoralists were key players in an east-west network that linked innovations and commodities between present-day China and southwest Asia,” said study co-author Michael Frachetti, PhD, an associate professor of archaeology in Arts & Sciences at Washington University and principal investigator on the research project.

Findings are based on archaeobotanical data collected from four Bronze Age pastoralist campsites in Central Eurasian steppe/mountains: Tasbas and Begash in the highlands of Kazakhstan and Ojakly and Site 1211/1219 in Turkmenistan.

Frachetti and a team of WUSTL researchers led the on-site excavations, working closely with archaeologists based in Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan and Italy. Spengler conducted the paleoethnobotany laboratory work at WUSTL, under the directorship of Gayle J. Fritz, PhD, professor of archaeology and expert in human-plant relationships.

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A photo of the long-term settlement stratigraphy at the site of Tasbas. Mudbrick/clay oven (visible on right lower portion) contained earliest evidence for grain farming. Credit: Paula Doumani /Washington University in St. Louis (2011

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 A view of the Byan Zhurek valley and setting near Tasbas. Credit: Michael Frachetti/Washington University in St. Louis (2011)

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Frachetti said that ancient wheat and broomcorn millet, recovered from the sites “show that prehistoric herders in Central Eurasia had incorporated both regional crops into their economy and rituals nearly 5,000 years ago, pushing back the chronology of interaction along the territory of the ‘Silk Road’ more than 2,000 years.” 

While these crops have been known to exist much earlier in ancient China and Southwest Asia, finding them intermingled in the Bronze Age burials and households of nomadic pastoralists provides some of the earliest concrete signs for east-west interaction in the vast expanse of Eurasian mountains and the first botanical evidence for farming among Bronze Age nomads.

Bread wheat, cultivated at least 6,000 years ago in Southwest Asia, was absent in China before 2500 B.C. while broomcorn millet, domesticated 8,000 years ago in China, is missing in southwest Asia before 2000 B.C. This study documents that ancient grains from eastern China and southwest Asia were present in Kazakhstan in the center of the continent by 2700-2500 B.C. (nearly 5,000 years ago).

“This study starts to rewrite the model for economic change across Eurasia,” said first author Robert Spengler, PhD, a paleoethnobotanist and research associate in Arts and Sciences at WUSTL. “It illustrates that nomads had diverse economic systems and were important for reshaping economic spheres more generally.”

“Finding this diverse crop assemblage at Tasbas and Begash illustrates first evidence for the westward spread of East Asian and Southwest Asian crops eastward, and the surprise is that it is nomads who are the agents of change,” Frachetti said.

The study is published April 2nd in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B.

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Source: Edited from a Washington University press release. 

Washington University co-authors include three anthropology graduate students: Paula Doumani, Lynne Rouse and Elissa Bullion. Doumani led the excavations at Tasbas in Kazakhstan while Rouse co-led the excavations at Ojakly in Turkmenistan.

Other co-authors are Barbara Cerasetti, of the Universita`degli Studi di Bologna, Italy, and Alexei Mar’yashev, of the Institute of Archaeology in Kazakhstan.

Funding was provided by National Science Foundation grant nos. 1010678, 0535341, 1132090 and 1036942, as well as Lambda Alpha National Honor Society, the Mary Morris-Stein Foundation, Wenner-Gren grant no. 8157, George F. Dales Foundation and International Research & Exchanges Board IARO.

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Located within the fertile plain of the Jezreel valley in northern Israel, the archaeological site known as Ein el-Jarba has been yielding finds that are beginning to tell a story of a people who lived there more than 6,000 years ago, before the pyramids arose in Egypt and before the ancient Canaanites dominated the region. 

Archaeologist Katharina Streit, a PhD student with the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, has been leading a team of archaeologists, students and volunteers through full-scale excavations at the site to uncover evidence of an Early Chalcolithic (or Copper Age) human settlement.[1]  Before implements of bronze were even invented, a community with skills enough to produce distinctive pottery, other ceramic ware, and tools made of obsidian, lived and died in this place.

“Little is known about this long period, which stretches over most of the 6th millennium BCE,” says Streit. “This period suffers an institutional bias, not fully belonging neither in prehistory, nor Biblical archaeology.”*

In a way, one can hardly fault the scholarly establishment for the ‘oversight’. In a region so rich in biblical history, prehistory, place-names and historical headline-grabbing archaeological discoveries, the attention has often been diverted to those things that have captured the public imagination, funding, and the draw of the popular press.

Among her goals with the project, Streit hopes to change that bias. 

“It is envisaged that renewed excavations at Ein el-Jarba will provide a better understanding of Kaplan’s exceptional, yet preliminary excavation results, as well as contribute to our understanding of chronology and material culture of the Protohistory of Israel,” Streit ads. It was under J. Kaplan that a one-season excavation at the site was initially conducted in 1966, yielding four phases of Chalcolithic occupation with architectural remains and burials. And although the site was visited and researched to a limited extent since then, comparatively little had been done since the Kaplan excavation.

As a part of her dissertation research, Streit returned twice to the site in the Spring and Summer of 2013 with a small team to begin the first renewed excavations. The results of these initial efforts solidly met her hopes and expectations. Systematic digging turned up an intact Early Bronze Age floor, house architecture remains, a possible silo and complete ceramic vessels and, most important to their research designs, an Early Chalcolithic level “yielding a rich assemblage of finds and several floor levels”.*

Among the many finds were retouched flint tools, sling stones, incised pottery, and numerous blades and fragments of obsidian. 

She takes special note of the obsidian artifacts, mainly because of the original source of the material.

“There are no obsidian sources in Israel or in the surrounding areas. The closest potential sources are in Anatolia, so each piece of obsidian we find must have been imported from at least that distance,” says Streit.* This could say something about the culture and capabilities of the people who lived here.

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 View of the 2013 excavation at Ein el-Jarba. Wikimedia Commons

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The richest yield, however, consisted of numerous sherds of what is designated as ‘Wadi Rabah’ pottery, a distinctive marker for the “Wadi Rabah culture”. In 1958 Kaplan coined this term as a categorical or chronological descriptor for artifacts he uncovered in the 1960’s at the protohistoric site of Wadi Rabah, located on the southern bank of its namesake tributary of the Yarkon River near the present-day Israeli city of Petah Tiqva in central Israel. Generally dated to the 5th millennium BCE, this cultural phase in Levantine archaeology has yet to be fully defined. It has been variously described as a material culture that falls within the “bridge” period between the Neolithic and the Early Bronze Age of the Middle East, or the Chalcolithic (“Copper” Age).  Other sites where artifacts attributed to the Wadi Rabah culture have been found in Israel include Munhata, Nahal Zehora, Tel Tsaf, Teluliot Batashi, Jericho, Tell Farah North, and Nahal Yarmut.

But while the small finds for the Early Chalcolithic are significant, very little in the way of domestic structures for this period have yet been found at the site. Of particular interest would be the presence of courtyard houses, as these structures are considered to be the dominant type of dwellings in the prehistoric southern Levant. But “no courtyard house has been found dating to the Early Chalcolithic period so far,” says Streit. “In fact, no complete houseplan is known from the Early Chalcolithic period so far, and consequently little is known about domestic life…….The target of this excavation project is thus to uncover domestic architecture and to document complete houseplans. The remains [previously] excavated by Kaplan suggest that domestic architecture is indeed present at the site and that preservation conditions are favourable.”*

Another of Streit’s goals includes uncovering evidence to clarify the dating of the Early Chalcolithic in the region.

“At Ein el-Jarba,” writes Streit, “Kaplan analyzed one bone (4920 ± 240) and one charcoal sample (5690 ± 140) but was dissatisfied by the results because of their great discrepancy. The renewed excavations intend to achieve a more precise absolute date, contributing to the chronological debate of the Early Chalcolthic. Further, renewed excavations will allow a quantitative analysis, comparing the Ein el-Jarba assemblage to other quantified assemblages” recovered from other sites.*    

Streit and her team, consisting of 8 to 10 Israelis and 16 volunteers from other countries, will be returning during the summer of 2014 to continue the excavations. The successful completion of their task in this and future seasons could have an important impact on research in this area of Levantine archaeology.

“The Wadi Rabah period remains ill-defined,” states Streit. “Very little is known about architecture, burial or ritual in the Early Chalcolithic period. This project will provide the chronological frame necessary for future research.”*

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Although the 2014 season is filled, those interested in participating in future seasons may visit the website for more information and application requirements. 

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[1] The archaeological work at Ein el-Jarba has been renewed in 2013 on behalf of the Institute of Archaeology of Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel, directed by Katharina Streit, in cooperation with the Jezreel Valley Regional Project.

*Source: publicly available website: http://eineljarba.wordpress.com/wadi-rabah/

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(CORTEZ, Colo.)—March 20, 2014 —The Crow Canyon Archaeological Center in Cortez, Colo., offers an extraordinary opportunity for teens seeking an exciting summer adventure that also will look great on a college application. Some participants will be able to attend on scholarships that will help cover the costs of tuition, room and board.

Students participating in Crow Canyon’s Middle School Archaeology Camp, High School Archaeology Camp, and High School Field School excavate alongside archaeologists in the field, analyze artifacts in the lab, visit archaeological sites, and discover the rich cultural history of the ancestral Pueblo Indians of the American Southwest. The camps offer a rare opportunity for students at the pre-college level to perform on-site archaeological work.

Archaeology camp students will work at the Dillard site, Crow Canyon’s current excavation site and the focus of the Center’s Basketmaker Communities Project. The site is an ancestral Pueblo community center dating from the Basketmaker III period (A.D. 500–750), a time of rapid population growth and social and technological change. Crow Canyon and the Dillard site will be featured on a PBS Time Team America episode on Aug. 26.

In accordance with Crow Canyon’s human remains policy and current research design, the Center does not seek out human remains as objects of study.

Scholarships are available, including several for local and American Indian students. Scholarship application deadlines are approaching. (Deadlines vary by program). For more information about Crow Canyon’s teen camps and scholarships, including application forms and application deadlines, log on to www.crowcanyon.org/summercamps, contact Greg Harpel at 970-564-4346 (direct) or 800-422-8975, ext. 146, or e-mail him at [email protected].

Visit Crow Canyon on the Web at www.crowcanyon.org.

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About the Crow Canyon Archaeological Center

The Crow Canyon Archaeological Center is a not-for-profit organization dedicated to understanding and teaching the rich history of the ancestral Pueblo Indians who inhabited the canyons and mesas of the Mesa Verde region more than 700 years ago. The Center is located just outside Cortez, Colo., in an area with one of the densest concentrations of well-preserved archaeological sites in the world.

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About the Crow Canyon Archaeological Center

The Crow Canyon Archaeological Center is a not-for-profit organization dedicated to understanding and teaching the

rich history of the ancestral Pueblo Indians who inhabited the canyons and mesas of the Mesa Verde region more than

700 years ago. The Center is located just outside Cortez, Colo., in an area with one of the densest concentrations of

well-preserved archaeological sites in the world.

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Source: 

Suzy Meyer

Media Relations

Crow Canyon Archaeological Center

[email protected]

800-442-8975, ext. 162

970-564-4362

23390 Road K

Cortez, CO 81321

Cover Photo: Crow Canyon Campus, Courtesy Crow Canyon Archaeological Center

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Subscription Price: A very affordable $5.75 for those who are not already premium subscribers of Popular Archaeology Magazine (It is FREE for premium subscribers to Popular Archaeology). Premium subscribers should email [email protected] and request the special coupon code. Or, for the e-Book version, it can be purchased for only $3.99 at Amazon.com. 

Popularly known as the site where archaeologists recently excavated an ancient jug containing a silver hoard, it sits near the border between modern day Israel and Lebanon to the north, in an area that brings to mind the political and military tensions that have so often plagued the border areas of these neighboring countries. Even thousands of years ago, this area figured prominently in conflicts and disputes among ancient players. 

Today the location is known as Tel Abel Beth Maacah, an archaeological site that has been identified by biblical scholars as the likely location of an ancient city that, at one time, may have had important Aramean connections. It is mentioned a number of times in the biblical account, including the battle related to the revolt against David by Sheba ben Bichri. In the early 19th century BCE it was conquered by Ben-hadad of Damascus, and by the Neo-Assyrian king Tiglath-pileser III in 733 BCE. Scholars suggest that it may have been at one time the capital of the Aramean kingdom of Maacah.

The site is historically important for its strategic location, controlling the roads leading north to the Lebanese Beq‘a, northeast to inner and northern Syria and into Mesopotamia, and also west to the Lebanese/ Phoenician coast. But despite this location and the prominence of the imposing mound containing its remains, the site has never been excavated until now. Early surveys were conducted in 1973 by William G. Dever of the University of Arizona, yielding evidence that suggested that the site was occupied from Early Bronze Age (third millennium BCE) up to the time when the city was destroyed by the Neo-Assyrian monarch Tiglath-pileser III in 733-32 BCE, but pottery from the Persian, Hellenistic, Roman-Byzantine, Arabic, and Ottoman periods was also found. A small Arab village occupied the site until 1948, and its remains can still be seen today.

Archaeologists finally returned to the site in May 2012, when a team led by Robert Mullins of Azusa Pacific University near Los Angeles, California and Nava Panitz-Cohen of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem conducted a survey to lay the foundation and select areas for the very first full-scale excavations of the site in 2013. 

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Above: This Iron Age I ring flask was recovered along with other finds during the 2012 survey. Photo by Moshe Cohen. 

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The 2013 excavations were not disappointing. “We conducted a four-week season in June and July,” reported Mullins and Panitz-Cohen in a recent article.  “We focused on two areas – ‘Area F’ on the southern end of the lower mound and ‘Area A’ on the eastern end of the connection between the upper and lower mounds.” What they found was a significant Iron Age I (1200 – 1000 BCE) domestic occupation in Area A, including a plethora of collared-rim jar fragments, and a structure in Area F built of massive stones, which they suggest could be the partial remains of a tower. The date of the structure is not yet known. “But our prize find in Area F,” they continued, “was a small jug containing a silver hoard that sat on a floor abutting the structure. We have tentatively attributed this to very late Late Bronze-early Iron Age I (1300 – 1200 BCE).”* Following meticulous treatment by conservator Mimi Lavi of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, the hoard was found to consist of “five complete earrings, three earring fragments, three ingots and one twisted piece that might also have been an earring.”**

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A general view of Area A looking south containing remains of houses from Iron Age I (11th century BCE). Photo by Robert Mullins, Abel Beth Maacah Excavations.

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A general view of excavation activity in Area F. Photo courtesy Abel Beth Maacah Excavations.

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Smashed collared-rim jar in Area F, which dates to Iron Age I (12th-11th centuries BCE). Photo by Robert Mullins, Abel Beth Maacah Excavations. 

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The jug containing the hoard in situ in Area F. Photo by Robert Mullins, Abel Beth Maacah Excavations. 

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Jug that contained the hoard and close-up of hoard before conservation. Photo by Gabi Laron, Institute of Archaeology, Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

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The hoard after conservation work, showing complete earrings, earring fragments, and an ingot. These artifacts would be dated to the Late Bronze Age, based on the earring style. Photo by Gabi Laron.

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Going forward, Mullins and Panitz-Cohen emphasize that much more work needs to be done before they can achieve their ultimate objective, which is to help fill in the many gaps of knowledge that still exist about the northern region of Israel during the Bronze and Iron Ages.  “Our understanding of this region has been based largely on an important, but limited data set from Dan and Hazor [two other major archaeological sites in northern Israel],” they maintain.*** They point out that other major nearby sites that would shed light on this, such as Damascus in Syria and Tyre in Lebanon, have not been investigated because they are overlayed with modern settlements, or for other reasons. 

Returning again in 2014, they hope to uncover more finds that will help them answer their questions and inch closer to re-constructing a picture of the Bronze Age and Iron Age Levant in this region. Excavations are slated to begin in late June. More information about the efforts and how one can participate can be obtained at the project website. (See video below)

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 Directors Robert Mullins and Nava Panitz Cohen at the excavation site. Photo courtesy Abel Beth Maacah Excavations.

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*Mullins, Robert and Panitz-Cohen, Nava, Breaking Ground at Tel Abel Beth Maacah – Why Dig at the Gateway to the Arameans, ASOR Blog, 18 March 2014.  

**http://www.abel-beth-maacah.org/index.php/the-silver-hoard

***http://www.abel-beth-maacah.org/index.php/about

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Archaeologists have found the oldest complete example in the world of a human with metastatic cancer in a 3,000 year-old skeleton. 

The findings are reported in the academic journal PLOS ONE today (17 March, 2014).

The finding came from a skeleton of a young adult male found by a Durham University PhD student in a tomb in modern Sudan in 2013. Dating back to 1200 BCE, it was estimated to be between 25-35 years old when he died and was found at the archaeological site of Amara West in northern Sudan, situated on the Nile, 750 km downstream of the country’s modern capital, Khartoum. It was buried extended on his back, within a badly deteriorated painted wooden coffin, and provided with a glazed faience amulet as a grave good.

The skeleton was examined by experts at Durham University and the British Museum using radiography and a scanning electron microscope (SEM) which resulted in clear imaging of the lesions on the bones. It showed cancer metastasized on the collar bones, shoulder blades, upper arms, vertebrae, ribs, pelvis and thigh bones. It is the oldest convincing complete example of metastatic cancer in the archaeological record.

Lead author, Michaela Binder, a PhD student in the Department of Archaeology at Durham University, excavated and examined the skeleton. She said: “Our analysis showed that the shape of the small lesions on the bones can only have been caused by a soft tissue cancer even though the exact origin is impossible to determine through the bones alone.”

“Insights gained from archaeological human remains like these can really help us to understand the evolution and history of modern diseases,” she added. “Very little is known about the antiquity, epidemiology and evolution of cancer in past human populations apart from some textual references and a small number of skeletons with signs of cancer.”

The cause of the cancer can only be speculative but the researchers say it could be as a result of environmental carcinogens such as smoke from wood fires, through genetic factors, or from infectious diseases such as schistosomiasis which is caused by parasites. 

They say that an underlying schistosomiasis infection seems a plausible explanation for the cancer in this individual as the disease had plagued inhabitants of Egypt and Nubia since at least 1500 BCE, and is now recognised as a cause of bladder cancer and breast cancer in men.

The researchers from Durham University and the British Museum say the discovery will help to explore underlying causes of cancer in ancient populations and provide insights into the evolution of cancer in the past. Ancient DNA analysis of skeletons and mummies with evidence of cancer can be used to detect mutations in specific genes that are known to be associated with particular types of cancer.

Even though cancer is one of the world’s leading causes of death today, it remains almost absent from the archaeological record compared to other pathological conditions, giving rise to the conclusion that the disease is mainly a product of modern living and increased longevity. These findings suggest that cancer is not only a modern disease but was already present in the Nile Valley in ancient times.

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Aerial view over the north-eastern cemetery area at Amara West with the Nile and the ancient settlement in the background. © Trustees of the British Museum   

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Nubian-style burial mound marking the grave on the surface. © Trustees of the British Museum

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The skeleton in its original burial position in the western chamber. The insert shows faience amulet found associated with the individual from both sides. The Egyptian god Bes (right side) is depicted on the reverse side. © Trustees of the British Museum

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The skeleton of the adult male excavated from Amara West. The skeleton shows signs of metastatic carcinoma. © Trustees of the British Museum 

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Previously, there has only been one convincing, and two tentative, examples of metastatic cancer predating the 1^st millennium BC reported in human remains. However, because the remains derived from early 20th century excavations, only the skulls were retained, thus making a full re-analysis of each skeleton, to generate differential (possible) diagnoses, impossible.

Co-author, Dr Neal Spencer from the Department of Ancient Egypt and Sudan at the British Museum, said: “From footprints left on wet mud floors, to the healed fractures of many ancient inhabitants, Amara West offers a unique insight into what it was like to live there – and die – in Egyptian-ruled Upper Nubia 3200 years ago.”

Michaela Binder added: “Through taking an evolutionary approach to cancer, information from ancient human remains may prove a vital element in finding ways to address one of the world’s major health problems.”

The tomb, where the skeleton was found, appears to have been used for high-status individuals from the town, but not the ruling elite, based on the tomb architecture and aspects of funerary ritual.

The tomb’s architecture is evidence of a hybrid culture blending Pharaonic elements (burial goods, painted coffins) with Nubian culture (a low mound to mark the tomb). 

The well preserved pottery recovered from the tomb provides a date within the 20th Dynasty (1187-1064 BCE), a period when Egypt ruled Upper Nubia, endured conflicts with Libya and while pharaohs such as Ramses III were being buried in the Valley of the Kings.

The research was funded by the Leverhulme Trust and the Institute of Bioarchaeology Amara West Field School, with the permission of the National Corporation of Antiquities and Museums in Sudan.

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Edited from a press release from the Durham University Media Relations Office.

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If you have European ancestry and you’re fairly light-skinned with light hair and light-colored eyes, there is now new scientific data to help explain why you are the way you are.

A recent DNA study supports the suggestion that strong selection factors for those phenotypes (physical characteristics) acted upon pigmentation genes over the last 5,000 years. Sandra Wilde of Johannes Gutenberg University in Mainz, Germany, along with her colleagues, developed estimates of selection acting on functional alleles of three pigmentation-related genes from Eneolithic, Bronze Age, and modern eastern European humans by using computer simulation techniques. 

Reports Wilde, et. al: “Our results provide direct evidence that strong selection favoring lighter skin, hair, and eye pigmentation has been operating in European populations over the last 5,000 years……….In sum, a combination of selective pressures associated with living in northern latitudes, the adoption of an agriculturalist diet, and assortative mating may sufficiently explain the observed change from a darker phenotype during the Eneolithic/Early Bronze Age to a generally lighter one in modern Eastern Europeans…….”  However, Wilde, et. al, caution that while this may be true, “other selective factors cannot be discounted.”*

The article detailing the study has been published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

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*Article #13-16513: “Direct evidence for positive selection of skin, hair, and eye pigmentation in Europeans during the last 5,000 y,” by Sandra Wilde et al.  at www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.1316513111

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And, Popular Archaeology’s annual Discovery edition 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.

Subscription Price: A very affordable $5.75 for those who are not already premium subscribers of Popular Archaeology Magazine (It is FREE for premium subscribers to Popular Archaeology). Premium subscribers should email [email protected] and request the special coupon code. Or, for the e-Book version, it can be purchased for only $3.99 at Amazon.com. 

* Sicoli MA, Holton G (2014) Linguistic Phylogenies Support Back-Migration from Beringia to Asia. PLoS ONE 9(3): e91722. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0091722.

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Cover Photo, Top Left: Map showing greatest extent of Beringia.

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March 9th, 2014

Finding Answers to New Mysteries at Cahokia

During the summer of 2014, archaeologists will be investigating the remains of a 900-year-old Native American ceremonial center site located in Illinois. Known as Emerald Mound in Lebanon, IL, about 25 miles east of the Cahokia mounds, the site is thought to be culturally associated with the well-known Cahokia mounds of the Pre-Columbian Mississipian culture, an advanced society that spread across the present-day Southeastern United States centuries before European contact. (Popular Archaeology)

Archaeologists found bones of a Stone Age child and an adult in tiny cave

Archaeologists at IT Sligo have found bones of a Stone Age child and an adult in a tiny cave high on Knocknarea mountain near the town. Radiocarbon dating has shown that they are some 5,500 years old, which makes them among the earliest human bones found in the county. The find represents important fresh evidence of Knocknarea’s Neolithic (Stone Age) links and a prehistoric practice known as “excarnation”. Researchers discovered a total of 13 small bones and bone fragments in an almost inaccessible cave last November. (Irish Mirror)

Archaeologists will soon start dig at the Fountain of Youth Archaeological Park

Another page may be added to St. Augustine’s historical legacy this spring once archaeologists explore an uncharted area of the nation’s oldest colony. Archaeologists start their dig at the Fountain of Youth Archaeological Park in a week. The site is regularly excavated by researchers who piece together the lives of America’s earliest Spanish settlers and the Native Americans who lived nearby. (The Saint Augustine Record)

Archaeologists find 3,000-year-old graves in Cusco, Peru

Excavators working in the city of Cusco have discovered a burial site containing five individuals from the Marcavalle culture, a pre-Inca society. Andina news agency reports that the skeletal remains date back to around 1,000 BC. The burial site, which contained two double graves and one single grave, was found on land owned by a Cusco center for juvenile rehabilitation. Three of the individuals found at the site were adults at the time of their deaths, while one was a child and the other an adolescent. (Peru this Week)

Ancient secrets of the sand unveiled

A DOG walker took a step back in time during his routine stroll, finding footprints thought to be 7,000 years old. Archaeologist Barry Mead was walking his dog Peedie on the beach near his Cresswell home when he came across a newly-exposed inter-tidal peat bed. The find, at the southern end of Druridge Bay, included footprints dating back thousands of years, which are the first of their kind to be found at that part of the beach. (Morpeth Herald)

Executed Vikings were inexperienced raiders who oozed smelly pus, say archaeologists

The bony discovery of 50 young male skeletons, decapitated and lumped in an old quarry pit before being found by diggers on an Olympic relief road in Weymouth five years ago, became an even more gripping story following scientific examinations revealing that this mass grave carried executed Vikings. David Score, of excavators Oxford Archaeology, called the test results “thrilling”, while Angus Campbell, the then-leader of Dorset County Council who is now the county’s Lord Lieutenant, admitted organisers “never would have dreamed of finding a Viking war grave.” (Culture24)

Great Gouda! World’s oldest cheese found – on mummies

Vintage Gouda may be aged for five years, some cheddar for a decade. They’re both under-ripe youngsters compared with yellowish clumps – found on the necks and chests of Chinese mummies – now revealed to be the world’s oldest cheese. The Chinese cheese dates back as early as 1615 BC, making it by far the most ancient ever discovered. Thanks to the quick decay of most dairy products, there isn’t even a runner-up. (USA Today)

Bronze Age rock art uncovered in Brecon Beacons

Rare, prehistoric rock art which could be more than 4,000 years old has been discovered in the Brecon Beacons. The Bronze Age discovery was made late last year by national park geologist Alan Bowring. Experts claim the stone probably served as a way marker for farming communities. Similar stones have been found in other parts of Britain but they are thought to be rare in mid Wales. (BBC News)

Statue of pharaoh’s daughter unearthed in Egypt

A statue of the daughter of King Amenhotep III, grandfather of Tutankhamen and ruler of Egypt around 3,350 years ago, has been unearthed by a team of Egyptian and European archaeologists. The statue of Princess Iset was discovered at the temple of her pharaoh father on the western bank of the Nile in the southern city of Luxor, the Egyptian antiquities ministry said on Friday. (Reuters)

During the summer of 2014, archaeologists will be investigating the remains of a 900-year-old Native American ceremonial center site located in Illinois. Known as  Emerald Mound in Lebanon, IL, about 25 miles east of the Cahokia mounds, the site is thought to be culturally associated with the well-known Cahokia mounds of the Pre-Columbian Mississipian culture, an advanced society that spread across the present-day Southeastern United States centuries before European contact.

Under the leadership of Timothy R. Pauketat of the University of Illinois and in conjunction with Indiana University, the effort will field crews of researchers and students to excavate a significant portion of what is thought to be a complex consisting of structures and other archaeological features such as houses and storage pits related to a principal 6-meter-high earthen platform. Investigations will also include geophysical exploration and mapping.

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Since their discoveries, the ancient Roman cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum, those hapless victims of the Mt. Vesuvius eruptions of AD 79, have captured the public’s imagination and have thus commanded the attention of both the academic community and the general public. The recent exhibition at the British Museum that highlighted Pompeii and Herculaneum, coupled with the release of the major motion picture, Pompeii, have popularized the ancient cities all the more. There is, however, another story along the northern slopes of Vesuvius that tells of a people who lived and died on the “other side” of the better-known setting. Archaeologists have recently uncovered evidence of the people who lived and died on what has been termed “the dark side of Vesuvius”, the northern slopes of the volcano and the adjoining ancient territories of Nola and Neapolis. It is a story that may encompass not just the well-known AD 79 eruption, but multiple past eruptions as well. Known as the Apolline Project, teams of archaeologists, other scientists, students and volunteers have been slowly piecing together what remains of the ancient settlements that survived and were dramatically affected by these cataclysms. 

The Northern Territories 

The fertile landscape around Mount Vesuvius has always made it an idyllic and desirable setting for human occupation. Rich in minerals, rivers, and hot springs, this fertile volcanic landscape is as inviting as it is precarious, yielding a wealth of foodstuffs such as olives, hazelnuts, shellfish, figs, and grapes, to name a few. Archaeologists have now discovered evidence of ancient ploughed fields, orchards, vineyards, and Roman centuriation grids, demonstrating that in antiquity the region was thoroughly exploited through the cultivation of a wide variety of crops, as it is today. Considering this abundance and variety of natural resources, from foodstuffs and fuel to natural building materials, the northern territories of Nola and Neapolis were well placed to become centers of mass industrial activity. Ancient literary sources testify to this; for example, Strabo described the area as “dotted all around with cities, buildings, and plantations, so thoroughly intertwined that it resembles closely a metropolis”. Wine, in particular, was a valuable export for this prosperous region, supporting trade connections as far as Britannia and India. Understanding the exact nature of the communications and exchange processes within this region both before and after AD 79 has become the principal pursuit of the Project, which seeks to understand not only the people who lived during these times, but the nature of the economic and industrial landscape as well.

But the archaeologists face a challenge not uncommon in the field. The region of Campania, which today contains the traces of this area, has been intensively settled and urbanized and as a result, only a small percentage of its vast history has been brought to light. It presents a real obstacle to archaeologists who are attempting to reconstruct an image of the ancient landscape and its settlements. Nevertheless, the accessible sites lying on the northern slope of Vesuvius have provided them with a window with long spans of occupation featuring multiple stages of post-eruption recovery and repopulation that provide clear, rich stratigraphies, allowing for the creation of extended chronologies and timelines.

The Finds at Pollena Trocchia

Key to the efforts on the northern slope has been the discovery of a Roman bath and villa site located in the town of Pollena Trocchia. Since 2005, most of the baths have been unearthed, revealing evidence to suggest that it was part of a larger villa complex now buried underneath an adjacent modern block of flats. The discovery of the volcanic material deposited by the AD 79 eruption indicated that the villa complex, or the baths at least, were built in the years after the eruption. As a result, the insight that the finds have provided in terms of both the inhabitants and their impetus to settle there has been extraordinary. The discovery of a brick stamp imprinted onto a tile lining the bath’s hypocaust, for example, shows the distinct mark of the Domitii brothers, a prosperous family from Rome who produced this stamp between AD 75 and AD 95. This connection with Rome, along with the many lavish finds, suggests that the inhabitants of this site were very affluent and settled there soon after the eruption, perhaps tempted by the fertile earth left by the volcano.

Moreover, the rich data from the site at Pollena Trocchia obtained through charcoal analysis of carbonized plant remains has revealed the exact species of vegetation and offers insight into how they were cultivated to shape the Roman landscape. For example, evidence of chestnut (a known construction timber used by the Romans) suggests that the late antique woodland on the north slope may have been partially and purposefully composed of chestnut trees. In fact, the plethora of woodland that blanketed Mount Vesuvius in Roman times was also required in vast quantities for fueling industries such as pottery-making and iron-smithing. It also played a more domestic role in cooking and in the heating of Roman baths. By identifying evidence of activities that would have incorporated wood, as well as the remains of wood itself, archaeologists and palaeobotanists alike are investigating the transportation and management of ancient forests, and whether the woodland of Vesuvius was enough to satisfy the enormous demand for timber.

The researchers have found that not all archaeological finds, however, are as easily comprehensible. A few years ago, the remains of two children were discovered buried in two small amphorae. Amphorae are large pottery vessels that were usually used for transporting wine and other foodstuffs, but they were also occasionally used for infant burials. Thus far, the tale surrounding these children, possibly twins, remains a mystery.

The occupation of this site may have ended the way it began, with a volcanic eruption. This eruption struck on November 6^th, AD 472, the site itself being destroyed by lahars. The lahars were produced by the eruption, creating an atmospheric disturbance that caused severe downpours of rain, which then flowed rapidly down the mountainsides, picking up literally tons of ash and mud on their way. As devastating as this event was, the stratigraphy it left behind has been indispensable to the archaeological research.

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 Overview of the excavated remains of the Pollena Trocchia bath complex. © Girolamo F. De Simone. 

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Excavating volcanic ash under the heat of the midday sun is no easy feat, but these archaeologists are determined to make a discovery. © Girolamo F. De Simone.

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Although the volcano leveled these baths, many walls are still so high that it remains a walk-in complex.  © Girolamo F. De Simone.

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Stunning preservation of mosaic floors bring the baths to life. © Girolamo F. De Simone. 

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A splash of water reveals the hidden maker’s mark of the Domitii Brothers on this flooring brick stamp.  © Girolamo F. De Simone. 

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The imprints of carbonized vegetation have led palaeobotanists to determine exactly what trees and plants the Roman inhabitants were using in their daily lives. © Girolamo F. De Simone.

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Pollena Trocchia is not the only site that has shed light on the area. For example, the grand villa complex at Somma Vesuviana boasts a long and mysterious history, with speculation about its ownership and function. Around the time of its discovery, it was thought to have been owned by the Emperor Augustus himself. Originally a luxurious stately home, the function of the building changed after the AD 79 eruption, and there are strong indications that it might have been an industrial center for the mass production of wine. During excavations by the University of Tokyo, a plethora of Dionysiac imagery and motifs have been found throughout the structure, strongly conveying Dionysus, the Roman God of wine and merriment, as the patron diety. One beautiful, well-preserved, marble statue particularly evokes this: it features the god holding a panther cub, a very rare pose. Due to the size and discoveries made at this site, it is well known within the field of Roman archaeology. It is this scale of attention that Apolline Project researchers hope to achieve for the Pollena excavations. In addition, the Villa of Lauro, also in this region, has had its fair share of archaeological attention. Abandoned after the AD 472 eruption, these Roman baths are thought to have belonged to a larger villa complex, much like those at Pollena Trocchia. Thanks to an extraordinary fresco found in Lancellotti Castle nearby, researchers have deduced that much of this villa was removed to construct the church of San Giovanni del Palco. The Villa of Laura baths are most noted for their decoration. Also known as ‘The Blue Baths’, the walls, flooring, and stone furnishings are studded with bold blue tesserae, shells and other decorative materials. The surviving mosaics depict detailed scenes involving various birds, plant life, and deer hunting.

Combining secondary sources such as maps and literary accounts with results of the actual excavations, the Project has constructed local archaeological maps of the area around Nola and Neapolis, thus giving back to the modern day residents a sense of their history and identity. Project staff have also engaged with local landowners and enthusiasts to give the community an active role in the search for their heritage, a quest that is expected to continue for generations.

For more information on the work of the Apolline Project and how to participate, go to the website at http://www.apollineproject.org/.

Interested readers may also contact the project’s director, Girolamo Ferdinando De Simone at [email protected].

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