UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND BALTIMORE COUNTY—New research published today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) shows that land use by human societies has reshaped ecology across most of Earth’s land for at least 12,000 years. The research team, from over ten institutions around the world, revealed that the main cause of the current biodiversity crisis is not human destruction of uninhabited wildlands, but rather the appropriation, colonization, and intensified use of lands previously managed sustainably.
The new data overturn earlier reconstructions of global land use history, some of which indicated that most of Earth’s land was uninhabited even as recently as 1500 CE. Further, this new PNAS study supports the argument that an essential way to end Earth’s current biodiversity crisis is to empower the environmental stewardship of Indigenous peoples and local communities across the planet.
“Our work shows that most areas depicted as ‘untouched,’ ‘wild,’ and ‘natural’ are actually areas with long histories of human inhabitation and use,” says UMBC’s Erle Ellis, professor of geography and environmental systems and lead author. He notes that they might be interpreted like this because in these areas, “societies used their landscapes in ways that sustained most of their native biodiversity and even increased their biodiversity, productivity, and resilience.”
Mapping 12,000 years of land use
The interdisciplinary research team includes geographers, archaeologists, anthropologists, ecologists, and conservation scientists. They represent the U.S., the Netherlands, China, Germany, Australia, and Argentina, pooling their knowledge and expertise into a large-scale study that required a highly collaborative approach. They tested the degree to which global patterns of land use and population over 12,000 years were associated statistically with contemporary global patterns of high biodiversity value within areas prioritized for conservation.
“Our global maps show that even 12,000 years ago, nearly three-quarters of terrestrial nature was inhabited, used, and shaped by people,” says Ellis. “Areas untouched by people were almost as rare 12,000 years ago as they are today.”
The maps created for the study are available to view interactively online:
The cultural practices of early land users did have some impact on extinctions. However, by and large, land use by Indigenous and traditional communities sustained the vast majority of Earth’s biodiversity for millennia. This finding comes at a critical time of heightened need to develop long-term, sustainable answers to our biggest environmental problems.
“The problem is not human use per se,” explains professor and co-author Nicole Boivin, of the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History in Jena, Germany. “The problem is the kind of land use we see in industrialized societies–characterized by unsustainable agricultural practices and unmitigated extraction and appropriation.”
To truly understand terrestrial nature today, it is necessary to understand the deep human history of that nature. Outside of a few remote areas, “nature as we know it was shaped by human societies over thousands of years,” says Ellis. He believes that efforts to conserve and restore “won’t be successful without empowering the Indigenous, traditional, and local people who know their natures in ways that scientists are only beginning to understand.”
Supporting Indigenous land use practices
The authors argue that their findings confirm that biodiversity conservation and restoration will benefit by shifting focus from preserving land in a form imagined as “untouched” to supporting traditional and Indigenous peoples whose land use practices have helped sustain biodiversity over the long term.
“This study confirms on a scale not previously understood that Indigenous peoples have managed and impacted ecosystems for thousands of years, primarily in positive ways,” says Darren J. Ranco, associate professor of anthropology and coordinator of Native American research at the University of Maine. “These findings have particular salience for contemporary Indigenous rights and self-determination.”
Ranco, a citizen of the Penobscot Indian Nation, notes that Indigenous people currently exercise some level of management of about 5% of the world’s lands, upon which 80% of the world’s biodiversity exists. Even so, Indigenous people have been excluded from management, access, and habitation of protected lands in places such as the U.S. National Parks.
“We must also assure that new attempts to protect lands and biodiversity are not just a green-grab of Indigenous lands,” says Ranco. “We cannot re-create the worst of colonial policies meant to exclude Indigenous people, which would undoubtedly make the situation much worse for the environment and humanity.”
A sustainable future
“Our research demonstrates the connections between people and nature that span thousands of years,” says Torben Rick, study co-author and curator of North American Archaeology at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History. “These connections are essential for understanding how we arrived at the present and how to achieve a more sustainable future.”
This research represents a new form of collaboration across archaeology, global change science, conservation, and scholars of Indigenous knowledge. The co-authors hope this work will open the door to increasing the use of global land use history data by natural scientists, policymakers, activists, and others. Leaders in a range of fields can use these data, they note, to better understand and collaborate with Indigenous, traditional, and local peoples to conserve biodiversity and ecosystems over the long term.
“It is clear that the perspectives of Indigenous and local peoples should be at the forefront of global negotiations to reduce biodiversity loss,” says Rebecca Shaw, chief scientist at World Wildlife Fund and another study co-author. “There is a global crisis in the way traditionally-used land has been transformed by the scale and magnitude of intensive human development. We have to change course if we are to sustain humanity over the next 12,000 years.”
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Ancient Gateway, Angkor, Cambodia. New research published today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) shows that land use by human societies has reshaped ecology across most of Earth’s land for at least 12,000 years. The research team, from more than a dozen institutions around the world, compared the history of global land use with current patterns of biodiversity and conservation. Their work revealed that the main cause of the current biodiversity crisis is not human destruction of uninhabited wildlands, but rather the appropriation, colonization, and intensified use of lands previously managed sustainably. Erle Ellis, Professor of Geography and Environmental Systems at the University of Maryland Baltimore County (UMBC).
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The five maps illustrate global changes in anthromes and populations from 10,000 BCE to 2017 CE. Erle Ellis, Professor of Geography and Environmental Systems at the University of Maryland Baltimore County (UMBC).
St. John’s College, University of Cambridge—Scientists have sequenced ancient DNA from soil for the first time and the advance will transform what is known about everything from evolution to climate change.
The findings have been described as the ‘moon landings’ of genomics because researchers will no longer have to rely on finding and testing fossils to determine genetic ancestry, links and discoveries – and it is thanks to Stone Age black bears who defecated in a remote cave in Mexico 16,000 years ago.
A team of scientists from The Lundbeck Foundation GeoGenetics Centre, University of Copenhagen, led by Professor Eske Willerslev, director of the foundation and a Fellow of St John’s College, University of Cambridge, recreated the genomes of animals, plants and bacteria of microscopic fragments of DNA found in Chiquihuite Cave.
The results, which have been published today (April 19 2021) in CurrentBiology, are the first time environmental DNA has been sequenced from soil and sediment and includes the ancient DNA profile of a Stone Age American black bear taken from samples in the cave.
This ‘scientific first’ has wider significance as it increases scientists’ ability to study the evolution of animals, plants and microorganisms, which has been hailed as the dawn of an ‘entirely new era’ of population genetics. The work was possible as a result of advanced technology and understanding over the past five years.
This is because working with highly fragmented DNA from soil samples means scientists no longer have to rely on DNA samples from bone or teeth for enough genetic material to recreate a profile of ancient DNA, which opens up the field to what can be tested and studied.
The samples included faeces and droplets of urine from an ancestor of North America’s most familiar and common bear – the American black bear – which allowed scientists to recreate the entire genetic code of two species of the animal. The first is the Stone Age American black bear, the second is an extinct short-faced bear called Arctodus simus which died out 12,000 years ago.
Professor Willerslev said: “When an animal or a human urinates or defecates, cells from the organism are also excreted. And the DNA fragments from these cells are what we can detect in the soil samples. Using extremely powerful sequencing techniques, we reconstructed genomes – genetic profiles – based on these fragments for the first time. We have shown that hair, urine and faeces all provide genetic material which, in the right conditions, can survive for much longer than 10,000 years.
“All over the world, everyone scientifically involved in the study of ancient DNA recognized the need to reconstruct genomes from fragments found in soil or sediment. Being able to do that for the first time means we have opened up a new frontier. Analysis of DNA found in soil could have the potential to expand the narrative about everything from the evolution of species to developments in climate change – this is the moon landing of genomics because fossils will no longer be needed.”
Chiquihuite Cave, where the samples were taken from, is a high-altitude site, 2,750 meters above sea level. Nearly 2,000 stone tools and small tool fragments, known as flakes, were discovered.
The same group of scientists revealed last year that DNA analysis of the plant and animal remains from the sediment packed around the tools in the cave dates the tools and the human occupation of the site to 25,000-30,000 years ago – 15,000 years earlier than people were previously thought to have reached the Americas. Human DNA has not yet been found.
DNA of mice, black bears, rodents, bats, voles and kangaroo rats was found and the genome of the two species of bear has now been sequenced. The huge predatory short-faced bear, which also lived in North America, stood at nearly two meters just on all fours and could weigh up to 1,000 kilos.
Assistant Professor Mikkel Winther Pedersen, first author of the paper, said: “The short-faced bears that lived in northern Mexico were distinctly different from the population of black bears living in north-western Canada. This is an excellent example of the new knowledge that suddenly becomes available when you reconstruct genomes based on DNA fragments extracted from soil.”
Professor Pedersen described the new sequencing as ‘the dawn of an entirely new era’ of population genomics.
He said: “Studies of ancient environmental DNA have been very limited until now. Fragmented DNA from a soil sample could only tell us whether a specific species lived in a certain locality at a certain time, but it gave us no concrete details about the individual in question.
“So, we couldn’t compare this individual with present-day individuals of the same species. But we can now. We have published for the first time a DNA profile of an American black bear that lived in a mountain cave in northern Mexico in the Stone Age. I’m not exaggerating when I say that the potential to extract this type of information from a soil sample of a mere few grams will revolutionize our field.”
Fragments in sediment will be able to be tested in many former Stone Age settlements around the world.
Professor Willerslev added: “Imagine the stories those traces could tell. It’s a little insane – but also fascinating – to think that, back in the Stone Age, these bears urinated and defecated in the Chiquihuite Cave and left us the traces we’re able to analyze today.”
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Assistant professor Mikkel Winther Pedersen from the University of Copenhagen sampling the cave sediments for DNA. Devlin A. Gandy
MAX PLANCK INSTITUTE FOR EVOLUTIONARY ANTHROPOLOGY—The field of ancient DNA has revealed important aspects of our evolutionary past, including our relationships with our distant cousins, Denisovans and Neanderthals. These studies have relied on DNA from bones and teeth, which store DNA and protect it from the environment. But such skeletal remains are exceedingly rare, leaving large parts of human history inaccessible to genetic analysis.
To fill these gaps, researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology developed new methods for enriching and analyzing human nuclear DNA from sediments, which are abundant at almost every archaeological site. Until now, only mitochondrial DNA has been recovered from archaeological sediments, but this is of limited value for studying population relationships. The advent of nuclear DNA analyses of sediments provides new opportunities to investigate the deep human past.
Sediments may contain genetic material from other mammals
When extracting ancient human DNA from the sediments, the scientists had to be careful to avoid the considerable amount of DNA from other mammals, such as bears and hyenas. “There are lots of places in the human genome that are very similar to a bear’s DNA, for example,” said Benjamin Vernot, the first author of the study. The researchers specifically targeted regions in the genome where they could be confident of isolating only human DNA, and they also designed methods to measure their success in removing non-human DNA. “We wanted to be confident that we weren’t accidentally looking at some unknown species of hyena,” said Vernot.
The scientists applied their techniques to study more than 150 sediment samples from three caves. At two of these—Chagyrskaya and Denisova Caves in the Altai Mountains of southern Siberia—previous studies had analyzed DNA from bones. So the authors were able to compare the DNA from sediments to the DNA from bones. “The techniques we developed are very new, and we wanted to be able to test them in places where we knew what to expect,” said Matthias Meyer, the senior author on the study. The researchers found that DNA from the sediments was most closely related to genomes retrieved from bones from those sites, giving them confidence in the robustness of their methods.
Nuclear DNA retrieved from cave deposits in northern Spain
Excavations at the third site, Galería de las Estatuas in northern Spain, led by Juan Luís Arsuaga from Universidad Complutense de Madrid, had uncovered stone tools spanning a period between 70 and 115 thousand years ago. But only a single Neanderthal toe bone had been found, and it was too small to sample for DNA. “There was no way of studying the genetics of the Neanderthals who lived in Estatuas,” said Asier Gómez-Olivencia, a scientist on the Estatuas team from Universidad del País Vasco/Euskal Herriko Unibertsitatea. The nuclear DNA extracted from the sediments revealed that not one, but two Neanderthal populations had lived in the cave, with the original group replaced by a later group approximately 100 thousand years ago.
When the scientists compared the sediment DNA to other skeletal samples, they noticed a striking trend—there seemed to have been two “radiations” of Neanderthals, with the older Estatuas population stemming from one radiation, and the younger population from a second event. “We wondered if these radiations, along with the population replacement in Estatuas, might have been tied to climate changes, or to changes in Neanderthal morphology that occurred around this time period – although we will need more data to say for sure,” said Juan Luís Arsuaga.
New insights into the deep human past
Even for sites where studies have previously analyzed DNA from bones, it is possible to glean new insights from the sediments. At Chagyrskaya Cave, earlier archaeological studies had suggested that the Neanderthal occupants belonged to a single population, and lived there for only a short time. But as previous work had only recovered a single genome from one of the bones found at the site, there was no way to tell if it was representative of the whole population that lived around Chagyrskaya Cave. The sediment DNA was able to confirm this hypothesis. “We took sediment samples from throughout the stratigraphy, and they all looked very similar to the DNA from the bone, even though the sediment DNA came from multiple individuals,” said Kseniya Kolobova at the Institute of Archaeology and Ethnography, Russian Academy of Sciences, the lead archaeologist at Chagyrskaya Cave.
“The dawn of nuclear DNA analysis of sediments massively extends the range of options to tease out the evolutionary history of ancient humans,” said Vernot. By freeing the field of ancient DNA from the constraints of finding human remains and expanding the number of sites potentially suitable for investigation, “we can now study the DNA from many more human populations, and from many more places, than has previously been thought possible,” said Meyer.
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Galería de las Estatuas cave site in northern Spain. Javier Trueba – Madrid Scientific Films
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Chagyrskaya cave in the Altai Mountains of southern Siberia. Richard G. Roberts
Julie Masis is a freelance journalist based in Cambodia. Her stories have appeared in the Christian Science Monitor, the Guardian, the Boston Globe, Science magazine and in other publications.
Angkor Wat: The name evokes mind-boggling, iconic, intricate temples projecting from the Cambodian jungle. Today arguably the most-visited archaeological site in Southeast Asia, it also still holds mysteries under investigation to this day and for years to come. But the Khmer civilization, of which Angkor Wat is but one representative center, also consists of thousands of temples and other structures and features on the broader landscape, many of which have been identified but remain largely unexplored and others assuredly not yet known to exist. This second installment of the Anniversary Issue showcases journalist Julie Masis’ compelling stories, published previously in Popular Archaeology, about the remains of this remarkable civilization. Through her presence in the country, she has offered a first-hand journalistic perspective on discoveries, and the views of the people involved in those discoveries. Most of the stories relate what most people don’t know about Angkor—the sites and features that have often gone unnoticed in the shadow of Angkor………….
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Undiscovered Country
There was a deliberate geometry to how they built their city. The streets ran exactly east to west or north to south. On each city block, which measured exactly 100 meters by 100 meters, there were 4 dwellings and 4 ponds, with each rectangular pond located on the north-eastern side of each dwelling. The dwellings were erected on mounds of earth, higher than the rice fields, so they wouldn’t flood during the rainy season – and so were the roads. The temples were built of stones or bricks, and the entrance faced eastward, if the temple was dedicated to Shiva, and westward if it was dedicated to Vishnu. This urban landscape extended for 35 square kilometers – and may have been home to a million people.
This was the city of Angkor, built more than 1,000 years ago.
For years, archaeologists who studied Angkor focused on its temples – because they alone survived the centuries. Everything else – including royal palaces and ordinary people’s homes – was built of wood and vanished.
But now, archaeologists are using a tool that allows them to retrace the streets of ancient cities – by pealing away the forests that cover them. Damian Evans, a landscape archaeologist from the University of Sydney in Australia, first learned about something called LiDAR from Arlen Chase, who was the first to use this technology in archaeological research in Mesoamerica. LiDAR (Laser Interferometry Detection and Ranging) is a system that uses laser pulses to reveal what the earth’s surface looks like below heavily forested areas. Chase used LiDAR in Belize to prove that the ancient Maya had built terraced agricultural fields – while Evans with his team were the first to use it in Asia. Evans’ project cost $250,000 and took 20 hours to survey 300 square kilometers around ancient Angkor. It would have taken years to clear this many kilometers with a machete.
What they found with LiDAR was staggering.
“It’s just amazing,” said Michael Coe, a world-renowned archaeologist who authored a book about Angkor. “In the case of Angkor, we knew where the temples were, but we never really knew what it was like as a city where people lived.”
In addition to creating a map of Angkor’s streets for the first time, archaeologists also found some strange coil-shaped features on the southern side of Angkor Wat – in an area that is now covered by forest and landmines. These embankments are 10-15 meters high and were created in a spiral pattern, with each bank measuring a meter in height. “We are not sure what they are,” Evans said.
One of the most important discoveries, however, was that Angkor Wat was actually bigger geographically than what had previously been thought. Evans and his team found that the city blocks extended far beyond its moat. “We found that this nicely formally planned grid extends for 35 square kilometers, rather than the 9 kilometers that had previously been mapped from the ground,” he said. “Angkor has been considered to be (among the) cities enclosed by moats or walls, but we found that the town area of the city grids extends far beyond the moat spaces.”
The implication is that Angkor was likely home to a significantly larger population than what had previously been assumed. We know, from Chinese sources, that the kings of Angkor kept censuses. Every year or two, the king would invite a person from every household in the kingdom to come to the city to be counted, according to Coe. The kings of Angkor collected this information in order to know how much they could collect in taxes each year – at the time, taxes were paid in rice. However, the census numbers were written down on paper and have not survived. Estimating the population of Angkor nowadays, therefore, is a guesstimate at best. However, knowing that the city extended for 35 square kilometers means that it may have been home to as many as 750,000 to a million inhabitants, according to the new research. “Angkor was a city the size of New York and that’s impressive in the ninth century,” said Francisco Goncalves, the president of McElhanney Indonesia, the company that adapted the LiDAR system for the Cambodian archaeology project.
Knowing this has shed new light on what may have caused the demise of Angkor. Scholars now suggest that as the city’s population grew, it likely became increasingly hard for the farmers from the countryside to support the urban dwellers. “You would have had a very large population that was not devoted to producing rice,” said Evans. “So they relied on consistent yields of the agricultural hinterland.” According toCoe, a large population may have also been responsible for the decision to move the Khmer capital to another area in the 14th century.
“They overused the land and probably caused a great amount of erosion, clogged up the canals and the whole irrigation system would have collapsed,” he said, adding that this is what happens “when populations grow beyond the agricultural capacity of the land.”
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A view of Angkor Wat and its immediate environs using LiDAR. Top layer: Digital orthophoto mosaic. Bottom layer: LiDAR digital terrain model, revealing what the eye does not see. Red lines indicate modern linear features including roads and canals. Courtesy Damian Evans
Above and below: LiDAR digital terrain model detail. Unseen ancient features come to view through the new technology. Courtesy Damian Evans
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A Lost City
In addition to the area around Angkor itself, archaeologists also surveyed a site called Phnom Kulen hill, a 25 x 15 kilometer plateau that is located about 40 kilometers northeast of Angkor. It was on this hill that they discovered another urban landscape – a landscape they say corresponds to the 8th – 9th century city named Mahendraparvata, one of the first capitals of the Khmer Empire, identified in some inscriptions on the doorposts of Angkor. These inscriptions describe a former capital city which was established by king Jayavarman II in the year 802. It was this area that captured media attention all over the world with air segments about Cambodia’s “lost city.”
In the article that Evans and his team just published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, they described their discovery as “an entire, previously undocumented cityscape etched into the surface of the mountain beneath the forest. This newly mapped urban landscape,” they went on to say, “was previously known primarily from written inscriptions.” However, according to Evans and JB Chevance, the program manager from the Archaeology & Development Foundation who worked with Evans on the Lidar project, the term “lost city” is actually a “misnomer.” The location of the pre-Angkorian capital has been known since the beginning of the 20th century because of the existence of dozens of temples on the Phnom Kulen mountain, including one pyramid temple that “looked very much like a royal temple of the King,” according to Evans and Chevance. But thanks to the LiDAR survey, archaeologists “moved from a situation where we had points on a map to the entire urban fabric that connects these points,” Evans said. As at Angkor, here the LiDAR was used “to see through” the cover of cashew nut plantations and forest foliage to create a three-dimensional map of the topography. The archaeologists mapped major and minor roads – stretching for 8 kilometers along east-west or north-south directions – as well as canals, dikes and ponds. The map of Mahendraparvata also confirmed the location of the 600 x 40 meter royal palace, which had been built of wood and disappeared. “With the LiDAR, we now have a very precise image of that site. It’s one of the main sites because all the roads are directed to it,” Chevance said.
In addition to this, archaeologists identified several geographically-oriented topographical anomalies that they could not identify or explain, according to Chevance. The next step will be to explore these features on the ground – not an easy task as large areas of the mountain have not been cleared of landmines.
Like Angkor, the city of Mahendraparvata was eventually abandoned, the capital moved to Angkor, and Mahendraparvata became a point of interest only for Buddhist pilgrims in the 16th century, according to Chevance. Indeed, there seems to be a tradition in Cambodia of abandoning the capital city and re-establishing it in another location. After Angkor, Cambodia’s capital moved to Lonvek in the 15th century, back to Angkor for a brief period in the 16th century, then to Oudong in the 17th century, and eventually to present day Phnom Penh in the 19th century. Perhaps, Chevance hypothesized, each king wanted to have the capital in his own hometown. Or perhaps the location of the capitals in different parts of the kingdom was testimony to the varying powers of the different royal houses, Evans said.
“People look at the movement of the royal court and imagine that it implied the movement of a large number of people,” Evans said, explaining that this is not necessarily what happened. “It could just be competing royal houses where one royal house gains power over another one.”
Shaded relief map of terrain beneath the vegetation in the Phnom Kulen area, with elevation derived from the LiDAR digital terrain model. Green denotes previously-documented archaeological features; areas shaded red contain newly-documented features indicative of an extensive urban layout. Data and image courtesy Archaeology and Development Foundation – Phnom Kulen Program
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Looking Ahead
Evans is currently engaged in raising more funds to continue exploring Cambodia with LiDAR. One of the locations he would like to survey is the largest enclosing wall in Southeast Asia, located in the Preah Vihear Province in the north of Cambodia. This earthen wall, called Preah Khan of Kampong Svay, is 5 x 5 kilometers in length and 40 meters tall in some areas – yet no one knows why it’s there.
“It’s huge – absolutely huge,” Evans said. “It’s kind of in the middle of nowhere.”
Archaeologists in neighboring Thailand are also becoming interested in the technology. Goncalves is looking into cooperating with Thai archaeologists to study ancient rice fields in the northeast of the country, an area now covered by forest – and to map the ancient road that once connected Angkor to the Siamese kingdom of Ayutthaya.
“A lot of that (road) has been obscured and taken over by the forest. There had to be settlements where people stopped,” he said
Overall, researchers said, Lidar will be just as revolutionary in archaeology as carbon dating – especially in tropical areas.
“Carbon dating gave us control of time, but what LiDAR does is it gives us control of space,” said Chase.
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Article Supplement
HOW LIDAR WORKS
LiDAR uses light to measure distance. That’s according to Francisco Goncalves, of the Jakarta-based company McElhanney, the group that adapted the technology to the Cambodian archaeology project.
“You know the position of the aircraft, you know the speed of light, and you measure the time that it takes for the Lidar’s laser signals to bounce back to the aircraft,” he explains.
“The laser signals don’t actually go through the vegetation, but there are so many of them that some find gaps in the leaves and make it all the way down to the forest floor. Scientists then analyze the data sets, discarding the shorter laser signals and keeping the ones that are longest, and create a pattern,” he said.
To conduct the Cambodian LiDAR survey, Australian archaeologist Damian Evans climbed into a helicopter from which seats had been torn out to make room for computers, batteries and a special display screen for the pilot – and slowly flew in a grid-like pattern, back and forth over the ancient city.
“It’s very difficult for pilots to fly this way,” he said. “Flying by the LiDAR instrument was a bit like playing a video game – the pilot had to keep looking at this screen and keep the helicopter icon within the circle in order to keep strictly in the flight path, which is a very different way for pilots to fly.”
But the new technology is not a panacea. It has its limitations.
“While laser signals can go through vegetation, water causes a problem because it doesn’t reflect the signal back, while foggy, smoky and cloudy weather conditions make the technology difficult to use,” Goncalves said.
Helicopter with LiDAR attached during flight operations over Angkor in April 2012. Courtesy Francisco Goncalves of McElhanney
STUDYING ANGKOR FROM AIR AND SPACE
The temples of Angkor are spread out over such a large area, and are so perfectly symmetrical, that to truly appreciate them, it’s best to get up in the air. Nowadays, a popular way to do it is with a hot-air balloon.
But for archaeologists, it began with the aerial photograph.
At the end of the 1920s, when people first took to the sky, these photographs allowed French archaeologists to appreciate the vast scale of Angkor. “But back then, archaeologists were mostly interested in temples – not in how ancient Cambodian cities were laid out or how their irrigation systems functioned,” says Australian archaeologist Damian Evans.
Then, in the mid-1960s, came the first satellite images of Cambodia. These images were taken by American and Soviet spy satellites and were not declassified until 2003. Covering hundreds of square kilometers, satellite images widened the archaeologists’ perspective further. These pictures are particularly interesting to look at today, Evans says, because they reveal how the Cambodian landscape looked “before the Khmer Rouge messed with it.”
“Instead of respecting the remains of the Angkor period, they (the Khmer Rouge) tried to implement a whole new system of fields and canals and they tried to radically re-engineer the landscape –and they failed,” he said.
The satellite images that were taken before the Khmer Rouge came to power help present-day archaeologists to separate ancient topographic features from the more recent ones, Evans says.
Then came the first radar image, which was taken from the space shuttle in 1994. The radar stripped away some vegetation – like grasses and rice fields – but it was powerless against forests.
Finally, we have the LiDAR system, which can penetrate the thick forest canopies and allows archaeologists to create three dimensional models of the landscape under the vegetation.
Angkor as seen from space, satellite image. NASA image
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The Lost Temples of Angkor
Phnom Penh, Cambodia – By the time they encountered a ten-meter-tall brick wall, trees growing from its top, they had been trudging through the jungle for an hour. It actually wasn’t that far from the village, but there was no straight path. No path at all, in fact. A motorbike couldn’t get through, so they walked. Following their guide, they zigzagged through unfamiliar terrain. They were compelled to look steadfastly down at the ground and step, as best they could, into the footprints of the person before. It was a matter of life or death. They were walking through a minefield, not far from the border between Cambodia and Thailand in the Oddar Meanchay province.
Before they left on this expedition through the forest, Nady Phann, an official from Cambodia’s Ministry of Culture, asked a local villager if there would be any mines. Phann was well aware of this legacy of his country’s war-torn past. “There are many”, the villager said. “We found five or six mines per day when we were planting rice.”
Despite that danger, on that day, in February of 2013, Phann and his team discovered five pre-Angkorian temples. These were temples that had been built before the rise of Angkor, a region of Cambodia that served as the center of the Khmer Empire, the most powerful empire of ancient Southeast Asia. Angkor flourished from approximately the 9th to the 15th centuries, AD, but these temples were made of brick and, according to Phann, they were probably built between the 6th and 8th centuries. Some were almost completely ruined. Others still stood. As he always does when he finds a new temple, he noted the exact location – latitude and longitude – took a few photos, and sketched a plan on a piece of paper. His favorite site, which the locals call ‘The Temple of the Black Water Lake’, consists of three temples in a line close to a nearly dried-up reservoir, with the tallest structure in the middle between the two smaller ones. He also recorded the names of the other sites: the ‘Little Monkey Temple’, the ‘Red Temple’, and strangely, the ‘Economic Development Temple’.
“I don’t know how (the economic development) temple got its name,” Phann admitted. “Maybe it comes from the Khmer Rouge. We have to study the names of the temples — (to find out) if the villagers gave the names or if the name relates to an inscription.”
He was pleased, but not completely blown away by his discovery. That is because more than 150 years after French traveler Henri Mouhot first stumbled upon Angkor Wat (Cambodia’s most popular tourist attraction, which is sometimes described as the world’s largest religious monument) archaeologists working in Cambodia are still discovering ancient temples almost every year.
There are approximately four thousand known Angkorian and pre-Angkorian-era archeological sites in Cambodia, including temples, bridges, reservoirs, and theaters – and new sites are being added to this inventory every year, according to Damian Evans, a University of Sydney archaeologist who studies ancient Cambodian temples. However, most of the newly discovered “temples” do not resemble the grandeur of Angkor Wat. A temple ten meters high is an unusual discovery, he said.
“Over the last 20 years, it’s been a constant process of finding several hundred new temples per year,” he said. “But if they’re finding temples of that size, that’s quite an amazing discovery. Normally we just find piles of bricks, just some rubble on the ground, a few pots here and there. It’s definitely not every day that you find a structure with walls.”
During his career with the Ministry of Culture, Phann added dozens of long-lost ancient temples to the map of Cambodia – probably more than anyone else alive, says Evans.
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The Red Temple Photo courtesy Nady Phann
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Black Water Lake Temple Photo courtesy Nady Phann
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Little Monkey Temple Photo courtesy Nady Phann
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According to Yern Hong, the director of the culture department of Oddar Meanchay province, the temples were initially discovered by villagers who went into the forest to gather fruits and hunt for animals. Others say that the temples were found by the Khmer Rouge soldiers, who hid in the forest near the Thai border while fighting the government’s army. But in either case, they didn’t inform authorities in Cambodia’s capital, and that is why the temples had not been documented or studied by archaeologists until now. Even after officials were told about the temples, they couldn’t visit them because of their remote location in the jungle, inaccessible by roads and surrounded by mine fields. Peace had only recently been restored in this sparsely populated area of Cambodia.
While Cambodia’s capital was liberated from the genocidal rule of the communist Khmer Rouge in 1979, fighting continued in some remote corners of the country – particularly near the Thai border – into the 1990s. According to Keo Tann, the police chief of the Traipang Prasat district where the temples were discovered, this area was occupied by the Khmer Rouge until 1998 or 1999.
“Both the Khmer Rouge and the government soldiers laid the mines. The Khmer Rouge reconciled with the government, but the landmines are still in the ground, they didn’t go anywhere. No one can go there because even the soldiers who laid the mines forgot where they put them,” he said.
Mining the areas around ancient temples was a common practice during Cambodia’s civil war because the stone structures could be used as bunkers, according to Heng Ratana, the director general of the Cambodian Mine Action Centre (CMAC), the country’s government de-mining agency.
The remote Oddar Meanchay province is one of the least populated in Cambodia. Christophe Pottier, an archaeologist with Ecole Francaise d’Extreme Orient who works in Cambodia, said that there is approximately one village every 50 kilometers. The temples, hidden by the forest, could not be seen in areal photographs.
In recent years, however, the country’s rapid economic development, the end of the war, and the push to build and pave more roads have led more people to move into previously unoccupied areas. More long-lost temples also began coming into view due to deforestation – in the last ten years, so much of Cambodia’s virgin forests disappeared due to logging that the country, which had appeared mostly green in photographs taken from space, now looks brown, a local newspaper recently reported.
Why so many temples?
There were thousands of stone temples in ancient Angkor, which between the 10th and 13th centuries extended from the border of Myanmar to the west and the Champa Kingdom in Southern Vietnam to the east.
Angkor’s temples, which were built to worship Hindu gods, were erected not only by the king, but also by ordinary people, and were also built to honor deceased ancestors, according to history professor Sombo Manara at the Royal University of Phnom Penh. Over time, it was not uncommon for old temples to be abandoned and new temples to be built somewhere else, leading to an increase in the number of temples over time.
Finding the temples gives historians a better idea about the exact location and extent of the ancient kingdom, and allows them to study how populations moved over time.
“Each of these small temples was a center of a community in the Angkor Empire,” Evans said. “For reasons we don’t clearly understand, the temples were abandoned. Once Angkor collapsed, this whole extended area collapsed at the same time.”
Some theories posit that the empire collapsed after being defeated by a Siamese invasion. According to other versions, climatic changes or drought may have played a role, or the fact that Hinduism was replaced by Buddhism, a more egalitarian religion.
Whatever the reason for Angkor’s demise, Phann and other archaeologists will continue searching for more ancient temples in Cambodia. Nady said he will return to Oddar Meanchey province again in the near future to explore the forest further – as he has heard that there are more temples beyond the minefields.
“We have to do the inventory of all the temples,” he said. “If we know where the temples are, we can inform the companies (that work in the region) that we want to protect these areas”.
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The Names of Angkor’s Lost Temples
Most of the names that are now used to refer to the ancient temples of the Angkor Empire are not original, according to Christophe Pottier, an archaeologist with Ecole Francaise d’Extreme Orient.
“In 98 percent of the cases, the current names are totally unrelated to the ancient names,” he said. “In the Angkor region, we know of temples that changed names three times in a century.”
Moreover, he says, “while some temples change names often, others share the same name. We have maybe 20 temples named ‘Prasat Pum,’ which means ‘the village temple’”.
Pottier explains that when archaeologists find an ancient temple that was previously unknown to them, they usually write down the name that the local people use, but also give the structure a new and unique number.
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The Mountain Temple of Angkor
Preah Vihear Province, Cambodia—Dozens of crates with ziplock bags populate the back room of a new museum near an Angkorian temple on the Thailand border. Each bag is carefully labeled in black marker, with the date and location of the artifact contained within. I can’t read Khmer, but I can see that many of the bags are marked with “2013” on them.
Acting Museum Director Seng Kompheak takes out a piece of pottery. “It looks like the face of a monkey because of the big ears,” he says.
From another bag, he removes a small stone object and turns it over—it’s a stamp depicting an image of a crocodile. “We had never seen this. It looks like a prehistoric tool,” he adds.
A large, partly broken jar rests on the table. “It was probably a burial jar,” Kompheak says, “because it has a small hole drilled in the bottom.”
These are some of the objects that will go on display at the Samdech Decho Hun Sen Eco-Global Museum of Preah Vihear, which is expected to open in early 2014. Named after, and funded in part by, Cambodia’s Prime Minister Hun Sen, the museum is dedicated to Cambodia’s second UNESCO World Heritage Site: the mountaintop temple, Prasat Preah Vihear, situated on the border between Thailand and Cambodia. It is an imposing structure, originally built to command a prominent place atop a 525-meter (1,722 ft) cliff in the Dângrêk Mountains during the reign of the Khmer Empire in the 11th-12th centuries C.E. Dedicated to the Hindu deity Shiva, it was known as “Shikareshvara” in Angkorian times.
Thailand and Cambodia have long disputed the ancient temple and the land surrounding it. In 1962, the Hague-based International Court of Justice ruled that the temple belongs to Cambodia—a decision some Thai nationalists did not accept. Fighting between Thai and Cambodian forces sparked up here in 2008 and in 2011, inflicting damage on the eleventh-century temple, which was hit by mortar and artillery shells. The Thais argued that, while the International Court of Justice ruled that the temple belongs to Cambodia, Thailand was not clear as to who owns the land around the ancient monument. To clarify the misunderstanding, the Court issued its final decision in November 2013, giving Cambodia sovereignty over the land around the temple, and ordering Thailand to withdraw its military from the area.
Located 500 km from Cambodia’s capital, the Preah Vihear Temple has long been inaccessible. Partly because of its remote location, Preah Vihear was among the last strongholds of the Khmer Rouge—civil war ended here only in 1998, and the area is still heavily mined. French colonial archaeologists couldn’t learn much about the site because of the land dispute with Thailand, according to Christiane Garnero Morena, a UNESCO expert who worked on the museum. It’s now impossible to get to the temple from the Thai side. The border has been closed since 2008, and visitors with Thai passports aren’t allowed to approach the temple.
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The Preah Vihear Temple straddles the border between Thailand and Cambodia
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Above and below: Today, scaffolding is a visible reminder that Cambodian authorities are focusing efforts to manage and develop the site. Photo by Julie Masis
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Perhaps because Preah Vihear Province has remained inaccessible to archaeologists, there’s a wealth of undiscovered history here. In the last five years, while digging trenches and building barricades, Cambodian soldiers came across dozens of Angkorian artifacts. The conscious effort on the part of the Cambodian government to develop the area for tourism has also helped; historic items were unearthed during road construction, or were returned to officials after villagers heard that a museum was being built.
“More than 500 pieces were found in the last few years,” said Pheng Sanoeun, director of the Department of Monuments and Archaeology at Cambodia’s National Authority for Preah Vihear. “We don’t count every single artifact. We are not interested in the number of pieces. We are interested in the pieces that give us new information.”
“The items were most likely left behind by the people who built the temple approximately a thousand years ago,” he added. Construction of the Preah Vihear Temple began in the ninth century, and lasted more than 200 years.
According to Philippe Delanghe, the culture specialist at UNESCO’s office in Phnom Penh, some of these newly discovered ceramics are considered extremely valuable or unique. Angkorian specialists are particularly puzzled by a small clay jar with holes in the lid. It may have been used for a medicinal purpose, as the holes would let vapor out.
“I have never seen a stamp with a picture of a crocodile on the bottom or a lid with many tiny holes in it,” said archaeologist Ea Darith, who wrote his PhD thesis on Angkorian ceramics.
Getting There
After almost four years of working as a journalist in Cambodia, Preah Vihear was the last important tourist attraction I hadn’t visited.
I was discouraged by Google Maps, according to which the easiest way to reach the temple is from Thailand, and by the Lonely Planet Cambodia travel guide, which notes that “the poor state of the roads, especially in the wet season, turns any trip up to Prasat Preah Vihear into something of a trek.” The guide also states that the accommodations in Sra Em, the closest village to the temple, are “rudimentary,” and “both uncomfortable and filthy.”
It happened, however, that this information was outdated. A new road has been built recently, shortening the trip between Siem Reap (where Angkor Wat is located) and Preah Vihear Temple to only three or four hours. Moreover, at least three new hotels—with 24-hour electricity and air conditioning—have opened in Sra Em, which is about 30 minutes from the temple.
Despite the improvements, not many tourists make the trip—and the journey along the almost deserted National Highway 67 to Preah Vihear Temple is still an adventure.
About halfway between Siem Reap and Preah Vihear lies the dusty town of Anlong Veng, the former Khmer Rouge stronghold that gives the impression that war ended only yesterday. Stray dogs wander along the town’s only street. Once darkness falls at 6 pm, people use flashlights to see where they’re going. There are no restaurants serving Western food, hotel workers don’t speak English, and children stare at foreigners as if they were exotic animals at a zoo.
We spent the night in Anglong Veng, and the next day took a “taxi” to Sra Em. It was not a pleasant ride: in typical Cambodian fashion, there were two passengers in the driver’s seat, five people in the back, and one in the trunk. The driver, sporting very long, curvy fingernails, answered his phone constantly, yet somehow managed to narrowly avoid collisions with cows and oncoming trucks. At one point we came to a broken bridge—one side of it was on the same level as the road, but the other came down at an almost 45 degree angle. Not stopping to inspect the structure, overloaded vehicles—including ours—simply drove across, assuming it would hold. All we could do was close our eyes and pray.
The Museum
The museum of Preah Vihear wasn’t officially open to the public when I visited at the end of October 2013—but the director greeted me at the entrance with his entire entourage and spent about two hours showing me around.
A pair of recently unearthed pieces of sandstone from Preah Vihear Temple guard the entrance—the ancient sculptor may have intended to turn them into lions, Kompheak said, although it’s hard to tell now.
A map on the wall illustrates the dimensions of the Khmer Empire, which once stretched from southern Vietnam to Thailand, Myanmar and parts of Malaysia. Another showcases the locations of Angkorian temples and how they were connected by ancient roads. One such road led from Angkor Wat to Preah Vihear—which, in Angkorian times, was called Shikareshvara —and from there to Wat Phu, in Laos. Along these royal roads, the kings of Angkor built the so-called “houses of fire” every 15 km—places where people stopped to pray and rest after a half-day’s journey, according to Kompheak. The rulers of Angkor also built 102 “houses for the sick”—hospitals—along these routes.
When this museum opens, visitors will first see the statues of two life-sized kneeling attendants, which were returned to Cambodia in the summer of 2013 from the Metropolitan Museum in New York, after museum authorities learned that the statues had been looted. More recently, a third ancient sculpture depicting Duryodhana, a Khmer warrior, will be displayed here as well — An American court determined in December that the statue, worth more than $2 million, should be returned. All three statues originally came from the Koh Ker temple complex in Preah Vihear Province.The statues show deities in motion, and are among the best that the Khmer empire produced, according to experts.
“Hopefully, more sculptures will come back to the country in the future,” Delanghe said.
To prevent further looting, on their own, authorities proactively removed several important works from the Preah Vihear Temple. One of these is a walking lion, which was brought to the museum from Preah Vihear Temple three months ago. “It’s an unusual lion,” Kompheak says. “In Khmer art lions are almost always standing, while this one is in motion.” Another is a sculpture of the Hindu god Vishnu, who holds an object in each of his four arms, symbolizing wind, fire, earth, and water. Finally, Kompheak shows me a door lintel from the temple, with images of cows and buffalos. Behind the sculpture, visitors can see cut marks. According to Kompheak, they were made by looters who tried to carry away the stone but couldn’t because it was too heavy.
The second museum building exhibits huge photographs of some animal species unique to Preah Vihear Province—including the critically endangered giant ibis, Cambodia’s national bird, and the kouprey, the country’s national mammal—a wild ox that’s on the verge of extinction from hunting and diseases introduced by domesticated cattle. There are also pictures of a peacock with a beautiful azure tail, a red-headed vulture, several species of frogs, and a southern serow, which Kompheak says is a goat-like herbivorous animal whose skin and bone powder are mixed with coconut juice or rice wine and used in traditional Cambodian medicine.
Around the museum, workers planted local trees, and labeled each one. The sap of one tree can be used to waterproof the bottom of boats and baskets, Kompheak explains. Another local variety was used to make wooden statues in the post-Angkorian period.
The idea behind the exhibits on flora and fauna is to create a link between Angkorian history and Cambodia’s natural environment—which also links the past to the present, according to UNESCO experts.
“Many museums have beautiful artifacts, but they are not connected to the location that they came from,” Garnero Morena said. “This museum is completely different from other Cambodian museums because there is no other museum in Cambodia that links ancient history to the present day.”
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Above and below: Two recent finds awaiting display in the new museum. Photos by Julie Masis
The Eco-Global Museum of Preah Vihear is also the first in Cambodia to have an exhibit on an ethnic minority group.
The display focuses on the Kuay, who have lived in Preah Vihear Province since the days of Angkor, and were intimately connected to the royal court. Because of their skills in iron smelting and domesticating wild elephants, the Kuay supplied the kings of Angkor with weapons and war elephants, according to Gérard Diffloth, another UNESCO expert who helped prepare the exhibit.
“The Kuay used to be iron smelters, extracting the ore from nearby hills and smelting it at very high temperatures to obtain iron ingots. This is high technology, using only traditional tools: bamboo, bellows made from buffalo-hides, and special charcoal,” Diffloth wrote in an email. “The technique is ancient, and was borrowed from India in ancient times. The Kuay had a monopoly on this industry, and the Khmer never took part in it.”
The museum places the Kuay villagers’ everyday items on display: mats and water containers from palm leaves, bamboo benches, and the monks’ palm-leaf manuscripts. These manuscripts, created using metal, string, and charcoal, were probably first used in the thirteenth century when Buddhism arrived, Kompheak said. There is also a display of big baskets that the present-day Kuay people wear on their heads during a rain-prayer ceremony that marks their New Year celebrations. The last item that caught my attention was a modern-looking hand-made toy: a cart made from a cut-up flip-flop (sandal) and a discarded plastic bottle.
“It’s very important to link the people who live here today with their history,” Garnero Morena said.
An Uneasy Presence
I couldn’t help but notice that one important piece of modern history was missing from the museum: the conflict with Thailand, and the dispute over who owns this ancient Angkorian site. While all the information in the museum is provided in three languages: English, French (Cambodia is a former French colony), and Khmer—there is no Thai translation.
“We don’t want to remind (visitors) about the war. It’s not good,” Kompheak said.
But, while war is never mentioned in the museum, it continues to affect the ancient temple and the lives of the people around it. In the past five years, due to fighting near the border, authorities relocated the residents of three communities near the Preah Vihear Temple—more than 1,200 families in all. This allowed government officials to expand the protection zone around the temple—now 10 by 20 km. One village, called Kor Muy, had actually been built on an ancient reservoir. Authorities have since refilled the reservoir with water and hope to conduct excavations to determine how big the ancient village was, and how many people lived there.
As we raced along the new, completely deserted road on our way from the museum to the temple, my eyes unconsciously scanned the landscape for ditches to roll into in case shooting broke out. We passed a village of identical houses with bright roofs: homes for the soldiers’ wives, we were told. At one point, we saw a tank coming toward us. Even our motorbike driver was a soldier. Since the village of Sra Em seemed to be cut off from the rest of the world, we questioned him about news at the border.
“Was it safe to visit the temple today?” we asked.
He said he didn’t know.
Tickets to the temple are free but required: foreign visitors must show their passports. Since there are no such regulations at any other Angkorian site in Cambodia, I could only imagine that the ticket was a safety measure: if something went wrong, authorities would know who was injured or killed. After the ticket booth, the ascent to the temple, which towers 625 m above sea level, became so steep that it could only be managed by the use of motorbikes with good brakes and four-wheel drive trucks.
On the top, I snapped photos of the out-of-breath Cambodian soldiers in camouflage uniforms — they had just hiked up the mountain with live turkeys in their arms. It appeared they were getting ready for lunch.
The temple itself surprised me. While I had seen it countless times on Cambodia’s 2,000 riel banknote—the equivalent of about 50 cents—it turned out that it was not one structure, but many pavilions stretched over 800 m, connected by steep stairs and a stone-paved road. The climb, under the scorching sun in the middle of the afternoon, made me stop several times to catch my breath.
Cambodian soldiers are a frequent presence at the temple complex remains. Photo by Julie Masis
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Unanswered Questions
Much remains to be uncovered and learned about the ancient site. Among other items recently found in the area—soon to be on display at the new museum—are a small bronze figurine of a female deity that was unearthed during the construction of a military base, a tiny bottle that may have been used to hold perfume—returned from the military during a training seminar on ceramics conservation—an urn that held someone’s ashes, and a jar that was used as an oil lamp. The oil lamp is also an unusual find: according to Sanoeun, very few Angkorian oil lamps had been found—and generally only near royal palaces—so finding one at Preah Vihear indicates that the area was important during the Angkorian period.
Archaeologists also discovered thirteenth century Chinese ceramics, which suggests that the people who lived in Preah Vihear had trade ties with China. The researchers’ goal is to gain more knowledge, not only about the temple, but about the daily lives of the people from the communities that surrounded it hundreds of years ago.
“This is very important for us because we know that Preah Vihear was a very important site during the Angkorian period, but we don’t know too much (about it) because we don’t have many researchers working on that,” Sanoeun said.
One intriguing unanswered question relates to its location. Australian archaeologist Damian Evans, a Postdoctoral Fellow with the University of Sydney who has led extensive research related to Angkor, is puzzled about how it was connected to the ancient Khmer capital. According to research conducted by his archaeologist colleague Mitch Hendrickson, who has examined artificial earth embankments and ancient bridges, the royal Angkorian highway led from Angkor to Wat Phu in Laos – but passed 40 kilometers away from the Preah Vihear temple. Angkorians also used rivers for transportation, but there are no rivers of suitable size near the Temple, according to Evans.
So how was the Preah Vihear Temple connected to Angkor Wat?
The answer might be found with technology.
To recreate maps of Angkorian cities, Evans and his team used LiDAR equipment, a technology that employed laser beams that bounced back to them, much like radar, to map small variations in altitude at Angkor, including Phnom Kulen, another old Khmer capital. Since Angkorian roads and streets were built higher than the surrounding rice fields to prevent flooding during the rainy season, they were able to map the ancient city blocks. To conduct this study, they flew back and forth over the ancient sites in a helicopter with their laser equipment.
But undertaking a similar study in Preah Vihear province, although very interesting, may not be possible in the current political climate. “We could definitely locate the existence of minor roads in the area using LiDAR, but that is not going to happen any time soon,“ says Evans. “To fly an aircraft low and slow over the disputed area would require a tremendous amount of planning and international cooperation at the very highest levels on both sides of the border – and I don’t think it’s feasible just for the purposes of archaeology, if at all in the current political climate.”
For now, it is a matter of waiting. In the meantime, Cambodian heritage authorities will continue to do what they can to raise the profile of the mountaintop temple as yet another gem in their cultural landscape.
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Living in the Shadow of Angkor
Lying beside the Phipot River about four hours drive from the Cambodian capital of Phnom Penh, the quiet community of Chi Phat goes about life much like many other villages and communities in the Cambodian countryside.These people are mostly farmers, growing rice, bananas and other crops, and fishermen. But a large number of village families also participate in the Chi Phat Community-Based Ecotourism (CBET) project, established about ten years ago with the help of a conservation organization. The ecotourism business offers a range of activities for those tourists who want the more unconventional experience of off-the-beaten-path activity and trekking—like morning bird-watching trips on the river, crab hunting at night, tree-planting, and trekking in the jungle. For those with special interests, such as archaeologists interested in the human past and things ancient, Chi Phat offers a special attraction—a chance to view the remains of a unique, ancient, mortuary ritual of a people still shrouded in mystery.
To see this, it often takes a journey on the back of a motorcycle along a trail so narrow that overhanging vegetation will scratch unprotected legs. The trail is at times so muddy that the rider must dismount to walk through leech-infested terrain, across fast-moving streams and slippery rocks, through clouds of butterflies, and near unsuspecting snakes. The trekker finally reaches a small clearing, to climb the rest of the way up a mountain to a wooden ladder. Here one encounters three high rock ledges. To explore the largest of them requires carefully crawling on hands and knees along a rock surface with a low ceiling above, inches away from the edge, a fall from which would surely mean an unsupported climber’s injury, if not death. Along the rock ledge surface are chipped stoneware jars containing bones, and what appear to be skillfully but simply crafted small wooden coffins with wooden lids. The bones within the jars are human. It is an ancient burial site.
Archaeologists have interpreted it as a secondary burial ritual mortuary site, one among 10 similar known sites distributed over 100 kilometers of the eastern ranges of Cambodia’s Cardamom Mountains jungle environment. Secondary burials have been practiced by a variety of cultures throughout history. They are often described as rites in which the bones of the deceased are placed in urns, bone boxes, or other vessels after the flesh has been stripped from the bones by natural decomposition. This particular secondary burial site, known as Phnom Pel, is the closest one to Chi Phat, and it, along with several other such sites, have been the objects of intensive study by Dr. Nancy Beavan and a team of associates. Beavan is an expert in radiocarbon dating, based at the University of Otago in New Zealand. She has examined and dated bones from a multitude of burial sites across the globe, but there was something unique and compelling about the Phnom Pel finds and those of the other nine sites. Beavan has made it her mission to find answers.
Map of Cambodia and the Cardamom Mountains region. Stars mark all 10 sites that have been geo-located during the project work. The distance between the southernmost and northernmost sites is about 72 km. Map from Beavan, et al., 2012
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“I got a call from the documentary film-makers for National Geographic’s “Riddles of the Dead”[in 2003],” said Beavan, “who asked me if I could date a bone in 3 weeks. After I started to prepare the bone, I became rather curious because it looked so fresh. I got back in touch with them and they told me it was from Cambodia and from a burial site.”* The dating of the bone placed it during the time of the demise of the Khmer Empire in the mid-fifteenth century CE. That was the civilization that built the iconic temple structures of Angkor.
“I became absolutely fascinated”, she said.*
That fascination drove Beavan to investigate the original context of the bone, a journey that eventually led to a full-scale study now financed under a $720,000 grant from the Royal Society of New Zealand Marsden Fund.
It hasn’t been an easy journey.
The site where the bone was found is known as Khnorng Sroal, a Cardamom Mountains site located high on a south-facing natural rock ledge. And like Phnom Pel and the other sites, access for extended study requires some extraordinary measures. Motorcycles must be used to negotiate narrow trails, rivers must be crossed, long hikes are required on rugged terrain. And then there is the climbing, as the sites are located on elevated rock ledges. “Instead of going to these places and collecting everything to take back to a comfy lab to work on,” says Beavan, “we live in the jungle for weeks at a time eating dried fish and dried sausages and rice, using this time to do all of our data collection in the field, and taking only tiny samples for scientific analysis, so that we can conserve and protect the sites in their original state.” At another site known as Phnom Khang Peung, 600 meters above seal level and deep in the jungle, they had to use a helicopter to bring in enough water and provisions, including people, to stay for two weeks of field work. “And helicopters are not cheap,” Beavan exclaims, “so that straightforward solution has only been used once!”
Two central questions have underpinned Beavan’s entire effort: Who were these people? And why did they “bury” their dead this way?
Out From Oblivion
For obvious reasons, much of the archaeology and research on ancient Cambodia has focused on the more visible and spectacular sites of the Khmer Empire, arguably Southeast Asia’s greatest ancient civilization, whose temple builders dotted the landscape with wonders like Angkor Wat and Angkor Thom. Flourishing from the ninth to fifteenth centuries CE, it dominated the region economically, culturally, and politically. Indeed, chronological and historical referencing in both popular literature and academic studies in the broader examination of Southeast Asia’s past have usually anchored around ‘before’, ‘during’ or ‘after’ Angkor.
But there is something apart, unique and tantalizingly mysterious about these Cardamom Mountains rock ledge burials when compared to the better-known discoveries associated with Angkor. Beavan thinks they could tell a story of a forgotten highland people with a unique culture living on the margins of the Angkorian world during its waning days in the fifteenth century, and then long after it’s fall. She also suggests that, though their time overlapped with that of the end of Angkor, the mountain culture that created this funeral ritual was separate and distinct from Angkor.
The first clue to this evolving story has to do with location. “The rugged terrain and isolation of the region has given it notoriety over the centuries as a place of refuge. The mountains have also been home to ethnic minorities who notably lived apart from the Khmer culture of the lowlands and were seen as “savages” and taken as slaves in Angkorian times,” writes Beavan and colleagues in an international publication in 2012. **
The second clue relates to the nature and unique combination of characteristics of the finds. Those sites, which Beavan has radiocarbon dated to between CE 1395 to 1650 using wood, tooth enamel and human bone samples from four sites, feature ritual use of 53 cm high stoneware storage jars containing human bones, and small coffins (averaging only about 1 meter in length), each much too small to accommodate a flesh and blood adult. The jars and coffins were placed together high on rock ledges or overhangs. The 50-53-cm-high stoneware jars used for the burials are known as Maenam Noi jars, made at the Maenam Noi kilns in the Singburi province along the Chao Phraya River in Thailand. These jars were in production from about the fourteenth to possibly the sixteenth centuries CE. The kilns are hundreds of miles distant from the region of the Cardamom sites. Says Beavan:
“There are at least 75 of these large storage jars among the 10 sites that we have located, and let me tell you, getting these things up into their mountain burial sites must have been a mission and a half. But they did, and they were very particular, too: only a certain type of storage jar, and then after having procured them and hauled them by some still unknown means into their mountain homelands, they used them simply to contain the bones of their dead, filling the jars with one or more skeletons.”
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The secondary burial jars and coffins were placed high on rock ledges in the Cardamom Mountains. Photo Credit Tep Sokha
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Dr. Nancy Beavan sitting among the artifacts on the Phnom Khnang Peung site ledge. Photo Credit Ouk Sokha
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A perspective view of the jars on a site rock ledge. Sitting in the background is Danni Eam, a member of the field team. Photo Credit Ouk Sokha
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Mr. Gan, a long-time member of the team and a member of the Chong ethnic minority, sieves sediments on the jar ledge for artifacts. Photo Credit Ouk Sokha
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And there is much more. Writes Beavan in the 2012 report:
“All of the burial jars appear to have been prepared by breaking away the rim to facilitate the emplacement of larger skeletal material such as entire skulls. A hole was drilled through the bottom of each jar, perhaps to ritually “kill” the vessel. The log coffins in the Phnom Pel, Damnak Samdech, and Khang Tathan sites are made of an as yet unidentified tree species, which is extremely dense and has a fine annual growth structure. The coffins vary in overall length between 90 to 178 cm, but their design is generally similar in that whole logs are cut into sections, the centers are carved out in squared corners, and each is topped by a lid, but there is no additional carving or decoration to the exterior. The exception to this, at one of the oldest sites, Khnang Tathan, is a single coffin of 210 cm, which has deep chevron carving on the ends of the coffin lid.”**
In addition, the jars were found to contain green, yellow and blue glass beads, and simple bronze rings. The assemblages in all 10 sites also contained additional tradeware jars, bowls, and dishes, possibly used, according to the archaeological interpretation, for food offerings. Curiously, at every site Beavan and her team always found at least one 45-cm-high ceramic Angkorian jar, made at the Buriram kilns in an area bordering the western boundaries of present-day Cambodia and Thailand. In the twelfth-thirteenth centuries CE the Buriram kilns were part of the Angkorian kingdom. The Angkorian jars are significantly earlier than the more numerous Maenam Noi jars. “The Angkorian jars sort of stick out like a sore thumb,” Beavan told the Phnom Penh Post recently. “Why, if you are collecting Maenam Noi with such a passion, do you pop in one Angkorian jar? What does that mean?” Though Beavan suggests that these people were not associated with the lowland Angkorians, had there been any sort of an Angkorian connection?
Perhaps. Yet most of the elements belie a cultural identity with Angkor. Write Beavan and her colleagues in their 2012 article:
“The ritual practices in the mountains are distinctive compared with what is known of lowland mortuary practices in the pre-Angkorian and Angkorian periods. What is especially remarkable about the Cardamom sites, and suggests much about their inter-relationship and the cultural similitude of those who created them, is the overall uniformity of the material aspects of the ritual for the dead. This uniformity includes such items as the small nautical tradeware bowls and plates that were possibly used for food offerings, the use of coffins in 3 of the 4 sites presented here, and the Maenam Noi jars used for the burials in all but the Khnang Tathan site.”**
Above and below: The ancients deposited the defleshed bones in modified Maenam Noi jars. Photo Credit Ouk Sokha
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Dr. Nancy Beavan views and examines a coffin on a ledge. Credit Ouk Sokha
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Nancy with three types of coffins at a site. Ouk Sokha
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The body of a coffin, which also has a tight fitting lid (not shown). Note the detail in the simple carving of the rim designed to receive the equally well carved lid. They are simple designs, with no outer decoration, but the craftsmanship of the people who made them is evident in the fine edges and the fit of the lids. Photo Credit Ouk Sokha
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To be sure, the general use of jars for secondary burials is not unique to these sites. The practice has been found at a number of ancient sites throughout Southeast Asia, including locations in Cambodia, Indonesia, Thailand, Laos, Vietnam, Okinawa, Borneo, Mindanao, and the Phillipines, to name a few. But those “jar burial” practices consist of the literal burial of the jar in the earth. The Cardamom Mountain ritual is among the few anywhere with jars set out upon the ground or in rock niches. The ceramic jars from Thailand’s Maenam Noi kilns used by the ancient tribes of the Cardamom Mountains, according to Louise Cort, curator for ceramics at the Freer and Sackler museums of Asian art in Washington, DC., were the “all purpose containers at a time when there weren’t other alternatives” – they were used to store everything from rice and indigo to sulfur for gunpowder and even textiles (so that insects couldn’t get to them). The jars were also used as containers for commercial goods that were shipped and traded from Siam throughout Asia, reaching as far as Japan. “They are very commonplace jars,” Cort said. “But what’s interesting is how these jars were moved and acquired and then taken up into the mountains.”
Some light was shed on this in 2006 near Cambodia’s Koh S’dech Island off the coast of Koh Kong Province in the southwestern Cardamom Mountains, when fishermen began pulling these same jars out of the sea. Further investigations by Cambodia’s Ministry of Culture showed that they had actually uncovered a medieval shipwreck, yielding 900 pieces of pottery in two recovery dives. Most of the cargo’s pottery consisted of Maenam Noi storage jars, exactly like the Cardamon bone burial jars, as well as examples of other types of ceramic ware of the period. Either it was a ship carrying only empty jars, or it was transporting another commodity inside the jars, Cort says. The discovery has led the researchers to suggest that the highland people identified with the jar and coffin burial sites may have exchanged forest products, such as wood, cardamom, and elephant tusks, for the jars and then brought them inland in river boats. Beavan cites the historical record of Zhou Daguan, a Chinese emissary who visited Angkor in the thirteenth century, who commented on how “mountain ethnic groups collected and sold exotic and desirable forest products such as resin, elephant tusks, and cardamom; these products would have been sought by supracultural traders.”** The shipwreck’s discovery underscored another distinction between these highland people and the people of Angkor — they used different trade routes. If the trade theory is correct, “the people of the Cardamom Mountains got their jars through a maritime trade connection in the Gulf of Thailand that the Angkorian people didn’t have,” according to Beavan. “The Angkorians used mainly overland trade routes, and possibly river systems. The Angkorians also created their own ceramics; the people of the Cardamoms appear not to have had any such ceramic tradition, as only tradeware has ever been found among the sites.”
Clues from the Living
Often the stories of living descendants or people who later settled the area of an archaeological site can provide some hints or insights that archaeologists can use to help interpret the material finds in the field. Beavan and her team have made a point of ensuring that what ethnologists and the current local inhabitants have said about the jars and their past play a role in helping to understand who these highland people were, and why they practiced this unique mortuary ritual and burial practice.
French ethnographers Marie Martin and Jean Ellul conducted studies of the current Cardamom highland inhabitants decades ago, and recorded stories from the people there of “bones in caves”, bones they thought belonged to the “people of the court” of Longvek, (a trading port on the Tonle river just north of present-day Phnom Penh) who had fled a Thai invasion in 1593. The site to which they referred was located in the Cardamom range flanking Kampong Speau province. But it was further investigated by Ellul and Roland Mourer, a French archaeologist, who concluded that associated remains, consisting of simple glass beads and metal rings, likely did not represent those of a high-status group or royalty and thus these people would not have been good candidates for the “people of the court”.
“For some reason they did not comment on the ceramics,” says Beavan, “but perhaps they did not realize they were looking at a very uncommon ceramics collection! And then, the researchers simply walked away from this quite unusual burial site, and the story of their single visit is recorded only by Marie Martin writing about her pre-1975 research in the Cardamom Mountains.”
Other oral traditions mention a “Chong Empire” that predated that of the Khmer. Its capital was said to be located near the town of Chanthaburi in Thailand. One legend has it that a people known as the Pear/Por of Kulen, north of Angkor, emigrated to the Cardamoms and discovered a cardamom spice called kravanh, a substance used in divine offerings during the eleventh century. Among thje legends, the Samre people of the Pursat Province also mention a Chong Empire that preceded the Khmer.
Were the ‘people of the jars’ a remnant of the Chong Empire, or somehow connected to them? There is no evidence to suggest this. And other than the single twelfth-thirteenth century Angkorian jar from the Buriram kilns that archaeologists have found at each of the Cardamom burial sites, there is nothing to suggest any real connection to Angkor or its people.
Beyond investigating known sites, archaeologists are also looking for new ones — the Cardamoms stretch for 20,000 square kilometers, and large areas still haven’t been surveyed. To find the sites and learn more about them, they are collecting stories about the jars from villagers. Finding people whose families are originally from the Cardamoms is not easy because during the Khmer Rouge period villages were forcefully relocated to different parts of the country — so much so that in Chi Phat probably as few as 10 percent of the inhabitants have family who lived in the area before Pol Pot’s regime.
Still, some locals maintain a connection to the sites.
On several visits to the mountain ledges, researchers came across candle wax and plastic bags. Once, scientists even encountered a group of 20 villagers who made a three-day trek on foot to offer food and incense to the bones. It is not clear whether these people have an ancestral connection to the site. Regardless, researchers are interested in interviewing the locals.
“We try to collect old stories, even old myths because sometimes in a myth there is a grain of memory,” says Beavan.
But the mystery remains.
A Race Against Time
Whether or not Beavan and her team ever find all of the answers they are looking for, one thing is certain — their time is running out. Like so many other verdant rainforest and mountain habitats and regions across the globe, the natural riches of the Cardamom Mountains region are in danger of disappearing at an ever-accelerating pace. Modern development has already taken its toll. Bulldozing and deforestation have left red-earth scars where once stood relatively untouched rainforest. Along with the wildlife and vegetation, any human cultural remains, like those of the jar and coffin ritual burial sites, will go with them, if not protected.
“There is a lot of illegal looting still going on,” Beavan says, “and economic land concessions, which turn the foothills into sugarcane and rubber plantations; hydroelectric schemes which flood valleys; black market trade in precious wood species; poaching of some of the world’s most endangered species; elephants and other wildlife being squeezed out of their natural ranges.”***
Beavan believes she has about 5 years to run with her project before it is too late, unless something is done to preserve the known sites as well as any future sites they may discover. She is now working with the Cambodian Ministry of Culture and Fine Arts to develop a heritage protection plan, hoping to buy more time.
And plenty of time is what it takes if archaeologists expect to get more than a few scraps and clues about who these people were and how they related to the larger context of Cambodian history and culture during the final years and aftermath of the Khmer Empire. Thus, like any project of an archaeological nature, the work is characteristically slow, but the mystery is compelling.
“Despite the work that has now spanned some ten years,” says Beavan, “we still do not know exactly who these people were, or where their burial practice came from. Did they make it up themselves? Did they get the idea from vaguely similar practices of other mountain people in Vietnam, Laos and Thailand and if so, how did that happen?”
So Beavan and her colleagues liken their work to piecing together a giant jigsaw puzzle, but without the benefit of the box lid that illustrates the complete picture. And most of the pieces may never be found.
In the end, they can only hope that enough of the picture will eventually materialize to tell a story of an enigmatic highland people who, long forgotten in the shadow of Angkor, lived their lives on the margin.
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* Nancy Beavan, “Burial Practices in the Cardamom Mountains,” interviewed by Kathryn Ryan, Nine to Noon, Radio New Zealand, July 20, 2012.
** Nancy Beavan, et al., “Radiocarbon Dates from Jar and Coffin Burials of the Cardamom Mountains Reveal a Unique Mortuary Ritual in Cambodia’s Late-to-Post-Angkor Period (15th-17th Centuries AD)”; Radiocarbon, 54: 1-22, 2012.
*** Nancy Beavan, “Burial Practices in the Cardamom Mountains,” interviewed by Kathryn Ryan, Nine to Noon, Radio New Zealand, July 20, 2012. Also includes statements to Popular Archaeology.
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A Lab in the Jungle
Much of the work of Beavan’s team is done in the field at the sites where the finds exist. There, the artifacts are recorded, mapped, measured, collected, sorted and examined. Thus, with the exception of sampling for radiocarbon dating where special equipment and facilities are required, they eschew a comfortable lab to study and work on all of the artifacts on site. “We live in the jungle for weeks at a time eating dried fish and dried sausages and rice, using the field time to do all of our data collection in the field, and taking only tiny samples for scientific analysis, so that we can conserve and protect the sites in their original state,” Beavan related to Popular Archaeology. Conservation takes place concurrent with the scientific work they perform at the site. For example, fragments of some of the ceramic ware that lay on the surface of the rock ledges, such as that of the Maenam Noir jars, were carefully pieced together onsite, an activity that in archaeology is normally done in museum or university conservation laboratories.
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Above, Tep Sokha and Danni Eam, responsible for the ceramic conservation work of the research team, reconstruct one jar that was broken into more than 160 pieces. All of this conservation work takes place in the middle of the jungle. Sokha has reconstructed dozens of burial jars and bowls, piecing them together like a puzzle. He doesn’t remove anything from the rock ledge – doing so would mean destroying the jar cemetery – so he places the reconstructed jars back on the ledge in the position where the fragments were found. He then photographs them to record their appearance. Says Beavan, “Mr. Tep is an extraordinary ceramic conservator. He can take a large jar broken into more than a hundred pieces and put it back together in the middle of the jungle on cliff edges. And one of his findings is that in those ancient times, people were also trying to mend their broken jars. Mr. Tep found two jars where broken pieces had been fixed anciently using natural tree resins.” Photo Credit Ouk Sokha
Above, Tep Sokha, the chief ceramics conservator, with a skull. Photo Credit Ouk Sokha
Above, Mr. Gan, a member of the field research team, piecing together broken jars. Photo Credit Nancy Beavan
Above, Dr. Sian Halcrow (right), Chief Bioarchaeologist for the project, and Stacey Ward at work at their bone analysis station in the midst of the jungle.
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Dr. Halcrow’s research on the bones suggests that the people who were buried in the jars did not die a violent death—their bones give no indication of that. The skeletal remains range in age from preterm infants and babies to older adults, including a skull that belonged to a woman who lived long enough to lose all her teeth in old age.
One of her most interesting discoveries relates to the teeth of the dead: many of the skulls have had the two lateral incisors—the teeth on the left and right of the two central teeth—removed. She believes that these teeth were pulled out deliberately—either as a sign of tribal affiliation or for beautification. According to Halcrow, pulling out teeth or changing how they look—by filing to give them a different shape or by removing teeth in a certain pattern — is a ritual that was last shown to have been practiced by lowland peoples in the Cambodian region around 200 CE. There is no mention of this practice in Angkor, however.
Halcrow also thinks that members of this tribe probably consumed significant quantities of rice, and that they did not eat much fibrous food, as the teeth do not show the signs of wear typical of fiber-rich food consumption.
Surprisingly, she also found some evidence among the bones of scurvy, a disease that results from lack of Vitamin C in the diet. This is unusual because these people lived in a jungle environment rich in fruits which contain high amounts of Vitamin C.
Dr. Halcrow at her jungle workstation for skeletal analysis. Photo Credit Ouk Sokha
Dr. Halcrow and Dr. Beavan sorting through the bone from one of the jars. Photo Credit Ouk Sokha
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Julie Masis is a freelance journalist. Her stories have appeared in the Christian Science Monitor, the Guardian, the Boston Globe, Science magazine and in other publications. She is also the publisher and editor of the Russian Boston Gazette.
Cover Image, Top Left: View of Angkor Wat.Kalibri5, Pixabay
“Only joint efforts will make decipherment possible.”
— Ester Salgarella
No one knows their names. Lost personalities of an ancient civilization, their most famous king is known to us only through Greek mythology—King Minos—if in fact he ever existed as described in the mythical narrative. But archaeological remains tell us that, whether or not King Minos was real as depicted in the mythology, there must have been kings in this land. Today the land is known as the island of Crete, a part of modern-day Greece, but as long ago as at least 3000 BCE it was the center of what has been penned in the historical literature as the ‘Minoan’ civilization—so named by the British archaeologist Sir Arthur Evans after the mythical king. It was Evans who first excavated the palatial remains at Knossos in 1900. In short, he ‘discovered’ the Minoans. Evans’ efforts were followed in succeeding years by a string of excavations and research that have revealed a remarkable ancient civilization that has left behind a wondrous legacy of monumental palaces, building complexes, tools, incredible artwork, writing systems, religion, and evidence of an expansive trade network across the Mediterranean. Remnants of their monumental past can be seen beyond Crete on multiple islands in the Aegean. They have been arguably described as representing Europe’s first great urbanized society.
Yet even so, we do not really know their story. We do not know the chronology of their kings, the major events of their history, or the affairs and issues of their elites. That is because, outside of Greek myth and unlike what scholars have been able to determine from the decipherment of ancient inscriptions that have testified and recorded the often detailed story of civilizations like ancient Egypt, Mesopotamia, and the ancient Maya, there are to-date no successfully deciphered written records for the Minoans. Evidence of ancient writing systems, however, was discovered during excavations at Knossos and other Minoan sites. Scholars, beginning with Evans, were able to distinguish three writing systems manifested mostly on clay tablets and seals that survived the ages due to baking from accidental fires, and on other artifacts. Known as Cretan Hieroglyphic (the earliest, a pictographic script), Linear A and Linear B, with Linear A determined to be the predecessor of linear B, the decipherment of these scripts eluded scholars for decades after their first discovery.
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Above and below: The ancient remains of Knossos, the largest known center of the Minoans on Crete. Above: Pat_Scrap, Pixabay Below: Bigfoot, Pixabay
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Cracking the Scripts
Scholars began to open windows on this mystery when, between 1951 and 1953, Michael Ventris and John Chadwick successfully deciphered the ancient Linear B script. Linear B was found mostly within palace archives at the excavated sites of Knossos, Cydonia,Pylos, Thebes and Mycenae. Excepting Knossos and Cydonia, these sites are best known as Mycenaean centers, and Linear B is thus largely associated with the Mycenaeans. The archaeological finds indicate this script was used to record and communicate economic transactions related to palatial center administration from approximately 1600–1100 BC. Although the Mycenaeans arose after the Minoans, with their most significant centers located in present-day mainland Greece, many scholars have suggested that the Mycenaeans were significantly influenced by the Minoans, with archaeological finds evidencing a strong trade and exchange relationship. Both Linear A and Linear B scripts share many common signs, and it is generally thought that Linear B is a derivative of the yet undeciphered Linear A. However, despite decades of study, scholars have yet to decipher Cretan Hieroglyphic and Linear A. But new strides have been made in recent years.
Clay tablet inscribed in Linear B from the Mycenaean palace of Pylos, on present-day mainland Greece. This inscription provides information on the distribution of bovine, pig and deer hides to shoe and saddle-makers. This tablet was preserved because it was baked in fire that destroyed the palace around 1200 BC. Sharon Mollerus, Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic, Wikimedia Commons
What follows is an interview with Dr. Ester Salgarella, who is a Junior Research Fellow at St. John’s College, University of Cambridge. She is most recently known for the creation of the open access SigLA database of Linear A inscriptions, a remarkable and possible game-changing tool developed in collaboration with computer scientist Dr Simon Castellan at INRIA, University of Rennes (France). Although this new tool is under ongoing development, it now features more than 3,000 individual inscription signs that are searchable. Her work, along with others, may prove to be a key to the eventual decipherment of this mysterious script, opening a long-awaited window for understanding the ancient Minoans………….
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Working Toward a Comprehension of the Minoan Script
Q: What is your background experience as it relates to the study and decipherment of Linear A? What inspired you to focus on research related to this?
ES (Ester Salgarella): My background is in Classics and Archaeology. Before coming to Cambridge, I received both my BA and MA from the University of Padova (Italy), where I started studying Aegean Prehistory and Mycenaean Greek out of passion and as optional classes (when available). I came to Cambridge for graduate study (MPhil and PhD) as I knew Cambridge is a leading institution in this field and the very place where the archive of LB decipherment is preserved. It was the most sensible place to go to follow my passion and further my knowledge. And, in hindsight, I was not mistaken!
However, my passion for the ancient world and ancient scripts is rooted in my childhood: I still remember a time when I was 6 years old. My parents took me to Venice to visit an exhibition featuring the Ancient Egyptian queen Nefertari (http://www.fondazionememmo.it/nefertari-regina-degitto/) . Needless to say, I fell in love with Egyptian Hieroglyphs more than anything else and at the exhibition shop I acquired a little booklet (for children) on how to draw hieroglyphs. Once back home, I started to cover the house with sticky labels displaying names of objects in hieroglyphic (to the extent a child would do, of course). This is my earliest memory of my passion for ancient scripts. As a teenager, at school I studied very fondly both Greek and Latin and I was mesmerized when the Aegean Bronze Age world was disclosed to me: I had a sudden and strong feeling of belonging… it was like a call. This is what I wanted to study, what I wanted to do. I wanted to work on the earliest evidence of writing on European soil, to know more about the people who invented and made use of writing there, to understand more of their history through the lens of writing. Moreover, it was a reasonably new field of study (beginning with Heinrich Schliemann’s excavations at Troy and Mycenae, and Sir Arthur Evans’ unearthing of the palace of Knossos), and this added to the excitement.
However, it was not until my PhD that I could focus on Linear A (LA). There are no classes on LA at the University, so only at the graduate level could I work freely on what I liked most. I had always been intrigued by the partial knowledge we had of the LA to Linear B (LB) transmission process, and it puzzled me. When I proposed this topic for my PhD to my supervisor, I must say I was expecting a rejection. When the ‘yes’ came, I was beyond delighted! This meant I had to acquire knowledge of LA by myself, and full days, weeks and months were dedicated to that single purpose, thanks to the magnificent holdings of the Cambridge University Libraries and the ‘Mycenaean Epigraphy Room’ private collection in the Faculty of Classics.
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Q: What is the current status of efforts to unlock the language behind Linear A and the implications or significance of this endeavor?
ES:
a). The state of the art: ‘readability’ of LA texts, within a hoped-for ‘decipherment’ framework
Despite the language difference between LB, which writes the earliest form of the Greek language known to date, and LA, which writes a language we dub ‘Minoan’, it is still possible – to some extent and with an approximation – to ‘read’ LA inscriptions. This is because of the script relationship between LA and LB. It has long been known that these scripts are related, and that the LB script (not language) is derivative from the LA script. The (to date) known context of use (primarily administrative purposes) also suggests the same. In my work (more on this below) I set off to examine the peculiarities of the transmission process to assess the degree of relatedness.
Given that the LB script used the LA script as a template, it is assumed that those LA signs that maintained approximately the same shape in LB may also be ‘read’ with the phonetic reading (approximate, if not the same) we have reconstructed in LB. This allows us to at least ‘read’ LA texts in phonetic transcription. Such transcriptions have now been made open-access by Prof. John Younger in his website: http://people.ku.edu/~jyounger/LinearA/Regrettably, the printed edition of LA inscriptions does not have any phonetic transcription. Although this method may well be subject to criticisms, as we do not have a way of uncontrovertibly proving all sound values remained approximately the same upon script transmission, there are a number of legitimate reasons in favor of applying this method, as it has been recently argued by two colleagues of mine, Dr. Torsten Meissner and Dr. Philippa Steele, based here at the University of Cambridge.
However, even if we could fully ‘read’ LA texts, we cannot yet understand the underlying language. To ‘decipher’ means to get to know the language encoded in a script. Hence, we are currently faced with what I call ‘readability’ of LA texts, within a hoped-for ‘decipherment’ framework. It has been demonstrated by Prof. Yves Duhoux from the University of Louvain that LA makes use of a good many prefixes and suffixes (i.e., in our case, syllabic signs that are attached to the beginning or end of a word-stem to create a new word). This makes it unlikely for it to belong to the Indo-European linguistic family, which does not show this feature to such an extent. More recently, Dr. Brent Davis from the University of Melbourne has investigated LA texts at a deeper level by using statistical and phonotactic methods (more on this below) and he has attempted to determine which linguistic family (e.g. Indo-European, Semitic, Afro-Asiatic etc.) may best fit the LA pattern. For now, none of the existing families shows a close correspondence with the features we see in LA.
In order to arrive at a decipherment, we need to carry out interdisciplinary research in a collaborative international environment. This is necessary until we eventually find a bilingual inscription (a ‘Rosetta Stone’ for LA), of which there is none to date. In light of this, in the following discussion I would rather leave aside the issue of ‘deciphering’ LA, though ultimately critical, and focus on the stepping stones that may help to pave the way to a future decipherment.
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Linear A tablets on display at the Archaeological Museum of Heraklion, Crete. DrEster Salgarella
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A Minoan clay tablet inscribed with Linear A, on display in Crete’s Archaeological Museum of Heraklion. Dr Ester Salgarella
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b). Significance of a long-awaited decipherment
On a local scale, knowing the language behind the LA texts shall allow us to carry out an assessment of the extent of literacy in the Bronze Age Aegean, developing insights into the workings of the palatial administrations during the Minoan period (ca. 1800-1450 BCE), and achieving a more nuanced reconstruction of ‘Minoan’ society, economy and religion. Moreover, further linguistic analysis shall allow us to assess linguistic/dialectal variation over time and space in the different parts of Crete (and the Aegean islands that have so far produced LA evidence).
On a global scale, linguistic data shall enable us to situate the language in its diachronic position, in case it can be successfully linked to one of the already known linguistic families; if not, this will nevertheless give us an astonishing example of an ‘isolated’ language (such as, e.g., Sumerian and Etruscan). Knowledge of the underlying language may also allow us to reconstruct (although with due caution) prehistoric population movements, giving us a hint as to the place of origin of the pristine nucleus of the so-called ‘Minoans’.
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Q: A recent press release article about your work stated the following: “Taking an interdisciplinary approach using evidence from linguistics, inscriptions, archaeology and palaeography (the study of the handwriting of ancient scripts), Dr Salgarella examined the two scripts in socio-historical context.”* Could you explain this in such a way that a reader from the general public would understand, perhaps giving some examples to illustrate?
ES: Let us start with the terms that may sound more familiar: archaeology and linguistics.
Archaeological analysis: in our case, this primarily concerns chronology. It is essential to know where tablets come from and the dating archaeologists have assigned to a given tablet deposit. This gives us a relative chronology of the finds being studied, and consequently allows us to situate the attestations of the script in its diachronic development.
Linguistic analysis: this involves an assessment of current approaches to the linguistic analysis of the Linear scripts. Of particular importance is the discussion about how legitimate it is to read LA signs with the phonetic values we have reconstructed for LB (see my discussion above). Moreover, we also need to take into consideration those signs that are attested in one script only: within LB, to try to understand the reasons why some signs were created anew and some others were discarded during the transmission process; within LA, to try to understand why some signs (esp. not continued into LB) are at times site-restricted, i.e. found at a given site only.
Let us now discuss two fields of study that may not be familiar: epigraphy and palaeography.
Epigraphic analysis (inscriptions): this has to do with the study of how inscriptions are made, with respect to both the implement and the support (in the case of LA and LB, the support is the clay tablet and the implement is a stylus). An examination of tablet layout and disposition of information on the writing surface also plays a key role. If we take for example the LB tablet I have annotated with a phonetic transcription and a translation in the before-mentioned St. John’s press release article, in that type of layout we can see that each spot occupied by a word is significant for administrative purposes: e.g. the first word (bigger size) is always a man-name (that of a shepherd), the slot on top is occupied by another man-name (that of the person responsible for overlooking the shepherd and its flock), finally the slot on the bottom is filled with a place-name (in this case ‘Ku-ta-to’). Epigraphy is also concerned with features like word division (e.g. in LB this could be achieved by changing the size of close-by words or by adding a word-divider in the shape of a little comma); erasures (cases in which a previously written sign or word was erased and a new one was written on top: at times we are still able to work out what had been written in the first instance and to make sense of the change); presence or absence of ruled lines to guide writing; and intentional blanks and spaces between words and/or lines. All these data give us information about how tablets were redacted and edited, and which kind of information the palace administrators (aka ‘scribes’) deemed ‘essential’ for future record.
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Linear B clay tablet with the text explained. DrEster Salgarella
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Palaeographical analysis: this is the study of sign forms, how a sign was designed in the first instance, the number of variant ways in which a sign can be drawn, the variation in handwriting that we witness between different ‘scribes’, the modifications signs undergo over time and place. By way of example, in Linear B palaeographic analysis has been used to detect ‘scribes’ (referred to with the more neutral term ‘scribal hand’ in the scholarship): i.e., the individuals who were responsible for writing the clay documents. Such a task has not been fully undertaken for LA, and we hope that the palaeographical analysis carried out in my book (Aegean Linear Script(s): Rethinking the Relationship between Linear A and Linear B), alongside SigLA (SigLA – The Signs of Linear A: a paleographic database), will help with the detection of individuality on Linear A tablets. This would have significant implications for our reconstruction of administrative connections in the palatial centers and it would be key to assessing the level of literacy at that time (e.g. how many people are likely to have mastered writing in the form of the LA syllabary?).
By examining the available evidence using and integrating these approaches, I was able to disentangle some of the intricacies that surround the LA to LB transmission process.
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Q: What have you specifically discovered about the relationship between Linear A and Linear B that opens up a significantly better window on understanding and deciphering Linear A, as opposed to what scholarship already knows about the two scripts?
ES: We already knew these scripts are derivative from one another, however, the precise way in which the latter was derived from the former was not straightforward, esp. in relation to the amount of change/rupture with the previous system: how much different is the LB script/system if compared to its template? In order to throw light on this, I set out to examine the structure and palaeographical features of both LA and LB.
By structure I mean the examination of the arrangement of their respective syllabaries, the function performed by a sign in context (e.g. syllabic, logographic, ideographic), the kind of sign combinations that were used in LA and which ones were continued in LB (and why so). This allows us to assess the level of ‘rupture’ with the previous system on a systemic level to get to an understanding of the degree of change (or lack thereof) upon the script transmission process from LA to LB.
As to palaeography, I produced detailed palaeographical charts of all signs attested on the LA tablets and the oldest LB tablets from Knossos (from the deposit called ‘The Room of the Chariot Tablets’) unearthed at any given site on Crete that has so far yielded written evidence. This allowed me to get a global view of all signs and their variants in each script and to assess the extent to which sign forms were modified when transmitted from LA to LB. These charts clearly showed that most of the graphic variants that we see in LA are also present in LB: this implies that the degree of change was kept to a minimum and there was no strong or drastic sign selection process (nor strong sign standardization) when LB was ‘created’.
The joint result of the combined structural and palaeographic analysis reveals that the two scripts (as well as systems) appear closer than previously assumed on both structural and graphic grounds: comparable categories of signs were transmitted from LA to LB, and also when LB innovates it appears to follow principles already operating in LA; also the graphic shapes of signs we see in LB were continued from LA antecedents most of the time, and not created completely anew. If change is likely to have been kept to a minimum during the script transmission process, this means that there may be scope for making even further comparisons between these two scripts as well as systems: in other words, we may want to test whether other features we see and know from the LB system may also be applied to the LA system to shed light on its characteristics. By way of example, LB tablets, in that they are records of economic transactions, contain a good number of words with administrative significance (e.g. ‘total’, ‘grand total’, ‘deficit in payment’, ‘allocation’, ‘contribution’, etc.): by studying contextual positions of words and their associations, we may be able to make inferences as to the plausible meaning of some LA words (and there are scholars already attempting to do so).
Moreover, by implication, these results may make us rethink our very interpretation of the so-called ‘Mycenaean takeover of Crete’ still found in the literature.From a script perspective, it is unlikely that there was an abrupt change: the script is continued in its graphic form with only slight modifications; the system itself was continued. The very purpose of clay documents was also the same as in the LA administration: documents used for the bookkeeping of palatial administrations. Moreover, this interpretation is consistent with the archaeological record: there is no evidence of a war-like context on Crete, at least on present evidence. These considerations may make us want to reconsider slightly our interpretation of the two communities dubbed ‘Minoans’ and ‘Mycenaeans’ by modernity. There was indeed language change in the transition between LA and LB, and their respective administrative systems, but this is not enough to claim a ‘takeover’ of the island.
I shall finish with a modern example: there are countries, like Switzerland for example, in which more than one language is spoken, though still they consider themselves as one nation. Language, therefore, shall not be taken a priori as a necessary condition to distinguish between different population groups. Moreover, it also needs stressing that we have to exercise due caution when projecting our modern views onto the past. We need to always question our interpretations and envisage more than one possible scenario.
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Q: What archaeological discoveries and sites have indicated the best potential for contributing to our understanding of Linear A?
ES: LA evidence does not amount to much, so we need to take into account all sites that have yielded written evidence in order to obtain as comprehensive a picture as possible. Only three sites on Crete have produced a sizeable amount of LA evidence allowing for site-internal comparison. These are: Haghia Triada in Central-South Crete (with some 1250 inscriptions: 147 tablets and 1103 sealed documents), Zakros on the North-East coast (with some 591 inscriptions: 31 tablets and 560 sealed documents) and Khania on the North-West coast (with some 309 inscriptions: 99 tablets and 210 sealed documents). The best preserved (and not only fragmentary) tablets come from these three sites, where there is potential to investigate the LA writing system at a deeper level given the higher amount of information we can retrieve from better preserved texts. However, scholars are now embarking on statistical and phonotactic analysis of the inscriptions with the aim at understanding some of the linguistic features (most importantly, Dr. Brent Davis from the University of Melbourne). Decipherment will only be made when we can say which language the tablets are written in, but in order to do so we first need to ‘tidy up’ our dataset: the structural and palaeographical analyses conducted in my work will be a stepping stone, complemented by progress in statistical and phonotactic analysis.
Thus, we need the whole LA dataset for statistical and cross-comparison analysis.
However, when it comes to examining the transmission process from LA to LB – esp. with respect to the much debated ‘place of origin’ of LB – then we can argue for some Cretan sites to have played a role in shaping up LB as we see it. My palaeographical analysis suggests that LB was ‘created’ under the graphic influences of LA writing practices in use at North and North-East coastal sites: these are primarily Khania, Arkhanes (and the area around Knossos) and Zakros. This scenario raises the issue of ‘connectivity’ and network analysis: in fact, when sailing from Mainland Greece, coastal sites are obviously more easily reached and connections between the two population groups (so-called Mainlander ‘Mycenaeans’ and Cretan ‘Minoans’) are more likely to have been more intense in such contexts. Adding to this, on Crete LB is only attested at Knossos, situated in a strategic position in the Centre-North area of the island. Only later on, we find some scattered evidence of LB at Khania (and one tablet fragment at Sissi, located near Mallia), but only at a time when LB at Knossos appears not to have been used any longer. This would be further evidence suggesting that LB is likely to have originated within a North coastal milieu.
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Q: When, for example, an inscribed tablet is discovered in archaeological context, how can you determine at first whether it is inscribed in Linear A or Linear B?
ES: In order to distinguish between a LB tablet (or other kind of inscribed document) from a LA one, we need to look at three sets of features (and the combination thereof): pinacological features, epigraphical features, palaeographical features.
Pinacology is the study of the shape and format of a clay document (πίναξ ‘pínax’ is the Greek term for ‘tablet’): LA tablets are only page-shaped (rectangular shape, they usually fit quite nicely into the palm of a hand), while LB tablets can be either elongated (called palmleaf-shaped tablets) or page-shaped tablets (however, esp. at Knossos, the palmleaf-shaped type is more frequent than the page-shaped one, and this is a new tablet format introduced in the LB administration). Hence, tablet format already gives us a hint for the correct identification as well as classification of an inscribed clay tablet.
Epigraphy studies the disposition of information and writing on the tablet surface and the way in which the inscription was made. This also helps us in the identification process. A few examples: (i) LB inscriptions appear neater and tidier than LA ones, hence gaining in clarity (a number of LB tablet layouts show a well-thought-out disposition of information on the writing surface, with specific spaces/slots destined to a given – and recurrent – type of information, which is significant from an administrative standpoint). (ii) Often LB tablets show ruling lines to guide writing (the LB tablet with my notes shows a middle line, but bigger size page-shaped LB tablets may show much more). This is also a new feature introduced in LB. (iii) Most LB tablets also tend to clearly separate different entries occurring on the same record (e.g. one per line) and to distinguish more clearly between text and logograms by placing logograms at the far end of each entry (this does not happen in LA, where entries are often broken across lines). The examination of epigraphical features clearly shows that in the move away from the LA administration, LB both improved and systematized tablet format and layout.
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Above: Linear B clay tablet showing ruling line. Dr Ester Salgarella Below: Linear B clay tablet KN Fp 13, showing ruling lines. It is dated to 1450-1375 BC. It records quantities of oil offered to deities. vintagedeptCreative CommonsAttribution 2.0 GenericWikimedia Commons
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Palaeographical features also help in this undertaking. Although very many sign shapes and variants were transmitted straight from LA to LB, some degree of change/modification did occur in LB. This, of course, did not compromise the overall shape of a given sign. LB signs appear to have been graphically systematized in order to ‘resonate’ with each other, so to say: e.g. similar traits got more marked in order to make signs more alike (See the image below from my book, where I discuss this systematization process, and where you can see in different colors those traits of LB signs that became more enhanced). Moreover, most LA composite signs were not continued into LB. Hence, if we see a composite sign, the inscription is more likely to be LA than LB.
By combining together these approaches and examining specific features, we are able to distinguish a LB document from a LA one. However, it is also worth mentioning that chronology may help us as well (in case a new find is unearthed from a clearly datable stratigraphic deposit). As mentioned already, LA spans ca. 1800/1700 to 1450 BCE, while LB is slightly later (ca. 1400/70-1200/1190). The earliest attestations of LA are dated to either 1800 or 1700 by scholars, and this fluctuation is due to the fact that there exist (at Knossos and Mallia) a number of inscribed clay documents called ‘dubitanda’ (= doubtful), as it is not clear whether we ought to classify them as Cretan Hieroglyphic or Linear A.
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Q: What additional or new archaeological discoveries or research/analysis could help provide the key to ‘unlocking the code’ of the Minoan language behind Linear A?
ES: What we all wish we could find is a bilingual text! A real ‘Rosetta Stone’. This does not need to be an inscription on hard support (like a clay tablet or a stone inscription). What we would need from any context (even beyond Crete) would be a bilingual text that could give us some clues as to the exact meaning and interpretation of the words of LA and ultimately the reconstruction (and possible) identification of the Minoan language. This lacking, we need to use ‘every tool we have’ in order to get as much as we can from the short and laconic texts.
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Q: Regarding the new online resource of individual signs and inscriptions you created, has this resource already been used by scholars/researchers? Why has such a resource or technique/instrument not been developed and used before?
ES: The SigLA database is a new resource and shall allow in-depth and comprehensive palaeographic and epigraphic comparison both within a given site that produced LA evidence and across different sites. Searches are customizable according to users’ needs. They will be able to create their own datasets in ways unfeasible before.
Why has it not been created before? My field of research is a relatively new one: excavations and discoveries of Bronze Age ‘Mycenaean’ citadels started with Heinrich Schliemann towards the end of the 19th century, and the ‘Minoan’ civilization was brought to light with the discovery of the palace of Knossos by Sir Arthur Evans at the very beginning of the 20th century. Much progress has been made ever since, however most works and editions of inscriptions have been published in old-fashioned print form only (for obvious reasons). The ‘digital era’ had yet to touch our field until recently. Most digital resources have been developed over the last decade, with digital education as well as skills on the rise. We are eventually moving toward a ‘digital landscape’ and away from unmovable print editions.
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Homepage of SigLA database. Salgarella and Castellan 2020
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The development of this research tool is also timely, as now – after a century of study of our material – we are asking ourselves more sophisticated palaeographical, epigraphical and linguistic questions (among others) that could not be answered without the help of digital resources. I am aware of a number of colleagues who are already using SigLA, and I am sending them regular updates on its implementation. In fact, it needs stressing the database is still under construction (it was started only one year ago) and it will take long before it comes to completion. In order to track changes and updates, we have added a specific page for users to see the amount of evidence they are searching. But this database has also been created with a view to making it accessible to the wider audience: that is the reason why we opted for an interactive interface that allows users to engage with the evidence displayed and to get information about signs and words by simply hovering with the mouse over a given sign or word (with the aid of color-code). In this way the world of LA is disclosed to everyone, for research, for self-study, or just for fun. As it is, it can also be taken as an open-access ‘didactic tool’ for everyone to use and enjoy.
Last but not the least, needless to say this project is interdisciplinary, but even more: it is also collaborative. SigLA is a joint effort, developed in collaboration with Dr. Simon Castellan, computer scientist at INRIA, University of Rennes (France), who has produced the software (Sigil) from scratch to tailor it to the needs and peculiarities of the LA evidence. I am beyond delighted to say this is a clear example of how far we can go by joining forces toward a common goal.
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Close-up of Linear A tablet HT 7 (from Haghia Triada), on display at the Archaeological Museum of Heraklion, Crete. DrEster Salgarella
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Screenshot of the same Linear A tablet, HT 7, from SigLA database. Salgarella and Castellan 2020
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Q: What are your next steps or projects in your quest to deciphering the script, and where do you see research going on this in the future?
ES: I need to stress again that my work is not necessarily concerned with decipherment itself (see reasons stated above), but it helps to ‘tidy up’ our dataset to eventually come to a better understanding and appreciation of the LA writing system. Only joint efforts will make decipherment possible.
For now, my project is to get SigLA to completion: it will take long until all known LA inscriptions are replicated (my drawings based on the edited corpus), their data and metadata parsed and coded and finally uploaded onto the database. In fact, only when complete will SigLA show its full potential. In the long-term, I would not mind creating a comparable database for LB inscriptions, given that no such tool has yet been developed. I must say, this may be the only area where LA studies are doing better than LB ones!
Finally, my wish for the future is that the much-awaited decipherment of the Minoan language encoded in the Linear A script be the result of a collective effort and undertaking. We are one global, interconnected research community helping each other with our respective expertise: what best to foster further interdisciplinary research approaches and avenues? I hope the age of ‘individualism’ in scholarship has come to an end.
Dan McLerran is a writer, journalist, and the founder and editor of Popular Archaeology Magazine, an online venue specializing in disseminating stories related to archaeological and anthropological discoveries worldwide to a global public readership. He previously created and published Archaeological Digs, a weblog highlighting archaeological excavation opportunities across the world. He is the author of numerous articles on a variety of archaeological developments and discoveries. As a writer, artist, and publisher, he has a passion for all things archaeological. Pictured left, he walks near the graves of members of the ancient Qumran community, adjacent to the caves where the Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered.
Above, 7th image from top, oriented left:Portrait Image of Dr Ester Salgarella: Dr Ester Salgarella began studying Linear A and B during her PhD. Her findings are revealed in her book, Aegean Linear Script(s) (Cambridge University Press) Dr Ester Salgarella.
Jerusalem, 1884 — Rosette Shapira must have felt an overwhelming sense of foreboding whenthree men, including the British consul to Jerusalem, arrived at the door of her home. After they entered, they sat opposite her and uttered those devastating words — her husband, Wilhelm Moses Shapira, was dead. He had killed himself with a gun in a rented guesthouse room near the Maas River wharf in Rotterdam, Netherlands, 2,000 miles away. Her life, and the lives of her daughters Augusta and Maria, would never be the same again.
Only days earlier, the office staff for the guesthouse began to wonder when they saw no sign of Moses leaving his room more than two days ago. A knock and shout from outside the locked door of his room yielded no sound. Soon, the police were at the door. Experiencing the same result, they broke into the room. What they found was everyone’s worst case scenario — Shapira was dead. He had apparently shot himself with a gun, leaving in the room his possessions, including a case that contained brochures, manuscripts, and letters. His body was taken and buried in an unmarked Rotterdam grave, far from his family home in Jerusalem. To this day, no one knows for certain where his body lies. It was a tragic and ignoble end to a life that mattered dearly to family and friends.
A Forgery
Moses (pictured left) Shapira’s journey to this tragic end actually began almost six years earlier, when he owned and managed what was considered to be “the best tourist shop in Jerusalem’s Old City” on Christian Street, not far from the historic Jaffa Gate. There, he sold books and a variety of other souvenir items popular to tourists. But his most passionate occupation was that of antiquities dealer, servicing, among other things, as a correspondent to the British Museum. Ancient manuscripts were his specialty, and over the years he had developed a body of knowledge and contacts that positioned him to be ‘in the right place at the right time’ when ancient artifacts and historic and ancient documents found their way into his sphere. His travels in the desert and elsewhere afforded him the opportunity to amass a significant collection of Arabic and Hebrew manuscripts, some of which he sold to the Royal Museum at Berlin, as well as to the British Museum. But none of his collections could possibly shine a light to what came his way in 1878, when Bedouins had discovered, in a cave high above the Wadi Mujib east of the Dead Sea, a bundle wrapped in linen. The bundle contained sixteen blackened leather strips, ranging from 3 to 4 inches in width, with varying lengths. The backside of the strips was coated with an asphalt/bitumin resin. But on the front side of the darkened strips, to Shapira’s astonishment, were barely legible written characters. Shapira knew enough to recognize it as a form of paleo-Hebrew. Knowing the relative antiquity of paleo-Hebrew script, could these be authentic documents, written by one or more unknown scribes, perhaps even well before Herodian times?
In his excitement he began to examine the strips on his own, preparing a transcription from whatever he could distinguish from leather surfaces that appeared to reflect the ravages of perhaps thousands of years. The strips appeared to document three incomplete manuscripts of a version of Deuteronomy, specifically the last speech of Moses to the Hebrews as they sojourned in the land of Moab, before his death. It contained a travelogue of the journey of the Hebrews in the wilderness, a somewhat different version of the Ten Commandments, and a series of blessings and cursings based on the commandments. One document was almost complete, another less complete, and a third represented only by a fragment. But he knew his initial transcription attempts would not be enough. The effort was a struggle. This was a job for an expert. In September, 1878, he sent his transcription to Konstantine Schlottman, a German scholar and friend, who in turn recruited the efforts of Franz Delitzsch, another German scholar. After examination, both strongly rejected the transcription as indicating the ancient documents had to be a forgery — the transcription, they maintained, deviated too radically from the traditional text of the Bible and what scholarship generally agreed was consistent with authentic scripture. Disappointed in Schlottmann and Delitzch’s determination, Shapira, still personally hopeful that the ancient strips were authentic, secured them away for a time in a vault at the Bergheim and Company Bank in Jerusalem and turned his attention back to other matters of his business.
………That is, until he got his hands on a book entitled Introduction to the Old Testament by another German scholar, Friedrich Bleek. The contents of the book convinced Shapira that the arguments that Schlottmann and Delitzsch used to refute his transcription could not be inarguably supported, and he decided to remove the strips from the vault and resurrect his efforts to seek scholarly examination and hopeful confirmation of the authenticity of the discovery. His strategy — to secure the services of other scholars in Germany and England, this time by bringing the actual documents, the strips, with him for their examination and study. If authenticated, his plan was to sell them to the British Museum for a handsome sum of, according to some newspaper accounts, as much as one million pounds, a value he felt well matched the value of the documents, which he hoped would bring financial independence to him and his family.
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Lithograph of one of the Shapira Scroll fragments, Frederick Dangerfield for Christian David Ginsburg. Christian David Ginsburg, Public Domain
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Two photographs of Shapira scroll ‘Fragment E’, columns 1–2, and one other fragment. In the top image, Fragment E is folded in half, with column 4 (verso) partially visible behind column 1 (recto). The image of the other fragment is cropped at the bottom. Idan Dershowitz, Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license, Wikimedia Commons
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Shapira Strips, 1883, Scientific American. Scientific American, October 27, 1883, Public Domain
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Examination resumed first with two German scholars, Hermann Guthe and Eduard Meyer, who carefully studied the strips and produced a transcript and evaluation. They leaned at first toward a determination of authenticity, but while they were finishing their work for publication, Karl Lepsius, head of the Royal Library at Berlin, convened another group of prominent scholars, consisting of professors Dillmann, Sachau, Schrader, Erman, and Steinschneider. Although these experts spent only a limited amount of time with the manuscripts, they quickly concluded that they were forgeries. They were impressed with them, however. They offered to purchase them, albeit at a lower price than Shapira was prepared to accept. These manuscripts, they maintained, were so cleverly forged they would be worth owning as an example of such outstanding effort.
Undaunted, Shapira went on to England, where, facilitated by Sir Walter Besant, secretary of the Palestine Exploration Fund, he secured the efforts of Christian David Ginsburg, one of the world’s leading authorities on Hebrew manuscripts. Ginsburg would spend weeks studying the manuscripts, including transcribing what he could successfully discern and decipher from the alleged ancient manuscript characters. Given the condition of the strips, the task was not easy. While he worked, regular updates of his progress were published in the Athenæum, a popularBritish literary magazine published in London at the time. While Ginsburg continued his examination, he expressed no clear opinion. That would wait for completion of his work. Some scholars, however, based mostly upon their reading of the continuing news and the reports in the Athenæum, expressed skepticism. Nonetheless, the excitement and news of Shapira’s manuscripts splashed across British newspaper venues. In addition, two fragments of the manuscripts were placed on display for the general public in the British Museum, drawing crowds. Even Prime Minister William Gladstone, who took a special interest in things biblical and the scholarly work of Ginsburg, visited the display and engaged in personal conversation with Ginsburg and Shapira about the manuscripts. It seemed, finally, Shapira’s manuscripts were gaining the positive traction he so longingly desired — at least from the public.
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Facsimile of some of the Shapira scroll, as published in The Athenaeum, September 8, 1883, after Ginsburg. Ginsburg, Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain
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The Crash
But the new high Shapira was experiencing would not last long. Charles Clermont-Ganneau, a world-renowned French orientalist and archaeologist, heard news of the leather strips coming out of England. He was known for his skill in detecting forgeries, and was in fact instrumental in debunking ancient Moabite pottery artifacts years before, an affair in which Shapira himself was deeply involved as a dealer. Clermont-Ganneau, even from afar, already harbored suspicions about the authenticity of Shapira’s leather strips, and wanted to see them for himself. With a mandate from the French minister of public instruction, he was sent on his way to England to examine for himself what the British hype was all about. On arrival, he was given access to view and study fragments of the strips, but under very limited access and time constraints, while Ginsburg continued with his more in-depth examination.
Even with the limitations, however, it did not take long for Clermont-Ganneau to come to his conclusions. Though he was expressly permitted to publicize his finding only after Ginsburg had a chance to publish his report, Clermont-Ganneau forged ahead prematurely and announced his thoughts to the press: The manuscripts were forgeries.
Although he noted various reasons supporting his conclusion, his most cited argument was that someone, perhaps Shapira himself, had cut off the bottom blank margin of an old Torah scroll, perhaps several centuries old, creating strips upon which he (or someone) inscribed characters very much like those found on the Moabite stone and Siloam Inscription. Moreover, shortly following Clermont-Ganneau’s pronouncement, Ginsburg published his report. He agreed with Clermont-Ganneau. The manuscripts were forgeries. The scholarly consensus fell in favor of the forgery assessment.
For Shapira, it was like his world had come crashing down. With this news out to the world, he must have thought he was ruined, branded perhaps forever as a forger. Even so, still clinging to his conviction that the inscribed leather strips were authentic, he left the manuscripts behind at the British Museum and traveled on to other points in Europe. He continued with some business dealings, but ended up ultimately in Rotterdam in early March, 1884, where he presumably took his own life in a guesthouse room near the Maas River.
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Illustration used by Clermont-Ganneau to demonstrate the cutting of the Torah scroll to create the Shapira strips. Clermont-Ganneau, Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain
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A Forgery? The Case for Re-examination
Scrolls in the Desert
New discoveries can often shift the ground upon which prevailing scholarship stands. One could argue that this is what happened when, between November 1946 and February 1947, Bedouin shepherds discovered seven ancient scrolls/fragments contained in ceramic jars in caves near the ancient site of Khirbet Qumran, 1.5 miles from the northwestern shore of the Dead Sea. Known today in the popular literature as the Dead Sea Scrolls, they were the first of subsequent ancient scroll and fragment discoveries in the Dead Sea area, attesting to the continuing ancient Hebrew practice of documenting sacred texts containing beliefs and histories on leather parchment and papyrus — and, given the dating of the finds, that such material could actually survive at least 2,000 years in the Dead Sea area.
This is important for these purposes because one of the salient early arguments among the 19th century scholars against the authenticity of Shapira’s manuscripts was that leather documents were unlikely to survive for 2,000 or more years in the environment in which they were allegedly found — in this case, caves above the Wadi Mujib, not far east from the Dead Sea.
What is more, the Shapira manuscript strips were alleged to have been found wrapped in cloth and treated on the exterior with a pitch/asphalt/wax/bitumin resin coating, not unlike the state and treatment of at least some of the Dead Sea Scrolls found, here again, by Bedouin shepherds in a high desert cave not far from the Dead Sea. Could it be that, as a clever forger, Shapira simply possessed an uncanny, almost “prophetic” sense for fabricating circumstances so serendipitously similar to those characterizing the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls, a series of events that occurred more than 65 years later? Some noted scholars have suggested that this would not have been probable.
Menahem Mansoor, Professor Emeritus of Hebrew and Semitic Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, wrote about the circumstances, and much more, related to the Shapira manuscripts: “Neither the internal nor the external evidence, so far as yet published, supports the idea of a forgery.”* His assessment was published in 1958, after the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Add to this the comments made by John Allegro, one member of the initial select team of scholars assigned to work on the Dead Sea Scrolls, wherein he stated that the Shapira manuscripts “may have been one of the most important archaeological findings of all time”.** Though Allegro’s scholarship and reputation were certainly not without controversy, it goes without saying that the Dead Sea Scrolls clearly had an impact on how he viewed the Shapira scrolls in 1965, when his book, The Shapira Affair, was published.
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View of the caves location near Qumran, where many of the Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered.
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Two scrolls from the Dead Sea Scrolls lie at their location in the Qumran Caves before being removed for scholarly examination by archaeologists. Abraham Meir Habermann, 1901–1980, Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain
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One of the original Dead Sea Scrolls before being unraveled by scholars. Abraham Meir Habermann, 1901-1980, Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain
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Add to this another prominent charge levied by scholars, led first and foremost by Clermont-Ganneau himself upon completing his initial cursory examination of the Shapira strips — in short, that Shapira’s leather strips were actually cut from the bottom blank margin of a Torah scroll and then used as the support medium upon which the paleo-Hebrew characters were written, or forged. The subject scroll may have eventually ended up in the Sutro Library in San Francisco, where today rests a Torah scroll that has been clearly intentionally cut off at its bottom margin. This, says investigative journalist Chanan Tigay in his recent book, The Lost Book of Moses, could be a candidate for the scroll. However, Idan Dershowitz, who is currently Chair of Hebrew Bible and Its Exegesis at the University of Potsdam and Faculty Member at Harvard University, has now suggested in a recent paper, The Valediction of Moses: New Evidence on the Shapira Deuteronomy Fragments, that the Torah scroll could as likely have been cut along the top edge of the bottom margin to remove clearly evident extensive water damage that effected the bottom of the scroll. Nonetheless, the cut Torah scroll argument has remained one of the pillars upon which scholars have rested their verdict for more than a century.
Enter here also the Dead Sea Leviticus scroll 11QpaleoLev, a leather parchment scroll which, like the Shapira scroll, was inscribed in paleo-Hebrew. It was discovered in “Qumran Cave 11,” about one mile north of Khirbet Qumran in January of 1956 by local Bedouin of the Taʿamireh clan. This scroll spreads lengthwise in an arc-like fashion. In like manner, the Shapira leather strips, also allegedly found by local Bedouins in a cave not far from the Dead Sea, spread lengthwise in an arc — not a characteristic that would likely be attributed to leather strips that were fraudulently cut from the bottom margin of a Torah scroll, which exhibits no such curvature.***
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Fragment E, prepared by Dangerfield Lithography (London, 1883), in consultation with Ginsburg. From Dershowitz, Idan (2021). The Valediction of Moses: A Proto-Biblical Book. Forschungen zum Alten Testament. Idan Dershowitz, Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license,Wikimedia Commons
A major line of reasoning for characterizing the Shapira manuscripts as forgeries revolves around the script and subject matter content. To this day, there are prominent scholars of the field who continue to maintain rejection based on these grounds. One notable example is André Lemaire, a well-known and highly regarded French epigrapher, historian and philologist, who has voiced his support for the results of, among other things, Ginsburg’s examination regarding the external and internal (language, paleography and grammar) criteria cited to justify rejection of Shapira’s strips. Lemaire’s argument, however, is based on his examination of Ginsburg’s facsimile of the original manuscripts, not the original strips themselves. Idan Dershowitz has now suggested in his recent paper (noted above) that Lemair’s argument falls flat on the basis of “a fundamental methodological problem with the entire enterprise of epigraphic analysis in this particular case: The fragments are no longer extant.” In his paper, Dershowitz argues in detail why Lemaire’s analysis is faulty in that it relies on 19th century drawings, not the original manuscripts, that are “demonstrably unreliable” for accurately depicting the paleography of the manuscripts.****
Another chief argument among scholars against the authenticity of the Shapira manuscripts revolved around how radically the content of the account departed from the Masoretic text and the generally accepted canon of Deuteronomy. Scholarly tradition holds that the original ‘writings of Moses’ that constituted the core of Deuteronomy were later supplemented/changed in antiquity (for example, the Deuteronomic law codes) to create what is today the accepted canon of Deuteronomy. Others, like Jonathan Klawans, Professor of Religion at Boston University most recently, have argued that the manuscript content reflects Shapira’s Jewish-Christian beliefs and thus a ‘Christianizing tendency’ in its fabrication. Dershowitz, however, presents a starkly different view based on his extensive study and analysis as related in his recent monograph, The Valediction of Moses. In this study, Dershowitz concludes that “the text contained in Shapira’s fragments is either a direct ancestor of the biblical book of Deuteronomy or a close relative of such an ancestor…….[it] preserves an earlier and dramatically different literary structure for the entire work — one that lacked the Deuteronomic law code altogether.”**** In short, according to Dershowitz and others who hold a similar view, Shapira’s scrolls reflect what scholars have suggested the original ‘writing of Moses’ would have looked like based on source-critical analysis — an analysis that was not available during the time of Shapira. Both Dershowitz’s article and book were featured through lavishly illustrated coverage by the New York Times on March 10, 2021—causing academic waves around the world with calls both for and against reassessing the Shapira case.*****
Finally, one puzzling conundrum lies in the question as to why Shapira, a Hebrew scholar in his own right, though not a credentialed expert, spent time and energy attempting to understand and decipher the text on the strips. Among his papers were some ruled sheets and notes of his early attempts at transcription, indicating his struggle to understand and decipher what he was looking at. If he was the forger, why would he do this? Dershowitz makes this same observation in his paper.
Is the ScrollExtant?
All of the arguments for and against the Shapira scrolls notwithstanding, none of them can be ultimately convincing unless the original leather strips can be re-examined, using the latest scientific techniques and procedures, including dating, scanning and digital imaging, as well as application of any advancements in the knowledge of paleography and epigraphy. Certainly, with the strips finally back in hand, the side-by-side comparison with relevant Dead Sea Scrolls using current knowledge and a multi-disciplinary international team of experts would go a long way toward placing a final lid on the case.
But where are the original manuscripts today?
After the fateful announcements of forgery in London and elsewhere, Shapira departed from London to points in Europe, but left his now discredited strips behind with the British Museum. In any case, they were not among the things he left behind in the Rotterdam guesthouse room where he died. For many years it was thought the scrolls were likely destroyed in a fire near London at the home of Sir Charles Nicholson. But the latest attestation is that they were acquired by a one Dr. Philip Brookes Mason of Burton-on-Trent, Staffordshire, in 1889. He died in 1903. Were the strips among the holdings of his estate upon his death? Or did they move on yet again before that date?
“We have a good chance of recovering the scrolls, or portions thereof,” says Dr. James Tabor, a well-known Biblical scholar and Professor of Ancient Judaism and Early Christianity at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. “There is a small private group of very initiated “Shapira researchers” who are in close touch and sharing information and ideas……..there are leads not only in the U.K. but also on the Continent, involving wills, estates, libraries, and other archives. I don’t think they were discarded and it is likely whoever has them is not aware of their value.”
The unwritten stories of priceless artifacts and art lost to the world, still languishing in oblivion in private attics or basements, would fill a book.
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The best account of the entire Shapira story, from start to finish, was published by author and researcher Ross K. Nichols, just two weeks before Dershowitz published his own academic analysis. Nichols also includes a transcription and translation, as well as the arguments for revisiting the issue of their authenticity. He presents a meticulously researched, in-depth account of their discovery, as well as their examination by 19th century scholars, including a presentation of the arguments both for and against their authenticity. Entitled The Moses Scroll, the book is highly readable and engaging for scholars and non-scholars alike.Nichols has also begun a regular blog on all the latest Shapira discussions and issues.
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*“The Case of Shapira’s Dead Sea (Deuteronomy) Scrolls of 1883.” Transactions of the Wisconsin Academy of Sciences, Arts and Letters (1958), p. 225
** Allegro, John Marco. The Shapira Affair. New York: Doubleday & Company, 1965
*** Shlomo Guil (2017) The Shapira Scroll was an Authentic Dead Sea Scroll, Palestine Exploration Quarterly, 149:1, 6-27, DOI: 10.1080/00310328.2016.1185895
****Idan Dershowitz, The Valediction of Moses: New Evidence on the Shapira Deuteronomy Fragments, Zeitschrift für die Alttestamentliche Wissenschaft, 2021. https://doi.org/10.1515/zaw-2021-0001
In this second installment of the Popular Archaeology Anniversary Issue, author and teacher Richard Marranca interviews Dr. Kara Cooney, the popular American Egyptologist perhaps best known for hosting television shows and authoring popular-press books on ancient Egypt. Among her books are When Women Ruled the World, The Woman Who Would Be King and, to be released in November, 2021, The Good Kings: Absolute Power in Ancient Egypt and the Modern World. Most significant, however, is her role as a professor of Egyptian Art and Architecture and Chair of the Department of Near Eastern Languages and Cultures at UCLA. Her current research focuses on ancient coffin reuse, most specifically that of Egypt’s 21st Dynasty. Generally, her research addresses the socioeconomic and political turmoil of this period, and how this was reflected in ancient Egyptian funerary and burial practices.
RM:Can we begin with your origin story? What are some things that led to your being an Egyptologist?
KC:If I had been a first-generation immigrant, I don’t think I would have had that opportunity because their parents focused on getting a trade and contributing to the family. None of this silly philosophical stuff, right? So, I might be encouraged to do something else. If I were born a man, I think I would also have been encouraged by my family or society to do something else. My brother has very academic interests and yet he went to law school. He felt he needed to go to law school. And so my being a woman allows me to — allows myself to be — less practical than some of the men in my socioeconomic class. I mean it when I say I am an upper middle class white chick. That’s important, the female part is important because that allows me to follow my heart and continue on with this study.
The second part is the more personal one. Why Egypt? I have no answer for you. And it is the question that I am asked in every interview. It is the question I am asked at every talk. How did you get involved in Egyptology? What is it about ancient Egypt? And I say, this is the one question that an Egyptologist would never ask another. It would be a kind of heresy to ask another Egyptologist this because we know there is no answer. We don’t ask it because we don’t, we’re confused about it ourselves. I am confused about my own interest. Why am I am drawn to learn about these ancient people of so many thousands of years ago and why do they never bore me (laughter) and why do I continue to be interested in these people? I don’t know the answer! It’s a mystery to me as well as it is to everybody else. I know people look at me and they’re like “What the hell is going on here? Why is this woman from Texas interested in ancient Egypt and so passionate, so interested?” There must be some weird thing or connection, but about that I have no answer. When I was seven years old, I remember my mother brought back from the British Museum books about Vikings, Romans, Egyptians and medieval Europe—and Egypt was my favorite. I don’t know why. I’ve always loved everything about it. I’ve always loved this idea of time travel. I don’t know why. And my interest is, as you can tell, quite passionate and I don’t know why. So that’s just a weird little thing and again, all Egyptologists share this. There aren’t many people crazy enough or socially entitled enough to be able to follow their interests to the level that we have in order to end up teaching, forming young minds, doing research, etc. I realize every day how lucky I am to be able to do this. It is quite a blessing. It’s amazing.
RM:Do you have any favorite archaeologists from long ago or closer to the present who were sort of dashing and romantic figures?
KC:Some people are drawn to Egyptology because of Margaret Murray or Flinders Petrie and they delve into the biographies of them. That wasn’t my gateway drug (laughter). I was more interested in the ancient Egyptians as I could find them in the ancient texts and in daily life, the way people behaved. I am happiest watching people try to spin their wool and people dressed up and speaking with their accents, trying to make mead or something. And with my graduate students, we do the same thing. We’ve done a lot of experiments on how Egyptian glue actually flows onto a piece of wood and how you apply it and what varnish is like and how you apply that. The practical aspects of life in the ancient world are more interesting to me than anything else. What it was like in the past draws me. But I’m not a dirt archaeologist, so I don’t romanticize about that part of life necessarily. I kind of treat it as a time machine of the mind where I fantasize about what it could have potentially been like to be in the ancient world.
RM:I recently showed an episode of your program, Out of Egypt, to my classes. It’s a fascinating broad approach, a true adventure that the viewer partakes. One of the things you show is how cities and civilization breed armies and large-scale violence.
KC: Essentially, complexity begets complexity; you don’t get complex violence until you have complex human systems. A bunch of roving hunter-gatherer bands, while quite violent, can’t compete in terms of the scale of that violence or the complexity of that violence. So, real war begins with agriculture. Agriculture demands settling down to form complex systems of government, with taxation, bureaucracy, stored wealth, redistributed wealth. Some people have much, some people very little, but it takes an army to protect it. If we asked anybody on the street, would you rather go back to live a hunter-gatherer existence or stay in the city? I think there would be many people who see the hunter-gatherer existence as a peaceful time, but the opposite is true. Hunter-gatherers killed more of their men, percentage wise, than any complex society. To get out of those cycles of violence, we gave up many freedoms with our move to settled society; women especially gave up many freedoms to be a part of this complex system that demanded warfare, taxation, etc. But I think human beings repeatedly left the hunter-gatherer existence around the planet, settling down, because they wanted to avoid the constant and brutal violence that could kill 30% of your male population in a given season.
RM:What were some of the high points for you in creating Out of Egypt?
KC: My favorite part was allowing myself not to be an expert, to be an intelligent questioner, to puzzle through larger questions. It’s a rare thing that an academic cannot be the expert and instead be the one who’s learning. So in a sense, I got to be a student again. And for most of the sites visited, we brought in an expert who knew all about the site and then I could just pepper that person with questions and learn as much as I wanted; it was such a privilege to be able to learn from such extraordinary people in such extraordinary places. The place that pops out the most, that I really remember and would love to visit again, was Sri Lanka—the island that time forgot. Muslims and Hindus and Buddhists all mixed up into one place. The majority are Buddhists. The Hindu temples are pretty extraordinary in their own way. To see the way these people have been through a civil war, through bombings and revolutionary attacks and how they’ve come to a peaceful place to live with each other, is extraordinary. To see all of these different rituals and rites coexisting is something to see. I remember a Christian couple in the Buddhist temple dedicated to the tooth of the Buddha, and I said, “Well you’re not Buddhist.” They said, “It doesn’t matter. We’re here to ask for blessings from the Buddha.” So, there was a lot of crossover as well. There was also a lot of old religion, magical shamanist religion, that had nothing to do with Christian, Muslim, Buddhist or Hindu.
I remember visiting the Temple of Cursing. You could curse somebody with hot chili peppers and grind it up and curse your enemies and that was a shamanist kind of practice. And there was a practice with a devil—also a very old shamanist practice, of inviting him (who is giving you sickness or giving you poor circumstances in your life) into your space through this Dance of Devils and then feeding them and appeasing them. It was a beautiful thing; having grown up with the Judeo-Christian-Islamic traditions, it was completely strange to invite a devil in and give him an offering in order to leave you in peace, but it makes perfect sense. And this is something that everybody participates in as well. Whether you’re Christian, Buddhist, Muslim or Hindu, it seems the lines are very blurred, so I love that.
RM:In many places that you present in that documentary, there are archetypal shapes, such as pyramids and circles. What does it mean? I’m also reminded of something Carl G. Jung might ask: how does the pyramid live in us?
KC: That’s the great thing about Out or Egypt—that I was able to ask these big questions and get scientific answers. It’s something that Erich von Däniken and John Anthony West often apply a more supernatural reasoning to. So, I can take aliens out of the equation, but I can bring the aliens back in, which was great. I mean in a sense, you stand in front of those pyramids and you think, my god, look at that. You can’t believe that it’s human hands, that human effort built this mountain of stone. It seems impossible and that’s exactly what the ancient Egyptians would have wanted you to believe. Every time we assign supernatural responsibility to the pyramids, whether it be aliens or something else, we are falling into an authoritarian trap, the propaganda trap. Their purpose in Mesoamerica or Egypt or Dubai was to show power, to show the ability to construct something that seems impossible, like the tallest building on the planet. It is also a way of proving to the people in material form that that community is at the pinnacle of a pyramidal society. And it works again and again and again—that we believe that the leader has some sort of spiritual otherworldly non-human power—and that to me is the key to nature. The fact that they are all pyramidal is obvious. You don’t have wheels to construct it, so to build a tall structure, you build it wide at the base, narrow at the top. And I am not the first to say something like that. Many engineers have said that. The pyramidal structure just happened because that’s how you build large buildings in pre-modern times. But the mountains of stone—independent of one another in Mesoamerica, in South America, in Europe, in Egypt, in China, in Indonesia, all over the planet—were there to create a political-supernatural link that cannot be denied. It creates unassailable leaders to whom you cannot say no, whom you must follow. And it worked again and again and again. And amazingly, even when the leaders are dead and gone and the pyramids are either covered with vegetation or sand and fallen into disrepair, people still look at them and say that they were built by other-worldly supernatural beings, and this still continues to work upon us today.
In Out of Egypt, I like taking the political tack. And I think I should have gone further with it. I think I have solidified my ideas over the years, and I was only just forming those ideas when I did that show. Today, I think I would have gone further in the political realm of things.
RM:We visited some of the places presented in your program, which added so much to my understanding, plus it continued the adventure. You presented the vast creativity of civilization as well as its dark side.
CK: The city offers civilization, but at a price – perhaps more for women than men. But there were exceptions, which is what my book, When Women Ruled the World, focuses on.
Ancient Women & Power
RM:Your books and courses have a lot to do with powerful women in ancient times. In Athens or Rome, there would be a problem with a woman looking to gain political power. In the case of Rome, it was also the fear of a distant, foreign power who seduced Caesar and Antony. Didn’t the Romans say the most horrible things about Cleopatra?
KC:Yes, for sure. I teach a class at UCLA called Women in Power in the Ancient World, and this is one of the reasons I can write this book so quickly. I have been thinking about it for the last four or five years. I’ve taught this class four times; we spend half of the class on Egypt because half the ancient female rulers were Egyptian—which is stunning in and of itself, but then we spend a week on Greece, a week on Rome, a week on China, a week on the Levant and Mesopotamia—and compare systems of power and female rule within those systems of power. It becomes ever so useful to see these patterns and it becomes a class on ancient power systems as big history, if you like.
Every class I start with a map of the Levant, a map of Mesopotamia, a map of Egypt, a map of Greece, a map of Rome, whatever. And I say, okay, will this place allow easy unification and easy communication like Egypt, which is the first regional state in the ancient world, or will this place, with its geography, lend itself more to constant competition, constant warfare? And if it’s the latter, and most places are the latter, then you see female power in a more limited way. Or in the case of ancient Greece – holy god! Can this place ever unify? Everyone was like, No! (laughter). How could they communicate with each other? Well, by sea. How are they going to get money? Well, by trade and shipping, mostly, and farming and animal husbandry sometimes.
And you know, Greece has an extraordinarily competitive decentralized type of system, which in Athens takes the primal form of a democratic peace effort, with only male citizens allowed in the game; if one man falls, another will take his place. And women are kept shut up in the home. There is no power for women in ancient Greece. I spend only half a week on women in Greece in my class because once we’ve discussed the system and I’ve given them two examples, we’re done. There is no power for women in this system. Rome is a little bit different because the woman is a representative of her family and can act as such, so you do see powerful women coming to the fore as representatives of a patriarchal system in times of great crisis.
But once you get this imperial hereditary monarchy in Rome, with the principate, a noblewoman can take power in the way that a woman took power in Egypt. You see Roman women taking power as the mother of the next emperor, or as a sister or wife of the emperor. The emperor system in Rome is so fraught and these emperors are killed more often than dying naturally. You can look it all up on Google. It’s great fun (laughter)—reasons for the deaths of the Roman emperors. You can spend a whole day going down that rabbit hole. But if you understand how contentious and uncertain the imperial Roman system of monarchy was, then it’s clear why women had so little chance for leadership there in any systematic way. But in the Eastern Roman Empire, as we move into the Byzantine system, we see that in Constantinople female rule was strong because it was supporting a stronger hereditary dynasty. And then I come to this conclusion again that the more unequal the social situation, the more a woman can step into power. Fittingly, the more pyramidal the social structure is, the more women can step into power.
And I ask myself if this is something that humans understand on a gut level: women who step into power like Indira Gandhi act as a representative of the patriarchy in a highly unequal situation in a time of crisis, often after there’s been an assassination. Given that, do we instinctively perceive female power as reflective of inequality, authoritarianism, unequal social systems? These women are allowed to work on behalf of their families and don’t fit the larger group of humanity. Is this one of the reasons we’re hostile towards female power? This is a puzzle I’m still trying to figure out. Our hostility towards female power, the biological sources, the social sources—these are areas of importance.
RM:I can see how getting into one specific area leads to others. Can you talk about Hatshepsut and the various positions she had in life? God’s Wife, queen, pharaoh herself? What did she achieve? What was she like as a real person?
KC:Ancient Egypt is extraordinarily frustrating to try to pin down what someone was really like. In the same way that I presented you with those maps of ancient Greece and Rome or ancient Egypt on the other side, the more decentralized and competitive a place is, the more we can potentially learn about an individual person from the political competition, because one either has to expose their personality to people to get their vote and their support or because there were political takedowns where tidbits of their life or personality were revealed to us in the historical record, letters and more. We know about the personality of Julius Cesar or Cleopatra because the Romans wrote about them, or about Solon as an example of a Greek leader. But in an authoritarian regime, this is buttoned down. You do not have people talking about the personality of their leader. The means of communication that are left to archaeologists are sacred temple spaces where everything is idealized.
For Hatshepsut’s reign, most of my evidence, if not all of it, comes from an ideological context – temples and tombs. I don’t have diaries. I don’t have letters. Now in temples or tombs, would I expect to find personal information – people revealing their innermost thoughts about what Hatshepsut was really like? No. So I can’t, unfortunately, tell you what her personality was like, or how she was perceived or accepted or not accepted. I have no idea, which is really frustrating, but if we then take a step back we can say, okay, what can we talk about? I can tell you that from a very young age, probably from the reign of her father, Thutmose I, she inhabited the most sacred priestess position, God’s Wife of Amun.
The details of her duties were shielded from us as well because this was a highly exclusive religion. We are not meant to know what mysteries were happening inside of these sacred enclosed spaces. This is something that is meant to be shielded from our eyes. So even here, where the temple might produce something, we’re almost at a loss of what’s actually going on. But using all we can from the Gods Wives of Amun, from the titles, even if they don’t explicitly tell us what mysteries were performed, the God’s Wife of Amun was meant to be a wife to the gods and it was meant to have a sexual component. It was meant to awaken the god through sexuality, to give him a rebirth through sexuality. One of the other titles of the God’s Wife of Amun was the God’s Hand; this was meant to masturbate so that he could recreate himself into existence every day. You just got back from India, so I don’t need to tell you about the lingam stone and how it represents creation. It’s there as well and sexual intercourse is there on the temple walls.
In Egypt, it’s less overt, but the notion that the god must sexually recreate himself in the depth of the temple every night to be recreated every morning is something the Egyptians clung to and their temples were built to facilitate this daily or seasonal rebirth. And so, the God’s Wife of Amun was very powerful. Hatshepsut knew mysteries that we will never know. She was initiated into unwritten mysteries about the rebirth of the gods, the creative god incarnate that we will never be able to do more than just touch. And she would have been there with eyes closed touching those most sacred mysteries to make sure that the world continued going as it should, that the sun rises and sets and the Nile floods its banks as it should. And whether or not she saw herself as an integral cog in this, she took her position very seriously and that title – the God’s Wife of Amun – was the one she used most when she took over the regency, ruling on behalf of her young nephew Thutmose III. This was after the death of her husband Thutmose II. She knew her power had a foundation in ideology too.
Now, I skipped over her queenship; she was daughter of the king and God’s Wife of Amun in the reign of her father. And when her father died, she was married to her half-brother Thutmose II, who by all accounts and from the mummy that we have preserved, was a sickly youth who died after three years of reign. And for him Hatshepsut acted as chief queen. This would have been a woman walking through the palace and temples with eyes raised looking at everybody in the eyes expecting servility. She would have an authority to her – an authority that maybe the new king Thutmose II didn’t even have because he didn’t expect to be king. He had older brothers who died before him. This kingship was probably a surprise to him as much as anybody else. When he died after such a short reign, she was left holding the bag of a family dynasty that was only nascent, begun by her father Thutmose I.
Before Thutmose I, there was Amenhotep I, a childless king. If they had allowed the kingship to go to a different family with the death of Thutmose II, then Thutmose’s line would have been two kings and done. Hatshepsut, with the help of her courtiers and priests and elites, stepped into this breach, this vacuum of power, and made sure that the kingship continued to another Thutmose. So, Hatshepsut had an extended regency for seven years, ruling on behalf of her young nephew, before she just took the whole thing and became king in her own right. Why and how she did that is probably the most frustrating part of the story because we don’t have the details preserved. She only reveals that she is doing what her father, Amun, asked her to do by becoming king. But something must have happened to demand that she grab power and formalize it by becoming king herself.
RM:An amazing story and history. It makes me think that Pres. Donald Trump was sort of like Thutmose III. Trump tried to erase Pres. Barack Obama’s legacy the way that Hatshepsut’s nephew tried to erase her when he becomes king.
KC:I don’t think that’s unusual. Let me put it this way. You either follow a good leader or a bad leader. If you follow a bad leader, then all you do is say, look what he’s done. It’s bad. Look what he’s done. If you follow a good leader, then you take credit for it. Trump was in an interesting position where he followed a very good leader when the economy rebounded and rule of law was returned in banking, etc.
But the propaganda was that he was a very bad leader. So Trump can take credit for things that are happening; he can say he did it, even though it was a legacy of Obama’s rule. Trump can claim, “Thank god I’m here and look at the bad things Obama did.” So there was a strange revision of history to Trump’s presidency. And while demonizing Obama, using a fictional account of his presidency, Trump took credit for the good things very cleverly. And it seems that most of his base goes along with this propaganda. So, Trump vilifies the black president that went before him. But this is a different discussion (laughter).
RM:The discussion of power takes us deep into the mind, in that labyrinth, into so many layers of society. Success is another loaded term too.
Success is a tricky thing and I’ve thought about this a lot and I write about this and I talked about this in the One Day University lecture that you attended. Success is abstract. It’s a very bland sort of thing. Success is not very sexy. There’s no salacious story. There is no fodder for the journalists, no big story. I spoke about this with my husband recently, who said, “Jerry Brown sure is under-appreciated.” People don’t talk about success the way they talk about failure. Anyway, in the ancient world, success is something that easily can be transferred from one ruler to another without people really noticing. It’s what they expect. It’s what they want; it’s what is assumed a ruler is going to strive for. So, Thutmose III and Amenhotep II can take credit for Hatshepsut’s achievements, saying, more or less: “We did this.” It’s easy for the people then to say, “Okay, thanks! Of course.”
On the other hand, failure is very idiosyncratic, very specific to one circumstance, one person, one time. It’s harder to transgress, nor would you want to. Cautionary tales are born; there is Cleopatra and the asp and the pearl earring dissolved in the vinegar. Stories like that recur which are more useful to transmit.
RM:It’s interesting to talk about how power operates. I bet most people don’t know that Jerry Brown actually did a great job as governor with little fanfare. Or the quality of life in Scandinavia and elsewhere, again with little fanfare and propaganda involved.
KC:Where’s the interest and scandal? Well, success is an interesting thing to think about. But success is not all it’s cracked up to be. Obama’s most idiosyncratic—the most identifiable part of his administration—was his African American background. And that’s the part that I think people cling to, whether they want to talk about it openly or not. He put himself out there in terms of racial politics. Also, he played it all without scandal, as he himself would proudly say.
RM:Was there any scandal with Senenmut? He exemplified the ancient Egyptian system with bureaucratic patronage. Does your gut instinct plus the evidence and that sexual cartoon prove anything about a relationship with Hatshepsut? Or was her private life really just totally invisible and we’ll never know anything?
KC:I think unfortunately the latter. I think her private life is totally invisible and we’ll never know anything. As frustrating as that is, I think it’s the truth. She certainly would have had lovers. Why not? But why would we know about them? There is absolutely no reason why we would have access to that kind of information. And so Senenmut is misread as her lover, and it’s kind of ridiculous – like he’s the only candidate. The reason I think Senenmut and Hatshepsut are so close is that he needed her and she needed him politically. I don’t think that there is any evidence – at all – that suggests a sexual relationship there. There is ample evidence for a power relationship. And that one graffito that you’re mentioning says more about Egyptologists than it does about Hatshepsut. There is nothing in that graffito that links it to Senenmut and Hatshepsut. Nothing. Not a name, not a title, not the way it’s drawn, no markers of kingship. Absolutely nothing links it to Hatshepsut and Senenmut. And yet, Egyptologists have gone crazy saying that this is evidence of their affair and what the Egyptians thought about it. But there’s nothing there but a scribe’s interest in and ability to draw a sexual scene. I don’t think we’ll ever really know. I am sure that Hatshepsut had an interesting sexual identity. What it was, I don’t think we’ll ever be able to get to it. Frustrating, yes, but I think that’s how it is with an authoritarian regime.
RM:What about the powers of the goddess and her influences. Isis, for example, is an amazing goddess, and everyone is fascinated by the Isis and Osiris story, as it says so much about Egyptian beliefs. Going all the way back to Paleolithic culture and after, there are amazing fertility figures, cave art, energetic symbols on goddesses. So, what’s the goddess code or imagery in ancient Egypt?
KC: There is typical stuff and indeed the Egyptian goddesses are quite interchangeable, almost like they’re one being, which is strange and interesting. Students who can’t read hieroglyphs will look at images of Hathor or Isis and say, “Well which is it?” And I point out that you can’t tell from what she is wearing. They both wear more or less the same thing and show themselves with the cow’s horns, with the sign in between. You have to read the text to know. And they also act very similar. So, they’re all magicians. They’re soft and kind, and they are tough and vicious sometimes.
The Egyptians celebrated feminine power with all of its hormonal craziness. When a woman becomes incensed and angry on behalf of her son, father or family and she goes out on a rampage to destroy, the Egyptians saw that as one of the most important things to protect the king or the sun god himself. They didn’t shy away from it. In fact, they thought of it as something to honor, to celebrate and learn to appease, to control.
I’m reading a book called Moody Bitches by Julie Holland, which is essentially telling women that your hormones and your sensitivity is your greatest asset. Don’t let anybody tell you that you’re just PMS-ing and you’re imagining things. Holland says you’re seeing more clearly during those times potentially than at any other. And the Egyptians understood that as well. They understood that sensitive female power and that they have more than men – the ability to see if someone’s going to screw you over, that female intuition, that sensitivity to facial features and mannerism. Their anger and emotionality is one of the most important protective features of the family and the child. And the Egyptians had a very important festival of drunkenness which involved sexuality, drinking and temple activity in the wee hours of the night where everyone could see the goddess and connect with her through this ritual. And so again, that female, mercurial nature was something that was celebrated, honored, included.
RM:Does goddess culture and women in power work elsewhere to better the position of women? Just because Victoria was Queen of England doesn’t mean the position of regular women was better.
KC:I agree with that, yes.
Life, Death, Mummies
RM:I know you have a fascination for mummies and have studied hundreds of them, including coffins and coffin reuse. Is there a message in that?
KC: Much. Yes, we can worry about dying, but you know, I see my son—he’s going to live forever! He’s going to live for a hundred years. Maybe global warming will get him. I don’t know. Maybe I’ll get to live for a hundred years. And I worry about my health and it’s a constant thing that I think about, but I’m not in pain constantly. I don’t have parasites coursing through my body enough to count my mitochondria (laughter). It’s a very clean existence that we live and I think we forget what real humanity is and was. You know that in the First World where we can shield ourselves so carefully and so cleanly, we forget what a struggle most people deal with.
What about the people that get strung out on opioids? What the hell else are they to do? The poor of this country with no safety net. I think it’s easy to forget what that’s like. And in a way, I’ll make a political statement here, too, because it’s more in our view than ever before. I don’t know what it’s like where you live, but in Los Angeles, homelessness is an epidemic and it is a very visible thing. And in a sense, I don’t have to close my eyes in my time machine and imagine what it was like to be an ancient person. I can go out to the streets in Los Angeles and look at somebody who has been homeless for ten years and there I have antiquity in front of me, in a sense. I have a person who is living a very hard-scrabble existence trying to survive day-to-day, living in a very uncomfortable set of circumstances, ignoring his health and looking very old before he should. This is something that I can go out and see in my own very wealthy Los Angeles cityscape quite easily; there in a way I have that humanity presented before me and that’s something I think we divorce ourselves from way too easily.
RM: Yes, for sure about patterns of wealth and poverty and total depredation continuing. C. G. Jung said that modern humans are ancient, medieval and modern at the same time. Speaking of the ancient-modern nexus, at One Day University you mentioned something most of us never realized – people are mummified today.
KC: We don’t even know why we do it, but we want that body preserved. We want it to be something we look at and we’re not facing death as overtly as if the body were decomposing in front of us. So we pump these bodies full of plastic, but there’s no real difference. Right? If people in the future look at our remains, they’ll say, “Oh look! You know Americans of the 21st Century were still mummifying the dead.”
Also, more people are cremated now than ever before. But we’re still mummifying and that is because of display. When you mummify a body, generally, it’s because you’re going to have the casket displayed in the funeral home. And so the display is essential and mummification is part of the display. And it’s no different from the ancient Egyptians. They needed to show that body to an audience. So when you see original activity, most Egyptologists and I dare say most archaeologists have been inclined to look at this ritual in a religious lens, thinking people did this because they believed that this would happen and they believed that that would happen.
And they forget that people did rituals because they wanted to compete with other families. They wanted to have a certain socioeconomic status. They wanted to show off. And they wanted to have a display in front of a large audience that gave their family a tremendous amount of power. I always hold to the old adage: the dead do not bury themselves.
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Detail of the Papyrus of Hunefer, from the Book of the Dead of Hunefer. The centerpiece of the upper scene is the mummy of Hunefer, shown supported by the god Anubis (or a priest wearing a jackal mask). Hunefer’s wife and daughter mourn, and three priests perform rituals. The two priests with white sashes are carrying out the Opening of the Mouth ritual. The white building at the right is a representation of the tomb, complete with portal doorway and small pyramid. Both these features can be seen in real tombs of this date from Thebes. To the left of the tomb is a picture of the stela which would have stood to one side of the tomb entrance. Following the normal conventions of Egyptian art, it is shown much larger than normal size, in order that its content (the deceased worshipping Osiris, together with a standard offering formula) is absolutely legible. At the right of the lower scene is a table bearing the various implements needed for the Opening of the Mouth ritual. At the left is shown a ritual, where the foreleg of a calf, cut off while the animal is alive, is offered. The animal was then sacrificed. The calf is shown together with its mother, who might be interpreted as showing signs of distress. Date: 1275 BC. Text and image from Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain
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This is a reflection of the families who are doing the burials rather than the dead. And I’m working on that in my next book, with chapter 1 including a queen who benefitted from sacrificial burials. People killed to accompany her in burial. And I could just talk about that or I could talk about the fact that she buried her dead husband with the same sacrificial victims, but she was there when her son was too young to rule on his own, ordering who would die and who would live and standing there watching as the courtiers that she grew up with are dispatched before her very eyes.
RM:She’s an Egyptian Queen from when?
KC:The first dynasty.
RM:Was that around the time of those sacrificial burials at Ur in Mesopotamia?
KC: It is. It’s an interesting thing that the beginnings of kingship often are accompanied, not just in Egypt or Mesopotamia, with sacrificial burial. And when kingship is established the sacrificial burials often end. Only in highly competitive societies do you see the sacrificial burials continuing. It’s a very cruel practice. It’s also a very socially expensive practice and something that your courtiers are going to rebel against eventually and find ways around it.
RM:How were they dispatched?
KC: With great trauma. They used a kind of bludgeon to the back of the head and the people were probably drugged or drunk and then they just slugged them in the back of the head with a blunt object; they probably dropped where they stood. In ancient Egypt, there is no evidence of any trauma. And Flinders Petrie discovered most of these bodies at the end of the 19th century and didn’t do what would be a modern scientific forensic analysis, it’s true. And only the skulls remain. They didn’t keep the entire body.
But new sacrificial victims have been found around the enclosure of Abydos by Laurel Bestock, among others. I don’t know of any evidence of trauma, like blunt force or if you could see strangulation on the body. It’s quite possible that these people were strangled or poisoned and that it didn’t leave any evidence on the body itself. There could have been a quieter form of death as opposed to what the Egyptians would have done to an enemy, which was blunt force trauma that was used in war. You hold the enemy by the hair and you dispatch them with a blow to the head.
RM: This reminds me of the bog bodies in Northern Europe. The sacrifices got a knock on the head and more.
KC: They still have the strangulation ties around the neck as well.
RM:And the Peruvian mummy bundles. I think some of them died of the cold and/or poison.
KC: Yes, I think you’re right. I would have to check on the Peruvian mummy bundles, but I think there was poison involved, particularly of the children. Finding cause of death in a mummy is not as easy as one would expect. And with skeletal material, which is what you have preserved for Dynasty I, of course, it’s even harder. We have Tutankhamen’s body, but do we know how he died? By no means. And people will continue to argue about that for some time. In my opinion, it’s the wrong thing to ask for Tutankhamen.
For the sacrificial burials I would like to know because you get a better understanding of how the ritual would have worked. But I have to assume in rituals of the first dynasty that courtiers would have all stood in a funeral enclosure or out on the necropolis grounds, watching their brothers and sisters and mothers and fathers killed before their eyes. And the mourning would have been heightened because of it. So, the king would have gone into burial with all of the power of that mourning, of that loss. The greater the lament, the more powerful the transformation in the next world. Stature added impetus to kill them. Also, it kept society controlled when you’re establishing kingship for the first time.
RM:As usual, a ritual works on many levels.
KC: Yes, for sure.
RM:I know you have to get going. If you have a few minutes, I wanted to ask you a few scattered questions. I recently watched one of John Romer’s older programs that focused on the dangers to archaeological sights. Is this a worry? Can you comment on the overall picture?
KC: Of course, I worry about Egyptian archaeology. I think archaeology is under threat everywhere right now. I think that whatever country you look at, whether in the west or in the east or in the Middle East, there is the threat of anti-intellectualism and there is a push against academics. And there is the possibility of seeing archaeology as frivolous, unnecessary and a waste of resources rather than seeing it as the best means of understanding human patterns, cycles of crisis and prosperity and human reaction to those cycles of crisis and prosperity.
RM:What is the message and wisdom that archaeology and related studies have for people today?
KC: We can learn so much from what we have already done, using them as cautionary tales. Using it as building blocks, using it to help us do better. And archaeology is one of the best tools that we have moving towards potential apocalypse of global climate change. People have gone through it before. I’ve studied the Bronze Age collapse, and the massive crisis that occurred because of climate change, maybe not human induced climate change, but because of climate change around 1200 BCE and what happened. How did government fail? What states collapsed? What did people do? What were the reactions? These are useful things to know going forward because we will go through this again. In many parts of this globe, people are already going though this. There are many places that are dealing with apocalypse in the here and now and archaeology can help us to understand these patterns.
Egyptology has one of the most colonial archaeological histories on the planet.
For pure archaeological work there is not a lot of money. There’s not a lot of return on your investment. And so what you end up having is a colonial science where a lot of non-Egyptians come into Egypt to do work; that creates tensions and problems. The more sensitive we can be to Egyptian ways of doing things, the better we can be. For example, I applied for and got the grant from the American Research Center in Egypt for US AID funds and in that $70,000 grant, I asked for $25,000 to go directly to the Egyptian Museum to help with the registrar and other costs that they may have. And the next grant I do, I will do the same thing. And if we can move money towards Egyptian institutions that have so very little, then the institutions will be better for it.
Every photo that I take of objects in the Cairo museum, I gladly give with no copyright restrictions to the Egyptian Museum. They can do whatever they want with those images and I am happy to do so because I know that their embarrassment of riches is a blessing, but it is also a responsibility and a weight that is difficult to deal with and I try to make my contribution as best I can. I see other archaeologists and historians doing the same. So, the more we can cooperate and help, the better, but with the understanding that we’re working in their country and we should abide by their rules and their cultural ways.
RM:Yes, for sure. You brought up the environmental qualities of studying archaeology; it makes me think we need a required class on archaeology, history and climate change.
KC: I’m reading about the ‘70s. Just the ‘70s is incredibly useful. All of the revolutionary thinking, all of the bombs, the schism between society on the left and right, the idea of these dirty hippies on one side and intellectuals and on the other side, the rise of the republican right. You know, it’s a useful thing to look back to see how we as a country cycled through that; now, the next schism between right and left is so much more destructive. History is our best tool for understanding the future.
RM:I know you have head out. That means time for the mummy movie question: do you have a favorite movie that depicts ancient Egypt?
KC: I showed my son Raiders of the Lost Ark for the first time—and wow did he love it! I hadn’t seen it in ten years. And all the Egyptian stuff is wrong but cool; it’s such a good movie and if I have to pick any movie about Egypt, it has to be Raiders of the Lost Ark. Is it authentic? No, but it doesn’t need to be. Julian can’t wait to see the second one. I keep trying to tell him it’s not as good.
RM:Great to relive these programs with your son. Thanks so much for your time, expertise and for keeping the adventure alive.
Kara Cooney’s latest book, The Good Kings: Absolute Power in Ancient Egypt and the Modern World, will be released November 2, 2021. Interested readers may purchase the book by pre-order at this site.
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About the interviewer
As a child, Richard Marranca was given books on history, myth and religion that ignited his interests. When he was seven, he went with his mom, grandmother and aunt to Italy and Switzerland – a trip that lasted a lifetime. During his doctoral studies at New York University, he spent a semester in Greece with a side project in Egypt. Around the midpoint of his career, he also was awarded a Fulbright to teach at LMU Munich (and for two years was president of NJ Fulbright chapter), as well as six NEH summer seminars, including Andean Worlds in Peru/Bolivia; Concord MA; and High Plains Indians of Nebraska.
For Richard, teaching and writing go together; he teaches a variety of humanities and English courses. His most recent publications include stories in Coneflower Café, The Raven’s Perch and Months to Years Magazine; interviews in Popular Archaeology and Minerva; and poetry in the Paterson Literary Review. His manuscript, Speaking of the Dead, has been accepted for publication by Blydyn Square Books in NJ.
The latest project: His wife Renah, daughter Hera and Richard create videos, the latest being Childe Hera’s World on YouTube; so far it’s mostly travel videos, but this year the highlight was Coronavirus, A Child’s View.
Richard wishes to thank his wife Renah and Bridget Briant for their help with this interview.
Samuel C. Walker was born and raised in East Africa and subsequently spent fifteen years in the Middle East including Yemen, Israel/West Bank, Jordan, Sudan, and Egypt. He currently is working in Ethiopia. He holds two Bachelor’s degrees; Religious Studies – Anthropology, and Natural Sciences & History, and two Master’s degrees; History and education (Western Oregon U) and Archaeology & Heritage Mgmt. (University of Leicester). For seven years he lived in the Micronesian Pacific islands conducting research on climate change, ecologies, and conducting research as lead field supervisory archaeologist for US Navy projects for EIS and cultural resource management. Since 2013, Walker has worked in Ethiopia, including establishing a Master’s program in Archaeology for Heritage Management and serving as lead field and supervisory archaeologist. As part of his research dissertation, he is working on creating graduate level field-intensive Cultural Resource Management teams (CRMT) specifically to address the critical needs of archaeological site identification, comprehensive field survey, data recovery and excavation field management skills, laboratory analysis and cultural material conservation, and presentation and display of these rich tangible and intangible heritages.
Much of Ethiopia’s rich cultural-social heritage lies within the history of the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church (EOTC). After the decline of the Aksumite Empire (650CE/AD), the Zagwe dynasty (Circa 1000 – 1270 CE/AD) arose, establishing its capital in Lalibela-Lasta. This capital, founded as a monastic kingdom, served as a historical bridge between the ancient and modern era. As a platform for understanding Ethiopia’s historicity, Lalibela encompasses and builds upon religious and cultural adaptations and identity-formation yet to be fully researched.One must not approach Lalibela or surrounding churches from the standpoint of an archaeologist or architect. Lalibela must be seen through pilgrim eyes.
As the nexus of human origins, Ethiopia constitutes a Holy Land in its own right, a sacred landscape rooted in humanity’s very creation. Ethiopia’s unbroken chain of history, reaching back to the foundations of civilizations and beyond, reflects one of humanity’s most significant chronicles of identity.It is this brilliant, yet underrepresented narrative, which continues to inform Ethiopia’s unique ethos and self identity, steeped in its own majestic, millennia-old mythos.
Multiple indigenous cultures and societies have shaped this land, weaving a vibrant tapestry of histories, cultures, languages, and religious identities that continue to breathe life into all humankind.Ethiopia also contains some of the most cherished cultural, historical, and archaeological sites in Africa, each serving as an integral cornerstone, undergirding age-old civilizations. At the core of much of this rich cultural, spiritual, and social-heritage mosaic is the history of the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church (EOTC) whose Aksumite religious antecedents extend to the early Judaic-Christian and Hebraic periods, to which it owes many of its religious and historical foundations.
Historical Background
Historical references to the regions of Ethiopia and the Horn are found in some of the earliest Egyptian records and images. Additionally, biblical and Greek literature present Ethiopia as a land of Eden, and the summer abode of the gods, respectively. Both Sargon II and Sennacherib mention Ethiopia (Meluhha) as the destination of those fleeing the destruction of the Assyrian invasions of Samaria, Jerusalem, and the Eastern Levant, in the 6th and 5th centuries CE/BC (Prichard, 1958, Orlinsky, 1956).Accounts also mention the military might of the Ethiopians, having an army “beyond counting.”
Archaeological evidence, written accounts, and local inscriptions indicate the rise of an Ethio-Sabaean culture in Ethiopia around the end of the 10th or early part of the 9th centuries BC.The indigenization of these various communities eventually developed into the kingdom of D’mt, with its capital and main temple at Yeha (Sergew, 1972). Current archaeological excavations reveal an administrative structure of great architectural and societal complexity associated with this site. The D’mt Kingdom began its decline around the end of the 4th into the 3rd century BC/BCE, and was succeeded by the emergence of Aksum as the dominant city-state.
During the first seven centuries AD/CE, Aksum, the ancient Ethiopian capital of the future Christian Aksumite Empire, thrived upon trade with the Mediterranean cities of Rome, Constantinople, and Alexandria. Situated within the highlands of the northern region of what is now Tigrai, the powerful center of the Aksumite Kingdom grew to dominate both sides of the southern Red Sea, regions in Sudan, including the northern capital of Meroe, and traded with ports across the Indian Ocean and down along the Swahili coast, functioning as an important commercial and military partner with the Late Roman and Early Byzantine Empires (Sergew, 1972).
As one of the largest and longest-lived African Empires, Aksum holds a unique place in the history of world civilizations. The introduction of Christianity in the mid-fourth century AD/CE by Ethiopia’s first Bishop, Frumentius, and King Ezana proved to be a pivotal historical juncture (Sergew, 1972).To this day, Aksum serves as the focal-point for Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Christianity and stands as a symbol of Ethiopia’s vibrant cultural continuity into modern history.
The development of Ge`ez as a language, with first unvocalized and then vocalized or Ethiopic, script, has left a unique written chronicle, both pre-Christian and Christian, retaining traditions and a liturgy of world importance and significance. Additionally, early manuscripts mention Aksum hosting the first Muslim communities fleeing persecution in Mecca. Many Islamic architectural and cultural elements remain across Ethiopia as witness to these broader regional influences in the 7th -11th centuries. These constitute a rich selection of heritage sites and cultures in their own right (Girma, 1997; Dagnachew, 2003).
It is not only these churches, monasteries, mosques, and holy sites, however, which constitute truly unique heritage assets. Their contents, including artifacts as old as the structures themselves: manuscripts, varieties of liturgical objects, such as icons and crosses, Qur’ans, crowns, liturgical fans, vestments, drums, lyres, sistra, etc., must also be considered. Ethiopia thus contains important historical, cultural, religious, and heritage-based sites, and a multitude of archaeological remains illustrative of the development and blossoming of major albeit underrepresented African civilizations.
Of special note are the Aksumite and Post-Aksumite rock-hewn churches located across the landscapes of Gheralta, Tembian, and regions in North Wollo. With the decline of Aksumite hegemony, population movements led settled communities to migrate progressively south, progressively inland, where they became increasingly more isolated. In the early Ethiopia medieval periods, the Zagwe dynasty (Circa 1000 – 1270 CE/AD) established its capital in Lalibela-Lasta, initiating this progressive movement of capitals southwards. The dynasty and structures of Lalibela, however, represent a particular uniqueness, serving as a historical bridge between the ancient and the modern. As a platform for understanding Ethiopia’s historicity and the uninterrupted continuity of Ethiopianness, Lalibela encompasses and builds upon religious and cultural adaptations, innovations, and the transmission of knowledge in ways yet to be fully appreciated, researched, or understood.
Construction out of Chaos
In 1520, one of the first outsiders to visit and record the church complexes of Lalibela, Chaplain Fransico Alverez of the Portuguese Embassy, viewed them two and a half centuries after they had been abandoned (Alvarez, 1881).Even in that state, however, these surreal edifices inspired him to wax eloquent on the grandeur and uniqueness of churches and other structures hewn completely out of living rock. But then he hesitated, concerned that if he continued in his descriptions, his readers might begin to disbelieve him. Such reticence, or perhaps a lack ofcontext with which to accurately expound the wonders of the Lalibela complex and surrounding churches, continues to this day.
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Fig. 1 – Beta Giorgyis – The Church of St. George in Lalibela. (Photo SCW)
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Prior to my first visit to Lalibela, I read various accounts: Alverez, 18th and 19th century visitors, and contemporary travelers and scholars. But it wasn’t until I stood atop the unworked bedrock peering into the carved out cavity and beheld the standing structures for myself that I apprehended what constrained previous writers. Incongruous was the first word that came to mind. That early medieval churches, literally chiseled free from stone, both inside and out, would be situated on a remote hillside in the central highlands of Ethiopia, made little sense.
Monumental hewn structures are not unique to Lalibela. Abu Simbal, the Valley of the Kings, among many other carved sites across Egypt, plus Cappadocia in Turkey, Petra in Jordan, and structures in India, are tied to trade networks, or located at crossroads or borders, and were specifically designed and situated to impress. Lalibela, however, fits none of these parameters. Something genuinely different was at play here. Its structures, and therefore its history, transcend the physical. These remain living, vibrant, churches, functioning within a pilgrim ethos still founded in the early medieval worldview. Something much deeper, more visceral, requires the story to be told in a radically different way.
For a thousand years, Lalibela has stood sentinel, overlooking an expansive valley to nowhere. Why? A mystery.As an archaeologist visiting a site for the first time, I examine the overall environment, the geology, the topography, the vegetation. Like reading an ancient crime scene, I look for the small clues, indications of humanity’s mark upon his or her landscape.
Like a sleuth, I tracked the slopes and bedrock overlooking the churches, the hewn river valleys, the two breast-shaped hills, Mount Tabor and the Mount of Olives, sites named after biblical locations thousands of kilometers to the north.Having traipsed the hills of Jerusalem and Israel for close to a decade, I was at first surprised at Lalibela’s smallness, its compactness.
Soon, however, clues emerged. Remnants of tombs carved atop the bedrock, foundation trenches of free-standing, stone-built structures, notches cut in the sides of the deep cut trenches, even a smoothed surface along a cliff-face that may have held a painted icon or an inscription, required a good deal more soil atop the bedrock back in antiquity. The Lalibela of today is not the Lalibela of the eleventh and twelfth centuries. Scoured through centuries, the original vibrancy had long ago eroded away. Today’s remnants comprise the revitalized relics of a long-past dynasty.
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Fig. 2 – Eroded surface above the Dual Chapels of Sinai and Golgotha, showing evidence of tombs and foundation trenches from the earliest phases of occupation in Lalibela. (Photo SCW)
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A Second Look
Since the collapse of the Aksumite Empire circa CE/AD 650, nearly four hundred silent years had limped by before the rise of the Zagwe dynasty. During this interval, no central capital, no nexus for defining “Ethiopianness” emerged. The hidden rock-hewn churches that dot the landscape of Tigrai and south into Gheralta and Tembien, retain impressive masterpieces of early ecclesiastical art and architecture, but a large, central, settled community has yet to be discovered. Previous research attributed this to the pressures of Islam, the newly dominant religion of Arabia and the Red Sea trade routes. Was Lalibela therefore all about security? The Lalibela-Lasta context failed to fit so simple or pedestrian an answer.
Contextual Framing
For my dissertation in Jordan, I researched the late Roman/early Byzantine rural structures, monasteries, and remote military outposts of the Jordanian desert from the reign of Diocletian (AD 296-304) to the eventual dominance of Constantine the Great (AD 308-330) as a newly-Christian Emperor (Walker, 2004). Such a major shift in the Eastern Mediterranean ushered in the emergence of a politically, newly powerful, Christianity.
With the evolution of a new ecclesiastical architecture came a new triumphalism. Adorning the highest cupulas of the grandest churches of the Byzantine Empire, icons flaunted Christ as Pantocrator – The Divine, undisputed champion, ruler of the universe. As an added measure of subjugation, the Hebraic terms, Yahweh Sabaoth – Lord of Hosts, and El Shaddai – Lord God Almighty, were pirated and ascribed to this Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews, as evidence that this new God of gods, had become the ultimate conqueror.
From Christianity’s humble origins as a peasant fellowship of fishermen along the shores of the Sea of Galilee, through three hundred years as a persecuted sect, Christendom burst forth as the state religion of one of the most powerful empires of its day. Many saw this as evidence that such a feat was ordained by God.
Christendom’s newly acquired dominance along with the subsequent, often politically motivated church councils, starting with that of Nicea (325 AD), ignited the counter-measure: the monastic movement in the deserts of Judea, Jordan, Syria, the Negev, the Sinai, and Egypt.Additionally, the Ethiopian church had maintained a presence in Jerusalem from the beginning, attending the church councils, through to the Council of Chalcedon (AD 451), where it disavowed the monophysite heresy, but maintained the miaphysite doctrine (Tewahedo), “One nature of God the Word incarnate” (Melaju, 2008).
The continuity of this history is illustrated not only by the intimate knowledge the Ethiopian Orthodox Church had of church history, but because it was integral in helping to write it.Mosaics in various 5th and 6th century Byzantine churches across Jordan, including Mt. Nebo and Petra, depict Ethiopians, evidence that communication between the two branches of Christianity were commonplace.
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Fig. 3- Mosaic in Mt. Nebo, Jordan, depicting Ethiopian person with an ostrich, zebra, and giraffe, shown as a “camel-leopard” as it was known. (Photo SCW)
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The word ‘monk’ comes from the Greek root mono, for “one who lives alone.”Monasticism remains the ultimate test of faithfulness to the call of discipleship. Allaying physical distractions tempered through the mortification of the flesh, prepared one for the daunting demands of spiritual discipline. What better way to be tested and proven faithful than to emulate Christ who withdrew to a deserted place for fasting and praying?
There is a deeply incarnational dimension to communing one-on-one with the Divine. Regardless of one’s faith-walk, isolation and reflection produce their own measure of spiritual reward. As opposed to the blatant political and economic messages broadcast by the architecture of the Byzantine Empire, or the earlier structures of Abu Simbal and Petra, it became increasingly clear that Lalibela-Lasta had been founded, inspired by an overarching need to dwell as a remote, monastic kingdom.
Lead me to the Rock . . .
Returning, I poured over the maps. And then, there it was. The massif of Mt. Lasta upon which the Lalibela complex is built, is situated just south of Mt. Abuna Yusef. At 4190 meters above sea level, it is the highest mountain in the region and only 430 meters lower than Ethiopia’s highest peak, Ras Dashen. A series of watersheds cuts the highlands of Ethiopia into four quadrants. Lalibela is situated just north-west of the convergence of the main mountain ridges that divides this rugged land. The Priest-Kings of the Zagwe Dynasty chose this isolation, purposely, as an island situated within an ocean of basaltic mountains. As near the center of that convergence as geographically possible, as far away from the corruption of the world, upon the farthest edge of Christendom, at the headwaters of the Tecazze River, the first Priest-Kings of the Zagwe Dynasty founded their monastic capital.
One must not, therefore, approach the Lalibela complex or surrounding churches from the standpoint simply of an archaeologist, historian, architect, or tourist. Lalibela must be seen through pilgrims’ eyes. These stone-hewn structures now retain the skeletal framework of their truer, more spiritual story. I have revisited Lalibela multiple times, seeking the greater contexts of Ethiopia’s previous identity formation in relation to the Aksumite Empire, and the direct connection this “Ethiopian Jerusalem” holds with the Jerusalem of Gold. Especially today, one must sit at the feet of ages past in order to grasp the broader medieval pilgrimage ethos surrounding the collapse of the corrupt, despotic Crusader Kingdoms in the Eastern Levant.
Seeing through pilgrims’ eyes unlocks this most extraordinary of sites to new avenues of comprehension. It creates a means of embracing the essence of the Lalibela-Lasta complex, that of greater Ethiopia, and ultimately, the whole of Africa. It illustrates just how significant and splendid these structures are, not simply as artifacts of devotion, but even more, as icons of faith, edifices of an eternal, yet grounded hope, amidst the darkness of Western Christendom’s early-medieval decay. It is within this light that the earlier churches and those of Lalibela need to be experienced.
From this elevated standpoint, the Lalibela-Lasta churches brilliantly epitomize the initial resurrection of a post-Crusader, Ethiopian kingdom of faith, that shone beyond the shadows of defeat in the Eastern Mediterranean and across North Africa. This sacred space specifically was designed to be a beacon for the many Christian-African kingdoms of the interior, even at times, casting its light upon the dim shores of Europe, stumbling in the pre-Renaissance era. Lalibela’s essence hearkens back to our origins. It remains a message across the centuries, calling all of us home to rest in the embrace of our common mother, Africa.
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Fig. 4 – Relief Map of Ethiopia and Eretria – Note the division of Ethiopia’s highlands into distinct quadrants and watersheds, with Lalibela situated centrally.
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Geology, Jewels, and a Miracle
The structures of Lalibela are constructed within a finger of tuff, a soft volcanic stone, which juts out into the valley. Tuff, as a softer stone made more of compacted volcanic ashes, absorbs water. When it is first exposed, one can easily carve and shape the stone with basic iron tools.I have seen masons and quarrymen dig out huge boulders of tuff and, with hammer and chisel, knock out building blocks, level, square, uniform, in minutes. And then a miracle happens. Once the stone is doused with water and exposed to air, it hardens to near concrete.
Tradition holds that after his 14-year sojourn in Jerusalem and the Holy Lands, King Lalibela received a vision. He was to build a new Jerusalem for a new priesthood serving a new chosen people of God. Visualizing Lalibela within its broader geological location, one grasps the perception of the miraculous. Consider that the site upon which the churches of Lalibela are built is less than two square kilometers of tuff in a region where, for literally hundreds of thousands of square kilometers to the north, and in an east-westerly direction, there is none (Morton, 1978, Williams, 2016). For those spiritually inclined, it is as if when God was crafting the world from time immemorial, he secreted away an infinitesimal nugget of constructional tuff in this land of ever-present, uplifted, hard basalt, for just such a time as this.
From this reddish-gray stone, King Lalibela hews a precious jewel, one of the truly magnificent world masterpieces of religious art. But it is not simply the structures themselves which speak of this brilliance. The churches, as wonderful as each are, are more than simply ecclesiastical edifices. The whole is far greater than the sum of its parts. Like all true art, Lalibela contains an astounding, hidden magic.
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Fig. 5 – An original stone from the initial carving out of the structures, kept in a pile beside the church of Beta Giyorgis. Note the chisel marks indicating the types of tools and force used to excavate. The fact such stones were retained on site indicates they were likely considered part of the sacredness of the “work is prayer” adage. (Photo SCW)
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. . . To the Rock that is Higher Than I
In order to gain a deeper understanding of why the Lalibela complex is such a sacred space, one must grasp the ascetic world view within a monastic mental landscape. The most ancient traditions related to the birth of Jesus place it in a cave dwelling adjacent to the house of Joseph’s family in Bethlehem (Murphey-O’Conner, 1992). The fanciful stories of a wooden manger in a wooden stable behind an inn are fabrications of Renaissance artists. Given Christ’s nativity occurs in a cave, this holds special emphasis within ancient monasticism. And then there is the burial after the crucifixion, also within a cave, that completes the incarnational circle to the monastic narrative. Living one’s life in a cave is as close as one can get to living as Christ. And thus, a monastic church in a cave or a church carved out of rock is the epitome of the dwelling of God with man, or the Beta Emmanuel (Hirscfeld, 1999).
The dominant focus on the Lalibela churches and complexes continues to be architectural and art history-based. Subsequently, a critical factor for adequately and accurately expounding the wonders of the Lalibela complex and surrounding churches remains unexplored. By continually ignoring the broader political, social, and cultural formations of the Zagwe Dynasty, scholars have limited the lexicon for creating the richer narrative of Lalibela-Lasta’s far deeper significance.
The era of the Zagwe Dynasty is one of the most impressive periods of Ethiopia’s history (Pankhurst, 1990, Phillipson, 2009, 2012). It is incumbent upon us to endeavor to rediscover, through research of the significant data-sets, the sociological and broader cultural frameworks preceding and leading up to, the rise of the Zagwe dynasty. Further research is required to capture the message within the Lalibela heritage sites beyond merely its architectural significance.
Lasta-Lalibela heritage stands as a uniting historical monument to Ethiopia’s shared historical experience. As contemporary Ethiopia undergoes shifts of cultural and societal identity across ethno-national and linguistic lines, these heritages retain prominent historical value to enable the building of comprehensive, mutual understanding. Lalibela-Lasta represents the continual adaptation of ascribed identities across generations and landscapes. The cumulative transference of societal knowledge, variable skill-sets, practices, cultural material, along with the geographical location of these structures and associated sites, build upon, and enhance community well-being, religious expression, and societal identifiers for each new generation.
Historical Framework of Lalibela-Lasta
Years before ascending the throne, two years after the defeat of the Crusaders in Jerusalem in 1187 by the Ayyubid dynasty, King Lalibela visited Egypt and the Holy Land. While there, he was invited for an audience with the conqueror, Salah ad-Din (Saladin). Because the Coptic Church in Alexandria was responsible for providing the Mutran (Metropolitan) for the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church, Salah ad-Din viewed King Lalibela as under his protection and neutral in the previous Crusader conflicts. Thus, Ethiopian and Coptic Christians were again given access to, and in some instances control of, the holy sites, a privilege denied them under the Crusaders. A Metropolitan (Mutran), as overseer of an ecclesiastical community or See, serves as the primary representative of a patriarch. Under agreement, the Coptic Alexandrian Church sent a Mutran from Egypt and the Ethiopian church would not select its own bishops or Patriarch. It is conjectured that under the Zagwe dynasty, the Priest-Kings broke with this tradition.
A brilliant example of the confluence of these two worlds, Crusader and Ethiopian, is depicted as graffiti in the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem. As one enters the sanctuary, on one of the limestone pillars, off to the far left, are the sketched images of crusader helmets and coats of arms. Two beautiful, regal African faces, in profile, grace this pillar. Staring into that face, one can easily imagine one to be King Lalibela on his sojourn. Of course, King Lalibela was no Crusader, but it is within this frame of reference, this seeking a common good for humanity and living within the core of the Christian and monastic mandate to love one’s enemies and pray for those who persecute, that we must understand his majesty. Upon this mountain, called Roha in antiquity, translated from the Ge’ez as “pure or clean,” a new focal point emerges of a new dynasty of these priest-kings, or in the local parlance, Presbyter Jan-hoy.
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Fig. 6 – Graffiti in the Church of Nativity in Bethlehem, depicting an African face in profile, atop a Crusader helmet. (Photo SCW)
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Finding Our Way
Pilgrimage is designed to set us right, to level the playing field. And Lalibela is one of the most profound places wherein one can be set right. But it takes work. It requires a different set of eyes, spiritual eyes, to see the beauty and wonder of not simply the stone churches, but hopefully, to apprehend the hidden, beating heart of devotion of the ancient, dynamic, living Ethiopic church that forged this icon of faith out of living rock.
In the hectic pantomime of modern Christianity, most have forsaken the practice of pilgrimage. Yet, pilgrimage or sojourning as a spiritual exercise, is a searching for the fingerprint of God. The essential element of pilgrimage is, as the word implies, leaving the security of home and seeking for that which is other. It is an intention of a destination, not simply to a sacred place, but more importantly, to dwell securely within a sacred space (Hirschfeld, 1992, Tsafrir, 1988). For the wearied wayfarer among Ethiopia’s and Africa’s early medieval Christian populace, the churches of Lalibela served and still serve as just such a space.
One major aspect of pilgrimage relates to manual labor as a form of prayer. Indeed, one finds the statement, “work is prayer” among many of the guiding principles of monastic orders. Is it any wonder then we see varying influences within the architecture and decoration in the various structures, especially in windows and cross forms? The retention of Aksumite ecclesiastical architecture, however, remains obvious throughout the Lalibela complex and earlier churches. It can be conjectured that many of these stone churches represent actual, contemporary structures which were subsequently destroyed in the religious wars of 1528-1543. Of these stone-hewn churches, architectural form supersedes function, even within many representational constructed elements. Wooden frames of windows and doors, currently found in the built churches such as Debre Damo and Yimerhane Kirstos, are exquisitely retained in stone in the Lalibela churches
Transcendence
Being religious, however, is not a requisite to appreciating or even experiencing things spiritual. The path an early-medieval pilgrim followed through the various churches illustrates how perfectly King Lalibela incorporated spiritual geography and embodied the deepest elements of the ancient pilgrimage ethos. In Zorzi’s accounts of travelers to Ethiopia in the mid-1440s, he records, “From Asquaga (modern Woldia) to Urvuar (often associated with Lalibela), and there is a king in the said great city, where are 12 churches of canons and a bishop, and the tomb of a holy king that works miracles, and has the name of Lalivela (sic); whither go very many pilgrims from all the lands.” (Crawford, 1956). But new research indicates the actual site of Urvuar to be ruins south of Istayish, serving as the administrative site to Lalibela 25 kms to the north.
The Beta Giyorgis complex, the lowest point geographically, was probably the last of the churches to be hewn. It is situated on a knoll of tuff that descends south of the main hillsides housing the other two, larger complexes. Three carved ravines designed to funnel off water, create an “island” or “mountain peak” amidst a broader ocean of stone. The eastern channel, named Gadet, meaning ‘the boundary marker between two lands’, is linked by a channel to the western gorge, referred to as the River Jordan.
In medieval times, pilgrims would initiate their pilgrimage via one of two paths at this lowest point, at the outflow of the Gadet as it runs into the south-western ravine. Via this deep cut in the bedrock, one enters Beta Giyorgis or St. George’s church within its original design.Up slope and to the west from the Gadet is a holy water site named after the dragon-slaying, mega-martyr, St. George or Beta Giyorgis, where pilgrims in need of physical, mental, or spiritual healing, or those seeking absolution for sins past, could be cleansed and begin anew – a regenesis of sorts, toward a renewed identity.
The Churches
Though dedicated to St. George, local traditions also state its architectural elements tie Beta Giyorgis to Noah’s Ark. Noah is often painted as a portrait of faith, because, as we find in Hebrews 11, Noah heeds God’s warning, believing something that had never before been seen. And thus, he and his family represent earth’s sole human survivors and heirs of righteousness.
Further, in the Epistles of Peter, Noah is held as an example of one whose faith saved not only his family, but also the whole of humanity. The spiritual geography of Beta Giyorgis serves as a rock-hewn ark secured to its own Mt. Ararat, with the priest-kings of the Zagwe Dynasty representing the faithful Noah, saving the broader Ethiopian communities, and consequently, humanity, from a deluge of sinfulness drowning the world as subsequent Crusades and other religious wars raged on further north.
Within the enclosure, to the northeast, as the craftsmen carved down, they hit the base rock of basalt. Too hard to hew, it was left and aptly named, Mt. Ararat, after the resting place of the original ark.And just as Noah’s ark had three levels and a roof, so does Beta Giyorgis, with open windows only on the upper-most level. To enter, one must ascend the seven hewn steps leading into the closed confines, the sacred security of this ark of stone. Each ascending step is higher and narrower than its predecessor, symbolizing the seven heavens, illustrating how each stride in the walk of faith requires more effort, less self-assurance, in obtaining salvation and the righteousness which comes by grace alone. Viewed from above, the series of three foundation steps which encircle the entire building give it the illusion that the last waves of the flood still lap at the now-grounded ark.
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Fig. 7 – The narrowing, ascending steps to Beta Giyorgis. (Photo SCW)
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The Church structure is said to also represent the Arc of the Covenant, containing the Decalogue or ten commandments. In the Chapel of Beta Gabriel, a wooden arc, in the exact style of Beta Giyorgis, beautifully retains that tradition in miniature.
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Fig. 8 – Miniature wooden Arc of the Covenant showing similarities to Beta Giyorgis Church. (Photo SCW)
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The floral motif atop each window could be taken as the olive branch brought back by the dove, or more likely, the vine that Noah planted post-flood and from which he made the first wine. Wine, of course, becomes the essential element of the holy sacrament representing the blood of Christ. Twelve windows, three on each branch of its cruciform shape, can be any of a number of elements, but are most likely for the twelve apostles, sent to spread the good news to the four corners of the world. The roof is carved with a cross within a cross within a cross, creating a Trinitarian unity of the central symbol of Christianity.
Saved from the condemnation of the flood, one exits the ark, and ascends, up across the hand-hewn trough linking Gadet and the Jordan. It is unknown what features, in medieval times, existed upon what is now the walkway and parking lot. Further research may illuminate a passageway demarcating a causeway into the new promised land upslope. Remnants of large hewn ashlar stones demarcate a path that may represent the way through one’s own wilderness wanderings from the realm of the Old Testament into the world of the New.
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Fig. 9 – Built pathway from Beta Giyorgis leading to the narrow alley to the Tomb of Adam – (Photo SCW)
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Orthodox icons of the crucifixion usually depict the cross, planted atop Calvary or Golgotha, the place of the skull. Traditionally, the place where the cross of Christ was fixed to the Earth has been interpreted as the original burial spot of Adam, as represented by a skull and long bones.The ascent, leading to the Tomb of Adam, takes one further up to a narrow, deeply carved alley with the closed-in feel of the Valley of the Shadow of Death. Steep steps lead up through the doorway into an enclosure, creating the impression of being enclosed within one’s tomb. Like the confined chapels within Jerusalem’s Church of the Holy Sepulcher, these spaces allowed a pilgrim to individually own that she or he is, like the original sinner, Adam, dead in sin ( I Cor 15:21 – “For since by (one) man came death, by (one) man came also the resurrection of the dead”).
From a low door, petitioning humility, one emerges from that tomb, to arrive at the twin chapels of Sinai, also referred to in the literature as Beta Mika’el, representing the giving of the Mosaic law, and Golgotha, where grace and forgiveness were bestowed upon humanity.
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Fig. 10 – Site of the Tomb of Adam looking down, with the dual chapels of Sinai (Beta Mika’el) on the far end, and Beta Golgotha, closer.Note the original door to Sinai (indicated by the top arrow) is rarely utilized today.It should be noted that entrance into Golgotha is only accessible through the Sinai chapel, possibly indicating that salvation comes only by passing through the law into grace. (Jn. 1:17- “Since though the law was given to Moses, grace and truth have come through Jesus Christ.” Jerusalem Bible, 1966). (Photo SCW)
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These dual churches, representing the old and new covenants, tie the Hebraic or Judaic heritage of the earliest representations of the living church to this modern living Ethiopic heritage and traditions. One of the verses often quoted in regard to this long historicity and connectivity to the promises of God through King David, is Psalm 68:31: “Princes shall come out of Egypt; Ethiopia shall soon stretch out her hands unto God” (KJV). This entire complex reverberates with the sense that these structures are designed to boldly claim that promise fulfilled. In a sense, these structures illustrate that the Gospel has indeed been preached to the ends of the earth.
The first structure, known as Beta Mika’el, or alternatively, as Mt. Sinai, represents the giving of the law. Mt. Sinai, where Moses received the law, proves our need of salvation. Access to the sanctuaries of Mt. Sinai and then Golgotha, originally required one to nearly circumambulate the building, to the far end, and then negotiate narrow steps to traverse the slender path along the exterior wall. Just as the Children of Israel wandered for forty years, and Jesus fasted for forty days in the wilderness, this path requires of a pilgrim time to prepare for entrance into these two sanctuaries. The eastern door, now rarely used, would have ushered a penitent into the closed confines of Sinai, which contains solid pillars and an aura of heaviness.With high, small windows, condemnation is palpable. Highly-stylized “angels’ eyes” stare, unblinkingly from every corner of each capital.
The second chapel, Golgotha, represents the giving of grace which now covers the debt of humanity’s sin. Beta Golgotha, off-limits to women, hides secrets. It is the only church with life-size relief statuary incorporated in the walls. There is argument as to whether the statuary are original, or later additions. Evidence for the argument that they are original, are similar pillar capitals, as well as a similar feature of a standing cleric, found in Kankanet Mika’el, far up slope from the main Lalibela complexes, on the way to the Hudad Plateau.
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Fig. 11- Relief statue in the chapel of Beta Golgotha – The sheen upon the stone comes from centuries of pilgrims venerating the image in prayers and petitions.
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The back part of the nave houses what is known as the Sellassie Chapel (Phillipson, 2009, Merceier, 2012). Normally a thick curtain covers the entrance to this chamber, protecting, as far as it is known, the only chapel in Christendom with three separate altars, one for each member of the Holy Trinity: Father, Son, Holy Spirit. Typical Ethiopic icons of the Trinity represent three sagacious, identical depictions of the one nature of the triune God. All equally share that single nature of Godhead from before creation, all eternally, self-existing. This triunity strongly exemplifies the miaphysite concept of God being of a single nature, rather than the dual nature doctrine – diaphysite – of other Orthodox, Catholic, and Reformed/Protestant traditions (Melaku, 2008).
The long Ethiopic presence in Jerusalem, especially as it relates to the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, has forged a deep link to the Holy Land and its spiritual history. Immediately after the Ayyubid re-conquest of Jerusalem in 1187, the Ethiopic church served as primary custodian of these holy sites. It is not unlikely that King Lalibela would have been intimately engaged in that administration. By recreating a tomb of Christ in Ethiopia, King Lalibela may have selected this back chapel as his final resting place, complete with a depiction of a resting or prone Christ, perhaps illustrating in stone, the incarnational aspects of the unified salvific work of both a human and divine nature, central to the belief of the Tewahedo or the miaphysite doctrine.
Having immersed oneself within the covenants of law and grace in Sinai and Golgotha, one then ascends a series of steps and navigates winding carved corridors, further upslope, to the large open area containing Beta Maryiam, the Church of Mary. Flanking this sanctuary are two smaller chapels, the chapel of the finding of the true cross (Beta Masqal) to the north, and the chapel of the 40 virgin martyrs (Beta Danagel) to the south.
Beta Maryiam is the only church that boasts an interior of colorful decorations and painted fresco icons. In the same way that St. Mary served as the vessel for incarnationally carrying Christ, so we as pilgrims, by entering this sacred space, partake in that incarnation and, as the true church, become the physical representation of Christ to the world. The open courtyard proffers the first place that pilgrims might celebrate communally. It is here the festival of incarnation at nativity, Ethiopian Genna, takes place each year. Multiple narratives coalesce within this complex. In a spiritual sense, the whole of the gospel abides herein: The Magnificat of Mary, the nativity, the incarnational ministry of Christ, the crucifixion, the faithfulness of martyrs.
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Fig. 12 – Interior of Beta Mariyam – The carved and painted designs retain the physical representations of the wood-carved, painted interiors of churches such as Yimerhane Kirstos, which predate the Lalibela churches. (Photo SCW)
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To the north lies a carved pool containing holy water where tradition states that barren women might be submerged and obtain fertility. The secret, hidden hope of barren women, also finds a place among the grandeur of this story. Just as God, through Mary, bestowed a physical child to Mary, and thus to the world, so He did for Sarai-Sarah, Revkah-Rebekah, Hanna, and the multiple nameless women who, through tears and social pain, found favor in a God who holds women in the highest esteem.
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Fig. 13 – The submersion pool with Beta Mariyam in the background. The baptistery steps are to the left. In the Early medieval periods, the reverse swastika motif was commonly associated with the tree of life, and can be seen represented in cultural material from Phoenician, Assyrian, and Indian cultural contexts. (Photo SCW)
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One final step, however, is required to usher the pilgrim into eternal, spiritual life. Through a constricting corridor within the imposing cliff face, like a passage through death into heavenly life, pilgrims lastly enter the large open space that houses Bete Medhane Alem, or Savior of the World Church. As the largest church, this would have served as the culmination, the high point of pilgrimage. The open area provided ample space for pilgrims to communally celebrate their renewed salvation. Inside, no imposing icon of Christ as Pantocrator looks down upon a sinful humanity. Here, it is the child-Christ, held by Mariyam, who reigns. From an Ethiopic (EOTC) perspective, this is the deity the world needs today, not the crusade-bent, angry god of so much of western Christendom.
Having completed our pilgrimage, the steps to the north allow one to ascend further, where, with an added hope, pilgrims look uphill, to the symbolic Mount of Olives, from which Christ ascended, and upon which he will return as Savior of the World.
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Fig. 14 – The Mt. of Olives viewed from the Medhane Alem church, finalizing the pilgrimage experience. (Photo SCW)
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Much more can, and should be said about this masterpiece of ecclesiastical architecture, part of this broader narrative within Ethiopian Christianity. The administrative complex further southeast, along with Mt. Tabor commemorating Christ’s transfiguration, contain multiple mysteries in their own right, yet have not been part of the broader discussion of this paper.
Here, it is Ethiopia’s narrative that must prevail. The living church of the EOTC community constitutes the primary custodian of the centuries-old heritage, and it is, therefore, their story to tell. Often, the parochial, colloquial imposition of outside academic, disengaged, world views have dominated the retelling of what is Africa. That must change. In much of the literature about Lalibela and the larger Ethiopic Tewahedo church traditions as a whole, a subtle, or occasionally overt sentiment persists that these traditions are somehow failed attempts at emulating “our more enlightened, more scholarly and sophisticated” western churches, or post-Christian world.
Often academia or scholars seek for minutia, or the mere stones and bones of an ancient tradition. Care is required lest we assume, because Western sacred sanctuaries have been reduced to museums or pubs, that Lalibela could be similarly defined. Continuing research sings a dynamically different story, however.
For now, our goal and honor remains to work with the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church to train local clergy and heritage management experts and equip them to discover and discern even more of Lalibela’s enchantment. Thus might these sanctuaries and adjacent settlements reverberate with further sacredness within their deeper, intended spirituality.Through continual co-research, it is hoped that more of the hidden messages are revealed as these Lalibela-Lasta complexes and communities still whisper secrets left nearly a thousand years ago.
Qidus, Sanctus, Holy
Like the first outsiders, however, I too must admit to only touching the surface of this mystical Holy Land. One final discovery, however, came to light while researching Ethiopic crosses. When one views the greater whole of the entire ecclesiastical complex of Lalibela, it becomes clear that the actual layout is designed to serve as more than a simple pathway for pilgrimage. The churches, chapels, and tunnels of Lalibela are themselves actually a magnificent, carved, monumental icon of the crucifixion.
Like the Ethiopian hand cross that every priest and monk carries, the bottom of the cross represents the square arc of the covenant. Other traditions relate that it represents the four corners of the world. Connecting the arc and the cross is the handle, representing the passageway to the foot of the cross, planted upon the tomb of Adam. In rare examples, the handle depicts Adam, rooted in his grave, with a shoot from the Tree of Paradise becoming the timber for the crossbeam for the crucifix. This apocryphal story is found in many older traditions, including a thread about King Solomon’s building of the Temple. The four branches of the cross emanating from the center, like the Jerusalem cross, comprise the core of the standard hand cross (Korabiewics, Waclaw, et al 1973).
As part of my research, I have come to the conclusion that every church or chapel in this complex represents an element of Christ’s sacrifice. The dual sanctuaries of Mt. Sinai (Beta Mika’el) and Golgotha comprise the two wounds of Christ’s feet. The Chapels of the Finding of the True Cross and the 40 Martyrs represent the nail-wounds in his hands. Beta Maryiam, the central place for incarnation, fully and beautifully represents the spear to his heart. For some, this similarly represents that Mary, Queen of Heaven and Co-Redemptrix, had her heart pierced as well. In the Middle Ages in Europe, the concept that St. Mary participated as an agent of redemption or salvation for humanity was promoted by the early Franciscans as a doctrine. It is not known to what extent this idea was present within the Zagwe dynasty, if at all. The Bete Medhane Alem, as the culminating sanctuary, honors the Savior of the World, and brilliantly represents his crown of thorns.
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Fig. 15 – Ethiopian hand-cross depicting Adam holding up the cross. The bottom is the Arc of the Covenant and each branch of the cross illustrates a wound, with Mary and Christ in the center (Photo SCW). A map of the Ecclesiastical structures illustrating the natural layout of the various sanctuaries (after Phillipson – 2009).
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As a sacred space, therefore, Lalibela-Lasta continues sharing the dividends of its spiritual economy, bestowing hope and identity to a nation so rich in heritage, but for so long hidden from the outside world.
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PLOS—A new investigation of stone tools buried in graves provides evidence supporting the existence of a division of different types of labor between people of male and female biological sex at the start of the Neolithic. Alba Masclans of Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas in Barcelona, Spain, and colleagues present these findings in the open-access journal PLOS ONE on April 14, 2021.
Previous research has suggested that a sexual division of labor existed in Europe during the transition to the Neolithic period, when farming practices spread across the continent. However, many questions remain as to how different tasks became culturally associated with women, men, and perhaps other genders at this time.
To provide further insights, Masclans and colleagues analyzed over 400 stone tools buried in graves in various cemeteries in central Europe about 5,000 years ago during the Early Neolithic. They examined the tools’ physical characteristics, including microscopic patterns of wear, in order to determine how the tools were used. Then, they analyzed these clues in the context of isotopic and osteological data from the graves.
The analysis showed that people of male biological sex were buried with stone tools that had previously been used for woodwork, butchery, hunting, or interpersonal violence. Meanwhile, those of female biological sex were buried with stone tools used on animal hides or leather.
The researchers also found geographic variations in these results, hinting that as agricultural practices spread westwards, sexual division of labor may have shifted. The authors note that the analyzed tools were not necessarily used by the specific people they were buried with, but could have been chosen to represent activities typically carried out by different genders.
These findings provide new support for the existence of sexual division of labor in the early Neolithic in Europe. The authors hope their study will contribute to better understanding of the complex factors involved in the rise of gender inequalities in the Neolithic, which may be heavily rooted in the division of labor during the transition to farming.
The authors add: “Our study points towards a complex and dynamic gendered social organization rooted in a sexed division of labour from the earliest Neolithic.”
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Neolithic agriculturalists. Illustration by L.P. Repiso
*Masclans A, Hamon C, Jeunesse C, Bickle P (2021) A sexual division of labour at the start of agriculture? A multi-proxy comparison through grave good stone tool technological and use-wear analysis. PLOS ONE 16(4): e0249130. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0249130
INSTITUT PASTEUR—Describing the genetic diversity of human populations is essential to improve our understanding of human diseases and their geographical distribution. However, the vast majority of genetic studies have been focused on populations of European ancestry, which represent only 16% of the global population. Scientists at the Institut Pasteur, Collège de France, and CNRS have looked at understudied human populations from the South Pacific, which are severely affected by a variety of diseases, including vector-borne infectious diseases such as Zika virus, dengue, and chikungunya, and metabolic diseases such as obesity and diabetes. Using genome sequencing of 320 individuals, the scientists have investigated how human populations have biologically adapted to the environments of the Pacific islands and how this has affected their current state of health. This study has also revealed hitherto unsuspected aspects of the history of human settlement in this region. This work is published in the April 14th, 2021 issue of Nature.
An international consortium of scientists organized by Etienne Patin (CNRS/Institut Pasteur) and Lluis Quintana-Murci (Collège de France/Institut Pasteur) was set up to characterize the genetic diversity of populations in the South Pacific, a region full of contrasts with its myriad islands that have been settled at very different time periods.
Indeed, shortly after humans left Africa, they settled Near Oceania (Papua-New-Guinea, the Bismarck Archipelago, and the Solomon Islands) approximately 45,000 years ago, while the rest of the Pacific, known as Remote Oceania (Vanuatu, the Wallis and Futuna Islands, Polynesia, etc.), remained uninhabited. It was only approximately 40,000 years later that Remote Oceania was peopled: it is currently accepted that a group of humans left Taiwan 5,000 years ago – a migration known as the ‘Austronesian expansion’ – passed through the Philippines, Indonesia, and the already-inhabited Near Oceanian islands to eventually settle Remote Oceania for the first time.
En route to these remote lands, the ancestors of South Pacific populations met with groups of archaic humans, with whom they interbred. While 2-3% of modern-day Oceanian populations’ genetic material is inherited from Neanderthals (which all populations outside Africa also possess), up to 3% of their genomes is also inherited from Denisovans (relatives of Neanderthals thought to have originated in Asia). It was already known that modern humans inherited beneficial mutations from Neanderthals via admixture, which improved their ability to adapt to their environment, including resistance to viral infections (Cell, 2016 ). In this study published today, scientists from the Human Evolutionary Genetics Unit (Institut Pasteur/CNRS ) in collaboration with various laboratories in France , Germany, Sweden, Switzerland, China, and Taiwan have sought to shed light on how ancient admixture helped Pacific populations to adapt to their specific island environments, including any pathogens encountered.
Historical events traced using genetics
Based on whole-genome-sequencing of over 320 individuals from Taiwan, the Philippines, the Bismarck Archipelago, the Solomon Islands, Santa Cruz Islands, and Vanuatu, this work published in the Nature journal has helped tracing the history of the human settlement of Oceania. First, the scientists have dated the settlement of the various islands of Near Oceania back to approximately 40,000 years, thus confirming archaeological records. They have also demonstrated that this initial settlement was followed by a period of genetic isolation between islands. “Our results confirm that humans were able to cross the seas to reach new lands from an early stage. However, they also suggest that these voyages were relatively infrequent at this distant period in history,” explains Etienne Patin, a CNRS scientist within the Human Evolutionary Genetics Unit at the Institut Pasteur. Moreover, the results of the study reveal a major reduction in the size of these populations just before the settlement.
Second, the study challenges the theory, known as the Out-of-Taiwan model, that a population left Taiwan approximately 5,000 years ago to rapidly settle Near and Remote Oceania. “Our analyses suggest that humans left Taiwan more than 5,000 years ago, and that admixture between the Austronesian incomers and the populations of Near Oceania started only 2,000 years later. The expansions from Taiwan therefore took some time, and may have involved a maturation phase in the Philippines or Indonesia,” comments Etienne Patin.
The heritage of Neanderthals and Denisovans in South Pacific populations
Through this work, it has been possible to estimate the proportions of Neanderthal and Denisovan material in the genomes of South Pacific populations. “We were surprised to note that, contrary to the Neanderthal heritage, which is very similar among the twenty populations studied (approximately 2.5%), the Denisovan legacy varies considerably between populations, from virtually 0% in Taiwan and the Philippines to up to 3.2% in Papua-New-Guinea and Vanuatu” comments Lluis Quintana-Murci, Professor at the Collège de France, holder of the Chair in Human Genomics and Evolution, and Head of the Human Evolutionary Genetics Unit (Institut Pasteur/CNRS).
But this was not the only surprise. The study confirms that Neanderthals provided modern human populations with beneficial mutations associated with numerous phenotypes: skin pigmentation, metabolism, neuronal development, etc. However, the most surprising finding is that admixture with Denisovans has almost exclusively brought beneficial mutations related to immune response regulation. This suggests that the Denisovan heritage has been a reservoir of advantageous mutations, which have improved the Pacific populations’ ability to survive local pathogens. Therefore, it appears that these populations have benefited from the advantages bestowed through admixture with both forms of archaic humans.
Furthermore, the study demonstrates that admixture with Denisovans did not occur at once, but over the course of at least four independent events. It shows that the Denisovans with whom the Pacific populations interbred were in fact highly diverse populations. This conclusion was impossible to deduce from the single genome of a Denisovan specimen found in Siberia: “One of the strengths of these analyses is that, by studying the 3% of archaic heritage present in the genomes of modern humans, one can ‘resurrect’ Denisovans’ genomes, and thus show that they presented high levels of genetic diversity,” comments Lluis Quintana-Murci.
Finally, besides the biological adaptation enabled by archaic admixture, the scientists have found that lipid metabolism, cholesterol in particular, was also a target of natural selection among Oceanian peoples. This insight will potentially improve our understanding of why recent changes in these populations’ lifestyle may be associated with metabolic disorders.
By taking an evolutionary genetics approach, it is possible to shed light on the history of populations’ biological adaptation to their environment, and provide the scientific community with valuable information on specific human traits. These large-scale genomic studies will eventually help us better understand the genetic causes of diseases affecting some regions of the globe, where medical research has hitherto been scarce.
PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES—A method for dating ostrich eggshells in a Middle Stone Age shell midden reveals a more intensely settled and older site than previously known. The stratified layers of shell middens formed from cast-off mussel and limpet shells and other artifacts can offer a window into early cultures. However, radiocarbon dating is accurate to only around 50,000 years. Elizabeth M. Niespolo and colleagues report* a method for dating ostrich eggshells in a Middle Stone Age shell midden and reveal an older site than previously known. The authors explored a method to precisely date older shell middens and thus allow comparisons among midden sites using debris from a common food source. The authors analyzed 17 eggshell samples from five strata of a midden at Ysterfontein 1, a collapsed rock shelter on the western coast of South Africa. Next, the authors measured the concentration of uranium and thorium, accounted for the secondary uptake of uranium upon burial, and estimated that the midden was formed 119,900- 113,100 years ago. Analysis of stable carbon, oxygen, and nitrogen isotopes within the eggshells offered insight into the paleoenvironment, indicating a cooling and drying climate. According to the authors, the accumulation rates of debris within the midden are more akin to those from the Later Stone Age, indicating that humans were intensively foraging marine resources.
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Ancient ostrich eggshells from Ysterfontein 1, a Middle Stone Age midden in South Africa. Shown are selected eggshells from the top layer of the midden dated by Uranium- Thorium (U-Th, or 230 Th/U) geochronology, with their outer surfaces facing up. Scale bar is 1 cm. Elizabeth M. Niespolo
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A. Thin section photomicrograph of a modern ostrich eggshell in cross section, and corresponding eggshell structures denoted by V (vertical layer), P (palisade or prismatic layer), and C (cone layer). Pores serving as oxygen pathways for incubating chicks are visible as open holes penetrating through the eggshell. B. Epoxy-mounted fragment of an ancient eggshell from Ysterfontein 1 in cross section, showing the same eggshell structures are well preserved in deep time. Analyses from laser ablation are evident along pitted lines and track concentrations of U and Th. A pore is apparent in the center of the mounted fragment. Scale bars are 1 mm. Elizabeth M. Niespolo
*”Early, intensive marine resource exploitation by Middle Stone Age humans at Ysterfontein 1 rockshelter, South Africa,” by Elizabeth M. Niespolo, Warren D. Sharp, Graham Avery, and Todd E. Dawson
WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY IN ST. LOUIS—Whatever ultimately caused inhabitants to abandon Cahokia, it was not because they cut down too many trees, according to new research from Washington University in St. Louis.
Archaeologists from Arts & Sciences excavated around earthen mounds and analyzed sediment cores to test a persistent theory about the collapse of Cahokia, the pre-Columbian Native American city in southwestern Illinois that was once home to more than 15,000 people.
No one knows for sure why people left Cahokia, though many environmental and social explanations have been proposed. One oft-repeated theory is tied to resource exploitation: specifically, that Native Americans from densely populated Cahokia deforested the area, an environmental misstep that could have resulted in erosion and localized flooding.
But such musings about self-inflicted disaster are outdated—and they’re not supported by physical evidence of flooding issues, Washington University scientists said.
“There’s a really common narrative about land use practices that lead to erosion and sedimentation and contribute to all of these environmental consequences,” said Caitlin Rankin, an assistant research scientist at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign who conducted this work as part of her graduate studies at Washington University.
“When we actually revisit this, we’re not seeing evidence of the flooding,” Rankin said.
“The notion of looming ecocide is embedded in a lot of thinking about current and future environmental trajectories,” said Tristram R. “T.R.” Kidder, the Edward S. and Tedi Macias Professor of Anthropology in Arts & Sciences at Washington University. “With a growing population and more mouths to feed, overconsumption of all resources is a real risk.
“Inevitably, people turn to the past for models of what has happened. If we are to understand what caused changes at sites like Cahokia, and if we are to use these as models for understanding current possibilities, we need to do the hard slogging that critically evaluates different ideas,” added Kidder, who leads an ongoing archaeological research program at the Cahokia Mounds State Historic Site. “Such work allows us to sift through possibilities so we can aim for those variables that do help us to explain what happened in the past—and explore if this has a lesson to tell us about the future.”
No indications of self-inflicted harm
Writing in the journal Geoarchaeology, Rankin and colleagues at Bryn Mawr University and Northern Illinois University described their recent excavations around a Mississippian Period (AD 1050-1400) earthen mound in the Cahokia Creek floodplain.
Their new archaeological work, completed while Rankin was at Washington University, shows that the ground surface on which the mound was constructed remained stable until industrial development.
The presence of a stable ground surface from Mississippian occupation to the mid-1800s does not support the expectations of the so-called “wood-overuse” hypothesis, the researchers said.
This hypothesis, first proposed in 1993, suggests that tree clearance in the uplands surrounding Cahokia led to erosion, causing increasingly frequent and unpredictable floods of the local creek drainages in the floodplain where Cahokia was constructed.
Rankin noted that archaeologists have broadly applied narratives of ecocide—the idea that societies fail because people overuse or irrevocably damage the natural resources that their people rely on—to help to explain the collapse of past civilizations around the world.
Although many researchers have moved beyond classic narratives of ecocide made popular in the 1990s and early 2000s, Cahokia is one such major archaeological site where untested hypotheses have persisted.
“We need to be careful about the assumptions that we build into these narratives,” Rankin said.
“In this case, there was evidence of heavy wood use,” she said. “But that doesn’t factor in the fact that people can reuse materials—much as you might recycle. We should not automatically assume that deforestation was happening, or that deforestation caused this event.”
Kidder said: “This research demonstrates conclusively that the over-exploitation hypothesis simply isn’t tenable. This conclusion is important because the hypothesis at Cahokia—and elsewhere—is sensible on its face. The people who constructed this remarkable site had an effect on their environment. We know they cut down tens of thousands of trees to make the palisades—and this isn’t a wild estimate, because we can count the number of trees used to build and re-build this feature. Wood depletion could have been an issue.”
“The hypothesis came to be accepted as truth without any testing,” Kidder said. “Caitlin’s study is important because she did the hard work—and I do mean hard, and I do mean work—to test the hypothesis, and in doing so has falsified the claim. I’d argue that this is the exciting part; it’s basic and fundamental science. By eliminating this possibility, it moves us toward other explanations and requires we pursue other avenues of research.”
Archaeologists at Washington University in St. Louis found scant evidence that ‘wood overuse’ at Cahokia caused local flooding and subsequent collapse. Joe Angeles / Washington University
American Association for the Advancement of Science—Modern human-like brains evolved comparatively late in the genus Homo and long after the earliest humans first dispersed from Africa, according to a new study. By analyzing the impressions left behind by the ancient brains that once sat inside now fossilized skulls, the authors discovered that the brains of the earliest Homo retained a primitive, great ape-like organization of the frontal lobe. The findings challenge the long-standing assumption that human-like brain organization is a hallmark of early Homo and suggest that the evolutionary history of the human brain is more complex than previously thought. Our modern brains are larger and structurally different than those of our closest living relatives, the great apes, particularly in frontal lobe areas involved with complex cognitive tasks like toolmaking and language. However, when these key differences arose during human evolution remains poorly understood. One of the major challenges in tracking brain evolution in early hominid species is that brain tissues rarely fossilize. As a result, much of what is known is derived from shape and structures on the surface of the brain cases of rare, fossilized skulls. Representations of these surfaces – or endocasts – can reveal patterned imprints representing the folds and indentations of the brain and its surrounding vasculature. Using a collection of well-preserved fossil Homo crania from the Dmanisi site in the modern-day nation of Georgia and a comparative sample of others from Africa and Southeast Asia, Marcia Ponce De León and colleagues tracked key changes in brain organization of early Homo from roughly 1.8 million years ago (Ma). They found that the structural innovations in the cerebral regions thought to allow for many of humans’ unique behaviors and abilities emerged later in the evolution of Homo. According to Ponce De León et al., the findings suggest that modern human-like brain reorganization – which was probably in place by 1.7-1.5 Ma – was neither a requisite trait for genus Homo, nor a prerequisite for early Homo’s dispersals into Europe and Asia. In a related Perspective, Amélie Beaudet discusses the study in greater detail.
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Skull of early Homo from Dmanisi (specimen D4500) showing internal structure of the brain case, and inferred brain morphology. M. Ponce de León and Ch. Zollikofer, University of Zurich
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Skulls of early Homo from Dmanisi, Georgia (specimen D4500, left) and Sangiran, Indonesia (specimen S17, right). Virtual fillings of their braincases permit inferences on brain organization (blue). Brains of Homo evolved from ape-like (D4500) to human-like (S17) in the time between 1.7 – 1.5 million years ago. M. Ponce de León and Ch. Zollikofer, University of Zurich
MAX PLANCK INSTITUTE FOR THE SCIENCE OF HUMAN HISTORY—Ancient DNA from Neanderthals and early modern humans has recently shown that the groups likely interbred somewhere in the Near East after modern humans left Africa some 50,000 years ago. As a result, all people outside Africa carry around 2% to 3% Neanderthal DNA. In modern human genomes, those Neanderthal DNA segments became increasingly shorter over time and their length can be used to estimate when an individual lived. Archaeological data published last year furthermore suggests that modern humans were already present in southeastern Europe 47-43,000 years ago, but due to a scarcity of fairly complete human fossils and the lack of genomic DNA, there is little understanding of who these early human colonists were – or of their relationships to ancient and present-day human groups.
In a new study published in Nature Ecology & Evolution, an international team of researchers reports what is likely the oldest reconstructed modern human genome to date. First discovered in Czechia, the woman known to researchers as Zlatý k (golden horse in Czech) displayed longer stretches of Neanderthal DNA than the 45,000-year-old Ust’-Ishim individual from Siberia, the so-far oldest modern human genome. Analysis suggests that she was part of a population that formed before the populations that gave rise to present-day Europeans and Asians split apart.
A recent anthropological study based on the shape of Zlatý’s skull showed similarities with people who lived in Europe before the Last Glacial Maximum – at least 30,000 years ago – but radiocarbon dating produced sporadic results, some as recent as 15,000 years ago. It wasn’t until Jaroslav Brek from the Faculty of Science, Prague and Petr Velemínský of Prague’s National Museum collaborated with the genetics laboratories of the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History that a clearer picture came into view.
“We found evidence of cow DNA contamination in the analyzed bone, which suggests that a bovine-based glue used in the past to consolidate the skull was returning radiocarbon dates younger than the fossil’s true age,” says Cosimo Posth, co-lead author of the study. Posth was formerly a research group leader at the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History and is currently Professor of Archaeo- and Palaeogenetics at the University of Tübingen.
However, it was the Neanderthal DNA that led the team to their major conclusions about the age of the fossil. Zlatý k carried about the same amount Neanderthal DNA in her genome, as Ust Ishim or other modern humans outside Africa, but the segments with Neanderthal ancestry were on average much longer.
“The results of our DNA analysis show that Zlatý k lived closer in time to the admixture event with Neanderthals,” says Kay Prüfer, co-lead author of the study.
The scientists were able to estimate that Zlatý k lived approximately 2,000 years after the last admixture. Based on these findings, the team argues that Zlatý k represents the oldest human genome to date, roughly the same age as – if not a few hundred years older than – Ust’-Ishim.
“It is quite intriguing that the earliest modern humans in Europe ultimately didn’t succeed! Just as with Ust’-Ishim and the so far oldest European skull from Oase 1, Zlatý k shows no genetic continuity with modern humans that lived in Europe after 40,000 years ago,” says Johannes Krause, senior author of the study and director at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology.
One possible explanation for the discontinuity is the Campanian Ignimbrite volcanic eruption roughly 39,000 years ago, which severely affected climate in the northern hemisphere and may have reduced the survival chances of Neanderthals and early modern humans in large parts of Ice Age Europe.
As advances in ancient DNA reveal more about the story of our species, future genetic studies of other early European individuals will help to reconstruct the history and decline of the first modern humans to expand out of Africa and into Eurasia before the formation of modern-day non-African populations.
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Initial attempts to date Zlatý based on the shape of her skull suggested she was at least 30,000 years old. Researchers now believe she lived more than 45,000 years ago. Martin Frouz
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Lateral view of the mostly-complete skull of Zlatý k. Martin Frouz
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Micro-sampling the petrous bone of Zlatý from the base of the skull in the clean room at the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Jena. Cosimo Posth
TEL-AVIV UNIVERSITY—Researchers at Tel Aviv University were able to reconstruct the nutrition of stone age humans. In a paper published in the Yearbook of the American Physical Anthropology Association, Dr. Miki Ben-Dor and Prof. Ran Barkai of the Jacob M. Alkov Department of Archaeology at Tel Aviv University, together with Raphael Sirtoli of Portugal, show that humans were an apex predator for about two million years. Only the extinction of larger animals (megafauna) in various parts of the world, and the decline of animal food sources toward the end of the stone age, led humans to gradually increase the vegetable element in their nutrition, until finally they had no choice but to domesticate both plants and animals – and became farmers.
“So far, attempts to reconstruct the diet of stone-age humans were mostly based on comparisons to 20th century hunter-gatherer societies,” explains Dr. Ben-Dor. “This comparison is futile, however, because two million years ago hunter-gatherer societies could hunt and consume elephants and other large animals – while today’s hunter gatherers do not have access to such bounty. The entire ecosystem has changed, and conditions cannot be compared. We decided to use other methods to reconstruct the diet of stone-age humans: to examine the memory preserved in our own bodies, our metabolism, genetics and physical build. Human behavior changes rapidly, but evolution is slow. The body remembers.”
In a process unprecedented in its extent, Dr. Ben-Dor and his colleagues collected about 25 lines of evidence from about 400 scientific papers from different scientific disciplines, dealing with the focal question: Were stone-age humans specialized carnivores or were they generalist omnivores? Most evidence was found in research on current biology, namely genetics, metabolism, physiology and morphology.
“One prominent example is the acidity of the human stomach,” says Dr. Ben-Dor. “The acidity in our stomach is high when compared to omnivores and even to other predators. Producing and maintaining strong acidity require large amounts of energy, and its existence is evidence for consuming animal products. Strong acidity provides protection from harmful bacteria found in meat, and prehistoric humans, hunting large animals whose meat sufficed for days or even weeks, often consumed old meat containing large quantities of bacteria, and thus needed to maintain a high level of acidity. Another indication of being predators is the structure of the fat cells in our bodies. In the bodies of omnivores, fat is stored in a relatively small number of large fat cells, while in predators, including humans, it’s the other way around: we have a much larger number of smaller fat cells. Significant evidence for the evolution of humans as predators has also been found in our genome. For example, geneticists have concluded that “areas of the human genome were closed off to enable a fat-rich diet, while in chimpanzees, areas of the genome were opened to enable a sugar-rich diet.”
Evidence from human biology was supplemented by archaeological evidence. For instance, research on stable isotopes in the bones of prehistoric humans, as well as hunting practices unique to humans, show that humans specialized in hunting large and medium-sized animals with high fat content. Comparing humans to large social predators of today, all of whom hunt large animals and obtain more than 70% of their energy from animal sources, reinforced the conclusion that humans specialized in hunting large animals and were in fact hypercarnivores.
“Hunting large animals is not an afternoon hobby,” says Dr. Ben-Dor. “It requires a great deal of knowledge, and lions and hyenas attain these abilities after long years of learning. Clearly, the remains of large animals found in countless archaeological sites are the result of humans’ high expertise as hunters of large animals. Many researchers who study the extinction of the large animals agree that hunting by humans played a major role in this extinction – and there is no better proof of humans’ specialization in hunting large animals. Most probably, like in current-day predators, hunting itself was a focal human activity throughout most of human evolution. Other archaeological evidence – like the fact that specialized tools for obtaining and processing vegetable foods only appeared in the later stages of human evolution – also supports the centrality of large animals in the human diet, throughout most of human history.”
The multidisciplinary reconstruction conducted by TAU researchers for almost a decade proposes a complete change of paradigm in the understanding of human evolution. Contrary to the widespread hypothesis that humans owe their evolution and survival to their dietary flexibility, which allowed them to combine the hunting of animals with vegetable foods, the picture emerging here is of humans evolving mostly as predators of large animals.
“Archaeological evidence does not overlook the fact that stone-age humans also consumed plants,” adds Dr. Ben-Dor. “But according to the findings of this study plants only became a major component of the human diet toward the end of the era.”
Evidence of genetic changes and the appearance of unique stone tools for processing plants led the researchers to conclude that, starting about 85,000 years ago in Africa, and about 40,000 years ago in Europe and Asia, a gradual rise occurred in the consumption of plant foods as well as dietary diversity – in accordance with varying ecological conditions. This rise was accompanied by an increase in the local uniqueness of the stone tool culture, which is similar to the diversity of material cultures in 20th-century hunter-gatherer societies. In contrast, during the two million years when, according to the researchers, humans were apex predators, long periods of similarity and continuity were observed in stone tools, regardless of local ecological conditions.
“Our study addresses a very great current controversy – both scientific and non-scientific,” says Prof. Barkai. “For many people today, the Paleolithic diet is a critical issue, not only with regard to the past, but also concerning the present and future. It is hard to convince a devout vegetarian that his/her ancestors were not vegetarians, and people tend to confuse personal beliefs with scientific reality. Our study is both multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary. We propose a picture that is unprecedented in its inclusiveness and breadth, which clearly shows that humans were initially apex predators, who specialized in hunting large animals. As Darwin discovered, the adaptation of species to obtaining and digesting their food is the main source of evolutionary changes, and thus the claim that humans were apex predators throughout most of their development may provide a broad basis for fundamental insights on the biological and cultural evolution of humans.”
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Human Brain. Dr. Miki Ben Dor
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The evolution of the HTL during the Pleistocene as we interpret it, based on the totality of the evidence. Dr. Miki Ben Dor
UNIVERSITY OF INNSBRUCK—”Our findings from this rockshelter show that overly simplified models for the origins of our species are no longer acceptable. Evidence suggests many regions across the African continent were involved, the Kalahari being just one,” Dr Wilkins said.
“Archaeological evidence for early Homo sapiens has been largely discovered at coastal sites in South Africa, supporting the idea that our origins were linked to coastal environments. There have been very few well-preserved, datable archaeological sites in the interior of southern Africa that can tell us about Homo sapiens’ origins away from the coast.
“A rockshelter on Ga-Mohana Hill that stands above an expansive savannah in the Kalahari is one such site.”
Used as a place of spiritual activities today by some of the local community, archaeological research in the rockshelter has revealed a long history as a place of spiritual significance.
The researchers excavated 22 white calcite crystals and fragments of ostrich eggshell, thought to be used as water containers, from deposits dated to 105,000 years ago at Ga-Mohana Hill North Rockshelter when the environment was much wetter than today. The researchers were delighted to discover that the assemblage of human-collected crystals and ostrich eggshell fragments at Ga-Mohana Hill were significantly older than that reported in interior environments elsewhere.
“Our analysis indicates that the crystals were not introduced into the deposits via natural processes, but were deliberately collected objects likely linked to spiritual beliefs and ritual,” Dr Wilkins said.
“The crystals point towards spiritual or cultural use of the shelter 105,000 years ago,” said Dr Sechaba Maape from the University of the Witwatersrand. “This is remarkable considering that site continues to be used to practice ritual activities today.”
The age of the archaeological layers was constrained via Optically Stimulated Luminescence (OSL) dating in the OSL laboratory at the Department of Geology at the University Innsbruck, Austria.
“This technique measures natural light signals that accumulate over time in sedimentary quartz and feldspar grains,” said Dr Michael Meyer, head of the OSL Laboratory. “You can think about each grain as a miniaturized clock, from which we can read out this natural light or luminescence signal, giving us the age of the archaeological sediment layers.”
The name Kalahari is derived from the Tswana word Kgala, meaning ‘great thirst’. And today the climate at Ga-Mohana is semi-arid, with little, very seasonal rainfall. However, ancient proof of abundant water on the landscape is evident from the abundant tufa formations around the shelter. These were aged using the uranium-thorium dating method to between 110,000 and 100,000 years ago – exactly the same time period as the people who were living there.
“This is a story of water in what we know now as a dry landscape, and of adaptable people who exploited the landscape to not only survive but to thrive,” says Dr Robyn Pickering, who is director of the Human Evolution Research Institute (HERI) at the University of Cape Town.
Due to the ongoing spiritual significance of Ga-Mohana Hill, the researchers are conscious to minimize their impact on the local communities’ use of the rockshelter after each season.
“Leaving no visible trace and working with the local community is critical for the sustainability of the project,” Dr Wilkins said. “So that Ga-Mohana Hill can continue to provide new insights about the origins and evolution of Homo sapiens in the Kalahari.”
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The archaeological site at a rock shelter in South Africa’s Kalahari Desert: More than 100,000 years ago, people used the so-called Ga-Mohana Hill North Rockshelter for spiritual activities. Jayne Wilkins
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The Kalahari Desert is a large semi-arid sandy savannah in Southern Africa extending for 900,000 square kilometres (350,000 sq mi), covering much of Botswana, and parts of Namibia and South Africa.Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain
MAX PLANCK INSTITUTE FOR THE SCIENCE OF HUMAN HISTORY—Because of their interactions and conflicts with the major contemporaneous civilizations of Eurasia, the Scythians enjoy a legendary status in historiography and popular culture. The Scythians had major influences on the cultures of their powerful neighbors, spreading new technologies such as saddles and other improvements for horse riding. The ancient Greek, Roman, Persian and Chinese empires all left a multitude of sources describing, from their perspectives, the customs and practices of the feared horse warriors that came from the interior lands of Eurasia.
Still, despite evidence from external sources, little is known about Scythian history. Without a written language or direct sources, the language or languages they spoke, where they came from and the extent to which the various cultures spread across such a huge area were in fact related to one another, remain unclear.
The Iron Age transition and the formation of the genetic profile of the Scythians
A new study published in Science Advances by an international team of geneticists, anthropologists and archaeologists lead by scientists from the Archaeogenetics Department of the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History in Jena, Germany, helps illuminate the history of the Scythians with 111 ancient genomes from key Scythian and non-Scythian archaeological cultures of the Central Asian steppe. The results of this study reveal that substantial genetic turnovers were associated with the decline of the long-lasting Bronze Age sedentary groups and the rise of Scythian nomad cultures in the Iron Age. Their findings show that, following the relatively homogenous ancestry of the late Bronze Age herders, at the turn of the first millennium BCE, influxes from the east, west and south into the steppe formed new admixed gene pools.
The diverse peoples of the Central Asian Steppe
The study goes even further, identifying at least two main sources of origin for the nomadic Iron Age groups. An eastern source likely originated from populations in the Altai Mountains that, during the course of the Iron Age, spread west and south, admixing as they moved. These genetic results match with the timing and locations found in the archaeological record and suggest an expansion of populations from the Altai area, where the earliest Scythian burials are found, connecting different renowned cultures such as the Saka, the Tasmola and the Pazyryk found in southern, central and eastern Kazakhstan respectively. Surprisingly, the groups located in the western Ural Mountains descend from a second separate, but simultaneous source. Contrary to the eastern case, this western gene pool, characteristic of the early Sauromatian-Sarmatian cultures, remained largely consistent through the westward spread of the Sarmatian cultures from the Urals into the Pontic-Caspian steppe.
The decline of the Scythian cultures associated with new genetic turnovers
The study also covers the transition period after the Iron Age, revealing new genetic turnovers and admixture events. These events intensified at the turn of the first millennium CE, concurrent with the decline and then disappearance of the Scythian cultures in the Central Steppe. In this case, the new far eastern Eurasian influx is plausibly associated with the spread of the nomad empires of the Eastern steppe in the first centuries CE, such as the Xiongnu and Xianbei confederations, as well as minor influxes from Iranian sources likely linked to the expansion of Persian-related civilization from the south.
Although many of the open questions on the history of the Scythians cannot be solved by ancient DNA alone, this study demonstrates how much the populations of Eurasia have changed and intermixed through time. Future studies should continue to explore the dynamics of these trans-Eurasian connections by covering different periods and geographic regions, revealing the history of connections between west, central and east Eurasia in the remote past and their genetic legacy in present day Eurasian populations.
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Mound 4 of the Eleke Sazy necropolis in eastern Kazakhstan. Zainolla Samashev
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The burial of a social elite known as ‘Golden Man’ from the Eleke Sazy necropolis. Zainolla Samashev
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An aerial view of Hun-Xianbi culture burials. Both horses and warriors can be identified. Zainolla Samashev
UNIVERSITY OF KENT—A new study from the University of Kent’s School of Anthropology and Conservation has found that Oldowan and Acheulean stone tool technologies are likely to be tens of thousands of years older than current evidence suggests.
They are currently the two oldest, well-documented stone tool technologies known to archaeologists.
These findings, published by the Journal of Human Evolution, provide a new chronological foundation from which to understand the production of stone tool technologies by our early ancestors. They also widen the time frame within which to discuss the evolution of human technological capabilities and associated dietary and behavioral shifts.
For the study, a team led by Kent’s Dr Alastair Key and Dr David Roberts, alongside Dr Ivan Jaric from the Biology Centre of the Czech Academy of Sciences, used statistical modeling techniques only recently introduced to archaeological science. The models estimated that Oldowan stone tools originated 2.617-2.644 million years ago, 36,000 to 63,000 years earlier than current evidence. The Acheulean’s origin was pushed back further by at least 55,000 years to 1.815-1.823 million years ago.
Early stone tool technologies, such as the Oldowan and Acheulean, allowed early human ancestors to access new food types, and increased the ease of producing wooden tools or processing animal carcasses.
Dr Key, a Palaeolithic Archaeologist and the lead author of the study, said: ‘Our research provides the best possible estimates for understanding when hominins first produced these stone tool types. This is important for multiple reasons, but for me at least, it is most exciting because it highlights that there are likely to be substantial portions of the artifact record waiting to be discovered.’
Dr Roberts, a conservation scientist and co-author of the study, said: ‘The optimal linear estimation (OLE) modeling technique was originally developed by myself and a colleague to date extinctions. It has proved to be a reliable method of inferring the timing of species extinction and is based on the timings of last sightings, and so to apply it to the first sightings of archaeological artifacts was another exciting breakthrough. It is our hope that the technique will be used more widely within archaeology.’
Although it is widely assumed that older stone tool sites do exist and are waiting to be discovered, this study provides the first quantitative data predicting just how old these yet-to-be-discovered sites may be.
The research paper ‘Statistical inference of earlier origins for the first flaked stone technologies’ is published by the Journal of Human Evolution. doi: 10.1016/j.jhevol.2021.102976
FIELD MUSEUM—Every society has some degree of wealth inequality–over history, across continents, there always seem to be some people who have more than others. But the amount of inequality differs–in some civilizations, a few powerful people have nearly all the wealth, whereas in others, it’s more spread out. In a new study in PLOS ONE, archaeologists examined the remains of houses in ancient Maya cities and compared them with other Mesoamerican societies; they found that the societies with the most wealth inequality were also the ones that had governments that concentrated power with a smaller number of people.
“Differences in house size are a reflection of wealth inequality,” says Amy Thompson, a postdoctoral researcher at Chicago’s Field Museum and corresponding author of the PLOS ONE study. “By looking at how house size varies within different neighborhoods within ancient cities, we can learn about wealth inequality in Classic Maya cities.”
There are millions of Maya people alive today, but the period that archaeologists refer to as the Classic Maya civilization dates to 250-900 CE. Classic Maya society stretched across what’s now eastern Mexico, the Yucatan Peninsula, Guatemala, Belize, and western El Salvador and Honduras, and it was composed of a network of independent cities. “Rather than being like the United States today where we have one central government overseeing all the states, Classic Maya civilization was a series of cities that each had its own independent ruler,” says Thompson.
Across Mesoamerica, these political systems varied–some shared power more collectively, while others were more autocratic and concentrated power in a smaller group of individuals. Archaeologists use a variety of clues to infer how autocratic a state was. “We look at the way they represented their leadership. In burials, are certain individuals treated completely differently from everyone else, or are the differences more muted?” says Keith Prufer, an author of the study from the University of New Mexico. “Another key is to look at palaces. When you have very centralized palace buildings or funerary temples dedicated to a ruling lineage , the government tends to be more autocratic. In societies that were less autocratic, it’s harder to determine where rulers lived or even who they were.”
In this study, the researchers wanted to know how the governmental structure affected the distribution of wealth among the people. They note that in more autocratic societies wealth inequality is pronounced between different social groups, and also between people living in the same neighborhoods who were previously assumed by archaeologists to be economic equals. Much of this inequality is linked to access to market goods or trade networks. To learn about how wealth was dispersed across the community, they analyzed the remains of ancient houses.
Factors like house size don’t give an absolute picture of wealth–for instance, a one-bedroom apartment off Central Park might be worth more than a two-bedroom in Queens, or a whole house in rural Kansas. “Everything is looked at in a relative sense,” says Gary Feinman, the Field Museum’s MacArthur curator of anthropology and a co-author of the paper. “We’re comparing houses within a neighborhood to each other, and it still reveals a pattern. It would be like if you compared all the houses in Kansas, some might be bigger than the houses in Manhattan, but that relative pattern of wealth distribution in Kansas, as compared to Manhattan, would still tell you something about wealth differentials in both areas.”
To study Maya houses, the researchers looked at a number of variables beyond just size. “Using household archaeology, we can get at the interactions and relationships between the people,” says Thompson. “We document where these houses are on the landscape, how big they are, where they’re located in relationship to each other, and which resources–like water and good agricultural land–are nearby.” For further clues about the distribution of wealth, the researchers also excavated houses to learn about the types of ceramics and stone tools that the people used.
The researchers found that patterns of wealth inequality were fairly consistent in different neighborhoods within two Classic Maya cities in southern Belize–even if one neighborhood was richer overall than another. Nevertheless, at both sites distinctions in wealth were most magnified in neighborhoods with access to exchange routes. “People have known for decades, if not centuries, that the Classic Maya were unequal,” says Prufer. “But the real thing we can add is that this inequality trickled down, even to neighborhoods. That hasn’t really been well documented before.”
The link between wealth inequality and autocracy isn’t exclusive to the Classic Maya, the researchers note. “We’re really trying to get at some of these very real issues of how inequality forms, how it’s perpetuated, and how it manifests in early cities,” says Prufer. “One of the larger goals within archaeology is to try to show that modern societies and ancient societies are, in their fundamental elements, not that much different from each other. There’s a lot of similarities that reflect human behavior and human ingenuity and also manifestations of human inequality and cruelty on different levels. This comes through from these types of studies, and we feel really good to be able to contribute our work to these broader discussions of social inequality, which are so, so important today.”
And while inequality has plagued humanity for millennia, Feinman says that we’re not doomed as a species. “There’s a tight interconnection between how power is funded and how power is wielded and monopolized,” he says. “People can and do establish institutions that try to check power, but it takes work, and it takes interpersonal interdependence and the recognition that we cooperate with communities of people beyond just one’s self and one’s family.”
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Local community members sharing archaeological finds during excavations at a Classic Maya house mound at Uxbenká. KM Prufer
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Uxbenká Archaeological Project member and lead author AE Thompson photographing an excavation of a Classic Maya house mound. KM Prufer
UNIVERSITY OF ADELAIDE—An international group of researchers led by the University of Adelaide has conducted a comprehensive genetic analysis and found no evidence of interbreeding between modern humans and the ancient humans known from fossil records in Island Southeast Asia. They did find further DNA evidence of our mysterious ancient cousins, the Denisovans, which could mean there are major discoveries to come in the region.
In the study published in Nature Ecology and Evolution, the researchers examined the genomes of more than 400 modern humans to investigate the interbreeding events between ancient humans and modern human populations who arrived at Island Southeast Asia 50,000-60,000 years ago.
In particular, they focused on detecting signatures that suggest interbreeding from deeply divergent species known from the fossil record of the area.
The region contains one of the richest fossil records (from at least 1.6 million years) documenting human evolution in the world. Currently there are three distinct ancient humans recognized from the fossil record in the area: Homo erectus, Homo floresiensis (known as Flores Island hobbits) and Homo luzonensis.
These species are known to have survived until approximately 50,000-60,000 years ago in the cases of Homo floresiensis and Homo luzonensis, and approximately 108,000 years for Homo erectus, which means they may have overlapped with the arrival of modern human populations.
The results of the study showed no evidence of interbreeding. Nevertheless, the team were able to confirm previous results showing high levels of Denisovan ancestry in the region.
Lead author and ARC Research Associate from the University of Adelaide Dr João Teixeira, said: “In contrast to our other cousins the Neanderthals, which have an extensive fossil record in Europe, the Denisovans are known almost solely from the DNA record. The only physical evidence of Denisovan existence has been a finger bone and some other fragments found in a cave in Siberia and, more recently, a piece of jaw found in the Tibetan Plateau.”
“We know from our own genetic records that the Denisovans mixed with modern humans who came out of Africa 50,000-60,000 years ago both in Asia, and as the modern humans moved through Island Southeast Asia on their way to Australia.
“The levels of Denisovan DNA in contemporary populations indicates that significant interbreeding happened in Island Southeast Asia.
“The mystery then remains, why haven’t we found their fossils alongside the other ancient humans in the region? Do we need to re-examine the existing fossil record to consider other possibilities?”
Co-author Chris Stringer of the Natural History Museum in London added:
“While the known fossils of Homo erectus, Homo floresiensis and Homo luzonensis might seem to be in the right place and time to represent the mysterious ‘southern Denisovans’, their ancestors were likely to have been in Island Southeast Asia at least 700,000 years ago. Meaning their lineages are too ancient to represent the Denisovans who, from their DNA, were more closely related to the Neanderthals and modern humans.”
Co-author Prof Kris Helgen, Chief Scientist and Director of the Australian Museum Research Institute, said: “These analyses provide an important window into human evolution in a fascinating region, and demonstrate the need for more archaeological research in the region between mainland Asia and Australia.”
Helgen added: “This research also illuminates a pattern of ‘megafaunal’ survival which coincides with known areas of pre-modern human occupation in this part of the world. Large animals that survive today in the region include the Komodo Dragon, the Babirusa (a pig with remarkable upturned tusks), and the Tamaraw and Anoas (small wild buffalos).
“This hints that long-term exposure to hunting pressure by ancient humans might have facilitated the survival of the megafaunal species in subsequent contacts with modern humans. Areas without documented pre-modern human occurrence, like Australia and New Guinea, saw complete extinction of land animals larger than humans over the past 50,000 years.”
Dr Teixeira said: “The research corroborates previous studies that the Denisovans were in Island Southeast Asia, and that modern humans did not interbreed with more divergent human groups in the region. This opens two equally exciting possibilities: either a major discovery is on the way, or we need to re-evaluate the current fossil record of Island Southeast Asia.”
“Whichever way you choose to look at it, exciting times lie ahead in palaeoanthropology.”
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Replica of the Sangiran 17 Homo erectus cranium from Java. Photo supplied by the Trustees of the Natural History Museum.
Compelling stories dramatize and humanize major events and characters in the history of Ephesus, the ruins of which are a popular destination for tourists in present-day Turkey.Historium Press, 2023.Available from Amazon and other online booksellers.
WHO WERE THE AEGEANS? The exciting new podcast series exploring the mysteries of the ancient Aegeans, the Bronze Age people who inspired Homer's epic stories of the Iliad and the Odyssey.
Q: What is your background experience as it relates to the study and decipherment of Linear A? What inspired you to focus on research related to this?
Dan McLerran is a writer, journalist, and the founder and editor of Popular Archaeology Magazine, an online venue specializing in disseminating stories related to archaeological and anthropological discoveries worldwide to a global public readership. He previously created and published Archaeological Digs, a weblog highlighting archaeological excavation opportunities across the world. He is the author of numerous articles on a variety of archaeological developments and discoveries. As a writer, artist, and publisher, he has a passion for all things archaeological. Pictured left, he walks near the graves of members of the ancient Qumran community, adjacent to the caves where the Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered. 
Moses (pictured left) Shapira’s journey to this tragic end actually began almost six years earlier, when he owned and managed what was considered to be “the best tourist shop in Jerusalem’s Old City” on Christian Street, not far from the historic Jaffa Gate. There, he sold books and a variety of other souvenir items popular to tourists. But his most passionate occupation was that of antiquities dealer, servicing, among other things, as a correspondent to the British Museum. Ancient manuscripts were his specialty, and over the years he had developed a body of knowledge and contacts that positioned him to be ‘in the right place at the right time’ when ancient artifacts and historic and ancient documents found their way into his sphere. His travels in the desert and elsewhere afforded him the opportunity to amass a significant collection of Arabic and Hebrew manuscripts, some of which he sold to the Royal Museum at Berlin, as well as to the British Museum. But none of his collections could possibly shine a light to what came his way in 1878, when Bedouins had discovered, in a cave high above the Wadi Mujib east of the Dead Sea, a bundle wrapped in linen. The bundle contained sixteen blackened leather strips, ranging from 3 to 4 inches in width, with varying lengths. The backside of the strips was coated with an asphalt/bitumin resin. But on the front side of the darkened strips, to Shapira’s astonishment, were barely legible written characters. Shapira knew enough to recognize it as a form of 
Kara Cooney’s latest book, The Good Kings: Absolute Power in Ancient Egypt and the Modern World, will be released November 2, 2021. Interested readers may purchase the book by pre-order 
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