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PLOS—A single accessory – an ornate necklace from a child’s grave in ancient Jordan – provides new insights into social complexity of Neolithic culture, according to a study published August 2, 2023 in the open-access journal PLOS ONE by Hala Alarashi of the Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, Spain, and the Université Côte d’Azur, France and colleagues.

Body adornments are powerful symbols that communicate cultural values and personal identities, and they are therefore highly valuable in the study of ancient cultures. In this study, Alarashi and colleagues analyze materials that adorned the body of an eight-year-old child buried in a grave at the Neolithic village of Ba’ja in Jordan, dating to between 7400 and 6800 BCE.

The materials in question comprise over 2,500 colorful stone and shell, two exceptional amber beads – the oldest known thus far in the Levant – along with a large stone pendant and a delicately engraved mother-of-pearl ring. Analyzing the composition, craftsmanship, and spatial layout of these items, the authors conclude that they belonged to a single composite multi-row necklace that had since fallen apart. As part of this study, the researchers created a physical reconstruction of the original necklace, which is now on display in the Petra Museum in Southern Jordan.

The multi-row necklace is one of the oldest and most impressive Neolithic ornaments, providing new insights into funerary practices at the time for individuals of apparently high social status. The making of the necklace appears to have involved meticulous work, as well as the import of certain exotic materials from other regions. The study of this necklace reveals complex social dynamics between community members at Ba’ja – including artisans, traders, and high-status authorities who would commission such pieces – which certainly merit further investigation of this Neolithic culture.

The authors add: “Adorning the deceased child, bridging the worlds of life and death: The discovery and reconstruction of an extraordinary necklace from the 9000-year-old village of Ba’ja (Jordan).”

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Final physical reconstruction of the necklace, today exposed at the new museum of Petra in Jordan. Alarashi et al., 2023, PLOS ONE, CC-BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)

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 Article Source: PLoS ONE news release.

*Alarashi H, Benz M, Gresky J, Burkhardt A, Fischer A, Gourichon L, et al. (2023) Threads of memory: Reviving the ornament of a dead child at the Neolithic village of Ba`ja (Jordan). PLoS ONE 18(8): e0288075. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0288075

Funding: ArchaeologyHub.CSIC 2022 Internal Research Grant (HA) https://archaeologyhub.csic.es/. H2020 Marie Sklodowska-Curie Actions, grant number 846097 (HA) https://cordis.europa.eu/project/id/846097. German Research Foundation (BO 1599/14-1; BO 1599/16-1) (MB, HGG) https://www.dfg.de/en/. Franz-and Eva Rutzen Stiftung Foundation (MB) https://www.deutsches-stiftungszentrum.de/stiftungen/franz-und-eva-rutzen-stiftung. Junta de Andalucía (Consejería de Economía, Conocimiento, Empresas y Universidad), under contract P20_01080 (CPO) https://www.juntadeandalucia.es/organismos/universidadinvestigacioneinnovacion.html. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.

FUNDAÇÃO DE AMPARO À PESQUISA DO ESTADO DE SÃO PAULO—An article* published on July 31 in Nature Ecology & Evolution reveals that Luzio, the oldest human skeleton found in São Paulo state (Brazil), was a descendant of the ancestral population that settled the Americas at least 16,000 years ago and gave rise to all present-day Indigenous peoples, such as the Tupi.

Based on the largest set of Brazilian archaeological genomic data, the study reported in the article also offers an explanation for the disappearance of the oldest coastal communities, who built the icons of Brazilian archaeology known as sambaquis, huge mounds of shells and fishbones used as dwellings, cemeteries and territorial boundaries. Archaeologists often refer to these monuments as shell mounds or kitchen middens.

“After the Andean civilizations, the Atlantic coast sambaqui builders were the human phenomenon with the highest demographic density in pre-colonial South America. They were the ‘kings of the coast’ for thousands and thousands of years. They vanished suddenly about 2,000 years ago,” said André Menezes Strauss, an archaeologist at the University of São Paulo’s Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology (MAE-USP) and principal investigator for the study.

The first author of the article is Tiago Ferraz. The study was supported by FAPESP (projects 17/16451-2 and 20/06527-4) and conducted in partnership with researchers at the University of Tübingen’s Senckenberg Center for Human Evolution and Paleoenvironment (Germany).

The authors analyzed the genomes of 34 samples from four different areas of Brazil’s coast. The fossils were at least 10,000 years old. They came from sambaquis and other parts of eight sites (Cabeçuda, Capelinha, Cubatão, Limão, Jabuticabeira II, Palmeiras Xingu, Pedra do Alexandre and Vau Una).

This material included Luzio, São Paulo’s oldest skeleton, found in the Capelinha river midden in the Ribeira de Iguape valley by a group led by Levy Figuti, a professor at MAE-USP. The morphology of its skull is similar to that of Luzia, the oldest human fossil found to date in South America, dating from about 13,000 years ago. The researchers thought it might have belonged to a biologically different population from present-day Amerindians, who settled in what is now Brazil some 14,000 years ago, but it turns out they were mistaken.

“Genetic analysis showed Luzio to be an Amerindian, like the Tupi, Quechua or Cherokee. That doesn’t mean they’re all the same, but from a global perspective, they all derive from a single migratory wave that arrived in the Americas not more than 16,000 years ago. If there was another population here 30,000 years ago, it didn’t leave descendants among these groups,” Strauss said.

Luzio’s DNA also answered another question. River middens are different from coastal ones, so the find cannot be considered a direct ancestor of the huge classical sambaquis that appeared later. This discovery suggests there were two distinct migrations – into the hinterland and along the coast.

What happened to the sambaqui builders?

Analysis of the genetic material revealed heterogeneous communities with cultural similarities but significant biological differences, especially between coastal communities in the southeast and south.

“Studies of cranial morphology conducted in the 2000s had already pointed to a subtle difference between these communities, and our genetic analysis confirmed it,” Strauss said. “We discovered that one of the reasons was that these coastal populations weren’t isolated but ‘swapped genes’ with inland communities. Over thousands of years, this process must have contributed to the regional differences between sambaquis.”

Regarding the mysterious disappearance of this coastal civilization, comprising the first hunter-gatherers of the Holocene, analysis of the DNA samples clearly showed that, in contrast with the European Neolithic substitution of entire populations, what happened in this part of the world was a change of practices, with a decline in construction of shell middens and the introduction of pottery by sambaqui builders. For example, the genetic material found at Galheta IV (Santa Catarina state), the most emblematic site for the period, has remains not of shells but of ceramics and is similar to the classic sambaquis in this respect.

“This information is compatible with a 2014 study that analyzed pottery shards from sambaquis and found that the pots in question were used to cook not domesticated vegetables but fish. They appropriated technology from the hinterland to process food that was already traditional there,” Strauss said.

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About São Paulo Research Foundation (FAPESP)

The São Paulo Research Foundation (FAPESP) is a public institution with the mission of supporting scientific research in all fields of knowledge by awarding scholarships, fellowships and grants to investigators linked with higher education and research institutions in the State of São Paulo, Brazil. FAPESP is aware that the very best research can only be done by working with the best researchers internationally. Therefore, it has established partnerships with funding agencies, higher education, private companies, and research organizations in other countries known for the quality of their research and has been encouraging scientists funded by its grants to further develop their international collaboration. You can learn more about FAPESP at www.fapesp.br/en and visit FAPESP news agency at www.agencia.fapesp.br/en to keep updated with the latest scientific breakthroughs FAPESP helps achieve through its many programs, awards and research centers. You may also subscribe to FAPESP news agency at http://agencia.fapesp.br/subscribe.

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The investigation that covered four different parts of Brazil carried out analysis of genomic data from 34 fossils, including larger skeletons and the famous mounds of shells and fishbones built on the coast. André Strauss

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Article Source: FUNDAÇÃO DE AMPARO À PESQUISA DO ESTADO DE SÃO PAULO news release.

*Genomic history of coastal societies from Eastern South America, Nature Ecology & Evolution, 31-Jul-2023. 10.1038/s41559-023-02114-9 

UNIVERSITY OF GOTHENBURG—“Considering the richness of the grave goods, it is a reasonable assumption that these were royal tombs, even though we do not know much about the form of government practiced in the city at the time. Undoubtedly those buried here were part of the city’s government,” says Peter Fischer, professor of archaeology and leader of the expedition.

The tombs, located outside the 50-hectare Bronze Age city, consist of underground chambers accessed via a narrow passage from the surface. The chambers varied in size, measuring up to 4 x 5 meters.

More than 500 artifacts

The Swedish Söderberg expedition, which has been excavating in Hala Sultan Tekke near the city of Larnaca on the south coast of Cyprus since 2010, has previously found chamber tombs with valuable grave goods. What distinguishes the newly discovered chamber tombs from those previously excavated is the sheer quantity of artifacts and their superb quality.

“We found more than 500 complete artifacts distributed among two tombs. Many of the artifacts consist of precious metals, gems, ivory and high-quality ceramics.”

About half of the artifacts were imported from neighboring cultures. Gold and ivory came from Egypt. Precious stones, such as blue lapis lazuli, dark red carnelian and blue-green turquoise, were imported from Afghanistan, India and Sinai respectively. The tombs also contain amber objects from the Baltic region.

The tombs were discovered using magnetometers, a type of instrument that can produce images showing objects and structures up to two meters beneath the surface.

“We compared the site where broken pottery had been plowed during farming with the magnetometer map, which showed large cavities one to two meters below the surface. This led us to continue investigating the area and to discover the tombs.”

Woman buried with one-year-old

The several well-preserved skeletons in the tombs include that of a woman surrounded by dozens of ceramic vessels, jewelry and a round bronze mirror that was once polished. A one-year-old child with a ceramic toy lay beside her.

“Several individuals, both men and women, wore diadems, and some had necklaces with pendants of the highest quality, probably made in Egypt during the 18th dynasty at the time of such pharaohs as Thutmos III and Amenophis IV (Akhenaten) and his wife Nefertiti.”

Embossed images of bulls, gazelles, lions and flowers adorn the diadems. Most of the ceramic vessels came from what we now call Greece, and the expedition also found pots from Turkey, Syria, Palestine and Egypt.

The grave goods also included bronze weapons, some inlaid with ivory, and a gold-framed seal made of the hard mineral haematite with inscriptions of gods and rulers.

“The vast wealth of the entombed individuals came from the production of copper. Nearby mines in the Troodos Mountains produced copper ore, which was refined in the city. This port city then exported the refined metal in large quantities to neighboring cultures. Copper was an important commodity because, combined with tin, it becomes the hard alloy bronze, which gave its name to the Bronze Age,” says Peter Fischer.

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Detail of the ”Bull Diadem” (c. 1350 BCE). P.M. Fischer

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One of the skeletons with tomb gifts (c. 1350 BCE). P.M. Fischer

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Excavation and recording in progress. P.M. Fischer

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Large Minoan “Octopus Krater” (Crete) (c. 1350 BCE). P.M. Fischer

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Large Mycenaean (Greek) “Chariot krater” (c. 1350 BCE). P.M. Fischer

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Read more about the excavations here:

• Department of Antiquities of Cyprus
• Season 2023 | Swedish Archaeology in Jordan, Palestine and Cyprus, Peter Fischer

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UNIVERSITY COLLEGE LONDON—Researchers at the UCL Institute of Archaeology have discovered some of the largest early prehistoric stone tools in Britain.

The excavations, which took place in Kent and were commissioned in advance of development of the Maritime Academy School in Frindsbury, revealed prehistoric artifacts in deep Ice Age sediments preserved on a hillside above the Medway Valley.

The researchers, from UCL Archaeology South-East, discovered 800 stone artifacts thought to be over 300,000 years old, buried in sediments which filled a sinkhole and ancient river channel, outlined in their research, published in Internet Archaeology.

Amongst the unearthed artifacts were two extremely large flint knives described as “giant handaxes”. Handaxes are stone artefacts which have been chipped, or “knapped,” on both sides to produce a symmetrical shape with a long cutting edge. Researchers believe this type of tool was usually held in the hand and may have been used for butchering animals and cutting meat. The two largest handaxes found at the Maritime site have a distinctive shape with a long and finely worked pointed tip, and a much thicker base.

Senior Archaeologist Letty Ingrey (UCL Institute of Archaeology), said: “We describe these tools as ‘giants’ when they are over 22cm long and we have two in this size range. The biggest, a colossal 29.5cm in length, is one of the longest ever found in Britain. ‘Giant handaxes’ like this are usually found in the Thames and Medway regions and date from over 300,000 years ago.

“These handaxes are so big it’s difficult to imagine how they could have been easily held and used. Perhaps they fulfilled a less practical or more symbolic function than other tools, a clear demonstration of strength and skill. While right now, we aren’t sure why such large tools were being made, or which species of early human were making them, this site offers a chance to answer these exciting questions.”

The site is thought to date to a period in the early prehistory of Britain when Neanderthal people and their cultures were beginning to emerge and may even have shared the landscape with other early human species. The Medway Valley at this time would have been a wild landscape of wooded hills and river valleys, inhabited by red deer and horses, as well as less familiar mammals such as the now-extinct straight-tusked elephant and lion.

While archaeological finds of this age, including another spectacular ‘giant’ handaxe, have been found in the Medway Valley before, this is the first time they have been found as part of large-scale excavation, offering the opportunity to glean more insights into the lives of their makers.

Dr Matt Pope (UCL Institute of Archaeology), said: “The excavations at the Maritime Academy have given us an incredibly valuable opportunity to study how an entire Ice Age landscape developed over a quarter of a million years ago. A program of scientific analysis, involving specialists from UCL and other UK institutions, will now help us to understand why the site was important to ancient people and how the stone artifacts, including the ‘giant handaxes’ helped them adapt to the challenges of Ice Age environments.”

The research team is now working on identifying and studying the recovered artifacts to better understand who created them and what they were used for.

Senior Archaeologist Giles Dawkes (UCL Institute of Archaeology) is leading work on a second significant find from the site – a Roman cemetery, dating to at least a quarter of a million years later than the Ice Age activity. The people buried here between the first and fourth centuries AD could have been the inhabitants of a suspected nearby villa that may have lain around 850 meters to the south.

The team found the remains of 25 individuals, 13 of which were cremated. Nine of the buried individuals were found with goods or personal items including bracelets, and four were interred in wooden coffins. Collections of pottery and animal bones found nearby likely relate to feasting rituals at the time of burial. Though Roman buildings and structures have been extensively excavated, cemeteries have historically been less of a focus for archaeologists and the discovery of this site offers potentially new insights into the burial customs and traditions of both the Romans who lived at the villa, and those in the nearby town of Rochester.

Jody Murphy, Director of Education at the Thinking Schools Academy Trust said: “We, at Maritime Academy and the Thinking Schools Academy Trust, feel very lucky to be a part of this phenomenal discovery. We take great pride in our connection to our local community and region, with much of our school identity linked to the history of Medway. We look forward to taking advantage of this unique opportunity to teach our young people about these finds, creating a lasting legacy for those who came before us.”

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The largest giant handaxe. Archaeology South-East/ UCL

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ASE Senior Archaeologist Letty Ingrey measures the largest giant handaxe. Archaeology South-East/ UCL

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Archaeologists excavating at the Maritime Academy School site in Frinsdbury. Archaeology South-East/ UCL

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One of the handaxes at the point of discovery on site. Archaeology South-East/ UCL

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Article Source: UNIVERSITY COLLEGE LONDON news release

PLOS—Stone tools bear microscopic evidence of ancient plant technology, according to a study published June 30, 2023 in the open-access journal PLOS ONE by Hermine Xhauflair of the University of the Philippines Diliman and colleagues.

Prehistoric communities likely made extensive use of plant materials for textiles and cordages, taking advantage of the flexibility and resistance of plant fibers just like modern communities do. However, plant-based materials like baskets and ropes are rarely preserved in the archaeological record, especially in the tropics, so prehistoric plant technology is often rendered invisible to modern science. In Southeast Asia, the oldest artefacts made of plant fibers are around 8,000 years old. In this study, Xhauflair and colleagues identify indirect evidence of much older plant technology.

This evidence comes from stone tools in Tabon Cave, Palawan Philippines dating as far back as 39,000 years old. These tools exhibit microscopic damage accrued during use. Indigenous communities in this region today use tools to strip plants like bamboo and palm, turning rigid stems into supple fibers for tying or weaving. Researchers experimentally followed these plant processing techniques and found that this activity leaves a characteristic pattern of microscopic damage on stone tools. This same pattern was identified on three stone artifacts from Tabon Cave.

This is among the oldest evidence of fiber technology in Southeast Asia, highlighting the technological skill of prehistoric communities going back 39,000 years. This research also demonstrates a method for revealing otherwise hidden signs of prehistoric plant technology. Further study will shed light on how ancient these techniques are, how widespread they were in the past, and whether modern practices in this region are the result of an uninterrupted tradition.

The authors add: “This study pushes back in time the antiquity of fiber technology in Southeast Asia. It means that the Prehistoric groups who lived at Tabon Cave had the possibility to make baskets and traps, but also ropes that can be used to build houses, sail boats, hunt with bows and make composite objects.”

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Fiber technology at Tabon Cave, 39-33 000 years ago. An artistic view based on the latest archaeological data. Drawing by Carole Cheval-Art’chéograph. Made for the exhibition “Trajectories and Movements of the Philippine Identity” curated by Hermine Xhauflair and Eunice Averion. Scientific advising: Hermine Xhauflair. Carole Cheval – Art’chéograph, Xhauflair & Averion, CC-BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)

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Article Source: PLoS ONE news release

*Xhauflair H, Jago-on S, Vitales TJ, Manipon D, Amano N, Callado JR, et al. (2023) The invisible plant technology of Prehistoric Southeast Asia: Indirect evidence for basket and rope making at Tabon Cave, Philippines, 39–33,000 years ago. PLoS ONE 18(6): e0281415. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0281415

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Don’t miss out on this unforgettable evening as Dr. Hawass reveals the most closely guarded secrets of ancient Egypt and presents his groundbreaking new discoveries and latest research live on stage. As the man behind all major discoveries in Egypt over the last few decades and director of several ongoing archaeological projects, Dr. Hawass may yet surprise you with unexpected revelations that will make news across the world.

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SMITHSONIAN—Researchers from the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History have identified the oldest decisive evidence of humans’ close evolutionary relatives butchering and likely eating one another.

In a new study* published today, June 26, in Scientific Reports, National Museum of Natural History paleoanthropologist Briana Pobiner and her co-authors describe nine cut marks on a 1.45 million-year-old left shin bone from a relative of Homo sapiens found in northern Kenya. Analysis of 3D models of the fossil’s surface revealed that the cut marks were dead ringers for the damage inflicted by stone tools. This is the oldest instance of this behavior known with a high degree of confidence and specificity.

“The information we have tells us that hominins were likely eating other hominins at least 1.45 million years ago,” Pobiner said. “There are numerous other examples of species from the human evolutionary tree consuming each other for nutrition, but this fossil suggests that our species’ relatives were eating each other to survive further into the past than we recognized.”

Pobiner first encountered the fossilized tibia, or shin bone, in the collections of the National Museums of Kenya’s Nairobi National Museum while looking for clues about which prehistoric predators might have been hunting and eating humans’ ancient relatives. With a handheld magnifying lens, Pobiner pored over the tibia looking for bite marks from extinct beasts when she instead noticed what immediately looked to her like evidence of butchery.

To figure out if what she was seeing on the surface of this fossil were indeed cut marks, Pobiner sent molds of the cuts—made with the same material dentists use to create impressions of teeth—to co-author Michael Pante of Colorado State University. She provided Pante with no details about what he was being sent, simply asking him to analyze the marks on the molds and tell her what made them. Pante created 3D scans of the molds and compared the shape of the marks to a database of 898 individual tooth, butchery and trample marks created through controlled experiments.

The analysis positively identified nine of the 11 marks as clear matches for the type of damage inflicted by stone tools. The other two marks were likely bite marks from a big cat, with a lion being the closest match. According to Pobiner, the bite marks could have come from one of the three different types of saber-tooth cats prowling the landscape at the time the owner of this shin bone was alive.

By themselves, the cut marks do not prove that the human relative who inflicted them also made a meal out of the leg, but Pobiner said this seems to be the most likely scenario. She explained that the cut marks are located where a calf muscle would have attached to the bone—a good place to cut if the goal is to remove a chunk of flesh. The cut marks are also all oriented the same way, such that a hand wielding a stone tool could have made them all in succession without changing grip or adjusting the angle of attack.

“These cut marks look very similar to what I’ve seen on animal fossils that were being processed for consumption,” Pobiner said. “It seems most likely that the meat from this leg was eaten and that it was eaten for nutrition as opposed to for a ritual.”

While this case may appear to be cannibalism to a casual observer, Pobiner said there is not enough evidence to make that determination because cannibalism requires that the eater and the eaten hail from the same species.

The fossil shin bone was initially identified as Australopithecus boisei and then in 1990 as Homo erectus, but today, experts agree that there is not enough information to assign the specimen to a particular species of hominin. The use of stone tools also does not narrow down which species might have been doing the cutting. Recent research from Rick Potts, the National Museum of Natural History’s Peter Buck Chair of Human Origins, further called into question the once-common assumption that only one genus, Homo, made and used stone tools.

So, this fossil could be a trace of prehistoric cannibalism, but it is also possible this was a case of one species chowing down on its evolutionary cousin.

None of the stone-tool cut marks overlap with the two bite marks, which makes it hard to infer anything about the order of events that took place. For instance, a big cat may have scavenged the remains after hominins removed most of the meat from the leg bone. It is equally possible that a big cat killed an unlucky hominin and then was chased off or scurried away before opportunistic hominins took over the kill.

One other fossil—a skull first found in South Africa in 1976—has previously sparked debate about the earliest known case of human relatives butchering each other. Estimates for the age of this skull range from 1.5 to 2.6 million years old. Apart from its uncertain age, two studies that have examined the fossil (the first published in 2000 and the latter in 2018) disagree about the origin of marks just below the skull’s right cheek bone. One contends the marks resulted from stone tools wielded by hominin relatives and the other asserts that they were formed through contact with sharp-edged stone blocks found lying against the skull. Further, even if ancient hominins produced the marks, it is not clear whether they were butchering each other for food, given the lack of large muscle groups on the skull.

To resolve the issue of whether the fossil tibia she and her colleagues studied is indeed the oldest cut-marked hominin fossil, Pobiner said she would love to reexamine the skull from South Africa, which is claimed to have cut marks using the same techniques observed in the present study.

She also said this new shocking finding is proof of the value of museum collections.

“You can make some pretty amazing discoveries by going back into museum collections and taking a second look at fossils,” Pobiner said. “Not everyone sees everything the first time around. It takes a community of scientists coming in with different questions and techniques to keep expanding our knowledge of the world.”

This research was supported by funding from the Smithsonian, the Peter Buck Fund for Human Origins Research and Colorado State University.

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View of the hominin tibia and magnified area that shows cut marks. Scale = 4 cm. In a new study published today, June 26, in Scientific Reports, Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History paleoanthropologist Briana Pobiner and her co-authors describe nine cut marks on a 1.45 million-year-old left shin bone from a relative of Homo sapiens found in northern Kenya. Analysis of 3D models of the fossil’s surface revealed that the cut marks were dead ringers for the damage inflicted by stone tools. This is the oldest instance of this behavior known with a high degree of confidence and specificity. Pobiner first encountered the fossilized tibia, or shin bone, in the collections of the National Museums of Kenya’s Nairobi National Museum while looking for clues about which prehistoric predators might have been hunting and eating humans’ ancient relatives. With a handheld magnifying lens, Pobiner pored over the tibia looking for bite marks from extinct beasts when she instead noticed what immediately looked to her like evidence of butchery. “You can make some pretty amazing discoveries by going back into museum collections and taking a second look at fossils,” Pobiner said. “Not everyone sees everything the first time around. It takes a community of scientists coming in with different questions and techniques to keep expanding our knowledge of the world.” Jennifer Clark

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Nine marks identified as cut marks (mark numbers 1–4 and 7–11) and two identified as tooth marks (mark numbers 5 and 6) based on comparison with 898 known bone surface modifications. Scale = 1 cm. None of the stone-tool cut marks overlap with the two bite marks, which makes it hard to infer anything about the order of events that took place. For instance, a big cat may have scavenged the remains after hominins removed most of the meat from the leg bone. It is equally possible that a big cat killed an unlucky hominin and then was chased off or scurried away before opportunistic hominins took over the kill. Jennifer Clark

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Close-up photos of three fossil animal specimens from the same area and time horizon as the fossil hominin tibia studied by the research team. These fossils show similar cut marks to those found on the hominin tibia studied. The photos show (a) an antelope mandible, (b) an antelope radius (lower front leg bone) and (c) a large mammal scapula (shoulder blade). By themselves, the cut marks do not prove that the human relative who inflicted them also made a meal out of the leg, but Pobiner said this seems to be the most likely scenario. She explained that the cut marks are located where a calf muscle would have attached to the bone—a good place to cut if the goal is to remove a chunk of flesh. The cut marks are also all oriented the same way, such that a hand wielding a stone tool could have made them all in succession without changing grip or adjusting the angle of attack. Briana Pobiner

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3D model of marks 7 and 8 identified as cut marks. Pobiner sent molds of the cuts—made with the same material dentists use to create impressions of teeth—to co-author Michael Pante of Colorado State University. She provided Pante with no details about what he was being sent, simply asking him to analyze the marks on the molds and tell her what made them. Pante created 3D scans of the molds and compared the shape of the marks to a database of 898 individual tooth, butchery and trample marks created through controlled experiments. The analysis positively identified nine of the 11 marks as clear matches for the type of damage inflicted by stone tools. The other two marks were likely bite marks from a big cat, with a lion being the closest match. According to Pobiner, the bite marks could have come from one of the three different types of saber-tooth cats prowling the landscape at the time the owner of this shin bone was alive. Michael Pante

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Article Source: Smithsonian news release.

*Early Pleistocene cut marked hominin fossil from Koobi Fora, Kenya, Scientific Reports, 26-Jun-2023. 10.1038/s41598-023-35702-7 

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Don’t miss out on this unforgettable evening as Dr. Hawass reveals the most closely guarded secrets of ancient Egypt and presents his groundbreaking new discoveries and latest research live on stage. As the man behind all major discoveries in Egypt over the last few decades and director of several ongoing archaeological projects, Dr. Hawass may yet surprise you with unexpected revelations that will make news across the world.

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PLOS—Markings on a cave wall in France are the oldest known engravings made by Neanderthals, according to a study published June 21, 2023 in the open-access journal PLOS ONE by Jean-Claude Marquet of the University of Tours, France and colleagues.

Research in recent decades has revealed a great deal about the cultural complexity of Neanderthals. However, relatively little is known about their symbolic or artistic expression. Only a short list of symbolic productions are attributed to Neanderthals, and the interpretation of these is often the subject of debate. In this study, Marquet and colleagues identified markings on a cave wall in France as the oldest known Neanderthal engravings.

The cave is La Roche-Cotard in the Centre-Val de Loire of France, where a series of non-figurative markings on the wall are interpreted as finger-flutings, marks made by human hands. The researchers made a plotting analysis and used photogrammetry to create 3D models of these markings, comparing them with known and experimental human markings. Based on the shape, spacing, and arrangement of these engravings, the team concluded that they are deliberate, organized and intentional shapes created by human hands.

The team also dated cave sediments with optically-stimulated luminescence dating, determining that the cave became closed off by infilling sediment around 57,000 years ago, well before Homo sapiens became established in the region. This, combined with the fact that stone tools within the cave are only Mousterian, a technology associated with Neanderthals, is strong evidence that these engravings are the work of Neanderthals.

Because these are non-figurative symbols, the intent behind them is unclear. They are, however, of a similar age with cave engravings made by Homo sapiens in other parts of the world. This adds to a growing body of evidence that the behavior and activities of Neanderthals were similarly complex and diverse as those of our own ancestors.

The authors add: “Fifteen years after the resumption of excavations at the La Roche-Cotard site, the engravings have been dated to over 57,000 years ago and, thanks to stratigraphy, probably to around 75,000 years ago, making this the oldest decorated cave in France, if not Europe!”

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Trine Freiesleben and Jean-Claude discussing the fingerprints and where to take OSL samples. Kristina Thomsen, CC-BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)

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Examples of engravings discovered in the Roche-Cotard cave (Indre et Loire – France). On the left, the “circular panel” (ogive-shaped tracings) and on the right the “wavy panel” (two contiguous tracings forming sinuous lines). Jean-Claude Marquet, CC-BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)

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Article Source: PLoS ONE news release

*Marquet J-C, Freiesleben TH, Thomsen KJ, Murray AS, Calligaro M, Macaire J-J, et al. (2023) The earliest unambiguous Neanderthal engravings on cave walls: La Roche-Cotard, Loire Valley, France. PLoS ONE 18(6): e0286568. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0286568

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Don’t miss out on this unforgettable evening as Dr. Hawass reveals the most closely guarded secrets of ancient Egypt and presents his groundbreaking new discoveries and latest research live on stage. As the man behind all major discoveries in Egypt over the last few decades and director of several ongoing archaeological projects, Dr. Hawass may yet surprise you with unexpected revelations that will make news across the world.

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MACQUARIE UNIVERSITY—What connects a fossil found in a cave in northern Laos with stone tools made in north Australia? The answer is, we do. When our early Homo sapiens ancestors first arrived in Southeast Asia on their way from Africa to Australia, they left evidence of their presence in the form of human fossils that accumulated over thousands of years deep in a cave.

The latest evidence from Tam Pà Ling cave in northern Laos, uncovered by a team of Laotian, French, American and Australian researchers and published in Nature Communications, demonstrates beyond doubt that modern humans spread from Africa through Arabia and to Asia much earlier than previously thought.

It also confirms that our ancestors didn’t just follow coastlines and islands. They travelled through forested regions, most likely along river valleys, too. Some then moved on through Southeast Asia to become Australia’s First People.

“Tam Pà Ling plays a key role in the story of modern human migration through Asia but its significance and value is only just being recognised,” says University of Copenhagen palaeoanthropologist Assistant Professor Fabrice Demeter, one of the paper’s lead authors.

Three Australian Universities contributed to the project. Macquarie University and Southern Cross University dated samples using multiple techniques. Flinders University showed that the sediment in the cave had been laid down in distinct layers over tens of thousands of years.

Since the first excavation and the discovery of a skull and mandible in 2009, the cave has been controversial. Evidence of our earliest journeys from Africa into Southeast Asia is usually dominated by island locations such as Sumatra, Philippines and Borneo.

This was before Tam Pà Ling, an upland cave site more than 300 kilometres from the sea in northern Laos, started divulging its secrets. The skull and jawbone were identified as belonging to Homo sapiens who had migrated through the region. But when?

As is usual in questions of human dispersal, the debate comes down to timing. But this evidence was hard to date.

The human fossils cannot be directly dated as the site is a World Heritage area and the fossils are protected by Laotian law. There are very few animal bones or suitable cave decorations to date, and it is too old for radiocarbon dating. This placed a heavy burden on the luminescence dating of sediments to form the backbone of the timeline.

Luminescence dating relies on a light-sensitive signal that is reset to zero when exposed to light but builds up over time when shielded from light during burial. It was originally used to constrain the burial sediments that encased the fossils.

“Without luminescence dating this vital evidence would still have no timeline and the site would be overlooked in the accepted path of dispersal through the region,” says Macquarie University geochronologist Associate Professor Kira Westaway. “Luckily the technique is versatile and can be adapted for different challenges.”

These techniques returned a minimum age of 46,000 years – a chronology in line with the expected timing of Homo sapiens’ arrival in Southeast Asia. But the discovery didn’t end here.

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From 2010 to 2023, annual excavations (delayed by three years of lockdowns) revealed increasingly more evidence that Homo sapiens had passed through en route to Australia. Seven pieces of human skeleton were found at intervals through 4.5 metres of sediment, pushing the potential timeline far back into the realms of the earliest Homo sapiens migrations to this region.

In this study*, the team overcame these issues by creatively applying strategic dating techniques where possible, such as the uranium-series dating of a stalactite tip that had been buried in sediment, and the use of uranium-series dating coupled with electron-spin-resonance dating techniques to two rare but complete bovid teeth, unearthed at 6.5 metres.

“Having direct dating of the fossil remains confirmed the age sequence obtained by luminescence, allowing us to propose a comprehensive and secure chronology for a Homo sapiens presence at Tam Pà Ling,” says Southern Cross University geochronologist Associate Professor Renaud Joannes-Boyau.

The team supported the dating evidence with a detailed analysis of the sediments to assess the origin of the fossils using micromorphology, a technique that examines sediments under a microscope to establish the integrity of the layers. This key component of the new chronology helped establish that there was a consistent accumulation of sedimentary layers over a long period.

“Far from reflecting a rapid dump of sediments, the site represents a consistent and seasonally deposited stack of sediments,” explains Flinders University geoarchaeologist Associate Professor Mike Morley, who worked with PhD students Vito Hernandez and Meghan McAllister-Hayward.

The new chronology revealed there had a been a human presence in this area for more than 56,000 years. Furthermore, the age of the lowest fossil at seven metres – a fragment of a leg bone – provides a timeline for modern human arrival in this region of between 86,000 to 68,000 years ago. This pushes back the arrival time in mainland Southeast Asia by approximately 40,000 years. Although, according to the genetics, these early migrations did not contribute significantly to our modern-day populations.

“This really is the decisive paper for the Tam Pà Ling evidence,” says Associate Professor Westaway. “Finally we have enough dating evidence to confidently say when Homo sapiens first arrived in this area, how long they were there and what route they may have taken.”

Tam Pà Ling cave is very close to the recently discovered Cobra Cave, which was frequented by Denisovans approximately 70,000 years earlier. Despite the previous lack of evidence for early arrival in mainland Southeast Asia, this area might be a previously used dispersal route among our ancestors, long before Homo sapiens.

“We have much to learn from the caves and forests of Southeast Asia,” adds Associate Professor Westaway.

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The extensive excavation pit in Tam Pà Ling reaching from the cave floor down to ~7 m. The deepest pit is found at the rear close to the cave wall. Copyright Vito Hernandez (Flinders University

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The extensive excavation pit in Tam Pà Ling reaching from the cave floor down to ~7 m. Copyright Kira Westaway (Macquarie University

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Taking sediment samples in the excavation pit in Tam Pà Ling cave, the team is with Flinders PhD student Vito Hernandez. Copyright Kira Westaway (Macquarie University

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Looking down into the wide steep entrance of Tam Pà Ling Cave. The excavation pit is visible on the right-hand side. Copyright Kira Westaway (Macquarie University

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Article Source: MACQUARIE UNIVERSITY news release.

*Early presence of Homo sapiens in Southeast Asia by 86–68 kyr at Tam Pà Ling, Northern Laos, Nature Communications, 13-Jun-2023. 10.1038/s41467-023-38715-y 

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Don’t miss out on this unforgettable evening as Dr. Hawass reveals the most closely guarded secrets of ancient Egypt and presents his groundbreaking new discoveries and latest research live on stage. As the man behind all major discoveries in Egypt over the last few decades and director of several ongoing archaeological projects, Dr. Hawass may yet surprise you with unexpected revelations that will make news across the world.

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CNRS—Although the prehistoric site of Eynan-Mallaha in northern Israel has been thoroughly examined since 1955, it still holds some surprises for scientists. Seven prehistoric wind instruments known as flutes, recently identified by a Franco-Israeli team1 , are the subject of an article published on 9 June in Nature Scientific Reports. The discovery of these 12,000-year-old aerophones is extremely rare – in fact, they are the first to be discovered in the Near East. The “flutes”, made from the bones of a small waterfowl, produce a sound similar to certain birds of prey (Eurasian sparrowhawk and common kestrel) when air is blown into them. The choice of bones used to make these instruments was no accident – larger birds, with bigger bones that produce deeper sounds, have also been found at the site. The Natufians, the Near Eastern civilization that occupied this village between 13,000 and 9,700 BC, deliberately selected smaller bones in order to obtain the high-pitched sound needed to imitate these particular raptors. The instruments may have been used for hunting, music or to communicate with the birds themselves. Indeed, it is clear that the Natufians attributed birds with a special symbolic value, as attested by the many ornaments made of talons found at Eynan-Mallaha. The village, located on the shores of Lake Hula, was home to this civilization throughout its 3,000 years of existence. It is therefore of vital importance in revealing the practices and habits of a culture at the crossroads between mobile and sedentary lifestyles, and the transition from a predatory economy to agriculture. This work2 was supported by the Fyssen Fondation and the ministère des Affaires étrangères.

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The seven aerophones discovered at Eynan-Mallaha. © Laurent Davin

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Article Source: CNRS news release

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Notes

1. 1- The team is co-directed by Laurent Davin (post-doctoral researcher at the Fyssen Fondation) and José-Miguel Tejero (University of Vienna, University of Barcelona) and includes scientists from the Centre de recherche français à Jérusalem (CNRS/Aix-Marseille Université/ministère de la Culture), the laboratoire Technologie et ethnologie des mondes préhistoriques (CNRS/Université Panthéon-Sorbonne/Université Paris Nanterre), The Hebrew University of Jerusalem (Institute of Archaeology), Israel Antiquities Authority, Virginia Commonwealth University (Department of Forensic Science), École Nationale Vétérinaire (Laboratoire d’Anatomie comparée, Nantes), the laboratoire Archéologies et sciences de l’Antiquité (CNRS/ministère de la Culture/Université Panthéon-Sorbonne/Université Paris Nanterre) and the l’Institut d’ethnologie méditerranéenne, européenne et comparative (CNRS/Université Aix-Marseille).
2. 2- Excavation of the Eynan-Mallaha site is still ongoing, under the direction of CNRS researcher Fanny Bocquentin and Israel Antiquities Authority researcher Lior Weisbrod.

Bibliography

Bone aerophones from Eynan-Mallaha (Israel) indicate imitation of raptor calls by the last hunter- gatherers in the Levant. Laurent Davin, José-Miguel Tejero, Tal Simmons, Dana Shaham, Aurélia Borvon, Olivier Tourny, Anne Bridault, Rivka Rabinovich, Marion Sindel, Hamudi Khalaily and François Valla. Nature Scientific Reports, June 8 2023. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-023-35700-9 (This link will work when the embargo is lifted)

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Don’t miss out on this unforgettable evening as Dr. Hawass reveals the most closely guarded secrets of ancient Egypt and presents his groundbreaking new discoveries and latest research live on stage. As the man behind all major discoveries in Egypt over the last few decades and director of several ongoing archaeological projects, Dr. Hawass may yet surprise you with unexpected revelations that will make news across the world.

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CNRS—The Zambratija boat in Croatia has stood the test of time, with 7 of its 12-metres still being remarkably well preserved. Dated to between the end of the 12th and the end of the 10th century BC, it is the oldest entirely hand-sewn boat in the Mediterranean. This wreck – a rare example of the ancient shipbuilding tradition of Istria and Dalmatia – will be studied in detail by a Franco-Croatian team from the Centre Camille Jullian (CNRS/AMU) and the Archaeological Museum of Istria (Pula, Croatia). From the 2nd July 2023, a team of divers will remove sections of the boat in the bay of Zambratija1 . Once the pieces have been removed and placed in a bespoke support, the scientists will reconstruct the boat in 3D and precise its construction date, will identify the fibres used for sewing and study the techniques used to shape the wood. Handling relics of this calibre is a delicate affair; therefore, every stage of the process will require the utmost care. Once the analyses have been completed, this exceptional vessel and its components will be desalted in Croatia before heading to Grenoble in 2024, where they will pass through the capable hands of the Arc-Nucléart restoration workshop. It is hoped that the fully-restored boat will one day be exhibited in a new museum dedicated to Istria’s naval maritime heritage in Pula, Croatia.

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Wreck of Zambratija, Istria. Observations on the hull. © Philippe Groscaux/Mission Adriboats/CNRS/CCJ

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Notes

1. 1 Operation carried out as part of Ministry of Europe and foreign Affairs mission “Adriboats – Navires et navigation en Adriatique orientale dans l’Antiquité”, directed by CNRS researcher Giulia Boetto

Article Source: CNRS news release

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_______________________________

Don’t miss out on this unforgettable evening as Dr. Hawass reveals the most closely guarded secrets of ancient Egypt and presents his groundbreaking new discoveries and latest research live on stage. As the man behind all major discoveries in Egypt over the last few decades and director of several ongoing archaeological projects, Dr. Hawass may yet surprise you with unexpected revelations that will make news across the world.

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AMERICAN ASSOCIATION FOR THE ADVANCEMENT OF SCIENCE (AAAS)—Native Americans who lived in present-day central Alaska during the last ice age may have started freshwater fishing by around 13,000 years ago, suggests a new analysis* of ancient DNA and stable isotopes from fish remains. Ancestors of Alaska Natives, many of whose livelihoods still depend on freshwater fish such as salmon, may have started subsistence fishing as a response to fewer food resources during long-term climate change, Ben Potter and colleagues say. Native Americans have relied on freshwater fish for thousands of years, but the origins of fishing in North America have been uncertain. Beringia, a region comprising present-day Alaska and Russia, was largely ice-free during the last ice age and is considered a key gateway to the Americas. Researchers have previously discovered well-preserved fish remains in Beringia, but it has been unclear when and how freshwater fishing began there. To investigate, Potter et al. used a combination of DNA and isotope analyses to identify 1,110 fish specimens recovered from six human settlement sites – including in the Tanana, Kuskokwim, Susitna, and Copper River basins – in what was once eastern Beringia (central Alaska). They identified four main fish taxa – salmon, burbot, whitefish, and northern pike – whose earliest appearances dated to around 13,000 and 11,800 years ago. These findings, along with well-documented fishing records from local Native Alaskans, suggest that early Native Americans may have started fishing as a response to environmental change during the Pleistocene-Holocene transition. “Our data collectively suggest that changes in climate and ultimately key mammal resources during the Younger Dryas led to human responses of widening diet breadth to incorporate multiple species of freshwater and anadromous fish, setting a pattern that would be expanded upon later in the Holocene as fish, particularly salmon, became key resources to Alaska Native lifeways,” the authors write.

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USR excavation. Ben Potter

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Mead Excavation. Ben Potter

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Mead articulated burbot vertebrae. Ben Potter

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Article Source: AMERICAN ASSOCIATION FOR THE ADVANCEMENT OF SCIENCE (AAAS) news release

Article summary by Nyla Husain

*Freshwater and anadromous fishing in Ice Age Beringia, Science Advances, 2-Jun-2023. www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.adg6802 

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Don’t miss out on this unforgettable evening as Dr. Hawass reveals the most closely guarded secrets of ancient Egypt and presents his groundbreaking new discoveries and latest research live on stage. As the man behind all major discoveries in Egypt over the last few decades and director of several ongoing archaeological projects, Dr. Hawass may yet surprise you with unexpected revelations that will make news across the world.

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UNIVERSITY OF CÓRDOBA—A research team at the University of Cordoba has identified, for the first time, the composition of a Roman perfume more than 2,000 years old thanks tothe discovery of a small vessel of ointment in Carmona.

2,000 years ago, in the Roman city of Carmo, today’s Carmona, in the province of Seville, someone placed a vessel of ointment in a funerary urn. Twenty centuries later, the FQM346 research team at the University of Cordoba, led by Professor of Organic Chemistry José Rafael Ruiz Arrebola, in collaboration with the City of Carmona, has been able to chemically describe the components of a perfume dating from the first century AD. The results were published in the Swiss scientific journal Heritage in an article* in which Ruiz Arrebola, the municipal archaeologist of Carmona, Juan Manuel Román; and UCO researchers Daniel Cosano and Fernando Lafont share the whole technical and scientific process enabling the world to”smell” the bygone Roman Empire.

The residue of the perfume, discovered in 2019 during an archaeological intervention in a mausoleum found during construction of a house on the Calle Sevillat, had been preserved, solidified, inside a vessel carved in quartz, which was still perfectly sealed. As Román explains, it was a collective tomb, possibly belonging to an affluent family and in which, in addition to numerous objects related to funeral rituals (offerings and trousseaus), the cinerary urns of six adult individuals – three women and three men – were found. In one of the urns, made of glass, over the cremated skeletal remains of the deceased (in this case a woman between 30 and 40 years old), a cloth bag had been placed (remains of it having been preserved) containing three amber beads and a small rock crystal (hyaline quartz) flask, carved in the shape of an amphora, containing ointment. Perfume containers used to be made of blown glass and, on very rare occasions, examples have been found made of this material which, owing to its characteristics and difficult carving, due to its hardness, made them very valuable and extremely expensive. In addition to the uniqueness of the receptacle, the truly extraordinary aspect of the find was that it was perfectly sealed, and that the solid residues of the perfume had been preserved inside, which made it possible to carry out this study.

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Ruiz Arrebola stresses that the use of dolomite, a type of carbon, as a stopper, and the bitumen used to seal it, were the key to the magnificent state of preservation of the piece and its contents.

To ascertain what the perfume was made of, different instrumental techniques were used, such as X-ray diffraction and gas chromatography coupled with mass spectrometry, among others. According to Ruiz, from the analyses it has been possible to determine that the small cylindrical stopper was made of dolomite (limestone), and that bitumen was used for its perfect fit and airtight seal. With respect to the perfume, two components have been identified: a base or binder, which allowed for the preservation of the aromas, and the essence itself, these findings according with descriptions by none other than Pliny the Elder. In this case, the base was a vegetable oil; possibly, according to some indications reflected in the analysis, olive oil, although this point could not be confirmed with certainty.

And the essence?

According to the results of chemical analyses carried out by the University of Cordoba, Rome smelled of patchouli, an essential oil obtained from a plant of Indian origin, Pogostemon cablin, widely used in modern perfumery, and whose use in Roman times was not known. The monumental characteristics of the tomb where it was found and, above all, the material of which the vessel containing it was made, suggest that it was a highly valuable product.

This study constitutes a breakthrough in the field of Roman perfumery and as regards to the use of patchouli as an essential oil. Further studies are currently being carried out on other unique materials (such as amber, fabrics, and pigments used in the wall paintings) preserved in the Carmona mausoleum. Results are expected soon.

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Place where the ointment was found. University of Córdoba

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Article Source: UNIVERSITY OF CÓRDOBA news release

*Archaeometric Identification of a Perfume from Roman Times, Heritage, 23-May-2023. 10.3390/heritage6060236 

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__________________________

Don’t miss out on this unforgettable evening as Dr. Hawass reveals the most closely guarded secrets of ancient Egypt and presents his groundbreaking new discoveries and latest research live on stage. As the man behind all major discoveries in Egypt over the last few decades and director of several ongoing archaeological projects, Dr. Hawass may yet surprise you with unexpected revelations that will make news across the world.

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