Archives: Articles

This is the example article

Archaeologists uncover monumental prehistoric structure on island of Menorca

Posted on March 29, 2016 by No Author -

Archaeologists have recently begun revealing the features of an ancient prehistoric stone structure on the Mediterranean island of Menorca in the Balearic Islands, an archipelago near the eastern coast of Spain.

Beginning in 2015, under the direction of archaeologists Montserrat Anglada, Irene Riudavets, and Cristina Bravo, an archaeological team began excavating a newly opened structure at the site, known as Sa Cudia Cremada, a site that is composed of distinctive Iron Age (part of Spain’s prehistoric period) stone structures such as talayots — truncated tower-shaped constructions. The builders were members of the mysterious Talayotic culture, a people who left no written records, but whose architectural legacy dots the Balearic Islands.

“This research project started in 2015, when the team started digging remains of an Iron Age sanctuary, a site that was untouched until we first started digging in August,” said Bravo, one of the lead archaeologists. “The most important finding did not wait too long to be discovered and, during the first field school session one of the students found a large stone slab which was clearly broken and in situ. Its vertical position, its shape and location inside the building helped shed light on the building’s typology: it was a Taula monument.”

Characteristic of the Talayotic culture, the Taula is a large vertical monolith or supporting stone combined with a horizontal one resting on top, forming a large T-shaped monument. “Taula” means table in Catalan, as they were by tradition once thought to be tables used by giants. Now archaeologists suggest they were monuments representing Talayotic deities, occupying central positions in sanctuaries where rituals were performed.

“During archaeological excavations, new architectural elements were located, which are typical from these buildings, such as pilasters abutting the perimeter walls,” reports the archaeological team about the building in which the Taula is located. Also found were several grinding stones and pestles, as well as indigenous pottery, including artifacts from later periods, such as the Punic, Roman, Islamic, and Medieval periods.

_________________________________________

Aerial view of Sa Cudia Cremada’s taula sanctuary after the 1st excavation campaign. Courtesy Sa Cudia Cremada Field School

______________________________________________________

Fieldwork at Sa Cudia Cremada’s sanctuary. Courtesy Sa Cudia Cremada Filed School

______________________________________________________

One of the taula sanctuaries already excavated in Menorca: the Taula sanctuary at Torralba d’en Salort. Courtesy Sa Cudia Cremada Field School

_______________________________________________________

The Talayotic culture is a society that flourished on the Gymnesian Islands (the easternmost Balearic Islands) during the Iron Age. Its origins date from the end of the second millennium BC. It is named after the talayots, abundant and emblematic structures from the prehistoric period of the Balearic Islands. Archaeologists are continuing to piece together excavated clues that are still raising more questions than answers, but progress is slowly being made. “Archaeological excavations and research tasks are slow and laborious,” reports the team. “As a consequence, the team has a long way to go to be able to ascertain all these questions and others, which will shed light on the function and significance of this type of unique sanctuary from Mediterranean Prehistory.”

An in-depth feature article about the new excavations at Sa Cudia Cremada will be published in the upcoming Summer 2016 issue of Popular Archaeology Magazine.

Individuals wishing to know more or who may be interested in participating in the excavations may visit the project’s website: http://archaeologysacudia.com/en/ or contact the team at [email protected].

_________________________________________

______________________________________________

Travel and learn with Far Horizons.

____________________________________________

This richly illustrated issue includes the following stories: Recent findings shedding new light on the whereabouts of the remains of Philip of Macedon, father of Alexander the Great; how an archaeologist-sculptor is bringing bones of the dead back to life; archaeologists uncovering town life at the dawn of civilization; an exclusive interview with internationally acclaimed archaeologist James M. Adovasio about what makes the Meadowcroft Rockshelter prominent in the ongoing search for the first Americans; what archaeologists are finding at the site of the ancient city of Gath, the home town of the biblical Philistine giant, Goliath; and how scientists are redrawing the picture of human evolution in Europe. Find it on Amazon.com.

Teeth from Natufian-hunted gazelles give clues to climate during Eastern Mediterranean Younger Dryas

Posted on March 28, 2016 by No Author -

A team of researchers have concluded that the Younger Dryas, the worldwide climatic downturn between 12,900 and 11,500 BP that many scientists suggest marked a return to glacial conditions, was cool but not as dry as previously thought in the Eastern Mediterranean region.

Led by Gideon Hartman of the University of Connecticut, the researchers developed a new set of seasonal climatic data for the southern Levant using carbon isotope measurements taken from the tooth enamel of gazelles killed by Natufian hunters as evidenced at Early and Late Natufian archaeological sites of the Hayonim and Hilton Tachtit caves in western Galilee, Israel. The values fall before and during the Younger Dryas, and provide a proxy measure for water availability in the area during that time period. The results reveal that, although climate conditions were cooler, consistent with the generally accepted characterization of the Younger Dryas, they were not dryer than the preceding Bølling-Allerød period. The researchers further hypothesize that the cooler conditions prompted the establishment of Natufian settlements in the Jordan Valley, where the warmer, more stable environment created conditions more favorable to higher wild cereal productivity. This, the researchers suggest, may have facilitated the transition to agriculture.

___________________________________________

Above, as exhibited in the Dagon Museum, mortars from Natufian culture and grinding stones from the Neolithic pre-pottery phase. Hanay, Wikimedia Commons

___________________________________________

The Natufian culture thrived from 12,500 to 9,500 BC in the Levant, before the advent of agriculture. The Natufians are thought to have been the ancestors of the builders of the first Neolithic settlements of the region. They were hunters, but they also exploited wild cereals. Some evidence has suggested that they actually cultivated rye at Tell Abu Hureyra, a site that is thought to have provided the earliest evidence of agriculture in the world.

The study* is published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

_________________________________________________________

*“Hunted gazelle evidence cooling, but not drying, during the Younger Dryas in the southern Levant,” by Gideon Hartman, Ofer Bar-Yosef, Alex Brittingham, Leore Grosman, and Natalie Munro.

_________________________________________________________

______________________________________________

Travel and learn with Far Horizons.

____________________________________________

Ancient Mesopotamian culture vanishing before our eyes

Posted on March 25, 2016 by No Author -

ECOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF AMERICA—For thousands of years, the marshes at the confluence of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers in modern day Iraq were an oasis of green in a dry landscape, hosting a wealth of wildlife. The culture of the Marsh Arab, or Ma’dan, people who live there is tightly interwoven with the ecosystem of the marshes. The once dense and ubiquitous common reed (Phragmites australis) served as raw material for homes, handicrafts, tools, and animal fodder for thousands of years. Distinctive mudhif communal houses, built entirely of bundled reeds, appear in Sumerian stonework from 5,000 years ago. Now that culture is drying up with the marshes.

Recent decades have brought extreme change to the fertile lands famous for the birth of agriculture and the rise of some of the world’s earliest cities. The sphere of daily life for Marsh Arab women has shrunk as the natural resources they traditionally cultivated have vanished, reports an international team of researchers in “Effects of Mesopotamian Marsh (Iraq) desiccation on the cultural knowledge and livelihood of Marsh Arab women,” published in the March 2016 issue of Ecosystem Health and Sustainability, a joint journal of the Ecological Society of America and Ecological Society of China.

The study* is the first effort to specifically document Marsh Arab women’s cultural relationship to marsh ecological services.

“Imagine the Everglades. The Marsh Arabs used to live in the middle of the water, surrounded by everything green. The fields, the reeds, and the water buffalo were around them. Now they have to walk five, ten kilometers to reach resources. The land is dry and brown,” said study author Nadia Al-Mudaffar Fawzi, an Iraqi marine ecologist who returned from New Zealand to the city of her birth in 2009 to teach and conduct research at the University of Basrah.

Al-Mudaffar Fawzi studies the impact of climate change on biodiversity in the marshes, the Persian Gulf, and the Shatt al-Arab river which connects them. Rising temperatures, falling water volume in the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, and groundwater pumping is causing the salt water in the Gulf to extend up the Shatt al-Arab, which is formed by the confluence of the Tigris and Euphrates. Basrah, now the second largest city in Iraq, is on the Shatt al Arab about 70 kilometers downstream of the confluence.

“When I came back in 2009, I knew there were lots of problems with drying of the system. We knew there was big impact on fish production, on water quality in the Shatt al-Arab, and in the north of the Gulf,” said Al-Mudaffar Fawzi.

In her investigations of the water systems, she also grew interested in the social impact of environmental change, and in people’s understandings of the effects of the environment on their lives. Iraq did not have environmental laws until the change of government in 2003, and they remain a low priority in the current chaotic conditions in the country.

“The whole situation in the marshes is completely different from what I saw before, in the ’70s and early ’80s,” she said. “Women used to play a role in the ecological system. They used to work with men in gathering reeds and in fishing, and we would see them in the market when they come and sell their produce, like the fish, and the milk from the buffalo, the cheese and the yogurt that they make.”

Al-Mudaffar Fawzi and her colleagues designed a survey to more formally ask Marsh Arab women about their lives and activities. With the exception of women living on the edge of the Mesopotamia Marshland National Park, created in 2013, where restoration efforts have seen some success, Marsh Arab women reported that their daily lives had narrowed to domestic tasks in the home. Very few women today go out to gather reeds or care for buffalo.

“The older women who were adults before the war would tell us, ‘back then I was out making dung patties, collecting reeds, taking care of buffalo,'” said author Kelly Goodwin, who works with the international NGO Millennium Relief and Development Services. “They say, ‘now I’m just at home’.”

Goodwin interviewed 34 women, ranging in age from teenagers to more than 70 years, in the Hammar Marshes north of the city of Basrah in December 2013-February 2014. More than half the interviewees were over 50. These older women were born and grew to adulthood before the war in the 1980s and destruction of the 1990s. Nearly 60 percent of younger women under 40 described their days as exclusively “domestic.”

We are not teaching our daughters, older women told the researchers, because the water is gone, the ground is dry and there are no reeds to gather. The water is too salty for our buffalo.

Although men and women have separate roles in Marsh Arab culture, traditional women’s work took women outside the home and brought supplementary income to the family through market sales. Women cared for water buffalo and gathered reeds to weave into mats, baskets, pigeon cages and other tools. Women turned high-fat buffalo milk into dairy products, dung into fuel, and raise chickens, cattle, and sheep. They helped cultivate rice, wheat, and dates. Usually women, not men, took fish, dairy, and handicrafts to sell in city markets.

“The marshes were a cultivated landscape, shaped by selective harvest, hunting, fishing, and burning to promote the natural resources that the Marsh Arabs used–much like the precolonial landscape was cultivated by native peoples here in California,” said author Michelle Stevens, a professor California State University in Sacramento. Also like California, Stevens said, climate change modeling predicts a future of hotter summers, accentuated droughts, and shrinking winter snowpacks in Turkey’s Taurus Mountains, where the Tigris and Euphrates rivers arise.

_________________________________________

A Marsh Arab (Ma’dan) woman carries freshly cut reeds, the traditional construction material of mats, baskets, and houses in the Mesopotamian Marshes of modern day Iraq. (2014) Credit: Kelly P. Goodwin

________________________________________________________

In Iraq, war and ongoing political instability have magnified the problems besieging marshes worldwide, particularly in arid landscapes: pollution and too many demands on the water that sustains them. The marshes enjoyed a burst of recovery the mid-2000s after drying up nearly completely in the previous decade. The influx of water, and resulting dramatic greening, can be seen in images from NASA’s Terra satellite, captured between 2000 and 2010. The resilient reeds returned quickly as the marshes rehydrated.

In the 1990s, former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein deliberately drained the marshes to facilitate oil discovery and to retaliate against tribes that participated in uprisings against his government. Marsh Arabs who had not already fled the front line fighting during the Iran-Iraq War of the 1980s, were forced to leave as the land became barren and dry.

After the Second Gulf War removed Hussein from power, Iraqis tore down the water diversions and returned water to the marshes. Many Marsh Arabs returned to their homeland. The apparent resilience of the ecosystem and the culture of the marshes masked fragility, however. The researchers fear that the Marsh may be approaching a threshold of no return, as the older generation with the wealth of skills needed to flourish in the marshes yields to a younger generation that never had the opportunity for hands-on learning.

Water in the Tigris and Euphrates has dropped to 20 percent of the pre-war volume. The remaining water carries so much salt that it is often undrinkable. Drought in 2007 hit the region hard, reversing many of the restorative gains for the ecosystem. The generation of Marsh Arabs that grew up outside the marshes had no practical experience of living in the marshes, and struggled to adapt to the lifestyle of their parents’ youth.

Goodwin describes the tapwater in Basrah as so salty that a filigree of crystals forms on the surface of dishes as they dry. Increased dependence on groundwater is worsening saltwater intrusion from the Gulf.

Although the Tigris and Euphrates rivers flow across the length Iraq, the water comes from outside its borders. Iraq is at the mercy of the water policies of its upstream neighbors Turkey, Syria, and Iran, all of which have intensified water development projects in recent years. The current political instability makes effective diplomacy on water issues difficult.

Recovery of the ecosystem and culture of the marshes will likely depend on diplomatic efforts to secure sufficient water, Al-Mudaffar Fawzi says. In Mesopotamia Marshlands National Park, Iraq’s first national park, restoration practices are emerging that appear to successfully restore social and ecological systems, and could be used as templates for restoration in other areas of the Mesopotamian Marshes. But this cannot be done without water.

The authors recommend that programs be implemented to preserve traditional skills, to develop a market for handicrafts to support women and their families, and to support cultural knowledge. Otherwise, with the passing of the older generation, these remnants of ancient Sumerian knowledge systems and traditional ways of life will soon be lost.

“It was extremely sobering sometimes to see the circumstances some people are living in,” said Goodwin. “Much of the land near Basrah city is desertified.” But visits to the marshes could also be thrilling, she said, and the visit to the restored region was almost magical.

“I really consider it was a privilege to sit with these women, drink tea, and hear their stories,” said Goodwin. “I would have loved to have tangible solutions to take back to them that could encourage the retention of cultural traditions and secure ecological restoration. I think they feel they are forgotten and overlooked. I wish I could tell them that they are not forgotten.”

Source: News release of the Ecological Society of America.

________________________________________________________

*Nadia Al-Mudaffar Fawzi, Kelly P. Goodwin , Bayan Mehdi, Michelle L. Stevens (2016) Effects of Mesopotamian Marsh (Iraq) desiccation on the cultural knowledge and livelihood of Marsh Arab women. Ecosystem Health and Sustainability 2(3):e01207. doi: 10.1002/ehs2.1207 Full text open access

________________________________________________________

______________________________________________

Travel and learn with Far Horizons.

____________________________________________

Australopithecus fossils found east of the Great Rift Valley

Posted on March 24, 2016 by No Author -

KYOTO UNIVERSITY—New fossils from Kenya suggest that an early hominid species— Australopithecus afarensis—lived far eastward beyond the Great Rift Valley and much farther than previously thought. An international team of paleontologists led by Emma Mbua of Mount Kenya University and Masato Nakatsukasa of Kyoto University report findings of fossilized teeth and forearm bone from an adult male and two infant A. afarensis from an exposure eroded by the Kantis River in Ongata-Rongai, a settlement in the outskirts of Nairobi.

“So far, all other A. afarensis fossils had been identified from the center of the Rift Valley,” explains Nakatsukasa. “A previous Australopithecus bahrelghazali discovery in Chad confirmed that our hominid ancestor’s distribution covered central Africa, but this was the first time an Australopithecus fossil has been found east of the Rift Valley. This has important implications for what we understand about our ancestor’s distribution range, namely that Australopithecus could have covered a much greater area by this age.”

A. afarensis is believed to have lived 3,700,000-3,000,000 years ago, as characterized by fossils like “Lucy” from Ethiopia.

____________________________________________

Above: A forensic facial reconstruction of A. afarensis based on fossil evidence. Cicero Moraes, Wikimedia Commons

___________________________________________________________

Stable isotope analysis revealed that the Kantis region was humid, but had a plain-like environment with fewer trees compared to other sites in the Great Rift Valley where A. afaransis fossils had previously appeared. “The hominid must have discovered suitable habitats in the Kenyan highlands. It seems that A. afaransis was good at adapting to varying environments,” notes Nakatsukasa.

The team’s survey also turned up masses of mammal fossils, including a few that probably belong to new species of bovids or baboons.

The authors write that the Kantis site was first noted in a 1991 geological survey. At that time, a farmer said that he and his family had come across fossilized bones from Kantis in the 1970s, although they did not recognize their importance. Following airing of Kenyan television programs on paleontological research, locals gradually started to appreciate the fossils. Since then, Kantis and other sites have been identified thanks to fossil notifications from the local population.

The team welcomes this achievement not only for its academic implications, but also for the benefits to the local community. “Kantis is in the vicinity of Nairobi, a major city,” said Nakatsukasa. “We hope that the discovery of the new site and the fossils will aid in increasing tourism, and in improving educational awareness of the local community.”

Source: Kyoto University news release.

__________________________________________________________

The paper “Kantis: A new Australopithecus site on the shoulders of the Rift Valley near Nairobi, Kenya” will appear May 2016 in the Journal of Human Evolution, with doi: 10.1016/j.jhevol.2016.01.006

__________________________________________________________

______________________________________________

Travel and learn with Far Horizons.

____________________________________________

Site in Germany yields human presence over 1 million years ago

Posted on March 23, 2016 by No Author -

The late Early Pleistocene site near Untermassfeld, in Germany, is now well known for a rich array of fauna dating back to about 1.07 million years ago, including simple ‘Mode 1’ (or Oldowan-type) stone tools evidencing early human occupation. Now researchers Günter Landeck and Joan Garcia Garriga report, for the first time, evidence of early human butchery in the form of cut marks on animal bones and intentional hammerstone-related bone breakage. These human-modified bones were recovered in a small faunal subsample excavated from levels with simple ‘Mode 1’ stone tools. The butchered assemblage was found during fieldwork and surveying of ancient riverbanks and channel erosion sediments. The report authors state that the frequent occurrence of butchery traces on bones of large-sized herd animals, such as an ancient species of Bison, may suggest that the early human occupiers of the site had an enhanced need for meat because of changes resulting in a depletion of nutritive plants in winter. The study authors further note that early access to the carcasses before they were consumed by other carnivores made it possible for the early humans to acquire a sufficient amount of meat for subsistence. The researchers conclude that the stone tools and human-altered faunal remains at Untermassfeld provide evidence for the oldest early human settlement at European continental mid-latitudes, or about 50° N.

_________________________________________________

A view of the picturesque modern village of Untermassfeld, near which the prehistoric site is located. Winfried Gaenssler, Wikimedia Commons

__________________________________________________________________

Untermassfeld is one among a few sites discovered in Europe that provide evidence of a Lower Pleistocene arrival of early humans in Europe. The findings from these sites have helped to formulate a new perspective on the dispersal pattern and timing of the prehistoric movement of humans, ultimately back to African origins.

The study is published in press in the Journal of Human Evolution.

_________________________________________________

______________________________________________

Travel and learn with Far Horizons.

____________________________________________

Uncovering the Citadel of El Pilar

Posted on March 21, 2016 by No Author -

Walking through this ancient Central American jungle landscape might be a puzzling, yet surprisingly delightful experience for a first-time visitor. You don’t clearly see the well-defined, great stone pyramids, ball-courts, temples, and other monuments so often attributed to great ancient Maya centers. But you see a tropical terrain that is anything but flat. There is a jungle-shrouded mound here, another one over there. A well-planned walking path winds through what one could describe as the Maya version of the Garden of Eden. Like the very first 18th and 19th century explorers of the Maya world, you see what could be ancient structures still hidden beneath their canopy shroud. Some of them have been partially exposed, betraying what might lie beneath, leaving the rest to the imagination. You soon realize that this place is very different than any other encountered in the Maya world. Today, archaeologists call this place El Pilar, which means “watering basin”, named for the abundance of streams around it and below its escarpment.

Divided along the imaginary line between western Belize and northeastern Guatemala, El Pilar is considered the largest site in the Belize River region, boasting over 25 known plazas and hundreds of other structures, covering an area of about 120 acres. Monumental construction at El Pilar began in the Middle Preclassic period, around 800 BCE, and at its height centuries later it supported more than 20,000 people. For three decades, archaeologist Anabel Ford has been exploring and studying this ancient Maya site. She is the Director of the Mesoamerican Research Center of the University of California, Santa Barbara. Unlike most archaeologists, however, she has taken a unique, highly selective conservation approach to investigating the site. With the exception of a fully exposed Maya house structure, most of the structures at El Pilar have remained completely conserved by design, still covered in their tropical shroud. She calls this ‘archaeology under the canopy’, where the natural environment enveloping the ancient monuments is maintained to protect the fragile structures from the elements. “Living biofilms attack the limestone where exposed, which rapidly deteriorates the vulnerable limestone facades,” she says. “It is tree cover that reduces exposure to sunshine and rain and maintains an even temperature that will preserve the monuments.”

__________________________________________

Courtesy BRASS/El Pilar

________________________________________________________

El Pilar lies below a thick jungle canopy. Courtesy BRASS/El Pilar

_____________________________________________

Above and below: Most of the El Pilar structures remain enshrouded in foliage, a natural strategy for conserving its remains. Courtesy BRASS/El Pilar Program

___________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________

The Citadel

Despite the mask of it’s jungle cloak, Ford and other archaeologists know that El Pilar generally resembles the pattern exhibited by most ancient Maya centers. Years of ground research and surveys have revealed this.

But in 2013, Ford and her colleagues encountered something very different.

“We discovered a completely new component of the greater site that does not meet with any traditional expectations,” said Ford. “It shares nothing in common with Classic Maya centers: no clear open plaza, no cardinal structure orientation, and curiously no evident relationship to the major Classic period site of El Pilar, little more that 500 meters away.”

What Ford is describing is an unseen building, or associated complex of buildings, that was only detected by remote sensing technology—more specifically, a laser application known as LiDAR, or Light Detection and Ranging—in this instance an airborne remote sensing technique utilizing a helicopter employing laser technology to penetrate the thick vegetation and forest canopy that overlies and enshrouds objects and structures. It is a way of ‘seeing through’ the forest to reveal things otherwise invisible to the naked eye.

LiDAR helped to produce a remarkable map of El Pilar, revealing unexposed Maya architectural and other human-made features that, although still hidden from the naked eye, fit an often-seen pattern. This new set of structures, however, was something new. Dubbed the “Citadel” because of its location perched atop a 380-meter-long by 200-meter-wide ridge, it features concentric terracing and what appear to be defensive ramparts up the ridge. “Based on the LiDAR, we knew that the overall area of the Citadel was approximately 13 hectares from the hilltop to the limits of the lower ramparts” states Ford in her report to the Belize government. It is topped by several structures up to five meters high. Unlike the other complexes below and nearby, it seems by placement to have been isolated from the rest of greater El Pilar.

Never before had Ford seen anything like this in all her years of Maya research. What could it be?

_____________________________________________

Above and below: LiDAR images showing the core area of El Pilar, with Citadel to its east (to the right in the picture). Courtesy BRASS/El Pilar

____________________________________________________________

Excavation

In a quest to find some answers, Ford returned to the site in 2015 with a small team, this time to do some ‘ground-truthing” and limited excavation to determine construction chronology and the age of the site. After arriving and beginning work, however, they found that they had to sift through extensive damage and debris left by looters. In addition, thick vines and underbrush had to be removed to examine and map the site. Despite this, the archaeologists began to develop a clearer picture of what they were uncovering.

“Covering almost 1 hectare, or about 2.5 acres, with 4-meter-high ramparts encircling a natural hill, the El Pilar ‘Citadel’ presents a remarkable image of construction ingenuity clearly with defense in mind,” said Ford. “While the lower two ramparts were created by the unusual strategy of quarrying into the limestone hill to create vertical faces that are impossible to scale, the upper terraces that make up the apex of the hill appear to be constructed with retaining walls and fill, a technique similar to most Maya monuments.”

“Our field investigations validated the architectural features of three in-line plazas from north to south along the hilltop,” writes Ford in her field report. “The northern plaza shows no evidence of superstructures, while the central (the highest) and southern ones supported ancient buildings, each with one temple and several other platforms.”* Stepped terraces were discovered to the north of the east corner of the North Plaza descending to the upper rampart. The Central Plaza featured the first five-meter tall temple with one platform to the south and one to the east with a small appendage. Immediately adjacent and to its south, the lower South Plaza featured another five-meter tall temple with an attached western platform. Two other small structures were located on the east side of the South Plaza.

The investigations confirmed some earlier LiDAR observations. Said Ford, “the archaeologists discovered that the placement of temples and platforms was not in the expected form that should be aligned in the cardinal directions at the edges of a plaza. Instead, the main central temple, at the highest point of the hill, is squarely in the middle of the plaza and oriented to the east.”

The team painstakingly cleared away the debris of looter’s trenches excavated decades ago into the core of the two temples. At the Central Plaza temple, the highest, archaeologists exposed a massive looter’s trench and shaft that demolished the center to a depth of more than 6 meters and exposed the details of some 10 construction episodes. Plaster floors, walls, stairs, rooms, and charcoal layers make up the sequence the archaeologists are piecing together from the devastation wrought by the looters. A second looter’s trench was discovered in the other temple, located within a southern plaza. Here, “the looter’s excavation destroyed the top of the temple and pried out beautifully dressed stone using picks on elegantly prepared stucco with painted black lines, showing cavalier disregard for the complexity of the ancient architecture,” said Ford. “Walls, doorways, additions, as well as a major plaster floor more than 25 cm think were so thoroughly damaged it is difficult to understand the architectural relationships.”

____________________________________________

Thick vines and underbrush at the Citadel site had to be removed, leaving trees for shade, before further work and mapping could take place. Courtesy BRASS/El Pilar

___________________________________________________________

The center temple structure before removal of overgrowth and debris. Courtesy BRASS/El Pilar

_______________________________________________

Center temple after clearing. Courtesy BRASS/El Pilar

_______________________________________________

Mapping the Citadel. Dr. Anabel Ford (left) with Julia Longo, a key member of the special team. Courtesy BRASS/El Pilar

_______________________________________________

The Age of the Site

In the 2015 exploratory excavations, much of the work necessarily focused on the temple areas affected by the looters’ trenches, which meant recovering ceramic material and other artifacts discarded by the looters into the backfill of their excavations. Although stratigraphic context could not obviously play a role in this, Ford and colleagues found that most of the recovered material, which represented vessels of bowls, jars and plates, were “consistent with the Preclassic (1000 BC to 250 AD)”. “Slipped vessels were waxy and presented durable surfaces characteristic of the Preclassic,” she reported. “Curiously, there were a few pieces that might be considered Middle Preclassic.”*

Preliminary analysis thus indicates that the Citadel is a Preclassic, or Late Preclassic, construction. But more significant than this is what the finds suggest about the relationship of the Citadel to the rest of the El Pilar center. “More significant,” reports Ford, “is that there was absolutely nothing to represent any of the later Classic (AD 250 – 950) periods. The El Pilar Citadel is firmly placed in the Late Preclassic and suggests a time frame around 250 BC would be probable, the same time the main monuments of El Pilar were expanding. Yet at the Citadel the constructions were left by c. 250 AD.”*

In other words, by Classic period times, when El Pilar was at its height, the Citadel may have been a relic of the past. Either the site was abandoned and unused as obsolete and unimportant since Preclassic times or it may have been left, for perhaps sacred or other reasons, intentionally ‘undefiled’ by later modification or construction.

In any case, clearly it was regarded as something significant at some point in ancient Maya history. The enormous work that had to be expended for the construction of its massive ramparts and associated concentric terraces seem to testify to a defensive work of monumental proportions. Reports Ford: “The rampart rings are the most distinguishing feature of the El Pilar Citadel, giving it an appearance of a bivallate European hill fort. The upper rampart, 14 meters below the Central Plaza at 224 meters, encloses a 20,000 square meter area and the lower, 38 meters below the Central Plaza at 200 meters, encloses approximately a 68,000 square meter area……..these ramparts present 3-4 meter high vertical obstacles with no obvious entry points.”* Ford estimates that their construction would have required the removal of approximately 12,400 cubic meters of earth and stone.

No small feat, that.

___________________________________________

LiDAR image showing more clearly delineated core area of El Pilar, and the Citadel to the far right, east of the core area. Courtesy BRASS/El Pilar

_____________________________________________________________

LiDAR image showing the Citadel with renderings of currently-detected structures and their relative dimensions and locations at the top of the ridge, including the two lower ramparts. Courtesy BRASS/El Pilar

______________________________________________________________

The Enduring Mystery

Archaeologists are now only beginning to scratch the surface to understand the nature, function, and dating of the site—and its enigmatic relationship (if any) to the Classic period El Pilar core site nearby. Answers to these key questions may help place the Citadel, and El Pilar generally, within the context of ancient Maya civilization and society in general.

The most recent excavations, including the analysis of recovered ceramics and profile maps developed from the initial Citadel ground investigation, however, have provided a few opening round clues and raised new questions. Whatever it is, the hilltop structures were constructed in Late Preclassic times, when the adjacent main site of El Pilar below it to the west was first expanding its monumental structures. Thus far, nothing has been recovered to date the ‘defensive’ ramparts and terracing, so it is not entirely improbable that they could have been built at a later time, such as the Classic period, to protect the site for some unknown reason. So were they constructed to protect the hilltop establishment while it was in use, or were they constructed to protect it as a sacred relic of the past? Finally, no Late Classic material was recovered from the looters’ trenches of the Citadel, the time period when El Pilar witnessed the bulk of its construction—this suggests the Citadel “was not integrated into the Late Classic civic monuments of El Pilar”.*

Ford is the first to suggest that much more work needs to be done before the mysteries of the Citadel can be solved. But a promising start has opened the way for more intensive and refined research.

“What was its significance? How was it used? Why was it isolated?” asks Ford. “There is no doubt we will have a better sense of the place after the investigations.”

__________________________________________________________

* Anabel Ford, Unexpected Discovery with LiDAR: Uncovering the Citadel at El Pilar in the Context of the Maya Forest GIS, University of California, Santa Barbara, December 2015

__________________________________________________________

Pushing the Prehistoric Fringe

Posted on March 21, 2016 by Jason Weaver -

For some, July and August in Siberia’s otherwise frigid Taimyr Peninsula could afford tolerable temperatures for walking about. At least that was the case for 11-year-old young explorer Yevgeny Salinder. During the summer of 2012, Yevgeny was living with his parents at the Sopkarga polar meteorological station on the Sopochnaya Karga (SK) Cape, where they were working. About 2,200 miles northeast of Moscow, the Cape is a stark sub-polar alpine landscape with mossy bogs, a moist tundra with waterlogged soils, and a home for the likes of animals like reindeer, wolves, arctic foxes, wolverines and mountain hare. For most of humanity, exploring this area might be at once both severe and exotic. For Yevgeny, however, a day’s adventure hiking about the Cape would not have been extraordinary.

Until he found a dead mammoth along the way.

Preserved for tens of thousands of years where it fell to its death in the permafrost, at least some of its remains were exposed enough by 2012 to have been visible to young Yevgeny on a coastal bluff off the eastern shore of Yenisei Bay—limbs sticking out of the frozen mud where a river enters the Yenisei Bay just 3 kilometers away from his station home.

It was like finding buried treasure.

After his return, he told his parents who, recognizing the potential rarity and import of the discovery, brought it to the attention of those who would know something about such things—like Alexei Tikhonov of the Russian Academy of Sciences in St. Petersburg. Tikhonov is a zoologist by education, but he is perhaps best known for his recent discoveries and published research related to paleontological finds through various excavations at arctic and subarctic locations. Leading a small team in late September of 2012, Tikhonov carefully excavated the carcass from its natural grave. In the process, more of its features became apparent—a nearly complete mammoth, with the right half of the carcass still retaining soft tissue, including skin, hair, one ear and even male reproductive organs. Weighing in at more than 500 kg, it turned out to be among the best-preserved mammoths ever found. The excavated remains were sent for cold storage in nearby Dudinks and then shipped to St Petersburg in early May of 2013.

A Pleistocene Hunting Scene

The most tantalizing findings, however, did not occur until after the scientists dated the bones and began examining them up close. Now popularly nick-named ‘Zhenya’ after the boy founder, researchers determined that the SK mammoth was about 15 or 16 years old when he died at least 45,000 years ago, based on radiocarbon dating. The likely cause of death—human hunting.

This was revelatory, as up until now no humans were known to have existed in the Arctic this long ago. “The [new Yenisei Bay] site is much older than everything known before in the arctic regions, and it is clearly located farther north from the areas where sites of that age have been found,” said Vladimir Pitulko, also of the Russian Academy of Sciences, who examined the remains in detail. “It is about 20 degrees north (about 1900 km, or 1300 miles) of any site of comparable age…… and this is a big change.”

So how did Pitulko and his colleagues come to suggest that Zhenya met his fate by human hunters?

After closely examining Zhenya’s bones, including the left scapula, several ribs, jugal bone, and right tusk, Pitulko could come to no other conclusion than that they bore marks characteristic of wounds inflicted by a weapon and butchering marks left by stone tools. He knew this because at least one of the marks exhibited features very similar to those he found on a Pleistocene wolf humerus from excavations he conducted at Bunge-Toll in the middle Yana river in the western part of the Yana-Indighirka lowland (in westernmost Western Beringia), years before. The wolf remains had been found among the remains of other Pleistocene megafauna, such as mammoth, bison, reindeer, and rhinoceros. Using high-resolution X-ray computed tomography done by Konstantin Kuper at the Budker Institute for Nuclear Physics in Novosibirsk, Pitulko and colleagues could see a clear bone injury caused by penetration of a sharp implement with a conical tip. “The tool penetrated the bone deeply, taking pieces of cortical pieces inside the bone, which means it was a powerful blow,” said Pitulko. And now, some years later, Zhenya’s bone marks were likewise telling. “One of them was found on the inner side of the jugal bone (cheek bone) which was still attached to the skull. There is no natural or taphonomic reason for such an injury — this was not a bone pathology, it was not the result of carnivore chewing and it was not left by the excavation process — therefore we may expect it to be a result of human contact,” said Pitulko. After X-ray computer tomography conducted by Konstantin Kuper, the researchers were actually able to determine the inflicting weapon’s shape and size, enough to even reconstruct the shape of the tip that penetrated the bone. “It had a thinned symmetric outline and was relatively sharp,” continued Pitulko. “In most cases, bone or ivory weapons have a conical tip that is symmetric and quite acute (~30° to 40°) at the end, but they are [usually] relatively fragile and often break as they penetrate bones. In this case, the tool resisted breaking and inflicted injury on the cranial bones. The blade retained its weapon characteristics and retained enough energy to penetrate the cheekbone surface deeply into the bone. The blow was evidently very powerful and was suffered by the animal from the left back and from top down, which is only possible if the animal was lying down on the ground.” Pitulko suggests that the blow was likely an attempt intended for the base of Zhenya’s trunk, a hunting practice still used by elephant hunters today to cut major arteries and cause mortal bleeding. “This blow becomes necessary,” he maintains, “after the animal has been sufficiently injured, and the SK mammoth (Zhenya) displays numerous injuries in the thoracic area (the ribs and the left scapula). The most remarkable of them is found on the fifth left rib. This is an incision or cut mark left by some sharp tool slicing down. This pattern is very typical on mammoth bones, specifically on ribs, found [for example] at the Yana site.”

Overall, Tikhonov, Pitulko and colleagues suggest a scene where Zhenya was encountered by human hunters about 45,000 years ago, wounded/ brought down and killed, and then butchered immediately thereafter in place. Cut marks clearly made by cutting tools were evidenced on the left scapula and ribs, and even the right tusk showed signs of bone removal of a nature that suggested the possibility that the hunters fashioned ivory cutting tools from Zhenya himself.

________________________________________________

Excavations of the SK mammoth site in late September of 2012 near Sopochnaya Karga weather station at the Yenisei river mouth. Photo by Aleksei Tikhonov

______________________________________________________________

SK mammoth (‘Zhenya’) unearthed. Sergey Gorbunov is excavating the left side of the carcass in the head area. Photo by Aleksei Tikhonov

____________________________________________________________

The SK mammoth (‘Zhenya’). Aleksei Tikhonov (in the middle, and his field crew). Photo by S.V.Gorbunov

_______________________________________________

Selection of bones collected by Tikhonov at the Bunge-Toll site. Note the wolf humerus (top left) positioned by the injuried side up. Photo Aleksei Tikhonov

___________________________________________________

Aleksei Tikhonov (left) and Vladimir Pitulko discussing injury on the jugal bone of the SK mammoth at Zoological Museum (RAS), St Petersburg. Photo by Elena Pavlova

______________________________________________________

Cut mark on the SK mammoth 5th left rib. Photo Pavel Ivanov

_____________________________________________________

Documenting human caused injuries on the SK mammoth scapula at the Institute for the History of Material Culture, RAS, St Petersburg. Pavel Ivanov and Vladimir Pitulko (on the right). Photo by Elena Pavlova

_________________________________________________________

The Significance and Implications

Paleolithic records of humans in the Eurasian Arctic are relatively scarce. Only a few sites in this region have yielded clues to an early human presence. In mainland arctic Siberia, the site of Berelekh, discovered by Nikolay Vereschagin in the early 70s, was for years the location yielding the oldest evidence for human migration into the arctic regions. It dated to about 13,000 years ago. But in 2001 another site in Siberia, known as Yana, produced evidence of a human presence dating back to about 27,000 -30,000 years. Excavated by archaeologist Vladimir Pitulko, also of the Russian Academy of Sciences, it yielded tools made from rhinoceros horn and mammoth tusk, as well as hundreds of other stone artifacts including choppers, scrapers and other biface implements. “But I never thought that even this was the final age estimate for human migrations into the arctic,” said Pitulko.

So Zhenya and the SK site have buttressed the site researchers’ suggestion that people were present in the central Siberian Arctic by about 45,000 years ago. At this time, according to Pitulko, mammoth hunting by modern humans probably became a critical element in human survival in the harsh environment and landscape of what is today Siberia. Like the modern-day elephant, the mammoth would have provided a critical source of food, fuel (dung, fat, and bones), and raw material for construction and hunting weapons and tools for processing, all the more important in the open landscapes of the Northern Eurasian steppe, which is mostly tree-less. Removed from the hunted dead carcasses of their mammoth prey, “ivory became a substitution for materials used for shafts and points long and strong enough for killing large animals, not necessarily the mammoth,” said Pitulko. “Such tools are found elsewhere in the Upper Paleolithic, and this includes even full-size spears of ivory which are known from [the sites of] Sunghir, European Russia or from Berelekh, Siberia. This innovation became a really important discovery for humans and finally helped them in surviving and settling these landscapes.”

_______________________________________________

Worked tip of the SK mammoth tusk. Photo by Pavel Ivanov

_________________________________________________

Field study of the bones collected at the Yana site from the Yana mass accumulation of mammoth (August 2012) – looking for human impact. Photo Elena Pavlova

___________________________________________________________________

Pitulko surveying exposures in Yana river. Photo Elena Pavlova

____________________________________________________________________

Thus, according to the researchers’ report, advancements in mammoth hunting likely allowed humans to survive and spread widely across northernmost Arctic Siberia at this time, representing an important cultural shift – one that likely facilitated the arrival of humans in the area close to the Bering land bridge, providing them an opportunity to enter the New World before the Last Glacial Maximum.

“This is especially important for questions related to the peopling of the New World, because now we know that the eastern Siberia up to its arctic limits was populated starting at roughly 50,000 years ago,” says Pitulko. “Until 15,000 years ago, sea-level (though changing) still remained low, which is clear from appropriate dates on terrestrial animals in the New Siberian islands. This presumes that the Bering Land Bridge existed probably most or part of this time, so the New World gate remained open…….The history of the territory which we call Western Beringia is of particular interest since it is close to the Bering Land Bridge area and then everything that was going on in this area is related (or can be related) to the question of the peopling of the New World. Most of the Eurasian north, including Western Beringia, was unglaciated [at this time] and available for humans.”

Could modern humans have crossed over to the New World from here in these early times?

“Probably yes,” says Pitulko.

But did they?

Pitulko recognizes that there is much more work to do, and additional finds that need to be made, before this question can be answered and a conclusive picture of human habitation in these regions can be drawn. In any case, for now, a new stage is set for going forward.

“These finds change our minds about possible options and this is going to provide a new stimulus for further research.”

______________________________________________________________

Metallic ink used in the Herculaneum scrolls

Posted on March 21, 2016 by No Author -

Analysis of Herculaneum papyrus scroll fragments reveals the use of metallic ink in Greco-Roman literary inscription centuries earlier than previously thought, according to a study*. Scholars of ancient scrolls hold that texts from antiquity, particularly Greek and Latin literary manuscripts produced until the fourth century AD, were largely written in carbon-based ink on papyri, the fibrous structure of which allowed scribes to jettison ruling lines. Vito Mocella and colleagues used nondestructive synchrotron X-ray-based methods to chemically analyze the barely visible black inscriptions on two nearly flat, multilayered papyrus fragments that were found at the Villa dei Papiri at Herculaneum in the mid-18th century and are housed at the Paris-based Institut de France. The introduction of metal in writing materials is generally dated to fourth-fifth century AD, but the fragments’ high lead concentrations—around 84 µg/cm² and 16 µg/cm²—suggest purposeful use of lead-containing ink, thus ruling out contamination from aqueducts, inkpots, or containers, and pushing back by several centuries the advent of metallic ink for literary inscription in the Greco-Roman period. Spots of concentrated lead likely correspond to the beginnings and ends of the scribes’ pen strokes on the scrolls. Letters on the fragments were bounded by naturally occurring horizontal lines of papyrus fibres that appear to have served as alignment guides for straight-line writing. The lines are likely signatures of cristobalite, a quartz-like mineral found in the papyrus plant. According to the authors, the findings might shape future analysis of unopened Herculaneum scrolls.

_______________________________________

An example of a section of one of the charred/carbonized scrolls found at the Villa dei Papiri in Herculaneum. Wikimedia Commons

____________________________________________________

The Herculaneum papyri consist of more than 1,800 papyri found in Herculaneum in the 18th century, carbonized by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in AD 79.

Source: PNAS subject news release

____________________________________________________

* “Revealing metallic ink in Herculaneum papyri,” by Emmanuel Brun et al.

____________________________________________________

______________________________________________

Travel and learn with Far Horizons.

____________________________________________

Archaeologists create 3-D interactive digital reconstruction of King Richard III

Posted on March 21, 2016 by No Author -

UNIVERSITY OF LEICESTER—University of Leicester archaeologists who discovered and helped to identify the mortal remains of King Richard III have created a 3D interactive representation of the grave and the skeleton of the king under the car park.

It is revealed today (Tuesday 22 March) on the first year anniversary of the reinterment of Richard III when the coffin bearing the mortal remains first emerged from the Fielding Johnson Building at the University of Leicester.

Following a procession through the county and city, the remains were handed to the care of Leicester Cathedral by archaeologist Richard Buckley and King Richard III was reinterred on 26 March 2015.

The team from University of Leicester Archaeological Services (ULAS) has now created a fully rotatable computer model which shows the king’s remains in-situ as they were found during the 2012 archaeological excavation.

Using photographs taken during the project, sophisticated photogrammetry software has been used to create an accurate representation of the grave and the skeleton.

The interactive model, which can be explored via the 3D sharing platform Sketchfab, graphically reveals in a new and immersive way the minimal reverence with which the king was buried.

Mathew Morris, Site Supervisor for University of Leicester Archaeological Services was the man who first discovered the remains of King Richard III- on the first day of the dig under the Leicester car park. He said: “Photographs and drawings of the grave, whilst dramatic, are only two-dimensional and do not always best show nuances in spatial relationships that a three-dimensional model can.

“Photogrammetry provides a fantastic analytical tool that allows us to examine the grave from angles that would have been physically difficult or impossible to achieve during the excavation, and gives us the ability to continue to examine the king’s grave long after the excavation has finished.”

Archaeologists discovered that the poorly dug grave was not only too short for the king, but was messily dug with sloping sides and an uneven base. This made it awkward for the burial party to lay the body out neatly in the grave. Instead, it was left slightly slumped on one side with the head propped up because it would not fit properly – physical evidence which fits with historical accounts which say that Richard III was buried without pomp or solemn funeral.

Mathew Morris added: “During the excavation in 2012 we took photographs of the skeleton from multiple angles to create a lasting record of how the king’s bones were positioned in the grave before we exhumed them. These photos were not taken with photogrammetry in mind but the software is incredibly versatile and can be applied retrospectively to create this superb model.”

Photogrammetry is used in a wide range of fields from topographic mapping to the movie and gaming industry and it is often used by archaeologists because it provides a quick, extremely versatile and cost-effective method of recording and analysing complex objects and surfaces using software that turns multiple two-dimensional digital photographs into a three-dimensional model. Under suitable conditions, the technique can produce geo-referenced results similar to those of laser scanning and can be applied to photographs taken during archaeological excavations, building surveys and laboratory conservation.

The software, Agisoft’s Photoscan, looks for points of commonality in overlapping photographs of a single object or surface from which it can extrapolate a three-dimensional point cloud which can be converted to a polygon mesh. The photographs can then also be used to render the surface reconstruction to create a photo-realistic effect.

__________________________________________________________

The remains of King Richard III were found by a team of archaeologists* from the University of Leicester beneath a city center car park in Leicester in 2012. Credit: University of Leicester

_____________________________________________________________

The interactive digital model can be explored via the 3-D sharing platform Sketchfab. Credit: University of Leicester

______________________________________________________________

King Richard III’s grave and other digital models of recent archaeological discoveries made by ULAS are all viewable via the 3D sharing platform Sketchfab for everyone to explore.

They can also be used for educational purposes, providing an interactive tool that can be used in the classroom by schools to study archaeological material that is often only accessible in museums.

Source: University of Leicester news release

_____________________________________________________________

*The dig for Richard III was led by the University of Leicester, working with Leicester City Council and in association with the Richard III Society. The originator of the Search project was Philippa Langley of the Richard III Society.

_____________________________________________________________

______________________________________________

Travel and learn with Far Horizons.

____________________________________________

Modern Melanesians have retained Denisovan DNA

Posted on March 17, 2016 by No Author -

AMERICAN ASSOCIATION FOR THE ADVANCEMENT OF SCIENCE—Modern Melanesians harbor genetic components passed on from Denisovans, a new study* suggests. In the past, ancestors of many modern human populations interbred with other hominin species that have since become extinct, such as the Neandertals and Denisovans. Mapping the gene flow of surviving genetic sequences from these species, as well as other species of hominin, helps shed light on how past interbreeding has affected human evolution. While previous studies have documented Neandertal gene flow in modern humans, much less is known about the characteristics of Denisovan DNA that persist in humans today. To gain more insights, Benjamin Vernot et al.* analyzed the genomes of 1,523 individuals from around the world, including 35 individuals from Northern Island Melanesia, in Papua New Guinea. Their results showed that while all non-African populations surveyed inherited roughly 1.5-4% of their genomes from Neandertals, Melanesians were the only population that also had significant Denisovan genetic ancestry, representing between 1.9% and 3.4% of their genome. The researchers then mapped out the genetic flow of Neandertal and Denisovan sequences, finding that Neandertal admixture, or gene flow, occurred at least three distinct times in human history. In contrast, Denisovan admixture likely only occurred once. Further analysis revealed that certain regions of the modern human genome are particularly depleted of these archaic lineages, including those that play a role in the developing cortex and adult striatum. These findings provide new insights into human evolution and gene flow.

_______________________________________

Map showing spread and evolution of Denisovans. John D. Croft, Wikimedia Commons

Article Source: American Association for the Advancement of Science news release.

_____________________________________________________

*”Excavating Neandertal and Denisovan DNA from the genomes of Melanesian individuals,” by B. Vernot; S. Tucci; J.G. Schraiber; A.B. Wolf; R.M. Gittelman; R.C. McCoy; J. Wakefield; J.M. Akey at University of Washington in Seattle, Washington; S. Tucci; S. Pääbo at University of Ferrara in Ferrara, Italy; J. Kelso; M. Dannemann; S. Grote at Max-Planck-Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany; H. Norton at University of Cincinnati in Cincinnati, OH; L.B. Scheinfeldt at Coriell Institute for Medical Research in Camden, NJ; D.A. Merriwether at Binghamton University in Binghamton, NY; G. Koki at Institute for Medical Research in Goroka, Papua New Guinea; J.S. Friedlaender at Temple University in Philadelphia, PA.

_____________________________________________________

______________________________________________

Travel and learn with Far Horizons.

____________________________________________

Popular Archaeology Spring 2016 Issue Released

Posted on March 15, 2016 by No Author -

Popular Archaeology Magazine is pleased to announce the issuance of the Spring 2016 issue of Popular Archaeology, featuring articles that many readers will surely find fascinating. The new feature articles include:

Uncovering the Citadel of El Pilar: An unusual, isolated ancient Maya complex has archaeologists digging for answers. (Complimentary free premium article)

Building the Great Pyramid: After years of research, an engineer hatches a radical new concept, joining the list of theories that explain how the Great Pyramid of Giza was constructed. (Premium article)

Pushing the Prehistoric Fringe: A recently examined mammoth tells a story of a human presence in the Arctic 45,000 years ago. (Premium article)

Spears of the Ancient Huntsman: The unprecedented finds at a site in Germany are changing what we know about Paleolithic humans. (Premium article)

An Alternative Perspective: The Jerusalem Temple: A controversial theory places the actual location of the biblical First and Second temples on ancient Jerusalem’s southeastern hill, in the old City of David. (Premium article)

What New York’s Catacombs Are Telling Me: One author’s personal quest takes us on a journey through the intersection of archaeology and genealogy. (Free to the public)

History in the Teeth: How ‘reading’ and studying the teeth of long-deceased people can shed light on past lives, deaths, and health conditions. (Available with a regular (free) subscription)

Rediscovering Our Element: One physician’s palaeoanthropological perspective on what makes so many of us ill and what we can do about it. (Free to the public)

Church and State in Late Roman Antiquity: An academic treatment shedding light on our understanding of the relationship between Church and State during late Roman antiquity. (Free to the public)

Planned for the Summer 2016 issue:

In Search of the Historical Jesus: Tantalizing archaeological finds bearing on Jesus and his times; and the compelling, life-long quest of a renowned, pioneering scholar searching for clues about the historical Jesus, his family, and early Christianity— and what he is discovering.

On the Edge of the Kingdom: Ancient Tamar: Archaeological finds tell the story of an important fortress on the fringe of ancient Israel and Judea.

The Compassionate Human: The evolutionary origins of tenderness, trust and morality.

And more to come……….

We hope you will enjoy the Spring 2016 issue, and please feel free to let us know what you think by emailing us at [email protected]

________________________________________________

______________________________________________

Travel and learn with Far Horizons.

____________________________________________

Early human habitat recreated for first time

Posted on March 10, 2016 by No Author -

RUTGERS UNIVERSITY—Scientists have pieced together an early human habitat for the first time, and life was no picnic 1.8 million years ago.

Our human ancestors, who looked like a cross between apes and modern humans, had access to food, water and shady shelter at a site in Olduvai Gorge, Tanzania. They even had lots of stone tools with sharp edges, said Gail M. Ashley, a professor in the Rutgers Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences in the School of Arts and Sciences.

But “it was tough living,” she said. “It was a very stressful life because they were in continual competition with carnivores for their food.”

During years of work, Ashley and other researchers carefully reconstructed an early human landscape on a fine scale, using plant and other evidence collected at the sprawling site. Their pioneering work was published recently in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The landscape reconstruction will help paleoanthropologists develop ideas and models on what early humans were like, how they lived, how they got their food (especially protein), what they ate and drank and their behavior, Ashley said.

Famous paleoanthropologist Mary Leakey discovered the site in 1959 and uncovered thousands of animal bones and stone tools. Through exhaustive excavations in the last decade, Ashley, other scientists and students collected numerous soil samples and studied them via carbon isotope analysis.

The landscape, it turned out, had a freshwater spring, wetlands and woodland as well as grasslands.

“We were able to map out what the plants were on the landscape with respect to where the humans and their stone tools were found,” Ashley said. “That’s never been done before. Mapping was done by analyzing the soils in one geological bed, and in that bed there were bones of two different hominin species.”

The two species of hominins, or early humans, are Paranthropus boisei – robust and pretty small-brained – and Homo habilis, a lighter-boned species. Homo habilis had a bigger brain and was more in sync with our human evolutionary tree, according to Ashley.

__________________________________________

An artist’s rendition of an early human habitat in East Africa 1.8 million years ago. Credit: M.Lopez-Herrera via The Olduvai Paleoanthropology and Paleoecology Project and Enrique Baquedano.

________________________________________________

Gail M. Ashley, a professor in Rutgers University’s Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences. Credit: Courtesy of Gail M. Ashley

________________________________________

Both species were about 4.5 to 5.5 feet tall, and their lifespan was likely about 30 to 40 years.

Through their research, the scientists learned that the shady woodland had palm and acacia trees. They don’t think the hominins camped there. But based on the high concentration of bones, the primates probably obtained carcasses elsewhere and ate the meat in the woods for safety, Ashley said.

In a surprising twist, a layer of volcanic ash covered the site’s surface, nicely preserving the bones and organic matter, said Ashley, who has conducted research in the area since 1994.

“Think about it as a Pompeii-like event where you had a volcanic eruption,” she said, noting that a volcano is about 10 miles from the site. The eruption “spewed out a lot of ash that completely blanketed the landscape.”

On the site, scientists found thousands of bones from animals such as giraffes, elephants and wildebeests, swift runners in the antelope family. The hominins may have killed the animals for their meat or scavenged leftover meat. Competing carnivores included lions, leopards and hyenas, which also posed a threat to hominin safety, according to Ashley.

Paleoanthropologists “have started to have some ideas about whether hominins were actively hunting animals for meat sources or whether they were perhaps scavenging leftover meat sources that had been killed by say a lion or a hyena,” she said.

“The subject of eating meat is an important question defining current research on hominins,” she said. “We know that the increase in the size of the brain, just the evolution of humans, is probably tied to more protein.”

The hominins’ food also may have included wetland ferns for protein and crustaceans, snails and slugs.

Scientists think the hominins likely used the site for a long time, perhaps tens or hundreds of years, Ashley said.

“We don’t think they were living there,” she said. “We think they were taking advantage of the freshwater source that was nearby.”

Source: Rutgers University

_______________________________________________

______________________________________________

Travel and learn with Far Horizons.

____________________________________________

Tiny island deer in Panama hunted to extinction thousands of years ago

Posted on March 3, 2016 by No Author -

SMITHSONIAN TROPICAL RESEARCH INSTITUTE—As polar ice caps melted at the end of the last Ice Age about 8,500 years ago, the global sea level rose and Panama’s Pearl Islands were isolated from the mainland. A new archaeological study by a team including a Smithsonian scientist shows that several thousand years later pre-Columbian colonists hunted a dwarf deer to extinction on an island called Pedro González.

The settlers arrived on the 14-hectare island by sea 6,200 years ago and stayed for a maximum of eight centuries, farming maize and roots, fishing, gathering palm fruits and shellfish and hunting deer, opossums, agoutis, iguanas and large snakes–the major predators.

“When I was washing the animal bones from the first test cut in 2008, out fell a deer ankle bone called a calcaneum,” said Richard Cooke, archaeologist at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute and co-author of the study. “It was so tiny that I realized we had come across a population that had probably dwarfed through isolation.”

The Pearl Archipelago, named for rich pearl beds encountered by early Spanish explorers, lies about 16 miles off Panama’s Pacific coast. The islands are perhaps best known as the location of several seasons of the TV series, Survivor. As Darwin discovered in the Galapagos, islands are hotbeds of evolution. Through time, animals isolated from mainland populations commonly undergo a reduction in size compared to their mainland relatives due to competition for limited food resources. In the case of the dwarf deer, this must have occurred between the time when the island was isolated from the mainland and the time when the settlers arrived.

Adult deer living on Pedro González island 6,000 years ago weighed less than 22 pounds, about as much as a beagle. Collagen fingerprint studies by Manchester University biochemist Mike Buckley infer that deer bones on the island were not from the tiny red brocket deer, corzo in Spanish, found in Panama today. Deer bones on the island represent a different group of deer, which includes white-tailed deer and some gray brocket populations found in South America. Only DNA studies will confirm to which deer clade the island deer belong. Buckley found that the 6,000-year-old deer bones belong to the same lineage as a larger deer still found on San José island, 5 miles to the south in the Pearl Archipelago. Why it survived there is an unresolved mystery.

About 2,500 fragments of deer bones corresponding to 22 individuals were found in the 4-meter-deep trash heap (midden) that built up in a large hollow near the coast. Some deer bones had cuts indicating butchering, such as disarticulation and slicing meat from the bone, or had the marks of human teeth. Others had been burned or smashed to get at the marrow. Antlers and long bones were often cut for making everyday tools and ornaments. Hunting appears to have been indiscriminate, including adults as well as juveniles.

The number of deer bones decreased in the youngest layer of the midden, and those of older adults were absent, suggesting that the species was becoming scarcer and life expectancies lower. No deer bones were found in later layers left by pottery-using people after 2,300 years ago, indicating that the species had become extinct on Pedro González by then.

__________________________________________

Bones of dwarf deer show butchering marks. Archaeologists on Pedro González Island in the Bay of Panama were surprised to find bones of a dwarf deer in a 6,000-year-old waste pile of island residents who apparently hunted the deer to extinction. Credit: STRI

________________________________________________________

The history of this tiny deer illustrates just how vulnerable island species can be. The loss of the Pedro González dwarf deer may inspire conservation of the population still found on the neighboring island.

Source: Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute subject news release.

________________________________________________________

______________________________________________

Travel and learn with Far Horizons.

____________________________________________

A newly discovered Anglo-Saxon island

Posted on March 2, 2016 by No Author -

UNIVERSITY OF SHEFFIELD—The remains of an Anglo-Saxon island have been uncovered in one of the most important archaeological finds in decades.

The island which was home to a Middle Saxon settlement was found at Little Carlton near Louth, Lincolnshire by archaeologists from the University of Sheffield.

It is thought the site is a previously unknown monastic or trading centre but researchers believe their work has only revealed an enticing glimpse of the settlement so far.

The exciting discovery was made after a local metal detectorist Graham Vickers reported an intriguing item to the Lincolnshire Finds Liaison Officer (FLO), Dr Adam Daubney, from the Portable Antiquities Scheme which encourages the voluntary recording of archaeological objects found by members of the public in England and Wales.

Mr Vickers unearthed a silver stylus, which is an ornate writing tool dating back to the 8th century, from a disturbed plough field.

This was the first of many unusual items found at the site which held important clues to the significant settlement lying below.

The large number of artefacts now include a total of 21 styli, around 300 dress pins, and a huge number of ‘Sceattas’, coins from the 7th-8th centuries, as well as a small lead tablet bearing the faint but legible letters spelling ‘Cudberg’ which is a female Anglo-Saxon name.

__________________________________________

A glass counter decorated with twisted colorful strands was found at the site. Credit: University of Sheffield

____________________________________________________________

After the interesting finds were reported, Dr Hugh Willmott and Pete Townend, a doctoral student from the University of Sheffield’s Department of Archaeology, visited the site to carry out targeted geophysical and magnetometry surveys along with 3D modelling to visualise the landscape on a large scale.

The imagery showed that the island they had discovered was much more obvious than the land today, rising out of its lower surroundings. To complete the picture the researchers raised the water level digitally to bring it back up to its early medieval height based on the topography and geophysical survey.

Dr Willmott, said: “Our findings have demonstrated that this is a site of international importance, but its discovery and initial interpretation has only been possible through engaging with a responsible local metal detectorist who reported their finds to the Portable Antiquities Scheme.”

Students from the University have subsequently opened nine evaluation trenches at the site which revealed a wealth of information about what life would have been like at the settlement.

They found a number of intriguing items including an area which seems to have been an area of industrial working, as well as very significant quantities of Middle Saxon pottery and butchered animal bone.

“It’s been an honour to be invited to work on such a unique site and demonstrate the importance of working with local people on the ground; one of the greatest strengths of the University of Sheffield is its active promotion of an understanding of our shared pasts for all concerned,” added Dr Willmott.

Source: University of Sheffield news release.

___________________________________________

______________________________________________

Travel and learn with Far Horizons.

____________________________________________

Finds reveal how ancient Egyptian and Nubian cultures blended

Posted on March 1, 2016 by No Author -

UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA – SANTA BARBARA—In a middle-class tomb just east of the Nile River in what was Upper Nubia, a woman offers a glimpse of how two met civilizations met, mingled and a new pharaonic dynasty arose. Her tomb was Egyptian, but she was buried in the Nubian style—placed in a flexed position on her side and resting on a bed. Around her neck she wore amulets of the Egyptian god Bes, the protector of households.

The Nubian woman is, according to Stuart Tyson Smith, a professor of archaeology and chair of the Department of Anthropology at UC Santa Barbara, a prime example of “cultural entanglement,” the process by which colonizing powers and indigenous people influence one another and change over time.

In a paper published in American Anthropologist, Michele Buzon of Purdue University and Smith explore cultural identity and transformation in the ancient village of Tombos in what is now northern Sudan. “Entanglement and the Formation of Ancient Nubian Napatan State” details the findings from Smith and Buzon’s excavations of cemeteries in Tombos, which became an important colonial hub after the Egyptians conquered Nubia around 1500 BCE.

“You get this really interesting entangled culture blending different elements in really different ways, but also there seems to be a lot of individual choice involved,” Smith explained. “It’s not just a matter of the two cultures mash up and then you get this new hybrid thing that’s consistent. There seems to be a lot of individual choice—whether or not you want a Nubian bed and/or an Egyptian coffin and/or to be wrapped like a mummy or whether or not you want an Egyptian-style amulet and/or Nubian ivory jewelry.”

Smith and Buzon, an associate professor of anthropology whose focus is bioarchaeology, are in their second year of excavations at Tombos as part of a three-year National Science Foundation (NSF) grant. Earlier fieldwork at the site was funded by a previous NSF grant and grants from the National Geographic Society, the Schiff-Giorgini Foundation, the Brennan Foundation and private donations. Their excavations are centered in graves from the New Kingdom (c. 1550-1070 BCE) and the Third Intermediate Period (c. 1070-615 BCE).

By measuring craniofacial features, Buzon is able to establish biological relationships and mixing between Nubians and Egyptians at Tombos. By analyzing skeletons, burial practices and contents of the graves, Smith and Buzon have been able to piece together a period of shifting cultural identities that led to the Nubian conquest of Egypt and the 25th Dynasty of Egypt (Napatan Period c. 750-650). Indeed, the shift was so complete the Nubians presented themselves as more culturally authentic Egyptian than the rulers they overthrew.

“We’re looking at the social dynamic from which those Nubian pharaohs emerged,” Smith explained, “and how that blended culture might have contributed to the cultural dynamic that allowed the pharaohs to come in, not just as conquerors, but as the legitimate restorers of the proper order of things in a decadent time. That’s exactly how they presented it.”

________________________________________________

The face of a statue of king Shebitku or Shabataka of the Nubian 25th dynasty of Egypt. Shebitku was succeeded in power after his death by Taharqa. Flop Eared Mule, Wikimedia Commons

________________________________________________________________

Smith and Buzon’s work also upends much conventional thinking about the dynamics of conquest. The graves of Tombos show that rather than the Egyptians simply imposing their will on the Nubians, which Smith calls “the old model,” cultural entanglement was a much more potent force shaping both cultures. Intermarriage and cultural pluralism in colonial Nubia gave rise to a new identity and the development of the Nubian pharaohs.

“What we’re looking at is a more nuanced model of Egyptian and Nubian culture entangling, and how individual choices drive this kind of ethnic and cultural change, and ultimately enable these Nubian pharaohs to take over,” Smith said. “The local people, and the colonists coming from Egypt who become locals over time, are driving the trajectory of the civilization as much as larger policies of colonial Egypt or, later on, these emerging pharaohs. That goes over very well with the local population. They like that idea. It’s not just Egypt imprinting their culture on Nubia; the local people are really influencing things and making it possible for the Nubians to eventually rule Egypt.”

Source: University of California, Sanata Barbara, news release.

________________________________________________

______________________________________________

Travel and learn with Far Horizons.

____________________________________________

Archaeologists investigate early 19th century asylum of old Tasmania

Posted on February 29, 2016 by No Author -

In February, it is the height of summer in New Norfolk, Tasmania. Although, at an average of 77 degrees Fahrenheit during the day, one can walk leisurely around without breaking a sweat in its characteristically cool temperate climate. Located in this Australian island state’s southeastern region, the town of over 5500 residents straddles both sides of the Derwent River, which runs through the valley by the same name. It is set within a backdrop of high hills dotted with gum trees. Walking along this river, one is likely to hear Kookaburras calling as they flutter from gum tree to gum tree, and at dusk or dawn, one might perhaps encounter an Eastern Grey Kangaroo.

The Asylum

Anciently, the banks of the Derwent around New Norfolk were covered by forests, and there is evidence of human habitation in the area — Australian Aboriginals — going back many thousands of years. But the town of New Norfolk was born in Australia’s colonial era, when groups of settlers, including convicts conscripted to do the hard work of building, arrived from the British Isles and other points in early colonial Australia beginning in the early 19th century. The town still features many of the structures and traces of that bygone era, including an almost forgotten complex known as Willow Court, a large group of buildings that served as a mental health institution from 1827 to 2000 and now under archaeological investigation by a team headed by Dr. Heather Burke of Flinders University. Originally named the New Norfolk Insane Asylum, it was built to care for the free people and convicts transported to Tasmania under the direction of the British government. Today its remains are only a decaying reminder of its past.

“Institutions like Willow Court are the physical remains of the forced labor economy that modern Australia emerged from,” said Kate Leonard, an archaeologist who helped to investigate the site remains. “Even the early structures of Willow Court, such as the Barracks Building, were built with convict labor. The evidence of this can be seen in the arrow-marked convict made bricks that are visible underneath the flaking plaster.”

Leonard came to New Norfolk for a few weeks as a volunteer to help with the investigations, which involved mapping the site’s features, conducting geophysical surveys, and cataloguing stored artifacts in anticipation of future excavations. It was part of an ambitious global project she hatched to volunteer her knowledge and skills to work at no less than 12 projects in 12 countries in 12 months. New Norfolk is the second stop on her Global Archaeology journey.

_____________________________________________

The barracked bulding of Williow Court as it appears today. Courtesy K. Leonard

___________________________________________________________

Kate Leonard doing a geophysical survey. Courtesy K. Leonard

________________________________________________

Kate Leonard busy with artifact cataloguing. Courtesy K. Leonard

__________________________________________________

A convict-made brick. Courtesy K. Leonard

___________________________________________________

The Legacy

Along the way at Willow Court, Leonard also encountered some tantalizing traces of history literally written on its walls.

“I had the opportunity to do a full survey of the graffiti that littered the inside and outside of the original Willow Court Barracks, whose construction was completed in 1834,” she said. “The graffiti was a mix of modern vandalism and the handiwork of inmates. I became absorbed with the search for the early writing on the walls and window sills, photographing it and making notes on location, condition and context. With my teammate I also continued to photograph the wall of the B Ward building (also known as Bronte).”

Her work in this area will result in a graffiti catalogue, something that the site investigators have long wanted to produce. The record could help shed some light on the unwritten history of inmate life.

Site investigators hope that the ongoing investigations will ultimately help paint a clearer picture of a sad, hard but important slice of life in this early colonial place. “Although I was aware of Australia’s Convict Era and had some general knowledge of the severity of the penal system in place, the mental health repercussions had never crossed my mind,” added Leonard. “The journey in convict ships, physical punishment and mental punishment (such as solitary and silent confinement of prisoners in places like Port Arthur and Cascades Female Factory), and forced hard labor tested the limits of all the convicts minds and some were irreparably damaged by their experiences.”

Leonard notes, however, that despite the hardships, “many of the convicts served their sentences and then moved forward with their lives as free citizens of the colony.”

“These men and women persevered through transportation, hard labor and foul, disease ridden, heavily over-populated prisons to become the foundation of modern Tasmania. The stories of those sent to Tasmania during the convict era are not easy to hear, but that is exactly why they should be told: they are a key part of what shaped Australia and its resilient people.”

Popular Archaeology will be following and reporting on Leonard’s worldwide experiences periodically throughout 2016 as she hops from one location to another.

Readers interested in reading about and supporting her self-directed Global Archaeology crowdfunded project can learn more at gofundme.com/globalarchaeology.

_____________________________________________

______________________________________________

Travel and learn with Far Horizons.

____________________________________________

A Sneak Peek at Coming Issues

Posted on February 26, 2016 by No Author -

It’s right around the corner. The upcoming Spring issue of Popular Archaeology, due to be released in March 2016, and the Summer issue, due mid-summer, will feature articles that many readers will surely find fascinating. Here is a sneak peek at what is in store:

For the Spring 2016 issue:

Uncovering the Citadel of El Pilar: An unusual, isolated ancient Maya complex has archaeologists digging for answers.

Building the Great Pyramid: After years of research, an engineer hatches a radical new concept, joining the list of theories that explain how the Great Pyramid of Giza was constructed.

Pushing the Prehistoric Fringe: A recently examined mammoth tells a story of a human presence in the Arctic 45,000 years ago.

Spears of the Ancient Huntsman: The unprecedented finds at a site in Germany are changing what we know about Paleolithic humans.

What New York’s Catacombs Are Telling Me: One author’s personal quest takes us on a journey through the intersection of archaeology and genealogy.

History in the Teeth: How ‘reading’ and studying the teeth of long-deceased people can shed light on past lives, deaths, and health conditions.

Rediscovering Our Element: One physician’s palaeoanthropological perspective on what makes so many of us ill and what we can do about it.

Church and State in Late Roman Antiquity: An academic treatment shedding light on our understanding of the relationship between Church and State during late Roman antiquity.

For the Summer 2016 issue:

On the Edge of the Kingdom: Ancient Tamar: The archaeological finds tell the story of an important fortress on the fringe of ancient Israel and Judea.

The Compassionate Human: The evolutionary origins of tenderness, trust and morality.

And more to come……….

Cover image, top left: Stained glass at St John the Baptist’s Anglican Church, Ashfield, New South Wales. Stained glass: Alfred Handel, d. 1946, photo: Toby Hudson, Wikimedia Commons

________________________________________________

oldcoverpic

______________________________________________

Travel and learn with Far Horizons.

____________________________________________

Genetics reveal 50,000 years of independent history of aboriginal Australian people

Posted on February 25, 2016 by No Author -

WELLCOME TRUST SANGER INSTITUTE—The first complete sequences of the Y chromosomes of Aboriginal Australian men have revealed a deep indigenous genetic history tracing all the way back to the initial settlement of the continent 50 thousand years ago, according to a study published in the journal Current Biology today (25th February 2016).

The study by researchers from the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute and collaborators at La Trobe University in Melbourne and several other Australian institutes, challenges a previous theory that suggested an influx of people from India into Australia around 4-5 thousand years ago. This new DNA sequencing study focused on the Y chromosome, which is transmitted only from father to son, and found no support for such a prehistoric migration. The results instead show a long and independent genetic history in Australia.

Modern humans arrived in Australia about 50 thousand years ago, forming the ancestors of present-day Aboriginal Australians. They were amongst the earliest settlers outside Africa. They arrived in an ancient continent made up of today’s Australia, Tasmania and New Guinea, called Sahul, probably thousands of years before modern humans arrived in Europe.

Five thousand years ago, dingos, the native dogs, somehow arrived in Australia, and changes in stone tool use and language around the same time raised the question of whether there were also associated genetic changes in the Australian Aboriginal population. At least two previous genetic studies, one of which was based on the Y chromosome, had proposed that these changes could have coincided with mixing of Aboriginal and Indian populations about 5 thousand years ago.

Anders Bergstrom, first author on the paper at the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute, said: “We worked closely with Aboriginal Australian communities to sequence the Y chromosome DNA from 13 male volunteers to investigate their ancestry. The data show that Aboriginal Australian Y chromosomes are very distinct from Indian ones. These results refute the previous Y chromosome study, thus excluding this part of the puzzle as providing evidence for a prehistoric migration from India. Instead, the results are in agreement with the archaeological record about when people arrived in this part of the world.”

Dr John Mitchell, Associate Professor at La Trobe University in Melbourne, explained: “Clearly there is keen interest in the Aboriginal community to explore their genetic ancestry and without them this study would not be possible – our first step was to return their results to them, before the scientific article was published. This collaboration in genome sequencing, to explore their ancient history, was made possible by years of engagement beforehand with Aboriginal communities.”

Further study is needed to answer questions such as how the dingo did get to Australia and why other people such as the seafaring Polynesians didn’t settle on the continent. Expanding the genetic analyses beyond the Y chromosome and to the whole genome will also be necessary to completely rule out external genetic influences on the Aboriginal Australian population before the very recent times.

Lesley Williams, who was responsible for the liaison with the Aboriginal community, said: “As an Aboriginal Elder and cultural consultant for this project I am delighted, although not surprised, that science has confirmed what our ancestors have taught us over many generations, that we have lived here since the Dreaming.”

Dr Chris Tyler Smith, group leader at the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute added: “By fully sequencing and analysing Y-chromosomal DNA, we have been able to trace ancient human migrations and inform living people about their ancestry. We are using the latest technology to genetically unearth our ancient history – something that has only become possible in the last decade. We look forward to further collaborations to understand more of this unique heritage.”

Source: News release of the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute.

Cover image, top left: Mr Sober88, Wikimedia Commons

________________________________________

______________________________________________

Travel and learn with Far Horizons.

____________________________________________

11,000 year old pendant is earliest known Mesolithic art in Britain

Posted on February 25, 2016 by No Author -

UNIVERSITY OF YORK—An 11,000 year old engraved shale pendant discovered by archaeologists during excavations at the Early Mesolithic site at Star Carr in North Yorkshire is unique in the UK, according to new research.

The artwork on the tiny fragile pendant, uncovered by a research team from the Universities of York, Manchester and Chester, is the earliest known Mesolithic art in Britain. Crafted from a single piece of shale, the subtriangular three-millimetre thick artefact measuring 31mm by 35mm contains a series of lines which archaeologists believe may represent a tree, a map, a leaf or even tally marks.

Engraved motifs on Mesolithic pendants are extremely rare and no other engraved pendants made of shale are known in Europe.

When archaeologists uncovered the pendant last year, the lines on the surface were barely visible. The research team used a range of digital microscopy techniques to generate high resolution images to help determine the style and order of engraving. They also carried out scientific analysis to try to establish if the pendant had been strung or worn and whether pigments had been used to make the lines more prominent.

The research, which is part of a five-year project supported by the European Research Council, is published in Internet Archaeology, http://dx.doi.org/10.11141/ia.40.8, as ‘A unique engraved shale pendant from the site of Star Carr: the oldest Mesolithic art in Britain’. The research is also supported by Historic England and the Vale of Pickering Research Trust. The pendant is to be showcased to the public for the first time in a display at the Yorkshire Museum in York on 27 February until 5 May.

Star Carr is one of a number of archaeological sites around what was the location of a huge lake which covered much of the Vale of Pickering in the Mesolithic era. Researchers discovered the pendant in lake edge deposits. Initially they thought it was natural stone — the perforation was blocked by sediment and the engravings were invisible.

It is the first perforated artefact with engraved design discovered at Star Carr though shale beads, a piece of perforated amber and two perforated animal teeth have been recovered from the site previously.

Professor Nicky Milner, of the Department of Archaeology at York, led the research. She said: “It was incredibly exciting to discover such a rare object. It is unlike anything we have found in Britain from this period. We can only imagine who owned it, how they wore it and what the engravings actually meant to them.

“One possibility is that the pendant belonged to a shaman—headdresses made out of red deer antlers found nearby in earlier excavations are thought to have been worn by shamans. We can only guess what the engravings mean but engraved amber pendants found in Denmark have been interpreted as amulets used for spiritual personal protection.”

Dr Chantal Conneller, from The University of Manchester and co-director of the excavations, said: “This exciting find tells us about the art of the first permanent settlers of Britain after the last Ice Age. This was a time when sea-level was much lower than today. Groups roamed across Doggerland (land now under the North Sea) and into Britain. The designs on our pendant are similar to those found in southern Scandinavia and other areas bordering the North Sea, showing a close cultural connection between northern European groups at this time.”

Dr Barry Taylor, from the University of Chester and co-director of the excavations, said: “I love these sorts of finds because they are a real connection to people in the past. When we study prehistory we deal with very long periods of time and often focus on very broad issues. But this is something that a person wore, that had significance to them and to the people around them. These sorts of artefacts tell us about people and, after all, that’s what archaeology is all about.”

Duncan Wilson, Chief Executive of Historic England which contributed to and part-funded the excavation and research publication said: “The discovery of the pendant is a sensational find. Star Carr is an internationally important ‘at risk’ site, which is why we have provided substantial financial support for the excavation and assistance through the input of our specialist archaeological and archaeological science teams. The results have exceeded our expectations and will help rewrite the story of this long and complex, but little understood early prehistoric period.”

Natalie McCaul, curator of archaeology at the Yorkshire Museum, said: “We are thrilled to be able to showcase such a nationally significant object for the first time. Its remarkable discovery changes the way we think about our ancestors who lived in Yorkshire 11,000 years ago and the rituals, beliefs and cultural values that were part of their lives. We are excited that the rest of the collection from the excavations will come to the museum in time and we’re looking forward to preserving and displaying it for the public to enjoy.”

_________________________________________

The site of the archaeological excavations at Star Carr, showing the soil marks of the 2010 excavations. Kirsty High, Wikimedia Commons

______________________________________________________

In the Star Carr collection at the Yorkshire museum – mesolithic headdress made from deer skull. From the earliest known post glacial settlement in England Jonathan Cardy, Wikimedia Commons

______________________________________________________

In the Star Carr collection at the Yorkshire museum – mesolithic spear tips from the earliest known post glacial settlement in England. Jonathan Cardy, Wikimedia Commons

______________________________________________________

Researchers from the University of York’s Department of Physics and Centre for Digital Heritage, and Hull York Medical School were also involved in the analysis of the pendant.

The display at the Yorkshire Museum will also feature other Star Carr finds including flints, a rare barbed point used for hunting or fishing and 11,000 year old fire lighters—amazingly preserved birch bark rolls. These will feature alongside digital interpretation and high resolution imagery of the pendant.

Source: University of York news release.

______________________________________________________

______________________________________________

Travel and learn with Far Horizons.

____________________________________________

Tel Aviv University discovers fabric collection dating back to Kings David and Solomon

Posted on February 24, 2016 by No Author -

AMERICAN FRIENDS OF TEL AVIV UNIVERSITY—The ancient copper mines in Timna are located deep in Israel’s Arava Valley and are believed by some to be the site of King Solomon’s mines. The arid conditions of the mines have seen the remarkable preservation of 3,000-year-old organic materials, including seeds, leather and fabric, and other extremely rare artifacts that provide a unique window into the culture and practices of this period.

A Timna excavation team from Tel Aviv University led by Dr. Erez Ben-Yosef has uncovered an extensive fabric collection of diverse color, design and origin. This is the first discovery of textiles dating from the era of David and Solomon, and sheds new light on the historical fashions of the Holy Land. The textiles also offer insight into the complex society of the early Edomites, the semi-nomadic people believed to have operated the mines at Timna.

The tiny pieces of fabric, some only 5 x 5 centimeters in size, vary in color, weaving technique and ornamentation. “Some of these fabrics resemble textiles only known from the Roman era,” said Dr. Orit Shamir, a senior researcher at the Israel Antiquities Authority, who led the study of the fabrics themselves.

“No textiles have ever been found at excavation sites like Jerusalem, Megiddo and Hazor, so this provides a unique window into an entire aspect of life from which we’ve never had physical evidence before,” Dr. Ben-Yosef said. “We found fragments of textiles that originated from bags, clothing, tents, ropes and cords.

“The wide variety of fabrics also provides new and important information about the Edomites, who, according to the Bible, warred with the Kingdom of Israel. We found simply woven, elaborately decorated fabrics worn by the upper echelon of their stratified society. Luxury grade fabric adorned the highly skilled, highly respected craftsmen managing the copper furnaces. They were responsible for smelting the copper, which was a very complicated process.”

________________________________________

A fine wool textile dyed red and blue, found at Timna. The textile used the various colors of natural animal hair to create black and orange-brown colors for decorative bands. Credit: Clara Amit, courtesy of the Israel Antiquities Authority.

_______________________________________

A trove of the “Seven Species”

The archaeologists also recently discovered thousands of seeds of the Biblical “Seven Species” at the site — the two grains and five fruits considered unique products of the Land of Israel. Some of the seeds were subjected to radiocarbon dating, providing robust confirmation for the age of the site.

“This is the first time seeds from this period have been found uncharred and in such large quantities,” said Dr. Ben-Yosef. “With the advancement of modern science, we now enjoy research options that were unthinkable a few decades ago. We can reconstruct wine typical of King David’s era, for example, and understand the cultivation and domestication processes that have been preserved in the DNA of the seed.”

The power of copper

Copper was used to produce tools and weapons and was the most valuable resource in ancient societies. Its production required many levels of expertise. Miners in ancient Timna may have been slaves or prisoners — theirs was a simple task performed under difficult conditions. But the act of smelting, of turning stone into metal, required an enormous amount of skill and organization. The smelter had to manage some 30 to 40 variables in order to produce the coveted copper ingots.

“The possession of copper was a source of great power, much as oil is today,” Dr. Ben-Yosef said. “If a person had the exceptional knowledge to ‘create copper,’ he was considered well-versed in an extremely sophisticated technology. He would have been considered magical or supernatural, and his social status would have reflected this.”

To support this “silicon valley” of copper production in the middle of the desert, food, water and textiles had to be transported long distances through the unforgiving desert climate and into the valley. The latest discovery of fabrics, many of which were made far from Timna in specialized textile workshops, provides a glimpse into the trade practices and regional economy of the day.

“We found linen, which was not produced locally. It was most likely from the Jordan Valley or Northern Israel. The majority of the fabrics were made of sheep’s wool, a cloth that is seldom found in this ancient period,” said TAU masters student Vanessa Workman. “This tells us how developed and sophisticated both their textile craft and trade networks must have been.”

“‘Nomad’ does not mean ‘simple,'” said Dr. Ben-Yosef. “This discovery strengthens our understanding of the Edomites as an important geopolitical presence. The fabrics are of a very high quality, with complex designs and beautiful dyes.”

Source: American Friends of Tel Aviv University news release.

______________________________________________________

______________________________________________

Travel and learn with Far Horizons.

____________________________________________

Archives: Articles

Archaeologists uncover monumental prehistoric structure on island of Menorca

Teeth from Natufian-hunted gazelles give clues to climate during Eastern Mediterranean Younger Dryas

Ancient Mesopotamian culture vanishing before our eyes

Australopithecus fossils found east of the Great Rift Valley

Site in Germany yields human presence over 1 million years ago

Uncovering the Citadel of El Pilar

Pushing the Prehistoric Fringe

Metallic ink used in the Herculaneum scrolls

Archaeologists create 3-D interactive digital reconstruction of King Richard III

Modern Melanesians have retained Denisovan DNA

Popular Archaeology Spring 2016 Issue Released

Early human habitat recreated for first time

Tiny island deer in Panama hunted to extinction thousands of years ago

A newly discovered Anglo-Saxon island

Finds reveal how ancient Egyptian and Nubian cultures blended

Archaeologists investigate early 19th century asylum of old Tasmania

A Sneak Peek at Coming Issues

Genetics reveal 50,000 years of independent history of aboriginal Australian people

11,000 year old pendant is earliest known Mesolithic art in Britain

Tel Aviv University discovers fabric collection dating back to Kings David and Solomon

Recent Articles

EXPLORE THE ANCIENT ETRUSCANS IN PERSON!

Directory

Recent Issues

Main Sections