Category Archives: Archaeology

Friar crushed by cart: bone analysis hints at causes of medieval deaths

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Research from three Cambridge grave sites suggests poor people were at greatest risk of injury

A friar crushed by a cart, another the victim of an attack by bandits: it sounds like the plot of a medieval mystery. But according to new research these are some of the possible misfortunes to have befallen those in centuries gone by.

An analysis of bones from 314 individuals aged 12 or older, dating from around 1100 to the 1530s, and found in three different sites across Cambridge, reveals that bone fractures were common among those buried in a parish cemetery – where many ordinary workers would have been laid to rest. But the team also found evidence of horrific injuries among those buried in an Augustinian friary, suggesting the clergy were not protected against violent events.

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A key, a casket and the hunt for Spanish dramatist Pedro Calderón’s bones

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Dogged detective work and radar scans of a church wall may help find the last resting place of the great playwright

The death of Pedro Calderón de la Barca – soldier, priest and one of the finest dramatists Spain has produced – continues to prove almost as turbulent and unpredictable as his long and improbable life.

Four centuries after Calderón died in Madrid aged 81, researchers believe they could be close to finding his remains, thanks to the deathbed testament of a priest, a key long guarded by the playwright’s family and the latest in ground-penetrating radar.

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Mexico archaeologists reveal tale of cannibalism and reprisal from conquest

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A convoy of Spaniards and allies was ritually sacrificed in 1520 at Tecoaque – ‘the place where they ate them’ – before Hernán Cortés wreaked revenge

New research suggests Spanish conquistadores butchered at least a dozen women and their children in an Aztec-allied town where the inhabitants sacrificed and ate a detachment of Spaniards they had captured months earlier.

The National Institute of Anthropology and History published findings on Monday from years of excavation work at the town of Tecoaque, which means “the place where they ate them” in the Nahuatl language of the Aztecs.

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50 ancient coffins uncovered at Egypt’s Saqqara necropolis

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Wooden sarcophagi discovered at site south of Cairo along with funerary temple of Queen Naert

Egypt has announced the discovery of a new trove of treasures at the Saqqara necropolis south of Cairo, including an ancient funerary temple.

The tourism and antiquities ministry said the “major discoveries” made by a team of archaeologists headed by the Egyptologist Zahi Hawass also included more than 50 sarcophagi.

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2,000-year-old remains of infant and pet dog uncovered in France

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Child was buried at beginning of first century surrounded by vases and animal offerings

French archaeologists have hailed the “exceptional” discovery of the 2,000-year-old remains of a child buried with animal offerings and what appears to have been a pet dog.

The child, believed to have been around a year old, was interred at the beginning of the first century, during Roman rule, in a wooden coffin 80cm long made with nails and marked with a decorative iron tag.

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World’s oldest known cave painting found in Indonesia

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Picture of wild pig made at least 45,500 years ago provides earliest evidence of human settlement

Archaeologists have discovered the world’s oldest known cave painting: a life-sized picture of a wild pig that was made at least 45,500 years ago in Indonesia.

The finding, described in the journal Science Advances on Wednesday, provides the earliest evidence of human settlement of the region.

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Victorian bathhouse uncovered beneath Manchester car park

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Mayfield baths found in ‘stunning’ condition by archaeologists on site behind Piccadilly station

A large Victorian washhouse that served Manchester textile workers more than 150 years ago has been uncovered during work to create the city’s first public park in a century.

The ornate tiles of the Mayfield baths, whose pools measured nearly 20 metres, were found in “stunning” condition beneath a car park 164 years after it opened.

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Squatters issue death threats to archaeologist who discovered oldest city in the Americas

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Squatters reportedly belonging to one family claim site of 5,000 year-old ruins was given to them in the 1970s

Illegal squatters have invaded the ruins of the oldest city in the Americas, and made death threats against Ruth Shady, the celebrated Peruvian archaeologist who discovered the 5,000 year-old civilization.

The threats came via telephone calls and messages to various workers at the archeological site at the height of Peru’s Covid-19 pandemic. They followed reports to the police and prosecutors about the invasions of the ancient ruins of Caral.

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Render unto Rome – contrite tourists return pilfered relics

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Whether compelled by guilt or superstition, more and more tourists are returning items they lifted from Italian cultural sites

Some of the repentant sinners may be compelled by guilt, others by superstition.

But Italian museum curators and archeological officers have observed a trend of tourists who, having pilfered artefacts from cultural sites, return them, years later, with a heartfelt letter of confession.

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Snack bar in Pompeii offers insights into ancient eating habits – video report

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The director of archaeology at Pompeii shows an exceptionally well-preserved snack bar, or thermopolium, which served food and drink to passers-by. Traces of food have been found in some of the jars, and the frescoes offer insights into Pompeiian eating habits. Human remains were also found of a victim of the volcanic eruption in AD79 that buried the ancient Roman city

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Fit for a king: true glory of 1,000-year-old cross buried in Scottish field is revealed at last

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Part of the Galloway Hoard, found in 2014, the piece is so spectacular it may have belonged to a monarch

A spectacular Anglo-Saxon silver cross has emerged from beneath 1,000 years of encrusted dirt following painstaking conservation. Such is its quality that whoever commissioned this treasure may have been a high-standing cleric or even a king.

It was a sorry-looking object when first unearthed in 2014 from a ploughed field in western Scotland as part of the Galloway Hoard, the richest collection of rare and unique Viking-age objects ever found in Britain or Ireland, acquired by the National Museums Scotland (NMS) in 2017.

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Tower of human skulls reveals grisly scale to archaeologists in Mexico City

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New sections of the tower at the capital’s Templo Mayor Aztec site include 119 skulls of men, women and children

Archaeologists have unearthed new sections of an Aztec tower of human skulls dating back to the 1400s beneath the center of Mexico City.

The team has uncovered the facade and eastern side of the tower, as well as 119 human skulls of men, women and children, adding to hundreds previously found, the National Institute of Anthropology and History (Inah) announced on Friday.

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Stunning dark ages mosaic found at Roman villa in Cotswolds

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Fifth-century discovery suggests break with Rome did not cause steep decline in living standards for all


Life at the start of the dark ages in Britain is generally thought of as a pretty uncomfortable time, an era of trouble and strife with the departure of Roman rulers resulting in economic hardship and cultural stagnation.

But a stunning discovery at the Chedworth Roman villa in the Cotswolds suggests that some people at least managed to maintain a rich and sophisticated lifestyle.

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The Guardian view on Amazonian cave art: a story about the environment, too | Editorial

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Astonishing rock paintings discovered in Colombia hold a lesson for today’s rainforest

In the past week, remarkable images of ancient cave art have hit the headlines: rock paintings made in South America around 12,000 years ago. The art, created on rock faces in the Serranía de la Lindosa, on the northern edge of the Colombian Amazon, is a riot of ochre-coloured geometrical pattern, handprints, and images of animals and humans. Until recent excavations, the works of art had been unknown to the international community. Their exuberant creativity will soon be revealed to a broad audience in the UK thanks to the Channel 4 series Jungle Mystery: Lost Kingdoms of the Amazon.

The people who made these works of art were, it is believed, among the earliest humans to occupy the region, after migrations across what is now the Bering Strait some 25,000 years ago. Preliminary study of the iconography of the art has led scholars to speculate that among the deer, tapirs, alligators, bats, serpents, turtles and porcupines, long-extinct megafauna are also represented: mastodons, American ice-age horses, giant sloths, camelids.

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Pompeii dig reveals ‘almost perfect’ remains of a master and his slave

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Archaeologists have unearthed two exceptionally well-preserved victims of the eruption of Vesuvius in AD79

The almost perfectly preserved remains of two men have been unearthed in an extraordinary discovery in the ancient Roman city of Pompeii.

The bodies of what are thought to be a wealthy man and his slave, believed to have died as they were fleeing the catastrophic eruption of Mount Vesuvius in AD79, were found during excavations at a villa in the outskirts of the city, Pompeii archaeological park officials said yesterday.

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Nearly 100 coffins buried over 2,500 years ago found in Egypt

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Mummies and up to 40 gilded statues found in a vast Pharaonic necropolis south of Cairo

Egyptian antiquities officials have announced the discovery of at least 100 ancient coffins, some with mummies inside, and about 40 gilded statues in a vast Pharaonic necropolis south of Cairo.

Sealed sarcophagi and statues that were buried more than 2,500 years ago were displayed in a makeshift exhibit at the feet of the famed Step Pyramid of Djoser at Saqqara.

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New museum in Nigeria raises hopes of resolution to Benin bronzes dispute

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Artefacts held by British Museum and other western institutions were looted by British forces in 1897

A new museum designed by Sir David Adjaye is to be built following the most extensive archaeological excavation ever undertaken in Benin City, Nigeria, raising hopes of a resolution to one of the world’s most controversial debates over looted museum artefacts.

The kingdom of Benin, in what is now southern Nigeria and not to be confused with the modern-day country of Benin, was one of the most important and powerful pre-colonial states of west Africa.

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Druids face defeat as bulldozers get set for Stonehenge bypass

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Ancient artefacts will be lost when tunnel for A303 is built near site, campaigners claim

It has been bitterly debated for the past three decades, but the latest plans to partly bury the A303 in a tunnel beside Stonehenge may this week finally get approval from transport secretary Grant Shapps.

The £2.4bn scheme – which will see the traffic-choked road to the west country widened into a dual carriageway near the ancient site before shooting down a two-mile tunnel – has pitted archaeologists, local campaigners and even the nation’s druids against the combined might of Highways England, English Heritage and the National Trust.

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A selfie set in stone: hidden portrait by cheeky mason found in Spain 900 years on

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A British art historian’s painstaking study of the cathedral in Santiago de Compostela uncovered a medieval prank

He is a medieval in-joke, a male figure carved in the early 12th century for one of the world’s greatest cathedrals, but no one has known of his existence until now. The figure has gone unnoticed by millions of worshippers who have made the long pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela in Galicia, north-western Spain over the centuries. He has looked down on them from the top of one of the many pillars that soar upwards, each decorated with carved foliage, among which he is concealed.

Now he has been discovered by a British art scholar who believes that he was actually never meant to be seen because he is a self-portrait of a stonemason who worked on the cathedral in the 12th century.

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