Category Archives: Archaeology

Archaeologists use AI to discover 303 unknown geoglyphs near Nazca Lines

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Newly discovered figures dating back to 200BCE nearly double the number of known geoglyphs at enigmatic site

Archaeologists using artificial intelligence (AI) have discovered hundreds of new geoglyphs depicting parrots, cats, monkeys, killer whales and even decapitated heads near the Nazca Lines in Peru, in a find that nearly doubles the number of known figures at the enigmatic 2,000-year-old archaeological site.

A team from the Japanese University of Yamagata’s Nazca Institute, in collaboration with IBM Research, discovered 303 previously unknown geoglyphs of humans and animals – all smaller in size than the vast geometric patterns that date from AD200-700 and stretch across more than 400 sq km of the Nazca plateau.

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Dorset ‘Stonehenge’ discovered under Thomas Hardy’s home

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Enclosure older than Salisbury monument found under late novelist’s garden is given heritage protection

When the author Thomas Hardy was writing Tess of the D’Urbervilles in 1891, he chose to set the novel’s dramatic conclusion at Stonehenge, where Tess sleeps on one of the stones the night before she is arrested for murder.

What the author did not know, as he wrote in the study of his home, Max Gate in Dorchester, was that he was sitting right in the heart of a large henge-like enclosure that was even older than the famous monument on Salisbury Plain.

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Battle of Waterloo dig uncovers horror of severed limbs and shot horses

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Excavators in Belgium find 15 limbs and seven equine skeletons at site of decisive 1815 battle against Napoleon

The carnage and horror of the battle of Waterloo have been laid bare in an excavation by military veterans and archaeologists that has uncovered amputated limbs and the remains of horses which were shot to be put out of their misery.

At least 20,000 men – and possibly many more – were killed in the epic 1815 battle when the British military officer the Duke of Wellington and a European alliance defeated Napoleon’s French forces in a decisive and bloody encounter that determined the power balance in Europe for nearly a century.

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Romans’ siege wall in Masada may have been built in a fortnight, study finds

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New archaeological research adds to view that siege may have been quicker and more efficient than was thought

The Roman siege of Jewish rebels in Masada, one of the founding myths of modern Israel, may have been far quicker and more efficient and brutal than it has been traditionally represented as, according to new archaeological research.

The end of the AD72-73 Jewish Revolt is conventionally depicted as a heroic last stand against the might of Rome by a handful of rebels who eventually killed themselves rather than be overwhelmed by the emperor Vespasian’s forces.

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‘Amazing’ Viking-age treasure travelled half the world to Scotland, analysis finds

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Lidded vessel is star object in rich Galloway Hoard and came from silver mine in what is now Iran

It is a star object of the Galloway Hoard, the richest collection of Viking-age objects ever found in Britain or Ireland, buried in AD900 and unearthed in a field in Scotland. Now a lidded silver vessel has been identified as being of west Asian origin, transported halfway around the world more than 1,000 years ago.

When it emerged from the ground a decade ago, the vessel was still wrapped in its ancient textiles, whose survival is extremely rare. Its surface could be seen only through X-ray scans. Since then, the textiles have been partially removed and preserved and the vessel has had laser cleaning to remove green corrosion over much of its silver surface. It has also undergone scientific analysis.

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Boy, four, who broke bronze age jar returns to museum in Israel

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The family watched the rare 3,500-year-old jar, believed used for wine or oil, being restored at the Hecht Museum

Smashing a rare museum artefact dating back thousands of years would probably earn you a lifetime ban at the very least.

But a four-year-old who accidentally toppled a jar from the bronze age, leaving it broken into pieces, was welcomed back to the Hecht Museum in Haifa, Israel, a week after the unfortunate incident.

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‘I couldn’t believe it was my son who did it’: boy, 4, smashes bronze age jar in Israel museum

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Instead of chastising family over breakage, director of the Hecht Museum invites them back

A rare bronze age jar – its history stretching back at least 3,500 years – had long graced the entrance of the Hecht Museum in Haifa, Israel, offering visitors a closeup look at an intact artefact believed to predate the biblical King David and King Solomon.

That is, until it was accidentally smashed by a four-year-old earlier this week.

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Bones found in north-west Spain could be legendary bishop’s, scientists believe

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New examination supports claim remains are of Teodomiro, a key figure in establishing Camino de Santiago pilgrimage

Scientists believe a set of ancient bones discovered in north-west Spain almost 70 years ago are those of the bishop whose devotion to St James the Apostle paved the way for the Camino de Santiago path taken by countless footsore pilgrims over the past 12 centuries.

According to historical sources and oral tradition, Bishop Teodomiro of Iria Flavia discovered the remains of St James – who was martyred in Jerusalem between the years AD41 and 44 – in an abandoned cemetery in what is now the Galician city of Santiago de Compostela. Teodomiro is said to have received the revelation in the early ninth century after days of fasting and meditation – and with a little help from a visionary local hermit.

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‘Humongous’ fort found in Wales may disprove theory of Celtic-Roman peace

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Site in Pembrokeshire suggests area was more militarised than previously thought, says expert who made discovery

A previously unknown Roman fort discovered in Pembrokeshire in Wales overturns assumptions that the area’s indigenous Celtic tribe was on peaceful terms with the Roman invaders.

The site, which has excited archaeologists, had been hidden until now beneath an enormous, overgrown field. It explains why the land had been unsuccessful for farming: the farmer kept hitting stone.

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Egyptian mummy with screaming expression ‘may have died in agony’, say researchers

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Archaeologists say wide open mouth of woman who died about 3,500 years ago may be caused by rare, immediate form of rigor mortis

She looks uncannily like The Scream painting by Edvard Munch, but just why an ancient Egyptian mummy has such a startling expression has long puzzled researchers. Now they say they may have the answer – suggesting the woman died crying out in agony.

The woman is thought to have been buried about 3,500 years ago and was discovered in 1935 in a wooden coffin beneath the tomb of Senmut – an important architect during the reign of the female pharaoh Hatshepsut.

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Ancient Roman Appian Way becomes Italy’s 60th Unesco world heritage site

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Highway that consolidated Roman empire joins modernist Romanian sculptures as latest sites added to list

Italy’s Via Appia Antica, or Appian Way, the earliest and most important road built by the ancient Romans, has been named a Unesco world heritage site, making Italy the country with the world’s highest number of locations on the coveted list.

Known as the Regina Viarum, or Queen of Roads, it connected Rome with the port of Brindisi in the south and marked a revolution in the construction of roads.

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Irish museum solves mystery of bronze age axe heads delivered in porridge box

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Artefacts sent by farmer, who made the ‘absolutely mad’ discovery while cutting silage

When the national museum of Ireland received two 4,000-year-old axe heads, “thoughtfully” wrapped in foam inside a porridge box, from an anonymous source last month, it put out an appeal. The objects were “significant” and “exciting”, it said, but experts needed to know more about where exactly they had been found.

Now they have their answer: a farmer from County Westmeath has come forward as the mysterious sender, saying he made the “absolutely mad” discovery while using a metal detector on his land.

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Chinese artefacts in repatriation row were ‘given willingly’ to British Museum

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Amid calls to return antiquities, historian finds documents that reveal many were not result of imperial plunder

The British Museum boasts one of the biggest collections of Chinese antiquities in the west, but it has faced repeated calls to return them to China. Now historical documents reveal that many of the antiquities were acquired with the full cooperation of Chinese officials in the last century.

US historian Justin M Jacobs has unearthed evidence that shows the Chinese government “willingly and enthusiastically helped them remove these treasures from their lands” because they wanted closer ties with the west and appreciated new scholarship.

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Earthquake at same time as eruption could have caused Pompeii deaths – study

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Research argues tremors occurred as Vesuvius erupted in AD79, causing buildings to collapse on to people

Victims who perished in Pompeii after the devastating AD79 eruption of Mount Vesuvius may have been killed by a simultaneous earthquake, research has suggested.

Scholars have debated for decades whether seismic activity occurred during the eruption of Vesuvius in southern Italy nearly 2,000 years ago, and not just before it, as reported by Pliny the Younger in his letters.

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Anglo-Saxons may have fought in northern Syrian wars, say experts

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Warriors from Britain joined far-flung Byzantine military campaigns in sixth century, grave goods suggest

Sixth-century Anglo-Saxon people may have travelled from Britain to the eastern Mediterranean and northern Syria to fight in wars, researchers have suggested, casting fresh light on their princely burials.

St John Simpson, a senior British Museum curator, and Helen Gittos, an Oxford scholar, have concluded that some of the exotic items excavated at Sutton Hoo, Taplow and Prittlewell, among other sites, originated in the eastern Mediterranean and north Syria and cannot have been conventional trade goods, as others have suggested.

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Archaeological survey detects Roman villas and iron age farmsteads in Shropshire

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National Trust ground-scanning technology maps new features close to site of Roman city of Wroxeter

An archaeological survey of more than 1,000 hectares (2,471 acres) in Shropshire has identified a wealth of previously unknown features, including two grand Roman villas and multiple earlier iron age farmsteads.

The geophysical survey, the largest ever conducted by the National Trust, used ground-scanning technology to map undetected features close to the site of the Roman city of Wroxeter, just south of modern day Shrewsbury.

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Oldest known picture story is a 51,000-year-old Indonesian cave painting

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New dating technique finds painting on island of Sulawesi is 6,000 years older than previous record holder

The world’s oldest known picture story is a cave painting almost 6,000 years older than the previous record holder, found about 10km away on the same island in Indonesia, an international team of archaeologists has said.

The painting, believed to be at least 51,200 years old, was found at Leang Karampuang cave on the east Indonesian island of Sulawesi, researchers from Griffith University, Southern Cross University and the Indonesian National Research and Innovation Agency wrote in the journal Nature.

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Egyptian scribes suffered work-related injuries, study says

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Higher incidence of damage to hips, jaws and thumbs reveals their writing efforts may have taken a toll

From bad backs to eye strain, office work can take its toll on the body.

But it seems such perils are nothing new: researchers have found Egyptian scribes experienced damage to their hips, jaws and thumbs as a result of their efforts.

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Fossil of Neanderthal child with Down’s syndrome hints at early humans’ compassion

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Skull anatomy shows the boy or girl would have been severely disabled, yet survived until the age of six

A Neanderthal child with Down’s syndrome survived until at least the age of six, according to a new study whose findings hint at compassionate caregiving among the extinct, archaic human species.

Recent examination of a human fossil unearthed at the Cova Negra archaeological site in the Spanish province of Valencia found traits in the inner-ear anatomy which indicated Down syndrome, in the earliest-known evidence of the genetic condition.

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Stonehenge likely to be put on world heritage danger list over tunnel plan

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Unesco officials recommend adding Wiltshire stone circle amid fears road scheme would compromise its integrity

Stonehenge is likely to be put on a list of world heritage sites that are in danger because of the plan to build a tunnel under the precious landscape.

Unesco officials have recommended adding the Wiltshire stone circle and the area around it to the list because of concerns that the tunnel would “compromise the integrity” of one of the Earth’s great prehistoric sites.

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