Archaeology

Appalachian-Americans rejoice, archaeologists have added a new piece to your heritage puzzle. The remains of the earliest European fort in the interior of (what is now) the United States have been discovered - and it gives new insight into both the start of the U.S. colonial era and the imperialism of the Spanish. Though it didn't last long. Native Americans killed almost all of the Spanish soldiers and destroyed the garrisons, which stretched from coastal South Carolina into eastern Tennessee, in under 18 months, said University of Michigan archaeologist Robin Beck. Spanish Captain Juan…

As Egypt fights over new leadership, Israeli archaeologists have found evidence of an ancient ruler in northern Israel.  At a site in Tel Hazor National Park, north of the Sea of Galilee, archaeologists from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem have unearthed part of a unique Sphinx belonging to one of the ancient pyramid-building pharaohs. The Sphinx was brought over from Egypt, with a hieroglyphic inscription between its front legs that bears the name of the Egyptian king Mycerinus, who ruled in the third millennium BCE, more than 4,000 years ago and was one of the builders of the famous…

Archaeologists hope to shed new light on Richard III’s final resting place, with a new dig at the site of the Grey Friars church. Experts will spend a month excavating the choir area of the church, where Richard’s body was discovered, and hope to reveal much more about the medieval friary than was possible during the initial dig. The team from University of Leicester Archaeological Services hope the new dig may help to uncover: - More details about Richard III’s burial and its place within the Grey Friars church - A much clearer picture of the church’s layout, dimensions and architecture…

The Sea of Galilee, located in the North of Israel, has numerous significant archaeological sites and an ancient structure underneath the waves adds to its mysteries. The cone-shaped monument, approximately 230 feet in diameter, 39 feet high, and weighing an estimated 60,000 tons, was found while conducting a geophysical survey on the southern Sea of Galilee, reports Prof. Shmulik Marco of TAU's Department of Geophysics and Planetary Sciences.  Initial findings indicate that the structure was built on dry land approximately 6,000 years ago, and later submerged under the water. Marco…

Archaeologists think they have some responses for the hypothesis that our early forebears were forced out of the trees and onto two feet when climate change reduced tree cover. Our earliest ancestors changed from tree dwelling quadrupeds to upright bipeds capable of walking and scrambling and the authors in Antiquity ('Complex Topography and Human Evolution: the Missing Link') say our upright gait may have its origins in the rugged landscape of East and South Africa, which was shaped during the Pliocene epoch by volcanoes and shifting tectonic plates. Hominins, our early forebears, would…

In Europe, the arrival of the farmers who replaced Mesolithic hunter-gatherers happened in force 9,000 years ago but it was happening elsewhere prior to that. In Syria, there is even evidence of scientific trait selection in grains in 10,000 B.C. but in other parts of the world agriculture came much later.   A region in sub-tropical China which did not have agriculture until the arrival of domesticated rice from elsewhere may have gotten agriculture prior to that - as far back as 3,000 B.C., according to a new paper. Current archaeological thinking is that it was the advent of rice…

The Atlantean Triangle Atlantis is in the news once more, and then some, so I thought I'd cash in on it analyse the stories scientifically to see what is being claimed. In a nutshell: the remains of the lost city / continent / village / villa have been almost certainly definitely tentatively identified by Richard Freund, Franck Goddio, Roberto Ventura Santos et al. Photographic image of 100% genuine Atlantiscourtesy Daily MailClearly identifiable rocks remains of Atlantis were found near the Rio Grande Elevation off the coast of  England just north of Egypt, right next to Cuba.…

Using advanced underwater imaging techniques, one of the most detailed analysis ever of the archaeological remains of the lost medieval town of Dunwich - 'Britain's Atlantis' - have been revealed. The project has provided the most accurate map to date of the town's streets, boundaries and major buildings, and revealed new ruins on the seabed.  Present day Dunwich is a village 14 miles south of Lowestoft in Suffolk, but it was once a thriving port, similar in size to London of the period. Extreme storms forced coastal erosion and flooding that almost completely wiped out this once…

The Carmona necropolis in Spain is a collection of funeral structures built between 200 B.C. and 200 A.D. One of them is known as the Elephant's Tomb because a statue in the shape of an elephant was found in the interior of the structure. The origin and function of the construction have been the subject of much speculation and now archaeologists from the University of Pablo de Olavide say their detailed analysis of the structure suggests that it may originally have been used for worshiping the Persian God called Mithra - Mithras in Greek.  Mithraism was an unofficial religion  of…

Europeans may not like immigrants from the east now, but that is where Stone Age Europe got its agriculture, and thus an origin of Western civilization, according to new data resulting from a study of the teeth of prehistoric farmers and the hunter-gatherers with whom they briefly overlapped. Agriculture was introduced to Central Europe from the Near East by colonizers who brought farming technology with them. Archaeologists have long debated how farming spread across Europe and ushered in various technologies, including the use of pottery, which led to the rise Western civilizations. Two…