https://phys.org/science-news/archaeology-fossils en-us The latest news on archaeology, archaeological research and archaeological advancements. In 79 CE, the active volcanic system in southern Italy known as Somma-Vesuvius erupted, burying the small Roman town of Pompeii and everyone in it. The "Pompeii eruption" covered everything in a layer of ash that preserved many of the bodies. https://phys.org/news/2024-11-dna-evidence-rewrites-histories-people.html Archaeology Thu, 07 Nov 2024 12:10:07 EST news650203801 The Ice Age camp site of Gönnersdorf on the banks of the Rhine has revealed a groundbreaking discovery that sheds new light on early fishing practices. New imaging methods have allowed researchers to see intricate engravings of fish on ancient schist plaquettes, accompanied by grid-like patterns that are interpreted as depictions of fishing nets or traps. https://phys.org/news/2024-11-oldest-depictions-fishing-ice-age.html Archaeology Thu, 07 Nov 2024 09:30:09 EST news650194201 An international group of researchers led by the University of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria have uncovered the earliest evidence of Ephedra use from the charred remains of the plant in a 15,000-year-old human burial site in northeastern Morocco. https://phys.org/news/2024-11-earliest-evidence-ephedra-year-moroccan.html Archaeology Wed, 06 Nov 2024 14:55:14 EST news650127310 The origins of writing in Mesopotamia lie in the images imprinted by ancient cylinder seals on clay tablets and other artifacts. A research group from the University of Bologna has identified a series of correlations between the designs engraved on these cylinders, dating back around six thousand years, and some of the signs in the proto-cuneiform script that emerged in the city of Uruk, located in what is now southern Iraq, around 3000 BCE. https://phys.org/news/2024-11-ancient-stone-cylinders-correspond-mesopotamia.html Archaeology Tue, 05 Nov 2024 06:00:02 EST news649957838 In an important discovery, archaeologists from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and the National Academy of Sciences of Tajikistan have uncovered a multi-layered archaeological site in the Zeravshan Valley, central Tajikistan, shedding rare light on early human settlement in the region. The findings from the site, known as Soii Havzak, provide crucial evidence that Central Asia played a vital role in early human migration and development. https://phys.org/news/2024-11-multi-layered-site-tajikistan-zeravshan.html Archaeology Mon, 04 Nov 2024 12:11:03 EST news649944661 A recent preliminary study by Ph.D. student Leonie Hoff of the University of Oxford, published in the Oxford Journal of Archaeology, provides insight into how ancient fingerprints left on terracotta figurines reveal the age and sex of their makers. https://phys.org/news/2024-11-fingerprints-ancient-terracotta-figurines-men.html Archaeology Mon, 04 Nov 2024 09:40:01 EST news649935414 A study led by the Department of Archaeology, Faculty of Arts, Charles University, has used stable isotope analysis to uncover medieval land-use practices beneath temperate forests in Europe. The research, published in Scientific Reports, provides evidence of agricultural activity at a Cistercian manor site dating back to the thirteenth century, revealing that cereal production rather than animal husbandry dominated the area. The isotopic data shows clear signatures of grain cultivation and fertilization practices. https://phys.org/news/2024-11-isotope-reveals-medieval-people-prioritized.html Archaeology Fri, 01 Nov 2024 09:23:02 EDT news649671781 Settlements in northern Arabia were in a transitional stage of urbanization during the third to second millennium BCE, according to a study published October 30, 2024 in the open-access journal PLOS ONE by Guillaume Charloux of the French National Center for Scientific Research, Paris and colleagues. https://phys.org/news/2024-10-archaeologists-urban-revolution-bronze-age.html Archaeology Wed, 30 Oct 2024 14:00:01 EDT news649500104 An international team of archaeologists, led by Antonis Bartsiokas with Democritus University of Thrace, in Greece, has uncovered evidence that a tunic found in one of the Royal Tombs at Vergina once belonged to Alexander the Great. https://phys.org/news/2024-10-tunic-royal-tombs-vergina-alexander.html Archaeology Wed, 30 Oct 2024 12:50:02 EDT news649508654 With the time traveling ability of archaeogenetic studies, it has become possible to shed light onto the dynamic past of human populations world-wide. Integrated with archaeological and anthropological data, it has been shown that fundamental changes in lifestyle, culture, technical know-how and social systems were often linked to the movement and interaction of people. https://phys.org/news/2024-10-genetic-wider-caucasus-region-steppe.html Archaeology Wed, 30 Oct 2024 12:00:01 EDT news649500065 Oysters play a crucial role in the marine ecosystem as they filter water, create habitats and support the nutrient cycle. Today, they are considered endangered in many parts of the world. https://phys.org/news/2024-10-sustainable-oyster-harvesting-stone-age.html Archaeology Tue, 29 Oct 2024 11:48:10 EDT news649421286 Prehistoric Polynesian seafarers were highly skilled and undertook some of the longest and most technically demanding voyages in prehistory—but did they ever sail into very high latitudes with landfall in Antarctica, as some scholars have argued? https://phys.org/news/2024-10-south-polynesian-seafarers.html Archaeology Tue, 29 Oct 2024 11:25:04 EDT news649419902 Archaeologists have analyzed lidar data from a completely unstudied corner of the Maya world in Campeche, Mexico, revealing 6,674 undiscovered Maya structures, including pyramids like those at the famous sites of Chichén Itzá or Tikal. https://phys.org/news/2024-10-major-maya-cities.html Archaeology Mon, 28 Oct 2024 19:00:01 EDT news648804541 University of Missouri scientist Brandi L. MacDonald is using modern technology only found at Mizzou to help researchers expand the collective understanding of how human thought and intellect has developed over time. https://phys.org/news/2024-10-geochemical-fingerprints-ochre-world-oldest.html Archaeology Mon, 28 Oct 2024 13:38:16 EDT news649341491 A study published in L'Anthropologie by Professor Ella Been from Ono Academic College and Dr. Omry Barzilai from the University of Haifa sheds new light on the burial practices of Homo sapiens and Neanderthals in the Levant region during the Middle Paleolithic (MP). https://phys.org/news/2024-10-ancient-graves-reveal-distinct-burial.html Archaeology Mon, 28 Oct 2024 10:30:01 EDT news649328206 A passage in the Norse "Sverris Saga," the 800-year-old story of King Sverre Sigurdsson, describes a military raid that occurred in AD 1197, during which a body was thrown into a well at Sverresborg Castle, outside Trondheim in central Norway, likely as an attempt to poison the main water source for the local inhabitants. https://phys.org/news/2024-10-thrown-castle-year-norse-saga.html Archaeology Fri, 25 Oct 2024 11:00:02 EDT news649063561 The first-ever use of cutting-edge drone-based lidar in Central Asia allowed archaeologists to capture stunning details of two newly documented trade cities high in the mountains of Uzbekistan. https://phys.org/news/2024-10-high-res-lidar-exposes-large.html Archaeology Wed, 23 Oct 2024 11:00:01 EDT news648892082 A pair of engineers and a historian have teamed up together to model the means by which the first use of the wheel may have happened. In their paper published in Royal Society Open Science, Lee Alacoque, from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, Kai James, with the Georgia Institute of Technology, and Richard Bulliet, from Columbia University, all in the U.S., describe the process that may have unfolded as workers at a copper mine in the Carpathian Mountains sought to move ore more easily from deep within a mine approximately 6,000 years ago. https://phys.org/news/2024-10-wheel.html Archaeology Wed, 23 Oct 2024 10:06:46 EDT news648896791 The Roman-era temple of Esna, 60 kilometers south of Luxor in Egypt, is undergoing extensive restoration work in an Egyptian-German cooperation project. The temple proper no longer exists, but the large vestibule or pronaos was rediscovered more than 200 years ago and is complete. https://phys.org/news/2024-10-uncovered-egyptian-temple-esna.html Archaeology Tue, 22 Oct 2024 13:03:00 EDT news648820971 The leather gloves, embroidered at the wrists, rest on a tufted pillow of red satin in a glassed wooden box, a fitting place for artifacts that have a history tied to the English-speaking world's most-famous playwright. https://phys.org/news/2024-10-exploring-authenticity-pair-storied-gloves.html Archaeology Tue, 22 Oct 2024 10:45:59 EDT news648812752 The extent to which "civilization" heightens or lessens the likelihood of violent conflict throughout human history has remained one of the most enduring questions among anthropologists. But a new collaborative study of archaeological groups from the Andes region of South America suggests that being part of a centrally organized state society is only part of the equation. https://phys.org/news/2024-10-society-agitating-pacifying-ancient-andes.html Archaeology Social Sciences Tue, 22 Oct 2024 10:27:03 EDT news648811622 During the late middle Pleistocene, between 300 and 400 thousand years ago, at least three ancient elephant relatives died near a river in the Kashmir Valley of South Asia. Not long after, they were covered in sediment and preserved along with 87 stone tools made by the ancestors of modern humans. https://phys.org/news/2024-10-rare-fossils-extinct-elephant-document.html Archaeology Mon, 21 Oct 2024 13:27:47 EDT news648736059 A study by Dr. Sarah Elizabeth Paris published in the International Journal of Osteoarcheology has investigated the link between ocher burials and chronology, age, sex mobility and funerary tradition at the site of Khok Phanom Di (~4000–3500BP), Thailand. https://phys.org/news/2024-10-archaeologist-reveals-factors-affecting-ocher.html Archaeology Mon, 21 Oct 2024 10:42:26 EDT news648726135 A team of international researchers has employed an integrated approach to uncover the mysteries of the Eastern Mausoleum of Qin State, an ancient royal burial site from China's Warring States period. https://phys.org/news/2024-10-space-ground-technologies-empower-archaeological.html Archaeology Mon, 21 Oct 2024 09:23:36 EDT news648721407 Strewn across the Namib desert is a treasure trove of stone tools of which little is known because getting to them is so difficult. There are few roads and vehicles have limited access in this protected area that lies in the desert of western Namibia. https://phys.org/news/2024-10-evidence-ancient-human-traverse-inhospitable.html Archaeology Thu, 17 Oct 2024 11:13:46 EDT news648382421 A recent experimental study led by Kent State University and the Cleveland Museum of Natural History suggests that hunting from elevated positions significantly increases the performance of thrown javelins while potentially decreasing the effectiveness of atlatl-thrown darts. https://phys.org/news/2024-10-paleolithic-hunters-benefited-high.html Archaeology Wed, 16 Oct 2024 16:20:02 EDT news648312971 A discovery of a secret tomb at one of the new seven wonders of the world has been made by a team of researchers, including academics from the University of St Andrews. https://phys.org/news/2024-10-hidden-tomb-beneath-petra-treasury.html Archaeology Tue, 15 Oct 2024 16:10:06 EDT news648227401 Archaeologists from Tel Aviv University and the National Museum in Copenhagen have analyzed 450 pottery vessels made in Tel Hama, a town at the edge of the Ebla Kingdom, one of the most important Syrian kingdoms in the Early Bronze Age (about 4,500 years ago). https://phys.org/news/2024-10-child-labor-fuel-ancient-pottery.html Archaeology Tue, 15 Oct 2024 10:18:03 EDT news648206281 A study by Prof. Dr. Wolf-Rüdiger Teegen, published in the International Journal of Osteoarchaeology, provides new insights into how the average human behavior in the tribal territory of Treveri changed as it transitioned from the Celtic Iron Age (La Tène Period) to Roman times. https://phys.org/news/2024-10-cemetery-reveals-daily-life-iron.html Archaeology Tue, 15 Oct 2024 08:00:01 EDT news648127980 A joint research group led by Jonghyun Kim and Jun Ohashi of the University of Tokyo has demonstrated that the majority of immigration to the Japanese Archipelago in the Yayoi and Kofun periods (between 3000 BCE and 538 CE) came from the Korean Peninsula. https://phys.org/news/2024-10-ancient-immigration-patterns-japan-year.html Archaeology Mon, 14 Oct 2024 20:00:01 EDT news648115511