Scandalous Construction in Bulgarian Black Sea Archaeology Site Halted

Photos of the illegal construction started circulating Bulgarian social networks on Saturday.

Municipal authorities have ordered a temporary stop of work on a construction site in the area of a protected archaeology site along Bulgaria's Black Sea coast.

The ongoing rapid construction was apparently started just ahead of Sunday's early general elections in Bulgaria, and raised among an outcry among environmentalistsand the general public.

The site appears to fall within the area of the Yaylata National ArchaeologicalReserve, located in a scenic area near the village of Kamen Bryag.

Monday Bulgaria's Ministry of Environment announced it has found that the ongoing construction does not comply with the construction permit issued.

The permit refers to "Reconstruction of a roof and masonry of a fisherman's hut," while builders have already erected two stories of a massive concrete building.

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Prehistoric ear bones could lead to evolutionary answers

Tiny ear bones (from left) the incus, stapes, and malleus could provide big clues to human evolution. Credit: Texas A&M

The tiniest bones in the human body – the bones of the middle ear – could provide huge clues about our evolution and the development of modern-day humans, according to a study by a team of researchers that include a Texas A&M University anthropologist.

Darryl de Ruiter, a professor in the Department of Anthropology at Texas A&M, and colleagues from Binghamton University (the State University of New York) and researchers from Spain and Italy have published their work in the current issue of PNAS (Proceedings of the National Academy of Science).

The team examined the skull of a hominin believed to be about 1.9 million years old and found in a cave called Swartkrans, in South Africa. Of particular interest to the team were bones found in the middle ear, especially one called the malleus. It and the other ear bones – the incus and the stapes – together show a mixture of ape-like and human-like features, and represent the first time all three bones have been found together in one skull.

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DNA reveals origin of Greece's ancient Minoan culture

The palace of Knossos on Crete is now a major tourist attraction

Europe's first advanced civilisation was local in origin and not imported from elsewhere, a study says.

Analysis of DNA from ancient remains on the Greek island of Crete suggests the Minoans were indigenous Europeans, shedding new light on a debate over the provenance of this ancient culture.

Scholars have variously argued the Bronze Age civilisation arrived from Africa, Anatolia or the Middle East.

Details appear in Nature Communications journal.

The concept of the Minoan civilisation was first developed by Sir Arthur Evans, the British archaeologist who unearthed the Bronze Age palace of Knossos on Crete.

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Early Greek states beyond the 'polis'

The Greek polis, as a political and territorial entity, is a remarkable social organisation that emerged in the Greek world after the collapse of the Mycenaean palace system and the “transition” period that followed. Because of its very distinctive character within the ancient world, the city-state dominates the study of Greek history. But how did this start and how can it be recorded?

Lefkandi on the island of Euboea and was extensively occupied since the
Early Bronze Age (roughly 2100 BC) to the end of the Geometric
period (ca 700 BC) [Credit: ULB]

Scholars often link the polis with communal rites and feasting in sacred or public spaces and they consider that these activities were a means to enhance the territory or group cohesion. Earlier literature has discussed cult and burial practices for periods earlier than the formation of the polis. However, what is missing is an up-to-date study of collective ceremonies from the Post Palatial period (ca 12th-11th c. BC) to the Archaic period (6th c. BC) where complex communal practices would be examined within a wider social context and, more importantly, beyond the structure of the Greek polis.

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Earliest evidence of human ancestors as hunters/scavengers found

A U.S. anthropologist says a dig in Africa has revealed the earliest evidence of humans involved in hunting and scavenging as food acquisition strategies.

Around 2 million years ago early stone tool-making humans known as Oldowan hominin started to exhibit a number of physiological and ecological adaptations -- an increase in brain and body size, heavier investment in their offspring and significant home-range expansion -- that required greater daily energy expenditures, and there has been debate about how those early humans acquired that extra energy.

A wealth of archaeological evidence from a site in Kenya known as Kanjera South, or KJS, including animal bones and rudimentary stone tools, suggests they met their new energy requirements through an increased reliance on meat eating, Baylor University anthropologist Joseph Ferraro said.

"Considered in total, this study provides important early archaeological evidence for meat eating, hunting and scavenging behaviors -- cornerstone adaptations that likely facilitated brain expansion in human evolution, movement of hominins out of Africa and into Eurasia, as well as important shifts in our social behavior, anatomy and physiology," he said.


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Heavy equipment invades İstanbul excavation site, harming Neolithic ruins

An archeologist examines a human skeleton found during construction in İstanbul's Pendik district. (Photo: AA, Şebnem Coşkun)

Heavy equipment belonging to a construction firm that is working on the long-expected Marmaray project -- an undersea commuter train connecting İstanbul's Asian and European sides -- invaded an excavation site in Yenikapı and has damaged remnants dating back to the Neolithic Age.

Archaeological excavation started in 2004 at the Yenikapı Marmaray construction site, reaching 8,500 years into the history of İstanbul. Skeletons, chapel remains, water wells, footprints, the world's best-preserved shipwreck and a merchant vessel, whose contents and wooden parts are in exceptionally good condition, have been uncovered by archaeologists so far. The excavations are still going on at the site, but the Marmaray construction firm interrupted the work when its heavy equipment invaded the excavation site on May 11, not thinking of any possible damage that it might cause to objects as yet unrevealed.

According to a Radikal daily report on Monday, without considering the warnings and concerns of archaeologists, the management of the construction firm insisted on continuing their work at the Neolithic site, which carries great importance in terms of shedding light on the history of world civilization. The construction firm started its activities at the site without informing the Cultural and Natural Assets Conservation Board and the İstanbul Archaeology Museum. Now, archaeologists, universities and nongovernmental organizations have called on state officials to stop the heavy equipment that might eliminate their chances of finding new artifacts.

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Unique workshop of Palaeolithic hunters discovered in Silesia

The digital model of a biface discovered in the area of the site. Below, a schematic tool cross section showing the method of making of plano-convex form. Scanning by M. Mackiewicz

More than a thousand flint tools and waste generated on during their treatment were discovered near Pietrowice Wielkie (Silesia) by archaeologists from the Institute of Archaeology, University of Wrocław - told PAP head researcher Dr. Andrzej Wiśniewski.

The flint workshops, remains of which were found by archaeologists, had been used by Neanderthals. The researchers are waiting for more detailed information on the site dating. The workshop is certainly more than 45 thousand years old.

"Tools were made by a specific canon of Neanderthals living in Central Europe. These items have a cutting edge on both sides, they are bifacial" - said Dr. Wiśniewski.

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Ancient wooden boat found in the Boyne river

Find made as shopping trolleys removed from river

Sean Cahill of the Boyne Fishermen’s Rescue and Recovery Service beside the log boat. Photograph: BFRRS

An ancient log-boat, possibly thousands of years old, has been discovered partly embedded in the banks of the River Boyne in Drogheda, possibly where it originally sank.

An initial examination by specialist archaeologist Karl Brady, suggests it could be unique because, unlike other dug-outs or log boats found in the Republic, it has a pair of oval shaped blisters on the upper edge.

Such features were “ very rare”.

“I have seen them on some boats found in Northern Ireland and Britain but not in Ireland. They could have been used for holding oars,” said Mr Brady, who is an underwater archaeologist with the Department of Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht.

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Neolithic huts built at Old Sarum by English Heritage

The aim is to build these Neolithic huts at the Stonehenge visitor next year

Three Neolithic-style huts have been built at Old Sarum to learn more about how the builders of Stonehenge lived.

The huts, made of chalk and straw daub and wheat-thatched roofing, have been based on archaeological remains found at Durrington Walls, near Stonehenge.

Project leader Luke Winter said: "What we're trying to do is get a sense of what these buildings looked like above-ground."

The hope is to re-build the huts at Stonehenge visitor centre next year.

Mr Winter added: "What makes the buildings interesting is that they were dated to about the same time as the large Sarson stones were being erected at Stonehenge.

"One of the theories is that these may have housed the people that were helping with construction of that monument."

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Toba super-volcano catastrophe idea 'dismissed'

Toba traces: The volcanic glass fragments are thinner than human hair

The idea that humans nearly became extinct 75,000 ago because of a super-volcano eruption is not supported by new data from Africa, scientists say.

In the past, it has been proposed that the so-called Toba event plunged the world into a volcanic winter, killing animal and plant life and squeezing our species to a few thousand individuals.

An Oxford University-led team examined ancient sediments in Lake Malawi for traces of this climate catastrophe.

It could find none.

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Cradle of Stonehenge: interview with David Jacques

In CA 271 we brought you news of astonishing Mesolithic finds at Vespasian’s Camp on Salisbury Plain, a potentially game-changing site for our understanding of the Stonehenge landscape.

With the site about to star in the first episode of a new BBC archaeology series, we caught up with project director, Buckingham University’s David Jacques, to find out the latest.

CA: Why did you choose this site to investigate?
DJ:  As a student working on a project in Amesbury, I wondered why Vespasian’s Camp was such an archaeological blind spot. When I realised that it was because of assumptions about the extent of 18th century landscaping, I investigated further and found that an area northeast of the camp was largely untouched.

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Bejeweled skeleton may be that of ancient queen

A reconstruction of what the ancient woman may have looked like when she was buried.

More than 4,000 years ago, a woman, perhaps an ancient queen, was carefully laid to rest outside of modern-day London, ornamented with beads of gold strung around her neck and a large drinking cup placed at her hip. Archaeologists have just uncovered her grave at a quarry that lies between Windsor Castle and Heathrow airport.

The gold ornaments suggest the woman was important, possibly of the elite and even a princess or queen, the excavators said.

The woman's bones have been degraded by acid in the soil, making radiocarbon dating and DNA analysis impossible. Nonetheless, excavators believe she was at least 35 years old when she died sometime between 2500 B.C. and 2200 B.C., around the era Stonehenge was constructed.

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Big dig uncovers Belfast's hidden treasure

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Archaeologists have taken to the Belfast hills in an effort to uncover hidden treasure of bygone years.

The big dig on Divis Mountain has already unearthed flints, pottery and other artefacts - proof, say experts, that life once flourished there.

"We know that there are pre-historic remains here, we find them all over the hills" said National Trust archaeologist Malachy Conway.

"We started finding flints which are probably about 4,000 years old.

"Most people will always associate Divis and Black Mountain with the fact that the land was locked out because it was Ministry of Defence property, but in many ways that actually helped the site because it preserved the archaeology."

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Did an Earthquake Destroy Ancient Greece?

Remnants of Cyclopean walls built by the Mycenaeans can be found at the
Acropolis in Athens, Greece.

The grand Mycenaens, the first Greeks, inspired the legends of the Trojan Wars, "The Iliad" and "The Odyssey." Their culture abruptly declined around 1200 B.C., marking the start of a Dark Ages in Greece.

The disappearance of the Mycenaens is a Mediterranean mystery. Leading explanations include warfare with invaders or uprising by lower classes. Some scientists also think one of the country's frequent earthquakes could have contributed to the culture's collapse. At the ruins of Tiryns, a fortified palace, geologists hope to find evidence to confirm whether an earthquake was a likely culprit.

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Tracing Our Footsteps: Archaeology in the Digital Age

Human ancestors that walked the earth left few traces of their passage. Some of their footprints have lithified, or turned to stone, but some survive to this day, unlithified, in soft sediment such as silt. These fragile records of ancient footprints pose a sizable challenge to archaeologists today: how do you preserve the ephemeral? According to new research published in PLOS ONE, the answer may be to “record and digitally rescue” these footprint sites.

The authors explored two methods in this study: digital photogrammetry, where researchers strategically photograph an object in order to derive measurements; and optical laser scanning, where light is used to measure the object’s physical properties. To begin, the authors filled trays with mixtures of sand, cement, and plaster and instructed a participant to walk through these samples. Four wooden 1 cm cubes were then placed beside a select number of footprints and photographs were taken. A laser scanner was then used to measure the same footprints. This simple procedure was also replicated outside of the lab, at a beach in North West England.

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New excavations indicate use of fertilizers 5,000 years ago

Researchers from the University of Gothenburg, Sweden, have spent many years studying the remains of a Stone Age community in Karleby outside the town of Falköping, Sweden. The researchers have for example tried to identify parts of the inhabitants' diet. 

Researchers from the University of Gothenburg, Sweden, have spent many years studying the remains of a Stone Age community in Karleby outside the town of Falköping, Sweden. The researchers have for example tried to identify parts of the inhabitants' diet. Right now they are looking for evidence that fertilisers were used already during the Scandinavian Stone Age, and the results of their first analyses may be exactly what they are looking for [Credit: University of Gothenburg]

Right now they are looking for evidence that fertilisers were used already during the Scandinavian Stone Age, and the results of their first analyses may be exactly what they are looking for.

Using remains of grains and other plants and some highly advanced analysis techniques, the two researchers and archaeologists Tony Axelsson and Karl-Göran Sjögren have been able to identify parts of the diet of their Stone Age ancestors.

'Our first task was to find so-called macrofossils, such as old weed seeds or pieces of grain. By analysing macrofossils, we can learn a lot about Stone Age farming and how important farming was in relation to livestock ranching,' says Axelsson.

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Lion statue guarding Etruscan tomb discovered

Recent excavations at the necropolis of Banditaccia in Cerveteri have unearthed a statue of a lion and an Etruscan tomb.

The lion statue unearthed at the necropolis of Banditaccia
in Cerveteri [Credit: Italy Mag]

Italian newspaper ‘Il Messaggero’ reports that a team of archaeologists has uncovered a masterpiece of Etruscan art in the form of the Leone di Cerveteri (Cerveteri Lion). The statue of a crouching lion is made from volcanic tuff and dates to the 6th century BC. The piece is said to be in perfect condition, showing taut muscles and well-defined legs.

The Cerveteri Lion is the first entire lion statue found at the site. It was found at the foot of what experts describe as an altar for funeral rites and was the “guardian” of an extraordinary tomb discovered only a few yards away.

The newly discovered tomb is in the form of an underground rectangular chamber accessed by a monumental staircase. The chamber dates from the 4th to 3rd century BC. The chamber contained some 20 skeletons, of which seven are well preserved.

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Big brains, no fur, sinuses … are these clues to our ancestors' lives as 'aquatic apes'?

Controversial theory that seeks to explain one of the great leaps of human evolution finds new support but still divides scientists

A female western lowland gorilla walks through a river. Some scientists believe our ancestors lived an aquatic lifestyle. Photograph: Getty

It is one of the most unusual evolutionary ideas ever proposed: humans are amphibious apes who lost their fur, started to walk upright and developed big brains because they took to living the good life by the water's edge.

This is the aquatic ape theory and although treated with derision by some academics over the past 50 years, it is still backed by a small, but committed group of scientists. Next week they will hold a major London conference when several speakers, including David Attenborough, will voice support for the theory.

"Humans are very different from other apes," said Peter Rhys Evans, an organiser of Human Evolution: Past, Present and Future. "We lack fur, walk upright, have big brains and subcutaneous fat and have a descended larynx, a feature common among aquatic animals but not apes."

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Online Courses in Archaeology

University of Oxford Online Courses in Archaeology

Cave paintings, castles and pyramids, Neanderthals, Romans and Vikings - archaeology is about the excitement of discovery, finding out about our ancestors, exploring landscape through time, piecing together puzzles of the past from material remains.

These courses enable you to experience all this through online archaeological resources based on primary evidence from excavations and artefacts and from complex scientific processes and current thinking. Together with guided reading, discussion and activities you can experience how archaeologists work today to increase our knowledge of people and societies from the past.

The following courses are available:

• Archaeology in Practice


• Archaeology of the Bible Lands


• Exploring Roman Britain


• Greek Mythology


• Origins of Human Behaviour


• Pompeii and the Cities of the Roman World


• Ritual and Religion in Prehistory


• Vikings: Raiders, Traders and Settlers

Beaker reconstructions by Karen Nichols

The two artist’s reconstructions are an impression of how the person may have looked during their life, and when placed in the grave. We know that the skeleton was that of an adult aged 35 or over and that they were placed in a crouched position, resting on their right side, facing east with their head towards the south – a rite that tends to be reserved for females at this time. Although the skull could be lifted in a soil block the bone was too degraded to attempt any form of accurate facial reconstruction – the face is that of the female artist! 

We have made the decision that the beads, along with an absence of more typical male grave goods, indicate a probable female burial. However, this assumption could be wrong as a number of beads have been found with men. This issue is further complicated as such items could represent gender and/or could be gifts from female mourners.  

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Extracting the Past

Phil Harding flint knapping

Have you been reading about rare Neolithic houses and a Beaker burial containing a ‘prehistoric princess’ recently? These discoveries were made during our excavations at Kingsmead Quarry, Horton. 

 

Saturday 27th April 2013, we are holding a FREE open day to showcase some of the amazing finds from these excavations. The event will be held in Wraysbury Village Hall, Berkshire (TW19 5NA) 10.30 am to 3.30 pm. 

 

The exhibition is open to all and explores the discoveries from the site as we present the hidden past beneath Horton’s landscape and uncover the imprints left by farming and ritual activity.

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Bronze Age treasure returns to Milford Haven

A Bronze Age treasure, unearthed in Steynton seven years ago, is set to return to its rightful place in Milford Haven Museum this summer.

The 3,400-year-old wooden trough, discovered by workmen laying a gas pipeline near St Botolphs in August 2006, will finally return to Milford Haven following years of preservation by the York Archaeological Trust.

Work on the site was suspended for weeks in 2006 when the Bronze Age relic, at first believed to be a canoe, was recovered from land in Tierson Farm. At the time, a fragment of the oak structure was radiocarbon-dated at about 1420 BC.

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Urgeschichte zum Anfassen

Innenhof des neuen Archäoparks Vogelherd (Abb.: Archäopark Vogelherd)

Nachdem die ältesten bekannten Kunstwerke der Menschheit durch Wissenschaftler der Tübinger Universität entdeckt wurden, ist es der Universität Tübingen ein Anliegen, die interessierte Öffentlichkeit an den daraus resultierenden Erkenntnissen und Einblicken in die Urgeschichte teilhaben zu lassen. Dem entsprechend hat sich Professor Nicholas Conard seit seinen faszinierenden Entdeckungen in der Vogelherdhöhle im Lonetal um eine auch populärwissenschaftliche Aufbereitung und Präsentation der Funde bemüht.

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